A word here explanatory of the position of the Senecas, and their relations with the Indians of the League, and other neighboring nations, may be useful. The Seneca tribe was more exposed to the French and their Indian allies on the lower Ohio and the lakes, than the other members of the League. They had the important and dangerous duties of keeping "the western door of the long house," as they termed their possessions. Their watch and ward extended from the Susquehanna to the Ohio and great lakes. The duplicity, and in fact treachery of the English crown, during the reign of the STUARTS, in not only abandoning the Six Nations in their war with the French which they had undertaken in the interest of the English, but when the League had defeated the French and well-nigh conquered them, the English government compelled them to make peace with France, and submit to the terms which the French dictated. These terms, however could not concede to the French a region of country from which they had been expelled, and which was in fact occupied by the Six Nations; and thus the whole country, south of the chain of the great lakes, was rescued from Canada. Referring to this period, Mr. BANCROFT says: "In the course of events, New York owes its present northern boundary to the valor of the Five Nations. But for them, Canada would have embraced the basin of the St. Lawrence."[J] Although the Six Nations were afterwards informed that the treachery and duplicity herein referred to, was not approved by the successors of the STUARTS, nor by the English people, but was the result of the bad conduct of English kings who were under French influence, yet it left an impression on their minds which had an injurious effect in after years. [J] History United States, volume II, page 424.