my companion the soldiers stopped. Stevens's eyes were fixed on me
with a puzzled, disturbed expression. He was well built, of intrepid
bearing, with a fine openness of manner joined to handsome features.
But there was a recklessness in his eye which seemed to me to come
nearer the swashbuckling character of a young French seigneur than
the wariness of a British soldier.

I spoke his name and introduced myself. His surprise and pleasure
were pronounced, for he had thought (as he said) that by this time
I would be dead. There was an instant's flash of his eye, as if a
suspicion of my loyalty had crossed his mind; but it was gone on
the instant, and immediately Doltaire, who also had interpreted the
look, smiled, and said he had carried me off to breakfast while the
furniture of my former prison was being shifted to my new one. After
a word or two more, with Stevens's assurance that the British had
recovered from Braddock's defeat and would soon be knocking at the
portals of the Chateau St. Louis, we parted, and soon Doltaire and
I got out at the high stone steps of the palace.

Standing there a moment, I looked round. In this space
surrounding the Intendance was gathered the history of New France.
This palace, large enough for the king of a European country with
a population of a million, was the official residence of the
commercial ruler of a province. It was the house of the miller, and
across the way was the King's storehouse, La Friponne, where poor
folk were ground between the stones. The great square was already
filling with people who had come to trade. Here were barrels of
malt being unloaded; there, great sacks of grain, bags of dried
fruits, bales of home-made cloth, and loads of fine-sawn boards and
timber. Moving about among the peasants were the regular soldiers