iplomacy, the
French had worn down the Spanish power, and France was now easily the
strongest nation in Europe. France also had a foothold, or rather two
footholds, in North America. One of her colonies, Louisiana, lay beyond
Florida at the mouth of the Mississippi; the other, Canada, to the north
of the Maine, at the mouth of the St. Lawrence. It was the aim of French
colonial ambition to extend both colonies inland into the unmapped heart
of the American continent until they should meet. This would necessarily
have had the effect of hemming in the English settlements on the
Atlantic seaboard and preventing their Western expansion. Throughout the
first half of the eighteenth century, therefore, the rivalry grew more
and more acute, and even when France and England were at peace the
French and English in America were almost constantly at war. Their
conflict was largely carried on under cover of alliances with the
warring Indian tribes, whose feuds kept the region of the Great Lakes in
a continual turmoil. The outbreak of the Seven Years' War and the
intervention of England as an ally of Prussia put an end to the
necessity for such pretexts, and a regular military campaign opened upon
which was staked the destiny of North America.

It is not necessary for the purposes of this book to follow that
campaign in detail. The issue was necessarily fought out in Canada, for
Louisiana lay remote from the English colonies and was separated from
them by the neutral territory of the Spanish Empire. England had
throughout the war the advantage of superiority at sea, which enabled
her to supply and reinforce her armies, while the French forces were
practically cut off from Europe. The French, on the other hand, had at
the beginning the advantage of superior numbers, at least so far as
regular troops were concerned, while for defensive purposes they
possessed an excellent chain of very strong fortresses carefully
prepared before the war. After the earlier operations, which cleared the
French invaders out of the English colonies, the gradual reduction of
these strongholds practically forms the essence of the campaign
undertaken by a succession of English generals under the political
direction of the elder Pitt. That campaign was virtually brought to a
close by the brilliant exploit of James Wolfe in 1759--the taking of
Quebec. By the Treaty of Paris in 1763 Canada was ceded to England.
Meanwhile Louisiana had been transferred to Spain i