"You know the country then?"
"For ten leagues around."
"And the town?"
"We know all our countrymen in it."
"Can you communicate with them?"
"We have many means of doing so."
"That is well. We shall need your services."
We have said that the object of Barbin and his companions was to enter into direct communication with some of the Continental officers, make known their plans of operation and devise some mode of systematising their services. This they partially accomplished in the course of a further conversation, and were told to return in a few days to receive direct commissions from headquarters. But they had a second duty to perform, or rather Batoche had, as he informed his companions on their way to the rendezvous, after hearing full particulars of everything that had taken place in the two days since the Americans had invested Quebec. Batoche delivered his ideas somewhat as follows. Addressing the officer, he said:
"You are aware that my countrymen within the town are divided in sentiment?"
"So we have heard."