CHAPTER 2: Robert Rogers.
They met for the first time, face to face, amid a world of ice and snow, upon the frozen surface of Lake George.
Stark and his little band had been through strange experiences, and had met with many adventures as they pursued their course towards the spot where they heard that the French and English were lying encamped and intrenched, awaiting the arrival of spring before commencing the campaign afresh; and they now began to have a clearer notion of the situation between the two nations than they had hitherto had.
They had spent a week in the quaint Dutch town of Albany, and there they had heard many things with regard to the state of parties and the affairs between the two nations.
England and France were nominally at peace, or had been, even whilst these murderous onslaughts had been going on in the west.
But it was evident to all that war must be shortly declared between the countries, if it had not already been proclaimed.

The scent of battle seemed in the very air.

Nothing was talked of but the great struggle for supremacy in the west, which must shortly be fought out to the bitter end.
The aim of France was to connect Canada with Louisiana by a chain of forts, and keep the English penned up in their eastern provinces without room to expand.

The northern links of this chain were Fort Ticonderoga, just where the waters of Lake George join those of Champlain; Fort Niagara, which commanded the lakes; and Fort Duquesne, at the head of the Ohio, the key to the great Mississippi.
It was a gigantic scheme, and one full of ambition; there was one immense drawback.

The French emigrants of the western world numbered only about one hundred and eighty thousand souls, whilst the English colonies had their two millions of inhabitants.