Amherst's army appeared in sight from the town of Montreal, towards the gate of Lachine, on the 7th of September, about three in the afternoon. General Murray with his army, from Quebec, appeared two hours after at the opposite side of the town: thus a dark crisis was at hand for the fate of Canada. Montreal was nowise susceptible of defence. It was surrounded with stone walls, built in the beginning of that colony, merely to preserve the inhabitants from the incursions of the Indians, few imagining at that time it would become the theatre of a regular war, and that one day they would see formidable armies of regular, well-disciplined troops before its walls. We were, however, all pent up in that miserable, bad place--without provisions, a thousand times worse off than an advantageous position in open fields--whose pitiful walls could not resist two hours' cannonade without being level with the ground, and where we would have been forced to surrender at discretion, if the English had insisted upon it. The night between the 7th and 8th September was passed in negotiating for the articles of capitulation. But in the morning all the difficulties were removed, and General Amherst granted conditions infinitely more favourable than could be expected in our circumstances. Thus the Canadians, as brave as they are docile, and easy to be governed, became subjects of Great Britain; and if they can think themselves happy under that Government, by remembering their past vexations, they will do so. M. (Col.) Poularies and M. (Col.) Dalquier, who were generally distinguished in the French army by their high sense of honor, probity, and their bravery, experience and knowledge in the art of war, were both of them, on their arrival in France, broken as commanders of a battalion--a grade which was abolished in the French service, in order to make the Major, as in the British service, command the regiment in absence of the Colonel and Lieutenant-Colonel. Belcomb, Poularies' Adjt. of Royal Roussillon, and Montgnary, Captain in the Regiment of Bearn which Dalquier commanded--(two very handsome men, capable to attract the attention of the ladies of any court in Europe)--were made Colonels of Foot, without possessing any remarkable military talent or capacity. Fortune manifested most cruelly her almighty power in the military state, where justice, punishments and rewards alone ought to be the base of it. Men conduct themselves from the view either of honor or interest; and there can be no emulation in a service where mediocrity of talents, intrigues, favor, and credit, override merit.