nt
of Cape Diamond Carleton erected a mast, thirty feet high, with a sentry
box at its top. From this he could command a bird's eye view of the
enemy's operations, to a point as distant as Ste. Foy Church. When one
of the besiegers asked a loyalist Canadian what the queer-looking object
on the pole really was he answered, "It is a wooden horse with a bundle
of hay before him." A second remark capped this one: "General Carleton
has said that he will not give up the town till the horse has ate all
the hay; and the General is a man of his word."

Although Montgomery did not eat his Christmas dinner in Quebec a few
days later he was ready for an assault. The crisis came on the last day
of the year 1775. Early on that day, between four and five in the
morning, Captain Malcolm Fraser, in command of the main guard, was
going his rounds in Quebec when he saw a signal thrown by the enemy from
the heights outside the walls near Cape Diamond. Fraser knew at once
that it meant an attack. He sent word to the other guards in Quebec and
ordered the ringing of the alarm bell, and the drum-beat to arms. He
himself ran down St. Louis street, shouting to the guards to "Turn out"
as loudly and often as he could, and with such effect that he was heard
even by General Carleton, lodged at the Recollet convent. It was a
boisterous night and the elements themselves raged so fiercely that some
of the alarms were not heard. But, in time, all Quebec was aroused and
the guards stood at their posts.

The alarm was completed when to its din was added the menacing sound of
cannon. The besiegers began to ply the town with shells, and those who
looked out over the ramparts could see in the darkness the flash of
guns. Soon began from behind ridges of snow, within eighty yards of the
walls of Cape Diamond, the patter of musketry. The Americans were
seeking to lead the defenders of Quebec to believe that an assault on
the walls of the Upper Town on the side of the Plains of Abraham was
imminent and to hold the defence to this point. In fact the real danger
was far away.

[Illustration: THE MANOR HOUSE AT MURRAY BAY

(The upper view from the West, the lower from the East)]

Montgomery's was a hazardous plan. He had resolved to try to seize the
Lower Town first and then to get his troops into the Upper Town by
way of the steep Mountain Street, thus taking the defenders of the walls
in the rear. It was a desperate venture, depending for its success
larg