e of the fifteenth.

Mr. Holt was somewhat cooled when his party had reached the citadel,
through streets so steep that the drive to their summit seemed a feat of
horsemanship. Here was the great rock whence Jacques Cartier, first of
European eyes, viewed the mighty river in the time of our Henry VIII.,
now bristling with fortifications which branch away in angles round the
Upper Town, crowned with a battery of thirty-two pounders, whose black
muzzles command the peaceful shipping below. Robert Wynn could not help
remarking on that peculiarly Canadian charm, the exquisite clearness of
the air, which brought distant objects so near in vision that he could
hardly believe Point Levi to be a mile across the water, and the woods
of the isle of Orleans more than a league to the eastward.

Captain Armytage had many reminiscences of the fortress, but enjoyed
little satisfaction in the relating of any; for nothing could get the
seignorial tenure out of Mr. Holt's head, and he drove in sentences
concerning it continually.

Outside the Castle gates the captain remembered important business,
which must preclude him from the pleasure of accompanying his friends
to Wolfe's Landing.

'Well, sir, I hope you now acknowledge that the seignorial system is a
blot on our civilisation.'

'I wish it had never been invented!' exclaimed the captain, very
sincerely. And, with the gracefullest of bows, he got quit of Mr. Holt
and his pet aversion together.

Hiram's features relaxed into a smile. 'I knew I could convince him; he
appears an agreeable companion,' remarked Mr. Holt, somewhat simply.
But the subject had given the keynote to the day; and in driving along
the road to Cape Rouge, parallel with the St. Lawrence, he was finding
confirmations for his opinion in most things they met and passed. The
swarming country, and minute subdivisions of land, vexed Hiram's spirit.
Not until they entered the precincts of the battlefield, and he was
absorbed in pointing out the spots of peculiar interest, did the
feudality of the Province cease to trouble him.

All along the river was bordered by handsome villas and pleasure-grounds
of Quebec merchants. Cultivation has gradually crept upon the battlefield,
obliterating landmarks of the strife. The rock at the base of which
Wolfe expired has been removed, and in its stead rises a pillar crowned
with a bronze helmet and sword, and is inscribed:

HERE DIED WOLFE, VICTORIOUS.

Not till seventy-f