A half-century of conflict. France and England in North America. Part ...

78 A MAD SCHEME. [1745.unknown to Vauban, for confounding the devices ofthe enemy. He advised that two trustworthy personsshould cautiously walk together along the front ofthe French ramparts under cover of night, one ofthem carry'ing a mallet, with which he was to hammerthe ground at short intervals. The French sentinels,it seems to have been supposed, on hearing thismysterious thumping, would be so bewildered as togive no alarm. While one of the two partners wasthus employed, the other was to lay his ear to theground, which, as the adviser thought, would returna hollow sound if the artful foe had dug a mine underit ; and whenever such secret danger was detected, amark was to be set on the spot, to warn off thesoldiers.^Equally zealous, after another fashion, was theRev. Samuel Moody, popularly known as FatherMoody, or Parson Moody, minister of York andsenior chaplain of the expedition. Though aboutseventy years old, he was amazingly tough andsturdy. He still lives in the traditions of York asthe spiritual despot ofthe settlement and the uncompromisingguardian ofits manners and doctrine, predominatingover it like a rough little village pope.The comparison would have kindled his burningwrath, for he abhorred the Holy Father as anembodied Antichrist. Many are the stories told ofhim by the descendants of those who lived under hisrod, and sometimes felt its weight ; for he was known1 Belknap, Hist. New Hampshire, ii. 208.