[Footnote 312:  Dialogue entre le Marechal de Saxe et le Baron de Dieskau aux Champs Elysees.  This paper is in the Archives de la Guerre, and was evidently written or inspired by Dieskau himself.  In spite of its fanciful form, it is a sober statement of the events of the campaign.  There is a translation of it in N.Y.  Col.  Docs., X. 340.]

It was near five o’clock when the final rout took place.  Some time before, several hundred of the Canadians and Indians had left the field and returned to the scene of the morning fight, to plunder and scalp the dead.  They were resting themselves near a pool in the forest, close beside the road, when their repose was interrupted by a volley of bullets.  It was fired by a scouting party from Fort Lyman, chiefly backwoodsmen, under Captains Folsom and McGinnis.  The assailants were greatly outnumbered; but after a hard fight the Canadians and Indians broke and fled.  McGinnis was mortally wounded.  He continued to give orders till the firing was over; then fainted, and was carried, dying, to the camp.  The bodies of the slain, according to tradition, were thrown into the pool, which bears to this day the name of Bloody Pond.

The various bands of fugitives rejoined each other towards night, and encamped in the forest; then made their way round the southern shoulder of French Mountain, till, in the next evening, they reached their canoes.  Their plight was deplorable; for they had left their knapsacks behind, and were spent with fatigue and famine.

Meanwhile their captive general was not yet out of danger.  The Mohawks were furious at their losses in the ambush of the morning, and above all at the death of Hendrick.  Scarcely were Dieskau’s wounds dressed, when several of them came into the tent.  There was a long and angry dispute in their own language between them and Johnson, after which they went out very sullenly.  Dieskau asked what they wanted.  “What do they want?” returned Johnson.  “To burn you, by God, eat you, and smoke you in their pipes, in revenge for three or four of their chiefs that were killed.  But never fear; you shall be safe with me, or else they shall kill us both."[313] The Mohawks soon came back, and another talk ensued, excited at first, and then more calm; till at length the visitors, seemingly appeased, smiled, gave Dieskau their hands in sign of friendship, and quietly went out again.  Johnson warned him that he was not yet safe; and when the prisoner, fearing that his presence might incommode his host, asked to be removed to another tent, a captain and fifty men were ordered to guard him.  In the morning an Indian, alone and apparently unarmed, loitered about the entrance, and the stupid sentinel let him pass in.  He immediately drew a sword from under a sort of cloak which he wore, and tried to stab Dieskau; but was prevented by the Colonel to whom the tent belonged, who seized upon him, took away his sword, and pushed him out.  As soon as his wounds would