But it looked hard enough, for
all that. Its alarm bells began to ring. Its signal cannon
fired. And all the people who had been living outside
hurried in behind the walls.
The New Englanders were so keen to land that they ran
some danger of falling into complete disorder. But
Pepperrell managed very cleverly. Seeing that some
Frenchmen were ready to resist a landing on Flat Point,
two miles south-west of Louisbourg, he made a feint
against it, drew their fire, and then raced his boats
for Freshwater Cove, another two miles beyond. Having
completely outdistanced the handful of panting Frenchmen,
he landed in perfect safety and presently scattered them
with a wild charge which cost them about twenty in killed,
wounded, and prisoners. Before dark two thousand Provincials
were ashore. The other two thousand landed at their
leisure the following day.
The next event in this extraordinary siege is one of the
curiosities of war. On May 14 the enthusiastic Vaughan
took several hundreds of these newly landed men to the
top of the nearest hillock and saluted the walls with
three cheers.
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