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The disturbances which have occurred for some years in the upper country have effectively prevented the Indians from hunting; the post of the Bay which abounds ordinarily with beaver, produced nothing; those of Detroit and Michilimakinac, only furnished very little.
This dissatisfaction was increased when the British government began to build forts on the Susquehanna, and to repair or erect those of Bedford, Ligonier, Pittsburg, Detroit, Presque Isle, St. Joseph and Michilimakinac. By this movement the Indians found themselves surrounded, on two sides, by a cordon of forts, and were threatened with an extension of them into the very heart of their country.
The company should have the control of these merchandise, so as to sell them to the indians on the base of a tariff, so as to prevent the greediness of the voyageurs which contributes very much to the discontent of the natives, because at first the French only went to the Hurons and since to Michilimakinac where they sold to the Indians of the locality, who then went to exchange with other indians in distant woods, lands and rivers, but now the said Frenchmen holding permits to have a larger gain pass over all the Ottawas and Indians of Michilimakinac to go themselves and find the most distant tribes which displeased the former very much.
It was for this reason that the frontiersmen grew to regard as essential to their well-being the possession of the lake posts; so that it became with them a prime object to wrest from the British, whether by force of arms or by diplomacy, the forts they held at Niagara, Detroit, and Michilimakinac.
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