Huron.

Before 1749 quarries were worked, especially at Stony Island. In 1763 there were several lime kilns within the present limits of Detroit, and not only stone foundations but also stone buildings, existed in the settlement. Several grist-mills existed along the river near Detroit. Agriculture was carried on profitably, and supplies were exported quite early, consisting chiefly of corn and wheat, and possibly beans and peas. Cattle, horses and swine were raised in considerable numbers; but as salt was very expensive, but little meat, if any, was packed for exportation. The salt springs near Lake St. Clair, it is true, were known, and utilized to some extent, but not to an appreciable extent. Gardening and fruitraising were carried on more thoroughly than general farming. Apples and pears were good and abundant.

During the French and English war Detroit was the principal source of supplies to the French troops west of Lake Ontario, and it also furnished a large number of fighting men. The upper posts

were not much involved in this war.

"Teuchsa Grondie," one of the many ways of spelling an old Indian name of Detroit, is rendered famous by a large and splendid poem of Levi Bishop, Esq., of that city.

During the whole of the 18th century the history of Michigan was little else than the history of Detroit, as the genius of French government was to centralize power instead of building up localities for self-government.

About 1704, or three years after the founding of Detroit, this place was attacked by the Ottawa Indians, but unsuccessfully; and again, in 1712, the Ottagamies, or Fox Indians, who were in secret alliance with the old enemies of the French, the Iroquois, attacked the village and laid siege to it. They were severely repulsed, and their chief offered a capitulation, which was refused. Considering this an insult, they became enraged and endeavored to burn up the town. Their method of firing the place was to shoot large arrows, mounted with combustible material in flame, in a track through the sky rainbow-form. The bows and arrows being very large and stout, the Indians lay with their backs on the ground, put both feet against the central portion of the inner side of the bow and pulled the strings with all the might of their hands. A ball of blazing material would thus be sent arching over nearly a quarter of a mile, which would come down perpendicularly upon the dry shingle, roofs of the houses and set them on fire. But this scheme was soon checkmated by the French, who covered the remaining houses with wet skins. The Foxes were considerably disappointed at this and discouraged, but they made one more desperate attempt, failed, and retreated toward Lake St. Clair, where they again entrenched themselves. From this place, however, they were soon dislodged. After this period these Indians occupied Wisconsin for a time and made it dangerous for travelers passing through from the lakes to the Mississippi. They were the Ishmaelites of the wilderness.

It

In 1749 there was a fresh accession of immigrants to all the points upon the lakes, but the history of this part of the world during the most of this century is rather monotonous, business and government remaining about the same, without much improvement. The records nearly all concern Canada east of the lake region. is true, there was almost a constant change of commandants at the posts, and there were many slight changes of administrative policy; but as no great enterprises were successfully put in operation, the events of the period have but little prominence. The northwestern territory during French rule was simply a vast ranging ground for the numerous Indian tribes, who had no ambition higher than obtaining an immediate subsistence of the crudest kind, buying arms, whisky, tobacco, blankets and jewelry by bartering for them the peltries of the chase. Like drop in the ocean was the missionary work of the few Jesuits at the half dozen posts on the great waters. The forests were full of otter, beaver, bear, deer, grouse, quails, etc., and on the few prairies the grouse, or "prairie chickens," were abundant. Not much work was required to obtain a bare subsistence, and human nature generally is not disposed to lay up much for the future. The present material prosperity of America is really an exception to the general law of the world.

In the latter part of 1796 Winthrop Sargent went to Detroit and organized the county of Wayne, forming a part of the Indiana Territory until its division in 1805, when the Territory of Michigan was organized.

NATIONAL POLICIES. THE GREAT FRENCH SCHEME.

Soon after the discovery of the mouth of the Mississippi by La Salle in 1682, the government of France began to encourage the policy of establishing a line of trading posts and missionary stations extending through the West from Canada to Louisiana, and this policy was maintained, with partial success, for about 75 years. The river St. Joseph of Lake Michigan was called "the river Miamis" in 1679, in which year La Salle built a small fort on its bank, near the lake shore. The principal station of the mission for the instruction of the Miamis was established on the borders of this river. The first French post within the territory of the Miamis was at the mouth of the river Miamis, on an eminence naturally fortified on two sides by the river, and on one side by a deep ditch made by a fall of water. It was of triangular form. The missionary Hennepin gives a good description of it, as he was one of the company who built it, in 1679. Says he: "We felled the trees that were on the top of the hill; and having cleared the same from bushes for about two musket shot, we began to build a redoubt of 80 feet long and 40 feet broad, with great square pieces of timber laid one upon another, and prepared a great number of stakes of about 25 feet long to drive into the ground, to make our fort more

inaccessible on the river side. We employed the whole month of November about that work, which was very hard, though we had no other food but the bears' flesh our savage killed. These beasts

are very common in that place because of the great quantity of grapes they find there; but their flesh being too fat and luscious, our men began to be weary of it and desired leave to go a hunting to kill some wild goats. M. La Salle denied them that liberty, which caused some murmurs among them; and it was but unwillingly that they continued their work. This, together with the approach of winter and the apprehension that M. La Salle had that his vessel (the Griffin) was lost, made him very melancholy, though he concealed it as much as he could. We made a cabin wherein we performed divine service every Sunday, and Father Gabriel and I, who preached alternately, took care to take such texts as were suitable to our present circumstances and fit to inspire us with courage, concord and brotherly love. * * The fort was at last perfected, and called Fort Miamis."

*

In 1765 the Miami nation, or confederacy, was composed of four tribes, whose total number of warriors was estimated at only 1,050 men. Of these about 250 were Twightwees, or Miamis proper, 300 Weas, or Ouiatenons, 300 Piankeshaws and 200 Shockeys; and at this time the principal villages of the Twightwees were situated about the head of the Maumee river at and near the place where Fort Wayne now is. The larger Wea villages were near the banks of the Wabash river, in the vicinity of the Post Quiatenon; and the Shockeys and Piankeshaws dwelt on the banks of the Vermillion, and on the borders of the Wabash between Vincennes and Ouiatenon. Branches of the Pottawatomie, Shawnee, Delaware and Kickapoo tribes were permitted at different times to enter within the boundaries of the Miamis and reside for a while.

The wars in which France and England were engaged, from 1688 to 1697, retarded the growth of the colonies of those nations in North America, and the efforts made by France to connect Canada and the Gulf of Mexico by a chain of trading posts and colonies naturally excited the jealousy of England and gradually laid the foundation for a struggle at arms. After several stations were established elsewhere in the West, trading posts were started at the Miami villages, which stood at the head of the Maumee, at the Wea villages about Ouiatenon on the Wabash, and at the Piankeshaw villages about the present sight of Vincennes. It is probable that before the close of the year 1719 temporary trading posts were erected at the sites of Fort Wayne, Ouiatenon and Vincennes. These points were probably often visited by French fur traders prior to 1700. In the meanwhile the English people in this country commenced also to establish military posts west of the Alleghanies, and thus matters went on until they naturally culminated in a general war, which, being waged by the French and Indians combined on one side, was called "the French and Indian war." This war was terminated in 1763 by a treaty at Paris, by which France ceded to

Great Britain all of North America east of the Mississippi except New Orleans and the island on which it is situated; and indeed, France had the preceding autumn, by a secret convention, ceded to Spain all the country west of that river.

In 1762, after Canada and its dependencies had been surrendered to the English, Pontiac and his partisans secretly organized a powerful confederacy in order to crush at one blow all English power in the West. This great scheme was skillfully projected and cautiously matured.

The principal act in the programme was to gain admittance into the fort at Detroit, on pretense of a friendly visit, with shortened muskets concealed under their blankets, and on a given signal suddenly break forth upon the garrison; but an inadvertent remark of an Indian woman led to a discovery of the plot, which was consequently averted. Pontiac and his warriors afterward made many attacks upon the English, some of which were successful, but the Indians were finally defeated in the general war.

BRITISH POLICY.

In 1765 the total number of French families within the limits of the Northwestern Territory did not probably exceed 600. These were in settlements about Detroit, along the river Wabash and the neighborhood of Fort Chartres on the Mississippi. Of these families, about 80 or 90 resided at Post Vincennes, 14 at Fort Ouiatenon, on the Wabash, and nine or ten at the confluence of the St. Mary and St. Joseph rivers.

The colonial policy of the British government opposed any measures which might strengthen settlements in the interior of this country, lest they become self-supporting and independent of the mother country; hence the early and rapid settlement of the Northwestern Territory was still further retarded by the short-sighted selfishness of England. That fatal policy consisted mainly in holding the land in the hands of the government and not allowing it to be subdivided and sold to settlers. But in spite of all her efforts in this direction, she constantly made just such efforts as provoked the American people to rebel, and to rebel successfully, which was within 15 years after the perfect close of the French and Indian

war.

AMERICAN POLICY.

Thomas Jefferson, the shrewd statesman and wise Governor of Virginia, saw from the first that actual occupation of Western lands was the only way to keep them out of the hands of foreigners and Indians. Therefore, directly after the conquest of Vincennes by Clark, he engaged a scientific corps to proceed under an escort to