Come, each death-doing dog who dares venture his neck,
Come, follow the hero that goes to Quebec;

Jump aboard of the transports, and loose every sail,
Pay your debts at the tavern by giving leg-bail;
And ye that love fighting shall soon have enough:

Wolfe commands us, my boys; we shall give them Hot Stuff.

Up the River St. Lawrence our troops shall advance,
To the Grenadiers' March we will teach them to dance.
Cape Breton we have taken, and next we will try
At their capital to give them another black eye.
Vaudreuil, 't is in vain you pretend to look gruff, –
Those are coming who know how to give you Hot Stuff.

With powder in his periwig, and snuff in his nose,
Monsieur will run down our descent to oppose;
And the Indians will come: but the light infantry
Will soon oblige them to betake to a tree.
From such rascals as these may we fear a rebuff?
Advance, grenadiers, and let fly your Hot Stuff!

When the forty-seventh regiment is dashing ashore,

While bullets are whistling and cannons do roar,

Says Montcalm: "Those are Shirley's, I know the lapels."
"You lie," says Ned Botwood, "we belong to Lascelles'!
Tho' our cloathing is changed, yet we scorn a powder-puff;
So at you, ye b-s, here's give you Hot Stuff."

On the repulse at Montmorenci, Wolfe to Pitt, 2 Septembre, 1759. Vaudreuil au Ministre, 5 Octobre, 1759. Panet, Journal du Siége. Johnstone, Dialogue in Hades. Journal tenu à l'Armée, etc. Journal of the Siege of Quebec, by a Gentleman in an eminent Station on the Spot. Mémoires sur le Canada, 1749-1760. Fraser, Journal of the Siege. Journal du Siége d'après un MS. déposé à la Bibliothêque Hartwell. Foligny, Journal mémoratif. Journal of Transactions at the Siege of Quebec, in Notes and Queries, xx. 164. John Johnson, Memoirs of the Siege of Quebec. Journal of an Expedition on the River St. Lawrence. An Authentic Account of the Expedition against Quebec, by a Volunteer on that Expedition. J. Gibson to Governor Lawrence, 1 August, 1759. Knox, i. 354. Mante, 244.

CHAPTER XXVI.

1759.

AMHERST. NIAGARA.

AMHERST ON LAKE GEORGE. - CAPTURE OF TICONDEROGA AND CROWN POINT. — DELAYS OF AMHERST.- NIAGARA EXPEDITION. -LA CORNE ATTACKS OSWEGO; HIS REPULSE. - NIAGARA BESIEGED. AUBRY COMES TO ITS RELIEF.- BATTLE.-ROUT OF THE FRENCH.-THE FORT TAKEN. - ISLE-AUX-NOIX.- AMHERST ADVANCES TO ATTACK IT.-STORM.-THE ENTERPRISE ABANDONED. ROGERS ATTACKS ST. FRANCIS; DESTROYS THE Town. -SUFFERINGS OF THE RANGERS.

PITT had directed that, while Quebec was attacked, an attempt should be made to penetrate into Canada by way of Ticonderoga and Crown Point. Thus the two armies might unite in the heart of the colony, or, at least, a powerful diversion might be effected in behalf of Wolfe. At the same time Oswego was to be re-established, and the possession of Fort Duquesne, or Pittsburg, secured by reinforcements and supplies; while Amherst, the commander-in-chief, was further directed to pursue any other enterprise which in his opinion would weaken the enemy, without detriment to the main objects of the campaign.1 He accordingly resolved to attempt the capture of Niagara.

1 Pitt to Amherst, 23 January, 10 March, 1759.

Brigadier Prideaux was charged with this stroke; Brigadier Stanwix was sent to conduct the operations for the relief of Pittsburg; and Amherst himself prepared to lead the grand central advance against Ticonderoga, Crown Point, and Montreal.1

Towards the end of June he reached that valley by the head of Lake George which for five years past had been the annual mustering-place of armies. Here were now gathered about eleven thousand men, half regulars and half provincials,2 drilling every day, firing by platoons, firing at marks, practising manœuvres in the woods; going out on scouting parties, bathing parties, fishing parties; gathering wild herbs to serve for greens, cutting brushwood and meadow hay to make hospital beds. The sick were ordered on certain mornings to repair to the surgeon's tent, there, in prompt succession, to swallow such doses as he thought appropriate to their several ailments; and it was further ordered that “every fair day they that can walk be paraded together and marched down to the lake to wash their hands and faces." Courtsmartial were numerous; culprits were flogged at the head of each regiment in turn, and occasionally one was shot. A frequent employment was the cutting of spruce tops to make spruce beer. This innocent beverage was reputed sovereign against scurvy; and such was the fame of its virtues that a copious supply of the West Indian molasses used in concocting it

•

1 Amherst to Pitt, 19 June, 1759. Amherst to Stanwix, 6 May, 1759. 2 Mante, 210.

was thought indispensable to every army or garrison in the wilderness. Throughout this campaign it is repeatedly mentioned in general orders, and the soldiers are promised that they shall have as much of it as they want at a halfpenny a quart.1

The rear of the army was well protected from insult. Fortified posts were built at intervals of three or four miles along the road to Fort Edward, and especially at the station called Halfway Brook; while, for the whole distance, a broad belt of wood on both sides was cut down and burned, to deprive a skulking enemy of cover. Amherst was never long in one place without building a fort there. He now began one, which proved wholly needless, on that flat rocky hill where the English made their intrenched camp during the siege of Fort William Henry. Only one bastion of it was ever finished, and this is still shown to tourists under the name of Fort George.

The army embarked on Saturday, the twenty-first of July. The Reverend Benjamin Pomeroy watched their departure in some concern, and wrote on Monday to Abigail, his wife: "I could wish for more appearance of dependence on God than was observable among them; yet I hope God will grant deliver

1 Orderly Book of Commissary Wilson in the Expedition against Ticonderoga, 1759. Journal of Samuel Warner, a Massachusetts Soldier, 1759. General and Regimental Orders, Army of Major-General Amherst, 1759. Diary of Sergeant Merriman of Ruggles's Regiment, 1759. I owe to William L. Stone, Esq., the use of the last two curi ous documents.

ance unto Israel by them." There was another military pageant, another long procession of boats and banners, among the mountains and islands of Lake George. Night found them near the outlet; and here they lay till morning, tossed unpleasantly on waves ruffled by a summer gale. At daylight they landed, beat back a French detachment, and marched by the portage road to the saw-mill at the waterfall. There was little resistance. They occupied the heights, and then advanced to the famous line of intrenchment against which the army of Abercrombie had hurled itself in vain. These works had been completely reconstructed, partly of earth, and partly of logs. Amherst's followers were less numerous than those of his predecessor, while the French commander, Bourlamaque, had a force nearly equal to that of Montcalm in the summer before; yet he made no attempt to defend the intrenchment, and the English, encamping along its front, found it an excellent shelter from the cannon of the fort beyond.

Amherst brought up his artillery and began approaches in form, when, on the night of the twenty-third, it was found that Bourlamaque had retired down Lake Champlain, leaving four hundred men under Hebecourt to defend the place as long as possible. This was in obedience to an order from Vaudreuil, requiring him on the approach of the English to abandon both Ticonderoga and Crown Point, retreat to the outlet of Lake Champlain, take post at Isle-aux-Noix, and there defend himself to