triumph.  He promised to the habitants liberty, freedom from heavy taxes, the abolition of the seigneurs’ rights and other good things.  Some of the Canadians hoped that, in joining the Americans, they were hastening the restoration of France’s power in Canada—­an argument however of little weight with many, who remembered grim days of hard service and starvation when, without appreciation or reward, they had fought France’s battle.  The habitants were, in truth, friendly enough to the Americans; but they would not fight for them.  The invaders tried to arouse the fear of the peasantry by a tale that when the British caught sixty rebel Canadians, they had hanged them over the ramparts of Quebec, without time even to say “Lord, have mercy upon me,” and had thrown their bodies to the dogs.  But this only made the habitants think it as well perhaps not to take arms openly against such stern masters.  The Church’s weight was wholly on the British side.  Canadians who joined the rebel Americans died without her last rites.  Only one priest, M. de Lotbiniere, a man, it is said, of profligate character, espoused the cause of the invaders.  For doing so he was promised a bishopric:  to see Puritan New Englanders offering a bishopric in the Roman Catholic Church as a reward for service, is not without its humour.

As December wore on Montgomery grew eager to seize his prey.  Carleton sat unmoved behind his walls and allowed the enemy to invest the town.  He would hold no communication with the rebel army.  When Montgomery sent messengers to the gates, under a flag of truce, Carleton would not receive them; the only message he would take, he said, would be an appeal to the mercy of the King, against whom they were in rebellion.  Montgomery, too, showed for his foe lofty scorn, in words at least.  On December 15th in General Orders he spoke of “the wretched garrison” posted behind the walls of Quebec, “consisting of sailors unacquainted with the use of arms, of citizens incapable of the soldier’s duty and [a gibe at the corps in which Nairne served] a few miserable emigrants.”  He went on to promise his troops that when they took Quebec “the effects of the Governor, garrison, and of such as have been active in misleading the inhabitants and distressing the friends of liberty” should be equally divided among the victors.  The opposing sides showed, in truth, the bitterness and exasperation of family quarrels and abandoned the usual courtesies of war.  The Americans lay in wait to shoot sentries; they fired on single persons walking on the ramparts.  It was reported to the British that Montgomery had said “he would dine in Quebec or in Hell on Christmas”—­gossip probably untrue, as a British diarist of the time is fair enough to note, since it is not in accord with the dignity and sobriety of Montgomery’s character.