Far-famed Fort Stanwix arose near the site of Fort Williams in 1758 and Fort Wood Creek (on the site of Fort Bull) and Fort Newport were built about the same time or a little earlier. In the British Museum may be seen a colored "plan of the forts at the Onoida, or great carrying place, in the province of New York in America," built by Major-General Shirley, commander-in-chief in North America, and destroyed by Major-General Webb, August 31, 1756, before they were finished. This map must ever be of entrancing interest to the student who views it knowingly. The strategic nature of this little plot of ground was recognized, a century or so ago, by a continent--indeed by a world. In the Old French War there was not, perhaps, so important a spot on the continent as this, the path from the Hudson to Lake George alone excepted. And when it is recalled that the Oneida portage led to the West--to the Lakes and the Ohio Basin--the Oneida path, taken throughout the years, can but be considered of preëminent importance, commercially. A visit to thriving little Rome and a study of the country roundabout will prove of appealing interest. Here, within cannon shot, stood half a dozen forts; here, in the very center of Rome is the wide straight roadway over which millions of pioneers moved to their conquest of the West; here is the junction of the Black River and the Erie Canal, which, "conceived by the genius, and achieved by the energy of De Witt Clinton, was, during the second quarter of this [nineteenth] century, the most potent influence of American progress and civilization." And, in its turn, here lie the gleaming rails of the New York Central--and the "Empire" has covered the canal boat with dust. The conditions here make it almost possible to say, "All roads lead to Rome, New York." From one and the same point of observation it is possible to see the junction of the Erie and Black River Canals, the portage path from the Mohawk to Wood Creek, the New York Central Railway, and the terminus of the Utica and Mohawk Valley Electric Railway. Two canals, a highway, a railway, and an electric line converging within an air-rifle shot would not be found in a town of only a few thousand inhabitants were it not for some extraordinary geographical reason.