The English privateersmen arrived in the St Lawrence in
July and took up their headquarters at Tadoussac. Already
they had captured several Basque fishing or trading
vessels. At Tadoussac they learned that at Cap Tourmente,
thirty miles below Quebec, there was a small farm from
which the garrison of Quebec drew supplies; and, as a
first effort to 'root out' the French, David Kirke decided
to loot and destroy this supply-post. A number of his
crew went in a fishing-boat, took the place by surprise,
captured its guard, plundered it, and killed the cattle.
When his men returned from the raid, Kirke dispatched
six of his Basque prisoners, with a woman and a little
girl, to Quebec. By one of them he sent a letter to
Champlain, demanding the surrender of the place in most
polite terms. 'By surrendering courteously,' he wrote,
'you may be assured of all kind of contentment, both for
your persons and your property, which, on the faith I
have in Paradise, I will preserve as I would mine own,
without the least portion in the world being diminished.'

Champlain replied to Kirke's demand with equal courtesy,
but bluntly refused to surrender. In his letter to the
English captain he said that the fort was still provided
with grain, maize, beans, and pease, which his soldiers
loved as well as the finest corn in the world, and that
by surrendering the fort in so good a condition, he should
be unworthy to appear before his sovereign, and should
deserve chastisement before God and men. As a matter of
fact this was untrue, for the French at Quebec were
starving and incapable of resistance. A single well-directed