The ease with which the French and English in America could approach each other, along the almost continuous water-route formed by Hudson River and Lake Champlain and their tributaries, made this central region the theatre of a protracted and desperate struggle throughout the French and Indian war; while we shall see that during the Revolution the Hudson was regarded as the key to the military situation. It has already been remarked (page 202, § 85) how important the English government deemed the possession of the Hudson, in 1664, as a means to the unification of the Anglo-American empire. Through its Mohawk arm, waters running into the Great Lakes could be readily reached. Sidenote: Soil and climate. The soil in the middle district, back from the sandy coast-belt, is for the most part fertile. Originally the entire country was densely wooded, even to the summits of the mountains, which nowhere rise to the snow-line. The climate is, judged by the record of average temperature, an agreeable compromise between New England and the South; although, as elsewhere on the Atlantic slope, it is subject to rapid and extreme variations. Penn wrote that the "weather often changeth without notice, and is constant almost in its inconstancy." 92. People of the Middle Colonies. Sidenote: Population of New York, The population of the middle colonies was noted for its heterogeneous character. New York was first settled by the Dutch, who ruled the district for fifty years. After the English conquest (1664), Dutch immigration practically ceased; nevertheless in 1700 a majority of the whites were Dutch, although the English, more of whom had emigrated from New England than from the parent isle, were widely spread and politically dominant. There were in 1700 about twenty-five thousand inhabitants, perhaps two thousand five hundred being blacks. Besides the prevailing Dutch and English, there were many French Huguenots, a number of Palatine Germans who had fled from persecution at home, and a few Jews. The New York colonists chiefly dwelt on the islands and shores of New York bay, and the banks of the Hudson and Mohawk. Beyond this thin fringe of settlement, the forest wall was for the most part still unbroken. Agricultural development was as yet slow, but the fur-trade was spreading far into the interior. Sidenote: of the Jerseys, East Jersey had a population of about ten thousand, composed of Quakers, New England men, and Scotch Presbyterians. Of the four thousand inhabitants of West Jersey, the Quakers were the prevailing element. The population of New Jersey was homogeneous, being very largely English; the few Dutch, Germans, and Swedes having little effect on the character of the colony. Jerseymen were vigorous and quick-witted, although Governor Belcher (1748-1757) wrote, "They are a very rustical people, and deficient in learning." Sidenote: and of Pennsylvania and Delaware.