AGRICULTURE, INDUSTRY, AND TRADE
It was the royal desire that New France should some day become a
powerful and prosperous agricultural colony, providing the motherland
with an acceptable addition to its food supply. To this end large
tracts of land were granted upon most liberal terms to incoming
settlers, and every effort was made to get these acres cultivated.
Encouragement and coercion were alike given a trial. Settlers who did
well were given official recognition, sometimes even to the extent of
rank in the _noblesse_. On the other hand those who left their lands
uncleared were repeatedly threatened with the revocation of their
land-titles, and in some cases their holdings were actually taken
away. From the days of the earliest settlement down to the eve of the
English conquest, the officials of both the Church and the State
never ceased to use their best endeavors in the interests of colonial
agriculture.
Yet with all this official interest and encouragement agricultural
development was slow. Much of the land on both the north and the south
shores of the St. Lawrence was heavily timbered, and the work of
clearing proved tedious. It was estimated that an industrious settler,
working by himself, could clear not more than one superficial _arpent_
in a whole season. So slowly did the work make progress, in fact, that
in 1712, after fifty years of royal paternalism, the cultivable area
of New France amounted to only 150,000 _arpents_, and at the close
of the French dominion in 1760 it was scarcely more than twice that
figure,--in other words, about five _arpents_ for each head of
population.
While industry and trade, particularly the Indian trade, took the
attention and interest of a considerable portion in the population of
New France, agriculture was from first to last the vocation of the
great majority. The census of 1695 showed more than seventy-five per
cent of the people living on the farms of the colony and this ratio
was almost exactly maintained, nearly sixty years later, when the
census of 1754 was compiled. This population was scattered along both
banks of the St. Lawrence from a point well below Quebec to the region
surrounding Montreal. Most of the farms fronted on the river so that
every habitant had a few _arpents_ of marshy land for hay, a tract of
cleared upland for ploughing, and an area extending to the rear which
might be turned into meadow or left uncleared to supply him with
firewood.
Wheat and maize were the great staples, although large quantities
of oats, barley, and peas were also grown. The wheat was invariably
spring-sown, and the yield averaged from eight to twelve
hundredweights per _arpent_, or from ten to fourteen bushels per acre.
Most of the wheat was made into flour at the seigneurial mills and
was consumed in the colony, but shipments were also made with
fair regularity to France, to the West Indies, and for a time to
Louisbourg. In 1736 the exports of wheat amounted to nearly 100,000
bushels, and in the year following the banner harvest of 1741 this
total was nearly doubled. The price which the habitant got for wheat
at Quebec ranged normally from two to four _livres_ per hundredweight
(about thirty to sixty cents per bushel) depending upon the harvests
in the colony and the safety with which wheat could be shipped to
France, which, again, hinged upon the fact whether France and England
were at peace or at war. Indian corn was not exported to any large
extent, but many cargoes of dried peas were sent abroad, and
occasionally there were small shipments of oats and beans.
There was also a considerable production of hemp, flax, and tobacco,
but not for export in any large quantity. The tobacco grown in the
colony was coarse and ill-flavored. It was smoked by both the habitant
and the Indian because it was cheap; but Brazilian tobacco was greatly
preferred by those who could afford to buy it, and large quantities
of this were brought in. The French Government frowned upon
tobacco-growing in New France, believing, as Colbert wrote to Talon in
1672, that any such policy would be prejudicial to the interests of
the French colonies in the tropical zones which were much better
adapted to this branch of cultivation.
Cattle raising made substantial progress, and the King urged the
Sovereign Council to prohibit the slaughter of cattle so that the
herds might keep on growing; but the stock was not of a high standard,
but undersized, of mongrel breed, and poorly cared for. Sheep raising,
despite the brisk demand for wool, made slow headway. Most of the wool
needed in the colony had to be brought from France, and the demand was
great because so much woolen clothing was required for winter use. The
keeping of poultry was, of course, another branch of husbandry. The
habitants were fond of horses; even the poorest managed to keep two or
three, which was a wasteful policy as there was no work for the horses
to do during nearly half the year. Fodder, however, was abundant and
cost nothing, as each habitant obtained from the flats along the
river all that he could cut and carry away. This marsh hay was not of
superior quality, but it at least served to carry the horses and stock
through the winter.
The methods of agriculture were beyond question slovenly and crude.
Catalogne, the engineer whom the authorities commissioned to make an
agricultural census of the colony, ventured the opinion that, if
the fields of France were cultivated as the farms of Canada were,
three-quarters of the French people would starve. Rotation of crops
was practically unknown, and fertilization of the land was rare,
although the habitant frequently burned the stubble before putting
the plough to his fields. From time to time a part of each farm was
allowed to lie fallow, but such fallow fields were left unploughed and
soon grew so rank with weeds that the soil really got no rest at all.
All the ploughing was done in the spring, and it was not very well
done at that, for the land was ploughed in ridges which left much
waste between the furrows. Too often the seed became poor, as a result
of the habitant using seed from his own crops year after year until
it became run out. Most of the cultivated land was high and dry and
needed no artificial drainage. Even where the water lay on the land
late in the spring, however, there was rarely an attempt, as Peter
Kalm in his _Travels_ remarks, to drain it off. The habitant had
patience in greater measure than industry, and he was always ready to
wait for nature to do his work. Everybody depended for his implements
largely upon his own workmanship, so that the tools of agriculture
were of poor construction. The cultivation of even a few _arpents_
required a great deal of manual drudgery. On the other hand, the land
of New France was fertile, and every one could have plenty of it
for the asking. Kalm thought it quite as good as the average in the
English colonies and far better than most arable land in his own
Scandinavia.
Why, then, did French-Canadian agriculture, despite the warm official
encouragement given to it, make such relatively meager progress? There
are several reasons for its backwardness. The long winters, which
developed in the habitant an inveterate disposition to idleness,
afford the clue to one of them. A general aversion to unremitting
manual toil was one of the colony's besetting sins. Notwithstanding
the small per capita acreage, accordingly, there was a continual
complaint that not enough labor could be had to work the farms. Women
and children were pressed into service in the busy seasons. Yet the
colony abounded in idle men, and mendicancy at one time assumed such
proportions as to require the enforcement of stringent penalties. The
authorities were partly to blame for the development of this trait,
for upon the slightest excuse they took the habitant from his daily
routine and set him to help with warlike expeditions against the
Indians and the English, or called him to build roads or to repair the
fortifications. And the lure of the fur trade, which drew the most
vigorous young men of the land off the farms into the forest, was
another obstacle to the growth of yeomanry. Moreover, the curious and
inconvenient shape of the farms, most of them mere ribbons of land,
with a narrow frontage and disproportionate depth, handicapped all
efforts to cultivate the fields in an intelligent way. Finally, there
was the general poverty of the people. With a large family to support,
for families of ten to fifteen children were not uncommon, it was hard
for the settler to make both ends meet from the annual yield of a few
_arpents_, however fertile. The habitant, therefore, took the shortest
cut to everything, getting what he could out of his land in the
quickest possible way with no reference to the ultimate improvement
of the farm itself. If he ever managed to get a little money, he was
likely to spend it at once and to become as impecunious as before.
Such a propensity did not make for progress, for poverty begets
slovenliness in all ages and among all races of men.
If anything like the industry and intelligence that was bestowed
upon agriculture in the English colonies had been applied to the St.
Lawrence valley, New France might have shipped far more wheat than
beaver skins each year to Europe. But in this respect the colony never
half realized the royal expectations. On the other hand, the attempt
to make the land a rich grain-growing colony was far from being a flat
failure. It was supporting its own population, and had a modest amount
of grain each year for export to France or to the French West Indies.
With peace it would soon have become a land of plenty, for the
traveler who passed along the great river from Quebec to Montreal in
the late autumn might see, as Kalm in his _Travels_ tells us he saw,
field upon field of waving grain extending from the shores inward as
far as the eye could reach, broken only here and there by tracts of
meadow and woodland. Here was at least the nucleus of a Golden West.
Of colonial industry, however, not as much can be said as of
agriculture. Down to about 1663 it had given scarcely a single token
of existence. The colony, until that date, manufactured nothing.
Everything in the way of furnishings, utensils, apparel, and ornament
was brought in the company's ships from France, and no one seemed to
look upon this procedure as at all unusual. On the coming of Talon in
1665, however, the idea of fostering home industries in the colony
took active shape. By persuasion and by promise of reward, the
"Colbert of New France" interested the prominent citizens of Quebec in
modest industrial enterprises of every sort.
But the outcome soon belied the intendant's airy hopes. It was easy
enough to make a brave start in these things, especially with the aid
of an initial subsidy from the treasury; but to keep the wheels of
industry moving year after year without a subvention was an altogether
different thing. A colony numbering less than ten thousand souls did
not furnish an adequate market for the products of varied industries,
and the high cost of transportation made it difficult to export
manufactured wares to France or to the West Indies with any hope
of profit. A change of tone, moreover, soon became noticeable in
Colbert's dispatches with reference to industrial development. In
1665, when giving his first instructions to Talon, the minister had
dilated upon his desire that Canada should become self-sustaining in
the matter of clothing, shoes, and the simpler house-furnishings.
But within a couple of years Colbert's mind seems to have taken a
different shift, and we find him advising Talon that, after all,
it might be better if the people of New France would devote their
energies to agriculture and thus to raise enough grain wherewith to
buy manufactured wares from France. So, for one reason or another,
the infant industries languished, and, after Talon was gone, they
gradually dropped out of existence.
Another of Talon's ventures was to send prospectors in search of
minerals. The use of malleable copper by the Indians had been noted by
the French for many years and various rumors concerning the source
of supply had filtered through to Quebec. Some of Talon's agents,
including Jean Peré, went as far as the upper lakes, returning with
samples of copper ore. But the distance from Quebec was too great for
profitable transportation and, although Père Dablon in 1670 sent
down an accurate description of the great masses of ore in the Lake
Superior region, many generations were to pass before any serious
attempt could be made to develop this source of wealth. Nearer at hand
some titaniferous iron ore was discovered, at Baie St. Paul below
Quebec, but it was not utilized, although on being tested it was
found to be good in quality. Then the intendant sent agents to verify
reports as to rich coal deposits in Isle Royale (Cape Breton), and
they returned with glowing accounts which, subsequent industrial
history has entirely justified. Shipments of this coal were brought
to Quebec for consumption. A little later the intendant reported to
Colbert that a vein of coal had been actually uncovered at the foot of
the great rock which frowns upon the Lower Town at Quebec, adding that
the vein could not be followed for fear of toppling over the Château
which stood above. No one has ever since found any trace of Talon's
coal deposit, and the geologists of today are quite certain that the
intendant had more imagination than accuracy of statement or even of
elementary mineralogical knowledge.
Above the settlement at Three Rivers some excellent deposits of bog
iron ore were found in 1668, but it was not until five decades later
that the first forges were established there. These were successfully
operated throughout the remainder of the Old Régime, and much of the
colony's iron came from them to supply the blacksmiths. From time
to time rumors of other mineral discoveries came to the ears of the
people. A find of lead was reported from the Gaspé peninsula, but an
investigation proved it to be a hoax. Copper was actually found in
a dozen places within the settled ranges of the colony, but not in
paying quantities. Every one was always on the _qui vive_ for a vein
of gold or silver, but no part of New France ever gave the slightest
hint of an El Dorado. Prospecting engaged the energies of many
colonists in every generation, but most of those who thus spent their
years at it got nothing but a princely dividend of chagrin.
Mention should also be made of the brewing industry which Talon set
upon its feet during his brief intendancy but which, like all the rest
of his schemes, did not long survive his departure. In establishing a
brewery at Quebec the paternal intendant had two ends in mind: first,
to reduce the large consumption of _eau-de-vie_ by providing a cheaper
and more wholesome substitute; and second, to furnish the farmers of
the colony with a profitable home market for their grain. In 1671
Talon reported to the French authorities that the Quebec brewery was
capable of turning out four thousand hogsheads of beer per annum, and
thus of creating a demand for many thousand bushels of malt. Hops were
also needed and were expensive when brought from France, so that the
people were encouraged to grow hop-vines in the colony. But even with
grain and hops at hand, the brewing industry did not thrive, and
before many years Talon's enterprise closed its doors. The building
was finally remodeled and became the headquarters of the later
intendants.
Flour-making and lumbering were the two industries which made most
consistent progress in the colony. Flour-mills were established both
in and near Quebec at an early date, and in course of time there were
scores of them scattered throughout the colony, most of them built
and operated as _banal_ mills by the seigneurs. The majority were
windmills after the Dutch fashion, but some were water-driven. On
the whole, they were not very efficient and turned out flour of such
indifferent grade that the bakers of Quebec complained loudly on more
than one occasion. In response to a request from the intendant, the
King sent out some fanning-mills which were distributed to various
seigneuries, but even this benefaction did not seem to make any great
improvement in the quality of the product. Yet in some years the
colony had flour of sufficiently good quality for export, and sent
small cargoes both to France and to the French West Indies.
The sawing of lumber was carried on in various parts of the colony,
particularly at Malbaie and at Baie St. Paul. Beam-timbers, planks,
staves, and shingles were made in large quantities both for use in the
colony and for export to France, where the timbers and planks were
in demand at the royal shipyards. Wherever lands were granted by the
Crown, a provision was inserted in the title-deed reserving all oak
timber and all pine of various species suitable for mastings. Though
such timber was not to be cut without official permission, the people
did not always respect this reservation. Yet the quantity of timber
shipped to France was very large, and next to furs it formed the
leading item in the cargoes of outgoing ships. For staves there was a
good market at Quebec where barrels were being made for the packing of
salted fish and eels.
The various handicrafts or small industries, such as blacksmithing,
cabinet-making, pottery, brick-making, were regulated quite as
strictly in Canada as in France. The artisans of the towns were
organized into _jurés_ or guilds, and elected a master for each trade.
These masters were responsible to the civil authorities for the proper
quality of the work done and for the observance of all the regulations
which were promulgated by the intendant or the council from time to
time.
This relative proficiency in home industry accounts in part for
the tardy progress of the colony in the matter of large industrial
establishments. But there were other handicaps. For one thing,
the Paris authorities were not anxious to see the colony become
industrially self-sustaining. Colbert in his earliest instructions
to Talon wrote as though this were the royal policy, but no other
minister ever hinted at such a desire. Rather it was thought best that
the colony should confine itself to the production of raw materials,
leaving it to France to supply manufactured wares in return. The
mercantilist doctrine that a colony existed for the benefit of the
mother country was gospel at Fontainebleau. Even Montcalm, a man of
liberal inclinations, expressed this idea with undiminished vigor in
a day when its evil results must have been apparent to the naked
eye. "Let us beware," he wrote, "how we allow the establishment of
industries in Canada or she will become proud and mutinous like the
English colonies. So long as France is a nursery to Canada, let not
the Canadians be allowed to trade but kept to their laborious life and
military services."
The exclusion of the Huguenots from Canada was another industrial
misfortune. A few Huguenot artisans came to Quebec from Rochelle at an
early date, and had they been welcomed, more would soon have followed.
But they were promptly deported. From an economic standpoint this was
an unfortunate policy. The Huguenots were resourceful workmen, skilled
in many trades. They would have supplied the colony with a vigorous
and enterprising stock. But the interests of orthodoxy in religion
were paramount with the authorities, and they kept from Canada the
one class of settlers which most desired to come. Many of those same
Huguenots went to England, and every student of economic history knows
how greatly they contributed to the upbuilding of England's later
supremacy in the textile and related industries.
If we turn to the field of commerce, the spirit of restriction appears
as prominently as in the domain of industry. The Company of One
Hundred Associates, during its thirty years of control, allowed no one
to proceed to Quebec except on its own vessels, and nothing could be
imported except through its storehouses. Its successor, the Company of
the West Indies, which dominated colonial commerce from 1664 to
1669, was not a whit more liberal. Even under the system of royal
government, the consistent keynotes of commercial policy were
regulation, paternalism, and monopoly.
This is in no sense surprising. Spain had first given to the world
this policy of commercial constraint and the great enrichment of the
Spanish monarchy was everywhere held to be its outcome. France, by
reason of her similar political and administrative system, found it
easy to drift into the wake of the Spanish example. The official
classes in England and Holland would fain have had these countries do
likewise, but private initiative and enterprise proved too strong in
the end. As for New France, there were spells during which the grip of
the trading monopolies relaxed, but these lucid intervals were never
very long. When the Company of the West Indies became bankrupt in
1669, the trade between New France and Old was ostensibly thrown open
to the traders of both countries, and for the moment this freedom gave
Colbert and his Canadian apostle, Talon, an opportunity to carry out
their ideas of commercial upbuilding.
The great minister had as his ideal the creation of a huge fleet of
merchant vessels, built and operated by Frenchmen, which would ply to
all quarters of the globe, bringing raw products to France and taking
manufactured wares in return. It was under the inspiration of this
ideal that Talon built at Quebec a small vessel and, having freighted
it with lumber, fish, corn, and dried pease, sent it off to the French
West Indies. After taking on board a cargo of sugar, the vessel was
then to proceed to France and, exchanging the sugar for goods which
were needed in the regions of the St. Lawrence, it was to return to
Quebec. The intendant's plans for this triangular trade were well
conceived, and in a general way they aimed at just what the English
colonies along the Atlantic seaboard were beginning to do at the time.
The keels of other ships were being laid at Quebec and the officials
were dreaming of great maritime achievements. But as usual the
enterprise never got beyond the sailing of the first vessel, for its
voyage did not yield a profit.
The ostensible throwing-open of the colonial trade, moreover, did not
actually change to any great extent the old system of paternalism and
monopoly. Commercial companies no longer controlled the channels of
transportation, it is true, but the royal government was not minded
to let everything take its own course. So the trade was taxed for the
benefit of the royal treasury, and the privilege of collecting the
taxes, according to the custom of the old régime, was farmed out. All
the commerce of the colony, imports and exports, had to pass through
the hands of these farmers-of-the-revenue who levied ten per cent on
all goods coming and kept for the royal treasury one-quarter of
the price fixed for all skins exported. Traders as a rule were not
permitted to ship their furs directly to France. They turned them in
to farmers-of-the-revenue at Quebec, where they received the price as
fixed by ordinance, less one-quarter. This price they usually took in
bills of exchange on Paris which, they handed over to the colonial
merchants in payment for goods, and which the merchants in turn sent
home to France to pay for new stocks. Nor were the authorities content
with the mere fixing of prices. By ordinance they also set the rate of
profit which traders should have upon all imported wares brought into
the colony. This rate of profit was fixed at sixty-five per cent, but
the traders had no compunction in going above it whenever they saw
an opportunity which was not likely to be discovered. As far as the
forest trade was concerned, the regulation was, of course, absurd.
Every year, about the beginning of May, the first ships left France
for the St. Lawrence with general cargoes consisting of goods for the
colonists themselves and for the Indians, as well as large quantities
of brandy. When they arrived at Quebec, the vessels were met by the
merchants of the town and by those who had come from Three Rivers and
Montreal. For a fortnight lively trading took place. Then the goods
which had been bought by the merchants of Montreal and Three Rivers
were loaded upon small barques and brought to these towns to be in
readiness for the annual fairs when the _coureurs-de-bois_ and their
Indians came down to trade in the late summer. As for the vessels
which had come from France, these were either loaded with timber or
furs and set off directly home again, or else they departed light to
Cape Breton and took cargoes of coal for the French West Indies, where
the refining of sugar occasioned a demand for fuel. The last ships
left in November, and for seven months the colony was cut off from
Europe.
Trade at Quebec, while technically open to any one who would pay the
duties and observe the regulations as to rates of profit, was actually
in the hands of a few merchants who had large warehouses and who took
the greater part of what the ships brought in. These men were, in
turn, affiliated more or less closely with the great trading houses
which sent goods from Rouen or Rochelle, so that the monopoly was
nearly as ironclad as when commercial companies were in control. When
an outsider broke into the charmed circle, as happened occasionally,
there was usually some way of hustling him out again by means either
fair or foul. The monopolists made large profits, and many of them,
after they had accumulated a fortune, went home to France. "I have
known twenty of these pedlars," quoth La Hontan, "that had not above
a thousand crowns stock when I arrived at Quebec in the year 1683 and
when I left that place had got to the tune of twelve thousand crowns."
Glancing over the whole course of agriculture, industry, and commerce
in New France from the time when Champlain built his little post at
the foot of Cape Diamond until the day when the fleur-de-lis fluttered
down from the heights above, the historian finds that there is one
word which sums up the chief cause of the colony's economic weakness.
That word is "paternalism." The Administration tried to take the place
of Providence. It was as omnipresent and its ways were as inscrutable.
Like as a father chasteneth his children, so the King and his
officials felt it their duty to chasten every show of private
initiative which did not direct itself along the grooves that they had
marked out for the colony to follow. By trying to order everything
they eventually succeeded in ordering nothing aright.