stop the perfect co-operation between the two halves of
the single United Service. 'The Admiral and General,'
wrote Wolfe, 'have carried on the public service with
great harmony, industry, and union. Mr Boscawen has given
all, and even more than we could ask of him. He has
furnished arms and ammunition, pioneers, sappers, miners,
gunners, carpenters, and boats.'

While Wolfe was doing his eight days' work of preparation
at the Lighthouse Battery, between the 12th and the 20th,
Amherst, whose favourite precept was 'slow and sure,'
was performing an even more arduous task by building a
road from Flat Point to where he intended to make his
trenches. This road meandered over the least bad line
that could be found in that country of alternate rock,
bog, sand, scrub, bush, and marshy ponds. The working
party was always a thousand strong, and shifts, of course,
were constant. Boscawen landed marines to man the works
along the shore, and bluejackets for any handy-man's job
required. This proved of great advantage to the army,
which had so many more men set free for other duties.
The landing of stores went on from sunrise to sunset,
whenever the pounding surf calmed down enough. Landing
the guns was, of course, much harder still. It accounted
for most of the hundred boats that were dashed to pieces
against that devouring shore.

Thorough and persistent as this work was, however, it
gave the garrison of Louisbourg little outward sign of
what was happening just beyond the knolls and hillocks.