Geography of Ohio 409 



sible for the western Indians reoccupying the territory out of 

 which the Iroquois Confederacy had driven them. 



Such a temporary conquest, followed shortly by a reassertion 

 of power on the part of those who had been dispossessed, hardly 

 constitutes an equitable title; but it was satisfactory^ to Gover- 

 nor Nanfan of the New York colony, who procured the deed for the 

 English, This whole question was reviewed very critically in 1839 

 by General William Henry Harrison, in whose opinion the Five 

 Nations never established a right to land west of the Scioto 

 river ;2 General Harrison conceded what others did not, the dis- 

 tance between the Muskingum and the Scioto. 



CLAIM OF THE FRENCH 



Basis of claiyn. Frenchmen, however, asserted ownership over 

 this territory. North America, as a continent, was claimed by 

 Great Britain on the basis of discovery made by John Cabot, 

 who did discover an island off the eastern coast of Canada. If 

 there was any virtue in this claim, surely the nation whose citi- 

 zens first walked over much of the continent itself could well 

 assert its title; accordingly this Ohio country belonged to the 

 French, because her emissaries in evangelization and industry 

 had tramped this basin back and forth for about a century before 

 the French and Indian war. Not only had they founded trad- 

 ing posts, but they had organized a few colonies, whose industry, 

 even in the manufacture of wheat flour, was felt in Europe; 

 the first shipment of flour went southward from the Wabash 

 country in 1746.^ The French, entering the continent through 

 the St. Lawrence river, spread easily across the low divides of the 

 Great Lakes' basin into that of the Mississippi, and with scarcely 

 less difficulty through certain adjacent parts of the Allegheny 

 plateau. 



The particular part of the basin in which we are interested was 

 visited first by Joliet. More than this, the industries of the 

 whole region were monopolized by the French for many decades 

 before any competition appeared. At several points along the 

 Great Lakes, the French maintained trading posts which were 

 widely known among the Indians, much to their advantage. 



2 R. King, Ohio, p. 40, in American Commonwealth Series, 

 s B. A. Hinsdale, The Old Northwest, 1889, p. 50. 



