Page:Nye's History of the USA.djvu/125

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INTERCOLONIAL AND INDIAN WARS.
121

array on the Plains of Abraham. An attack was made by Montcalm as soon as he got over his wonder and surprise. At the third fire Wolfe was fatally wounded, and as he was carried back to the rear he heard some one exclaim,—

"They run! They run!"

"Who run?" inquired Wolfe.

"The French! The French!" came the reply.

"Now God be praised," said Wolfe, "I die happy."

Montcalm had a similar, experience. He was fatally wounded. "They run! They run!" he heard some one say.

"Who run?" exclaimed Montcalm, wetting his lips with a lemonade-glass of cognac.

"We do," replied the man.

"Then so much the better," said Montcalm, as his eye lighted up, "for I shall not live to see Quebec surrendered."

This shows what can be done without a rehearsal; also how the historian has to control himself in order to avoid lying.

The death of these two brave men is a beautiful and dramatic incident in the history of our country, and should be remembered by every school-boy, because neither lived to write articles criticising the other.

Five days later the city capitulated. An attempt was made to recapture it, but it was not