ARE you familiar with that fertile, laughing country, so rich in

historical souvenirs, whose virgin soil was first trodden by our

French ancestors? Are you familiar with these green and undulating

prairies, watered by limpid streams, and shaded by maples, plane-trees,

figs, and acacias, in the midst of which rises, brilliant in youth

and prospective greatness, the flourishing city of Detroit? If you

wish to enjoy fully the enchanting picture that this charming country

presents—whose climate need not be envious of the Italian sun—ascend

the Detroit River some fresh spring morning, when Aurora has shaken

her dewy wings over these vast plains, and when the bright May sun has

thrown its luminous rays through the transparent mists of morning.

Nowhere is there a clearer sky or more ravishing nature. Nowhere

are the wavy lines of the blue horizon more distinctly traced. Here

are wild and uncultivated sites, romantic landscapes, little wooded

islands, like baskets of verdure, all re-echoing the mocking laughter

of multitudes of birds. Pretty promontories whose round arms encircle

gulfs full of shadows and sunlight; whose waves, caressed by these

warm breaths, deposit along the shore a fringe of silver foam. Hills

and valleys, covered with luxuriant verdure, mirror themselves in the

neighboring wave. On either side the shore stretches along, covered

with pebbles or fine gray sand; sometimes embroidered with a lace-like

turf, or bristling with tall reeds, crowned with little tufts, among

which the timid kingfishers perch, and take flight at the least noise.

Here the fresh murmuring rivulets flow under the flowery arches of

interlacing boughs; there tiny paths, edged with strawberries and

forget-me-nots, wind over the brow of the hill; and, more distant, the

fresh spring zephyr trembles on the green meadows, and perfumes the air

with a delicious fragrance. The thousand confused noises of the water

and the rustling foliage, the warbling of birds, the buzz of human

voices, the lowing of herds, and the distant and silvery echo of the

bells of the steamers that ply along the river, ascend from time to

time through the air, and diffuse an indefinable charm in the soul and

through the senses. At short distances apart, pretty little villages

stretch along the shore, or group themselves on the banks of a stream,

or again on the slope of a hill, or crowning its summit like a diadem.

Finally you arrive at Detroit, with its steeples and roofs glittering

in the sunlight. Hundreds of boats, engaged in commercial interests,

are constantly arriving at or leaving its quays, furrowing the river

in every direction. Were I a poet, I would compare this charming city

to the superb swan of this country, which, on awakening in the midst

of the rushes on the river’s bank, shakes its white wings in taking

flight, and showers around a rain of dew and down; or, better still, to

the stately magnolia growing on the banks of the stream, when, shaken

by the aromatic breath of the morning breeze, it covers the wave in

which it is mirrored with the fertile dust of its corolla.

II.—THE PIONEER.

Founded in the year 1700, by M. de la Mothe-Cadillac, Detroit remained

for a long time under the Canadian government. It was taken by the

English in 1760, and remained in their possession until the war of

1812. Then the United States became the happy possessor of this

charming country, which F. Charlevoix has so justly called “the garden

spot.” “Detroit,” says the Canadian historian, “has preserved, in spite

of its many vicissitudes, the characteristics of its origin, and French

is still the language of a large portion of its population. Like all

the cities founded and settled by this great people—the monuments of

whose genius are landmarks in America—Detroit is destined to become a

great business centre, on account of its favorable situation between

Lake Huron and Lake Erie.”[183] Toward the year 1770 or 1780, Detroit

was far from presenting the flourishing aspect which it offers to the

stranger to-day. It was only a small fort surrounded by weak ramparts,

and a stockade in which lived a few hundred Canadian colonists—a

veritable tent in the wilderness. The fort was the advanced sentinel

of the colony, and by consequence constantly exposed to the attacks

of the Indians. Around the fortifications the colonists had cleared

a few acres of land, which they could only cultivate at the risk of

their lives, holding a pickaxe in one hand, and a gun in the other;

while beyond, before, behind, to the right, to the left, everywhere

a wilderness, everywhere interminable forests, whose gloomy shades

concealed multitudes of beings a thousand times more cruel, a thousand

times more formidable and to be feared, than the wild beasts and

reptiles which shared alike the tenebrious shelter. It is easy from

this to imagine what indomitable courage these hardy pioneers possessed

who dared to come and plant the standard of civilization in the

midst of these distant solitudes, in the face of such multitudinous

perils. One of the grandest pictures that the history of the New World

presents, after the sublime figure of the missionary, is that of the

Canadian pioneer. He is the father of the strongest race that has been

implanted on the American continent—the Canadian race; and the noblest

blood that has ever flowed in human veins, flows through his—the

French blood. Everywhere on the continent the Canadian pioneer is to be

found, and everywhere can be traced by his blood. Travel through North

America, from Hudson’s Bay to the Gulf of Mexico, from Halifax to San

Francisco, and on the snows of the North Pole and the golden sands of

California, along the Atlantic strand, and on the moss-covered slopes

of the Rocky Mountains, you will find the print of his footsteps. An

insatiable activity consumes him. Onward! is his watchword, and he only

rests when he has reached the goal of his ambition. But it is not alone

the love of adventure nor the violent thirst for gold that stimulates

him to action: a nobler ambition urges him on, a more legitimate

instinct animates and guides him. He has a mission to accomplish—a

mysterious apostleship. Turn for a moment to the pages of our history,

and especially to the accounts of the Jesuits, and you will see the

Canadian pioneer throughout animated by the most admirable zeal for

the conversion of the savages, opening a way for the missionaries

by the most heroic efforts, and frequently himself making the most

wonderful conversions. We find united in him the three grandest types

of manhood: priest, laborer, soldier. Priest!—by his ardent piety,

his lively faith, his zeal for the salvation of vacillating souls and

obdurate hearts, drawing to the faith entire settlements. Was there

ever a more admirable priesthood? Laborer!—before his powerful axe

the great forests fall with a crash around him, and his plough tracks,

through the fallen trunks, the furrow where the green germ of the

future harvest will soon begin to tremble. Soldier!—by years of mortal

combat, he has conquered the soil that his hand cultivates. Ah! were

I only an artist, to trace on canvas this noble figure in his triple

character of priest, laborer, and soldier. In the background of the

picture, immense forests, in all their savage grandeur; nearer, the

waving grain, growing between the charred trunks. In the foreground,

a portion of the great river, with its emerald waves sparkling in the

sun. On one side, an angle of the old fort, with its ramparts and

stockade, whence rises a modest little belfry surmounted by a cross.

On the other side, a band of Indians flying toward the edge of the

wood. The centre-piece would be my brave pioneer, his eyes flashing,

his hair blown by the breeze, and his forehead bleeding from a ball

which had just grazed it, near him his plough, and holding his gun,

whose muzzle still smokes from a recent conflict. At the right, he

would be pouring the water of baptism on the head of his vanquished and

dying enemy, whom he had just converted to the faith. Oh! how could I

attempt to paint this vigorous figure in the various attitudes of a

soldier-laborer, with his iron muscles, and the calm, serene strength

of the man of the fields; the invincible courage of the soldier, and

the sublime enthusiasm of the priest! Verily, this picture would not be

unworthy of the pencil of a Rubens or a Michael Angelo. Faith, toil,

courage; priest, laborer, soldier—this is the Canadian pioneer. It is

Cincinnatus, the soldier-laborer, become a Christian. It is the Spartan

warrior, who has passed through the Catacombs. The Canadian reader

who peruses these lines can raise his head with noble pride, for the

blood that flows through his veins is the blood of heroes. He can look

attentively at the palm of his hand, and see there still the unction of

earth, of powder, and of the priesthood. The pioneer has nobly filled

his mission: yours remains to be accomplished. A people to whom God has

given such ancestors is necessarily destined for something great, if it

faithfully corresponds with the designs of divine Providence. But let

us leave these teachings, which properly belong to venerable heads, and

return to our story.

III.—EVENING.

At the remote period which we describe, the fur trade of Detroit was

immense; and the Indians, aided and encouraged by the facilities for

reaching there, came in great numbers to sell the products of their

hunting expeditions. There were representatives from the various

tribes—Iroquois, Potawatamies, Illinois, Miamis, and a host of others.

M. Jacques Du Perron Baby was at that time Indian superintendent at

Detroit. This was an extremely important and responsible position at

that period. M. Baby had realized a handsome fortune there in a few

years. Almost all the land on which the Detroit of to-day stands was

then owned by him and a Mr. Macomb, the father of General Macomb, who

commanded a portion of the American troops during the war of 1812. At

the close of this war, the entire property of M. Baby was confiscated

in consequence of his political opinions, which were declared in favor

of Canada _versus_ the United States. His fine mansion stood in the

centre of the fort, surrounded by a beautiful garden. Having luxurious

tastes, he embellished it with all the requirements of refined and

cultivated life. The garden was on raised ground, surrounded by a

sodded terrace; the house stood in the centre, half concealed by a

dense foliage of maple, pear, and acacia trees, which waved their

branches coaxingly over its roof. A number of birds, sometimes

hidden in the branches, sometimes flying through the air, crossing,

pursuing each other, describing a thousand bewildering circles,

abandoned themselves to joyous song, while the little _ramoneur_,[184]

complaining on the chimney-top, mingled his shrill, harsh cry with

their melodious voices. It was evening. The last rays of the setting

sun colored with rose and saffron tints the tops of the forests.

The heat had been intense throughout the day. The evening breeze,

coquetting among the roses, dahlias, and flowering eglantine, refreshed

exhausted nature deliciously, and perfumed the air with the most

intoxicating fragrance. Tea was about being served in the garden, and

the table was most invitingly covered with tempting viands and lovely

flowers. The superintendent and his family were seated around; a young

officer who had been several months in Detroit had been invited to join

the family party. Two colored servants waited most assiduously at the

repast. “What a charming evening!” said the officer—he was a handsome

young man, with light hair, noble and expressive features, and rather

a high forehead. There was a proud, intelligent expression in his

bright eyes, and yet at times something vague and dreamy. “Truly,” he

continued, “I have never seen anything in Italy more delightful than

this; such a climate, and such ravishing scenery, such fine effects

of light and shade! Look there along the horizon, and at those fleecy

clouds which float through the azure sky; they resemble a superb scarf

fringed with purple and gold.”

“It is indeed a magnificent evening,” replied the superintendent. “We

really enjoy a very fine climate in this section of country. I have

never seen anywhere a clearer sky or more transparent atmosphere, and

nature so grand; but, against all of this, we are deprived of nearly

all of the luxuries and comforts of the old country, to say nothing of

the constant dangers to which we are exposed from the Indians; for we

are on the utmost limits of civilization. You, who have just left the

civilized shores of Europe, can scarcely form any idea of the cruelty

of these barbarians. Life is indeed very severe in this new country.”

“Yes,” said his wife, whose fine physiognomy indicated her great force

of character; “it is only a few years ago that I was obliged to do

sentinel duty, and stand at the entrance of the fort with a gun in my

hand, while the men were occupied in cultivating the fields around

it.”[185]

The conversation was here interrupted by one of the servants, who came

to say that a stranger was waiting to see the superintendent and his

wife. They all arose from the tea-table.

“You look very sad this evening, mademoiselle,” said the officer,

addressing a young girl of sixteen or eighteen years of age, and who,

from a strong resemblance, could be easily recognized as the daughter

of M. Baby. “What can have happened to cause such a shadow to fall on

your fair brow; while all are smiling around you, your heart seems full

of sorrow? It is almost impossible that any one could contemplate this

lovely scene, and not experience a feeling of interior peace. Nothing

so completely bewilders me like an evening of this kind. This graceful

harmony of light and shade is for me full of a mysterious intoxication.”

“Alas!” said the young girl, “a few days ago I too could have enjoyed

this scene; but to-day, as it were, every object is covered with a

funereal pall. This beautiful sky, these green fields, the flowers

and fruit, these vermilion roses, which charm your sight, all make me

shudder. I see blood everywhere.”

“My God!” cried the officer, “what misfortune can have happened to you?”

“Oh! only a few hours ago, I witnessed such a distressing scene that it

is impossible to imagine it. I cannot obliterate it from my mind, or

distract my thoughts in the least from the shocking spectacle. But I

ought not to distress you by this sorrowful recital. I had rather let

you enjoy tranquilly these hours that afford you so much pleasure.”

“Continue, continue,” exclaimed he. “Relate to me this tragic story.

Happiness is often so selfish, but we should always have our sympathies

ready for the sorrows of others.”

The young girl then continued: “Day before yesterday evening, a party

of Indians half intoxicated came into the fort to see my father; they

brought with them a young girl, whom they had captured several days

before. Oh! if you could only have seen the despair on her countenance!

Poor child, her clothes were in rags, her hair hung in tangled masses,

and her face was all scratched and bleeding. She did not utter a

complaint, nor did she weep; but stood with fixed eyes, mute and

immovable as a statue. We might have believed her dead but for a slight

trembling of the lips that betrayed the life that was not visible.

It was a fearful sight. I have never seen anything like it. Great

misfortunes are like severe wounds; they dry up our tears as terrible

and sudden wounds arrest the blood in our veins. Compassionating her

distressed situation, my sister and myself made her come in and stay

in our room through the night; but we did not deceive ourselves with

the slightest hope that anything could be done for her rescue, for we

knew too well the character of these savages. Nevertheless, we tried to

sustain her with a little hope that something might possibly be done.

Perhaps our father could succeed in inducing the Indians to let her go.

At last she gradually recovered from her state of stupor, and told us

her sad, sad story.”

IV.—AGONY.

“I have lived for some time,” said she, “near Fort Wayne with my

married sister. One morning, while her husband was at work in the

field, several Indians suddenly entered our house. ‘Where is your

husband?’ they inquired roughly of my sister. ‘He is at Fort Wayne,’

she replied, frightened by their sinister aspect; and they went out

again. Full of anxiety, we followed them with our eyes for some time.

‘O my God! sister,’ exclaimed I, trembling, ‘I am so frightened, so

terrified. Let us fly; these savages appear to me to be meditating

some dreadful act. I am convinced that they will return.’ Without

paying any attention to my words, she continued to watch them as they

went off in the direction of Fort Wayne. The road which they took lay

only a short distance from the place where her husband was quietly

at work, not having the slightest idea of the danger that threatened

him. Fortunately, a clump of trees hid him from their sight. We began

to breathe more freely, for they had now gone beyond the field; but

suddenly one of them happened to turn around. ‘They have discovered

him! they have discovered him!’ shrieked my sister, almost fainting

with terror. And really they had all stopped, and were looking in the

direction where Joseph was stooping down, gathering up the branches of

a tree which he had just cut down. He had no suspicion of danger. The

Indians, concealed by the trees, were now only a short distance off.

Suddenly we heard the report of a gun, and Joseph fell to the ground.

Believing him dead, they advanced boldly; but the ball had only grazed

his head, and he was stunned for the moment. He quickly recovered

himself, and, making a breastwork of the branches of the felled tree,

seized his gun, and in an instant two of them were stretched stiff

corpses on the ground. The others, alarmed, made a precipitate retreat

toward the edge of the woods, and then a quick firing commenced on both

sides. Joseph was a fine marksman; at each shot, he disabled an enemy.

Three had already fallen. We awaited, in an agony of apprehension, the

result of the mortal combat, which would not have been doubtful had

it been only an ordinary enemy that the savages had to contend with.

But Joseph was a formidable adversary. He fired rapidly, reloading his

gun with the most perfect coolness, while the balls were whistling all

around him. Placing the muzzle of his gun between the branches, he made

the sign of the cross on his breast at the moment of taking aim; then,

pulling the trigger, we counted another Indian less. Every time I saw

a new victim fall, I could not repress a tremor of delight. Joseph’s

unerring ball had just struck a fourth enemy. We began to hope, when we

discovered one of the savages creeping along on the ground behind him.

No serpent could have advanced with more cunning or address. Without

shaking a pebble or disturbing a leaf, he approached slowly; at one

time concealing himself behind a little knoll, then under a thicket

of brambles, only exposing himself when he saw Joseph busy taking

aim. Finally he arrived within two steps of him without being seen.

Then, stopping, he waited until Joseph had reloaded his gun. Without

suspecting the danger behind him, he raised his gun to his shoulder to

take aim; then we saw him lower it quickly, and look around. He had

heard a slight noise in the bushes near him. He raised his head and

listened an instant, then leaned toward the right, and then toward the

left, without perceiving anything; for the savage was lying flat on the

ground, behind a pile of branches. Feeling entirely reassured, he again

raised his gun to take aim. At the same moment, the Indian, with an

infernal smile, raised himself from the earth, and, just as Joseph was

preparing to immolate another enemy, he brandished his knife. A last

shot was heard, a last Indian fell; but Joseph had also fallen, struck

to the heart by the cowardly fiend. The wretch then proceeded to scalp

him, after which he plundered him of his clothes, in which he arrayed

himself.”

V.—LAMENTATION.

“Paralyzed with horror and fright, we thought no longer of saving

ourselves. My sister, in her despair, pressed her baby to her heart,

and threw herself at the foot of a crucifix, which she seized in her

hands, and mutely covered it with tears and kisses, while I, too,

utterly overcome, threw myself on my knees beside her, and mingled

my tears and prayers with hers. Poor mother! she did not tremble for

herself, but for her child—that dear little angel, whom she loved so

tenderly, whom she so adored. It was indeed a beautiful babe, scarcely

eighteen months old, and had already begun to lisp ‘Mamma.’ ‘O my God!’

cried my sister between her sobs, ‘if I must die, I willingly give up

my life; but save, oh! save my child!’ Then, embracing it, and bathing

it in her tears, she clasped it to her heart, and sank to the floor

insensible. Although more dead than alive myself, I tried to sustain

her, and had her in my arms, when Joseph’s murderer entered, followed

by his cruel companions. Without uttering a word, he advanced toward

us, and violently snatched the child from its mother. She had not heard

them enter the room, but, when they tore the child away from her,

she shuddered and suddenly recovered her consciousness. The savages,

exasperated at having lost seven of their comrades, now only thought

of blood and vengeance. The assassin of Joseph, holding the child at

arm’s length, looked at it with the diabolical expression of a serpent

charming his victim before striking him. It was an angel in the grasp

of a demon. The monster smiled—Satan alone could have laughed as he

did. The baby, as if to supplicate his pity, smiled also, with that

angelic expression of innocence that would have moved the most hardened

and obdurate of hearts. But he, seizing it by the leg, whirled it round

for an instant, and then—oh! horror!—dashed its head against the

heavy edge of the huge stove. Its brains spattered over its mother’s

face. Like a tiger she sprang at the murderer of her child. Maternal

love gave her superhuman strength, and, seizing him by the throat, she

buried her fingers in his flesh. He tottered; his face turned black,

and he fell heavily to the floor, suffocated by the strength of her

desperate grasp. She would have undoubtedly strangled him, had not

another savage at that instant struck her a blow on the head with his

hatchet. My poor sister! her death was indeed a cruel one, but her

agony only lasted a moment—her troubles are ended, and she is now in

heaven. But I—what will become of me? You see the condition that I am

in. O my God, my God! have pity on me.”

And the young girl, wringing her hands in despair, threw herself

sobbing into my arms, pressed me to her heart, and implored me not to

abandon her into the hands of these brutal savages. But, oh! what is

more heart-breaking than to witness misfortune without the power of

alleviating it! We spent the night in weeping and trying to encourage

her, but I could not help feeling at the time that it was cruel to

inspire her with a confidence that I had not; for I knew these savages

too well. I knew that the monsters never abandoned their victims. The

next day, my father tried in every way to conciliate them, and then

interceded in behalf of the young captive. He offered any amount of

ransom for her, but in vain; nothing would tempt them. The effects

of the liquor had not entirely worn off, and they were sullen and

obstinate. My father used in turn prayers and threats to move them;

but neither presents, prayers, nor threats could rescue her from their

merciless hands. The wretched girl threw herself at their feet, and,

embracing their knees, besought them to listen to her supplications;

but the monsters only replied to her entreaties by bursts of laughter;

and, in spite of her prayers, and sobs, and supplications, they carried

her off with them.[186]

“Alas!” said Mlle. Baby, looking sorrowfully at the young officer, “are

you surprised now at my sadness, and that I could not smile and be gay

after having witnessed such a scene?”

“The demons!” exclaimed the officer, stamping his foot in horror

and indignation. “This infamous, bloodthirsty race should be

exterminated—exterminated to the last man. Why did I not know this

sooner? Yesterday, a Potawatamie came to my quarters to sell some furs.

He asked three times as much as they were worth, and I declined buying

them. He hung around for some time, annoying me very much, until I

finally ordered him to leave. He refused to do so; then, losing all

patience with the fellow, I rose from my seat, and, leading him to the

door, I kicked him out. He went away muttering, and threatening me with

his knife. I had a stick in my hand, and I now regret that I did not

knock him down.”

“How imprudent!” said the young girl. “You ought not to have provoked

that Indian; don’t you know that a savage never forgets an injury? He

may wander around the fort for a year, spying all of your movements,

watching your footsteps, tracking you everywhere, hiding in the woods

and among the rushes in the river, until an opportunity offers, and he

will approach with all the _finesse_ and cunning of a serpent, spring

upon you like a tiger, and strike you a death-blow, when you least

expect it. I see that you go every day out of the fort to fish on the

banks of the river. I advise you not to go any more; it is not safe,

and something terrible might happen to you.”

“Pshaw!” said the young officer, “you are too timid. I saw the fellow

leave this morning with a number of warriors belonging to his tribe;

they were going to Quebec to sell the furs, which they could not

dispose of here.”

VI.—THE DREAM.

The clock in the _salon_ had just struck one. Mme. Baby and her

daughter were seated sewing in the deep recess of an open window,

with a little work-table in front of them. M. Baby had gone away

that morning, to look after some land that he had just bought on the

other side of the river. The streets were deserted; nearly all the

inhabitants of the fort were at work in the fields in the vicinity.

The heat was intense. Not a breath agitated the trees in the garden,

whose motionless branches drooped languidly toward the earth, as if

imploring a refreshing breath or a drop of dew. A negro servant was

spreading some linen out to dry on the bushes, and put to flight, in

her perambulations, some chickens that were panting with the heat

under the sheltering foliage of the trees and shrubs. The silence was

only broken by the buzzing of insects, and the noisy whirr of the

grasshopper as it danced through the sunlight. The open window, filled

with bouquets, looked into the garden, and the pale, melancholy face

of Mlle. Baby could be seen between them, bending over an open flower

which imaged her loveliness in its fragrant corolla. “Mamma,” said she

at last, raising her head, “do you think papa will be away a long time?”

“I think he will be back in four or five days at the latest,” replied

her mother. “But why do you ask such a question?”

“Oh! because I am so anxious to have him back again. I want him to take

us immediately to Quebec, instead of waiting until next month. The trip

will divert my thoughts; for, since those Indians were here the other

day with that poor girl they had captured, I have not had a moment’s

piece of mind. She is always before my eyes. I see her everywhere;

she follows me everywhere. I even saw her in my dream last night. I

thought I was sitting in the midst of a gloomy and immense forest, near

a wild, rushing river that dashed over a precipice into a bottomless

chasm a few steps from me. On the opposite bank, which was covered with

flowers, and charming to behold, stood the young captive, pale and

tranquil, in a halo of soft, transparent light. She seemed to be in

another world. She held in her hands an open book, and, bending towards

me, she slowly turned over the leaves. She turned at least sixteen;

then she stopped and looked at me with an expression of the greatest

sorrow and distress, and made a sign to some one, who then seemed to be

standing near me, to cross the torrent. At the signal, all his limbs

trembled; his knees knocked together, and his eyes dilated, his mouth

gasped with terror, and a cold perspiration stood upon his forehead. He

tried to draw back, but an invincible power drew him toward the abyss.

He turned toward me, and besought my help most piteously. I experienced

the greatest commiseration for him, and tried in vain to extend my

hands to help him; invisible cords bound all my limbs, and prevented

any movement whatsoever. Vainly he tried to cling to the cliffs along

the shore; a relentless force impelled him towards the abyss. He had

already reached the middle of the stream, whose deep and foaming waters

roared around him, as if impatient to swallow him up. He tottered at

every step, and came near losing his equilibrium; but, rallying his

strength, he struggled on. At last a great wave broke over him, and

he lost his balance. His feet slipped; he looked toward me with a

glance of the most inexpressible anguish, and fell. In an instant, he

was borne to the brink of the precipice; he threw out his hands, and

grasped at a piece of rock that jutted out of the water, burying his

fingers in the green and slimy moss which covered it. For an instant,

he hung on with the strength of despair; his body, stopped suddenly in

its precipitate course, appeared for an instant above the waves. The

foam and spray enveloped it like a cloud, and the wind from the fall

blew through his dank and dripping hair. His dilated eyes were fastened

on the rock, which little by little receded from his convulsive grasp.

Finally, with a terrible shriek, he disappeared in the yawning gulf

below. Transfixed with agony and horror, I looked across at the young

captive; but she, without uttering a word, wiped away a tear, and

silently pointed to the last page in the book, which seemed to me to

be covered with blood. I screamed aloud with fright, and awoke with a

start. My God! will it be a page in my life?”

VII.—BLOOD.

Scarcely had Mlle. Baby finished speaking, when the sound of hasty

footsteps was heard at the door, and a man, covered with blood, and

with a terrified look, rushed in. It was the young officer. His right

arm was broken, and hanging at his side.

“Hide me quickly,” cried he. “I am pursued by the Indians.”

“Up in the attic, quick,” said Mme. Baby to him, “and do not stir for

your life.”

In another moment, the savages had entered the room; but, before they

could say a word, Mme. Baby pointed to the next street, and they went

out again quickly, believing that the officer had escaped in that

direction. The admirable composure of Mme. Baby had completely deceived

them. Not a muscle of her face betrayed her excessive agitation, and,

happily, they did not have time to notice the mortal pallor of the

young girl, who, still leaning among the flowers on the window-sill,

had almost fainted away. It was one of those moments of inexpressible

anguish when a chill like death strikes the heart. Mme. Baby hoped

that the savages, fearing the superintendent, would not dare to force

themselves into the house; and yet, who could stop them if they did,

or who could foresee what these barbarians, once having tasted blood,

might do? She hoped that their fruitless efforts might induce them

to abandon their search, or, if they persisted, that she would have

sufficient time to obtain help, in case they again entered the house.

Making a sign to a servant who was at work in the garden, she ordered

him to run as fast as he could, and notify some men belonging to the

fort of the danger which threatened them. Some anxious minutes elapsed,

but the savages did not return. “Do you think they have really gone?”

asked the young girl, in a low tone. A faint glimmer of hope appeared

in her countenance.

“Even if they should return,” answered Mme. Baby, “they would not dare

...”

She did not finish, but leaning toward the window, she tried to catch

the sound of human voices which were heard in the distance. Was it the

help that she expected, or was it the voices of the Indians coming

back? She could not distinguish. The sound drew nearer and nearer, and

became more distinct as it approached. “They are our men,” exclaimed

Mlle. Baby. “Don’t you hear the barking of our dog?” And she drew a

long breath of relief, as if an immense weight had been taken from her

heart.

Mme. Baby did not reply; a faint smile played over her lips. She,

too, had heard the dogs barking; but another noise that she knew only

too well had also reached her ears. Very soon the voices became so

distinct that it was impossible to be deceived any longer. “Here they

are, here they are!” shrieked the young girl, sinking into a seat near

the window, as the different-colored feathers with which the savages

decorated their heads appeared between the trees.

“Don’t tremble so,” said Mme. Baby in a quiet voice to her daughter,

“or you will betray us. Look out of the window, and don’t let them

perceive your emotion.”

Courage and coolness at a critical moment are always admirable, but

when a woman possesses these qualities, they are sublime. Calm and

impassive, without even rising from her seat, Mme. Baby tranquilly

continued her work. The most practised eye could not have detected the

smallest trace of emotion, the least feverish excitement or agitation,

on her commanding and noble countenance. A heroine’s heart beat in

her woman’s breast, and it was thus that she awaited the arrival of

the savages. “Tell us where you have concealed the white warrior,”

cried the first one who entered the room. It was the Potawatamie whom

the young officer had so imprudently offended. He was dripping with

perspiration, and out of breath with his long and fatiguing quest.

You could see the rage and exasperation of his disappointment in his

ferocious glances, his scowling brow, and the excitement that made

every feature quiver.

“Comrade,” replied Mme. Baby, in a tranquil tone of voice, “you know

the superintendent well; and, if you have the misfortune to misbehave

in his house, you will get into trouble.”

The Indian hesitated a moment, then said, in a feigned mildness of

voice, “My white sister knows that the Potawatamie loves peace, and

that he never makes the first attack. The white warrior is on the

war-path, or the Potawatamie would not have pursued.”

“I have not hidden the white warrior,” answered Mme. Baby. “It is

useless to search here; you had better look elsewhere, or he will

escape you.”

The Indian did not reply, but, looking at Mme. Baby with a smile, he

pointed to a little stain on the floor that no one but an Indian would

have discovered. But the sharp eye of the savage had detected there a

trace of his enemy. It was a drop of blood, which Mme. Baby had taken

the precaution to wipe away most carefully. “My sister has told the

truth,” said the Indian, in an ironical tone. “The white warrior has

not passed this way; that drop of blood, I suppose, she put there to

persuade the Indian that she had concealed the white warrior.” Then,

assuming a more serious tone, he continued: “My sister, know well that

the Potawatamie will do the white warrior no harm; only show us where

he is hidden, and we will go away; we only want to take him pris ...”

He stopped, and, bending his head forward, looked through an open

window at the other end of the apartment; then, giving a hideous yell,

he rushed across the room, and leaped out of the window that opened

into the garden. His ferocious companions followed him, howling like a

troop of demons. Without seeing what had happened, Mme. Baby understood

all. The young officer, hearing the Indians return, and believing

himself lost, had the imprudence to jump out of one of the windows

into the garden. He ran toward a covered fountain in the centre of the

_parterre_ to hide, when the Indian perceived him. How can I describe

the scene which followed? The pen drops from my hand. In two bounds,

they had reached him, and one of the savages, striking him a terrible

blow with his fist, sent him reeling to the ground. He fell on his

broken arm, and the excruciating pain caused him to utter a deep groan.

They then seized hold of him, and bound his hands and feet. Poor young

man! what resistance could he make to his cruel enemies, with a broken

arm, and totally disabled and weakened by the loss of blood. He called

for help, but the echoes in the garden only answered his cries, and

redoubled the horror of the scene. Mlle. Baby, bereft of her senses,

threw herself at her mother’s feet, and, hiding her face on her knees,

she covered her ears with her hands, to shut out, if possible, from

sight and hearing the frightful tragedy. While the rest of the savages

were tying their victim down, the Potawatamie drew out his knife, and

deliberately commenced to sharpen it on a stone. His face betrayed no

excitement whatever; not even the horrible pleasure of gratifying his

vengeance, which caused his heart to palpitate with an infernal joy,

could change his stoical countenance. “My brother the white warrior,”

said he, continuing to whet his knife with the utmost coolness, “knows

very well that he can insult the Potawatamie with impunity, because the

Potawatamie is a coward, and would rather run than fight.... Does my

brother now wish to make peace with his friend, the Potawatamie? He can

speak if he wishes, and name his terms, for he is free.” Then, suddenly

assuming a ferocious air, he straightened himself up, and, fixing his

inflamed eyes on the young officer, said: “My brother the white warrior

can now chant his death-song, because he must die.” And brandishing

his knife, he plunged it into his throat, while another of these

monsters caught the blood in a little copper kettle. The rest of the

savages then kicked and stamped upon the body with the most infernal

yells and contortions. The death-rattle of the poor victim, mingling

with these howls, reached the ears of the young girl, and she shook

in a convulsion of horror. At last it all ceased. The victim had been

immolated. Pushing aside the corpse with his foot, the Potawatamie,

followed by his companions, came again toward the house. “Ha! ha! so

you would not tell us where your friend, the white warrior, was?” cried

the Indian, as he entered the room. “Very well, since you love him so

much, you shall drink his blood.” Mme. Baby, pale as a marble statue,

drew herself up firmly. “You can kill me,” said she, “but you can never

make me drink it!” The young girl had fainted, and was lying at her

mother’s feet. They seized hold of Mme. Baby, and tried to force open

her mouth; but failing in their efforts, they threw the contents of the

vessel in her face, and left the house.[187]

VIII.—THE SERPENT.

Several months had elapsed since the events had taken place which we

have just narrated. It was night. In the centre of the garden, a simple

black cross had been erected on the spot where the unfortunate young

man had been massacred. No inscription revealed to the passer-by either

the name of the victim or the fatal circumstances of his death. Alas!

it was written for ever in characters of blood on the hearts of the

family. Every evening, the superintendent, with his wife, children, and

servants, assembled at the foot of this cross, to pray for the repose

of the soul of his unfortunate friend. On this especial evening, all

the family had as usual visited the grave, and returned to the house,

except the young girl, who, dressed in deep mourning, still remained

kneeling at the foot of the sombre monument. She was very pale, and

there was an expression of the most ineffable sadness on her face. The

evening dew had almost entirely uncurled her long ringlets, which now

hung in disorder around her cheeks. You might have mistaken her for a

statue of grief. From the clear, high heaven above, the moon poured

floods of melancholy light. Its dreamy rays fell on the sod at the

foot of the cross and on the face of the young girl like a thought from

beyond the tomb—like a silent and grateful sigh from the innocent

victim whose memory had left so tender and anguishing an impression

in her soul. Her lips moved in ardent prayer—prayer, that celestial

solace of the grief-stricken heart, the smile of the angels through

the tears of earth. For a long time she thus silently held communion

with her God, breathing out her prayers with sighs and tears, as

she knelt at the foot of this cross, on the sod still damp with the

victim’s blood. At last she rose, and was about to leave, when, raising

her eyes for a moment, she thought she saw a shadow moving across an

opening in the wall of a shed near by. A cloud, at that moment passing

over the moon, prevented her from distinguishing what the object was.

She waited a moment until the cloud had passed over, when what was

her astonishment to see a human face in the aperture! It must be a

robber, she thought, and yet she knew positively that the gate was well

secured. “He will find himself nicely caught when the servants come to

lock up,” said she to herself. By degrees, however, the head was pushed

more and more through the air-hole, and gradually emerged from the

obscurity. At the same moment, the moonlight fell clear and full on the

face. The young girl actually shivered. She recognized it but too well;

it was impossible to be mistaken. It was he; she recognized perfectly

his copper skin, his hard, ferocious features, and his yellowish eyes,

rolling in their sockets. It was indeed the Potawatamie, the murderer

of the young officer.[188]

Her first thought was flight, but an invincible curiosity fastened

her to the spot. The Indian continued to work through the aperture;

one arm was already out, and he held something in his hand which

she could not discern. He tried for a long time to get through the

air-hole, which was too small for his body. Finally, while making a

last effort, he suddenly turned his head, and fixed his eyes with a

very uneasy expression on a little bush near him. He seemed undecided

what to do; then, letting go the object, he rested his hand on the

ground, and, pushing it against the earth with all his strength, tried

to force himself back again through the hole. But his broad shoulders,

compressed on both sides by the wall, held him like a vice, and he

could neither move one way nor another. Then his uneasiness increased,

and he looked again anxiously toward the bushes. A slight rustling of

the leaves was then perceptible, and a small head emerged slowly from

the shadow of the branches, and extended itself toward the savage.

It was a rattlesnake.[189] Immovable and with fixed eyes, the Indian

watched the least movement of the reptile, which advanced softly and

cautiously, as if aware of the strength and power of his redoubtable

adversary. When within a few feet of the savage, it stopped, raised

itself up, and, throwing out its forked tongue, sprang toward his face;

but, before he could touch him, the Indian, as quick as thought, gave

him a violent blow with the hand that was free, and the reptile fell

a short distance from him. Then he began again to make every effort

to disengage himself; but in vain. The snake, now furious, advanced

a second time to recommence the attack, but with more caution than

before. Approaching still nearer to his enemy, he threw himself forward

with much greater violence, but without success; for the hand of the

savage sent him rebounding further off than before. The Potawatamie

then gathered all his strength for a final effort of liberation, but

of no avail: he remained fast in the opening of the air-hole. Quick

as lightning, the reptile, now foaming at the mouth, with blazing

eyes, and jaws swollen with rage, his forked tongue extended, sprang

with renewed strength toward his prey. His scaly skin glistened and

sparkled in the silvery light of the moon, and the slight noise made by

his rattles resembled the rustling of parchment, and alone broke the

silence of the night. This mortal combat in the stillness of night,

between a serpent and a savage more subtle than the serpent, had an

indescribable fascination; it was more like a contest between two evil

spirits, in the shadow of night, over some unfortunate victim. The

serpent now approached so near the Indian that he could almost have

seized him with his hand; he raised himself a last time, and, throwing

back his head, sprang forward. The savage, guarding himself carefully

with his one hand, had followed with his eyes the least movement of

the writhing body. It was plain to see that the final fight had begun,

and could only terminate in the total vanquishment of one or the other

of the combatants. At the instant that the snake sprang like an arrow

upon his enemy, the Indian raised his hand; but this time the attack

of the reptile had been so rapid and instantaneous that, before he

could strike him a blow, his fangs had entered his cheek. A hoarse cry

died away in the throat of the savage, who, seizing the serpent with

his hand before he could escape, raised him to his mouth, and in his

rage tore him to pieces with his teeth. A vain reprisal—the blow had

been struck. A short time after, the most horrible cries and fearful

convulsions announced that the mortal venom had entered his veins. The

victim writhed with despair in the midst of his excruciating agony.

It was thought at first that he had finally succeeded in getting out;

but subsequently they found the body, enormously swollen, still held

in the aperture of the air-hole. His bloodshot eyes were starting

from their sockets, his face as black as ink, while his gaping mouth

revealed two rows of white teeth, to which still clung the fragments of

the reptile’s skin, and flakes of bloody foam. Providence had indeed

terribly avenged the assassination of the young officer.

THE JESUITS IN PARIS.

A WALK in the direction of the gloomy though now as ever fashionable

Faubourg St. Germain is not exactly one that a non-fashionable person

would ordinarily choose; nor does the Rue de Sèvres in that quarter

hold out any particular inducement for a foot-passenger to traverse it.

However, it was to the Rue de Sèvres that, on the 18th of January,

1873, I bent my steps; for at one o’clock precisely I had an

appointment to keep there with a Father of the _Compagnie de Jésus_;

and No. 35 in that street is the society’s headquarters.

I crossed the Seine at the Pont Royale, and soon found myself in the

main artery of the faubourg—the well-known Rue du Bac. I splashed

along with omnibuses that seemed determined to do their best to destroy

the roughly macadamized carriage-road; by huge gaps in the façade,

where the _pétroleuse_ had been at work, and where the dull-red walls

looked as if the destroying element were still lurking about them;

by blue-coated and blue-hooded policemen, who scrutinized one to an

extent that made you debate within your mind whether you had or had

not picked the pocket of a passer-by, or lately become affiliated to

the _Internationale_. On, by the “Maison Petit St. Thomas”—a large

dry-goods establishment, the name of which may bring back perhaps to

some of our lady readers the pleasant season passed a few years since

in Paris, with its gay _fêtes_ and agreeable shopping excursions. On,

till the plate-glass of the store windows becomes less costly, and

the fish and the _charcuterie_, or ham and sausage shops, become more

plentiful. On, till at last, to right and left, “Rue de Sèvres,” in

bold white letters on a blue ground, tells me that I have reached my

destination. To save time, I thought it necessary to ask some one where

the particular house that I wanted was situated. I looked at a _sergent

de ville_, but his glances repelled me. I turned towards a cabman, but

I fancied he expected something more than I was prepared to give him;

and then, not in despair, but in the natural order of things, I had

recourse to the inevitable Parisian chestnut-man, who (I having taken

the precaution of buying two sous’ worth of damply-warm chestnuts)

willingly gave me all the information that I required.

The exterior of No. 35 Rue de Sèvres is as much like that of any other

house in Paris as you can well imagine. There is a certain number of

feet of stucco, relieved by oblong windows; and there are two large

_portes cochères_, or folding-doors, far apart from one another, and

looking incapable either of being opened or closed; although, in point

of fact, the one leads to the church, and the other to the convent.

I entered, of course, by the last-named portal, and, passing through

the usual French courtyard, knocked at a glass door, from whence it was

evident that a brother porter within held communication with the world

without.

I presented my letter of introduction to him, and, while he was making

arrangements for the transmission of it to the rightful owner, because

it was raining heavily, and because I saw only one door open, I entered

by that door, and found myself uninvited and unwittingly in the

_conciergerie_, or porter’s lodge, itself.

The _concierge_ and his occupation afforded me a good deal of

amusement, or, to speak less lightly, a good deal of room for thought

during part of the three-quarters of an hour that I was destined to

wait for the arrival of the priest with whom I had the engagement.

He has under his control the management of ten brown wooden handles,

attached to ten wires, which wires are connected with ten different

doors in different parts of the establishment.

If a person want a confessor, he pulls the wire connected with the

church. If a lady desires advice, another pull opens the parlors to

her. If a priest wishes to come from the convent, another pull in

another direction is necessary. And as these pulls (except in the last

case) are invariably followed by a message sent through a speaking-tube

by the same brother porter, to inform the priest of the fact that he is

wanted; and as through the before-mentioned glass door and otherwise

he receives all letters, and answers all queries, both from within and

without, he has, I take it, a pretty hard time of it.

I had been too much absorbed at first to observe what was taking place

around me; but, after a little, I began to remark that the priests,

in passing to and fro through the _conciergerie_, bestowed upon me

more glances of earnest inquiry than I thought my personal appearance

actually warranted. At last the mystery was solved by one father being

so good as to tell me that seculars generally waited in the parlors.

I bowed, thanked him gratefully, and went; but not before I had

discovered that, if the pigeon-holes for letters be a true test, there

were fourteen or more priests resident in the Rue de Sèvres at that

particular time.

I was not sorry for the exchange of place. It was strangely interesting

to be sitting in those rooms where, so short a time since, the

Communists, under the command of an energetic young gentleman named

Citoyen Lagrange, took prisoner the good Superior Father Olivaint and

his Père Procureur, M. Caubert.

Strange to sit in those parlors, and gaze upon the large and

well-photographed portraits of those two men and martyrs, and to notice

the remarkable likeness existing between them. How both had the same

square forehead and firmly set, powerful mouth; and how both looked—as

they were—soldiers ready to die under the banner for which they fought.

_Ne pleurez pas sur moi_,[190] cried Father Olivaint to the solitary

group of sympathizers whom he met on his way to the _Préfecture de

Police_.

No! _mon père_, we weep not, but rather thank God that the grand old

spirit of martyrdom has not yet died out among us!

Besides the thoughts which the past suggested to me, it was interesting

to note the living occupants of the rooms. One silver-haired old

gentleman, whom I afterwards found out to be the self-same Père Alexis

Lefebvre whom Lagrange left in charge of the house, telling him to keep

it _au nom de la Commune_, was holding a very serious conversation with

two or three gentlemen, the red ribbons in whose button-holes declared

them to be _chevaliers de la Legion d’Honneur_. Another father was

having quite a small reception of middle-aged married ladies, who

probably had, or desired to have, sons either at the College of

Vaugirard or at that of S. Geneviève. Another—but stay! here is my

particular father, to whose kindness I owe it that I have been enabled

to write this paper.

The Society of Jesus is so well known to the citizens of New York that

it would be superfluous for me to give any lengthened description of

the general principles of government upon which the order is based.

Suffice it to say, for the benefit of the uninitiated, that, in common

with other religious, they have a head resident at the Roman court;

provincials under him, among whom the supervision of the different

stations is divided; and superiors of individual houses.

It is peculiar, however, to the Society of Jesus that each provincial

has attendant upon him an officer called _socius_, whose care it is to

look after the pecuniary business of the province, and in many kindred

ways to assist his chief; but this office, I am informed, does not

confer any additional rank upon the holder.

The case is different, however, with some other officials of the

society, called “consulters,” who, as their name implies, are chosen

from among the number of the elder and more experienced brethren.

The house in the Rue de Sèvres was reopened in the year 1853, after

having been considerably enlarged.

The main building consists of a plainly-built quadrangle, on the north

side of which, and in immediate connection with it, stands the church,

dedicated to the sacred name of Jesus. Running along all the inner

sides of the quadrangle, both on the ground and the other two floors,

is a lofty, well-ventilated corridor or cloister, adorned here and

there, after the usual manner of convents, with religious paintings.

The piece of ground forming the natural centre of the quadrangle is

laid out with shrubbery, though without pretension to anything more

than neatness.

On the ground floor are situated the refectory, the kitchens, and other

offices; while the first and second floors are devoted exclusively to

the use of the fathers. The cells, like the corridors, are lofty and

well ventilated, but so simple in their arrangement as to require no

description.

The priests, in the true monastic spirit, sweep and keep clean their

own rooms and even the cloisters; and, from the general air of

cleanliness and order that pervades the place, it is evident that the

work is well done. This walk through the cloisters of the Jesuit house

in Paris would be uninteresting were it not for the remembrance of one

ne’er-to-be-forgotten room; and for the sake of the names printed upon

the cell doors, bringing back as they do to one’s mind the recollection

of past times and weary troubles; and the near presence of men so many

of whom have distinguished themselves in working for the cause of holy

church.

Tread softly, and be silent now, as ye approach yonder door that bears

no printed name; for the key that turns the jealous lock will disclose

that to thy gaze which should excite thy intensest feelings of humility!

It is the “Martyrs’ Room,” where are kept the relics of the five heroic

men, each one of whom “pro lege Dei sui certavit usque ad mortem

et a verbis impiorum non timuit; fundatus enim erat supra firmam

petram.”[191]

Anatole de Beugy was arrested with the Père Ducoudray.

“Voilà un nom à vous faire couper le cou,” cried the officer in charge

of the party of arrest.

“Oh! j’espère,” replied the father calmly; “que vous ne me ferez pas

couper le cou à cause de mon nom.”

I imagine that the officer did not think more highly of F. de Beugy

after this. In fact, all through the time of his imprisonment, his

captors seem not to have liked him or his indomitable _sang froid_. His

coat is there, in this “Martyrs’ Room” (a secular one, by the bye),

and it is pierced with seventy-two Communist bullets—truly, a very

palpable proof of his enemies’ animosity.

When the Père Olivaint was on his way to execution, as he descended the

stairs of the prison of La Roquette, he found—how naturally!—that he

had his breviary tightly grasped in his hand. “They have me,” perhaps

he thought, “but they need not have _this_”; and he presented the book

to the _concierge_ of the prison, who had shown him some kindness. God

knows what motives the man had, but an officer of the National Guard

snatched it from his hand, and threw it into the flames of a fire near

by.

The _concierge_ recovered the breviary, or what remained of it, and it

is now in the “Martyrs’ Room.”

He who can look upon this relic without emotion must have a very hard

heart indeed!

Do any of us ever think that the spirit of penance—corporal

penance—is dying out amongst us? There are instruments of

self-mortification in this “Martyrs’ Room” that will convince us to the

contrary.

It is not a miracle—unless the world and life be all a miracle—if,

when men die wondrous deaths, wonderful things should follow upon those

deaths; and when we see a marble tablet in this “Martyrs’ Room” telling

how, not eighteen months ago, at Mass-time, when the priest invoked the

saints whose relics lay beneath the altars in the church, a child was

healed of a grievous disease, we must not be surprised.

“Ecce ego vobiscum sum omnibus diebus usque ad consummationem

sœculi.”[192]

The beds from La Roquette are here—pieces of sacking, stretched out by

a contrivance something similar to that made use of in the formation of

camp-stools.

Here are the little silver cases in which the fathers concealed the

Blessed Sacrament, to be at last, as each anticipated, his viaticum.

But enough....

The church, as I before stated, is situated on the north side of the

quadrangle. It is Gothic, and of fair proportions, consisting of a

choir and two aisles. The only side chapel worthy of note is that where

repose the bodies of the PP. Olivaint, Ducoudray, Clerc, Caubert, and

De Beugy, murdered on the 24th and 26th of May, 1871, by the Communists

of Paris. The walls, the floor, the whole chapel, in fact, is literally

covered with wreaths of blood-red _immortelles_; while in front of

what, in the event of their canonization, will be the “Martyrs’ Altar,”

are five white marble slabs, bearing upon them the names of the five

victims, together with the incidents and date of their deaths.

My kind guide—the priest whom I have elsewhere described as being

“my particular father”—having now shown me all that was necessary of

the house and chapel, returned with me to his cell, and, in some very

interesting conversations then and on my succeeding visits, soon gave

me an idea of the important works undertaken by his society in Paris.

“We are,” said he, “quite a military order. Fighting is as much our

business as it is the soldier’s; and I will even go so far as to say

that he is no true Jesuit who does not fight. Of enemies, as you may

imagine, there is no lack whatever; but, undoubtedly, here our _bête

noire_ is socialism; for you know in Paris, as indeed elsewhere, it

has ever been our aim to undertake, if possible, the education of the

male portion of society. And this, unfortunately, happens to be the

favorite work of the socialists also; for, however faulty their code of

moral philosophy may be in other respects, they have at least grasped

the fact that to educate the affluent youth of a country is to form the

intellect of a rising generation. However,” concluded my instructor

laughingly, “we have never been _very_ popular in European society.”

“No,” I answered abstractedly; for I was thinking just then of the

sacred name which the order bears—of him who was “Virum dolorum et

scientem infirmitatem”;[193] and my thoughts reverted to the martyr

shrine that I had so lately seen in the chapel. “But perhaps you, who

have in such a special manner enrolled yourselves under the banner of

the sacred name of Jesus, have received of him a greater share than

others of the shame of the cross.”

The father’s reply was a very practical one. “My dear sir,” said he,

“nothing of the kind. The world dislikes us because we persist in

teaching, and because it knows perfectly well that all our teaching is

impregnated to the core with that particular kind of Catholicity which

it hates—the Catholicity, I mean, whose first principle is devotion

and implicit obedience to the Holy See.”

It will be seen, therefore, from the foregoing fragment of

conversation, that the Jesuits’ work in Paris is for the most part the

Catholic education of the upper classes.

The fathers in the Rue de Sèvres do, in one way and another, a good

deal of work, although but little, perhaps, of a character that

directly identifies itself with the peculiar animus of the order to

which I have alluded. They are popular as confessors, and this involves

a good deal of labor.

They direct two confraternities of men, each numbering respectively

upwards of two hundred members. One is for the fathers of families,

and the other for young men. Each society meets in the chapel upon

alternate Thursdays for Mass and instruction. Again, the Jesuits render

every assistance that lies in their power to the parochial clergy; and

thus the fathers become, now conductors of missions, and now Lenten or

Advent preachers.

At the Rue de Sèvres are given retreats, not only to their own

brethren and the secular clergy, but also, and on a large scale, to

private individuals—men whom care has driven to seek refuge in the

contemplation of the treasures laid up for them in heaven.

Jesuits, whose duty calls them to places _en route_ to which Paris

becomes a natural resting-place, find a haven in the Rue de Sèvres. The

provincial resides here when he is in Paris; and, finally, a few men

who, at a moment’s notice, are available to be sent anywhere to meet a

sudden emergency, make for the time this most interesting house their

home.

In a dark, narrow street in close proximity to the Pantheon—in a

street that, in its unlikeness to some other parts of the city, reminds

one of the Paris of history—is situated the College of S. Geneviève.

This is the chief educational establishment of the order; the other

being that of the school of the Immaculate Conception at Vaugirard—a

village on the southwest side of Paris.

In concluding this chapter in the life of what, next to holy church

itself, must ever be considered the most wonderful organization that

the world has ever seen, I cannot do better than append a brief account

of the character of the work done in these two houses.

The Ecole S. Geneviève, founded in the year 1854, proposes for its

object the preparation of youths for admission into the various

professional colleges in France. That the work is a success may be

seen in the fact that, in 1872-1873, sixty-four students were actually

admitted from thence to the military academy at St. Cyr, while

twenty-three more were declared “admissibles”; that the same school

sent sixteen boys to the Ecole Centrale, to be educated as engineers,

seven to the Ecole Navale, and twenty-three to the Polytechnique; and,

lastly, that, exclusive of these, many more have been admitted into

other similar establishments in Paris or elsewhere. The aggregate

number of students appears, from the statistics put into my hands, to

exceed four hundred and fifty.

The present rector of S. Geneviève is the immediate successor of the

Père Ducoudray; and it is a noteworthy fact that three out of the five

men killed under the Commune were connected with the school; the other

two being PP. Caubert and Clerc. The services of the last-named father

must have been extremely valuable; for, previous to his admission to

the Society of Jesus, he had been for many years a naval officer.

The school of the Immaculate Conception, at Vaugirard, is perhaps as

perfect a specimen of its kind as can be found in Europe.

At the present moment, there are upwards of six hundred and forty boys,

representing the flower of the French _beau monde_, receiving at this

institution a sound high-class education.

On his entrance, the scholar is at first put through an elementary

course, out of which he is drafted into the sixth form, from which he

rises to the third, and then completes his education by successive

courses of classics, rhetoric, and philosophy.

Thus, to an outsider and to a passer-by in Paris, appears the work of

that grand order whose aim we believe to be no less than the motto they

have adopted:

_Ad majorem Dei gloriam!_

SAN MARCO: A REMINISCENCE.

IN all the great cities of the Old World, the cathedral is the nucleus

round which gathers the social life of the community. It is a national

monument, a historical representative; it keeps in its tombs records

more precious to the nation than those treasured in archives and

libraries; it is identified with the city’s success or failure, and

often bears visible marks of this sympathetic life in its trophies or

in its ruins. Of old, the principal church of a city became the mirror

of the people’s individuality; it took on the form that best expressed

the people’s genius; it was an index to the national character. If this

is so with other churches, it is perhaps even more strikingly true of

S. Mark’s in Venice.

This unique church, the S. Sophia of the West, and the inheritrix

_par excellence_ of Byzantine treasures, is one that, to our fancy,

makes a deeper impression on the stranger than S. Peter’s at Rome. To

describe it technically; to speak of its uneven floor and crowded,

heavy pilasters; to enumerate its columns, and analyze the color of

its mosaics, is simply a desecration, besides inevitably implying an

untruth. Criticism cannot be anything but an afterthought, even though

genuine admiration should not be the first impression of the visitor.

A spell is laid upon you at the very outset, and an indescribable

feeling of reverence steals over your every sense as you tread the

dusky aisles. We have always found it most satisfactory, in visiting

either churches or cities, to slowly drink in the spirit of the place,

rather than rush into a dissection of its detailed sights; and we are

persuaded that this slow, receptive method is the only way in which to

enjoy travel of any sort.

Thus, for instance, S. Mark’s became so woven in with our daily life

that, without being able to give a single date or statistical fact

concerning it, we were yet entirely penetrated with its peculiar

beauty, but, above all, by its silent influence.

We went there every morning to early Mass—which, by the bye, is the

only way to see a beautiful church on the Continent. You grow to love

it, to know its every corner, to feel its peace, to be quite at home

in it, to look out for the sunbeam throwing its line of gold over some

particular spot on the marble floor, or for the red glow of the sunset

to illumine some favorite mosaic. Then, too, you begin to know your

fellow-worshippers, and to expect the clamorous hum of devotion with

which this old man tells his beads, or to be disappointed if you fail

to see the old beggar-woman crouching behind the ponderous door, and

stretching out her hand with a ready blessing for the daily alms. S.

Mark’s is one of the most peaceful churches in Europe; silence seems

natural to it, and not even a great ceremony appears to create any

stir there. The midnight Mass, which, by a singular exemption from the

ordinary rule, takes place on Christmas eve, at five o’clock in the

afternoon (this and the Christmas Mass at Vienna are the only such

exceptions), is celebrated with great pomp, and the music is not too

full of repose; yet the spirit of the church seems serenely unaltered,

and the great brooding silence hangs over the echoes of the pageants,

hushing them till the mind wanders away so far from their earthly

presence that it is hardly more conscious of them than a man standing

on a high mountain would be of the suppressed hum of the city lying

at his feet. But another solemnity have we witnessed in this church

much more congenial to its spirit, and indeed the most impressive of

all Christian ceremonies—the office of _Tenebræ_. S. Mark’s is never

lighted by anything save the golden lamps of its distant shrines, and

the tall columns of wax on the high altar. The service on the three

evenings of Holy Wednesday and Thursday, and Good Friday, is generally

after dark, and every one brings his own light—a _cerino_, or coil

of waxen taper—by which to read his book. This will barely suffice

for two persons to read by, so that, from the gallery where we were

stationed, we could see the church sown with stars, like the heavens at

midnight; while, in the various fantastic recesses above and below our

own, called galleries, glimmered a score of similar fitful lights. The

attendance was small, and the beauty of the sight thereby increased.

The chant, coming from below as the invisible choir breathed out the

solemn lamentations, had a weird, stilling effect, like that of the

sighing of the wind among the pines, suggesting everything that was

strange, far-away, and desolate. We had heard the _Miserere_ of the

Sistine Chapel in Rome, and likened it to what one might dream the

angels to have sung while Christ hung on the cross of Calvary; but

this—the same service, the same words, almost the same chant—seemed

rather what the watchers round the sepulchre might have whispered amid

their sobs, as they left the sacred body of their dead Lord on the

evening of the first Good Friday.

Among the few people whose faces were near enough to be recognized

were some of our acquaintances of the Venetian _salons_. They wore

the customary dress, black gowns and lace veils falling gracefully

around them. One was a great beauty by night, though what looked a

soft, cream-colored complexion then would look sallow by day. She was

the daughter of a Jew, married to a nominal Catholic, but an actual

atheist, and herself practised no religion whatsoever. Here she was,

with her beautiful, hopeless eyes fixed on the religious ceremonial

with a sort of weary, hungry, perplexed look, while a friend tried

earnestly to interest her in the spirit of the ritual.

Don Carlos and his family were there too, he and his brother being mere

boys at the time, and more occupied by the care required to keep the

_cerino_ from burning down too low than by the solemn ceremonies at

which they were assisting. The daily life, if one may so call it, of

the Venetian Basilica has, however, more power to charm the memory than

its hours of splendid show. We like best to think of it almost empty

and quite silent, its high altar seldom used, and its Lady Chapel,

Chapel of the Blessed Sacrament, and altar of the Crucifix quaintly

propped up against the corner of the pilaster, surrounded by the few

worshippers whose faithful instincts bid them haunt the same spots

day after day. In the early morning, you enter the seemingly deserted

church. No hum of prayer is heard; hardly a human form is in sight.

Suddenly, to the right of the high chancel, the sound of a little

bell is heard, and, from the winding path that leads through chapels

and pillars from the sacristy, a priest appears, vested for Mass, and

accompanied by his server. From hidden corners rise up silent forms

that join his train, and follow him to the altar which he has chosen;

a devout congregation is quietly collected, and crowds round the

rails, outside and inside, or, where there are no rails, presses up

to the priest’s very feet, and often impedes the server’s movements.

The latter is not always very reverential, however, and his motions

sometimes savor of abruptness; but the people are too simple-minded to

be shocked. When the bell should be rung, the boy ensconces himself at

the side of the altar, and pulls a string attached to a bell high up

above his head; and here, as in most Italian churches, the _Domine non

sum dignus_ is not distinguished by a bell at all. Another feature of

S. Mark’s is the collector. At every Mass, he comes round, rattling

a box in the face of each person, and crying, in a monotonous tone,

“For the poor, my brethren,” or, “For the souls in purgatory”; and, as

there are many collectors, and the succession of Masses at each of the

three or four altars is uninterrupted, it may be judged whether this

simple and erratic style of collecting is not rather an infliction

than otherwise; yet somehow it fits in with the spirit of the place.

S. Mark’s contains no pictures; that is, no masterpieces of those

whom the world recognizes as the kings of their art. SS. Giovanni e

Paolo, the Jesuit church, that of the Frari, and many others, are

rich in these treasures; but San Marco has its matchless mosaics,

combining Scriptural, historical, and allegorical subjects of colossal

dimensions, with the most fanciful arabesques and purely decorative

tracery. The colors, both in the interior, where the low arches seem

lined with the golden glow of an everlasting sunset, and on the outer

porch, where figures of vast size and groups of bold conception strike

the eye, are almost as brilliant to-day as they must have been a

thousand years ago.

If there is no _chef-d’œuvre_ of modern art, there is nevertheless

something more suggestive to the Catholic mind. The “picture” we grew

to love most in all Venice was no Titian or Paul Veronese, nor even a

Bellini (though the latter have the fragrance of Beato Angelico about

them); but a brown Byzantine Madonna, hidden behind crowns and necklets

of heavy gold, and enthroned in a deep, receding shrine—a temple of

blazing gems under the massive, overhanging arches of S. Mark’s. The

face, as revealed in the unadorned prints of it sold all over Venice,

is very beautiful, the features severely regular, and the expression

one of infinite majesty and calm. We know more than one of these sombre

masterpieces of unknown artists, which no one admires, because no one,

as a rule, _sees_ them, but which, though overloaded with precious

metals to the detriment of their beauty, and branded contemptuously

by sightseers as mere “miraculous images,” are yet very pure models

of ancient art, and most interesting relics of early Christianity.

For instance, there is one at Warsaw in universal veneration all over

Poland, and whose grave, dignified, and grandly serene cast of features

raises it as a work of religious art far above the portraits of

simpering maidens, buxom peasants, or gorgeous sultanas, whom the world

has recognized for nearly four hundred years as the type of the Mother

of God. Russia is rich in these Byzantine pictures, and the Greek

Church holds them in as great honor as the Catholic.

We seem to have wandered out of Venice, somehow, in this gossip about

unrecognized pictures; but the mention of Byzantium in reality brings

us back to the lagoons, for it is as familiar to the Venetian as his

own republic. Indeed, one would think that Venice had no civilization

before she invaded Constantinople in 1204; for everything of any

value, artistic or historical, is always traced up to this date. As

it is impossible to create a new Venice, so it would be to build a

new Basilica of San Marco; the city of the Evangelist stands alone

in history, and its cathedral alone in art. It has the rare merit of

suggesting nothing if not Christianity; it is more individual than S.

Peter’s, and less associated with pageants and festivals; it is no mere

imitation or adaptation of the forms of pagan art; it suits the purple

sky and brilliant atmosphere of the South, yet without jarring on the

sense of the Christianity to whose use it is dedicated; and, if its

style is less symbolical than the Gothic, it is at least less servile

than the Palladian. The chief impression it has left on us, as well as

the only analysis we wish to make of its beauties, is this—that it is

the easiest church in Europe in which to pray without distraction.

“MOTHER OF GOD.”

I KNEW, O God! that thou wert great and good,

Holy and just, and yet most loving, too;

But never did I know thy tenderness

Till these sweet words had pierced me through and through.

It seemed so far to lift my heart to thee,

I could but fear and tremble as I prayed;

Until thy grace made these sweet words disclose

The infinite act of love which thou hadst made.

Mother of God! Then Thou art one with us—

Our Brother, Lover, Saviour, all in one;

And the great distance ‘twixt our souls and thee

Was bridged by Mary’s words, “Thus be it done.”

Henceforth, when I would make my act of love,

When my full heart would lift itself to thee,

Should holy awe and fear weigh down my soul,

“Mother of God” upon my lips shall be.

MEMOIRS OF A GOOD FRENCH PRIEST.

IT must not be always that men’s evil manners are writ in brass, their

good deeds in water. The one grand, true, and pure wife of Henry

VIII., with her strong sense of justice, commended the chronicler of

the virtues of her once-potent but then fallen enemy. The history of

conquerors, which most attracts the world’s admiring gaze, is but too

often a record of crime; but, _fiat justitia_, with their crimes let

their redeeming qualities, if any there be, stand forth, so that the

good and the evil may flow down the stream of time in history, as they

move in life, together.

We have recently read a work which contains in a few pages a large

record of virtue and vice, of good and evil: the actors, however, were

different parties—as far apart in their spheres as the spirits on the

right and the left hand on the day of doom.

The _Memoirs of the Rt. Rev. Simon Gabriel Bruté_, with his sketches

of scenes connected with the French Revolution, and extracts from

his journal by Bishop (now Archbishop) Bayley, is one of a class

of works which is deeply interesting in its nature and striking in

its contrasts. The glory and shame of France are strangely brought

together. The culmination of the neverending contest between the church

of Christ, on the one hand, and the world and the gates of hell, on the

other, appeared to be reached in the French Revolution. Heaven-born

piety and hell-born iniquity, each in its most potential form, seemed

to meet in a death-grapple. Astonished and awe-stricken nations looked

on as spectators of the combat, as if upon that field hung the fate of

Christianity, of revelation, of, in short, the subordination of the

creature to the Creator. The struggle indeed was appalling; and the

modern followers of that fool who said in his heart, There is no God,

often threw up their fool’s-caps, _bonnets-d’âne_, or _bonnets-rouges_

in token of victory. But the end was not yet, as it is not yet. In

that struggle, as in all others for eighteen hundred years, the divine

prophecy was vindicated, and the oracles of Satan for a time were

silenced, at least until the father of sin could rehabilitate them

in other forms. The American Catholic whose memory serves him for a

couple of score of years, may remember to have seen at Mount S. Mary’s

College, or in Baltimore, a French priest, whose very physiognomy

would strongly rivet attention. We remember once, in early college

days, passing from Georgetown College, where we were acquiring the

humanities, to Mount S. Mary’s on a holiday excursion. We had fresh in

mind as the very ideal of a venerable priest good old Father Jerome

Dzierozynski, priest, philosopher, scholar, saint, the pastor of the

college, and a model for his younger brethren aspiring to Christian

perfection. We found his counterpart in the French priest, Father

Bruté, at the mountain. His very presence was inspiring. The man of

God was plainly discernible in his calm, placid face, which spoke,

without words, of holiness, of wisdom, of learning, of the subjection

of self and the man of the flesh, of the age, to the spiritual man,

the pilgrim to eternity. Our personal recollections of this eminent

man, however, go not beyond appearances and first-sight impressions. We

are indebted to Archbishop Bayley’s fascinating work for a knowledge

of his eventful career. Born and bred in France in a model Catholic

family, he witnessed in his boyhood the practical workings of the

French Revolution. He had not the honor to undergo exile or martyrdom,

but he knew intimately many of the victims of that reign of _Satanas_;

and his young eyes were made to ache with the lurid coruscations of the

philosophy of Antichrist, which swept over France as fire sweeps over a

prairie.

Losing his father early in life, his education was conducted by a

wise and prudent mother, such as is called in Holy Writ “a valiant

woman.” He was sent to the best schools of the day in his native city

of Rennes, and he was fortunate in having for his teachers priests

eminent for piety and learning, several of whom gave up their lives

for the faith. For a short time he worked as a practical printer. “In

1793-4,” he writes of himself, “during the height of ‘The Terror,’

my mother made me work in the printing-office to save me from being

enrolled in a regiment of children named ‘The Hope of the Country’;

and a hopeful set they were.” A regiment of boys was formed, who acted

as so many young demons. “My mother was much pressed to allow me to

join them, and was terribly alarmed on this account. I remained in the

printing-office nearly a year, and became a pretty good compositor.”

To the honor of the craft, we may add that his widowed mother had a

printing establishment under her own direction, probably derived from

her first husband, Francis Vatar, printer to the king and parliament at

Rennes, who prided himself on his hereditary art, his ancestors having

been printers for many generations.

After this interruption to his studies, he resumed them, and in due

time began the study of medicine. His fondness for the profession, his

talents, his industry, gave sure indications of eminent success. In

1799, at twenty years of age, he entered the Medical School at Paris.

“At the time this occurred,” he says, “I was entirely wrapt up in my

medical studies, and preparing for the prize.” This indeed he obtained.

He graduated with the highest honors. There were at that time eleven

hundred students attending the course; out of these, one hundred

and twenty were chosen by _concursus_ as the best; and among this

number M. Bruté received the first prize after another examination.

An official appointment immediately followed this youthful triumph.

But his thoughts were now turned to another field of labor, and to

that vocation alone more worthy than medicine of his high endowments.

He determined to study for the church. “He was not led to abandon a

profession to which he had devoted so many years of assiduous study,

and which opened its most brilliant prospects before him,” as Dr.

McCaffrey remarks, “from any feelings of disgust. He always honored it

as one of the noblest to which a highly gifted and philanthropic man

can devote himself. Delightful as his conversation was to all, and to

men of science in particular, it was peculiarly so to the student or

to the practitioner or professor of medicine. He turned from it only

because he had higher and more important objects in view. His eleven

hundred classmates in medicine told him that it was easy to find

physicians for the body, but the Revolution had made it more difficult

to find physicians for the souls of men. The guillotine and prisons and

privations of exile had spared but a comparatively small number of the

former clergy, and of these many were occupied in foreign missions.

Dreadful as had been the ravages of infidelity and impiety, and the

almost entire privation of all spiritual succor, an immense number of

the French people still remained faithful to their religion, and a new

supply of Levites, to fill the places of those who had perished, was

called for on every side.”

The medical student who had gone through the Parisian curriculum with

a pure heart and a sinless soul proved thereby his title to join the

choicest body of Levites. He not only had gone through the course

with virginal purity, but he had already made a fight for the faith

amidst its most potent enemies. If he resembled Aloysius at Rennes, he

showed the spirit of Bayard at Paris. “Not satisfied with professing

and openly practising his religion, he entered into a combination

with several of his fellow-students, particularly those from his own

province, boldly to oppose the false principles to which they were

obliged to listen. They chose such subjects for their theses before

the class as to enable them to avow their belief in revelation, and to

defend its truth. One of the beneficial effects which followed from

this course, was that the attention of the government was called to it.

Bonaparte, then First Consul, was laboring to restore Christianity in

France, as the necessary means of reorganizing society; and the infidel

professors were made to confine their teaching to its proper limits.”

It would be well if infidel or atheistical professors at the present

day could be restrained to their respective courses of instruction.

Some of them seem to think it incumbent on them to proclaim, _ex

cathedrâ_, their irreligious or atheistical convictions. Such men

are entirely unfit for their occupations, no matter what talents or

learning they may possess, and they ought to be silenced by authority.

This may be considered illiberal by some, but let them make a little

change in the order, and suppose a Catholic professor of anatomy to

give a daily discourse to his pupils on the infallibility of the Pope

before mixed classes of Catholics and Protestants, Jews and infidels:

would such teachings, we ask, be greeted with liberal approbation?

We think not. Then the infidel professor cannot expect a Christian

public to consent to his teachings, beyond his proper course. This is a

practical question of the day, and all honest men should demand in the

teaching of medicine, or of any science or sciences, that the teachers

should confine themselves to demonstrative and demonstrable facts.

It is the last degree of folly or of impudence to attempt to prove

anything of the relations of the soul to the body by the aid of scalpel

or microscope. Professors in the Parisian schools still claim the right

to teach covert or overt atheism, and they deem interference nothing

less than persecution. They are philosophers, and claim free thought.

But their opponents say properly (and this matter has been before the

French Senate) that it is not the thought of the professors which is

the matter in dispute, but their officious _teachings_. If they are

free to think what they please, says an eminent medical writer, M.

Garnier, they are not therefore free to profess or to teach all that

they think. Animism, spiritism, materialism, are equally intractable

to science. In these matters science can prove nothing; the rights of

science, then, are neither compromised nor sacrificed by keeping it

within the limits defined by its very nature.

All parents and guardians of youth, whatever their faith, or want of

it, should protest against professors of medicine making use of their

chairs to inculcate upon their pupils that the soul is subordinate to

the body, the immortal to the mortal part of man. These are matters

which are not now, never were, and never will be under the dominion of

human wisdom or learning.

We will now follow Dr. Bruté rapidly in his career as physician in the

higher order, that is, for the souls of men. He made his studies in

divinity with the intense earnestness of his nature. “Theology was a

science for which his mind was admirably fitted. He loved his religion,

and it evidently became his delight thoroughly to explore the very

foundations of it.” He was ordained priest in 1808, and was for a short

time professor of theology in his native city. In 1810, he came to the

United States, and began that active career in Baltimore and at Mount

S. Mary’s College which made him so favorably known to the clergy and

people of this country. “If Mount S. Mary’s, in addition to all the

other benefits it has bestowed upon Catholicity in this country, has

been in a remarkable degree the nursery of an intelligent, active,

zealous priesthood, exactly such as was needed to supply the wants

of the church in this country, every one at all acquainted with the

history of that institution will allow that the true ecclesiastical

spirit was stamped upon it by Bishop Bruté. His humility, piety, and

learning made him a model of the Christian priest; and the impression

of his virtues made upon both ecclesiastical and lay students surpassed

all oral instruction. The Catholic religion alone can produce such men,

and hence their example confirms the faith and elevates the character

of all who come in contact with them. The name of Bishop Bruté has

been, and ever will be, associated with that of Bishop Dubois as common

benefactors to the infant church in this country.”

The church in America has obligations to a considerable body of

French priests, driven from their own country for the most part

by the ruthless madmen who for a season ruled fair France, which

obligations can never be repaid and have scarcely been recognized.

Even American Catholics often speak of Lafayette and his followers as

the only Frenchmen entitled to our gratitude, forgetting entirely the

valiant soldiers of the cross from the same country who Christianized

our savages in the wilderness, or who astonished our Protestant

civilization with their learning, their talents, and their virtues.

Speaking of Bishop Cheverus, first Catholic Bishop of Boston, “which

of us,” says Dr. W. E. Channing, the most eminent Protestant minister

of his time in that city—“which of us would like to have our lives

compared with his?” This candid and generous admission might have

applied to others as well as to the almost peerless Cheverus, but none

could have deserved it more. How truly is the blood of the martyrs

the seed of the church!—including in the martyrs all who suffer in

person or property for Christ. The French Revolution sent to our shores

as fine a body of priests as the world ever saw—learned, pious,

accomplished, refined, and highly cultured in every sense, they left

an ineffaceable impression upon their successors in the priesthood in

this country. In the order of God’s providence, persecution, in fact,

has given the greatest impetus to Catholicity in America. The perpetual

persecution of the Irish on account of their religion, the recent

or actual persecutions by Garibaldi, Victor Emanuel, and Bismarck,

all give laborers to this vineyard, where they are so much needed,

and where they are doing a world of good a century in advance of an

adequate supply of native priests.

In 1834, Dr. Bruté was consecrated as Bishop of Vincennes; in 1839,

worn out with much and faithful service, his pure spirit took its

departure. In his poor diocese, he had everything to construct, and

everybody to instruct, even some Indian tribes, who received him with

great joy as a “chief of the black robes,” a priest of “the true

prayer.” He had no sinecure dignity. “At home he was at once the

bishop, the pastor of the congregation, the professor of theology for

his seminary, and a teacher for one of his academies.” These give

a small idea of his labors. When the king of terrors (to most men)

came, he found the bishop at his post, on duty, like the faithful

Roman sentinel at the gates of Pompeii. But there were no terrors for

him. “On the morning of the day before his death, he remarked to the

clergyman who attended him with unwearied solicitude and affection:

‘My dear child, I have the whole day yet to stay with you; to-morrow

with God!’ To another pious friend he used these simple but expressive

words: ‘I am going home!’” And when his pure soul was disengaging

itself, as it were, from the body, having received all the last rites

of the church, he directed the prayers for the departing to be said,

which he answered devoutly and fervently to the last; and then he

entered upon that eternal life which he had always been contemplating,

and for which his whole career had been one long preparation.

We would wish, if space permitted, to give selections from some of

the good bishop’s “Brief Notes” of his recollections connected with

the persecutions in France in 1793 and the following years, for they

show in their simple details the striking contrasts between the lives

and deaths of the children of Christ and the children of Antichrist,

among the French people of that day. Never before in the history of the

church, or in the history of humanity, did virtue and vice, face to

face, reach loftier heights or deeper depths.

The aim of the French rulers was to extinguish Christianity. The “age

of reason” had arrived, and its advanced fautors determined that the

world should recognize it. But the priests stood in the way, and,

by some strange mischance, all the honest and meritorious people of

the land made common cause with the priests. To bring these people

to a just appreciation of reason, the churches were plundered and

dismantled, and turned into temples of reason or barracks and stables,

and, if possible, viler uses. To take God’s house from him was to

deprive him of a dwelling-place in France, and the example of France

would be followed everywhere, so that God should be banished from

the earth of his own creation. But the priests—the unreasonable,

intractable priests—instead of adopting the new lights, would adhere

to the doctrines and traditions of past ages. When the churches were

closed, they would worship God by stealth, with their followers, in

private houses, in the fields, in the woods, offering their pure

and unbloody sacrifice on every hill and in every dale and valley

of France. To correct this, their existence, and that of those

who harbored them, was demanded in bloody sacrifice. “During the

progress of the persecution,” says Bishop Bruté, “the greater number

of the priests of the diocese had been either guillotined or shot,

or transported to the penal colonies. The more aged and infirm were

imprisoned in the Castle of St. Michael. Of the few left in deep

concealment, some were almost daily discovered, and, according to the

_law_, led with those who had harbored them to the guillotine within

twenty-four hours.” Young Bruté often followed the accused to the

criminal court, and listened with palpitating heart to the mock trials

of priests and people. His instances are deeply touching. The very

_capitula_ arrest attention: as “Trial of the priest and the three

sisters of La Chapelle S. Aubert, Diocese of Rennes.” The priest, M.

Raoul, was summarily convicted and sentenced; he submitted without a

murmur, but attempted to offer a plea for the sisters, who sheltered

him, when he was immediately silenced. The ladies were then put upon

trial, and convicted and sentenced also. One of them had been a nun,

and, driven from her convent home, had returned to her sister’s house.

She was a woman of spirit, and when under the sentence of death she

had a word to say to the court and the spectators. “When the sentence

had been pronounced, the nun could not restrain her feelings of

indignation. She rose from her seat, snatched from her cap the national

cockade, which even the women were obliged to wear during those days

of national delusion, and, trampling it under her feet, she addressed

alternately the judges and the people with two or three sentences of

vehement reproach: ‘Barbarous people,’ she exclaimed, ‘amongst what

savage nations has hospitality ever been made a crime punishable with

death?’ I cannot now call to mind her other expressions, except that

she appealed to the higher tribunal of God, and denounced his judgment

against them.... The same day these four victims were immolated upon

the fatal guillotine. They were taken, I think, as was often the case,

from the tribunal to the scaffold, which remained permanently erected

under the windows.” “A priest and peasant, bound together, were led to

the ‘Fusilade’ singing the service for the dead.” One morning early,

young Bruté was startled from his studies by the notes of the _Libera

me, Domine_, from the Burial Service of the church, sung by some one

in the streets. “I understood too well what it all meant, and ran to

the door to go out and follow them, agitated and partially frightened

by the usual terror which rested on my heart, but at the same time

animated by the song of death, for it was the priest who was thus

singing his own _Libera_, and the poor peasant stepped along quickly

by his side, looking, as may be supposed, very serious, but without

the least appearance of fear. The impression on my mind is that the

soldiers, who generally followed their prisoners with jokes and abuse,

accompanied these two in silence.”

Priests and peasants and nobles were victims to the impious rage of

those days, and even women and children. It is appalling to read the

summary account of “children shot and children drowned; women shot and

women drowned; priests shot and priests drowned; nobles drowned, and

artisans drowned, besides the hosts who were guillotined or sent into

exile.”

We cannot draw further from the pages of this most interesting book,

but the reader may do so at his leisure. We have thought sometimes in

reading it that Victor Emanuel and Bismarck might find its perusal

profitable. While writing this, we see by the papers that the Upper

House of the Prussian diet has passed a bill authorizing a complete

control of the church—that is, of all religious matter—by the state

government. In other words, the church must be the king’s creature, or

must perish. We shall see. There is traditional policy in this move. In

one of Frederic the Great’s letters to Voltaire, he expresses a wish to

break up the Catholic Church first, for then, he adds, the Protestant

churches will be very easily disposed of.

The modern persecutors might see, if they were not blind, that after

all the follies and crimes and slaughters of the French Revolution—and

surely they can bring nothing worse or more potent than this—the

church has risen again in France in her glory, and that hers is at this

day the only one great conservative influence in France, as everywhere

else in Christendom. Surely it is plain that, though often doomed to

death, she is fated not to die. But how strange the infatuation of

princes or people who would wish to blot out Christianity from the face

of the earth, or to make it a mere servile tool of tyrants! To blot it

out! and what then the history of man? Some philosophic inquirer has

suggested the extinction of the sun, and then on this now bright planet

of ours universal darkness, intense cold, the congelation of all the

waters, the death of all vegetable life, the death of all animal life,

and of the last strong man in the midst of an infinitude of horrors!

Even so in the moral world if the church of Christ, by the malice of

man, could be extinguished: darkness, crime, and death, death temporal

and eternal, would be poor lost man’s only inheritance. But, thanks be

to God, we know that the bark of Peter will survive all tempests in the

future as in the past, and that she will float over the stormy sea of

time in safety to the consummation of ages; for the divine assistance

is promised to her for ever.

In conclusion, we beg leave to express the hope that Archbishop

Bayley will give to the world a new and enlarged edition of Bishop

Bruté’s life, as his materials are by no means exhausted. It will be

no detriment to Mr. Clarke’s excellent work to give to many of the

deceased prelates, individually, much more extended biographies than

that gentleman could possibly give in his instructive pages. And

finally, we may express a hope that, when Lady Herbert edits a new

edition, she will not forget to give due credit to the distinguished

author whose labors she has in some sense so fully appreciated.[194]

NEW PUBLICATIONS.

LECTURES AND SERMONS. By the Very Rev. Thomas N. Burke, O.P.

New York: P. M. Haverty. 1873.

This, the second volume, containing thirty-two of F. Burke’s

magnificent discourses, has just been issued by his authorized

publisher, Mr. Haverty. In neither matter nor form is it inferior to

the splendid volume published a year ago. It contains lectures on

most of the important questions of the day, and nowhere better than

in these lectures may be found a solution to the great problems that

the moral and social condition of our age and country present. The

fundamental principles of religion, order, and law treasured up in

the _Summa_ of S. Thomas, F. Burke has thoroughly mastered and made

his own; and, armed with these, he comes forth in the might of his

eloquence, prepared to offer a remedy for every disease, intellectual

and moral, of the XIXth century. The principles which he advocates and

has proclaimed on the house-tops, from the Merrimac to the Mississippi,

are just those by which modern society must be saved, if saved at

all. His mission has been called a providential one with reference to

the Irish in this country; but we believe it to be a providential one

with reference to the American people at large. Never before have the

genuine principles of human action been so publicly and brilliantly

taught in our land; and the good seed, sown broadcast as it has been,

cannot but take root and produce fruit in due season.

Even now the conversions to our holy religion, wrought through the

instrumentality of F. Burke’s preaching, are many and widespread. But

how great and palpable the good he has done amongst his own people!

He has aroused their love for faith and fatherland to enthusiasm; he

has made them to realize the important influence they are to exert

on this continent; he has taught them to feel their dignity; he has

told them what is required of them as citizens of the republic; he has

pointed out their dangers, and suggested remedies for their disorders.

His constant aim has been to instil into the minds of his countrymen

every sentiment of religion, patriotism, and honor that could elevate

and ennoble a generous race. Since the days of O’Connell, no one man

has done so much for the Irish people, and none has received so much

of their gratitude and confidence. It is but a short time ago that we

heard a poor fellow say he had resolved “never to get drunk again,

lest he might disgrace a country that could produce such a man as F.

Tom Burke”—a noble sentiment truly, and one that speaks volumes for

the man who could inspire it. We seem to be describing the work of a

lifetime, and surely what we have said and had reason to say would make

a long lifetime illustrious. Yet in very truth are we but enumerating

the labors of a few months. What may not critics be able to write in

the future, should F. Burke return to us, and resume his glorious work?

THE IRISH RACE IN THE PAST AND IN THE PRESENT. By Rev. Aug.

J. Thebaud, S.J. New York: D. Appleton & Co. 1873.

F. Thebaud has written us a philosophy of Irish history. He has

sought out the characteristics of the Celtic race, and has, we think,

discovered them and successfully traced them down from the earliest to

the latest annals of that grand old people. He has read Irish history,

and reflected on it, and his views, in relation to the Ireland of the

past at least, are correct. We are glad that one not an Irishman has

written this book; for when an Irishman speaks of his country’s bygone

glories, he is pretty generally accused of exaggeration, and the world

refuses to be interested in the details of an antique history which it

supposes to be in great part the creation of national pride. We have

always regretted that Montalembert did not write a history of Ireland,

as he once intended to do, and we have never quite forgiven Victor

Cousin for the part he took in dissuading the count from carrying out

this the cherished scheme of his youth. Had the brilliant author of

_The Monks of the West_ compiled the annals of Ireland, the story of

Erin’s ancient greatness and civilization would now have its fitting

place in the classic lore of Europe. F. Thebaud’s treatment of early

Irish history is very satisfactory; he has a real love and admiration

for that land—

“History’s sad wonder, whom all lands save one

Gaze on through tears, and name with gentler tone.”

Christian Ireland in its golden age is particularly dear to him, and he

delights in describing the glories of that Erin, then

“Lamp of the north when half the world was night,

Now England’s darkness ‘mid her noon of light.”

In dealing with the events of this period, we think the learned author

more happy than in his treatment of modern Irish history, though we are

not at all disposed to disagree to any great extent with his views of

martyred Ireland’s wrongs and their needs. We, too, believe that

... “Ere long

Peace Justice-built the Isle shall cheer.”

From what he says of the present condition of things in that

misgoverned country, however, we do think he has not consulted the most

reliable authorities on all points; his account of the ignorance and

destitution of the poorer classes is certainly somewhat exaggerated.

This is about the only thing we find to criticise in a book which is

manifestly a labor of love, and executed with an ardor and enthusiasm

that love alone can enlist. F. Thebaud’s work is a valuable and highly

important contribution to Irish history. To our Irish fellow-citizens

it commends itself. To our American and non-Catholic readers who want

to form correct views of Ireland and its people, we commend it.

THE LIMERICK VETERAN; OR, THE FOSTER SISTERS. By Agnes M.

Stewart. Baltimore: Kelly, Piet & Co. 1873.

This is a historical romance, and a very good one of its kind.

Throughout its two hundred and fifty pages thrilling facts and pleasing

fiction are well and judiciously blended. The style is really good,

and the name of Agnes Stewart is sufficient warrant that the tone is

high and unexceptionable. If there were anything in a name, we might be

disposed to criticise it in this particular; for, in very truth, the

connection between the title and the tale that hangs thereon is slight.

The story opens in Scotland, and the bonny Highlands are kept pretty

well in view throughout, though the scene shifts to England, France,

and Germany, and the curtain falls on a Christmas scene by the frozen

St. Lawrence. In a novel such as this we do believe; it amuses, it

instructs; from such a book much valuable history may be learned in a

pleasing way.

The publishers have done Miss Stewart justice by giving to the public

her graceful story in an appropriate form.

SINS OF THE TONGUE. By Monseigneur Landroit, Abp. of Rheims.

Boston: P. Donahoe. 1873.

Mgr. Landroit is already favorably known to the English reader by

a series of discourses for the use of women living in the world,

translated under the title of _The Valiant Woman_. The present work not

only treats of the subject indicated by the title, but also of “Envy

and Jealousy,” “Rash Judgments,” “Christian Patience,” and “Grace”;

and is intended for those who would naturally derive greater spiritual

advantage from thoughtful reading than from formal meditation.

From the unrestful condition of things in this age and country it

probably comes that there are fewer vocations to a contemplative life,

and less inclination to habits of systematic contemplation, than in

older and more settled communities. Hence, works like the present are

perhaps more appropriate to those not consecrated to the religious

state than many of the ordinary books of meditation. We therefore

welcome it as we do all judicious efforts to assist persons in the

world to perform the duties to which they may be called, and to resist

the temptations by which they may be assailed.

The Marthas are likely always to outnumber the Marys, and should have

every assistance at the hands of those capable of leading them in the

path of holiness. The church in this and similar ways is ever adapting

its aids to the varying circumstances by which her children may be

surrounded.

OUT OF SWEET SOLITUDE. By Eleanor C. Donnelly. Philadelphia:

Lippincott & Co. 1873.

This modest little volume, a “first book,” gives us confidence that

the authoress will fill a useful place in the Catholic literature of

America. We say a useful place, for poetry like hers is much in demand

in our Catholic homes.

The three divisions of the volume—“Sacred Legends,” “Poems of the

Civil War,” and “Miscellaneous Poems”—present a pleasing variety,

both of matter and of style. Some of her lyrics are more accurate than

others; and some of her descriptions would be stronger with fewer

epithets. But her verse is, for the most part, as smooth as simple.

And while no one can charge her with affectation, she is certainly not

lacking in originality.

There is but a single line on which we shall make a stricture. It

occurs in a poem called “The Skeleton at the Feast”: the sixth line of

the fifth stanza, p. 77. She speaks of

“The flame

Lit for the damned _from all eternity_.”

Now, God did not create “from eternity”; still less are any of his

creatures damned “from eternity.” We therefore pronounce this line a

slip of the pen, and beg that it may be altered in the next edition.

In conclusion, we thankfully welcome the authoress into the number

of our Catholic poetesses, and hope that ere long she will be again

tempted to come to us “out of sweet solitude.”

OLD NEW ENGLAND TRAITS. Edited by George Lunt. New York:

Published by Hurd & Houghton. Cambridge: The Riverside Press. 1873.

Any one acquainted with the ancient city of Newburyport will have a

special interest in the reminiscences which this very readable book

contains. To those who are not, it will give a very perfect idea of the

New England of the past, which is even now pretty well preserved in

these old seaport towns of Massachusetts. There is not a dry or tedious

page in it from beginning to end, and, both in matter and style, it is

just the kind of a book for any time of year, but particularly for the

summer. At the end, there are a number of ghost stories. Ghosts seem to

thrive well in Newburyport, judging from recent developments as well as

these more ancient ones, and there can be no doubt that the reputation

of Essex County for the preternatural is really very well founded.

BOOKS AND PAMPHLETS RECEIVED.

From W. G. SIMONS & CO., Richmond: Pastoral Letter on

Christian Education. By the Rt. Rev. James Gibbons, D.D. 8vo, paper,

pp. 19.

From P. O’SHEA, New York: Essays on Various Subjects. By H.

E. Card. Wiseman. Vol. IV. 12mo, pp. 300.

From LEE & SHEPARD, Boston: The Year. By D. C. Colesworthy.

12mo, pp. 120.

From E. O’KEEFE, New York: Third Annual Report of St.

Vincent’s Home for Boys, 10 Vine Street, Brooklyn. Paper, 24mo, pp. 16.

From D. APPLETON & CO., New York: Insanity in its Relation to

Crime. By W. A. Hammond, M.D. 8vo, pp. 77.—A Review of Prof. Reese’s

Review of the Wharton Trial. By W. E. A. Aikin, M.D., LL.D. Paper,

8vo, pp. 20.

From the AUTHOR: Religion in the University: Being a Review

of the Subject as agitated in the Legislature of Michigan. By S. B.

McCracken. Paper, 8vo, pp. 19.

From the GENERAL THEOLOGICAL LIBRARY, Boston: Eleventh Annual

Report, April 21, 1873. Paper, 8vo, pp. 44.

From HOLT & WILLIAMS, New York: Babolain. By Gustave Droz.

18mo, pp. 306.

From BURNS & OATES, London: The Question of Anglican

Ordinations Discussed. By E. E. Estcourt, M.A., F.S.A. With Original

Documents and Fac-similes. 8vo, pp. xvi.-381.-cxvi.—A Theory of the

Fine Arts. By S. M. Lanigan, A.B., T.C.D. 12mo, pp. xiii.-194.—The

Prophet of Carmel. By Rev. C. B. Garside, M.A. 18mo, pp. xiii.-348.

From T. & T. CLARK, Edinburgh: The Works of S. Aurelius

Augustine—Vol. VII., On the Trinity. Vol. VIII., The Sermon on the

Mount, and The Harmony of the Evangelists.

THE

CATHOLIC WORLD.

VOL. XVII., No. 102.—SEPTEMBER, 1873.

Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1873, by Rev.

I. T. HECKER, in the Office of the Librarian of Congress, at

Washington, D. C.

SHEA’S CHARLEVOIX.

WHEN the history of American Catholic literature comes to be written,

the name of John Gilmary Shea will hold one of the most honorable

places in the record. So much rough work has been needed to prepare the

ground for the American church, so much polemical discussion has been

called forth by our peculiar position in the midst of a hostile and

prejudiced community, so many problems of philosophy and social science

have pressed upon us for consideration, and the demand for books of

education and devotion has been so urgent, that few of our writers have

found occasion to apply themselves to strictly literary and historical

studies or to those branches of criticism which are included in the

department of polite letters. And yet how richly this neglected field

of research would repay the labors of the Catholic investigator! The

early history of many parts of the North American continent is only a

chapter in the history of the Catholic Church. The most picturesque

characters in the early American annals are the Catholic voyagers

of France and Spain, the settlers of Canada, and Florida, and the

Pacific coast, and the missionaries who followed them across the ocean,

and pushed forward in advance of them into the savage wilderness.

How tame and mean appear the quarrels of the Plymouth settlers with

hostile Indians, and rival adventurers, and preaching sectaries, and

bewitched old women, after one has read of the heroism of a Jogues

and a Brebœuf, and the romantic travels of the discoverer of the

Mississippi. The settlement of Virginia was a prosaic and commonplace

affair beside the settlement of Canada. The monks who accompanied the

armies of the Spanish conquerors passed through experiences of the

most thrilling kind, whose story has been only imperfectly outlined in

the glowing pages of Prescott. Within the limits of the present Union,

the missionary has been the chief actor in many an extraordinary

scene of dramatic interest, and the hero of many a daring enterprise.

Simple-minded F. Mark traversing the desert in search of the seven

mythical cities of New Mexico; the gentle Marquette guiding his canoe

down the great river of the West, and breathing his last prayer on the

shores of the mighty lake; Hennepin, pattern of grotesque mendacity; La

Salle, model of a magnanimous commander and a daring explorer—such are

among the infinite variety of figures in the early Catholic history of

our country. Its later annals are not inferior in interest to the more

remote. Even yet the task of the pioneer is not complete, and startling

incidents are still common in the chronicles of missionary adventure.

No man has done more than Mr. Shea to preserve the record of all

these events and all these personages. For more than twenty years, he

has devoted himself to the study of the old materials for American

Catholic history. He gave to the world the first authentic and complete

narrative of the discovery and exploration of the Mississippi, and

brought to light the manuscript narratives of the actors in that most

important and striking achievement. He prepared the only connected

account of the various Catholic missions among the Indian tribes, from

the discovery of the country to the present day. He was one of the

joint authors of the only general history of the American church. To

these works, and a large number of books of a miscellaneous character,

short histories, religious biographies, statistical publications, etc.,

he has recently added the result of patient and learned research into

the Indian languages; he has recovered the grammars and vocabularies

prepared by the old missionaries; he has assisted in the preparation

of various works on the Indians printed at the cost of the United

States government; he has edited an extraordinary variety of historical

collections and monographs; and, finally, he has prepared for the press

a number of hitherto unpublished narratives, memoirs, and relations in

connection with the early French and Spanish settlements. The value of

these publications can hardly be overstated. The care and judgment of

the editor have been universally recognized by the highest authorities;

and though Mr. Shea can hardly expect an adequate pecuniary recompense

for his time, his labor, and his outlay, he has been rewarded in a most

flattering way by the respect and gratitude of historical students,

Catholic and Protestant alike.

His latest work is one of the most laborious of his life, and one of

the most splendid in its results. It is a translation, with notes, of

the _History and General Description of New France_, from the French of

the Rev. P. F. X. de Charlevoix, S.J. The first of the six sumptuous

volumes of this elegant work appeared from the author’s own press in

this city in 1866, and the last was issued at the close of 1872. As we

shall see further on, Mr. Shea has expended upon the “translation and

notes” an extraordinary amount of pains of which the modest title-page

affords no hint; but the book was well worth the trouble. No history

of America can be written without a constant reference to the labors

of F. Charlevoix. He is our best and sometimes our only authority for

the transactions in all the French North American settlements. Of

many of the scenes that he describes he was an eye-witness. He was a

diligent and conscientious student; he had access to important and

little-known sources of information; he sympathized with the sentiment

of the early French explorers, and caught as by instinct the spirit of

those curious expeditions wherein the priest and the peddler marched

side by side through the wilderness for the glory of God and of France,

and the spread simultaneously of the Gospel and the fur-trade. Born in

the north of France in 1682, Charlevoix entered the Society of Jesus,

and was sent to the Canada mission when he was about twenty-three years

old. He spent four years in America, returning to France in 1709, and

teaching philosophy for some time in various colleges of his society.

Eleven years later, the king sent him to make a tour among the French

settlements of the New World, and a curious account of this adventurous

journey is preserved in his _Journal of a Voyage to North America_,

a translation of which was published in London in 1761. He landed at

Quebec in October, 1720, visited Montreal and other settlements on the

St. Lawrence, and the following spring set out on his remarkable canoe

voyage to the Gulf of Mexico. This took him through Lakes Ontario,

Erie, Huron, and Michigan. On the 6th of August, 1721, he entered the

St. Joseph River, at the southern end of Lake Michigan. Thence by a

tedious portage he reached the head-waters of the Kankakee. Towards

the end of September, he found himself on the Illinois, and on the 9th

of October his frail bark floated on the waters of the Mississippi.

Stopping at various posts along the bank, he was nearly three months

in reaching New Orleans, whence he embarked in April, 1722, for Santo

Domingo. Wrecked on one of the Florida keys, he made his way back to

Louisiana in an open boat, and at the end of June took ship again

at Biloxi. After touching at Havana, and narrowly escaping another

disaster, he made Cape François, in Santo Domingo, and there found a

merchant ship, which took him home.

Before starting on this extensive and arduous tour, he had begun a

series of histories of all the countries unknown to Europeans previous

to the XIVth century, giving to that tolerably comprehensive portion of

the universe the general name of the New World. The first instalment of

his task, a _History and Description of Japan_, was printed at Rouen in

three volumes in 1715. He had no expectation of completing the whole

series of proposed histories. That was an enterprise beyond the powers

of one man; but “the same may be said of this,” he remarked, “as of

the discovery of America: the worst was done when it was once begun;

there is, then, every reason to believe that it will be continued after

me, and that, if I have the advantage of suggesting the idea, those

who succeed me will have the glory of perfecting it.” The second fruit

of the scheme was the _History of Santo Domingo_, which appeared at

Paris in two quarto volumes, in 1730. The third was the _History of

New France_, in three quarto volumes, in 1744; and there was a fourth

book, a _History of Paraguay_, in three quarto volumes, in 1756. F.

Charlevoix died in 1761, having been for more than twenty years one of

the principal workers on the famous _Journal de Trévoux_.

Of the four works embraced in his uncompleted series, three are

little known on this side of the ocean, except in the libraries of

the curious. The _History of New France_, however, has long enjoyed

an American celebrity, through the frequent references to it in the

pages of modern historians; and Mr. Shea is not unreasonably surprised

that it should so long have gone untranslated. Fidelity is by no means

its only merit. It is well planned, and written with a carefulness,

simplicity, and good judgment which give it a very respectable, if

not a very high, literary character. Its style is not remarkable for

eloquence, but it is chaste and direct. It is never ambitious, but

it is always agreeable; rarely picturesque, but never dry. Prefixing

to his work a comprehensive chronology of European explorations and

settlements in the New World (taking that phrase in his own extended

application), and an excellent bibliographical account of the numerous

authors whom he has consulted, he begins his narrative proper with the

voyages of Cortereal and Verazzano to Newfoundland, between 1500 and

1525. It is with the expedition of Jacques Cartier, however, in 1534,

that the story of the French settlements in North America properly

commences. Cartier ascended the St. Lawrence, visited the site of

Montreal, and planned a town there, though he did not succeed in making

a permanent establishment. There is a curious illustration in this part

of the narrative of the simplicity which gives F. Charlevoix’s book

such a peculiar charm. Misled by an unfaithful abridgment of Cartier’s

narrative, the good father gently rebukes the traveller for certain

marvellous tales which he is unjustly accused of bearing back to

France: but there is one strange story to which the reverend historian

is evidently more than half disposed to attach credit. An Indian named

Donnacona is reported to have told Cartier that in a remote part of

the land “were men who had but one leg and thigh, with a very large

foot, two hands on the same arm, the waist extremely square, the breast

and head flat, and a very small mouth; that still further on he had

seen pigmies, and a sea the water of which was fresh. In fine, that,

ascending the Saguenay, you reach a country where there are men dressed

like us, who live in cities, and have much gold, rubies, and copper.”

Now, by ascending the Saguenay, Charlevoix conjectures, and turning

west, an Indian might reach Lake Assiniboin, and thence penetrate to

New Mexico, where the Spaniards had begun to settle—a conjecture

which certainly betrays a rather loose idea of American geography.

The pigmies he supposes to be the Esquimaux. But of the men with one

leg, he remarks that the story is “very strange.” He does not accept,

but he certainly does not reject it. Nay, he cites a long account by

an Esquimaux girl, who was in Quebec while he was there in 1720, of a

kind of men among her country people “who had only one leg, one thigh,

and a very large foot, two hands on the same arm, a broad body, flat

head, small eyes, scarcely any nose, and a very small mouth”; they were

always in a bad humor, and could remain under water three-quarters of

an hour at a time. “As for the monstrous men,” he concludes, “described

by the slave of M. de Courtemanche and by Donnacona, and the headless

men killed, it is pretended, by an Iroquois hunter a few years since

while hunting, it is easy to believe that there is some exaggeration;

but it is easier to deny extraordinary facts than to explain them; and,

moreover, are we at liberty to reject whatever we cannot explain? Who

can pretend to know all the caprices and mysteries of nature?”

From Canada our historian passes suddenly to Florida, which he defines

as “all that part of the continent of America lying between the two

Mexicos, New France, and North Carolina.” To this part of the new world

Admiral de Coligni sent out a colony of Huguenots in 1562 under John

de Ribaut, who built a fort at Port Royal, near the site of Beaufort,

South Carolina. In all the early settlements of America, there is the

same story to be told of avarice and childish folly. The colonists

were not settlers, but adventurers. They had come in search of a land

where they could grow rich without work, and pick up gold and silver

with no more trouble than the occasional killing of a few Indians. They

depended for sustenance upon what they brought from France and the

provisions they might purchase from the savages. But there was little

to be obtained from a race of hunters who were half the year themselves

on the brink of starvation, and the fresh supplies promised from home

were often delayed. It is almost incredible that no attempt should have

been made to cultivate the fertile lands upon which they established

themselves; but year after year the same blunder was repeated: winter

found the adventurers famishing; and promising colonies were broken

up by their reckless improvidence. Such was the fate of Ribaut’s

settlement at Port Royal. The commander had gone home to obtain

re-enforcements. When the re-enforcements arrived under Laudonniere in

1564, Port Royal had been abandoned. The colonists had built a vessel,

caulked the seams with moss, twisted the bark of trees for ropes, used

their shirts for sails, and, with a short supply of provisions and a

crew composed of soldiers, had put to sea. They suffered terribly. The

water gave out, and some died of thirst. After they had eaten their

last shoe and their last scrap of leather, a soldier named Lachau

offered the sacrifice of his own life to save the rest. They ate

Lachau, and drank his blood. Soon afterward, they sighted land, and

about the same time fell in with an English vessel.

Laudonniere established himself on the St. John’s River, in Florida.

F. Charlevoix tells an interesting story of his curious dealings with

the Indians and the dissensions of his disorderly colonists. He seems

to have been upon the whole a fair commander, but the fatal mistake of

all these adventurers soon brought him to the brink of ruin. Provisions

gave out. The expected relief from France was delayed. Fish and game

grew scarce. In July, 1567, Laudonniere was trying to patch up his one

small vessel to return home, when he was unexpectedly relieved by a

visit from Sir John Hawkins with four English ships. Hawkins treated

the suffering Frenchmen with great generosity. He gave them bread and

wine, replenished their stores of clothing and munitions, offered the

whole party a passage home to France, and finally persuaded them to

purchase one of his vessels which was better fitted for their use than

their own. Laudonniere now hastened his preparations for the voyage,

and was actually weighing anchor, when Ribaut entered the river with

seven vessels, and set about restoring the dismantled Fort Caroline,

and planning an expedition after gold to the distant mountains of

Apalache. But this whole chapter is a tale of surprises. Six days after

the arrival of Ribaut, another squadron appeared at the mouth of the

river. It consisted of six Spanish ships under the command of Don

Pedro Menendez, whom Philip II. had despatched to conquer Florida, and

drive out the heretics.