But of the seven thousand French who peopled Canada in 1672 it is probable that not more than four hundred were scattered through the forest. The greater part of the inhabitants occupied the seigneuries along the St Lawrence and the Richelieu. Tadoussac was hardly more than a trading-post. Quebec, Three Rivers, and Montreal were but villages. In the main the life of the people was the life of the seigneuries—an existence well calculated to bring out in relief the ancestral heroism of the French race. The grant of seigneurial rights did not imply that the recipient had been a noble in France. The earliest seigneur, Louis Hébert, was a Parisian apothecary, and many of the Canadian gentry were sprung from the middle class. There was nothing to induce the dukes, the counts, or even the barons of France to settle on the soil of Canada. The governor was a noble, but he lived at the Château St Louis. The seigneur who desired to achieve success must reside on the land he had received and see that his tenants cleared it of the virgin forest. He could afford little luxury, for in almost all cases his private means were small. But a seigneur who fulfilled the conditions of his grant could look forward to occupying a relatively greater position in Canada than he could have occupied in France, and to making better provision for his children.
Both the seigneur and his tenant, the habitant, had a stake in Canada and helped to maintain the colony in the face of grievous hardships. The courage and tenacity of the French Canadian are attested by what he endured throughout the years when he was fighting for his foothold. And if he suffered, his wife suffered still more. The mother who brought up a large family in the midst of stumps, bears, and Iroquois knew what it was to be resourceful.
Obviously the Canada of 1672 lacked many things—among them the stern resolve which animated the Puritans of New England that their sons should have the rudiments of an education.[[5]] At this point the contrast between New France and New England discloses conflicting ideals of faith and duty. In later years the problem of knowledge assumed larger proportions, but during the period of Frontenac the chief need of Canada was heroism. Possessing this virtue abundantly, Canadians lost no time in lamentations over the lack of books or the lack of wealth. The duty of the hour was such as to exclude all remoter vistas. When called on to defend his hearth and to battle for his race, the Canadian was ready.
[[1]] See The Great Intendant in this Series.
[[2]] Anne Robert Jacques Turgot (1727-81), a statesman, thinker, and philanthropist of the first order. It was as intendant of Limoges that Turgot disclosed his great powers. He held his post for thirteen years (1761-74), and effected improvements which led Louis XVI to appoint him comptroller-general of the Kingdom.