MISSIONS IN MAINE FROM 1613 TO 1854.
“THE BLOOD OF THE MARTYRS IS THE SEED OF THE CHURCH.”
To the historical student the following paper can have but trifling value, as the writer makes no pretension to originality of matter, and seeks but to bring within the grasp of the general reader, in a condensed form, the gist of many books, a large number of which are rare, and almost inaccessible.
It is hoped, however, that there are many persons who will read with interest a paper thus compiled from undoubted authorities, who have neither the time nor the inclination to consult these authorities for themselves. These persons will learn with wonder of the self-abnegation of the French priests who went forth among the savages with their lives in their hands, with but one thought in their brains, one wish in their hearts, one prayer on their lips—the evangelization of the Indians.
As Shea says: “The word Christianity was, in those days, identical with Catholicity. The religion to be offered to the New World was that of the Church of Rome, which church was free from any distinct national feeling, and in extending her boundaries carried her own language and rites, not those of any particular state.”
The Franciscan, Dominican, and Jesuit bore the heat and burden of the day, and reaped the most bountiful harvest in that part of North America now known as the State of Maine; and the first mission in that neighborhood was planted at Mt. Desert, and called St. Sauveur. A hotel at Bar Harbor is so named, but not one in a hundred of the numerous guests who cross its threshold knows the reason of the French name of their temporary abiding-place.
This reason, and the facts connected therewith, we shall now proceed to give to our readers. In 1610 Marie de Médicis was Regent of France. The king had been assassinated in the streets of Paris in the previous month of May. Sully was dismissed from court. All was confusion and dissension. Twelve years of peace and the judicious rule of the king had paid the national debt and filled the treasury.
The famous Father Cotton, confessor of the late king, was still powerful at court. He laid before the queen the facts that Henri IV. had been deeply interested in the establishment of the Jesuit order in Acadia, and had evinced a tangible proof of that interest in the bestowal of a grant of two thousand livres per annum.
The ambitious queen listened indulgently, with a heart softened, possibly, by recent sorrows, and consented to receive the son of the Baron Poutrincourt, who had just returned from the New World, where he had left his father with Champlain. Father Cotton ushered the handsome stripling into the presence of the stately queen and her attendant ladies. Young Biencourt at first stood silent and abashed, but, as the ladies gathered about him and plied him with questions, soon forgot himself and told wondrous tales of the dusky savages—of their strange customs and of their eagerness for instruction in the true faith. He displayed the baptismal register of the converts of Father Fléche, and implored the sympathy and aid of these glittering dames, and not in vain; for, fired with pious emulation, they tore the flashing jewels from their ears and throats. Among these ladies was one whose history and influence were so remarkable that we must translate for our readers some account of her from the Abbé de Choisy.
Antoinette de Pons, Marquise de Guercheville had been famed throughout France, not only for her grace and beauty, but for qualities more rare at the court where her youth had been passed.
When Antoinette was La Duchesse de Rochefoucauld, the king begged her to accept a position near the queen. “Madame,” he said, as he presented her to Marie de Médicis, “I give you a Lady of Honor who is a lady of honor indeed.”
Twenty years had come and gone. The youthful beauty of the marquise had faded, but she was fair and stately still, and one of the most brilliant ornaments of the brilliant court; and yet she was not altogether worldly. Again a widow and without children, she had become sincerely religious, and threw herself heart and soul into the American missions, and was restrained only by the positive commands of her mistress the queen from herself seeking the New World.
Day and night she thought of these perishing souls. On her knees in her oratory she prayed for the Indians, and contented herself not with this alone. From the queen and from the ladies of the court she obtained money, and jewels that could be converted into money. Charlevoix tells us that the only difficulty was to restrain her ardor within reasonable bounds.
Two French priests, Paul Biard and Enémond Massé, were sent to Dieppe, there to take passage for the colonies. The vessel was engaged by Poutrincourt and his associates, and was partially owned by two Huguenot merchants, who persistently and with indignation refused to permit the embarkation of the priests. No entreaties or representations availed, and finally La Marquise bought out the interest of the two merchants in the vessel and cargo, and transferred it to the priests as a fund for their support.
At last the fathers set sail, on the 26th of January, 1611. Their troubles, however, were by no means over; for Biencourt, a mere lad, clothed in a little brief authority—manly, it is true, beyond his years—hampered them at every turn. They arrived at Port Royal in June, after a hazardous and tempestuous voyage, having seen, as Father Biard writes, icebergs taller and larger than the Church of Notre Dame. The fathers became discouraged by the constant interference of young Biencourt, and determined to return to Europe, unless they could, with Mme. de Guercheville’s aid, found a mission colony in some other spot.
Their zealous protectress obtained from De Monts—who, though a Protestant, had erected six years before the first cross in Maine at the mouth of the Kennebec—a transfer of all his claims to the lands of Acadia, and soon sent out a small vessel with forty colonists, commanded by La Saussaye, a nobleman, and having on board two Jesuit priests, Fathers du Thet and Quentin.
It was on the 1st of March, 1613, that this vessel left Honfleur, laden with supplies, and followed by prayers and benedictions.
On the 16th of May La Saussaye reached Port Royal, and there took on board Fathers Massé and Biard, and then set sail for the Penobscot. A heavy fog arose and encompassed them about; if it lifted for a moment, it was but to show them a white gleam of distant breakers or a dark, overhanging cliff.
“Our prayers were heard,” wrote Biard, “and at night the stars came out, and the morning sun devoured the fogs, and we found ourselves lying in Frenchmans Bay opposite Mt. Desert.”
L’Isle des Monts Déserts had been visited and so named by Champlain in 1604, and Frenchman’s Bay gained its title from a singular incident that had there taken place in the same spring.
De Monts had broken up his winter encampment at St. Croix. Among his company was a young French ecclesiastic, Nicholas d’Aubri, who, to gratify his curiosity in regard to the products of the soil in this new and strange country, insisted on being set ashore for a ramble of a few hours. He lost his way, and the boatmen, after an anxious search, were compelled to leave him. For eighteen days the young student wandered through woods, subsisting on berries and the roots of the plant known as Solomon’s Seal. He, however, kept carefully near the shore, and at the end of this time he distinguished a sail in the distance. Signalling this, he was fortunate enough to be taken off by the same crew that had landed him. On these bleak shores the colonists decided to make their future home, and, with singular infelicity, selected them as the site of the new colony. It is inconceivable how Father Biard, who had already spent some time in the New World, could have failed to suggest to La Saussaye and to their patroness that a colony, to be a success, must be not only in a spot easily accessible to France, but that a small force of armed men was imperative; for, to Biard’s own knowledge, the English had already seized several French vessels in that vicinity.
On these frowning shores La Saussaye landed, and erected a cross, and displayed the escutcheon of Mme. de Guercheville; the fathers offered the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass, and gave to the little settlement the name of St. Sauveur.
Four tents—the gift of the queen—shone white in the soft spring sunshine. The largest of these was used as a chapel, the decorations of which, with the silver vessels for the celebration of the Mass and the rich vestments, were presented by Henriette d’Entraigues, Marquise de Verneuil.
The colonists labored night and day to raise their little fort and to land their supplies. Their toil was nearly over, the vessel, ready for sea, rode at anchor, when a sudden and violent storm arose.
This storm had been felt twenty-four hours earlier off the Isles of Shoals by a fishing vessel commanded by one Samuel Argall. Thick fogs bewildered him, and a strong wind drove him to the northeast; and when the weather cleared, Argall found himself off the coast of Maine. Canoes came out like flocks of birds from each small bay. The Indians climbed the ship’s side, and greeted the new-comers with such amazing bows and flourishes that Argall, with his native acuteness, felt certain that they could have learned them only from the French, who could not be far away. Argall plied the Indians with cunning questions, and soon learned of the new settlement. He resolved to investigate farther, and set sail for the wild heights of Mt. Desert. With infinite patience he crept along through the many islands, and, rounding the Porcupines, saw a small ship anchored in the bay. At the same moment the French saw the English ship bearing down upon them “swifter than an arrow,” writes Father Biard, “with every sail set, and the English flags streaming from mast-head and stern.”
La Saussaye was within the fort, Lieut. la Motte on board with Father du Thet, an ensign, and a sergeant. Argall bore down amid a bewildering din of drums and trumpets. “Fire!” cried La Motte. Alas! the gunner was on shore. Father du Thet seized and applied the match.
Another scathing discharge of musketry, and the brave priest lay dead. He had his wish; for the day before he left France he prayed with uplifted hands that he might not return, but perish on that holy enterprise. He was buried the following day at the foot of the rough cross he had helped to erect.
La Motte, clear-sighted enough to see the utter uselessness of any farther attempt at defence, surrendered, and Argall took possession of the vessel and of La Saussaye’s papers, from among which he abstracted the royal commission. On La Saussaye’s return from the woods, where he had retreated with the colonists, he was met by Argall, who informed him that the country belonged to his master, King James, and finally asked to see his commission. In vain did the French nobleman search for it. Argall’s courtesy changed to wrath; he accused the officer of piracy, and ordered the settlement to be given up to pillage, but offered to take any of the settlers who had a trade back to Virginia with him, promising them protection. Argall counted, however, without his host; for on reaching Jamestown the governor swore that the French priests should be hung. Useless were Argall’s remonstrances, and finally, seeing no other way to save the lives of the fathers, he produced the commission and acknowledged his stratagem.
The wrath of Sir Thomas Dale was unappeased, but the lives of the priests were, of course, safe. He despatched Argall with two additional ships back to Mt. Desert, with orders to cut down the cross and level the defences.
Father Biard was on board, as well as Father Massé; they, with refined cruelty, being sent to witness the destruction of their hopes.
This work of destruction completed, Argall set sail for Virginia. Again a storm arose, and the vessel on which were the ecclesiastics was driven to the Azores. Here the Jesuits, who had been so grossly ill-treated, had but a few words to say to be avenged. The captain of the vessel was not without uneasiness, and entreated the priests to remain in concealment when the vessel was visited by the authorities. This visit over, the English purchased all they needed, and weighed anchor for England. Arrived there, a new difficulty occurred; for there was no commission to show. The captain was treated as a pirate, thrown into prison, and released only on the testimony of the Jesuit Fathers, who thus returned good for evil.
Father Biard hastened to France, where he became professor of theology at Lyons, and died at Avignon on the 17th of November, 1622. Father Massé returned to Canada, where he labored without ceasing until his death, in 1646.
With the destruction of St. Sauveur, the pious designs of Mme. de Guercheville seem to have perished. At any rate, the most diligent research fails to find her name again in the annals of that time. Probably the troubled state of France made it impossible for her to provide the sinews of war, or of evangelization. Nevertheless, the good seed was planted, and zeal for the mission cause again revived in Europe, particularly in the Society of Jesus. Young men left court and camp to share the privations and life of self-denial of the missionaries. Even the convents partook of the general enthusiasm, and Ursuline Nuns came to show the Indians Christianity in daily life, ministering to the sick and instructing the young.
Many years after the melancholy failure of the mission at Mt. Desert, an apparent accident recalled the Jesuit Fathers to the coast of Maine.
In 1642 there was a mission at Sillery, on the St. Lawrence, where had been gathered together a large number of Indian converts, who lived, with their families about them, in peace and harmony under the watchful care of the kind fathers. Among these converts was a chief who, to rescue some of his tribe who had been taken prisoners, started off through the pathless wilderness, and finally reached the English at Coussinoe, now known as Augusta, on the Kennebec.
There the Indian convert so extolled the Christian faith and its mighty promises that he took back with him several of the tribe. These were baptized at Sillery, and became faithful servants of our Lord Jesus Christ. In consequence of the entreaties of these converts, Father Gabriel Drouillettes was sent to the lonely Kennebec.
Here he built a chapel of fir-trees in a place now known as Norridgewock, a lovely, secluded spot. Some years before Father Biard had been there for a few weeks, so that the Indians were not totally unprepared to receive religious instruction. Father Drouillettes was greatly blessed in his teaching, and converted a large number, inspiring them with a profound love for the Catholic faith, which the English, twenty years before, had failed to do for the Protestant religion. He taught them simple prayers, and translated for their use, into their own dialect, several hymns. The savages even learned to sing, and it was not long before the solemn strains of the Dies Iræ awakened strange echoes in the primeval forests.
Even the English, biassed as they were against the Catholics, watched the good accomplished by the faithful servant of the great Master, and learned to regard his coming as a great blessing, though at this very time the stern Puritans at Plymouth were enacting cruel laws against his order.
When the Indians went to Moosehead Lake to hunt and fish, Father Drouillettes went with them, watching over his flock with unswerving solicitude. But the day of his summons to Quebec came, and a general feeling of despair overwhelmed his converts. He went, and the Assumption Mission was deserted; for by that name, as it was asked for on that day, was this mission always designated.
Year after year the Abnakis—for so were called the aborigines of Maine—sent deputations to Quebec to entreat the return of their beloved priest, but in vain; for the number of missionaries was at that time very limited. Finally, in 1650, Father Drouillettes set out with a party on the last day of August for the tiresome eight days’ march through the wilderness; the party lost their way, their provisions were gone, and it was not until twenty-four days afterwards that they reached Norridgewock.
From a letter written at this time by Father Drouillettes we transcribe the following: “In spite of all that is painful and crucifying to nature in these missions, there are also great joys and consolations. More plenteous than I can describe are those I feel, to see that the seed of the Gospel I scattered here four years ago, in land which for so many centuries has lain fallow, or produced only thorns and brambles, already bears fruit so worthy of the Lord.” Nothing could exceed the veneration and affection of the Indians for their missionary; and when an Englishman vehemently accused the French priest of slandering his nation, the chiefs hurried to Augusta, and warned the authorities to take heed and not attack their father even in words.
The following spring Father Drouillettes was sent to a far-distant station, and years elapsed before he returned to Quebec, where he died in 1681, at the age of eighty-eight.
About this time two brothers, Vincent and Jacques Bigot, men of rank and fortune, left their homes in sunny France to share the toil and privations of life in the New World. They placed themselves and their fortunes in the hands of the superior at Quebec, and were sent to labor in the footprints of Father Drouillettes. During their faithful ministrations at Norridgewock, the chapel built by their predecessor was burned by the English, but was rebuilt in 1687 by English workmen sent from Boston, according to treaty stipulations. And now appears upon the scene the stately form of one of the greatest men of that age; but before we attempt to bring before our readers the character and acts of Sebastian Râle, we must beg them to turn from Norridgewock, the scene of his labors and martyrdom, to the little village of Castine. For in 1688 Father Thury, a priest of the diocese of Quebec, a man of tact and ability, had gathered about him a band of converts at Panawauski, on the Penobscot. This settlement was protected by the Baron Saint-Castine. This Saint-Castine was a French nobleman and a soldier who originally went to Canada in command of a regiment. The regiment was disbanded, and Saint-Castine’s disappointed ambition and a heart sore from domestic trials decided him, rather than return to France, to plunge into the wilderness, and there, far from kindred and nation, create for himself a new home.
After a while the baron married a daughter of one of the sachems of the Penobscot Indians, and became himself a sagamore of the tribe. The descendants of this marriage hold at the present day some portion of the Saint-Castine lands in Normandy.
Twice was the French baron driven from his home by the Dutch; twice was the simple chapel burned by them. In 1687 Sir Edmund Andros was appointed governor of New England, and in the following year, sailing eastward in the frigate Rose, he anchored opposite the little fort and primitive home of Saint-Castine. The baron retreated with the small band of settlers to the woods. Andros, being a Catholic, touched nothing in the chapel, but carried off everything else in the village. In 1703 the war known as Queen Anne’s war broke out. Again Saint-Castine was attacked by the English, and his wife and children carried off as prisoners, but were soon after exchanged. From this time the name of Baron Saint-Castine appears in all the annals of the time, as the courageous defender of his faith and of its priests. Father Râle, at Norridgewock, turned to him for counsel and aid, and never turned in vain. From Castine on to Mt. Desert the shores are full of historical interest; for there were many French settlements thereabouts, the attention of that nation having been drawn to that especial locality by a grant of land which M. Cardillac obtained of Louis XIV. in April, 1691. This grant was evidently made to confirm possession. A certain Mme. de Grégoire proved herself to be a lineal descendant of Cardillac, and in 1787 acquired a partial confirmation of the original grant.
Relics of the French settlers are constantly turned up by the plough in the vicinity of Castine, and in 1840 a quantity of French gold pieces were found; but of infinitely more interest was the discovery there, in 1863, of a copper plate ten inches in length and eight in width. The finder, knowing nothing of the value of this piece of metal, cut off a portion to repair his boat. This fragment was, however, subsequently recovered. The letters on the plate are unquestionably abbreviations of the following inscription: “1648, 8 Junii, S. Frater Leo Parisiensis, in Capuccinorum Missione, posuit hoc fundamentum in honorem nostræ Dominæ Sanctæ Spei”—1648, 8th of June, Holy Friar Leo of Paris, Capuchin missionary, laid this foundation in honor of Our Lady of Holy Hope.
In regard to this Father Leo the most diligent research fails to find any other trace. The plate, however, was without doubt placed in the foundation of a Catholic chapel—probably the one within the walls of the old French fort. Father Sebastian Râle sailed in 1689 for America. After remaining for nearly two years in Quebec, he went thence to Norridgewock. He found the Abnakis nearly all converted, and at once applied himself to learning their dialect. To this work he brought his marvellous patience and energy, and all his wondrous insight into human nature. He began his dictionary, and erected a chapel on the spot known now as Indian Old Point. This chapel he supplied with all the decorations calculated to engage the imagination and fix the wandering attention of the untutored savage. The women contended with holy emulation in the embellishment of the sanctuary. They made mats of the soft and brightly-tinted plumage of the forest birds and of the white-breasted sea-gulls. They brought offerings of huge candles, manufactured from the fragrant wax of the bay-berry, with which the chapel was illuminated. A couple of nuns from Montreal made a brief sojourn at Norridgewock, that they might teach the Indian women to sew and to make a kind of lace with which to adorn the altar. Busied with his dictionary and with his flock, Father Râle thus passed the most peaceful days of his life; but this blessed quiet ended only too soon.
In 1705 a party of English, under the command of a Capt. Hilton, burst from out the forest, attacking the little village from all sides at once, finishing by burning the chapel and every hut.
About the same time the governor-general of New England sent to the lower part of the Kennebec the ablest of the Boston divines to instruct the Indian children. As Baxter’s (the missionary) salary depended on his success, he neglected no means that could attract.
For two months he labored in vain. His caresses and little gifts were thrown away; for he made not one convert.
Father Râle wrote to Baxter that his neophytes were good Christians, but far from able in disputes.
This same letter, which was of some length, challenged the Protestant clergyman to a discussion. Baxter, after a long delay, sent a brief reply, in Latin so bad that the learned priest says it was impossible to understand it.
In 1717 the Indian chiefs held a council. The governor of New England offered them an English and an Indian Bible, and Mr. Baxter as their expounder.
The Abnakis refused them one and all, and elected to adhere to their Catholic faith, saying: “All people love their own priests! Your Bibles we do not care for, and God has already sent us teachers.”
Thus years passed on in monotonous labor. The only relaxation permitted to himself by Father Râle was the work on his dictionary. The converts venerated their priest; their keen eyes and quick instincts saw the sincerity of his life, the reality of his affection for them, and recognized his self-denial and generosity. They went to him with their cares and their sorrows, with their simple griefs and simpler pleasures. He listened with unaffected sympathy and interest. No envious rival, no jealous competitor, no heretical teacher, disturbed the relations between pastor and flock. So, too, was it but natural that they should look to him for advice when they gathered about their council-fires.
The wrongs which the Eastern Indians were constantly enduring at the hands of the English settlers kindled to a living flame the smouldering hatred in their hearts, which they sought every opportunity of wreaking in vengeance on their foe. Thus, like lightning on the edge of the horizon, they hovered on the frontier, making daring forays on the farms of the settlers.
It was not unnatural that the English, bristling with prejudices against the French, and still more against Catholics, should have seen fit to look on Father Râle as the instigator of all these attacks, forgetting—what is undeniably true—that Father Râle’s converts were milder and kinder and more Christian-like than any of their Indian neighbors. The good father was full of concern when he heard that a fierce and warlike tribe, who had steadily resisted all elevating influences, were about settling within a day’s journey of Norridgewock. He feared lest his children should be led away by pernicious examples; so he with difficulty persuaded some of the strangers to enter the chapel, and to be present at some of the imposing ceremonies of the mother church. At the close of the service he addressed them in simple words, and thus concluded:
“Let us not separate, that some may go one way and some another. Let us all go to heaven. It is our country, and the place to which we are invited by the sole Master of life, of whom I am but the interpreter.” The reply of the Indians was evasive; but it was evident that an impression was made, and in the autumn they sent to him to say that if he would come to them they would receive his teachings.
Father Râle gladly went at this bidding, erected a cross and a chapel, and finally baptized nearly the whole tribe.
At this time Father Râle wrote to his nephew a letter, in which he says: “My new church is neat, and its elegantly-ornamented vestments, chasubles, copes, and holy vessels would be esteemed highly appropriate in almost any church in Europe. A choir of young Indians, forty in number, assist at the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass, and chant the divine Offices for the consecration of the Holy Sacrament; and you would be edified by the beautiful order they preserve and the devotion they manifest. After the Mass I teach the young children, and the remainder of the morning is devoted to seeing those who come to consult me on affairs of importance. Thus, you see, I teach some, console others, seek to re-establish peace in families at variance, and to calm troubled consciences.”
Another letter still later, in speaking of the attachment of the converts to their faith, says: “And when they go to the sea-shore in summer to fish, I accompany them; and when they reach the place where they intend to pass the night, they erect stakes at intervals in the form of a chapel, and spread a tent made of ticking. All is complete in fifteen minutes. I always carry with me a beautiful board of cedar, with the necessary supports. This serves for an altar, and I ornament the interior with silken hangings. A huge bear-skin serves as a carpet, and divine service is held within an hour.”
While away on one of the excursions which Father Râle thus describes, the village was attacked by the English; and again, in 1722, by a party of two hundred under Col. Westbrook. New England had passed a law imposing imprisonment for life on Catholic priests, and a reward was offered for the head of Father Râle. The party was seen, as they entered the valley of the Kennebec, by two braves, who hurried on to give the alarm; the priest having barely time to escape to the woods with the altar vessels and vestments, leaving behind him all his papers and his precious Abnaki dictionary, which was enclosed in a strong box of peculiar construction. It had two rude pictures on the lid, one of the scourging of our Blessed Lord, and the other of the Crowning of Thorns. This box is now in the possession of the Massachusetts Historical Society, while the dictionary itself is at Harvard.
Father Râle saved himself by taking refuge in a hollow tree, where he remained for thirty-six hours, suffering from hunger and a broken leg.
With wonderful courage Father Râle built up another chapel, and writes thus, after recounting the efforts of the English to take him prisoner: “In the words of the apostle, I conclude: I do not fear the threats of those who hate me without a cause, and I count not my life dear unto myself, so that I might finish my course and the ministry which I have received of the Lord Jesus.”
Again, over the council-fires, the Indian chiefs assembled. They decided to send an embassy to Boston, to demand that their chapel, which had been destroyed by the English, should be rebuilt.
The governor, anxious to secure the alliance of the tribe, listened patiently, and told them in reply that it belonged properly to the governor of Canada to rebuild their church; still, that he would do it, provided they would agree to receive the clergy he would choose, and would send back to Quebec the French priest who was then with them. We cannot forbear repeating here the unequalled satire of the Indian’s reply:
“When you came here,” answered the chief, “we were unknown to the French governor, but no one of you spoke of prayer or of the Great Spirit. You thought only of my skins and furs. But one day I met a French black-coat in the forest. He did not look at the skins with which I was loaded, but he said words to me of the Great Spirit, of Paradise and of hell, and of prayer, by which is the only path to heaven.
“I listened with pleasure, and at last begged him to teach and to baptize me.
“If, when you saw me, you had spoken to me of prayer, I should have had the misfortune to pray as you do; for I was not then able to know if your prayers were good. So, I tell you, I will hold fast to the prayers of the French. I will keep them until the earth burn up and perish.”
At last the final and fatal effort on the life of Father Râle was made, in 1724.
All was quiet in the little village. The tall corn lay yellow in the slanting rays of an August sun, when suddenly from the adjacent woods burst forth a band of English with their Mohawk allies. The devoted priest, knowing that they were in hot pursuit of him, sallied forth to meet them, hoping, by the sacrifice of his own life, to save his flock. Hardly had he reached the mission cross in the centre of the village than he fell at its foot, pierced by a dozen bullets. Seven Indians, who had sought to shield him with their bodies, lay dead beside him.
Then followed a scene that beggars description. Women and children were killed indiscriminately; and it ill became those who shot women as they swam across the river to bring a charge of cruelty against the French fathers.
The chapel was robbed and then fired; the bell was not melted, but was probably afterward buried by the Indians, for it was revealed only a few years since by the blowing down of a huge oak-tree, and was presented to Bowdoin College.
The soft, dewy night closed on the scene of devastation, and in the morning, as one by one the survivors crept back to their ruined homes with their hearts full of consternation and sorrow, they found the body of their beloved priest, not only pierced by a hundred balls, but with the skull crushed by hatchets, arms and legs broken, and mouth and eyes filled with dirt. They buried him where the day before had stood the altar of the little chapel, and sent his tattered habits to Quebec.
It was by so precious a death that this apostolical man closed a career of nearly forty years of painful missionary toil. His fasts and vigils had greatly enfeebled his constitution, and, when entreated to take precautions for his safety, he answered: “My measures are taken. God has committed this flock to my charge, and I will share their fate, being too happy if permitted to sacrifice myself for them.”
Well did his superior in Canada, M. de Bellemont, reply, when requested to offer Masses for his soul: “In the words of S. Augustine, I say it would be wronging a martyr to pray for him.”
There can be no question that Sebastian Râle was one of the most remarkable men of his day. A devoted Christian and finished scholar, commanding in manners and elegant in address, of persuasive eloquence and great administrative ability, he courted death and starvation, for the sole end of salvation for the Indian.
From the death of Father Râle until 1730 the mission at Norridgewock was without a priest. In that year, however, the superior at Quebec sent Father James de Sirenne to that station. The account given by this father, of the warmth with which he was received, and of the manner in which the Indians had sought to keep their faith, is very touching. The women with tears and sobs hastened with their unbaptized babes to the priest.
In all these years no Protestant clergyman had visited them, for Eliot was almost the only one who devoted himself to the conversion of the Indians, though even he, as affirmed by Bancroft, had never approached the Indian tribe that dwelt within six miles of Boston Harbor until five years after the cross had been borne, by the religious zeal of the French, from Lake Superior to the valley of the Mississippi.
But Father Sirenne could not be permitted to remain any length of time with the Abnakis. Again were they deserted, having a priest with them only at long intervals.
Then came the peace of 1763, in which France surrendered Canada. This step struck a most terrible blow at the missions; for although the English government guaranteed to the Canadians absolute religious freedom, they yet took quiet steps to rid themselves of the Jesuit Fathers.
A short breathing space, and another war swept over the land, and with this perished the last mission in Maine. In 1775 deputies from the various tribes in Maine and Nova Scotia met the Massachusetts council. The Indians announced their intention of adhering to the Americans, but begged, at the same time, for a French priest. The council expressed their regret at not being able to find one.
“Strange indeed was it,” says Shea, “that the very body which, less than a century before, had made it felony for a Catholic priest to visit the Abnakis, now regretted their inability to send these Christian Indians a missionary of the same faith and nation.”
Years after, when peace was declared, and the few Catholics in Maryland had chosen the Rev. John Carroll—a member of the proscribed Society of Jesus—as bishop, the Abnakis of Maine sent a deputation bearing the crucifix of Father Râle. This they presented to the bishop, with earnest supplications for a priest.
Bishop Carroll promised that one should be sent, and Father Ciquard was speedily despatched to Norridgewock, where he remained for ten years. Then ensued another interval during which the flock was without a shepherd.
At last a missionary priest at Boston, Father (afterward Cardinal) Cheverus, turned his attention to the study of the Abnaki dialect, and then visited the Penobscot tribe.
Desolate, poor, and forsaken as they had been, the Indians still clung to their faith. The old taught the young, and all gathered on Sundays to chant the music of the Mass and Vespers, though their altar had no priest and no sacrifice.
Father Cheverus, after a few months, was succeeded by Father Romagné, who for twenty years consecrated every moment and every thought to the evangelization of the Penobscot and Passamaquoddy tribes. In July, 1827, Bishop Fenwick visited this portion of his diocese, and in 1831 sent them a resident missionary. A beautiful church stood at last in the place of Romagné’s hut, and two years later Bishop Fenwick, once a father in the Society of Jesus, erected a monument to Father Râle on the spot where he was slain a hundred and nine years before. From far and near gathered the crowd, Protestant as well as Catholic, to witness the ceremony. The monument stands in a green, secluded spot, a simple shaft of granite surmounted by a cross, and an inscription in Latin tells the traveller that there died a faithful priest and servant of the Lord. Bishop Fenwick became extremely anxious to induce some French priest to go to that ancient mission, and a year later the Society of Picpus, in Switzerland, sent out Fathers Demilier and Petithomme to restore the Franciscan missions in Maine. They conquered the difficulties of the Abnaki dialect with the aid of a prayer-book which the bishop had caused to be printed, and in this small and insignificant mission Father Demilier toiled until his death, in 1843.
The successor of Bishop Fenwick resolved to restore the Abnaki mission to the Fathers of the Society of Jesus, by whom it had been originally founded. Therefore, since 1848, the Penobscots and Passamaquoddys have been under the care of the Jesuits, who in that year sent out from Switzerland Father John Bapst to Old Town, on the Penobscot—a short distance from Bangor—where he ministered faithfully to the Abnakis until he nearly lost his life in a disgraceful Know-Nothing riot in 1854.
As we find ourselves thus at the conclusion of our narration, incidents crowd upon our memory of the wondrous sacrifices made by the Catholic clergy in the old missions of Maine; but we are admonished that our space is limited.
Little attention, however, has been paid to the fact that to these Catholic priests alone under God is due the evangelization of the many Indian tribes which formerly haunted our grand old forests. Of these tribes, only a few of the Penobscots are left, and these cling still to the cross as the blessed symbol of the faith first brought to them, “as a voice crying in the wilderness,” by Fathers Biard and Du Thet at St. Sauveur in 1613.