That what was written could, in the midst of official duties, be prepared for the press is due largely to the patient, verifying, proof-reading labors of Mr. Frank L. Tolman, my young associate in the State Library. The title of this book (appearing first as the general title for some of these chapters in _Scribner's Magazine_ in 1912) has a purely geographical connotation. But I advise the reader, in these days of bitterness, to go no further if he carry any hatred in his heart. JOHN FINLEY. STATE EDUCATION BUILDING, ALBANY, N. Y. Washington's Birthday, 1915. CONTENTS I. INTRODUCTION II. FROM LABRADOR TO THE LAKES III. THE PATHS OF THE GRAY FRIARS AND BLACK GOWNS IV. FROM THE GREAT LAKES TO THE GULF V. THE RIVER COLBERT: A COURSE AND SCENE OF EMPIRE VI. THE PASSING OF NEW FRANCE AND THE DREAM OF ITS REVIVAL VII. THE PEOPLING OF THE WILDERNESS VIII. THE PARCELLING OF THE DOMAIN IX. IN THE TRAILS OF THE COUREURS DE BOIS X. IN THE WAKE OF THE "GRIFFIN" XI WESTERN CITIES THAT HAVE SPRUNG FROM FRENCH FORTS XII. WESTERN TOWNS AND CITIES THAT HAVE SPRUNG FROM FRENCH PORTAGE PATHS XIII. FROM LA SALLE TO LINCOLN XIV. THE VALLEY OF THE NEW DEMOCRACY XV. WASHINGTON: THE UNION OF THE EASTERN AND THE WESTERN WATERS XVI. THE PRODUCERS XVII. THE THOUGHT OF TO-MORROW XVIII. "THE MEN OF ALWAYS" XIX. THE HEART OF AMERICA EPILOGUE THE FRENCH IN THE HEART OF AMERICA From "a series of letters to a friend in England," in 1793, "tending to shew the probable rise and grandeur of the American Empire": "_It struck me as a natural object of enquiry to what a future increase and elevation of magnitude and grandeur the spreading empire of America might attain, when a country had thus suddenly risen from an uninhabited wild, to the quantum of population necessary to govern and regulate its own administration._" G. IMLAY ("A captain in the American Army during the late war, and a commissioner for laying out land in the back settlements"). CHAPTER I INTRODUCTION I address the reader as living in the land from which the pioneers of France went out to America; first, because I wrote these chapters in that land, a few steps from the Seine; second, because I should otherwise have to assume the familiarity of the reader with much that I have gathered into these chapters, though the reader may have forgotten or never known it; and, third, because I wish the reader to look at these new-world regions from without, and, standing apart and aloof, to see the present restless life of these valleys, especially of the Mississippi Valley, against the background of Gallic adventure and pious endeavor which is seen in richest color, highest charm, and truest value at a distance.