Controversies still rage over the propriety of legalising the French language in a British dominion; but any one who examines well the circumstances which induced it must see that not only justice but military expediency required liberal treatment and wide consideration for seventy thousand subjects speaking an alien tongue, if the fruits of the Seven Years' War were not to be heedlessly thrown away. The solution of the language problem lies in the peaceful assimilation which time and growing population alone can bring. Almost a thousand years ago a Norman race was grafted upon a Saxon stock, and the blending of these elements has produced Great Britain, the strongest nation of the modern world. In Canada religious, industrial, and social conditions have as yet prevented definite fusion of the two races; but the march of events and the pressure of common interests must secure it in good time. CHAPTER XVII THE FIFTH SIEGE Besides Sir Guy Carleton, Wolfe's army of 1759 contained other officers who were destined to reappear in the history of the city. One of these was Richard Montgomery, then a lieutenant in the Seventeenth Foot, but now, after a lapse of sixteen years, a brigadier-general, and charged with a far different commission. Moses Hazen and Donald Campbell, two officers who figured prominently in the battle of Ste. Foye, were likewise returning in different guise to the scene of their former exploits; and Benedict Arnold, no stranger in Quebec, came there once more. All of these had made merry at Freemasons' Hall, the festive hostelry at the top of Mountain Hill, which had been a jovial rendezvous in the days of military rule. Here they had toasted and sung, little dreaming that one day they would assail that fort they had so dearly won, and face in battle their former messmates. Yet fate had so ordained; and when the thirteen revolting colonies determined to strike the mother-country by an attack on Canada, it was to Richard Montgomery and Benedict Arnold that Congress gave the command of the two invading armies. The former was despatched against Montreal, the latter was sent to take Quebec. [Illustration: General Sir James Henry Craig, K.C.B. Governor General of Canada 1807-1811.]