THE BATTLEFIELDS OF QUEBEC.

Wairarapa Age, Volume XXXI, Issue 9136, 8 July 1908, Page 4

THE BATTLEFIELDS OF QUEBEC.

Lord Crewe, the new Secretary of State for the Colonies, recently addressed a meeting in England on behalf of the Wolfe and Montcalm Memorial, which it is proposed to raise at Quebec, in connection with the dedication of the Heights of Abraham as a national park. There are many names of places all over the world the bare repetition of which thrills our minis with recollections of the great deeds of the past," said Lord Crewe. "But there are some few which are doubly Facred because they not only recall the memory of famous achieveme.iti, but also remind us of the passing away from this mortal scene of the spirits of those who planned and guided their execution. Such a name is Trafalgar, such is Lucknow, and such also is Quebec. I think it may fairly be said that, among all the histcric dramas of the past, there is none more complete in all its details, none, if I may use the phrase, more altogether satisfying than that which was played in Canada in the middle of the eighteenth century. Consider the two great protagonists of the light. There was Wolfe—a plain soldier, a young man, for he was not 33 when ho fell—personally not welcome to the governing clique at Home of courtiers and of courtier politicians, but one of the finest of British soldiers, and the man who, above all others of our national heroes, was cast in the same mould as our favourite hero uf all--1 mean, of course, Nelson. Opposed to him was Montcalm—a man glowing with the fire of his Southern blood, a scholar and a student, as Wolfe hin - self was, and altogether a specimen of one of the finest types that the world has ever shown —that of the noble French gentleman. Then, consider the two races, the two nations that were thus pitted against each other. They were well matched in the race of honour, and they were well matched also in victory—because we must never forget that, although the famous struggle of 1759

on the Heights of Abraham was a British victory, it was followed in the year following, bv the battle of Sainte Foye, which was as completely a victory for the French arms. These two nations are, we delight to think, now fused together under a common Government, and own a common loyalty."