As it happened, the Canadian officer, Colonel de Vergor, who commanded the guard at the top of the ravine, where Wolfe’s advanced party clambered up, was asleep in his tent, and many of his men had gone home, by his permission, to hoe their gardens. The English forlorn hope made, therefore, quick work, when they reached the top, as they rushed on the tents. Their shots and huzzas told Wolfe, waiting below, that a foothold was gained, and he led his army up the steeps with as much haste as possible. While the line of battle was forming, detachments were sent to attack the batteries up the river, which, alarmed by the noise, were beginning to fire on the last of the procession of boats. The celerity of the movement accomplished its end, and the French were driven off and the batteries taken.
Sheer good luck, quite as much as skill and courage, had at last placed Wolfe in an open field, where Montcalm must fight him, if he would save his communications and prevent the guns of Quebec, in the event of its capture,[1176] being turned upon his camp.
Not a mile from Quebec, and fronting its walls, Wolfe had formed his final line, but he had turned its direction on the left, and there the line faced the St. Charles. In the early morning he saw the French form on a ridge in front of him, when some skirmishing ensued, as also in his rear, where a detachment sent by Bougainville began to harass him. With a foe before and behind, quick and decisive work was necessary.
MONTCALM.
After a portrait, “une gravure du temps,” in Charles de Bonnechose’s Montcalm et le Canada Français, 5th ed., Paris, 1882. Cf. the likeness in Daniel, Nos Gloires, ii. 273, and in Martin, De Montcalm en Canada.
The portrait given in Parkman (Montcalm and Wolfe, vol. i.) is after a photograph from an original picture, representing him at 29, now in the possession of the present Marquis de Montcalm. Cf. the likeness in Higginson’s Larger Hist. of the United States, p. 190.
Montcalm, whom Admiral Saunders had been deceiving all night, hurried over to Vaudreuil’s headquarters in the morning to learn what the firing above the town meant. From this position he saw the seriousness of the situation at once. The red coats of the British line were in full view beyond the St. Charles. He hastened across the bridge, and was soon on the ground, bringing the regiments into line as they came up. But all the help he had a right to expect did not come. Ramezay made excuses for not sending cannon. Vaudreuil kept back the left wing at Beaufort, for fear that Saunders meant something, after all.
Montcalm’s impetuosity, now that it was unshackled, could not brook delay. It would take time to concert with Bougainville an attack on the front and rear of the British simultaneously, and that time would give Wolfe the chance to entrench and bring up reinforcements, if he had any. So the decision in Montcalm’s council was for an instant onset.
It was ten o’clock when Wolfe saw it coming. He advanced his line to meet it, and when the French were close upon them the fire burst from the English ranks. Another volley followed; and as the smoke passed away, Wolfe saw the opportunity and gave the word to charge. As he led the Louisbourg grenadiers he was hit twice before a shot in the breast bore him to the ground. He was carried to the rear, and as he was sinking he heard those around him cry that the enemy was flying. He turned, praised God, and died.[1177]