Compromise and Conceit

Colonel George Washington, 5th August 1754

Attended Madame C’s Firefly party last night. Better than last year, more pretty dancing girls (one Chinese with a cloud of fireflies particularly feisty in the back of the library, damn her for saying no but she learnt the hard way that no-one can!). Guests were worse though, one supposes that the greater the effort on a soiree the more of the public one needs to invite, and one could hardly avoid inviting a few of the heroes of the French-Indian war, but bringing Frenchy? And those damned natives? It may not be proven, but everyone knows Magua murdered Colonel Munro in cold blood, ate his heart by all accounts, and damn my breeches if I can tell how exactly Madame C expected Francois Frenchy to get along with that bloody native Tacharison, who slaughtered Jumonville right in front of me (not that I told him to stop, heh!). A weird mix by all accounts, and there was that brazen slut Cora Munro fawning over her father’s murderer! I swear she had a hand in it the ungrateful tart. Bit of a shame I could never get my fingers in her, but now that her Daddy’s shamefully put aside maybe I can give it a go… Magua will have done the white man one favour at least… maybe a bit of  attention from a white gentleman will prevent her going native like her retarded sister did…

Of course, it was interesting to meet the “heroes” of the French and Indian War. Bunch of ignorant foreigners, we thought they might have some value for colonial interests but it seems they can’t even summon enough racial pride to support any white man, let alone to throw in their lot with the Americans whose rightful country they’re in. I tell you, it sticks in my craw that some Irish Priest can have the balls to call me a coward when all 5 of those pimped up heroes were hiding behind native skirts for every battle. Though I suppose they did go into Huron territory, which is more than you would catch me doing! It took all the balls I had to encourage Braddock to ambush the French at Monongahela, even though they were running away, and that didn’t exactly go as planned now did it? Frenchy couldn’t be bothered chasing retreating Americans, and we had to sign that damned peace deal after all. But there’s a lesson in that isn’t there? Never hatch a plan which relies on others to do your own dirty work.

Still, I thought those heroes might have some use, even if it was only temporary. It looks like they’re pretty soft on the natives though, so any use we put them to would be pretty limited, and I reckon half of them still have loyalty to the old White Father. Best keep an eye on their contacts, in case they become trouble, but we definitely won’t be relying on them for anything else. Friends with two different native “nations”, and proud of it! A disgrace…

Anyway, we’ll see what comes of it all… maybe there are other ways we can use Frenchy to our advantage than just by accident!

Miss Cora Munro, 5th August

Dear Diary, it would appear I have the singular distinction of being able to report on a most diverting evening at Madame C’s Firefly party, the first I’ve been invited to in the New World and surely one of the most illuminating events I’ve attended in years (oh dear, do pardon the pun won’t you my dear diary?) Of course I had the chance to meet that fascinating brute Magua, who tells me my dear sister has hunted her first deer and eaten it’s heart (I do hope that when he says deer it is not a euphemism for anything else!) I do declare this to be positively disgusting, but my sister has always been a tad strange, so it’s best I suppose that she is doing something she likes, and it’s not as if she hadn’t first hand experience after seeing what happened to Daddy (Satan take him), but really… I shall have words with her about a Lady’s Decency when next I visit her. No word on children, so I don’t know yet if she’s come around to his ways, lord knows I would in a flash… oh don’t blush dear Diary, there’s far worse in your earlier pages and you aren’t telling anyone, now are you?

Of course I also met those dear stuck up Frenchies, they had nothing much to say except trying to slobber on my hand, of course, but infinitely more charming than the colonials. I really don’t like the way that Colonel Washington looks at me… he may be a battle mage and a hero, but that doesn’t give him the right to look at me like that. And by the way dear Diary, how does one get to be a hero by merely retreating? I could do that! I would never say it, of course, but I was mighty entertained to see the English Heroes burt it out like the quaintly uncultured chaps they are. That Irish Priest is rather dishy, I must say if I were to have a chance to see under his habit I would rather like to take it, but I suppose it shan’t be happening. So mysterious with the collar and the coat! And even the Torturer is so much more charming than oily George Washington, the fast-footed hero of monongahela. Anyway, it’s nice as well to see that they interacted with the Natives as if they were men (and Kings!) instead of fools… maybe there is some good yet in the White man…

Anyway, dear Diary, I suppose I should speak a little of my garden. There was [ Several pages of botanical science follow]

Magua, 5th August

Hmmm. Interesting. The prophet suggests the White Heroes may have a use. The Colonel has only one use, but the White Heroes showed his skin too thin to be used in even the smallest war drum. Fools, these Americans. Dangerous arrogant fools.