191then rendezvoused at Fort Western, opposite the present town of Augusta. This was on the verge of an uninhabited and almost unexplored wilderness, * and toward its fearful shadows these brave men turned their faces. A small reconnoitering party was sent in advance to Lake Megantic, or Chaudière Pond, and another to survey the course and distances of the Dead River, a tributary of the Kennebec. The main body moved forward in four divisions, a day apart in time. Morgan, with the riflemen, was in the van; next were Greene and Bigelow, with their companies of musketeers; Meigs, with four other companies, followed, and the rear was brought up by Elios, with three remaining companies. Arnold was the last to leave Fort Western. He proceeded in a birch canoe, passed the several parties, and overtook Morgan on the third day at Norridgewock Falls. Here, upon a beautiful plain on the eastern bank of the river, the ancient Norridgewock Indians, a tribe of the Abenakes, had a village, and in the midst of the grandeur, beauty, and fertility of nature, and the barbarous heathenism of man in this picturesque region, Father Ralle, a French Jesuit, had erected a Christian altar, and taught the sublime truths of the Gospel. ** Here the first severe toils of the little army began, for they were obliged to carry all their bateaux, provisions, and stores around the falls, a mile and a quarter, into the navigable waters above. The banks were rocky and precipitous. They found, too, that their boats were leaky, and much of their provisions was spoiled or greatly damaged. Seven days were consumed in passing the falls and repairing the 191these vessels. The troops vessels. The same labor, though not so fatiguing, was demanded at the Carratunc Falls. * Colonel Montressor, a British officer, had traversed the wilderness fifteen years before. He ascended the Chaudière from Quebec, crossed the Highlands near the head waters of the Penobscot, passed through Moose- head Lake, and entered the eastern branch of the Kennebec. Arnold possessed an imperfect copy of the printed journal of Montressor, and this, with information received from some St. Francis Indians who visited Washington's camp, gave him an idea of the country and the privations his men must suffer. The same region was traversed by a French missionary named Decuillettes, more than two hundred years before. He crossed the St. Lawrence to the sources of the Kennebec, down which river he descended to its mouth, and thence coasted eastward to the missionary station on the Penobscot.--Hildreth, ii., 84.