University of Virginia Library

17. CHAPTER XVII.
THE PRISONER.

It is not our province to detail the operations
of the campaign of the winter of seventeen hundred
and seventy-five, six, during the farther progress
of the fruitless siege of Quebec. The elegant historian
and biographer Marshall, and other writers,
have left the novelist no excuse for encroaching
on the empire of history: it is his province only
to make use of the materials they have furnished
him.

With the death of General Montgomery the soul
of the expedition departed, and the Canadians, who,
previous to this event, had encouraged the invasion
of their country by the colonial army, began to lose
confidence in the ability of the invaders to accomplish
what they had undertaken. A universal disposition
became manifest among them to withdraw
their countenance from the American cause, and
patiently endure the existing government, which,
save that it was that of conquerors, was exercised
with unparalleled forbearance and generosity towards
the conquered. Referring the reader, whose
curiosity may have been awakened by the perusal
of these pages, to the histories of the period and
the scenes which they relate, we will follow our
hero, whose adventures it is alone our purpose to
record, into the camp of the besieged.

Burton, on being seized and made prisoner as he
was about to leap from the ramparts which he had
so rashly but intrepidly mounted to support the

unfortunate chevalier, was led, or rather dragged,
to the rear by his captors, with that exultation which
the besieged might be expected to display on making
their first prisoner. Several of the Canadians
proposed that his life should be sacrificed on the
spot. Once he had nearly fallen a victim to their
resentment, a rude burgher having cocked and presented
a pistol to his head, when a British officer,
who had hastened to the spot on seeing a prisoner
evidently of rank, struck it from his hands, and
commanded them to release him. The captors reluctantly
resigned their prize, but were better reconciled
to the loss when, at length, the shouts of
their comrades beyond the barrier informed them
that the whole force of the besiegers had fallen into
their hands.

“You are an officer in this rebel army?” said
the officer, inquiringly.

“A volunteer, and an aiddecamp to the late General
Montgomery.”

“It is, then, true that Montgomery has fallen. I
heard such a rumour, and, indeed, judged so from
the precipitate retreat of his division. I regret that
it is my duty,” added the Englishman, with that
military courtesy which none know better how to
assume towards a prisoner than British officers,
“to send you to General Carleton. Your sword, I
perceive, has already fallen into the possession of
those inexperienced volunteers, who know not how
to use a victory with moderation. Ha! Saint
George!” he said, with animation, “those shouts
tell me that your party have surrendered. I will
attend you to the chateau, as I wish myself to be
the bearer of the news to Governor Carleton.”

On the arrival of the officer to communicate the
intelligence of the surrender, the governor was on
a balcony of the vice-regal chateau of Saint Louis,

which, supported by piers, projected over the precipice
and commanded a view of the Lower Town.

“I guessed it, Miltimore,” he exclaimed, as the
officer approached, rubbing his hands and pacing
the balcony; “the storm is too dense to see the
operations, but those hearty shouts I heard a while
since came only from British throats. How many
prisoners say you?”

“The whole attacking force has fallen into our
hands; it cannot be much less than five hundred
men.”

“Bravely done! I would have been in the fray
had I dared leave my post here. Their plan was
so well concerted, that from the Saint Lawrence
to the basin every part seemed equally threatened.
Had they come down on our heads, it would not
have increased my surprise. I wonder at the result
with such a leader as Montgomery.”

“Montgomery has fallen,” said the lieutenant.
“He fell mortally wounded at the first and only
discharge of artillery.”

“Fallen! Then has a brave man gone to his reward.
I need not now be surprised at our victory;
for, in spite of Harley the Earl of Oxford's impeachment
for attempting the same thing, I feared
for our Western Gibraltar. 'Tis strange that he
should have lost his life in attacking a citadel which
he himself, but a few years since, aided us in acquiring!”

The governor paced the piazza thoughtfully a
few moments, and then raising his eyes, as if to put
a question to his officer, they rested on the prisoner,
who stood within the window, guarded by two
soldiers.

“Ha! whom have we here?” he quickly asked,
fixing his dark and penetrating eyes upon him.

“A late aiddecamp of General Montgomery, who
was taken prisoner at the barrier.”

A slight exclamation from a room which opened
on the gallery drew the attention of the gentlemen,
and the train of a lady's robe was not so hastily
drawn from the open door as to escape the prisoner's
eye. The governor walked forward, closed the
door, and then said, in a polite tone of sympathy,

“I regret, sir, that the fortune of war has placed
you in our hands. For one so young, methinks,”
he added, surveying him attentively, and then
speaking somewhat sternly, “you are rather old in
rebellion against your lawful monarch.”

“I am not too young, Governor Carleton,” firmly
replied the prisoner, “to distinguish oppression
from injustice, and to know that George of England
has no better title to my allegiance or that of
my countrymen than Louis of France. When the
monarch encroaches upon the liberty of the subject,
the latter is not to be censured for asserting his invaded
rights.”

“Nay, young sir, your patriotism, like that of
your hot-headed fellow-colonists, outruns your judgment.
Great Britain is the colonial mother of your
states; and, as such, is entitled to your allegiance
until she herself acknowledges your independence.
And, forsooth, because she desires you to contribute
to the support of the government which protects
you, you rise up in arms, and involve her in
a civil war.”

“The tax you allude to, which she levied and
which we resist, was not for the just and necessary
expenses of government, but for defraying the cost
of the conquest of these very Canada's which she
now holds. We did not choose to pay for Canada,
nor did we esteem it the part of political wisdom to

pour our money into her coffers without receiving
some benefit from its outlay.”

“Here you err again, my dear sir,” said the governor,
as if wishing to persuade; “you had the interest
which all Britons, whether colonists or Englishmen,
feel in the growth of empire.”

“But we were not regarded as Englishmen,
nor were the privileges and blessings of the British
constitution shared by us. If we are Britons,
why is not our voice heard on the floor of parliament?
We ought—and future ages will echo the
sentiment—to cast off our allegiance to the colonial
mother rather than submit to be taxed in any mode
whatsoever without being represented in the imperial
senate.”

“There may be something very plausible in all
this,” said the governor, in a careless tone, as if dismissing
the subject; “but, sir,” he added, advancing
and taking him by the arm, and leading him from
the place where he had continued to stand between
his guards to the opposite extremity of the balcony,
“I regret extremely that a gentleman apparently
so well calculated to adorn society, and possessing
talents and address to enable him to make his way
among men, should have taken so unfortunate a side
in this unhappy quarrel. The war will soon terminate,
and the colonists who have engaged in it
will labour under his majesty's displeasure; and, I
fear, much blood will be shed, even on the scaffold,
before all will be over. You are a volunteer, and
therefore hold no commission in the rebel army,
hence you will break no faith therein. Be persuaded
by me to accept a commission in his majesty's
service, and I will ensure you rapid promotion.
After the war, if I am not deceived in you,
I will favourably represent you to his majesty.
Otherwise,” he added, with some show of feeling,

but with marked emphasis upon the last word, “I
shall have to commit you to prison.”

“I am flattered, Governor Carleton, by the confidence
you are pleased to bestow on me,” replied
the prisoner, with cold politeness, “and appreciate
your kind offer of patronage, but I fear I must forfeit
your good-will in choosing the fate which war
has allotted me.”

“You will not, then, embrace my proposal, young
gentleman?” said the governor, with some sternness
of manner, fixing his penetrating eyes upon
his face.

“I will not, General Carleton,” he replied, firmly,
meeting his glance with an eye as keen and resolute
as his own.

“Then take the consequences of your folly,” said
the general, turning away from him in displeasure,
chagrined at his want of success, while at the same
time really feeling interested in the fate of one so
young and prepossessing in his address, for whose
neck he beheld, in perspective, a gibbet or a block.
“Miltimore, conduct your prisoner for the present
to the guardroom of the hall, and desire Captain
M`Lean to attend me here, that we may arrange for
the disposal of the other prisoners.”

The fate of the captive besiegers was soon decided.
They were thrust into the Dauphin prison,
there to await, in extraordinary suffering and privations
both from hunger and the severity of the
season, their release, either by exchange or some
favourable operation of the war.

The apartment allotted to the prisoner in the
Chateau Saint Louis, at that period the military
quarters of the governor, was a small oriel or anteroom
adjoining the main hall; and, under the ancient
regime, was often used for the temporary
confinement of state-prisoners. It was built on the

extremity of a bastion or wing of the building, and
overhung the precipice. A single window lighted
the cell and looked down upon the Lower Town,
commanding a view of the basin in front of the
city, and the shores of the St. Lawrence for many
leagues. The window was without the precautionary
addition of iron bars, as the possibility of escape
was effectually precluded by the dizzy precipice
which met the eye of the captive as it followed,
with a giddy brain, its sheer descent of three
hundred feet to the water.

The prisoner, on being left alone, approached
the window and listlessly looked forth. At once
his gaze was fixed in admiration on the sublimity
of the prospect that burst on his sight. The
storm had ceased, and the rising sun, dissipating
the clouds that, in innumerable fragments, mottled
the brilliant blue of the heavens, shed a cheerful
glow over the landscape, which, although mantled
in snow, presented a majesty of outline that winter
had no power to diminish.

The St. Lawrence moved majestically past, like
a lake in motion. Its bosom was relieved by vessels
of war; and numerous merchant craft of every
class, from the tall Indiaman to the light sloop, and
small sailboats, light skiffs, and batteaux moving in
different directions, gave life and spirit to the picture.
The towering promontory on which the citadel
stood stretched away from his eye like a gigantic
wall, and was lost in the outline of the distant
shores of the mainland; and the stupendous
cataract of Montmorenci arrested his eye as it leaped
from a cliff two hundred feet in perpendicular
height in an extended sheet of foam, that rivalled
in whiteness the surrounding snow. The distant
populous country; the forests, churches, and picturesque
villages; the lofty mountains, the summits

of which lined the horizon; Point Levi, with its
cottages and towers; the battlements running along
the edge of the precipice; the density of the Lower
Town; its crooked streets of rude stone houses,
alive with the victors and parties of his fellow-prisoners
on their way to confinement under strong escort,
all formed a striking scene, which was vividly
impressed upon the mind, and was long retained
in the memory, of the youthful captive.

Governor Carleton had scarcely dismissed his
prisoner, with a sternness proportionate to his mortification
at his failure in the conversion of a rebel
to loyalty, when the door of the balcony opened,
and a graceful female, veiled to the feet, came from
the room to which the attention of both the governor
and his prisoner had been attracted in the
early part of the conference. Approaching him as
he was promenading the gallery, supporting his
steps with his sheathed sword, which he used like
a walking-stick, she placed a fair hand upon his
shoulder, and removing her veil, though not sufficiently
to exhibit the whole of her features, which
were fair and youthful, said,

“I congratulate you, my dear governor, on the
surrender of the rebel troops to his majesty's arms.”

“'Tis a glorious victory, child, and has saved his
majesty's provinces.”

“There must be a great many prisoner,” she
continued; “I wonder what you will do with them
all?”

“Lock them up till the rebels treat for them.
But they ought to be shot, every one of them, as
insurgents.”

“Wouldn't it be wisest, general, to try and persuade
them to join his majesty's colours? A little
eloquence, I think, should succeed with them.”

“No eloquence but that of the British bayonet

will avail,” he said, hastily. “They are stubborn
like all rebels, and obstinately bent on their own
ruin.”

“But why do you not make the attempt, general?”

“I have done so. But now I sent to prison a
noble-looking youth, with the eye of Mars, and a
brow and bearing that should have been that of a
prince instead of an untitled rebel, and who from
the first I took a fancy to, because I thought I discovered
in him the elements which go to make a
man in these stirring times. And, forsooth, when
I offered him his liberty and an honourable commission
under his legitimate king, what does he
but thank me as coolly as if he had only declined
a glass of wine, and say he would rather choose a
king's prison than a king's commission.”

“And were you so cruel as to send the youth to
prison, sir?” inquired the lady, in a tone of mingled
sympathy and reproach.

“That was I; he is now doing penance in the
guardroom cell.”

“I wish you would let me persuade him, my
dear General Carleton,” she said, in a voice of the
most insinuating sweetness.

“Cupid forfend!” said the governor, smiling.
“Dost thou think those pretty eyes could convert
an arrant rebel into a good subject? Nay, nay,
my little novice, I am too old a falconer to train an
eyas with a dove, coo it never so sweetly.”

The maiden appeared for a moment embarrassed,
and then said,

“I can't bear that this poor youth should be shut
up in a cold prison. Will you give me leave to
send Father Eustache to talk with him? I am sure
holy council will avail him much.”

“Thou art a true Catholic, girl, even though

thou likest not a convent's walls. But who will
answer that Father Eustache be not himself won
by the youth? Our Canadian priests are already
but indifferently affected towards the government.”

“I will answer for his loyalty with my life,” she
said, warmly.

“Were I a score of years younger,” said the
governor, with gallantry, “I would accept the security;
but bargain that the gage should be thy
hand instead of thy life.”

“A poor hand, without roof or rood,” she replied,
with emotion.

“If justice can get thee back roof and rood, thou
wilt yet hold a dowry in thy hand, that, with thy
person, shall mate thee with the noblest. But go;
have it your own way. But see that this new proselyte
of Father Eustache's steal not thy heart if I
take him, on repentance, into my military family.
I must send thee to England, if once your eyes
meet, to keep your lands from owning a colonial
lord. Now go, for here comes M`Lean. Send
me word—nay, come yourself, and tell me how
your legate succeeds.”

“You give me leave, then, to send the priest to
the officer in the guardroom?” she said, turning
back and speaking in a lively tone as she passed a
window opening on the balcony where a guard was
constantly stationed.

“Yes, yes,” he replied, impatiently, as Colonel
M`Lean entered.

“You hear that, soldier?” she said, lifting her
forefinger as if to attract attention.

“Yes, lady,” replied the armed automaton.

“Then send that man who is smoking by the
fire to tell the guard of the prisoner's cell to be ready
to admit a priest, by the governor's order, in a quarter
of an hour from this time.”

The guard briefly conveyed the order to the soldier,
and the lady immediately disappeared through
the door from which she had issued upon the balcony.

In a short time afterward, the sentinel stationed
in the hall, into which the door of the prisoner's
cell opened, was accosted by a priest advancing towards
him from that part of the chateau appropriated
to the governor's family, who demanded admittance
to the prisoner in a voice scarcely heard beneath
his cowl, which, with the privilege of the priestly
order, he wore closely muffled about his face.

“I have no order from the general, Sir Priest,”
said the soldier.

The priest started as if embarrassed, and was
at length about to retreat, when a soldier slowly
opened one of the doors, and said, in a drawling,
gaping tone,

“Oh—h! John, I'd like to forgot. The general
says as 'ow you must let in a priest to pray with—
hey! there he be now; well, that's all right, then,
and no mistake made. Heighho! eigho!” and the
diligent messenger, gaping for the third time, closed
the door and slowly disappeared.

“Well, I suppose it is all right, though I like
to see written orders,” grumbled the soldier, taking
the keys from his belt and putting one of them into
the lock of a small door near him. Then turning
the heavy bolt, he admitted the priest, and, closing
the door after him, cautiously turned the key.

The prisoner was still leaning out of the win
dow, his eye watching with apparent interest the
manœuvres of a vessel of war which was hovering
about the shores of Cape Rouge, but his mind
occupied by reflections on the temporary suspension
of his liberty, and the check it placed upon
the brilliant military career his ambitious aspira

tions had marked out, when the opening of the door
of his cell roused him from his gloomy contemplation.
Turning quickly round, he beheld the intruder,
who raised a finger in a cautionary manner;
then dropping the hood and robe, the lovely form of
Eugenie de Lisle stood before him, and the next
moment was clasped to his heart.

“Eugenie, my charming Eugenie!” he exclaimed,
“is this reality or a vision?”

“Nay, if you doubt my identity,” said the blushing
novice, disengaging herself from his ardent embrace,
“especially after such a mode as you have
chosen to convince your senses that I am flesh and
blood, I had best vanish whence I came.”

“Not so, sweet Eugenie,” he said, seizing her
hand as if to detain her; “I am convinced of your
claim to mortality, though, if cherubs have lips, I
would swear those I have but now pressed were
no mortal ones. But tell me, whether of heaven
or earth, for both may justly claim you, Eugenie,”
he continued, pressing her hand, and looking into
her eyes with a gaze that fascinated her with its
love and devotion, his voice modulated to tones of
inconceivable sweetness; “explain the mystery of
your appearance here. Does the camp offer such
charms for one so lovely that she must leave the
roof of her protectress to follow its fortunes?”

“Or the fortunes of one in the camp, you would
say, sir,” she answered, with playful irony. “Upon
my word, you young soldiers think your charms so
irresistible, that maidens have nothing better to do
than race the country to feast their eyes upon them
withal. Now if you think I followed you to the
siege because, like a heroine of romance, I could
not endure your absence, you are marvellously deceived.
I am here for the same reason that you
are, my gallant cavalier, because I could not help

it. But sit here; nay, a little farther off! well, that
will do; and now, if you will be very quiet, I will
tell my story.”

In a tone more natural to her, and in better keeping
with the true state of her heart, the feelings of
which, the maidenly raillery she assumed for the
purpose of disguising only served to betray, she
briefly recounted her adventures, to which we will
devote the beginning of a new chapter.