Barron, Dunn, Eau Claire, Clark, Chippewa, Washburn, Sawyer, Price, and Taylor, with parts of Buffalo, Trempealeau, Jackson, Wood, Marathon, Lincoln, Burnett, Polk and Ashland, with a part of Minnesota, and contain an area of about fourteen thousand square miles.

Whether such a deed was ever made, and is not a mere fiction, has given rise to many well-founded doubts. It is not spoken of by CARVER in his "Journal" of his travels. However the fact may be, it is well known that the Naudowissies, or Sioux of the plains, had no claim to any territory east of the Great River, and as the two Indians by whom this deed purports to have been signed were chiefs of this tribe, they were granting that to which they had no claim.

If the authenticity of the deed be conceded, as well as the validity of the title of the grantors, the transaction was in direct violation of the proclamation of his king, made less than three years before, of which Capt. CARVER was no doubt aware, which strictly enjoined and required that no private person should presume to make any purchase of any land from any Indian.

A petition of the heirs of CARVER and their assignees, for the recognition of the validity of their title under this grant, appears to have been presented to congress as early as 1806, and referred to a committee of the senate, but no report seems to have been made. Subsequently, January 23, 1823, Mr. VAN DYKE, from the committee on public lands, submitted to the senate a report upon a like petition, concluding with a resolution, that the prayer of the petitioners ought not to be granted.

A similar petition was presented to the next congress, and on the 28th of January, 1825, a report was made by Mr. CAMPBELL of Ohio, from the committee on private land claims, which contains a most exhaustive discussion of all the questions involved, and demonstrates most conclusively that there was no foundation for the pretended claim, and that it was utterly worthless.

In a letter from Lord PALMERSTON, dated February 8, 1834, to Hon. AARON VAIL, then charge d'affaires of the United States to Great Britain, is the statement in reference to this claim that

"No trace has been found of any ratification of the grant in question by His Majesty's government."

A claim of somewhat the same kind was made by the

"Illinois and Wabash Land Company," for a large territory in Illinois, under a grant claimed to have been made to WILLIAM MURRAY in 1773, and met a like fate at the hands. of congress as the CARVER claim.

The validity of claims founded on actual settlement and improvement, without other pretended title, has been recognized by the United States government. Of this character were all the claims to lands at Green Bay and Prairie du Chien, which, on examination, have been confirmed by the general government.

In continuing the account of the travels of Capt. CARVER, it appears that having first ascertained that the goods which Gov. ROGERS had promised to send to the Falls of St. Anthony for him, had not arrived, he decided to return to Prairie du Chien, abandoning for the present his original plan of proceeding further to the Northwest. Here he obtained from the traders what goods they could spare, but as they were not sufficient, he determined to make his way across the country of the Chippewas to Lake Superior, where he hoped to meet the traders that annually went from Mackinaw to the Northwest, from whom he thought he should be able to obtain what goods he required.

In the month of June CARVER left Prairie du Chien, and leaving the Mississippi River, he ascended the Chippewa, near the head waters of which he found a Chippewa village, composed of forty houses adjacent to a small lake. He left this village in July, and having crossed a number of small lakes and portages that intervened, came to a head branch of the St. Croix River-probably the Namekagon. This branch he descended to a fork, and then ascended another-probably one of the Totogatics - to its source. On both these branches he discovered, as he says, several mines of virgin copper, very pure. That many of the outcrops of rock upon these branches are cupriferous has been shown by the explorations of the late geological survey of the state, but "mines of virgin copper" will be developed only as the result of more labor than has yet been bestowed upon them. From this last branch he made a portage to a stream which flowed into Lake Superior. Descending this he coasted around the western extremity of the lake, and finally arrived at the Grand Portage on the north shore. Here, although he obtained much information about the lakes and rivers lying to the northwest, he could not pro

cure the goods he wanted, and was compelled to give up the one great object of his travels, and return to Mackinaw, where he arrived the beginning of November. He spent the winter at Mackinaw, and returned to Boston the following year, having been absent two years and five months, and traversed seven thousand miles.

CHAPTER V.

PROGRESS OF SETTLEMENTS IN THE NORTHWEST, AND TRANSFER TO BRITISH JURISDICTION.

The history of the war with the Outagamies on Fox River after their failure to destroy Detroit in 1712, naturally led to an account of the DE LANGLADES and of events intimately connected with them, causing a digression from the chronological narrative which had been attempted and which will now be resumed.

During the first half of the eighteenth century, the progress of settlement and industry in the Wabash country was very considerable. As early as 1705 fifteen thousand skins and hides had been sent to Mobile for the European market. In 1716 the French population of that fertile region kept up a lucrative trade with Mobile, by means of traders and voyageurs. Agriculture soon began to flourish, and in 1746, six hundred barrels of flour were manufactured and shipped to New Orleans, besides large quantities of hides, peltry, tallow and beeswax.

In 1730 the Illinois country, not including the Wabash valley, contained one hundred and forty French families, besides about six hundred converted Indians, many traders, voyageurs and couriers du bois. About twenty years later (1751) it contained six distinct settlements, with their respective villages. These were Cahokia, St. Philip, Fort Chartres, Kaskaskia, Prairie du Rochier, and St. Genevieve. Kaskaskia in its best days, under the French regime, contained two or three thousand inhabitants, but under British dominion the population in 1773 had decreased to four hundred and fifty souls.

The ambition of the French was to preserve the possession

of all important points in the Northwest, and to prevent the slightest attempt of the English to occupy any part of the territory west of the Alleghanies, and French commanders had avowed the purpose of seizing every Englishman within the Ohio Valley. In 1753 the Ohio company opened a road into the western valley, and GIST established a plantation near the Youghiogeny, where eleven families settled, and a town and fort were marked out on Shurtee's creek.

Gov. DINWIDDIE, fearful for the safety of these pioneer settlers upon the western dominion of Virginia, in November, 1753, sent WASHINGTON-then twenty-one, to the commander of the French forces on the Ohio river, to know his reasons for invading the British dominions. The commander, GARDEUR DE ST. PERRE, refused to discuss questions of right. "I am here," said he, "by the orders of my general, to which I shall conform with exactness and resolution." WASHINGTON hastened homeward to Virginia, where, after many hardships and dangers, he arrived in January, 1754. WASHINGTON's report was followed by immediate activity. The Virginians had commenced a fort at the forks of the Ohio, which, on the 17th of April, they surrendered to the superior forces of the French, who occupied and fortified it and named it Du Quesne, from the governor of New France. Pittsburg now occupies its site. On the 27th of May, WASHINGTON, followed by only forty raw recruits and a few Mingo allies, coming upon the French, himself fired the first hostile gun, which kindled the world into a flame, and was the signal for the great French war which ensued. The engagement was short. Ten of the French, among them JUMONVILLE, the commander of the party, were killed, and twenty-one made pris

oners.

On the first day of July, Washington, not being reinforced as he expected, was compelled to fall back upon Fort Necessity, a rude stockade at Great Meadows. Here for nine hours the fire of the French was returned, when, at last, after thirty of the English and but three of the French were killed, terms of capitulation were accepted. On the 4th day of July, the English garrison, retaining all its effects, withdrew from the basin of the Ohio, and no standard but that of France floated in the whole valley of the Missippi its head springs in the Alleghanies.

The next year the contest for the possess

Quesne was renewed, and Gen. BRADDOCK'S signal defeat on the banks of the Monongahela occurred on the 9th of July, 1755. From that period to the victory of Gen. WOLFE at Quebec in September 1759, various engagements had taken place between the English and French with various fortunes. At length, on the 8th of September, 1760, Ticonderoga, Crown Point, Niagara and Quebec having previously fallen, Montreal, Detroit and all Canada were given up to the English by the French governor, and the principal posts on the Ohio passed into the possession of the English. The post of Detroit was given by the French into the hands of Major ROGERS on the 25th of November, 1760, and from this period the French power in this region was forever overthrown.

The affection of the Indians for the French was deeply rooted, and by the commingling of blood, created the strong ties of nature between them, which even now continues. Through all the changes in the country that time has wrought, the French language still partially holds its place, and this is especially observable in the vicinity of Green Bay and Prairie du Chien.

The first settlements made by the French on the east side of the Mississippi river were at Cahokia, St. Phillips, La Prairie du Rocher and Kaskaskia. The first is situated nearly opposite to St. Louis, and contained about one hundred and twenty houses; the second became extinct; the third is about twelve miles above Kaskaskia and contained thirtytwo houses. Kaskaskia is situated about seven miles up a river of the same name, though not more than three miles from the Mississippi, nearly opposite to St. Genevieve, and about fifty-five miles below Cahokia. This village was once considered as the capital of the country, and was rich and populous and contained two thousand or three thousand inhabitants, but under the British dominion as late as 1772, it contained only five hundred whites and as many blacks, and at a later period it was reduced to forty-five families. This loss of population was occasioned largely by its being transferred to the west side of the Mississippi, principally to St. Louis. Two causes mainly produced this result. The first was the ordinance of 1787 which prohibited slavery in the Northwestern Territory. The slave-holders were disposed to retain their slaves, and to do it effectually, they abandoned their ancient habitations and joined their friends