why does command echo \\\foobar print \\foobar

[Mark Galeck (CW)]

With the makefile

foobar:
                echo \\\foobar


why 

C:\Temp>make foobar
\\foobar


Where is this explained in the manual? echo \\\foobar produces 3 slashes, so it 
must be make that is stripping off one slash.  Therefore it must be that \ is a 
special character in this context.  OK, then the first \ escapes the second 
one, the second one is printed, then why doesn't the third one escape the "f" 
and produce "f".  It should be either \\\foobar, or \oobar, but I don't see how 
this should produce \\foobar  ???  Where is this explained in the manual?  
Thank you very much.

Mark