Without
fortuitous advantage the Americans proved too much for the redoubtable
English, though superior in number, therefore universally arrogating to
themselves even with inferior numbers, a mastery but faintly questioned
by most Americana; no accident to depreciate the triumph of the younger
over the older nation; no more fortune than what favors the bravest.
Physical and even corporeal national characteristics, did not escape
comparison in this normal contest. The American rather more active and
more demonstrative than his ancestors, many of the officers of imposing
figure, Scott and McNeil particularly, towering with gigantic stature
above the rest, stood opposed in striking contrast to the short, thick,
brawny, burly Briton, hard to overcome.... The Marquis of Tweedale,
with his sturdy, short person, and stubborn courage, represented
the British.... Even the names betokened at once consanguinity and
hostility. Scott, McNeill, and McRee, in arms against Gordon, Hay, and
Maconochie. And the harsh Scotch nomenclature, compared with the more
euphonious savage Canada, Chippewa, Niagara, which latter modern English
prosody has corrupted from the measure of Goldsmith's Traveller:--
"Where wild Oswego spreads her swamps around,
And Niagara stuns with thundering sound.
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