more later, was forced to give up his hope of pushing on to Crown Point. This closed the fighting for the year, leaving the outlook for the colonies gloomy indeed.
War between France and England was formally declared in May, 1756—just twenty years before that memorable Revolution which separated the United States from England. The Earl of Loudon was sent out to take command of a new expedition north, but his work in that territory was no more victorious than Johnson's had been, and as a consequence the French commander, General Montcalm, captured Oswego, with all the guns and supplies left there the year previous by Shirley, and in his defeat General Webb, with a large portion of the British troops, had to fall back to Albany.
Early in the following year the English made greater preparations than ever to bring the war to a satisfactory close. Loudon sailed from New York with six thousand men, and was joined at Halifax by Admiral Holborne with a fleet of eleven warships. The object of the expedition was to attack Louisburg, but when the English arrived in the vicinity of that French stronghold they found seventeen of the enemy's warships awaiting them, backed up by heavy land fortifications, and to attack such
