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Alors que Français et Anglais se livrent une lutte sans merci pour la conquête du Nouveau Monde, les deux filles du colonel Munro tentent de rejoindre leur père au Canada. Trahison ! Elles tombent dans une embus- cade ! Uncas, un jeune guerrier de la tribu des Mohicans, tente de les sauver. Le petit groupe s'enfuit, pourchassé par la redoutable tribu des Iroquois...

Le dernier des Mohicans

It is believed that the scene of this tale, and most of the information necessary to understand its allusions, are rendered sufficiently obvious to the reader in the text itself, or in the accompanying notes. Still there is so much obscurity in the Indian traditions, and so much confusion in the Indian names, as to render some explanation useful.

Few men exhibit greater diversity, or, if we may so express it, greater antithesis of character, than the native warrior of North America. In war, he is daring, boastful, cunning, ruthless, self-denying, and self-devoted; in peace, just, generous, hospitable, revengeful, superstitious, modest, and commonly chaste. These are qualities, it is true, which do not distinguish all alike; but they are so far the predominating traits of these remarkable people as to be characteristic.

It is generally believed that the Aborigines of the American continent have an Asiatic origin. There are many physical as well as moral facts which corroborate this opinion, and some few that would seem to weigh against it.

The color of the Indian, the writer believes, is peculiar to himself, and while his cheek-bones have a very striking indication of a Tartar origin, his eyes have not. Climate may have had great influence on the former, but it is difficult to see how it can have produced the substantial difference which exists in the latter. The imagery of the Indian, both in his poetry and in his oratory, is oriental; chastened, and perhaps improved, by the limited range of his practical knowledge. He draws his metaphors from the clouds, the seasons, the birds, the beasts, and the vegetable world. In this, perhaps, he does no more than any other energetic and imaginative race would do, being compelled to set bounds to fancy by experience; but the North American Indian clothes his ideas in a dress which is different from that of the African, and is oriental in itself.

The Last of the Mohicans

1757, la guerre franco-anglaise fait rage pour la conquête du Nouveau Monde tandis que les tribus indiennes se livrent une lutte sans merci. Le maréchal français Montcalm remonte le lac Champlain avec ses soldats pour prendre le fort William-Henry, tenu par le colonel Munro. Au même moment, les filles de ce dernier, Cora et Alice, sont en chemin pour le rejoindre. Egarées dans la forêt nord-américaine, elles rencontrent un chasseur blanc, Natty Bumppo, alias Oeil-de-Faucon, et deux Indiens, Chingachgook et son fils Uncas, le dernier des Mohicans, qui deviennent leurs guides dans cette Amérique sauvage. Ce livre sans pareil, immense roman d'aventures qui connu dès sa parution un succès international, annonce la disparition des Amérindiens et la naissance des Etats-Unis.

Vie d'Harvey Birch, espion de George Washington, lors de la guerre de 1776, en Amérique opposant la domination anglaise aux Américains désireux d'obtenir leur indépendance. Après une vie pleine de péripéties, nous retrouvons notre héros trente trois ans plus tard, lors d'une autre guerre entre anglais et américains, où il trouvera la mort.

L'Espion - Un épisode de la guerre d'indépendance

Le héros de notre histoire naquit à Bristol, petite ville du comté de Bucks, dans la province de Pensylvanie, il y a une soixantaine d'années, avant que le goût des noms modernes, aussi pompeux que ridicules, eût fait invasion en Amérique ; aussi reçut-il tout simplement le nom de Marc. De nos jours, on n'eût pas manqué de l'appeler Philémas ou Amindas, à moins que ce ne fût Marindas : les Kate, les Dolly, les Betty étant complètement passés de mode.Fruit d'une sélection réalisée au sein des fonds de la Bibliothèque nationale de France, Collection XIX a pour ambition de faire découvrir des textes classiques et moins classiques dans les meilleures éditions du XIXe siècle.

Le Cratère - Adaptation et réduction à l'usage de la jeunesse

Au début de la conquête de l'Amérique par les Anglais et les Français, la concurrence, euphémisme pour une véritable guerre, fait rage entre les deux camps. Pour les aider dans leurs manoeuvres et dans l'exploration du territoire, les deux partis se sont alliés avec des tribus indiennes. Les Français, qui n'ont pas vraiment le beau rôle dans ce récit, avec les Hurons, branche du peuple Iroquois. Les Anglais, ce sont les héros..., avec les Delawares, branche du peuple Mohican. Un jeune homme blanc, mais élevé par les Delawares, après la mort de ses parents, surnommé Deerslayer - Tueur de daims - du fait de sa grande adresse au tir à la carabine, accompagné par son ami delaware Chingachgook, s'est donné pour mission de délivrer la fiancée de ce dernier, Hist, détenue par les guerriers Hurons.

Le Tueur de daims

En 1757, au coeur de la guerre qui déchire les camps français et britannique autour de la conquête du Nouveau Monde, deux soeurs, Alice et Cora, doivent rejoindre leur père, le colonel Munro. Escortées par trois membres de la tribu indienne des Mohicans, eux-mêmes en lutte contre la tribu des Hurons, les deux jeunes filles découvrent la cruauté de l'histoire dont elles sont les témoins.

The Last of the Mohicans is a historical novel by James Fenimore Cooper, first published in January 1826.

It was one of the most popular English-language novels of its time. Its narrative flaws were criticized from the start, and its length and elaborately formal prose style have reduced its appeal to later readers. Regardless, The Last of the Mohicans is widely read in American literature courses. This second book of the Leatherstocking Tales pentalogy is the best known. The Pathfinder, written 14 years later in 1840, is its sequel.

Cooper named a principal character Uncas after the most famous of the Mohicans. The real Mohicans lived in the colony of Connecticut in the mid-seventeenth century, and not in the New York frontier a century later. Uncas was a Mohegan, not a Mohican, and Cooper's usage has helped to confuse the names of two tribes to the present day. When John Uncas, his last surviving male descendant died in 1842, the Newark Daily Advertiser wrote "Last of the Mohegans Gone" lamenting the extinction of the tribe. The writer was not aware that Mohegans still existed then and to the present day.

The story takes place in 1757 during the Seven Years' War (known in America as the French and Indian War), when France and the United Kingdom battled for control of the American and Canadian colonies. During this war, the French often allied themselves with Native American tribes in order to gain an advantage over the British, with unpredictable and often tragic results.

Near the centre of the State of New York lies an extensive district of country whose surface is a succession of hills and dales, or, to speak with greater deference to geographical definitions, of mountains and valleys. It is among these hills that the Delaware takes its rise; and flowing from the limpid lakes and thousand springs of this region the numerous sources of the Susquehanna meander through the valleys until, uniting their streams, they form one of the proudest rivers of the United States. The mountains are generally arable to the tops, although instances are not wanting where the sides are jutted with rocks that aid greatly in giving to the country that romantic and picturesque character which it so eminently possesses. The vales are narrow, rich, and cultivated, with a stream uniformly winding through each. Beautiful and thriving villages are found interspersed along the margins of the small lakes, or situated at those points of the streams which are favorable for manufacturing; and neat and comfortable farms, with every indication of wealth about them, are scattered profusely through the vales, and even to the mountain tops. Roads diverge in every direction from the even and graceful bottoms of the valleys to the most rugged and intricate passes of the hills. Academies and minor edifices of learning meet the eye of the stranger at every few miles as be winds his way through this uneven territory, and places for the worship of God abound with that frequency which characterize a moral and reflecting people, and with that variety of exterior and canonical government which flows from unfettered liberty of conscience.

Le dernier des Mohicans

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