ainly that in Europe the regiments of
France were no longer what they had once been. It was not so with those
who fought in America. Here, for enduring gallantry, officers and men
alike deserve nothing but praise.

[Footnote 371: Of about twelve hundred who came with Montcalm, nearly
three hundred were now in hospital. The four battalions that came with
Dieskau are reported at the end of May to have sixteen hundred and
fifty-three effective men. _Etat de la Situation actuelle des
Bataillons,_ appended to Montcalm's despatch of 12 June. Another
document, _Detail de ce qui s'est passe en Canada, Juin, 1755, jusqu'a
Juin_, 1756, sets the united effective strength of the battalions in
Canada at twenty-six hundred and seventy-seven, which was increased by
recruits which arrived from France about midsummer.]

[Footnote 372: Except perhaps, the battalion of Bearn, which formerly
wore, and possibly wore still, a uniform of light blue.]

[Footnote 373: Susane, _Ancienne Infanterie Francaise_. In the atlas of
this work are colored plates of the uniforms of all the regiments of
foot.]

The _troupes de la marine_ had for a long time formed the permanent
military establishment of Canada. Though attached to the naval
department, they served on land, and were employed as a police within
the limits of the colony, or as garrisons of the outlying forts, where
their officers busied themselves more with fur-trading than with their
military duties. Thus they had become ill-disciplined and inefficient,
till the hard hand of Duquesne restored them to order. They originally
consisted of twenty-eight independent companies, increased in 1750 to
thirty companies, at first of fifty, and afterwards of sixty-five men
each, forming a total of nineteen hundred and fifty rank and file. In
March, 1757, ten more companies were added. Their uniform was not unlike
that of the troops attached to the War Department, being white, with
black facings. They were enlisted for the most part in France; but when
their term of service expired, and even before, in time of peace, they
were encouraged to become settlers in the colony, as was also the case
with their officers, of whom a great part were of European birth. Thus
the relations of the _troupes de la marine_ with the colony were close;
and formed a sort of connecting link between the troops of the line and
the native militia.[374] Besides these colony regulars, there was a
company of colonial artillery, co