[816] Even the more distant Hotel-Dieu was
pierced by fifteen projectiles, some of which had exploded in the
halls and chambers.[817]
[Footnote 815: Drawings made on the spot by Richard Short. These drawings,
twelve in number, were engraved and published in 1761.]
[Footnote 816: Short's _Views in Quebec_, 1759. Compare Pontbriand,
in _N.Y. Col. Docs._, X. 1,057.]
[Footnote 817: Casgrain, _Hotel-Dieu de Quebec_, 445.]
The Commissary-General, Berniers, thus describes to
Bourlamaque the state of the town: "Quebec is nothing but
a shapeless mass of ruins. Confusion, disorder, pillage reign
even among the inhabitants, for the English make examples of
severity every day. Everybody rushes hither and thither, without
knowing why. Each searches for his possessions, and, not
finding his own, seizes those of other people. English and
French, all is chaos alike. The inhabitants, famished and
destitute, escape to the country. Never was there seen such a
sight."[818]
[Footnote 818: _Berniers a Bourlamaque, 27 Sept. 1759_.]
Quebec swarmed with troops. There were guardhouses at
twenty different points; sentinels paced the ramparts, squads
of men went the rounds, soldiers off duty strolled the streets,
some in mitre caps and some black three-cornered hats; while
a ceaseless rolling of drums and a rigid observance of military
forms betrayed the sense of a still imminent danger. While
some of the inhabitants left town, others remained, having no
refuge elsewhere.
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