Historic Handbook of the Northern Tour, by Francis Parkman (2025)

OF THE

WOLFE.

Aged 32.

OF THE

LAKES GEORGE AND CHAMPLAIN; NIAGARA; MONTREAL; QUEBEC.

BY

FRANCIS PARKMAN.

BOSTON:
LITTLE, BROWN, AND COMPANY.
1899.

Copyright, 1885,
By Francis Parkman.

University Press:
John Wilson and Son, Cambridge.

This book is a group of narratives of the most striking events of ourcolonial history connected with the principal points of interest to thetourist visiting Canada and the northern borders of the United States.

The narratives are drawn, with the addition of explanatory passages,from "The Conspiracy of Pontiac," "Pioneers of France in the New World,""The Jesuits in North America," "Count Frontenac," and "Montcalm andWolfe."

Boston, 1 April, 1885.

LAKE GEORGE AND LAKE CHAMPLAIN.

NIAGARA.

MONTREAL.

QUEBEC.

LAKE GEORGE AND LAKE CHAMPLAIN.

DISCOVERY OF LAKE CHAMPLAIN.

This beautiful lake owes its name to Samuel de Champlain, the founder ofQuebec. In 1609, long before the Pilgrim Fathers landed at Plymouth, hejoined a band of Huron and Algonquin warriors on an expedition againsttheir enemies, the Iroquois, since known as the Five Nations of NewYork. While gratifying his own love of adventure, he expected to makeimportant geographical discoveries.

After a grand war dance at the infant settlement of Quebec, the alliesset out together. Champlain was in a boat, carrying, besides himself,eleven men, chief among whom were one Marais and a pilot named LaRoutte, all armed with the arquebuse, a species of firearm shorter thanthe musket, and therefore better fitted for the woods.

They ascended the St. Lawrence and entered the Richelieu, which formsthe outlet of Lake Champlain. Here, to Champlain's great disappointment,he found his farther progress barred by the rapids at Chambly, thoughthe Indians had assured him that his boat could pass all the wayunobstructed. He told them that though they had deceived him, he wouldnot abandon them, sent Marais with the boat and most of the men back toQuebec, and, with two who offered to follow him, prepared to go on inthe Indian canoes.

The warriors lifted their canoes from the water, and in long processionthrough the forest, under the flickering sun and shade, bore them ontheir shoulders around the rapids to the smooth stream above. Here thechiefs made a muster of their forces, counting twenty-four canoes andsixty warriors. All embarked again, and advanced once more, by marsh,meadow, forest, and scattered islands, then full of game, for it was anuninhabited land, the war-path and battle-ground of hostile tribes. Thewarriors observed a certain system in their advance. Some were in frontas a vanguard; others formed the main body; while an equal number werein the forests on the flanks and rear, hunting for the subsistence ofthe whole; for, though they had a provision of parched maize poundedinto meal, they kept it for use when, from the vicinity of the enemy,hunting should become impossible.

Still the canoes advanced, the river widening as they went. Greatislands appeared, leagues in extent: Isle à la Motte, Long Island,Grande Isle. Channels where ships might float and broad reaches ofexpanding water stretched between them, and Champlain entered the lakewhich preserves his name to posterity. Cumberland Head was passed, andfrom the opening of the great channel between Grande Isle and the main,he could look forth on the wilderness sea. Edged with woods, thetranquil flood spread southward beyond the sight. Far on the left, theforest ridges of the Green Mountains were heaved against the sun,patches of snow still glistening on their tops; and on the right rosethe Adirondacks, haunts in these later years of amateur sportsmen fromcounting-rooms or college halls, nay, of adventurous beauty, withsketch-book and pencil. Then the Iroquois made them theirhunting-ground; and beyond, in the valleys of the Mohawk, the Onondaga,and the Genesee, stretched the long line of their five cantons andpalisaded towns.

The progress of the party was becoming dangerous. They changed theirmode of advance, and moved only in the night. All day, they lay close inthe depth of the forest, sleeping, lounging, smoking tobacco of theirown raising, and beguiling the hours, no doubt, with the shallow banterand obscene jesting with which knots of Indians are wont to amuse theirleisure. At twilight they embarked again, paddling their cautious waytill the eastern sky began to redden. Their goal was the rockypromontory where Fort Ticonderoga was long afterward built. Thence, theywould pass the outlet of Lake George, and launch their canoes again onthat Como of the wilderness, whose waters, limpid as a fountain-head,stretched far southward between their flanking mountains. Landing at thefuture site of Fort William Henry, they would carry their canoes throughthe forest to the River Hudson, and descending it, attack, perhaps, someoutlying town of the Mohawks. In the next century this chain of lakesand rivers became the grand highway of savage and civilized war, abloody debatable ground linked to memories of momentous conflicts.

The allies were spared so long a progress. On the morning of thetwenty-ninth of July, after paddling all night, they hid as usual in theforest on the western shore, not far from Crown Point. The warriorsstretched themselves to their slumbers, and Champlain, after walking fora time through the surrounding woods, returned to take his repose on apile of spruce-boughs. Sleeping, he dreamed a dream, wherein he beheldthe Iroquois drowning in the lake; and, essaying to rescue them, he wastold by his Algonquin friends that they were good for nothing and hadbetter be left to their fate. Now, he had been daily beset, onawakening, by his superstitious allies, eager to learn about his dreams;and, to this moment, his unbroken slumbers had failed to furnish thedesired prognostics. The announcement of this auspicious vision filledthe crowd with joy, and at nightfall they embarked, flushed withanticipated victories.

It was ten o'clock in the evening, when they descried dark objects inmotion on the lake before them. These were a flotilla of Iroquoiscanoes, heavier and slower than theirs, for they were made of oak or elmbark. Each party saw the other, and the mingled war-cries pealed overthe darkened water. The Iroquois, who were near the shore, having nostomach for an aquatic battle, landed, and, making night hideous withtheir clamors, began to barricade themselves. Champlain could see themin the woods, laboring like beavers, hacking down trees with iron axestaken from the Canadian tribes in war, and with stone hatchets of theirown making. The allies remained on the lake, a bowshot from the hostilebarricade, their canoes made fast together by poles lashed across. Allnight, they danced with as much vigor as the frailty of their vesselswould permit, their throats making amends for the enforced restraint oftheir limbs. It was agreed on both sides that the fight should bedeferred till daybreak; but meanwhile a commerce of abuse, sarcasm,menace, and boasting gave unceasing exercise to the lungs and fancy ofthe combatants,—"much," says Champlain, "like the besiegers andbesieged in a beleaguered town."

As day approached, he and his two followers put on the light armor ofthe time. Champlain wore the doublet and long hose then in vogue. Overthe doublet he buckled on a breastplate, and probably a back-piece,while his thighs were protected by cuisses of steel, and his head by aplumed casque. Across his shoulder hung the strap of his bandoleer, orammunition-box; at his side was his sword, and in his hand hisarquebuse, which he had loaded with four balls. Such was the equipmentof this ancient Indian-fighter, whose exploits date eleven years beforethe landing of the Puritans at Plymouth, and sixty-six years before KingPhilip's War.

Each of the three Frenchmen was in a separate canoe, and, as it grewlight, they kept themselves hidden, either by lying at the bottom, orcovering themselves with an Indian robe. The canoes approached theshore, and all landed without opposition at some distance from theIroquois, whom they presently could see filing out of their barricade,tall, strong men, some two hundred in number, of the boldest andfiercest warriors of North America. They advanced through the forestwith a steadiness which excited the admiration of Champlain. Among themcould be seen several chiefs, made conspicuous by their tall plumes.Some bore shields of wood and hide, and some were covered with a kind ofarmor made of tough twigs interlaced with a vegetable fibre supposed byChamplain to be cotton.

CHAMPLAIN'S FIGHT WITH THE IROQUOIS.

(Drawn by himself)

The allies, growing anxious, called with loud cries for their champion,and opened their ranks that he might pass to the front. He did so, and,advancing before his red companions-in-arms, stood revealed to theastonished gaze of the Iroquois, who, beholding the warlike apparitionin their path, stared in mute amazement. But his arquebuse was levelled;the report startled the woods, a chief fell dead, and another by hisside rolled among the bushes. Then there rose from the allies a yell,which, says Champlain, would have drowned a thunder-clap, and theforest was full of whizzing arrows. For a moment, the Iroquois stoodfirm and sent back their arrows lustily; but when another and anothergunshot came from the thickets on their flank, they broke and fled inuncontrollable terror. Swifter than hounds, the allies tore through thebushes in pursuit. Some of the Iroquois were killed; more were taken.Camp, canoes, provisions, all were abandoned, and many weapons flungdown in the panic flight. The arquebuse had done its work. The victorywas complete.

The victors made a prompt retreat from the scene of their triumph. Threeor four days brought them to the mouth of the Richelieu. Here theyseparated; the Hurons and Algonquins made for the Ottawa, their homewardroute, each with a share of prisoners for future torments. At partingthey invited Champlain to visit their towns and aid them again in theirwars,—an invitation which this paladin of the woods failed not toaccept.

Thus did New France rush into collision with the redoubted warriors ofthe Five Nations. Here was the beginning, in some measure doubtless thecause, of a long suite of murderous conflicts, bearing havoc and flameto generations yet unborn. Champlain had invaded the tiger's den; andnow, in smothered fury, the patient savage would lie biding his day ofblood.

DISCOVERY OF LAKE GEORGE.

It was thirty-three years since Champlain had first attacked theIroquois. They had nursed their wrath for more than a generation, and atlength their hour was come. The Dutch traders at Fort Orange, nowAlbany, had supplied them with firearms. The Mohawks, the most easterlyof the Iroquois nations, had, among their seven or eight hundredwarriors, no less than three hundred armed with the arquebuse. They weremasters of the thunderbolts which, in the hands of Champlain, had struckterror into their hearts.

In the early morning of the second of August, 1642, twelve Huron canoeswere moving slowly along the northern shore of the expansion of the St.Lawrence known as the Lake of St. Peter. There were on board about fortypersons, including four Frenchmen, one of them being the Jesuit, IsaacJogues. During the last autumn he, with Father Charles Raymbault, hadpassed along the shore of Lake Huron northward, entered the straitthrough which Lake Superior discharges itself, pushed on as far as theSault Sainte Marie, and preached the Faith to two thousand Ojibwas, andother Algonquins there assembled. He was now on his return from a farmore perilous errand. The Huron mission was in a state of destitution.There was need of clothing for the priests, of vessels for the altars,of bread and wine for the eucharist, of writing materials,—in short, ofeverything; and, early in the summer of the present year, Jogues haddescended to Three Rivers and Quebec with the Huron traders, to procurethe necessary supplies. He had accomplished his task, and was on his wayback to the mission. With him were a few Huron converts, and among thema noted Christian chief, Eustache Ahatsistari. Others of the party werein course of instruction for baptism; but the greater part were heathen,whose canoes were deeply laden with the proceeds of their bargains withthe French fur-traders.

Jogues sat in one of the leading canoes. He was born at Orleans in 1607,and was thirty-five years of age. His oval face and the delicate mouldof his features indicated a modest, thoughtful, and refined nature. Hewas constitutionally timid, with a sensitive conscience and greatreligious susceptibilities. He was a finished scholar, and might havegained a literary reputation; but he had chosen another career, and onefor which he seemed but ill fitted. Physically, however, he was wellmatched with his work; for, though his frame was slight, he was soactive, that none of the Indians could surpass him in running.

With him were two young men, René Goupil and Guillaume Couture, donnésof the mission,—that is to say, laymen who, from a religious motive andwithout pay, had attached themselves to the service of the Jesuits.Goupil had formerly entered upon the Jesuit novitiate at Paris, butfailing health had obliged him to leave it. As soon as he was able, hecame to Canada, offered his services to the Superior of the mission, wasemployed for a time in the humblest offices, and afterwards became anattendant at the hospital. At length, to his delight, he receivedpermission to go up to the Hurons, where the surgical skill which he hadacquired was greatly needed; and he was now on his way thither. Hiscompanion, Couture, was a man of intelligence and vigor, and of acharacter equally disinterested. Both were, like Jogues, in the foremostcanoes; while the fourth Frenchman was with the unconverted Hurons, inthe rear.

The twelve canoes had reached the western end of the Lake of St. Peter,where it is filled with innumerable islands. The forest was close ontheir right, they kept near the shore to avoid the current, and theshallow water before them was covered with a dense growth of tallbulrushes. Suddenly the silence was frightfully broken. The war-whooprose from among the rushes, mingled with the reports of guns and thewhistling of bullets; and several Iroquois canoes, filled with warriors,pushed out from their concealment, and bore down upon Jogues and hiscompanions. The Hurons in the rear were seized with a shameful panic.They leaped ashore; left canoes, baggage, and weapons; and fled into thewoods. The French and the Christian Hurons made fight for a time; butwhen they saw another fleet of canoes approaching from the oppositeshores or islands, they lost heart, and those escaped who could. Goupilwas seized amid triumphant yells, as were also several of the Huronconverts. Jogues sprang into the bulrushes, and might have escaped; butwhen he saw Goupil and the neophytes in the clutches of the Iroquois, hehad no heart to abandon them, but came out from his hiding-place, andgave himself up to the astonished victors. A few of them had remained toguard the prisoners; the rest were chasing the fugitives. Joguesmastered his agony, and began to baptize those of the captive convertswho needed baptism.

Couture had eluded pursuit; but when he thought of Jogues and of whatperhaps awaited him, he resolved to share his fate, and, turning,retraced his steps. As he approached, five Iroquois ran forward to meethim; and one of them snapped his gun at his breast, but it missed fire.In his confusion and excitement, Couture fired his own piece, and laidthe savage dead. The remaining four sprang upon him, stripped off allhis clothing, tore away his finger-nails with their teeth, gnawed hisfingers with the fury of famished dogs, and thrust a sword through oneof his hands. Jogues broke from his guards, and, rushing to his friend,threw his arms about his neck. The Iroquois dragged him away, beat himwith their fists and war-clubs till he was senseless, and, when herevived, lacerated his fingers with their teeth, as they had done thoseof Couture. Then they turned upon Goupil, and treated him with the sameferocity. The Huron prisoners were left for the present unharmed. Moreof them were brought in every moment, till at length the number ofcaptives amounted in all to twenty-two, while three Hurons had beenkilled in the fight and pursuit. The Iroquois, about seventy in number,now embarked with their prey; but not until they had knocked on the headan old Huron, whom Jogues, with his mangled hands, had just baptized,and who refused to leave the place. Then, under a burning sun, theycrossed to the spot on which the town of Sorel now stands, at the mouthof the River Richelieu, where they encamped.

Their course was southward, up the River Richelieu and Lake Champlain;thence, by way of Lake George, to the Mohawk towns. The pain and feverof their wounds, and the clouds of mosquitoes, which they could notdrive off, left the prisoners no peace by day nor sleep by night. On theeighth day, they learned that a large Iroquois war-party, on their wayto Canada, were near at hand; and they soon approached their camp, on asmall island near the southern end of Lake Champlain. The warriors, twohundred in number, saluted their victorious countrymen with volleys fromtheir guns; then, armed with clubs and thorny sticks, ranged themselvesin two lines, between which the captives were compelled to pass up theside of a rocky hill. On the way, they were beaten with such fury, thatJogues, who was last in the line, fell powerless, drenched in blood andhalf dead. As the chief man among the French captives, he fared theworst. His hands were again mangled, and fire applied to his body; whilethe Huron chief, Eustache, was subjected to tortures even moreatrocious. When, at night, the exhausted sufferers tried to rest, theyoung warriors came to lacerate their wounds and pull out their hair andbeards.

In the morning they resumed their journey. And now the lake narrowed tothe semblance of a tranquil river. Before them was a woody mountain,close on their right a rocky promontory, and between these flowed astream, the outlet of Lake George. On those rocks, more than a hundredyears after, rose the ramparts of Ticonderoga. They landed, shoulderedtheir canoes and baggage, took their way through the woods, passed thespot where the fierce Highlanders and the dauntless regiments of Englandbreasted in vain the storm of lead and fire, and soon reached the shorewhere Abercrombie landed and Lord Howe fell. First of white men, Joguesand his companions gazed on the romantic lake that bears the name, notof its gentle discoverer, but of the dull Hanoverian king. Like a fairNaiad of the wilderness, it slumbered between the guardian mountainsthat breathe from crag and forest the stern poetry of war. But all thenwas solitude; and the clang of trumpets, the roar of cannon, and thedeadly crack of the rifle had never as yet awakened their angryechoes.[1]

Again the canoes were launched, and the wild flotilla glided on itsway,—now in the shadow of the heights, now on the broad expanse, nowamong the devious channels of the narrows, beset with woody islets,where the hot air was redolent of the pine, the spruce, and thecedar,—till they neared that tragic shore, where, in the followingcentury, New England rustics baffled the soldiers of Dieskau, whereMontcalm planted his batteries, where the red cross waved so long amidthe smoke, and where at length the summer morning was hideous withcarnage, and an honored name was stained with a memory of blood.

The Iroquois landed at or near the future site of Fort William Henry,left their canoes, and, with their prisoners, began their march for thenearest Mohawk town. Each bore his share of the plunder. Even Jogues,though his lacerated hands were in a frightful condition and his bodycovered with bruises, was forced to stagger on with the rest under aheavy load. He with his fellow-prisoners, and indeed the whole party,were half starved, subsisting chiefly on wild berries. They crossed theupper Hudson, and, in thirteen days after leaving the St. Lawrence,neared the wretched goal of their pilgrimage, a palisaded town, standingon a hill by the banks of the River Mohawk.

Such was the first recorded visit of white men to Lake George. In theIroquois villages Jogues was subjected to the most frightful sufferings.His friend Goupil was murdered at his side, and he himself was saved asby miracle. At length, with the help of the Dutch of Albany, he made hisescape and sailed for France; whence, impelled by religious enthusiasm,he returned to Canada and voluntarily set out again for the Iroquoistowns, bent on saving the souls of those who had been the authors of hiswoes. Reaching the head of Lake George on Corpus Christi Day, 1646, hegave it the name of Lac St. Sacrement, by which it was ever after knownto the French. Soon after his arrival the Iroquois killed him by theblow of a hatchet.

BATTLE OF LAKE GEORGE.

For more than a century after the death of Jogues, Lakes George andChamplain were the great route of war parties between Canada and theBritish Colonies. Courcelles came this way in 1666 to lay waste theMohawk towns; and Mantet and Sainte-Hélène, in 1690, to destroySchenectady in the dead of winter; while, in the next year, MajorSchuyler took the same course as he advanced into Canada to retort theblow. Whenever there was war between France and England, these two lakesbecame the scene of partisan conflicts, in which the red men took partwith the white, some as allies of the English, and some as allies of theFrench. When at length the final contest took place for the possessionof the continent, the rival nations fiercely disputed the mastery ofthis great wilderness thoroughfare, and the borders of Lake Georgebecame the scene of noteworthy conflicts. The first of these was in1755, the year of Braddock's defeat, when Shirley, governor ofMassachusetts, set on foot an expedition for the capture of Crown Point,a fort which the French had built on Lake Champlain more than twentyyears before.

THE REGION OF LAKE GEORGE from surveys made in 1762

In January, Shirley had proposed an attack on it to the Ministry; and inFebruary, without waiting their reply, he laid the plan before hisAssembly. They accepted it, and voted money for the pay and maintenanceof twelve hundred men, provided the adjacent colonies would contributein due proportion. Massachusetts showed a military activity worthy ofthe reputation she had won. Forty-five hundred of her men, or one ineight of her adult males, volunteered to fight the French, and enlistedfor the various expeditions, some in the pay of the province, and somein that of the King. It remained to name a commander for the Crown Pointenterprise. Nobody had power to do so, for Braddock, thecommander-in-chief, was not yet come; but that time might not be lost,Shirley, at the request of his Assembly, took the responsibility onhimself. If he had named a Massachusetts officer, it would have rousedthe jealousy of the other New England colonies; and he thereforeappointed William Johnson, of New York, thus gratifying that importantprovince and pleasing the Five Nations, who at this time looked onJohnson with even more than usual favor. Hereupon, in reply to hisrequest, Connecticut voted twelve hundred men, New Hampshire fivehundred, and Rhode Island four hundred, all at their own charge; whileNew York, a little later, promised eight hundred more. When, in April,Braddock and the Council at Alexandria approved the plan and thecommander, Shirley gave Johnson the commission of major-general of thelevies of Massachusetts; and the governors of the other provincescontributing to the expedition gave him similar commissions for theirrespective contingents. Never did general take the field with authorityso heterogeneous.

He had never seen service, and knew nothing of war. By birth he wasIrish, of good family, being nephew of Admiral Sir Peter Warren, who,owning extensive wild lands on the Mohawk, had placed the young man incharge of them nearly twenty years before. Johnson was born to prosper.He had ambition, energy, an active mind, a tall, strong person, a rough,jovial temper, and a quick adaptation to his surroundings. He coulddrink flip with Dutch boors, or Madeira with royal governors. He likedthe society of the great, would intrigue and flatter when he had an endto gain, and foil a rival without looking too closely at the means; butcompared with the Indian traders who infested the border, he was a modelof uprightness. He lived by the Mohawk in a fortified house which was astronghold against foes and a scene of hospitality to friends, bothwhite and red. Here—for his tastes were not fastidious—presided formany years a Dutch or German wench whom he finally married; and afterher death a young Mohawk squaw took her place. Over his neighbors, theIndians of the Five Nations, and all others of their race with whom hehad to deal, he acquired a remarkable influence. He liked them, adoptedtheir ways, and treated them kindly or sternly as the case required, butalways with a justice and honesty in strong contrast with therascalities of the commission of Albany traders who had lately managedtheir affairs, and whom they so detested that one of their chiefs calledthem "not men, but devils." Hence, when Johnson was made Indiansuperintendent there was joy through all the Iroquois confederacy. When,in addition, he was made a general, he assembled the warriors in councilto engage them to aid the expedition.

This meeting took place at his own house, known as Fort Johnson; and asmore than eleven hundred Indians appeared at his call, his larder wassorely taxed to entertain them. The speeches were interminable. Johnson,a master of Indian rhetoric, knew his audience too well not to contestwith them the palm of insufferable prolixity. The climax was reached onthe fourth day, and he threw down the war-belt. An Oneida chief took itup; Stevens, the interpreter, began the war-dance, and the assembledwarriors howled in chorus. Then a tub of punch was brought in, and theyall drank the King's health. They showed less alacrity, however, tofight his battles, and scarcely three hundred of them would take thewar-path. Too many of their friends and relatives were enlisted for theFrench.

While the British colonists were preparing to attack Crown Point, theFrench of Canada were preparing to defend it. Duquesne, recalled fromhis post, had resigned the government to the Marquis de Vaudreuil, whohad at his disposal the battalions of regulars that had sailed in thespring from Brest under Baron Dieskau. His first thought was to use themfor the capture of Oswego; but letters of Braddock, found on thebattle-field of the Monongahela, warned him of the design against CrownPoint; while a reconnoitring party which had gone as far as the Hudsonbrought back news that Johnson's forces were already in the field.Therefore the plan was changed, and Dieskau was ordered to lead the mainbody of his troops, not to Lake Ontario, but to Lake Champlain. Hepassed up the Richelieu, and embarked in boats and canoes for CrownPoint. The veteran knew that the foes with whom he had to deal were buta mob of countrymen. He doubted not of putting them to rout, and meantnever to hold his hand till he had chased them back to Albany. "Make allhaste," Vaudreuil wrote to him; "for when you return we shall send youto Oswego to execute our first design."

Johnson on his part was preparing to advance. In July about threethousand provincials were encamped near Albany, some on the "Flats"above the town, and some on the meadows below. Hither, too, came a swarmof Johnson's Mohawks,—warriors, squaws, and children. They adorned theGeneral's face with war-paint, and he danced the war-dance; then withhis sword he cut the first slice from the ox that had been roasted wholefor their entertainment. "I shall be glad," wrote the surgeon of a NewEngland regiment, "if they fight as eagerly as they ate their ox anddrank their wine."

Above all things the expedition needed promptness; yet everything movedslowly. Five popular legislatures controlled the troops and thesupplies. Connecticut had refused to send her men till Shirley promisedthat her commanding officer should rank next to Johnson. The wholemovement was for some time at a deadlock because the five governmentscould not agree about their contributions of artillery and stores. TheNew Hampshire regiment had taken a short cut for Crown Point across thewilderness of Vermont; but had been recalled in time to save them fromprobable destruction. They were now with the rest in the camp at Albany,in such distress for provisions that a private subscription was proposedfor their relief.

Johnson's army, crude as it was, had in it good material. Here wasPhineas Lyman, of Connecticut, second in command, once a tutor at YaleCollege, and more recently a lawyer,—a raw soldier, but a vigorous andbrave one; Colonel Moses Titcomb, of Massachusetts, who had fought withcredit at Louisbourg; and Ephraim Williams, also colonel of aMassachusetts regiment, a tall and portly man, who had been a captain inthe last war, member of the General Court, and deputy-sheriff. He madehis will in the camp at Albany, and left a legacy to found the schoolwhich has since become Williams College. His relative, Stephen Williams,was chaplain of his regiment, and his brother Thomas was its surgeon.Seth Pomeroy, gunsmith at Northampton, who, like Titcomb, had seenservice at Louisbourg, was its lieutenant-colonel. He had left a wife athome, an excellent matron, to whom he was continually writingaffectionate letters, mingling household cares with news of the camp,and charging her to see that their eldest boy, Seth, then in college atNew Haven, did not run off to the army. Pomeroy had with him his brotherDaniel; and this he thought was enough. Here, too, was a man whose nameis still a household word in New England,—the sturdy Israel Putnam,private in a Connecticut regiment; and another as bold as he, JohnStark, lieutenant in the New Hampshire levies, and the future victor ofBennington.

The soldiers were no soldiers, but farmers and farmers' sons who hadvolunteered for the summer campaign. One of the corps had a blue uniformfaced with red. The rest wore their daily clothing. Blankets had beenserved out to them by the several provinces, but the greater partbrought their own guns; some under the penalty of a fine if they camewithout them, and some under the inducement of a reward. They had nobayonets, but carried hatchets in their belts as a sort of substitute.At their sides were slung powder-horns, on which, in the leisure of thecamp, they carved quaint devices with the points of their jack-knives.They came chiefly from plain New England homesteads,—rustic abodes,unpainted and dingy, with long well-sweeps, capacious barns, roughfields of pumpkins and corn, and vast kitchen chimneys, above which inwinter hung squashes to keep them from frost, and guns to keep them fromrust.

As to the manners and morals of the army there is conflict of evidence.In some respects nothing could be more exemplary. "Not a chicken hasbeen stolen," says William Smith, of New York; while, on the otherhand, Colonel Ephraim Williams writes to Colonel Israel Williams, thencommanding on the Massachusetts frontier: "We are a wicked, profanearmy, especially the New York and Rhode Island troops. Nothing to beheard among a great part of them but the language of Hell. If CrownPoint is taken, it will not be for our sakes, but for those good peopleleft behind." There was edifying regularity in respect to form. Sermonstwice a week, daily prayers, and frequent psalm-singing alternated withthe much-needed military drill. "Prayers among us night and morning,"writes Private Jonathan Caswell, of Massachusetts, to his father. "Herewe lie, knowing not when we shall march for Crown Point; but I hope notlong to tarry. Desiring your prayers to God for me as I am agoing towar, I am Your Ever Dutiful Son."

To Pomeroy and some of his brothers in arms it seemed that they wereengaged in a kind of crusade against the myrmidons of Rome. "As you haveat heart the Protestant cause," he wrote to his friend Israel Williams,"so I ask an interest in your prayers that the Lord of Hosts would goforth with us and give us victory over our unreasonable, encroaching,barbarous, murdering enemies."

Both Williams the surgeon and Williams the colonel chafed at theincessant delays. "The expedition goes on very much as a snail runs,"writes the former to his wife; "it seems we may possibly see Crown Pointthis time twelve months." The Colonel was vexed because everything wasout of joint in the department of transportation: wagoners mutinous forwant of pay; ordnance stores, camp-kettles, and provisions left behind."As to rum," he complains, "it won't hold out nine weeks. Things appearmost melancholy to me." Even as he was writing, a report came of thedefeat of Braddock; and, shocked at the blow, his pen traced the words:"The Lord have mercy on poor New England!"

Johnson had sent four Mohawk scouts to Canada. They returned on thetwenty-first of August with the report that the French were all astirwith preparation, and that eight thousand men were coming to defendCrown Point. On this a council of war was called; and it was resolved tosend to the several colonies for reinforcements. Meanwhile the main bodyhad moved up the river to the spot called the Great Carrying Place,where Lyman had begun a fortified storehouse, which his men called FortLyman, but which was afterwards named Fort Edward. Two Indian trails ledfrom this point to the waters of Lake Champlain, one by way of LakeGeorge, and the other by way of Wood Creek. There was doubt which coursethe army should take. A road was begun to Wood Creek; then it wascountermanded, and a party was sent to explore the path to Lake George."With submission to the general officers," Surgeon Williams againwrites, "I think it a very grand mistake that the business ofreconnoitring was not done months agone." It was resolved at last tomarch for Lake George; gangs of axemen were sent to hew out the way; andon the twenty-sixth two thousand men were ordered to the lake, whileColonel Blanchard, of New Hampshire, remained with five hundred tofinish and defend Fort Lyman.

The train of Dutch wagons, guarded by the homely soldiery, jolted slowlyover the stumps and roots of the newly made road, and the regimentsfollowed at their leisure. The hardships of the way were not withouttheir consolations. The jovial Irishman who held the chief command madehimself very agreeable to the New England officers. "We went on aboutfour or five miles," says Pomeroy in his Journal, "then stopped, atepieces of broken bread and cheese, and drank some fresh lemon-punch andthe best of wine with General Johnson and some of the field-officers."It was the same on the next day. "Stopped about noon and dined withGeneral Johnson by a small brook under a tree; ate a good dinner of coldboiled and roast venison; drank good fresh lemon-punch and wine."

That afternoon they reached their destination, fourteen miles from FortLyman. The most beautiful lake in America lay before them; then morebeautiful than now, in the wild charm of untrodden mountains and virginforests. "I have given it the name of Lake George," wrote Johnson to theLords of Trade, "not only in honor of His Majesty, but to ascertain hisundoubted dominion here." His men made their camp on a piece of roughground by the edge of the water, pitching their tents among the stumpsof the newly felled trees. In their front was a forest of pitch-pine; ontheir right, a marsh, choked with alders and swamp-maples; on theirleft, the low hill where Fort George was afterwards built; and at theirrear, the lake. Little was done to clear the forest in front, though itwould give excellent cover to an enemy. Nor did Johnson take much painsto learn the movements of the French in the direction of Crown Point,though he sent scouts towards South Bay and Wood Creek. Every day storesand bateaux, or flat boats, came on wagons from Fort Lyman; andpreparation moved on with the leisure that had marked it from the first.About three hundred Mohawks came to the camp, and were regarded by theNew England men as nuisances. On Sunday the gray-haired StephenWilliams preached to these savage allies a long Calvinistic sermon,which must have sorely perplexed the interpreter whose business it wasto turn it into Mohawk; and in the afternoon young Chaplain Newell, ofRhode Island, expounded to the New England men the somewhat untimelytext, "Love your enemies." On the next Sunday, September seventh,Williams preached again, this time to the whites from a text in Isaiah.It was a peaceful day, fair and warm, with a few light showers; yet notwholly a day of rest, for two hundred wagons came up from Fort Lyman,loaded with bateaux. After the sermon there was an alarm. An Indianscout came in about sunset, and reported that he had found the trail ofa body of men moving from South Bay towards Fort Lyman. Johnson calledfor a volunteer to carry a letter of warning to Colonel Blanchard, thecommander. A wagoner named Adams offered himself for the perilousservice, mounted, and galloped along the road with the letter. Sentrieswere posted, and the camp fell asleep.

While Johnson lay at Lake George, Dieskau prepared a surprise for him.The German Baron had reached Crown Point at the head of three thousandfive hundred and seventy-three men, regulars, Canadians, and Indians. Hehad no thought of waiting there to be attacked. The troops were told tohold themselves ready to move at a moment's notice. Officers—so ran theorder—will take nothing with them but one spare shirt, one spare pairof shoes, a blanket, a bearskin, and provisions for twelve days; Indiansare not to amuse themselves by taking scalps till the enemy is entirelydefeated, since they can kill ten men in the time required to scalp one.Then Dieskau moved on, with nearly all his force, to Carillon, orTiconderoga, a promontory commanding both the routes by which aloneJohnson could advance, that of Wood Creek and that of Lake George.

The Indian allies were commanded by Legardeur de Saint-Pierre. Theseunmanageable warriors were a constant annoyance to Dieskau, being aspecies of humanity quite new to him. "They drive us crazy," he says,"from morning till night. There is no end to their demands. They havealready eaten five oxen and as many hogs, without counting the kegs ofbrandy they have drunk. In short, one needs the patience of an angel toget on with these devils; and yet one must always force himself to seempleased with them."

They would scarcely even go out as scouts. At last, however, on thefourth of September, a reconnoitring party came in with a scalp and anEnglish prisoner caught near Fort Lyman. He was questioned under thethreat of being given to the Indians for torture if he did not tell thetruth; but, nothing daunted, he invented a patriotic falsehood; andthinking to lure his captors into a trap, told them that the Englisharmy had fallen back to Albany, leaving five hundred men at Fort Lyman,which he represented as indefensible. Dieskau resolved on a rapidmovement to seize the place. At noon of the same day, leaving a part ofhis force at Ticonderoga, he embarked the rest in canoes and advancedalong the narrow prolongation of Lake Champlain that stretched southwardthrough the wilderness to where the town of Whitehall now stands. Hesoon came to a point where the lake dwindled to a mere canal, while twomighty rocks, capped with stunted forests, faced each other from theopposing banks. Here he left an officer named Roquemaure with adetachment of troops, and again advanced along a belt of quiet watertraced through the midst of a deep marsh, green at that season withsedge and water-weeds, and known to the English as the Drowned Lands.Beyond, on either hand, crags feathered with birch and fir, or hillsmantled with woods, looked down on the long procession of canoes. Asthey neared the site of Whitehall, a passage opened on the right, theentrance to a sheet of lonely water slumbering in the shadow of woodymountains, and forming the lake then, as now, called South Bay. Theyadvanced to its head, landed where a small stream enters it, left thecanoes under a guard, and began their march through the forest. Theycounted in all two hundred and sixteen regulars of the battalions ofLanguedoc and La Reine, six hundred and eighty-four Canadians, and aboutsix hundred Indians. Every officer and man carried provisions for eightdays in his knapsack. They encamped at night by a brook, and in themorning, after hearing Mass, marched again. The evening of the next daybrought them near the road that led to Lake George. Fort Lyman was butthree miles distant. A man on horseback galloped by; it was Adams,Johnson's unfortunate messenger. The Indians shot him, and found theletter in his pocket. Soon after, ten or twelve wagons appeared incharge of mutinous drivers, who had left the English camp withoutorders. Several of them were shot, two were taken, and the rest ran off.The two captives declared that, contrary to the assertion of theprisoner at Ticonderoga, a large force lay encamped at the lake. TheIndians now held a council, and presently gave out that they would notattack the fort, which they thought well supplied with cannon, but thatthey were willing to attack the camp at Lake George. Remonstrance waslost upon them. Dieskau was not young, but he was daring to rashness,and inflamed to emulation by the victory over Braddock. The enemy werereported greatly to outnumber him; but his Canadian advisers had assuredhim that the English colony militia were the worst troops on the face ofthe earth. "The more there are," he said to the Canadians and Indians,"the more we shall kill;" and in the morning the order was given tomarch for the lake.

They moved rapidly on through the waste of pines, and soon entered therugged valley that led to Johnson's camp. On their right was a gorgewhere, shadowed in bushes, gurgled a gloomy brook; and beyond rose thecliffs that buttressed the rocky heights of French Mountain, seen byglimpses between the boughs. On their left rose gradually the lowerslopes of West Mountain. All was rock, thicket, and forest; there was noopen space but the road along which the regulars marched, while theCanadians and Indians pushed their way through the woods in such orderas the broken ground would permit.

They were three miles from the lake, when their scouts brought in aprisoner who told them that a column of English troops was approaching.Dieskau's preparations were quickly made. While the regulars halted onthe road, the Canadians and Indians moved to the front, where most ofthem hid in the forest along the slopes of West Mountain, and the restlay close among the thickets on the other side. Thus, when the Englishadvanced to attack the regulars in front, they would find themselvescaught in a double ambush. No sight or sound betrayed the snare; butbehind every bush crouched a Canadian or a savage, with gun cocked andears intent, listening for the tramp of the approaching column.

The wagoners who escaped the evening before had reached the camp aboutmidnight, and reported that there was a war-party on the road near FortLyman. Johnson had at this time twenty-two hundred effective men,besides his three hundred Indians. He called a council of war in themorning, and a resolution was taken which can only be explained by acomplete misconception as to the force of the French. It was determinedto send out two detachments of five hundred men each, one towards FortLyman, and the other towards South Bay, the object being, according toJohnson, "to catch the enemy in their retreat." Hendrick, chief of theMohawks, a brave and sagacious warrior, expressed his dissent after afashion of his own. He picked up a stick and broke it; then he picked upseveral sticks, and showed that together they could not be broken. Thehint was taken, and the two detachments were joined in one. Still theold savage shook his head. "If they are to be killed," he said, "theyare too many; if they are to fight, they are too few." Nevertheless, heresolved to share their fortunes; and mounting on a gun-carriage, heharangued his warriors with a voice so animated, and gestures soexpressive, that the New England officers listened in admiration, thoughthey understood not a word. One difficulty remained. He was too old andfat to go afoot; but Johnson lent him a horse, which he bestrode, andtrotted to the head of the column, followed by two hundred of hiswarriors as fast as they could grease, paint, and befeather themselves.

Captain Elisha Hawley was in his tent, finishing a letter which he hadjust written to his brother Joseph; and these were the last words: "I amthis minute agoing out in company with five hundred men to see if we canintercept 'em in their retreat, or find their canoes in the DrownedLands; and therefore must conclude this letter." He closed and directedit; and in an hour received his death-wound.

It was soon after eight o'clock when Ephraim Williams left the camp withhis regiment, marched a little distance, and then waited for the rest ofthe detachment under Lieutenant-Colonel Whiting. Thus Dieskau had fulltime to lay his ambush. When Whiting came up, the whole moved ontogether, so little conscious of danger that no scouts were thrown outin front or flank; and, in full security, they entered the fatal snare.Before they were completely involved in it, the sharp eye of oldHendrick detected some sign of an enemy. At that instant, whether byaccident or design, a gun was fired from the bushes. It is said thatDieskau's Iroquois, seeing Mohawks, their relatives, in the van, wishedto warn them of danger. If so, the warning came too late. The thicketson the left blazed out a deadly fire, and the men fell by scores. In thewords of Dieskau, the head of the column "was doubled up like a pack ofcards." Hendrick's horse was shot down, and the chief was killed with abayonet as he tried to rise. Williams, seeing a rising ground on hisright, made for it, calling on his men to follow; but as he climbed theslope, guns flashed from the bushes, and a shot through the brain laidhim dead. The men in the rear pressed forward to support their comrades,when a hot fire was suddenly opened on them from the forest along theirright flank. Then there was a panic: some fled outright, and the wholecolumn recoiled. The van now became the rear, and all the force of theenemy rushed upon it, shouting and screeching. There was a moment oftotal confusion; but a part of Williams's regiment rallied under commandof Whiting, and covered the retreat, fighting behind trees likeIndians, and firing and falling back by turns, bravely aided by some ofthe Mohawks and by a detachment which Johnson sent to their aid. "And avery handsome retreat they made," writes Pomeroy; "and so continued tillthey came within about three quarters of a mile of our camp. This wasthe last fire our men gave our enemies, which killed great numbers ofthem; they were seen to drop as pigeons." So ended the fray long knownin New England fireside story as the "bloody morning scout." Dieskau nowordered a halt, and sounded his trumpets to collect his scattered men.His Indians, however, were sullen and unmanageable, and the Canadiansalso showed signs of wavering. The veteran who commanded them all,Legardeur de Saint-Pierre, had been killed. At length they werepersuaded to move again, the regulars leading the way.

About an hour after Williams and his men had begun their march, adistant rattle of musketry was heard at the camp; and as it grew nearerand louder, the listeners knew that their comrades were on the retreat.Then, at the eleventh hour, preparations were begun for defence. A sortof barricade was made along the front of the camp, partly of wagons, andpartly of inverted bateaux, but chiefly of the trunks of trees hastilyhewn down in the neighboring forest and laid end to end in a single row.The line extended from the southern slopes of the hill on the leftacross a tract of rough ground to the marshes on the right. The forest,choked with bushes and clumps of rank ferns, was within a few yards ofthe barricade, and there was scarcely time to hack away the interveningthickets. Three cannon were planted to sweep the road that descendedthrough the pines, and another was dragged up to the ridge of the hill.The defeated party began to come in; first, scared fugitives both whiteand red; then, gangs of men bringing the wounded; and at last, an hourand a half after the first fire was heard, the main detachment was seenmarching in compact bodies down the road.

Five hundred men were detailed to guard the flanks of the camp. The reststood behind the wagons or lay flat behind the logs and invertedbateaux, the Massachusetts men on the right, and the Connecticut men onthe left. Besides Indians, this actual fighting force was betweensixteen and seventeen hundred rustics, very few of whom had been underfire before that morning. They were hardly at their posts when they sawranks of white-coated soldiers moving down the road, and bayonets thatto them seemed innumerable glittering between the boughs. At the sametime a terrific burst of war-whoops rose along the front; and, in thewords of Pomeroy, "the Canadians and Indians, helter-skelter, the woodsfull of them, came running with undaunted courage right down the hillupon us, expecting to make us flee." Some of the men grew uneasy; whilethe chief officers, sword in hand, threatened instant death to any whoshould stir from their posts. If Dieskau had made an assault at thatinstant, there could be little doubt of the result.

This he well knew; but he was powerless. He had his small force ofregulars well in hand; but the rest, red and white, were beyond control,scattering through the woods and swamps, shouting, yelling, and firingfrom behind trees. The regulars advanced with intrepidity towards thecamp where the trees were thin, deployed, and fired by platoons, tillCaptain Eyre, who commanded the artillery, opened on them with grape,broke their ranks, and compelled them to take to cover. The fusilladewas now general on both sides, and soon grew furious. "Perhaps," SethPomeroy wrote to his wife, two days after, "the hailstones from heavenwere never much thicker than their bullets came; but, blessed be God!that did not in the least daunt or disturb us." Johnson received aflesh-wound in the thigh, and spent the rest of the day in his tent.Lyman took command; and it is a marvel that he escaped alive, for he wasfour hours in the heat of the fire, directing and animating the men. "Itwas the most awful day my eyes ever beheld," wrote Surgeon Williams tohis wife; "there seemed to be nothing but thunder and lightning andperpetual pillars of smoke." To him, his colleague Doctor Pynchon, oneassistant, and a young student called "Billy," fell the charge of thewounded of his regiment. "The bullets flew about our ears all the timeof dressing them; so we thought best to leave our tent and retire a fewrods behind the shelter of a log-house." On the adjacent hill stood oneBlodget, who seems to have been a sutler, watching, as well as bushes,trees, and smoke would let him, the progress of the fight, of which hesoon after made and published a curious bird's-eye view. As the woundedmen were carried to the rear, the wagoners about the camp took theirguns and powder-horns, and joined in the fray. A Mohawk, seeing one ofthese men still unarmed, leaped over the barricade, tomahawked thenearest Canadian, snatched his gun, and darted back unhurt. The bravesavage found no imitators among his tribesmen, most of whom did nothingbut utter a few war-whoops, saying that they had come to see theirEnglish brothers fight. Some of the French Indians opened a distantflank fire from the high ground beyond the swamp on the right, but weredriven off by a few shells dropped among them.

Dieskau had directed his first attack against the left and centre ofJohnson's position. Making no impression here, he tried to force theright, where lay the regiments of Titcomb, Ruggles, and Williams. Thefire was hot for about an hour. Titcomb was shot dead, a rod in front ofthe barricade, firing from behind a tree like a common soldier. Atlength Dieskau, exposing himself within short range of the English line,was hit in the leg. His adjutant, Montreuil, himself wounded, came tohis aid, and was washing the injured limb with brandy, when theunfortunate commander was again hit in the knee and thigh. He seatedhimself behind a tree, while the Adjutant called two Canadians to carryhim to the rear. One of them was instantly shot down. Montreuil took hisplace; but Dieskau refused to be moved, bitterly denounced the Canadiansand Indians, and ordered the Adjutant to leave him and lead the regularsin a last effort against the camp.

It was too late. Johnson's men, singly or in small squads, were alreadycrossing their row of logs; and in a few moments the whole dashedforward with a shout, falling upon the enemy with hatchets and the buttsof their guns. The French and their allies fled. The wounded Generalstill sat helpless by the tree, when he saw a soldier aiming at him. Hesigned to the man not to fire; but he pulled trigger, shot him acrossthe hips, leaped upon him, and ordered him in French to surrender. "Isaid," writes Dieskau, "'You rascal, why did you fire? You see a manlying in his blood on the ground, and you shoot him!' He answered: 'Howdid I know that you had not got a pistol? I had rather kill the devilthan have the devil kill me.' 'You are a Frenchman?' I asked. 'Yes,' hereplied; 'it is more than ten years since I left Canada;' whereuponseveral others fell on me and stripped me. I told them to carry me totheir general, which they did. On learning who I was, he sent forsurgeons, and, though wounded himself, refused all assistance till mywounds were dressed."

It was near five o'clock when the final rout took place. Some timebefore, several hundred of the Canadians and Indians had left the fieldand returned to the scene of the morning fight, to plunder and scalp thedead. They were resting themselves near a pool in the forest, closebeside the road, when their repose was interrupted by a volley ofbullets. It was fired by a scouting party from Fort Lyman, chieflybackwoodsmen, under Captains Folsom and McGinnis. The assailants weregreatly outnumbered; but after a hard fight the Canadians and Indiansbroke and fled. McGinnis was mortally wounded. He continued to giveorders till the firing was over; then fainted, and was carried, dying,to the camp. The bodies of the slain, according to tradition, werethrown into the pool, which bears to this day the name of Bloody Pond.

The various bands of fugitives rejoined each other towards night, andencamped in the forest; then made their way round the southern shoulderof French Mountain, till, in the next evening, they reached theircanoes. Their plight was deplorable; for they had left their knapsacksbehind, and were spent with fatigue and famine.

Meanwhile their captive general was not yet out of danger. The Mohawkswere furious at their losses in the ambush of the morning, and above allat the death of Hendrick. Scarcely were Dieskau's wounds dressed, whenseveral of them came into the tent. There was a long and angry disputein their own language between them and Johnson, after which they wentout very sullenly. Dieskau asked what they wanted. "What do they want?"returned Johnson. "To burn you, by God, eat you, and smoke you in theirpipes, in revenge for three or four of their chiefs that were killed.But never fear; you shall be safe with me, or else they shall kill usboth." The Mohawks soon came back, and another talk ensued, excited atfirst, and then more calm; till at length the visitors, seeminglyappeased, smiled, gave Dieskau their hands in sign of friendship, andquietly went out again. Johnson warned him that he was not yet safe; andwhen the prisoner, fearing that his presence might incommode his host,asked to be removed to another tent, a captain and fifty men wereordered to guard him. In the morning an Indian, alone and apparentlyunarmed, loitered about the entrance, and the stupid sentinel let himpass in. He immediately drew a sword from under a sort of cloak which hewore, and tried to stab Dieskau; but was prevented by the colonel towhom the tent belonged, who seized upon him, took away his sword, andpushed him out. As soon as his wounds would permit, Dieskau was carriedon a litter, strongly escorted, to Fort Lyman, whence he was sent toAlbany, and afterwards to New York. He is profuse in expressions ofgratitude for the kindness shown him by the colonial officers, andespecially by Johnson. Of the provincial soldiers he remarked soon afterthe battle that in the morning they fought like good boys, about noonlike men, and in the afternoon like devils. In the spring of 1757 hesailed for England, and was for a time at Falmouth; whence ColonelMatthew Sewell, fearing that he might see and learn too much, wrote tothe Earl of Holdernesse: "The Baron has great penetration and quicknessof apprehension. His long service under Marshal Saxe renders him a manof real consequence, to be cautiously observed. His circumstancesdeserve compassion, for indeed they are very melancholy, and I muchdoubt of his being ever perfectly cured." He was afterwards a long timeat Bath, for the benefit of the waters. In 1760 the famous Diderot methim at Paris, cheerful and full of anecdote, though wretchedly shatteredby his wounds. He died a few years later.

On the night after the battle the yeomen warriors felt the truth of thesaying that, next to defeat, the saddest thing is victory. Comrades andfriends by scores lay scattered through the forest. As soon as he couldsnatch a moment's leisure, the overworked surgeon sent the dismaltidings to his wife: "My dear brother Ephraim was killed by a ballthrough his head; poor brother Josiah's wound I fear will prove mortal;poor Captain Hawley is yet alive, though I did not think he would livetwo hours after bringing him in." Daniel Pomeroy was shot dead; and hisbrother Seth wrote the news to his wife Rachel, who was just deliveredof a child: "Dear Sister, this brings heavy tidings; but let not yourheart sink at the news, though it be your loss of a dear husband. Mondaythe eighth instant was a memorable day; and truly you may say, had notthe Lord been on our side, we must all have been swallowed up. Mybrother, being one that went out in the first engagement, received afatal shot through the middle of the head." Seth Pomeroy found a momentto write also to his own wife, whom he tells that another attack isexpected; adding, in quaintly pious phrase: "But as God hath begun toshow mercy, I hope he will go on to be gracious." Pomeroy was employedduring the next few days with four hundred men in what he calls "themelancholy piece of business" of burying the dead. A letter-writer ofthe time does not approve what was done on this occasion. "Our people,"he says, "not only buried the French dead, but buried as many of themas might be without the knowledge of our Indians, to prevent their beingscalped. This I call an excess of civility;" his reason being thatBraddock's dead soldiers had been left to the wolves.

The English loss in killed, wounded, and missing was two hundred andsixty-two; and that of the French, by their own account, two hundred andtwenty-eight,—a somewhat modest result of five hours' fighting. TheEnglish loss was chiefly in the ambush of the morning, where the killedgreatly outnumbered the wounded, because those who fell and could not becarried away were tomahawked by Dieskau's Indians. In the fight at thecamp, both Indians and Canadians kept themselves so well under coverthat it was very difficult for the New England men to pick them off,while they on their part lay close behind their row of logs. On theFrench side, the regular officers and troops bore the brunt of thebattle and suffered the chief loss, nearly all of the former and nearlyhalf of the latter being killed or wounded.

Johnson did not follow up his success. He says that his men were tired.Yet five hundred of them had stood still all day, and boats enough fortheir transportation were lying on the beach. Ten miles down the lake, apath led over a gorge of the mountains to South Bay, where Dieskau hadleft his canoes and provisions. It needed but a few hours to reach anddestroy them; but no such attempt was made. Nor, till a week after, didJohnson send out scouts to learn the strength of the enemy atTiconderoga. Lyman strongly urged him to make an effort to seize thatimportant pass; but Johnson thought only of holding his own position. "Ithink," he wrote, "we may expect very shortly a more formidableattack." He made a solid breastwork to defend his camp; and asreinforcements arrived, set them at building a fort, which he named FortWilliam Henry, on a rising ground by the lake. It is true that justafter the battle he was deficient in stores, and had not bateaux enoughto move his whole force. It is true, also, that he was wounded, and thathe was too jealous of Lyman to delegate the command to him; and so thedays passed till, within a fortnight, his nimble enemy were intrenchedat Ticonderoga in force enough to defy him.

The Crown Point expedition was a failure disguised under an incidentalsuccess.

A WINTER RAID.

While Johnson was building Fort William Henry at one end of Lake George,the French began Fort Ticonderoga at the other, though they did notfinish it till the next year. In the winter of 1757, hearing that theEnglish were making great preparations at Fort William Henry to attackthem, they resolved to anticipate the blow and seize that post bysurprise. To this end, Vaudreuil, Governor of Canada, sent a largedetachment from Montreal, while the small body of troops and provincialswho occupied the English fort remained wholly ignorant of the movement.

On St. Patrick's Day, the seventeenth of March, the Irish soldiers whoformed a part of the garrison of Fort William Henry were paying homageto their patron saint in libations of heretic rum, the product of NewEngland stills; and it is said that John Stark's rangers forgottheological differences in their zeal to share the festivity. The storyadds that they were restrained by their commander, and that theirenforced sobriety proved the saving of the fort. This may be doubted;for without counting the English soldiers of the garrison who had nospecial call to be drunk that day, the fort was in no danger tilltwenty-four hours after, when the revellers had had time to rally fromtheir pious carouse. Whether rangers or British soldiers, it is certainthat watchmen were on the alert during the night between the eighteenthand nineteenth, and that towards one in the morning they heard a soundof axes far down the lake, followed by the faint glow of a distant fire.The inference was plain, that an enemy was there, and that the necessityof warming himself had overcome his caution. Then all was still for sometwo hours, when, listening in the pitchy darkness, the watchers heardthe footsteps of a great body of men approaching on the ice, which atthe time was bare of snow. The garrison were at their posts, and all thecannon on the side towards the lake vomited grape and round-shot in thedirection of the sound, which thereafter was heard no more.

Those who made it were the detachment, called by Vaudreuil an army, sentby him to seize the English fort. Shirley had planned a similar strokeagainst Ticonderoga a year before; but the provincial levies had come inso slowly, and the ice had broken up so soon, that the scheme wasabandoned. Vaudreuil was more fortunate. The whole force, regulars,Canadians, and Indians, was ready to his hand. No pains were spared inequipping them. Overcoats, blankets, bearskins to sleep on, tarpaulinsto sleep under, spare moccasins, spare mittens, kettles, axes, needles,awls, flint and steel, and many miscellaneous articles were provided, tobe dragged by the men on light Indian sledges, along with provisions fortwelve days. The cost of the expedition is set at a million francs,answering to more than as many dollars of the present time. To thedisgust of the officers from France, the Governor named his brotherRigaud for the chief command; and before the end of February the wholeparty was on its march along the ice of Lake Champlain. They restednearly a week at Ticonderoga, where no less than three hundred shortscaling-ladders, so constructed that two or more could be joined in one,had been made for them; and here, too, they received a reinforcement,which raised their number to sixteen hundred. Then, marching three daysalong Lake George, they neared the fort on the evening of theeighteenth, and prepared for a general assault before daybreak.

The garrison, including rangers, consisted of three hundred andforty-six effective men. The fort was not strong, and a resolute assaultby numbers so superior must, it seems, have overpowered the defenders;but the Canadians and Indians who composed most of the attacking forcewere not suited for such work; and, disappointed in his hope of asurprise, Rigaud withdrew them at daybreak, after trying in vain to burnthe buildings outside. A few hours after, the whole body reappeared,filing off to surround the fort, on which they kept up a brisk butharmless fire of musketry. In the night they were heard again on theice, approaching as if for an assault; and the cannon, firing towardsthe sound, again drove them back. There was silence for a while, tilltongues of flame lighted up the gloom, and two sloops, ice-bound in thelake, and a large number of bateaux on the shore were seen to be onfire. A party sallied to save them; but it was too late. In the morningthey were all consumed, and the enemy had vanished.

It was Sunday, the twentieth. Everything was quiet till noon, when theFrench filed out of the woods and marched across the ice in procession,ostentatiously carrying their scaling-ladders, and showing themselves tothe best effect. They stopped at a safe distance, fronting towards thefort, and several of them advanced, waving a red flag. An officer with afew men went to meet them, and returned bringing Le Mercier, chief ofthe Canadian artillery, who, being led blindfold into the fort,announced himself as bearer of a message from Rigaud. He was conductedto the room of Major Eyre, where all the British officers wereassembled; and, after mutual compliments, he invited them to give up theplace peaceably, promising the most favorable terms, and threatening ageneral assault and massacre in case of refusal. Eyre said that heshould defend himself to the last; and the envoy, again blindfolded, wasled back to whence he came.

The whole French force now advanced as if to storm the works, and thegarrison prepared to receive them. Nothing came of it but a fusillade,to which the British made no reply. At night the French were heardadvancing again, and each man nerved himself for the crisis. The realattack, however, was not against the fort, but against the buildingsoutside, which consisted of several storehouses, a hospital, a saw-mill,and the huts of the rangers, besides a sloop on the stocks and piles ofplanks and cord-wood. Covered by the night, the assailants crept up withfagots of resinous sticks, placed them against the farther side of thebuildings, kindled them, and escaped before the flame rose; while thegarrison, straining their ears in the thick darkness, fired whereverthey heard a sound. Before morning all around them was in a blaze, andthey had much ado to save the fort barracks from the shower of burningcinders. At ten o'clock the fires had subsided, and a thick fall of snowbegan, filling the air with a restless chaos of large moist flakes. Thislasted all day and all the next night, till the ground and the ice werecovered to a depth of three feet and more. The French lay close in theircamps till a little before dawn on Tuesday morning, when twentyvolunteers from the regulars made a bold attempt to burn the sloop onthe stocks, with several storehouses and other structures, and severalhundred scows and whaleboats which had thus far escaped. They were onlyin part successful; but they fired the sloop and some buildings near it,and stood far out on the ice watching the flaming vessel, a superbbonfire amid the wilderness of snow. The spectacle cost the volunteers afourth of their number killed and wounded.

On Wednesday morning the sun rose bright on a scene of wintry splendor,and the frozen lake was dotted with Rigaud's retreating followerstoiling towards Canada on snow-shoes. Before they reached it many ofthem were blinded for a while by the insufferable glare, and theircomrades led them homewards by the hand.

SIEGE AND MASSACRE OF FORT WILLIAM HENRY.

Having failed to take Fort William Henry by surprise, the Frenchresolved to attack it with all the force they could bring against it,and in the summer of 1757 the Marquis de Montcalm and the Chevalier deLévis advanced against it with about eight thousand regulars, Canadians,and Indians. The whole assembled at Ticonderoga, where several weekswere spent in preparation. Provisions, camp equipage, ammunition,cannon, and bateaux were dragged by gangs of men up the road to the headof the rapids. The work went on through heat and rain, by day and night,till, at the end of July, all was done.

The bateaux lay ready by the shore, but could not carry the whole force;and Lévis received orders to march by the side of the lake withtwenty-five hundred men, Canadians, regulars, and Iroquois. He set outat daybreak of the thirtieth of July, his men carrying nothing but theirknapsacks, blankets, and weapons. Guided by the unerring Indians, theyclimbed the steep gorge at the side of Rogers Rock, gained the valleybeyond, and marched southward along a Mohawk trail which threaded theforest in a course parallel to the lake. The way was of the roughest;many straggled from the line, and two officers completely broke down.The first destination of the party was the mouth of Ganouskie Bay, nowcalled Northwest Bay, where they were to wait for Montcalm, and kindlethree fires as a signal that they had reached the rendezvous.

Montcalm left a detachment to hold Ticonderoga; and then, on the firstof August, at two in the afternoon, he embarked at the Burned Camp withall his remaining force. Including those with Lévis, the expeditioncounted about seven thousand six hundred men, of whom more than sixteenhundred were Indians. At five in the afternoon they reached the placewhere the Indians, who had gone on before the rest, were smoking theirpipes and waiting for the army. The red warriors embarked, and joinedthe French flotilla; and now, as evening drew near, was seen one ofthose wild pageantries of war which Lake George has often witnessed. Arestless multitude of birch canoes, filled with painted savages, glidedby shores and islands, like troops of swimming water-fowl. Two hundredand fifty bateaux came next, moved by sail and oar, some bearing theCanadian militia, and some the battalions of Old France in trim and gayattire: first, La Reine and Languedoc; then the colony regulars; then LaSarre and Guienne; then the Canadian brigade of Courtemanche; then thecannon and mortars, each on a platform sustained by two bateaux lashedside by side, and rowed by the militia of Saint-Ours; then thebattalions of Béarn and Royal Roussillon; then the Canadians of Gaspé,with the provision-bateaux and the field-hospital; and, lastly, a rearguard of regulars closed the line. So, under the flush of sunset, theyheld their course along the romantic lake, to play their part in thehistoric drama that lends a stern enchantment to its fascinatingscenery. They passed the Narrows in mist and darkness; and when, alittle before dawn, they rounded the high promontory of Tongue Mountain,they saw, far on the right, three fiery sparks shining through thegloom. These were the signal-fires of Lévis, to tell them that he hadreached the appointed spot.

Lévis had arrived the evening before, after his hard march through thesultry midsummer forest. His men had now rested for a night, and at tenin the morning he marched again. Montcalm followed at noon, and coastedthe western shore, till, towards evening, he found Lévis waiting for himby the margin of a small bay not far from the English fort, thoughhidden from it by a projecting point of land. Canoes and bateaux weredrawn up on the beach, and the united forces made their bivouactogether.

The earthen mounds of Fort William Henry still stand by the brink ofLake George; and seated at the sunset of an August day under the pinesthat cover them, one gazes on a scene of soft and soothing beauty, wheredreamy waters reflect the glories of the mountains and the sky. As it isto-day, so it was then; all breathed repose and peace. The splash ofsome leaping trout, or the dipping wing of a passing swallow, alonedisturbed the summer calm of that unruffled mirror.

About ten o'clock at night two boats set out from the fort toreconnoitre. They were passing a point of land on their left, two milesor more down the lake, when the men on board descried through the glooma strange object against the bank; and they rowed towards it to learnwhat it might be. It was an awning over the bateau that carried Roubaudand his brother missionaries. As the rash oarsmen drew near, thebleating of a sheep in one of the French provision-boats warned them ofdanger; and turning, they pulled for their lives towards the easternshore. Instantly more than a thousand Indians threw themselves intotheir canoes and dashed in hot pursuit, making the lake and themountains ring with the din of their war-whoops. The fugitives hadnearly reached land when their pursuers opened fire. They replied; shotone Indian dead, and wounded another; then snatched their oars again,and gained the beach. But the whole savage crew was upon them. Severalwere killed, three were taken, and the rest escaped in the dark woods.The prisoners were brought before Montcalm, and gave him valuableinformation of the strength and position of the English.[2]

The Indian who was killed was a noted chief of the Nipissings; and histribesmen howled in grief for their bereavement. They painted his facewith vermilion, tied feathers in his hair, hung pendants in his ears andnose, clad him in a resplendent war-dress, put silver bracelets on hisarms, hung a gorget on his breast with a flame-colored ribbon, andseated him in state on the top of a hillock, with his lance in his hand,his gun in the hollow of his arm, his tomahawk in his belt, and hiskettle by his side. Then they all crouched about him in lugubrioussilence. A funeral harangue followed; and next a song and solemn danceto the thumping of the Indian drum. In the gray of the morning theyburied him as he sat, and placed food in the grave for his journey tothe land of souls.

As the sun rose above the eastern mountains the French camp was allastir. The column of Lévis, with Indians to lead the way, moved throughthe forest towards the fort, and Montcalm followed with the main body;then the artillery boats rounded the point that had hid them from thesight of the English, saluting them as they did so with musketry andcannon; while a host of savages put out upon the lake, ranged theircanoes abreast in a line from shore to shore, and advanced slowly, withmeasured paddle-strokes and yells of defiance.

SIEGE OF FORT WILLIAM HENRY. 1757.

The position of the enemy was full in sight before them. At the head ofthe lake, towards the right, stood the fort, close to the edge of thewater. On its left was a marsh; then the rough piece of ground whereJohnson had encamped two years before; then a low, flat, rocky hill,crowned with an intrenched camp; and, lastly, on the extreme left,another marsh. Far around the fort and up the slopes of the westernmountain the forest had been cut down and burned, and the ground wascumbered with blackened stumps and charred carcasses and limbs of fallentrees, strewn in savage disorder one upon another. Distant shouts andwar-cries, the clatter of musketry, white puffs of smoke in the dismalclearing and along the scorched edge of the bordering forest, told thatLévis' Indians were skirmishing with parties of the English, who hadgone out to save the cattle roaming in the neighborhood, and burn someout-buildings that would have favored the besiegers. Others were takingdown the tents that stood on a plateau near the foot of the mountain onthe right, and moving them to the intrenchment on the hill. The garrisonsallied from the fort to support their comrades, and for a time thefiring was hot.

Fort William Henry was an irregular bastioned square, formed byembankments of gravel surmounted by a rampart of heavy logs, laid intiers crossed one upon another, the interstices filled with earth. Thelake protected it on the north, the marsh on the east, and ditches withchevaux-de-frise on the south and west. Seventeen cannon, great andsmall, besides several mortars and swivels, were mounted upon it; and abrave Scotch veteran, Lieutenant-Colonel Monro, of the thirty-fifthregiment, was in command.

General Webb lay fourteen miles distant at Fort Edward, with twenty-sixhundred men, chiefly provincials. On the twenty-fifth of July he hadmade a visit to Fort William Henry, examined the place, given someorders, and returned on the twenty-ninth. He then wrote to the Governorof New York, telling him that the French were certainly coming, begginghim to send up the militia, and saying: "I am determined to march toFort William Henry with the whole army under my command as soon as Ishall hear of the farther approach of the enemy." Instead of doing so hewaited three days, and then sent up a detachment of two hundred regularsunder Lieutenant-Colonel Young, and eight hundred Massachusetts menunder Colonel Frye. This raised the force at the lake to two thousandand two hundred, including sailors and mechanics, and reduced that ofWebb to sixteen hundred, besides half as many more distributed at Albanyand the intervening forts. If, according to his spirited intention, heshould go to the rescue of Monro, he must leave some of his troopsbehind him to protect the lower posts from a possible French inroad byway of South Bay. Thus his power of aiding Monro was slight, so rashlyhad Loudon, intent on Louisbourg, left this frontier open to attack. Thedefect, however, was as much in Webb himself as in his resources. Hisconduct in the past year had raised doubts of his personal courage; andthis was the moment for answering them. Great as was the disparity ofnumbers, the emergency would have justified an attempt to save Monro atany risk. That officer sent him a hasty note, written at nine o'clock onthe morning of the third, telling him that the French were in sight onthe lake; and, in the next night, three rangers came to Fort Edward,bringing another short note, dated at six in the evening, announcingthat the firing had begun, and closing with the words: "I believe youwill think it proper to send a reinforcement as soon as possible." Now,if ever, was the time to move, before the fort was invested and accesscut off. But Webb lay quiet, sending expresses to New England for helpwhich could not possibly arrive in time. On the next night another notecame from Monro to say that the French were upon him in great numbers,well supplied with artillery, but that the garrison were all in goodspirits. "I make no doubt," wrote the hard-pressed officer, "that youwill soon send us a reinforcement;" and again on the same day: "We arevery certain that a part of the enemy have got between you and us uponthe high road, and would therefore be glad (if it meets with yourapprobation) the whole army was marched." But Webb gave no sign.

When the skirmishing around the fort was over, La Corne, with a body ofIndians, occupied the road that led to Fort Edward, and Lévis encampedhard by to support him, while Montcalm proceeded to examine the groundand settle his plan of attack. He made his way to the rear of theintrenched camp and reconnoitred it, hoping to carry it by assault; butit had a breastwork of stones and logs, and he thought the attempt toohazardous. The ground where he stood was that where Dieskau had beendefeated; and as the fate of his predecessor was not of flatteringaugury, he resolved to besiege the fort in form.

He chose for the site of his operations the ground now covered by thevillage of Caldwell. A little to the north of it was a ravine, beyondwhich he formed his main camp, while Lévis occupied a tract of dryground beside the marsh, whence he could easily move to interceptsuccors from Fort Edward on the one hand, or repel a sortie from FortWilliam Henry on the other. A brook ran down the ravine and entered thelake at a small cove protected from the fire of the fort by a point ofland; and at this place, still called Artillery Cove, Montcalm preparedto debark his cannon and mortars.

Having made his preparations, he sent Fontbrune, one of hisaides-de-camp, with a letter to Monro. "I owe it to humanity," he wrote,"to summon you to surrender. At present I can restrain the savages, andmake them observe the terms of a capitulation, as I might not have powerto do under other circumstances; and an obstinate defence on your partcould only retard the capture of the place a few days, and endanger anunfortunate garrison which cannot be relieved, in consequence of thedispositions I have made. I demand a decisive answer within an hour."Monro replied that he and his soldiers would defend themselves to thelast. While the flags of truce were flying, the Indians swarmed over thefields before the fort; and when they learned the result, an Abenakichief shouted in broken French: "You won't surrender, eh! Fire awaythen, and fight your best; for if I catch you, you shall get noquarter." Monro emphasized his refusal by a general discharge of hiscannon.

The trenches were opened on the night of the fourth,—a task of extremedifficulty, as the ground was covered by a profusion of half-burnedstumps, roots, branches, and fallen trunks. Eight hundred men toiledtill daylight with pick, spade, and axe, while the cannon from the fortflashed through the darkness, and grape and round-shot whistled andscreamed over their heads. Some of the English balls reached the campbeyond the ravine, and disturbed the slumbers of the officers off duty,as they lay wrapped in their blankets and bearskins. Before daybreak thefirst parallel was made; a battery was nearly finished on the left, andanother was begun on the right. The men now worked under cover, safe intheir burrows; one gang relieved another, and the work went on all day.

The Indians were far from doing what was expected of them. Instead ofscouting in the direction of Fort Edward to learn the movements of theenemy and prevent surprise, they loitered about the camp and in thetrenches, or amused themselves by firing at the fort from behind stumpsand logs. Some, in imitation of the French, dug little trenches forthemselves, in which they wormed their way towards the rampart, and nowand then picked off an artillery-man, not without loss on their ownside. On the afternoon of the fifth, Montcalm invited them to a council,gave them belts of wampum, and mildly remonstrated with them. "Whyexpose yourselves without necessity? I grieve bitterly over the lossesthat you have met, for the least among you is precious to me. No doubtit is a good thing to annoy the English; but that is not the main point.You ought to inform me of everything the enemy is doing, and always keepparties on the road between the two forts." And he gently hinted thattheir place was not in his camp, but in that of Lévis, wheremissionaries were provided for such of them as were Christians, and foodand ammunition for them all. They promised, with excellent docility, todo everything he wished, but added that there was something on theirhearts. Being encouraged to relieve themselves of the burden, theycomplained that they had not been consulted as to the management of thesiege, but were expected to obey orders like slaves. "We know more aboutfighting in the woods than you," said their orator; "ask our advice, andyou will be the better for it."

Montcalm assured them that if they had been neglected, it was onlythrough the hurry and confusion of the time; expressed high appreciationof their talents for bush-fighting, promised them ample satisfaction,and ended by telling them that in the morning they should hear the bigguns. This greatly pleased them, for they were extremely impatient forthe artillery to begin. About sunrise the battery of the left openedwith eight heavy cannon and a mortar, joined, on the next morning, bythe battery of the right, with eleven pieces more. The fort replied withspirit. The cannon thundered all day, and from a hundred peaks and cragsthe astonished wilderness roared back the sound. The Indians weredelighted. They wanted to point the guns; and to humor them, they werenow and then allowed to do so. Others lay behind logs and fallen trees,and yelled their satisfaction when they saw the splinters fly from thewooden rampart.

Day after day the weary roar of the distant cannonade fell on the earsof Webb in his camp at Fort Edward. "I have not yet received the leastreinforcement," he writes to Loudon; "this is the disagreeable situationwe are at present in. The fort, by the heavy firing we hear from thelake, is still in our possession; but I fear it cannot long hold outagainst so warm a cannonading if I am not reinforced by a sufficientnumber of militia to march to their relief." The militia were coming;but it was impossible that many could reach him in less than a week.Those from New York alone were within call, and two thousand of themarrived soon after he sent Loudon the above letter. Then, by strippingall the forts below, he could bring together forty-five hundred men;while several French deserters assured him that Montcalm had nearlytwelve thousand. To advance to the relief of Monro with a force soinferior, through a defile of rocks, forests, and mountains, made bynature for ambuscades,—and this too with troops who had neither thesteadiness of regulars nor the bush-fighting skill of Indians,—was anenterprise for firmer nerve than his.

He had already warned Monro to expect no help from him. At midnight ofthe fourth, Captain Bartman, his aide-de-camp, wrote: "The General hasordered me to acquaint you he does not think it prudent to attempt ajunction or to assist you till reinforced by the militia of thecolonies, for the immediate march of which repeated expresses have beensent." The letter then declared that the French were in completepossession of the road between the two forts, that a prisoner justbrought in reported their force in men and cannon to be very great, andthat, unless the militia came soon, Monro had better make what terms hecould with the enemy.

The chance was small that this letter would reach its destination; andin fact the bearer was killed by La Corne's Indians, who, in strippingthe body, found the hidden paper, and carried it to the General.Montcalm kept it several days, till the English rampart was halfbattered down; and then, after saluting his enemy with a volley from allhis cannon, he sent it with a graceful compliment to Monro. It wasBougainville who carried it, preceded by a drummer and a flag. He wasmet at the foot of the glacis, blindfolded, and led through the fortand along the edge of the lake to the intrenched camp, where Monro wasat the time. "He returned many thanks," writes the emissary in hisDiary, "for the courtesy of our nation, and protested his joy at havingto do with so generous an enemy. This was his answer to the Marquis deMontcalm. Then they led me back, always with eyes blinded; and ourbatteries began to fire again as soon as we thought that the Englishgrenadiers who escorted me had had time to re-enter the fort. I hopeGeneral Webb's letter may induce the English to surrender the sooner."

By this time the sappers had worked their way to the angle of the lake,where they were stopped by a marshy hollow, beyond which was a tract ofhigh ground, reaching to the fort and serving as the garden of thegarrison.[3] Logs and fascines in large quantities were thrown into thehollow, and hurdles were laid over them to form a causeway for thecannon. Then the sap was continued up the acclivity beyond, a trench wasopened in the garden, and a battery begun, not two hundred and fiftyyards from the fort. The Indians, in great number, crawled forward amongthe beans, maize, and cabbages, and lay there ensconced. On the night ofthe seventh, two men came out of the fort, apparently to reconnoitre,with a view to a sortie, when they were greeted by a general volley anda burst of yells which echoed among the mountains; followed byresponsive whoops pealing through the darkness from the various campsand lurking-places of the savage warriors far and near.

The position of the besieged was now deplorable. More than three hundredof them had been killed and wounded; small-pox was raging in the fort;the place was a focus of infection, and the casemates were crowded withthe sick. A sortie from the intrenched camp and another from the forthad been repulsed with loss. All their large cannon and mortars had beenburst, or disabled by shot; only seven small pieces were left fit forservice; and the whole of Montcalm's thirty-one cannon and fifteenmortars and howitzers would soon open fire, while the walls were alreadybreached, and an assault was imminent. Through the night of the eighththey fired briskly from all their remaining pieces. In the morning theofficers held a council, and all agreed to surrender if honorable termscould be had. A white flag was raised, a drum was beat, andLieutenant-Colonel Young, mounted on horseback,—for a shot in the foothad disabled him from walking,—went, followed by a few soldiers, to thetent of Montcalm.

It was agreed that the English troops should march out with the honorsof war, and be escorted to Fort Edward by a detachment of French troops;that they should not serve for eighteen months; and that all Frenchprisoners captured in America since the war began should be given upwithin three months. The stores, munitions, and artillery were to be theprize of the victors, except one field-piece, which the garrison were toretain in recognition of their brave defence.

Before signing the capitulation Montcalm called the Indian chiefs tocouncil, and asked them to consent to the conditions, and promise torestrain their young warriors from any disorder. They approvedeverything and promised everything. The garrison then evacuated thefort, and marched to join their comrades in the intrenched camp, whichwas included in the surrender. No sooner were they gone than a crowd ofIndians clambered through the embrasures in search of rum and plunder.All the sick men unable to leave their beds were instantly butchered. "Iwas witness of this spectacle," says the missionary Roubaud; "I saw oneof these barbarians come out of the casemates with a human head in hishand, from which the blood ran in streams, and which he paraded as if hehad got the finest prize in the world." There was little left toplunder; and the Indians, joined by the more lawless of the Canadians,turned their attention to the intrenched camp, where all the Englishwere now collected.

The French guard stationed there could not or would not keep out therabble. By the advice of Montcalm the English stove their rum-barrels;but the Indians were drunk already with homicidal rage, and the glitterof their vicious eyes told of the devil within. They roamed among thetents, intrusive, insolent, their visages besmirched with war-paint;grinning like fiends as they handled, in anticipation of the knife, thelong hair of cowering women, of whom, as well as of children, there weremany in the camp, all crazed with fright. Since the last war the NewEngland border population had regarded Indians with a mixture ofdetestation and horror. Their mysterious warfare of ambush and surprise,their midnight onslaughts, their butcheries, their burnings, and alltheir nameless atrocities, had been for years the theme of firesidestory; and the dread they excited was deepened by the distrust anddejection of the time. The confusion in the camp lasted through theafternoon. "The Indians," says Bougainville, "wanted to plunder thechests of the English; the latter resisted; and there was fear thatserious disorder would ensue. The Marquis de Montcalm ran thitherimmediately, and used every means to restore tranquillity: prayers,threats, caresses, interposition of the officers and interpreters whohave some influence over these savages." "We shall be but too happy ifwe can prevent a massacre. Detestable position! of which nobody who hasnot been in it can have any idea, and which makes victory itself asorrow to the victors. The Marquis spared no efforts to prevent therapacity of the savages and, I must say it, of certain personsassociated with them, from resulting in something worse than plunder. Atlast, at nine o'clock in the evening, order seemed restored. The Marquiseven induced the Indians to promise that, besides the escort agreed uponin the capitulation, two chiefs for each tribe should accompany theEnglish on their way to Fort Edward." He also ordered La Corne and theother Canadian officers attached to the Indians to see that no violencetook place. He might well have done more. In view of the disorders ofthe afternoon, it would not have been too much if he had ordered thewhole body of regular troops, whom alone he could trust for the purpose,to hold themselves ready to move to the spot in case of outbreak, andshelter their defeated foes behind a hedge of bayonets.

Bougainville was not to see what ensued; for Montcalm now sent him toMontreal, as a special messenger to carry news of the victory. Heembarked at ten o'clock. Returning daylight found him far down the lake;and as he looked on its still bosom flecked with mists, and its quietmountains sleeping under the flush of dawn, there was nothing in thewild tranquillity of the scene to suggest the tragedy which even thenwas beginning on the shore he had left behind.

The English in their camp had passed a troubled night, agitated bystrange rumors. In the morning something like a panic seized them; forthey distrusted not the Indians only, but the Canadians. In their hasteto be gone they got together at daybreak, before the escort of threehundred regulars had arrived. They had their muskets, but no ammunition;and few or none of the provincials had bayonets. Early as it was, theIndians were on the alert; and, indeed, since midnight great numbers ofthem had been prowling about the skirts of the camp, showing, saysColonel Frye, "more than usual malice in their looks." Seventeen woundedmen of his regiment lay in huts, unable to join the march. In thepreceding afternoon Miles Whitworth, the regimental surgeon, had passedthem over to the care of a French surgeon, according to an agreementmade at the time of the surrender; but, the Frenchman being absent, theother remained with them attending to their wants. The French surgeonhad caused special sentinels to be posted for their protection. Thesewere now removed, at the moment when they were needed most; upon which,about five o'clock in the morning, the Indians entered the huts, draggedout the inmates, and tomahawked and scalped them all, before the eyes ofWhitworth, and in presence of La Corne and other Canadian officers, aswell as of a French guard stationed within forty feet of the spot; and,declares the surgeon under oath, "none, either officer or soldier,protected the said wounded men." The opportune butchery relieved them ofa troublesome burden.

A scene of plundering now began. The escort had by this time arrived,and Monro complained to the officers that the capitulation was broken;but got no other answer than advice to give up the baggage to theIndians in order to appease them. To this the English at length agreed;but it only increased the excitement of the mob. They demanded rum; andsome of the soldiers, afraid to refuse, gave it to them from theircanteens, thus adding fuel to the flame. When, after much difficulty,the column at last got out of the camp and began to move along the roadthat crossed the rough plain between the intrenchment and the forest,the Indians crowded upon them, impeded their march, snatched caps,coats, and weapons from men and officers, tomahawked those thatresisted, and seizing upon shrieking women and children, dragged themoff or murdered them on the spot. It is said that some of theinterpreters secretly fomented the disorder. Suddenly there rose thescreech of the war-whoop. At this signal of butchery, which was given byAbenaki Christians from the mission of the Penobscot, a mob of savagesrushed upon the New Hampshire men at the rear of the column, and killedor dragged away eighty of them. A frightful tumult ensued, whenMontcalm, Lévis, Bourlamaque, and many other French officers, who hadhastened from their camp on the first news of disturbance, threwthemselves among the Indians, and by promises and threats tried to allaytheir frenzy. "Kill me, but spare the English who are under myprotection," exclaimed Montcalm. He took from one of them a youngofficer whom the savage had seized; upon which several other Indiansimmediately tomahawked their prisoners, lest they too should be takenfrom them. One writer says that a French grenadier was killed and twowounded in attempting to restore order; but the statement is doubtful.The English seemed paralyzed, and fortunately did not attempt aresistance, which, without ammunition as they were, would have ended ina general massacre. Their broken column struggled forward in wilddisorder, amid the din of whoops and shrieks, till they reached theFrench advance-guard, which consisted of Canadians; and here theydemanded protection from the officers, who refused to give it, tellingthem that they must take to the woods and shift for themselves. Frye wasseized by a number of Indians, who, brandishing spears and tomahawks,threatened him with death and tore off his clothing, leaving nothing butbreeches, shoes, and shirt. Repelled by the officers of the guard, hemade for the woods. A Connecticut soldier who was present says of himthat he leaped upon an Indian who stood in his way, disarmed and killedhim, and then escaped; but Frye himself does not mention the incident.Captain Burke, also of the Massachusetts regiment, was stripped, after aviolent struggle, of all his clothes; then broke loose, gained thewoods, spent the night shivering in the thick grass of a marsh, and onthe next day reached Fort Edward. Jonathan Carver, a provincialvolunteer, declares that, when the tumult was at its height, he sawofficers of the French army walking about at a little distance andtalking with seeming unconcern. Three or four Indians seized him,brandished their tomahawks over his head, and tore off most of hisclothes, while he vainly claimed protection from a sentinel, who calledhim an English dog, and violently pushed him back among his tormentors.Two of them were dragging him towards the neighboring swamp, when anEnglish officer, stripped of everything but his scarlet breeches, ranby. One of Carver's captors sprang upon him, but was thrown to theground; whereupon the other went to the aid of his comrade and drove histomahawk into the back of the Englishman. As Carver turned to run, anEnglish boy, about twelve years old, clung to him and begged for help.They ran on together for a moment, when the boy was seized, dragged fromhis protector, and, as Carver judged by his shrieks, was murdered. Hehimself escaped to the forest, and after three days of famine reachedFort Edward.

The bonds of discipline seem for the time to have been completelybroken; for while Montcalm and his chief officers used every effort torestore order, even at the risk of their lives, many other officers,chiefly of the militia, failed atrociously to do their duty. How manyEnglish were killed it is impossible to tell with exactness. Roubaudsays that he saw forty or fifty corpses scattered about the field. Lévissays fifty; which does not include the sick and wounded before murderedin the camp and fort. It is certain that six or seven hundred personswere carried off, stripped, and otherwise maltreated. Montcalm succeededin recovering more than four hundred of them in the course of the day;and many of the French officers did what they could to relieve theirwants by buying back from their captors the clothing that had been tornfrom them. Many of the fugitives had taken refuge in the fort, whitherMonro himself had gone to demand protection for his followers; and hereRoubaud presently found a crowd of half-frenzied women, crying inanguish for husbands and children. All the refugees and redeemedprisoners were afterwards conducted to the intrenched camp, where foodand shelter were provided for them, and a strong guard set for theirprotection until the fifteenth, when they were sent under an escort toFort Edward. Here cannon had been fired at intervals to guide those whohad fled to the woods, whence they came dropping in from day to day,half dead with famine.

On the morning after the massacre the Indians decamped in a body and setout for Montreal, carrying with them their plunder and some two hundredprisoners, who, it is said, could not be got out of their hands. Thesoldiers were set to the work of demolishing the English fort; and thetask occupied several days. The barracks were torn down, and the hugepine-logs of the rampart thrown into a heap. The dead bodies that filledthe casemates were added to the mass, and fire was set to the whole. Themighty funeral pyre blazed all night. Then, on the sixteenth, the armyreimbarked. The din of ten thousand combatants, the rage, the terror,the agony, were gone; and no living thing was left but the wolves thatgathered from the mountains to feast upon the dead.

MONTCALM.

Aged 29.

BATTLE OF TICONDEROGA.

In 1758, the English commanders, incensed at the loss of Fort WilliamHenry, resolved to retaliate by a strong effort to seize Ticonderoga. InJune, the combined British and provincial force destined for theexpedition was gathered at the head of Lake George under GeneralAbercromby, while the Marquis de Montcalm lay around the walls of theFrench stronghold with an army not one fourth so numerous.

Montcalm hesitated whether he should not fall back to Crown Point. Itwas but a choice of difficulties, and he stayed at Ticonderoga. Histroops were disposed as they had been in the summer before; onebattalion, that of Berry, being left near the fort, while the main body,under Montcalm himself, was encamped by the saw-mill at the Falls, andthe rest, under Bourlamaque, occupied the head of the portage, with asmall advanced force at the landing-place on Lake George. It remained todetermine at which of these points he should concentrate them and makehis stand against the English. Ruin threatened him in any case; eachposition had its fatal weakness or its peculiar danger, and his besthope was in the ignorance or blundering of his enemy. He seems to havebeen several days in a state of indecision.

In the afternoon of the fifth of July the partisan Langy, who had goneout to reconnoitre towards the head of Lake George, came back in hastewith the report that the English were embarked in great force. Montcalmsent a canoe down Lake Champlain to hasten Lévis to his aid, and orderedthe battalion of Berry to begin a breastwork and abatis on the highground in front of the fort. That they were not begun before shows thathe was in doubt as to his plan of defence; and that his whole army wasnot now set to work at them shows that his doubt was still unsolved.

It was nearly a month since Abercromby had begun his camp at the head ofLake George. Here, on the ground where Johnson had beaten Dieskau, whereMontcalm had planted his batteries, and Monro vainly defended the woodenramparts of Fort William Henry, were now assembled more than fifteenthousand men; and the shores, the foot of the mountains, and the brokenplains between them were studded thick with tents. Of regulars therewere six thousand three hundred and sixty-seven, officers and soldiers,and of provincials nine thousand and thirty-four. To the New Englandlevies, or at least to their chaplains, the expedition seemed a crusadeagainst the abomination of Babylon; and they discoursed in their sermonsof Moses sending forth Joshua against Amalek. Abercromby, raised to hisplace by political influence, was little but the nominal commander. "Aheavy man," said Wolfe in a letter to his father; "an aged gentleman,infirm in body and mind," wrote William Parkman, a boy of seventeen, whocarried a musket in a Massachusetts regiment, and kept in his knapsack adingy little note-book, in which he jotted down what passed each day.The age of the aged gentleman was fifty-two.

Pitt meant that the actual command of the army should be in the hands ofBrigadier Lord Howe, and he was in fact its real chief; "the noblestEnglishman that has appeared in my time, and the best soldier in theBritish army," says Wolfe. And he elsewhere speaks of him as "that greatman." Abercromby testifies to the universal respect and love with whichofficers and men regarded him, and Pitt calls him "a character ofancient times; a complete model of military virtue." High as this praiseis, it seems to have been deserved. The young nobleman, who was then inhis thirty-fourth year, had the qualities of a leader of men. The armyfelt him, from general to drummer boy. He was its soul; and whilebreathing into it his own energy and ardor, and bracing it by stringentdiscipline, he broke through the traditions of the service and gave itnew shapes to suit the time and place. During the past year he hadstudied the art of forest warfare, and joined Rogers and his rangers intheir scouting-parties, sharing all their hardships and making himselfone of them. Perhaps the reforms that he introduced were fruits of thisrough self-imposed schooling. He made officers and men throw off alluseless incumbrances, cut their hair close, wear leggings to protectthem from briers, brown the barrels of their muskets, and carry in theirknapsacks thirty pounds of meal, which they cooked for themselves; sothat, according to an admiring Frenchman, they could live a monthwithout their supply-trains. "You would laugh to see the droll figure weall make," writes an officer. "Regulars as well as provincials have cuttheir coats so as scarcely to reach their waists. No officer or privateis allowed to carry more than one blanket and a bearskin. A smallportmanteau is allowed each officer. No women follow the camp to washour linen. Lord Howe has already shown an example by going to the brookand washing his own."

Here, as in all things, he shared the lot of the soldier, and requiredhis officers to share it. A story is told of him that before the armyembarked he invited some of them to dinner in his tent, where they foundno seats but logs, and no carpet but bearskins. A servant presentlyplaced on the ground a large dish of pork and peas, on which hislordship took from his pocket a sheath containing a knife and fork andbegan to cut the meat. The guests looked on in some embarrassment; uponwhich he said: "Is it possible, gentlemen, that you have come on thiscampaign without providing yourselves with what is necessary?" And hegave each of them a sheath, with a knife and fork, like his own.

Yet this Lycurgus of the camp, as a contemporary calls him, is describedas a man of social accomplishments rare even in his rank. He madehimself greatly beloved by the provincial officers, with many of whom hewas on terms of intimacy, and he did what he could to break down thebarriers between the colonial soldiers and the British regulars. When hewas at Albany, sharing with other high officers the kindly hospitalitiesof Mrs. Schuyler, he so won the heart of that excellent matron that sheloved him like a son; and, though not given to such effusion, embracedhim with tears on the morning when he left her to lead his division tothe lake. In Westminster Abbey may be seen the tablet on whichMassachusetts pays grateful tribute to his virtues, and commemorates"the affection her officers and soldiers bore to his command."

On the evening of the fourth of July, baggage, stores, and ammunitionwere all on board the boats, and the whole army embarked on the morningof the fifth. The arrangements were perfect. Each corps marched withoutconfusion to its appointed station on the beach, and the sun wasscarcely above the ridge of French Mountain when all were afloat. Aspectator watching them from the shore says that when the fleet wasthree miles on its way, the surface of the lake at that distance wascompletely hidden from sight. There were nine hundred bateaux, a hundredand thirty-five whaleboats, and a large number of heavy flat boatscarrying the artillery. The whole advanced in three divisions, theregulars in the centre, and the provincials on the flanks. Each corpshad its flags and its music. The day was fair, and men and officers werein the highest spirits.

Before ten o'clock they began to enter the Narrows; and the boats of thethree divisions extended themselves into long files as the mountainsclosed on either hand upon the contracted lake. From front to rear theline was six miles long. The spectacle was superb: the brightness of thesummer day; the romantic beauty of the scenery; the sheen and sparkle ofthose crystal waters; the countless islets, tufted with pine, birch, andfir; the bordering mountains, with their green summits and sunny crags;the flash of oars and glitter of weapons; the banners, the varieduniforms, and the notes of bugle, trumpet, bagpipe, and drum, answeredand prolonged by a hundred woodland echoes. "I never beheld sodelightful a prospect," wrote a wounded officer at Albany a fortnightafter.

Rogers with the rangers, and Gage with the light infantry, led the wayin whaleboats, followed by Bradstreet with his corps of boatmen, armedand drilled as soldiers. Then came the main body. The central column ofregulars was commanded by Lord Howe, his own regiment, the fifty-fifth,in the van, followed by the Royal Americans, the twenty-seventh,forty-fourth, forty-sixth, and eightieth infantry, and the Highlandersof the forty-second, with their major, Duncan Campbell of Inverawe,silent and gloomy amid the general cheer, for his soul was dark withforeshadowings of death. With this central column came what aredescribed as two floating castles, which were no doubt batteries tocover the landing of the troops. On the right hand and the left were theprovincials, uniformed in blue, regiment after regiment, fromMassachusetts, Connecticut, New York, New Jersey, and Rhode Island.Behind them all came the bateaux, loaded with stores and baggage, andthe heavy flat boats that carried the artillery, while a rear-guard ofprovincials and regulars closed the long procession.

At five in the afternoon they reached Sabbath-Day Point, twenty-fivemiles down the lake, where they stopped till late in the evening,waiting for the baggage and artillery, which had lagged behind; and hereLord Howe, lying on a bearskin by the side of the ranger, John Stark,questioned him as to the position of Ticonderoga and its best points ofapproach. At about eleven o'clock they set out again, and at daybreakentered what was then called the Second Narrows; that is to say, thecontraction of the lake where it approaches its outlet. Close on theirleft, ruddy in the warm sunrise, rose the vast bare face of Rogers Rock,whence a French advanced party, under Langy and an officer namedTrepezec, was watching their movements. Lord Howe, with Rogers andBradstreet, went in whaleboats to reconnoitre the landing. At the placewhich the French called the Burned Camp, where Montcalm had embarked thesummer before, they saw a detachment of the enemy too weak to opposethem. Their men landed and drove them off. At noon the whole army was onshore. Rogers, with a party of rangers, was ordered forward toreconnoitre, and the troops were formed for the march.

Sketch of the country round Tyconderoga

From this part of the shore[4] a plain covered with forest stretchednorthwestward half a mile or more to the mountains behind which lay thevalley of Trout Brook. On this plain the army began its march in fourcolumns, with the intention of passing round the western bank of theriver of the outlet, since the bridge over it had been destroyed.Rogers, with the provincial regiments of Fitch and Lyman, led the way,at some distance before the rest. The forest was extremely dense andheavy, and so obstructed with undergrowth that it was impossible to seemore than a few yards in any direction, while the ground was encumberedwith fallen trees in every stage of decay. The ranks were broken, andthe men struggled on as they could in dampness and shade, under a canopyof boughs that the sun could scarcely pierce. The difficulty increasedwhen, after advancing about a mile, they came upon undulating and brokenground. They were now not far from the upper rapids of the outlet. Theguides became bewildered in the maze of trunks and boughs; the marchingcolumns were confused, and fell in one upon the other. They were in thestrange situation of an army lost in the woods.

The advanced party of French under Langy and Trepezec, about threehundred and fifty in all, regulars and Canadians, had tried to retreat;but before they could do so, the whole English army had passed them,landed, and placed itself between them and their countrymen. They had noresource but to take to the woods. They seem to have climbed the steepgorge at the side of Rogers Rock and followed the Indian path that ledto the valley of Trout Brook, thinking to descend it, and, by circlingalong the outskirts of the valley of Ticonderoga, reach Montcalm's campat the saw-mill. Langy was used to bushranging; but he too becameperplexed in the blind intricacies of the forest. Towards the close ofthe day he and his men had come out from the valley of Trout Brook, andwere near the junction of that stream with the river of the outlet, in astate of some anxiety, for they could see nothing but brown trunks andgreen boughs. Could any of them have climbed one of the great pines thathere and there reared their shaggy spires high above the surroundingforest, they would have discovered where they were, but would havegained not the faintest knowledge of the enemy. Out of the woods on theright they would have seen a smoke rising from the burning huts of theFrench camp at the head of the portage, which Bourlamaque had set onfire and abandoned. At a mile or more in front, the saw-mill at theFalls might perhaps have been descried, and, by glimpses between thetrees, the tents of the neighboring camp where Montcalm still lay withhis main force. All the rest seemed lonely as the grave; mountain andvalley lay wrapped in primeval woods, and none could have dreamed that,not far distant, an army was groping its way, buried in foliage; norumbling of wagons and artillery trains, for none were there; all silentbut the cawing of some crow flapping his black wings over the sea oftree-tops.

Lord Howe, with Major Israel Putnam and two hundred rangers, was at thehead of the principal column, which was a little in advance of the threeothers. Suddenly the challenge, Qui vive! rang sharply from thethickets in front. Français! was the reply. Langy's men were notdeceived; they fired out of the bushes. The shots were returned; a hotskirmish followed; and Lord Howe dropped dead, shot through the breast.All was confusion. The dull, vicious reports of musketry in thickwoods, at first few and scattering, then in fierce and rapid volleys,reached the troops behind. They could hear, but see nothing. Alreadyharassed and perplexed, they became perturbed. For all they knew,Montcalm's whole army was upon them. Nothing prevented a panic but thesteadiness of the rangers, who maintained the fight alone till the restcame back to their senses. Rogers, with his reconnoitring party, and theregiments of Fitch and Lyman, were at no great distance in front. Theyall turned on hearing the musketry, and thus the French were caughtbetween two fires. They fought with desperation. About fifty of them atlength escaped; a hundred and forty-eight were captured, and the restkilled or drowned in trying to cross the rapids. The loss of the Englishwas small in numbers, but immeasurable in the death of Howe. "The fallof this noble and brave officer," says Rogers, "seemed to produce analmost general languor and consternation through the whole army." "InLord Howe," writes another contemporary, Major Thomas Mante, "the soulof General Abercromby's army seemed to expire. From the unhappy momentthe General was deprived of his advice, neither order nor discipline wasobserved, and a strange kind of infatuation usurped the place ofresolution." The death of one man was the ruin of fifteen thousand.

The evil news was despatched to Albany, and in two or three days themessenger who bore it passed the house of Mrs. Schuyler on the meadowsabove the town. "In the afternoon," says her biographer, "a man was seencoming from the north galloping violently without his hat. Pedrom, as hewas familiarly called, Colonel Schuyler's only surviving brother, waswith her, and ran instantly to inquire, well knowing that he rodeexpress. The man galloped on, crying out that Lord Howe was killed. Themind of our good aunt had been so engrossed by her anxiety and fears forthe event impending, and so impressed with the merit and magnanimity ofher favorite hero, that her wonted firmness sank under the stroke, andshe broke out into bitter lamentations. This had such an effect on herfriends and domestics that shrieks and sobs of anguish echoed throughevery part of the house."

The effect of the loss was seen at once. The army was needlessly keptunder arms all night in the forest, and in the morning was ordered backto the landing whence it came. Towards noon, however, Bradstreet wassent with a detachment of regulars and provincials to take possession ofthe saw-mill at the Falls, which Montcalm had abandoned the eveningbefore. Bradstreet rebuilt the bridges destroyed by the retiring enemy,and sent word to his commander that the way was open; on whichAbercromby again put his army in motion, reached the Falls late in theafternoon, and occupied the deserted encampment of the French.

Montcalm with his main force had held this position at the Falls throughmost of the preceding day, doubtful, it seems, to the last whether heshould not make his final stand there. Bourlamaque was for doing so; buttwo old officers, Bernès and Montguy, pointed out the danger that theEnglish would occupy the neighboring heights; whereupon Montcalm atlength resolved to fall back. The camp was broken up at five o'clock.Some of the troops embarked in bateaux, while others marched a mile anda half along the forest road, passed the place where the battalion ofBerry was still at work on the breastwork begun in the morning, and madetheir bivouac a little farther on, upon the cleared ground thatsurrounded the fort.

The peninsula of Ticonderoga consists of a rocky plateau, with lowgrounds on each side, bordering Lake Champlain on the one hand, and theoutlet of Lake George on the other. The fort stood near the end of thepeninsula, which points towards the southeast. Thence, as one goeswestward, the ground declines a little, and then slowly rises, till,about half a mile from the fort, it reaches its greatest elevation, andbegins still more gradually to decline again. Thus a ridge is formedacross the plateau between the steep declivities that sink to the lowgrounds on right and left. Some weeks before, a French officer namedHugues had suggested the defence of this ridge by means of an abatis.Montcalm approved his plan; and now, at the eleventh hour, he resolvedto make his stand here. The two engineers, Pontleroy and Desandrouin,had already traced the outline of the works, and the soldiers of thebattalion of Berry had made some progress in constructing them. At dawnof the seventh, while Abercromby, fortunately for his enemy, was drawinghis troops back to the landing-place, the whole French army fell totheir task. The regimental colors were planted along the line, and theofficers, stripped to the shirt, took axe in hand and labored with theirmen. The trees that covered the ground were hewn down by thousands, thetops lopped off, and the trunks piled one upon another to form a massivebreastwork. The line followed the top of the ridge, along which itzigzagged in such a manner that the whole front could be swept by flankfires of musketry and grape. Abercromby describes the wall of logs asbetween eight and nine feet high; in which case there must have been arude banquette, or platform to fire from, on the inner side. It wascertainly so high that nothing could be seen over it but the crowns ofthe soldiers' hats. The upper tier was formed of single logs, in whichnotches were cut to serve as loopholes; and in some places sods and bagsof sand were piled along the top, with narrow spaces to fire through.From the central part of the line the ground sloped away like a naturalglacis; while at the sides, and especially on the left, it wasundulating and broken. Over this whole space, to the distance of amusket-shot from the works, the forest was cut down, and the trees leftlying where they fell among the stumps, with tops turned outwards,forming one vast abatis, which, as a Massachusetts officer says, lookedlike a forest laid flat by a hurricane. But the most formidableobstruction was immediately along the front of the breastwork, where theground was covered with heavy boughs, overlapping and interlaced, withsharpened points bristling into the face of the assailant like thequills of a porcupine. As these works were all of wood, no vestige ofthem remains. The earthworks now shown to tourists as the lines ofMontcalm are of later construction; and though on the same ground, arenot on the same plan.

Here, then, was a position which, if attacked in front with musketryalone, might be called impregnable. But would Abercromby so attack it?He had several alternatives. He might attempt the flank and rear of hisenemy by way of the low grounds on the right and left of the plateau, amovement which the precautions of Montcalm had made difficult, but notimpossible. Or, instead of leaving his artillery idle on the strand ofLake George, he might bring it to the front and batter the breastwork,which, though impervious to musketry, was worthless against heavycannon. Or he might do what Burgoyne did with success a score of yearslater, and plant a battery on the heights of Rattlesnake Hill, nowcalled Mount Defiance, which commanded the position of the French, andwhence the inside of their breastwork could be scoured with round-shotfrom end to end. Or, while threatening the French front with a part ofhis army, he could march the rest a short distance through the woods onhis left to the road which led from Ticonderoga to Crown Point, andwhich would soon have brought him to the place called Five-Mile Point,where Lake Champlain narrows to the width of an easy rifle-shot, andwhere a battery of field-pieces would have cut off all Montcalm'ssupplies and closed his only way of retreat. As the French wereprovisioned for but eight days, their position would thus have beendesperate. They plainly saw the danger; and Doreil declares that had themovement been made, their whole army must have surrendered. Montcalm haddone what he could; but the danger of his position was inevitable andextreme. His hope lay in Abercromby; and it was a hope well founded. Theaction of the English general answered the utmost wishes of his enemy.

Abercromby had been told by his prisoners that Montcalm had six thousandmen, and that three thousand more were expected every hour. Therefore hewas in haste to attack before these succors could arrive. As was thegeneral, so was the army. "I believe," writes an officer, "we were oneand all infatuated by a notion of carrying every obstacle by a merecoup de mousqueterie." Leadership perished with Lord Howe, and nothingwas left but blind, headlong valor.

Clerk, chief engineer, was sent to reconnoitre the French works fromMount Defiance; and came back with the report that, to judge from whathe could see, they might be carried by assault. Then, without waitingto bring up his cannon, Abercromby prepared to storm the lines.

The French finished their breastwork and abatis on the evening of theseventh, encamped behind them, slung their kettles, and rested aftertheir heavy toil. Lévis had not yet appeared; but at twilight one of hisofficers, Captain Pouchot, arrived with three hundred regulars, andannounced that his commander would come before morning with a hundredmore. The reinforcement, though small, was welcome, and Lévis was a hostin himself. Pouchot was told that the army was half a mile off. Thitherhe repaired, made his report to Montcalm, and looked with amazement atthe prodigious amount of work accomplished in one day. Lévis himselfarrived in the course of the night, and approved the arrangement of thetroops. They lay behind their lines till daybreak; then the drums beat,and they formed in order of battle. The battalions of La Sarre andLanguedoc were posted on the left, under Bourlamaque, the firstbattalion of Berry with that of Royal Roussillon in the centre, underMontcalm, and those of La Reine, Béarn, and Guienne on the right, underLévis. A detachment of volunteers occupied the low grounds between thebreastwork and the outlet of Lake George; while, at the foot of thedeclivity on the side towards Lake Champlain, were stationed fourhundred and fifty colony regulars and Canadians, behind an abatis whichthey had made for themselves; and as they were covered by the cannon ofthe fort, there was some hope that they would check any flank movementwhich the English might attempt on that side. Their posts being thusassigned, the men fell to work again to strengthen their defences.Including those who came with Lévis, the total force of effectivesoldiers was now thirty-six hundred.

Soon after nine o'clock a distant and harmless fire of small-arms beganon the slopes of Mount Defiance. It came from a party of Indians who hadjust arrived with Sir William Johnson, and who, after amusing themselvesin this manner for a time, remained for the rest of the day safespectators of the fight. The soldiers worked undisturbed till noon, whenvolleys of musketry were heard from the forest in front. It was theEnglish light troops driving in the French pickets. A cannon was firedas a signal to drop tools and form for battle. The white uniforms linedthe breastwork in a triple row, with the grenadiers behind them as areserve, and the second battalion of Berry watching the flanks and rear.

Meanwhile the English army had moved forward from its camp by thesaw-mill. First came the rangers, the light infantry, and Bradstreet'sarmed boatmen, who, emerging into the open space, began a spatteringfire. Some of the provincial troops followed, extending from left toright, and opening fire in turn; then the regulars, who had formed incolumns of attack under cover of the forest, advanced their solid redmasses into the sunlight, and passing through the intervals between theprovincial regiments, pushed forward to the assault. Across the roughground, with its maze of fallen trees whose leaves hung withering in theJuly sun, they could see the top of the breastwork, but not the menbehind it; when, in an instant, all the line was obscured by a gush ofsmoke, a crash of exploding firearms tore the air, and grapeshot andmusket-balls swept the whole space like a tempest; "a damnable fire,"says an officer who heard them screaming about his ears. The English hadbeen ordered to carry the works with the bayonet; but their ranks werebroken by the obstructions through which they struggled in vain to forcetheir way, and they soon began to fire in turn. The storm raged in fullfury for an hour. The assailants pushed close to the breastwork; butthere they were stopped by the bristling mass of sharpened branches,which they could not pass under the murderous crossfires that swept themfrom front and flank. At length they fell back, exclaiming that theworks were impregnable. Abercromby, who was at the saw-mill, a mile anda half in the rear, sent orders to attack again, and again they came onas before.

The scene was frightful: masses of infuriated men who could not goforward and would not go back; straining for an enemy they could notreach, and firing on an enemy they could not see; caught in theentanglement of fallen trees; tripped by briers, stumbling over logs,tearing through boughs; shouting, yelling, cursing, and pelted all thewhile with bullets that killed them by scores, stretched them on theground, or hung them on jagged branches in strange attitudes of death.The provincials supported the regulars with spirit, and some of themforced their way to the foot of the wooden wall.

The French fought with the intrepid gayety of their nation, and shoutsof Vive le Roi! and Vive notre Général! mingled with the din ofmusketry. Montcalm, with his coat off, for the day was hot, directed thedefence of the centre, and repaired to any part of the line where thedanger for the time seemed greatest. He is warm in praise of his enemy,and declares that between one and seven o'clock they attacked him sixsuccessive times. Early in the action Abercromby tried to turn theFrench left by sending twenty bateaux, filled with troops, down theoutlet of Lake George. They were met by the fire of the volunteersstationed to defend the low grounds on that side, and, still advancing,came within range of the cannon of the fort, which sank two of them anddrove back the rest.

A curious incident happened during one of the attacks. De Bassignac, acaptain in the battalion of Royal Roussillon, tied his handkerchief tothe end of a musket and waved it over the breastwork in defiance. TheEnglish mistook it for a sign of surrender, and came forward with allpossible speed, holding their muskets crossed over their heads in bothhands, and crying Quarter. The French made the same mistake; andthinking that their enemies were giving themselves up as prisoners,ceased firing, and mounted on the top of the breastwork to receive them.Captain Pouchot, astonished, as he says, to see them perched there,looked out to learn the cause, and saw that the enemy meant anything butsurrender. Whereupon he shouted with all his might: "Tirez! Tirez! Nevoyez-vous pas que ces gens-là vont vous enlever?" The soldiers, stillstanding on the breastwork, instantly gave the English a volley, whichkilled some of them, and sent back the rest discomfited.

This was set to the account of Gallic treachery. "Another deceit theenemy put upon us," says a military letter-writer: "they raised theirhats above the breastwork, which our people fired at; they havingloopholes to fire through, and being covered by the sods, we did themlittle damage, except shooting their hats to pieces." In one of the lastassaults a soldier of the Rhode Island regiment, William Smith, managedto get through all obstructions and ensconce himself close under thebreastwork, where in the confusion he remained for a time unnoticed,improving his advantages meanwhile by shooting several Frenchmen. Beingat length observed, a soldier fired vertically down upon him andwounded him severely, but not enough to prevent his springing up,striking at one of his enemies over the top of the wall, and braininghim with his hatchet. A British officer who saw the feat, and was struckby the reckless daring of the man, ordered two regulars to bring himoff; which, covered by a brisk fire of musketry, they succeeded indoing. A letter from the camp two or three weeks later reports him as ina fair way to recover, being, says the writer, much braced andinvigorated by his anger against the French, on whom he was swearing tohave his revenge.

Toward five o'clock two English columns joined in a most determinedassault on the extreme right of the French, defended by the battalionsof Guienne and Béarn. The danger for a time was imminent. Montcalmhastened to the spot with the reserves. The assailants hewed their wayto the foot of the breastwork; and though again and again repulsed, theyagain and again renewed the attack. The Highlanders fought with stubbornand unconquerable fury. "Even those who were mortally wounded," writesone of their lieutenants, "cried to their companions not to lose athought upon them, but to follow their officers and mind the honor oftheir country. Their ardor was such that it was difficult to bring themoff." Their major, Campbell of Inverawe, found his foreboding true. Hereceived a mortal shot, and his clansmen bore him from the field.Twenty-five of their officers were killed or wounded, and half the menfell under the deadly fire that poured from the loopholes. Captain JohnCampbell and a few followers tore their way through the abatis, climbedthe breastwork, leaped down among the French, and were bayoneted there.

As the colony troops and Canadians on the low ground were leftundisturbed, Lévis sent them an order to make a sortie and attack theleft flank of the charging columns. They accordingly posted themselvesamong the trees along the declivity, and fired upwards at the enemy, whopresently shifted their position to the right, out of the line of shot.The assault still continued, but in vain; and at six there was anothereffort, equally fruitless. From this time till half-past seven alingering fight was kept up by the rangers and other provincials, firingfrom the edge of the woods and from behind the stumps, bushes, andfallen trees in front of the lines. Its only objects were to cover theircomrades, who were collecting and bringing off the wounded, and toprotect the retreat of the regulars, who fell back in disorder to theFalls. As twilight came on, the last combatant withdrew, and none wereleft but the dead. Abercromby had lost in killed, wounded, and missing,nineteen hundred and forty-four officers and men. The loss of theFrench, not counting that of Langy's detachment, was three hundred andseventy-seven. Bourlamaque was dangerously wounded; Bougainvilleslightly; and the hat of Lévis was twice shot through.

Montcalm, with a mighty load lifted from his soul, passed along thelines, and gave the tired soldiers the thanks they nobly deserved. Beer,wine, and food were served out to them, and they bivouacked for thenight on the level ground between the breastwork and the fort. The enemyhad met a terrible rebuff; yet the danger was not over. Abercromby stillhad more than thirteen thousand men, and he might renew the attack withcannon. But, on the morning of the ninth, a band of volunteers who hadgone out to watch him brought back the report that he was in fullretreat. The saw-mill at the Falls was on fire, and the last Englishsoldier was gone. On the morning of the tenth, Lévis, with a strongdetachment, followed the road to the landing-place, and found signs thata panic had overtaken the defeated troops. They had left behind severalhundred barrels of provisions and a large quantity of baggage; while ina marshy place that they had crossed was found a considerable number oftheir shoes, which had stuck in the mud, and which they had not stoppedto recover. They had embarked on the morning after the battle, andretreated to the head of the lake in a disorder and dejection wofullycontrasted with the pomp of their advance. A gallant army was sacrificedby the blunders of its chief.

Montcalm announced his victory to his wife in a strain of exaggerationthat marks the exaltation of his mind. "Without Indians, almost withoutCanadians or colony troops,—I had only four hundred,—alone with Lévisand Bourlamaque and the troops of the line, thirty-one hundred fightingmen, I have beaten an army of twenty-five thousand. They repassed thelake precipitately, with a loss of at least five thousand. This gloriousday does infinite honor to the valor of our battalions. I have no timeto write more. I am well, my dearest, and I embrace you." And he wroteto his friend Doreil: "The army, the too-small army of the King, hasbeaten the enemy. What a day for France! If I had had two hundredIndians to send out at the head of a thousand picked men under theChevalier de Lévis, not many would have escaped. Ah, my dear Doreil,what soldiers are ours! I never saw the like. Why were they not atLouisbourg?"

On the morrow of his victory he caused a great cross to be planted onthe battle-field, inscribed with these lines, composed by thesoldier-scholar himself,—

A LEGEND OF TICONDEROGA.

Mention has been made of the death of Major Duncan Campbell of Inverawe.The following family tradition relating to it was told me in 1878 by thelate Dean Stanley, to whom I am also indebted for various papers on thesubject, including a letter from James Campbell, Esq., the present lairdof Inverawe, and great-nephew of the hero of the tale. The same story istold, in an amplified form and with some variations, in the LegendaryTales of the Highlands of Sir Thomas Dick Lauder. As related by DeanStanley and approved by Mr. Campbell, it is this:—

Such is the tradition. The indisputable facts are that Major DuncanCampbell of Inverawe, his arm shattered by a bullet, was carried to FortEdward, where, after amputation, he died and was buried. (Abercromby toPitt, 19 August, 1758.) The stone that marks his grave may still beseen, with this inscription: "Here lyes the Body of Duncan Campbell ofInverawe, Esq^re., Major to the old Highland Regiment, aged 55 Years,who died the 17^th July, 1758, of the Wounds he received in the Attackof the Retrenchment of Ticonderoga or Carrillon, on the 8^th July,1758."

His son, Lieutenant Alexander Campbell, was severely wounded at the sametime, but reached Scotland alive, and died in Glasgow.

Mr. Campbell, the present Inverawe, in the letter mentioned above, saysthat forty-five years ago he knew an old man whose grandfather wasfoster-brother to the slain major of the forty-second, and who told himthe following story while carrying a salmon for him to an inn nearInverawe. The old man's grandfather was sleeping with his son, then alad, in the same room, but in another bed. This son, father of thenarrator, "was awakened," to borrow the words of Mr. Campbell, "by someunaccustomed sound, and behold there was a bright light in the room, andhe saw a figure, in full Highland regimentals, cross over the room andstoop down over his father's bed and give him a kiss. He was toofrightened to speak, but put his head under his coverlet and went tosleep. Once more he was roused in like manner, and saw the same sight.In the morning he spoke to his father about it, who told him that it wasMacdonnochie [the Gaelic patronymic of the laird of Inverawe] whom hehad seen, and who came to tell him that he had been killed in a greatbattle in America. Sure enough, said my informant, it was on the veryday that the battle of Ticonderoga was fought and the laird was killed."

It is also said that two ladies of the family of Inverawe saw a battlein the clouds, in which the shadowy forms of Highland warriors wereplainly to be descried; and that when the fatal news came from America,it was found that the time of the vision answered exactly to that of thebattle in which the head of the family fell.

HENNEPIN'S PICTURE OF NIAGARA.

SIEGE OF FORT NIAGARA.

The River Niagara was known to the Jesuits as early as 1640. The Fallsare indicated on Champlain's map of 1632, and in 1648 the JesuitRugueneau speaks of them as a "cataract of frightful height."

In 1678, the Falls were visited by the friar Louis Hennepin, who givesan exaggerated description of them, and illustrates it by a curiouspicture. The name Niagara is of Iroquois origin, and in the Mohawkdialect is pronounced Nyàgarah.

In the year of Hennepin's visit, the followers of Cavelier de la Sallebegan a fortified storehouse where Lewiston now stands, and on CayugaCreek, a few miles above the Falls, La Salle built the "Griffin," thefirst vessel that ever sailed on the Upper Lakes. At the same time hebegan a fort at the mouth of the river. La Salle's fort fell to ruin,and another was built in its place a few years after. This, too, wasabandoned to be again rebuilt, and the post remained in French handsmore than half a century. It was of the greatest importance, since itcommanded the chief route from Canada to the interior of the continent.At length, in 1759, the year of Wolfe's famous victory at Quebec,General Prideaux was sent to reduce it.

Prideaux safely reached Niagara, and laid siege to it. Fort Niagara wasa strong work, lately rebuilt in regular form by an excellent officer,Captain Pouchot, of the battalion of Béarn, who commanded it. It stoodwhere the present fort stands, in the angle formed by the junction ofthe River Niagara with Lake Ontario, and was held by about six hundredmen, well supplied with provisions and munitions of war. Higher up theriver, a mile and a half above the cataract, there was another fort,called Little Niagara, built of wood, and commanded by the half-breedofficer, Joncaire-Chabert, who with his brother, Joncaire-Clauzonne, anda numerous clan of Indian relatives, had long thwarted the efforts ofSir William Johnson to engage the Five Nations in the English cause. Butrecent English successes had had their effect. Joncaire's influence waswaning, and Johnson was now in Prideaux's camp with nine hundred FiveNation warriors pledged to fight the French. Joncaire, finding his fortuntenable, burned it, and came with his garrison and his Indian friendsto reinforce Niagara.

Pouchot had another resource, on which he confidently relied. Inobedience to an order from Vaudreuil, the French population of theIllinois, Detroit, and other distant posts, joined with troops ofWestern Indians, had come down the Lakes to restore French ascendency onthe Ohio. These mixed bands of white men and red, bushrangers andsavages, were now gathered, partly at Le Boeuf and Venango, but chieflyat Presquisle, under command of Aubry, Ligneris, Marin, and otherpartisan chiefs, the best in Canada. No sooner did Pouchot learn thatthe English were coming to attack him than he sent a messenger to summonthem all to his aid.

The siege was begun in form, though the English engineers were soincompetent that the trenches, as first laid out, were scoured by thefire of the place, and had to be made anew. At last the batteries openedfire. A shell from a cochorn burst prematurely, just as it left themouth of the piece, and a fragment striking Prideaux on the head, killedhim instantly. Johnson took command in his place, and made up in energywhat he lacked in skill. In two or three weeks the fort was inextremity. The rampart was breached, more than a hundred of the garrisonwere killed or disabled, and the rest were exhausted with want of sleep.Pouchot watched anxiously for the promised succors; and on the morningof the twenty-fourth of July a distant firing told him that they were athand.

Aubry and Ligneris, with their motley following, had left Presquisle afew days before, to the number, according to Vaudreuil, of elevenhundred French and two hundred Indians. Among them was a body of colonytroops; but the Frenchmen of the party were chiefly traders andbushrangers from the West, connecting links between civilization andsavagery; some of them indeed were mere white Indians, imbued with theideas and morals of the wigwam, wearing hunting-shirts of smokeddeer-skin embroidered with quills of the Canada porcupine, paintingtheir faces black and red, tying eagle feathers in their long hair, orplastering it on their temples with a compound of vermilion and glue.They were excellent woodsmen, skilful hunters, and perhaps the bestbushfighters in all Canada.

When Pouchot heard the firing, he went with a wounded artillery officerto the bastion next the river; and as the forest had been cut away for agreat distance, they could see more than a mile and a half along theshore. There, by glimpses among trees and bushes, they descried bodiesof men, now advancing, and now retreating; Indians in rapid movement,and the smoke of guns, the sound of which reached their ears in heavyvolleys, or a sharp and angry rattle. Meanwhile the English cannon hadceased their fire, and the silent trenches seemed deserted, as if theiroccupants were gone to meet the advancing foe. There was a call in thefort for volunteers to sally and destroy the works; but no sooner didthey show themselves along the covered way than the seemingly abandonedtrenches were thronged with men and bayonets, and the attempt was givenup. The distant firing lasted half an hour, then ceased, and Pouchotremained in suspense; till, at two in the afternoon, a friendlyOnondaga, who had passed unnoticed through the English lines, came tohim with the announcement that the French and their allies had beenrouted and cut to pieces. Pouchot would not believe him.

Nevertheless his tale was true. Johnson, besides his Indians, had withhim about twenty-three hundred men, whom he was forced to divide intothree separate bodies,—one to guard the bateaux, one to guard thetrenches, and one to fight Aubry and his band. This last body consistedof the provincial light infantry and the pickets, two companies ofgrenadiers, and a hundred and fifty men of the forty-sixth regiment, allunder command of Colonel Massey. They took post behind an abatis at aplace called La Belle Famille, and the Five Nation warriors placedthemselves on their flanks. These savages had shown signs ofdisaffection; and when the enemy approached, they opened a parley withthe French Indians, which, however, soon ended, and both sides raisedthe war-whoop. The fight was brisk for a while; but at last Aubry's menbroke away in a panic. The French officers seem to have made desperateefforts to retrieve the day, for nearly all of them were killed orcaptured; while their followers, after heavy loss, fled to their canoesand boats above the cataract, hastened back to Lake Erie, burnedPresquisle, Le Boeuf, and Venango, and, joined by the garrisons of thoseforts, retreated to Detroit, leaving the whole region of the upper Ohioin undisputed possession of the English.

At four o'clock on the day of the battle, after a furious cannonade onboth sides, a trumpet sounded from the trenches, and an officerapproached the fort with a summons to surrender. He brought also a papercontaining the names of the captive French officers, though some of themwere spelled in a way that defied recognition. Pouchot, feigningincredulity, sent an officer of his own to the English camp, who soonsaw unanswerable proof of the disaster; for here, under a shelter ofleaves and boughs near the tent of Johnson, sat Ligneris, severelywounded, with Aubry, Villiers, Montigny, Marin, and their companions inmisfortune,—in all, sixteen officers, four cadets, and a surgeon.

Pouchot had now no choice but surrender. By the terms of thecapitulation, the garrison were to be sent prisoners to New York, thoughhonors of war were granted them in acknowledgment of their courageousconduct. There was a special stipulation that they should be protectedfrom the Indians, of whom they stood in the greatest terror, lest themassacre of Fort William Henry should be avenged upon them. Johnsonrestrained his dangerous allies, and, though the fort was pillaged, noblood was shed.

The capture of Niagara was an important stroke. Thenceforth Detroit,Michillimackinac, the Illinois, and all the other French interior postswere severed from Canada and left in helpless isolation. The conquest ofthe whole interior became only a question of time.

MASSACRE OF THE DEVIL'S HOLE.

After the conquest of Canada, there was a general uprising of the Indiantribes, led by the famous Pontiac, against the British forts andsettlements. In the war that followed, a remarkable incident took placea little way below Niagara Falls.

The carrying-place of Niagara formed an essential link in the chain ofcommunication between the province of New York and the interior country.Men and military stores were conveyed in boats up the river, as far asthe present site of Lewiston. Thence a portage road, several miles inlength, passed along the banks of the stream, and terminated at FortSchlosser, above the cataract. This road traversed a region whosesublime features have gained for it a world-wide renown. The RiverNiagara, a short distance below the cataract, assumes an aspect scarcelyless remarkable than that stupendous scene itself. Its channel is formedby a vast ravine, whose sides, now bare and weather-stained, now shaggywith forest-trees, rise in cliffs of appalling height and steepness.Along this chasm pour all the waters of the lakes, heaving their furioussurges with the power of an ocean and the rage of a mountain torrent.About three miles below the cataract, the precipices which form theeastern wall of the ravine are broken by an abyss of awful depth andblackness, bearing at the present day the name of the Devil's Hole. Inits shallowest part, the precipice sinks sheer down to the depth ofeighty feet, where it meets a chaotic mass of rocks, descending with anabrupt declivity to unseen depths below. Within the cold and damprecesses of the gulf, a host of forest-trees have rooted themselves;and, standing on the perilous brink, one may look down upon the mingledfoliage of ash, poplar, and maple, while, above them all, the spruce andfir shoot their sharp and rigid spires upward into sunlight. The roar ofthe convulsed river swells heavily on the ear, and, far below, itsheadlong waters may be discerned careering in foam past the openings ofthe matted foliage.

On the thirteenth of September, 1763, a numerous train of wagons andpack horses proceeded from the lower landing to Fort Schlosser, and onthe following morning set out on their return, guarded by an escort oftwenty-four soldiers. They pursued their slow progress until theyreached a point where the road passed along the brink of the Devil'sHole. The gulf yawned on their left, while on their right the road wasskirted by low and densely wooded hills. Suddenly they were greeted bythe blaze and clatter of a hundred rifles. Then followed the startledcries of men, and the bounding of maddened horses. At the next instant,a host of Indians broke screeching from the woods, and rifle-butt andtomahawk finished the bloody work. All was over in a moment. Horsesleaped the precipice; men were driven shrieking into the abyss; teamsand wagons went over, crashing to atoms among the rocks below. Traditionrelates that the drummer boy of the detachment was caught, in his fall,among the branches of a tree, where he hung suspended by his drum-strap.Being but slightly injured, he disengaged himself, and, hiding in therecesses of the gulf, finally escaped. One of the teamsters also, whowas wounded at the first fire, contrived to crawl into the woods, wherehe lay concealed till the Indians had left the place. Besides these two,the only survivor was Stedman, the conductor of the convoy, who, beingwell mounted, and seeing the whole party forced helplessly towards theprecipice, wheeled his horse, and resolutely spurred through the crowdof Indians. One of them, it is said, seized his bridle; but he freedhimself by a dexterous use of his knife, and plunged into the woods,untouched by the bullets which whistled about his head. Flying at fullspeed through the forest, he reached Fort Schlosser in safety.

The distant sound of the Indian rifles had been heard by a party ofsoldiers, who occupied a small fortified camp near the lower landing.Forming in haste, they advanced eagerly to the rescue. In anticipationof this movement, the Indians, who were nearly five hundred in number,had separated into two parties, one of which had stationed itself at theDevil's Hole, to waylay the convoy, while the other formed an ambuscadeupon the road a mile nearer the landing-place. The soldiers, marchingprecipitately, and huddled in a close body, were suddenly assailed by avolley of rifles, which stretched half their number dead upon the road.Then, rushing from the forest, the Indians cut down the survivors withmerciless ferocity. A small remnant only escaped the massacre, and fledto Fort Niagara with the tidings. Major Wilkins, who commanded at thispost, lost no time in marching to the spot, with nearly the wholestrength of his garrison. Not an Indian was to be found. At the twoplaces of ambuscade, about seventy dead bodies were counted, naked,scalpless, and so horribly mangled that many of them could not berecognized. All the wagons had been broken to pieces, and such of thehorses as were not driven over the precipice had been carried off,laden, doubtless, with the plunder. The ambuscade of the Devil's Holehas gained a traditionary immortality, adding fearful interest to ascene whose native horrors need no aid from the imagination.

MONTREAL.

THE BIRTH OF MONTREAL.

We come now to an enterprise as singular in its character as it provedimportant in its results.

At La Flèche, in Anjou, dwelt one Jérôme le Royer de la Dauversière,receiver of taxes. His portrait shows us a round, bourgeois face,somewhat heavy perhaps, decorated with a slight mustache, and redeemedby bright and earnest eyes. On his head he wears a black skull-cap; andover his ample shoulders spreads a stiff white collar, of wide expanseand studious plainness. Though he belonged to the noblesse, his lookis that of a grave burgher, of good renown and sage deportment.Dauversière was, however, an enthusiastic devotee, of mysticaltendencies, who whipped himself with a scourge of small chains till hisshoulders were one wound, wore a belt with more than twelve hundredsharp points, and invented for himself other torments, which filled hisconfessor with admiration. One day, while at his devotions, he heard aninward voice commanding him to become the founder of a new Order ofhospital nuns; and he was further ordered to establish, on the islandcalled Montreal, in Canada, a hospital, or Hôtel-Dieu, to be conductedby these nuns. But Montreal was a wilderness, and the hospital wouldhave no patients. Therefore, in order to supply them, the island mustfirst be colonized. Dauversière was greatly perplexed. On the one hand,the voice of Heaven must be obeyed; on the other, he had a wife, sixchildren, and a very moderate fortune.

Again: there was at Paris a young priest, about twenty-eight years ofage,—Jean Jacques Olier, afterwards widely known as founder of theSeminary of St. Sulpice. Judged by his engraved portrait, hiscountenance, though marked both with energy and intellect, was anythingbut prepossessing. Every lineament proclaims the priest. Yet the AbbéOlier has high titles to esteem. He signalized his piety, it is true, bythe most disgusting exploits of self-mortification; but, at the sametime, he was strenuous in his efforts to reform the people and theclergy. So zealous was he for good morals, that he drew upon himself theimputation of a leaning to the heresy of the Jansenists,—a suspicionstrengthened by his opposition to certain priests, who, to secure thefaithful in their allegiance, justified them in lives of licentiousness.Yet Olier's catholicity was past attaintment, and in his horror ofJansenists he yielded to the Jesuits alone.

He was praying in the ancient church of St. Germain des Prés, when, likeDauversière, he thought he heard a voice from Heaven, saying that he wasdestined to be a light to the Gentiles. It is recorded as a mysticcoincidence attending this miracle, that the choir was at that very timechanting the words, Lumen ad revelationem Gentium; and it seems tohave occurred neither to Olier nor to his biographer, that, falling onthe ear of the rapt worshipper, they might have unconsciously suggestedthe supposed revelation. But there was a further miracle. An inwardvoice told Olier that he was to form a society of priests, and establishthem on the island called Montreal, in Canada, for the propagation ofthe True Faith; and writers old and recent assert, that, while both heand Dauversière were totally ignorant of Canadian geography, theysuddenly found themselves in possession, they knew not how, of the mostexact details concerning Montreal, its size, shape, situation, soil,climate, and productions.

The annual volumes of the Jesuit Relations, issuing from the renownedpress of Cramoisy, were at this time spread broadcast throughout France;and, in the circles of haute devotion, Canada and its missions wereeverywhere the themes of enthusiastic discussion; while Champlain, inhis published works, had long before pointed out Montreal as the propersite for a settlement. But we are entering a region of miracle, and itis superfluous to look far for explanations. The illusion, in thesecases, is a part of the history.

Dauversière pondered the revelation he had received; and the more hepondered, the more was he convinced that it came from God. He thereforeset out for Paris, to find some means of accomplishing the task assignedhim. Here, as he prayed before an image of the Virgin in the church ofNotre-Dame, he fell into an ecstasy, and beheld a vision. "I should befalse to the integrity of history," writes his biographer, "if I did notrelate it here." And he adds, that the reality of this celestial favoris past doubting, inasmuch as Dauversière himself told it to hisdaughters. Christ, the Virgin, and St. Joseph appeared before him. Hesaw them distinctly. Then he heard Christ ask three times of his VirginMother, Where can I find a faithful servant? On which, the Virgin,taking him (Dauversière) by the hand, replied, See, Lord, here is thatfaithful servant!—and Christ, with a benignant smile, received himinto his service, promising to bestow on him wisdom and strength to dohis work. From Paris he went to the neighboring château of Meudon, whichoverlooks the valley of the Seine, not far from St. Cloud. Entering thegallery of the old castle, he saw a priest approaching him. It wasOlier. Now we are told that neither of these men had ever seen or heardof the other; and yet, says the pious historian, "impelled by a kind ofinspiration, they knew each other at once, even to the depths of theirhearts; saluted each other by name, as we read of St. Paul, the Hermit,and St. Anthony, and of St. Dominic and St. Francis; and ran to embraceeach other, like two friends who had met after a long separation."

"Monsieur," exclaimed Olier, "I know your design, and I go to commend itto God at the holy altar."

And he went at once to say mass in the chapel. Dauversière received thecommunion at his hands; and then they walked for three hours in thepark, discussing their plans. They were of one mind, in respect both toobjects and means; and when they parted, Olier gave Dauversière ahundred louis, saying, "This is to begin the work of God."

They proposed to found at Montreal three religious communities,—threebeing the mystic number,—one of secular priests to direct the colonistsand convert the Indians, one of nuns to nurse the sick, and one of nunsto teach the Faith to the children, white and red. To borrow their ownphrases, they would plant the banner of Christ in an abode of desolationand a haunt of demons; and to this end a band of priests and women wereto invade the wilderness, and take post between the fangs of theIroquois. But first they must make a colony, and to do so must raisemoney. Olier had pious and wealthy penitents; Dauversière had a friend,the Baron de Fancamp, devout as himself and far richer. Anxious for hissoul, and satisfied that the enterprise was an inspiration of God, hewas eager to bear part in it. Olier soon found three others: and thesix together formed the germ of the Society of Notre-Dame de Montreal.Among them they raised the sum of seventy-five thousand livres,equivalent to about as many dollars at the present day.

Now to look for a moment at their plan. Their eulogists say, and withperfect truth, that, from a worldly point of view, it was mere folly.The partners mutually bound themselves to seek no return for the moneyexpended. Their profit was to be reaped in the skies: and, indeed, therewas none to be reaped on earth. The feeble settlement at Quebec was atthis time in danger of utter ruin; for the Iroquois, enraged at theattacks made on them by Champlain, had begun a fearful course ofretaliation, and the very existence of the colony trembled in thebalance. But if Quebec was exposed to their ferocious inroads, Montrealwas incomparably more so. A settlement here would be a perilousoutpost,—a hand thrust into the jaws of the tiger. It would provokeattack, and lie almost in the path of the war-parties. The Associatescould gain nothing by the fur-trade; for they would not be allowed toshare in it. On the other hand, danger apart, the place was an excellentone for a mission; for here met two great rivers: the St. Lawrence, withits countless tributaries, flowed in from the west, while the Ottawadescended from the north; and Montreal, embraced by their unitingwaters, was the key to a vast inland navigation. Thither the Indianswould naturally resort; and thence the missionaries could make their wayinto the heart of a boundless heathendom. None of the ordinary motivesof colonization had part in this design. It owed its conception and itsbirth to religious zeal alone.

The island of Montreal belonged to Lauson, former president of the greatcompany of the Hundred Associates; and his son had a monopoly of fishingin the St. Lawrence. Dauversière and Fancamp, after much diplomacy,succeeded in persuading the elder Lauson to transfer his title to them;and, as there was a defect in it, they also obtained a grant of theisland from the Hundred Associates, its original owners, who, however,reserved to themselves its western extremity as a site for a fort andstorehouses. At the same time, the younger Lauson granted them a rightof fishery within two leagues of the shores of the island, for whichthey were to make a yearly acknowledgment of ten pounds of fish. Aconfirmation of these grants was obtained from the King. Dauversière andhis companions were now seigneurs of Montreal. They were empowered toappoint a governor, and to establish courts, from which there was to bean appeal to the Supreme Court of Quebec, supposing such to exist. Theywere excluded from the fur-trade, and forbidden to build castles orforts other than such as were necessary for defence against the Indians.

Their title assured, they matured their plan. First they would send outforty men to take possession of Montreal, intrench themselves, and raisecrops. Then they would build a house for the priests, and two conventsfor the nuns. Meanwhile, Olier was toiling at Vaugirard, on theoutskirts of Paris, to inaugurate the seminary of priests, andDauversière at La Flèche, to form the community of hospital nuns. Howthe school nuns were provided for we shall see hereafter. The colony, itwill be observed, was for the convents, not the convents for the colony.

The Associates needed a soldier-governor to take charge of their fortymen; and, directed as they supposed by Providence, they found onewholly to their mind. This was Paul de Chomedey, Sieur de Maisonneuve, adevout and valiant gentleman, who in long service among the heretics ofHolland had kept his faith intact, and had held himself resolutely alooffrom the license that surrounded him. He loved his profession of arms,and wished to consecrate his sword to the Church. Past all comparison,he is the manliest figure that appears in this group of zealots. Thepiety of the design, the miracles that inspired it, the adventure andthe peril, all combined to charm him; and he eagerly embraced theenterprise. His father opposed his purpose; but he met him with a textof St. Mark, "There is no man that hath left house or brethren orsisters or father for my sake, but he shall receive an hundred-fold." Onthis the elder Maisonneuve, deceived by his own worldliness, imaginedthat the plan covered some hidden speculation, from which enormousprofits were expected, and therefore withdrew his opposition.

Their scheme was ripening fast, when both Olier and Dauversière wereassailed by one of those revulsions of spirit, to which saints of theecstatic school are naturally liable. Dauversière, in particular, was aprey to the extremity of dejection, uncertainty, and misgiving. What hadhe, a family man, to do with ventures beyond sea? Was it not his firstduty to support his wife and children? Could he not fulfil all hisobligations as a Christian by reclaiming the wicked and relieving thepoor at La Flèche? Plainly, he had doubts that his vocation was genuine.If we could raise the curtain of his domestic life, perhaps we shouldfind him beset by wife and daughters, tearful and wrathful, inveighingagainst his folly, and imploring him to provide a support for thembefore squandering his money to plant a convent of nuns in awilderness. How long his fit of dejection lasted does not appear; but atlength he set himself again to his appointed work. Olier, too, emergingfrom the clouds and darkness, found faith once more, and again placedhimself at the head of the great enterprise.

There was imperative need of more money; and Dauversière, underjudicious guidance, was active in obtaining it. This miserable victim ofillusions had a squat, uncourtly figure, and was no proficient in thegraces either of manners or of speech: hence his success in commendinghis objects to persons of rank and wealth is set down as one of the manymiracles which attended the birth of Montreal. But zeal and earnestnessare in themselves a power; and the ground had been well marked out andploughed for him in advance. That attractive, though intricate, subjectof study, the female mind, has always engaged the attention of priests,more especially in countries where as in France, women exert a strongsocial and political influence. The art of kindling the flames of zeal,and the more difficult art of directing and controlling them, have beenthemes of reflection the most diligent and profound. Accordingly we findthat a large proportion of the money raised for this enterprise wascontributed by devout ladies. Many of them became members of theAssociation of Montreal, which was eventually increased to aboutforty-five persons, chosen for their devotion and their wealth.

Olier and his associates had resolved, though not from any collapse ofzeal, to postpone the establishment of the seminary and the collegeuntil after a settlement should be formed. The hospital, however, might,they thought, be begun at once; for blood and blows would be the assuredportion of the first settlers. At least, a discreet woman ought toembark with the first colonists as their nurse and housekeeper. Scarcelywas the need recognized when it was supplied.

Mademoiselle Jeanne Mance was born of an honorable family ofNogent-le-Roi, and in 1640 was thirty-four years of age. These Canadianheroines began their religious experiences early. Of Marie del'Incarnation we read, that at the age of seven Christ appeared to herin a vision; and the biographer of Mademoiselle Mance assures us, withadmiring gravity, that, at the same tender age, she bound herself to Godby a vow of perpetual chastity. This singular infant in due time becamea woman, of a delicate constitution, and manners graceful, yetdignified. Though an earnest devotee, she felt no vocation for thecloister; yet, while still "in the world," she led the life of a nun.The Jesuit Relations, and the example of Madame de la Peltrie, of whomshe had heard, inoculated her with the Canadian enthusiasm, then soprevalent; and, under the pretence of visiting relatives, she made ajourney to Paris, to take counsel of certain priests. Of one thing shewas assured: the Divine will called her to Canada, but to what end sheneither knew nor asked to know; for she abandoned herself as an atom tobe borne to unknown destinies on the breath of God. At Paris, Father St.Jure, a Jesuit, assured her that her vocation to Canada was, past doubt,a call from Heaven; while Father Rapin, a Récollet, spread abroad thefame of her virtues, and introduced her to many ladies of rank, wealth,and zeal. Then, well supplied with money for any pious work to which shemight be summoned, she journeyed to Rochelle, whence ships were to sailfor New France. Thus far she had been kept in ignorance of the plan withregard to Montreal; but now Father La Place, a Jesuit, revealed it toher. On the day after her arrival at Rochelle, as she entered the Churchof the Jesuits, she met Dauversière coming out. "Then," says herbiographer, "these two persons, who had never seen nor heard of eachother, were enlightened supernaturally, whereby their most hiddenthoughts were mutually made known, as had happened already with M. Olierand this same M. de la Dauversière." A long conversation ensued betweenthem; and the delights of this interview were never effaced from themind of Mademoiselle Mance. "She used to speak of it like a seraph,"writes one of her nuns, "and far better than many a learned doctor couldhave done."

She had found her destiny. The ocean, the wilderness, the solitude, theIroquois,—nothing daunted her. She would go to Montreal withMaisonneuve and his forty men. Yet, when the vessel was about to sail, anew and sharp misgiving seized her. How could she, a woman, not yetbereft of youth or charms, live alone in the forest, among a troop ofsoldiers? Her scruples were relieved by two of the men, who, at the lastmoment, refused to embark without their wives,—and by a young woman,who, impelled by enthusiasm, escaped from her friends, and took passage,in spite of them, in one of the vessels.

All was ready; the ships set sail; but Olier, Dauversière, and Fancampremained at home, as did also the other Associates, with the exceptionof Maisonneuve and Mademoiselle Mance. In the following February, animpressive scene took place in the Church of Notre-Dame, at Paris. TheAssociates, at this time numbering about forty-five, with Olier at theirhead, assembled before the altar of the Virgin, and, by a solemnceremonial, consecrated Montreal to the Holy Family. Henceforth it wasto be called Villemarie de Montreal,—a sacred town, reared to thehonor and under the patronage of Christ, St. Joseph, and the Virgin, tobe typified by three persons on earth, founders respectively of thethree destined communities,—Olier, Dauversière, and a maiden of Troyes,Marguerite Bourgeoys: the seminary to be consecrated to Christ, theHôtel-Dieu to St. Joseph, and the college to the Virgin.

But we are anticipating a little; for it was several years as yet beforeMarguerite Bourgeoys took an active part in the work of Montreal. Shewas the daughter of a respectable tradesman, and was now twenty-twoyears of age. Her portrait has come down to us; and her face is a mirrorof loyalty and womanly tenderness. Her qualities were those of goodsense, conscientiousness, and a warm heart. She had known no miracles,ecstasies, or trances; and though afterwards, when her religioussusceptibilities had reached a fuller development, a few such arerecorded of her, yet even the Abbé Faillon, with the best intentions,can credit her with but a meagre allowance of these celestial favors.Though in the midst of visionaries, she distrusted the supernatural, andavowed her belief that, in His government of the world, God does notoften set aside its ordinary laws. Her religion was of the affections,and was manifested in an absorbing devotion to duty. She had felt novocation to the cloister, but had taken the vow of chastity, and wasattached, as an externe, to the Sisters of the Congregation of Troyes,who were fevered with eagerness to go to Canada. Marguerite, however,was content to wait until there was a prospect that she could do good bygoing; and it was not till the year 1653, that, renouncing aninheritance, and giving all she had to the poor, she embarked for thesavage scene of her labors. To this day, in crowded school-rooms ofMontreal and Quebec, fit monuments of her unobtrusive virtue, hersuccessors instruct the children of the poor, and embalm the pleasantmemory of Marguerite Bourgeoys. In the martial figure of Maisonneuve,and the fair form of this gentle nun, we find the true heroes ofMontreal.

Maisonneuve, with his forty men and four women, reached Quebec too lateto ascend to Montreal that season. They encountered distrust, jealousy,and opposition. The agents of the Company of the Hundred Associateslooked on them askance; and the Governor of Quebec, Montmagny, saw arival governor in Maisonneuve. Every means was used to persuade theadventurers to abandon their project, and settle at Quebec. Montmagnycalled a council of the principal persons of his colony, who gave it astheir opinion that the newcomers had better exchange Montreal for theIsland of Orleans, where they would be in a position to give and receivesuccor; while, by persisting in their first design, they would exposethemselves to destruction, and be of use to nobody. Maisonneuve, who waspresent, expressed his surprise that they should assume to direct hisaffairs. "I have not come here," he said, "to deliberate, but to act. Itis my duty and my honor to found a colony at Montreal; and I would go,if every tree were an Iroquois!"

At Quebec there was little ability and no inclination to shelter the newcolonists for the winter; and they would have fared ill, but for thegenerosity of M. Puiseaux, who lived not far distant, at a place calledSt. Michel. This devout and most hospitable person made room for themall in his rough, but capacious dwelling. Their neighbors were thehospital nuns, then living at the mission of Sillery, in a substantial,but comfortless house of stone; where, amidst destitution, sickness,and irrepressible disgust at the filth of the savages whom they had incharge, they were laboring day and night with devoted assiduity. Amongthe minor ills which beset them were the eccentricities of one of theirlay sisters, crazed with religious enthusiasm, who had the care of theirpoultry and domestic animals, of which she was accustomed to inquire,one by one, if they loved God; when, not receiving an immediate answerin the affirmative, she would instantly put them to death, telling themthat their impiety deserved no better fate.

Early in May, Maisonneuve and his followers embarked. They had gained anunexpected recruit during the winter, in the person of Madame de laPeltrie, foundress of the Ursulines of Quebec. The piety, the novelty,and the romance of their enterprise, all had their charms for the fairenthusiast; and an irresistible impulse—imputed by a slanderinghistorian to the levity of her sex—urged her to share their fortunes.Her zeal was more admired by the Montrealists whom she joined than bythe Ursulines whom she abandoned. She carried off all the furniture shehad lent them, and left them in the utmost destitution. Nor did sheremain quiet after reaching Montreal, but was presently seized with alonging to visit the Hurons, and preach the Faith in person to thosebenighted heathen. It needed all the eloquence of a Jesuit, latelyreturned from that most arduous mission, to convince her that theattempt would be as useless as rash.

It was the eighth of May when Maisonneuve and his followers embarked atSt. Michel; and as the boats, deep-laden with men, arms, and stores,moved slowly on their way, the forest, with leaves just opening in thewarmth of spring, lay on their right hand and on their left, in aflattering semblance of tranquillity and peace. But behind woody islets,in tangled thickets and damp ravines, and in the shade and stillness ofthe columned woods, lurked everywhere a danger and a terror.

On the seventeenth of May, 1642, Maisonneuve's little flotilla—apinnace, a flat-bottomed craft moved by sails, and tworow-boats—approached Montreal; and all on board raised in unison a hymnof praise. Montmagny was with them, to deliver the island, in behalf ofthe Company of the Hundred Associates, to Maisonneuve, representative ofthe Associates of Montreal. And here, too, was Father Vimont, Superiorof the missions; for the Jesuits had been prudently invited to acceptthe spiritual charge of the young colony. On the following day, theyglided along the green and solitary shores now thronged with the life ofa busy city, and landed on the spot which Champlain, thirty-one yearsbefore, had chosen as the fit site of a settlement. It was a tongue ortriangle of land, formed by the junction of a rivulet with the St.Lawrence, and known afterwards as Point Callière. The rivulet wasbordered by a meadow, and beyond rose the forest with its vanguard ofscattered trees. Early spring flowers were blooming in the young grass,and birds of varied plumage flitted among the boughs.

Maisonneuve sprang ashore, and fell on his knees. His followers imitatedhis example; and all joined their voices in enthusiastic songs ofthanksgiving. Tents, baggage, arms, and stores were landed. An altar wasraised on a pleasant spot near at hand; and Mademoiselle Mance, withMadame de la Peltrie, aided by her servant, Charlotte Barré, decoratedit with a taste which was the admiration of the beholders. Now all thecompany gathered before the shrine. Here stood Vimont, in the richvestments of his office. Here were the two ladies, with their servant;Montmagny, no very willing spectator; and Maisonneuve, a warlike figure,erect and tall, his men clustering around him,—soldiers, sailors,artisans, and laborers,—all alike soldiers at need. They kneeled inreverent silence as the Host was raised aloft; and when the rite wasover, the priest turned and addressed them:—

"You are a grain of mustard-seed, that shall rise and grow till itsbranches overshadow the earth. You are few, but your work is the work ofGod. His smile is on you, and your children shall fill the land."

The afternoon waned; the sun sank behind the western forest, andtwilight came on. Fireflies were twinkling over the darkened meadow.They caught them, tied them with threads into shining festoons, and hungthem before the altar, where the Host remained exposed. Then theypitched their tents, lighted their bivouac fires, stationed theirguards, and lay down to rest. Such was the birth-night of Montreal.

Is this true history, or a romance of Christian chivalry? It is both.

A few years later there was another emigration to Montreal, of acharacter much like the first. The pious little colony led a strugglingand precarious existence. Many of its inhabitants were killed by theIroquois, and its escape from destruction was imputed to theintervention of the Holy Virgin. The place changed as years went on, andbecame a great centre of the fur trade, though still bearing strongmarks of its pristine character. The institutions of religion andcharity planted by its founders remain to this day, and the Seminary ofSt. Sulpice holds vast possessions in and around the city. During thewar of 1755-1760, Montreal was a base of military operations. In thelatter year three English armies advanced upon it from three differentpoints, united before its walls, and forced Governor Vaudreuil tosurrender all Canada to the British Crown.

QUEBEC.

INFANCY OF QUEBEC.

Champlain was the founder of this old capital of French Canada, whoseexistence began in 1608. In that year he built a cluster of fortifieddwellings and storehouses, which he called "The Habitation of Quebec,"and which stood on or near the site of the marketplace of the LowerTown.

The settlement made little progress for many years. A company ofmerchants held the monopoly of its fur-trade, by which alone it lived.It was half trading-factory, half mission. Its permanent inmates did notexceed fifty or sixty persons,—fur-traders, friars, and two or threewretched families, who had no inducement and little wish to labor. Thefort is facetiously represented as having two old women for garrison,and a brace of hens for sentinels. All was discord and disorder.Champlain was the nominal commander; but the actual authority was withthe merchants, who held, excepting the friars, nearly every one in theirpay. Each was jealous of the other, but all were united in a commonjealousy of Champlain. From a short-sighted view of self-interest, theysought to check the colonization which they were pledged to promote. Thefew families whom they brought over were forbidden to trade with theIndians, and compelled to sell the fruits of their labor to the agentsof the company at a low, fixed price, receiving goods in return at aninordinate valuation. Some of the merchants were of Rouen, some of St.Malo; some were Catholics, some were Huguenots. Hence unceasingbickerings. All exercise of the Reformed Religion, on land or water, wasprohibited within the limits of New France; but the Huguenots set theprohibition at nought, roaring their heretical psalmody with such vigorfrom their ships in the river, that the unhallowed strains polluted theears of the Indians on shore. The merchants of Rochelle, who had refusedto join the company, carried on a bold, illicit traffic along theborders of the St. Lawrence, eluding pursuit, or, if hard pressed,showing fight; and this was a source of perpetual irritation to theincensed monopolists.

Champlain, in his singularly trying position, displayed a mingled zealand fortitude. He went every year to France, laboring for the interestsof the colony. To throw open the trade to all competitors was a measurebeyond the wisdom of the times; and he aimed only so to bind andregulate the monopoly as to make it subserve the generous purpose towhich he had given himself. He had succeeded in binding the company ofmerchants with new and more stringent engagements; and, in the vainbelief that these might not be wholly broken, he began to conceive freshhopes for the colony. In this faith he embarked with his wife for Quebecin the spring of 1620; and, as the boat drew near the landing, thecannon welcomed her to the rock of her banishment. The buildings werefalling to ruin; rain entered on all sides; the court-yard, saysChamplain, was as squalid and dilapidated as a grange pillaged bysoldiers. Madame de Champlain was still very young. If the Ursulinetradition is to be trusted, the Indians, amazed at her beauty andtouched by her gentleness, would have worshipped her as a divinity. Herhusband had married her at the age of twelve; when, to his horror, hepresently discovered that she was infected with the heresies of herfather, a disguised Huguenot. He addressed himself at once to herconversion, and his pious efforts were something more than successful.During the four years which she passed in Canada, her zeal, it is true,was chiefly exercised in admonishing Indian squaws and catechising theirchildren; but, on her return to France, nothing would content her but tobecome a nun. Champlain refused; but, as she was childless, he at lengthconsented to a virtual, though not formal, separation. After his deathshe gained her wish, became an Ursuline nun, founded a convent of thatorder at Meaux, and died with a reputation almost saintly.

A stranger visiting the fort of Quebec would have been astonished at itsair of conventual decorum. Black Jesuits and scarfed officers mingled atChamplain's table. There was little conversation, but, in its place,histories and the lives of saints were read aloud, as in a monasticrefectory. Prayers, masses, and confessions followed each other with anedifying regularity, and the bell of the adjacent chapel, built byChamplain, rang morning, noon, and night. Godless soldiers caught theinfection, and whipped themselves in penance for their sins. Debauchedartisans outdid each other in the fury of their contrition. Quebec wasbecome a Mission. Indians gathered thither as of old, not from thebaneful lure of brandy, for the traffic in it was no longer tolerated,but from the less pernicious attractions of gifts, kind words, andpolitic blandishments. To the vital principle of propagandism thecommercial and the military character were subordinated; or, to speakmore justly, trade, policy, and military power leaned on the missions astheir main support, the grand instrument of their extension. Themissions were to explore the interior; the missions were to win overthe savage hordes at once to Heaven and to France.

Years passed. The mission of the Hurons was established, and here theindomitable Brébeuf, with a band worthy of him, toiled amid miseries andperils as fearful as ever shook the constancy of man; while Champlain atQuebec, in a life uneventful, yet harassing and laborious, was busied inthe round of cares which his post involved.

Christmas day, 1635, was a dark day in the annals of New France. In achamber of the fort, breathless and cold, lay the hardy frame which war,the wilderness, and the sea had buffeted so long in vain. After twomonths and a half of illness, Champlain, at the age of sixty-eight, wasdead. His last cares were for his colony and the succor of its sufferingfamilies. Jesuits, officers, soldiers, traders, and the few settlers ofQuebec followed his remains to the church; Le Jeune pronounced hiseulogy, and the feeble community built a tomb to his honor.

The colony could ill spare him. For twenty-seven years he had laboredhard and ceaselessly for its welfare, sacrificing fortune, repose, anddomestic peace to a cause embraced with enthusiasm and pursued withintrepid persistency. His character belonged partly to the past, partlyto the present. The preux chevalier, the crusader, the romance-lovingexplorer, the curious, knowledge-seeking traveller, the practicalnavigator, all claimed their share in him. His views, though far beyondthose of the mean spirits around him, belonged to his age and his creed.He was less statesman than soldier. He leaned to the most direct andboldest policy, and one of his last acts was to petition Richelieu formen and munitions for repressing that standing menace to the colony,the Iroquois. His dauntless courage was matched by an unweariedpatience, a patience proved by life-long vexations, and not whollysubdued even by the saintly follies of his wife. He is charged withcredulity, from which few of his age were free, and which in all ageshas been the foible of earnest and generous natures, too ardent tocriticise, and too honorable to doubt the honor of others. Perhaps inhis later years the heretic might like him more had the Jesuit liked himless. The adventurous explorer of Lake Huron, the bold invader of theIroquois, befits but indifferently the monastic sobrieties of the fortof Quebec and his sombre environment of priests. Yet Champlain was noformalist, nor was his an empty zeal. A soldier from his youth, in anage of unbridled license, his life had answered to his maxims; and whena generation had passed after his visit to the Hurons, their eldersremembered with astonishment the continence of the great Frenchwar-chief.

His books mark the man,—all for his theme and his purpose, nothing forhimself. Crude in style, full of the superficial errors of carelessnessand haste, rarely diffuse, often brief to a fault, they bear on everypage the palpable impress of truth.

A MILITARY MISSION.

Quebec was without a governor. Who should succeed Champlain? and wouldhis successor be found equally zealous for the Faith, and friendly tothe mission? These doubts, as he himself tells us, agitated the mind ofthe Father Superior, Le Jeune; but they were happily set at rest, when,on a morning in June, he saw a ship anchoring in the basin below, and,hastening with his brethren to the landing-place, was there met byCharles Huault de Montmagny, a Knight of Malta, followed by a train ofofficers and gentlemen. As they all climbed the rock together, Montmagnysaw a crucifix planted by the path. He instantly fell on his kneesbefore it; and nobles, soldiers, sailors, and priests imitated hisexample. The Jesuits sang Te Deum at the church, and the cannon roaredfrom the adjacent fort. Here the new governor was scarcely installed,when a Jesuit came in to ask if he would be godfather to an Indian aboutto be baptized. "Most gladly," replied the pious Montmagny. He repairedon the instant to the convert's hut, with a company of gayly apparelledgentlemen; and while the inmates stared in amazement at the scarlet andembroidery, he bestowed on the dying savage the name of Joseph, in honorof the spouse of the Virgin and the patron of New France. Three daysafter, he was told that a dead proselyte was to be buried, on which,leaving the lines of the new fortification he was tracing, he took inhand a torch, De Lisle, his lieutenant, took another, Repentigny andSt. Jean, gentlemen of his suite, with a band of soldiers, followed, twopriests bore the corpse, and thus all moved together in procession tothe place of burial. The Jesuits were comforted. Champlain himself hadnot displayed a zeal so edifying.

A considerable reinforcement came out with Montmagny, and among the restseveral men of birth and substance, with their families and dependants."It was a sight to thank God for," exclaims Father Le Jeune, "to beholdthese delicate young ladies and these tender infants issuing from theirwooden prison, like day from the shades of night." The Father, it willbe remembered, had for some years past seen nothing but squaws, withpappooses swathed like mummies and strapped to a board.

Both Montmagny and De Lisle were half churchmen, for both were Knightsof Malta. More and more the powers spiritual engrossed the colony. Asnearly as might be, the sword itself was in priestly hands. The Jesuitswere all in all. Authority, absolute and without appeal, was vested in acouncil composed of the governor, Le Jeune, and the syndic, an officialsupposed to represent the interests of the inhabitants. There was notribunal of justice, and the governor pronounced summarily on allcomplaints. The church adjoined the fort; and before it was planted astake bearing a placard with a prohibition against blasphemy,drunkenness, or neglect of mass and other religious rites. To the stakewas also attached a chain and iron collar; and hard by was a woodenhorse, whereon a culprit was now and then mounted by way of example andwarning. In a community so absolutely priest-governed, overt offenceswere, however, rare; and, except on the annual arrival of the shipsfrom France, when the rock swarmed with godless sailors, Quebec was amodel of decorum, and wore, as its chroniclers tell us, an aspectunspeakably edifying.

In the year 1640, various new establishments of religion and charitymight have been seen at Quebec. There was the beginning of a college anda seminary for Huron children, an embryo Ursuline convent, an incipienthospital, and a new Algonquin mission at a place called Sillery, fourmiles distant. Champlain's fort had been enlarged and partly rebuilt instone by Montmagny, who had also laid out streets on the site of thefuture city, though as yet the streets had no houses. Behind the fort,and very near it, stood the church and a house for the Jesuits. Bothwere of pine wood; and this year, 1640, both were burned to the ground,to be afterwards rebuilt in stone.

Aside from the fur trade of the Company, the whole life of the colonywas in missions, convents, religious schools, and hospitals. Here on therock of Quebec were the appendages, useful and otherwise, of anold-established civilization. While as yet there were no inhabitants,and no immediate hope of any, there were institutions for the care ofchildren, the sick, and the decrepit. All these were supported by acharity in most cases precarious. The Jesuits relied chiefly on theCompany, who, by the terms of their patent, were obliged to maintainreligious worship.

Quebec wore an aspect half military, half monastic. At sunrise andsunset, a squad of soldiers in the pay of the Company paraded in thefort; and, as in Champlain's time, the bells of the church rang morning,noon, and night. Confessions, masses, and penances were punctiliouslyobserved; and, from the governor to the meanest laborer, the Jesuitwatched and guided all. The social atmosphere of New England itself wasnot more suffocating. By day and by night, at home, at church, or at hisdaily work, the colonist lived under the eyes of busy and over-zealouspriests. At times, the denizens of Quebec grew restless. In 1639,deputies were covertly sent to beg relief in France, and "to representthe hell in which the consciences of the colony were kept by the unionof the temporal and spiritual authority in the same hands."

The very amusements of this pious community were acts of religion. Thus,on the fête-day of St. Joseph, the patron of New France, there was ashow of fireworks to do him honor. In the forty volumes of the JesuitRelations there is but one pictorial illustration; and this representsthe pyrotechnic contrivance in question, together with a figure of theGovernor in the act of touching it off. But, what is more curious, aCatholic writer of the present day, the Abbé Faillon, in an elaborateand learned work, dilates at length on the details of the display; andthis, too, with a gravity which evinces his conviction that squibs,rockets, blue-lights, and serpents are important instruments for thesaving of souls. On May-Day of the same year, 1637, Montmagny plantedbefore the church a May-pole surmounted by a triple crown, beneath whichwere three symbolical circles decorated with wreaths, and bearingseverally the names, Iesus, Maria, Ioseph; the soldiers drew upbefore it, and saluted it with a volley of musketry.

On the anniversary of the Dauphin's birth there was a dramaticperformance, in which an unbeliever, speaking Algonquin for the profitof the Indians present, was hunted into Hell by fiends. Religiousprocessions were frequent. In one of them, the Governor in a courtdress and a baptized Indian in beaver-skins were joint supporters of thecanopy which covered the Host. In another, six Indians led the van,arrayed each in a velvet coat of scarlet and gold sent them by the King.Then came other Indian converts, two and two; then the foundress of theUrsuline convent, with Indian children in French gowns; then all theIndian girls and women, dressed after their own way; then the priests;then the Governor; and finally the whole French population, male andfemale, except the artillery-men at the fort, who saluted with theircannon the cross and banner borne at the head of the procession. Whenall was over, the Governor and the Jesuits rewarded the Indians with afeast.

Now let the stranger enter the church of Notre-Dame de la Recouvrance,after vespers. It is full, to the very porch: officers in slouched hatsand plumes, musketeers, pikemen, mechanics, and laborers. Here isMontmagny himself; Repentigny and Poterie, gentlemen of good birth;damsels of nurture ill fitted to the Canadian woods; and, mingled withthese, the motionless Indians, wrapped to the throat in embroideredmoose-hides. Le Jeune, not in priestly vestments, but in the commonblack dress of his Order, is before the altar; and on either side is arow of small red-skinned children listening with exemplary decorum,while, with a cheerful, smiling face, he teaches them to kneel, clasptheir hands, and sign the cross. All the principal members of thiszealous community are present, at once amused and edified at the gravedeportment, and the prompt, shrill replies of the infant catechumens;while their parents in the crowd grin delight at the gifts of beads andtrinkets with which Le Jeune rewards his most proficient pupils.

The methods of conversion were simple. The principal appeal was to fear."You do good to your friends," said Le Jeune to an Algonquin chief, "andyou burn your enemies. God does the same." And he painted Hell to thestartled neophyte as a place where, when he was hungry, he would getnothing to eat but frogs and snakes, and, when thirsty, nothing to drinkbut flames. Pictures were found invaluable. "These holyrepresentations," pursues the Father Superior, "are half the instructionthat can be given to the Indians. I wanted some pictures of Hell andsouls in perdition, and a few were sent us on paper; but they are tooconfused. The devils and the men are so mixed up, that one can make outnothing without particular attention. If three, four, or five devilswere painted tormenting a soul with different punishments,—one applyingfire, another serpents, another tearing him with pincers, and anotherholding him fast with a chain,—this would have a good effect,especially if everything were made distinct, and misery, rage, anddesperation appeared plainly in his face."

The preparation of the convert for baptism was often very slight. Adying Algonquin, who, though meagre as a skeleton, had thrown himself,with a last effort of expiring ferocity, on an Iroquois prisoner, andtorn off his ear with his teeth, was baptized almost immediately. In thecase of converts in health there was far more preparation; yet theseoften apostatized. The various objects of instruction may all beincluded in one comprehensive word, submission,—an abdication of willand judgment in favor of the spiritual director, who was the interpreterand vicegerent of God.

MASSACHUSETTS ATTACKS QUEBEC.

Like Montreal, Quebec transformed itself in time lost much of itscharacter of a mission, and became the seat of the colonial government.In short, it became secularized, though not completely so; for thepriesthood still held an immense influence and disputed the mastery withthe civil and military powers.

In the beginning of William and Mary's War, Count Frontenac, governor ofCanada, sent repeated war-parties to harass the New England borders;and, in 1690, the General Court of Massachusetts resolved to retort by adecisive blow. Sir William Phips was chosen to command the intendedexpedition. Phips is said to have been one of twenty-six children, allof the same mother, and was born in 1650 at a rude border settlement,since called Woolwich, on the Kennebec. His parents were ignorant andpoor; and till eighteen years of age he was employed in keeping sheep.Such a life ill suited his active and ambitious nature. To better hiscondition, he learned the trade of ship-carpenter, and, in the exerciseof it, came to Boston, where he married a widow with some property,beyond him in years, and much above him in station. About this time, helearned to read and write, though not too well, for his signature islike that of a peasant. Still aspiring to greater things, he promisedhis wife that he would one day command a king's ship and own a "fairbrick house in the Green Lane of North Boston," a quarter then occupiedby citizens of the better class. He kept his word at both points.Fortune was inauspicious to him for several years; till at length, underthe pressure of reverses, he conceived the idea of conquering fame andwealth at one stroke, by fishing up the treasure said to be stored in aSpanish galleon wrecked fifty years before somewhere in the West Indianseas. Full of this project, he went to England, where, throughinfluences which do not plainly appear, he gained a hearing from personsin high places, and induced the Admiralty to adopt his scheme. A frigatewas given him, and he sailed for the West Indies; whence, after a longsearch, he returned unsuccessful, though not without adventures whichproved his mettle. It was the epoch of the buccaneers; and his crew,tired of a vain and toilsome search, came to the quarter-deck, armedwith cutlasses, and demanded of their captain that he should turn piratewith them. Phips, a tall and powerful man, instantly fell upon them withhis fists, knocked down the ringleaders, and awed them all intosubmission. Not long after, there was a more formidable mutiny; but,with great courage and address, he quelled it for a time, and held hiscrew to their duty till he had brought the ship into Jamaica, andexchanged them for better men.

Though the leaky condition of the frigate compelled him to abandon thesearch, it was not till he had gained information which he thought wouldlead to success; and, on his return, he inspired such confidence thatthe Duke of Albemarle, with other noblemen and gentlemen, gave him afresh outfit, and despatched him again on his Quixotic errand. This timehe succeeded, found the wreck, and took from it gold, silver, and jewelsto the value of three hundred thousand pounds sterling. The crew nowleagued together to seize the ship and divide the prize; and Phips,pushed to extremity, was compelled to promise that every man of themshould have a share in the treasure, even if he paid it himself. Onreaching England, he kept his pledge so well that, after redeeming it,only sixteen thousand pounds was left as his portion, which, however,was an ample fortune in the New England of that day. He gained, too,what he valued almost as much, the honor of knighthood. Tempting offerswere made him of employment in the royal service; but he had an ardentlove for his own country, and thither he presently returned.

Phips was a rude sailor, bluff, prompt, and choleric. He never gaveproof of intellectual capacity; and such of his success in life as hedid not owe to good luck was due probably to an energetic andadventurous spirit, aided by a blunt frankness of address that pleasedthe great, and commended him to their favor. Two years after theexpedition against Quebec, the king, under the new charter, made himgovernor of Massachusetts, a post for which, though totally unfit, hehad been recommended by the elder Mather, who, like his son Cotton,expected to make use of him. He carried his old habits into his newoffice, cudgelled Brinton, the collector of the port, and belaboredCaptain Short of the royal navy with his cane. Far from trying to hidethe obscurity of his origin, he leaned to the opposite foible, and wasapt to boast of it, delighting to exhibit himself as a self-made man.New England writers describe him as honest in private dealings; but, inaccordance with his coarse nature, he seems to have thought thatanything is fair in war. On the other hand, he was warmly patriotic, andwas almost as ready to serve New England as to serve himself.

Returning from an expedition to Acadia, he found Boston alive withmartial preparation. Massachusetts of her own motion had resolved toattempt the conquest of Quebec. She and her sister colonies had not yetrecovered from the exhaustion of Philip's War, and still less from thedisorders that attended the expulsion of the royal governor and hisadherents. The public treasury was empty, and the recent expeditionsagainst the eastern Indians had been supported by private subscription.Worse yet, New England had no competent military commander. The Puritangentlemen of the original emigration, some of whom were as well fittedfor military as for civil leadership, had passed from the stage; and, bya tendency which circumstances made inevitable, they had left nonebehind them equally qualified. The great Indian conflict of fifteenyears before had, it is true, formed good partisan chiefs, and provedthat the New England yeoman, defending his family and his hearth, wasnot to be surpassed in stubborn fighting; but, since Andros and hissoldiers had been driven out, there was scarcely a single man in thecolony of the slightest training or experience in regular war. Up tothis moment, New England had never asked help of the mother country.When thousands of savages burst on her defenceless settlements, she hadconquered safety and peace with her own blood and her own slenderresources; but now, as the proposed capture of Quebec would inure to theprofit of the British crown, Governor Bradstreet and his council thoughtit not unfitting to ask for a supply of arms and ammunition, of whichthey were in great need. The request was refused, and no aid of any kindcame from the English government, whose resources were engrossed by theIrish war.

While waiting for the reply, the colonial authorities urged on theirpreparations, in the hope that the plunder of Quebec would pay theexpenses of its conquest. Humility was not among the New Englandvirtues, and it was thought a sin to doubt that God would give hischosen people the victory over papists and idolaters; yet no pains werespared to insure the divine favor. A proclamation was issued, callingthe people to repentance; a day of fasting was ordained; and, as Matherexpresses it, "the wheel of prayer was kept in continual motion." Thechief difficulty was to provide funds. An attempt was made to collect apart of the money by private subscription; but, as this plan failed, theprovisional government, already in debt, strained its credit yetfarther, and borrowed the needful sums. Thirty-two trading and fishingvessels, great and small, were impressed for the service. The largestwas a ship called the "Six Friends," engaged in the dangerous West Indiatrade, and carrying forty-four guns. A call was made for volunteers, andmany enrolled themselves; but, as more were wanted, a press was orderedto complete the number. So rigorously was it applied that, what withvoluntary and enforced enlistment, one town, that of Gloucester, wasdeprived of two thirds of its fencible men. There was not a moment ofdoubt as to the choice of a commander, for Phips was imagined to be thevery man for the work. One John Walley, a respectable citizen ofBarnstable, was made second in command, with the modest rank of major;and a sufficient number of ship-masters, merchants, master mechanics,and substantial farmers, were commissioned as subordinate officers.About the middle of July, the committee charged with the preparationsreported that all was ready. Still there was a long delay. The vesselsent early in spring to ask aid from England had not returned. Phipswaited for her as long as he dared, and the best of the season was overwhen he resolved to put to sea. The rustic warriors, duly formed intocompanies, were sent on board; and the fleet sailed from Nantasket onthe ninth of August. Including sailors, it carried twenty-two hundredmen, with provisions for four months, but insufficient ammunition and nopilot for the St. Lawrence.

The delay at Boston, waiting aid from England that never came, was notpropitious to Phips; nor were the wind and the waves. The voyage to theSt. Lawrence was a long one; and when he began, without a pilot, togrope his way up the unknown river, the weather seemed in league withhis enemies. He appears, moreover, to have wasted time. What was mostvital to his success was rapidity of movement; yet, whether by his faultor his misfortune, he remained three weeks within three days' sail ofQuebec. While anchored off Tadoussac, with the wind ahead, he passed theidle hours in holding councils of war and framing rules for thegovernment of his men; and, when at length the wind veered to the east,it is doubtful if he made the best use of his opportunity.

When, after his protracted voyage, Phips sailed into the Basin ofQuebec, one of the grandest scenes on the western continent opened uponhis sight: the wide expanse of waters, the lofty promontory beyond, andthe opposing heights of Levi; the cataract of Montmorenci, the distantrange of the Laurentian Mountains, the warlike rock with its diadem ofwalls and towers, the roofs of the Lower Town clustering on the strandbeneath, the Château St. Louis perched at the brink of the cliff, andover it the white banner, spangled with fleurs-de-lis, flauntingdefiance in the clear autumnal air. Perhaps, as he gazed, a suspicionseized him that the task he had undertaken was less easy than he hadthought; but he had conquered once by a simple summons to surrender, andhe resolved to try its virtue again.

The fleet anchored a little below Quebec; and towards ten o'clock theFrench saw a boat put out from the admiral's ship, bearing a flag oftruce. Four canoes went from the Lower Town, and met it midway. Itbrought a subaltern officer, who announced himself as the bearer of aletter from Sir William Phips to the French commander. He was taken intoone of the canoes and paddled to the quay, after being completelyblindfolded by a bandage which covered half his face. An officer namedPrévost, sent by Count Frontenac, received him as he landed, and orderedtwo sergeants to take him by the arms and lead him to the governor. Hisprogress was neither rapid nor direct. They drew him hither and thither,delighting to make him clamber in the dark over every possibleobstruction; while a noisy crowd hustled him, and laughing women calledhim Colin Maillard, the name of the chief player in blindman's buff.Amid a prodigious hubbub, intended to bewilder him and impress him witha sense of immense warlike preparation, they dragged him over the threebarricades of Mountain Street, and brought him at last into a large roomof the château. Here they took the bandage from his eyes. He stood for amoment with an air of astonishment and some confusion. The governorstood before him, haughty and stern, surrounded by French and Canadianofficers, Maricourt, Sainte-Hélène, Longueuil, Villebon, Valrenne,Bienville, and many more, bedecked with gold lace and silver lace,perukes and powder, plumes and ribbons, and all the martial foppery inwhich they took delight, and regarding the envoy with keen, defianteyes. After a moment, he recovered his breath and his composure,saluted Frontenac, and, expressing a wish that the duty assigned him hadbeen of a more agreeable nature, handed him the letter of Phips.Frontenac gave it to an interpreter, who read it aloud in French thatall might hear. It ran thus:—

When the reading was finished, the Englishman pulled his watch from hispocket, and handed it to the governor. Frontenac could not, or pretendedthat he could not, see the hour. The messenger thereupon told him thatit was ten o'clock, and that he must have his answer before eleven. Ageneral cry of indignation arose; and Valrenne called out that Phips wasnothing but a pirate, and that his man ought to be hanged. Frontenaccontained himself for a moment, and then said to the envoy:—

"I will not keep you waiting so long. Tell your general that I do notrecognize King William; and that the Prince of Orange, who so styleshimself, is a usurper, who has violated the most sacred laws of blood inattempting to dethrone his father-in-law. I know no king of England butKing James. Your general ought not to be surprised at the hostilitieswhich he says that the French have carried on in the colony ofMassachusetts; for, as the king my master has taken the king of Englandunder his protection, and is about to replace him on his throne by forceof arms, he might have expected that his Majesty would order me to makewar on a people who have rebelled against their lawful prince." Then,turning with a smile to the officers about him: "Even if your generaloffered me conditions a little more gracious, and if I had a mind toaccept them, does he suppose that these brave gentlemen would givetheir consent, and advise me to trust a man who broke his agreementwith the governor of Port Royal, or a rebel who has failed in his dutyto his king, and forgotten all the favors he had received from him, tofollow a prince who pretends to be the liberator of England and thedefender of the faith, and yet destroys the laws and privileges of thekingdom and overthrows its religion? The divine justice which yourgeneral invokes in his letter will not fail to punish such actsseverely."

The messenger seemed astonished and startled; but he presently asked ifthe governor would give him his answer in writing.

"No," returned Frontenac, "I will answer your general only by the mouthsof my cannon, that he may learn that a man like me is not to be summonedafter this fashion. Let him do his best, and I will do mine;" and hedismissed the Englishman abruptly. He was again blindfolded, led overthe barricades, and sent back to the fleet by the boat that brought him.

Phips had often given proof of personal courage, but for the past threeweeks his conduct seems that of a man conscious that he is charged witha work too large for his capacity. He had spent a good part of his timein holding councils of war; and now, when he heard the answer ofFrontenac, he called another to consider what should be done. A plan ofattack was at length arranged. The militia were to be landed on theshore of Beauport, which was just below Quebec, though separated from itby the St. Charles. They were then to cross this river by a fordpracticable at low water, climb the heights of St. Geneviève, and gainthe rear of the town. The small vessels of the fleet were to aid themovement by ascending the St. Charles as far as the ford, holding theenemy in check by their fire, and carrying provisions, ammunition, andintrenching tools, for the use of the land troops. When these hadcrossed and were ready to attack Quebec in the rear, Phips was tocannonade it in front, and land two hundred men under cover of his gunsto effect a diversion by storming the barricades. Some of the Frenchprisoners, from whom their captors appear to have received a great dealof correct information, told the admiral that there was a place a mileor two above the town where the heights might be scaled and the rear ofthe fortifications reached from a direction opposite to that proposed.This was precisely the movement by which Wolfe afterwards gained hismemorable victory; but Phips chose to abide by the original plan.

While the plan was debated, the opportunity for accomplishing it ebbedaway. It was still early when the messenger returned from Quebec; but,before Phips was ready to act, the day was on the wane and the tide wasagainst him. He lay quietly at his moorings when, in the evening, agreat shouting, mingled with the roll of drums and the sound of fifes,was heard from the Upper Town. The English officers asked theirprisoner, Granville, what it meant. "Ma foi, Messieurs," he replied,"you have lost the game. It is the Governor of Montreal with the peoplefrom the country above. There is nothing for you now but to pack and gohome." In fact, Callières had arrived with seven or eight hundred men,many of them regulars. With these were bands of coureurs de bois andother young Canadians, all full of fight, singing and whooping withmartial glee as they passed the western gate and trooped down St. LouisStreet.

The next day was gusty and blustering; and still Phips lay quiet,waiting on the winds and the waves. A small vessel, with sixty men onboard, under Captain Ephraim Savage, ran in towards the shore ofBeauport to examine the landing, and stuck fast in the mud. TheCanadians plied her with bullets, and brought a cannon to bear on her.They might have waded out and boarded her, but Savage and his men keptup so hot a fire that they forbore the attempt; and, when the tide rose,she floated again.

There was another night of tranquillity; but at about eleven onWednesday morning the French heard the English fifes and drums in fullaction, while repeated shouts of "God save King William!" rose from allthe vessels. This lasted an hour or more; after which a great number ofboats, loaded with men, put out from the fleet and rowed rapidly towardsthe shore of Beauport. The tide was low, and the boats grounded beforereaching the landing-place. The French on the rock could see the troopsthrough telescopes, looking in the distance like a swarm of black ants,as they waded through mud and water, and formed in companies along thestrand. They were some thirteen hundred in number, and were commanded byMajor Walley. Frontenac had sent three hundred sharpshooters, underSainte-Hélène, to meet them and hold them in check. A battalion oftroops followed; but, long before they could reach the spot,Sainte-Hélène's men, with a few militia from the neighboring parishes,and a band of Huron warriors from Lorette, threw themselves into thethickets along the front of the English, and opened a distant butgalling fire upon the compact bodies of the enemy. Walley ordered acharge. The New England men rushed, in a disorderly manner, but withgreat impetuosity, up the rising ground; received two volleys, whichfailed to check them; and drove back the assailants in some confusion.They turned, however, and fought in Indian fashion with courage andaddress, leaping and dodging among trees, rocks, and bushes, firing asthey retreated, and inflicting more harm than they received. Towardsevening they disappeared; and Walley, whose men had been much scatteredin the desultory fight, drew them together as well as he could, andadvanced towards the St. Charles, in order to meet the vessels whichwere to aid him in passing the ford. Here he posted sentinels, andencamped for the night. He had lost four killed and about sixty wounded,and imagined that he had killed twenty or thirty of the enemy. In fact,however, their loss was much less, though among the killed was avaluable officer, the Chevalier de Clermont, and among the wounded theveteran captain of Beauport, Juchereau de Saint-Denis, more thansixty-four years of age. In the evening, a deserter came to the Englishcamp, and brought the unwelcome intelligence that there were threethousand armed men in Quebec.

Meanwhile, Phips, whose fault hitherto had not been an excess ofpromptitude, grew impatient, and made a premature movement inconsistentwith the preconcerted plan. He left his moorings, anchored his largestships before the town, and prepared to cannonade it; but the fieryveteran who watched him from the Château St. Louis anticipated him, andgave him the first shot. Phips replied furiously, opening fire withevery gun that he could bring to bear; while the rock paid him back inkind, and belched flame and smoke from all its batteries. So fierce andrapid was the firing, that La Hontan compares it to volleys of musketry;and old officers, who had seen many sieges, declared that they had neverknown the like. The din was prodigious, reverberated from thesurrounding heights, and rolled back from the distant mountains in onecontinuous roar. On the part of the English, however, surprisinglylittle was accomplished beside noise and smoke. The practice of theirgunners was so bad that many of their shot struck harmlessly against theface of the cliff. Their guns, too, were very light, and appear to havebeen charged with a view to the most rigid economy of gunpowder; for theballs failed to pierce the stone walls of the buildings, and did solittle damage that, as the French boasted, twenty crowns would haverepaired it all. Night came at length, and the turmoil ceased.

Phips lay quiet till daybreak, when Frontenac sent a shot to waken him,and the cannonade began again. Sainte-Hélène had returned from Beauport;and he, with his brother Maricourt, took charge of the two batteries ofthe Lower Town, aiming the guns in person, and throwing balls ofeighteen and twenty-four pounds with excellent precision against thefour largest ships of the fleet. One of their shots cut the flagstaff ofthe admiral, and the cross of St. George fell into the river. It driftedwith the tide towards the north shore; whereupon several Canadianspaddled out in a birch canoe, secured it, and brought it back intriumph. On the spire of the cathedral in the Upper Town had been hung apicture of the Holy Family, as an invocation of divine aid. The Puritangunners wasted their ammunition in vain attempts to knock it down. Thatit escaped their malice was ascribed to miracle, but the miracle wouldhave been greater if they had hit it.

At length, one of the ships, which had suffered most, hauled off andabandoned the fight. That of the admiral had fared little better, andnow her condition grew desperate. With her rigging torn, her mainmasthalf cut through, her mizzen-mast splintered, her cabin pierced, andher hull riddled with shot, another volley seemed likely to sink her,when Phips ordered her to be cut loose from her moorings, and shedrifted out of fire, leaving cable and anchor behind. The remainingships soon gave over the conflict, and withdrew to stations where theycould neither do harm nor suffer it.

Phips had thrown away nearly all his ammunition in this futile anddisastrous attack, which should have been deferred till the moment whenWalley, with his land force, had gained the rear of the town. Walley layin his camp, his men wet, shivering with cold, famished, and sickeningwith the small-pox. Food, and all other supplies, were to have beenbrought him by the small vessels, which should have entered the mouth ofthe St. Charles and aided him to cross it. But he waited for them invain. Every vessel that carried a gun had busied itself in cannonading,and the rest did not move. There appears to have been insubordinationamong the masters of these small craft, some of whom, being owners orpart-owners of the vessels they commanded, were probably unwilling torun them into danger. Walley was no soldier; but he saw that to attemptthe passage of the river without aid, under the batteries of the townand in the face of forces twice as numerous as his own, was not an easytask. Frontenac, on his part, says that he wished him to do so, knowingthat the attempt would ruin him. The New England men were eager to pushon; but the night of Thursday, the day of Phips's repulse, was so coldthat ice formed more than an inch in thickness, and the half-starvedmilitia suffered intensely. Six field-pieces, with their ammunition, hadbeen sent ashore; but they were nearly useless, as there were no meansof moving them. Half a barrel of musket powder, and one biscuit foreach man, were also landed; and with this meagre aid Walley was left tocapture Quebec. He might, had he dared, have made a dash across the fordon the morning of Thursday, and assaulted the town in the rear whilePhips was cannonading it in front; but his courage was not equal to sodesperate a venture. The firing ceased, and the possible opportunity waslost. The citizen soldier despaired of success; and, on the morning ofFriday, he went on board the admiral's ship to explain his situation.While he was gone, his men put themselves in motion, and advanced alongthe borders of the St. Charles towards the ford. Frontenac, with threebattalions of regular troops, went to receive them at the crossing;while Sainte-Hélène, with his brother Longueuil, passed the ford with abody of Canadians, and opened fire on them from the neighboringthickets. Their advance parties were driven in, and there was a hotskirmish, the chief loss falling on the New England men, who were fullyexposed. On the side of the French, Sainte-Hélène was mortally wounded,and his brother was hurt by a spent ball. Towards evening, the Canadianswithdrew, and the English encamped for the night. Their commanderpresently rejoined them. The admiral had given him leave to withdrawthem to the fleet, and boats were accordingly sent to bring them off;but, as these did not arrive till about daybreak, it was necessary todefer the embarkation till the next night.

At dawn, Quebec was all astir with the beating of drums and the ringingof bells. The New England drums replied; and Walley drew up his menunder arms, expecting an attack, for the town was so near that thehubbub of voices from within could plainly be heard. The noise graduallydied away; and, except a few shots from the ramparts, the invaders wereleft undisturbed. Walley sent two or three companies to beat up theneighboring thickets, where he suspected that the enemy was lurking. Onthe way, they had the good luck to find and kill a number of cattle,which they cooked and ate on the spot; whereupon, being greatlyrefreshed and invigorated, they dashed forward in complete disorder, andwere soon met by the fire of the ambushed Canadians. Several morecompanies were sent to their support, and the skirmishing became lively.Three detachments from Quebec had crossed the river; and the militia ofBeauport and Beaupré had hastened to join them. They fought likeIndians, hiding behind trees or throwing themselves flat among thebushes, and laying repeated ambuscades as they slowly fell back. Atlength, they all made a stand on a hill behind the buildings and fencesof a farm; and here they held their ground till night, while the NewEngland men taunted them as cowards who would never fight except undercover.

Walley, who with his main body had stood in arms all day, now called inthe skirmishers, and fell back to the landing-place, where, as soon asit grew dark, the boats arrived from the fleet. The sick men, of whomthere were many, were sent on board, and then, amid floods of rain, thewhole force embarked in noisy confusion, leaving behind them in the mudfive of their cannon. Hasty as was their parting, their conduct on thewhole had been creditable; and La Hontan, who was in Quebec at the time,says of them, "They fought vigorously, though as ill-disciplined as mengathered together at random could be; for they did not lack courage,and, if they failed, it was by reason of their entire ignorance ofdiscipline, and because they were exhausted by the fatigues of thevoyage." Of Phips he speaks with contempt, and says that he could nothave served the French better if they had bribed him to stand all thewhile with his arms folded. Some allowance should, nevertheless, be madehim for the unmanageable character of the force under his command, theconstitution of which was fatal to military subordination.

On Sunday, the morning after the re-embarkation, Phips called a councilof officers, and it was resolved that the men should rest for a day ortwo, that there should be a meeting for prayer, and that, if ammunitionenough could be found, another landing should be attempted; but therough weather prevented the prayer-meeting, and the plan of a new attackwas fortunately abandoned.

Quebec remained in agitation and alarm till Tuesday, when Phips weighedanchor and disappeared, with all his fleet, behind the Island ofOrleans. He did not go far, as indeed he could not, but stopped fourleagues below to mend rigging, fortify wounded masts, and stopshot-holes. Subercase had gone with a detachment to watch the retiringenemy; and Phips was repeatedly seen among his men, on a scaffold at theside of his ship, exercising his old trade of carpenter. This delay wasturned to good use by an exchange of prisoners. Chief among those in thehands of the French was Captain Davis, late commander at Casco Bay; andthere were also two young daughters of Lieutenant Clark, who had beenkilled at the same place. Frontenac himself had humanely ransomed thesechildren from the Indians; and Madame de Champigny, wife of theintendant, had, with equal kindness, bought from them a little girlnamed Sarah Gerrish, and placed her in charge of the nuns at theHôtel-Dieu, who had become greatly attached to her, while she, on herpart, left them with reluctance. The French had the better in theseexchanges, receiving able-bodied men, and returning, with the exceptionof Davis, only women and children.

The heretics were gone, and Quebec breathed freely again. Her escape hadbeen a narrow one; not that three thousand men, in part regular troops,defending one of the strongest positions on the continent, and commandedby Frontenac, could not defy the attacks of two thousand raw fishermenand farmers, led by an ignorant civilian, but the numbers which were asource of strength were at the same time a source of weakness. Nearlyall the adult males of Canada were gathered at Quebec, and there wasimminent danger of starvation. Cattle from the neighboring parishes hadbeen hastily driven into the town; but there was little other provision,and before Phips retreated the pinch of famine had begun. Had he come aweek earlier or stayed a week later, the French themselves believed thatQuebec would have fallen, in the one case for want of men, and in theother for want of food.

Phips returned crestfallen to Boston late in November; and one by onethe rest of the fleet came straggling after him, battered andweather-beaten. Some did not appear till February, and three or fournever came at all. The autumn and early winter were unusually stormy.Captain Rainsford, with sixty men, was wrecked on the Island ofAnticosti, where more than half their number died of cold and misery. Inthe other vessels, some were drowned, some frost-bitten, and above twohundred killed by small-pox and fever.

At Boston, all was dismay and gloom. The Puritan bowed before "thisawful frown of God," and searched his conscience for the sin that hadbrought upon him so stern a chastisement. Massachusetts, alreadyimpoverished, found herself in extremity. The war, instead of payingfor itself, had burdened her with an additional debt of fifty thousandpounds. The sailors and soldiers were clamorous for their pay; and, tosatisfy them, the colony was forced for the first time in its history toissue a paper currency. It was made receivable at a premium for allpublic debts, and was also fortified by a provision for its earlyredemption by taxation; a provision which was carried into effect inspite of poverty and distress.

Massachusetts had made her usual mistake. She had confidently believedthat ignorance and inexperience could match the skill of a triedveteran, and that the rude courage of her fishermen and farmers couldtriumph without discipline or leadership. The conditions of her materialprosperity were adverse to efficiency in war. A trading republic,without trained officers, may win victories; but it wins them either byaccident or by an extravagant outlay in money and life.

THE HEIGHTS OF ABRAHAM.

The early part of the Seven Years' War was disastrous to England. Thetide turned with the accession to power of the great war minister,William Pitt. In 1759, he sent General James Wolfe with a combinedmilitary and naval force to capture Quebec. The British troops numberedsomewhat less than nine thousand, while Montcalm and Vaudreuil wereposted to receive them, on positions almost impregnable, with an army ofregulars, Canadians, and Indians, amounting in all to about sixteenthousand. The great height of the shores made the British ships oflittle or no use for purposes of attack.

Wolfe took possession of Point Levi, from which he bombarded Quebec. Healso seized the high grounds just below the Montmorenci, and vainlytried to cross that stream above the cataract and gain the rear ofMontcalm's army, which lay encamped along the shore from the Montmorencito the city. Failing in this and every other attempt to force the enemyto a battle, he rashly resolved to attack them in front, up the steepdeclivities at the top of which they were intrenched. The grenadiersdashed forward prematurely and without orders, struggling desperately toscale the heights under a deadly fire. The result was a completerepulse, with heavy loss.

SIEGE OF QUEBEC, 1759.

The capture of Quebec now seemed hopeless. Wolfe was almost in despair.His body was as frail as his spirit was ardent and daring. Since thesiege began he had passed with ceaseless energy from camp to camp,animating the troops, observing everything, and directing everything;but now the pale face and tall lean form were seen no more, and therumor spread that the General was dangerously ill. He had in fact beenseized by an access of the disease that had tortured him for some timepast; and fever had followed. His quarters were at a French farmhouse inthe camp at Montmorenci; and here, as he lay in an upper chamber,helpless in bed, his singular and most unmilitary features haggard withdisease and drawn with pain, no man could less have looked the hero. Butas the needle, though quivering, points always to the pole, so, throughtorment and languor and the heats of fever, the mind of Wolfe dwelt onthe capture of Quebec. His illness, which began before the twentieth ofAugust, had so far subsided on the twenty-fifth that Captain Knox wrotein his Diary of that day: "His Excellency General Wolfe is on therecovery, to the inconceivable joy of the whole army." On thetwenty-ninth he was able to write or dictate a letter to the threebrigadiers, Monckton, Townshend, and Murray: "That the public servicemay not suffer by the General's indisposition, he begs the brigadierswill meet and consult together for the public utility and advantage, andconsider of the best method to attack the enemy." The letter thenproposes three plans, all bold to audacity. The first was to send a partof the army to ford the Montmorenci eight or nine miles above its mouth,march through the forest, and fall on the rear of the French atBeauport, while the rest landed and attacked them in front. The secondwas to cross the ford at the mouth of the Montmorenci and march alongthe strand, under the French intrenchments, till a place could be foundwhere the troops might climb the heights. The third was to make ageneral attack from boats at the Beauport flats. Wolfe had beforeentertained two other plans, one of which was to scale the heights atSt. Michel, about a league above Quebec; but this he had abandoned onlearning that the French were there in force to receive him. The otherwas to storm the Lower Town; but this also he had abandoned, because theUpper Town, which commanded it, would still remain inaccessible.

The brigadiers met in consultation, rejected the three plans proposed inthe letter, and advised that an attempt should be made to gain a footingon the north shore above the town, place the army between Montcalm andhis base of supply, and so force him to fight or surrender. The schemewas similar to that of the heights of St. Michel. It seemed desperate,but so did all the rest; and if by chance it should succeed, the gainwas far greater than could follow any success below the town. Wolfeembraced it at once.

Not that he saw much hope in it. He knew that every chance was againsthim. Disappointment in the past and gloom in the future, the pain andexhaustion of disease, toils, and anxieties "too great," in the words ofBurke, "to be supported by a delicate constitution, and a body unequalto the vigorous and enterprising soul that it lodged," threw him attimes into deep dejection. By those intimate with him he was heard tosay that he would not go back defeated, "to be exposed to the censureand reproach of an ignorant populace." In other moods he felt that heought not to sacrifice what was left of his diminished army in vainconflict with hopeless obstacles. But his final resolve once taken, hewould not swerve from it. His fear was that he might not be able to leadhis troops in person. "I know perfectly well you cannot cure me," hesaid to his physician; "but pray make me up so that I may be withoutpain for a few days, and able to do my duty: that is all I want."

In the last of August, he was able for the first time to leave thehouse. It was on this same day that he wrote his last letter to hismother: "My writing to you will convince you that no personal evilsworse than defeats and disappointments have fallen upon me. The enemyputs nothing to risk, and I can't in conscience put the whole army torisk. My antagonist has wisely shut himself up in inaccessibleintrenchments, so that I can't get at him without spilling a torrent ofblood, and that perhaps to little purpose. The Marquis de Montcalm is atthe head of a great number of bad soldiers, and I am at the head of asmall number of good ones, that wish for nothing so much as to fighthim; but the wary old fellow avoids an action, doubtful of the behaviorof his army. People must be of the profession to understand thedisadvantages and difficulties we labor under, arising from the uncommonnatural strength of the country."

On the second of September a vessel was sent to England with his lastdespatch to Pitt. It begins thus: "The obstacles we have met with in theoperations of the campaign are much greater than we had reason to expector could foresee; not so much from the number of the enemy (thoughsuperior to us) as from the natural strength of the country, which theMarquis of Montcalm seems wisely to depend upon. When I learned thatsuccors of all kinds had been thrown into Quebec; that five battalionsof regular troops, completed from the best inhabitants of the country,some of the troops of the colony, and every Canadian that was able tobear arms, besides several nations of savages, had taken the field in avery advantageous situation,—I could not flatter myself that I shouldbe able to reduce the place. I sought, however, an occasion to attacktheir army, knowing well that with these troops I was able to fight, andhoping that a victory might disperse them." Then, after recounting theevents of the campaign with admirable clearness, he continues: "I foundmyself so ill, and am still so weak, that I begged the general officersto consult together for the general utility. They are all of opinionthat, as more ships and provisions are now got above the town, theyshould try, by conveying up a corps of four or five thousand men (whichis nearly the whole strength of the army after the Points of Levi andOrleans are left in a proper state of defence), to draw the enemy fromtheir present situation and bring them to an action. I have acquiescedin the proposal, and we are preparing to put it into execution." Theletter ends thus: "By the list of disabled officers, many of whom are ofrank, you may perceive that the army is much weakened. By the nature ofthe river, the most formidable part of this armament is deprived of thepower of acting; yet we have almost the whole force of Canada to oppose.In this situation there is such a choice of difficulties that I ownmyself at a loss how to determine. The affairs of Great Britain, I know,require the most vigorous measures; but the courage of a handful ofbrave troops should be exerted only when there is some hope of afavorable event; however, you may be assured that the small part of thecampaign which remains shall be employed, as far as I am able, for thehonor of His Majesty and the interest of the nation, in which I am sureof being well seconded by the Admiral and by the generals; happy if ourefforts here can contribute to the success of His Majesty's arms in anyother parts of America."

Perhaps he was as near despair as his undaunted nature was capable ofbeing. In his present state of body and mind he was a hero without thelight and cheer of heroism. He flattered himself with no illusions, butsaw the worst and faced it all. He seems to have been entirely withoutexcitement. The languor of disease, the desperation of the chances, andthe greatness of the stake may have wrought to tranquillize him. Hisenergy was doubly tasked: to bear up his own sinking frame, and toachieve an almost hopeless feat of arms.

Audacious as it was, his plan cannot be called rash if we may accept thestatement of two well-informed writers on the French side. They say thaton the tenth of September the English naval commanders held a council onboard the flagship, in which it was resolved that the lateness of theseason required the fleet to leave Quebec without delay. They sayfurther that Wolfe then went to the Admiral, told him that he had founda place where the heights could be scaled, that he would send up ahundred and fifty picked men to feel the way, and that if they gained alodgment at the top, the other troops should follow; if, on the otherhand, the French were there in force to oppose them, he would notsacrifice the army in a hopeless attempt, but embark them for home,consoled by the thought that all had been done that man could do. Onthis, concludes the story, the Admiral and his officers consented towait the result.

As Wolfe had informed Pitt, his army was greatly weakened. Since the endof June his loss in killed and wounded was more than eight hundred andfifty, including two colonels, two majors, nineteen captains, andthirty-four subalterns; and to these were to be added a greater numberdisabled by disease.

The squadron of Admiral Holmes above Quebec had now increased totwenty-two vessels, great and small. One of the last that went up was adiminutive schooner, armed with a few swivels, and jocosely named the"Terror of France." She sailed by the town in broad daylight, theFrench, incensed at her impudence, blazing at her from all theirbatteries; but she passed unharmed, anchored by the Admiral's ship, andsaluted him triumphantly with her swivels.

Wolfe's first move towards executing his plan was the critical one ofevacuating the camp at Montmorenci. This was accomplished on the thirdof September. Montcalm sent a strong force to fall on the rear of theretiring English. Monckton saw the movement from Point Levi, embarkedtwo battalions in the boats of the fleet, and made a feint of landing atBeauport. Montcalm recalled his troops to repulse the threatened attack;and the English withdrew from Montmorenci unmolested, some to the Pointof Orleans, others to Point Levi. On the night of the fourth a fleet offlat boats passed above the town with the baggage and stores. On thefifth, Murray, with four battalions, marched up to the River Etechemin,and forded it under a hot fire from the French batteries at Sillery.Monckton and Townshend followed with three more battalions, and theunited force, of about thirty-six hundred men, was embarked on board theships of Holmes, where Wolfe joined them on the same evening.

These movements of the English filled the French commanders with mingledperplexity, anxiety, and hope. A deserter told them that AdmiralSaunders was impatient to be gone. Vaudreuil grew confident. "Thebreaking up of the camp at Montmorenci," he says, "and the abandonmentof the intrenchments there, the re-embarkation on board the vesselsabove Quebec of the troops who had encamped on the south bank, themovements of these vessels, the removal of the heaviest pieces ofartillery from the batteries of Point Levi,—these and the lateness ofthe season all combined to announce the speedy departure of the fleet,several vessels of which had even sailed down the river already. Theprisoners and the deserters who daily came in told us that this was thecommon report in their army." He wrote to Bourlamaque on the first ofSeptember: "Everything proves that the grand design of the English hasfailed."

Yet he was ceaselessly watchful. So was Montcalm; and he, too, on thenight of the second, snatched a moment to write to Bourlamaque from hisheadquarters in the stone house, by the river of Beauport: "The night isdark; it rains; our troops are in their tents, with clothes on, readyfor an alarm; I in my boots; my horses saddled. In fact, this is myusual way. I wish you were here; for I cannot be everywhere, though Imultiply myself, and have not taken off my clothes since thetwenty-third of June." On the eleventh of September he wrote his lastletter to Bourlamaque, and probably the last that his pen ever traced."I am overwhelmed with work, and should often lose temper, like you, ifI did not remember that I am paid by Europe for not losing it. Nothingnew since my last. I give the enemy another month, or something less, tostay here." The more sanguine Vaudreuil would hardly give them a week.

Meanwhile, no precaution was spared. The force under Bougainville aboveQuebec was raised to three thousand men. He was ordered to watch theshore as far as Jacques-Cartier, and follow with his main body everymovement of Holmes's squadron. There was little fear for the heightsnear the town; they were thought inaccessible. Even Montcalm believedthem safe, and had expressed himself to that effect some time before."We need not suppose," he wrote to Vaudreuil, "that the enemy havewings;" and again, speaking of the very place where Wolfe afterwardslanded, "I swear to you that a hundred men posted there would stop theirwhole army." He was right. A hundred watchful and determined men couldhave held the position long enough for reinforcements to come up.

The hundred men were there. Captain de Vergor, of the colony troops,commanded them, and reinforcements were within his call; for thebattalion of Guienne had been ordered to encamp close at hand on thePlains of Abraham. Vergor's post, called Anse du Foulon, was a mile anda half from Quebec. A little beyond it, by the brink of the cliffs, wasanother post, called Samos, held by seventy men with four cannon; and,beyond this again, the heights of Sillery were guarded by a hundred andthirty men, also with cannon. These were outposts of Bougainville, whoseheadquarters were at Cap-Rouge, six miles above Sillery, and whosetroops were in continual movement along the intervening shore. Thus allwas vigilance; for while the French were strong in the hope of speedydelivery, they felt that there was no safety till the tents of theinvader had vanished from their shores and his ships from their river."What we knew," says one of them, "of the character of M. Wolfe, thatimpetuous, bold, and intrepid warrior, prepared us for a last attackbefore he left us."

Wolfe had been very ill on the evening of the fourth. The troops knewit, and their spirits sank; but, after a night of torment, he grewbetter, and was soon among them again, rekindling their ardor, andimparting a cheer that he could not share. For himself he had no pity;but when he heard of the illness of two officers in one of the ships, hesent them a message of warm sympathy, advised them to return to PointLevi, and offered them his own barge and an escort. They thanked him,but replied that, come what might, they would see the enterprise to anend. Another officer remarked in his hearing that one of the invalidshad a very delicate constitution. "Don't tell me of constitution," saidWolfe; "he has good spirit, and good spirit will carry a man througheverything." An immense moral force bore up his own frail body andforced it to its work.

Major Robert Stobo, who, five years before, had been given as a hostageto the French at the capture of Fort Necessity, arrived about this timein a vessel from Halifax. He had long been a prisoner at Quebec, notalways in close custody, and had used his opportunities to acquainthimself with the neighborhood. In the spring of this year he and anofficer of rangers named Stevens had made their escape withextraordinary skill and daring; and he now returned to give hiscountrymen the benefit of his local knowledge. His biographer says thatit was he who directed Wolfe in the choice of a landing-place. Be thisas it may, Wolfe in person examined the river and the shores as far asPointe-aux-Trembles; till at length, landing on the south side a littleabove Quebec, and looking across the water with a telescope, he descrieda path that ran with a long slope up the face of the woody precipice,and saw at the top a cluster of tents. They were those of Vergor'sguard at the Anse du Foulon, now called Wolfe's Cove. As he could seebut ten or twelve of them, he thought that the guard could not benumerous, and might be overpowered. His hope would have been stronger ifhe had known that Vergor had once been tried for misconduct andcowardice in the surrender of Beauséjour, and saved from meriteddisgrace by the friendship of the intendant Bigot and the protection ofVaudreuil.

The morning of the seventh was fair and warm, and the vessels of Holmes,their crowded decks gay with scarlet uniforms, sailed up the river toCap-Rouge. A lively scene awaited them; for here were the headquartersof Bougainville, and here lay his principal force, while the restwatched the banks above and below. The cove into which the little riverruns was guarded by floating batteries; the surrounding shore wasdefended by breastworks; and a large body of regulars, militia, andmounted Canadians in blue uniforms moved to and fro, with restlessactivity, on the hills behind. When the vessels came to anchor, thehorsemen dismounted and formed in line with the infantry; then, withloud shouts, the whole rushed down the heights to man their works at theshore. That true Briton, Captain Knox, looked on with a critical eyefrom the gangway of his ship, and wrote that night in his Diary thatthey had made a ridiculous noise. "How different!" he exclaims, "hownobly awful and expressive of true valor is the customary silence of theBritish troops!"

In the afternoon the ships opened fire, while the troops entered theboats and rowed up and down as if looking for a landing-place. It wasbut a feint of Wolfe to deceive Bougainville as to his real design. Aheavy easterly rain set in on the next morning, and lasted two dayswithout respite. All operations were suspended, and the men sufferedgreatly in the crowded transports. Half of them were therefore landed onthe south shore, where they made their quarters in the village of St.Nicolas, refreshed themselves, and dried their wet clothing, knapsacks,and blankets.

For several successive days the squadron of Holmes was allowed to driftup the river with the flood tide and down with the ebb, thus passing andrepassing incessantly between the neighborhood of Quebec on one hand,and a point high above Cap-Rouge on the other; while Bougainville,perplexed, and always expecting an attack, followed the ships to and froalong the shore, by day and by night, till his men were exhausted withceaseless forced marches.

At last the time for action came. On Wednesday, the twelfth, the troopsat St. Nicolas were embarked again, and all were told to hold themselvesin readiness. Wolfe, from the flagship "Sutherland," issued his lastgeneral orders. "The enemy's force is now divided, great scarcity ofprovisions in their camp, and universal discontent among the Canadians.Our troops below are in readiness to join us; all the light artilleryand tools are embarked at the Point of Levi; and the troops will landwhere the French seem least to expect it. The first body that gets onshore is to march directly to the enemy and drive them from any littlepost they may occupy; the officers must be careful that the succeedingbodies do not by any mistake fire on those who go before them. Thebattalions must form on the upper ground with expedition, and be readyto charge whatever presents itself. When the artillery and troops arelanded, a corps will be left to secure the landing-place, while therest march on and endeavor to bring the Canadians and French to abattle. The officers and men will remember what their country expectsfrom them, and what a determined body of soldiers inured to war iscapable of doing against five weak French battalions mingled with adisorderly peasantry."

The spirit of the army answered to that of its chief. The troops lovedand admired their general, trusted their officers, and were ready forany attempt. "Nay, how could it be otherwise," quaintly asks honestSergeant John Johnson, of the fifty-eighth regiment, "being at the heelsof gentlemen whose whole thirst, equal with their general, was forglory? We had seen them tried, and always found them sterling. We knewthat they would stand by us to the last extremity."

Wolfe had thirty-six hundred men and officers with him on board thevessels of Holmes; and he now sent orders to Colonel Burton at PointLevi to bring to his aid all who could be spared from that place and thePoint of Orleans. They were to march along the south bank, afternightfall, and wait further orders at a designated spot convenient forembarkation. Their number was about twelve hundred, so that the entireforce destined for the enterprise was at the utmost forty-eight hundred.With these, Wolfe meant to climb the heights of Abraham in the teeth ofan enemy who, though much reduced, were still twice as numerous as theirassailants.

Admiral Saunders lay with the main fleet in the Basin of Quebec. Thisexcellent officer, whatever may have been his views as to the necessityof a speedy departure, aided Wolfe to the last with unfailing energy andzeal. It was agreed between them that while the General made the realattack, the Admiral should engage Montcalm's attention by a pretendedone. As night approached, the fleet ranged itself along the Beauportshore; the boats were lowered and filled with sailors, marines, and thefew troops that had been left behind; while ship signalled to ship,cannon flashed and thundered, and shot ploughed the beach, as if toclear a way for assailants to land. In the gloom of the evening theeffect was imposing. Montcalm, who thought that the movements of theEnglish above the town were only a feint, that their main force wasstill below it, and that their real attack would be made there, wascompletely deceived, and massed his troops in front of Beauport to repelthe expected landing. But while in the fleet of Saunders all was uproarand ostentatious menace, the danger was ten miles away, where thesquadron of Holmes lay tranquil and silent at its anchorage offCap-Rouge.

It was less tranquil than it seemed. All on board knew that a blow wouldbe struck that night, though only a few high officers knew where.Colonel Howe, of the light infantry, called for volunteers to lead theunknown and desperate venture, promising, in the words of one of them,"that if any of us survived we might depend on being recommended to theGeneral." As many as were wanted—twenty-four in all—soon came forward.Thirty large bateaux and some boats belonging to the squadron lay mooredalongside the vessels; and late in the evening the troops were orderedinto them, the twenty-four volunteers taking their place in theforemost. They held in all about seventeen hundred men. The restremained on board.

Bougainville could discern the movement, and misjudged it, thinking thathe himself was to be attacked. The tide was still flowing; and, thebetter to deceive him, the vessels and boats were allowed to driftupward with it for a little distance, as if to land above Cap-Rouge.

The day had been fortunate for Wolfe. Two deserters came from the campof Bougainville with intelligence that, at ebb tide on the next night,he was to send down a convoy of provisions to Montcalm. The necessitiesof the camp at Beauport, and the difficulties of transportation by land,had before compelled the French to resort to this perilous means ofconveying supplies; and their boats, drifting in darkness under theshadows of the northern shore, had commonly passed in safety. Wolfe sawat once that, if his own boats went down in advance of the convoy, hecould turn the intelligence of the deserters to good account.

He was still on board the "Sutherland." Every preparation was made, andevery order given; it only remained to wait the turning of the tide.Seated with him in the cabin was the commander of the sloop-of-war"Porcupine," his former school-fellow John Jervis, afterwards Earl St.Vincent. Wolfe told him that he expected to die in the battle of thenext day; and taking from his bosom a miniature of Miss Lowther, hisbetrothed, he gave it to him with a request that he would return it toher if the presentiment should prove true.

Towards two o'clock the tide began to ebb, and a fresh wind blew downthe river. Two lanterns were raised into the maintop shrouds of the"Sutherland." It was the appointed signal; the boats cast off and felldown with the current, those of the light infantry leading the way. Thevessels with the rest of the troops had orders to follow a little later.

To look for a moment at the chances on which this bold adventure hung.First, the deserters told Wolfe that provision-boats were ordered to godown to Quebec that night; secondly, Bougainville countermanded them;thirdly, the sentries posted along the heights were told of the order,but not of the countermand; fourthly, Vergor at the Anse du Foulon hadpermitted most of his men, chiefly Canadians from Lorette, to go homefor a time and work at their harvesting, on condition, it is said, thatthey should afterwards work in a neighboring field of his own; fifthly,he kept careless watch, and went quietly to bed; sixthly, the battalionof Guienne, ordered to take post on the Plains of Abraham, had, forreasons unexplained, remained encamped by the St. Charles; and lastly,when Bougainville saw Holmes's vessels drift down the stream, he did nottax his weary troops to follow them, thinking that they would return asusual with the flood tide. But for these conspiring circumstances NewFrance might have lived a little longer, and the fruitless heroism ofWolfe would have passed, with countless other heroisms, into oblivion.

For full two hours the procession of boats, borne on the current,steered silently down the St. Lawrence. The stars were visible, but thenight was moonless and sufficiently dark. The General was in one of theforemost boats, and near him was a young midshipman, John Robison,afterwards professor of natural philosophy in the University ofEdinburgh. He used to tell in his later life how Wolfe, with a lowvoice, repeated Gray's Elegy in a Country Churchyard to the officersabout him. Probably it was to relieve the intense strain of histhoughts. Among the rest was the verse which his own fate was soon toillustrate,—

"The paths of glory lead but to the grave."

"Gentlemen," he said, as his recital ended, "I would rather have writtenthose lines than take Quebec." None were there to tell him that the herois greater than the poet.

As they neared their destination, the tide bore them in towards theshore, and the mighty wall of rock and forest towered in darkness ontheir left. The dead stillness was suddenly broken by the sharp Quivive! of a French sentry, invisible in the thick gloom. France!answered a Highland officer of Fraser's regiment from one of the boatsof the light infantry. He had served in Holland, and spoke Frenchfluently.

À quel régiment?

De la Reine, replied the Highlander. He knew that a part of that corpswas with Bougainville. The sentry, expecting the convoy of provisions,was satisfied, and did not ask for the password.

Soon after, the foremost boats were passing the heights of Samos, whenanother sentry challenged them, and they could see him through thedarkness running down to the edge of the water, within range of apistol-shot. In answer to his questions, the same officer replied, inFrench: "Provision-boats. Don't make a noise; the English will hear us."In fact, the sloop-of-war "Hunter" was anchored in the stream not faroff. This time, again, the sentry let them pass. In a few moments theyrounded the headland above the Anse du Foulon. There was no sentrythere. The strong current swept the boats of the light infantry a littlebelow the intended landing-place. They disembarked on a narrow strand atthe foot of heights as steep as a hill covered with trees can be. Thetwenty-four volunteers led the way, climbing with what silence theymight, closely followed by a much larger body. When they reached the topthey saw in the dim light a cluster of tents at a short distance, andimmediately made a dash at them. Vergor leaped from bed and tried to runoff, but was shot in the heel and captured. His men, taken by surprise,made little resistance. One or two were caught, and the rest fled.

The main body of troops waited in their boats by the edge of the strand.The heights near by were cleft by a great ravine choked with foresttrees; and in its depths ran a little brook called Ruisseau St.-Denis,which, swollen by the late rains, fell plashing in the stillness over arock. Other than this no sound could reach the strained ear of Wolfe butthe gurgle of the tide and the cautious climbing of his advance-partiesas they mounted the steeps at some little distance from where he satlistening. At length from the top came a sound of musket-shots, followedby loud huzzas, and he knew that his men were masters of the position.The word was given; the troops leaped from the boats and scaled theheights, some here, some there, clutching at trees and bushes, theirmuskets slung at their backs. Tradition still points out the place, nearthe mouth of the ravine, where the foremost reached the top. Wolfe saidto an officer near him: "You can try it, but I don't think you'll getup." He himself, however, found strength to drag himself up with therest. The narrow slanting path on the face of the heights had been madeimpassable by trenches and abatis; but all obstructions were sooncleared away, and then the ascent was easy. In the gray of the morningthe long file of red-coated soldiers moved quickly upward, and formed inorder on the plateau above.

Before many of them had reached the top, cannon were heard close on theleft. It was the battery at Samos firing on the boats in the rear andthe vessels descending from Cap-Rouge. A party was sent to silence it;this was soon effected, and the more distant battery at Sillery was nextattacked and taken. As fast as the boats were emptied they returned forthe troops left on board the vessels and for those waiting on thesouthern shore under Colonel Burton.

The day broke in clouds and threatening rain. Wolfe's battalions weredrawn up along the crest of the heights. No enemy was in sight, though abody of Canadians had sallied from the town and moved along the strandtowards the landing-place, whence they were quickly driven back. He hadachieved the most critical part of his enterprise; yet the success thathe coveted placed him in imminent danger. On one side was the garrisonof Quebec and the army of Beauport, and Bougainville was on the other.Wolfe's alternative was victory or ruin; for if he should be overwhelmedby a combined attack, retreat would be hopeless. His feelings no man canknow; but it would be safe to say that hesitation or doubt had no partin them.

He went to reconnoitre the ground, and soon came to the Plains ofAbraham, so called from Abraham Martin, a pilot known as Maître Abraham,who had owned a piece of land here in the early times of the colony. ThePlains were a tract of grass, tolerably level in most parts, patchedhere and there with cornfields, studded with clumps of bushes, andforming a part of the high plateau at the eastern end of which Quebecstood. On the south it was bounded by the declivities along the St.Lawrence; on the north, by those along the St. Charles, or rather alongthe meadows through which that lazy stream crawled like a writhingsnake. At the place that Wolfe chose for his battle-field the plateauwas less than a mile wide.

Thither the troops advanced, marched by files till they reached theground, and then wheeled to form their line of battle, which stretchedacross the plateau and faced the city. It consisted of six battalionsand the detached grenadiers from Louisbourg, all drawn up in ranks threedeep. Its right wing was near the brink of the heights along the St.Lawrence; but the left could not reach those along the St. Charles. Onthis side a wide space was perforce left open, and there was danger ofbeing outflanked. To prevent this, Brigadier Townshend was stationedhere with two battalions, drawn up at right angles with the rest, andfronting the St. Charles. The battalion of Webb's regiment, underColonel Burton, formed the reserve; the third battalion of RoyalAmericans was left to guard the landing; and Howe's light infantryoccupied a wood far in the rear. Wolfe, with Monckton and Murray,commanded the front line, on which the heavy fighting was to fall, andwhich, when all the troops had arrived, numbered less than thirty-fivehundred men.

Quebec was not a mile distant, but they could not see it; for a ridge ofbroken ground intervened, called Buttes-à-Neveu, about six hundred pacesoff. The first division of troops had scarcely come up when, about sixo'clock, this ridge was suddenly thronged with white uniforms. It wasthe battalion of Guienne, arrived at the eleventh hour from its camp bythe St. Charles. Some time after there was hot firing in the rear. Itcame from a detachment of Bougainville's command attacking a house wheresome of the light infantry were posted. The assailants were repulsed,and the firing ceased. Light showers fell at intervals, besprinklingthe troops as they stood patiently waiting the event.

Montcalm had passed a troubled night. Through all the evening the cannonbellowed from the ships of Saunders, and the boats of the fleet hoveredin the dusk off the Beauport shore, threatening every moment to land.Troops lined the intrenchments till day, while the General walked thefield that adjoined his headquarters till one in the morning,accompanied by the Chevalier Johnstone and Colonel Poulariez. Johnstonesays that he was in great agitation, and took no rest all night. Atdaybreak he heard the sound of cannon above the town. It was the batteryat Samos firing on the English ships. He had sent an officer to thequarters of Vaudreuil, which were much nearer Quebec, with orders tobring him word at once should anything unusual happen. But no word came,and about six o'clock he mounted and rode thither with Johnstone. Asthey advanced, the country behind the town opened more and more upontheir sight; till at length, when opposite Vaudreuil's house, they sawacross the St. Charles, some two miles away, the red ranks of Britishsoldiers on the heights beyond.

"This is a serious business," Montcalm said; and sent off Johnstone atfull gallop to bring up the troops from the centre and left of the camp.Those of the right were in motion already, doubtless by the Governor'sorder. Vaudreuil came out of the house. Montcalm stopped for a few wordswith him; then set spurs to his horse, and rode over the bridge of theSt. Charles to the scene of danger. He rode with a fixed look, utteringnot a word.

The army followed in such order as it might, crossed the bridge in hothaste, passed under the northern rampart of Quebec, entered at thePalace Gate, and pressed on in headlong march along the quaint narrowstreets of the warlike town: troops of Indians in scalplocks andwar-paint, a savage glitter in their deep-set eyes; bands of Canadianswhose all was at stake,—faith, country, and home; the colony regulars;the battalions of Old France, a torrent of white uniforms and gleamingbayonets, La Sarre, Languedoc, Roussillon, Béarn,—victors of Oswego,William Henry, and Ticonderoga. So they swept on poured out upon theplain, some by the gate of St. Louis, and some by that of St. John, andhurried, breathless, to where the banners of Guienne still fluttered onthe ridge.

Montcalm was amazed at what he saw. He had expected a detachment, and hefound an army. Full in sight before him stretched the lines of Wolfe:the close ranks of the English infantry, a silent wall of red, and thewild array of the Highlanders, with their waving tartans, and bagpipesscreaming defiance. Vaudreuil had not come; but not the less was feltthe evil of a divided authority and the jealousy of the rival chiefs.Montcalm waited long for the forces he had ordered to join him from theleft wing of the army. He waited in vain. It is said that the Governorhad detained them, lest the English should attack the Beauport shore.Even if they did so, and succeeded, the French might defy them, couldthey but put Wolfe to rout on the Plains of Abraham. Neither did thegarrison of Quebec come to the aid of Montcalm. He sent to Ramesay, itscommander, for twenty-five field-pieces which were on the Palacebattery. Ramesay would give him only three, saying that he wanted themfor his own defence. There were orders and counter-orders;misunderstanding, haste, delay, perplexity.

Montcalm and his chief officers held a council of war. It is said thathe and they alike were for immediate attack. His enemies declare that hewas afraid lest Vaudreuil should arrive and take command; but theGovernor was not a man to assume responsibility at such a crisis. Otherssay that his impetuosity overcame his better judgment; and of thischarge it is hard to acquit him. Bougainville was but a few milesdistant, and some of his troops were much nearer; a messenger sent byway of Old Lorette could have reached him in an hour and a half at most,and a combined attack in front and rear might have been concerted withhim. If, moreover, Montcalm could have come to an understanding withVaudreuil, his own force might have been strengthened by two or threethousand additional men from the town and the camp of Beauport; but hefelt that there was no time to lose, for he imagined that Wolfe wouldsoon be reinforced, which was impossible, and he believed that theEnglish were fortifying themselves, which was no less an error. He hasbeen blamed not only for fighting too soon, but for fighting at all. Inthis he could not choose. Fight he must, for Wolfe was now in a positionto cut off all his supplies. His men were full of ardor, and he resolvedto attack before their ardor cooled. He spoke a few words to them in hiskeen, vehement way. "I remember very well how he looked," one of theCanadians, then a boy of eighteen, used to say in his old age; "he rodea black or dark bay horse along the front of our lines, brandishing hissword, as if to excite us to do our duty. He wore a coat with widesleeves, which fell back as he raised his arm, and showed the whitelinen of the wristband."

The English waited the result with a composure which, if not quite real,was at least well feigned. The three field-pieces sent by Ramesay pliedthem with canister-shot, and fifteen hundred Canadians and Indiansfusilladed them in front and flank. Over all the plain, from behindbushes and knolls and the edge of cornfields, puffs of smoke sprangincessantly from the guns of these hidden marksmen. Skirmishers werethrown out before the lines to hold them in check, and the soldiers wereordered to lie on the grass to avoid the shot. The firing was livelieston the English left, where bands of sharpshooters got under the edge ofthe declivity, among thickets, and behind scattered houses, whence theykilled and wounded a considerable number of Townshend's men. The lightinfantry were called up from the rear. The houses were taken andretaken, and one or more of them was burned.

Wolfe was everywhere. How cool he was, and why his followers loved him,is shown by an incident that happened in the course of the morning. Oneof his captains was shot through the lungs; and on recoveringconsciousness he saw the General standing at his side. Wolfe pressed hishand, told him not to despair, praised his services, promised him earlypromotion, and sent an aide-de-camp to Monckton to beg that officer tokeep the promise if he himself should fall.

It was towards ten o'clock when, from the high ground on the right ofthe line, Wolfe saw that the crisis was near. The French on the ridgehad formed themselves into three bodies, regulars in the centre,regulars and Canadians on right and left. Two field-pieces, which hadbeen dragged up the heights at Anse du Foulon, fired on them withgrape-shot, and the troops, rising from the ground, prepared to receivethem. In a few moments more they were in motion. They came on rapidly,uttering loud shouts, and firing as soon as they were within range.Their ranks, ill ordered at the best, were further confused by a numberof Canadians who had been mixed among the regulars, and who, afterhastily firing, threw themselves on the ground to reload. The Britishadvanced a few rods; then baited and stood still. When the French werewithin forty paces the word of command rang out, and a crash of musketryanswered all along the line. The volley was delivered with remarkableprecision. In the battalions of the centre, which had suffered leastfrom the enemy's bullets, the simultaneous explosion was afterwards saidby French officers to have sounded like a cannon-shot. Another volleyfollowed, and then a furious clattering fire that lasted but a minute ortwo. When the smoke rose, a miserable sight was revealed: the groundcumbered with dead and wounded, the advancing masses stopped short andturned into a frantic mob, shouting, cursing, gesticulating. The orderwas given to charge. Then over the field rose the British cheer, mixedwith the fierce yell of the Highland slogan. Some of the corps pushedforward with the bayonet; some advanced firing. The clansmen drew theirbroadswords and dashed on, keen and swift as bloodhounds. At the Englishright, though the attacking column was broken to pieces, a fire wasstill kept up, chiefly, it seems, by sharpshooters from the bushes andcornfields, where they had lain for an hour or more. Here Wolfe himselfled the charge, at the head of the Louisbourg grenadiers. A shotshattered his wrist. He wrapped his handkerchief about it and kept on.Another shot struck him, and he still advanced, when a third lodged inhis breast. He staggered, and sat on the ground. Lieutenant Brown, ofthe grenadiers, one Henderson, a volunteer in the same company, and aprivate soldier, aided by an officer of artillery who ran to join them,carried him in their arms to the rear. He begged them to lay him down.They did so, and asked if he would have a surgeon. "There's no need," heanswered; "it's all over with me." A moment after, one of them criedout: "They run; see how they run!" "Who run?" Wolfe demanded, like a manroused from sleep. "The enemy, sir. Egad, they give way everywhere!""Go, one of you, to Colonel Burton," returned the dying man; "tell himto march Webb's regiment down to Charles River, to cut off their retreatfrom the bridge." Then, turning on his side, he murmured, "Now, God bepraised, I will die in peace!" and in a few moments his gallant soul hadfled.

Montcalm, still on horseback, was borne with the tide of fugitivestowards the town. As he approached the walls a shot passed through hisbody. He kept his seat; two soldiers supported him, one on each side,and led his horse through the St. Louis Gate. On the open space within,among the excited crowd, were several women, drawn, no doubt, byeagerness to know the result of the fight. One of them recognized him,saw the streaming blood, and shrieked, "O mon Dieu! mon Dieu! leMarquis est tué!" "It's nothing, it's nothing," replied thedeath-stricken man; "don't be troubled for me, my good friends." ("Cen'est rien, ce n'est rien; ne vous affligez pas pour moi, mes bonnesamies.")

Some of the fugitives took refuge in the city and others escaped acrossthe St. Charles. In the next night the French army abandoned Quebec toits fate and fled up the St. Lawrence. The city soon surrendered toWolfe's successor, Brigadier Townshend, and the English held it duringthe winter. In April, the French under the Chevalier de Lévis made abold but unsuccessful attempt to retake it. In the following summer,General Amherst advanced on Montreal, till in September all Canada wasforced to surrender, and the power of France was extinguished on theNorth American continent.

University Press: John Wilson & Son, Cambridge

Transcriber's Notes:
original hyphenation, spelling and grammar have been preserved as in the original
Page 15, "Day, 1646. he gave" changed to "Day, 1646, he gave"
Page 22, "want of pay: ordnance" changed to "want of pay; ordnance"
Page 41, "moccasons" changed to "moccasins"
Page 99, "rifle-but" changed to "rifle-butt"
Page 114, "seized her How" changed to "seized her. How"

[End of Historic Handbook of the Northern Tour, by Francis Parkman]