army from Canada. This retreat of undisciplined troops, in the presence
of vastly superior numbers of the enemy, would have been extremely
hazardous had it not been effected on a line of forts which were held by
our own troops. As it was we sustained no considerable loss.

Carleton pursued on rapidly, to co-operate with General Howe, who was
now lying at New York with over one hundred ships and about thirty-five
thousand troops; but he received a decided check from the guns of
Ticonderoga, and retired again to Canada.

By the British plan of campaign in 1777, the entire force of their
northern army was to concentrate at Albany. One division of fifteen
hundred men, including Indians, advanced by Oswego, Wood Creek, and the
Mohawk; but Fort Stanwix, with a garrison of only six hundred men,
arrested their progress and forced them to return. Another, leaving New
York, ascended the Hudson as far as Esopus; but its progress was so much
retarded by the small forts and water-batteries along that river, that
it would have been too late to assist Burgoyne, even if it could
possibly have reached Albany. The principal division of the enemy's
army, numbering about nine thousand men, advanced by the Champlain
route. Little or no preparations were made to arrest its progress. The
works of Ticonderoga were so out of repair as to be indefensible on the
flanks. Its garrison consisted of only fifteen hundred continental
troops, and about as many militia, over whom the general had no control.
Their supply of provisions was exhausted, and only one man in ten of the
militia had bayonets to their guns. Under these circumstances it was
deemed best to withdraw the garrison six days after the investment.
Burgoyne now advanced rapidly, but with so little precaution as to leave
his communications in rear entirely unprotected. Being repulsed by the
American forces collected at Saratoga, his line of supplies cut off by
our detached forts, his provisions exhausted, his troops dispirited, and
his Indian allies having deserted him, retreat became impossible, and
his whole army was forced to capitulate. This campaign closed the
military operations on our northern frontier during the war of the
Revolution.

We now come to the war of 1812. In the beginning of this war the number
of British regulars in the Canadas did not exceed three thousand men,
who were scattered along a frontier of more than nine hundred miles in
extent. In the whole of Upper Canad