led to communicate to Sir James your account
and your charity towards the poor old fellow, formerly of the
king's.[30] He has in consequence directed the allowance of
the ration to be authorized and continued to him, for which
purpose I must request his Christian name and the date of the
first issue, but I am to remind you of the danger of
establishing a precedent of this nature, and to request in the
general's name that you will refrain as much as possible from
indulging the natural benevolence of your disposition in this
way, as he has hitherto resisted all applications of this
sort.

Your successor, as commandant of Quebec, is certainly much to
be esteemed--a good kind of man, and devoted to his
profession--but it is vanity in the extreme to attempt to
describe the general admiration and estimation of his _cara et
dolce sposa_: she is young, (twenty-three,) fair,
beautiful,--lively, discreet, witty, affable,--in short, so
engaging, or rather so fascinating, that neither the courier
nor my paper will admit of my doing her justice; however, from
what I have said it is necessary further to add and explain,
that this is not my opinion alone but that of the public.

Two hundred volunteers for Colonel Zouch, from other veteran
battalions, have just arrived and landed: the regiment is to
be completed in this manner to one thousand.

_Colonel Baynes to Brigadier Brock._

QUEBEC, October 11, 1810.

Sir James has conversed with me fully on the subject of your
wish for leave, and prefaced it by declaring himself very
desirous on his part to forward your views as far as he could
do so with propriety, but that he had written in such strong
terms, urging the necessity of a third general officer being
kept constantly on the staff of the Canadas, and assigned as a
principal reason the advantage of an officer of that rank
being stationed in the Upper Province, that he does not
conceive himself at liberty to overset an arrangement which he
has been two years soliciting the means to carry into effect,
and the absolute necessity of which he is highly impressed
with. In reply to an observation of mine, that you regretted
the inactive prospect before you, and looked with envy on
those employed in Spain and Portugal, he said: "I make no
doubt of it, but I can in no shape aid h