Vaudreuil grew more and more bitter.  “As the King has intrusted this colony to me, I cannot help warning you of the unhappy consequences that would follow if the Marquis de Montcalm should remain here.  I shall keep him by me till I receive your orders.  It is essential that they reach me early.”  “I pass over in silence all the infamous conduct and indecent talk he has held or countenanced; but I should be wanting in my duty to the King if I did not beg you to ask for his recall."[673]

[Footnote 670:  Vaudreuil au Ministre, 8 Aout, 1758.]

[Footnote 671:  Much of the voluminous correspondence on these matters will be found in N.Y.  Col.  Docs., X.]

[Footnote 672:  Vaudreuil au Ministre, 8 Avril, 1759.]

[Footnote 673:  Ibid.]

He does not say what is meant by infamous conduct and indecent talk; but the allusion is probably to irreverent utterances touching the Governor in which the officers from France were apt to indulge, not always without the knowledge of their chief.  Vaudreuil complained of this to Montcalm, adding, “I am greatly above it, and I despise it."[674] To which the General replied:  “You are right to despise gossip, supposing that there has been any.  For my part, though I hear that I have been torn to pieces without mercy in your presence, I do not believe it."[675]

[Footnote 674:  Vaudreuil a Montcalm, 1 Aout, 1758.]

[Footnote 675:  Montcalm a Vaudreuil, 6 Aout, 1758.]

In these infelicities Bigot figures as peacemaker, though with no perceptible success.  Vaudreuil’s cup of bitterness was full when letters came from Versailles ordering him to defer to Montcalm on all questions of war, or of civil administration bearing up war.[676] He had begged hard for his rival’s recall, and in reply his rival was set over his head.

[Footnote 676:  Ordres du Roy et Depeches des Ministres, 1758, 1759.]

The two yokefellows were excellently fitted to exasperate each other:  Montcalm, with his southern vivacity of emotion and an impetuous, impatient volubility that sometimes forgot prudence; and Vaudreuil, always affable towards adherents, but full of suspicious egotism and restless jealousy that bristled within him at the very thought of his colleague.  Some of the by-play of the quarrel may be seen in Montcalm’s familiar correspondence with Bourlamaque.  One day the Governor, in his own house, brought up the old complaint that Montcalm, after taking Fort William Henry, did not take Fort Edward also.  The General, for the twentieth time, gave good reasons for not making the attempt.  “I ended,” he tells Bourlamaque, “by saying quietly that when I went to war I did the best I could; and that when one is not pleased with one’s lieutenants, one had better take the field in person.  He was very much moved, and muttered between his teeth that perhaps he would; at which I said that I should be delighted