Montcalm and Wolfe Part 36

Ais.e.m.e.nt cela se peut croire.

Montcalm, comme defunt Annibal, S'montroit soldat et general.

_S--e! sil y avoit quelqu'un qui ne l'aimit point!_"

"Je veux etre un chien; a coups d'pieds, a coups d'poings, j'lui ca.s.s'rai la gueule et la machoire."

This is an allusion to Vaudreuil. On the battle of Ticonderoga, see Appendix G]

Chapter 21

1758

Fort Frontenac

The rashness of Abercromby before the fight was matched by his poltroonery after it. Such was his terror that on the evening of his defeat he sent an order to Colonel c.u.mmings, commanding at Fort William Henry, to send all the sick and wounded and all the heavy artillery to New York without delay.[638] He himself followed so closely upon this disgraceful missive that c.u.mmings had no time to obey it.

[Footnote 638: _Cunningham, aide-de-camp of Abercromby, to c.u.mmings, 8 July, 1758_.]

The defeated and humbled troops proceeded to reoccupy the ground they had left a few days before in the flush of confidence and pride; and young Colonel Williams, of Ma.s.sachusetts, lost no time in sending the miserable story to his uncle Israel. His letter, which is dated "Lake George (sorrowful situation), July ye 11th," ends thus: "I have told facts; you may put the epithets upon them. In one word, what with fatigue, want of sleep, exercise of mind, and leaving the place we went to capture, the best part of the army is unhinged. I have told enough to make you sick, if the relation acts on you as the facts have on me."

In the routed army was the st.u.r.dy John Cleaveland, minister of Ipswich, and now chaplain of Bagley's Ma.s.sachusetts regiment, who regarded the retreat with a disgust that was shared by many others. "This day," he writes in his Diary, at the head of Lake George, two days after the battle, "wherever I went I found people, officers and soldiers, astonished that we left the French ground, and commenting on the strange conduct in coming off." From this time forth the provincials called their commander Mrs. Nabbycromby.[639] He thought of nothing but fortifying himself. "Towards evening," continues the chaplain, "the General, with his Rehoboam counsellors, came over to line out a fort on the rocky hill where our breastwork was last year. Now we begin to think strongly that the grand expedition against Canada is laid aside, and a foundation made totally to impoverish our country." The whole army was soon intrenched. The chaplain of Bagley's, with his brother Ebenezer, chaplain of another regiment, one day walked round the camp and carefully inspected it. The tour proved satisfactory to the militant divines, and John Cleaveland reported to his wife: "We have built an extraordinary good breastwork, sufficient to defend ourselves against twenty thousand of the enemy, though at present we have not above a third part of that number fit for duty." Many of the troops had been sent to the Mohawk, and others to the Hudson.

[Footnote 639: Trumbull, _Hist. Connecticut_, II. 392. "Nabby" (Abigail) was then a common female name in New England.]

In the regiment of which Cleaveland was chaplain there was a young surgeon from Danvers, Dr. Caleb Rea, who also kept a copious diary, and, being of a serious turn, listened with edification to the prayers and exhortations to which the yeoman soldiery were daily summoned. In his zeal, he made an inquest among them for singers, and chose the most melodious to form a regimental choir, "the better to carry on the daily service of singing psalms;" insomuch that the New England camp was vocal with rustic harmony, sincere, if somewhat nasal. These seemly observances were not inconsistent with a certain amount of disorder among the more turbulent spirits, who, removed from the repressive influence of tight-laced village communities, sometimes indulged in conduct which grieved the conscientious surgeon. The rural New England of that time, with its narrowness, its prejudices, its oddities, its combative energy, and rugged, unconquerable strength, is among the things of the past, or lingers in remote corners where the whistle of the locomotive is never heard. It has spread itself in swarming millions over half a continent, changing with changing conditions; and even the part of it that clings to the ancestral hive has transformed and continues to transform itself.

The provincials were happy in their chaplains, among whom there reigned a marvellous harmony, Episcopalians, Presbyterians, and Congregationalists meeting twice a week to hold prayer-meetings together. "A rare instance indeed," says Dr. Rea, "and perhaps scarce ever was an army blessed with such a set of chaplains before." On one occasion, just before the fatal expedition, nine of them, after prayers and breakfast, went together to call upon the General. "He treated us very kindly," says the chaplain of Bagley's, "and told us that he hoped we would teach the people to do their duty and be courageous; and told us a story of a chaplain in Germany, where he was, who just before the action told the soldiers he had not time to say much, and therefore should only say: 'Be courageous; for no cowards go to heaven.' The General treated us to a bowl of punch and a bottle of wine, and then we took our leave of him."[640]

[Footnote 640: For the use of the Diary of Chaplain Cleaveland, as well as of his letters to his wife, I am indebted to the kindness of Miss Abby E. Cleaveland, his descendant.]

When Cleaveland and the more gifted among his brethren preached of a Sunday, officers and men of the regulars, no less than the provincials, came to listen; yet that pious Sabbatarian, Dr. Rea, saw much to afflict his conscience. "Sad, sad it is to see how the Sabbath is profaned in the camp," above all by "the horrid custom of swearing, more especially among the regulars; and I can't but charge our defeat on this sin."

It would have been well had the harmony that prevailed among the chaplains found its counterpart among the men of the sword; but between the British regular officers and those of the provinces there was anything but an equal brotherhood. It is true that Pitt, in the spirit of conciliation which he always showed towards the colonies, had procured a change in the regulations concerning the relative rank of British and provincial officers, thus putting them in a position much nearer equality; but this, while appeasing the provincials, seems to have annoyed the others. Till the campaign was nearly over, not a single provincial colonel had been asked to join in a council of war; and, complains Cleaveland, "they know no more of what is to be done than a sergeant, till the orders come out." Of the British officers, the greater part had seen but little active service. Most of them were men of family, exceedingly prejudiced and insular, whose knowledge of the world was limited to certain cla.s.ses of their own countrymen, and who looked down on all others, whether domestic or foreign. Towards the provincials their att.i.tude was one of tranquil superiority, though its tranquillity was occasionally disturbed by what they regarded as absurd pretension on the part of the colony officers. One of them gave vent to his feelings in an article in the _London Chronicle_, in which he advanced the very reasonable proposition that "a farmer is not to be taken from the plough and made an officer in a day;" and he was answered wrathfully, at great length, in the _Boston Evening Post_, by a writer signing himself "A New England Man." The provincial officers, on the other hand, and especially those of New England, being no less narrow and prejudiced, filled with a sensitive pride and a jealous local patriotism, and bred up in a lofty appreciation of the merits and importance of their country, regarded British superciliousness with a resentment which their strong love for England could not overcome. This feeling was far from being confined to the officers. A provincial regiment stationed at Half-Moon, on the Hudson, thought itself affronted by Captain Cruikshank, a regular officer; and the men were so incensed that nearly half of them went off in a body. The deportment of British officers in the Seven Years War no doubt had some part in hastening on the Revolution.

What with levelling Montcalm's siege works, planting palisades, and grubbing up stumps in their bungling and laborious way, the regulars found abundant occupation. Discipline was stiff and peremptory. The wooden horse and the whipping-post were conspicuous objects in the camp, and often in use. Caleb Rea, being tender-hearted, never went to see the lash laid on; for, as he quaintly observes, "the cries were satisfactory to me, without the sight of the strokes." He and the rest of the doctors found active exercise for such skill as they had, since fever and dysentery were making scarcely less havoc than the bullets at Ticonderoga. This came from the bad state of the camps and unwholesome food. The provincial surgeons seem to have been very little impressed with the importance of sanitary regulations, and to have thought it their business not to prevent disease, but only to cure it. The one grand essential in their eyes was a well-stocked medicine-chest, rich in exhaustless stores of rhubarb, ipecacuanha, and calomel. Even this sometimes failed. Colonel Williams reports "the sick dest.i.tute of everything proper for them; medicine-chest empty; nothing but their dirty blankets for beds; Dr. Ashley dead, Dr. Wright gone home, low enough; Bille worn off his legs,--such is our case. I have near a hundred sick. Lost a sergeant and a private last night."[641] Chaplain Cleaveland himself, though strong of frame, did not escape; but he found solace in his trouble from the congenial society of a brother chaplain, Mr. Emerson, of New Hamps.h.i.+re, "a right-down hearty Christian minister, of savory conversation," who came to see him in his tent, breakfasted with him, and joined him in prayer. Being somewhat better, he one day thought to recreate himself with the apostolic occupation of fis.h.i.+ng.

The sport was poor; the fish bit slowly; and as he lay in his boat, still languid with his malady, he had leisure to reflect on the contrasted works of Providence and man,--the bright lake basking amid its mountains, a dream of wilderness beauty, and the swarms of harsh humanity on the sh.o.r.e beside him, with their pa.s.sions, discords, and miseries. But it was with the strong meat of Calvinistic theology, and not with reveries like these, that he was accustomed to nourish his military flock.

[Footnote 641: _Colonel William Williams to Colonel Israel Williams, 4 Sept. 1758_.]

While at one end of the lake the force of Abercromby was diminished by detachments and disease, that of Montcalm at the other was so increased by reinforcements that a forward movement on his part seemed possible.

He contented himself, however, with strengthening the fort, reconstructing the lines that he had defended so well, and sending out frequent war-parties by way of Wood Creek and South Bay, to hara.s.s Abercromby's communications with Fort Edward. These parties, some of which consisted of several hundred men, were generally more or less successful; and one of them, under La Corne, surprised and destroyed a large wagon train escorted by forty soldiers. When Abercromby heard of it, he ordered Rogers, with a strong detachment of provincials, light infantry, and rangers, to go down the lake in boats, cross the mountains to the narrow waters of Lake Champlain, and cut off the enemy. But though Rogers set out at two in the morning, the French retreated so fast that he arrived too late. As he was on his way back, he was met by a messenger from the General with orders to intercept other French parties reported to be hovering about Fort Edward. On this he retraced his steps, marched through the forest to where Whitehall now stands, and thence made his way up Wood Creek to old Fort Anne, a relic of former wars, abandoned and falling to decay. Here, on the neglected "clearing"

that surrounded the ruin, his followers encamped. They counted seven hundred in all, and consisted of about eighty rangers, a body of Connecticut men under Major Putnam, and a small regular force, chiefly light infantry, under Captain Dalzell, the brave officer who was afterwards killed by Pontiac's warriors at Detroit.

Up to this time Rogers had observed his usual caution, commanding silence on the march, and forbidding fires at night; but, seeing no signs of an enemy, he forgot himself; and on the following morning, the eighth of August, he and Lieutenant Irwin, of the light infantry, amused themselves by firing at a mark on a wager. The shots reached the ears of four hundred and fifty French and Indians under the famous partisan Marin, who at once took steps to reconnoitre and ambuscade his rash enemy. For nearly a mile from the old fort the forest had formerly been cut down and burned; and Nature had now begun to rea.s.sert herself, covering the open tract with a dense growth of bushes and saplings almost impervious to anything but a wild-cat, had it not been traversed by a narrow Indian path. Along this path the men were forced to march in single file. At about seven o'clock, when the two marksmen had decided their bet, and before the heavy dew of the night was dried upon the bushes, the party slung their packs and set out. Putnam was in the front with his Connecticut men; Dalzell followed with the regulars; and Rogers, with his rangers, brought up the rear of the long and slender line. Putnam himself led the way, shouldering through the bushes, gun in hand; and just as the bluff yeoman emerged from them to enter the forest-growth beyond, the air was rent with yells, the thickets before him were filled with Indians, and one of them, a Caughnawaga chief, sprang upon him, hatchet in hand. He had time to c.o.c.k his gun and snap it at the breast of his a.s.sailant; but it missed fire, and he was instantly seized and dragged back into the forest, as were also a lieutenant named Tracy and three private men. Then the firing began. The French and Indians, lying across the path in a semicircle, had the advantage of position and surprise. The Connecticut men fell back among the bushes in disorder; but soon rallied, and held the enemy in check while Dalzell and Rogers--the latter of whom was nearly a mile behind--were struggling through briers and thickets to their aid. So close was the brushwood that it was full half an hour before they could get their followers ranged in some kind of order in front of the enemy; and even then each man was forced to fight for himself as best he could.

Humphreys, the biographer of Putnam, blames Rogers severely for not coming at once to the aid of the Connecticut men; but two of their captains declare that he came with all possible speed; while a regular officer present highly praised him to Abercromby for cool and officer-like conduct.[642] As a man his deserts were small; as a bushfighter he was beyond reproach.

[Footnote 642: _Letter from the Camp at Lake George, 5 Sept. 1758_, signed by Captains Maynard and Giddings, and printed in the _Boston Weekly Advertiser_. "Rogers deserves much to be commended." _Abercromby to Pitt, 19 Aug. 1758_.]

Another officer recounts from hearsay the remarkable conduct of an Indian, who sprang into the midst of the English and killed two of them with his hatchet; then mounted on a log and defied them all. One of the regulars tried to knock him down with the b.u.t.t of his musket; but though the blow made him bleed, he did not fall, and would have killed his a.s.sailant if Rogers had not shot him dead.[643] The firing lasted about two hours. At length some of the Canadians gave way, and the rest of the French and Indians followed.[644] They broke into small parties to elude pursuit, and reuniting towards evening, made their bivouac on a spot surrounded by impervious swamps.

[Footnote 643: _Thomas Barnsley to Bouquet, 7 Sept. 1758_.]

[Footnote 644: _Doreil au Ministre, 31 Aout, 1757_.]

Rogers remained on the field and buried all his own dead, forty-nine in number. Then he resumed his march to Fort Edward, carrying the wounded on litters of branches till the next day, when he met a detachment coming with wagons to his relief. A party sent out soon after for the purpose reported that they had found and buried more than a hundred French and Indians. From this time forward the war-parties from Ticonderoga greatly relented in their activity.

The adventures of the captured Putnam were sufficiently remarkable. The Indians, after dragging him to the rear, lashed him fast to a tree so that he could not move a limb, and a young savage amused himself by throwing a hatchet at his head, striking it into the wood as close as possible to the mark without hitting it. A French petty officer then thrust the muzzle of his gun violently against the prisoner's body, pretended to fire it at him, and at last struck him in the face with the b.u.t.t; after which dastardly proceeding he left him. The French and Indians being forced after a time to fall back, Putnam found himself between the combatants and exposed to bullets from both sides; but the enemy, partially recovering the ground they had lost, unbound him, and led him to a safe distance from the fight. When the retreat began, the Indians hurried him along with them, stripped of coat, waistcoat, shoes, and stockings, his back burdened with as many packs of the wounded as could be piled upon it, and his wrists bound so tightly together that the pain became intense. In his torment he begged them to kill him; on which a French officer who was near persuaded them to untie his hands and take off some of the packs, and the chief who had captured him gave him a pair of moccasons to protect his lacerated feet. When they encamped at night, they prepared to burn him alive, stripped him naked, tied him to a tree, and gathered dry wood to pile about him. A sudden shower of rain interrupted their pastime; but when it was over they began again, and surrounded him with a circle of brushwood which they set on fire. As they were yelling and dancing their delight at the contortions with which he tried to avoid the rising flames, Marin, hearing what was going on forward, broke through the crowd, and with a courageous humanity not too common among Canadian officers, dashed aside the burning brush, untied the prisoner, and angrily upbraided his tormentors. He then restored him to the chief who had captured him, and whose right of property in his prize the others had failed to respect.

The Caughnawaga treated him at first with kindness; but, with the help of his tribesmen, took effectual means to prevent his escape, by laying him on his back, stretching his arms and legs in the form of a St.

Andrew's cross, and binding the wrists and ankles fast to the stems of young trees. This was a mode of securing prisoners in vogue among Indians from immemorial time; but, not satisfied with it, they placed brushwood upon his body, and then laid across it the long slender stems of saplings, on the ends of which several warriors lay down to sleep, so that the slightest movement on his part would rouse them. Thus he pa.s.sed a night of misery, which did not prevent him from thinking of the ludicrous figure he made in the hands of the tawny Philistines.

On the next night, after a painful march, he reached Ticonderoga, where he was questioned by Montcalm, and afterwards sent to Montreal in charge of a French officer, who showed him the utmost kindness. On arriving, wofully tattered, bruised, scorched, and torn, he found a friend in Colonel Schuyler, himself a prisoner on parole, who helped him in his need, and through whose good offices the future major-general of the Continental Army was included in the next exchange of prisoners.[645]

[Footnote 645: On Putnam's adventures, Humphreys, 57 (1818). He had the story from Putnam himself, and seems to give it with substantial correctness, though his account of the battle is at several points erroneous. The "Molang" of his account is Marin. On the battle, besides authorities already cited, _Recollections of Thomson Maxwell_, a soldier present (_Ess.e.x Inst.i.tute_, VII. 97). Rogers, _Journals_, 117. Letter from camp in _Boston Gazette_, no. 117. Another in _New Hamps.h.i.+re Gazette_, no. 104. _Gentleman's Magazine, 1758_, p. 498. Malartic, _Journal du Regiment de Bearn_. Levis, _Journal de la Guerre en Canada_.

The French notices of the affair are few and brief. They admit a defeat, but exaggerate the force and the losses of the English, and underrate their own. Malartic, however, says that Marin set out with four hundred men, and was soon after joined by an additional number of Indians; which nearly answers to the best English accounts.]

The petty victory over Marin was followed by a more substantial success.

Early in September Abercromby's melancholy camp was cheered with the tidings that the important French post of Fort Frontenac, which controlled Lake Ontario, which had baffled s.h.i.+rley in his attempt against Niagara, and given Montcalm the means of conquering Oswego, had fallen into British hands. "This is a glorious piece of news, and may G.o.d have all the glory of the same!" writes Chaplain Cleaveland in his Diary. Lieutenant-Colonel Bradstreet had planned the stroke long before, and proposed it first to Loudon, and then to Abercromby. Loudon accepted it; but his successor received it coldly, though Lord Howe was warm in its favor. At length, under the pressure of a council of war, Abercromby consented that the attempt should be made, and gave Bradstreet three thousand men, nearly all provincials. With these he made his way, up the Mohawk and down the Onondaga, to the lonely and dismal spot where Oswego had once stood. By dint of much persuasion a few Oneidas joined him; though, like most of the Five Nations, they had been nearly lost to the English through the effects of the defeat at Ticonderoga. On the twenty-second of August his fleet of whaleboats and bateaux pushed out on Lake Ontario; and, three days after, landed near the French fort. On the night of the twenty-sixth Bradstreet made a lodgment within less than two hundred yards of it; and early in the morning De Noyan, the commandant, surrendered himself and his followers, numbering a hundred and ten soldiers and laborers, prisoners of war. With them were taken nine armed vessels, carrying from eight to eighteen guns, and forming the whole French naval force on Lake Ontario. The crews escaped. An enormous quant.i.ty of provisions, naval stores, munitions, and Indian goods intended for the supply of the western posts fell into the hands of the English, who kept what they could carry off, and burned the rest.

In the fort were found sixty cannon and sixteen mortars, which the victors used to batter down the walls; and then, reserving a few of the best, knocked off the trunnions of the others. The Oneidas were bent on scalping some of the prisoners. Bradstreet forbade it. They begged that he would do as the French did,--turn his back and shut his eyes; but he forced them to abstain from all violence, and consoled them by a lion's share of the plunder. In accordance with the orders of Abercromby, the fort was dismantled, and all the buildings in or around it burned, as were also the vessels, except the two largest, which were reserved to carry off some of the captured goods. Then, with boats deeply laden, the detachment returned to Oswego; where, after unloading and burning the two vessels, they proceeded towards Albany, leaving a thousand of their number at the new fort which Brigadier Stanwix was building at the Great Carrying Place of the Mohawk.

Next to Louisbourg, this was the heaviest blow that the French had yet received. Their command of Lake Ontario was gone. New France was cut in two; and unless the severed parts could speedily reunite, all the posts of the interior would be in imminent jeopardy. If Bradstreet had been followed by another body of men to reoccupy and rebuild Oswego, thus recovering a harbor on Lake Ontario, all the captured French vessels could have been brought thither, and the command of this inland sea a.s.sured at once. Even as it was, the advantages were immense. A host of savage warriors, thus far inclined to France or wavering between the two belligerents, stood henceforth neutral, or gave themselves to England; while Fort Duquesne, deprived of the supplies on which it depended, could make but faint resistance to its advancing enemy.

Amherst, with five regiments from Louisbourg, came, early in October, to join Abercromby at Lake George, and the two commanders discussed the question of again attacking Ticonderoga. Both thought the season too late. A fortnight after, a deserter brought news that Montcalm was breaking up his camp. Abercromby followed his example. The opposing armies filed off each to its winter quarters, and only a few scouting parties kept alive the embers of war on the waters and mountains of Lake George.

Meanwhile Brigadier Forbes was climbing the Alleghanies, hewing his way through the forests of western Pennsylvania, and toiling inch by inch towards his goal of Fort Duquesne.[646]

[Footnote 646: On the capture of Fort Frontenac, _Bradstreet to Abercromby_, _31 Aug. 1758_. _Impartial Account of Lieutenant-Colonel Bradstreet's Expedition, by a Volunteer in the Expedition_ (London, 1759). Letter from a New York officer to his colonel, in _Boston Gazette_, no. 182. Several letters from persons in the expedition, in _Boston Evening Post_, no. 1,203, _New Hamps.h.i.+re Gazette_, no. 104, and _Boston News Letter_, no. 2,932. _Abercromby to Pitt_, _25 Nov. 1758_.

_Lieutenant Macauley to Horatio Gates_, _30 Aug. 1758._ _Vaudreuil au Ministre_, _30 Oct. 1758_. Pouchot, I. 162. _Memoires sur le Canada_, 1749-1760.]

Chapter 22

1758

Fort Duquesne

During the last year Loudon, filled with vain schemes against Louisbourg, had left the French scalping-parties to their work of havoc on the western borders. In Virginia Was.h.i.+ngton still toiled at his hopeless task of defending with a single regiment a forest frontier of more than three hundred miles, and in Pennsylvania the a.s.sembly thought more of quarrelling with their governor than of protecting the tormented settlers. Fort Duquesne, the source of all the evil, was left undisturbed. In vain Was.h.i.+ngton urged the futility of defensive war, and the necessity of attacking the enemy in his stronghold. His position, trying at the best, was made more so by the behavior of Dinwiddie. That crusty Scotchman had conceived a dislike to him, and sometimes treated him in a manner that must have been unspeakably galling to the proud and pa.s.sionate young man, who nevertheless, unconquerable in his sense of public duty, curbed himself to patience, or the semblance of it.

Dinwiddie was now gone, and a new governor had taken his place. The conduct of the war, too, had changed, and in the plans of Pitt the capture of Fort Duquesne held an important place. Brigadier John Forbes was charged with it. He was a Scotch veteran, forty-eight years of age, who had begun life as a student of medicine, and who ended it as an able and faithful soldier. Though a well-bred man of the world, his tastes were simple; he detested ceremony, and dealt frankly and plainly with the colonists, who both respected and liked him. In April he was in Philadelphia waiting for his army, which as yet had no existence; for the provincials were not enlisted, and an expected battalion of Highlanders had not arrived. It was the end of June before they were all on the march; and meanwhile the General was attacked with a painful and dangerous malady, which would have totally disabled a less resolute man.

His force consisted of provincials from Pennsylvania, Virginia, Maryland, and North Carolina, with twelve hundred Highlanders of Montgomery's regiment and a detachment of Royal Americans, amounting in all, with wagoners and camp followers, to between six and seven thousand men. The Royal American regiment was a new corps raised, in the colonies, largely from among the Germans of Pennsylvania. Its officers were from Europe; and conspicuous among them was Lieutenant-Colonel Henry Bouquet, a brave and accomplished Swiss, who commanded one of the four battalions of which the regiment was composed. Early in July he was encamped with the advance-guard at the hamlet of Raystown, now the town of Bedford, among the eastern heights of the Alleghanies. Here his tents were pitched in an opening of the forest by the banks of a small stream; and Virginians in hunting-s.h.i.+rts, Highlanders in kilt and plaid, and Royal Americans in regulation scarlet, labored at throwing up intrenchments and palisades, while around stood the silent mountains in their mantles of green.

Now rose the question whether the army should proceed in a direct course to Fort Duquesne, hewing a new road through the forest, or march thirty-four miles to Fort c.u.mberland, and thence follow the road made by Braddock. It was the interest of Pennsylvania that Forbes should choose the former route, and of Virginia that he should choose the latter. The Old Dominion did not wish to see a highway cut for her rival to those rich lands of the Ohio which she called her own. Was.h.i.+ngton, who was then at Fort c.u.mberland with a part of his regiment, was earnest for the old road; and in an interview with Bouquet midway between that place and Raystown, he spared no effort to bring him to the same opinion. But the quartermaster-general, Sir John Sinclair, who was supposed to know the country, had advised the Pennsylvania route; and both Bouquet and Forbes were resolved to take it. It was shorter, and when once made would furnish readier and more abundant supplies of food and forage; but to make it would consume a vast amount of time and labor. Was.h.i.+ngton foretold the ruin of the expedition unless it took Braddock's road.

Ardent Virginian as he was, there is no cause to believe that his decision was based on any but military reasons; but Forbes thought otherwise, and found great fault with him. Bouquet did him more justice.