Jared Sparks and Alexis de Tocqueville
by Bernard Christian Steiner (9780217495837)

Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: II. THE NORTHERN LAKE BOUNDARY OF A NEW AMERICAN NATION. Conditions Which Led To The Treaty Of 1783. Some part of the inland waterways which stretch along our northern border was the scene of warlike movement from a time previous to the first discovery of Lake Champlain till the close of the War of 1812. Champlain found the Hurons fighting the Iroquois. His injudicious interference in their quarrels served afterwards as a factor in extending English influence toward the Great Lakes, and induced the French to push their discoveries along the western part of these waters and into the country drained by the Mississippi and its branches. The French thus obtained control of the fur trade of the upper lake region. But the Iroquois found it profitable to carry beavers of the Northwest to the English at Albany. So they determined to wage war against the Indian tribes of the upper lakes, to seize Mackinaw, and to drive away the French, in order to get this trade into their hands.1 But their attempt was unsuccessful. The English, too, had begun to establish posts in the Northwest in the region of Mackinaw, and it became evident to the French that the Iroquois were the mere agents of the English. English traders were passing back and forth between Albany and Lake Ontario, and their trade with the Iroquois was increasing. The French in Canada saw that in order to retain a monopoly of the fur trade they must destroy the source of supply to the Iroquois. Thus grew up the question of whether France or England shouldcontrol the lakes and the Northwest, and the conflict between the Indian tribes was transferred to two great nations.1 1 VVinsor: Narrative and Critical History, Vol. 4. Soon after the colonization movement west of the mountains began, the English were thrown into c...

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