[615] With this central column came what are
described as two floating castles, which were no doubt batteries to
cover the landing of the troops. On the right hand and the left were the
provincials, uniformed in blue, regiment after regiment, from
Massachusetts, Connecticut, New York, New Jersey, and Rhode Island.
Behind them all came the bateaux, loaded with stores and baggage, and
the heavy flatboats that carried the artillery, while a rear-guard of
provincials and regulars closed the long procession.[616]
[Footnote 615: See Appendix G.]
[Footnote 616: _Letter from Lake George_, in _Boston News Letter_. Even
Rogers, the ranger, speaks of the beauty of the scene.]
At five in the afternoon they reached Sabbath-Day Point, twenty-five
miles down the lake, where they stopped till late in the evening,
waiting for the baggage and artillery, which had lagged behind; and here
Lord Howe, lying on a bearskin by the side of the ranger, John Stark,
questioned him as to the position of Ticonderoga and its best points of
approach. At about eleven o'clock they set out again, and at daybreak
entered what was then called the Second Narrows; that is to say, the
contraction of the lake where it approaches its outlet. Close on their
left, ruddy in the warm sunrise, rose the vast bare face of Rogers Rock,
whence a French advanced party, under Langy and an officer named
Trepezec, was watching their movements.
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