To most women country means home. Jeannette was tenaciously fond of the gray old city of Quebec, but home to her was to be near that Highland officer. Her humiliation passed into the very agony of tenderness. To go wherever he was going was enough. She did not want him to speak to her, or touch her, or give any sign that he knew she was in the world. She wanted to sit still by his side under the negation of darkness and be satisfied. Jeannette had never dreamed how long the hours between turn of tide and dawn may be. They were the principal part of her life. Keen stars held the sky at immeasurable heights. There was no mist. The chill wind had swept the river clear like a great path. Within reach of Jeannette's hand, but hidden from her, as most of us are hidden from one another, sat one more solitary than herself. He had not her robust body. Disease and anxiety had worn him away while he was hopelessly besieging Quebec. In that last hour before the 13th of September dawned, General Wolfe was groping down river toward one of the most desperate military attempts in the history of the world. There was no sound but the rustle of the water, the stir of a foot as some standing man shifted his weight, and the light click of metal as guns in unsteady hands touched barrels. A voice, modulating rhythm which Jeannette could not understand, began to speak. General Wolfe was reciting an English poem. The strain upon his soul was more than he could bear, and he relieved it by those low-uttered rhymes. Jeannette did not know one word of English. The meaning which reached her was a dirge, but a noble dirge; the death hymn of a human being who has lived up to his capacities. She felt strangely influenced, as by the neighborhood of some large angel, and at the same time the tragedy of being alive overswept her. For one's duty is never all done; or when we have accomplished it with painstaking care, we are smitten through with finding that the greater things have passed us by. The tide carried the boats near the great wall of rock. Woods made denser shade on the background of night. The cautious murmur of the speaker was cut short. "Who goes there?" came the sharp challenge of a French sentry. The soldiers were silent as dead men. "France!" answered Colonel Fraser in the same language. "Of what regiment?" "The Queen's." The sentry was satisfied. To the Queen's regiment, stationed at Cap Rouge, belonged the duty of convoying provisions down to Quebec. He did not further peril what he believed to be a French transport by asking for the password. Jeannette breathed. So low had she sunk that she would have used her language herself to get the Highland colonel past danger. It was fortunate for his general that he had the accent and readiness of a Frenchman. Again they were challenged. They could see another sentry running parallel with their course. "Provision boats," this time answered the Highlander. "Don't make a noise. The English will hear us."