"a
most remarkable character for inhumanity."]

Throughout the siege, the Acadians outside the fort, aided by Indians,
had constantly attacked the English, but were always beaten off with
loss. There was an affair of this kind on the morning of the surrender,
during which a noted Micmac chief was shot, and being brought into the
camp, recounted the losses of his tribe; "after which, and taking a dram
or two, he quickly died," writes Winslow in his Journal.

Fort Gaspereau, at Baye Verte, twelve miles distant, was summoned by
letter to surrender. Villeray, its commandant, at once complied; and
Winslow went with a detachment to take possession.[261] Nothing remained
but to occupy the French post at the mouth of the St. John. Captain
Rous, relieved at last from inactivity, was charged with the task; and
on the thirtieth he appeared off the harbor, manned his boats, and rowed
for shore. The French burned their fort, and withdrew beyond his
reach.[262] A hundred and fifty Indians, suddenly converted from enemies
to pretended friends, stood on the strand, firing their guns into the
air as a salute, and declaring themselves brothers of the English. All
Acadia was now in British hands. Fort Beausejour became Fort
Cumberland,--the second fort in America that bore the name of the royal
Duke.

[Footnote 261: Winslow, _Journal. Villeray au Ministre, 20 Sept. 1755._]

[Footnote 262: _Drucour au Ministre, 1 Dec. 1755._]

The defence had been of the feeblest. Two years later, on pressing
demands from Versailles, Vergor was brought to trial, as was also
Villeray. The Governor, Vaudreuil, and the Intendant, Bigot, who had
returned to Canada, were in the interest of the chief defendant. The
court-martial was packed; adverse evidence was shuffled out of sight;
and Vergor, acquitted and restored to his rank, lived to inflict on New
France another and a greater injury.[263]

[Footnote 263: _Memoire sur les Fraudes commises dans la Colonie_, 1759.
_Memoires sur le Canada_, 1749-1760.]

Now began the first act of a deplorable drama. Monckton, with his small
body of regulars, had pitched their tents under the walls of
Beausejour. Winslow and Scott, with the New England troops, lay not far
off. There was little intercourse between the two camps. The British
officers bore themselves towards those of the provincials with a
supercilious coldness common enough on their part throughout the war.
July had passed in what Winslow calls "an indol