are, which in bitterness has probably not had its equal
in all the long history of the efforts of expanding civilization
to beat down the encircling walls of barbarism. In 1758, Canada
was attacked by several English expeditions, the most of which were
successful. One of these was headed by General John Forbes, and
directed against Fort Duquesne. After a remarkable forest march,
overcoming mighty obstacles, Forbes arrived at his destination to find
that the French had blown up the fortifications, some of the troops
retreating to Lake Erie and others to rehabilitate Fort Massac on the
Lower Ohio.

Thus England gained possession of the valley. New France had been cut
in twain. The English Fort Pitt commanded the Forks of the Ohio,
and French rule in America was now doomed. The fall of Quebec soon
followed (1759), then of Montreal (1760); and in 1763 was signed
the Treaty of Paris, by which England obtained possession of all
the territory east of the Mississippi River, except the city of New
Orleans and a small outlying district. In order to please the savages
of the interior, and to cultivate the fur-trade,--perhaps also, to
act as a check upon the westward growth of the too-ambitious coast
colonies,--King George III. took early occasion to command his "loving
subjects" in America not to purchase or settle lands beyond the
mountains, "without our especial leave and license." It is needless to
say that this injunction was not obeyed. The expansion of the English
colonies in America was irresistible; the Great West was theirs, and
they proceeded in due time to occupy it.

Long before the close of the French and Indian War, English
colonists--whom we will now, for convenience, call Americans--had made
agricultural settlements in the Ohio basin. As early as 1752, we have
seen, the Redstone fort was built. In 1753, the French forces,
on retiring from Great Meadows, burned several log cabins on the
Monongahela. The interesting story of the colonizing of the Redstone
district, at the western end of Braddock's Road, has been outlined in
Chapter I. of the text; and it has been shown, in the course of the
narrative of the pilgrimage, how other districts were slowly settled
in the face of savage opposition. Although driven back in numerous
Indian wars, these American borderers had come to the Ohio valley to
stay.

We have seen the early attempt of the Ohio Company to settle the
valley. Its agents blazed the way, but the French a