There were, however, a few Frenchmen who had glimmerings of the dream of La Salle. As early as 1686 a party under Du Luth established a French outpost between Lakes Huron and Erie. Eight years later La Mothe Cadillac urged upon the French government the importance of holding this post, which in fact controlled the outlet of the two lakes. The consent of those in authority having been obtained, the French began in 1701 the erection of the city of Detroit. The Iroquois at last realised what was happening; they saw that, just as Fort Frontenac some years before had very seriously curtailed their rights of hunting and had indeed endangered their power, so now that they might again be trapped. To prevent this, on July 19, 1701, they ceded their hunting grounds to the King of England, retaining the right of free hunting. They were not versed in European politics; nor did they know that the magnificent Louis was gradually being ruined by William III. and Marlborough. The war of the Spanish Succession, fought for the most part in the Netherlands and Spain, had a vital effect upon those Iroquois nations of the Western prairies. The victories of Marlborough brought to England many possessions, and amongst them those lands which had been so trustingly conceded in 1701. The Treaty of Utrecht, although it brought peace after a long and expensive war, may be said to mark a new epoch in the stories of both British and French colonial expansion. This epoch is not one of peace in the true sense; the actual fighting, when it occurred, was not always sanctioned by the home government; but the period was one of aggression on the part of the French in Canada and resistance on the part of the British colonists along the Eastern seaboard. FOOTNOTES: [239] Bateson, _Cambridge Modern History_ (1905), vol. vii. p. 70. [240] _Hakluyt's Voyages_ (1904), viii. 438. [241] _Hakluyt's Voyages_ (1904), viii. p. 242. [242] _Ibid._, p. 244. [243] Le Clercq, _First Establishment of the Faith in New France_ (1881), p. 52. [244] Le Clercq, _First Establishment of the Faith in New France_ (1881), p. 52. [245] The modern Kingston. [246] These men were the first to explore the river, but it was undoubtedly reached in 1659 by two fur traders, Radisson and Des Grosseilliers. [247] _French, Historical Collections of Louisiana_ (1850), Part II. [248] _Ibid._ [249] _Ibid._ [250] _Ibid._ [251] Parkman, _La Salle_ (edition eleven), p. 112. [252] French, _Historical Collections of Louisiana_ (1850), Part IV. [253] _Ibid._ [254] French, _Historical Collections of Louisiana_ (1850), Part IV. CHAPTER XI FRENCH AGGRESSION