This cut has interest as a contemporary sketch for popular instruction.
He knew also that he must place little reliance on the cannon of the ships, for the high rocks and bluffs of the defences were above the elevation which could be given to the guns, and a broad stretch of mud-flats kept the vessels from a near approach to that portion of the French camp which was low and lay nearest the St. Charles. Cape Diamond, the promontory of Quebec, so jutted out that Wolfe could not inspect at present the banks of the river above the town.
Montcalm had determined on a policy of wearing out his assailants,—and he came very near doing it,—and when a gale sprang up he hoped that its power of devastation would be his best ally. When he saw that fail, he tried his fire-ships; but the British sailors grappled them and towed them aground, where they were harmless.
Wolfe’s next movement was to occupy Point Levi, opposite the city,[1171] whence he showered shot and shell into the town, and drove the non-combatants out. The French tried to dislodge him, but failed. The English army was now divided by the river, and ran some risk of attack in detail. Montcalm, however, was not tempted; nor was he later, when Wolfe next landed a force below him, beyond the Montmorenci, and began to entrench himself, though the English general was interrupted in the beginning of this movement by an attack of Canadians, who had crossed the Montmorenci by an upper ford. The attack was not persisted in, however, and Wolfe was soon well entrenched. The cannonading was incessant. Night after night the sky was streaked with the shells from the vessels, and from each of Wolfe’s three camps.
The dilatory policy of Montcalm soon began to tell on his force, and then weariness and ominous news from Bourlamaque and Pouchot hastened the desertion of his Canadians. Wolfe tried to affect the neighboring peasantry by proclamations more and more threatening, and felt himself obliged at last to enforce his authority by the destruction of crops and villages.
On the 18th of July, in the night, the “Sutherland” and some smaller vessels pushed up the river beyond the town, while a fleet of boats was dragged overland back of Point Levi and launched above, out of gun-shot from the town. A force was sent by a détour to operate with them. Thus Wolfe, in defiance of the French general, had made a fourth division of his troops, each liable to separate attack. The English vessels above the town made descents along the north shore, and took some prisoners, but did little else. The French made their final attempt with a huge fire-raft, but it was as unsuccessful as the earlier ones.
Wolfe now determined to provoke Montcalm to fight, and under cover of a cannonade from Point Levi and from some of his ships[1172] he landed a force from boats beneath the precipice at the lower end of the French camp. An additional body at the same time crossed by a ford, in front of the falls of Montmorenci, which was traversable at low tide. The impetuosity of the grenadiers, who were in advance, not waiting for support, and a tempest which at the moment broke over them, convinced the quick eye of Wolfe that the attempt was to fail, and he recalled his men. The French let them retire in good order, and began to think their Fabian policy was to be crowned with success. Wolfe was correspondingly shaken and rebuked the grenadiers. He began to think, even, that the season might wear away with no better results, and that he should have to abandon the campaign.
There was one plan yet, which might succeed, and he sought to push more ships and march more troops above the town. Murray, who now took command at that point, began to raid upon the shore, but with poor success. Montcalm sent Bougainville with 1,500 men to patrol the shore, and incessant marching they had, as the English by water flitted up and down the river with the tides, threatening to land. The English restlessness was too oppressive, however, for the French camp at Beaufort, which felt that its supplies from Three Rivers and Montreal might be cut off at any moment by an English descent. Desertions increased, and rapidly increased when in August the French got decisive and unfavorable news from Lake Champlain and Ontario. The French fearing an approach of Amherst down the St. Lawrence, Quebec was further weakened by the despatch of Lévis to confront the English in that direction. By the end of August there were no signs of immediate danger at Montreal, and the French took heart.
Wolfe was now ill,—not so prostrate, however, but he could propose various new plans to a council of his brigadiers, but his suggestions were all rejected as too hazardous. They recommended, in the end, an attempt to gain the heights somewhere above the town, and force Montcalm to fight for his communications. Wolfe was ready to try it; but it was the first of September before he was able to undertake it.[1173] He saw no other hope, slight as this one was. The letter which Amherst had sent to him by the Kennebec route had just reached him, and he felt there was to be no assistance from that quarter. On the 3d of September he evacuated the camp at Montmorenci, Montcalm being prevented from molesting him by a feint which was made by boats in front of his Beaufort lines. Other troops were now marched above Quebec, and when Wolfe himself joined Admiral Holmes, who commanded that portion of the fleet which was above the town, he found he had almost 3,600 men, beside what he might draw from Point Levi, for his adventurous exploit. The French were deceived, and thought that the English were to go down the river, as indeed, if the scheme to scale the banks failed on the first attempt, they were. Bougainville’s corps of observation was increased, and it was its duty to patrol a long stretch of the river shore.