We now had arrived before the city of Quebec, to take which by surprise was the great object of our expedition.
A Lieutenant with 20 men was sent forward to see if our way was clear. At 2 o'clock at night the advanced party reached the St. Lawrence and halted. In the morning we perceived we were in fair view of Quebec, nothing but the river separating us.
November 8. We took up our residence in houses along the south side of the river St. Lawrence, and remained until the 13th waiting for the sick, the halt and feeble, who had been left behind at different places to come up. By the 13th all had arrived who were to be expected; many we learnt, to our great sorrow, had perished by the way.
When a general muster was made, and all appeared who had survived the perils of the wilderness, a more pitiful and humorous spectacle was exhibited than I had ever before seen.
In our long and tedious march through the wilderness, it was not with us as with the children of Israel, that our cloathes waxed not old, ours were torn in pieces by the bushes, and hung in strings—few of us had any shoes, but moggasons made of raw skins—many of us without hats—and beards long and visages thin and meager. I thought we much resembled the animals which inhabit New-Spain, called the Ourang-Outang. The French appeared a little surprised at the first sight of us; and had not Colonel Arnold gone forward to apprise them of our approach, they might have fled from their habitations.
In coming to this place we passed several very pretty villages, ornamented with handsome churches for worship. We discovered some people of fashion, living in good style, but most of the inhabitants appeared ignorant and to have but little ambition.
November 7. This day we were very busy in preparing to cross the river at night; we had collected a great number of Canoes, some of them made of bark by the Indians; but most of them of large pine logs. When night approached, we began to cross, and made our first landing at a place called Wolfe's Cove. We directly ascended a steep bank and paraded on the plains of Abraham, where we found a plenty of barracks which had been erected for the use of the British troops and were then unoccupied. Several of the bark canoes in crossing upset, by which accident we lost some muskets, and baggage, but no lives, though some of us very narrowly escaped.—Most of the troops were over by day break; those who crossed after were fired upon by the Lizard, a British frigate that lay in the river, but received no damage.
November 14. We now had in our possession the midshipman of the Lizard, and several other prisoners, which we had taken on the south side of the river. The frigate fired upon us in our encampment; but she was at too great a distance to do us any injury. We this day took a prisoner near our encampment—supposed to be a spy. We let him and our other prisoners, every day walk on parole.
The weather being very cold, we quit our barracks and took up our residence in houses, built for the King's officers, which they evacuated on our approach. We remained here until the 21st, during which time we received intelligence that there were not more than 100 regular troops in the city—some sailors, and a few newly enlisted troops from Newfoundland; in all not exceeding 400 under arms. This intelligence was soon contradicted. A servant of Colonel Arnold's who had been taken prisoner and made his escape gave us a very different account: he stated that the inhabitants and King's troops exceeded 800 under arms; our whole force at that time not exceeding 500, and the most of our ammunition spent.
We this day lost one of our sentry, next the walls of the city. He was treacherously decoyed and taken. This event soon rallied all our detachment. We marched on to that place of the plains where Wolfe fought his battle, in sight of the city walls. Our troops were drawn up in battle array and we gave them a challenge for a field battle, our riflemen forming our right wing. Though much superior to us in numbers and better provided with arms and ammunition, they declined an engagement. They fired on us from the fort, and as they were in a situation in which we could not attack them, we did not choose to stand merely to be shot at: we deliberately retreated, and soon got beyond reach of their balls.