two children....It would be difficult to describe the horror of this terrible disaster, the cries of those still on board the ship, and the harrowing spectacle of those who, having thrown themselves into the waves, were making useless efforts to gain the beach....Seven living men at last found themselves on the shore of that unknown land...and (in the evening) it was a heartrending sight which presented itself when a hundred and fourteen corpses were stretched on the sand, many of them with arms and legs broken, or bearing other marks of the fury of the elements." For weeks the fugitives wandered about the woods, and at last were rescued by a party of Indians thirty leagues from Louisbourg. The indefatigible La Corne crossed in a birch-bark canoe from Cape Breton to the mainland, and, travelling five hundred and fifty leagues on snow-shoes, came again to Quebec. Here, in spite of his own dire predictions, he found a gaiety and contentment which fairly startled him. Within the walls of the grim old river-fortress the ancient foes were making peace in the reconstruction of industry. The wise forbearance of the conquerors, and the facile temper of the conquered, provided, far beyond hope, a solution for what was, _prima facie_, a difficult situation. "It is very surprising," writes an officer of the Highlanders, "with what ease the gaiety of their tempers enables them to bear misfortunes which to us would be insupportable. Families, whom the calamities of war have reduced from the height of luxury to the want of common necessaries, laugh, dance, and sing, comforting themselves with this reflection--_Fortune de guerre_. Their young ladies take the utmost pains to teach our officers French; with what views I know not, if it is not that they may hear themselves praised, flattered, and courted without loss of time," Those who remained behind, sacrificing allegiance to their old flag for the sake of allegiance to the soil, were indeed far happier than the irreconcilables who had elected to return to the motherland, bereft of all but their movable property. And among these homing Frenchmen were some whose reception caused them a very reasonable anxiety. Vaudreuil, Bigot, Péan, Cadet, Varin, Penisseault, and several others who had held offices in Canada, were cast into the Bastille, charged with the corruptions which had sapped the life-blood of New France. For months they contemplated their misdeeds in the sombre silence of the dungeon, and the next year were brought forth for trial. Vaudreuil, for lack of evidence, was acquitted properly acquitted, so far as can be known, his chief fault having been a fatal ill-judgment; but a just fate overtook Bigot, Cadet, and their knavish parasites. The Intendant was banished from France for life, and all his property confiscated; Cadet was banished for nine years and fined six million _livres_; the others received sentences in keeping with the measure of their guilt.