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You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: Famous Firesides of French Canada + +Author: Mary Wilson Alloway + +Release Date: December 14, 2009 [EBook #30674] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: UTF-8 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK FAMOUS FIRESIDES OF FRENCH CANADA *** + + + + +Produced by Marcia Brooks, Josephine Paolucci and the +Online Distributed Proofreading Canada Team at +http://www.pgdpcanada.net (This file was produced from +images generously made available by The Internet +Archive/Canadian Libraries) + + + + + + +</pre> + + +<p> </p><p> </p><p> </p> + +<div class="figcenter" style="width: 429px;"> +<img src="images/cover.jpg" width="429" height="650" alt="" title="" /> +</div> + +<p><a name="front" id="front"></a></p> +<div class="figcenter" style="width: 392px;"> +<img src="images/frontis.jpg" width="392" height="650" alt="Hearths beside which were rocked the cradles of those who +made the history of Canada." title="" /> +<span class="caption">Hearths beside which were rocked the cradles of those who +made the history of Canada.</span> +</div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h1>FAMOUS FIRESIDES</h1> + +<h4>OF</h4> + +<h1>FRENCH CANADA</h1> + +<h3>BY</h3> + +<h2><span class="smcap">Mary Wilson Alloway</span>.</h2> + +<h3>ILLUSTRATED.</h3> + +<p class="center">MONTREAL:<br /> + +PRINTED BY JOHN LOVELL & SON<br /> + +1899</p> + +<hr style="width: 35%;" /> +<div class="blockquot"><p>Entered according to Act of Parliament of Canada, in the year +one thousand eight hundred and ninety-nine, by <span class="smcap">Mary Wilson +Alloway</span>, in the office of the Minister of Agriculture and +Statistics at Ottawa.</p></div> + +<hr style="width: 35%;" /> +<p class="center"> +TO<br /> +<br /> +THE RIGHT HONOURABLE<br /> +<br /> +LORD STRATHCONA AND MOUNT ROYAL, G.C.M.G., LL.D., &c.,<br /> +<br /> +CHANCELLOR OF McGILL UNIVERSITY, MONTREAL,<br /> +<br /> +AND<br /> +<br /> +HIGH COMMISSIONER FOR CANADA IN LONDON,<br /> +<br /> +THIS VOLUME<br /> +<br /> +IS<br /> +<br /> +BY SPECIAL PERMISSION<br /> +<br /> +<i>Respectfully Dedicated</i><br /> +<br /> +BY<br /> +<br /> +THE AUTHOR.<br /> +</p> + +<hr style="width: 35%;" /> +<p>The principal authorities consulted in the preparation of this work were +Le Moyne, Kingsford, Rattray, Garneau, Parkman, Hawkins and Bouchette.</p> + +<p>Acknowledgments are also due to the kind interest evinced and +encouragement given by the Hon. Judge Baby, President of the Numismatic +and Antiquarian Society of Montreal.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2>CONTENTS.</h2> + +<p> +Château de Ramezay <span class="tocnum"><a href='#Page_19'>19</a></span><br /> +<br /> +Heroes of the Past <span class="tocnum"><a href='#Page_30'>30</a></span><br /> +<br /> +Chapel of Notre-Dame-de-la-Victoire <span class="tocnum"><a href='#Page_51'>51</a></span><br /> +<br /> +Le Séminaire <span class="tocnum"><a href='#Page_56'>56</a></span><br /> +<br /> +Cathedrals and Cloisters <span class="tocnum"><a href='#Page_58'>58</a></span><br /> +<br /> +Massacre of Lachine <span class="tocnum"><a href='#Page_82'>82</a></span><br /> +<br /> +Château de Vaudreuil <span class="tocnum"><a href='#Page_95'>95</a></span><br /> +<br /> +Battle of the Plains <span class="tocnum"><a href='#Page_103'>103</a></span><br /> +<br /> +Canada under English Rule <span class="tocnum"><a href='#Page_125'>125</a></span><br /> +<br /> +American Invasion <span class="tocnum"><a href='#Page_144'>144</a></span><br /> +<br /> +The Continental Army in Canada <span class="tocnum"><a href='#Page_155'>155</a></span><br /> +<br /> +Fur Kings <span class="tocnum"><a href='#Page_192'>192</a></span><br /> +<br /> +Interesting Sites <span class="tocnum"><a href='#Page_199'>199</a></span><br /> +<br /> +Famous Names <span class="tocnum"><a href='#Page_203'>203</a></span><br /> +<br /> +Echoes from the Past <span class="tocnum"><a href='#Page_212'>212</a></span><br /> +</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2>ILLUSTRATIONS.</h2> + + +<p> +<span class="tocnum"><span class="smcap">Page.</span></span><br /> +<br /> +Fireplace <span class="tocnum"><i><a href="#front">Frontispiece</a>.</i></span><br /> +<br /> +Château Kitchen <span class="tocnum"><a href='#Page_24'>24</a></span><br /> +<br /> +Château de Ramezay <span class="tocnum"><a href='#Page_26'>26</a></span><br /> +<br /> +Montgomery Salon <span class="tocnum"><a href='#Page_28'>28</a></span><br /> +<br /> +Chapel of Notre Dame de la Victoire <span class="tocnum"><a href='#Page_52'>52</a></span><br /> +<br /> +Le Séminaire <span class="tocnum"><a href='#Page_56'>56</a></span><br /> +<br /> +Home of La Salle <span class="tocnum"><a href='#Page_84'>84</a></span><br /> +<br /> +St. Amable St. <span class="tocnum"><a href='#Page_98'>98</a></span><br /> +<br /> +Fort Chambly <span class="tocnum"><a href='#Page_146'>146</a></span><br /> +<br /> +Château Fortier <span class="tocnum"><a href='#Page_156'>156</a></span><br /> +<br /> +Franklin Vaults <span class="tocnum"><a href='#Page_170'>170</a></span><br /> +</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_xi" id="Page_xi">[Pg xi]</a></span></p> +<h2>PREFACE.</h2> + + +<p>In offering this little volume to the kind consideration of Canadian and +American readers, it is the earnest wish of the Author that it may +commend itself to the interest of both, as the early histories of Canada +and the United States are so closely connected that they may be +considered identical.</p> + +<p>We have tried to recall the days when, by these firesides, we re rocked +the cradles of those who helped to make Canadian history, and to render +more familiar the names and deeds of the great men, French, English and +American, upon whose valour and wisdom such mighty issues depended.</p> + +<p>The recital is, we trust, wholly impartial and without prejudice.</p> + +<p>It is to be hoped that the union of sentiment which the close of this +century sees between the two great Anglo-Saxon peoples may cast<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_xii" id="Page_xii">[Pg xii]</a></span> a veil +of forgetfulness over the strife of the one preceding it; and be a +herald of that reign of peace, when "nation shall no more rise against +nation, and wars shall cease."</p> + +<div class="figcenter" style="width: 300px;"> +<img src="images/p0020.jpg" width="300" height="88" alt="Signature" title="" /> +</div> + +<p class="center"><span class="smcap">Montreal</span>, May 24, 1899.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_13" id="Page_13">[Pg 13]</a></span></p> +<h2>INTRODUCTION.</h2> + + +<p>About twelve years after the first Spanish caravel had touched the +shores of North America, we find the French putting forth efforts to +share in some of the results of the discovery. In the year 1504 some +Basque, Breton and Norman fisher-folk had already commenced fishing +along the bleak shores of Newfoundland and the contiguous banks for the +cod in which this region is still so prolific.</p> + +<p>The Spanish claim to the discovery of America is disputed by several +aspirants to that honour. Among these are the ancient mariners of +Northern Europe, the Norsemen of the Scandinavian Peninsula. They assert +that their Vikings touched American shores three centuries before +Isabella of Castille drove the Moors from their palaces among the orange +groves of <i>Espana</i>. Eric the Red, and other sea-kings, made voyages to +Iceland and Greenland<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_14" id="Page_14">[Pg 14]</a></span> in the eleventh and following centuries; and it +is highly probable that these Norsemen, with their hardihood and +enterprise, touched on some part of the mainland. One Danish writer +claims that this occurred as far back as the year 985, about eighty +years after the death of the Danes' mortal enemy, the great Saxon King +Alfred.</p> + +<p>Even the Welsh, from the isolation of their mountain fastnesses, declare +that a Cambrian expedition, in the year 1170, under Prince Modoc, landed +in America. In proof of this, there is said to exist in Mexico a colony +bearing indisputable traces of the tongue of these ancient Celts.</p> + +<p>The term Canada first appears as the officially recognized name of the +region in the instructions given by Francis I to its original colonists +in the year 1538.</p> + +<p>There are various theories as to the etymology of the word, its having +by different authorities been attributed to Indian, French and Spanish +origins.</p> + +<p>In an old copy of a Montreal paper, bearing date of Dec. 24, 1834, it is +asserted<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_15" id="Page_15">[Pg 15]</a></span> that Canada or <i>Kannata</i> is an Indian word, meaning a village, +and was mistaken by the early visitors for the name of the whole +country.</p> + +<p>The Philadelphia <i>Courier</i>, of July, 1836, gives the following not +improbable etymology of the name of the province:—Canada is compounded +of two aboriginal words, <i>Can</i>, which signifies the mouth, and <i>Ada</i> the +country, meaning the mouth of the country. A writer of the same period, +when there seems to have been considerable discussion on the subject, +says:—The word is undoubtedly of Spanish origin, coming from a common +Spanish word, <i>Canada</i>, signifying a space or opening between mountains +or high banks—a district in Mexico of similar physical features, +bearing the same name.</p> + +<p>"That there were Spanish pilots or navigators among the first +discoverers of the St. Lawrence may be readily supposed, and what more +natural than that those who first visited the gulf should call the +interior of the country <i>El Canada</i> from the typographical appearance of +the opening to it,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_16" id="Page_16">[Pg 16]</a></span> the custom of illiterate navigators naming places +from events and natural appearances being well established."</p> + +<p>Hennepin, an etymological <i>savant</i>, declares that the name arose from +the Spaniards, who were the first discoverers of Canada, exclaiming, on +their failure to find the precious metals, "<i>El Capa da nada</i>," or Cape +Nothing. There seems to be some support of this alleged presence of the +Spanish among the early navigators of the St. Lawrence, by the finding +in the river, near Three Rivers, in the year 1835, an ancient cannon of +peculiar make, which was supposed to be of Spanish construction.</p> + +<p>The origins of the names of Montreal and Quebec are equally open to +discussion. Many stoutly assert that Montreal is the French for Mount +Royal, or Royal Mount; others, that by the introduction of one letter, +the name is legitimately Spanish—<i>Monte-real</i>. <i>Monte</i>, designating any +wooded elevation, and that <i>real</i> is the only word in that language for +royal.</p> + +<p>The word Quebec is attributed to Indian and French sources. It is said +that it is<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_17" id="Page_17">[Pg 17]</a></span> an Algonquin word, meaning a strait, the river at this point +being not more than a mile wide; but although Champlain coincided in +this view, its root has never been discovered in any Indian tongue. Its +abrupt enunciation has not to the ear the sound of an Indian word, and +it could scarcely have come from the Algonquin language, which is +singularly soft and sweet, and may be considered the Italian of North +American dialects.</p> + +<p>Those who claim for it a French origin, say that the Normans, rowing up +the river with Cartier at his first discovery, as they rounded the +wooded shores of the Isle of Orleans, and came in sight of the bare rock +rising three hundred feet from its base, exclaimed "<i>Quel bec!</i>" or, +What a promontory! The word bears intrinsically strong evidence of +Norman origin.</p> + +<p>Cape Diamond received its name from the fact that in the "dark colored +slate of which it is composed are found perfectly limpid quartz crystals +in veins, along with crystallized carbonate of lime, which, sparkling +like diamonds among the crags, suggested the appellation."</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_19" id="Page_19">[Pg 19]</a></span></p> +<h2>Famous Firesides</h2> + +<h4>—OF—</h4> + +<h2>French Canada</h2> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2>THE CHATEAU DE RAMEZAY.</h2> + +<div class="drop"> +<img src="images/dropa.jpg" width="98" height="125" alt="A" class="cap" /> + +<p class="cap_2">A few yards from the busy municipal centre of the city of Montreal, +behind an antique iron railing, is a quaint, old building known as the +Château de Ramezay. Its history is contemporary with that of the city +for the last two centuries, and so identified with past stirring events +that it has been saved from the vandalism of modern improvement, and is +to be preserved as a relic of the old <i>Régime</i> in New France. It is a +long one-storied structure, originally red-tiled, with graceful, sloping +roof, double rows of peaked, dormer windows, huge chimneys and the +unpolished architecture of the period.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_20" id="Page_20">[Pg 20]</a></span></p> +</div> + +<p>Among the many historical buildings of America, none have been the scene +of more thrilling events, a long line of interesting associations being +connected with the now quiet old Château, looking in its peaceful old +age as out of keeping with its modern surroundings as would an ancient +vellum missal, mellowed for centuries in a monkish cell, appear among +some of the ephemeral literature of to-day.</p> + +<p>A brilliant line of viceroys have here held rule, and within its walls +things momentous in the country's annals have been enacted. During its +checkered experience no less than three distinct <i>Régimes</i> have followed +each other, French, British and American. In an old document still to be +found among the archives of the Seminary of St. Sulpice, it is recorded +that the land on which it stands was ceded to the Governor of Montreal +in the year 1660, just eighteen years after Maisonneuve, its founder, +planted the silken Fleur-de-Lys of France on the shores of the savage +Redman, and one hundred years before the tri-cross of England floated +for the first time from the ramparts.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_21" id="Page_21">[Pg 21]</a></span></p> + +<p>Somewhere about the year 1700 a portion of this land was acquired by +Claude de Ramezay, Sieur de la Gesse, Bois Fleurent and Monnoir, in +France, and Governor of Three Rivers, and this house built.</p> + +<p>De Ramezay was of an old Franco-Scottish family, being descended by +<i>Thimothy</i>, his father, from one Sir John Ramsay, a Scotchman, who, with +others of his compatriots, went over to France in the 16th century. He +may have joined an army raised for the French wars, or may have formed +part of a bridal train similar to the gay retinue of the fair Princess +Mary, who went from the dark fells and misty lochs of the land of the +Royal Stuarts to be the loveliest queen who ever sat on the throne of +<i>la belle France</i>. De Ramezay was the father of thirteen children, by +his wife, Mademoiselle Denys de la Ronde, a sister of Mesdames Thomas +Tarieu de La Naudière de La Pérade, d'Ailleboust d'Argenteuil, Chartier +de Lotbinière and Aubert de la Chenage, the same family out of whom came +the celebrated de Jumonville, so well known in connection with the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_22" id="Page_22">[Pg 22]</a></span> +unfortunate circumstances of Fort Necessity. The original of the +marriage contract is still preserved in the records of the Montreal +Court House; with its long list of autographs of Governor, Intendant, +and high officials, civil and military, scions of the nobility of the +country, appended thereto. The annals of the family tell us that some of +them died in infancy, several met violent and untimely deaths, two of +the sisters took conventual vows in the cloisters of Quebec, two +married, having descendants now living in France and Canada, and two +remained unmarried.</p> + +<p>De Ramezay came over as a captain in the army with the Viceroy de Tracy, +and was remarkable for his highly refined education, having been a pupil +of the celebrated Fénélon, who was said to have been the pattern of +virtue in the midst of a corrupt court, and who was entrusted by Louis +the Fourteenth with the education of his grandsons, the Dukes of +Burgundy, Anjou and Berri. Had the first named, who was heir-presumptive +to the throne, lived to practice the princely virtues, the seeds of<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_23" id="Page_23">[Pg 23]</a></span> +which his preceptor had sown in his heart, some of the most bloody pages +in French history might never have been written.</p> + +<p>De Ramezay, for many years being Governor of Montreal, held official +court in the Council chamber to the right of the entrance hall of the +Château, which is now a museum of rare and valuable relics of Canada's +past.</p> + +<p>The Salon was the scene of many a gay rout, as Madame de Ramezay, +imitating the brilliant social and political life as it was in France in +the time of <i>Le Grand Monarque</i>, transplanted to the wilds of America +some reflection of court ceremonial and display as they culminated in +that long and brilliant reign. From the dormer windows above, high-bred +French ladies looked at the sun rising over the forest-clothed shores of +the river, on which now stands the architectural grandeur of the modern +city. How strange to the swarthy-faced dwellers in the wigwam must the +old-time gaieties have appeared, as the lights from the silver +<i>candelabres</i> shone far out in the night, when the old Château was <i>en +fête</i><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_24" id="Page_24">[Pg 24]</a></span> and aglow with music, dancing and laughter.</p> + +<p>What a contrast to the burden-bearing squaws were the dainty French +women in stiff brocade and jewels, high heels, paint, patches and +tresses <i>à la Pompadour</i>, tripping through the stately measures of the +minuet to the sound of lute or harpsichord!</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">"O, fair young land of <i>La Nouvelle France</i>,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">With thy halo of olden time romance,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Back like a half-forgotten dream<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Come the bygone days of the old <i>Régime</i>."<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>The servants and retainers, imitating their lords, held high revel in +the vaulted kitchens; while dishes and confections, savoury and +delicious, came from the curious fireplace and ovens recently discovered +in the vaults. These ancient kitchen offices, built to resist a siege, +are exceedingly interesting in the light of our culinary arrangements of +to-day. They were so constructed that if the buildings above, with their +massive masonry, were destroyed, they would afford safe and comfortable +refuge. The roof is arched, and, like the walls, is several feet thick, +of solid stone, lighted by heavily barred windows, with strong iron +shutters. In clearing out the walled-up and long-forgotten ovens, there +were found bits of broken crockery, pipe-stems and the ashes of fires, +gone out many, many long years ago. As indicated by an early map of the +city, the position of the original well was located; in which, when it +is cleaned out, it is intended to hang an old oaken bucket and drinking +cups as nearly as possible as they originally were.</p> + +<div class="figcenter" style="width: 650px;"> +<img src="images/p0033.jpg" width="650" height="408" alt="Ancient kitchen and fireplace of the Château de Ramezay." title="" /> +<span class="caption">Ancient kitchen and fireplace of the Château de Ramezay.<br /> + +COPYRIGHT.</span> +</div><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_25" id="Page_25">[Pg 25]</a></span></p> + +<p>Some time after the death of de Ramezay, which occurred in the city of +Quebec in 1724, these noble halls fell into the possession of the +fur-traders of Canada, and many a time these underground cellars were +stored with the rich skins of the mink, silver fox, marten, sable and +ermine for the markets of Europe and for royalty itself. They were +brought in by the hunters and trappers over the boundless domains of the +fur companies, and by the Indian tribes friendly to the peltrie trade. +As these hardy, bronzed men sat around the hearth, while the juicy +haunch of venison roasted on the spit by the blazing logs,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_26" id="Page_26">[Pg 26]</a></span> relating +blood-curdling tales and hairbreadth escapes, they were a necessary +phase of times long passed away, but which will always have a +picturesqueness especially their own.</p> + +<p>Instead of the white man's influencing the savage towards civilized +customs, it was often found, as one writer has said, that hundreds of +white men were barbarized on this continent for each single savage that +was civilized. Many of the former identified themselves by marriage and +mode of life with the Indians, developed their traits of hardihood and +acquired their knowledge of woodcraft and skill in navigating the +streams. In pursuit of the fur-bearing animals in their native haunts, +they shot the raging rapids, ventured out upon the broad expanse of the +treacherous lakes, and endured without complaint the severity of winter +and the exposure of forest life in summer.</p> + +<div class="figcenter" style="width: 650px;"> +<img src="images/p0037.jpg" width="650" height="409" alt="CHATEAU DE RAMEZAY." title="" /> +<span class="caption">CHATEAU DE RAMEZAY.</span> +</div><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_27" id="Page_27">[Pg 27]</a></span></p> + +<p>Their ranks were continually increased by those who were impatient of +the slow method of obtaining a livelihood from the tillage of the soil, +when the husbandman was frequently driven from the plough by the sudden +attack of Indian foes, or interrupted in his hasty and anxious +harvesting by their war-whoop, or perhaps was compelled to leave his +farm to take up arms, if the occasion arose, so that in many instances +the homesteads were left to the old men, women and children. The +excitement of the chase and the wild freedom of the plains had a +fascination that many could not resist, so much so that the king had to +promulgate an edict, to stop, under heavy penalties, this roving life of +his Canadian subjects, as their nomadic tendencies interfered with the +successful settlement of the colony.</p> + +<p>To the lover of the quaint architecture of other centuries, there is an +indescribable charm in these time-worn walls, which are still as +substantial as if the snows and rains of two centuries had not beaten +against them. The interior is equally interesting in this regard, as the +walls dividing the chambers and corridors, though covered with modern +plaster and stucco, are found to consist of several feet of solid<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_28" id="Page_28">[Pg 28]</a></span> stone +masonry, while the ornamental ceiling covers beams of timber, twenty +inches by eighteen, which is strong, well jointed and placed as close as +flooring. Above this is heavy stone work over twelve inches thick, so +that the sloping roof was the only part pregnable in an assault with the +munitions of war then in use. Upon removing a portion of the modern +wainscotting in the main reception room, there was discovered an ancient +fireplace, made of roughly hewn blocks of granite. A crescent-shaped +portion of the hearthstone is capable of removal, for what purpose it is +not known. With old andirons and huge logs, it looks to-day exactly as +it must have done when Montgomery and his suite, in revolutionary +uniform, received delegations in this chamber, and when Brigadier +General Wooster, who succeeded him, wrote and sent despatches by courier +from the French Château to the Colonial mansion at Mount Vernon.</p> + +<div class="figcenter" style="width: 650px;"> +<img src="images/p0041.jpg" width="650" height="411" alt="Salon in which Montgomery held official receptions, 1775." title="" /> +<span class="caption">Salon in which Montgomery held official receptions, 1775.<br /> + +COPYRIGHT.</span> +</div><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_29" id="Page_29">[Pg 29]</a></span></p> + +<p>The rooms of state in those days were, it is said, all in what is at +present the back of the house, the rear of the building being the front, +facing the river, down to which ran the gardens.</p> + +<p>It may be that the moonlight cast on these panes the shadow of the noble +Sir Jeffrey Amherst, in his red coat, as looking out over the river he +may have seen the smoke of the fire lighted by de Lévis, where he burnt +his colours rather than let them fall into the hands of the English.</p> + +<div class="figcenter" style="width: 289px;"> +<img src="images/p0043.jpg" width="289" height="300" alt="" title="" /> +</div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_30" id="Page_30">[Pg 30]</a></span></p> +<h2>HEROES OF THE PAST.</h2> + + +<div class="drop"> +<img src="images/dropo.jpg" width="81" height="125" alt="O" class="cap" /> + +<p class="cap_2">On the river bank below the Château, tradition says, was the spot +trodden by Jacques Cartier, who gave the river its name. Born at the +time when all Europe was still excited over the tales of Columbus' +adventures, he left the white cliffs and grey docks of St. Malo, where +he had learned the sailor's craft, to search for the western route to +the Indies.</p></div> + +<p>A little higher up, less than a century later, Champlain, to push on +actively his operations in the fur-trade, built his fort, the name which +he then gave the spot, "<i>Place Royale</i>," being recently restored to it. +In his wanderings for the further pursuance of this object, he +discovered Lakes Ontario, Huron and Champlain.</p> + +<p>Being betrothed to a twelve year old maiden, Hélène Bouillé, the +daughter of a Huguenot, he named the island opposite the city, which +lies like a green gem among the crystal waters, Hélène, in<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_31" id="Page_31">[Pg 31]</a></span> affectionate +remembrance of her who, at the end of eight years, was to join him in +his adventurous life.</p> + +<p>The winding length of quiet, old St. Paul street, then an Indian trail, +following the course of the river through the oak forest, must often +have known the presence of this picturesque warrior in his +weather-beaten garments of the doublet and long hose then in vogue. +"Over the doublet he buckled on a breastplate, and probably a back +piece, while his thighs were protected by cuisses of steel and his head +by a plumed casque. Across his shoulders hung the strap of his +<i>baudolier</i> or ammunition box, at his side was his sword, and in his +hand his arquebuse. Such was the equipment of this ancient Indian +fighter, whose exploits date eleven years before the Puritans landed," +among the grey granite hills of New England.</p> + +<p>He was an armourer of Dieppe, who, though "a great captain, a successful +discoverer and a noted geographer, was more than all a God-fearing, +Christian<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_32" id="Page_32">[Pg 32]</a></span> gentleman." He was more concerned to gain victories by the +cross than by the sword, saying:—"The salvation of a soul is of more +value than the conquest of an empire."</p> + +<p>The year 1620 was a red letter day in the history of the Colony, when, +from a little vessel moored at the foot of the cliff, he led on shore at +Quebec his young bride, who with her three maids had come to the western +wilderness, the first gentlewoman to land on Canadian shores. He +conducted her to where is now the corner of Notre Dame and Sous-le-Fort +streets, to the rude "<i>habitation</i>" he had prepared for her reception, +which was poorly furnished and unhomelike in comparison to the one which +she had left over the sea. But history tells of no word of complaint nor +disappointment coming from the gentle lips; but, as the youthful +<i>châteleine</i> sat by her hearth, it shed a light among the huts of the +settlers and dusky lodges of the natives, as her example of patience and +duty performed by the first refined, civilized fireside in the land +does<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_33" id="Page_33">[Pg 33]</a></span> to the thousands who have succeeded her. After almost three +hundred years, the "charms of her person, her elegance and kindliness of +manner" are still remembered. The chronicler tells us that the +"Governor's lady wore in her daily rambles, amongst the wigwams, an +article of feminine attire, not unusual in those days, a small mirror at +her girdle." It appealed irresistibly to the simple natures around her, +that "a beauteous being should love them so much as to carry their +images reflected close to her heart."</p> + +<p>"The graceful figure of the first lady of Canada, gliding noiselessly +along by the murmuring waters of the St. Lawrence, showering everywhere +smiles and kindness, a help-mate to her noble lord, and a pattern of +purity and refinement, was indeed a vision of female loveliness" which +time cannot obliterate nor forgetfulness dim. The domestic life of the +colony dates from about the time of her arrival, the first regular +register of marriage being entered in the following year; two months +after the first nuptial ceremony<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_34" id="Page_34">[Pg 34]</a></span> was performed in New England. The +first christening took place in the same year, 1621, the ordinance being +administered to the infant son of Abraham Martin, <i>dit L'Ecossais</i>, +pilot of the river St. Lawrence. This old pilot, named in the journal of +the Jesuits as <i>Maître</i> Abraham, has bequeathed his name to the famous +Plains, on which was decided the destiny of New France.</p> + +<p>It was indeed a sorry day for the settlement when the inhabitants, on +the 16th of August, 1624, saw the white sails of Champlain's vessel +disappear behind what is now Point Levis, carrying back, alas! forever, +to the shores of her beloved France, Madame de Champlain, sighing for +the mystic life of the cloister, tired out by the incessant alarms and +the Indian ferocities spread around the Fort during the frequent +absences of her husband and her favourite brother, Eustache Bouillé. The +daintily-nurtured French lady must have found the quiet of the old-world +convent a very haven of peace and rest. She died at Mieux, an<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_35" id="Page_35">[Pg 35]</a></span> Ursuline +Nun, in the order which subsequently was to be so closely identified +with the religious history of her wilderness home.</p> + +<p>But monastic retreat had no attractions for the founder of Fort St. +Louis. Parkman says: "Champlain, though in Paris is restless. He is +enamoured of the New World, whose rugged charms have seized his fancy +and his heart. His restless thoughts revert to the fog-wrapped coasts, +the piney odours of the forests, the noise of waters and the sharp and +piercing sunlight so dear to his remembrance."</p> + +<p>Among these he was destined to lay down his well worn armour at the +command of death, the only enemy before whom he ever retreated; for on +Christmas Day, 1635, in a chamber in the Fort at Quebec, "breathless and +cold lay the hardy frame which war, the wilderness and the sea had +buffeted so long in vain. The chevalier, crusader, romance-loving +explorer and practical navigator lay still in death," leaving the memory +of a courage<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_36" id="Page_36">[Pg 36]</a></span> that was matchless and a patience that was sublime.</p> + +<p>For over two hundred and sixty years, no monument stood to celebrate +this true patriot's name, but now his statue stands in his city, near to +where he laid the foundations and built the Château St. Louis. Most +unfortunately his last resting place is unknown, notwithstanding the +laborious and learned efforts of the many distinguished antiquarians of +Quebec.</p> + +<p>The Fort which Champlain built in 1620, and in which he died, was for +over two centuries the seat of government, and the name recalls the +thrilling events which clothed it with an atmosphere of great and +stirring interest during its several periods. The hall of the Fort +during the weakness of the colony was often, it is said, a scene of +terror and despair from the inroads of the ferocious savages, who, +having passed and overthrown all the French outposts, threatened the +Fort itself, and massacred some friendly Indians within sight of its +walls.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_37" id="Page_37">[Pg 37]</a></span></p> + +<p>"In the palmy days of French sovereignty it was the centre of power over +the immense domain extending from the Gulf of St. Lawrence along the +shores of the noble river and down the course of the Mississippi to its +outlet below New Orleans.</p> + +<p>The banner which first streamed from the battlements of Quebec was +displayed from a line of forts which protected the settlements +throughout this vast extent of country. The Council Chamber of the +Castle was the scene of many a midnight vigil, many a long deliberation +and deep-laid project, to free the continent from the intrusion of the +ancient rivals of France and assert her supremacy. Here also was +rendered, with all its ancient forms, the fealty and homage of the +<i>noblesse</i> and military retainers, who held possessions under the Crown, +a feudal service suited to those early times, and which is still +performed by the peers at the coronation of our kings in Westminster +Abbey."<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_38" id="Page_38">[Pg 38]</a></span></p> + +<div class="figcenter" style="width: 330px;"> +<img src="images/p0052.jpg" width="330" height="450" alt="Frontenac" title="" /> +</div> + +<p>Among the many dramatic scenes of which it was the theatre, no +occurrence was more remarkable than an event which happened in the year +1690, when "Castle St. Louis had assumed an appearance worthy of the +Governor-General, who then made it the seat of the Royal Government, the +dignified Count de Frontenac, a nobleman of great talents, long service +and extreme pride, and who is considered<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_39" id="Page_39">[Pg 39]</a></span> one of the most illustrious of +the early French rulers." The story is, that Sir William Phipps, an +English admiral, arriving with his fleet in the harbour, and believing +the city to be in a defenceless condition, thought he might capture it +by surprise. An officer was sent ashore with a flag of truce. He was met +half way by a French major and his men, who, placing a bandage over the +intruder's eyes, conducted him by a circuitous route to the Castle, +having recourse on the way to various stratagems, such as making small +bodies of soldiers cross and re-cross his path, to give him the +impression of the presence of a strong force. On arriving at the Castle, +his surprise we are told was extreme on finding himself in the presence +of the Governor-General, the Intendant and the Bishop, with a large +staff of French officers, uniformed in full regimentals, drawn up in the +centre of the great hall ready to receive him.</p> + +<p>The British officer immediately handed to Frontenac a written demand for +an unconditional surrender, in the name<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_40" id="Page_40">[Pg 40]</a></span> of the new Sovereigns, William +and Mary, whom Protestant England had crowned instead of the dethroned +and Catholic James. Taking his watch from his pocket and placing it on a +table near by, he peremptorily demanded a positive answer in an hour's +time at the furthest. This action was like the spark in the tinder, and +completely roused the anger and indignation of his hearers, who had +scarcely been able to restrain their excitement during the reading of +the summons, which the Englishman had delivered in an imperious voice, +and which an interpreter had translated word for word to the outraged +audience.</p> + +<p>A murmur of repressed resentment ran through the assembly, when one of +the officers, without waiting for his superior to reply, exclaimed +impetuously:—that the messenger ought to be treated as the envoy of a +corsair, or common marauder, since Phipps was in arms against his +legitimate Sovereign. Frontenac, although keenly hurt in his most +vulnerable point,—his pride—by the lack of ceremony displayed<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_41" id="Page_41">[Pg 41]</a></span> in the +conduct of the Englishman, replied in a calm voice, but in impassioned +words, saying loftily:—"You will have no occasion to wait so long for +my answer,—here it is:—I do not recognize King William, but I know +that the Prince of Orange is an usurper, who has violated the most +sacred ties of blood and religion in dethroning the King, his +father-in-law; and I acknowledge no other legitimate Sovereign than +James the Second. Do your best, and I will do mine."</p> + +<p>The messenger thereupon demanded that the reply be given him in writing, +which the Governor haughtily refused, saying:—</p> + +<p>"I am going to answer your master at the cannon's mouth; he shall be +taught that this is not the manner in which a person of my rank ought to +be summoned."</p> + +<p>Charlevoix seems to have very much admired the lordly bearing of +Frontenac on this occasion, which was so trying to his self-control, +but, with an impartiality creditable to a Frenchman, he justly<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_42" id="Page_42">[Pg 42]</a></span> +chronicles his equal admiration for the coolness and presence of mind +with which the Englishman signalized himself in carrying out his +mission, under insults and humiliations scarcely to be looked for from +those who should have known better the respect due to a flag of truce.</p> + +<p>The commander of the fleet, finding the place ready for resistance, +concluded that the lateness of the season rendered it unwise to commence +a regular siege against a city whose natural and artificial defences +made it a formidable fortress, and which, when garrisoned by troops of +such temper and mettle, it appeared impossible to reduce. It must also +be considered that Phipps had been delayed by contrary winds and pilots +ignorant of the river navigation, which combination of untoward +circumstances conspired to compel him to relinquish his design, which +under more favouring conditions he might have carried out with success, +and conquered the place before it could have been known in Montreal that +it was even in danger.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_43" id="Page_43">[Pg 43]</a></span></p> + +<p>"Without doubt Frontenac was the most conspicuous figure which the +annals of the early colonization of Canada affords. He was the +descendant of several generations of distinguished men who were famous +as courtiers and soldiers." He was of Basque origin and proud of his +noble ancestry. He was born in 1620, and was distinguished by becoming +the god-child of the King, the royal sponsor bestowing his own name on +the unconscious babe, who was in after years to be a sturdy defender of +France's dominions over the ocean. He became a soldier at the age of +fifteen, and even in early youth and manhood saw active service and gave +promise of gallantry and bravery.</p> + +<p>In October, 1648, he married the lovely young Anne de la Grange-Trianon, +a "maiden of imperious temper, lively wit and marvellous grace." She was +a beauty of the court and chosen friend of Mademoiselle de Montpensier, +the granddaughter of King Henry the Fourth. A celebrated painting of the +<i>Comtesse de Frontenac</i>,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_44" id="Page_44">[Pg 44]</a></span> in the character of Minerva, smiles on the +walls of one of the galleries at Versailles.</p> + +<p>The marriage took place without the consent of the bride's relatives, +and soon proved an ill-starred one, the young wife's fickle affection +turning into a strong repulsion for her husband, whom she intrigued to +have sent out of the country.</p> + +<p>Her influence at court, and some jealousy on the part of the King +combined to bring about this end, and Frontenac was appointed Governor +and Lieutenant-General of <i>La Nouvelle France</i>.</p> + +<p>Parkman says:—"A man of courts and camps, born and bred in the focus of +a most gorgeous civilization, he was banished to the ends of the earth, +among savage hordes and half-reclaimed forests, to exchange the +splendour of St. Germain and the dawning glories of Versailles for a +stern, grey rock, haunted by sombre priests, rugged merchants, traders, +blanketed Indians and wild bushrangers." When he sailed up the river and +the stern grandeur of the scene opened up before him, he felt as he +afterwards wrote:—<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_45" id="Page_45">[Pg 45]</a></span></p> + +<p>"I never saw anything more superb than the position of this town. It +could not be better situated for the future capital of an empire."</p> + +<p>But the dainty and luxurious <i>Comtesse</i> had no taste for pioneer life, +and no thought of leaving her silken-draped <i>boudoir</i> for a home in a +rude fort on a rock; she therefore accepted the offer of a domicile with +her kindred spirit, Mademoiselle d'Outrelaise. The "<i>Divines</i>," as they +were called, established a <i>Salon</i>, which, among the many similar +coteries of the time, was remarkable for its wit and gaiety. It set the +fashion to French society, and was affected by all the leading spirits +of the Court and Capital.</p> + +<p>Although an occasional <i>billet</i> came from the recreant spouse to her +husband in the Castle St. Louis, no home life nor welcoming domestic +fireside threw a charm over his exile. The glamour with which affection +can glorify even the rudest surroundings was denied him in his long life +of seventy-six years.</p> + +<p>To avoid the confusion to which the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_46" id="Page_46">[Pg 46]</a></span> terms Fort St. Louis and Castle St. +Louis might lead, it must be understood that they in a measure were the +same, as the one enclosed the other.</p> + +<p>In the year 1834, two hundred and fourteen years after the foundation of +this Château, a banquet was prepared for the reception of those invited +to partake of the official hospitality of the Governor; when suddenly +the tocsin sounded,—the dreaded alarm of fire. Soon the streets were +thronged with citizens, with anxious enquiries passing from lip to lip, +and ere long the cry was uttered: "To the Castle, to the Castle!"</p> + +<p>The entire population of merchants and artisans, soldiers from the +garrison, priests from the monasteries, and citizens, rich and poor, +joined hands with the firemen to save the mediæval fortress from +destruction, and its treasured contents from the flames. Old silver was +snatched from the banquet table by some who had expected to sit around +the board as guests.</p> + +<p>At the head of the principal staircase, where it had stood for fifty +years or more,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_47" id="Page_47">[Pg 47]</a></span> was a bust of Wolfe, with the inscription upon it:—</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">"Let no vain tear upon this bust be shed,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A common tribute to the common dead,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But let the good, the generous, the brave,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">With God-like envy sigh for such a grave."<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>Fortunately, in the confusion of the disaster it was not overlooked, but +was carried to a place of safety. While every heart present could not +but be moved with the deepest feelings of regret at the loss of its +hoary walls, yet the beholder was forced to admire the magnificent +spectacular effect of the conflagration which crowned the battlements +and reflected over crag and river, as the old fort, which had stubbornly +resisted all its enemies during five sieges, fell before the devouring +element.</p> + +<p>Its stones were permeated with the military and religious history of the +"old rock city," for, in the fifteen years of its occupancy by +Champlain, it was as much a mission as a fort. The historian says:—"A +stranger visiting the Fort of Quebec would have been astonished at its +air of conventual decorum. Black-robed Jesuits<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_48" id="Page_48">[Pg 48]</a></span> and scarfed officers +mingled at Champlain's table. There was little conversation, but in its +place histories and the lives of the saints were read aloud, as in a +monastic refectory. Prayers, masses and confessions followed each other, +and the bell of the adjacent chapel rang morning, noon and night. Quebec +became a shrine. Godless soldiers whipped themselves to penitence, women +of the world outdid each other in the fury of their contrition, and +Indians gathered thither for the gifts of kind words and the polite +blandishments bestowed upon them."</p> + +<p>The site where the old Château St. Louis once stood, with its halo of +romance and renown, is now partially covered by the great Quebec +hostelry, the Château Frontenac, which in its erection and appointments +has not destroyed, but rather perpetuated, the traditions of the +"Sentinel City of the St. Lawrence."</p> + +<p>"Château Frontenac has been planned with the strong sense of the fitness +of things, being a veritable old-time Château, whose curves and cupolas, +turrets and<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_49" id="Page_49">[Pg 49]</a></span> towers, even whose tones of gray stone and dulled brick +harmonize with the sober quaint architecture of our dear old Fortress +City, and looks like a small bit of Mediæval Europe perched upon a +rock."</p> + +<p>Under the promenade of Durham Terrace is still the cellar of the old +Château; and standing upon it, the patriot, whether English or French, +cannot but thrill as he looks on the same scene upon which the heroes of +the past so often gazed, and from which they flung defiance to their +foes.</p> + +<p>On almost the same spot upon which Champlain had landed at Montreal, and +about seven years after his death, a small band of consecrated men and +women, singing a hymn, drew up their tempest-worn pinnace, and raised +their standard in the name of King Louis, while Maisonneuve, the ascetic +knight, planted a crucifix, and dedicated the land to God.</p> + +<p>The city as it stands on this spot is a fulfilment of his vow then made, +when he declared, as he pitched his tent and lighted his camp-fire, that +here he would found a city though every tree on the island were<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_50" id="Page_50">[Pg 50]</a></span> an +Iroquois. On an altar of bark, decorated with wild flowers and lighted +by fireflies, the first mass was celebrated, and the birthnight of +Montreal registered.</p> + +<p>From the little seed thus planted in this rude altar, a mighty harvest +has arisen in cathedral, monastery, church and convent, representing +untold wealth and influence. The early French explorer, with a "sword in +his hand and a crucifix on his breast," was more desirous of +Christianizing than of conquering the native tribes. So completely has +this creed become identified with the country's character and history, +that the province of Quebec is emphatically a Catholic community. So +faithfully have its tenets been handed down by generations of devout +followers of this faith, that even the streets and squares bear the +names of saints and martyrs, such as St. Francis Xavier, St. Peter, St. +John, St. Joseph, St. Mary, and in fact the entire calendar is +represented, especially in the east end of the town. St. Paul, which was +probably the first street laid out, is called after the city's founder +himself,—Paul Chomedy de Maisonneuve.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_51" id="Page_51">[Pg 51]</a></span></p> +<h2>NOTRE-DAME-DE-LA-VICTOIRE.</h2> + + +<div class="drop"> +<img src="images/dropa.jpg" width="98" height="125" alt="A" class="cap" /> + +<p class="cap_2">A few rods to the west of the Château, through a vaulted archway leading +from the street, in the shadow of the peaceful convent buildings is a +little chapel called <i>Notre-Dame-de-la-Victoire</i>. The swallows +twittering under its broken eaves are now the only sign of life; and its +rotting timbers and threshold, forgotten by the world, give no +suggestion of the martial incident to which it owes its existence. While +the American Colonies were still English, the British Ensign floated +over Boston town, and good Queen Anne was prayed for in Puritan pulpits, +an expedition was fitted out under Sir Hovenden Walker to drive the +French out of Canada. In the previous year, 1710, the Legislature of New +York had taken steps to lay before the Queen the alarming progress of +Gallic domination in America, saying:—</p></div> + +<p>"It is well known that the French can<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_52" id="Page_52">[Pg 52]</a></span> go by water from Quebec to +Montreal; from thence they can do the like through the rivers and lakes, +at the risk of all your Majesty's plantations on this Continent, as far +as Carolina."</p> + +<p>In the command of Walker were several companies of regulars draughted +from the great Duke of Marlborough's Army. While he was leading it from +victory to victory for the glory of his King, his wife, the famous Sarah +Jennings, was making a conquest at home of the affections of the +simple-minded and susceptible Queen. It is remarkable that the coronet +of this ambitious woman should now rest on the brow of an American girl, +and that a daughter of New York should reign at Blenheim Castle. At that +period France possessed the two great valleys of North America, the +Mississippi and the St. Lawrence; to capture the latter was the aim of +the expedition.</p> + +<div class="figcenter" style="width: 650px;"> +<img src="images/p0067.jpg" width="650" height="454" alt="CHAPEL OF NOTRE-DAME-DE-LA-VICTOIRE." title="" /> +<span class="caption">CHAPEL OF NOTRE-DAME-DE-LA-VICTOIRE.<br /> +COPYRIGHT.</span> +</div><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_53" id="Page_53">[Pg 53]</a></span></p> + +<p>As the hostile fleet sailed up the St. Lawrence, a storm of great +severity burst upon the invaders. Eight of the transports were recked on +the reefs, and in the dawn of the midsummer morning the bodies of a +thousand red-coated soldiers were strewn on the sands of +<i>Isle-aux-Œufs</i>. It has been said that an old sea-dog, Jean Paradis, +refused to act as pilot, and in a fog allowed them to run straight on to +death; and also that among those who perished was one of the court +beauties who had eloped with Sir Hovenden.</p> + +<p>The disabled vessels retreated before the artillery of the elements, and +left Bourbon's Lilied Blue to wave for half a century longer over Fort +St. Louis. This bloodless victory for the French was attributed by them +to the intervention of the Virgin, in gratitude for which this chapel +was vowed and built, as was also another on the market place, Lower +Town, Quebec. The miraculous feature of the defeated invasion was +considered certain from the fact that a recluse in the convent near the +chapel, and who was remarkable for her piety, had embroidered a prayer +to the Virgin on the flag which the Baron de Longueuil had borne from +Montreal in command of a detachment of troops.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_54" id="Page_54">[Pg 54]</a></span></p> + +<p>Some of the original interior fittings of the chapel still exist, but +the bell which chimed its first call to vespers, when the great city was +a quiet, frontier hamlet, has long been silent. It is to be regretted +that from its historical character it has not been preserved from decay, +but looks as time-worn and mouldering as does the rusty cannon in the +hall of the Château, which was one of the guns of the ill-fated fleet, +and over which the river had flowed for almost two hundred years. Seven +of England's sovereigns had lived, reigned and died, and in France the +Royal house had fallen in the deluge of blood that flowed around the +guillotine. Quebec had changed flags—the Tri-color had been unfurled +over the <i>Hôtel-de-Ville</i> at Paris, and the Stars and Stripes over the +new-born nation.</p> + +<p>The thrones of Europe had tottered at the word of the Corsican boy,—he +had played with crowns as with golden baubles, and had gone from the +imperial purple to the mist-shrouded rocks of St. Helena. Eugenie, the +Beautiful, had ruled the world by her grace, and fled from the throne +of<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_55" id="Page_55">[Pg 55]</a></span> the haughty Louis to a loveless exile—while the old gun, with its +charge rusting in its mouth, lay in silence under the passing keels of a +million craft.</p> + +<div class="figcenter" style="width: 400px;"> +<img src="images/p0071.jpg" width="400" height="225" alt="" title="" /> +</div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_56" id="Page_56">[Pg 56]</a></span></p> +<h2>LE SÉMINAIRE.</h2> + + +<div class="drop"> +<img src="images/drops.jpg" width="88" height="125" alt="S" class="cap" /> + +<p class="cap_2">Still more ancient is a venerable postern in the blackened wall of the +Seminary of St. Sulpice, near by, which is now the oldest building in +the city, being erected some fifty years before the Château. It leads by +a narrow lane to the gardens of the Monastery, which bloom quiet and +still here in the heart of the throbbing life of a city of to-day. +Generations of saintly men, under vows, have trodden in the shade of its +walks, trying with the rigours of monastic life to crush out the +memories of love and home left behind among the sun-kissed vineyards of +France. For two hundred years and more no woman's footstep had fallen +here among the flowers, until recently the wife of a Governor-General +was admitted on a special occasion. On the cobble-stones of the +courtyard, pilgrims, penitents, priests and soldiers have trodden, the +echoes of their footsteps passing away in centuries of years. Above the +walls, blackened by time and pierced by windows with the small panes of +a fashion gone by, the bells of the clock ring out the stroke of +midnight over one-third of a million souls, as it did the hours of +morning when the great-great-grandfathers of the present generation ran +to school over the grass-grown pavements of young Ville-Marie.</p></div> + +<div class="figcenter" style="width: 650px;"> +<img src="images/p0073.jpg" width="650" height="405" alt="SEMINARY OF ST. SULPICE" title="" /> +<span class="caption">SEMINARY OF ST. SULPICE</span> +</div><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_57" id="Page_57">[Pg 57]</a></span></p> + +<p>"The inimitable old roof-curves still cover the walls, and the +Fleur-de-Lys still cap the pinnacles" as in the days when Richelieu, the +prince of prelates, sought to plant the feudalism and Christianity of +old France on the shores of the new. They still rise against the blue of +Canadian skies unmolested, while in France, in the early years of the +century, popular frenzy dragged this symbol of royalty from the spires +of the churches and convents of Paris.</p> + +<div class="figcenter" style="width: 286px;"> +<img src="images/p0075.jpg" width="286" height="300" alt="" title="" /> +</div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_58" id="Page_58">[Pg 58]</a></span></p> +<h2>CATHEDRALS AND CLOISTERS.</h2> + + +<div class="drop"> +<img src="images/dropt.jpg" width="98" height="125" alt="T" class="cap" /> + +<p class="cap_2">The Order of the Gentlemen of St. Sulpice is supposed to be very rich, +the amount of the immense revenues never being made public. They were +the feudal lords of the Island of Montreal in the earlier chapters of +its history. Through their zealous efforts and the generosity of their +parishioners was opened in the year eighteen hundred and twenty-nine the +grand church adjoining, that of <i>Notre Dame</i>, built on the site of the +original parish church. Viewing it from the extensive <i>plaza</i> in front, +its imposing proportions fill the beholder with the same awe as when +looking at some lofty mountain peak, but its symmetry is so exquisite +that its size cannot at first be appreciated.</p></div> + +<p>In imitation of its prototype, <i>Notre Dame de Paris</i>, twin towers rise +in stateliness to a height of two hundred and twenty-seven feet, and are +visible for a distance<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_59" id="Page_59">[Pg 59]</a></span> of thirty miles. The façade is impressive, the +style a modification of different schools adapted to carry out the +design intended. Three colossal statues of the Virgin, St. Joseph and +St. John the Baptist are placed over the arcades. The sublime structure +belongs to a branch of the Gothic, in the pointed arch type of +architecture which was brought home from the Crusades,—a style which +has come down from the time-honoured architecture of the old world, when +religious thought that now finds expression in books was written and +symbolized in stone.</p> + +<p>From a vestibule at the foot of the western tower, an ascent of two +hundred and seventy-nine steps offers a most enchanting view of +mountain, river, street and harbour, with such a wilderness of dome, +steeple and belfry, that the exclamation involuntarily arises—this is +truly a city of churches!</p> + +<p>On the descent, a pause on a platform gives the opportunity of admiring +"<i>Le Gros Bourdon</i>," or great bell, and one of the largest in the world. +It weighs twenty-four<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_60" id="Page_60">[Pg 60]</a></span> thousand, seven hundred and eighty pounds, and is +six feet high. Its mouth measures eight feet, seven inches in diameter. +The tone is magnificent in depth and fullness. On occasions such as the +death of high ecclesiastics or other solemn events, its tolling is +indescribable in its slow, sonorous vibrations. In the eastern tower +hang ten smaller bells of beautiful quality, and so harmonized that +choice and varied compositions can be performed by the eighteen ringers +required in their manipulation. On high festivals, when all ring out +with brazen tongues, caught up and re-echoed from spire to spire in what +Victor Hugo describes as:—"Mingling and blending in the air like a rich +embroidery of all sorts of melodious sounds"—America can furnish no +greater oratorio.</p> + +<p>Its interior, which is profusely embellished and enriched, the spacious, +two-storied galleries, in a twilight of mysterious gloom, and an altar +upon which so much wealth has been consecrated, combine to make it a +temple worthy of any time or race.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_61" id="Page_61">[Pg 61]</a></span></p> + +<p>"Whatever may be the external differences, we always find in the +Christian Cathedral, no matter how modified, the Roman Basilica. It +rises forever from the ground in harmony with the same laws. There are +invariably two naves intersecting each other in the form of a cross, the +upper end being rounded into a chancel or choir. There are always side +aisles for processions or for chapels, and a sort of lateral gallery +into which the principal nave opens by means of the spaces between the +columns.</p> + +<p>"The number of chapels, steeples, doors and spires may be modified +indefinitely, according to the century, the people and the art. Statues, +stained glass, rose-windows, arabesques, denticulations, capitals and +bas-reliefs are employed according as they are desired. Hence the +immense variety in the exterior of structures, within which there dwells +such unity and order."</p> + +<p>The nave here is two hundred and twenty feet long, almost eighty in +height, and one hundred and twenty in width, including the side aisles. +The walls, which<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_62" id="Page_62">[Pg 62]</a></span> are five feet thick, have fourteen side windows forty +feet high, which light softly the galleries and grand aisle. So +admirable is the arrangement, that fifteen thousand people can find +accommodation and hear perfectly in all parts of the building. On high +festivals, such as Christmas or Easter, when the great organ, said to be +the finest in America, under the fingers of a master, with full choir +and orchestra, rolls out the music of the masses, the senses are +enthralled by the magnificence of the harmony. The various altars and +mural decorations are beautiful with painting, gilding and carving. In +the subdued light, which filters through the stained windows, are found +many things of especial sanctity to the faithful. On a column rests an +exquisite little statuette of the Virgin, which was a gift from Pope +Pius the Ninth, the finely chased and wrought crucifix and the riband +attached to it having been worn around the neck of the High Pontiff +himself. Directly opposite to it is a statue of St. Peter, a copy of +that at Rome. Fifty days indulgence are granted to those who piously<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_63" id="Page_63">[Pg 63]</a></span> +kiss this image. Under one altar rest the bones of St. Felix, which were +taken from the Catacombs at Rome, and on another is a picture of the +Madonna, said to be a copy of one painted by St. Luke. On all the +shrines are candlesticks, votive offerings and many other articles of +great age, value and veneration.</p> + +<p>The main altar is exceedingly rich in artistic ornamentation, +representing in its design the religious history of the world, and is +the only one of the kind in existence. Although the foundation stones of +this great pile were laid seventy years ago, this grand anthem in stone +has not yet reached its "amen," many additions to it being yet in +contemplation.</p> + +<p>Like many others of earth masterpieces in architecture, it is at once +the monument to and the mausoleum of its builder, whose body, according +to his dying request, although a Protestant, lies in the vaults beneath +his greatest life-work.</p> + +<p>Through some halls and corridors back of the grand altar is the chapel +of "Our<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_64" id="Page_64">[Pg 64]</a></span> Lady of the Sacred Heart," which is one of the most beautiful +sanctuaries in the city, and remarkable for the harmony of its lines and +proportions. It is in the form of a cross, ninety feet in length, +eighty-five feet in the transept with an altitude of fifty-five feet. +The splendour of its ornamentation, carving, sculpture, elegant +galleries, panels in mosaic, original paintings by Canadian artists, and +a beautiful reproduction of Raphael's celebrated frieze of "The Dispute +of the Blessed Sacrament," unite to constitute this piece of +ecclesiastical architecture a <i>chef d'œuvre</i>.</p> + +<p>An iconoclast might marvel at the absorption in prayer of some of the +devotees, among accessories bewildering to eyes accustomed to the +plainer surroundings of other forms of ritual, but the worship of those +in attendance seems sincere and complete.</p> + +<p>Following the footsteps of Cartier to where, near the foot of Mount +Royal, he found the Indian village of Hochelaga, is now to be seen the +St. James' Cathedral,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_65" id="Page_65">[Pg 65]</a></span> which is a reduced copy of St. Peter's at Rome, +the great centre from which radiates the Catholicism of Christendom. It +is somewhat less than half the dimensions of its model, with certain +modifications necessary in the differences of climate. The work was +entrusted to M. Victor Bourgeau, who, to gain the information necessary +to carry out successfully a repetition of the great master, Michael +Angelo's conception, spent some time in the Eternal City studying the +various details. But the real architect, it may be said, who made the +plans and supervised and directed the building of the sacred monument, +was Rev. Father Michaud, of the St. Viateur Order. To raise the funds +necessary for the initial work, every member of the immense diocese was +taxed; and even now, after a lapse of thirty years, it is still +unfinished, so great has been the expense involved. The handsome façade +is elaborately columned in cut-stone, for which only blocks of the most +perfect kind were used.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_66" id="Page_66">[Pg 66]</a></span></p> + +<p>Like the colossal dome at Rome, this one towers above every other +structure in the city, with the height of the cross included, being +forty feet higher than the lofty towers of <i>Notre Dame</i>. It is seventy +feet in diameter, and two hundred and ten feet above the pavement. It is +after the work of Brunelleschi, whose exquisite art and genius flung the +airy grace of his incomparable domes against Florentine and Roman skies.</p> + +<p>There is none of the "dim, religious light" in the interior decoration +of white and gold, the subtle colouring of the symbolic frescoing and +the brilliance of the gold and brazen altar furnishing. At a service +celebrated especially for the Papal Zuaves, the picturesque red and grey +of their uniform, the priests in gorgeous canonicals of scarlet, stiff +with gold, the acolytes in white surplices and the venerable archbishop +in cardinal and purple, with a chorus from Handel ringing through the +vaulted roof, a full conception of the Papal form of worship can be +obtained; while a squaw in blanket and<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_67" id="Page_67">[Pg 67]</a></span> moccasins kneeling on the floor +beside a fluted pillar seems the living symbol of the heathendom the +early fathers came to convert.</p> + +<p>In Canada the Jesuits have always been prominent in its history, +signalizing themselves by extraordinary devotion and self-sacrifice, and +were among the earliest explorers of the Continent, the first sound of +civilization over many of the lakes and rivers being the chant of the +capuchined friar. Fathers Brebœuf and Lalemant, burnt by the Indians; +Garreau, butchered; Chabanel, drowned by an apostate Huron, and others +hideously tortured, testified with their blood to their devotion. From +the Atlantic to the prairies, from the bleak shores of the Hudson Bay to +the sunny beaches of Louisiana, they suffered, bled and died.</p> + +<p>It is said the Jesuits have a genius for selecting sites, and certainly +the situation of their especial church and adjoining colleges bears out +the statement. Like the other churches of this most Catholic city, it is +not complete, the towers having<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_68" id="Page_68">[Pg 68]</a></span> yet to be continued into spires. It is +much frequented for the fine music and admired for its beautiful +interior. It is in the Florentine Renaissance style, which is the one +usually favoured by this Order. The frescoes are unusually pleasing, +being in soft tones of monochrome, the work of eminent Roman artists, +and are reproductions of the modern German School of Biblical scenes and +from the history of the Jesuits. There are in addition some fine +paintings by the Gagliardi brothers at Rome and others.</p> + +<p>In the Eastern part of the city, commonly called the French quarter, so +purely French are the people, with temperaments as gay and volatile as +in <i>Le Beau Paris</i> itself, is a gem of architecture in the church of +"Our Lady of Lourdes." This chapel, reared as a visible expression of +the dogma of the Immaculate Conception, is of the Byzantine and +Renaissance type, a style frequently to be seen reflected from the +lagoons of Venice.</p> + +<p>"The choir and transepts terminate in a circular domed apsis, and a +large central<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_69" id="Page_69">[Pg 69]</a></span> dome rises at the intersection of the latter. The statue +over the altar, and which immediately strikes the eye, is symbolic of +the doctrine illustrated. The Virgin is represented in the attitude +usually shown in the Spanish School of Painters, with hands crossed upon +the breast, standing on a cloud with the words: 'A woman clothed with +the sun and the moon under her feet.'" A singularly beautiful light, +thrown down from an unseen source, casts a kind of heavenly radiance +around the figure with fine effect.</p> + +<p>"Some of the painting is exceedingly good. The decoration of the church, +in gold and colours, arabesque and fifteenth century ornament, is very +beautiful and harmonious. This building is interesting as being the only +one of the kind in America."</p> + +<p>By descending a narrow stairway, which winds beneath the floor, is found +a shrine fitted up in imitation of the grotto near Lourdes, in France, +in which it is said the Virgin appeared to a young<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_70" id="Page_70">[Pg 70]</a></span> girl, Bernadette +Souberous, at which time a miracle-working fountain is said to have +gushed out of the rock, and still continues its wonderful cures. A +goblet of the water stands on the altar, and is said to have powers of +healing. This underground shrine, lighted only by dim, coloured lamps, +gives a sensation of peculiar weirdness after the light and beauty of +the structure above.</p> + +<div class="figcenter" style="width: 391px;"> +<img src="images/p0088.jpg" width="391" height="500" alt="" title="" /> +</div> + +<p>Perhaps there is no church of French Canada of deeper interest than<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_71" id="Page_71">[Pg 71]</a></span> +"<i>Notre Dame de Bonsecours</i>." On its site stood the first place of +worship built, for which Maisonneuve himself assisted to cut and draw +the timbers, some of which are still in existence. The name +<i>Bonsecours</i>, signifying succour, was given on account of a narrow +escape of the infant colony from the Iroquois. The present building, +erected in 1771 on the old foundations, was, until a few years ago, +remarkable for its graceful tin roof and finely-pointed spire. The rear +having since been altered in a manner entirely out of keeping with the +original, which time had "painted that sober hue which makes the +antiquity of churches their greatest beauty," much of the charm which +made it unique has been destroyed. If it is true that it was an act of +piety on the part of a devoted priest, it is another proof that zeal at +times outruns correct taste.</p> + +<p>The statue of heroic size on the new portion of the edifice, with arms +uplifted as if in blessing, was the gift of a noble of Brittany. It was +brought over in the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_72" id="Page_72">[Pg 72]</a></span> Seventeenth Century, and for two hundred years has +been the patron saint of sailors, who ascribe to it miraculous powers. +Its ancient pews, the crutches on the walls, and pictures which are +among the first works of art brought to the country, suggest the varied +scenes which have taken place around the old sanctuary since its doors +were first opened for worship.</p> + +<p>The ascent of a hundred steps reveals the daintiest and most aerial of +chapels above the roof of the church. Tiny coloured windows, designed in +lilies and pierced hearts, a microscopic organ, brought from France, no +one knows when, and a few rows of seats are the furnishing. The altar, +instead of the usual appearance, is a miniature house. Its history is as +follows:—"One of the most remarkable events in the history of the +Church was the sudden disappearance of the house which had been +inhabited by the Holy Family at Nazareth in Galilee. This took place in +1291. As this sacred relic was about to be exposed to the danger of +being destroyed by the Saracen infidels,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_73" id="Page_73">[Pg 73]</a></span> it was miraculously raised +from its foundations and transported by angels to Dalmatia, where, early +in the morning, some peasants discovered on a small hill, a house +without foundations, half converted into a shrine, and with a steeple +like a chapel.</p> + +<p>The next day their venerable bishop informed them that Our Lady had +appeared to him and said that this house had been carried by angels from +Nazareth, and was the same in which she had lived; that the altar had +been erected by the apostles, and the statue sculptured in cedar wood +had been made by St. Luke. Three years afterwards it again disappeared, +its luminous journey being witnessed by some Italian shepherds.</p> + +<p>Its present position is about a mile from the Adriatic, at Loretto, just +as the angels placed it six hundred years ago. Millions of pilgrims +visit it from all parts of the world."</p> + +<p>For the aerial chapel of <i>Bonsecours</i>, a fac-simile has been obtained. +To render it more sacred it was placed for a period<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_74" id="Page_74">[Pg 74]</a></span> within the holy +house, it touched its walls, and was blessed with holy water in the +vessel from which our Lord drank. Such is the alleged history of this +shrine, and the peculiar sanctity attached to it.</p> + +<p>The extensive convent buildings of the Grey Nuns and other sisterhoods +are as numerous as the churches. As the <i>matin</i> bell falls on the ear in +the early morning hours, calling to prayers those who have chosen the +austerities and serenities of convent life, it recalls to memory the +noble band of ladies of the old aristocracy who left châteaux hoary with +the traditions of a chivalrous ancestry, and dear with the memories of +home, in the company of rough seamen to brave the untried perils of the +ocean, a hostile country, homesickness and death, to carry spiritual and +bodily healing to the savages. Their followers keep the same vigils now +among the sins and sorrows of the bustling city. They glide through the +streets with downcast eyes, in sombre robes, wimple and linen coif, bent +on missions of church service and errands of mercy, tending the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_75" id="Page_75">[Pg 75]</a></span> sick +and suffering, and striving to win back human wrecks to a better life.</p> + +<p>The various sisterhoods differ in degrees of austerity, the Grey Nuns +being one of the least exacting. Their Foundling Hospital, it is said, +had its origin in a most touching circumstance. One of the original +members of the Order, Madame d'Youville, on leaving the convent gates in +the middle of winter, found frozen in the ice of a little stream that +then flowed near what is called Foundling street, an infant with a +poignard in its heart. Since then tens of thousands of these small +outcasts have found sanctuary and tender care within the cloister walls.</p> + +<p>The daughter of Ethan Allan, the founder of Vermont, died a member of +this Order.</p> + +<p>The Carmelites are the most rigid in their requirements of service. They +are small numerically and live behind high walls, and renounce forever +the sight of the outside world, never leaving their cloister, and being +practically dead to home and friends, sleeping, it is said, in their own +coffins.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_76" id="Page_76">[Pg 76]</a></span></p> + +<p>Instances have been known of a sister's assuming vows of special +severity, as in the case of Jean Le Ber, of the <i>Congregation de Notre +Dame</i>, a daughter of a merchant in the town, who voluntarily lived in +solitary confinement from the year 1695 to 1714—nineteen years of +self-immolation, when her couch was a pallet of straw, and her prayers +and fastings unceasing. She denied herself everything that to us would +make life desirable or even endurable—sacrificed the dearest ties of +kindred, and pursued with intense fervour the self-imposed rigours of +her vocation. Yet, it was not that in her nature she had no love for +beauty nor craving for pleasure, for in the sacristy of the Cathedral, +carefully preserved in a receptacle in which are kept the vestments of +the clergy, are robes ornamented by her needle that are simply marvels +of colour, design and exquisite finish. The modern robes, though +gorgeous in richly-piled velvet from the looms of Lyons, heavy with gold +work and embroidered with angels and figures so exquisitely wrought as +to look as if<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_77" id="Page_77">[Pg 77]</a></span> painted on ivory, yet do not compare with that done by +the fingers that were worn by asceticism within the walls of her cell. +In the spare form, clad in thread-bare garments, there must have been +crushed down a gorgeously artistic nature which found visible expression +in the beautifully adorned <i>chasubles</i> of the priests and altar cloths, +which are solid masses of delicate silken work on a ground of fine +silver threads, the colours and lustre of which seem unimpaired by time. +Six generations of priests have performed the sacrifice of the mass in +these marvellously beautiful robes, the incense from the swaying censors +of two hundred years have floated around them in waves of perfume. The +taste and skill with which high-born ladies of that time wrought +tapestries to hang on their castle walls were consecrated by her to +religion, in devoting to the Church, work which was fit to adorn the +royal drapings of a Zenobia.</p> + +<p>Without the magnificence which distinguishes the cathedrals, some of the +rural shrines are full of interest. The church<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_78" id="Page_78">[Pg 78]</a></span> of <i>Ste. Anne's</i>, an old +building near the western end of the island, and one of the oldest +sacerdotal edifices in America, has around it a halo of romance and +piety since the fur-trading days, being the last church visited by the +<i>voyageurs</i> and their last glimpse of civilization before facing the +dangers of the pathless wilderness of the West. At its altar these +rough, half-wild men knelt to pray and put themselves under the +protection of their titular <i>Sainte Anne</i>.</p> + +<p>The Trappists, though rarely seen outside the walls of their retreat, +look precisely as did mediæval monks of centuries ago, with whose +appearance we are familiar in pictures of Peter the Hermit and other +zealots, who with their fiery eloquence sent the Armies of Christendom +to fight for the Holy Sepulchre. They dress in a coarse brown gown and +cowl, with a girdle of rope, and are under vows of perpetual silence. +They live on frugal meals of vegetables and fruit twice a day, have the +head tonsured, and feet bare in sandals. The continued fasts, severe +flagellations, labours and meditations<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_79" id="Page_79">[Pg 79]</a></span> of those anchorites make the +regulations governing this order exceedingly strict, and recall the +times when kings and emperors, in the same monkish garb, walked barefoot +to knock humbly in penance at monastery gates.</p> + +<p>Perhaps the most unique shrine in the province is that of Mount Rigaud, +on the banks of the Ottawa, not far from the spot where Dollard and his +band of Christian knights lay down their lives. The mountain is regarded +with much superstition by the ignorant, on account of its peculiar and +unaccountable natural phenomena, whose origin has puzzled the most +learned scientists to account for. The wooded mountain is crowned by +what is called "The Field of Stones," or "The Devil's Garden," from a +deposit of almost spherical boulders, of so far unmeasured depth, which +cover its surface. Encircled by trees and verdure, this strange +formation of several acres in extent is composed mainly of rock +different from the mass of the mountain, which belongs to the same +family as the igneous mountains of the neighbouring region.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_80" id="Page_80">[Pg 80]</a></span> What were +the causes and conditions which carried this strange material to the top +of this elevation will, when they are explained, be of intense interest. +It is said that the only other deposit similar, though smaller in +extent, is in Switzerland. Perhaps some ancient glacier, through eons of +time, gradually melted here, and slowly deposited the drift it had borne +from regions far away.</p> + +<p>A bold spur of the hill has been converted into a shrine, adorned with +images, while on the bare rough sides of the lichen-covered rocks have +been inscribed in large white letters the words "Penitence—Penitence." +At regular intervals on the stony road approaching it are what are +called the "Stations of the Cross." They are fourteen in number, being +little chapels made from the uncut stones of the "Devil's Garden." The +floors of these, on which the penitents kneel before pictures of the +"Passion," are covered with sand and coarse gravel.</p> + +<p>The conquest of Canada in 1759 by the English differed from that of +Britain by the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_81" id="Page_81">[Pg 81]</a></span> Norman French in 1066, in that here the vanquished were +allowed to retain their language, customs and full religious liberties, +so that, after a lapse of one hundred and fifty years, the Papal service +is solemnized with all the pomp and ceremonial of the Vatican, and in +the courts, the Quebec Legislature and in Society is heard the euphonic +French speech, and, outside of Rome, Canada is considered the chief +bulwark of Papacy.</p> + +<div class="figcenter" style="width: 350px;"> +<img src="images/p0099.jpg" width="350" height="174" alt="" title="" /> +</div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_82" id="Page_82">[Pg 82]</a></span></p> +<h2>THE MASSACRE OF LACHINE.</h2> + + +<div class="drop"> +<img src="images/dropt.jpg" width="98" height="125" alt="T" class="cap" /> + +<p class="cap_2">The conquest and settlement of all new regions are necessarily more or +less written in blood, and the natural characteristics of the North +American Indian have caused much of the early history of Canada to be +traced in deeds of horror and agony lighted by the torture fire, with +sufferings the most exquisite of which the human mind can conceive. When +these were inflicted on individuals, it was sufficiently heartrending, +but when a whole community fell a victim to their ferocity, as was the +case in what is called "The Massacre of Lachine," the details are too +horrible for even the imagination to dwell upon. Standing on the river +bank, or "shooting" the rapids in the steamer, with the green shores as +far as the eye can reach dotted with villages and villas, the wonderful +bridges spanning the stream, and beyond, the great city with its domes +and spires, it can scarcely be realized that for two days<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_83" id="Page_83">[Pg 83]</a></span> and two +nights the spot was a scene of the most revolting carnage. It was an +evening in the summer of 1689. In spite of a storm of wind and rain +which broke over the young settlement, the fields of grain and meadows +looked cheerful and thrifty. In each cabin home the father had returned +from the day's toil in the harvest field and was sitting by the +fireside, where the kettle sang contentedly. The mother sat spinning or +knitting, and perhaps singing a lullaby, as she rocked the cradle, +little recking that ere the morning dawned the hamlet would lie in +ashes, and the tomahawk of the Indian be buried in her babies' hearts; +but such was the case, for after forty-eight hours of fiendish cruelty, +death and desolation reigned for miles along the shores. Where the blue +smoke had curled up among the trees were only the smoking ruins of +hearths and homes, surrounded with sights and suggestions of different +forms of death, which even the chronicler, two hundred years after, is +fain to pass by in shuddering silence.</p></div> + +<p>The crumbling remains of a fortified<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_84" id="Page_84">[Pg 84]</a></span> seigniorial château, within sight +of the Rapids of Lachine, a tradition asserts, was in the year 1668 the +home of La Salle, who was one of the most excellent men of his day. +Leaving his fair demesne, which the Sulpicians had conferred upon him, +and the home which to-day is slowly falling to decay among the +apple-orchards along the river side, he too followed his thirst for +adventure into untrodden fields.</p> + +<p>There is a well-founded legend that the old chimney attached thereto was +built by Champlain in his trading post of logs. It is of solid masonry, +and is sixty years older than the walls which surround it. The wide +fireplace has a surface of fifty square feet, and is the most +interesting piece of architecture in all Canada. The snowflakes of +almost three hundred winters have fallen into its cavernous depths since +these stones and mortar were laid. When Champlain stood by its hearth, +as its first blaze, lighted by tinder and flint, roared up to the +sky—William Shakespeare was still writing his sublime lines, Queen +Elizabeth had lain but twelve years in her marble tomb, and the Château +de Ramezay was not to be built for a hundred years to come. Often in the +two years during which it had for La Salle the sacredness of the home +fireside, its light must have fallen on his handsome young face, and +flowing curls, as he laid out plans for his palisaded village, and +dreamt of the golden lands towards the setting sun. He was a true +patriot, and literally gave his life for the advancement of his country, +being murdered in the Lower Mississippi by one of his own men while +endeavouring to extend its territory.</p> + +<div class="figcenter" style="width: 650px;"> +<img src="images/p0103.jpg" width="650" height="443" alt="HOME OF LA SALLE." title="" /> +<span class="caption">HOME OF LA SALLE.<br /> + +COPYRIGHT.</span> +</div><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_85" id="Page_85">[Pg 85]</a></span></p> + +<p>Posterity is not true to the memory of these great pioneers, for the +elements beat upon the roofless timbers, the north wind sweeps the +hearth that is mouldering under the rains and sunshine of the skies they +loved. In another generation all that can be said will be—here once +stood the historic stones of the ancient fireside of the heroes who won +the wilderness for those who have allowed this monument of their +fortitude and self-sacrifice to crumble into dust.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_86" id="Page_86">[Pg 86]</a></span></p> + +<div class="figcenter" style="width: 318px;"> +<img src="images/p0106.jpg" width="318" height="450" alt="La Salle" title="" /> +</div> + +<p>La Salle had heard from some stray bands of Seneca Indians, who had +visited his post at Lachine, of a great river that flowed from their +hunting grounds to the sea. Imagining it would open his way to find the +route to the golden Ind, he sold his grant at Lachine, and in company +with two priests from the Seminary at Montreal, and some Senecas as +guides, started on July 6th, 1669. With visions of finding for France a +clime of warmer suns and more rich in silver and gold than Canada, he +pushed on. The priests on their return<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_87" id="Page_87">[Pg 87]</a></span> brought back nothing of any +value except the first map procured of the upper lake region.</p> + +<p>One of the most enthusiastic fellow travelers of La Salle was a +Franciscan, Father Hennepin. They crossed the ocean from France +together, and probably beguiled many an hour of the long voyage in +relating their dreams of finding the treasures hidden in the land to +which the prow of the vessel pointed.</p> + +<p>Hennepin also penetrated to the Mississippi, reaching in his wanderings +a beautiful fall foaming between its green bluffs which he named St. +Anthony, on which spot now stands the "Flour City," Minneapolis, in the +county of Hennepin, Minnesota. He probably heard of the other falls, +five miles away, which we know as Minnehaha, and around which the +sweetest of American poets has woven the witchery of Indian legend in +the wooing of "Hiawatha." It seems almost incredible that where are now +the largest flour mills in the world, turning out daily about 40,000 +barrels, there was, scarcely fifty years ago, only<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_88" id="Page_88">[Pg 88]</a></span> the cedar strewn +wigwam and smoke of the camp fire, the tread of moccasined feet and the +dip of the paddles by the bark canoe.</p> + +<p>Near by <i>Place d'Armes</i> Square may be seen a grey stone house on which +is written "Here lived Sieur DuLuth." He was a leading spirit among the +young men of the town, who gathered around his fireside to listen to his +thrilling tales of adventure, and of his early life when he was a +<i>gendarme</i> in the King's Guard. Coming to Canada in the year 1668, he +explored among the Sioux tribes of the Western plains. He was one of the +first Frenchmen to approach the sources of the Mississippi. The city of +Duluth in Minnesota received its name from him. A tablet on a modern +building in the same locality informs the passer-by that <i>Cadillac</i>, who +founded the City of Detroit about the same time as the Château de +Ramezay was built, spent the last years of his wandering life on this +spot.</p> + +<p>The town of Varennes, down the river, is called from the owner of a +Seigniory in<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_89" id="Page_89">[Pg 89]</a></span> the forest, le Chevalier Gauthier de la Vérandrye, a +soldier and a trader, who was the first to explore the great Canadian +North-West, and to discover the "Rockies." He was an undaunted and +fearless traveler, establishing post after post, as far as the wild +banks of the Saskatchewan and even further north, which, in giving to +France, he ultimately gave to Canada.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">"Honour to those who fought the trees,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And won the land for us."<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>The traditions connected with the Château de Ramezay are scarcely more +interesting than those surrounding many spots in the vicinity. +Incorporated in this prosaic, business part of the city are many an old +gable or window, which were once part of some mediæval chapel or home of +these early times. On the other side of Notre Dame street, where now +stands the classic and beautiful pile called the City Hall, were to be +seen in those days the church and "<i>Habitation</i>," as it was called, of +the Jesuit Fathers, within whose walls lived many learned sons of +Loyola, Charlevoix among others. They were burnt down in 1803,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_90" id="Page_90">[Pg 90]</a></span> at the +same time as the Château de Vaudreuil was destroyed, by one of the +disastrous fires which have so frequently swept the cities of Montreal +and Quebec, and in which many quaint historical structures disappeared. +About a mile to the west is still standing the family residence of +Daniel Hyacinthe, Marie Liénard de Beaujeu, the hero of the Monongahela, +at which battle George Washington was an officer.</p> + +<div class="figcenter" style="width: 295px;"> +<img src="images/p0110.jpg" width="295" height="450" alt="De Beaujeu" title="" /> +</div> + +<p>It was a lamentable event, the indiscriminate slaughter of three +thousand men through the stupidity and incredible obstancy<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_91" id="Page_91">[Pg 91]</a></span> of General +Braddock, who, like Dieskau at a subsequent time, despising the counsel +of those familiar with Indian methods of warfare, determinedly followed +his own plans.</p> + +<p>Washington in this engagement held the rank of Adjutant-General of +Virginia. "His business was to inform the French that they were building +forts on English soil, and that they would do well to depart peaceably."</p> + +<p>Beaujeu was sent at the head of a force composed of French soldiers and +Indian allies to answer the Briton with the powerful argument of force +of arms.</p> + +<p>As Braddock reached the ford over the river which was to put him on the +same side as the fort, Colonel Thomas Gage crossed in advance, without +opposition. Beaujeu had intended to contest the passage, but his Indians +being refractory, his march was delayed. Gage with the advance was +pushing on when his engineer saw a man, apparently an officer, wave his +cap to his followers, who were unseen in the woods. From every vantage +ground of knoll and bole, and on three sides of the column, the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_92" id="Page_92">[Pg 92]</a></span> +concealed muskets were levelled upon the English, who returned the fire. +As Beaujeu fell, Dumas, who succeeded him, thought that the steady front +of the red-skins was going to carry the day, until he saw his Canadians +fly, followed by the Indians, after Gage had wheeled his cannon on the +woods. A little time, however, changed all this. The Indians rallied and +poured their bullets into the massed and very soon confused British +troops. Braddock, when he spurred forward, found everybody demoralized +except the Virginians, who were firing from the tree trunks, as the +enemy did. The British General was shocked at such an unmilitary habit, +and ordered them back into line. No one under such orders could find +cover, and every puff from a concealed Indian was followed by a +soldier's fall. No exertion of Braddock, nor of Washington, nor of +anyone prevailed. The General had four horses shot under him and +Washington had two. Still the hillsides and the depths of the wood were +spotted by puffs of smoke, and the slaughter-pen was in a<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_93" id="Page_93">[Pg 93]</a></span> +turmoil—scarce one Englishman in three escaped bullets. The commander +then gave the sign to retreat, and was endeavouring to restore order +when a ball struck him from his horse. The British Army had become +bewildered fugitives, and a guard could hardly be kept for the wounded +General, as he was borne along on a horse as a litter.</p> + +<p>The sinking Braddock at last died and was buried in the road, that the +tramp of the surging mass of men might obliterate his grave. His remains +are said to have been discovered in 1823 by some workmen engaged in +constructing the National road, at a spot pointed out by an old man who +had been in the ranks in 1755. He claimed to have seen Braddock buried, +and to have fired the bullet that killed him. It was impossible to +identify the remains almost seventy years after their interment, but +with them were found bits of military trappings, so his tale may have +been correct. In the year 1841, near to the spot, was discovered a large +quantity of shot and shell left by the retreating army.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_94" id="Page_94">[Pg 94]</a></span></p> + +<p>Adjoining the grounds of the Château de Ramezay was the mansion of +General Ralph Burton, who fought close to Wolfe in the siege of Quebec, +to whom his dying words were spoken, and who carried out his last +command, which decided the day. As Wolfe lay half unconscious, the riot +of the battle growing dull on his failing senses, they were roused by +the cry, "They run!" He opened his glazed eyes and asked, "Who run?" and +the reply was, "The French!" With a supreme effort he turned to Burton, +and ordered him, saying, "Command Webb to march down to the St. Charles +and cut off the retreat at the bridge"; and then amid the crash and +carnage of war, he murmured, "Now I thank God, and die contented," and +instantly expired.</p> + +<div class="figcenter" style="width: 220px;"> +<img src="images/p0114.jpg" width="220" height="250" alt="" title="" /> +</div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_95" id="Page_95">[Pg 95]</a></span></p> +<h2>THE CHATEAU DE VAUDREUIL.</h2> + + +<div class="drop"> +<img src="images/dropa.jpg" width="98" height="125" alt="A" class="cap" /> + +<p class="cap_2">A short distance to the south-west is the spot on which stood the +Château and famous gardens of the Marquis de Vaudreuil, the last French +Governor of Canada. Imagination can forget the miles of docks and +warehouses, the electricity and commerce with which we are entering the +twentieth century, and fancy it sees again the old vice-regal palace, a +miniature in Canadian forests of the gay court at the Tuilleries, with +its bewitchment of lace, silk and velvet, powdered wigs and the +exaggerated politeness and exquisite bows of <i>la grande dame</i> and <i>le +chevalier</i> of the time.</p></div> + +<p>Let us step back to the winter of 1758 and '59. The mountain is +snow-capped and the St. Lawrence is frozen several feet thick, making +good roads for the shaggy Canadian pony and <i>cariole</i>, or heavy +<i>traineau</i> with wooden runners. In the early winter's evening, lights +gleam through<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_96" id="Page_96">[Pg 96]</a></span> the small windows of the earthen citadel which guards the +<i>Porte St. Martin</i>, and the clash of arms or halberds, and the pacing of +the sentries' footsteps, are heard at every closed gate of the little +walled town. Patches of warm light from candle and hearth checker the +snow which lies glistening on the sidewalks, for there are no street +lamps on the St. Paul, St. Mary or Notre Dame streets of these old days.</p> + +<p>Under the night sky, the storehouses look like gloomy prisons, but +cheerful groups talk and laugh, as the beaux and belles bend their steps +along the narrow streets to the Governor's salon. As the guests of the +Marquis de Vaudreuil assemble, the brilliance of their costumes is +heightened in effect by the gorgeous livery of the attendants and the +blue and white of the soldiers' regimentals. Groups around the +spindle-legged card tables exchange <i>bon-mots</i> and play, while others +dance and promenade on the polished floors until the morning light +breaks over the river.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_97" id="Page_97">[Pg 97]</a></span></p> + +<div class="figcenter" style="width: 500px;"> +<img src="images/p0117.jpg" width="500" height="353" alt="" title="" /> +</div> + +<p>The gaiety and frivolity, feasting and gossip are in strange contrast to +the grey gown of the Jesuit priest hurrying from the monastery opposite, +to shrive some sinner, or to administer "Extreme Unction" to some dying +saint. Within the convent walls pious sisters, followers of Mademoiselle +Mance and Madame d'Youville, tend the sick and unfortunate, whom the +tide of life has cast upon this far away shore. From the taverns on the +corners and on the river front comes<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_98" id="Page_98">[Pg 98]</a></span> the sound of mirth and merriment, +as with the cup of good Gascon wine are passed around tales of the high +seas or of times gone by in the old-world towns of Brittany.</p> + +<p>On the altars of the chapels lights burn dimly in a silence unbroken, +save by the murmuring of prayers and telling of beads by suppliants +driven hither by sin, sorrow or homesickness.</p> + +<div class="figcenter" style="width: 401px;"> +<img src="images/p0119.jpg" width="401" height="650" alt="RUE ST. AMABLE." title="" /> +<span class="caption">RUE ST. AMABLE.<br /> + +COPYRIGHT.</span> +</div><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_99" id="Page_99">[Pg 99]</a></span></p> + +<p>A narrow little street, named St. Amable, running west from the +Governor's mansion, has been subjected to so little change since those +days of long ago that the passer-by on its two feet of sidewalk sees it +just as it was when its vaulted warehouses held the cargoes of the +weather-beaten sailing craft that anchored at the shore below. Where now +the French <i>habitant</i> sits chattering with his <i>confrères</i> and smoking +his pipe filled with home-grown <i>tabac</i> were once the shady walks and +stiff parterres of the ancient garden. Here, under the summer moons, +were doubtless stolen meetings as sweet, vows as insincere, and +intrigues as foolish as those in the exquisite bowers of <i>Le Petit +Trianon</i> at Versailles. On its paths have fallen the martial tread of +"de Lévis, de Beaujeu, and many a brave soldier and dainty courtier, +official guests at the Governor's Château." Among them was one who +eclipsed all others in sad interest, the courtly young commander, Louis +Joseph Saint Veran de Montcalm. Any spot associated with this ill-fated +general is of immortal memory. After his skillful manœuvering at the +battle of Carillon, his march to Montreal was a triumph. At the close of +this engagement, as, accompanied by de Lévis and his staff, he rode +along the ranks, thanking his troops, who idolized him, in the name of +their king, for their glorious display of French valour in a field where +thirty-six hundred men had for six hours withstood fifteen thousand, he +was in every particular a worthy and capable general. He spoke of his +own share in the glory of the day with simplicity and modesty, writing +the next day to Vaudreuil:<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_100" id="Page_100">[Pg 100]</a></span>—</p> + +<p>"The only credit I can claim as accruing to me is the glory of +commanding troops so valorous."</p> + +<p>On one occasion, the capture of Oswego, which is described as the most +brilliant military exploit then known in Canadian history, he with his +own hand snatched the colours from a British officer and sent the trophy +to Quebec, to adorn the walls of the Cathedral of that city; as many a +time before had been done for old-world Minsters by knights on the +battlefields of Europe, whose empty armour now hangs in the baronial +halls of England.</p> + +<p>Montcalm had been summoned to Montreal to confer with the Governor on +the further conduct of the war, and, as he marched forth to take command +of the Citadel of Quebec, all hearts centred on him, saying, "Save for +France her fair dominion in the West;" but the gallant soldier, in his +endeavour to do so, met his tragic and untimely end.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_101" id="Page_101">[Pg 101]</a></span></p> + +<div class="figcenter" style="width: 413px;"> +<img src="images/p0123.jpg" width="413" height="450" alt="Louis Joseph Marquis de Montcalm" title="" /> +</div> + +<p>Entrenched behind the ramparts of Quebec, he prepared for the great +struggle which was to decide the fortunes of the then two foremost +powers of Europe. He and de Lévis, although a considerable distance from +each other, had seventeen thousand men under their command, with a +splendid line of fortifications running from Montmorenci to the St. +Charles, supplementing the granite defences of the Citadel. Montcalm +being in doubt for some time at what point to look for attack from the +enemy, sent orders along the whole line for his troops to<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_102" id="Page_102">[Pg 102]</a></span> be in perfect +readiness everywhere. He was several years older than Wolfe, and was an +old campaigner, having served his king with honour and distinction in +Germany, Italy and Bohemia.</p> + +<div class="figcenter" style="width: 232px;"> +<img src="images/p0124.jpg" width="232" height="350" alt="" title="" /> +</div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_103" id="Page_103">[Pg 103]</a></span></p> +<h2>THE BATTLE OF THE PLAINS.</h2> + + +<div class="drop"> +<img src="images/dropi.jpg" width="43" height="125" alt="I" class="cap" /> + +<p class="cap_1">It was the evening of the 12th of Sept., 1759. The French troops were on +the alert,—the British ready. The evening was calm and fine and the +occasion full of solemnity as Wolfe embarked in a boat to visit some of +his posts. As the oars dipped softly in the stream, and the quiet dusk +of the autumn twilight hid the grim signs of war and brought out the +peaceful beauty of the scene, he thought of the morrow—that where</p></div> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">"Now fades the glimmering landscape on the sight,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And all the air a solemn stillness holds,"<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>would be rent by the roar of cannon, the flash of bloody steel and the +cries of the wounded and dying.</p> + +<p>Feeling perhaps a shrinking from the great crisis which the dawn would +bring, he repeated to the officers and midshipmen within hearing a +number of the verses from the most finished poem in the English +language, Grey's "Elegy in a<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_104" id="Page_104">[Pg 104]</a></span> Country Churchyard," and which had +appeared a short time before. Probably the lines on which he lingered +longest were:—</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">"The boast of heraldry, the pomp of power,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And all that beauty, all that wealth e'er gave,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Await alike the inevitable hour;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The paths of glory lead but to the grave."<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>The last line was, alas! prophetic in his own case, and he may have had +some premonition of it, for turning to his listeners, who were to share +with him victory or defeat, he said with a wistful pathos in his young +voice, "I would prefer being the author of that poem to the glory of +beating the French to-morrow."</p> + +<p>He did not dream that for what that morrow would bring, his name, with +that of the poet he loved, would be carven among those of England's +great men in Westminster Abbey—</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">"Where thro' the long-drawn aisle and fretted vault<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The pealing anthem swells the note of praise."<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>Landing in a ravine (Wolfe's Cove), which he had located by the use of a +glass—with the strategic venture at<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_105" id="Page_105">[Pg 105]</a></span> which all the world has since +wondered—in the dark hours of the same night, he, at the head of the +famous Fraser Highlanders, placed his force on the Plains of Abraham, +each man knowing it was victory or death, as there was no possibility of +retreat.</p> + +<p>The intelligence of the landing of the British troops was first brought +to the Governor-General, the Marquis de Vaudreuil, and he had the task +of communicating the unwelcome news to Montcalm, who had hurried from +his quarters on the ramparts to ascertain what was the meaning of the +firing above the town.</p> + +<p>On learning the situation, he bitterly exclaimed:—</p> + +<p>"They have at least got to the weak side of this miserable garrison, +and, therefore, we must endeavour to crush them by our numbers before 12 +o'clock."</p> + +<p>Montcalm, with more courage than discretion, without waiting for de +Lévis, who was twenty-eight miles away,—the victim of an inexorable +destiny, unsupported<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_106" id="Page_106">[Pg 106]</a></span> led forth his men, and saw, not without surprise, +the whole British Army ranged in battle array. Without giving his men +time to recover breath after the fatigue of their laborious and hurried +march, he went into action, trusting to the well-tested courage of his +troops.</p> + +<div class="figcenter" style="width: 335px;"> +<img src="images/p0128.jpg" width="335" height="450" alt="Jam: Wolfe" title="" /> +</div> + +<p>Wolfe led the charge at the head of the Louisburg Grenadiers, and when +the Highlanders, throwing away their muskets, rushed on with their broad +swords<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_107" id="Page_107">[Pg 107]</a></span> like a tempest of steel, the hapless blue coats, though lacking +in neither prowess nor patriotism, fled in all directions. The two young +leaders fell almost simultaneously.</p> + +<p>When Wolfe received his death wound, he was in a conspicuous spot near +the Redoubt, and was thence borne to the rear. He had calmly prepared +for this contingency. He had made his will, of which he appointed Sir +Guy Carleton the executor, and for whom he had early formed a close +friendship, generally speaking of him as "My friend Carleton," and to +whom he bequeathed his books and papers. His plate he willed to +Saunders, and to another friend he entrusted the miniature of his +betrothed with the charge of returning it to her in the event of his +fall. That was probably the most trying moment of those hours so fraught +with tragedy—a moment like those on the eve of Waterloo, when there +were</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">"Partings that crush the life from out young hearts."<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>It was not in his martial cloak nor in<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_108" id="Page_108">[Pg 108]</a></span> his country's flag that he was +carried dead off the field, but in the tartan "plaidie" of an old +Highland man, named McLeod, which was tenderly wrapped around him, wet +with tears from eyes to which tears had long been strangers.</p> + +<p>As he fell, his principal care was for the effect it would have upon his +troops, who, down to the humblest in his command, had caught his spirit, +and who felt that "they must fulfil the trust reposed in them, or die in +the ranks."</p> + +<p>Leaning against the shoulder of the officer who caught him when falling, +he implored him to support him, saying, "Do not let my brave soldiers +see me drop, the day is ours, keep it!" A death attended with +circumstances more pathetic or incidents more picturesque the annals of +war do not record.</p> + +<p>"The capture of Quebec was an achievement of so formidable a character, +so distinguished by chivalrous enterprise, and so fraught with singular +adventure, that the interest attending it still remains undimmed and its +glorious recollections unfaded."<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_109" id="Page_109">[Pg 109]</a></span></p> + +<p>The virtues and heroism of the youthful leader of the campaign and the +bravery of his troops, whose toast was "The British flag on every fort, +post and garrison in America," are themes of just pride to the lover of +his country. "Young in years but mature in experience, Wolfe possessed +all the liberal virtues in addition to an enthusiastic knowledge of the +military art with a sublimity of genius, always the distinguishing mark +of minds above the ordinary level of mankind. His celebrated letter to +Mr. Pitt is still considered unsurpassed in military composition."</p> + +<p>As Montcalm was carried off the field he enquired if his wound was +mortal; on being answered in the affirmative, with a mental anguish +keener than the intense physical pain he was suffering, he said, "So +much the better, I shall not live to see the surrender of Quebec." Few +scenes are more full of sadness than his march from his last +battle-field, as supported by two grenadiers, and passing through the +St. Louis Gate on his black charger, he courteously greeted the weeping +women<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_110" id="Page_110">[Pg 110]</a></span> who lined his path, telling them not to weep for him; but it +could not be but a day of tears for the daughters of Quebec as groans of +mortal agony came to their ears through the smoke and dust of retreat.</p> + +<p>A few hours afterward, on being visited by M. de Ramezay, who commanded +the garrison, with the title of Lieutenant <i>du Roy</i>, and another +officer, Montcalm addressed them saying, "Gentlemen, I commend to your +keeping the honour of France,—for myself, I shall pass the night with +God, and prepare myself for death."</p> + +<p>On M. de Ramezay's pressing to receive commands respecting the defence +of Quebec, he exclaimed with emotion:—"I will neither give orders nor +interfere further. I have business that must be attended to of greater +moment than your ruined garrison and this wretched country. My time is +very short, so pray leave me; I wish you all comfort, and to be happily +extricated from your present difficulties."</p> + +<p>Before expiring, he paid a noble tribute to his late foes, when he +said:<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_111" id="Page_111">[Pg 111]</a></span>—</p> + +<p>"Since it was my misfortune to be discomfited and mortally wounded, it +is a great consolation to me to be vanquished by so brave and generous +an enemy. If I could survive this wound, I would engage to beat three +times the number of such forces as I commanded this morning with a third +of such troops as were opposed to me."</p> + +<p>Almost his last conscious act was to write a letter praying the English +victors to show clemency to the French prisoners.</p> + +<p>It is said that a fissure ploughed by a cannon ball within the walls of +the Ursuline Convent furnished him a fitting soldier's grave.</p> + +<p>One of the sisterhood, an eye-witness of the event, described the burial +in the following touching and graphic words:—</p> + +<p>"At length it was September, with its lustrous skies and pleasant +harvest scenes. The city was destroyed, but it was not taken. Would not +the early autumn, so quickly followed by winter, force the enemy to +withdraw their fleet? For several days the troops which had been so +long<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_112" id="Page_112">[Pg 112]</a></span> idle were moving in various directions above and below Quebec, but +they were watched and every point guarded, but no one dreamed of the +daring project the intrepid Wolfe was meditating. The silence of the +night told no tale of the stealthy march of five thousand soldiers. The +echoes of the high cliff only brought to the listening boatmen the +necessary password. No rock of the shelving precipice gave way under the +cat-like tread of the Highlanders accustomed to the crags of their +native hills, but the morning light glittered on serried rows of British +bayonets, and in an hour the battle of the Plains changed the destinies +of New France. The remnant of the French army, after turning many times +on their pursuers, completely disappeared. Their tents were still +standing on the Plains of Beauport, but their batteries were silent and +trenches empty—their guns still pointed, but were mute.</p> + +<p>"At nine o'clock in the evening a funeral <i>cortège</i> issuing from the +castle, wound its way through the dark and obstructed streets to the +little church of the Ursulines.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_113" id="Page_113">[Pg 113]</a></span> The measured foot steps of the military +escort kept time with the heavy tread of the bearers, as the officers of +the garrison followed the lifeless remains of their illustrious +commander-in-chief to their last resting place. No martial pomp was +displayed around that humble bier and rough wooden box, which were all +the ruined city could afford the body of her defender; but no burial +rite could be more solemn than that hurried evening service performed by +torchlight under the war-scarred roof of the Convent, as with tears and +sighs were chanted the words 'Libera me Domine.'"</p> + +<p>Some years ago an Englishman, Lord Aylmer, caused to be placed within +the convent enclosure a tablet with the words carved in marble:—</p> + +<p class="center">Honneur<br /> +à<br /> +Montcalm.<br /> +Le Destin en lui dérobant<br /> +La Victoire,<br /> +L'a récompensé par<br /> +Une Mort Glorieuse.<br /></p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_114" id="Page_114">[Pg 114]</a></span></p> + +<p>Or, Honor to Montcalm. Fate denied him victory, but rewarded him with a +glorious death. Byron expresses a similar sentiment when he said:—</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">"They never fail who die in a good cause."<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>On the spot where Wolfe fell has been raised a simple shaft on which is +written:—</p> + +<p class="center">"Here Wolfe died victorious,<br /> +Sept. 13th, 1759,<br /> +In the thirty-fourth year of his age."<br /></p> + +<p>The stone which formed his death couch is preserved in its original +position, but sunk beneath the ground to protect it from the ravages of +the relic hunter. The column is supported on a pedestal of rocks formed +of boulders from the scene of the battle, conspicuous among which may be +seen the actual rock upon which Wolfe was supported when he breathed his +last. The stones of the monument are strongly cemented together, +embedded in the solid foundation of rock, and will be as enduring as the +fame of him whose name it bears.</p> + +<p>The well near by, from which the water<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_115" id="Page_115">[Pg 115]</a></span> was brought to allay his thirst, +was filled up and obliterated some years ago, much to the regret of +those who venerated the immortal incident connected with it, and which +placed it among the historic shrines of the world.</p> + +<div class="figcenter" style="width: 300px;"> +<img src="images/p0137.jpg" width="300" height="450" alt="Chas Saunders" title="" /> +</div> + +<p>Associated with Wolfe, and a sharer in the glory of the capture of +Quebec, was Charles Saunders, commander of the squadron. By bombarding +the town, he kept the enemy in a state of constant and<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_116" id="Page_116">[Pg 116]</a></span> anxious alarm, +at the same time showing wonderful skill in cleverly protecting his +fleet from disaster; even when threatened by fire-ships sent to destroy +it, which were grappled by the British sailors and run aground.</p> + +<p>Among those who rendered signal service to Admiral Saunders when he +neared Quebec was the famous navigator, Captain Cook. He was the pilot +who conducted the boats to the attack at Montmorency on July 31st, 1759, +and managed the disembarkment at the Heights of Abraham.</p> + +<p>The great mariner, while engaged in his celebrated voyages of discovery, +was murdered by South Sea Islanders at Owhyhee on the 14th of Feby., +1779. He had been sent by the British Government to find if the +discovery of the North-West passage, which seemed impossible by the +Atlantic, were feasible by the Pacific Ocean; for which purpose he had +to round the southern part of the entire American Continent. He was on +the point of abandoning the project and returning home when he met<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_117" id="Page_117">[Pg 117]</a></span> his +terrible death, "leaving a name unsurpassed for gallantry by any +sea-faring man of his time."</p> + +<p>In the month of October Saunders' fleet dropped silently down the river. +On one of the ships was the embalmed body of James Wolfe, returning to +the land he had served so well, but where alas! he would never hear the +acclamations with which his fellow countrymen, from the palace to the +cabin, would lay the laurel wreath upon his tomb,—the paths of glory +had truly led but to the grave!</p> + +<p>Saunders on his return was appointed Lieutenant-General of Marine, and +on taking his seat as a member of the House of Commons received the +thanks of the Speaker. He became Knight Commander of the Bath, and on +his death was buried in Westminster Abbey near to the Monument of Wolfe.</p> + +<p>Of the regiments to whom England owes the Conquest of Canada, the Scotch +claim the greatest share of glory. "Hardy sons of mountain and heather, +they were in fact the flower of the army, the boldest<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_118" id="Page_118">[Pg 118]</a></span> in attack, the +fiercest at close quarters, the last to retreat at command, and always +the bravest of the brave in the forefront of England's battles."</p> + +<p>The kilted "laddies" from beyond the Grampians, in their "<i>braw</i>" plumed +bonnets, with their war-pipes lilting above the loudest din of war, have +met some of the fiercest onslaughts singing and stepping to the +blood-stirring strains of "Scots wha ha'e wi' Wallace bled."</p> + +<p>An eye-witness of their march out of Brussels on that beautiful June +morning in 1815, the dawn of Waterloo, says:</p> + +<p>"One could not but admire their fine appearance, their steady military +demeanour, with their pipes playing before them, and the beams of the +rising sun shining on their glittering arms." Many of the young officers +were in the silk stockings and dancing pumps which they wore the night +before to the Duchess of Richmond's ball, when they laughed:—</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">"On with the dance, let joy be unconfined,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">No sleep till morn when youth and beauty meet,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To chase the glowing hours with flying feet."<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_119" id="Page_119">[Pg 119]</a></span></div></div> + +<p>With swords waving, the pibroch screaming and the "stirring memories of +a thousand years," they rushed into the stupendous conflict leading the +"<i>Forty-twa</i>" into the field, which the setting of the same sun saw +drenched through with blood, but marked by deeds which covered with +glory many a thatched ingle-nook on highland hills and in lowland +valleys.</p> + +<p>After the Conquest of Canada, the Fraser Highlanders with the remains of +the 42nd were offered grants of land if they chose to remain as +settlers, a privilege which many of them accepted. Sixteen years +afterward, when a foreign invasion threatened Canada, they loyally left +the plough in the furrow and again sprang to arms, to protect their +altars and firesides.</p> + +<p>Among the blue Laurentian hills of the lower St. Lawrence, around their +simple hearths, their descendants live the placid life of the Canadian +<i>habitant</i>. They bear the old historic names of their Gaelic +forefathers,—Fraser, Cameron, Blackburn, MacDonald, etc.—but in +nothing else could<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_120" id="Page_120">[Pg 120]</a></span> it be thought that in their veins runs the blood of +those who fought at Colloden and Bannockburn. They are as purely French +in their religion, language and customs, as those whose sires sailed +from Breton and Norman ports.</p> + +<p>The Commandant of Quebec at the time of its fall was the son of Claude +de Ramezay, the builder of the Château of that name. After the +disastrous battle, Vaudreuil, Governor of Montreal, sent him urgent +charges to do his utmost to hold out until reinforcements, which were on +a forced march from Montreal and elsewhere, should arrive to his +succour; but, the besieged being in the greatest extreme of fright and +starvation, his force refused to fight. His conduct has been much +criticized, but one annalist asserts that he was "not the man to shrink +from danger or death had there been anything but foolhardiness in the +risk, as he belonged to the good old fighting stock of North +Britain,"—the race which produced a Wallace and a Bruce. He, however, +signed the articles of capitulation, as recommended<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_121" id="Page_121">[Pg 121]</a></span> by the Council of +War summoned, and the British marched in through the iron-spiked +gates,—when, had he held out only twenty-four hours longer, Canada +might have been saved for France, as the British could not for any +length of time have maintained their position on the Plains of Abraham. +Returning to France, where he was related to several families of the +Noblesse, who held that "war was the only worthy calling, and prized +honour more than life," he received so cool a reception at Court that +his proud spirit, being unable to brook the humiliation, he applied for +a passport allowing him to return to Canada, but subsequently he +abandoned the idea of returning to his native land. Had he carried out +his intention, he might have seen French, English and American flags +successively wave over the red roof of the Château of his boyhood.</p> + +<p>To complete the conquest, Montreal was attacked at three different +points by Generals Amherst, Murray and Haldimand. Arriving within a few +hours of each other, they camped outside of the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_122" id="Page_122">[Pg 122]</a></span> old walls of the town. +Vaudreuil and de Lévis tried to oppose them, but with Quebec lost, and +the only defences a rude citadel and weak walls built to resist Indian +attack and useless in civilized warfare, they were compelled to +surrender. A small stone cottage, until quite recently standing in a +private garden on the mountain side, was used as Amherst's headquarters, +and in which the articles of capitulation were signed between the +victorious and vanquished generals.</p> + +<p>Among those who entered the town with Amherst was Israel Putnam, a man +who had been brought into Montreal a year before a prisoner by the +French. He had great physical strength and decision of character, and +was absolutely incapable of fear. On the breaking out of the +Revolutionary War, he entered with zeal into the cause of the colonists, +and lead them in the battle of Bunker Hill. True to his convictions, he +refused the large sums of money offered him by the British for his +services. By the American troops he was lovingly called "Old Put."<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_123" id="Page_123">[Pg 123]</a></span> On +his tombstone was inscribed:—"He dared to lead where any dared to +follow."</p> + +<p>As the British entered the city by the old Recollet Monastery gate, the +French retired to <i>la Citadelle</i>, a strong wood block house at the other +end of the town. General Haldimand was the First Englishman to enter +within the walls, remains of which are still frequently dug up in +excavating. The oldest Ensign in Amherst's army received the French +colours, and it is said the keys of the city were given over by a woman, +but it is recorded with certainty that the fallen foes were treated with +the greatest consideration and respect, not even the Indian allies being +permitted to commit a single act of violence. "Amherst commanded the +principal division, including the 'Black Watch,' or gallant 42nd, which +has been renowned in military story wherever the British flag has been +borne to victory for more than a hundred and forty years." At Waterloo, +Corunna, Alma and Lucknow, in Afghan defiles and Egyptian deserts, they +were always in the thickest of the fight.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_124" id="Page_124">[Pg 124]</a></span></p> + +<p>It is said, Pitt, wanting a safe and sure officer to command them, chose +what he called a stubborn Colonel, who had shown his mettle in Germany, +and made him Major-General Amherst.</p> + +<div class="figcenter" style="width: 215px;"> +<img src="images/p0146.jpg" width="215" height="450" alt="" title="" /> +</div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_125" id="Page_125">[Pg 125]</a></span></p> +<h2>CANADA UNDER ENGLISH RULE.</h2> + + +<div class="drop"> +<img src="images/dropg.jpg" width="87" height="125" alt="G" class="cap" /> + +<p class="cap_2">General James Murray, the son of Lord Elibank, was appointed the first +British Governor of Canada. Previous to the fall of Montreal, de Lévis, +refusing to consider the cause of France lost on the St. Lawrence, +valiantly resolved on an attack on General Murray at Quebec. The news of +his advance was conveyed to Murray by a "half-frozen <i>cannonier</i>, whom +the British troops carried up Mountain Hill in a sailor's +hammock."—April 26th, 1760. Hearing of this unfortunate circumstance, +which gave up to the enemy his intention of taking him unawares, de +Lévis hurriedly led his men under the walls of the city, where Murray, +promptly coming out to meet him, the battle of "Ste. Foye" took place, +when the French this time saw their efforts crowned with success, the +British having to<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_126" id="Page_126">[Pg 126]</a></span> find a shelter within the walls of the old Citadel. +The French leader was too weak to operate a regular siege, so remained +camped on the battle-field, awaiting the reinforcements expected.</p></div> + +<div class="figcenter" style="width: 369px;"> +<img src="images/p0148.jpg" width="369" height="450" alt="De Lévis" title="" /> +</div> + +<p>One bright sunny morning it was heralded on all sides that a fleet had +been signalled, and the joy of the French troops knew no bounds; but, +alas! for them it was found out but too soon that<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_127" id="Page_127">[Pg 127]</a></span> the ships were under +England's flag. Instead of de Lévis receiving the assistance he +required, it came to the already victorious Briton. It but remained, +therefore, for him to retire in haste to Montreal, where, being soon +followed up by the enemy and surrounded on all sides, he had to submit +to the dictates of fate, as already stated.</p> + +<p>He affixed his name to the Articles of Capitulation, with, it is said, +the document placed against a tree at the head of St. Helen's Island.</p> + +<p>De Lévis, although blamed for his unsoldierlike act in the destruction +of his regimental colours, was, nevertheless, a fine specimen of the +long line of chivalrous nobles, whose names and deeds emblazon French +chronicles of field and foray since the days when Charlemagne wore his +iron crown. Deeply chagrined at the refusal of the British to allow the +garrison to march out with the honours of war, although high-spirited to +a fault, he humbled himself to pray in writing for the reversal of the +order. It may have<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_128" id="Page_128">[Pg 128]</a></span> been in the salon of the Château that the +representatives of the two knights stood face to face as suppliant and +arbiter. Their fathers may have crossed swords at Crécy, when the +Plantagenet Prince bore off the feathered crest which was to be the +insignia of all future first-born sons of English kings, or they may +have tilted with lance and pennon on the Field of the Cloth of Gold; but +here de Lévis, with his petition sternly denied, was forced to retire in +anger, filled with humiliation at the failure of his intercession.</p> + +<p>It may be imagined with what conflicting emotions he entered the +following words in his journal:—</p> + +<p>"The British sent a detachment to <i>Place d'Armes</i> with artillery, +whither our battalions marched one after another, to lay down their +arms, and the enemy took possession of the posts and watches of the +city." As they filed past the Château, which was on their line of march, +many a heavy heart beat beneath the blue coats, and when a few days<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_129" id="Page_129">[Pg 129]</a></span> +later they embarked with their chief for France, even valour need not +have been ashamed if tears dimmed the sight of the English colours +flying from their flag staffs, and the fair land fading from their sight +forever.</p> + +<p>The Château de Vaudreuil was then dismantled of its treasures of fine +china and specimens of the arts revived in what is known as the +<i>Renaissance</i>, when everything that was exquisite in painting, +sculpture, working in metals, and art in all its forms had received such +an impetus from the Italian artists whom Louis the Fourteenth gathered +around his court, as well as from the influence of Madame de Pompadour, +whose taste, unhappily, far exceeded her morals. It was purchased by +Chartier de Lotbinière, and it is pleasant to chronicle that a few years +ago his direct descendant, M. de Léry Macdonald, while visiting France, +had the honour of meeting la Comtesse de Clairemont-Tonnerre, the last +living representative of the De Vaudreuil family, who graciously +presented to him the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_130" id="Page_130">[Pg 130]</a></span> "<i>Croix St. Louis</i>," which had been bestowed upon +the first Vaudreuil who held an official position in Canada, which relic +is now to be seen in the Château de Ramezay.</p> + +<p>The old fortifications of Ville Marie were planned by a de Léry; he, and +the military engineer who traced out his campaigns with Bonaparte, and +whom he called the "<i>Immortel Général</i>," were members of this family, in +the possession of which are priceless old tapestries, which were gifts +from royalty as rewards of diplomatic or personal services.</p> + +<p>About a year after the evacuation of Quebec, Murray was sitting in the +chilliness of an October evening by the chimney meditating. As he gazed +at the glowing fire of maple logs, he may have fancied that he saw again +the face of his dead commander, and may have thought of that desperate +charge outside the gates—of the shouts of victory and cries of +defeat—where then the only sound to be heard was the wind rustling the +withered grass that had been dyed red in the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_131" id="Page_131">[Pg 131]</a></span> blood of so many gallant +young hearts. The soldier's face may have softened as he thought of the +old hearthstone among the heather hills, where tales of the Border and +the traditions of his clan had fired his young soul for the glory of +conquest.</p> + +<p>He was suddenly aroused from his dream by the announcement that two +warlike frigates were sailing below the cliffs. He hurried to the +bastion, which commanded the spot, to survey what might portend fresh +struggles and more bloodshed. But soon a standard was run up to the +masthead, unfolding to the breeze the flag of England. Immediately from +the ramparts, where so recently had proudly floated the flag of France, +an answering signal was shown, and, as the guns roared out a salute to +the British colours, it was also a farewell honour to the old <i>Régime</i>, +which has passed away forever from Canadian shores.</p> + +<p>Of Murray, the first British Governor of Canada, it has been said that, +in the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_132" id="Page_132">[Pg 132]</a></span> long roll of unblemished good service, in the record of his +honourable fidelity to his trust and duty, no passage of his life stands +out in brighter colours than this period, during which he turned a deaf +ear to intolerance and the spirit of persecution, and strove to show the +new subjects of the Crown how truly beneficent, just and good, with all +its errors, the rule of Great Britain had ever proved to be.</p> + +<p>With the Treaty of Paris in 1763 King George III. abolished the French +laws, substituting for them the English Code in the newly won Dominion; +later on, however, by the "Quebec Act," they were restored to the +Canadians.</p> + +<p>The members of the <i>Noblesse</i>, whose ties compelled their remaining in +Canada, sent to London to offer fealty to King George, and thus further +their personal interests.</p> + +<p>When the Chevalier de Léry and his wife, the beautiful Louise de +Brouages, one of the most lovely women of her day, were presented at the +Court of St. James, the young Sovereign was<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_133" id="Page_133">[Pg 133]</a></span> so struck with her beauty +that he gallantly exclaimed:—</p> + +<p>"If all Canadian ladies resemble her, we have indeed made a conquest."</p> + +<p>A French writer of the time says:—</p> + +<p>"How can we sufficiently deplore the loss of Canada, with all its +present value and with all its future hope—a possession of which all +the difficulties were already overcome, and of which the consequent +advantages were secure and within reach! That loss might have been +guarded against—yes, that land consecrated by the blood of a Montcalm, +a Jumonville, and so many brave Frenchmen who shared their dangers, and +were united with them in fate—that country honoured with the name of +New France—that country where we may yet trace her children enjoying +the manners and customs of their forefathers—that country might yet +have existed under its rightful princes, if the Cabinet of Versailles +had known the true position it held—had erected there a new throne and +had placed upon it a Prince of the Royal Family—it<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_134" id="Page_134">[Pg 134]</a></span> would have ruled +to-day over that vast region, and preserved the treasures vainly spent +in its defence."</p> + +<p>After the conquest the Château de Ramezay was saved from being a mere +fur-trading post by becoming the city residence of the Baron de +Longueuil, a Canadian feudal lord, the towers, embattlements and chapel +of whose castle were visible on the south side of the river. The founder +of this house, which to-day holds the only hereditary feudal barony of +Canada, was Charles LeMoyne, who came to Canada in 1642 with +Maisonneuve. This man was the son of an innkeeper at Dieppe (France), +who it is alleged was descended from a younger branch of the old Norman +family of LeMoyne, the head of the house being the Marquis de Longueuil.</p> + +<p>Fourteen years after his arrival in Canada, LeMoyne received the +Seigniory of Longueuil, he having in the meantime amassed a considerable +fortune in the fur trade.</p> + +<p>The eldest son, who was named after<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_135" id="Page_135">[Pg 135]</a></span> his father, was born in 1656, and +in recognition of his services at a siege of Quebec, and against the +Iroquois, he was made a Baron of France in 1700 by Louis 14th. The old +deed of nobility is to this day in an almost perfect condition.</p> + +<p>An original sketch of the Château de Longueuil, taken after a fire which +partially destroyed it in 1792, is still in possession of the family. +The Château, or in reality the Castle, was built by the first Baron in +1699, and for nearly a hundred years sheltered the family of LeMoyne.</p> + +<p>It stood partly on the ground now occupied by the front of the present +parish church of Longueuil, and partly across the highway, at a corner +of the Chambly road. The north-west tower was located as late as 1835, +but was covered with earth by the excavation for the new church. The +Château, comprising the chapel, was 210 by 170 feet, and was constructed +in the strongest possible manner of stones which were<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_136" id="Page_136">[Pg 136]</a></span> gathered by the +river bank. The building was two storeys in height all around, and was +flanked by four towers with conical tops. There were high gables over +the building, and in the centre a court. On the river-side front it was +loop-holed for defence, and it was here that the retainers came in time +of trouble. On the west side was the chapel, which was large and +extensive.</p> + +<p>After the fire it was never again occupied, and later on the stone work +went to help make the present roadway, as had been the fate of many an +Italian palace and temple of Greece. The family gave the land where the +present church stands, and they also built the first church, with vaults +below. This was done on condition that the family should all be buried +there, and so far this has been carried out. The barony was once very +extensive, taking in a territory of about one hundred and fifty square +miles, including St. Helen's Island, upon which may still be recognized +the ruins of the residence which stood on the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_137" id="Page_137">[Pg 137]</a></span> eastern side of it, Capt. +Grant and his wife, Madame de Baronne de Longueuil, having lived there +for some time.</p> + +<p>Fort Senneville, an interesting ruin, at the western end of Montreal +Island, and which was destroyed by Benedict Arnold at the invasion of +Canada, during the American Revolution, was erected by the Le Ber +family, which was closely allied to that of LeMoyne, and was enobled at +the same time as the latter. The fort was intended for a fortified +fur-trading post.</p> + +<p>In 1880 the seventh Baron claimed royal recognition from the English +Crown of his title to the old French Barony, which Queen Victoria was +graciously pleased to recognize. The de Longueuil family was always +generously treated by royalty, and on the Richelieu river are several +Seigniories which have been granted to members of it. On the same side +of the river St. Lawrence, but a considerable distance inland, is the +pretty town of Iberville. It is named after LeMoyne d'Iberville, a +member of this family, who, with his<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_138" id="Page_138">[Pg 138]</a></span> seven brothers, took their several +names from their seigniories, and were all distinguished for daring and +ambition in all the perilous adventures of New France in their day.</p> + +<div class="figcenter" style="width: 325px;"> +<img src="images/p0160.jpg" width="325" height="450" alt="Le Moyne D'Iberville" title="" /> +</div> + +<p>In the Indian village of Caughnawaga, situated near the Lachine Rapids, +is the half-ruined Curial House, if it may be so called, of the early +historian, the Jesuit Charlevoix. Like all French travellers<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_139" id="Page_139">[Pg 139]</a></span> of that +period, he had his visions of reaching the Pacific coast, which, +although never realized, yet he was a celebrated explorer and an +accurate and painstaking writer. His "<i>Histoire Générale de la Nouvelle +France</i>" is a valuable and authentic history of the period it covers, +and is looked upon as one of the most reliable authorities to-day.</p> + +<p>In this thrifty hamlet, clustering around the church, under whose +steeple worship the remnants of the once fierce and dreaded Iroquois, +are the last of their race. They are adroit in the use of the canoe, and +for many years have acted as pilots for the St. Lawrence steamers in the +perilous navigation of the Rapids. The squaws are skilful in the bead +work so dear to the savage heart, and form picturesque groups in +blankets and moccasins exposing their wares for sale in the railway +stations.</p> + +<p>About ten years after the British occupation, the Château de Ramezay +fell again into government hands, being selected as the official +residence. One of<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_140" id="Page_140">[Pg 140]</a></span> those who frequently crossed its threshold at this +period was General Thomas Gage, second in command under Sir Jeffrey +Amherst.</p> + +<p>He was the first British Governor of Montreal, and the last of +Massachusetts, and was remarkable for his doughty deeds during the +American Revolution. And then in these rooms, where so often had +sparkled French wit and wine, high-born English dames held sway, with +the grand manners and stately dances of Queen Charlotte's Drawing Rooms +at Windsor Castle. These doors were none too large for the extended +skirts and towering head-dresses, some of which had satin cushions large +enough to have had the family coat of arms painted on them, and yet had +room to spare. The ladies naturally followed the fashions set by the +Queen, who was exceedingly fond of display in dress, and had an oriental +love for gems. A description of one of her toilettes has come down to +us, which was almost barbaric in its profusion of ornaments. At the +first Drawing Room held after King George's recovery from a dangerous +illness, she "fairly glittered in a blaze of diamonds. Around her neck +was a double row of these gems, to which was suspended a medallion. +Across her shoulders were festooned three rows of costly pearls, and the +portrait of the King was hung upon the back of her skirt from five rows +of brilliants, producing a gorgeous effect. The tippet was of fine lace, +fastened with the letter G. in diamonds of immense size and value, and +in Her Majesty's hair was—'God save the King,' in letters formed of the +same costly gems."<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_141" id="Page_141">[Pg 141]</a></span></p> + +<div class="figcenter" style="width: 500px;"> +<img src="images/p0163.jpg" width="500" height="322" alt="THE MINUET—QUEEN OF SWORDS." title="" /> +<span class="caption">THE MINUET—QUEEN OF SWORDS.</span> +</div><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_142" id="Page_142">[Pg 142]</a></span></p> + +<p>Under her sovereignty the guttural Anglo-Saxon tongue was heard in the +homes and on the streets mingling with the mellifluent French, and the +liturgy of Westminster Abbey was solemnized side by side with the ritual +of St. Peter's in the hush of Sabbaths, after the din and clamour of war +had ceased, and quiet once more reigned in the grey old town.</p> + +<p>As memorials of those days of strife, carnage and conquest, some +Canadian<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_143" id="Page_143">[Pg 143]</a></span> names have taken root in British soil. Gen. James Murray chose +the name of Beauport for his country seat, and that of the Earls of +Amherst, among the hop gardens and rose hedges of Kent, bears the name +of Montreal, Amherst having been created Baron of Montreal.</p> + +<div class="figcenter" style="width: 281px;"> +<img src="images/p0165.jpg" width="281" height="300" alt="" title="" /> +</div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_144" id="Page_144">[Pg 144]</a></span></p> +<h2>AMERICAN INVASION.</h2> + + +<div class="drop"> +<img src="images/dropi.jpg" width="43" height="125" alt="I" class="cap" /> + +<p class="cap_1">In the year 1775, when the thirteen American Colonies had risen in arms +against the Motherland, it was to be expected that they would desire to +have the assistance of those north of the forty-ninth parallel. Being so +recently laid under British allegiance, it was supposed there would be +much sympathy for the young cause in the Canadian Colonies. But, whether +the treaty which had been made had been considered gracious in its +terms, or that the horrible memories of war had not had time to die +away, or from a combination of causes, the French-English provinces +refused to take up the Colonial grievances. To compel them to do this, +an expedition, consisting of Col. Ethan Allen and his "Green Mountain +Boys," was detached against Montreal. Arriving on the opposite bank of +the river, just below the town, with about one hundred and fifty men, he +crossed over from Longueuil and reached<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_145" id="Page_145">[Pg 145]</a></span> the eastern suburbs at about +ten o'clock p.m., when he proceeded to billet his men in private houses. +That was before the days of telephones, so it was some time before the +news reached the city and the gates were closed. The rash project of so +small a force attempting to beleaguer a walled town of fourteen thousand +inhabitants could have but one outcome, and it resulted in the capture +of Ethan Allen. He was brought in through the Quebec Gate, or <i>Porte St. +Martin</i>, sent to England and lodged in Pendennis Castle, where he could +hear the moan of the wide sea that separated him from the land he loved +and longed to fight for.</p></div> + +<p>But the expedition was not abandoned on account of this repulse, for +soon General Montgomery appeared. Rattray describes Montgomery as a +brave officer of generous and exemplary character. He was an Irishman, a +lieutenant in the 17th Foot, but resigned his commission in the year +1772, owing, it is said, to some grievance connected with promotion; +when he settled and married in the State of New York.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_146" id="Page_146">[Pg 146]</a></span> Crossing the +Canadian lines he captured Forts St. Jean and Chambly, the latter a +stone fortress on the site of a post built by Tracey's men, and thus he +became possessed of ammunition and other military stores of which he +stood in need. The French-Canadian <i>Noblesse</i> were the first to offer to +defend the country against the invader, but Sir Guy Carleton, +Commander-in-Chief of the forces, being without sufficient troops to +successfully resist attack at this point, determined to retire to Quebec +and make a resolute stand within its walls. He therefore dismissed to +their homes the Canadians under arms, spiked the cannon and burned the +<i>bateaux</i> he could not use. Three armed sloops were loaded with +provisions and baggage to be ready for emergency. He felt it was a point +of honour to remain at Montreal as long as possible, but it was of the +utmost importance to the cause that his person should not fall into the +hands of the enemy. He therefore remained until news arrived that the +Americans had landed on a small island in the river, a short distance +above the city, now called Nun's Island, and then hurried arrangements +were made for his departure. As he left the Château, passing out of the +main entrance and down the path that led to the river, he was followed +by groups of friends and citizens, whose sad countenances evinced their +forebodings of the future. The historian Bouchette, whose father was one +of those in attendance on the Commander, relates the incidents of the +perilous and momentous journey in the following words:—</p> + +<div class="figcenter" style="width: 650px;"> +<img src="images/p0169.jpg" width="650" height="394" alt="FORT CHAMBLY" title="" /> +<span class="caption">FORT CHAMBLY,<br /> + +Near Montreal, captured by the Continental Army, under Gen. Montgomery, +in 1775.</span> +</div><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_147" id="Page_147">[Pg 147]</a></span></p> + +<p>"It was through the intrepidity of a party of Canadian boatmen that the +Governor of the country was enabled, after escaping the most critical +perils, to reach the Capital of the Province, where his arrival is well +known to have prevented the capitulation of Quebec and the surrender of +the country. In reverting to the history of the Revolutionary contest, +no event will be found more strikingly illustrative of the extraordinary +chances of war than the perilous, though fortunate, adventure of the +Commander-in-Chief of the army in Canada, whose descent by water from +Montreal<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_148" id="Page_148">[Pg 148]</a></span> to Quebec was effected with safety in the very teeth of +danger. The shores of the St. Lawrence for upwards of fifty miles below +the city were possessed by the enemy, who had constructed armed rafts +and floating batteries at the junction of the Sorel with the St. +Lawrence, to cut off communication with the Capital. Upon the successful +issue of so hazardous an attempt depended the preservation of Canada, +and the taking of General Carleton, which appeared nearly certain, would +have rendered its fate inevitable; but the happy arrival of the Governor +at Quebec at so critical a juncture, and the well-advised and active +steps which he immediately adopted, secured to Britain a footing in that +beautiful portion of America which circumstances threatened to forever +deny her. A clandestine escape from the surrounding enemy was the only +alternative left, and an experienced officer, distinguished for his +intrepidity and courage, was immediately sent for to concert measures +for the General's precipitate departure. Captain Bouchette, the officer +selected for<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_149" id="Page_149">[Pg 149]</a></span> this purpose, then in command of an armed vessel in the +harbour, and who was styled the 'wild pigeon' on account of the celerity +of his movements, zealously assumed the responsible duty assigned him, +suggesting at the same time the absolute necessity of the General's +disguise in the costume of a Canadian peasant fisherman. This was deemed +prudent as increasing the chances of escape, if, as seemed probable, +they should fall in with the enemy, whose gun-boats, chiefly captures, +were cruising in various parts of the river.</p> + +<p>"It was a dark and damp night in November, a light skiff with muffled +paddles, manned by a few chosen men, provisioned with three biscuits +each, lay alongside the waiting vessel." Under cover of the night, the +disguised Governor embarked, attended by an orderly sergeant, and his +devoted Aide-de-Camp, Charles Terieu de la Pérade, Sieur de Lanaudière, +Seigneur de Ste. Anne, and a lineal descendant of de Ramezay. The skiff +silently pushed off, the Captain frequently communicating his orders in +a preconcerted<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_150" id="Page_150">[Pg 150]</a></span> manner by silently touching the shoulder or head of the +man next to him, who passed on the signal to the one nearest, and so on. +"Their perplexity increased as they approached the Berthier Islands, +from the knowledge that the enemy had taken up strong positions at this +point, especially in the islands which commanded the channel on the +south-west of Lake St. Peter, which compelled their adoption of the +other to the northward, although the alternative seemed equally fraught +with peril, as the American troops were encamped on the banks. The most +eminent danger they experienced was passing through the 'Narrows' at +Berthier, the shores of which were lined by American bivouacs, whose +blazing fires, reflecting far out on the surface of the waters, obliged +them to stoop, cease paddling and allow themselves to drift down with +the current, imitating the appearance of drifting timber frequently seen +in the St. Lawrence. So near did they approach, that the Sentinel's +exulting shout of 'All's well' occasionally broke<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_151" id="Page_151">[Pg 151]</a></span> upon the awful +stillness of the night. Their perilous situation was increased by the +constant barking of dogs that seemed to threaten them with discovery. It +evidently required the greatest prudence and good fortune to escape the +vigilance of an enemy thus stationed. The descent was, however, happily +made by impelling the skiff smoothly along the water, and paddling with +the hands for a distance of nine miles. After ascertaining that the +enemy had not yet occupied Three Rivers (a point half way to Quebec), +they repaired thither to recruit from their fatigue, when the whole +party narrowly escaped being made prisoners by a detachment of the +American Army which was then entering the town. Overcome by exhaustion, +the General leaned over a table in an inner room and fell asleep. The +clang of arms was presently heard in the outer passage, and soon +afterward American soldiers filled the adjoining apartment to that in +which the General himself was, but his disguise proved his preservation. +Captain Bouchette, with peculiar self-possession<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_152" id="Page_152">[Pg 152]</a></span> and affected +listlessness, walked up to the Governor, and with the greatest +familiarity beckoned him away, at the same time apprising him of the +threatened danger. Passing through the midst of the heedless guards, and +hastening to the beach, they moved oft precipitately in the skiff and +reached unmolested the foot of the Richelieu Rapids, where an armed brig +was fortunately found lying at anchor, which on their arrival +immediately set sail with a favouring breeze for Quebec.</p> + +<p>Arrived at the Citadel, they proceeded to the Château St. Louis, where +the important services just rendered the country were generously +acknowledged."</p> + +<div class="figcenter" style="width: 372px;"> +<img src="images/p0177.jpg" width="372" height="450" alt="Lanaudière" title="" /> +</div> + +<p>It is remarkable that the man who shared so largely in the risk involved +in this dramatic scene should have been a Frenchman, Carleton's +Aide-de-camp. Between him and his Chief a warm attachment continued to +exist until the end of their lives, an uninterrupted correspondence +being kept up between this noble soldier, Charles Terieu de Lanaudière +and Lord Dorchester, after the latter with the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_153" id="Page_153">[Pg 153]</a></span> title bestowed upon him +for his success on this occasion had retired from active service in the +colonies. De Lanaudière's career was a remarkable one. He began with the +rank of Lieutenant in the Régiment de la Sarre, and was wounded in the +battle of Ste. Foye. He was afterwards received with royal favour by +King George the Third, being present at the state dinner when His<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_154" id="Page_154">[Pg 154]</a></span> +Majesty with the dignity which he knew how to assume when the occasion +required, rang for the carriage of his sometime favourite, the +fastidious Beau Brummel, who had presumed on his august good nature by +undue familiarity.</p> + +<div class="figcenter" style="width: 400px;"> +<img src="images/p0178.jpg" width="400" height="340" alt="" title="" /> +</div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_155" id="Page_155">[Pg 155]</a></span></p> +<h2>THE CONTINENTAL ARMY IN CANADA.</h2> + + +<div class="drop"> +<img src="images/dropo.jpg" width="81" height="125" alt="O" class="cap" /> + +<p class="cap_2">On the Sunday following Sir Guy Carleton's departure from Montreal, as +the people were proceeding to church, they were thrown into a state of +great alarm by the tidings of the landing of Montgomery's force on the +Island of Montreal itself, at the spot where now the great Victoria +Bridge springs from the shore, this densely-packed manufacturing +district being then swamps and meadows. There was no hope of attempting +defence under the circumstances, so both French and English, represented +by an important committee of the foremost inhabitants of the town, +headed by Col. Pierre Guy, entered into terms with Montgomery respecting +persons and property. At nine o'clock in the morning, Nov. 13, 1775, the +American troops marched in through the same gate by which Amherst had +entered sixteen years before. Just inside the walls was the most +sumptuous<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_156" id="Page_156">[Pg 156]</a></span> private dwelling in the city, called the Château Fortier. Its +walls were hung with beautiful tapestries wrought in historical scenes, +and its rooms were elegantly furnished and elaborately wainscotted. This +old house still stands among the tall, business blocks, strong yet as a +fortress, with high tin roof and deep windows and doors. It is now used +as a tavern, but even this does not spoil the charm of its unique +exterior, which still remains unchanged since the winter of 1775, when +Montgomery and his officers held their mess here, and the descendants of +the Puritans changed the character of the French château, as Oliver +Cromwell and his "Roundheads," a century before, altered that of the +English palace of Whitehall.</p></div> + +<div class="figcenter" style="width: 650px;"> +<img src="images/p0181.jpg" width="650" height="523" alt="CHATEAU FORTIER." title="" /> +<span class="caption">CHATEAU FORTIER.<br /> + +Where Montgomery and his officers held their mess in the winter of 1775.<br /> + +COPYRIGHT.</span> +</div><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_157" id="Page_157">[Pg 157]</a></span></p> + +<p>Little or nothing is known of what happened in Montreal during the +autumn of 1775, when the Army of Congress held possession of the town. +There may, and doubtless were, some sympathizers in the city who +frequented the Château Fortier, but the loyalists avoided its vicinity +as much as policy permitted. The French and English ladies looked +askance at the American soldiers, and if a town, invested by an enemy, +indulged in any form of merriment, it is probable that no invitation was +ever addressed to General Montgomery or Brigadier-General Wooster. In +their rounds of the town it may have been that glimpses of home +gatherings in the firelight may have given to these men of war many a +twinge of homesickness for hearths across the border, where women who +had been clad in satin and brocade sat spinning homespun, and were +content to drink spring water from the hills, while the tea they had +loved to sip in their Colonial drawing-rooms was floating about the +Boston beaches. If the Boys in blue and buff encountered any of the +Montreal maidens in their walks by the river, or glanced at them as they +passed through the gates to wander in the maple woods around, the +English girls passed them haughtily with a cold disdain in their blue +eyes, and the French demoiselles flashed a fine scorn from the depths of +their dark orbs, which wounded as keenly as a thrust of steel.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_158" id="Page_158">[Pg 158]</a></span></p> + +<p>Events followed each other so rapidly across the line that Montgomery, +tired of inaction, resolved to carry out before the year ended his +cherished plan of making an assault on Quebec, and proceeded to join +Arnold's men, who, half-famished and in rags, had arrived outside that +city's walls.</p> + +<p>Arnold, who was born at Norwich, Connecticut, Jan. 14, 1741, was, it is +said, a very handsome man, but his character was a striking combination +of contradictory qualities, and his career marked by extremes. He was +the bearer of a letter from General Washington to the Canadians, in +which was written: "We have taken up arms in defence of our liberty, our +property, our wives and our children. The Grand American Congress has +sent an army into your province, not to plunder but to protect you. To +co-operate with this design I have detached Col. Arnold into your +country, with a part of the Army under my command. Come then, ye +generous citizens, range yourselves under the standard of general +liberty, against which<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_159" id="Page_159">[Pg 159]</a></span> all the force of artifice and tyranny will never +be able to prevail."</p> + +<p>Arnold with his two regiments, numbering together about eleven hundred +men, had left Boston in the month of September, with the fixed intention +of penetrating the unbroken wilderness which lay between the two cities. +On the twenty-second of the month he embarked with his troops on the +Kennebec River, in two hundred <i>batteaux</i>, and notwithstanding "all the +natural impediments, the ascent of the rapid streams, interrupted by +frequent <i>portages</i>, through thick woods and swamps, in spite of +accidents, the desertion of one-third of their number, difficulties and +privations so great as on one occasion to compel them to kill their dogs +for sustenance;" after thirty-two days of the perils of this wilderness +march they came in sight of the first settlement near Quebec.</p> + +<p>About a week later, when darkness had fallen along the river shores and +lights twinkled from the little dwellings of the lower town on the +opposite bank,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_160" id="Page_160">[Pg 160]</a></span> they embarked in canoes for a silent passage across, and +arrived early in the morning at Wolfe's Cove, where, sixteen years +before, a similar landing had been effected, with the same purpose in +view of assaulting the garrison in the seemingly impregnable fortress. +For weeks the blockade was maintained, the American troops being +established in every house near the walls, more especially in the +vicinity of the Intendant's Palace, which once had been gorgeous with +the prodigal luxury and magnificence for which this old Château had been +notorious. The roughly-shod New England soldiers tramped through the +rooms and up the noble staircases on which ladies of fashion had glided +when the infamous Intendant Bigot had disgraced his King and office by +his profligacies. These men, establishing themselves in the cupola, +found it an excellent vantage point to fire upon and annoy the sentries +on guard.</p> + +<p>On the 5th of December General Montgomery arrived with his troops from<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_161" id="Page_161">[Pg 161]</a></span> +Montreal and joined Arnold. "They sent a flag of truce to General +Carleton, who utterly disregarded it, declaring that he would not have +any communication with rebels unless they came to claim the King's +mercy."</p> + +<p>General Montgomery, realizing that it was impossible to carry on a +regular siege, with neither the engineers nor artillery requisite for +the purpose, determined upon a night attack. This intention became known +to the garrison, and the most careful precautions were taken against +surprise. For several days those on duty and in responsible positions +observed the strictest vigilance, even sleeping in their clothes, with +their arms within reach, to be ready for the slightest alarm. The report +reached the garrison that Montgomery had said that he would dine within +the walls on Christmas Day, and he certainly seemed to consider himself +sure of victory.</p> + +<p>Arnold's communications to Carleton has been treated with contempt, no +parley being entered into nor conditions considered.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_162" id="Page_162">[Pg 162]</a></span> Montgomery tried +various expedients to have his messages received, but without success, +until an old woman was found willing to carry them in. On her errand +becoming known, she was arrested, imprisoned for a few hours and then +drummed out of the city, thus receiving the most disgraceful dismissal +possible in military discipline. The two letters of which she was the +bearer were directed, one to Carleton and the other to the citizens.</p> + +<p>That to the Governor read:—</p> + +<p>"I am at the head of troops accustomed to success, confident of the +righteousness of the cause they are engaged in and inured to danger."</p> + +<p>To the people his words were:—</p> + +<p>"My friends and fellow subjects, 'tis with the utmost compunction I find +myself reduced to measures which may overwhelm you with distress. The +city in flames at this severe season, a general attack on your wretched +works, defended by a more wretched garrison, the confusion, carnage and +plunder which must<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_163" id="Page_163">[Pg 163]</a></span> be the consequence of such an attack, fill me with +horror! Let me entreat you to use your endeavours to procure my +peaceable admission. I have not the reproach to make my own conscience +that I have not warned you of your danger."</p> + +<p>Montgomery, waiting for a night of unusual darkness, during which he +hoped to place his ladders against the barriers unnoticed by the guards, +found the 31st of December suited to his purpose. On the last day of the +year, when in Boston, New York and other American towns, family +re-unions and festive gatherings were taking place, as far as the +disturbed state of the country permitted, in a blinding snow-storm, +poorly-clad, but resolute, these troops stood in line of battle, waiting +for the word of command through the dreary hours of that night, in which +every belfry in New England was chiming out the dawn of the New Year, +which was to be the greatest in the Republic's history—1776—the birth +year of the nation.</p> + +<p>At four o'clock in the morning two<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_164" id="Page_164">[Pg 164]</a></span> rockets glared redly to the sky, and +were immediately responded to by answering signals, which were observed +from the ramparts. The solitary sentinel on St. John's Bastion reported +an armed body of men approaching. It was a feint to distract attention +from the point where Montgomery was to make the attack.</p> + +<p>The tidings spread that the riflemen of New England were at the gates; +the peaceable denizens of the town were startled with the cry of "To +arms! To arms!" from officers hastening through the streets. The pickets +in the Recollet Convent hurriedly gathered—the church bells clanged out +the alarm for the troops to march at once to their posts, while drums +beat and muskets rattled.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">"Ah! then and there was hurrying to and fro,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And gathering tears and tremblings of distress,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And cheeks all pale—and whispering with white lips,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">'The foe! They come, they come!'"<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>Lights glimmered from the frost-covered casements as fearful mothers +tried to still the cries of their children, frightened<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_165" id="Page_165">[Pg 165]</a></span> with the unusual +clamour. Hands were rung and tearful farewells taken of those whose duty +called them out, with no certainty of return, for</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">"Who could guess if ever more should meet those mutual eyes?"<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>Arnold's men rushed at the barricades in Sault-au-Matelot st., with the +words "Victory or Death" stuck in their hats, while Montgomery +approached by a path known as "Près-de-Ville." It was extremely narrow, +and obstructed with blocks of ice and snow-drifts. It was in the +neighbourhood of where now are the wharves of the Allan Line Steamship +Co.</p> + +<p>In the narrowest part the Americans marched slowly and cautiously. They +passed the outer barrier without resistance and approached the inner, +commanded by Dambourges. All was apparently unwarned and silent, but it +was not deserted. Within was a masked battery of only a few +three-pounders, with a little band of Canadians, eight British Militia +and nine seamen to work the guns.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_166" id="Page_166">[Pg 166]</a></span> The force advanced to within thirty +yards, with Montgomery in front. Beside a gun, which pointed directly +down their path, Sergeant Hugh McQuarters stood ready, the match in his +hand lighted to send the deadly missile at the advancing column.</p> + +<p>A quick movement—a flash—a dull boom—and the fearless leader of the +assault fell dead, with twelve others, including his secretary and +aide-de-camp—Arnold, his lieutenant, being wounded, and thus ended the +fifth and last siege of Quebec.</p> + +<p>It was well for Quebec that her gates that night were not thrown open to +the sack of troops, among which was Aaron Burr, who had accompanied +Arnold's command. These two men were possessed of less moral character +than any who were connected with the Revolutionary struggle. Arnold was +a strange mixture of bravery and treachery, generosity and rapacity, +courage and petty spite. This arch-traitor subsequently offered to sell +West Point to the British<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_167" id="Page_167">[Pg 167]</a></span> for $30,000, then took service among his +country's foes, and returned to pillage and ravage his former comrades. +Aaron Burr, though descended from generations of clergymen, among whom +was the saintly and learned Jonathan Edwards, was guilty of murder, +treason, and every other vice by which a man could become notorious, his +whole career leaving dishonour, blasting, misery and death, like the +trail of a venomous serpent, behind him.</p> + +<p>Governor Carleton, being desirous of ascertaining the certainty of +Montgomery's fate, sent an aide-de-camp to enquire if any of the +American prisoners would identify the body. A field officer, who had +commanded in Arnold's Division, consented to perform the sad office. He +followed the aide-de-camp to the Près-de-Ville guard, and singled out +from among the other bodies his General's remains, by the side of which +lay his sword, at the same time pronouncing with the deepest emotion a +glowing eulogium of the worth and character of him who,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_168" id="Page_168">[Pg 168]</a></span> frozen stiff +and cold, had been found half buried in his winding-sheet—a Canadian +snow-drift. Deeply impressed by the scene and circumstances, Sir Guy +Carleton ordered that his late enemy be interred in the foreign soil +with the glory of martial, burial honours. In the Château Museum may be +seen a sword which was picked up in the morning after Montgomery's +repulse. It is in a good state of preservation, much care evidently +having since been bestowed upon it.</p> + +<div class="figcenter" style="width: 387px;"> +<img src="images/p0194.jpg" width="387" height="450" alt="SIR GUY CARLETON" title="" /> +</div><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_169" id="Page_169">[Pg 169]</a></span></p> + +<p>"Of these five sieges, in the years 1629, 1690, 1759, 1760 and 1775, +none were pushed with more spirit and apparent prospects of success than +this blockade of the city by the two armies sent by Congress in the +autumn of 1775, under the advice of the illustrious General George +Washington; and, had there been a governor less firm, less wise and less +conciliating than Sir Guy Carleton, the Star-Spangled Banner would now +be floating from Cape Diamond.</p> + +<p>Fort after fort, town after town, Ticonderoga, Crown Point, Saint John, +Chambly, Montreal, Sorel and Three Rivers, had hoisted the white emblem +of surrender, but there still streamed to the breeze the banner of St. +George on the Citadel. With the black flag of rebellion over the suburbs +and the American riflemen of undisputed courage and determination +thundering at the gates, never had a brave little garrison to contend +against greater odds, nor leader to accept a more unequal contest, no +help from Britain being possible."<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_170" id="Page_170">[Pg 170]</a></span></p> + +<p>"When news reached Congress that the assault on Quebec had failed; that +Montgomery had been left dead on the snowy heights, and Arnold had been +borne from the field; that cold, hunger and small-pox were wasting the +army, and that discipline was forgotten, the expedient was resorted to +of appointing commissioners to go to Montreal to confer with Arnold, and +arrange a plan for the rectification of Canadian affairs."</p> + +<p>They were received by General Arnold in the most polite manner, +conducted to the Château de Ramezay, the headquarters of the Continental +Army, where a "genteel" company of ladies and gentlemen had assembled to +welcome them, after which they supped with Arnold, probably in the +dining-room adjoining the <i>Sâlon</i>.</p> + +<p>In a vaulted cellar next to the subterranean kitchens and dungeons, +Benjamin Franklin set up his printing press, the first in the city, and +with it issued manifestoes to the people, to try and induce them to join +in rebellion, and send delegates to the Congress at Philadelphia.</p> + +<div class="figcenter" style="width: 650px;"> +<img src="images/p0197.jpg" width="650" height="412" alt="Vault in which Benjamin Franklin set up his printing press, 1775." title="" /> +<span class="caption">COPYRIGHT.<br /> + +Vault in which Benjamin Franklin set up his printing press, 1775.</span> +</div><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_171" id="Page_171">[Pg 171]</a></span></p> + +<p>The instructions given to Franklin and the other members of the +commission directed them to extend to the Canadians, "whom the Americans +regarded as brothers," the means of assuring their own independence. +They were also to demonstrate to the people of Canada the necessity of +adopting decisive and prompt measures for coming under the protection of +the American confederation.</p> + +<p>Through the doors of the Château then entered Chase, Carroll, of +Carrolltown (who was expected to have influence with the French people, +and especially with the clergy), and others great in the young American +Commonwealth's struggle for freedom. From the antiquated ovens, +doubtless the brown bread and baked beans of New England succeeded the +roast beef of Old England, and the <i>entrées</i>, <i>fricassées</i> and <i>pâtés</i> +of the French <i>cuisine</i>.</p> + +<p>In the gloom of this chamber Franklin no doubt uttered some of his wise +sayings, gems of philosophy, which in his "Poor Richard's Almanac" had +for<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_172" id="Page_172">[Pg 172]</a></span> years been familiar in every chimney corner of New England.</p> + +<div class="figcenter" style="width: 399px;"> +<img src="images/p0200.jpg" width="399" height="450" alt="Franklin" title="" /> +</div> + +<p>In the <i>Montreal Gazette</i>, which is still in circulation, the present +voluminous and influential journalism of the Metropolis of the Dominion +had here its origin in the setting up of this old hand printing-press, +similar to if not the same which is now preserved in the Patent<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_173" id="Page_173">[Pg 173]</a></span> Office +at Washington. For it Franklin sometimes made his own type and ink, +engraved the wood cuts, and even carried in a wheelbarrow through the +streets of Philadelphia the white paper required for the printing of his +paper, the <i>Pennsylvania Gazette</i>. It is now called the <i>Saturday +Evening Post</i>, and has about it a certain quaintness and originality +suggestive of the great mind which gave such an impetus to the American +and Canadian press of over a century ago.</p> + +<p>"For nearly one hundred and seventy years there has been hardly a week, +except only when a British army held Philadelphia, when this paper has +not been sent to press regularly."</p> + +<p>His identification with the history of letters in the United States and +Canada was an epoch in the development of both. In the great army of +newsboys in America Franklin was the first; he was also the first editor +of a monthly magazine in the country, his having on its title page the +Prince of Wales' Feathers, with the motto: 'Ich Dien.'<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_174" id="Page_174">[Pg 174]</a></span></p> + +<p>"He has never been surpassed in the editorial faculty, at the same time +being apt as compositor, pressman, verse-maker, compiler and reporter; +but as adviser, satirist and humorist he was perhaps at his best. His +one and two line bits of comment and wisdom were models of pithiness, +and few writers have equalled him in masterly skill in argument. He is +spoken of by David Hume as the first great man of letters to whom +England was beholden to America."</p> + +<p>In addition to these qualifications, he founded the Library of +Philadelphia, the American post-office system, made several valuable +inventions for the improvement of heating, was the first to call +practical attention to ventilation, and to attempt experiment with +electricity. "He founded the American Philosophical Society, and led to +the foundation of the High School system in the State of Pennsylvania, +assisted in opening its first hospital, and helped to defend the city +against an attack of Indians. He was a leading factor in securing the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_175" id="Page_175">[Pg 175]</a></span> +union and independence of the Colonies, being the principal mover in the +repeal of the Stamp Act." He made valuable meteorological discoveries, +improved navigation, and was an earnest advocate of the abolition of +slavery; so that in sending Benjamin Franklin to Canada at this critical +juncture, she was compelled to hold to her political convictions against +one of the intellectual giants of the day. On discovering the patriotic +obstinacy of the Canadians, he wrote to Congress, saying:—</p> + +<p>"We are afraid that it will not be in our power to render our country +any further service in this colony."</p> + +<p>Perceiving the hopelessness of the situation, and that not even his +matchless logic could win sympathy in his project, he left Montreal on +May 11, and thus ended the efforts to coerce Canada into a struggle +which was to try so sorely the energy and fortitude of the thirteen +colonies—efforts which had cost them the life of one of their greatest +generals—Richard Montgomery.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_176" id="Page_176">[Pg 176]</a></span></p> + +<p>Franklin, when leaving, had under his escort some ladies who were +returning to the United States. Of one of these he wrote to Congress, +saying:—</p> + +<p>"We left Mrs. Walker and her husband at Albany. They took such liberties +in taunting us at our conduct in Canada that it came almost to a +quarrel. We parted civilly, but coldly. I think they both have an +excellent talent for making enemies, and I believe where they live they +will never be long without them!"</p> + +<p>Charles Carroll, who was associated with Franklin in trying to obtain +the concurrence of the Canadians in revolt, was of a family which had +always stood at the head of the colonial aristocracy, and which had +owned the most ample estate in the country. His character was mild and +pleasing, his deportment correct and faultless. By his eloquence +everyone was charmed, and many were persuaded, but even his great and +subtle powers in argument were abortive here. Through his daughter, +Polly Carroll, he<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_177" id="Page_177">[Pg 177]</a></span> became associated afterwards with the most dignified +circles of the British aristocracy. In the year 1809 two of his +grand-daughters were celebrated beauties in the most exclusive social +circles of Washington and Baltimore. The eldest, during a tour with her +husband through Europe, formed a warm friendship with Sir Arthur +Wellesley, afterwards the great Duke of Wellington. On becoming a widow +and returning to London, he introduced her to his elder brother, the +Marquis of Wellesley, whose wife she subsequently became. Her younger +sister married Colonel Hervey, who acted as aide-de-camp to the hero of +Waterloo on that momentous occasion. This family, therefore, was closely +identified with that great struggle between the two nations who had +fought on Canadian soil a few years before Carroll set foot upon it.</p> + +<p>During the first Presidential court, many distinguished Frenchmen came +to America; some in official capacities, others from curiosity, and many +were<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_178" id="Page_178">[Pg 178]</a></span> driven into forced or voluntary exile by the French Revolution. +Among these were M. de Talleyrand, the exiled Bishop of Autun, the Duke +de Liancourt, the Duke de la Rochefoucauld, Louis Philippe d'Orleans and +his two brothers, the Duke de Montpensier and the Count de Beaujolais.</p> + +<p>Louis Philippe lodged in a single room over a barber's shop in +Philadelphia. On one occasion, when entertaining some friends at dinner, +he apologized with a courtly grace for seating one-half his guests on +the side of a bed, saying he had himself occupied less comfortable +places without the consolation of an agreeable company.</p> + +<p>The exiled Prince fell in love with the beautiful Miss Bingham, the +reigning belle of the city. On her royal suitor's asking her fair hand +from her father, the American citizen declined the alliance with the +French Prince, saying to him:—"Should you ever be restored to your +hereditary position you will be too great a match for her; if not, she +is too great a match for you."<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_179" id="Page_179">[Pg 179]</a></span></p> + +<div class="figcenter" style="width: 360px;"> +<img src="images/p0207.jpg" width="360" height="450" alt="Rich Montgomery" title="" /> +</div> + +<p>One year from the fall of Montgomery, the event was celebrated by +special religious services and social functions in Quebec, the city he +had never succeeded in entering. "At nine o'clock grand mass was +celebrated by the Bishop in the Cathedral. On this occasion those who +had shown sympathy with the Congress troops had to perform public +penance. The officers of the garrison and the militia, with the British +inhabitants, met<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_180" id="Page_180">[Pg 180]</a></span> at 10 o'clock, waited upon Carleton, and then +proceeded to the English Church. After the service a parade took place +when a <i>feu de joie</i> was fired. Carleton himself gave a dinner to sixty +people, and a public <i>fête</i> was given at seven o'clock, which ended with +a ball."</p> + +<p>About fifty years later, at Montgomery Place, on the banks of the +Hudson, an aged face, with eyes dimmed with the tears of long years of +waiting, looked sadly at the vessel that was bringing back to her the +dust of her young soldier husband, which had so long lain in the gorge, +near the fatal bastion. Forty-three years before, he had buckled on his +sword to fight for what he considered a righteous cause, at the command +of his leader, Washington. Expecting a speedy return, he marched away as +she listened to the drum beats growing fainter and fainter in the +distance, and, after half a century had passed, he was still to her the +young soldier in his brave, blue coat, who had kissed her for that long +farewell. All<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_181" id="Page_181">[Pg 181]</a></span> that is left on Canadian soil to recall this gallant +though luckless soldier is the low-ceiled cottage where his body was +laid out, a small tablet on the precipice, which reads, "Here Montgomery +fell, 1775," and another of white marble, in the courtyard of the +military prison in the Citadel, recently erected by two patriotic +American girls in memory of the volunteers who fell with him.</p> + +<p>One hundred New Year's Eves came and passed away, and, on Dec. 31st, +1875,</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">"There was a sound of revelry by night,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And Canada's Capital had gathered there<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Her beauty and her chivalry, and bright<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The lamps shone o'er fair women and brave men."<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>It was with no desire to re-kindle the rancours and strifes of that +distant period, but to properly celebrate an event of such importance, +and commemorate that night of blustering storm, gallant attack and sore +defeat a century before, that the Centennial Montgomery Ball was given. +Soldiers and citizens, in the costumes of 1775, some in the identical +dress worn<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_182" id="Page_182">[Pg 182]</a></span> by their ancestors in that memorable repulse; and the ladies +in toilettes of the same period, received their guests as they entered +the ball-room, the approaches to which were tastefully decorated. "Half +way between the dancing and receiving rooms was a grand, double +staircase, the sides of which were draped with the white and golden +lilies of France, our Dominion Ensign, and the Stars and Stripes of the +neighbouring Republic. On the other side of the broad steps were stacks +of arms and warlike implements. Facing the guests as they ascended the +stairs, among the huge banners which fell gracefully about the dark +musketry, and parted to right and left above the drums and trumpets, +there hung from the centre a red and black pennant—the American colours +of 1775. Immediately underneath was the escutcheon of the United States, +on which, heavily craped, was suspended the hero's sword—the weapon by +which, one hundred years before, the dead, but honoured and revered hero +had beckoned on his men,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_183" id="Page_183">[Pg 183]</a></span> and which only left his hand when he like 'a +soldier fell.'</p> + +<p>"Underneath the kindly tribute to the dead General were the solemn +prayerful initials of <i>Requiescat in Pace</i>.</p> + +<p>"At the foot of the trophy were piled two sets of old flint-lock muskets +and accoutrements, and in the centre a brass cannon, which was captured +from the Americans in 1775, and which bore the 'Lone Star' and the +figure of an Indian—the Arms of the State of Massachusetts. This +military tableau vividly recalled the troublous times of long ago, and +spoke of the patience and pluck, the bravery and sturdy manhood of a +bygone century.</p> + +<p>"On the stroke of the hour of midnight, the clear, clarion notes of a +trumpet thrilled all hearts present. A panel in the wainscotting of the +lower dancing-room flew open as if by magic, and out jumped a jaunty +little trumpeter with a slashed and decorated jacket and the busby of a +hussar. The blast he blew rang in tingling echoes far and wide, and<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_184" id="Page_184">[Pg 184]</a></span> a +second later the weird piping and drumming of an unfamiliar music were +heard in a remote part of the barracks.</p> + +<p>"Nearer and nearer every moment came the sharp shrill notes of the fifes +and the quick detonation of the drum-stick taps. The rattle of the drums +came closer and closer, when two folding-doors opened, and through them +stalked in grim solemnity the 'Phantom Guard,' led by the intrepid +Sergeant Hugh McQuarters.</p> + +<p>"Regardless of the festive decorations and the bright faces around them, +the 'Guard' passed through the assembly as if they were not. On through +salon and passage—past ball-room and conversation parlor—they glided +with measured step, and halting in front of the 'Montgomery Trophy,' +paid military honours to the memento of a hero's valiant, if +unsuccessful act. Upon their taking close order, the Bombardier, who +personated the dead Sergeant, and who actually wore the blood-stained +sword-belt of a man who was killed in the action commemorated, advanced +and delivered an<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_185" id="Page_185">[Pg 185]</a></span> address to the Commander of the Quebec Garrison, of +which the concluding words were:—</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">'We ask of you to pay us now one tribute,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">By firing from these heights one last salute.'<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>"The grave, sonorous words of the martial request were hardly uttered, +ere through the darkness of the night the great cannon boomed,—a +soldier's welcome and a brave man's requiem,—which caused women's +hearts to throb and men's to beat exultingly." While the whole air +trembled with the sullen reverberations, which echoed from crag to crag, +the glare of rockets lit up the path of Près-de-Ville, as the signal +lights had done one hundred winters before.</p> + +<p>At the suggestion of the American Consul, the old house on St. Louis +street, in which the body of Montgomery was laid out January 1st, 1776, +was decorated with the American flag, and brilliantly illuminated, in +honour of him who had so nobly tried to do what he considered his duty.</p> + +<p>And thus the years of the century, as<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_186" id="Page_186">[Pg 186]</a></span> they rolled around, have in a +great measure smoothed away the animosities which marked those days that +tried men's souls, when the sons of those who had played around the same +old English hearths fought to the death for liberty or loyalty. That the +angry strifes are forgotten, leaving only the memory of the bravery +which distinguished the star actors in the great drama, needs no further +proof than can be found on a green hill near the Palisades, in the State +of New York, where one hundred and twenty years ago a warm young heart, +beating beneath the soldier's red coat, was stilled by American justice. +The granite shaft on the spot tells its sad and sombre story:—</p> + +<p class="center">Here died, October 2nd, 1780,<br /> +Major John André, of the British Army, who, entering<br /> +the American lines on a Secret Mission to<br /> +Benedict Arnold for the Surrender of<br /> +West Point, was taken prisoner,<br /> +tried and condemned<br /> +as a spy.<br /> +<br /> +His death, though according to the stern code of<br /> +war, moved even his enemies to pity, and<br /> +both armies mourned the fate of<br /> +one so young and so brave.<br /> +In 1821 his remains were removed to<br /> +Westminster Abbey.<br /> +<br /> +A hundred years after his execution this stone was<br /> +placed above the spot where he lay, by a citizen of<br /> +the States against which he fought; not to perpetuate<br /> +a record of strife, but in token of those<br /> +better feelings which have since united<br /> +two nations, one in race, in language<br /> +and religion, with<br /> +the earnest hope that<br /> +this friendly union<br /> +will never be<br /> +broken.<br /> +<br /> +"He was more unfortunate than criminal,<br /> +An accomplished man and a gallant officer." +</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i23">—George Washington.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>An American visitor to Quebec was recently shown the cannon used in the +trophy, which the British Corporal proudly explained had been taken at +Bunker Hill.</p> + +<p>"Ah! yes, friend," the stranger replied, "you have the cannon, but we +have the hill."</p> + +<p>On the top of the monument, near Boston, which marks the spot on which +this battle took place, are two guns similar to this one, the +inscription on which corroborates the soldier's statement; it reads:<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_188" id="Page_188">[Pg 188]</a></span>—</p> + +<p class="center">"Sacred to Liberty."<br /> +<br /> +This is one of the four cannon which constituted<br /> +the whole train of field<br /> +artillery possessed by<br /> +the British Colonies<br /> +of<br /> +North America,<br /> +at the commencement of the<br /> +War<br /> +on the 19th of April, 1775.<br /> +This cannon and its fellow belonged to<br /> +a number of citizens of<br /> +Boston.<br /> +<br /> +The other two, the property of the Government<br /> +of Massachusetts, were taken by the enemy.<br /></p> + +<div class="figcenter" style="width: 428px;"> +<img src="images/p0216.jpg" width="428" height="400" alt="" title="" /> +</div> + +<p>With the failure of the American expedition, and the return of the +British troops to Montreal, the Château again became Government +headquarters and was called Government House.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_189" id="Page_189">[Pg 189]</a></span></p> + +<p>When internal and international tranquillity were completely restored, +and the people were permitted to return to their ordinary avocations of +life, Sir Guy Carleton established himself at Quebec with his wife, the +Lady Maria, and their three children, one of whom had been born in +Canada. She had joined him at Montreal, being the bearer of the +decoration of the Order of the Bath, which she had received from the +hands of the King to present to her husband. Sir Guy Carleton or Lord +Dorchester was one of those men "who, during a long and varied public +life, lived so utterly irreproachably, that his memory remains unstained +by the charge of any semblance of a vice."</p> + +<p>On the occasion of his last appearance in an official character he +arrived to make his final inspection of the troops. After general parade +the officers waited upon him to pay their last respects to one who had +been the bulwark of Canada through her greatest vicissitudes. The +leave-taking of their old General, whom they<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_190" id="Page_190">[Pg 190]</a></span> never expected to see +again, was marked by the deepest feelings of regard and regret. His +connection with Canadian history covered a period marked by events of a +nature the most critical, the results of which will colour the entire +future of the Dominion.</p> + +<div class="figcenter" style="width: 355px;"> +<img src="images/p0218.jpg" width="355" height="450" alt="" title="" /> +</div> + +<p>Between the years eighteen thirty-seven and forty, when Canada was torn +by internal rebellion, the Earl of Elgin, who was then Governor-General, +drove<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_191" id="Page_191">[Pg 191]</a></span> in hot haste to the Château, where had sat the special council +during the suspension of the Constitution. After giving the Queen's +sanction to what was called by a certain party "The Rebel Indemnity +Bill," he rushed into one door and out of another, when this Peer of the +Realm, in all the dignity of coach and four, postillions and outriders, +was pelted with rotten eggs and other unpleasant missiles. Then, in the +dark of night, at the instance of some so-called politicians, the mob +moved on to the Parliament buildings, and, most unfortunately for +Montreal, deliberately set them on fire; which act resulted ultimately +in the removal of the seat of government to Ottawa and the decline of +the glory of the old Château.</p> + +<div class="figcenter" style="width: 350px;"> +<img src="images/p0219.jpg" width="350" height="247" alt="" title="" /> +</div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_192" id="Page_192">[Pg 192]</a></span></p> +<h2>THE FUR KINGS.</h2> + + +<div class="figcenter" style="width: 315px;"> +<img src="images/p0220.jpg" width="315" height="450" alt="Sir William Alexander" title="" /> +</div> + +<div class="drop"> +<img src="images/dropi.jpg" width="43" height="125" alt="I" class="cap" /> + +<p class="cap_1">It was to the French explorers whose names stand "conspicuous on the +pages of half-savage romance," and to their successors the Scotch +fur-kings, that we owe much of the geographical knowledge of the +northern part of the Continent. There is some uncertainty as to who was +the discoverer of the Mackenzie River, which carries its waters to the +ice-fields<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_193" id="Page_193">[Pg 193]</a></span> of Polar seas, but it bears the name of one claimant to the +distinction, Sir Alexander Mackenzie.</p></div> + +<p>Of the other waterways of the region much valuable information was +obtained by Alexander Henry in his intercourse with the native tribes. +To Sir William Alexander was given the honour of being the first +Scotchman to cross the Rocky Mountains. Like his fellow countrymen, he +was distinguished by the same characteristics which made their fathers +in tartan and kilt foemen "worthy of any man's steel," and themselves +fit successors of the bearers of such honourable names as duLuth, Joliet +and de La Vérandrye. A few rods from the gate of the Château de Ramezay +is a tall warehouse which bears on its peaked gable the date 1793. It +was in this old building that the early business years of John Jacob +Astor, the New York millionaire, were spent. It was the property of the +North-West Fur Company, which was the centre of so much that was +romantic and captivating. This Company was an<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_194" id="Page_194">[Pg 194]</a></span> association of Scottish +and Canadian merchants, who, in the political changes which had taken +place, had supplanted those purely French. In energy and enterprise they +did not exceed their predecessors, but had more capital and influence at +their command.</p> + +<p>In consequence of their more lavish measures, they were called the +"Lordly Nor' Westers." Full justice has been done them by the pen of +Washington Irving, who, in writing the tale of "Astoria," that +Northwestern "Utopia," so splendid in its conception, but so lamentable +in its failure, became familiar with their life in all its phases. He +says:—"To behold the North-West Company in all its grandeur it was +necessary to witness the annual gathering at Fort William. On these +occasions might be seen the change since the unceremonious time of the +old French traders, with their roystering <i>coureurs des bois</i> and +<i>voyageurs</i> gaily returning from their adventurous trading in the +pathless regions of the West. Then the aristocratic character of the +Briton, or rather<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_195" id="Page_195">[Pg 195]</a></span> the feudal spirit of the Highlander, shone out +magnificently. Every partner who had charge of an inferior post felt +like the chieftain of a Highland clan. To him a visit to the grand +conference at Fort William was a most important event, and he repaired +thither as to a meeting of Parliament. They were wrapped in rich furs, +their huge canoes being freighted with every luxury and convenience. The +partners at Montreal were the lords of these occasions, as they ascended +the river, like sovereigns making a progress. At Fort William an immense +wooden building was the council chamber and also the banqueting hall, +decorated with Indian arms and accoutrements, and with trophies of the +fur trade. The great and mighty councils alternated with feasts and +revels." These old days of primitive bartering are gone forever from the +St. Lawrence, but to-day as it flows in majesty to the ocean, carrying +with it one-third of the fresh water of the world, it is a great highway +for the commerce of the globe.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_196" id="Page_196">[Pg 196]</a></span></p> + +<p>The University of McGill stands on what was once, in part, the ancient +village of Hochelaga, which was visited by Jacques Cartier, and was +later the domain belonging to old "Burnside Hall." Its cheerful fire +many a time shone out under the shadow of Mount Royal, when were +gathered around its board Simon McTavish, Duncan McGillivray, Sir John +Franklin and Joseph Frobisher. With them was frequently seen Thomas +Douglas, Earl of Selkirk, who formulated the scheme of populating the +prairies of the North-West with poverty-stricken and down-trodden +tenants from older lands, many of whom lie in the old grave-yard of the +Kildonan settlement on the Red River of the North, a few miles from the +City of Winnipeg. Their descendants with their Scotch thrift form the +backbone of that progressive province of such magnificent possibilities. +Their weary journeys overland, toilsome <i>portages</i> and struggles with +want and isolation are now mere matters of history, for the overflow +population of the crowded centres of Europe<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_197" id="Page_197">[Pg 197]</a></span> are carried in a few days +from sea to sea with every possible convenience and even luxury. The +great Canadian transcontinental line has spanned the valleys and crossed +the mountains, literally opening up a highway for the thousands who from +the ends of the earth are yearly crowding into these vast fertile plains +and sub-arctic gold fields.</p> + +<p>Franklin lies in an unknown grave among Northern snows, lost in his +attempt, at the age of sixty, to find the North Pole. He was last seen +moored to an iceberg in Baffin's Bay, apparently waiting for a +favourable opportunity to begin work in what is known as the Middle Sea. +The problem of his fate long baffled discovery, although many an earnest +searching party, in the Polar twilight, has sought him in that region of +ice and snow, in a silence broken only by the howl of the arctic blast, +the scream of sea-fowl or the thundering report of an ice-floe breaking +away from the mainland.</p> + +<p>One party sent out by the Hudson Bay Co. in 1853 found traces of the +expedition<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_198" id="Page_198">[Pg 198]</a></span> in some bits of metal and a silver plate engraved with the +name Franklin. Another, fitted out partly by Lady Franklin, and partly +by public subscription, and commanded by McClintock, afterwards Sir +Leopold McClintock, learned from an Eskimo woman that she had heard of a +party of men, whom it was said "fell down and died as they walked." With +the exception of these faint traces, their fate is still wrapped in +obscurity.</p> + +<div class="figcenter" style="width: 450px;"> +<img src="images/p0226.jpg" width="450" height="216" alt="" title="" /> +</div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_199" id="Page_199">[Pg 199]</a></span></p> +<h2>INTERESTING SITES.</h2> + + +<div class="drop"> +<img src="images/dropf.jpg" width="78" height="125" alt="F" class="cap" /> + +<p class="cap_2">Few visitors to the city, as the Palace cars of the Canadian Pacific +Railway carry them into the mammoth station on Dalhousie Square, realize +the historic associations which cling around this spot. In the +magnificently equipped dining-room of the Company's Hotel, as delicacies +from the most distant parts of the earth are laid before the traveller, +he should call to remembrance the lives of deprivation and uncomplaining +endurance which have made the ground now crowned by the beautiful +edifice full of the most tragic interest, and filled with memories which +will be immortal as long as courage and stout-heartedness are honoured.</p></div> + +<p>Two hundred and fifty years ago the sound of hammer and saw here awoke +the echoes of the forest. Workmen who had learned their craft in old +French towns, when Colbert, the great statesman and financier, was +developing the architecture<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_200" id="Page_200">[Pg 200]</a></span> and industries, revenues and resources of +the kingdom, here reared a wind-mill, the first industrial building in +Montreal.</p> + +<p>The winds of these autumns long ago turned the fans and ground the seed +of harvests toilsomely gathered from corn-fields, among whose furrows +many a time the arrow and tomahawk spilt the blood of reaper and sower. +The old mill with its pastoral associations of peaceful toil in time +passed away, and was succeeded by a structure dedicated to the art of +war, for on the same spot stood <i>la Citadelle</i>. This stronghold, though +primitive in its appointments, was important during the French +occupation and evacuation of New France, being the last fortification +held by French troops on Canadian soil.</p> + +<p>This old earthen Citadel, a relic of mediæval defence, was, about +seventy years ago, removed, its material being used in the leveling and +enlargement of the Parade Ground, or, as it is called, the +"<i>Champ-de-Mars.</i>" Its demolition might be regretted were it not that in +an age of progress even sentiment must give way<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_201" id="Page_201">[Pg 201]</a></span> before advance. The +grand Hotel Viger, although built to promote the comfort of the people +of the Dominion, has not destroyed the pathetic interest of the early +struggles and heroism which still clothes its site, and which heightens +the present appreciation of a civilization of which the old mill and +fort were the pioneers.</p> + +<p>The hospitable hearth of James McGill, graced by his noble-minded +French-Canadian wife, has also long since disappeared; but through his +endowment, and the prince-like gifts of William Molson, Peter Redpath, +Lord Strathcona and Mount Royal, Sir Wm. Macdonald and many others, the +torch of education has been lighted here, which shall shine a beacon for +ages to come. Although but three-quarters of a century old, yet the +University of McGill compares favourably with older institutions, its +Mining Building being the most perfectly fitted up in the world. Its +sons take rank with the most cultured minds in Europe and America, +influencing to a most marked degree the educational thought of the day.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_202" id="Page_202">[Pg 202]</a></span></p> + +<p>The year 1896 marked an epoch in its history, when a graduate of the +class of '68 was elected to the Presidency of the British Medical +Association, one of the most august and learned corporations in the +world. In calling a Canadian, Dr. T. G. Roddick, M.P., to this eminent +position, a signal honour was conferred, it being the first time the +office was held by a Colonial member. Thirty-five years ago, a +French-Canadian youth, slight in form, with broad brow and eyes full of +deep thoughtfulness, stood before the Faculty and friends as the +valedictorian of his class. That slender boy is to-day the great +Canadian Premier, Sir Wilfrid Laurier, the eloquent Statesman and the +honoured of Her Majesty the Queen.</p> + +<div class="figcenter" style="width: 350px;"> +<img src="images/p0230.jpg" width="350" height="322" alt="" title="" /> +</div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_203" id="Page_203">[Pg 203]</a></span></p> +<h2>FAMOUS NAMES.</h2> + + +<div class="drop"> +<img src="images/dropc.jpg" width="61" height="125" alt="C" class="cap" /> + +<p class="cap_2">Conspicuous among the portraits of soldiers, heroes and navigators which +adorn the walls of the different rooms of the Château, is one, a full +size painting of an old Highland Chief, a veritable Rhoderick Dhu, in +Scotch bonnet and dirk, who, with the call of his clan, and the pipes +playing the airs of his native glen, led the charge of Bunker Hill. He +was Sir John Small, who came to Canada with his regiment, the famous +"Black Watch," and served under Abercrombie in the battle of Carillon. +One of his<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_204" id="Page_204">[Pg 204]</a></span> descendants, visiting Boston early in the century, found on +the walls of a museum, and where it may still be seen, a painting of the +battle of Bunker Hill with General Small on his white horse, rallying +his men to the attack. It was to the credit of the successors of those +who fought that day, although only thirty or forty years had elapsed +since their forefathers had met in mortal combat, that the most gentle +courtesy and kindness were shown on both sides by their descendants.</p></div> + +<p>A fine picture of a full-blooded Indian is that of Brant, the great +Mohawk Chief, an ally of the English and a cruel and ruthless foe; on +one occasion having, it is said, slain with his own hand, forty-four of +his enemies. Other portraits of Jacques Cartier, Champlain, Vaudreuil, +Montcalm, deLevis, Dorchester, deSalaberry and Murray are also there to +be seen and admired.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_205" id="Page_205">[Pg 205]</a></span></p> + +<div class="figcenter" style="width: 351px;"> +<img src="images/p0233.jpg" width="351" height="450" alt="Sir John Small" title="" /> +<span class="caption"> +British Leader in the Battle of Bunker Hill.</span> +</div> + +<p>Many of the streets of Montreal, such as Dorchester, Sherbrooke, Wolfe, +d'Youville, Jacques Cartier, Guy, Amherst, Murray, Vaudreuil, de +Lagauchetière, Olier, Mance, Longueuil, and others equally well named, +will carry down to future generations the memory of those who were +prominent in the making and moulding of Canada. It is strange that one +of the most insignificant streets in the city, a mere lane, of a single +block in<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_206" id="Page_206">[Pg 206]</a></span> length, should bear the name of Dollard, the hero of one of +the most illustrious deeds recorded in history, an event which has +rightly been called the Thermopylæ of Canada. The facts were as +follows:—In 1660 the Colony was on the eve of extinction by the +Iroquois, the whole of the tribes being on the war-path with the +intention of sweeping the French from the St. Lawrence. Dollard des +Ormeaux and sixteen young men of Montreal determined upon a deed which +should teach the savages a lesson. They bound themselves by an oath +neither to give nor take quarter. They made their wills and took the +sacrament in the Chapel of the <i>Hôtel-Dieu</i>, and then started up Lake +St. Louis. They were not accustomed to the management of the frail +canoes of bark, and day after day struggled to pass the currents of St. +Anne's, at the head of the island, where now the pleasure yacht spreads +its white sails to the breezes of summer, and on whose shores the +huntsmen and hounds gaily gallop when in the woods of autumn the leaves +turn<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_207" id="Page_207">[Pg 207]</a></span> crimson and gold under the mellow hunter's moon. At last, after a +week had been thus spent, they entered the Ottawa River, proceeding by +the shores until they descried the remains of a rough palisaded fort +surrounded by a small clearing. It was only a circle enclosed by trunks +of trees, but here they "made their fire and slung their kettles. Being +soon joined by some friendly Hurons and Algonquins they bivouacked +together. Morning, noon and night they prayed, and when at sunset the +long reaches of forest on the opposite shore basked peacefully in the +level rays, the rapids joined their hoarse music to the notes of their +evening hymn." As their young voices floated through the forest glades, +and they lay down to sleep under the stars of the sweet May skies, they +thought of the bells tinkling in the still air of their loved +<i>Ville-Marie</i>, where those they had come to die for sent up for them +<i>Aves</i> around hearth and altar. In the words of a Canadian poet, it is +thus described:—</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">"Beside the dark Uttawa's stream, two hundred years ago,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_208" id="Page_208">[Pg 208]</a></span><br /></span> +<span class="i0">A wondrous feat of arms was wrought, which all the world should know.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">'Tis hard to read with tearless eyes this record of the past,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">It stirs our blood, and fires our souls, as with a clarion blast.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">What, though beside the foaming flood untombed their ashes lie,—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">All earth becomes the monument of men who nobly die.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Daulac, the Captain of the Fort, in manhood's fiery prime<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Hath sworn by some immortal deed to make his name sublime,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And sixteen soldiers of the Cross, his comrades true and tried,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Have pledged their faith for life or death, all kneeling side by side.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And this their oath, on flood or field, to challenge face to face<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The ruthless hordes of Iroquois,—the scourges of their race.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">No quarter to accept nor grant, and loyal to the grave.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To die like martyrs for the land they'd shed their blood to save.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And now these self-devoted youths from weeping friends have passed,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_209" id="Page_209">[Pg 209]</a></span><br /></span> +<span class="i0">And on the Fort of <i>Ville-Marie</i> each fondly looks his last.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Soft was the balmy air of spring in that fair month of May,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The wild flowers bloomed, the spring birds sang on many a budding spray,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When loud and high a thrilling cry dispelled the magic charm,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And scouts came hurrying from the woods to bid their comrades arm.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And bark canoes skimmed lightly down the torrent of the <i>Sault</i>,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Manned by three hundred dusky forms, the long-expected foe.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Eight days of varied horrors passed, what boots it now to tell<br /></span> +<span class="i0">How the pale tenants of the fort heroically fell?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Hunger and thirst and sleeplessness, Death's ghastly aids, at length.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Marred and defaced their comely forms, and quelled their giant strength.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The end draws nigh,—they yearn to die—one glorious rally more<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For the sake of <i>Ville-Marie</i>, and all will soon be o'er.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Sure of the martyr's golden crown, they shrink not from the Cross;<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_210" id="Page_210">[Pg 210]</a></span><br /></span> +<span class="i0">Life yielded for the land they love, they scorn to reckon loss.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The fort is fired, and through the flame, with slippery, splashing tread,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The Redmen stumble to the camp o'er ramparts of the dead.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Then with set teeth and nostrils wide, Daulac, the dauntless, stood,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And dealt his foes remorseless blows 'mid blinding smoke and blood,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Till hacked and hewn, he reeled to earth, with proud, unconquered glance,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Dead—but immortalized by death—Leonidas of France;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">True to their oath, his comrade knights no quarter basely craved,—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">So died the peerless twenty-two—so Canada was saved."<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>The historian says:—"It was the enthusiasm of honour, the enthusiasm of +adventure and the enthusiasm of faith. Daulac was the <i>Cœur-de-Lion</i> +among the forests and savages of the New World." The names and +occupations of the young men may still be read in the parish registers, +the faded writing illumined by the sanctity of martyrdom. The "Lays of<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_211" id="Page_211">[Pg 211]</a></span> +Rome" recount among her heroes none of greater valour than these by the +lonely rapids in the silence of the Canadian forest.</p> + +<div class="figcenter" style="width: 196px;"> +<img src="images/p0239.jpg" width="196" height="200" alt="" title="" /> +</div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_212" id="Page_212">[Pg 212]</a></span></p> +<h2>ECHOES FROM THE PAST.</h2> + + +<div class="drop"> +<img src="images/dropn.jpg" width="97" height="125" alt="N" class="cap" /> + +<p class="cap_2">Near a modern window in the gallery leans an old spinning-wheel, which +was found in the vaults. By its hum in winter twilights, a hundred years +ago, soft lullabies were crooned, and fine linen spun for dainty brides, +over whose forgotten graves the blossoms of a century of summers have +fallen. In hoop and farthingale they tripped over the threshold of the +old church of <i>Notre Dame de Bonsecours</i>. They plighted their troth as +happily before the altar of the little chapel, as do their descendants +in the stately church of <i>Notre Dame</i>, with the grand organ pealing +through the dim arches and groined roof.</p></div> + +<p>The old, old wheel is silent, and the fingers that once held distaff and +spindle have crumbled into dust, but the noble deeds and glorious names +of those days gone by are carven deep in the monument of a grateful +country's memory.</p> + +<p>Over an archway in the picture gallery<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_213" id="Page_213">[Pg 213]</a></span> is an enormous oil painting, +dark with age, of the British Coat of Arms, which, it is whispered, was +brought over hurriedly from New York during the American Revolution.</p> + +<p>The museum of the Château is daily receiving donations of interesting +relics, and has already a fine collection of coins, medals, old swords +and historical mementoes—some of the autograph letters of Arnold, +Champlain, Roberval, Vaudreuil, Amherst, Carleton, the de Ramezay family +and many others, being of great interest.</p> + +<p>These early days have passed away forever. The whirr of the +spinning-wheel, or shout of the hunter, no longer sound along the banks +of the St. Lawrence. No canoe of the painted warrior now glides silently +by the shore; for Montreal with its three thousand inhabitants when +Vaudreuil beat his retreat, to its present population of 300,000, has +thrown its magnificent civilization around these spots hallowed by the +footprints of the great men whose feet have walked her ancient streets.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_214" id="Page_214">[Pg 214]</a></span></p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">"She has grown in her strength like a Northern queen,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">'Neath her crown of light and her robe of snow,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And she stands in her beauty fair between<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The Royal Mount and the river below."<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>The two nationalities live harmoniously side by side in commercial and +social life, both retaining their racial and distinctive +characteristics. The old <i>chansons</i> of Brittany are still heard from the +hay-carts and by the firesides, and up and down the rivers ring out the +same songs as when the "fleet of swift canoes came up all vocal with the +songs of <i>voyageurs</i>, whose cadence kept time among the dipping +paddles."</p> + +<p>The Château de Ramezay has suffered many changes and modifications in +the various hands through which it has passed since its foundation +stones were laid, but the citizens of Montreal, revering its age and +associations, are restoring it as much as possible to its original state +and appearance; and the thousands who yearly pass through it testify to +the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_215" id="Page_215">[Pg 215]</a></span> romance surrounding the walls of the old Château, <i>Ville Marie's</i> +grandest relic of an illustrious past—a past which belongs equally to +both French and British subjects, and which has developed a patriotism +well expressed in the words of the eloquent churchman, Bruchesi, +Archbishop of Montreal, who says:</p> + +<p>"I know the countries so much boasted of where the myrtles bloom, where +the birds are lighter on the wing, and where gentler breezes blow. I +have passed quiet days on the beach at Sorrento, where the Mediterranean +rolls its blue waves to the foot of the orange tree. I have seen Genoa, +the superb and radiant Florence, and Venice, the Queen of the Adriatic. +More than once I have gazed upon the beauty of Naples glittering with +the fires of the setting sun. I have sailed upon the azure waves of the +Lake of Geneva. I have tasted the charm of our sweet France. My steps +have trodden the blessed soil of Rome, and I have trembled with +unspeakable gladness. But all these noble sights, all<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_216" id="Page_216">[Pg 216]</a></span> these undying +memories, all this sublime poetry, all these enchantments of nature did +not take the place in my heart of Canada, my Fatherland, which I have +never ceased to regard with enthusiasm and admiration.</p> + +<p>What nation can boast of a purer or more glorious origin? May the future +of Canada be worthy of its noble past. May charity, true charity, reign +among all our citizens as among the children of the same mother. Let us +have none of those intestine divisions which enfeeble us,—none of those +unhappy jealousies capable of compromising the most sacred interests."</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Our fathers' battle-cries are hushed,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The ancient feuds are gone;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Canadians now and brothers,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">With God we're marching on.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">With spears to ploughshares beaten,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The furrowed land is won.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Through bannered fields of waving corn<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In peace we're marching on.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The North wind through the pine woods<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Swells out our pæan song,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_217" id="Page_217">[Pg 217]</a></span><br /></span> +<span class="i0">To the music of its harping<br /></span> +<span class="i0">We bravely march along,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And join the trampling millions,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In chorus deep and strong.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To drum-beats of a nation's heart,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">We proudly march along.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">O, fair, blue skies, and mountain streams<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Whose flashing sands run gold,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">No standard but the Triple-Cross<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thy breezes shall unfold.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">With roaring surge of circling seas<br /></span> +<span class="i0">We shout our patriot song<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For Home and Queen and Canada,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">With God we're marching on.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">On, marching on, while brave the colours float<br /></span> +<span class="i0">From sea to sea, with cheer and song,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">This watchword pass the ranks along,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Our Land is marching on!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<div class="figcenter" style="width: 255px;"> +<img src="images/p0245.jpg" width="255" height="250" alt="" title="" /> +</div> +<p> </p><p> </p> + + + + + + + + +<pre> + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Famous Firesides of French Canada, by +Mary Wilson Alloway + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK FAMOUS FIRESIDES OF FRENCH CANADA *** + +***** This file should be named 30674-h.htm or 30674-h.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + https://www.gutenberg.org/3/0/6/7/30674/ + +Produced by Marcia Brooks, Josephine Paolucci and the +Online Distributed Proofreading Canada Team at +http://www.pgdpcanada.net (This file was produced from +images generously made available by The Internet +Archive/Canadian Libraries) + + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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