At this point, however, in a land of great and lesser rivers, with a network of creeks, the boat provided the chief means of communication.

Behind all, enveloping all, still spread the illimitable forest, the haunt of Indians and innumerable game.
Virginians were already preparing for an expansion to the north.

There was a man in Virginia named William Claiborne.

This individual--able, determined, self-reliant, energetic--had come in as a young man, with the title of surveyor-general for the Company, in the ship that brought Sir Francis Wyatt, just before the massacre of 1622.

He had prospered and was now Secretary of the Province.