season made them very restive under arms. There was no superfluity of food, let alone market profits; and the breadwinners were anxious to look after their crops. A certain number were given leave in rotation. The Americans across the river seemed very raw and unprepared, in spite of their immense superiority in resources. And the news from the West on the 20th of July was that Hull was at the head of 2000 Americans, moving slowly, and open to attack. Brock wanted to go himself. But the session of his thwarting little parliament kept him back. On the whole, the situation, especially in the West, looked very black to the much harassed general. The Grand River Indians were unwilling to turn out, so threatening did the American invasion seem. This immobilised the neighbouring militia, who were unwilling to leave their families while the Indians remained in a state of menacing doubt. On the 28th of July Brock wrote: "My situation is getting each day more critical."

On the 29th of July he had the satisfaction of reporting the fall of Michillimackinac. But his letter teems with forebodings. So does that of the 4th of August. "The House of Assembly have refused to do any one thing they were required everybody considers the fate of the country as already decided. . . . I begin to be uneasy for Procter. . . . I am collecting a force at Long Point with a view to afford him relief, but until I receive information of the state of affairs in that quarter I cannot move."

Twelve days later he might have written-veni, vidi, vici. Martial law had been proclaimed. The fighting men had felt the touch of the leader born. And the whole aspect of the war had been changed in the twinkling of an eye.

2. MICHILLIMACKINAC.-Brock had long foreseen that the best defence in the West was an attack on this American post, which was situated on an island in the straits between Lakes Huron and Michigan, 255 miles N.N.W. of Detroit.

The best defence always is attack, whenever the attackers can destroy the enemy's means of destroying them. Brock left the initiative to Captain Roberts, who commanded at St. Joseph's Island, and who was in a position to judge whether to strike or stand fast to repel attack himself. Brock wrote on the 4th of July. Roberts received the letter on the 15th, and the next day set out for the attack with a motley little force of 400 Indians, 180 French-Canadians, and 45 men of the 10th Royal Veterans, which was his own corps. His artillery consisted of only two unwieldy " iron 6-pounders. The distance was nearly fifty miles. But, as he gratefully reported, "by the almost unparalleled exertions of the Canadians who manned the boats we arrived at the place of Rendezvous at 3 o'clock the following morning." At ten he had a gun in position and all his men ready to storm the post. A summons was then sent in; and, as the American lieutenant in charge had only fifty-nine effectives, a surrender was soon agreed upon.

The news

The effect was tremendous and immediate. ran like wildfire along every land and water trail throughout the West. As this was the first feat of arms performed in the war it naturally attracted much more than the usual amount of excited attention. It encouraged the Indians already on the British side, won over the waverers, and made neutrals of those who might have joined the Americans. Michillimackinac was at the cross-roads of all the western lines of communication, especially the water lines along the Lakes; and the possession of both it and St. Joseph's Island settled the local control as well as the essential link of connection with the East for the rest of the war.

Michillimackinac was not the only American reverse in the West. Chicago, then known as Fort Dearborn, appeared in history for the first time, as a place of political importance, when, on the 9th of August, Captain Heald received Hull's orders to evacuate the fort and make his way to Detroit.

Unfortunately a good deal of strong drink had been given to the Indians round about when the stores were distributed with a view to securing a safe retreat among "friendlies." The inevitable result followed. An Indian attack began. Most of the 66 Americans were killed or captured. Heald and his wife were rescued and cared for by a trader, and then sent to Roberts, who treated them with the utmost kindness at Michillimackinac before sending them home to Pittsburg.

3. DETROIT.-The American plan of campaign included a double invasion of Upper Canada. Hull was to move in from Detroit, van Rensselaer across the Niagara. This combination, if successful, would cut off the main peninsula of Ontario, lying between Lakes Ontario and St. Clair; and, if this peninsula fell wholly into American occupation, Michillimackinac and the connection with the West would fall with it. Lake Erie is nearly 250 miles long and 60 at its widest. Neither side had a flotilla to control it when the war broke out; but the preponderance of force at first was in favour of the British. On the other hand, here as elsewhere, American resources vastly exceeded British in every way. There had been forts at Sandusky and on the Maumee (Miami) before, and there were to be again. But the immediate objective for British attack was Detroit, just across a river dividing it from Canadian territory, and chosen by Hull as his advanced base for the invasion of Canada from the West. Detroit had a fort, the strongest then existing in the West, and a settlement of almost 1000 people. Three miles down the Detroit River on the Canadian side stood the tiny unfortified village of Sandwich. The river is about half a mile wide and either side could be commanded by artillery on the other. The country is almost uniformly flat. It was then well wooded and very swampy in several places.