arrival, they were joined by the other division, which had returned from the pursuit of Tecumseh and his Indians.

"The cause is now shewn, which has not been generally understood heretofore, why the British were not all captured, when they had been so totally defeated.

"The troops were then formed in line, fronting the field of battle; when Colonel Miller rode in front of the centre, and addressed them in the following words:

"My brave fellows! you have done well! every man has done his duty. I give you my hearty thanks for your conduct on this day; you have gained my highest esteem; you have gained fresh honor to yourselves, and to the American arms; your fellow-soldiers in arms will love you, and your country will reward you. You will return to the field of battle, to collect those who have gloriously fallen; your friendly attention to your wounded companions is required.'

"At sunrise the march was resumed, and at 12 o'clock on the 12th of August, the detachment re-entered the town of Detroit, covered with mud from foot to head, their clothes not having been dried in two and a half days. The sun now cheered them with its influence; they marched through the street to the encampment. They were met by their brother soldiers and citizens, with all that sympathy and heartfelt joy which constitutes the soldier's reward for his hard earned victory."

Now, the courtine, alluded to by Major Dalliba, could have had no existence except in the heated imagination of a warrior flushed with victory, and magnifying the difficulties which his intrepidity and daring have surmounted. We had no breastwork of any description, and for this simple reason that when we left Brownstown in the morning to meet the enemy, we knew not at what point we should halt. When the ground we did occupy was reached, the Americans were not more than a mile, or a mile and a half, in our front, and Major Muir, finding it to be not an unfavorable position for defence, inasmuch as we were covered by the brow of a slightly rising ground,

ordered the men to lie down, and otherwise cover themselves with what logs happened to be in the way. There had been no previous selection of ground, and, therefore, no preparation—no precaution beyond that which has just been stated. Here we had been only a very short time, before the American advance was engaged with the Indians on our left, thrown forward, and soon the affair, during which the enemy's grape was very liberally dispensed, became general.—Great, however, as was the disproportion of arm and numbers (for it will be recollected that even with the reinforcement brought by Lieut. Bullock, ours did not exceed 150 men of the 41st Regiment, to which might be added some 40 or 50 militia) there is no reason to infer that the men would not longer have maintained their ground, had it not been for the certainty which existed that the enemy were outflanking us. I perfectly recollect the position, even at this hour, although I have never passed over the ground since, and I can understand the alarm which prevailed. Immediately on our right—and I was on the extreme of that flank—was a plain of wild high grass, extending about 600 yards, and at its termination, an open wood, running parallel with the roads, thro' which, during the heat of the affair, a large body of men, whom it was impossible to distinguish, were discovered hastening their movements, with the evident intention of gaining our rear. Such, indeed, proved to be their object, but the men, who unluckily had not been apprised of the fact of a party of Indians having been despatched to the extremity of the wood in question, mistook these (now driven back by the American left) for the enemy, and commenced firing upon them; thus relieving the actual enemy from much of the obstacle which had hitherto been opposed to their advance. The Indians, probably laboring under the same erroneous impression, or indignant at being assailed in this manner by their friends, partially returned the fire, and this of course tended still more to confirm the belief entertained by the men that they were Americans endeavoring to turn

their flank-nor could the earnest assurances of their officers remove this conviction. The discouraging effect of a panic of this kind is well known. The men hastily retired, carrying off their wounded, however, but the Americans did not pursue farther than the point we had abandoned. As has already been seen, the troops were speedily rallied and reformed, but without further invitation from the enemy to renew the contest.

There is another error in Major Dalliba's very lengthy detail of this affair, a notice of which is only important, because it tends to show, that the courtine, which he has so emphatically described, may have originated in the same want of recollection (and he states that he writes from recollection) of the actual condition of the ground where the skirmish commenced. He states, as will be seen in the extract I have given, that before the action commenced, they (the American detachment) passed the spot where Major Van Horne had been defeated a few days before; and that they, among many dead bodies of men and horses, discovered that of Captain McCulloch placed under an Indian bark. Now this was impossible for we had passed these dead bodies in the morning, and they lay nearly midway between Brownstown and the scene of action. I can well recollect this fact, for such was the stench and the effluvia arising from the disgusting and bloated objects, which had been suffered to fester beneath a scorching sun, during several consecutive days, that, both in the advance, and the retreat, I experienced anything but regret when I had quitted the atmosphere they poisoned with their presence. Major Dalliba must have passed these at a subsequent period of the day, when, as he observes, the Americans came out of the wood near Brownstown, and found that the handful of British had been suffered to effect their retreat without interruption.

It must not be omitted to remark that, on the return of Colonel Miller to Detroit, he was closely followed by a band of about 250 Indians, chiefly Pottawattomies, who hung on the American rear and captured several boats

laden with ammunition, and containing their wounded. Among the latter were two privates of the 41st who had been too badly hit to be brought off, and being close to the Americans had fallen into their hands, at the first and feeble attempt made at pursuit.

As I have unconsciously been led into a much more explanatory account of the Maguaga affair than I had originally intended, I cannot take my leave of it without transcribing an anecdote related by the same writer which is so characteristic of the detestation entertained by the Indians for the Americans, and resembles so nearly the conduct of the noble Hancock, who fell at the Canard, that it cannot fail to be read with interest.

"Some time in the evening of the 9th (writes Major Dalliba) Captain Maxwell returned with his spies, having been sent forward to the village of Brownstown, and reported that the village was abandoned, and that no enemy could be discovered. Early next morning, August 10th, detachments were sent out by Colonel Miller, to scour the woods in search of one man who was ascertained to be still missing he was, however, found dead. While the men were ranging over the woods, one of them was shot dead. A smoke of a piece was discovered at a distance, rising from the ground by the party-they approached the spot, and beheld an Indian lying on the ground wounded, and unable to stand. One arm and one leg were broken, -he had lain there, during the night, by his piece which was loaded when he fell. The cool deliberation with which he died (of course from this we infer the Americans killed the wounded man) proved the native fortitude of the savage to meet death when resistance is useless. Unwilling to endure his pains longer, and die by degrees, he determined to die by the hand of his enemies, and to sell his life as dear to them as possible. He summoned together the little strength which remained, and so steadily levelled his rifle at the approaching American, as to put the ball through his heart."

IV

BROCK'S CAPTURE OF DETROIT

Meanwhile General Brock, then at York (Toronto) fully sensible of the danger of Amherstburg, threatened as he knew it to be by an overwhelming, and professedly exterminating foe, lost no time in repairing to its assistance. The first detachment of the 41st pushed forward to its relief was, as has been seen, that which joined us at Maguaga-and consisting of sixty men. Forty more were sent to Long Point, for the purpose of collecting the Militia in that neighborhood, and fifty, under Captain Chambers,' were despatched into the interior with a view of encouraging and being joined by the Indians. The General himself embarked on the 5th of August, 2 for Fort George and Long Point, doubtless having inwardly matured the daring object which he subsequently accomplished, so much to his own honor, and that of the troops who participated in his glory. Leaving Long Point on the 8th, with no other force than the 40 men of the 41st, who had been previously despatched thither, and about 260 militia, principally volunteers from Toronto, General Brock coasted the shore of Lake Erie, on his route to Amherstburg, which post he reached on the morning of the 13th.

The two subjoined orders, issued on this occasion, are not unworthy of record, not because they are important in themselves, but because they are eminently characteristic

I Captain Peter Latouche Chambers came to Canada with the 41st Regiment about the year 1800. He was frequently mentioned in despatches during the war and afterward became Lieut.-Colonel of the 41st. His death occurred in 1828.

2 In Tupper's Life of Brock, p. 241, this date is given as the 6th of August.