his gigantic efforts must have been crowned with the
fullest success. But the reader has already seen how
miraculously Captain de Haldimar, reduced to the last
stage of debility, as much from inanition as from the
unnatural efforts of his flight, finally accomplished
his return to the detachment.




CHAPTER X.

At the western extremity of the lake Huron, and almost
washed by the waters of that pigmy ocean, stands the fort
of Michilimackinac. Constructed on a smaller scale, and
garrisoned by a less numerical force, the defences of
this post, although less formidable than those of the
Detroit, were nearly similar, at the period embraced by
our story, both in matter and in manner. Unlike the latter
fortress, however, it boasted none of the advantages
afforded by culture; neither, indeed, was there a single
spot in the immediate vicinity that was not clad in the
eternal forest of these regions. It is true, that art
and laborious exertion had so far supplied the deficiencies
of nature as to isolate the fort, and throw it under the
protecting sweep of its cannon; but, while this afforded
security, it failed to produce any thing like a pleasing
effect to the eye. The very site on which the fortress
now stood had at one period been a portion of the wilderness
that every where around was only terminated by the sands