rench; with what view I know not, if it is not that
they may hear themselves praised, flattered, and courted without
loss of time."[819]

[Footnote 819: _Alexander Campbell to John Floyd, 22 Oct. 1759_. Campbell
was a lieutenant of the Highlanders; Lloyd was a Connecticut
merchant.]

Knox was quartered in a small stable, with a hayloft above
and a rack and manger at one end: a lodging better than fell
to the lot of many of his brother officers; and, by means of a
stove and some help from a carpenter, he says that he made
himself tolerably comfortable. The change, however, was an
agreeable one when he was ordered for a week to the General
Hospital, a mile out of the town, where he was to command
the guard stationed to protect the inmates and watch the
enemy. Here were gathered the sick and wounded of both armies,
nursed with equal care by the nuns, of whom Knox speaks with gratitude
and respect. "When our poor fellows were ill and ordered to be removed
from their odious regimental hospital to this general receptacle, they
were indeed rendered inexpressibly happy. Each patient has his bed, with
curtains, allotted to him, and a nurse to attend him. Every sick
or wounded officer has an apartment to himself, and is attended
by one of these religious sisters, who in general are young,
handsome, courteous, rigidly reserved, and very respectful.
Their office of nursing the sick furnishes them with opportunities
of taking great latitudes if they are so disposed; but I
never heard any of them charged with the least levity." The
nuns, on their part, were well pleased with the conduct of
their new masters, whom one of them describes as the "most
moderate of all conquerors."

"I lived here," Knox continues, "at the French King's table,
with an agreeable, polite society of officers, directors, and commissaries.
Some of the gentlemen were married, and their ladies honored us with their
company. They were generally cheerful, except when we discoursed on
the late revolution and the affairs of the campaign; then they seemingly
gave way to grief, uttered by profound sighs, followed by an _O mon
Dieu!_" He walked in the garden with the French officers,
played at cards with them, and passed the time so pleasantly
that his short stay at the hospital seemed an oasis in his hard
life of camp and garrison.

Mere de Sainte-Claude, the Superior, a sister of Ramesay,
late commandant of Quebec, one morning sent him a note of
invitation to w