SOBAPSQUA 91 



march down the frozen lake to the succor of their 

 hard-pressed brethren; the following summer, the 

 same brave commander bearing homeward the 

 feeble remnant of the Northern army. 



Here Arnold's flotilla passed on its way to the 

 bloody battle at Valcour, and here the escaping 

 vessels were overtaken by Carleton's fleet and the 

 running fight began which ended at Arnold's Bay. 

 Through this broad gateway came Burgoyne's un- 

 returning host. Ticonderoga fell, and henceforth 

 till the close of the war British warships passed 

 and repassed in undisputed possession of the lake 

 whose waters mirrored no flag but the red cross 

 of England. Then it vanished from them till it 

 reappeared when Captain Pring's flotilla made it3 

 unsuccessful assault on Fort Cassin, at the mouth 

 of the Otter, in which McDonough's unready fleet 

 lay moored. Next day the Stars and Stripes 

 flashed past these headlands as the gallant fleet 

 sailed down the lake to its eventual glorious vic- 

 tory in Plattsburg Bay. 



Thus, for two centuries, such shifting scenes of 

 war passed in broken succession before these stead- 

 fast sentinels. Then came the peaceful sails of 

 commerce, white-winged schooners and sloops, the 

 single square canvas of Canadian craft; immense 

 lumber rafts, coaxed slowly northward by sweep 

 and sail; the first clumsy steamboat, making 

 tortoise-like progress, followed in a little while 



