1625-1750.] AMALGAMATION. 77 



could only be reached through the medium of the 

 civil courts, whose delays, uncertainties and evasions 

 excited the wonder and provoked the contempt of 

 the Indians. 



It was by observance of the course indicated 

 above, that the French w^ere enabled to maintain 

 themselves in small detached posts, far aloof from 

 the parent colony, and environed by barbarous 

 tribes where an English garrison would have been 

 cut off in a twelvemonth. They professed to hold 

 these posts, not in their own right, but purely 

 through the grace and condescension of the sur- 

 rounding savages ; and by this conciliating assurance 

 they sought to make good their position, until, with 

 their growing strength, conciliation should no more 

 be needed. 



In its efforts to win the friendship and alliance 

 of the Indian tribes, the French government found 

 every advantage in the peculiar character of its 

 subjects — that pliant and plastic temper which 

 forms so marked a contrast to the stubborn spirit 

 of the Englishman. From the beginning, the 

 French showed a tendency to amalgamate with the 

 forest tribes. " The manners of the savages," 

 writes the Baron La Hontan, " are perfectly agree- 

 able to my palate ; " and many a restless adventurer 

 of high oy low degree might have echoed the words 

 of the erratic soldier. At first, great hopes were 

 entertained that, by the mingling of French and 

 Indians, the latter would be won over to civilization 

 and the church ; but the effect was precisely the 

 reverse ; for, as Charlevoix observes, the savages 



