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THE NEW YORK PUBLIC LIBRARY

ASTOR, LENOX

TILDEN FOUNDATIONS

to the rescue. They fell into an Indian ambuscade, and a hot fight ensued. Putnam and a few were captured. Putnam's companions were killed and scalped; but the major was reserved for a more cruel fate. He was tied to a tree, where, being part of the time between the fire of friend and foe, his clothes were riddled. When there was a lull in the conflict, a young Indian warrior amused himself by throwing a hatchet at his head, sinking it into the tree first on the right and then on the left side. When the rangers had been driven back, the major was released and taken deeper into the forest and tied to a tree. Dry brushwood was piled up about his feet and ignited. The flames began to crackle and hiss about him when a sudden thun

der shower almost extinguished them. In a moment they were rekindled and the hero would have been burned alive, had not Molang suddenly rushed on the scene, hurled the Indians right and left, and carried Putnam a captive to Ticonderoga.

Israel Putnam had more thrilling and odd adventures, perhaps, than any other American. When the conflict between the regular officers commissioned by the king and the provincials, as to questions of rank, was at its height, Putnam, who was both witty and sarcastic, said some hard things about the regulars. A captain of infantry among the regulars took exception to some of his remarks

and demanded an apology. Putnam angrily slapped his face and was challenged to fight a duel.

"As the challenged party, I have a right to choose weapons and methods, have I not?" asked Putnam.

"Certainly," the second of the British captain answered.

Putnam then proposed that each should be seated upon a keg of gunpowder with a fuse attached: that the fuse of each should be lighted at the same time by their seconds, and that he who would sit longest should be regarded as the bravest man. Two kegs were brought from Putnam's quarters. The principals were seated upon them, and the fuses of equal length lighted by the seconds. the fuses began to fizz, and the fire flash along the train, the officer of the regulars began to evince

nervousness.

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Keep your seat, captain, it's all over in a flash," said Putnam coolly.

“I am not d—n fool enough to sit here and be blown to eternity!" yelled the British captain and, leaping from the keg, he ran away. Putnam coolly walked over to the fuse of his antagonist, put it out, extinguished his own, and, when the terrified. seconds ventured, after a long time, to peep at the intrepid American, he was sitting on his keg without evincing any concern. Both kegs were filled

with onions, and, when the joke got out, the captain was so chagrined that he resigned and returned to England.

Pitt, after the success of American arms in the Ohio valley, which has been deferred for the concluding chapter of this volume, determined to deal a crushing blow at the French, which should give Canada to the English. In his arrangements for the campaign of 1759, the secretary disregarded seniority of rank. He believed in the old adage, "old men for council and young men for war. Pitt reasoned well, when he appointed General James Wolfe to the terrible task of capturing Quebec. Wolfe was young, ambitious and would do it or die. To fail would entail a life of disgrace, and, with a proud, ambitious soldier, death was preferable. History proves that young men make the best soldiers.

As soon in 1759 as the floating masses of ice would permit, the forces for the expedition against Quebec repaired to Louisburg. Wolfe, by his activity and zeal, his good judgment and the clearness of his orders, inspired unbounded confidence. His army consisted of eight regiments, two battalions of royal Americans, three companies of rangers, artillery and a brigade of engineers,-in all about eight thousand men, accompanied by a fleet. of two-and-twenty ships of the line and as many

frigates and armed vessels. On the twenty-sixth of June, the whole armament arrived off the Isle of Orleans, on which they disembarked the next day. A little south of west could be seen the cliff of Quebec, rising precipitously in the midst of one of the grandest scenes in nature, and seemingly impregnable. To protect this guardian citadel of New France, Montcalm had, of regular troops, no more than six wasted battalions, of Indians but few, for the wary savage preferred the security of the neutrals. His principal force was made up of Canadian militia. Above Quebec, the high promontory on which the upper town is built expands into an elevated plain, having, toward the river, the steepest acclivities. For nine miles above the city, every landing place was intrenched and strongly guarded. The river St. Charles, after meandering through a fertile valley, sweeps the rocky base of the town, which it covers by expanding into sedgy marshes. Nine miles below the city, the noisy Montmorenci, after fretting itself a whirlpool route and leaping for miles down the steps of a rocky bed, rushes with the velocity of an express train toward the ledge, over which, falling two hundred and fifty feet, it pours its fleecy cataract into the chasm. It was amid these scenes that Adele De Vere, more than a quarter of a century before, first had her heart touched by the soft

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