The
French had halted where they stood, and, among them, the dead and
wounded were thickly strewn. All order and regularity had been lost
under that terrible fire, and, in three minutes, the line of advancing
soldiers was broken up into a disorderly shouting mob. Then Wolfe gave
the order to charge, and the British cheer, mingled with the wild yell
of the Highlanders, rose loud and fierce. The English regiments
advanced with levelled bayonets. The Highlanders drew their broadswords
and rushed headlong forward.
The charge was decisive. The French were swept helplessly before it,
and the battle was at an end, save that the scattered parties of
Canadians and Indians kept up, for some time, a fire from the bushes
and cornfields.
Their fire was heaviest on the British right, where Wolfe himself led
the charge, at the head of the Louisbourg Grenadiers. A shot shattered
his wrist. He wrapped his handkerchief around it and kept on. Another
shot struck him, but he still advanced. When a third pierced his
breast, he staggered and sat down. Two or three officers and men
carried him to the rear, and then laid him down, and asked if they
should send for a surgeon.
"There is no need," he said. "It is all over with me.
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