The Boston Puritans joyfully pillaged the church at Port
Royal, and overturned the high altar and the images. The booty
was considerable and by the end of May Phips, a prosperous hero,
was back in Boston.
Boston was aflame with zeal to go on and conquer Canada. By the
middle of August Phips had set out on the long sea voyage to
Quebec, with twenty-two hundred men, a great force for a colonial
enterprise of that time, and in all some forty ships. The voyage
occupied more than two months. Apparently the hardy
carpenter-sailor, able enough to carry through a difficult
undertaking with a single ship, lacked the organizing skill to
manage a great expedition. He performed, however, the feat of
navigating safely with his fleet the treacherous waters of the
lower St. Lawrence. On the morning of October 16, 1690, watchers
at Quebec saw the fleet, concerning which they had already been
warned, rounding the head of the Island of Orleans and sailing
into the broad basin. Breathless spectators counted the ships.
There were thirty-four in sight, a few large vessels, some mere
fishing craft.
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