1721-1748
SIDE LIGHTS OF CIVIC PROGRESS
II
THE FIRE OF 1721--BUILDING REGULATIONS--STONE ENCOURAGED--TOWN
EMBELLISHMENT--CITY PLANNING--THE FORTIFICATIONS--PEW
RENTING--CHATEAU DE VAUDREUIL--TRADE WITH NEW ENGLAND
FORBIDDEN--ILLICIT LIQUOR TRAFFIC--DEATHS OF DE RAMEZAY
AND DE VAUDREUIL--EVEN NATURALIZED STRANGERS FORBIDDEN TO
TRADE--DESCRIPTION OF INDIAN LIFE AT MONTREAL--MONTREAL
IS FOLLOWED BY QUEBEC IN THE REFORM OF WEIGHTS AND
MEASURES--VERENDRYE'S EXPEDITION FROM MONTREAL--RELIGIOUS ASYLUM
FORBIDDEN--FIRST SAILING VESSEL OF LAKE SUPERIOR--THE "OUTRAGED
CRUCIFIX"--SORCERY, MAGIC AND SACRILEGE--THE LEGEND OF THE RED
CROSS--PUNISHMENT OF "BREAKING ALIVE" IN THE MARKET PLACE--CARE
OF FOUNDLINGS--SULPICIANS FOUND LA PRESENTATION--SKATING
IN THE STREETS; FAST DRIVING. NOTES: THE DISCOVERIES OF LA
VERENDRYE--CHATEAU VAUDREUIL.
A disastrous fire having occurred on June 19, 1721, an _ordonnance_
was prepared by Intendant Bégon, who was in Montreal, to regulate the
reconstruction of the buildings. The preamble gives us an insight into
the architectural construction of the town. "On the representation
to us by Sieur de Léry, King's engineer, after the examination made
by him, it has been noticed that the greater part of the houses were
only of wood, or of framework, and roofed with carpentry, and this
has increased the spread of the fire, and that like accidents so
prejudicial to the inhabitants of the town, could be avoided to the
further good of the town, by making the streets regular, for they are
not large enough nor straight enough; that while this cannot be done
without individuals suffering, yet at the present moment, seeing that
there are only ruins in the streets, it would be easy for individuals,
before rebuilding, to conform with the alignment which shall be drawn
up by the Engineer, the following precautions should be observed...."
The employment of stone is greatly encouraged. In the living part of
the town only buildings of stone and of two stories should replace the
burned ones.
This added to the beauty of the town and we are gratified to learn that
the example of Montreal led the Intendant Claude Thomas Dupuy, on June
7, 1727, to issue an _ordonnance_ for Quebec and the other towns, to
take similar precautions against fire, adding that this would also
be a means to beautify this town (_embellir cette ville_). A further
_ordonnance_ on fire prevention was issued by Gilles Hocquart, the
intendant, when present in Montreal on July 12, 1724.
[Illustration: HOCQUART]
To the year 1722 we may attribute the beginning of work on the
fortifications of Montreal under Chaussegros de Léry. Up to that date
there had been much talk of building a worthy defence around the city,
but still the old wooden palisading was continued. The truth is that
the Montrealers ever have been sluggards in city planning; they have
never taken a forward move until forced by a crisis. "Prevention being
better than cure," never rose beyond a theory. The same tardiness has
been shown in hygienic and sanitary and general civic improvement. The
wars with the Indians had produced a brave race of Montrealers, so that
they relied rather on their personal valour than on fortifications. In
the moment of danger, the wisdom of having strong fortifications was
felt by all, but the danger passed, they became forgetful and apathetic
again. In 1693 the palisade built by de Callières was restored, and in
1709 de Longueuil had called a meeting in the Seminary Hall, "where,"
says the Engineer de Catalogue, "each one was given the liberty to
speak out his mind; as there were no troups and few inhabitants, it
was proposed to curtail the town by a fourth, by making a palisading
at St. Francis Xavier Street, cutting down the fruit gardens of the
Recollects (in the northwest) and others; but as I thought differently,
I made them see that fifty men in the mill and granary of the Seigneurs
were sufficient to defend this part and the more retrenchments and
enclosures the enemy should find to force, the more obstacles he would
find in forcing the rest of the town." Thus all things remained in the
same state as before.
[Illustration: References
Extent of walls from A to B, 218 ft.; A to C 88 ft.; C to D, 202 ft.; B
to D, 108 ft.; E--entrance; F--mill; G G G G--small towers; H--walls.]
[Illustration: ELEVATIONS OF FORTIFICATIONS ERECTED AT CHAUS. DE LERY.]
[Illustration: DE LERY'S PLANS OF THE FORTIFICATION]
But other counsels prevailed in 1716 when the government determined
to improve the fortifications and the Regent imposed on the town a
contribution of 6,000 _livres_, of which 2,000 had to be paid by
the Seigneurs and the rest by the religious communities and the
inhabitants, without exception. The works, however, did not begin till
1722. The new walls of rough stone, ornamented with barbicans, were
eighteen feet high, four feet thick at their base and three feet at the
top. They presented thirteen bastions, four facing the St. Lawrence,
four giving on the Little River, and the five others, which were armed
with little pieces of artillery, faced three on the north, and two on
the west. There were five gates and five posterns. The space enclosed
was about 110 _arpents_ (ninety-three acres). The fortifications were
never completely finished. As intended by de Léry they might have been
strong for he wrote to France on August 17, 1717, "I have determined
to commence an inclosure capable to resist the artillery that the
English might bring from Orange." Yet a French officer, quoted by
Sandham, in "Montreal and Its Fortifications," as present in the city
during Amherst's siege of Montreal in 1760, which was to end in the
Capitulation, writes of the results as follows: "Montreal was in no
way susceptible of a defense. It was surrounded with walls built with
design only to preserve the inhabitants from the incursions of the
Indians, little imagining at that time that it would become the theatre
of a regular war and that one day they would see formidable armies of
well disciplined troops before its walls. We were, however, all pent up
in that miserable bad place without provisions, a thousand times worse
than a position in an open field, whose pitiful walls could not resist
two hours' cannonade without being leveled to the ground, when we
would have been forced to surrender at discretion if the English had
insisted upon it."[174]
The extent of the paternal supervision of France, over what we should
consider trifles, is shown in a royal decree of June 9, 1723, on the
subject of the renting of pews in the churches, to the following
effect: that widows, remaining such, shall enjoy those pews granted to
their husbands by paying the same rent; that with regard to children,
whose father and mother are dead, their seats shall be put up for
auction, and given to the highest bidder, but they shall have the
preference, if they pay the same price as that offered by the last
bidder.
In 1723, de Vaudreuil commenced the building of his _Château_.
In 1724 the King found it necessary by a decree of May 22d to prohibit
peltry being conveyed into New England or the returning from there with
merchandise. As Montreal was evidently the recognized business point of
distribution, whence the trouble had arisen, the King ordered all who
should have permission from the Governor General or his representative
to cross the frontier, to declare at Montreal the quantity and quality
of the effects taken, making a similar declaration on their return.
Students watching the progress of the liquor traffic will not be
surprised at the skillful adroitness of illicit traders, in evading
detection. An edict of de Vaudreuil and Intendant Bégon of May 22,
1725, ordered all those who possessed birch bark canoes to make a
declaration of them to the nearest _greffe_ (record office) within
a fortnight of the publication. The object was to frustrate illicit
traders who made use of the light weight of these canoes to carry
liquor into the woods and then to hide there and thence distribute
the liquor without arousing the attention of the authorities. The
canoe was also doubtless to be watched as a means of illicit trade in
furs. No less a person than the lieutenant-general of the government
of Montreal, Sieur François Marie Bouat, was condemned in 1719, to a
month's imprisonment, and was suspended from his office, for having
sent a canoe up-country for trading purposes. The deliberations of the
court martial are dated October 18, 1719. The suspension was raised by
the King on June 2, 1720.
The year 1724 saw the death of the governor of Montreal, Claude de
Ramezay, who was succeeded by Charles LeMoyne, first Baron of Longueuil.
On October 25, 1725, the Governor General de Vaudreuil also died. He
was succeeded as administrator by the Baron of Longueuil. In 1726 the
Marquis de Beauharnois became Governor General and Thomas Claude Dupuy
Intendant, his first act being signed on December 1st of the same year.
In 1727, a special edict concerning commerce with outsiders was issued
by the King.[175] Title VI enacts that "strangers established in Our
Colonies, even naturalized, cannot be merchants, brokers or commercial
agents under any form, on a penalty of 3,000 _livres_, applicable to
the denounceand of perpetual banishment from Our Colonies. We permit
them only to make use of their lands and dwellings, and to trade only
in provisions which come from their lands. We forbid all merchants
and traders established in old said Colonies to have any clerk,
assistant, bookkeeper or other persons engaged in their business who
are strangers, although they may be naturalized...."
Clearly the modern cosmopolitan character of Montreal was not foreseen.
A decree of the Sovereign Council of February 16, 1682, had already
been made, forbidding the transportation by _habitants_ or others
of peltries to Manhattan or Orange or other places, and back, under
pain of confiscation of their peltry, money, attire, canoes and other
effects seized on their departure or return. This was promulgated at
Montreal by Sergeant Lorry about March 8th of the same year.
A letter of 1730,[176] giving a description of Indian dress, love making,
feasts, burials, fills in the picture of this period and keeps us in
touch with the Indian population of Montreal and its district.
"Would you like to learn how they dress--how they marry--how they are
buried? First you must know that several tribes go completely naked and
wear but the fig leaf. In Montreal you may meet many stately and well
proportioned savages, walking about in a state of nudity, as proud in
their bearing as if they wore good clothes. Some have on a shirt only;
others have a covering negligently thrown over one shoulder.
"Christianized Indians are differently habited. The Iroquois put the
shirt over their wearing apparel, and over the shirt another raiment
which encloses a portion of the head, which is always bare. The men
generally wear garments over their shirts; the latter, when new, is
generally very white, but is used until it gets perfectly dark and
disgustingly greasy. They sometimes shave a portion of their head, or
else they comb one-half of their hair back, the other half front. They
occasionally tie up a tuft of hair very tight on the top of the head,
so as to look like a plume on a horse's head, rising towards the skies.
At other times, some allow a long tress of hair to fall over their
face: it interferes with their eating, but that has to be put up with.
They smear their ears with a white substance or their face with blue,
vermillion, black. They are more elaborate in their war-toilet--lavish
of paint--than a coquette would be in dressing,--so that they may
conceal the paleness which fear might engender. They are profuse of
gold and silver brocade, porcelain necklaces, bracelets of beads--the
women, especially in their youth. This is their jewelry, their
diamonds, the value whereof sometimes reach 1,000 francs. The Abenakis
enclose their heads in a small cap embroidered with beads or ornamented
with brocade. They wrap their legs in leggings with a fringe three or
four inches long. Their shoes consist of socks, with plaits around the
toe, covering the foot. All this has its charm in their eyes: they are
as vain of dress as any Frenchman.
"The pagan tribe, whenever any love is felt, marry without any
ceremonial. The pair will discover whether they love one another in
silence--Indian-like. One of the caresses consists in throwing the
loved one a small pebble, or grains of Indian corn, or else some other
object which cannot hurt. The swain, on throwing the pebble, is bound
to look in the opposite direction, to make believe he did not do it.
Should the adored one return it, matters look well, else the game is up.
[Illustration: MONTREAL
1725.
PLAN DE LA VILLE DE MONTREAL EN CANADA]
"The Christianized Indians are married before the church, without
contract of marriage and without stipulations, because an Indian cannot
hold real estate and cannot bequeath to his children. The wealthiest is
the mightiest hunter. This favored individual in his village passes for
a grand match.
"Bravery and great warriors they think much of--they constitute them
their chiefs. Poverty is no disgrace at the council board, and an
orator in rags will speak out as boldly, as successfully, as if he
were decked out in gold cloth. They come thus badly habited in the
presence of the governor, indulge in long harangues and touch his hand
fearlessly. When ladies are present at these interviews, they honour
them thus--seize their hand and shake it in token of friendship. Before
I was a nun, I was present at some of these ceremonies and, having won
their good opinion, they would extend to me a hand which was disgusting
in the extreme, but which I had cheerfully to accept for fear of
offending them. They are sometimes asked to dine at the governor's
table. Unlucky are their neighbours, especially when they happen to be
ladies,--they are so filthy in their persons."[177]
Gilles Hocquart no doubt struck terror into the hearts of some of
the defaulters at Montreal on July 22, 1730, when he ordered all
the merchants and other business men without exception to repair
immediately to the Governor of Montreal to have their weights and
measures reformed, verified, sealed and marked with the _fleur de lis_.
Although there had been legislation before, still complaints had been
brought to him that there was wanting uniformity in the city on this
hand, some giving too short measure and others, strangely, too long.
Two years later, on August 9, 1732, Hocquart did the same good turn for
Quebec. In business methods Montrealers like to be pioneers and it is
to be noticed that the preamble of this _ordonnance_ Hocquart gives as
a reason for the new move, the success at Montreal, "_ainsi que nous
l'avons pratiqué pour la ville de Montréal_."
In 1731 Montreal traders sent out the Chevalier Varennes de la
Vérendrye to hunt, trade and to find the Pacific. In 1735 he built Fort
Rouge, on the site of the City of Winnipeg and in 1743 he and his sons
were the first white men to see the Rocky Mountains.
A decree of February 19, 1732, strikes a blow at the system of
religious asylum being granted to fugitives from justice. "We forbid
all curés, ecclesiastics, and secular and regular communities of
either sex, harbouring or giving asylum to all deserters, vagabonds
and persons charged with crimes, under penalty of loss of our favour,
and of the seizure of their property and of deprivation of their
privileges."
About 1736 the first sailing vessel on Lake Superior was constructed
and furnished through Montreal commercial enterprise.[178]
In a letter, dated October 22, 1730, it is mentioned that Governor
Beauharnois had that spring sent orders to the officer commanding
Chouamigon (La Plante) to make an examination of the copper mine
alleged to have been discovered in the vicinity. Nothing very
satisfactory eventuated. The Sieur Denys de la Ronde, who succeeded
as commandant, had faith, however, in the mines and had obtained a
concession to work copper mines at Lake Superior. In 1736, a son of de
la Ronde, visited an isle in search of copper. De la Ronde, the father,
in 1740, on his way to La Pointe, was taken sick at Mackinac and
returned to Montreal, but he did not despair of finding valuable copper
mines. The colonial officers, in a dispatch, wrote as to de la Ronde,
that "this officer has been ordered with his son to build at the River
Ste. Anne, a house of logs 200 feet long, with a fort and curtain,
which he assures us he has executed. He has had other expenses on
account of the mines, such as the voyage and presents for the Indians.
He has constructed, at his own expense, a bark of forty tons on Lake
Superior, and was obliged to transport the rigging and materials for
the vessel as far as Sault Ste. Marie in canoes. The post of Chouamigon
was given to him as gratuity to defray expenses. A merchant of
Montreal, named Charley St. Ange, furnished de la Ronde with goods, and
miners named Forestier were employed in prospecting."
To the date of 1742 belong the following sidelight of the methods of
execution of justice:
"Under the title of 'The Outraged Crucifix,' in the 'Choses et
Autres,' of M. Faucher de St. Maurice, an interesting historical
sidelight is given of the first half of the eighteenth century,
of a charge of sorcery, magic and sacrilege in Montreal against a
soldier named Flavart de Beaufort, then belonging to the garrison.
He was a "_farceur_," who had only wished to amuse himself at the
expense of the credulity of the poor. But as the good Montrealers
of the period did not suffer any ridicule of holy things, the
affair had a tragic ending.
"On August 27, 1742, the King's procurator brought him in
guilty under the three heads of accusation,--sorcery, magic,
and sacrilege,--and demanded that in fitting reparation Charles
François Flavart de Beaufort should be condemned "in his shirt,
the rope round his neck, holding between his hands a torch of
burning wax of the weight of two pounds, bare-headed and on his
knees, before the great door and the principal entrance of the
parish church of this town, on the first day of the market, to
say and to declare aloud and intelligibly, that wickedly and
ill advised he had profaned the words of Our Lord Jesus Christ
Crucified for the purposes of divination ... and moreover he is
condemned to be beaten and whipped with rods, through the squares
and public thoroughfare of this town and to be banished from the
boundaries of this jurisdiction for three years and be held to
keep his ban.
"On the 30th these conclusions were ratified by the judgment
of the court of Montreal, which further added that "Flavart de
Beaufort should be conducted by the hangman, the 'executeur
de haute justice,' bearing the inscription in front and
behind--'Profaner of Holy things,'--This done, we have condemned
him to serve as a convict in the galleys of the King for the space
of five years.
"(Signed) Guiton de Monrepos."
Flavart, however, appealed against this sentence to the sovereign
council at Quebec, which but confirmed the above sentence, remitting,
however, two years from his services in the galleys. The above sentence
was carried out as a certificate bears out, dated Friday, October 5,
1742, and signed by M. Fr. Daine, councillor, and M. Porlier, greffier.
The incident left a lasting impression, for the clergy was shocked
at the sacrilege. By a _mandement_ of September 10, 1742, the
bishop, Monseigneur de Pont Briand, ordered an amende honorable
and a procession from the parish church to that of Bonsecours. Two
years later, having obtained the cross from the authorities, the
bishop instituted the feast of the Outraged Crucifix. This was to
be celebrated the first Friday in March, each year; and in 1804
Monseigneur du Plessis changed the day to the first day of October,
attaching to this a day of plenary indulgence, obtained by a papal
brief, dated March 28, 1802.
The legend of The Red Cross, illustrating further the methods of
civil punishment of this period, may be here told. Over one hundred
and fifty years ago, this part of the island, from the summit of the
mountain to the pebbly shore of the St. Lawrence, was a thickly wooded
forest. Where Dorchester Street exists today, there was then a narrow
path, beaten by the feet of the passers-by from Lachine, St. Laurent
and the environs. It bore, however, the high sounding title of: "The
King's Highway." Here and there, at irregular distances, a few farms
bordered the simple thoroughfare. At the point where today Guy Street
crosses Dorchester lived an honest farmer, Jean Favre and his wife,
Marie-Anne Bastien. Being an industrious couple, they were supposed to
have realized a good sum from the produce of their prosperous farm,
which sum, in all probability, they hoarded away in some corner of
their dwelling. In the same spot where now stand the iron gates, which
open on the avenue going up to the Convent Church, was a small house
occupied by a petty farmer, named Belisle. The demon of covetousness
had taken hold of his soul and the unfortunate man brooding constantly
over his neighbour's supposed wealth, resolved to become its possessor.
The month of May, 1752, had again decked nature in its garb of green.
The sun, his daily course over, had sunk behind the mountain and the
last echoes of the evening _Angelus_ bell had ceased to vibrate on
the air. Peace and security seemed to reign throughout the colony, as
the shades of night crept over the island, lulling its inhabitants to
slumber and to rest.
Alas! an unholy shadow lured on by the evil one, glided through the
darkness, with the tread of the panther to seize its prey, and drew
near the dwelling of Favre. Suspecting no ill, the honest man sat
quietly smoking near the hearth, from whence a brisk fire cast a mellow
light through the room, showing the table, with its two covers set for
the evening meal. Finally rising, the farmer took from his pocket a
key with which he opened a cupboard near at hand,--drew forth a small
well filled sack and added to its contents the proceeds of the day's
sale. Through the open shutter, from outside, the wretched Belisle,
with glaring eyes, watched every movement of Favre, while his hands
kept spasmodically clutching the knife he held. Wresting from his
bosom the pistol, hid therein, he burst, like a wild beast, into the
dwelling and fired at the old man, then finished him with the knife.
The wife, terrified by the unusual noise, rushed in from an adjoining
room and was at once attacked by the murderer, who plunged the knife
repeatedly into her breast, and then crushed in her skull with the blow
of a spade which he found near by. Side by side lay the unfortunate
husband and wife, victims of man's cupidity. For a moment the murderer
contemplated his work, then, like another Cain, he fled from the spot,
haunted by the dread spectre of the "_Lex talionis_."
The absence of the old couple gave rise to surmises. Search was made
and the horrible crime discovered. Suspicion rested on Belisle, who was
soon after arrested, tried and convicted. The following copy of the
"Réquisitoire du Procureur du Roi," dated 6th June, 1752, shows that
the terrible punishment of "breaking alive" was then in force under the
French régime in Canada. Belisle was condemned to "torture ordinary and
extraordinary," then to be broken alive on a scaffold erected in the
market place (the present Custom House Square) in this city.
This awful sentence was carried out to the letter, his body buried in
Guy Street,[179] and the Red Cross erected to mark the spot, as fully
described in the following document historically valuable:--
_Extract from the Requisition of the King's Attorney_
"I require for the King that Jean Baptiste Goyer dit Belisle be
arraigned and convicted of having wilfully and feloniously killed
the said Jean Favre by a pistol shot and several stabs with a
knife, and of having similarly killed the said Marie-Anne Bastien,
wife of the said Favre, with a spade and a knife; and of having
stolen the money that was in their house; for punishment of which
that he be condemned to have his arms, legs, thighs and backbone
broken at noon, he alive, on a scaffold which shall be erected for
that purpose in the market place of this city: then, on a rack,
his face turned towards the sky, he be left to die. The said Jean
Baptiste Goyer dit Belisle, being previously put to the torture
ordinary and extraordinary, his dead body shall be carried by the
executioner to the highway which lies between the house lately
occupied by the said accused and the house lately occupied by the
said Jean Favre and his wife. The goods and chattels of the said
Jean Baptiste Goyer dit Belisle confiscated to the king, or for
the benefit of those who may have a right to them, or of those
not liable to confiscation, the sum of 300 _livres_ fine being
previously set apart, in case that confiscation could not be made
for the benefit of His Majesty.
"Done at Montreal this 6th June, 1752.
"(Signed) Foucher."
An _ordonnance_ with respect to the care of the foundlings of Montreal
was issued by Intendant Hocquart on March 12, 1748. It allows us to see
how the government undertook the preliminary cost of child rearing by
providing nurses for the first eighteen months; after that the children
should be "hired out" to good _habitants_ of town or country until the
age of eighteen to twenty years. Hocquart notices with surprise that
of the bastards, who survived the first eighteen months, there were
four born in 1743, six in 1744, ten in 1745, who are still being cared
for in 1748 at the expense of the King; they were to be soon "hired;"
and the Sieur Foucher, then _procureur du roi_, who seems to have been
responsible for the great delay, is informed that if the like occurs
again he will have to pay out of his own purse the expense incurred
during the long time intervening.
Students following the story of explorations from Montreal will find
that in September, 1748, a Sulpician, M. l'Abbé Picquet, began a fort
at La Présentation (Ogdensburg). He is to be found early in the summer
of 1751 with six Canadians and five Indians, beginning the circuit of
Lake Ontario. On June 26th he reached Toronto, where he found a band of
Messessagas. On June 28th he reached Niagara and on July 12th the mouth
of the Genessee, where he visited the falls.
Two of Intendant Bigot's[180] earliest _ordonnances_ are of interest
in that the first, issued on December 24, 1748, evidently in view
of the Christmas and New Year season, forbids sliding or skating on
the streets, which, "it has come to our knowledge," is practiced by
children and even grown-ups; the reason alleged being danger to the
passers by, who are not able to get out of the way quick enough;
children who are caught will be put into prison until their parents
or guardians have paid the fine of 10 _livres_. The second is leveled
against fast drivers, who are to be fined 20 _livres_ for galloping
their horses in the street. This is dated December 28th. These,
however, mostly concerned Quebec, as far as we know, but probably
similar regulations were needed at Montreal.
NOTE I
THE DISCOVERIES OF LA VERENDRYE
Sieur Pierre Gaultier de Varennes de la Vérendrye was born in Three
Rivers, the home of Radisson, in 1686. He was the son of René
Gaultier de Varennes and Marie Boucher, daughter of the governor
of Three Rivers, who was married as a young girl of twelve years
on September 12, 1667. At the age of fourteen he, too, determined
to be a discoverer. At eighteen he was fighting in New England, at
nineteen in Newfoundland and at twenty-three in Europe at the battle
of Malplaquet, where he was carried off the field with nine wounds.
In his twenty-ninth year he returned to Canada and was relegated to
the obscure fur posts in the north, eating his heart out till between
1728-1730 at Nepigon, a lonely post north of Michilimackinac. He heard
of a "great river flowing west." Perhaps this was the great western
sea which Russia and France both wished to secure. Accordingly he
descended to Quebec and in the winter of 1730-1731 he placed his dreams
of discovery before the Governor, the Marquis Charles de Beauharnois.
He obtained the government prestige and patronage and a monopoly of the
fur trade in the countries he might discover.
He turned to Montreal traders for the goods to trade and a company
was formed. On June 8, 1731, he left Montreal with his three sons,
Jean Pierre, François and Louis, the eldest only being eighteen years
of age, among the band of fifty adventurers, _coureurs de bois_,
voyageurs and Indian interpreters, to discover the fabled western sea
and so acquire great glory and probably wealth. He reached familiar
ground at Michilimackinac and then after seventy-eight days from
Montreal he touched Kaministiquia after a month's coasting from the
Straits of Mackinaw. As he went onward he established fur posts and
sent east cargoes of furs but not enough for his partners so that in
the winter of 1734-35 Vérendrye was back in Montreal, leaving his
party up-country. He managed to get credit and back he went with the
Jesuit Aulneau to his search. Little fur could he send to redeem his
debts. Instead he was to meet misfortune in the loss of his eldest
son, Jean, the Jesuit Aulneau, and a party of voyageurs who were
treacherously slaughtered by the Sioux on Massacre Island on the night
of June 8, 1736, five years after most of the party had left Montreal.
In September, 1738, Vérendrye entered, the first white man, the Red
River for the forks of the Assiniboine. But he found not the western
sea but the great western Canadian prairie lands. On December 3,
1738, he entered the village of the Indians. There he learned vaguely
of a people in the west who lived on the shores of water bitter for
drinking. After that his sons went on courageously for the western sea,
while he went back to Montreal for supplies and to contest the lawsuits
of his partners who had seized all his posts and properties to meet his
creditors. But his sons found only a sea of prairie, a sea of mountains
and two great rivers, the Saskatchewan and the Missouri, and reached
the foothills of the northern Rockies on New Year's Day, in 1743. At
the end of July they were back again at the Assiniboine River.
[Illustration: MASSACRE ISLAND]
Vérendrye had failed as a trader; moreover he was the object of
the jealousy of the traders who wrongfully accused him of private
speculation and who now desired to exploit the trade of the trail he
had blazed along the Assiniboine and the Missouri. The ruined man was
recalled to Quebec in 1746 and M. de Noyelles was given his command.
Governors Beauharnois and de la Galissonière were believers in his
honesty. He was decorated with the Order of the Cross of St. Louis and
given permission to continue his explorations. His constitution was
broken and on December 6, 1749, while preparing for a further quest,
he died suddenly at Montreal. But he had opened the door to the west,
leaving it to another fur trader of Montreal, Alexander Mackenzie, to
be the first to cross the Rockies and to reach, by land, on July 22,
1793, the Pacific Ocean--the western sea, the dream of Cartier, LaSalle
and Vérendrye at last come true!
NOTE II
CHATEAU VAUDREUIL
[Illustration: MARQUIS PHILIPPE DE RIGAUD DE VAUDREUIL]
[Illustration: CHATEAU VAUDREUIL]
The Château de Vaudreuil was commenced in 1723, as it appears from the
following inscription, found May 15, 1806, under the foundation stone
at the southwest angle.
Cetter pierre. a. esté posée par Dame Louise Elizabeth. Jouabere. femme.
du haut. et. puissent, seigneur, Philippe. de Rigaud Chevalier.
Marquis. de Vaudreuil. grand Croix. de l'ordre militaire, de
St. Louis Gouverneur et lieutenant, general pour le roy.
de toute. la nouvelle France Septentrionale
En 1723 le 15 May.
Sept Maison appartien à Monsieur le Marquis de Vaudreuil.
The Château Vaudreuil or Hôtel de Vaudreuil occupied with its ground,
acquired in 1721, a large tract of land between St. Paul Street and
Notre-Dame and included what is now known as Jacques Cartier Square.
After the cession in 1763, on April 12th, the son of the builder, the
Marquis Pierre de Rigaud, and his lady, then living at Paris in their
hotel, Rue de Deux Boulles, sold the estate to Messire Michel Chartier,
Chevalier et Seigneur de Lothbinière, ordinarily dwelling in the
town of Quebec, Canada, but being at present in Paris. In 1771 M. de
Lothbinière sold the Château Vaudreuil to M. Joseph Fleury Deschambault
de la Gorgendière. In 1773 the latter sold it on July 26th to the
church wardens of the parish of Notre-Dame, for the establishment of a
colony. The building was opened as a school on the following October
1st under the name of Collège de St. Raphael. This was the continuation
of a college founded about 1767 in the priests' house at Longue
Pointe by a priest of St. Sulpice, J. B. Curatteau de la Blaiserie.
St. Raphael's College remained here till June 6, 1803, when it was
reduced to ashes. It was then transferred to College Street in 1804,
being rebuilt at the expense of the Seminary of St. Sulpice. In 1806,
on October 20th, it was opened under the name of the Collège ou Petit
Séminaire de Montréal.
On December 14, 1803, the Vaudreuil estate with the ruined college
and its dependencies was sold by the church wardens to two merchants,
MM. Jean Baptiste Durocher and Joseph Périnault, for a sum of 3,000
guineas. During the month of December, 1803, these divided their land
as well as that which they had bought from the seminary, as follows:
1. They have left for the public use a place named the New Market, 172
French feet in breadth on Notre-Dame Street and 175 on St. Paul Street,
without comprising St. Charles Street, which terminated this market on
the northeast and that of "La Fabrique," which terminated it at the
southwest. The said place extending in length from Notre Dame Street to
St. Paul Street, a distance of about 388 feet.
2. The rest of the land on the southwest of the market and Fabrique
Street was divided into eight holdings and sold to eight persons on
December 26th and 27th.
FOOTNOTES:
[174] The work of demolition of the useless fortifications began in
1804 to make room for local expansion.
[175] The Marquis de Beauharnois became governor-general in 1726,
holding the post till 1747. In dealing with his government and that
of his successors, till the Seven Years' War, we shall pursue the
chronological method as before.
[176] From a MSS. Letter of Soeur Ste. Hélène--1730.
[177] Translated from the "Revue Canadienne" for February, 1876, pp.
108-9.
[178] The first ship built in Canada to sail the inland waters was that
built by a Montrealer, Sieur de la Salle, in 1667, when, with his ship
carpenters from France, he constructed the Griffon on Lake Erie, near
Niagara, to explore the waters of the west.
[179] The exigencies of the time requiring the highway to be widened,
the Red Cross was removed inside the fence, on property belonging to
the Seminary St. Sulpice, to which land it gave its name.
When the Grey Nuns, in 1869, became, in turn, proprietors of the land,
which they purchased from St. Sulpice, in order to erect thereon the
new convent, the Sisters had the Red Cross raised, about 1870, on a
mound, within their grounds. It occupies a pretty spot inside the
enclosure, where Dorchester and Guy streets meet, and from its elevated
position can be partly seen by persons passing outside.
[180] François Bigot was commissioned on January 1, 1748; he arrived at
Quebec on August 25th.