Land Settlements
The first permanent English settlements in America were made at Jamestown, Va., in 1607, and at Plymouth, Mass., in 1620; and from these two settlements we may trace in large part the growth, character, and development of our national life. The story of the "Pilgrim Fathers" in Massachusetts has been told for generations in literature and in song, and can never cease to be of romantic and thrilling interest.
The story of the settlement and dispersal of other nationalities in America—the Swedes in Delawaxe, the Dutch in New York, the Spanish and French in Florida and along the banks of the Mississippi and Ohio Rivers—all this is summed up in what is known as "colonial history."
In 1763, at the dose of the French and Indian wars, England had come into possession of practically all the territory east of the Mississippi—that territory which was ceded in 1783 as the original territory of the United States.
You will sometimes hear it said that thirteen is an unlucky number. Indeed you may have known people so superstitious that they refuse to sit down at a table when the number is thirteen. Again you may know it to be a fact that some hotels do not have a room numbered thirteen, and that many steam-boats likewise follow the same custom in state-room arrangement. Strange superstition for Americans! It took thirteen states to make our Union; we have made thirteen additions to our territory; when George Washington was inaugurated as president, a salute of thirteen guns was fired; and, finally, the foundation of the flag of our country bears thirteen stripes.
The American Revolution
The story of the American Revolution (1775–1783)–Declaration of Independence (1776), the adoption of the Articles of Confederation (x78Q, and, finally, the making and adoption of the Constitution of the United States in 1789—all is summed up in a period of fourteen years, and may be told and written in the life of George Washington, who was indeed the "Father of His Country."
The cause of the.American Revolution was England's oppression of her American colonists; and the injustice of taxation without representation, with other injustices, finally brought about rebellion. The war began in Massachusetts with the battles of Lexington and Concord, April 19, 1775, and ended at Yorktown, Va., October x9, 1781 The treaty of peace was
