lion, he opposed the enemy’s advance long enough to secure the escape of six of his vessels; and then, seeing his one consort forced to strike, he ran his own galley ashore and set her on fire.  “Arnold,” says the naval historian Cooper, “covered himself with glory, and his example seems to have been nobly followed by most of his officers and men.  The manner in which the Congress was fought until she had covered the retreat of the galleys, and the stubborn resolution with which she was defended until destroyed, converted the disasters of this part of the day into a species of triumph.”  “The Americans,” says a contemporary British writer, “chiefly gloried in the dangerous attention paid by Arnold to a nice point of honor, in keeping his flag flying, and not quitting his galley till she was in flames, lest the enemy should have boarded and struck it.”

Pellew received like recognition, not, perhaps, from the popular voice, but from his official superiors.  Douglas, the senior naval officer at Quebec, who was made a baronet in reward of these operations, Lord Howe at New York, and the First Lord of the Admiralty in England, all sent him personal letters of commendation; and the two latter promised him promotion as soon as he came within their respective jurisdictions.  His continuance at the front of operations during this and the following year therefore postponed his deserved advancement to a lieutenancy, by retaining him from the “jurisdiction” of those able to bestow it.

The two gallant enemies were soon again brought together in an incident which came near to change the career of one of them, and, in so doing, to modify seriously the fortunes of many others.  Arnold having one day pulled out on the open lake, in his venturesome manner, Pellew gave chase in another boat.  The Americans being hard pressed and capture probable, Arnold unbuckled his stock and himself took an oar.  So nearly caught was he, that he had to escape into the bushes, leaving behind him stock and buckle; and these, as late as sixty years after, remained in the possession of Pellew’s brother.  Had he thus been deprived of the opportunity that Saratoga gave him the next year, Arnold’s name might now be known to us only as that of the brave officer who kept his country’s flag flying till his vessel was in flames.

On the 14th of October Carleton landed at Crown Point, which the Americans had abandoned; but the lateness of the season deterred him from advancing against Ticonderoga, and he soon afterwards returned to Canada.  The full import of this halt is too easily overlooked, with consequent failure to appreciate the momentous influence exerted upon the course of the Revolutionary War by this naval campaign, in which Pellew bore so conspicuous a part.  It has never been understood in America, where the smallness of the immediate scale has withdrawn attention from the greatness of the ultimate issue, in gaining time for the preparations which resulted in the admittedly decisive victories