He expected an attack. “We were informed of the preparations from the first,” says the _Habitant de Louisbourg_. Some Indians, who had been to Boston, carried to Canada the news of what was going on there; but it was not believed, and excited no alarm.[95] It was not so at Louisbourg, where, says the French writer just quoted, “we lost precious moments in useless deliberations and resolutions no sooner made than broken. Nothing to the purpose was done, so that we were as much taken by surprise as if the enemy had pounced upon us unawares.” It was about the twenty-fifth of March[96] when the garrison first saw 97 the provincial cruisers hovering off the mouth of the harbor. They continued to do so at intervals till daybreak of the thirtieth of April, when the whole fleet of transports appeared standing towards Flat Point, which projects into Gabarus Bay, three miles west of the town.[97] On this, Duchambon sent Morpain, captain of a privateer, or “corsair,” to oppose the landing. He had with him eighty men, and was to be joined by forty more, already on the watch near the supposed point of disembarkation.[98] At the same time cannon were fired and alarm bells rung in Louisbourg, to call in the militia of the neighborhood. Pepperrell managed the critical work of landing with creditable skill. The rocks and the surf were more dangerous than the enemy. Several boats, filled with men, rowed towards Flat Point; but on a signal from the flagship “Shirley,” rowed back again, Morpain flattering himself that his appearance had frightened them off. Being joined by several other boats, the united party, a hundred men in all, pulled for another landing-place called Fresh-water Cove, or Anse de la Cormorandière, two miles farther up Gabarus Bay. Morpain and his party ran to meet them; but the boats were first in the race, and as soon 98 as the New England men got ashore, they rushed upon the French, killed six of them, captured as many more, including an officer named Boularderie, and put the rest to flight, with the loss, on their own side, of two men slightly wounded.[99] Further resistance to the landing was impossible, for a swarm of boats pushed against the rough and stony beach, the men dashing through the surf, till before night about two thousand were on shore.[100] The rest, or about two thousand more, landed at their leisure on the next day.