If we have sometimes to blush for the conduct of our allies, we can show that we are capable of better things ourselves; and if we can make reparation ever so little, you will not find us backward in doing it." This indeed seemed to be the feeling of those within the fort.
Although these men were Rangers, part of the band which had harassed them so sorely through the winter months, the garrison received them with open arms, ministered to their wants, and vied with one another in making them at home.
The influence of the venerable Abbe might have had something to do with this; but it was greatly due to the chivalry of the French nature, and to the eager desire to show kindness to those who had witnessed and suffered from that awful tragedy which had followed upon the surrender of Fort William Henry, which they felt to be a lasting disgrace to their cause.
Those of the officers who had been there averred that they could never forget the horror of those two days; and the French surgeon who had taken over the English sick and wounded, and yet saw them butchered before his eyes ere he could even call for help, had never been the same man since.
So when Fritz was able to rise from his bed and join his companions, he found himself in pleasant enough quarters, surrounded by friendly faces, and made much of by all in the fort.
He, being able to speak French fluently, made himself a great favorite with the men, and he enjoyed many long conversations with the Abbe, who was a man of much acumen and discernment, and saw more clearly the course which events were likely to take than did those amongst whom he lived.
From him Fritz learned that affairs in Canada were looking very grave.

There were constant difficulties arising between the various officials there, and the most gross corruption existed in financial affairs, so that there was a rottenness that was eating like a canker into the heart of the colony, despite its outward aspect of prosperity.

France was burdened by foreign wars and could do little for her dependencies beyond the sea; whilst England was beginning to awake from her apathy, and she had at her helm now a man who understood as no statesman there had done before him the value to her of these lands beyond the sea.
"I have always maintained," the Abbe would say, "that in spite of all her blunders, which blunders and tardinesses are still continuing, there is a spirit in your English colonies which will one day rise triumphant, and make you a foe to be feared and dreaded.

You move with the times; we stand still.

You teach and learn independence and self government; we depend wholly upon a King who cares little for us and a country that is engrossed in other matters, and has little thought to spend upon our perils and our troubles.