us; all the light
artillery and tools are embarked at the Point of Levi; and the troops
will land where the French seem least to expect it. The first body that
gets on shore is to march directly to the enemy and drive them from any
little post they may occupy; the officers must be careful that the
succeeding bodies do not by any mistake fire on those who go before
them. The battalions must form on the upper ground with expedition, and
be ready to charge whatever presents itself. When the artillery and
troops are landed, a corps will be left to secure the landing-place,
while the rest march on and endeavor to bring the Canadians and French
to a battle. The officers and men will remember what their country
expects from them, and what a determined body of soldiers inured to war
is capable of doing against five weak French battalions mingled with a
disorderly peasantry."

The spirit of the army answered to that of its chief. The troops loved
and admired their general, trusted their officers, and were ready for
any attempt. "Nay, how could it be otherwise," quaintly asks honest
Sergeant John Johnson, of the fifty-eighth regiment, "being at the heels
of gentlemen whose whole thirst, equal with their general, was for
glory? We had seen them tried, and always found them sterling. We knew
that they would stand by us to the last extremity."

Wolfe had thirty-six hundred men and officers with him on board the
vessels of Holmes; and he now sent orders to Colonel Burton at Point
Levi to bring to his aid all who could be spared from that place and the
Point of Orleans. They were to march along the south bank, after
nightfall, and wait further orders at a designated spot convenient for
embarkation. Their number was about twelve hundred, so that the entire
forced destined for the enterprise was at the utmost forty-eight
hundred.[767] With these, Wolfe meant to climb the heights of Abraham in
the teeth of an enemy who, though much reduced, were still twice as
numerous as their assailants.[768]

[Footnote 767: See Note, end of chapter.]

[Footnote 768: Including Bougainville's command. An escaped prisoner
told Wolfe, a few days before, that Montcalm still had fourteen thousand
men. _Journal of an Expedition on the River St. Lawrence._ This meant
only those in the town and the camps of Beauport. "I don't believe their
whole army amounts to that number," wrote Wolfe to Colonel Burton, on
the tenth. He knew, however, that if Montcalm c