In such circumstances Montcalm appears to have succumbed to nervous strain and to have lost his wits. He held a hasty council of war with his principal officers and decided to fight at once. He was afraid, it seems, lest Wolfe should be reinforced or lest he might entrench himself. Yet there was no occasion for extreme haste. Another two hours would have sufficed, if not to bring up the missing troops from Beauport, at all events to procure more guns and to send a messenger by a safe route to concert measures with Bougainville; and the day was yet young. The supplies of the French were failing, it is true, but their army was not starving; and from whence was Wolfe himself, with Bougainville in his rear, to draw his supplies even supposing that he did entrench himself? The British had two days' provisions with them, but for all further supply they must depend on a single zigzag path wide enough for but one man abreast. Even supposing that Montcalm could not succeed in obtaining the thirty field-guns for which he asked, and which if obtained would almost inevitably have blasted the British army off the field, there was nothing to prevent him from manœuvring with a superior force to keep the British under arms until nightfall, while his Indians and irregulars, of whom he had abundance, harried the British right flank in front and rear under shelter of the scrub, and hindered the bringing up of further stores. What would have been the condition of Wolfe's army on the following morning after a second night under arms, and what opening might there not have been for successful attack? But it was not to be. Whether Montcalm was spurred on by the impatience of his own half-distracted force, or whether he simply gave way to nervous exhaustion, must remain uncertain. At any rate he resolved with the five thousand troops that were with him to accept battle at once.