Page:Cambridge Modern History Volume 7.djvu/158

 126 Mont calm in Canada. [1756 scarcity of food that prevailed there through the winter of 1755-56. But in May, 1756, war was formally declared; and the Marquis de Mont- calm sailed in the same month with supplies of all kinds and 1200 fresh troops to take command of the Canadian forces. He was a man of high character and ability, then in his forty-fourth year, and had served with distinction in Europe. His immediate subordinates were de Levis, Bourlamaque, and de Bougainville, all three of them efficient soldiers. England sent out Lord Loudon as commander-in-chief, the 35th regiment, 900 strong, sailing just before him, with Abercrombie and Webb. Loudon was a respectable soldier, but wholly lacked vigour and initiative. He was quite unequal to a situation so strange and trying, and no match whatever for his able adversary with an army and a colony at his entire disposal. Montcalm indeed lost little time. In August he headed in person an expedition against Oswego and forced the garrison, some thousand strong, who should have been reinforced, to capitulate at discretion. Forts, houses, stores and shipping were de- molished. The place was temporarily erased from the map, and Ontario once more became a French lake. The blow was a severe one, and the English this summer had no successes of any kind to counterbalance it. It had been intended to send another expedition against Fort Duquesne along Braddock's road, but Pennsylvania and Virginia refused all as- sistance, and the project had to be abandoned. The chief operations of the summer had their centre at Albany, which may be roughly described as in the angle of the only two routes to Canada the one leading north through Lakes George and Champlain to Montreal, the other westward up the Mohawk valley to Oswego on Lake Ontario. The country they penetrated was a rugged and romantic wilderness, the historic battle-ground of eighteenth century America, much of it occupied by the Indians of the Five Nations, whom a tradi- tional policy and Johnson's skilful diplomacy kept neutral or friendly in spite of French prestige. The efforts of the British were mainly directed towards the northern route and, as in the preceding year, to the expulsion of the French from the lodgements they had gained within such easy striking distance both of New York and the New England colonies. There were as yet few British regulars in America. The newly arrived 35th and Braddock's survivors were almost all that Loudon had at his disposal. But an army of several thousand provincials, mostly New Englanders, had taken the field, and were gathered under his orders. Except that they could handle a gun and possessed as much courage as could be expected without discipline, never was a people more calculated to be the despair of a commander than the Americans of that day. Every colony jealously controlled its own levies and its own military expenditure, and set limits, not only to the term of the men's services, but sometimes even to the districts in which those services were to be given. The New England militia regiments chose their own officers, usually their own social