man that accompanied me. I acquainted the Indians that I was determined to leave them to-morrow, and return homeward.

September 19th-Scaiohady, Tanughrisson and Oniadagarehra, with a few more, came to my lodging and spoke as follows: "Brother Onas-We desire that you will hear what we are going to say to you, in behalf of all the Indians on the Ohio, their deputies have sent us to you. We have heard what you have said, and we return you many thanks for your kindness in informing us of what passed between the King of Great Britain and the French King; and in particular, we return you many thanks for the large presents; we do the same to our brother Assaraquoa, who joined our brother Onas in making us a present. Our brethren have indeed tied our hearts to theirs; we at present can but return thanks with an empty hand, till another opportunity serves to do it sufficiently. We must call a great council, and do everything regular; in the mean time, look upon us as your true brothers.

"Brother-You said the other day, in council, if anything befel us from the French, we must let you know it. We will let you know if we hear of anything from the French, be it against us or yourself. You will have peace; but it is most certain that the Six Nations and their allies are upon the point of declaring war against the French. Let us keep up the correspondence, and always hear of one another."-They gave a belt. Scaiohady and the Half-King, with two others, had informed me that they often send messengers to Indian Towns and Nations, and had nothing in their council bag, as they were now beginners, either to recompense a messenger or to get wampum to do the business, and begged I would assist them with something. I had saved a piece of stroud, and half barrel of powder, 100 pounds of lead, ten shirts, six knives, and one pound of vermillion, and gave them it for the aforesaid use. They returned many thanks and were mightily pleased.

The same day I set out for Pennsylvania, in rainy weather, and arrived at George Croghan's on the 28th instant. CONRAD WEISER.

Pennsburg, September 29, 1748.

Provincial Record Book L, pp. 420-438.20

A most interesting biography of Conrad Weiser is that of I. D. Rupp's, from which the sketch in his "History of Western Pennsylvania" has been extracted.21

At one time Weiser closely coöperated with the Moravians, but after 1743 not so efficiently, says Rupp. His descendants included many persons prominent in Pennsylvania history, for in 1743 his daughter Maria became the wife of the celebrated Henry Melchior Muhlenberg, Lutheran divine, who was the father of Henry A. Muhlenberg, of Reading, noted in the State's early political history. Weiser in 1750 built a house in what is now Reading, and opened the first store in the settlement. His initials and the date were carved in a round stone inset between the second story front windows. He died at his country seat at Womelsdorf, July 13, 1760, having gone there from Reading the day before in his usual health. His death was caused by a violent colic. He was sixty-three years and eight months old. He was the father of fifteen children, of whom seven and his widow survived him. This extraordinary man was for a while commemorated in Pittsburgh by a street name given one of those forming the North Diamond

20 Rupp's references are to an old series. Weiser's "Journal" in the series of "Colonial Records," now available, is in Vol. V, pp. 348-358. Pennsburg as a name has been changed to Pennsboro.

21"History of Berks and Lebanon Counties," 1845; pp. 195 et seq. See also "History Berks County;" M. L. Montgomery, Vol. I, pp. 330, 331.

square in former Allegheny City after the annexation to Pittsburgh. Recently the name has fallen into disuse, and the directories record only the word Diamond, prefixed by the names of the points of the compass. In 1912 Weiser street was the East Diamond.

"Tradition has it," wrote Rupp in 1844, "that from a high regard for his character, the Indians for many years after his death were in the habit of making visits of affectionate remembrance to his grave.”

CHAPTER XI.

New France in America.

La Nouvelle France, as they called it, was a vast domain. Its extent is clearly shown on the maps of the period, portraying also the English settlements along the Atlantic, a pitiable and insignificant strip in comparison. That the region of our homes, Pittsburgh and its Environs, was once included in this French territory; that the site of our home city was a French outpost in the wilderness; that the fleur-de-lis of Louis XV. floated in short-lived triumph over the French fort at the famous Forks of the Ohio, significant of French sovereignty, is all well known history. Yet we are prone to forget the French regime here, its tragedies and its lessons. We are prone, also, to forget that the beautiful old standard of France was the symbol of the first sovereignty of the region, giving way by right of conquest to the royal standard of St. George, and then the flag of free America, our loved Stars and Stripes, came to stay. Three sovereignties have been our allotment, in manner more tragic than New York's, St. Louis' and New Orleans'; more also than that of our French contemporary, Detroit, a famous place in American history. Evidences of French dominion in and about Pittsburgh are not lacking in commemorated names, both geographical and municipal. Close to the street bearing the name of doughty Governor Dinwiddie, whose acts began the struggle for the continent of North America, there are yet two streets with unmistakably French names, those of Coulon de Villiers and his slain brother, Jumonville. Once that gallant soldier of France, Legardeur St. Pierre, was likewise commemorated, but his name has passed. Then there are the names of the French merchants who came to the site of Fort Duquesne--Berthoud, partner of the Tarascons, shipbuilders of Pittsburgh, and Claire Aimee Francois de Rouaud, the eccentric Vendean, emigre and semi-recluse, whose life story, only partly brought to light, overshadows any romance yet written. Hyerome Bonnett, his partner, must have mention also,

Then the French princes came and stood on the site of Fort Duquesne -the Duke of Orleans, subsequently Louis Phillipe of France, and his brothers. They meet the Chevalier Dubac and Jean Marie. They find also humbler countrymen who loved France, though many were descendants of the coureurs de bois, born under the golden lilies in New France in America. We have one immortalized by Morgan Neville, by name Pierre Cabot, locally known as "French Peter," a typical emigre from Old France, dressed in blanket capot with hood in place of a hat, in the manner of all Canadian boatmen, and wearing moccasins. No Jacobin was honest Peter, who had left his native land long before the philosophic Robespierre and his colleagues arose to fame. Hailed by Dubac on the bank of the Monongahela, Peter was presented to a scion of le Grande Monarque in exile. With all the love and veneration for the princes which Frenchmen under the old regime never failed to cherish.

and with tears in his eyes, Peter, in his inimitable patois, told Neville of the meeting: "Savez vous mon enfant ce que m'est arrive. J'ai de causer avec monseigneur en pleine rue. Ah, bon Dieu! quelle chose a affreuse que la revolution."1

Ah, yes! the French regime here was that which existed under the Grand Monarchy. The revolution took away the fleur-de-lis and gave in its stead the tricolor. It was only the lilies that waved here in the river breezes the lillies of Louis XV., grandson of the great Louis.

There are other emigres to have mention in Pittsburgh history: The friend and companion en voyage of La Fayette, Dr. Felix Brunot, who has left his name in the island at the head of the Ohio where once stood his palatial home, described by F. Cuming and other voyagers. John B. C. Lucas also, trader, lawyer, legislator, congressman and judge, potent enough in the councils of the Jeffersonian party to secure Alexander Addison's impeachment and removal from the bench of the Fifth Judicial District of Pennsylvania, which included Allegheny county. Lucas became famous and wealthy years later in St. Louis, where his eldest son fell in a duel with Thomas H. Benton in 1817.

La Fayette came too, on triumphal tour in 1825; he learns the true story of Braddock's battle; he sleeps in the Wallace mansion, still standing on the spot where the first volleys poured from the hidden foe. The little city that grew up around the English fort that took the place of their Fort Duquesne seems to have had a fascination for the French, for in the early days of this city, in its making, so to speak, the French Colony here was considerable, respectable, and influential in the affairs of the community. The boatmen who manned the oars and poled the keel-boats on the rivers between Pittsburgh and New Orleans, and Pittsburgh and St. Louis, and the French towns on the Mississippi -Kaskaskia, St. Genevieve and Cape Girardeau-were mainly the descendants of the crusaders of New France, their sires followers of the famous explorers who had traversed the western wilderness and made New France what it was. Some of the history of the French dominion in North America, especially as it applies to Pittsburgh and Western Pennsylvania, is not only pertinent, but of absorbing interest. A brief resumé:

France was first in the field of exploration in North America. As early as 1506 hardy fishermen from Brittany discovered and named. Cape Breton for their home province. They made rude charts of the Gulf of St. Lawrence. They maintained the link between the North American coast and Europe for almost a century with their fishing vessels of Newfoundland. Beginning in 1524, under Francis I., with the voyage of Verrazzano, there came to the shores of this continent Cartier in 1534, Robervale, 1540-1543, and Champlain in 1608. Robervale's attempt to establish a colony in Canada failed, though Cartier aided. Demont's failed in 1603, but Poutrincourt in 1607 succeeded in establishing the first permanent settlement at Port Royal in Nova Scotia. Samuel

1"Learn my child what has happened. I have the honor to talk with my lord in the open street. Ah! Good God! What a terrible thing is the revolution." "Annals of Philadelphia;" Watson, Vol. II, p. 133.

de Champlain the next year, by founding Quebec, became the father of New France in North America.

It is a fact of the history of those years that not until the religious wars in Europe had been brought to a close by Henry IV., the French began to colonize in the territory belonging to them by right of discovery according to the laws of nations. The northwestern fur trade became more alluring than the Newfoundland fisheries. France must colonize if she would maintain her new lands. The years passed until the coming of Champlain, whom Fiske justly calls the most remarkable Frenchman of his day; "A beautiful character, devout and high-minded, brave and tender; a man of scientific attainments, a naturalist and historian." An explorer whose fame has been perpetuated in our geography in the beautiful lake that bears his name. Champlain's settlement at Quebec was the feeble beginning of the rival power in America that was a century and a half later to dispute the right of Great Britain to possess any part of the country claimed by France by right of discovery. So the French rovers, when the fur trade assumed large dimensions, formed alliances with the Indians throughout the region of the St. Lawrence and the Great Lakes. These nations were with the exceptions of the Hurons, Algonquins. The French got on well with their savage allies. Had they not, the history of Western Pennsylvania had been vastly different. When the wars came, the Algonquins were with the French, and their ancient enemies, the Iroquois, with the English. When Champlain courted the friendship of the Algonquins he courted well. "New France was not equivalent in extent to our British America, but embraced all the territory from the Atlantic Ocean with its coast islands to the western extremity of Lake Superior and from Hudson's Bay to a line running through the northern part of the United States from Maine to Minnesota, but none of the boundaries were accurately defined."2

Father Lambing was referring to the boundaries of the French possessions acknowledged by the English. This in the North. The French territory in the South figures in history as Louisiana.

Garneau and Lescarbot have asserted boundaries for New France, the latter claiming virtually the continent. Garneau's are much as we have learned them. It will be sufficient to call attention to his records as they place the trans-Allegheny region within the confines of the French.3

"Pittsburgh, Canada," is unthinkable as a geographical term. Not so Fort du Quesne, Canada, for that was a reality. With the English conquest came the name, Pittsburgh. In like manner one may cite Port Royal, changed to Annapolis; Frontenac to Kingston, and Presq'

2"Historical Researches in Western Pennsylvania," principally Catholic, by Rev. A. A. Lambing, in "American Catholic Researches," Vol. I, p. 17. A paper read before the Historical Society of Western Pennsylvania, December 13, 1883; revised and annotated by Father Lambing and published in Vol. I, No. 1, supra.

3"L'Histoire du Canada;" "Description, etc.;" F. X. Garneau, English Edition, by Andrew Bell, Montreal, 1862. Cf. pp. 112-113. See bibliography as given by William Bennett Monro, "Crusaders of New France," 1918, pp. 229-231. Charlevoix, "Histoire et Description, etc." (Shea's translation), most applicable, Cf. also Parkman's works.