petty rivulet that hurries down the steep to
be lost in the river. Its cradle lies in the bed of a broad ravine,
forty or fifty feet deep, that rises in the hill-side, and, crossing the
whole of the second bottom, debouches on the first, where the waters
whose current it so far guides, trickle oozily down through a swampy
bed. Great trees grew within and along this chasm, and the usual smaller
growth peculiar to such a situation; and a prodigious copse of wild
grape-vines, not yet entirely gone, shrouded its termination upon the
first bottom and shadowed the birth of the infant brook.

About two hundred yards from the line of hills, and three hundred south
of the ravine just described, commences another of a more singular
nature; with its steep sides, almost exactly perpendicular, it perfectly
resembles a ditch cut for purposes of defence. Rising near the middle of
the second bottom, it runs westwardly to the upper edge of the first,
with a depth at its head of four or five feet, increasing as it
descends, and a width of eight or ten. A century ago its channel was
overhung and completely concealed by a luxurious thicket of pea-vines
and trailers, of bramble-bushes and the Indian plum; its edges closely
fringed with the thin, tall wood-grass of summer. But even now, when the
forests are gone and the plough long since passed over the scene, the
ravine cannot be at all perceived until one is directly upon it; and
hence arose the chief disasters of the day. Parallel with and about one
hundred fifty yards north of this second gulley ran a third; a dry, open
hollow, and rather thinly wooded; but which afforded a happy protection
to the enemy from the English fire. Either of these ravines would have
sheltered an army; the second--the most important, though not the
largest--would of itself afford concealment to a thousand men.

There is little reason to doubt that as Braddock drew near, M. de
Contrecoeur was almost decided to abandon his position without
striking a blow, and, withdrawing his men, as did his successor, in
1758, leave to the English a bloodless victory. He certainly was
prepared to surrender on terms of honorable capitulation. A solitary
gun was mounted upon a carriage to enable the garrison to evacuate with
the honors of war; it being a point of nice feeling with a defeated
soldier that he should retire with drums beating a national march, his
own colors flying, and a cannon loaded, with a lighted match. This
d