384: _Montcalm au Ministre, 20 Juillet, 1756._]

[Footnote 385: _Levis au Ministre, 17 Juillet, 1756._]

The danger from the English proved to be still remote, and there was
ample leisure in the camp. Duchat, a young captain in the battalion of
Languedoc, used it in writing to his father a long account of what he
saw about him,--the forests full of game; the ducks, geese, and
partridges; the prodigious flocks of wild pigeons that darkened the air,
the bears, the beavers; and above all the Indians, their canoes, dress,
ball-play, and dances. "We are making here," says the military prophet,
"a place that history will not forget. The English colonies have ten
times more people than ours; but these wretches have not the least
knowledge of war, and if they go out to fight, they must abandon wives,
children, and all that they possess. Not a week passes but the French
send them a band of _hairdressers_, whom they would be very glad to
dispense with. It is incredible what a quantity of scalps they bring us.
In Virginia they have committed unheard-of cruelties, carried off
families, burned a great many houses, and killed an infinity of people.
These miserable English are in the extremity of distress, and repent too
late the unjust war they began against us. It is a pleasure to make war
in Canada. One is troubled neither with horses nor baggage; the King
provides everything. But it must be confessed that if it costs no money,
one pays for it in another way, by seeing nothing but pease and bacon on
the mess-table. Luckily the lakes are full of fish, and both officers
and soldiers have to turn fishermen."[386]

[Footnote 386: _Relation de M. Duchat, Capitaine au Regiment de
Languedoc, ecrite au Camp de Carillon, 15 Juillet, 1756._]

Meanwhile, at the head of Lake George, the raw bands of ever-active New
England were mustering for the fray.

Chapter 12

1756

Oswego

When, at the end of the last year, Shirley returned from his bootless
Oswego campaign, he called a council of war at New York and laid before
it his scheme for the next summer's operations. It was a comprehensive
one: to master Lake Ontario by an overpowering naval force and seize the
French forts upon it, Niagara, Frontenac, and Toronto; attack
Ticonderoga and Crown Point on the one hand, and Fort Duquesne on the
other, and at the same time perplex and divide the enemy by an inroad
down the Chaudiere upon the settlements about Quebec.[387] The council