1673-1675.
Frontenac and Perrot.
La Salle • Fort Frontenac • Perrot • His Speculations • His Tyranny •
The Bush-rangers • Perrot revolts • Becomes alarmed • Dilemma of
Frontenac • Mediation of Fénelon • Perrot in Prison • Excitement of the
Sulpitians • Indignation of Fénelon • Passion of Frontenac • Perrot on
Trial • Strange Scenes • Appeal to the King • Answers of Louis XIV. and
Colbert • Fénelon rebuked.
Not long before Frontenac's arrival, Courcelle, his predecessor, went to
Lake Ontario with an armed force, in order to impose respect on the
Iroquois, who had of late become insolent. As a means of keeping them in
check, and at the same time controlling the fur trade of the upper
country, he had recommended, like Talon before him, the building of a
fort near the outlet of the lake. Frontenac at once saw the advantages
of such a measure, and his desire to execute it was stimulated by the
reflection that the proposed fort might be made not only a safeguard to
the colony, but also a source of profit to himself.
At Quebec, there was a grave, thoughtful, self-contained young man, who
soon found his way into Frontenac's confidence. There was between them
the sympathetic attraction of two bold and energetic spirits; and though
Cavelier de la Salle had neither the irritable vanity of the count, nor
his Gallic vivacity of passion, he had in full measure the same
unconquerable pride and hardy resolution. There were but two or three
men in Canada who knew the western wilderness so well. He was full of
schemes of ambition and of gain; and, from this moment, he and Frontenac
seem to have formed an alliance, which ended only with the governor's
recall.
In telling the story of La Salle, I have described the execution of the
new plan: the muster of the Canadians, at the call of Frontenac; the
consternation of those of the merchants whom he and La Salle had not
taken into their counsels, and who saw in the movement the preparation
for a gigantic fur trading monopoly; the intrigues set on foot to bar
the enterprise; the advance up the St. Lawrence; the assembly of
Iroquois at the destined spot; the ascendency exercised over them by the
governor; the building of Fort Frontenac on the ground where Kingston
now stands, and its final transfer into the hands of La Salle, on
condition, there can be no doubt, of sharing the expected profits with
his patron. [1]
[1] Discovery of the Great West, chap. vi.
On the way to the lake, Frontenac stopped for some time at Montreal,
where he had full opportunity to become acquainted with a state of
things to which his attention had already been directed. This state of
things was as follows:--
When the intendant, Talon, came for the second time to Canada, in 1669,
an officer named Perrot, who had married his niece, came with him.
Perrot, anxious to turn to account the influence of his wife's relative,
looked about him for some post of honor and profit, and quickly
discovered that the government of Montreal was vacant. The priests of
St. Sulpice, feudal owners of the place, had the right of appointing
their own governor. Talon advised them to choose Perrot, who thereupon
received the desired commission, which, however, was revocable at the
will of those who had granted it. The new governor, therefore, begged
another commission from the king, and after a little delay he obtained
it. Thus he became, in some measure, independent of the priests, who, if
they wished to rid themselves of him, must first gain the royal consent.
Perrot, as he had doubtless foreseen, found himself in an excellent
position for making money. The tribes of the upper lakes, and all the
neighboring regions, brought down their furs every summer to the annual
fair at Montreal. Perrot took his measures accordingly. On the island
which still bears his name, lying above Montreal and directly in the
route of the descending savages, he built a storehouse, and placed it in
charge of a retired lieutenant named Brucy, who stopped the Indians on
their way, and carried on an active trade with them, to the great profit
of himself and his associate, and the great loss of the merchants in the
settlements below. This was not all. Perrot connived at the desertion of
his own soldiers, who escaped to the woods, became coureurs de bois, or
bush-rangers, traded with the Indians in their villages, and shared
their gains with their commander. Many others, too, of these forest
rovers, outlawed by royal edicts, found in the governor of Montreal a
protector, under similar conditions.
The journey from Quebec to Montreal often consumed a fortnight. Perrot
thought himself virtually independent; and relying on his commission
from the king, the protection of Talon, and his connection with other
persons of influence, he felt safe in his position, and began to play
the petty tyrant. The judge of Montreal, and several of the chief
inhabitants, came to offer a humble remonstrance against disorders
committed by some of the ruffians in his interest. Perrot received them
with a storm of vituperation, and presently sent the judge to prison.
This proceeding was followed by a series of others, closely akin to it,
so that the priests of St. Sulpice, who received their full share of
official abuse, began to repent bitterly of the governor they had
chosen.
Frontenac had received stringent orders from the king to arrest all the
bush-rangers, or coureurs de bois; but, since he had scarcely a soldier
at his disposal, except his own body-guard, the order was difficult to
execute. As, however, most of these outlaws were in the service of his
rival, Perrot, his zeal to capture them rose high against every
obstacle. He had, moreover, a plan of his own in regard to them, and had
already petitioned the minister for a galley, to the benches of which
the captive bush-rangers were to be chained as rowers, thus supplying
the representative of the king with a means of transportation befitting
his dignity, and at the same time giving wholesome warning against the
infraction of royal edicts. [2] Accordingly, he sent orders to the
judge, at Montreal, to seize every coureur de bois on whom he could lay
hands.
[2] Frontenac au Ministre, 2 Nov., 1672.
The judge, hearing that two of the most notorious were lodged in the
house of a lieutenant named Carion, sent a constable to arrest them;
whereupon Carion threatened and maltreated the officer of justice, and
helped the men to escape. Perrot took the part of his lieutenant, and
told the judge that he would put him in prison, in spite of Frontenac,
if he ever dared to attempt such an arrest again. [3]
[3] Mémoire des Motifs qui ont obligé M. le Comte de Frontenac de faire
arrêter le Sieur Perrot.
When Frontenac heard what had happened, his ire was doubly kindled. On
the one hand, Perrot had violated the authority lodged by the king in
the person of his representative; and, on the other, the mutinous
official was a rival in trade, who had made great and illicit profits,
while his superior had, thus far, made none. As a governor and as a man,
Frontenac was deeply moved; yet, helpless as he was, he could do no more
than send three of his guardsmen, under a lieutenant named Bizard, with
orders to arrest Carion and bring him to Quebec.
The commission was delicate. The arrest was to be made in the dominions
of Perrot, who had the means to prevent it, and the audacity to use
them. Bizard acted accordingly. He went to Carion's house, and took him
prisoner; then proceeded to the house of the merchant Le Ber, where he
left a letter, in which Frontenac, as was the usage on such occasions,
gave notice to the local governor of the arrest he had ordered. It was
the object of Bizard to escape with his prisoner before Perrot could
receive the letter; but, meanwhile, the wife of Carion ran to him with
the news, and the governor suddenly arrived, in a frenzy of rage,
followed by a sergeant and three or four soldiers. The sergeant held the
point of his halberd against the breast of Bizard, while Perrot, choking
with passion, demanded, "How dare you arrest an officer in my government
without my leave?" The lieutenant replied that he acted under orders of
the governor-general, and gave Frontenac's letter to Perrot, who
immediately threw it into his face, exclaiming: "Take it back to your
master, and tell him to teach you your business better another time.
Meanwhile you are my prisoner." Bizard protested in vain. He was led to
jail, whither he was followed a few days after by Le Ber, who had
mortally offended Perrot by signing an attestation of the scene he had
witnessed. As he was the chief merchant of the place, his arrest
produced a great sensation, while his wife presently took to her bed
with a nervous fever.
As Perrot's anger cooled, he became somewhat alarmed. He had resisted
the royal authority, and insulted its representative. The consequences
might be serious; yet he could not bring himself to retrace his steps.
He merely released Bizard, and sullenly permitted him to depart, with a
letter to the governor-general, more impertinent than apologetic. [4]
[4] Mémoire des Motifs, etc.
Frontenac, as his enemies declare, was accustomed, when enraged, to foam
at the mouth. Perhaps he did so when he learned the behavior of Perrot.
If he had had at command a few companies of soldiers, there can be
little doubt that he would have gone at once to Montreal, seized the
offender, and brought him back in irons; but his body-guard of twenty
men was not equal to such an enterprise. Nor would a muster of the
militia have served his purpose; for the settlers about Quebec were
chiefly peaceful peasants, while the denizens of Montreal were disbanded
soldiers, fur traders, and forest adventurers, the best fighters in
Canada. They were nearly all in the interest of Perrot, who, if
attacked, had the temper as well as the ability to make a passionate
resistance. Thus civil war would have ensued, and the anger of the
king would have fallen on both parties. On the other hand, if Perrot
were left unpunished, the coureurs de bois, of whom he was the patron,
would set no bounds to their audacity, and Frontenac, who had been
ordered to suppress them, would be condemned as negligent or incapable.
Among the priests of St. Sulpice at Montreal was the Abbé Salignac de
Fénelon, half-brother of the celebrated author of Télémaque. He was a
zealous missionary, enthusiastic and impulsive, still young, and more
ardent than discreet. One of his uncles had been the companion of
Frontenac during the Candian war, and hence the count's relations with
the missionary had been very friendly. Frontenac now wrote to Perrot,
directing him to come to Quebec and give account of his conduct; and he
coupled this letter with another to Fénelon, urging him to represent to
the offending governor the danger of his position, and advise him to
seek an interview with his superior, by which the difficulty might be
amicably adjusted. Perrot, dreading the displeasure of the king, soothed
by the moderate tone of Frontenac's letter, and moved by the assurances
of the enthusiastic abbé, who was delighted to play the part of
peace-maker, at length resolved to follow his counsel. It was
mid-winter. Perrot and Fénelon set out together, walked on snow-shoes a
hundred and eighty miles down the frozen St. Lawrence, and made their
appearance before the offended count.
Frontenac, there can be little doubt, had never intended that Perrot,
once in his power, should return to Montreal as its governor; but that,
beyond this, he meant harm to him, there is not the least proof. Perrot,
however, was as choleric and stubborn as the count himself; and his
natural disposition had not been improved by several years of petty
autocracy at Montreal. Their interview was brief, but stormy. When it
ended, Perrot was a prisoner in the château, with guards placed over him
by day and night. Frontenac made choice of one La Nouguère, a retired
officer, whom he knew that he could trust, and sent him to Montreal to
command in place of its captive governor. With him he sent also a judge
of his own selection. La Nouguère set himself to his work with vigor.
Perrot's agent or partner, Brucy, was seized, tried, and imprisoned; and
an active hunt was begun for his coureurs de bois. Among others, the two
who had been the occasion of the dispute were captured and sent to
Quebec, where one of them was solemnly hanged before the window of
Perrot's prison; with the view, no doubt, of producing a chastening
effect on the mind of the prisoner. The execution was fully authorized,
a royal edict having ordained that bush-ranging was an offence
punishable with death. [5] As the result of these proceedings, Frontenac
reported to the minister that only five coureurs de bois remained at
large; all the rest having returned to the settlements and made their
submission, so that farther hanging was needless.
[5] Édits et Ordonnances, I. 73.
Thus the central power was vindicated, and Montreal brought down from
her attitude of partial independence. Other results also followed, if we
may believe the enemies of Frontenac, who declare that, by means of the
new commandant and other persons in his interest, the governor-general
possessed himself of a great part of the trade from which he had ejected
Perrot, and that the coureurs de bois, whom he hanged when breaking laws
for his rival, found complete impunity when breaking laws for him.
Meanwhile, there was a deep though subdued excitement among the priests
of St. Sulpice. The right of naming their own governor, which they
claimed as seigniors of Montreal, had been violated by the action of
Frontenac in placing La Nouguère in command without consulting them.
Perrot was a bad governor; but it was they who had chosen him, and the
recollection of his misdeeds did not reconcile them to a successor
arbitrarily imposed upon them. Both they and the colonists, their
vassals, were intensely jealous of Quebec; and, in their indignation
against Frontenac, they more than half forgave Perrot. None among them
all was so angry as the Abbé Fénelon. He believed that he had been used
to lure Perrot into a trap; and his past attachment to the
governor-general was turned into wrath. High words had passed between
them; and, when Fénelon returned to Montreal, he vented his feelings in
a sermon plainly levelled at Frontenac. [6] So sharp and bitter was it,
that his brethren of St. Sulpice hastened to disclaim it; and Dollier de
Casson, their Superior, strongly reproved the preacher, who protested in
return that his words were not meant to apply to Frontenac in
particular, but only to bad rulers in general. His offences, however,
did not cease with the sermon; for he espoused the cause of Perrot with
more than zeal, and went about among the colonists to collect
attestations in his favor. When these things were reported to Frontenac,
his ire was kindled, and he summoned Fénelon before the council at
Quebec to answer the charge of instigating sedition.
[6] Information faite par nous, Charles le Tardieu, Sieur de Tilly.
Tilly was a commissioner sent by the council to inquire into the affair.
Fénelon had a relative and friend in the person of the Abbé d'Urfé, his
copartner in the work of the missions. D'Urfé, anxious to conjure down
the rising storm, went to Quebec to seek an interview with Frontenac;
but, according to his own account, he was very ill received, and
threatened with a prison. On another occasion, the count showed him a
letter in which D'Urfé was charged with having used abusive language
concerning him. Warm words ensued, till Frontenac, grasping his cane,
led the abbé to the door and dismissed him, berating him from the top of
the stairs in tones so angry that the sentinel below spread the report
that he had turned his visitor out of doors. [7]
[7] Mémoire de M. d'Urfé à Colbert, extracts in Faillon.
Two offenders were now arraigned before the council of Quebec: the first
was Perrot, charged with disobeying the royal edicts and resisting the
royal authority; the other was the Abbé Fénelon. The councillors were at
this time united in the interest of Frontenac, who had the power of
appointing and removing them. Perrot, in no way softened by a long
captivity, challenged the governor-general, who presided at the council
board, as a party to the suit and his personal enemy, and took exception
to several of the members as being connections of La Nouguère. Frontenac
withdrew, and other councillors or judges were appointed provisionally;
but these were challenged in turn by the prisoner, on one pretext or
another. The exceptions were overruled, and the trial proceeded, though
not without signs of doubt and hesitation on the part of some of the
councillors. [8]
[8] All the proceedings in the affair of Perrot will be found in full in
the Registre des Jugements et Déliberations du Conseil Supérieur. They
extend from the end of January to the beginning of November, 1674.
Meanwhile, other sessions were held for the trial of Fénelon; and a
curious scene ensued. Five councillors and the deputy attorney-general
were seated at the board, with Frontenac as presiding judge, his hat on
his head and his sword at his side, after the established custom.
Fénelon, being led in, approached a vacant chair, and was about to seat
himself with the rest, when Frontenac interposed, telling him that it
was his duty to remain standing while answering the questions of the
council. Fénelon at once placed himself in the chair, and replied that
priests had the right to speak seated and with heads covered.
"Yes," returned Frontenac, "when they are summoned as witnesses, but not
when they are cited to answer charges of crime."
"My crimes exist nowhere but in your head," replied the abbé. And,
putting on his hat, he drew it down over his brows, rose, gathered his
cassock about him, and walked in a defiant manner to and fro. Frontenac
told him that his conduct was wanting in respect to the council, and to
the governor as its head. Fénelon several times took off his hat, and
pushed it on again more angrily than ever, saying at the same time
that Frontenac was wanting in respect to his character of priest, in
citing him before a civil tribunal. As he persisted in his refusal to
take the required attitude, he was at length told that he might leave
the room. After being kept for a time in the anteroom in charge of a
constable, he was again brought before the council, when he still
refused obedience, and was ordered into a sort of honorable
imprisonment. [9]
[9] Conteste entre le Gouverneur et l'Abbé de Fénelon; Jugements et
Déliberations du Conseil Supérieur, 21 Août, 1674.
This behavior of the effervescent abbé, which Frontenac justly enough
characterizes as unworthy of his birth and his sacred office, was,
nevertheless, founded on a claim sustained by many precedents. As an
ecclesiastic, Fénelon insisted that the bishop alone, and not the
council, had the right to judge him. Like Perrot, too, he challenged his
judges as parties to the suit, or otherwise interested against him. On
the question of jurisdiction, he had all the priests on his side. Bishop
Laval was in France; and Bernières, his grand vicar, was far from
filling the place of the strenuous and determined prelate. Yet the
ecclesiastical storm rose so high that the councillors, discouraged and
daunted, were no longer amenable to the will of Frontenac; and it was
resolved at last to refer the whole matter to the king. Perrot was taken
from the prison, which he had occupied from January to November, and
shipped for France, along with Fénelon. An immense mass of papers was
sent with them for the instruction of the king; and Frontenac wrote a
long despatch, in which he sets forth the offences of Perrot and
Fénelon, the pretensions of the ecclesiastics, the calumnies he had
incurred in his efforts to serve his Majesty, and the insults heaped
upon him, "which no man but me would have endured so patiently." Indeed,
while the suits were pending before the council, he had displayed a
calmness and moderation which surprised his opponents. "Knowing as I
do," he pursues, "the cabals and intrigues that are rife here, I must
expect that every thing will be said against me that the most artful
slander can devise. A governor in this country would greatly deserve
pity, if he were left without support; and, even should he make
mistakes, it would surely be very pardonable, seeing that there is no
snare that is not spread for him, and that, after avoiding a hundred of
them, he will hardly escape being caught at last." [10]
[10] Frontenac au Ministre, 14 Nov., 1674. In a preceding letter, sent
by way of Boston, and dated 16 February, he says that he could not
suffer Perrot to go unpunished without injury to the regal authority,
which he is resolved to defend to the last drop of his blood.
In his charges of cabal and intrigue, Frontenac had chiefly in view the
clergy, whom he profoundly distrusted, excepting always the Récollet
friars, whom he befriended because the bishop and the Jesuits opposed
them. The priests on their part declare that he persecuted them,
compelled them to take passports like laymen when travelling about the
colony, and even intercepted their letters. These accusations and many
others were carried to the king and the minister by the Abbé d'Urfé, who
sailed in the same ship with Fénelon. The moment was singularly
auspicious to him. His cousin, the Marquise d'Allègre, was on the point
of marrying Seignelay, the son of the minister Colbert, who, therefore,
was naturally inclined to listen with favor to him and to Fénelon, his
relative. Again, Talon, uncle of Perrot's wife, held a post at court,
which brought him into close personal relations with the king. Nor were
these the only influences adverse to Frontenac and propitious to his
enemies. Yet his enemies were disappointed. The letters written to him
both by Colbert and by the king are admirable for calmness and dignity.
The following is from that of the king:--
"Though I do not credit all that has been told me concerning various
little annoyances which you cause to the ecclesiastics, I nevertheless
think it necessary to inform you of it, in order that, if true, you may
correct yourself in this particular, giving to all the clergy entire
liberty to go and come throughout all Canada without compelling them to
take out passports, and at the same time leaving them perfect freedom as
regards their letters. I have seen and carefully examined all that you
have sent touching M. Perrot; and, after having also seen all the papers
given by him in his defence, I have condemned his action in imprisoning
an officer of your guard. To punish him, I have had him placed for a
short time in the Bastile, that he may learn to be more circumspect in
the discharge of his duty, and that his example may serve as a warning
to others. But after having thus vindicated my authority, which has been
violated in your person, I will say, in order that you may fully
understand my views, that you should not without absolute necessity
cause your commands to be executed within the limits of a local
government, like that of Montreal, without first informing its governor,
and also that the ten months of imprisonment which you have made him
undergo seems to me sufficient for his fault. I therefore sent him to
the Bastile merely as a public reparation for having violated my
authority. After keeping him there a few days, I shall send him back to
his government, ordering him first to see you and make apology to you
for all that has passed; after which I desire that you retain no
resentment against him, and that you treat him in accordance with the
powers that I have given him." [11]
[11] Le Roi à Frontenac, 22 Avril, 1675.
Colbert writes in terms equally measured, and adds: "After having spoken
in the name of his Majesty, pray let me add a word in my own. By the
marriage which the king has been pleased to make between the heiress of
the house of Allègre and my son, the Abbé d'Urfé has become very closely
connected with me, since he is cousin german of my daughter-in-law; and
this induces me to request you to show him especial consideration,
though, in the exercise of his profession, he will rarely have occasion
to see you."
As D'Urfé had lately addressed a memorial to Colbert, in which the
conduct of Frontenac is painted in the darkest colors, the almost
imperceptible rebuke couched in the above lines does no little credit to
the tact and moderation of the stern minister.
Colbert next begs Frontenac to treat with kindness the priests of
Montreal, observing that Bretonvilliers, their Superior at Paris, is his
particular friend. "As to M. Perrot," he continues, "since ten months of
imprisonment at Quebec and three weeks in the Bastile may suffice to
atone for his fault, and since also he is related or connected with
persons for whom I have a great regard, I pray you to accept kindly the
apologies which he will make you, and, as it is not at all likely that
he will fall again into any offence approaching that which he has
committed, you will give me especial pleasure in granting him the honor
of your favor and friendship." [12]
[12] Colbert à Frontenac, 13 Mai, 1675.
Fénelon, though the recent marriage had allied him also to Colbert,
fared worse than either of the other parties to the dispute. He was
indeed sustained in his claim to be judged by an ecclesiastical
tribunal; but his Superior, Bretonvilliers, forbade him to return to
Canada, and the king approved the prohibition. Bretonvilliers wrote to
the Sulpitian priests of Montreal: "I exhort you to profit by the
example of M. de Fénelon. By having busied himself too much in worldly
matters, and meddled with what did not concern him, he has ruined his
own prospects and injured the friends whom he wished to serve. In
matters of this sort, it is well always to stand neutral." [13]
[13] Lettre de Bretonvilliers, 7 Mai, 1675; extract in Faillon. Fénelon,
though wanting in prudence and dignity, had been an ardent and devoted
missionary. In relation to these disputes, I have received much aid from
the research of Abbé Faillon, and from the valuable paper of Abbé
Verreau, Les deux Abbés de Fénelon, printed in the Canadian Journal de
l'Instruction Publique, Vol. VIII.