CHAPTER VIII.
VILLE MARIE.
BEAUTIFULLY situated as it was between Mount Royal and the St. Lawrence, at that early date Ville Marie could scarcely be termed imposing in appearance. It was busy and bustling, and had been described as “a place which makes so much noise, but is of so little account.” A frontier town at the head of the colony, it was the natural resort of desperadoes of every description, offering a singular contrast between the rigor of its clerical seigniors and the riotous license of the wild crews which invaded it. Its citizens were mostly disbanded soldiers, traders and coureurs de bois—a turbulent population, whose control taxed to the utmost the patience, tact and ingenuity of the priestly governors. While a portion of the residents were given up to practices of mystical piety, others gambled, drank and stole; if hard pressed by justice they had only to cross the river and place themselves beyond seigniorial jurisdiction.
Limited as was the sphere of action, here existence offered many striking contrasts. In love with an exquisite ideal, men and women struggled to attain purity and unselfishness: they nursed the sick, fed the hungry, loved and forgave, lived in godly fear and died fortified by eternal hope; and this side by side with those who yielded themselves up with boundless license to the worse passions of the human heart.
While scarcely more than a village in dimensions, the preponderance of large buildings, churches and convents imparted to the town a substantial appearance which the number of the population and its scanty resources scarcely warranted. Quaint steeples and turrets cut the misty pallor of the sky. Ville Marie wore an aspect half military, half monastic. At sunrise and sunset a squad of soldiers paraded in front of the citadel; at night patrols marched through the streets; church bells, deep and sweet mouthed, rang out the Angelus morning, noon and night.
On the river-front were numerous taverns, in front of which boats and canoes were drawn up on the shore. Here voyageurs swaggered and swore, and Indians, whom what Charlevois quaintly terms “a light tinge of Christianity” had scarcely redeemed from savagery, squatted in sullen apathy or quarrelled with brutal ferocity. A row of small compact dwellings extended along a narrow street then, as now, called St. Paul. Some of the houses were of stone, but the majority were of wood with stone gables, as required by law, the roofs covered with shingles. All outlying houses were pierced with loopholes and fortified as well as the slender means of their owners would permit. Gardens were mostly fenced by pointed cedar stakes, with the poles firmly tied together. Fields studded with scarred and blackened stumps stretched away to the bordering forest, crowding gloomy and silent on the right side and on the left. The green shaggy back of the Mountain towered over all.
Crowning the hill on the right stood the Seignior’s windmill, built of rough stone, and pierced with loopholes to serve in time of need as a place of defence. This mill had a right to claim one-third of the grain brought to be ground; of which portion the miller received one-third as his share, and the Seminary required that the inhabitants should have all their corn ground there, or at one of the other mills owned by the priests.
Toward the left, on an artificial elevation, at an angle formed by the junction of a swift-glancing rivulet with the St. Lawrence, was a square-bastioned stone fort. This was the citadel of Ville Marie. About 1640, M. d’Ailleboust had removed the palisade of stakes which had formerly protected it, and had fortified it by two bastions. The fort was provided with artillery, and here, in command of a portion of the Carignan-Salière regiment, resided the military governor appointed by the Seminary.
Overlooking the river appeared the church of Notre Dame de Bonsecours, whose walls of rough grey stone have shone as a symbol of hope to the yearning eyes of many a weary voyageur, many a travel-worn emigrant. Above the entrance stood a statue of the Virgin, below which ran the inscription:
“Si l’amour de Marie
Dans ton cœur est gravé,
En passant ne t’oublie
De lui dire un avé.”
The Hotel-Dieu, founded in 1644 by Madame de Bouillon, fronting on both St. Paul and St. Joseph (now St. Sulpice) streets, was an abode of much charity, tender devotion and heroic self-abnegation. The nuns, a devoted sisterhood, nobly conspicuous in the annals of the colony, excelled in acts of kindness which had become sacramental symbols of faithful obedience to God and loving brotherhood with man. Under their snow-white wimples beat hearts as brave as ever stirred under the robe of statesman or gorget of soldier. The church stood on St. Paul street, and was of stone in Tuscan style, surmounted by a triangular pediment and cross. The buildings consisted of hospital, convent and church.
On a gently swelling knoll west of the citadel stood the edifice erected by M. Charon as a hospital. Farther back, to the left, was the Jesuit church, fronting on Notre Dame street. Adjoining this was the College, a very small structure with large and carefully cultivated gardens attached. The buildings of the Congregation of Notre Dame faced on St. Paul street, while the back windows overlooked the river; they were surrounded by a high stone wall. Here Marguerite Bourgeois, assisted by a band of noble women, labored for the conversion of the savages, and here the young girls of Ville Marie received all the instruction they were likely to obtain. Back of the settlement ran from the citadel a rough country road, which is now Notre Dame street.
Fronting the river on the line of the street were the enclosures and buildings of the Seminary, fortified, as was the Hotel-Dieu, to resist the attacks of the Iroquois. The ancient edifice was of the same shape as the present, forming three sides of a square, surrounded by spacious grounds. The priests’ gardens were already renowned for the delicious quality of their fruit. The air of thrift and comfort which characterized the belongings of the clergy presented a painful contrast to the extreme penury of the colonists. With them, method, industry and frugality had resulted in abounding prosperity. The parish church of Notre Dame was directly in the centre of Notre Dame street. It was a low edifice, built of rough stone, pointed with mortar; the high-pitched roof, covered with tin, reflecting the sunshine in dazzling brightness. The principal entrance was at the south end, and on the south-west corner was a tower, surmounted by a belfry. The public market was near the river, directly facing the Seminary property. This was a favorite rendezvous for all loiterers, as were also the public wells, which, to suit the general convenience, had been placed near the Seminary, at the market-place, and in the Jesuits’ garden. Here the citizens gathered. The women enjoyed the opportunities of gossiping at the well, their tongues moving as swiftly as the running water, their whole bodies aiding with an endless variety of appropriate gestures.
The men, with a vivacity that never diminished, held choleric arguments, or repeated marvellous stories. They tapped their foreheads, clasped their hands, clutched impetuously at perruques that presented a wonderful impunity from becoming disarranged. They discussed how Jean Louis had strained his right arm and fallen under the power of a sorcerer; how the good St. Anne had rescued Pierre Boulot and his comrade from shipwreck because they had made a vow in her honor; how Mère Bouillette had been tormented by the lutin in the shape of a will-o’-the-wisp, and the good Mère Berbier, of the Congregation of Notre Dame, had presented Madelon with a scapulaire as a charm against fever. It was whispered that it was feared that Georgeon and his fifty wolves, invisible when hunted by honest men, were driving the colts about at night. With bated breath they spoke of the dreaded scourge, the Iroquois, and then, with tears still glistening in their eyes, they broke into merry laughter at some careless jest. The rigor of the climate prevented much indulgence in that pleasant outdoor life in which the French peasant delights, but as soon as the late northern spring broke forth, and the air became soft and balmy, the natural instincts reasserted themselves.
To the east of the town, where Viger Square now stands, stretched a swampy marsh where the bulrushes raised their tall heads and the stately purple iris bloomed in profusion; there the long-drawn plaintive cry of the water-fowl echoed through the stillness in melancholy cadences. Back of the settlement, parallel with Notre Dame street, a stream with mimic rush and roar urged its way to the river. Between this and the street, removed from the noise and bustle, lay the quiet cemetery. Some distance away, to the left, nestling at the foot of the mountain, was situated the Mission village established by St. Sulpice for the Christianized Indians. It was dominated by two round stone towers, which afforded considerable protection to the colony; a few French soldiers were always stationed here. Near at hand, in winter half buried in peaked drifts and massive banks of snow, was the shrine of Notre Dame des Nièges.
Opposite the city, on the south bank of the St. Lawrence, extending from Longueuil to Laprairie, lay the fief acquired by that brave colonist Charles Le Moyne, the brother-in-law of Jacques Le Ber. His son, the Baron de Longueuil, notwithstanding the conditions of painful change and fluctuation that attended the fortunes of the colony, reigned like a feudal noble at Longueuil. His stone fort, flanked by four strong towers, resembled a fortified French chateau. A church and various substantial stone buildings clustered around it. On St. Helen’s lovely isle, rising with gently wooded slopes out of the water, the troops often camped. Opposite La Salle’s Seigniory at La Chine, on the south bank, was Sault St. Louis (Caughnawaga), an Indian mission station.
Ville Marie was open to attack on all sides. The town had been recently fortified with palisades. The few defences it possessed were in very indifferent condition. The country around, and for nearly a hundred miles below it, was easily accessible to the Iroquois by the routes of Lake Champlain and the Upper St. Lawrence. In the unsettled and variable condition of the colony, the clerical influence maintained a certain solidity of aim to the community which they had originated, and in which they certainly were the ruling influence.
A Christian outpost established in the wilderness, ravaged by foes, feeble from the exhaustion of a starved and persecuted infancy, Ville Marie still contrived to exist.
Amid all the conflicting elements of her new surroundings, Lydia Longloy contrived dexterously to steer her way. In her old home she had been taught to regard the French as “bloodthirsty heathen,” but with easy adaptability and admirable tact she now showed herself quite as ready to adopt the faith and opinions of these new friends as she was to follow their fashions and manners. A beguiling innocence was her chief characteristic, accompanied as it was by a soft amiability and teachableness both touching and flattering.
Père de Mereil, of the Seminary, who spoke the English language and devoted himself especially to the conversion of heretics, declared enthusiastically that this young girl was the most interesting convert he had ever been privileged to instruct. If the English captive were occasionally betrayed into frivolity by the levity of youth, the worthy priest ascribed these lapses entirely to the worldly influence of Mademoiselle de Monesthrol. Lydia had an easy way of explaining herself to be always in the right, and it would be unjust to attribute the pretty creature’s innocent vanity and frank simplicity to other than natural childish frailty.
Heedlessly generous with the divine faith of youth, Diane de Monesthrol gave her love to the stranger. During the long illness which followed Lydia’s removal to Ville Marie, Diane nursed her with tender care, and in her helplessness she had twined herself around the closest fibres of Diane’s heart. She might not be either very strong or very wise, but she was her own pet, the joint protégé of herself and du Chesne. Lydia’s trials and sufferings invested her with a halo of romantic interest. Diane’s own glowing imagination conferred upon the Puritan maiden qualities of which the stranger had formed no conception. Her pure and simple beauty would have shone alike at a cottage door and in the halls of princes.
Lydia rejoiced in the sweet and exhilarating consciousness of an approving Providence. She found herself placed exactly to her taste. Dreading pain, she was only too well pleased to be allowed to forget the past; finding herself flattered and caressed, she desired nothing better than to enjoy the present. An orphan, thrown upon the charity of distant and reluctant relatives, her life had not been happy. She had no enthusiasm, no imagination, no warm human sympathy to render the severe existence of her childhood endurable. Without in the least realizing it, Lydia had been bored to extinction. She hated now to think of those long, unlovely years of repression of her natural faculties. She had been accustomed to be looked down upon by her thrifty England kindred, who had felt no hesitation in sharply chiding her shortcomings. There her beauty had been of small account; she had no chance of wearing beautiful clothes, and had never listened to the sweet accents of flattery. Her various misdeeds had been severely visited upon her, her frailties exposed to open scorn, with the cheerful prospect held over her that in another existence these trifling vanities should be still more actively rued in fire and brimstone.
Thinking of all this Lydia Longloy rejoiced in her new freedom with the whole strength of her trivial soul. The Puritan settlement of Grotton, near Boston, with its memories of friends and neighbors, its precise restraint and rigid formality, became merely an unpleasant remembrance to be crushed out of sight. All the strict discipline of her New England training fell from her like a cast-off garment. She learned French with rapidity, absorbing the ideas and sentiments of those among whom her lot was cast. She adopted powder and patches, fans and feathers, as though to the manner born. She acquired a deliciously arch imitation of the Marquise’s airs; and if she missed Diane’s dainty grace, her coquetry had a touch of sweet naturalness as of a child’s affectation and extravagance. Once she found that to be pious was considered essential, thereafter her piety satisfied even Anne Barroy.
In the large, hospitable household one more or less made very little difference. Le Ber smiled indulgently upon what he considered his ward’s new caprice, but for him the English prisoner had no charms. There were two whose favor she never succeeded in winning: these were Madame de Monesthrol and Nanon, who quickly arrived at a very distinct perception of the situation.
“Plebeian to the core,” Madame nodded her stately head sagaciously, smelling at her flacon as if to keep off infection. “The little one waters a barren field. All that will count for nothing. This English girl will keep all she can get, and she is clever at getting. Yet one is young but once—can one blame her faith?”
Nanon was still more outspoken in her opinion.
“Bah! that crocodile blonde demoiselle. There are two words to a bargain, and our demoiselle will always be a loser, for she is of those who give lavishly with both hands; this other is a sponge who absorbs all and yields nothing in return.”