king advantage of his
superiority in numbers and the favorable circumstances of the time, he
entered into an armistice with the British general, and his whole army
of thirteen thousand five hundred men lay inactive till the 13th of
October, when the absurd project of crossing the Niagara at Lewiston
failed, because the New-York militia had _constitutional scruples_
against crossing a river so long as the enemy were on the other side.
The Lake Champlain column, consisting of three thousand regulars and two
thousand militia, a considerable portion of which had been collected as
early as the first of August, had in four months advanced as far as La
Cole river, a distance of about two hundred miles from Albany. The
unimportant action at this place terminated the campaign, and the army
of the North returned to winter-quarters.

All the early part of the campaign of 1813, on the northern frontier,
was spent in a war of detachments, in which our troops captured Fort
George and York, and repelled the predatory excursions of the enemy. In
these operations our troops exhibited much courage and energy, and the
young officers who led them, no little skill and military talent. But
nothing could have been more absurd than for a general, with superior
forces in the vicinity of an enemy, to act only by detachments at a time
when his opponents were daily increasing in number. This useless war of
outposts and detachments was continued till July, when General Dearborn
was recalled, and General Wilkinson, another old officer of the
Revolution, put in his place. It was now determined to make a push for
Montreal, with the combined forces of the Northern army. Wilkinson, with
8,000 men, descended the St. Lawrence, but did not reach Prescott till
the 6th of November, thus affording to the English plenty of leisure to
prepare for his reception. Hampton, another old officer of the
Revolution, ascended Lake Champlain with another column of 4,000 men,
but refused to form any co-operation with Wilkinson, and after the
unimportant combat of Chrystler's Field, the whole army again retired
to winter-quarters.

In the mean time the army of the West, under Harrison, who was assisted
by the military skill and science of McCrea and Wood, and the bravery of
Croghan and Johnson, held in check the British and Indians; and the
battle of the Thames and the victory of Lake Erie formed a brilliant
termination to the campaign in that quarter. Had such victories