[Footnote 24: 'We lost time at the siege, still more after the siege, and blundered from the beginning to the end of the campaign' (from a letter written Dec. 1, 1758; Wright's _Life of Wolfe_, p. 465). Similarly, Wolfe wrote from the camp before Louisbourg, on July 27, 1758, the day after the capitulation: 'If this force had been properly managed, there was an end of the French colony in North America in one campaign' (Wright, p. 449).] [Footnote 25: Lord Chesterfield to his son, May 18, 1758 (1775 ed., vol. iv, p. 136; Letter 298).] [Footnote 26: See the letter already quoted above, p. 273, note. Drucour is explaining why he would not allow the French ships to leave Louisbourg harbour, 'It was our business to defer the determination of our fate as long as possible. My accounts from Canada assured me that M. de Montcalm was marching to the enemy and would come up with them between July 15 and 20. I said then "if the ships leave the harbour on June 10 (as they desire), the English admiral will enter it immediately after," and we should have been lost before the end of the month, which would have put it in the power of the generals of the besiegers to have employed the months of July and August in sending succours to the troops marching against Canada, and to have entered the river St. Lawrence at the proper season.' In a 'Scheme for taking Louisbourg,' which was submitted to Pitt by Brigadier Waldo (who had been on Pepperell's expedition) on Nov. 7, 1757, fourteen days were given to Louisbourg to hold out when once duly invested, and an attack on Quebec was contemplated as the immediate result of its fall (Brymer's _Report on Canadian Archives_, 1886, pp. 151-3).] [Sidenote: _Wolfe returns to England._] Yet it was but the end of July when Louisbourg fell, and, if Wolfe had had his way, the ships would have gone on to Quebec. Even Amherst might have gone on but for the bad news from Abercromby, which confirmed his habitual caution, and retarded instead of quickening his movements. One officer, Lord Rollo, was sent to reduce the Île St. Jean; another, Monckton, cleared the valley of the St. John river on the mainland. Wolfe was dispatched to Gaspé Bay and the mouth of the St. Lawrence, to harry the settlers and the fishermen; and when he had accomplished his task, which was little to his taste, he sailed for home angry and disappointed that more had not been done, and that his advice had not been taken. Amherst, in the meantime, had gone with six regiments to reinforce Abercromby at Lake George. [Sidenote: _The Maritime Provinces finally secured to England._]