On first assuming the command of a regiment, Wolfe writes, "I take upon me the difficult duty of a commander. It is a hard thing to keep the passions within bounds, where authority and immaturity go together. It is hard to be a severe disciplinarian, yet humane; to study the temper of all, and endeavor to please them, and yet be impartial—to discourage vice at the turbulent age of twenty-three."
His letters breathe a spirit of tenderness and gentleness, over which ambition could not triumph. In writing to his mother on the 28th of September, 1755, he says, "My nature requires some extraordinary events to produce itself. I want that attention and those assiduous cares that commonly go along with good nature and humanity. In the common occurrences of life I am not seen to advantage." So far back as the 13th of August, 1749, he writes also to his mother from Glasgow, "I have observed your instructions so rigidly that, rather than want the word, I got the reputation of being a very good Presbyterian by frequenting the Kirk of Scotland till our chapel opens." Again he writes to his mother from Inverness, November 6th, 1751, "There are times when men fret at trifles, and quarrel with their tooth-picks. In one of these ill habits I exclaim against my present condition, and think it the worst of all, but coolly and temperately, it is plainly the best. Where there is most employment and least vice, there should one wish most to be."
On the 18th of February, 1755, he writes to his father, "I find that your bounty and liberality keep pace, as they usually do, with my necessities. I shall not abuse your kindness, nor receive it unthankfully, and what use I make of it shall be for your honor and the king's service—an employment worthy of the hand that gives it." His amiable temper strongly inclined him, from an early age, to domestic life; in the letter, November 6th, 1751 (before quoted), he declares that he has "a turn of mind that favors matrimony prodigiously; I love children, and think them necessary to people in their later days." He, however, struggled with these wishes, and for a long time overcame them, from his ardent love of fame.
Of Wolfe's life we know but little; the waves of oblivion have closed over it, but the story of his death remains forever treasured in England's grateful memory.
"Annual Register," May, 1760.
Some gentlemen in the parish of Westerham, in Kent, have erected a plain monument to the late General Wolfe, in the inscription on which the extraordinary honor intended his memory by his sovereign is hinted at, and the impropriety of a more expensive monument in that place justly shown. The table is of statuary marble, beautifully executed by Mr. Lovel, near Cavendish Square.
JAMES,
Son of Colonel Edward WOLFE, and Henrietta his wife, was born in
this parish, January 2d, 1727,
And died in America, September 13th, 1759.
"While George in sorrow bows his laurel'd head,
And bids the artist grace the soldier dead,
We raise no sculptured trophy to thy name,
Brave youth! the fairest in the list of fame.
Proud of thy birth, we boast th' auspicious year;
Struck with thy fall, we shed a general tear;
With humble grief inscribe one artless stone,
And from thy matchless honors date our own."
"I Decus I Nostrum."[235]
"Annual Register," October, 1773.
On an oval tablet on front of the sarcophagus of General Wolfe's monument in Westminster Abbey, just opened, is the following inscription:
To the memory of
JAMES WOLFE, Esq.,
Major General and Commander-in-Chief
Of the British Land Forces
On an expedition against Quebec,
Who,
Surmounting, by ability and valor,
All obstacles of art and nature,
Was slain,
In the moment of Victory,
At the head of his conquering troops,
On the 13th of Sept., 1759,
The King
And the Parliament of Great Britain
Dedicate this monument.
"Annual Register," 1762.
The Right Honorable the Earl Temple has lately dedicated a most magnificent building at Stowe, of the Ionic order, Concordiæ Et Victoriæ.