never determined "the only possible method" of avoiding hesitancy and confusion, and placing metaphysics on the same stable foundation with the other abstract sciences. But the indirect influences of his writings may be distinctly traced in the works of nearly all the speculatists, who have succeeded him, not only in Germany, but in France and England. While his innovations in the nomenclature have changed the whole garb of philosophy, and rendered the study of systems more abstruse, fatiguing, and repulsive, it must be confessed, that they have also removed some causes of ambiguity and mistake, and have pointed out the path for effecting a more systematic and beneficial reform. His example has also given a fresher impulse to the spirit of inquiry, increased the eagerness for the formation of new systems, and carried boldness of theorizing on all topics far beyond its ancient limits. His great demerit consists, in having effectually, though perhaps not intentionally, served the cause of infidelity, while professing to repair and extend the defences of belief. Had the real character of his doctrines been evident at a glance, their influence, whether for good or evil, could not have reached so far. But his disciples groped about in the intricacies of a system, which they could not fully master, and embraced opinions, of the nature and tendency of which they had but a blind conception. Thus, they were fairly enlisted on the side of skepticism, before they had thought of quitting the banners of faith. Once engaged in the work, they felt only the desire of surpassing their instructer in dogmatism of manner, rashness in forming novel hypotheses, and general license of speculation on the most sacred subjects. As his theory extended over the whole territory of knowledge, almost every science has in turn been infected with the wild and crude imaginings of his followers. It is this general effervescence of thought and reasoning, which has brought a reproach on the very name of philosophy, and, through the mournful perversion of terms which it has occasioned, has given too good cause for regarding a system of philosophical radicalism as a mere cover for an attack on all the principles of government and social order, and for considering a philosophical religion as atheism itself. Under such circumstances, we can hardly wonder, that many reflecting persons have conceived a distrust of the consequences of such free inquiry, and do not suppress either alarm or contempt at the bare mention of German metaphysics.

ART. III.1. Travels through the Interior Parts of North America, in the Years 1766, 1767, and 1768. By J. CARVER, Esquire, Captain of a Company of Provincial Troops, during the late War with France. The Third Edition. To which is added, some Account of the Author, and a Copious Index. London: printed for C. Dilly, H. Paine, and J. Phelps. 1780. 2. CARVER's Travels in Wisconsin. From the Third London Edition. New York: Harper & Brothers. 1838.

Ir is not our purpose to review the Journal of the old traveller in the Northwest, though it is curious and interesting; but to give, within the proper limits, an outline of the history of the Ohio valley from 1744 to 1774, a period which has been generally despatched in two pages, but might, if well explored, fill a volume. In our last number but one, we sketched, with a few rapid strokes, the progress of French discovery in the valley of the Mississippi. The first travellers reached that river in 1673, and when the new year of 1750 broke upon the great wilderness of the West, all was still a wilderness, except those little spots upon the prairies of Illinois, and among the marshes of Louisiana, of which we gave a list in that sketch. It is true, that some have told us that St. Vincent's, or Vincennes, upon the Wabash, was settled before the middle of the last century. Volney thought he found evidence of its settlement in 1735,* and Bishop Bruté, the present Catholic bishop of Indiana, speaks of a missionary station at Vincennes in 1700, and of the death of a M. de Vincennes, who was sent to protect the post, in 1735. We cannot, however, discover any early authority to support the traveller or the bishop. Charlevoix, whose History comes down to about 1735, makes no mention either in that, or in his Journal, of any such missionary station as that referred to by Bishop Bruté, nor is any point upon his map of the Wabash marked as a settlement; and the M. de Vincennes whose death he mentions, was killed at the South. Vivier, who names the settlements of the West in 1750, says nothing of Vincennes, although he was giving to his religious superiors an account of the missionary stations. In a

* Volney's View, p. 336.

+ Butler's Kentucky. Intro. xviii. Note. 2d edition. North American Review, Vol. XLVIII. p. 98.

volume of Mémoires on Louisiana, compiled from the minutes of M. Dumont, and published in Paris in 1753, but probably written in 1749, though we have an account of the Wabash or St. Jerome, its course and origin, and the use made of it by the traders, not a word is found touching any fort, settlement, or station on it; and Vaudreuil, then governor of Louisiana, and afterwards of Canada, as quoted by Pownall, mentions, even in 1751, Fort Massac upon the Ohio, and Fort Miamis on the Maumee, but says nothing of a post on the Wabash. Nor is this negative evidence all; for, in a pamphlet published in London in 1755, called "The Present State of North America," which is accompanied with a map giving all the French forts and stations, we have a particular account of the settlement of Vincennes. This work states, that in 1750 a fort was founded there, and that in 1754, three hundred families were sent to settle about it. ‡

In 1749, therefore, when the English first began to move seriously about sending men into the West, there were, we think, only the Illinois and lower country settlements; the present States of Ohio, Indiana, and Kentucky, being still in the possession of the Indians, though forts may have been founded at Sandusky and the mouth of the Maumee.

Having seen on what the French claim to the West rested,

* Mémoires Historiques sur la Louisiane, &c. &c.

+ Pownall's Memorial on Service in North America, &c., drawn up in 1756. It forms an Appendix to his "Administration of the Colonies;"' 4th edition. London. 1768.

Present State of North America, p. 65. — See this settlement referred to by Governor Morris of Pennsylvania, 1754, in Sparks's Franklin, Vol. III., page 285.

The French forts mentioned in this work as north of the Ohio, were,
Two on French Creek, (Rivière des Bœufs.)

Du Quesne.

Sandusky.

Miamis on Maumee.

St. Joseph's on the St. Joseph's of Lake Michigan.

At the mouth of the Scioto (called in the work just named, the "Sikoder") the French had a post during the war of 1756; see Rogers's Journal, London, 1765; Post's Journal in Proud's Pennsylvania, Vol. 11. App. p. 117.

viz. discovery and occupancy; we now, before proceeding to the quarrel which arose for the possession of that Edenlike land, shall give, as well as we can, the grounds of the British claims to it.

England, from the outset, claimed from the Atlantic to the Pacific, on the ground that the discovery and possession of the seacoast was a discovery and possession of the country; and, as is well known, her grants to Virginia, Connecticut, and other colonies were through to the South Sea. It was not upon this, however, that Great Britain relied in her contest with France; she had other grounds, namely, actual discovery, and purchase or title of some kind from the Indian owners.

Her claim on the score of actual discovery was poorly supported, and little insisted on; the statements given by Coxe, as to Colonel Wood and others, will be found in our last volume.* Beside those, we have it from tradition, that in 1742, John Howard crossed the mountains from Virginia, sailed in a canoe made of a buffalo skin down the Ohio, and was taken by the French on the Mississippi; † and this tradition is confirmed by a note, contained in a London edition of Du Pratz, printed in 1774, in which the same facts as to Howard are substantially given as being taken from the official report of the Governor of Virginia, at the time of his expedition. But this expedition by Howard, even if true, could give England no claim to the West, for he made no settlement, and the whole Ohio valley had doubtless long before been explored by the French traders; it is, however, worthy of remembrance, as the earliest visit by an Englishman to the West, which can be considered as distinctly authenticated. Soon after that time, traders undoubtedly began to flock thither from Pennsylvania and Virginia. In 1748, Conrad Weiser, an interpreter, was sent from Philadelphia with presents to the Indians at Logstown, an Indian town upon the Ohio, between Pittsburg and the Big Beaver creek, and we find the residence of English traders in that neighbourhood referred to as of some standing, even then. ‡

* Vol. XLVIII. pp. 103, 104.

Kercheval's Valley of Virginia, p. 67.

Butler's History of Kentucky, Vol. I. 2d edition, (Introd. xx.) gives the adventures of one Salling in the West, as early as 1730; but his authority is a late work, (Chronicles of Border Warfare,) and the account is merely traditional, we presume; Salling is named in the note to Du Pratz, as having been with Howard in 1742. There are various vague accounts of English in the West, before Howard's voyage. Keating, in Long's Expedi tion, speaks of a Colonel Wood, who had been there, beside the one men

But the great ground whereon the English claimed dominion beyond the Alleghanies, was, that the Six Nations * owned the Ohio valley, and had placed it, with their other lands, under the protection of England. As early as 1684, Lord Howard, governor of Virginia, held a treaty with the Six Nations, at Albany, when, at the request of Colonel Dungan, the governor of New York, they placed themselves under the protection of the mother country. This was again done in 1701; and, upon the 14th of September, 1726, a formal deed was drawn up, and signed by the chiefs, by which their lands were conveyed to England, in trust, "to be protected and defended by his Majesty, to and for the use of the grantors and their heirs." If, then, the Six Nations had a good claim to the western country, there could be little doubt that England was justified in defending that country against the French; particularly as France, by the treaty of Utrecht, had agreed not to invade the lands of Britain's Indian allies, or something to that effect. § But this claim of the New York savages has been disputed. Very lately, General William H. Harrison has attempted to disprove it, and show, that the Miami confederacy of Illinois and Ohio could not have been conquered by the Iroquois. We shall not, at present, enter into the controversy; but will only say, that to us the evidence is very strong, that, before 1680, the Six Nations had overrun the western lands, and were dreaded tioned by Coxe. In a work called “The Contest in America between Eng. land and America. By an Impartial Hand. London, 1757," we find it stated, that the Indians at Albany, in 1754, acknowledged that the English had been on the Ohio for thirty years. And in a memorial by the British ministry, in 1755, they speak of the West as having been cultivated by England for "above twenty years." (Sparks's Franklin, Vol. IV. p. 330.)

*When we first hear of the great northern confederacy, there were five tribes in it; viz. Mohawks, Oneidas, Onondagas, Cayugas, and Senecas. Afterwards the Tuscaroras were conquered and taken into the confederacy, and it became the Six Nations. Still later, the Nanticokes, and Tuteloes, came into the union, which was, however, still called the Six Nations, though sometimes the Eight United Nations. This confederacy was by the French called the "Iroquois," by the Dutch "Maquas," by the other Indians "Mengive," and, thence, by the English, "Mingoes." These varied names have produced countless errors, and endless confusion. Thus, on the first page of Butler's History, we are told of the Iroquois or Mohawks; and the Mingoes of the Ohio are almost always spoken of as a tribe. We have used the terms "Six Nations," and "Iroquois," and now and then "Mingoes," always meaning the whole confederacy.

+ Plain Facts, &c. Philadelphia, 1781. pp. 22, 23.

This may be found at length in Pownall's Administration of the Colonies, 4th edition, London, 1768, p. 269.

§ Sparks's Franklin, Vol. IV. p. 329.

See Harrison's Historical Address, 1837.