Page:Aristopia (1895).pdf/209

 bridged with commodious foot-logs; on streams too wide to be bridged, boats were placed for ferriage. At every twenty miles on the route a strong log-house was built, where parties of boatmen might sleep, secure from savages and sheltered from storms. At two points on the route posts were established and garrisoned, where the travelers could replenish their stock of food for the journey. These places also served as posts for the purchase of furs from the Indians.

Another war, in which the American colonies took part, broke out in 1755, between England and France, for the possession of Canada. Aristopia was in principle opposed to a war of conquest, but such was the animosity of the French in Canada, such their persistency in striving to incite the Indians against all the English colonies, and their determination to prevent any further extension of those colonies, that Aristopia saw that in self-defense the French must be driven from the upper lakes. A strong land-force, co-operating with heavily armed vessels from Lake Michigan, captured all the French posts as far east as Niagara, sent the soldiers prisoners into the eastern part of Aristopia, and disarmed all the French set-