The Last of the Mohicans | Page 7

with avidity the narrative of some fearful tale of
midnight murder, in which the natives of the forests were the principal
and barbarous actors. As the credulous and excited traveler related the
hazardous chances of the wilderness, the blood of the timid curdled
with terror, and mothers cast anxious glances even at those children
which slumbered within the security of the largest towns. In short, the
magnifying influence of fear began to set at naught the calculations of
reason, and to render those who should have remembered their
manhood, the slaves of the basest passions. Even the most confident
and the stoutest hearts began to think the issue of the contest was
becoming doubtful; and that abject class was hourly increasing in

numbers, who thought they foresaw all the possessions of the English
crown in America subdued by their Christian foes, or laid waste by the
inroads of their relentless allies.
* Washington, who, after uselessly admonishing the European general
of the danger into which he was heedlessly running, saved the remnants
of the British army, on this occasion, by his decision and courage. The
reputation earned by Washington in this battle was the principal cause
of his being selected to command the American armies at a later day. It
is a circumstance worthy of observation, that while all America rang
with his well-merited reputation, his name does not occur in any
European account of the battle; at least the author has searched for it
without success. In this manner does the mother country absorb even
the fame, under that system of rule.
When, therefore, intelligence was received at the fort which covered
the southern termination of the portage between the Hudson and the
lakes, that Montcalm had been seen moving up the Champlain, with an
army "numerous as the leaves on the trees," its truth was admitted with
more of the craven reluctance of fear than with the stern joy that a
warrior should feel, in finding an enemy within reach of his blow. The
news had been brought, toward the decline of a day in midsummer, by
an Indian runner, who also bore an urgent request from Munro, the
commander of a work on the shore of the "holy lake," for a speedy and
powerful reinforcement. It has already been mentioned that the distance
between these two posts was less than five leagues. The rude path,
which originally formed their line of communication, had been
widened for the passage of wagons; so that the distance which had been
traveled by the son of the forest in two hours, might easily be effected
by a detachment of troops, with their necessary baggage, between the
rising and setting of a summer sun. The loyal servants of the British
crown had given to one of these forest-fastnesses the name of William
Henry, and to the other that of Fort Edward, calling each after a favorite
prince of the reigning family. The veteran Scotchman just named held
the first, with a regiment of regulars and a few provincials; a force
really by far too small to make head against the formidable power that
Montcalm was leading to the foot of his earthen mounds. At the latter,

however, lay General Webb, who commanded the armies of the king in
the northern provinces, with a body of more than five thousand men.
By uniting the several detachments of his command, this officer might
have arrayed nearly double that number of combatants against the
enterprising Frenchman, who had ventured so far from his
reinforcements, with an army but little superior in numbers.
But under the influence of their degraded fortunes, both officers and
men appeared better disposed to await the approach of their formidable
antagonists, within their works, than to resist the progress of their
march, by emulating the successful example of the French at Fort du
Quesne, and striking a blow on their advance.
After the first surprise of the intelligence had a little abated, a rumor
was spread through the entrenched camp, which stretched along the
margin of the Hudson, forming a chain of outworks to the body of the
fort itself, that a chosen detachment of fifteen hundred men was to
depart, with the dawn, for William Henry, the post at the northern
extremity of the portage. That which at first was only rumor, soon
became certainty, as orders passed from the quarters of the
commander-in-chief to the several corps he had selected for this service,
to prepare for their speedy departure. All doubts as to the intention of
Webb now vanished, and an hour or two of hurried footsteps and
anxious faces succeeded. The novice in the military art flew from point
to point, retarding his own preparations by the excess of his violent and
somewhat distempered zeal; while the more practiced veteran