fixedly at the rock, and raised his hand
in a gesture much like that with which he had cursed the chateau of
Count Jean de Mezy. His eyes were set and stern, but, as the sun fell in
floods of burnished gold on the cathedral and the convents, his accusing
look softened, became sad, then pitying, then hopeful.

"A wonderful sight, Father Drouillard," said Willet, who stood at his
elbow and who also gazed at Quebec with feelings quite his own. "I've
seen it before, but I can never see it too often."

"Mr. Willet," said the priest, "you and I are greater in years than
these youths, and perhaps for that reason we can look farther into the
future. Youth fears nothing, but age fears everything. You come to
Quebec now in peace, and I trust that you may never come in war. I can
feel, nay I can see the clouds gathering over our two lands. Why should
we fight? On a continent so vast is there not room enough for all?"

"Room and to spare," replied the hunter, "but as you say, Father
Drouillard, you and I have lived longer than these youths, and age has
to think. If left to themselves I've no doubt that New France and the
English colonies could make a lasting peace, but the intrigues, the
jealousies and the hates of the courts at London and Paris keep our
forests, four thousand miles away, astir. When the Huron buries his
arrow in the heart of a foe the motive that sent him to the deed may
have had its start in Europe, but the poor savage never knows it."

The priest sighed, and looked at Willet with an awakened curiosity.

"I see that you're a man of education," he said, "and that you think.
What you say is true, but the time will come when other minds than those
of vain and jealous courtiers will sway the fortunes of all these vast
regions. I have asked you nothing of your mission in Quebec, Mr. Willet,
but I hope that I will see you again before you return."

"I hope so too," said the hunter sincerely.

The _Frontenac_ now drew in to a wharf between the Royal Battery and the
Dauphin's Battery, and Robert was still all eyes for the picturesque
sights that awaited him in the greatest French town of the New World. De
Galisonniere was hailed joyously by young officers and he made joyous
replies. Robert, as they landed, saw anew and in greater detail the
immense strength of Quebec.

He beheld the line of huge earthworks that Frontenac had built from the
river St. Charles to Cape Diamond, and he saw the massive redoubts lined