[18] Champigny au Ministre, 24 Oct., 1694. Trouble on this matter had begun some time before. Mémoire du Roy pour Frontenac et Champigny, 1694; Le Ministre à l'Évêque, 8 Mai, 1694.
[19] La Motte-Cadillac à———, 28 Sept., 1694; Champigny au Ministre, 27 Oct., 1694.
Except Frontenac alone, Callières, the local governor, was the man in all Canada to whom the country owed most; but, like his chief, he was a friend of the Récollets, and this did not commend him to the bishop. The friars were about to receive two novices into their order, and they invited the bishop to officiate at the ceremony. Callières was also present, kneeling at a prie-dieu, or prayer-desk, near the middle of the church. Saint-Vallier, having just said mass, was seating himself in his arm-chair, close to the altar, when he saw Callières at the prie-dieu, with the position of which he had already found fault as being too honorable for a subordinate governor. He now rose, approached the object of his disapproval, and said, "Monsieur, you are taking a place which belongs only to Monsieur de Frontenac." Callières replied that the place was that which properly belonged to him. The bishop rejoined that, if he did not leave it, he himself would leave the church. "You can do as you please," said Callières; and the prelate withdrew abruptly through the sacristy, refusing any farther part in the ceremony. [20] When the services were over, he ordered the friars to remove the obnoxious prie-dieu. They obeyed; but an officer of Callières replaced it, and, unwilling to offend him, they allowed it to remain. On this, the bishop laid their church under an interdict; that is, he closed it against the celebration of all the rites of religion. [21] He then issued a pastoral mandate, in which he charged Father Joseph Denys, their superior, with offences which he "dared not name for fear of making the paper blush." [22] His tongue was less bashful than his pen; and he gave out publicly that the father superior had acted as go-between in an intrigue of his sister with the Chevalier de Callières. [23] It is said that the accusation was groundless, and the character of the woman wholly irreproachable. The Récollets submitted for two months to the bishop's interdict, then refused to obey longer, and opened their church again.
[20] Procès-verbal du Père Hyacinthe Perrault, Commissaire Provincial des Récollets (Archives Nationales); Mémoire touchant le Démeslé entre M. l'Évesque de Québec et le Chevalier de Callières (Ibid.).
[21] Mandement ordonnant de fermer l'Église des Récollets, 13 Mai, 1694.
[22] "Le Supérieur du dit Couvent estant lié avec le Gouverneur de la dite ville par des interests que tout le monde scait et qu'on n'oseroit exprimer de peur de faire rougir le papier." Extrait du Mandement de l'Évesque de Québec (Archives Nationales). He had before charged Mareuil with language "capable de faire rougir le ciel."
[23] "Mr. l'Évesque accuse publiquement le Rev. Père Joseph, supérieur des Récollets de Montréal, d'être l'entremetteur d'une galanterie entre sa sœur et le Gouverneur. Cependant Mr. l'Évesque sait certainement que le Père Joseph est l'un des meilleurs et des plus saints religieux de son ordre. Ce qu'il allègue du prétendu commerce entre le Gouverneur et la Dame de la Naudière (sœur du Père Joseph) est entièrement faux, et il l'a publié avec scandale, sans preuve et contre toute apparence, la ditte Dame ayant toujours eu une conduite irréprochable." Mémoire touchant le Démeslé, etc. Champigny also says that the bishop has brought this charge, and that Callières declares that he has told a falsehood. Champigny au Ministre, 27 Oct., 1694.
Quebec, Three Rivers, Sorel, and Montreal had all been ruffled by the breeze of these dissensions, and the farthest outposts of the wilderness were not too remote to feel it. La Motte-Cadillac had been sent to replace Louvigny in the command of Michillimackinac, where he had scarcely arrived, when trouble fell upon him. "Poor Monsieur de la Motte-Cadillac," says Frontenac, "would have sent you a journal to show you the persecutions he has suffered at the post where I placed him, and where he does wonders, having great influence over the Indians, who both love and fear him, but he has had no time to copy it. Means have been found to excite against him three or four officers of the posts dependent on his, who have put upon him such strange and unheard of affronts, that I was obliged to send them to prison when they came down to the colony. A certain Father Carheil, the Jesuit who wrote me such insolent letters a few years ago, has played an amazing part in this affair. I shall write about it to Father La Chaise, that he may set it right. Some remedy must be found; for, if it continues, none of the officers who were sent to Michillimackinac, the Miamis, the Illinois, and other places, can stay there on account of the persecutions to which they are subjected, and the refusal of absolution as soon as they fail to do what is wanted of them. Joined to all this is a shameful traffic in influence and money. Monsieur de Tonty could have written to you about it, if he had not been obliged to go off to the Assinneboins, to rid himself of all these torments." [24] In fact, there was a chronic dispute at the forest outposts between the officers and the Jesuits, concerning which matter much might be said on both sides.
[24] Frontenac à M. de Lagny, 2 Nov., 1695
The bishop sailed for France. "He has gone," writes Callières, "after quarrelling with everybody." The various points in dispute were set before the king. An avalanche of memorials, letters, and procès-verbaux, descended upon the unfortunate monarch; some concerning Mareuil and the quarrels in the council, others on the excommunication of Desjordis, and others on the troubles at Montreal. They were all referred to the king's privy council. [25] An adjustment was effected: order, if not harmony, was restored; and the usual distribution of advice, exhortation, reproof, and menace, was made to the parties in the strife. Frontenac was commended for defending the royal prerogative, censured for violence, and admonished to avoid future quarrels. [26] Champigny was reproved for not supporting the governor, and told that "his Majesty sees with great pain that, while he is making extraordinary efforts to sustain Canada at a time so critical, all his cares and all his outlays are made useless by your misunderstanding with Monsieur de Frontenac." [27] The attorney-general was sharply reprimanded, told that he must mend his ways or lose his place, and ordered to make an apology to the governor. [28] Villeray was not honored by a letter, but the intendant was directed to tell him that his behavior had greatly displeased the king. Callières was mildly advised not to take part in the disputes of the bishop and the Récollets. [29] Thus was conjured down one of the most bitter as well as the most needless, trivial, and untimely, of the quarrels that enliven the annals of New France.