[363] Journal de Bougainville. This is a fragment; his Journal proper begins a few weeks later.
[364] Lévis à——, 5 Avril, 1756.
The voyage was a rough one. "I have been fortunate," writes Montcalm to his wife, "in not being ill nor at all incommoded by the heavy gale we had in Holy Week. It was not so with those who were with me, especially M. Estève, my secretary, and Joseph, who suffered cruelly,—seventeen days without being able to take anything but water. The season was very early for such a hard voyage, and it was fortunate that the winter has been so mild. We had very favorable weather till Monday the twelfth; but since then till Saturday evening we had rough weather, with a gale that lasted ninety hours, and put us in real danger. The forecastle was always under water, and the waves broke twice over the quarter-deck. From the twenty-seventh of April to the evening of the fourth of May we had fogs, great cold, and an amazing quantity of icebergs. On the thirtieth, when luckily the fog lifted for a time, we counted sixteen of them. The day before, one drifted under the bowsprit, grazed it, and might have crushed us if the deck-officer had not called out quickly, Luff. After speaking of our troubles and sufferings, I must tell you of our pleasures, which were fishing for cod and eating it. The taste is exquisite. The head, tongue, and liver are morsels worthy of an epicure. Still, I would not advise anybody to make the voyage for their sake. My health is as good as it has been for a long time. I found it a good plan to eat little and take no supper; a little tea now and then, and plenty of lemonade. Nevertheless I have taken very little liking for the sea, and think that when I shall be so happy as to rejoin you I shall end my voyages there. I don't know when this letter will go. I shall send it by the first ship that returns to France, and keep on writing till then. It is pleasant, I know, to hear particulars about the people one loves, and I thought that my mother and you, my dearest and most beloved, would be glad to read all these dull details. We heard Mass on Easter Day. All the week before, it was impossible, because the ship rolled so that I could hardly keep my legs. If I had dared, I think I should have had myself lashed fast. I shall not soon forget that Holy Week."
This letter was written on the eleventh of May, in the St. Lawrence, where the ship lay at anchor, ten leagues below Quebec, stopped by ice from proceeding farther. Montcalm made his way to the town by land, and soon after learned with great satisfaction that the other ships were safe in the river below. "I see," he writes again, "that I shall have plenty of work. Our campaign will soon begin. Everything is in motion. Don't expect details about our operations; generals never speak of movements till they are over. I can only tell you that the winter has been quiet enough, though the savages have made great havoc in Pennsylvania and Virginia, and carried off, according to their custom, men, women, and children. I beg you will have High Mass said at Montpellier or Vauvert to thank God for our safe arrival and ask for good success in future." [365]
[365] These extracts are translated from copies of the original letters, in possession of the present Marquis de Montcalm.
Vaudreuil, the governor-general, was at Montreal, and Montcalm sent a courier to inform him of his arrival. He soon went thither in person, and the two men met for the first time. The new general was not welcome to Vaudreuil, who had hoped to command the troops himself, and had represented to the Court that it was needless and inexpedient to send out a general officer from France. [366] The Court had not accepted his views; [367] and hence it was with more curiosity than satisfaction that he greeted the colleague who had been assigned him. He saw before him a man of small stature, with a lively countenance, a keen eye, and, in moments of animation, rapid, vehement utterance, and nervous gesticulation. Montcalm, we may suppose, regarded the Governor with no less attention. Pierre François Rigaud, Marquis de Vaudreuil, who had governed Canada early in the century; and he himself had been governor of Louisiana. He had not the force of character which his position demanded, lacked decision in times of crisis; and though tenacious of authority, was more jealous in asserting than self-reliant in exercising it. One of his traits was a sensitive egotism, which made him forward to proclaim his own part in every success, and to throw on others the burden of every failure. He was facile by nature, and capable of being led by such as had skill and temper for the task. But the impetuous Montcalm was not of their number; and the fact that he was born in France would in itself have thrown obstacles in his way to the good graces of the Governor. Vaudreuil, Canadian by birth, loved the colony and its people, and distrusted Old France and all that came out of it. He had been bred, moreover, to the naval service; and, like other Canadian governors, his official correspondence was with the minister of marine, while that of Montcalm was with the minister of war. Even had Nature made him less suspicious, his relations with the General would have been critical. Montcalm commanded the regulars from France, whose very presence was in the eyes of Vaudreuil an evil, though a necessary one. Their chief was, it is true, subordinate to him in virtue of his office of governor; [368] yet it was clear that for the conduct of the war the trust of the Government was mainly in Montcalm; and the Minister of War had even suggested that he should have the immediate command, not only of the troops from France, but of the colony regulars and the militia. An order of the King to this effect was sent to Vaudreuil, with instructions to communicate it to Montcalm or withhold it, as he should think best. [369] He lost no time in replying that the General "ought to concern himself with nothing but the command of the troops from France;" and he returned the order to the minister who sent it. [370] The Governor and the General represented the two parties which were soon to divide Canada,—those of New France and of Old.
[366] Vaudreuil au Ministre, 30 Oct. 1755.
[367] Ordres du Roy et Dépêches des Ministres, Fév. 1756.
[368] Le Ministre à Vaudreuil, 15 Mars, 1756. Commission du Marquis de Montcalm. Mémoire du Roy pour servir d'Instruction au Marquis de Montcalm.
[369] Ordres du Roy et Dépêches des Ministres, 1756. Le Ministre à Vaudreuil, 15 Mars, 1756.