FRONTENAC'S LAST DAYS
Though the English might withdraw from Quebec, New France
always had the Iroquois with her. We must now pursue the
thread of Frontenac's dealings with the savages from the
moment when he replaced Denonville.
It requires no flight of the imagination to appreciate
the rage Frontenac must have felt when, on returning to
Canada, he saw before his eyes the effects of La Barre's
rapacity and Denonville's perfidy, of which the massacres
of Lachine and La Chesnaye furnished the most ghastly
proofs. But in these two cases the element of tragedy
was so strong as to efface the mood of exasperation.
There remained a third incident which must have provoked
pure rage. This was the destruction of Fort Frontenac,
blown up, at Denonville's order, by the French themselves
(October 1689). The erection and maintenance of this post
had been a cardinal point in Frontenac's Indian policy;
and, more particularly to aggravate the offence, there
was the humiliating fact that Denonville had ordered it
demolished to comply with a demand from the Iroquois.
This shameful concession had been made shortly before
Frontenac reached Canada. It was Denonville's last
important act in the colony. On the chance that something
might have occurred to delay execution of the order,
Frontenac at once countermanded it and sent forward an
expedition of three hundred men. But they were too late.
His beloved fortress was gone. The only comfort which
Frontenac could derive from the incident was that the
work of destruction had been carried out imperfectly.
There remained a portion of the works which could still
be used.
Thus with regard to the Iroquois the situation was far
worse in 1689 than it had been when Frontenac came to
Canada in 1672. Everything which he had done to conciliate
the Five Nations had been undone; and Dongan's intelligent
activities, coinciding with this long series of French
mistakes, had helped to make matters worse. Nor was it
now merely a question of the Iroquois. The whole Indian
world had been convulsed by the renewal of strife between
Onontio and the Five Nations. Tribes long friendly to
the French and in constant trade with them were being
alienated. The Indian problem as Frontenac saw it in 1690
resolved itself to this: either peace with the Iroquois
on terms which would prove impressive to the Hurons, the
Ottawas, and even to the savages of the Mississippi; or
else uncompromising war. For under no circumstances could
the French afford to lose their hold upon the tribes from
whom they derived their furs.
Obviously an honourable peace would be preferable to the
horrors of a forest war, and Frontenac did his best to
secure it. To undo, as far as possible, Denonville's
treachery at Fort Frontenac and elsewhere, he had brought
back with him to Quebec the Iroquois who had been sent
to France--or such of them as were still alive. First
among these was a Cayuga chief of great influence named
Ourehaoue, whose friendship Frontenac assiduously cultivated
and completely won. Towards the close of January 1690 an
embassy of three released Iroquois carried to Onondaga
a message from Ourehaoue that the real Onontio had returned
and peace must be made with him if the Five Nations wished
to live. A great council was then held at which the
English, by invitation, were represented, while the French
interest found its spokesman in a Christian Iroquois
named Cut Nose. Any chance of success was destroyed by
the implacable enmity of the Senecas, who remembered the
attempt of the French to check their raids upon the
Illinois and the invasion of their own country by
Denonville. Cannehoot, a Seneca chieftain, rose and stated
that the tribes of Michilimackinac were ready to join
the English and the Iroquois for the destruction of New
France; and the assembly decided to enter this triple
alliance. Frontenac's envoys returned to Quebec alive,
but with nothing to show for their pains. A later effort
by Frontenac was even less successful. The Iroquois, it
was clear, could not be brought back to friendship by
fair words.
War to the knife being inevitable, Frontenac promptly
took steps to confirm his position with the hitherto
friendly savages of the Ottawa and the Great Lakes. When
Cannehoot had said that the tribes of Michilimackinac
were ready to turn against the French, he was not drawing
wholly upon his imagination. This statement was confirmed
by the report of Nicolas Perrot, who knew the Indians of
the West as no one else knew them--save perhaps Du Lhut
and Carheil. [Footnote: Etienne de Carheil was the most
active of the Jesuit missionaries in Canada during the
period of Frontenac. After fifteen years among the Iroquois
at Cayuga (1668-83) he returned for three years to Quebec.
He was then sent to Michilimackinac, Where he remained
another fifteen years. Shortly after the founding of
Detroit (1701) he gave up life in the forest. Despite
the great hardships which he endured, he lived to be
ninety-three. None of the missionaries was more strongly
opposed to the brandy trade.]
The French were now playing a desperate game in the vast
region beyond Lake Erie, which they had been the first
of Europeans to explore. The Ottawas and the Hurons,
while alike the hereditary foes of the Iroquois, were
filled with mutual jealousy which must be composed. The
successes of the Iroquois in their raids on the French
settlements must be explained and minimized. 'The Rat'
Kondiaronk, the cleverest of the western chieftains, must
be conciliated. And to compass all these ends, Perrot
found his reliance in the word that Frontenac had returned
and would lead his children against the common foe.
Meanwhile, the Iroquois had their own advocates among
the more timid and suspicious members of these western
tribes. During the winter of 1689-90 the French and the
Iroquois had about an even chance of winning the Indians
who centred at Michilimackinac. But the odds were against
the French to this extent--they were working against a
time limit. Unless Frontenac could quickly show evidence
of strength, the tribes of the West would range with the
Iroquois.
In the spring of 1690 Frontenac dispatched a force of a
hundred and fifty men to reinforce the garrison at
Michilimackinac. On their way westward these troops
encountered a band of Iroquois and fortunately killed a
number of them. The scalps were an ocular proof of success;
and Perrot, who was of the party, knew how to turn the
victory to its best use by encouraging the Ottawas to
torture an Iroquois prisoner. The breach thus made between
the Ottawas and the Five Nations distinctly widened as
soon as word came that the French had destroyed Schenectady.
Thus this dreadful raid against the English did not fail
of its psychological effect, as may be gathered from one
of the immediate consequences. Early in August there
appeared on Lake St Louis a vast flotilla of canoes,
which at first caused the afflicted habitants to fear
that the Iroquois were upon them again. Instead of this
it was a great band of friendly savages from the West,
drawn from all the trading tribes and bringing a cargo
of furs of far more than the usual value. Frontenac
himself chanced to be in Montreal at this fortunate
moment. The market was held and concluded to mutual
satisfaction, but the crowning event of the meeting was
a council, at which, after an exchange of harangues,
Frontenac entered into the festivities of the savages as
though he were one of themselves (August 1690). The
governor's example was followed by his leading officers.
Amid the chanting of the war-song and the swinging of
the tomahawk the French renewed their alliance with the
Indians of the West. All were to fight until the Iroquois
were destroyed. Even the Ottawas, who had been coquetting
with the Senecas, now came out squarely and said that
they would stand by Onontio.
Here, at last, was a real answer to the Lachine massacre.
The challenge had been fairly given, and now it was not
a Denonville who made the reply. There followed three
years of incessant warfare between the Iroquois and the
French, which furnished a fair test of the strength that
each side could muster when fighting at its best. The
Five Nations had made up their minds. The cares of
diplomacy they threw to the winds. They were on the
war-path, united and determined. The French, on their
side, had Frontenac for leader and many outrages to
avenge. It was war of the wilderness in its most unrelenting
form, with no mercy expected or asked. The general result
can be quickly stated. The Iroquois got their fill of
war, and Frontenac destroyed their power as a central,
dominating, terrorizing confederacy.
The measure of this achievement is to be sought in the
difficulties which were overcome. Despite the eighty
years of its existence the colony was still so poor that
regularity in the arrival of supplies from France was a
matter of vital importance. From the moment war began
English cruisers hovered about the mouth of the St
Lawrence, ready to pounce upon the supply-ships as they
came up the river. Sometimes the French boats escaped;
sometimes they were captured; but from this interruption
of peaceful oversea traffic Canada suffered grievously.
Another source of weakness was the interruption of
agriculture which followed in the train of war. As a rule
the Iroquois spent the winter in hunting deer, but just
as the ground was ready for its crop they began to show
themselves in the parishes near Montreal, picking off
the habitants in their farms on the edge of the forest,
or driving them to the shelter of the stockade. These
forays made it difficult and dangerous to till the soil,
with a corresponding shrinkage in the volume of the crop.
Almost every winter famine was imminent in some part of
the colony, and though spring was welcome for its own
sake, it invariably brought the Iroquois. A third calamity
was the interruption of the fur trade. Ordinarily the
great cargoes descended the Ottawa in fleets of from one
hundred to two hundred canoes. But the savages of the
West well knew that when they embarked with their precious
bales upon a route which was infested by the Iroquois,
they gave hostages to fortune. In case of a battle the
cargo was a handicap, since they must protect it as well
as themselves. In case they were forced to flee for their
lives, they lost the goods which it had cost so much
effort to collect. In these circumstances the tribes of
Michilimackinac would not bring down their furs unless
they felt certain that the whole course of the Ottawa
was free from danger. In seasons when they failed to
come, the colony had nothing to export and penury became
extreme. At best the returns from the fur trade were
precarious. In 1690 and 1693 there were good markets; in
1691 and 1692 there were none at all.
From time to time Frontenac received from France both
money and troops, but neither in sufficient quantity to
place him where he could deal the Iroquois one final
blow. Thus one year after another saw a war of skirmishes
and minor raids, sufficiently harassing and weakening to
both sides, but with results which were disappointing
because inconclusive. The hero of this border warfare is
the Canadian habitant, whose farm becomes a fort and
whose gun is never out of reach. Nor did the men of the
colony display more courage than their wives and daughters.
The heroine of New France is the woman who rears from
twelve to twenty children, works in the fields and cooks
by day, and makes garments and teaches the catechism in
the evening. It was a community which approved of early
marriage--a community where boys and girls assumed their
responsibilities very young. Youths of sixteen shouldered
the musket. Madeleine de Vercheres was only fourteen when
she defended her father's fort against the Iroquois with
a garrison of five, which included two boys and a man of
eighty (October 1692).
A detailed chronicle of these raids and counter-raids
would be both long and complicated, but in addition to
the incidents which have been mentioned there remain
three which deserve separate comment--Peter Schuyler's
invasion of Canada in 1691, the activities of the Abnakis
against New England, and Frontenac's invasion of the
Onondaga country in 1696.
We have already seen that in 1690 an attempt was made by
John Schuyler to avenge the massacre at Schenectady. The
results of this effort were insignificant, but its purpose
was not forgotten; and in 1691 the Anglo-Dutch of the
Hudson attempted once more to make their strength felt
on the banks of the St Lawrence. This time the leader
was Peter Schuyler, whose force included a hundred and
twenty English and Dutch, as against the forty who had
attacked Canada in the previous summer. The number of
Indian allies was also larger than on the former occasion,
including both Mohawks and Mohegans. Apart from its
superior numbers and much harder fighting, the second
expedition of the English was similar to the first. Both
followed Lake Champlain and the Richelieu; both reached
Laprairie, opposite Montreal; both were forced to retreat
without doing any great damage to their enemies. There
is this notable difference, however, that the French were
in a much better state of preparation than they had been
during the previous summer. The garrison at Laprairie
now numbered above seven hundred, while a flying squadron
of more than three hundred stood ready to attack the
English on their retreat to the Richelieu. On the whole,
Schuyler was fortunate to escape as lightly as he did.
Forty of his party were killed in a hot battle, but he
made his retreat in good order after inflicting some
losses on the French (August 1, 1691). Although Schuyler's
retreat was skilfully conducted, his original object had
been far more ambitious than to save his men from
extermination. The French missed a chance to injure their
foe more seriously than they had done at Schenectady. At
the same time, this second English invasion was so far
from successful that the New France of Frontenac suffered
no further attack from the side of Albany.
While Callieres and Valrennes were repulsing Peter Schuyler
from Laprairie, the French in another part of Frontenac's
jurisdiction were preparing for the offensive. The centre
of this activity was the western part of Acadia--that
is, the large and rugged region which is watered by the
Penobscot and the Kennebec. Here dwelt the Abnakis, a
tribe of Algonquin origin, among whom the Jesuits had
established a mission and made many converts. Throughout
Acadia the French had established friendly relations with
the Indians, and as the English settlements began to
creep from New Hampshire to the mouth of the Kennebec,
the interval between the rival zones of occupation became
so narrow as to admit of raiding. Phips's capture of Port
Royal had alarmed some of the Abnakis, but most of them
held fast to the French connection and were amenable to
presents. It soon proved that all they needed was
leadership, which was amply furnished by the Baron de
Saint-Castin and Father Thury.
Saint-Castin was a very energetic French trader, of noble
birth, who had established himself at Pentegoet on
Penobscot Bay--a point which, after him, is now called
Castine. Father Thury was the chief of the mission priests
in the western part of Acadia, but though an ecclesiastic
he seems to have exalted patriotism above religion. That
he did his best to incite his converts against the English
is beyond question. Urged on by him and Saint-Castin,
the savages of the Penobscot and the Kennebec proceeded
with enthusiasm to destroy the English settlements which
lay within their reach. In the course of successive raids
which extended from 1692 to 1694 they descended upon
York, Wells, and Oyster Bay, always with the stealth and
swiftness which marked joint operations of the French
and Indians. The settlements of the English were sacked,
the inhabitants were either massacred or carried into
captivity, and all those scenes were re-enacted which
had marked the success of Frontenac's three war-parties
in 1690. Thus New England was exposed to attack from the
side of Acadia no less than from that of Canada.
Incidentally Canada and Acadia were drawn into closer
connection by the vigour which Frontenac communicated to
the war throughout all parts of his government.
But the most vivid event of Frontenac's life after the
defence of Quebec against Phips was the great expedition
which he led in person against the Onondagas. It was an
exploit which resembles Denonville's attack upon the
Senecas, with the added interest that Frontenac was in
his seventy-seventh year when he thus carried the war
into the heart of the enemy's country. As a physical tour
de force this campaign was splendid, and it enables us,
better than any other event, to appreciate the magnificent
energy which Frontenac threw into the fulfilment of his
task. With over two thousand men, and an equipment that
included cannon and mortars, he advanced from the south
shore of Lake Ontario against the chief stronghold of
the Iroquois. At the portage the Indians would not permit
their aged, indomitable Onontio to walk, but insisted
that he should remain seated in his canoe, while they
carried it from the pool below the fall to the dead water
above. All the French saw of the stronghold they had come
to attack was the flame which consumed it. Following the
example of the Senecas, the Onondagas, when they saw that
the invader was at hand, set fire to their palisade and
wigwams, gathered up what property was portable, and took
to the woods. Pursuit was impossible. All that could be
done was to destroy the corn and proceed against the
settlement of the Oneidas. After this, with its maize,
had been consumed, Frontenac considered whether he should
attack the Cayugas, but he decided against this extension
of the campaign. Unlike Denonville, he was at war with
the English as well as with the Iroquois, and may have
thought it imprudent to risk surprise at a point so far
from his base. While it was disappointing that the
Onondagas did not wait to be destroyed by the cannon
which with so much effort had been brought against them,
this expedition was a useful proof of strength and produced
a good moral effect throughout the colony as well as
among the western tribes.
The events of 'William and Mary's War,' as it was known
in New England, show how wide the French zone in North
America had come to be. Frontenac's province extended
from Newfoundland to the Mississippi, from Onondaga to
Hudson Bay. The rarest quality of a ruler is the power
to select good subordinates and fill them with his own
high spirit. Judged by this standard Frontenac deserves
great praise, for he never lacked capable and loyal
lieutenants. With Callieres at Montreal, Tonty on the
Mississippi, Perrot and Du Lhut at Michilimackinac,
Villebon and Saint-Castin in Acadia, Sainte-Helene at
the siege of Quebec, and Iberville at Hudson Bay, he was
well supported by his staff. At this critical moment the
shortcomings of the French in America were certainly not
due to lack of purpose or driving power. The system under
which they worked was faulty, and in their extremity they
resorted to harsh expedients. But there were heroes in
New France, if courage and self-sacrifice are the essence
of heroism.
The Peace of Ryswick, which was signed in the year after
Frontenac's campaign against the Onondagas, came as a
happy release to Canada (1697). For nine years the colony
had been hard pressed, and a breathing space was needed.
The Iroquois still remained a peril, but proportionately
their losses since 1689 had been far heavier than those
of the French and English. Left to carry on the war by
themselves, they soon saw the hopelessness of their
project to drive the French from the St Lawrence. The
English were ready to give them defensive assistance,
even after word came from Europe that peace had been
signed. In 1698 the Earl of Bellomont, then governor of
New York, wrote Frontenac that he would arm every man in
his province to aid the Iroquois if the French made good
their threat to invade once more the land of the Five
Nations. Frontenac, then almost on his death-bed, sent
back the characteristic reply that this kind of language
would only encourage him to attack the Iroquois with the
more vigour. The sequel shows that the English at Albany
overplayed their part. The reward of their protection
was to be suzerainty, and at this price protection proved
unacceptable to the Iroquois, whose safety lay in the
equipoise of power between the rival whites. Three years
later the Five Nations renewed peace with Onontio; and,
though Frontenac did not live to see the day, he it was
who had brought it to pass. His daring and energy had
broken the spirit of the red man. In 1701 Callieres, then
governor of New France, held a great council at Montreal,
which was attended by representatives from all the Indian
tribes of the West as well as from the Iroquois. There,
amid all the ceremonies of the wilderness, the calumet
was smoked and the hatchet was interred.
But the old warrior was then no more. On returning to
Quebec from his war against the Onondagas he had thrown
himself into an active quarrel with Champigny, the
intendant, as to the establishment and maintenance of
French posts throughout the West. To the last Frontenac
remained an advocate of the policy which sought to place
France in control of the Great Lakes and the Mississippi.
Champigny complained of the expense and the Jesuits
lamented the immorality which life in the forest encouraged
among young men. It was an old quarrel renewed under
conditions which Made the issue more important than ever,
for with open war between French and English it became
of vital moment to control points which were, or might
be, strategic.
This dispute with Champigny was the last incident in
Frontenac's stormy life. It remains to the credit of both
governor and intendant that their differences on matters
of policy did not make them irreconcilable enemies. On
the 28th of November 1698 Frontenac died at the Chateau
St Louis after an illness of less than a month. He had
long been a hero of the people, and his friendship with
the Recollets shows that he had some true allies among
the clergy. No one in Canada could deny the value of his
services at the time of crisis--which was not a matter
of months but of years. Father Goyer, of the Recollets,
delivered a eulogy which in fervour recalls Bossuet's
funeral orations over members of the royal family. But
the most touching valedictory was that from Champigny,
who after many differences had become Frontenac's friend.
In communicating to the Colonial Office tidings of the
governor's death, Champigny says: 'On the 28th of last
month Monsieur le Comte de Frontenac died, with the
sentiments of a true Christian. After all our disputes,
you will hardly believe, Monseigneur, how truly and deeply
I am touched by his death. He treated me during his
illness in a manner so obliging that I should be utterly
devoid of gratitude if I did not feel thankful to him.'
There is a well-known portrait of Madame de Frontenac,
which may still be seen at Versailles. Of Frontenac
himself no portrait whatever exists. Failing his likeness
from brush or pencil, we must image to ourselves as best
we may the choleric old warrior who rescued New France
in her hour of need. In seeking to portray his character
the historian has abundant materials for the period of
his life in Canada, though we must regret the dearth of
information for the years which separate his two terms
of office. There is also a bad gap in our sources for
the period which precedes his first appointment as
governor. What we have from Madame de Montpensier and
Saint-Simon is useful, but their statements are far from
complete and provoke many questions which must remain
unanswered. His letters and reports as governor of Canada
exist in considerable numbers, but it must remain a source
of lasting regret that his private correspondence has
perished.
Some one has said that talent should be judged at its
best and character at its worst; but this is a phrase
which does not help us to form a true estimate of Frontenac.
He touched no heights of genius and he sank to no depths
of crime. In essential respects his qualities lie upon
the surface, depicted by his acts and illustrated by his
own words or those of men who knew him well. Were we
seeking to set his good traits against his bad, we should
style him, in one column, brave, steadfast, daring,
ambitious of greatness, far-sighted in policy; and in
the other, prodigal, boastful, haughty, unfair in argument,
ruthless in war. This method of portraiture, however, is
not very helpful. We can form a much better idea of
Frontenac's nature by discussing his acts than by throwing
adjectives at him.
As an administrator he appears to least advantage during
his first term of office, when, in the absence of war,
his energies were directed against adversaries within
the colony. Had he not been sent to Canada a second
time, his feud with Laval, Duchesneau, and the Jesuits
would fill a much larger space in the canvas than it
occupies at present. For in the absence of great deeds
to his credit obstinacy and truculence might have been
thought the essentials rather than the accidents of his
character. M. Lorin, who writes in great detail, finds
much to say on behalf of Frontenac's motives, if not of
his conduct, in these controversies. But viewing his
career broadly it must be held that, at best, he lost a
chance for useful co-operation by hugging prejudices and
prepossessions which sprang in part from his own love of
power and in part from antipathy towards the Jesuits in
France. He might not like the Jesuits, but they were a
great force in Canada and had done things which should
have provoked his admiration. In any case, it was his
duty to work with them on some basis and not dislocate
the whole administration by brawling. As to Duchesneau,
Frontenac was the broader man of the two, and may be
excused some of the petulance which the intendant's
pin-pricks called forth.
Frontenac's enemies were fond of saying that he used his
position to make illicit profits from the fur trade.
Beyond question he traded to some extent, but it would
be harsh to accuse him of venality or peculation on the
strength of such evidence as exists. There is a strong
probability that the king appointed him in the expectation
that he would augment his income from sources which lay
outside his salary. Public opinion varies from age to
age regarding the latitude which may be allowed a public
servant in such matters. Under a democratic regime the
standard is very different from that which has existed,
for the most part, under autocracies in past ages.
Frontenac was a man of distinction who accepted an
important post at a small salary. We may infer that the
king was willing to allow him something from perquisites.
If so, his profits from the fur trade become a matter of
degree. So long as he kept within the bounds of reason
and decency, the government raised no objection. Frontenac
certainly was not a governor who pillaged the colony to
feather his own nest. If he took profits, they were not
thought excessive by any one except Duchesneau. The king
recalled him not because he was venal, but because he
was quarrelsome.
Assuming the standards of his own age, a reasonable plea
can also be made on Frontenac's behalf respecting the
conduct of his wars. 'Man's inhumanity to man makes
countless thousands mourn' in our own day no less than
in the seventeenth century; while certain facts of recent
memory are quite lurid enough to be placed in comparison
with the border raids which, under Frontenac, were made
by the French and their Indian allies. It is dreadful to
know that captured Iroquois were burned alive by the
French, but after the Lachine massacre and the tortures
which French captives endured, this was an almost inevitable
retaliation. The concluding scenes of King Philip's War
prove, at any rate, that the men of New England exercised
little more clemency towards their Indian foes than was
displayed by the French. The Puritans justified their
acts of carnage by citations from the Old Testament
regarding the Canaanites and the Philistines. The most
bitter chronicler of King Philip's War is William Hubbard,
a Calvinist pastor of Ipswich. On December 19, 1675, the
English of Massachusetts and Connecticut stormed the
great stronghold of the Narragansetts. To quote John
Fiske: 'In the slaughter which filled the rest of that
Sunday afternoon till the sun went down behind a dull
gray cloud, the grim and wrathful Puritan, as he swung
his heavy cutlass, thought of Saul and Agag, and spared
not. The Lord had delivered up to him the heathen as
stubble to his sword. As usual the number of the slain
is variously estimated. Of the Indians probably not less
than a thousand perished.'
For the slaughter of English women and children by French
raiders there was no precedent or just provocation. Here
Frontenac must be deemed more culpable than the Puritans.
The only extenuating circumstance is that those who
survived the first moments of attack were in almost all
cases spared, taken to Canada, and there treated with
kindness.
Writers of the lighter drama have long found a subject
in the old man whose irascibility is but a cloak for
goodness of heart. It would be an exaggeration to describe
Frontenac as a character of this type, for his wrath
could be vehement, and benevolence was not the essential
strain in his disposition. At the same time, he had many
warm impulses to his credit. His loyalty to friends stands
above reproach, and there are little incidents which show
his sense of humour. For instance, he once fined a woman
for lampooning him, but caused the money to be given to
her children. Though often unfair in argument, he was by
nature neither mean nor petty. In ordinary circumstances
he remembered noblesse oblige, and though boastfulness
may have been among his failings, he had a love of
greatness which preserved him from sordid misdemeanours.
Even if we agree with Parkman that greatness must be
denied him, it yet remains to be pointed out that absolute
greatness is a high standard attained by few. Frontenac
was a greater man than most by virtue of robustness,
fire, and a sincere aspiration to discharge his duty as
a lieutenant of the king.
He doubtless thought himself ill-used in that he lacked
the wealth which was needed to accomplish his ambitions
at court. But if fortune frowned upon him at Versailles,
she made full compensation by granting him the opportunity
to govern Canada a second time. As he advanced in years
his higher qualities became more conspicuous. His vision
cleared. His vanities fell away. There remained traces
of the old petulance; but with graver duties his stature
increased and the strong fibre of his nature was disclosed.
For his foibles he had suffered much throughout his whole
life. But beneath the foibles lay courage and resolve.
It was his reward that in the hour of trial, when upon
his shoulders rested the fate of France in America, he
was not found wanting.
BIBLIOGRAPHICAL NOTE
Of the literature on Frontenac and his period the greater
part is in French. The books in English to which attention
may be specially called are:
Parkman, Francis: 'Count Frontenac and New France
under Louis XIV.'
Le Sueur, William Dawson: 'Count Frontenac' in the
'Makers of Canada' series.
Winsor, Justin: 'Cartier to Frontenac.'
Stewart, George: 'Frontenac and his Times' in the
'Narrative and Critical History of America,' edited
by Justin Winsor, vol. iv.
In French the most important works are:
Lorin, Henri: 'Le Comte de Frontenac.'
Myrand, Ernest: 'Frontenac et ses Amis; Phips devant
Quebec.'
Rochemonteix, Le Pere Camille de: 'Les Jesuites et la
Nouvelle France,' vol. iii.
Gosselin, L'Abbe: 'La Vie de Mgr Laval.'
Sulte, B.: 'Histoire des Canadiens-Francais.'
Ferland, L'Abbe: 'Cours d'Histoire du Canada.'
Faillon, L'Abbe: 'Histoire de la Colonie Francaise en
Canada,' vol. iii.
Gagnon, Ernest: 'Le Fort et le Chateau Saint-Louis.'
Garneau, F.-X.: 'Histoire du Canada,' edited by Hector
Garneau.
Among the original sources for this period the following
are likely to be found in any large library:
'Jugements et Deliberations du Conseil Souverain.'
'Edits et Ordonnances.'
'Relations des Jesuites.' Ed. Thwaites.
'Memoires et Documents pour servir a l'histoire des
origines francaises des pays d'outre-mer,'
ed. P. Margry.
'Les Lettres de La Hontan.'
'Histoire de l'Hotel-Dieu de Quebec, par la mere
Juchereau de Saint-Denis.'