Produced by Nathan Harris, Charles Franks and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team [Illustration: THE WARRIOR'S LAST RIDE (See the Battle of Deerfield, Vol. 1., p. 205) _Painted by Frederic Remington_] THE HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES FROM 1492 TO 1910 By JULIAN HAWTHORNE VOLUME I From Discovery Of America October 12, 1492 To Battle Of Lexington April 19, 1775 CONTENTS OF VOLUME ONE INTRODUCTION BEFORE DAWN I. COLUMBUS, RALEIGH, AND SMITH II. THE FREIGHT OF THE "MAYFLOWER" III. THE SPIRIT OF THE PURITANS IV. FROM HUDSON TO STUYVESANT V. LIBERTY, SLAVERY, AND TYRANNY VI. CATHOLIC, PHILOSOPHER, AND REBEL VII. QUAKER, YANKEE, AND KING VIII. THE STUARTS AND THE CHARTER IX. THE NEW LEAF, AND THE BLOT ON IT X. FIFTY YEARS OF FOOLS AND HEROES XI. QUEM JUPITER VULT PERDERE XII. THE PLAINS OF ABRAHAM AND THE STAMP ACT XIII. THE PASSING OF THE RUBICON XIV. THE SHOT HEARD ROUND THE WORLD INTRODUCTION When we speak of History, we may mean either one of several things. A savage will make picture-marks on a stone or a bone or a bit of wood; they serve to recall to him and his companions certain events which appeared remarkable or important for one or another reason; there was an earthquake, or a battle, or a famine, or an invasion: the chronicler himself, or some fellow-tribesman of his, may have performed some notable exploit. The impulse to make a record of it was natural: posterity might thereby be informed, after the chronicler himself had passed away, concerning the perils, the valor, the strange experiences of their ancestors. Such records were uniformly brief, and no attempt was made to connect one with another, or to interpret them. We find such fragmentary histories among the remains of our own aborigines; and the inscriptions of Egypt and Mesopotamia are the same in character and intention, though more elaborate. Warlike kings thus endeavored, from motives of pride, to perpetuate the memory of their achievements. At the time when they were inscribed upon the rock, or the walls of the tombs, or the pedestals of the statues, they had no further value than this. But after the lapse of many ages, they acquire a new value, far greater than the original one, and not contemplated by the scribes. They assume their proper place in the long story of mankind, and indicate, each in its degree, the manner and direction of the processes by which man has become what he is, from what he was. Thereby there is breathed into the dead fact the breath of life; it rises from its tomb of centuries, and does its appointed work in the mighty organism of humanity.