earlier times, when nicknames were more apt to become
historic, he might well have gone down to posterity as
Prevost the Pusillanimous.

Day after day Prevost's armistice kept the British
helpless, while supplies and reinforcements for the
Americans poured in at every advantageous point. Brock
was held back from taking either Sackett's Harbour, which
was meanwhile being strongly reinforced from Ogdensburg,
or Fort Niagara, which was being reinforced from Oswego,
Procter was held back from taking Fort Wayne, at the
point of the salient angle south of Lake Michigan and
west of Lake Erie--a quite irretrievable loss. For the
moment the British had the command of all the Lakes. But
their golden opportunity passed, never to return. By
land their chances were also quickly disappearing. On
September 1, a week before the armistice ended, there
were less than seven hundred Americans directly opposed
to Brock, who commanded in person at Queenston and Fort
George. On the day of the battle in October there were
nearly ten times as many along the Niagara frontier.

The very day Brock heard that the disastrous armistice
was over he proposed an immediate attack on Sackett's
Harbour. But Prevost refused to sanction it. Brock then
turned his whole attention to the Niagara frontier, where
the Americans were assembling in such numbers that to
attack them was out of the question. The British began
to receive a few supplies and reinforcements. But the
Americans had now got such a long start that, on the