Chambly is an old town, at the foot of the rapids, and bears evidence of thrift. A Frenchman bearing that name built a small wood fort there, which was afterward replaced by the solid stone structure pictured on page 171. The latter retained the name of the original fort, as also does the village. It is a military station at present, and, being at the head of the navigation of the Richelieu or Sorel from the St. Lawrence, has a commanding position
The river here, at the foot of the falls, expands into a circular basin about a mile and a hall in diameter. The old fort is dismantled and ungarrisoned, and is now used only for a store-house. Near it are seen the remains of the battery erected by Bedell, while pre paring to storm the fort in 1775. I tarried at Chambly long enough only to reconnoiter ant sketch the old fortress and the features of the Beloeil, the only mountain range in view, ant then went to an inn to dine, a mile on the road toward Longueuil. There I learned that a French Canadian, nearly one hundred years old, was living near. Although the sun was declining, and we had seventeen miles' travel before us, I determined to visit the old man.
* This sketeh is taken from the southeast angle of old Fort Chambly, showing the rapids in the fore ground. The mountain is twenty miles distant, near the Sorel. On the highest point of the range the Bishop of Nancy, a French prelate, ereeted a huge cross in 1843, the pedestal of which was sufficiently large to form a chapel capable of containing fifty persons. In November, 1847, during a severe thunder gust, the lightning and wind completely demolished the cross, but spared the pedestal, and that, being white, may be seen at a great distance.
Francois Yest.—His Age and Reminiscences.—Temperance Pledge.— Ride to Longueuil.—A Caleche.
and sound in his memory. We met him upon the road, coming toward the inn. He had just left his rake in the field, and had on a leather apron and broad-rimmed hat. He was a small, firmly-built man, apparently sixty-five years old. Conversation with him was difficult, for his dialect, professedly French, was far worse than Gascon. Still we managed to understand each other, and I gleaned from him, during our brief interview, the facts that he was born in Quebec in 1752; remembered the storming of the city by the English under Wolfe; removed to Chambly in 1770; was a spectator of the capture of the fort by a detachment from Montgomery's army in 1775; assisted in furnishing stores for Burgoyne's army at St John's in 1777; and has lived upon and cultivated the same small farm of thirty acres from that time until the present. He was ninety-six years old, and appeared to have stamina sufficient for twenty years more of active life.
