lked
of, but Captain Beaujeu determined to lead a force out to meet the
approaching army. Taking with him a total effective of thirty-six
officers and cadets, seventy-two regular soldiers, one hundred and
forty-six Canadians, and about six hundred Indian warriors, a command
less than half the number of the enemy, he sallied out to meet him. How
insignificant were the armed forces with which the two empires were now
challenging each other for the splendid prize of a new world! Beaujeu,
gaily clad in a fringed hunting dress, intrepidly pressed on until he
came in sight of the English invaders. As soon as the alert French
commander felt the hot breath of his foe he waved his hat and his
faithful followers disappeared behind rocks and trees as if the very
earth had swallowed them.

The unsuspecting English came on. But here, when they have crossed, is a
level plain, elevated but a few feet above the surface of the river,
extending nearly half a mile landwards, and then gradually ascending
into thickly wooded hills, with Fort Duquesne beyond. The troops in
front had crossed the plain and plunged into the road through the forest
for a hundred feet when a heavy discharge of musketry and arrows was
poured upon them, which wrought in them a consternation all the greater
because they could see no foe anywhere. They shot at random, and not
without effect, for when Beaujeu fell the Canadians began to flee and
the Indians quailed in their covers before the cannon fire of the
English. But the French fighters were rallied back to their hidden
recesses, and they now kept up an incessant and destructive fire. In
this distressing situation the English fell back into the plain.
Braddock rode in among them, and he and his officers persistently
endeavored to rally them, but without success. The Colonial troops
adopted the Indian method, and each man fought for himself behind a
tree. This was forbidden by Braddock, who attempted to form his men in
platoons and columns, making their slaughter inevitable. The French and
Indians, concealed in the ravines and behind trees, kept up a cruel and
deadly fire, until the British soldiers lost all presence of mind and
began to shoot each other and their own officers, and hundreds were thus
slain. The Virginia companies charged gallantly up a hill with a loss of
but three men, but when they reached the summit the British soldiery,
mistaking them for the enemy, fired upon them, killing fifty out of
eigh