Montcalm's army, was amongst the slain of the fateful 13th of September, and so were many other officers of his regiment, and also of Bearn's. Captains Tignes and Maubeuge of the latter mentioned corps, fell on the fatal field, and Captains Figuiery and Tourville were wounded. Brigade-Major Malartic, of this regiment, had his horse killed under him, and several shots passed through his clothing. Malartic left a journal of the siege, to which we have had frequent occasions of referring in the course of this work. He was the second son of the Count of Montricoux, was born in 1730, entered the regiment of La Sarre at the age of fifteen years, and shortly afterwards obtained a company in that of Bearn, in which he served, as Captain, in the campaigns of Flanders, of Italy and of Provence. He took part in the battle of Plaisance and became Assistant-Major in 1749. He joined the army in Canada in 1755, and after Montcalm assumed the command in 1756, Malartic accompanied him in all his campaigns. He fought at FortWilliam Henry and at Carillon, where he was wounded in the left knee. After the battle of the Plains he was left in charge of the guard at the General Hospital, where he not only secured the gratitude of the wounded but the esteem and affection of General Murray. He was severely wounded at the second battle of the Plains, in 1760, and returned to France with the remainder of the army. He was appointed Colonel of the Vermandois Regiment in 1763, and Governor of Guadeloupe with the rank of Brigadier, in 1770. He was made a Commander of St. Louis and died at Mauritius, of which he was Governor, in 1800, much beloved and lamented by the colonists, Two Canadian officers of Montcalm's army are worthy of special notice. Captain Dumas was one of the bravest and most experienced of the officers of the Colonial Troops, and the Chevalier de Repentigny had already greatly distinguished himself in repelling the British assaults at Montmorency. He performed prodigies of valour in the following year in the engagement between Murray's and de Levis' armies where the British were defeated and where he arrested the progress of the British centre. He left Canada for France after the cession, and was subsequently made a Marquis, then a Brigadier, Governor of Senegal on the coast of Africa, and finally Governor of Malie in the East Indes, where he died in 1776. He came of a noble family, whose name is intimately associated with many of the stirring incidents recorded in the history of Canada, his great grand father having settled in the colony in the early part of the seventeenth century. Before the statue of the Blessed Virgin in the Chapel of Saints, within the Ursuline Convent of Quebec, burus a votive lamp which was lighted in 1717, and has never since been extinguished. Its flame is due to the piety of a young novice of the institution, as a perpetual testimony of her gratitude for the joy and consolation that came to her in answer to her prayers in that very sanctuary. She had been racked with doubts and fears as to the choice she was called upon to make, between life in the world and a sacrifice of its pleasures for the duties and the self abnegation of the cloister. The young Ursuline Sister was Marie Madeleine de Repentigny, and her brother was the father of the Chevalier de Repentigny, who fought (1) under Montcalm in 1759 and under de Levis in 1760. With brotherly devotion he paid the three hundred livres for the lamp donated by his sister and for the cost of its perpetual maintenance. (1) Miss Repentigny was one of the most beautiful young girls of her time in Canadian society, and shortly after leaving the Ursuline Convent as a pupil, was engaged to be married to an officer who died a few months before she made her resolve to enter the cloister. Her own death had occurred before the battle of the Plains, which was destined to terminate the era of French sovereignty in Canada, but the lamp she lighted in the Ursuline Convent under that regime, to which her family was so warmly attached, still burns to day as brightly as it did of yore; and the annals of the monastery after recording the chief stirring scenes of the engagement described in the present chapter, admit that "History has kept her record, and taught the same lesson as Faith: that all things work together for good to them that love God." (2) (1) Les Ursulines de Quebec, Vol. II, page 126. CHAPTER XI. THE UNE MORT GLORIEUSE. HE battle had been fought and lost. Montcalm, already slightly wounded, was endeavoring to rally his troops, when he received a fatal shot through the loins. Two grenadiers hurried to his side, and supported by them, the unfortunate general entered the city through St. Louis gate. As he rode down the street on his black horse, bleeding, and supported in the saddle by his disheartened soldiers, some women overwhelmed by the momentous events of the day, by the frightful clamour of defeat, by the mournful sight of the death-stricken hero, by all the crushing feelings of this tragic and dark hour, began to weep despairingly, exclaiming : "Oh mon Dieu ! Mon Dieu! le Marquis est tué !" (1) Montcalm, concealing his sufferings, courteously tried to reassure them: "Ce n'est rien ! ce n'est rien ! Ne vous affligez pas pour moi, mes bonnes amies." (2) He was conducted to the house of Mr. Arnoux the (1) "My God, the Marquis has been killed!"' (2) "It is nothing; don't be distressed on my account, my good friends!" |