nt many. It was the strife, too, of the past against the
future; of the old against the new; of moral and intellectual torpor
against moral and intellectual life; of barren absolutism against a
liberty, crude, incoherent, and chaotic, yet full of prolific vitality.

Chapter 2

1749-1752

Celeron de Bienville

When the peace of Aix-la-Chapelle was signed, the Marquis de la
Galissoniere ruled over Canada. Like all the later Canadian governors,
he was a naval officer; and, a few years after, he made himself famous
by a victory, near Minorca, over the English admiral Byng,--an
achievement now remembered chiefly by the fate of the defeated
commander, judicially murdered as the scapegoat of an imbecile ministry.
Galissoniere was a humpback; but his deformed person was animated by a
bold spirit and a strong and penetrating intellect. He was the chief
representative of the American policy of France. He felt that, cost what
it might, she must hold fast to Canada, and link her to Louisiana by
chains of forts strong enough to hold back the British colonies, and
cramp their growth by confinement within narrow limits; while French
settlers, sent from the mother-country, should spread and multiply in
the broad valleys of the interior. It is true, he said, that Canada and
her dependencies have always been a burden; but they are necessary as a
barrier against English ambition; and to abandon them is to abandon
ourselves; for if we suffer our enemies to become masters in America,
their trade and naval power will grow to vast proportions, and they will
draw from their colonies a wealth that will make them preponderant in
Europe.[2]

[Footnote 2: La Galissoniere, _Memoire sur les Colonies de la France
dans l'Amerique septentrionale_.]

The treaty had done nothing to settle the vexed question of boundaries
between France and her rival. It had but staved off the inevitable
conflict. Meanwhile, the English traders were crossing the mountains
from Pennsylvania and Virginia, poaching on the domain which France
claimed as hers, ruining the French fur-trade, seducing the Indian
allies of Canada, and stirring them up against her. Worse still, English
land speculators were beginning to follow. Something must be done, and
that promptly, to drive back the intruders, and vindicate French rights
in the valley of the Ohio. To this end the Governor sent Celoron de
Bienville thither in the summer of 1749.

He was a chevalier de St. Louis