United States or Bermuda ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !
Again he tried to have Vergor recalled, but in vain. Then, in the afternoon of the 12th, he took the bold but the only safe course of ordering the Guienne battalion, four hundred strong, to go up at once and camp for the night at the top of the Foulon, near Vergor. The men were all ready to march off when Vaudreuil found out what they were going to do. It was no order of his!
Vergor sustained Le Loutre, and threatened to put in irons any of the exiles who talked of going back to the English. Some of them bethought themselves of an appeal to Duquesne, and drew up a petition asking leave to return home. Le Loutre told the signers that if they did not efface their marks from the paper they should have neither sacraments in this life nor heaven in the next.
Yet he knew Wolfe; he knew Vergor; and now the sound of the cannonade alarmed him. Setting spurs to his horse, he galloped down from Beauport to the bridge of boats, giving orders as he went to turn out every man at once. At the bridge he found Vaudreuil writing a letter to Bougainville.
On the 16th of October, as the brigantine and schooner were entering the Bay of Fundy, Captain Vergor noticed, at 11 in the morning, an English frigate, which put on all sail and came after him. A quarter of an hour afterwards the frigate fired a cannon shot and displayed her flag. Vergor immediately hoisted his own flag and responded with a cannon shot, continuing on his way.
A tear and a drop of scarlet raced down his cheek, uniting as they dripped from his chin. "Have you been wounded?" inquired Jeannette. "It isn't the wound," he answered, "but that Captain Vergor has let them take the heights. I heard something myself, and tried to wake him. The pig turned over and went to sleep again." "Let me tie it up," said Jeannette.
All such matters of detail having been arranged satisfactorily, Vergor gave a grand dinner to the English and French officers in the stronghold of which his cowardice had robbed his country. The fort was rechristened "Fort Cumberland," and the curiously assorted guests all joined most cordially in drinking to the new title.
"If I had been taller, the bullet might have killed me; and I would rather be killed than see the English on this rock, marching to take Quebec. What will my father say? I am ashamed to look him in the face and own I slept in the camp of Vergor last night. The Le Moynes and Repentignys never let enemies get past them before. And I knew that man was not keeping watch; he did not set any sentry."
These exiles, who cannot be called self-exiled, in view of the outrageous means used to force most of them from their homes, were in a deplorable condition. They lived in constant dread of Le Loutre, backed by Vergor and his soldiers.
The party was at breakfast when the unwelcome visitor burst in. Just opposite was a second bomb-proof, where was Vergor himself, with Le Loutre, another priest, and several officers, who felt that they might at any time share the same fate. The effect was immediate. The English, who had not yet got a single cannon into position, saw to their surprise a white flag raised on the rampart.
Two years later, on pressing demands from Versailles, Vergor was brought to trial, as was also Villeray. The Governor, Vaudreuil, and the Intendant, Bigot, who had returned to Canada, were in the interest of the chief defendant.
Word Of The Day