George Bancroft, History of the United States from the Discovery of the American Continent, Vol. 4, 15th edition.

[266] themselves. The march to Fort Edward was a fight;

chap. XI.} 1757.

not more than six hundred reached there in a body. From the French camp Montcalm collected together more than four hundred, who were dismissed with a great escort, and he sent De Vaudreuil to ransom those whom the Indians had carried away.¹

After the surrender of Fort William Henry, the savages retired. Twelve hundred men were employed to demolish the fort, and nearly a thousand to lade the vast stores that had been given up. As Montcalm withdrew, he praised his happy fortune, that his victory was, on his own side, almost bloodless, his loss in killed and wounded being but fifty-three. The Canadian peasants returned to gather their harvests, and the Lake resumed its solitude. Nothing told that civilized man had reposed upon its margin, but the charred rafters of ruins, and here and there, on the side hill, a crucifix among the pines to mark a grave.²

Pusillanimity pervaded the English camp. Webb at Fort Edward, with six thousand men, was expecting to be attacked every minute. He sent his own baggage to a place which he deemed secure; and wished to retreat to the highlands on the Hudson. ‘For God's sake,’ wrote the officer in command at Albany, to the governor of Massachusetts, ‘exert yourselves to save a province; New York itself may fall;³ save a country; prevent the downfall of the ⁴ ’