"
Then, passing to the deck, silent and steady, no signs of pain
upon his face, so had the calm come to him, as to Nature and this
beleaguered city, before the whirlwind, he looked out upon the
clustered groups of boats filled with the flower of his army,
settled in a menacing tranquillity. There lay the Light Infantry,
Bragg's, Kennedy's, Lascelles's, Anstruther's Regiment, Fraser's
Highlanders, and the much-loved, much-blamed, and impetuous
Louisburg Grenadiers. Steady, indomitable, silent as cats, precise
as mathematicians, he could trust them, as they loved his awkward
pain-twisted body and ugly red hair. "Damme, Jack, didst thee ever
take hell in tow before?" said a sailor from the Terror of France
to his fellow once, as the marines grappled with a flotilla of
French fire-ships, and dragged them, spitting destruction, clear
of the fleet, to the shore. "Nay, but I've been in tow of Jimmy
Wolfe's red head; that's hell-fire, lad!" was the reply.
From boat to boat the General's eye passed, then shifted to the
ships--the Squirrel, the Leostaff, the Seahorse, and the rest--and
lastly to where the army of Bougainville lay. Then there came
towards him an officer, who said quietly, "The tide has turned,
sir." For reply the general made a swift motion towards the
maintop shrouds, and almost instantly lanterns showed in them. In
response the crowded boats began to cast away, and, immediately
descending, the General passed into his own boat, drew to the
front, and drifted in the current ahead of his gallant men, the
ships following after.
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