[90] See Histoire de la Gazette de Québec—Gérin, p. 24.
[91] The "Neptune" Inn was opened as a house of public entertainment for captains, by William Arrowsmith, on 1st May, 1809 (See Quebec Mercury, 1st May, 1809.)
[92] DOINGS OF THE PRESS GANG AT QUEBEC, 1807—Le Canadien newspaper, of September, 1807, thus records the death, on the 13th September of that year, of Simon Latresse, from the discharge of fire arms.—It had taken place on the evening of the preceding Saturday, the perpetrator being one of the crew of H.M. man-of-war Blossom, commanded by Captain George Picket. "Latresse," says this journal, "was at the time attending a dance in St. John suburbs, when a press-gang, under the charge of Lieut. Andrel, entered. Latresse was laid hold of, but his great strength and activity enabled him to shake off his captors. He then took to his heels and received from one of them a pistol shot, the ball going through his body. He was a native of Montreal, aged 25 years; had been for seven years a voyageur to Michilimakinac; was noted for his fidelity and attachment to his employers. Latresse leaves a widowed mother of 75 years of age to mourn his loss, of whom he was the support". The poet Quesnel wrote a fine piece of verse to commemorate the event. It is to be found in the Bibliothèque Canadienne of 1826.
[93] Quebec, 5th December, 1816. "At a meeting of the Board of Green Cloth, held at the "Neptune" Inn, John Wm. Woolsey in the chair, it was unanimously decided to establish a Merchants' Exchange in the lower part of the Neptune Inn, &c. (Then follow the resolutions.) Subscription to be two guineas per annum.
"On motion of John Jones, Esq., Resolved that the following gentlemen do form a Committee of Management:—Thomas Edward Brown, James Heath, George Symes, John W. Woolsey and Robert Melvin."
[94] William Finlay, an eminent merchant of Quebec, and one of its chief benefactors, made several bequests which the city authorities invested in the purchase of this market. Mr. Finlay died at the Island of Madeira, whether he had gone for his health, about the year 1831.
[95] "ROMPU VIF," 1752—A good deal of patriotic indignation has been bubbled over at the mention of what was termed the Old World mode of punishing high treason against the State. With respect to the atrocious sentence pronounced by Chief Justice Osgood, at Quebec, in 1797, carried out on the criminal David McLane, the "disembowling and hanging" particulars (so well related by an eye-witness, the late P. A. DeGaspé, Esq.,) ought not to be considered such a novelty in Canada.
A Montreal antiquary, Mr. P. S. Murphy, has unearthed a sentence pronounced at Montreal in the good old Bourbon times, 6th June, 1752, which shows that the terrible punishment of "breaking alive" (rompu vif) was in force under the French régime.
"Belisle," says Mr. P. S. Murphy, "was condemned to 'torture ordinary and extraordinary,' then to be broken alive on a scaffold erected in the market place. The awful sentence was carried out to the letter, his body buried in Guy street, Montreal, and a Red Cross erected to mark the spot."
Translation.—Extract from the requisition of H. C. Majesty's Attorney:—