It was the hour of midnight, and all was still in the solitary cabin of Batoche. Little Blanche was fast asleep in her sofa-crib, and Velours was rolled in a torpid circle on the hearth. The fire burned low, casting a faint and fitful gleam through the room. The hermit occupied his usual seat in the leather chair at one corner of the chimney.

Whether he had been napping or musing it were difficult to say, but it was with a quiet, almost stealthy movement that he walked to the door which he opened, and looked out into the night. Returning, he placed a large log on the fire, stirring it with his foot till its reflection lighted one half of the apartment. He then proceeded to the alcove, and drew forth from it his violin. The strings were thrummed to make sure of their accord, the heel was set in the hollow of the shoulder, and the bow executed a rapid prelude. The old man smiled as if satisfied with the cunning of his hand, and well he might, for these simple touches revealed the artist.

"What will you sing me to-night?" said Batoche looking lovingly at his old brown instrument. "There has been strange thunder in the voice of the Falls all the day, and I have felt very singular this evening. I do not know what is abroad, but perhaps you will tell me."

So saying, he raised his violin to his shoulder again, and began to play. At first there were slow broad notes drawn out with a long bow, then a succession of rapid sounds rippling over one another. The alternation was natural and pleasing, but as he warmed to his work, the old musician indulged in a revelry of sounds--the crash of the tempest, the murmur of the breeze, the sparkling clatter of rain drops, the monotone of lapsing water. The left hand would lie immoveable on the neck, and a grand unison issued from the strings like a solemn warning; then the fingers would dance backwards and forwards to the bridge, and the chords vibrated in a series of short, sharp echoes like the petulant cries of children. A number of ravishing melodies glided and wove into each other like the flowers of a nosegay, producing a harmonious whole of charming effect, and sweetening the very atmosphere in which they palpitated. Then the perverse old man would shatter them all by one fell sweep of his arm, causing a terrific discord that almost made his cabin lurch from its seat. For one full hour, standing there in the middle of the room, with the flickering light of the fire falling upon his face, Batoche played on without any notable interval of rest. At the end of that time he stopped, tightened his keys, swung his bow-arm in a circle two or three times as if to distend his muscles, and then attacked the single E string. It was there that he expected the secret which he sought. He rounded his shoulders, bent his ear close to the board, peered with his grey eyes into the serpentine fissures of the instrument, pressed his left-hand fingers nervously up and down, while his bow caressed the string in an infinite series of mysterious evolutions. The music produced was weird and preternatural. The demon that lay crouched in the body of the instrument was speaking to Batoche.

Now loud as an explosion, then soft as a whisper; now shrill as the scream of a night bird, then sweet as the breath of an infant, the violin uttered its varied and magical language, responsive to the touch of the wizard. There were moments when the air throbbed and the room rocked with the sound, and other moments when the music was all absorbed in the soul of the performer. Finally the old man drew himself up, threw his head backward, ran his fingers raspingly up towards the bridge and made a desperate plunge with his bow. A loud snap was heard like the report of a pistol. The string had broken. Batoche quietly lowered the instrument and looked around him. Little Blanche was sitting up in the bed gazing about with wide vacant eyes. The black cat stood glaring on the hearth with bristling fur and back rounded into a semi-circle.

"Good!" muttered Batoche, as he walked to the alcove and laid by his violin. Then going as quietly to the door, he opened it wide. Barbin and two other men, closely wrapped in hoods, stood before him.

"Come in," said Batoche, "I expected you."

There was no agitation or eccentricity in his manner, but his features were pinched, and his grey eyes shed a sombre light upon the deep shadows of their cavities.

"We have come for you, Batoche," said Barbin.

"I knew it."

"Are you ready?"

"I am ready."

And he stepped forward to take his old carbine from its hooks.

"No gun," said Barbin, laying his hand upon the old man's arm. "You are not to attack, nor will you be attacked."

"Ah! I see," muttered Batoche, throwing his wild-cat great coat over his shoulders.

"You know the news?"

"I know there is some news."

"The day of deliverance has come."

"At last!" exclaimed the hermit, raising his eyes to the ceiling.

"The Bastonnais have surrounded the city."

"And will the Wolves be trapped?" asked Batoche in a voice of thunder.

"Ha! ha! I heard it all in the song of my old violin. I heard the roar of their march through the forest; their shout of triumph when they reached the Heights of Levis, and first saw the rock of the citadel; the splash of their oars in crossing the river; the deep murmur of their columns forming on the Plains of Abraham. Thus far have they come, have they not?"

"Yes, thus far," responded the three men together, amazed at the accuracy of the information which they knew that Batoche had not obtained that day from any human lip.

"But they will go farther," resumed the hermit, "because I have heard more. I have heard the boom of cannon, the rattle of musketry, the hiss of rockets, the wail of the wounded, the shriek of the dying, the malediction over the dead. Then a long interval, and after it, I have heard the crackling of flames, the cry of the hungry, the moan of those who suffered, the lamentation of the sick, and the loud, terrible voice of insurrection. And all this in the camp of our friends, while within the city, where the Wolves are gathered, I have heard the clink of glasses, the song of revelry, the shout of defiance, the threat against treason,--mark the word, my friends. Are we traitors, you and I, because we love our old motherland too well, and hate the Wolves that have devoured our inheritance? Yes, I repeat, I have heard to-night the shout of defiance, the threat against treason, the mocking laugh against weakness, and the deep growl of inebriate repletion. Another interval and then the catastrophe. I heard the soft voice of the night, the fall of the snow, the muffled tread of advancing regiments, the low word of command,--then all at once a thunderous explosion of cannon,--and, finally, silence, defeat and death."

Barbin and his two companions stood listening to the old man in rapt wonder. To them he appeared like a prophet, as he unfolded before their eyes the vision of war and desolation which the genius of music had evoked for him. And when he had concluded, they looked at each other, as doubtful of what to say. Batoche added:

"I fear that things will not turn out as favorably as we could wish. We may hurt, but shall not succeed in destroying the pack of wolves.

However, we must do our best."

The men did not reply, but abruptly changed the current of the old hermit's thoughts by walking towards the door, and urging him to follow them.

"It is late," said Barbin. "We have work to do and must hurry."

The four then walked out of the house, leaving little Blanche and Velours to the calm slumbers which they had resumed, so soon as the voice of the violin was hushed.

X.

BLOOD THICKER THAN WATER.

Batoche and his companions plunged into the forest. On the way, the object of the expedition was fully explained to the old man. He was expected to have an interview that night with some officer of the Continental army for the purpose of organizing a system of action between them and the malcontents of the environs of Quebec. These malcontents were of various degrees of earnestness, courage and activity. Some had boasted a great deal of what they would do when the Americans came, but when the Americans did come, and the loyalist troops showed a determined front of opposition, they quietly slunk into the background or even betrayed their former professions. Others of these malcontents confined themselves to secret action, such as furnishing information of what was going on within the city, harboring those who were tracked for treason, or affording supplies of food and ammunition to such of their friends as needed them for use. Finally, there were a determined few, chiefly old soldiers or the sons of old soldiers of Montcalm and Levis, who, having never become reconciled to their English masters, in the sixteen years which had elapsed since the Conquest, hailed the appearance of the Americans as the prelude of deliverance, and openly raised the standard of revolt. Of these there were again two classes. One formed into a duly equipped battalion which joined the army of Arnold and took part in all the subsequent events of the siege. The second class consisted of farmers around Quebec, who, not being able to quit their families and perform regular military service, engaged in a species of guerilla warfare which was both effective and romantic.

Among these were ranged Barbin and his companions. Among them Batoche was called to take a position. His well-known skill with the carbine, his rare knowledge of all the woods for miles in circumference, his remarkable powers of endurance, his reckless bravery and fertility of expedient in the midst of most critical danger, all fitted him for the trying events which circumstances thrust upon him and his friends. But the oddities of his mode of life, the eccentricities of his character, his generally accredited relations with the spirits of the departed, and the gift of divination which all the country-side accorded him, spite of occasional and deriding criticism, went still further to point him out as a foremost man in the secret insurrection of the farmers. He himself, in his own way, favored the movement with enthusiasm. He was not a Canadian, but a Frenchman born. His youth had been spent in the wars of his country. When the great Marquis de Montcalm was ordered to New France, he followed him as a member of the famous Roussillon regiment In that capacity, he fought at Carillon, and shared the glory of the campaign of 1758. In the same capacity, he shared the stupendous defeat of Sept. 13th, 1759, on the Plains of Abraham. He had the sad consolation of having been one of those who bore the wounded Marquis from the field, and accompanied him to the Hospice of the Ursulines where he died, and where his glorious remains still rest. This circumstance saved him from the ignominy of capture. Before Murray, the successor of Wolfe, entered the vanquished city in triumph, he effected his escape by creeping along the valley of the St. Charles during the darkness, and making his way into the country. After wandering some miles, he paused near the Falls of Montmorenci, and built himself a kind of rustic tent on the very spot where he afterwards erected his lonely cabin. He chose this place not only on account of the beauty of its scenery, and the shelter from hostile intrusion which it afforded, but also because it was in the immediate neighborhood of the fortifications--visible even to this day--which his beloved commander had constructed there, and from which he repulsed Wolfe with great loss, only two months before the disastrous battle of the Plains of Abraham.

"Alas!" Batoche would often exclaim, standing over those earthworks, "if the great Marquis had relied upon the walls of Quebec, as he did upon these fortifications, we should still be masters of the country. Wolfe owed his success solely to the imprudence of Montcalm."

In the spring of the following year, Batoche joined the army of the Chevalier de Levis, and was present at the great victory of Ste. Foye.

But the successful retreat of the British army, under Murray, behind the walls of Quebec; the inability of Levis to press the siege of the city; the gradual disbanding of the French forces throughout the Province, and the final surrender of Vaudreuil, at Montreal, whereby the whole French possessions in America, were ceded to Britain--one of the most momentous events of modern times in its gradual results--forced Batoche to return to his Montmorenci solitude.

He might have gone back to France, if he had been so minded, but after lingering some time in indecision, a circumstance occurred which determined him to fix his abode definitively in the new world. This was the receipt of a letter from his family, informing him of the death of his wife and the utter poverty in which his daughter, a girl of seventeen, was left. The girl herself appended a note stating that she intended to sail by the first occasion to join her father in Canada. The old soldier wrote at once to dissuade her from taking the step, giving the characteristic reason that he did not want her to become a servant of the detested English, but before his letter reached France, the girl landed in Quebec, and thus the course of Batoche's destiny was changed.

His daughter was bright, intelligent and good looking, and received at once advantageous offers of situations in several of the best families of the capital, but the old man would not listen to any proposition of the kind.

"Come with me, into the woods," he said to her. "We will live there happily together. I don't want an Englishman to set his eyes upon you. I am still able to work. You will help me. We shall want for nothing."

And he took her into his lonely habitation beside the Falls of Montmorenci, where in effect the two spent a tranquil, easy existence.

At the end of three years, the son of a farmer of Charlesbourg fell in love with the girl, and spite of his attachment, Batoche consented to a marriage between them. It was a rude blow when the bride went forth from his cabin to take up her residence in her husband's house, about twelve miles away, but the sacrifice was generously made, and when ten or eleven months later, a grandchild was born to him, Batoche felt that he had received sufficient compensation for his loss.

"Little Blanche will live with me," he said, "and replace her mother."

He did not know how sad was the prophecy that he uttered.

XI.

DEATH IN THE FALLS.

It was a beautiful summer evening. The young mother, having recovered from her illness, decided that her first visit should be to the cabin of her old father, and, of course, the baby went with her. After resting awhile, and receiving the caresses of the hermit, the daughter, with the child in her arms, wandered about the familiar environs to enjoy once more all the pleasures attached to her old home. It was a beautiful summer evening. The forest was charged with perfume; a thousand birds fluttered from branch to branch; the earth was spangled with an endless variety of wild flowers; brilliant insects flashed and buzzed in the slanting beams of the sunset; the whole air gently undulated in a rhythmic wave that disposed the soul to revery and prayer. The young woman felt this influence, without, of course, being able to define it, and yielding to its sway, she wandered farther than she had intended, or than her bodily strength justified, from the hut of her father. It was so delightful to revisit all these scenes which she had learned to love so much, and to see them again under such different circumstances. Even the inanimate world is not the same to the wife as it is to the girl.

Marriage for woman seems to alter the form, color, scent and effect of material things, giving them a character of pathos, if not of sadness, which they never wore in the pleasant days when the body owed no service to a master, and the mind was, in very literalness, fancy-free.

With her child in her arms--the flesh-and-blood pledge of her altered life--the young woman strayed away along the avenues of the forest, and out into the open spaces, until she reached the skirt of the high road, fully half a mile from Batoche's hut. The white dusty stretch of the road brought her to a pause, being as it were a dividing line between the expanses of greenery over which she was wandering. Feeling now the fatigue which she had not experienced before, she sat down upon the warm tufted grass to rest, and, like all mothers, became oblivious of self in attention to the wants of her babe. She had been nursing it at her breast about ten minutes, while her eyes were fixed on its rosy limbs, and her mind revelled in the half-sensuous, half-spiritual delights of maternity, when all at once a mighty clatter of hoofs was heard along the road, followed immediately after by loud shouts of men, the flash of red coats and the clang of sabre-sheaths on the flanks of rushing horses. What ensued was never fully known, but the young mother, with disordered dress, hair streaming behind, and babe convulsively pressed against her bosom, fled like a deer through the wood in the direction of the Falls. Behind her went two pursuers, fleet as fate, but indistinct as spectres in the twilight. Unfortunately the poor woman was on the side of the Falls opposite her father's cabin. When she reached the top of the headland, the cataract roared on her right, and the broad St.

Lawrence flowed at her feet. There was no outlet of escape. Disgrace and death behind her; death and oblivion before her. There was not a moment to waste. In the highest access of her despair, she heard a voice across the Falls. It was that of her father, who, with hand and word, directed her to go down the steep side of the promontory to the foot of the cascade. He himself immediately disappeared under the overhanging rock and curtain of water, and joined her just as she had attained the desired spot. No time was lost in explanations. Seizing the babe in his right arm, and encircling his left around the waist of his daughter, the valiant old man turned and disappeared again under the Fall. Overhead a yell of baffled rage was heard above the thunder of the torrent, but it was not repeated.

Batoche had not advanced many steps when he noticed that the burden on his left arm was growing heavier and heavier--and, on looking down, he observed with terror that his daughter had swooned. The grand flower of love was broken on its stem. This circumstance added tenfold to the old man's peril. The slightest slip of his foot, the slightest jolt from the perpendicular, the slightest deviation from the protecting line of the granite wall, would hurl him and his precious freight into destruction.