Spread of English-Speaking Peoples 53 



the land to remain a wilderness, the home of the 

 trapper and the fur trader, of the Indian hunter and 

 the French voyageur. She desired it to be kept as 

 a barrier against the growth of the seaboard colonies 

 toward the interior. She regarded the new lands 

 across the Atlantic as being won and settled, not 

 for the benefit of the men who won and settled them, 

 but for the benefit of the merchants and traders 

 who stayed at home. It was this that rendered the 

 Revolution inevitable; the struggle was a revolt 

 against the whole mental attitude of Britain in re- 

 gard to America, rather than against any one special 

 act or set of acts. The sins and shortcomings of 

 the colonists had been many, and it would be easy 

 to make out a formidable catalogue of grievances 

 against them, on behalf of the mother country; but 

 on the great underlying question they were wholly 

 in the right, and their success was of vital con- 

 sequence to the well-being of the race on this con- 

 tinent. 



Several of the old colonies urged vague claims to 

 parts -of the Northwestern Territory, basing them 

 on ancient charters and Indian treaties; but the 

 British heeded them no more than the French had, 

 and they were very little nearer fulfilment after the 

 defeat of Montcalm and Pontiac than before. The 

 French had held adverse possession in spite of them 

 for sixty years; the British held similar possession 

 for fifteen more. The mere statement of the facts 

 is enough to show the intrinsic worthlessness of the 

 titles. The Northwest was acquired from France 



