to Brigadier Townshend.[31] Expecting every moment to be
attacked by Bougainville, Townshend called back his battalions from
the charge, and drew them up anew, a movement scarcely accomplished
before Bougainville's army was seen advancing from Cap Rouge.
Bougainville, however, soon perceived signs of Montcalm's defeat, and
unwilling to risk an engagement with a wholly victorious enemy, he
retreated without a blow.

[Footnote 31: Afterwards Marquis of Townshend.]

Meanwhile, Governor Vaudreuil had held a council of war in the
hornwork which protected the St. Charles bridge. Roused now to
intelligent action, he was for making an immediate junction with
Bougainville and attacking Townshend before the English position could
be strengthened. Bigot recommended the same course; but all the other
officers were against it, and the brave but vacillating Vaudreuil was
overborne by their counsel. A despairing note was despatched to the
little garrison at Quebec; and an army that still outnumbered the
British forces began a march thus described by one of the
participants: "It was not a retreat, but an abominable flight, with
such disorder and confusion that, had the English known it, three
hundred men sent after us would have been sufficient to cut all our
army to pieces. The soldiers were all mixed, scattered, dispersed, and
running as hard as they could, as if the English army were at their
heels." Their tents were left standing at the Beauport camp, where in
their inglorious haste they had even abandoned their heavy baggage.
Passing through Charlesbourg, Lorette, and St. Augustin, by the
evening of the 15th they had covered the thirty miles intervening
between Quebec and the Jacques-Cartier river.

This desertion by the army was a cruel blow to those who still manned
the ramparts of the city. For more than two months they had mended the
breaches and fought the fires kindled by the guns of Point Levi; they
had stood by their feeble batteries for weary weeks, toiling night and
day on half-rations. And now ignominious abandonment was their
reward! Of the total population within the walls, twenty-six hundred
were women and children, ten hundred were invalids, while the
able-bodied defenders, all told, numbered less than a thousand, and
even these were worn out by privations.

De Ramezay, the commandant, called a council of war which fourteen
officers attended, and all of these but one were in favour of
capitulation. The citizens