[Sidenote:  July 14.]

[Sidenote:  Arrival of Girard, minister plenipotentiary from the King of France.]

In the midst of these transactions with the commissioners of Great Britain, the Sieur Girard arrived at Philadelphia, in the character of Minister Plenipotentiary of his Most Christian Majesty.

The joy produced by this event was unbounded; and he was received by congress with great pomp.

While these diplomatic concerns employed the American cabinet, and while the war seemed to languish on the Atlantic, it raged to the west in its most savage form.

[Sidenote:  June 11.]

The difficulties which the inability of the American government to furnish the neighbouring Indians with those European articles which they were accustomed to use, opposed to all the efforts of congress to preserve their friendship, have already been noticed.  Early in 1778, there were many indications of a general disposition among those savages to make war on the United States; and the frontiers, from the Mohawk to the Ohio, were threatened with the tomahawk and the scalping knife.  Every representation from that country supported the opinion that a war with the Indians should never be defensive; and that, to obtain peace, it must be carried into their own country.  Detroit, whose governor was believed to have been particularly active in exciting hostilities, was understood to be in a defenceless condition; and congress resolved on an expedition against that place.  This enterprise was entrusted to General M’Intosh, who commanded at Pittsburg, and was to be carried on with three thousand men, chiefly militia, to be drawn from Virginia.  To facilitate its success, the resolution was also taken to enter the country of the Senecas at the same time, by the way of the Mohawk.  The officer commanding on the east of the Hudson was desired to take measures for carrying this resolution into execution; and the commissioners for Indian affairs, at Albany, were directed to co-operate with him.

Unfortunately, the acts of the government did not correspond with the vigour of its resolutions.  The necessary preparations were not made, and the inhabitants of the frontiers remained without sufficient protection, until the plans against them were matured, and the storm which had been long gathering, burst upon them with a fury which spread desolation wherever it reached.

[Sidenote:  Colonel John Butler, with a party of Indians, breaks into the Wyoming settlement.]

About three hundred white men, commanded by Colonel John Butler, and about five hundred Indians, led by the Indian chief Brandt, who had assembled in the north, marched late in June against the settlement of Wyoming.  These troops embarked on the Chemung or Tyoga, and descending the Susquehanna, landed at a place called the Three Islands, whence they marched about twenty miles, and crossing a wilderness, and passing through a gap in the mountain, entered the valley of Wyoming near its northern boundary.  At this place a small fort called Wintermoots had been erected, which fell into their hands without resistance, and was burnt.  The inhabitants who were capable of bearing arms assembled on the first alarm at Forty fort, on the west side of the Susquehanna, four miles below the camp of the invading army.