"Nay, Major Montgomerie," observed the General, "it would indeed be exacting too much to require that we should offer ourselves unresisting victims to the ambitious designs (forgive the expression) of your Government; and what but self immolation would it be to abstain from the only means by which we can hope to save these threatened Provinces? Colonel D'Egville has just said that, with the Indians opposed to us, Canada would fall. I go farther, and aver that, without the aid of the Indians, circumstanced as England now is, Canada must be lost to us. It is a painful alternative I admit, for that a war, which is not carried on with the conventional courtesies of civilized belligerent nations, is little suited to our taste, you will do us the justice to believe; but by whom have we been forced into the dilemma? Had we been guilty of rousing the Indian spirit against you, with a view to selfish advantage; or had we in any may connived at the destruction of your settlements, from either dread or jealousy of your too close proximity, then should we have deserved all the odium of such conduct. But this we unequivocally deny. Had we even, presuming on the assistance to be derived from them, been the first to engage the Indians in this war, and sent them forth to lay waste your possessions, we might have submitted to well merited censure; but what is our real position? Without any fair pretext, and simply in furtherance of its ambitious views, the Government of the United States declares war against England, and, with, an eagerness that sufficiently discloses its true object, marches its rapidly organized armies as rapidly to our weakly defended frontier. It is scarcely a week since an express reached this post, bringing the announcement that hostilities had been declared and as a proof that these must have been long in contemplation, even the very day previous to its arrival, a numerous army marched past on their way to Detroit. The sound of their drums was the first intimation we had of their approach, and our surprise was only equalled by our utter ignorance of the motive, until the arrival of the express at once explained the enigma. [Footnote: Fact.] In such a case, I maintain, we stand justified before God and man in availing ourselves of every means of defence." "I cannot acknowledge," replied the American, "that the war undertaken by our Government, is without sufficient pretext, or in a mere spirit of conquest. You forget that an insult was offered to our national flag."