harles. Here Wetherall obtained information which led him to
fear that Gore {84} had met with some kind of check; and he was
persuaded to send back to Chambly for a reinforcement of one company
which had been left in garrison there. His messenger reached Chambly
at four o'clock on the morning of the 24th. Major Warde, the
commandant at Chambly, at once embarked his company on a scow and
dropped down the river to St Hilaire; but he arrived too late to allow
of any further action that day, and it was not until the morning of the
25th that the column moved on St Charles.

Meanwhile, the rebels had been making preparations for defence. They
had fortified the manor-house of Debartzch, who had fled to Montreal,
and built round it a rampart of earth and tree-trunks--a rampart which,
for some mysterious reason, was never completed. They appointed as
commander Thomas Storrow Brown, a Montreal iron-merchant, for whose
arrest a warrant had been issued and who had fled to St Charles with
two or three other _Patriote_ politicians. But Brown had no military
experience, and was still suffering so severely from injuries received
in the rioting in Montreal that his proper place was a home for
convalescents rather than a field of battle. His appointment can only
be {85} explained by the non-appearance of the local _Patriote_
leaders. 'The chief men,' Brown testified afterwards, 'were, with two
or three exceptions, absent or hiding.' It is evident that the British
authorities expected to meet with the strongest opposition at St
Charles, since that place had been the scene of the great demonstration
earlier in the year. But, as a matter of fact, the rebel forces at St
Charles were much less formidable than those at St Denis. Not only
were they lacking in proper military leadership; they were also fewer
in number and were, moreover, very inadequately armed. If Brown's
statements are to be relied upon, there were not in the rebel camp two
hundred men. 'Of ammunition,' wrote Brown, 'we had some half dozen
kegs of gunpowder and a little lead, which was cast into bullets; but
as the fire-arms were of every calibre, the cartridges made were too
large for many, which were consequently useless. We had two small
rusty field-pieces, but with neither carriages nor appointments they
were as useless as two logs. There was one old musket, but not a
bayonet. The fire-arms were common flintlocks, in all conditions of
dilapidation, some tie