" Then, turning with a smile to the officers about him:
"Even if your general offered me conditions a little more gracious,
and if I had a mind to accept them, does he suppose that these brave
gentlemen would give their consent, and advise me to trust a man who
broke his agreement with the governor of Port Royal, or a rebel who
has failed in his duty to his king, and forgotten all the favors he
had received from him, to follow a prince who pretends to be the
liberator of England and the defender of the faith, and yet destroys
the laws and privileges of the kingdom and overthrows its religion?
The divine justice which your general invokes in his letter will not
fail to punish such acts severely."
The messenger seemed astonished and startled; but he presently asked
if the governor would give him his answer in writing.
"No," returned Frontenac, "I will answer your general only by the
mouths of my cannon, that he may learn that a man like me is not to be
summoned after this fashion. Let him do his best, and I will do mine;"
and he dismissed the Englishman abruptly. He was again blindfolded,
led over the barricades, and sent back to the fleet by the boat that
brought him. [Footnote: _Lettre de Sir William Phips a M. de
Frontenac, avec sa Reponse verbale; Relation de ce qui s'est passe a
la Descente des Anglois a Quebec au mois d'Octobre_, 1690.
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