America: A history

It was late in the history of the world before Europe and America became known to each other. During the first fifteen centuries of the Christian era Europe was unaware of the v...

For many years European adventurers continued to resort to the American coast in the hope of finding the way to immediate wealth. Some feeble attempts had been made to colonize....

Sir Walter Raleigh spent a large fortune in attempting to colonize Virginia. He succeeded in directing the attention of his countrymen to the region which had kindled his own en...

A little more than two centuries ago New England was one vast forest. Here and there a little space was cleared, a little corn was raised; a few Indian families made their tempo...

The Puritans left their native England and came to the “outside of the world,” as they called it, that they might enjoy liberty to worship God according to the way which they de...

When the Pilgrims left their native land, the belief in witchcraft was universal. England, in much fear, busied herself with the slaughter of friendless old women who were suspe...

with the French and Indians, and was suffering cruelly from their ravages. The doctors sat in solemn conclave on the afflicted girls, and pronounced them bewitched. Mr. Paris, n...

The great continent on which the Pilgrims had landed was the home of innumerable tribes of Indians. They had no settled abode. The entire nation wandered hither and thither as t...

During the first forty years of its existence, the great city which we call New York was a Dutch settlement, known among men as New Amsterdam. [Sidenote: 1609 A.D.] That region...

It was not till the year 1682 that the uneventful but quietly prosperous career of Pennsylvania began. The Stuarts were again upon the throne of England. They had learned nothin...

[Sidenote: 1732 A.D.] Of these the latest born was Georgia. Only fifty years had passed since Penn established the Quaker State on the banks of the Delaware. But changes greater...

In the month of December 1620, the Pilgrim Fathers landed from the _Mayflower_. Their landing takes rank among our great historical transactions. The rock which first received t...

There was at the outset considerable diversity of pattern among the governments of the colonies. As time wore on, the diversity lessened, and one great type becomes visible in a...

In the year 1740 there fell out a great European war. There was some doubt who should fill the Austrian throne. The emperor had just died, leaving no son or brother to inherit h...

While Washington’s boyhood was being passed on the banks of the Potomac, a young man, destined to help him in gaining the independence of the country, was toiling hard in the ci...

The peace of Aix-la-Chapelle, which gave a brief repose to Europe, left unsettled the contending claims of France and England upon American territory. [Sidenote: 1748 A.D.] Fran...

A century and a half had now passed since the first colony had been planted on American soil. The colonists were fast ripening into fitness for independence. They had increased...

The encounters at Lexington and Concord thoroughly aroused the American people. The news rang through the land that blood had been spilt--that already there were martyrs to the...

Even yet, after months of fighting, the idea of final separation from Great Britain was distasteful to a large portion of the American people. To the more enlightened it had lon...

England put forth as much strength as she deemed needful to subdue her rebellious colonists. She prepared a strong fleet and a strong army. She entered into contracts with some...

France still felt, with all the bitterness of the vanquished, her defeat at Quebec and her loss of Canada. She had always entertained the hope that the Americans would avenge he...

Spring-time came--“the time when Kings go out to battle”--but General Howe was not ready. Washington was contented to wait, for he gained by delay. [Sidenote: 1777 A.D.] Congres...

In the month of June, when Howe was beginning to win his lingering way to Philadelphia, a British army set out from Canada to conquer the northern parts of the revolted territor...

A great war may be very glorious, but it is also very miserable. Twenty thousand Englishmen had already perished in this war. [Sidenote: 1778 A.D.] Trade languished, and among t...

The Americans had a strong fortress at West Point, on the Hudson river. It was one of the most important places in the country, and its acquisition was anxiously desired by the...

During the later years of the war the English kept possession of the Southern States, which, as we have seen, they had gained so easily. [Sidenote: 1781 A.D.] When the last camp...

Washington saw from the beginning that his country was without a government. Congress was a mere name. There were still thirteen sovereign States--in league for the moment, but...

America was well contented during many years to be merely a spectator of the Great European War. In spite of some differences which had arisen, she still cherished a kindly feel...

When Europeans first visited the southern parts of America, they found in abundant growth there a plant destined to such eminence in the future history of the world as no other...

When America gained her independence slavery existed in all the colonies. No State was free from the taint; even the New England Puritans held slaves. At an early period they ha...

When the State of Louisiana was received into the Union in 1812, there was left out a large proportion of the original purchase from Napoleon. As yet this region was unpeopled....

The North participated in the gains of slavery. The cotton-planter borrowed money at high interest from the Northern capitalist. He bought his goods in Northern markets; he sent...

The decaying energies of Spain were sorely wasted by the wars which Napoleon forced upon her. Invaded, conquered, occupied, fought for during years by great armies, Spain issued...

Mexico was displeased with the annexation of Texas, but did not manifest so quickly as it was hoped she would any disposition to avenge herself. Mr. Polk, a Southern man, was no...

One of the provinces which composed this magnificent prize was California. The slave-owners had gone to war with Mexico that they might gain territory which slavery should posse...

The great Louisiana purchase from Napoleon was not yet wholly portioned off into States. Westward and northward of Missouri was an enormous expanse of the richest land in the Un...

The conflict deepened as years passed. The Abolitionists became more irrepressible, the Slave-holders more savage. There seemed no hope of the law becoming just. The American pe...

The hatred of the North to slavery was rapidly growing. In the eyes of some, slavery was an enormous sin, fitted to bring the curse of God upon the land. To others, it was a pol...

In this year America made her decennial enumeration of her people and their possessions. The industrial greatness which the census revealed was an astonishment, not only to the...

South Carolina was the least loyal to the Union of all the States. She estimated very highly her own dignity as a sovereign State. She held in small account the allegiance which...

Mr. Lincoln was elected, according to usage, early in November, but did not take possession of his office till March. In the interval President Buchanan remained in power. This...

When his Inaugural Address was delivered, Mr. Lincoln was escorted by his predecessor in office back to the White House, where they parted--Buchanan to retire, not with honour,...

When the North addressed herself to her task, her own capital was still threatened by the rebels. Two or three miles down the Potomac, and full in view of Washington, lies the o...

General M’Dowell had led the Northern army to a defeat which naturally shook public confidence in his ability to command. A new general was indispensable. When the war broke out...

The slave question, out of which the rebellion sprang, presented for some time grave difficulties to the Northern Government. As the Northern armies forced their way southwards,...

M’Clellan’s ignominious failure disappointed but did not dishearten the Northern people. While M’Clellan was hasting away from Richmond, the Governors of seventeen States assure...

Hitherto the men who had fought for the North had been volunteers. They had come when the President called, willing to lay down their lives for their country. Already volunteers...

The Confederate Government had always been eager to carry the contest into Northern territory. It was satisfying to the natural pride of the South, and it was thought that some...

Even before the disasters of Gettysburg and Vicksburg, and while General Lee was still pursuing a course of dazzling success, it had become evident to many that the cause of the...

When the closing operations against Richmond were being arranged, President Lincoln went down to General Grant’s head-quarters at City Point, and remained there till Lee’s surre...

The Great Rebellion was at an end. It was not closed by untimely concessions which left a discontented party, with its strength unbroken, ready to renew the contest at a more fi...

In all civil strifes, until now, the woe which waits upon the vanquished has been mercilessly inflicted. After resistance has ceased, the grim scaffold is set up, and brave men...

Wars have been, in general, made by Kings to serve the purposes of their own ambition or revenge. This war was made by the American people, and willingly fought out by their own...

Long ago thoughtful men had foreseen that a permanent union between slave communities and free communities was impossible. Wise Americans knew that their country could not conti...

America looked to England for sympathy when the rebellion began. England had often reproached her, often admonished her, in regard to the question of Slavery. The war which thre...

The chosen career of the American people is a career of peaceful industry. Wisely shunning the glories and calamities of war, they have devoted themselves to the worthier labour...

The Pilgrim Fathers carried with them to New England a deep persuasion that the people of the State which they went to found must be universally educated. Not otherwise could th...

From the very dawn of her history, America has been a powerful factor in the solution of many great European problems. In the early days of her settlement she offered a welcome...

The dazzling success which had crowned the efforts of Columbus awakened in Europe an eager desire to make fresh discoveries. Henry VII. of England had consented to equip Columbu...

The fierce strifes which raged between Catholic and Protestant during the latter half of the sixteenth century engrossed the mind of France to the exclusion of all that concerne...

The Reformation had made so large progress in France that at the beginning of the seventeenth century the Protestants were able to regard themselves as forming one-half of the n...

The discovery of the Mississippi by Ferdinand de Soto was not immediately productive of benefit. For nearly a century and a half after this ill-fated explorer slept beneath the...

The first English settlement which became permanent in Virginia was founded in 1606. Seven years later--while the settlement was still struggling for existence--the colonists be...

A century and a half had elapsed since Champlain laid the foundations of French empire among the forests of the St. Lawrence valley. During those years the nations of Western Eu...

The condition of the Canadian people at the time of the conquest by the English was exceedingly miserable. Every man was in the ranks, and the fields on which their maintenance...

The Quebec Act roused much indignation among the American colonists. From Pennsylvania and Virginia twenty thousand persons had already settled in the valley of the Ohio. These...

In course of years the English Government fought out its quarrel with the revolted American colonists and was defeated. [Sidenote: 1783 A.D.] A treaty of peace was concluded, an...

Canada was now, for a space of two and a half years, to be involved in war, and subjected to the miseries of invasion. It was a war with which she had no proper concern. The mea...

During the ten or twelve years which succeeded the war with America, Canada increased more rapidly than at any previous period. The English Government offered free conveyance an...

The progress of years did not allay, but, on the contrary, steadily enhanced the fever of political discontent which now pervaded the colonies. The measure of representation whi...

The political system which existed in British America before the union of the two provinces was in a high degree inconvenient. There were, in all, six colonies--Nova Scotia, New...

On the outer margin of the great bay into which the waters of the St. Lawrence discharge themselves, there lie certain British provinces which had till now maintained their colo...

The boundary-line which marks the southern limit of British territory divides the continent into two not very unequal portions. On one side stretches out the vast area covered b...

Canada is, in respect of extent, the noblest colonial possession over which any nation has ever exercised dominion. It covers an area of three million three hundred and thirty t...

Columbus prosecuted, down to the close of life, the great work of discovery to which, as he never ceased to feel, God had set him apart. He occupied himself almost entirely amon...

The native populations with which the Spaniards were brought into contact differed widely, in respect of the degree of civilization to which they had attained, from the Indians...

The ruin which fell on the native population of the New World was at no time promoted by the rulers of Spain; it was the spontaneous result of the unhappy circumstances which th...

For three hundred years Spain governed the rich possessions which she had so easily won. At the close of that period the population was about sixteen million--a number very much...

When the thirteen English colonies of the Northern Continent gained their independence, they entered upon a political condition for which their qualities of mind and their exper...

At the time when the discovery and possession of the New World occupied the Spaniards, the Church of Rome exercised over that people an influence which had no parallel elsewhere...

King John of Portugal, to whom Columbus first made offer of his project of discovery, was grievously chagrined when the success of the great navigator revealed the magnificence...