desperate battle was fought. The raw soldiers of New York and New England, however, proved to be more than a match for the French regulars. General Johnson was wounded early in the fight; but the French commander was taken prisoner, and his army was utterly routed.

Sir William Johnson. After this the colonists felt for a time as though they were quite secure from the French in

Canada. The credit for the victory seems really to have belonged to General Lyman, who conducted the battle after Johnson was wounded. But, for some reason, General Johnson was everywhere praised as the hero who had avenged the defeat of Braddock and saved the English colonies.

The British parliament voted him a

gift equal to twenty-five thousand dollars in our money; and two months later he was made a baronet of Great Britain and became Sir William Johnson.

A long war. It is no part of our purpose to follow Sir William Johnson through the long war that was fought for the possession of the West. Nor is it necessary to name the great men who took part in that war, or to describe the campaigns, the victories, the defeats, the various maneuvers by land and sea. Sir William Johnson's influence over the Iroquois was such that no temptations which the French might put in their way could make them unfriendly to the English; and this had very much to do in deciding the outcome of the war.

Quebec and Montreal.

The war had been going on for five years when the British under General Wolfe attacked Quebec. A desperate battle was fought outside of the walls of that city, and the French under General Montcalm were defeated. This was the deathblow to the cause of France in America. A few months later, Sir William Johnson was one of the officers to receive the surrender of Montreal and with it the whole of Canada.

Results of the war. - France had lost everything. At the treaty of peace that was signed some time afterwards,

she gave up to Great Britain not only Canada but 1763 the Great Lakes and all the region between the Mississippi River and the Alleghany Mountains. The country west of the Mississippi was given to Spain. The king of France had no longer any possessions in North America.

III. THE LORD OF KINGSLAND

A great landholder. Sir William Johnson was well rewarded for his services in the war. Besides the money

that had been given him by the British parliament, he

received a grant of one hundred thousand acres of land in the Mohawk Valley. He soon afterwards went to live on this estate, which was long known as Kingsland. He induced many enterprising men to make their homes there; he laid out the village of Johnstown, which he named after himself; he built in it a courthouse, a church, and an inn; he supplied the villagers with lumber from his own mill; he established a free school for the village

children; and he took a fatherly interest in the welfare of every white person or Indian within his reach.

Johnson Hall. Not far from the village he built for himself a noble mansion which he called "Johnson Hall."

There for the rest of his life he lived in the style of a feudal lord, surrounded by his tenants and his Indian dependants. He took great pride in the management of his estate; he experimented with the best grains and the finest fruit trees; he was the first in that region to raise sheep and fine breeds of cattle and horses. Inspired by his example, the white settlers took much pride in raising good crops and in improving their farms. Even many of the Indians left off their savage ways and became excellent farmers.

To the end of his life Sir William was superintendent of the Iroquois and other northern Indians; and it is said that his death was caused by a cold, brought on while making a speech at an Indian council on a very warm day. He died ten months before the beginning of the Revolutionary War, being nearly sixty years of age.

REVIEW

Who were the Iroquois Indians and where did they live? What important part did they perform in the history of our country? What was the secret of Sir William Johnson's influence over them? What was the cause of the French and Indian War? Tell about the convention at Albany. Tell about Braddock's defeat. Why was Sir William Johnson regarded so highly by the British government? What was the result of the French and Indian War?

1732

GEORGE WASHINGTON

AND THE WAR FOR INDEPENDENCE

I. WHEN WASHINGTON WAS YOUNG

Childhood and Youth. George Washington was born in Virginia a little more than a year before General Oglethorpe and his first colonists landed in Georgia. Virginia had then been settled about a hundred and twenty-five years. It was not only the oldest but the richest of the English colonies in America, and it had more inhabitants than any other.

George Washington's father owned at least three large plantations. One of these was on the banks of the Potomac, nearly forty miles above its mouth; another was farther up the river, at a place then called Hunting Creek, but since known as Mount Vernon; the third was on the Rappahannock River, nearly opposite the town of Fredericksburg. It was in a quaint old house on the first of these plantations that George Washington was born, on the 22d of February, 1732. Much of his childhood was spent at the Rappahannock home, and there, when George was eleven years old, his father died. During his youth he lived at Mount Vernon with his elder brother Lawrence, who had inherited nearly all of their father's estate.