rossed with them, but on
reaching the other side of the lake claimed the command.
Allen angrily refused. The debate waxed hot; Arnold had the
commission; Allen had the men: the best of the situation lay
with the latter. He was about to settle the difficulty by
ordering Arnold under guard, when one of his friends,
fearing danger to the enterprise from the controversy,
suggested that the two men should march side by side. This
compromise was accepted and the dispute ended.

By this time day was about to break. Eighty-three men had
landed, and the boats had returned for the rest. But there
was evidently no time to lose if the fort was to be
surprised. They must move at once, without waiting for the
remainder of the party. A farmer's boy of the vicinity, who
was familiar with the fort, offered to act as guide, and in
a few minutes more the advance was begun, the two leaders at
the head, Allen in command, Arnold as a volunteer.

The stockade was reached. A wicket stood open. Through this
Allen charged followed by his men. A sentry posted there
took aim, but his piece missed fire, and he ran back
shouting the alarm. At his heels came the two leaders, at
full speed, their men crowding after, till, before a man of
the garrison appeared, the fort was fairly won.

Allen at once arranged his men so as to face each of the
barracks. It was so early that most of those within were
still asleep, and the fort was captured without the
commander becoming aware that any thing unusual was going
on. His whole command was less than fifty men, and
resistance would have been useless with double their number
of stalwart mountaineers on the parade-ground.

Allen forced one of the sentries who had been captured to
show him the way to the quarters of Captain Delaplace, the
commander. Reaching the chamber of the latter, the militia
leader called on him in a stentorian voice to surrender.
Delaplace sprang out of bed, and, half dressed, appeared
with an alarmed and surprised face at the door.

"By whose authority?" he demanded, not yet alive to the
situation.

"In the name of the great Jehovah and the Continental
Congress!" roared out the Green Mountaineer.

Here was a demand which backed as it was by a drawn sword
and the sound of shouts of triumph outside, it would have
been madness to resist. The fort was surrendered with
scarcely a shot fired or a blow exchanged, and its large
stores of cannon and ammunition, then sorely needed by th