In 1756 he was too young and clever to be always prudent in speech.It is from his quick eye and eager pen that we learn much of the inner story of these last days of New France.Montcalm discusses frankly in his letters these and other officers, with whom he was on the whole well pleased.In his heart he could echo the words of Bougainville as he watched the brilliant spectacle of the embarkation at Brest: "What a nation is ours! Happy is he who leads and is worthy of it."It was in this spirit of confidence that Montcalm faced the struggle in America.For him sad days were to come and his sunny, vivacious, southern temperament caused him to suffer keenly.At first, however, all was full of brilliant promise.So eager was he that, when his ships lay becalmed in the St.Lawrence some thirty miles below Quebec, he landed and drove to the city.It is the most beautiful country in the world, he writes, highly cultivated, with many houses, the peasants living more like the lesser gentry of France than like peasants, and speaking excellent French.He found the hospitality in Quebec such that a Parisian would be surprised at the profusion of good things of every kind.The city was, he thought, like the best type of the cities of France.The Canadian climate was health-giving, the sky clear, the summer not unlike that of Languedoc, but the winter trying, since the severe weather caused the inhabitants to remain too much indoors.He described the Canadian ladies as witty, lively, devout, those of Quebec amusing themselves at play, sometimes for high stakes; those of Montreal, with conversation and dancing.He confessed that one of them proved a little too fascinating for his own peace of mind.The intolerable thing was the need to meet and pay court to the Indians whom the Governor, the Marquis de Vaudreuil, regarded as valuable allies.These savages, brutal, changeable, exacting, Montcalm from the first despised.It filled him with disgust to see them swarming in the streets of Montreal, sometimes carrying bows and arrows, their coarse features worse disfigured by war-paint and a gaudy headdress of feathers, their heads shaven, with the exception of one long scalp-lock, their gleaming bodies nearly naked or draped with dirty buffalo or beaver skins.What allies for a refined grand seigneur of France! It was a costly burden to feed them.
Sometimes they made howling demands for brandy and for bouillon, by which they meant human blood.Many of them were cannibals.
Once Montcalm had to give some of them, at his own cost, a feast of three oxen roasted whole.To his disgust, they gorged themselves and danced round the room shouting their savage war-cries.
The Governor of Canada, Pierre de Rigaud, Marquis de Vaudreuil, belonged to one of the most ancient families of France, related to that of Levis.He had been born in Canada where his father was Governor for the long period of twenty-two years, from 1703 to 1725, and in his outlook and prejudices he was wholly of New France, with a passionate devotion to its people, and a deep resentment at any airs of superiority assumed by those who came from old France.A certain admiration is due to Vaudreuil for his championship of the Canadians and even of the savages of the land of his birth against officers of his own rank and caste who came from France.There was in Canada the eternal cleavage in outlook and manners between the Old World and the New, which is found in equal strength in New England, and which was one of the chief factors in causing the American Revolution.Vaudreuil, born at Quebec in 1698, had climbed the official ladder step by step until, in 1742, he had been made Governor of Louisiana, a post he held for three years.He succeeded the Marquis Duquesne as Governor of Canada in the year before Montcalm arrived.He meant well but he was a vain man, always a leading figure in the small society about him, and obsessed by a fussy self-importance.He was not clever enough to see through flattery.The Intendant Bigot, next to the Governor the most important man in Canada, an able and corrupt rascal, knew how to manage the Governor and to impose his own will upon the weaker man.Vaudreuil and his wife between them had a swarm of needy relatives in Canada, and these and other Canadians who sought favors from the Governor helped to sharpen his antagonism to the officers from France.Vaudreuil believed himself a military genius.It was he and not Montcalm who had the supreme military command, and he regarded as an unnecessary intruder this general officer sent out from France.
Now that Montcalm was come, Vaudreuil showed a malignant alertness, born of jealousy, to snub and check him.Outward courtesies were, of course, maintained.Vaudreuil could be bland and Montcalm restrained, in spite of his southern temperament, but their dispatches show the bitterness in their relations.The court of France encouraged not merely the leaders but even officers in subordinate posts to communicate to it their views.Avoluble correspondence about affairs in Canada has been preserved.Vaudreuil himself must have tried the patience of the French ministers for he wrote at prodigious length, exalting his own achievements to the point of being ludicrous.At the same time he belittled everything done by Montcalm, complained that he was ruining the French cause in America, hinted that he was in league with corrupt elements in Canada, and in the end even went so far as to request his recall in order that the more pliant Levis might be put in his place.The letters of Montcalm are more reserved.Unlike Vaudreuil, he never stooped to falsehood.He knew that he was under the orders of the Governor and he accepted the situation.When operations were on hand, Vaudreuil would give Montcalm instructions so ambiguous that if he failed he would be sure to get the discredit, while, if he succeeded, to Vaudreuil would belong the glory.
