Montcalm's utmost exertions failed to prevent desertion among the Canadians; he scourged some offenders, hanged others, threatened their villages with the vengeance of the savages, but still the unhappy peasantry were with difficulty held together. At the camp they were badly supplied with provisions, while their families almost starved at home. Their harvest, that which the English had not destroyed, remained unreaped. At length the general was obliged to yield to the urgent necessity of the case, and at a most critical period of the campaign he allowed 2000 of the militia to depart for the purpose of getting in their crops.
The Indians, however, still remained faithful: as long as a chance of blood and plunder offered, they were sure to be present; but in a pitched battle they were nearly useless, and the increased experience of the British troops rendered even their forest warfare now less dangerous.
Not only provisions, but even ammunition, were becoming scarce in Montcalm's camp: there was no hope of supplies from any quarter. The Lower Town and a large portion of the Upper Town were laid in ruins by the English artillery: the defenses, it was true, still remained uninjured; but, except in natural advantages, they were by no means formidable. The repulse of the besiegers at Montmorency had for a time raised the spirits of the French, and given them a better opinion of Canadian prowess, for upon that occasion the peasantry had fired with great steadiness from behind their breast-works. But the daring though misdirected valor of the British Grenadiers, and the imposing front of their supports, failed not to confirm Montcalm's deep forebodings of the probable result of a battle. Then the incessant activity of the invaders, their pertinacious retention of any point which offered an apparent advantage, and their seemingly inexhaustible resources, showed that no stone would be left unturned for his destruction.
One only hope remained to the French general: the winter approached. In a few weeks the northern blast would scare away the stubborn enemy, against whom his arms and skill were ineffectual. Could he struggle on a little longer, the fate of Canada might be thrown upon the chances of another campaign, and a turn in European affairs yet preserve the splendid colony of France. "Unless Wolfe lands above the town, and forces me to a battle, I am safe," writes Montcalm. But while, on the night of the 12th of September, he watched in confident expectation the deceitful preparations of the fleet below the town, the ebbing tide silently floated down the British army toward that position the occupation of which he knew must be his ruin.