Bishop Laval, _Lettre du_ 20 _Nov_., 1690, says that there was a
quarrel between the English and their Iroquois allies, who, having
plundered a magazine of spoiled provisions, fell ill, and thought that
they were poisoned. Colden and other English writers seem to have been
strangely ignorant of this expedition. The Jesuit Michel Germain
declares that the force of the English alone amounted to four thousand
men (_Relation de la Defaite des Anglois_, 1690). About one tenth of
this number seem actually to have taken the field.
CHAPTER XIII.
1690.
DEFENCE OF QUEBEC.
PHIPS ON THE ST. LAWRENCE.--PHIPS AT QUEBEC.--A FLAG OF TRUCE.--SCENE
AT THE CHATEAU.--THE SUMMONS AND THE ANSWER.--PLAN OF ATTACK.--LANDING
OF THE ENGLISH.--THE CANNONADE.--THE SHIPS REPULSED.--THE LAND
ATTACK.--RETREAT OF PHIPS.--CONDITION OF QUEBEC.--REJOICINGS OF THE
FRENCH.--DISTRESS AT BOSTON.
The delay at Boston, waiting aid from England that never came, was not
propitious to Phips; nor were the wind and the waves. The voyage to
the St. Lawrence was a long one; and when he began, without a pilot,
to grope his way up the unknown river, the weather seemed in league
with his enemies. He appears, moreover, to have wasted time. What was
most vital to his success was rapidity of movement; yet, whether by
his fault or his misfortune, he remained three weeks within three
days' sail of Quebec.
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