Twenty-four volunteers lead the way up the stony path, silent and agile as cats. At the top are the tents of the sentries, who rush from their couches to be overpowered by the English. Before daybreak the whole army has ascended to the plateau behind the city, known as the Plains of Abraham. No use entering here into the dispute whether Wolfe took his place where the goal now stands, or farther back from the city wall. Roughly speaking, the main line of Wolfe's forces, three deep, with himself, Monckton, and Murray in command, faced the rear of Quebec about three quarters of a mile from what was then the wall. To his left was the wooded road now known as St. Louis. He posts Townshend facing this, at right angles to his front line. Another battalion lay in the woods to the rear. There were, besides, a reserve regiment, and a battalion to guard the landing. What was Wolfe's position? Behind him lay Bougainville with three thousand French soldiers, fresh and in perfect condition. In front lay Quebec with three thousand more. To his right was the river; to his left, across the St. Charles, Montcalm's main army of five thousand men. "When your enemies blunder, {271} don't interrupt them," Napoleon is reported to have advised. If some one had not blundered badly now, it might have been a second Ticonderoga with Wolfe; but some one did blunder most tragically. Montcalm had come from the trenches above Beauport, where he had been guarding against Saunders' landing, and he had ordered hot tea and beer served to the troops, when he happened to look across the St. Charles River towards Quebec. It had been cloudy, but the sun had just burst out; and there, standing in the morning light, were the English in battle array, red coat and tartan kilt, grenadier and Highlander, in the distance a confused mass of color, which was not the white uniform of the French.