THE SURVIVAL OF THE FITTEST 93 



in a thick fog so as to avoid exposure to fire from the 

 enemy's cannon. Thirteen years afterwards when Amherst 

 besieged Louisburg a second time he made use of eleven 

 thousand British regulars supplied with all possible equip- 

 ments, to accomplish results similar to what Pepperell se- 

 cured with his four thousand New England fishermen and 

 volunteer soldiery, supplied only with what scanty appara- 

 tus their own ingenuity could devise. 



For forty-nine days Louisburg was besieged closely by 

 land and by sea. At one time, fever and exposure placed 

 fifteen hundred of the besiegers on the sick list, yet they 

 toiled on with indomitable pluck and cheerfulness, "do- 

 ing the work oxen could not do, with no comfort but their 

 daily dram of New England rum." Nine thousand can- 

 non balls and six hundred bombs were fired into the French 

 entrenchments. Pepperell wrote that never was a place 

 more mauled with cannon and shells, nor does his- 

 tory give an account of troops behaving with greater cour- 

 age. 1 When the victorious New Englanders finally entered 

 the fortifications they first fully realized the stupendous 

 task they had undertaken and were astonished at their 

 own success. 



Thirty years afterwards a member stated in the House of 

 Commons that the colonists "took Louisburg from the 

 French single-handed, without any European assistance 

 as mettled an enterprise as any in our history an ever- 

 lasting memorial to the zeal, courage and troops of New 

 England." The historian Smollett regarded the capture 

 of Louisburg "the most important achievement of the war 

 of 1744," since the outcome of this New England expedi- 

 tion "proved the equivalent of all the success of the French 

 on the continent. ' ' 2 



The peace of Aix la Chapelle, in 1748, was dishonorable 



iParkman, II, p. 131. 



2 Smollett, History of England, III, p. 155. 



