Page:History of the United States of America, Spencer, v1.djvu/397

] beat fiercely in their faces, the road was cumbered with huge drifts of snow, and in the open and unsheltered country the cold was almost beyond endurance. Such was the season when the American troops commenced the siege of Quebec, furnished only with a few guns, which were reared on batteries of snow and ice, and produced no effect whatever on the solid ramparts that confronted them. For three weeks they continued, nevertheless, to abide the bitter severity of the weather, until the small-pox broke out in the camp, the term of enlistment of many of the troops had nearly expired, discontent and despondency began to prevail, and Montgomery perceived that nothing but engaging them in some vigorous effort could keep the expedition much longer from falling to pieces. It was determined, therefore, to try the desperate chances of an assault. One body of the troops was to make a feigned attack upon the upper town from the plains of Abraham, while Montgomery and Arnold, at the head of their respective divisions, were to storm the lower town at two opposite points, and thence proceed to invest the upper town and citadel.

It was on the last day of the year, in the thick gloom of an early morning, while the snow was falling fast, and the cutting wind whirling it about in heavy drifts, that Montgomery, at the head of his New York troops, proceeded along the narrow road leading under the foot of the precipices from Wolfe's Cove into the lower town of Quebec. At the entry of the street, crouching beneath the lofty rock of Cape Diamond, was planted a block-house, its guns pointed carefully so as to sweep the approach. This post was manned by Captain Barnsfare, with a few British seamen and a body of Canadian militia. As Montgomery approached along a roadway encumbered with heaps of ice and snow, he encountered a line of stockades, part of which he sawed through with his own hands, and having at length opened a passage, exclaiming to his troops, "Men of New York, you will not fear to follow where your general leads," he rushed forward to storm the block-house. But the vigilant officer had faintly descried the approach of the besiegers, and when they were within a few paces, the fatal match was applied, a hurricane of grape-shot swept the pass, and the gallant Montgomery fell dead upon the spot. With him were struck down Captains Cheesman and McPherson, his aids-de-camp, and several among the foremost soldiers. Astounded and terrified at this fatal result, the Americans precipitately retreated.

Meantime, Arnold, from the opposite side, advanced to his attack with desperate resolution. In assaulting the first barrier, he received a severe wound in the leg, which obliged him to quit the field. "Happy for him," as Mr. Irving feelingly exclaims, "had he fallen at this moment. Happy for him had he found a soldier's and a patriot's grave beneath the rock-built walls of Quebec. Those walls would have remained enduring monuments of his renown. His name, like that of Montgomery, would have been treasured up