The principal French forts in America were
occupied by British troops. Louisbourg had been razed to
the ground; the British flag waved over Quebec, Montreal,
and Niagara, and was soon to be raised on all the lesser
forts in the territory known as Canada. The Mississippi
valley from the Illinois river southward alone remained
to France. Vincennes on the Wabash and Fort Chartres on
the Mississippi were the only posts in the hinterland
occupied by French troops. These posts were under the
government of Louisiana; but even these the American
colonies were prepared to claim, basing the right on
their 'sea to sea' charters.
The British in America had found the strip of land between
the Alleghanies and the Atlantic far too narrow for a
rapidly increasing population, but their advance westward
had been barred by the French. Now, praise the Lord, the
French were out of the way, and American traders and
settlers could exploit the profitable fur-fields and the
rich agricultural lands of the region beyond the mountains.
True, the Indians were there, but these were not regarded
as formidable foes. There was no longer any occasion to
consider the Indians--so thought the colonists and the
British officers in America. The red men had been a force
to be reckoned with only because the French had supplied
them with the sinews of war, but they might now be treated
like other denizens of the forest--the bears, the wolves,
and the wild cats.
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