Montcalm’s career in Canada was a struggle against an inexorable destiny. He bore hunger, thirst, and fatigue without a murmur, caring for his soldiers, but with no thought for himself. In the midst of general corruption he stood forth immaculate, having but one thought, the good of the colony; the savages themselves declared they learnt from him patience in suffering.
A story is told of an Indian chief, when presented to Montcalm, expressing his astonishment that a man who was capable of such great deeds should be so diminutive in stature.
“Ah! how small thou art!” he exclaimed; then added, “but I see reflected in thy eyes the height of the oak and the vivacity of the eagle.”
His own soldiers and his officers worshipped him, but such men as the Governor Vaudreuil and his satellites, Bigot, Cadet, and the rest, both hated and feared him, as the evil man hates and fears the just one.
In the opposite camp a dying man held sway. James Wolfe knew that he was doomed; and his heart sank within him as the days went by, and at the end of July he found himself no nearer taking Quebec than upon the first day on which he landed. He could not move Montcalm to attack. On the 31st of July he made a desperate attempt on the French camp, on the heights of Montmorenci; but notwithstanding acts of the most daring courage, the English were driven back with enormous loss. The blow was such a severe one that Wolfe, thoroughly disheartened, meditated fortifying the Île-aux-Coudres, and then sailing for England with the remainder of his army, to return the following year. But the following year! could he even reckon on a month of life? and he had so hoped, when he accepted his office from William Pitt, to return triumphant, having blotted out and repaired the faults of his predecessors. Imbued with an ardent love of glory, what must have been the feelings of such a man at the prospect of issuing the order for the army he had expected to lead to victory to sail homewards—if not conquered, at least foiled! He could not make up his mind to such a step as long as there still remained the shadow of a chance.
In the middle of August he issued another proclamation, couched in the following terms:—
“Seeing that the people of Canada have shown so little appreciation of my mercy, I am resolved to listen no longer to the sentiments of humanity which have so far ruled me. It is a cause of bitter sorrow to me to be obliged even remotely to imitate the acts of barbarity perpetrated by the Canadians and Indians; yet in justice to myself and my army, I feel bound to chastise the Canadian people. From henceforth therefore any village or settlement which offers resistance to British rule will be razed to the ground.”
The churches were to be respected, and women and children treated with due honour. “If any violence is offered to a woman, the offender shall be punished with death.”
The Rangers and Light Infantry were charged to carry out these orders, and soon on the sunny plains around Quebec flames and smoke arose from many a farmhouse and peaceful village, and the population went forth in flocks, victims of the scourge of war. The Governor Vaudreuil wrote despatches home in which he dilated at great length upon the barbarity of the English, utterly ignoring the fact that for years past he had sent his savages the length and breadth of the English colonies to waste and murder at will, without regard to either age or sex. Quebec was itself greatly injured; many families had forsaken the city, and taken refuge at Pointe-aux-Trembles, some eighteen miles up the river on the north shore. Colonel Carleton landed here with six hundred men, and took upwards of a hundred ladies, old men, and children prisoners. They were conducted to Wolfe’s camp, where they were courteously treated, the ladies being invited to dine at his table, and the following day they were sent under escort back to Quebec.
The general aspect of affairs grew daily more and more serious for English and French alike. Dysentery and fever broke out in the English camp. On the French side the Canadians were deserting in great numbers, and food was becoming daily so scarce that the rations had to be again and again reduced. English ships prevented food arriving from Montreal by the river, and the conveyance by land was both slow and expensive. In Quebec there was real suffering.