1813	British and Americans on Canadian lakes	249

of the proceedings on this lake, to state " 150, " instead of 50 seamen. It is asserted, on the express authority of Captain Barclay himself, that no more than 50 seamen were at any time on board the Lake Erie flotilla ; the complements having been made up by Canadian peasants and soldiers, men that, without disparagement to either, were sorry substitutes for British sailors. On the other hand, the ships of the Americans, as their newspapers informed us, were equipped in the most complete manner; and through the same channel we learned, that large draughts of seamen had repeatedly marched to Lake Erie from the sea-board. The best of riflemen were to be obtained on the spot. What else was required, to render the American ships in these waters quite as effective as the best appointed ships on the ocean ?

On the 9th of September Captain Barclay was lying, with his little squadron, in the port of Amherstburgh, anxiously waiting the arrival of a promised supply of seamen. Almost surrounded by hostile shores, his people on half-allowance of food, not another day's flour in store, a large body of Indians, whose friendship would cease, with the least abridgment in their accustomed supply, close in his rear; alike hopeless of succour and of retreat, what was Captain Barclay to do ? Impelled by dread of famine, and, not improbably, of Indian treachery too, he sailed out in the evening, to risk a battle with an enemy's fleet, whose force he knew was nearly double his own.

The following statement will place the fact of superiority beyond a doubt:

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