A minute detail of local occurrences would be out of place in a work of this nature; it may be sufficient to say, that from this period, (1674,) when the population, embracing converted Indians, did not exceed eight thousand, the French settlement in Canada continued to increase, and as it rose in power, and assumed offensive operations on the New England frontier, the jealousy of the British colonists became roused, and both parties, aided alternately by the Indians, carried on a destructive and harassing border warfare. And here it may not be amiss to observe, how much the progress of the British colonists in New York, New England, &c., and the prosperity of the French in Canada, were influenced during successive years by the strength and moral character of their respective sovereigns. I may allude, for instance, to the licentious reign of Louis XV., and the vigorous administration of William III., during whose governments the progress of their respective colonies was retarded or advanced by the example or stimulus afforded by the mother country; thus demonstrating how much, under a monarchy, the character and happiness of nations are influenced by the principles and habits of their rulers. For many years the French in Canada made head against the assaults of their less skilful, but more persevering neighbours, owing to the active cooperation and support which the Canadians received from their Indian allies, whom the British were by nature less adapted for conciliating; but at length the latter, seeing the necessity for native cooperation, conciliated the favour of the aborigines, and turned the tide of success in their own favour. The hostilities waged by the Indians were dreadful. Setting little value on life, they fought with desperation, and gave no quarter; protected by the natural fastnesses of their country, they chose in security their own time for action, and when they had enclosed their enemies in a defile, or amidst the intricacies of the forest, the war-whoop of the victor and the death-shriek of the vanquished were almost simultaneously heard; and while the bodies of the slain served for food to the savage, the scalped head of the white man was a trophy of glory, and a booty of no inconsiderable value to its possessor. The Canadians themselves sometimes experienced the remorseless fury of their Indian forces. On the 26th of July, 1688, Le Rat, a chief of the Huron tribe, mortified by the attempt of the French commanders to negotiate a peace with the Iroquois, or Five Nations, without consulting the wishes of their Huron allies, urged his countrymen, and even stimulated the Iroquois, to aid him in an attack on Montreal. The colonists were taken by surprise, a thousand of them slain, and the houses, crops, and cattle on the island destroyed. Charlevais, in his history of _La Nouvelle France_, says of the Indians, “Ils ouvrirent le sein des femmes enceintes pour en arracher le fruit qu’elles portoient; ils mirent des