and had won the rank of lieutenant-colonel. In 1758 he aided General Amherst to take Louisburg from the French, strongly fortified as it was. The next year he sailed up the St. Lawrence to attack Quebec. The town lies between the rivers St. Lawrence and St. Charles. Precipices rise from the river banks to the Heights of Abraham behind it. A French general, Montcalm, was there to defend it with a large force. Men said Wolfe was mad to attack it. "I wish he would bite some of the other generals, Wolfe takes then," said old George II., who underQuebec, 1759. stood Wolfe's courage. For three months Wolfe could do nothing. At last, embarking his men in boats, he brought them under cover of night to where the precipices of the Heights of Abraham frown over the river. He had heard of a narrow dangerous path. Silently the men climbed it in the darkness. When day broke, Wolfe's army was drawn up for battle on the open ground at the top. Montcalm led out the French to drive Wolfe back into the river, but his men could not resist the charge of the British. In the moment of victory Wolfe himself was struck by three balls. He lived long enough to hear that the French were beaten. "God be praised!" he cried; "I shall die happy." Quebec surrendered. All Canada was taken from the French, and by the treaty of Paris in 1763 passed into British hands.

Discontent.

British power was now supreme in America; the next war, however, was to see most of it disappear. Colonial So long as the French held Canada our American colonists feared them too much to wish to cast off British rule, for to rebel against Britain would have meant falling into the hands of France. This check being removed, the colonists

grew dissatisfied. They complained that Britain hampered their trade. This was true, for British commercial policy at this time thought it right to destroy any trade in the colonies which might rival a home industry. Thus the colonists were not allowed to manufacture iron goods-nails, knives, and such like-for fear they might injure British ironworkers; they might not make beaver hats, but had to send the beaver to England to be made up, and then had to buy British-made hats. Even colonial produce, such as sugar and tobacco, had to be sent straight to Britain, in order that the merchants at home might be able to buy cheap. These rules were part of what was called the Mercantile System, by which everything was to be sacrificed to keep British merchants and manufactures prosperous.

Proposals to tax the Colonies, 1765 and 1767.

The colonists thus felt that Britain gave them little, and took a great deal. So when a tax called the Stamp Act was laid on the colonies, men grew very angry. No one would use British goods: ships which brought British tea were boarded, and the tea-chests emptied into Boston harbour; and soon after a party of British troops was fired on.

1775-1783.

The war of American Independence lasted seven years. The British generals were bad; the troops that were sent from home were mostly War of American Hessians hired from Germany; the Independence, country was so vast that as soon as rebellion seemed crushed in one place, it burst out afresh in another. At first the British won most of the battles, though they had to fight hard for them; but the colonists were determined not to Washington. give in, and they had a general, George Washington, who, even when his men were short of

arms and powder, shoeless and half starving, yet managed always to make head against the British. Help came to him against Britain from an old British foe. France saw a chance to revenge herself for the loss of Canada; she took the side of the colonists. Cornwallis, the British general, had entrenched himself at Yorktown, trusting to get supplies by sea; but a French fleet appeared, drove off the English ships Yorktown, and blockaded Cornwallis. Washington closed in round him on land. Cornwallis had at last to yield. This was a death-blow to British power. Soon after we were compelled to acknowledge the United States to be independent.

1781.

So went our first great colony. After the first bitterness of defeat was over, men took it surprisingly calmly. They thought it was natural; "colonies", it was said, 66 were like pears; they would fall when they were ripe ". But we shall find that this view has proved false. Our American colonies were lost because they were governed on a bad principle; but we have learned by experience to manage colonies on a better plan, and now our colonies are more firmly joined to their mother country than they have ever been.

Anson.

III.-BRITISH POWER AT SEA.

In

If now we turn to what was done at sea during these three wars, we find a mixture of success and failure. Many brilliant things were done. 1740 Anson started with a squadron to attack the Spanish possessions in the Pacific. He imitated Drake's great exploits, attacking and plundering towns, seizing Spanish treasure-ships, and returned home after four years' absence, bringing with him a million and a quarter in treasure. In 1759 Hawke

won perhaps the most daring battle ever fought by a British commander. The French fleet had drawn in for shelter into Quiberon Bay, on the Quiberon western coast of France. The bay is full Bay, 1759. of rocks and shoals; a wild November gale was blowing; to add to other difficulties night had fallen. Hawke dashed in among the Frenchmen, and made short work of them. Most were taken, burnt, or driven on shore. Hawke only lost forty men. Our fleet gave another proof of its importance on the outbreak of war with Spain in 1762. Manilla and Havana were immediately taken from the Spaniards, and the Plate fleet captured, one ship carrying treasure worth £800,000.

On the other hand, there are some failures to set against these exploits. There were many indecisive actions; one in 1744 led to a number of Byng, 1757. accusations between the officers in command, and a court-martial, in which the admiral was dismissed from the service. A worse thing yet was to come. At the beginning of the Seven Years' War, Admiral Byng, being sent to relieve Minorca, met a French fleet stronger than his own. He fought it in a very half-hearted way, and retreated. Minorca was lost, and Byng was brought to trial for misconduct, and shot. Voltaire said, "In England they have shot one of their admirals in order to encourage the others". In the war of American Independence we have already seen how de Grasse's fleet cut off Cornwallis, and caused his surrender at Yorktown.

For the greater part of that war, indeed, the British navy was not at its best. It did not appear to be able to strike a hard blow; it could wound, but not kill. The French took many of our West Indian islands; for three years Gibraltar was besieged, and though

Defence of
Gibraltar,

Governor Eliott's defence of it never wavered, though he drove off every attack by showering red-hot shot on the enemy's ships and 1779-1782. setting them on fire, yet the mere fact that French and Spanish fleets should be able to engage in such a siege almost uninterrupted, seems discreditable to the British navy. Clearly it had not the command of the sea which we expect it to have nowadays.

One fact may well serve as a lesson-that the war in which our sea-power wavers is the only war that turns out disastrous. France had much improved her navy, while ours had been allowed to stand still; the result was that, fighting with fleets superior in numbers, in tonnage, and in guns, our admirals often failed to do anything decisive.

At last, however, when Britain was in the depths of despair, when America was gone, and when most of Rodney's Victory our West Indian colonies had been of 12th April, 1782. taken, a man was found to finish the war with a victory. Rodney met the French fleet off Dominica, and shattered it; the French admiral, de Grasse, was captured on his own flagship, which was reckoned to be the finest ship afloat.

This battle enabled us to make a much better peace than we should otherwise have done, but it Breaking has another and a much greater importance. the Line. The naval battles of the day had been indecisive, because the idea had been to lay the British ships alongside the French in line. What usually happened was this. As the British fleet filed by the French, each vessel received the fire of every French vessel in turn, and generally got its rigging cut up. When at last the two fleets were in position, van to van, centre to centre, rear to rear, and the British