And Xavier was not consulted. He stayed. But his was a face of sore disappointment when we left him with Philip at the cottage,--"to guard with your life, if need be!" said I, in going. And thus gave him a sense of responsibility and peril to cheer his bitter inaction. It had been snowing all day, but lightly. After nightfall there blew up a fitful wind, now fierce, now breathless. At one moment the air would be thick with drift, and the great blasts would buffet us in the teeth. At another, there would seem to be in all the dim-glimmering world no movement and no breathing but our own. It was far past midnight when we came upon the hill-slope overlooking Grand Pre village; and the village was asleep. Not a light was visible save in one long row of cottages at the extreme east end, close by the water side. Thither, at our orders, the villagers had quietly withdrawn before midnight. The rash New England men lay sleeping, with apparently no guards set. If there were sentries, then the storm had driven them indoors. The great gusts swirled and roared past their windows, piling the drift more deeply about their thresholds. If any woke, they turned perchance luxuriously in their beds and listened to the blasts, and praised God that the Acadian peasants builded their houses warm. They had no thought of the ruin that drew near through the drifts and the whirling darkness. I have never heard that one of them was kept awake with strange terrors, or had any prevision, or made special searching of his soul before sleep. It would seem as if Heaven must have forgotten them for a little. Or perhaps the saints remembered that the English were not a people to take advice kindly, or to change their plans for any sort of warning that might seem to them irregular. But among us French, that night, there was one at least who was granted some prevision. Just before the two columns separated, Tamin came to me and wrung my hand. He was with de Villiers' detachment. There was a certain awe, a something of farewell, in his manner, and it moved my heart mightily. But I clapped him on the back. "No forebodings, now, my friend," said I; "keep a good heart and your eyes wide open." "The snow is deep to-night, Monsieur!" said he gravely, as he turned away. "True," I answered; "but the apple trees are at the other end of the village; and who ever heard that the Black Abbe was a prophet?" Even as I spoke my heart smote me, and I would have given much to wring the loyal fellow's hand once more. But I feared to add to his depression. My men all knew their parts before I led them from the camp. Once in the village, only a few whispered orders were necessary. Squad by squad, dim forms like phantoms in the drift, filed off stealthily to their places.