stood ready to move as soon as the
word should be given. Just at the moment, however, when they were
listening to hear the order, "Forward, march!" drop from their
general's lips, they were startled by a sudden and heavy firing among
the hills, which put a sudden stop to the hundred axes, and told but
too plainly that the road-cutters and their guard of regulars had been
drawn into an ambuscade. Washington knew at once, and too well, that
the evil he dreaded from the beginning, had, on the very eve of
success, come upon them; and with it also came the painful reflection,
that it would never have so befallen them, had the rangers been
suffered to scour the woods, and beat up the enemy, as had been
recommended by him but a few hours before. Braddock forthwith ordered
two companies to hurry on to the relief of the pioneers; and, at his
bidding, one of his aides spurred forward to learn further of the
matter, and bring him word. The firing grew heavier and heavier, and
seemed to be coming nearer and nearer. The lonely hills and woods
around rang with the whoops and yells of the unseen savages. Not able
to restrain his impatience till his aide came back, Braddock ordered
his main division to come up at double-quick; and, taking with him his
two remaining aides and a small guard of light-horse, galloped up to
the scene of action. Here what was his rage and mortification to find
his doughty regulars, of whom he had boasted so much, changed, as it
were in the whistling of a bullet, into a mere disorderly rabble of
red-coats,--confused, bewildered, to a degree that he could never have
dreamed possible! Crowded and huddled together in the narrow road, he
saw them dropping down under the Indian bullets, helpless as a herd of
frightened deer beset by a band of unseen hunters.

By this time, the Indians, still hid from view by the grass and
bushes, had stretched their lines along either side of the road, from
the hollows among the hills to some distance down the rocky slope, and
were pouring in a murderous fire upon the affrighted English; yelling
and whooping the while like a legion of devils at some infernal
frolic. Two bayonet charges had been made to drive them from their
hiding-places, but in vain. The regulars, notwithstanding their
officers' orders to the contrary, kept up a hurried but random firing,
which had little or no effect upon the enemy, as nothing could be seen
of him but the puffs of rifle-smoke that rose and hover