tricts and settlements; factories and store-houses had been established in each; the attention of the colonists had been drawn from the unprofitable search for gold, to the importance of agriculture; the culture of rice, indigo and tobacco had been introduced, and figs and oranges were growing in luxuriant abundance; communication and commerce had been opened with the Indies and Canada; in short, the colony had been brought into a condition of self support.

On the reversion of Louisiana to the King, he began the chastisement of the Indians, who had been instigated to deeds of violence by the English and Spaniards. One powerful tribe, the Natches, was utterly annihilated, and the Chicasaws severely punished.

The territory claimed by the French under the name of Louisiana was immense. Beginning to the east, midway between Pensacola and Mobile, the boundary ran north to the head waters of the Ohio. Every rivulet whose waters ran to the Mississippi was claimed by the French. "Half a mile," says Bancroft, "from the head of the southern branch of the Savannah River is a spring, which flows to the Mississippi; strangers who drank of it would say that they had tasted of French waters." Beginning at the south-west on the Rio del Norte and ascending on a line of the ridge that divides it from the Red River, the boundary extended along this ridge to the Gulf of California. On the north-west, the boundary line between the Hudson Bay Company was not fixed. On the north-east it was bounded by Canada.

It must not be supposed that while the French were thus exploring, taking possession of, and settling so vast a country, that the Spaniards and English were wholly ignorant of, or indifferent to, their operations. Both nations had watched the French with a jealous eye and envied their success. The Spaniards had at one time destroyed a settlement at the Isle of Dauphine and frequently harassed the colonists. From the discovery of the continent, England had

claimed all territory from sea to sea. In 1684 and 1726 she had purchased all the land laying north-west of the Ohio from the Six Nations, who claimed to hold it. As early as 1724 English settlers were found along the Ohio River.Upon these grounds England based a claim to this country, and the Governor of Virginia had repeatedly called the attention of the legislators to the importance of protecting their claim against the encroachments of the French.

It was not until 1748 that anything was done by the English to openly assert their right to the territory. It was then resolved that the most effectual way to secure their possessions was to settle them. The Ohio company was organized with a grant of a half a million acres of land and several other companies of a similar nature were formed. These sent out emigrants, established settlements, opened farms, built store-houses and began a traffic with the Indians,

The Governor of Canada learning the movements of the British, caused inscriptions to be made upon plates of lead, setting forth the fact that the territory belonged to France, and had them placed on stakes in different parts of the disputed possessions. But this effort to stay the encroachment of the English proving futile, an irregular warfare was begun between the French settlers and their allies-the Indians-on the one side, and the English settlers on the other, until finally one neighborhood of the latter was utterly destroyed.

Meanwhile the Governor of Canada constructs military roads and forts in different parts of the territory. The executive of Virginia learning of the sad destruction of an English settlement on the banks of the Ohio by the French and their other warlike demonstrations, despatched a messenger (Geo. Washington) to the commander of one of the French forts to inquire what business he had upon his Majesty's domains and require his removal from the territory. This messenger having met with a decided refusal by the French General to comply with these requisitions,

an open rupture soon took place between the two nations. The war which followed-commonly known as the French war-I have not space to treat of in detail. It lasted for nine years, first in America, then in Europe, and was terminated, in 1763, by the treaty of Paris.

This treaty ceded from France to England Canada, Nova Scotia and the Island of Cape Breton, with their dependencies; fixed the boundary between the dominions of the two nations by a line drawn along the middle of the river Mississippi from its source to the river Iberville, and from thence by a line drawn along the middle of this river and the lakes Maurepas and Ponchartrain, to the sea, and withdrew all claim on the part of France to any territory east of the Mississippi. The vast territory, thus acquired by England west of the Alleghanies, was divided out among the colonies along the Atlantic coasts and held by them by charters from their mother country until after their independence.

Spain, who had stood aloof from the conflict of the two nations until she had seen the vast territory in America wrested from France, alarmed at the increasing greatness of Britain and the danger of losing her own possessions across the Atlantic, in 1762, determined to make common cause with France, and declared war against England. But by this step she suffered what she sought to avert; for before another year had passed, she, with France, was compelled to treat for peace by relinquishing Florida in favor of England.

But France undervaluing her remnant of Louisiana, ceded it, in 1764, to Spain as a compensation for her loss of Florida. Thus the vast and fertile territory included in Canada and Louisiana, which had awakened dazzling hopes in France by the greatness of its prospects, and which had cost her so much solicitude, expense and misfortune, was swept from her by the fortune of war.

This cession of Louisiana to Spain was not made known

to the inhabitants for a time; but when the rumor reached them, it awakened a general dissatisfaction among the colonists; for they were intensely French, and nothing could be more odious to them than Spanish rule. When Spain did take possession of Louisiana, it was in such a way as to exasperate the excited inhabitants, and the policy she pursued, was one not calculated to win their affection. It was years before the machinery of government was fully established and worked with smoothness.

In 1776, the thirteen colonies east of the Alleghanies declared their separation from England, and by a long and hard struggle maintained it. After the establishment of the general government, they ceded their respective claims to territory in the west, to the sovereignty of the United States. This broad expanse of country lying between the Alleghany mountains and the Mississippi river, once a part of Louisiana, was divided up into districts by Congress, which were organized under territorial government, and, in a constitutional way, successively admitted into the Union as states with the names they now bear.

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In this great American revolution, which resulted in the independence of the English colonies, Spain employed about the same tactics as in the former war, but with better success. France had repeatedly solicited her to join the cause of the colonies against Britain, but fearing the effects of their independence upon her adjoining possessions, she observed a strict neutrality, hoping to be able to accomplish more by diplomacy than by a resort to arms. fered herself as a mediator between the belligerent powers, to which France acceded, but England peremptorily refused to acknowledge the independence of her subjects across the ocean, whereupon Spain joined (1779) heartily in the strife, doing much mischief to Engalnd by her maritime strength. The colony of Louisiana, rejoicing at the opportunity of revenging her suffering during the last war, raised fourteen thousand men, under the command of Galvez, and took

possession of the East and the West Floridas. By the treaty of peace which England was compelled to make this time, all the territory east of the Mississippi, below the thirtyfirst degree of latitude, was ceded to Spain.

The treaty between the United States and Spain in, 1795, conceded to the former the free navigation of the Mississippi, the right of deposit at New Orleans, and fixed the boundary of the two dominions east of the Mississippi on the thirty-first degree of north latitude, deviating slightly from it towards the Atlantic.

From 1793 to 1797 efforts were made by the agents of France and Spain to prevail upon the people of the south-western territory to separate from the United States, and, with Louisiana in connection with these two powers, form an independent government west of the Alleghany mountains. Genet, the Minister of the French Republic, first fermented the idea, and even went so far as to enlist the sympathies and co-operation of the western people. But his government discovering his acts and recalling him, the United States establishing a strong military force in the West, squelched the movement. Garondolet, the governor of Louisiana, sought to attain the same object. He refused to give up certain posts that fell to the United States by the treaty, and embarrassed the navigation of the Mississippi. He sent secret agents into Ohio and Kentucky and sought to bribe over commanders of military posts to his interests; but finding them incorruptible, his project failed.

Therefore, when the United States ascertained through her Minister at Paris, Mr. Livingston, that the whole of Louisiana had been re-troceded to France by the secret treaty of Ildefonso (1800), as might be expected, was greatly alarmed. While impotent Spain had held dominion there, she had experienced great danger; still more was she imperilled when ambitious and powerful France established herself in so strong and commanding position.

The sagacious Jefferson, then President, comprehending the peril of his country's situation, like a wise and skillful statesman, by one of the most celebrated and strategic strokes of American di