We find, then, that the battle of Bennington had cost Burgoyne not far from two thousand men, whether soldiers or Indians. More than this, it had thrown him back upon his second alternative, which, we remember, was to halt until supplies could be brought from Canada. This was easily equivalent to a month's delay. Thirty days of inaction were thus forced upon Burgoyne at a time when every one of them was worth five hundred men to the Americans. Such were some of the substantial results of the victory at Bennington. To the Americans, the moral and material gains were no less striking or important. At once confidence was restored. Men no longer hesitated to turn out, or feared for the result. A most hopeful sign was the alacrity with which the well-to-do farmers went into the ranks. There was general appreciation of the fact that Burgoyne had seriously compromised himself by advancing as far as he had; in short, the re-action was quite as decisive as that which had followed the victory at Trenton. FOOTNOTES: [34] BREYMAN'S RETREAT. The express from Baum arrived at headquarters at 5 A.M. of the fifteenth. Orders were immediately given Breyman to march. News of Baum's defeat reached Burgoyne during the night of the sixteenth. The 20th regiment, British, was immediately marched to Breyman's support. Burgoyne's anxiety was so great, that he followed it until Breyman's corps was met on the road. [35] ECHELON, the French word for step-ladder, by adoption a universal military term, well describes the posting of troops, belonging to one army, at stated intervals apart, so as to be moved forward or backward step by step, always keeping the same relative distances between the separate bodies. In marking out such positions on the map, the columns would look like the rounds of a ladder, hence the term. X. ST. LEGER'S EXPEDITION. Burgoyne's hopes now chiefly turned upon the promised cooeperation of St. Leger from Oswego, and of Sir William Howe from New York. [Sidenote: Refer to "Plan of Campaign."] Convinced that the enemy would shortly invade the Mohawk Valley, Schuyler had sent Colonel Gansevoort[36] to put Fort Stanwix,[37] the key to this valley, in a state of defence, before it should be attacked. [Illustration: ST. LEGER'S ROUTE TO FORT STANWIX.] St. Leger's force was the counterpart of Burgoyne's, in that it consisted of regular troops, loyalists, and Indians. Many of the loyalists, and most of the Indians, had lived in this valley, so that St. Leger had no want of guides, who knew every foot of ground, or of spies acquainted with the sentiments of every settler. [Sidenote: Aug. 3.] A scanty supply of provisions had just been brought into the fort when St. Leger's scouts opened fire upon it. The garrison shut the gates and returned the fire. Instead of finding Fort Stanwix defenceless, St. Leger was compelled to lay siege to it.