n. "When shall I be again at the Chateau of Candiac, with my
plantations, my oaks, my oil mill, my mulberry trees? O good God." He
lays bare his spirit especially to Bourlamaque, a quiet, efficient,
thoughtful man, like himself, and enjoins him to burn the letters--which
he does not, happily for posterity. Scandal does not touch him but, like
most Frenchmen, he is dependent on the society of women. He lived in a
house on the ramparts of Quebec and visited constantly the salons of
his neighbor in the Rue du Parloir, the beautiful and witty Madame de la
Naudiere. In two or three other households he was also intimate and
the Bishop was a sympathetic friend. His own tastes were those of the
scholar, and more and more, during the long Canadian winters, he
enjoyed evenings of quiet reading. The elder Mirabeau, father of the
revolutionary leader of 1789, had just published his "Ami des Hommes"
and this we find Montcalm studying. But above all he reads the great
encyclopaedia of Diderot. By 1759 seven of the huge volumes had been
issued. They startled the intellectual world of the time and Montcalm
set out to read them, omitting the articles which had no interest
for him or which he could not understand. C is a copious letter in
an encyclopaedia, and Montcalm found excellent the articles on
Christianity, College, Comedy, Comet, Commerce, Council, and so on.
Wolfe--soon to be his opponent--had the same taste for letters. The two
men, unlike in body, for Wolfe was tall and Montcalm the opposite, were
alike in spirit, painstaking students as well as men of action.

At first Montcalm had not realized what was the deepest shadow in
the life of Canada. Perhaps chiefly because Vaudreuil was always at
Montreal, Montcalm preferred Quebec and was surprised and charmed by
the life of that city. It had, he said, the air of a real capital. There
were fair women and brave men, sumptuous dinners with forty or fifty
covers, brilliantly lighted salons, a vivid social life in which he was
much courted. The Intendant Bigot was agreeable and efficient. Soon,
however, Montcalm had misgivings. It was a gambling age, but he was
staggered by the extent of the gambling at the house of the Intendant.
He did not wish to break with Bigot, and there was perhaps some
weakness in his failure to denounce the orgies from which his conscience
revolted. He warned his own officers but he could not control the
colonial officers, and Vaudreuil was too weak to check