Preface to Third Edition n 



and Canadians under Captain Muir, and 250 In 

 dians under Tecumseh, and whipped them, Te- 

 cumseh's Indians standing their ground longest. 

 The Americans lost 75, their foes 180 men. At 

 Chicago the small force of 66 Americans was sur 

 prised and massacred by the Indians. Meanwhile, 

 General Brock, the British commander, advanced 

 against Hull with a rapidity and decision that 

 seemed to paralyze his senile and irresolute oppo 

 nent. The latter retreated to Detroit, where, with 

 out striking a blow, he surrendered 1,400 men to 

 Brock's nearly equal force, which consisted nearly 

 one-half of Indians under Tecumseh. On the Ni 

 agara frontier, an estimable and honest old gentle 

 man and worthy citizen, who knew nothing of mili 

 tary matters, Gen. Van Rensselaer, tried to cross 

 over and attack the British at Queenstown ; 1,100 

 Americans got across and were almost all killed 

 or captured by an equal number of British, Cana 

 dians, and Indians, while on the opposite side a 

 larger number of their countrymen looked on, 

 and with abject cowardice refused to cross to 

 their assistance. The command of the army was 

 then handed over to a ridiculous personage named 

 Smythe, who issued proclamations so bombastic that 

 they really must have come from an unsound mind, 

 and then made a ludicrously abortive effort at inva 

 sion, which failed almost of its own accord. A Brit 

 ish and Canadian force of less than 400 men was 

 foiled in an assault on Ogdensburg, after a slight 

 skirmish, by about 1,000 Americans under Brown; 



