160 BRADSTREET'S ARMY ON THE LAKES. [1763,1764. 



gave my reasons for so doing. Had I continued, 

 I could be of no more service than I have 

 been these eighteen months past ; which was none 

 at all, as no regard was had to any intelligence I 

 sent, no more than to my opinion." Croghan, who 

 could not be spared, was induced, on Gage's acces- 

 sion to the command, to withdraw his resignation 

 and retain his post. 



Next, we have a series of complaints from Lieu- 

 tenant Blane of Fort Ligonier ; who congratulates 

 Bouquet on his recent victory at Bushy Run, and 

 adds : " I have now to beg that I may not be left 

 any longer in this forlorn way, for I can assure you 

 the fatigue I have gone through begins to get the 

 better of me. I must therefore beg that you will 

 appoint me, by the return of the convoy, a proper 

 garrison. . . . My present situation is fifty times 

 worse than ever/' And again, on the seventeenth 

 of September : " I must beg leave to recommend to 

 your particular attention the sick soldiers here ; as 

 there is neither surgeon nor medicine, it would 

 really be charity to order them up. I must also 

 beg leave to ask what you intend to do with the 

 poor starved militia, who have neither shirts, shoes, 

 nor any thing else. I am sorry you can do nothing 

 for the poor inhabitants. ... I really get heartily 

 tired of this post." He endured it some two months 

 more, and then breaks out again on the twenty- 

 fourth of November : "I intend going home by the 

 first opportunity, being pretty much tired of a service 

 that's so little worth any man's time ; and the more 

 so, as I cannot but think I have been particularly 

 unlucky in it." 



