GOVERNORSHIP OF M. DE LA BARRE
1682 TO 1685
The successors of Frontenac and Duchesneau received their appointments
in the month of May 1682, and arrived at Quebec towards the end of the
following September. They were, respectively, a military officer named
Lefebvre de la Barre who had served with some distinction in the West
Indies; and a man of whose previous career little or nothing is known,
one M. Jacques de Meulles. If the fault of Frontenac had been the
assumption of too much state and dignity, and the exercise of too much
self-will, the fault of La Barre was that he possessed too little
dignity and extremely little firmness of character. The recall of
Frontenac had practically been one more triumph for the ecclesiastical
authorities, who caused it to be understood that, if Duchesneau had also
been recalled, it was simply to save Frontenac from too open
humiliation. La Barre prudently determined, therefore, from the first
not to come into collision with the clergy, whatever else he might do.
On the other hand the Abbe Dudouyt writing from Paris, enjoins prudence
on the bishop, lest "it should seem as if he could not keep on good
terms with anybody." With such dispositions on both sides, it is not
surprising that, during the whole of La Barre's administration his
relations with the church were extremely harmonious. The Abbe Gosselin
says that he and Meulles "revived the happy times of the highly
Christian administration of M. de Tracy." The king, however, did not
view the situation with equal approval; the despatches of the period
show that he thought that deference to the views of the clergy was being
carried too far.
We have seen that, towards the close of Frontenac's administration, the
Indian situation was again becoming critical. The arrangement patched up
by him in the month of August was far from being of a very solid
character; and when La Barre assumed the reins of government he found a
widespread feeling of insecurity as to the continuance of peace. He
thought it prudent, therefore, to summon, as Frontenac had done
previously, a conference of persons specially competent to advise on the
Indian question. The meeting took place on the 10th of October at
Quebec, before Frontenac had left the country. He might, therefore, have
attended it, had he chosen; and we cannot help feeling surprised that he
did not. The general opinion expressed by those who took part in the
deliberations was that the Iroquois were planning hostilities, and that
the king should be asked to send out more troops. La Barre wrote home to
this effect; but the same vessel that bore his despatch carried the
returning ex-governor, who, on arriving in France, seems to have made it
his business to throw cold water on the appeal for help. It was
doubtless to Frontenac's interest to represent that he had left the
country in a peaceful and secure condition; but his conduct would appear
in a better light had he gone before the conference at Quebec, and there
explained, in the presence of those possessing local information, why he
considered that there was no danger. La Barre could then in writing to
the government have given his reasons and those of his advisers for
dissenting from the ex-governor's views, and the latter could honourably
have made his own representations to the court. As it was, the man who
had ceased to be responsible was allowed to thwart the policy of the
actual administrator on whom the whole responsibility for the safety of
the country rested. La Barre is not a man who attracts our admiration or
sympathy, but, in this matter at least, it is difficult to feel that he
received fair treatment.
Remembering all the trouble there had been between the former governor
and the intendant, La Barre hastens to inform the court that he and
Meulles are on the very best of terms. As they had scarcely been two
months in the country when this despatch was written, the announcement
seems a little hasty. Meulles on his part does not make any such
statement, and his letters of the following and subsequent years show
that he had not formed a very high opinion of his superior officer. He
complains that the meetings of the Sovereign Council are held in the
governor's own antechamber, amid the noise of servants going and coming
and the clatter of the guards in an adjoining room. The minister takes
no notice of this; and a year later Meulles returns to the charge,
stating that the governor held the meetings "in his own chimney corner
where his wife, his children and his servants were always in the way."
The intendant was a man of business, and liked to see things done in a
businesslike way. If he did not admire the disorderly methods of the
governor, neither did he approve of the dilatory methods of the council.
When matters were brought before him for adjudication he dealt with them
promptly; and, in his desire to save delays, he disposed of some cases
which the council considered as falling within its sole jurisdiction.
Frontenac, it will be remembered, had packed off young d'Auteuil, who
had been nominated by Duchesneau as attorney-general, to France to
justify, if he could, the conduct he had been pursuing. The youth had
come back a full-fledged attorney-general, and at once fell foul of the
intendant, accusing him of exceeding his powers. Meulles was a prudent
man and contrived to make his peace with the council. M. Lorin says
there was probably as much real dissension as in Frontenac's time, but
that it was hushed up. There is no evidence of this. Some dissension
there may have been; but La Barre was not as fiery as Frontenac, nor was
Meulles as intriguing as Duchesneau. The same elements of discord were,
therefore, not present.
We have seen that the court did not seem to take any serious notice of
the charges of trading reciprocally brought by Frontenac and Duchesneau
against one another; and in this matter La Barre appears to have assumed
from the first that for him there was an "open door." At a very early
period of his residence in the country, he formed intimate relations
with certain prominent traders; it soon became evident, indeed, that he
had placed himself and his policy largely in their hands. They were in
the main the same men with whom Frontenac had accused Duchesneau of
having underhand dealings, La Chesnaye, Lebert and one or two others.
According to Meulles, the governor not only carried on trade on his own
account contrary to the king's regulations, but trade in its most
illegal form, that is to say with the English. His Majesty's
representative found out without much trouble what the Indians were well
aware of, that the English paid a much better price for furs than could
be got in Canada from the king's farmers who controlled the fur trade of
the country. He talks freely indeed of the English in a despatch dated
in May 1683, and says that they both sell goods cheap to the Indians and
give them full price for their furs. It is a saying among the English,
he adds, that the French do not _trade_ with the Indians but _rob_ them.
It is no wonder he was anxious to send his own wares to so good a
market. If the intendant may be trusted, indeed the governor was
continually receiving at the chateau at Quebec Englishmen and Dutchmen
who were simply his agents at New York. La Hontan avers that he saw two
canoe loads of his stuff at Chambly on their way to that emporium.
A man so devoted to money-making as La Barre could hardly be expected to
take a very deep interest in the wider schemes of exploration and
territorial expansion which appealed to the imagination of a La Salle.
Possibly he thought he could curry favour with the court by disparaging
the achievements of the latter. In a despatch of the 30th May 1683 we
find him saying that he did not think much of the discovery of the mouth
of the Mississippi, and that in any case there was a great deal of
falsehood mixed up with the tales that were told of it. If the remark
was meant to please, it seems to have been successful, for the king in
his reply, under date 5th August following, says: "I am persuaded with
you that _Sieur de la Salle's discovery is very useless, and such
enterprises must be prevented hereafter_, as they tend only to debauch
the inhabitants by the hope of gain and to diminish the revenue from the
beaver." Could the power of official narrowness and banality go further?
A man, taking his life in his hand, penetrates forest and jungle,
commits himself to unknown waters, braves the encounter of hostile
peoples, takes the risk of treachery among his own followers, faces
every form of privation and all extremities of fatigue, travels a
thousand leagues, and adds a continent to the possessions of his
sovereign, only to have the verdict pronounced by that sovereign that
his discoveries are very useless, and that similar expeditions must be
prevented for the future lest the beaver trade of Ca Canada suffer!
La Salle's great discovery was made in the month of April 1682.
Returning northwards in the autumn, with the intention of proceeding to
France, and making a full report of his proceedings to the king, he
heard, on reaching Michilimackinac, that the Iroquois were preparing a
hostile movement against the Illinois. He determined at once to go back
with a picked body of men to protect his threatened allies. The news of
his discovery was therefore carried to France by the Recollet, Father
Zenobe, who reached Quebec just as the ships were leaving, and may
possibly have sailed in the same vessel as Frontenac. He does not seem
to have given any information, in passing, to La Barre. The latter was
expecting La Salle's return, and chose to put an unfavourable
construction on his failure to appear. In writing to the minister he
says that Fort Frontenac has been abandoned. The truth was that La Salle
had left it in charge of one La Forest, and that subsequently a cousin
of the explorer's, named Plet, had come from France to look after the
trade of the fort in the interest of the parties in France who had
advanced money for its construction and equipment. It is doubtful
whether the place was ever left even temporarily unoccupied; but
certainly La Salle had no intention of abandoning it. On the contrary,
not knowing of Frontenac's recall, he had written to him in October 1682
asking him to maintain La Forest in command and to let him have a
sufficient number of men for purposes of defence. What is singular is
that he does not appear to have given Frontenac any more information
regarding his discovery than Father Zenobe gave to La Barre. Possibly he
had some hope, as the latter hints, of organizing a separate government
in the new territory he had discovered. In no case, however, can La
Barre's proceedings towards him be justified. On the pretext that Fort
Frontenac had been abandoned, he took possession of it, and turned it,
if we are to credit Meulles, into a trading-post for himself and his
friends. He had a barque built there, professedly for the king's service
on the lake, but used it mainly, the intendant says, for his own trade.
La Salle spent the winter in the Illinois country. In the spring of 1683
he wrote to La Barre from his fort of St. Louis, announcing his
discovery, and expressing the hope that the kindly treatment which he
had always received from the previous governor would continue to be
extended to him. His financial affairs had for some time been in a very
unsatisfactory state, but he expected, he said, to be able in the course
of the then current year to place them on a sound footing, and prove
that he had not undertaken more than it was in his power to accomplish.
He had meantime sent men to Montreal for supplies, but these did not
return, nor did he get any reply from La Barre either to this letter or
to a later one written in June. Instead of replying, La Barre sent an
officer named Baugy to take possession of Fort St. Louis. La Salle, who
had started for Quebec, met Baugy on the way, and sent back word to his
men at the fort not to resist the seizure. Du Lhut, under instructions
from the governor, followed shortly after, confiscated the merchandise
stored in the fort, and brought it to Montreal. La Salle on arriving at
Quebec saw La Barre, and obtained from him restitution of Fort
Frontenac, but could not get any compensation for the loss he had
sustained through the interruption of his trading operations at that
point. He consequently proceeded to France in the fall of the year, and
in the course of the winter presented a full statement of the case to
the minister, M. de Seignelay. Only a few months before, the king had
expressed the opinion above quoted as to the uselessness, or worse than
uselessness, of such explorations as La Salle had been engaged in; but
when the explorer himself appeared upon the scene, a change came over
the views of the court. The king writes to the intendant that, not only
is the fort which the governor had wrongfully seized to be handed over
to La Salle, but that full reparation is to be made for all the loss
which he has sustained, and that the intendant is to see that this is
done. Writing to La Barre himself, the king informs him that he takes
La Salle under his particular protection, and cautions the governor not
to do anything against his interest. La Salle's agent, La Forest, is to
be placed in charge of Fort St Louis.
Settling down to business, as he did, almost immediately on his arrival
in the country, La Barre was naturally anxious that the persons to whom
he issued hunting and trading permits under the regulations established
in Frontenac's time should, as far as possible, be screened from
competition, and he therefore most ill-advisedly gave the Iroquois
tribes to understand that they might treat as they pleased any persons
found trading who were unprovided with permits signed by him. The
Iroquois, greatly pleased to have a pretext for such operations,
proceeded to plunder some canoes belonging to the governor's own
friends, who were still in the woods on the authority of permits issued
by Frontenac. This alarmed the governor not a little, and caused him, in
the spring of 1683, to send a special vessel to France with an earnest
request for military reinforcements. Worse news came to hand very
shortly after. La Salle's fort of St. Louis having been seized, the
governor wished to stock it with goods, and had despatched thither seven
canoe loads to the value of fifteen or sixteen thousand francs. As these
canoes were passing through the Illinois country, where the Iroquois
were on the war-path, the latter, who were not in a humour for fine
discrimination, seized them, explaining afterwards that they supposed
them to belong to La Salle, whose property they claimed to have the
governor's permission to plunder. La Barre writes to the king, under
date 5th June, in still stronger terms, and says that, with or without
reinforcements, he will move against the Senecas about the middle of
August. This was mere bluster, as no preparations had at that time been
made for a campaign. The king sent out one hundred and fifty men in
August; but these did not arrive till the 10th October. It was then
decided that war should be waged the following year. The intendant
appears to have agreed entirely with the governor that war was
inevitable; his chief fear seems to have been that the governor, in
whose stability of character he had very little confidence, would change
his mind on the subject, and fall back on some weak and futile scheme of
conciliation.
The winter of 1683-4 was not marked by any notable event. In the
following spring, pursuant to the plan which he had communicated to the
French government, the governor sent instructions to the post commanders
in the West, La Durantaye, Du Lhut, and Nicolas Perrot, to rendezvous at
Niagara with as many men of the different Ottawa tribes as they could
persuade to follow them. At that point they would find awaiting them
provisions, arms, and ammunition, with means of transportation to the
scene of action. Home levies of militia and of mission Indians were at
the same time being raised and equipped. At this stage of the
proceedings it occurred to La Barre that it would be a good thing to
inform the governor of New York, Colonel Dongan, of his intention to
make war upon the Senecas. The communication happened to be particularly
ill-timed. The English of Maryland and Virginia had been having their
own troubles with the Iroquois, who had made many destructive raids into
their territory; and in the early summer of 1684 Lord Howard of
Effingham, governor of Virginia, had gone to New York to consult with
the governor there as to the measures to be adopted, and thence had gone
on to Albany, Colonel Dongan accompanying him, to hold a conference with
the offending tribes--in this case the Oneidas, Onondagas, and Cayugas.
Delegates from the Mohawks, who had not broken the peace, were also
present; and one of them, Cadianne by name, made ample acknowledgment of
the wrongs done by his brethren of the other tribes, to whom he took the
opportunity of addressing some very severe and wholesome remarks.
Shortly afterwards delegates from the Senecas also arrived, when a
general treaty of peace and good-will was made between the Five Nations
on the one hand, and the English and their Indians on the other. It was
in the midst of these proceedings that Dongan received La Barre's
letter. He replied by saying that the King of England exercised
sovereignty over the whole Iroquois confederacy, and that if the Senecas
had committed the depredations complained of he would see that they
made reparation; he hoped that La Barre, in the interest of peace, would
refrain from invading British territory. He then took occasion of the
conference to inform the tribes of the French designs, his object being
to draw from them an acknowledgment of the sovereignty of the English
king in return for a promise of protection against the French. The
tribes, who had some time before requested that the arms of the Duke of
York (now James II) should be raised over their fortresses, consented to
this, but with the not altogether consistent proviso that they should
still be considered a free people. The subject was further debated at
the chief town of the Onondagas, the central nation of the confederacy,
a few weeks later. Dongan was represented by Arnold Viele, a Dutchman.
It happened that Charles Le Moyne of Montreal was also there, having
been sent by La Barre to invite the Onondagas to a conference, as well
as the Jesuit, Father Lamberville. Very little progress was made with
the diplomatic question; but the Seneca deputies expressed very savage
sentiments in regard to the French, promising themselves a feast of
French flesh as the result of the coming war.
This was in the month of August, and La Barre, at the head of an
expedition consisting of seven hundred Canadian militia, one hundred and
thirty regular troops, and two hundred Indians, had left Montreal on the
27th July, expecting to be joined by about one thousand Indian
auxiliaries from the north and west. It took about two weeks to reach
Fort Frontenac, where a delay of two or three weeks occurred, during
which time the army began to sicken. The heat was intense, and the camp
had been established on low malarial ground. La Barre himself became
dangerously ill. Finally a move was made to the southern side of Lake
Ontario, the army encamping at the mouth of what is now known as the
Salmon River, a little east of Oswego. The place at that time was known
by the ill-omened name of La Famine. In point of unwholesomeness the
place was quite as bad as Fort Frontenac; and a large part of the army
fell into a most deplorable condition of debility. Moreover, provisions
ran short, and those whom malaria and other diseases had spared were
face to face with hunger. Discontent was rife in the camp. All chance of
taking the offensive against the Senecas was at an end. La Barre's one
hope was that Charles Le Moyne's mission to the Onondagas had been
successful, and that, through the good offices of that tribe, he might
be able to make peace with some little show of honour. Most opportunely
Le Moyne arrived on the 3rd September, bringing with him a celebrated
Onondaga orator and politician named Ourouehati, otherwise known as
Grande Gueule, or, as Colden, historian of the Five Indian Nations, has
it, Garangula, together with twelve other deputies, eight of his own
people, two Oneidas, and two Cayugas. To conceal as far as possible his
real situation, La Barre had sent away his sick, and pretended to have
come with a mere escort, the body of his army being at Fort Frontenac.
Nevertheless, in his speech, while professing a desire for peace, he
threatened war unless complete satisfaction were rendered by the Senecas
and others for the mischief they had done, and pledges given for their
future good conduct. Perfectly informed as to the real weakness of the
French governor's position, Grande Gueule (Big Mouth) did not mince
matters in replying to him. He thanked Onontio for bringing back the
calumet of peace, and congratulated him that he had not dug up the
hatchet that had so often been red with the blood of his countrymen.
Onontio, he said, pretended to have come to smoke the calumet of peace,
but the pretence was false: he had come to make war, and would have done
so but for the sickness of his men. If the Iroquois had pillaged
Frenchmen, it was because the latter were carrying arms to the Illinois.
(This of course was not true as regards the seven canoes which the
governor and his friends had sent forward; but Big Mouth was a
diplomatist.) As regards conducting certain English traders to the
lakes, which was one of the points complained of by La Barre, they were
acting perfectly within their rights. They were free to go where they
pleased, and to take with them whom they pleased. They were also quite
justified in making war on the Illinois, who had hunted on their lands,
and would give no pledge to refrain from attacking them in future. In
this respect they had done less than the English and French, who had
dispossessed many tribes and made settlements in their country.
This was a forenoon's work. In the afternoon another session was held,
and the day concluded with the settlement of the terms of peace. La
Barre was not to attack the Senecas, and Big Mouth undertook that
reparation should be made for the acts of plunder committed. He refused
entirely to pledge his people to desist from war on the Illinois; they
would fight them to the death; and La Barre, notwithstanding what he had
said about the king's determination to protect his western children, was
obliged to give way. Next morning he broke up camp and set out on the
return journey. Sickness continued to plague his force, and eighty men
died on the way to Montreal.[25]
But this was not all. The commanders in the West had acted on their
orders to raise as many men as they could amongst the Indian allies in
the region of the Great Lakes, and to lead them to Niagara. Du Lhut and
La Durantaye had great difficulty in executing their task. Only the
Hurons seemed in the least disposed to move. Nicolas Perrot, however,
possessed more influence; and, mainly through his persuasions, a force
was gathered of about five hundred men, drawn from the Hurons, Ottawas,
and other neighbouring tribes. Accompanying these were about one hundred
Frenchmen of the _coureur de bois_ class, who in manners and customs
were at times hardly distinguishable from their native companions.
Having got the force together, the next thing to do was to start them
and keep them on the march. The commanders had a hard time of it:
certain accidents happened on the way which to the Indians were of evil
omen; and it was difficult to prevent whole bands from deserting.
Finally, however, the expedition reached Niagara just about the time
that La Barre was making terms with Big Mouth. They found there neither
provisions, nor arms, nor instructions. In a short time a sail appeared.
It was a boat sent by La Barre to tell them that he had made peace with
the Iroquois, and that they might go home. The indignation and disgust
of the warriors, the disappointment and mortification of the French
leaders, may be imagined. The Indian allies said they had been betrayed,
and expressed their opinion of the French in no measured terms. Some of
the more hot-headed ones urged that, as they had started on the
war-path, they should go on and attack the Senecas by themselves. Wiser
counsels prevailed. The chief men had not been eager for the war from
the first; and, calming the spirits of their followers, they induced
them to turn their faces homewards. Some of them had come a thousand
miles, and now that long journey had to be retraced with nothing
accomplished. It was a desperate blow to French influence in all the
region of the Great Lakes.
The only man who gave La Barre any comfort in these depressing
circumstances was Pere Lamberville, missionary among the Onondagas. This
amiable and kindly priest, who had written to Frontenac some valued
words of commendation when he was leaving the country, wrote to La Barre
to tell him that he had acted most wisely in making peace. So doubtless
he had, in comparison with making war just at that time; but none the
less the peace was one which made the colonists hang their heads with
shame. Meulles in his despatch to the minister did not help to put the
matter in a more favourable light. Speaking of the governor he said: "He
signed the peace just as he decided on the war, without consulting any
one but a few merchants; and he has uselessly expended forty-five
thousand francs, of which he alone will owe an account to the king." So
much severity on the intendant's part was hardly necessary; the facts
spoke for themselves; and the king, when they were brought to his
knowledge, wrote to the discomfited governor, under date the 10th March
1685, the following gently worded letter:--
"Monsieur de la Barre,--Having been informed that your years
make it impossible for you to support the fatigues inseparable
from your office of governor and lieutenant-general in Canada, I
send you this letter to acquaint you that I have selected M. de
Denonville to serve in your place; and my intention is that, on
his arrival, after resigning to him the command, with all
instructions concerning it, you embark for your return to
France."
Thus ended an administration that cannot be regarded as a happy or a
creditable one. In no respect was M. de la Barre on a level with the
office he held. He had no clear policy of his own, and was, therefore,
more or less, at the mercy of incompetent or interested advisers. As is
not uncommonly the case with such men, he was sometimes foolishly
impulsive. In a letter, dated 10th April 1684, the king expresses the
greatest surprise that the governor should have actually proposed to
hang, of his own authority, a colonist who was preparing to remove to
the English settlements. He reminds him that, except in military
matters, he possesses no judicial power whatever, and adds the sage
observation that the exercise of such constraint would certainly
increase the desire of the French inhabitants to go where they would
enjoy more liberty. In the matter of ecclesiastical policy, La Barre
failed to carry out the views of the king. His instructions were to
afford all the help in his power to the clergy in their efforts for the
good of the country, but to see that they did not extend their authority
beyond its proper bounds. In his first despatch he indulges in a little
criticism of the bishop for his delay in establishing permanent _cures_,
as desired by the king; but this is his sole exhibition of anything like
independence of the ecclesiastical power. There was a question pending
at the time as to the emoluments to be secured to the country _cures_;
and La Barre and Meulles are both blamed by the court for having allowed
the bishop to appropriate a larger amount out of the royal grant for
church purposes than the king had authorized or intended.
In the matter just referred to, however, the bishop may well have been
substantially in the right. He knew the country, its needs, and its
possibilities better than the king; and he had the interests both of his
clergy and of his people sincerely at heart. It seems a little
surprising that, just at this time, when his relations with the secular
power were so satisfactory, he should have formed the intention of
resigning the office which he had been so eager to obtain only a few
years before, and of confining himself to the oversight of the Seminary.
The explanation is to be found partly in the state of his health, and
partly in the expectation he entertained of being able to find a man to
replace him as bishop who would adopt and carry out all his views with
the utmost fidelity and exactness, and thus give him even greater
influence than he had had in the past. If a bishop alone could make
headway against all the opposition of the civil power, what might not be
expected of a bishop of sound opinions supported by such an ex-bishop as
Laval himself? With these views he sailed for France in the fall of
1684 to tender his resignation to the king; and, with these views also,
he not long afterwards recommended as his successor a pious ecclesiastic
of noble family, M. Jean Baptiste de la Croix Chevrieres de Saint
Vallier, who, though only thirty-two years of age, had already refused
two bishoprics. Once before Laval had chosen a man for his piety, M. de
Mezy, and it had not turned out well. The Reverend M. Gosselin, in his
life of Saint Vallier, says that the day of his nomination was a regular
"day of dupes." The appointment did not take place till the year 1688;
but meantime M. de Saint Vallier consented to go out to Canada in the
capacity of vicar-general, and make acquaintance with the diocese. Thus
it happened that he and the Marquis de Denonville, La Barre's successor,
came out together in the same ship, arriving at Quebec on the 1st August
1685. The vessel which brought the new governor was accompanied by two
others carrying troops to the number of three hundred. Fever broke out
on the way, as was so often the case in those days, and there were many
deaths. Amongst those who succumbed were two priests, who, in their
attendance on the sick, had caught the malady. Their fate inspired Saint
Vallier with intense regret that he had not taken passage on the same
vessel, so that he might have shared so glorious a death. The sentiment
seems strange on the part of a man at his time of life, just entering on
a career in which he might reasonably hope for long years of the most
exalted usefulness. He did not in fact die till the year 1727.
We have two accounts of the condition of Canada at this time; one from
the pen of the bishop designate, the other from that of the new governor
after a residence of a little over three months in the country. Strange
to say, the two do not in the very least agree. Saint Vallier sees
everything _couleur de rose_, and detects the odour of sanctity
everywhere. Denonville, on the contrary, sees license, insubordination,
idleness, luxury, debauchery, running riot throughout the land. "The
Canadian people," says Saint Vallier, "is, generally speaking, as devout
as the clergy is holy. One remarks among them something resembling the
disposition which we recognize and admire in the Christians of the early
centuries." Even in the distant settlements where a priest is rarely
seen, the people are constant in the practice of virtue, the fathers
making up for the lack of priests, so far as the training of their
children is concerned, "by their wise counsels and firm discipline."[26]
Denonville, just about the same time, undertakes to give the minister an
account of the disorders prevailing not only in the woods, but, as he
states, in the settlements as well. "These arise," he says, "from the
idleness of young persons, and the great liberty which fathers, mothers,
and guardians have for a long time given them of going into the forest
under pretence of hunting or trading. One great evil," he continues, "is
the infinite number of drinking-shops. . . . All the rascals and idlers
of the country are attracted into this business of tavern-keeping. They
never dream of tilling the soil; on the contrary, they deter other
inhabitants, and end by ruining them." Of the two pictures, it is
probable that the governor's was nearer the truth; though probably his
ascetic turn of mind led him to exaggerate the evils that existed. Saint
Vallier, when he came to the country as bishop in 1688, was not long in
discovering how greatly he had overrated the virtue and piety of the
inhabitants. He took an early opportunity of repairing his error as far
as possible by preaching a sermon on the sins which he found prevailing.
"We thought," he said, "before we knew our flock, that the Iroquois and
the English were the only wolves we had to fear; but, God having opened
our eyes, we are forced to confess that our most dangerous foes are
drunkenness, luxury, impurity, and slander." We cannot think very highly
of the judgment of a man who has to repudiate his own statements so
completely in regard to facts fully open to observation.
It is allowable, fortunately, to take a more favourable view of the
Canadian people than either the governor, or the bishop in his revised
opinion, expresses. They were careless and ease-loving, more fond of
adventure than of steady toil; they were vain and given to luxury; but
these qualities were in a large measure the result of the circumstances
in which they were placed and the general influences of the time. How
could they fail to be fond of adventure when incitements to it presented
themselves on every hand, and the rewards that it promised were so much
more tempting than those to be derived from the tillage of the soil? It
was human nature in those days to prefer the gun to the spade, and the
paddle to the scythe. If they were vain and fond of luxury and show, it
proceeded in part from innate taste, and in part from the example of
those above them, who, in turn, reflected the manners, the habits, and
the tone of the most luxurious court in Europe. It soon began to be
observed that a given class in Canada represented a higher degree of
refinement and culture than a similar class in European France. The
reason was that, in the vast spaces and free air of a new continent,
human nature had more scope for expansion; ambition was stirred; thought
and imagination were quickened. The old seed was germinating with new
power in a virgin soil. The people were gay, chivalrous, courteous, and
brave, with an underlying tenacity of purpose and power of industry
ready to be revealed in due season under more settled conditions of
life. That intemperance was a serious evil there can be no doubt; but
that, too, was more or less incidental to the times. The physique of the
people was good; and, if their moral habits were not all that their
spiritual guides could have wished, they were at least free from
serious corruption. In a word, the Canadians of that period lived, on
the whole, healthy lives, and were planting a hardy and enduring race on
the soil they had made their own.
[Footnote 25: Colden pithily sums up the result of the campaign in the
following words: "Thus a very chargeable and fatiguing expedition (which
was to strike terror of the French name into the stubborn hearts of the
Five Nations) ended in a scold between the French general and an old
Indian."]
[Footnote 26: Saint Vallier, _Etat present de l'Eglise et de la Colonie
Francaise_, p. 84.]