that they were at
hand.

[Footnote 740: _Rutherford to Haldimand, 14 July, 1759._ Prideaux was
extremely disgusted. _Prideaux to Haldimand, 13 July, 1759_. Allan
Macleane, of the Highlanders, calls the engineers "fools and blockheads,
G--d d--n them." _Macleane to Haldimand, 21 July, 1759._]

Aubry and Ligneris, with their motley following, had left Presquisle a
few days before, to the number, according to Vaudreuil, of eleven
hundred French and two hundred Indians.[741] Among them was a body of
colony troops; but the Frenchmen of the party were chiefly traders and
bushrangers from the West, connecting links between civilization and
savagery; some of them indeed were mere white Indians, imbued with the
ideas and morals of the wigwam, wearing hunting-shirts of smoked
deer-skin embroidered with quills of the Canada porcupine, painting
their faces black and red, tying eagle feathers in their long hair, or
plastering it on their temples with a compound of vermilion and glue.
They were excellent woodsmen, skilful hunters, and perhaps the best
bush-fighters in all Canada.

[Footnote 741: "Il n'y avoit que 1,100 Francois et 200 sauvages."
_Vaudreuil au Ministre, 30 Oct. 1759._ Johnson says "1,200 men, with a
number of Indians." _Johnson to Amherst, 25 July, 1759._ Portneuf,
commanding at Presquisle, wrote to Pouchot that there were 1,600 French
and 1,200 Indians. Pouchot, II. 94. A letter from Aubry to Pouchot put
the whole at 2,500, half of them Indians. _Historical Magazine_, V.,
Second Series, 199.]

When Pouchot heard the firing, he went with a wounded artillery officer
to the bastion next the river; and as the forest had been cut away for a
great distance, they could see more than a mile and a half along the
shore. There, by glimpses among trees and bushes, they descried bodies
of men, now advancing, and now retreating; Indians in rapid movement,
and the smoke of guns, the sound of which reached their ears in heavy
volleys, or a sharp and angry rattle. Meanwhile the English cannon had
ceased their fire, and the silent trenches seemed deserted, as if their
occupants were gone to meet the advancing foe. There was a call in the
fort for volunteers to sally and destroy the works; but no sooner did
they show themselves along the covered way than the seemingly abandoned
trenches were thronged with men and bayonets, and the attempt was given
up. The distant firing lasted half an hour, then ceased, and Pouchot
remained in su