The occupation of Point Lévis by Monckton's brigade, which Wolfe now ordered on that service, need not detain us. They crossed from the camp of Orleans to the village of Beaumont, which was seized with slight resistance. Thence moving on along the high road to Point Lévis, they found the church and village occupied by what Knox, who was there, estimates at a thousand riflemen and Indians. The Grenadiers charging the position in front, and the Highlanders and light infantry taking it in the rear, it was stormed with a loss of thirty men, and Monckton then occupied a position which, so far as artillery fire was concerned, had Quebec at its mercy. The brigadier, who had fully expected to find French guns there, at once began to intrench himself on this conspicuous spot, while floating batteries now pushed out from Quebec and began throwing shot and shell up at his working-parties, till Saunders sent a frigate forward to put an end to what threatened to be a serious annoyance. The French had changed their minds about the danger of Monckton's guns, though not a shot had yet been fired, and agitated loudly for a sortie across the river. Montcalm thought poorly of the plan; but a miscellaneous force of fifteen hundred Canadians, possessed of more ardor than cohesion, insisted on attempting a night assault. They landed some way up the river, but did not so much as reach the British position. The difficulties of a combined midnight movement were altogether too great for such irregulars, and they ended by firing upon one another in the dark and stampeding for their boats, with a loss of seventy killed and wounded. Two brigades were now in midstream on the Isle of Orleans and one on Point Lévis. Landing artillery and stores, intrenching both positions, and mounting siege-guns at the last-named one consumed the first few days of July. Wolfe's skill in erecting and firing batteries had been abundantly demonstrated at Louisburg; and though his head quarters were on the island, he went frequently to superintend the preparations for the bombardment of Quebec. On July 12th a rocket leaped into the sky from Wolfe's camp. It was the signal for the forty guns and mortars that had been mounted on Point Lévis to open on the city that Vaudreuil and his friends had fondly thought was out of range. The first few shots may have encouraged the delusion, as they fell short; but the gunners quickly got their distance, and then began that storm of shot and shell which rained upon the doomed city, with scarce a respite, for upward of eight weeks.