Montcalm, with a mighty load lifted from his soul, passed along the lines, and gave the tired soldiers the thanks they nobly deserved.  Beer, wine, and food were served out to them, and they bivouacked for the night on the level ground between the breastwork and the fort.  The enemy had met a terrible rebuff; yet the danger was not over.  Abercromby still had more than thirteen thousand men, and he might renew the attack with cannon.  But, on the morning of the ninth, a band of volunteers who had gone out to watch him brought back the report that he was in full retreat.  The saw-mill at the Falls was on fire, and the last English soldier was gone.  On the morning of the tenth, Levis, with a strong detachment, followed the road to the landing-place, and found signs that a panic had overtaken the defeated troops.  They had left behind several hundred barrels of provisions and a large quantity of baggage; while in a marshy place that they had crossed was found a considerable number of their shoes, which had stuck in the mud, and which they had not stopped to recover.  They had embarked on the morning after the battle, and retreated to the head of the lake in a disorder and dejection wofully contrasted with the pomp of their advance.  A gallant army was sacrificed by the blunders of its chief.

Montcalm announced his victory to his wife in a strain of exaggeration that marks the exaltation of his mind.  “Without Indians, almost without Canadians or colony troops,—­I had only four hundred,—­alone with Levis and Bourlamaque and the troops of the line, thirty-one hundred fighting men, I have beaten an army of twenty-five thousand.  They repassed the lake precipitately, with a loss of at least five thousand.  This glorious day does infinite honor to the valor of our battalions.  I have no time to write more.  I am well, my dearest, and I embrace you.”  And he wrote to his friend Doreil:  “The army, the too-small army of the King, has beaten the enemy.  What a day for France!  If I had had two hundred Indians to send out at the head of a thousand picked men under the Chevalier de Levis, not many would have escaped.  Ah, my dear Doreil, what soldiers are ours!  I never saw the like.  Why were they not at Louisbourg?”

On the morrow of his victory he caused a great cross to be planted on the battle-field, inscribed with these lines, composed by the soldier-scholar himself,—­

   “Quid dux? quid miles? quid strata ingentia ligna? 
   En Signum! en victor!  Deus hic, Deus ipse triumphat.”

   “Soldier and chief and rampart’s strength are nought;
   Behold the conquering Cross!  ’T is God the triumph wrought."[637]

[Footnote 637:  Along with the above paraphrase I may give that of Montcalm himself, which was also inscribed on the cross:—­

   “Chretien! ce ne fut point Montcalm et la prudence,
     Ces arbres renverses, ces heros, leurs exploits,
   Qui des Anglais confus ont brise l’esperance;
     C’est le bras de ton Dieu, vainqueur sur cette croix.”