now for the first time aware of where they were, they resolved on yielding themselves prisoners to save their lives.  Night, however, again found them in the forest.  Their guide became delirious, saw visions of Indians all around, and, murmuring incoherently, straggled off a little way, seated himself in the snow, and was soon dead.  The two officers, themselves but half alive, walked all night round a tree to keep the blood in motion.  In the morning, again toiling on, they presently saw the fort across the intervening snowfields, and approached it, waving a white handkerchief.  Several French officers dashed towards them at full speed, and reached them in time to save them from the clutches of the Indians, whose camps were near at hand.  They were kindly treated, recovered from the effects of their frightful ordeal, and were afterwards exchanged.  Pringle lived to old age, and died in 1800, senior major-general of the British army.[543]

[Footnote 543:  Rogers, two days after reaching Fort Edward, made a detailed report of the fight, which was printed in the New Hampshire Gazette and other provincial papers.  It is substantially incorporated in his published Journals, which also contain a long letter from Pringle to Colonel Haviland, dated at Carillon (Ticonderoga), 28 March, and giving an excellent account of his and Roche’s adventures.  It was sent by a flag of truce, which soon after arrived from Fort Edward with a letter for Vaudreuil.  The French accounts of the fight are Hebecourt a [Vaudreuil?], 15 Mars, 1758.  Montcalm au Ministre de la Guerre, 10 Avril, 1758.  Bougainville, Journal.  Relation de l’Affaire de Roger, 19 Mars, 1758. Autre Relation, meme date.  Levis, Journal.  According to Levis, the French force consisted of 250 Indians and Canadians, and a number of officers, cadets, and soldiers.  Roger puts it at 700.  Most of the French writers put the force of the rangers, correctly, at about 180.  Rogers reports his loss at 125.  None of the wounded seem to have escaped, being either murdered after the fight, or killed by exposure in the woods.  The Indians brought in 144 scalps, having no doubt divided some of them, after their ingenious custom.  Rogers threw off his overcoat during the fight, and it was found on the field, with his commission in the pocket; whence the report of his death.  There is an unsupported tradition that he escaped by sliding on his snow-shoes down a precipice of Rogers Rock.]

Chapter 17

1753-1760

Bigot

At this stormy epoch of Canadian history the sinister figure of the Intendant Bigot moves conspicuous on the scene.  Not that he was answerable for all the manifold corruption that infected the colony, for much of it was rife before his time, and had a vitality of its own; but his office and character made him the centre of it, and, more than any other man, he marshalled and organized the forces of knavery.