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The messenger thereupon told him that it was ten o'clock, and that he must have his answer before eleven. A general cry of indignation arose; and Valrenne called out that Phips was nothing but a pirate, and that his man ought to be hanged. Frontenac contained himself for a moment, and then said to the envoy: "I will not keep you waiting so long.
For its sake he had become the butt of scandal and opprobrium; but not the less had he always stood its strenuous and passionate champion. His orders had been but too promptly obeyed. The convoy was scarcely gone an hour, when, to Frontenac's unutterable wrath, Valrenne appeared with his garrison.
He was at Three Rivers at a ball when news of the disaster at La Prairie damped the spirits of the company, which, however, were soon revived by tidings of the fight under Valrenne and the retreat of the English, who were reported to have left two hundred dead on the field.
To his extreme disgust, he learned that Denonville had sent a Canadian officer by secret paths to Fort Frontenac, with orders to Valrenne, the commandant, to blow it up, and return with his garrison to Montreal. Frontenac had built the fort, had given it his own name, and had cherished it with a paternal fondness, reinforced by strong hopes of making money out of it.
Tried by the standard of partisan war, his raid had been a success. He had inflicted great harm and suffered little; but the affair was not yet ended. A day or two before, Valrenne, an officer of birth and ability, had been sent to Chambly, with about a hundred and sixty troops and Canadians, a body of Huron and Iroquois converts, and a band of Algonquins from the Ottawa.
The object of Schuyler was to break through the French and reach his canoes: the object of Valrenne was to drive him back upon the superior force at La Prairie. The cautious tactics of the bush were forgotten. Three times the combatants became mingled together, firing breast to breast, and scorching each other's shirts by the flash of their guns.
As this fight under Valrenne has been represented as a French victory against overwhelming odds, it may be well to observe the evidence as to the numbers engaged. The French party consisted, according to Benac, of 160 regulars and Canadians, besides Indians. La Potherie places it at 180 men, and Frontenac at 200 men.
We were living in our old chateau of Valrenne, near Caudebec-en-Caux. "At this period my mother's chambermaid was one of the prettiest girls you could see, fair-haired, slender and sprightly in manner, a genuine soubrette of the old type that no longer exists. To-day these creatures spring up into hussies before their time.
At about nine o'clock, the scouts of the hostile parties met each other, and their war-whoops gave the alarm. Valrenne instantly took possession of a ridge of ground that crossed the way of the approaching English. Two large trees had fallen along the crest of the acclivity; and behind these the French crouched, in a triple row, well hidden by bushes and thick standing trunks.
We were living in our old chateau of Valrenne, near Caudebec-en-Caux. "At this period my mother's chambermaid was one of the prettiest girls you could see, fair-haired, slender and sprightly in manner, a genuine soubrette of the old type that no longer exists. To-day these creatures spring up into hussies before their time.
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