Admiral Saunders lay with the main fleet in the Basin of Quebec.  This excellent officer, whatever may have been his views as to the necessity of a speedy departure, aided Wolfe to the last with unfailing energy and zeal.  It was agreed between them that while the General made the real attack, the Admiral should engage Montcalm’s attention by a pretended one.  As night approached, the fleet ranged itself along the Beauport shore; the boats were lowered and filled with sailors, marines, and the few troops that had been left behind; while ship signalled to ship, cannon flashed and thundered, and shot ploughed the beach, as if to clear a way for assailants to land.  In the gloom of the evening the effect was imposing.  Montcalm, who thought that the movements of the English above the town were only a feint, that their main force was still below it, and that their real attack would be made there, was completely deceived, and massed his troops in front of Beauport to repel the expected landing.  But while in the fleet of Saunders all was uproar and ostentatious menace, the danger was ten miles away, where the squadron of Holmes lay tranquil and silent at its anchorage off Cap-Rouge.

It was less tranquil than it seemed.  All on board knew that a blow would be struck that night, though only a few high officers knew where.  Colonel Howe, of the light infantry, called for volunteers to lead the unknown and desperate venture, promising, in the words of one of them, “that if any of us survived we might depend on being recommended to the General."[769] As many as were wanted—­twenty-four in all—­soon came forward.  Thirty large bateaux and some boats belonging to the squadron lay moored alongside the vessels; and late in the evening the troops were ordered into them, the twenty-four volunteers taking their place in the foremost.  They held in all about seventeen hundred men.  The rest remained on board.

[Footnote 769:  Journal of the Particular Transactions during the Siege of Quebec.  The writer, a soldier in the light infantry, says he was one of the first eight who came forward.  See Notes and Queries, XX. 370.]

Bougainville could discern the movement, and misjudged it, thinking that he himself was to be attacked.  The tide was still flowing; and, the better to deceive him, the vessels and boats were allowed to drift upward with it for a little distance, as if to land above Cap-Rouge.

The day had been fortunate for Wolfe.  Two deserters came from the camp of Bougainville with intelligence that, at ebb tide on the next night, he was to send down a convoy of provisions to Montcalm.  The necessities of the camp at Beauport, and the difficulties of transportation by land, had before compelled the French to resort to this perilous means of conveying supplies; and their boats, drifting in darkness under the shadows of the northern shore, had commonly passed in safety.  Wolfe saw at once that, if his own boats went down in advance of the convoy, he could turn the intelligence of the deserters to good account.