"On ascending," says Abbé Faillon, "from the Lower to the Upper Town by a tortuous road, contrived betwixt the rocks, and on the right hand side, we reach the Cemetery. [72] This road, which terminated at the Parish Church, [73] divided itself into two,—on one side it led to the Jesuits (Jesuits' College) and to the Hospital (Hôtel Dieu); and on the other, to the Indian Fort [74] and to the Castle of Saint Louis. The Castle and King's Fort, guarded by soldiers night and day, under the orders of the Governor, was of an irregular shape, flanked by bastions, fortified by pieces of artillery, and contained in its interior several suites of apartments separated one from the other. At the distance of about forty toises (240 feet) from the Castle was seen, on the south side, a small garden, fenced in, for the use of the Governor, and in front, towards the west, was the Place d'Armes (now the Ring), in the form of a trapezium."
St. John street, for years without a rival as chief commercial thoroughfare for retail trade in dry goods, sees its former busy aspect daily fleeting since the invasion of that bitter foe to wheeled vehicles— the street railway. Its glory is departing: the mercer's showy counter and shelves are gradually replaced by vegetable and fruit stores. Stately shops on Desfosses, Crown and Craig streets are rapidly diverting the Pactolus of the city custom northwards. In the dark ages of the Ancient Capital, when this lengthy, narrow lane was studded with one-story wooden or stone tenements, Old Sol occasionally loved to look down and gladden with his rays its miry footpaths. To our worthy grandfathers 'twas a favorite rendezvous—the via sacra—the Regent street—the Boulevard des Italiens—where the beau monde congregated at 4 P.M., sharp; where the merry jingle of the tandem grelots invaded the frosty air in January; where the freshest toilettes, the daintiest bonnets—those "ducks of bonnets" invented fifty years ago by Mrs. T—d—ensnared admirers; where marten or "silver fox" muffs of portentous size—all the rage then—kept warm and coursing the stream of life in tiny, taper hands, cold, alas! now in Death's pitiless grasp; where the old millionaire, George Pozer, chinked his English guineas or piled up in his desk his army bills. Alas! Jean Bourdon, the pioneer of our land surveyors, you, who, more than two centuries ago, left your name to this vaunted locality—your street as well as your name are getting to be things of the past! Shall we bid adieu to this oft travelled over thoroughfare without deigning a parting glance, as we saunter on, at that low old-fashioned house, No. 84, on the north side of the street, where, for a quarter of a century and more, Monsieur Charles Hamel's book and church ornament emporium held its own against all the other book stores? It is now occupied as a dwelling and a notarial office by an ex-Mayor and late member for the city, P. A. Tourangeau, Esq., N.P. Vividly, indeed, can we recall the busy aspect of its former counter, studded with gilt madonnas, rosaries, some in brass mountings, variegated Job beads for the million; others set in ebony and silver for rich dévotes, flanked with wax tapers, sparkling church ornaments, bronze crucifixes—backed with shelves of books bearing, some, the visa of Monseigneur de Tours—the latter for the faithful; others in an inner room, without the visa—these for city littérateurs; whilst in a shady corner-cupboard, imported to order—sometimes without order— stood a row of short-necked but robust bottles, labelled "Grande Chartreuse" and "Bénédictine," for the especial delectation of a few Quebec Brillat-Savarins—the gourmets!
Monsieur Hamel, a sly, courteous, devout old bachelor, had a honied word, a holy, upturned glance, a jaunty welcome for all and every one of his numerous "dévotes" or fashionable pratiques. A small fortune was the result of the attention to business, thrift and correct calculations of this pink of French politeness. Monsieur Chas. Hamel, honoured by his familiars with the sobriquet "Lily Hamel," possibly because his urbanity was more than masculine, in fact, quite lady-like—the crème de la crème of commercial suavity. This stand, frequented by the Quebec gentry from 1840 to 1865, had gradually become a favourite stopping place, a kind of half-way house, where many aged valetudinarians tarried a few minutes to gossip with friends equally aged, homeward bound, on bright winter afternoons, direct from their daily "constitutional" walk, as far as the turnpike on St. John's road. Professor Hubert Larue [75] will introduce us to some of the habitués of this little club, which he styles Le Club des Anciens, a venerable brotherhood uniting choice spirits among city littérateurs, antiquarians, superannuated Militia officers, retired merchants: Messrs. Henry Forsyth, Long John Fraser, Lieut.-Colonel Benjamin LeMoine, F. X. Garneau, G. B. Faribault, P. A. De Gaspé, Commissary-General Jas. Thompson, Major Lafleur, Chs. Pinguet, the valiant Captain of the City Watch in 1837. The junior members counted from fifty to sixty summers; their seniors had braved some sixty or seventy winters. After discussing the news of the day, local antiquities and improvements, there were certain topics, which possessed the secret of being to them eternally young, irresistibly attractive: the thrilling era of Colonel De Salaberry and General Sir Isaac Brock; the Canadian Voltigeurs, [76] the American War of 1812-14, where a few of these veterans had clanked their sabres and sported their epaulettes, &c. With the exception of an esteemed and aged Quebec merchant, Long John Fraser, all now sleep the long sleep, under the green sward and leafy shades of Mount Hermon or Belmont cemeteries, or in the moist vaults of some city monastery.
On revisiting lately these once famous haunts of our forefathers, the new proprietor, ex-Mayor Tourangeau, courteously exhibited to us the antiques of this heavy walled tenement, dating back possibly to the French régime, perhaps the second oldest house in St. John street. In a freshly painted room, on the first story, in the east end, hung two ancient oil paintings, executed years ago by a well-remembered artist, Jos. Legaré, for the owners, two octogenarian inmates—his friends, Messrs. Michel and Charles Jourdain, architects and builders. They were charged some seventy years ago with the construction of the District Court House (burnt in 1872) and City Jail (now the Morrin College.) Messrs. Jourdain had emigrated to Canada after the French Revolution of 1789. They had a holy horror of the guillotine, though, like others of the literati of Quebec in former days, they were well acquainted with the doctrines and works of Voltaire, Diderot, and d'Alembert. One of the Jourdains, judging from his portrait, must have been a shrewd, observant man. Later on, the old tenement had sheltered the librarian of the Legislative Council, Monsieur Jourdain—a son—quite a savant in his way, and whose remains were escorted to their last resting place by the élite of the Canadian population. It is a mistake to think that culture and education were unknown in those early times; in some instances the love of books prevailed to that degree that, in several French- Canadian families, manuscript copies then made at Quebec exist to this day, of the Latin and French classics from the difficulty of procuring books; there being little intercourse then with Paris book-stores, in fact, no importations of books. Among many quaint relics of the distant days of the Messrs. Jourdain and of their successor, Monsieur Audiverti dit Romain, we saw a most curiously inlaid Marqueterie table, dating, we might be tempted to assert, from the prehistoric era!
Innumerable are the quaint, pious or historical souvenirs, mantling like green and graceful ivy, the lofty, fortified area, which comprises the Upper Town of this "walled city of the North". An incident of our early times—the outraged Crucifix of the Hôtel Dieu Convent, [77] and the Military Warrant, appropriating to urgent military wants, the revered seat of learning, the Jesuits' College, naturally claim a place in these pages. The Morning Chronicle will furnish us condensed accounts, which we will try and complete:—
LE CRUCIFIX OUTRAGÉ.
"An interesting episode in the history of Canada during the last century attaches to a relic in the possession of the Reverend Ladies of the Hôtel Dieu, or, more properly, "the Hospital of the Most Precious Blood of Jesus Christ," of which the following is a synopsis taken from l'Abbé H. G. Casgrain's history of the institution:—
"On the 5th October, 1742, it was made known that a soldier in the garrison in Montreal, named Havard de Beaufort, professed to be a sorcerer, and, in furtherance of his wicked pretensions, had profaned sacred objects. He had taken a crucifix, and having besmeared it with some inflammable substance—traces of which are still to be seen upon it—had exposed it to the flames, whilst he at the same time recited certain passages of the Holy Scripture. The sacrilege had taken place in the house of one Charles Robidoux, at Montreal. Public indignation at this profanation of the sacred symbol and of the Scripture was intense; the culprit was arrested, tried and convicted, and sentenced to make a public reparation, after which he was to serve three years in the galleys. To this end he was led by the public executioner, with a cord around his neck, bareheaded and barefooted, wearing only a long shirt, and having a placard on his breast and back on which was inscribed the legend "Desecrator of holy things" (Profanateur des choses saintes), in front of the parish church in Montreal, and being placed on his knees, he made the amende honorable to God, to the King and to Justice, and declared in a loud and intelligible voice that he had rashly and wickedly desecrated the sacred image of Jesus Christ, and had profaned the words of Holy Scripture. He was then brought to all the cross-roads of the town, where he was scourged by the public executioner, and afterwards lodged in prison to await the sailing of the vessel which was to convey him to France, where he was to undergo the remainder of his sentence. The Bishop of Quebec, (whose vast diocese then included all of North America) immediately wrote a letter to Montreal, inviting the people to make reparation by penances and public prayers for the outrage committed, and ordering a public procession from the parish church to that of Notre Dame de Bonsecours, where the veneration of the cross took place. He then obtained the crucifix from the magistrates, and forwarded it to the reverend ladies of the Hôtel Dieu in Quebec, accompanied by a letter in which he directed that it should be placed in their chapel, and that on a certain day the veneration of it should be made in reparation of the insult offered the Saviour of the world in his sacred image on the cross. The nuns placed it in a reliquary, and to this day it occupies a prominent position on the high altar. In virtue of a brief of His Holiness the Pope, dated the 15th December, 1782, a plenary indulgence was granted to any one who, having fulfilled the usual conditions, should visit the Hôtel Dieu chapel on the first Friday in March of each year. By an indult of the Supreme Pontiff, dated 21st March, 1802, this indulgence was transferred to the first Friday of October, when the veneration of the relic takes place annually.
The cross is of some sort of dark wood, about five or six inches long, bearing a brass figure of our Saviour, with the inscription I. N. R. I. (Jesus Nazarene Rex Judaeorum) overhead and the skull and cross-bones beneath. Attached to it is the certificate of authenticity and the seal of the Bishop, Monseigneur de Pontbriand. In accordance with this arrangement, public service was held in the chapel of the hospital yesterday. The crucifix, enclosed in a gorgeous reliquary and surrounded with a number of lighted tapers, flowers and other ornaments, was placed on one of the lateral altars. Solemn mass was sung at eight o'clock by the Rev. Mr. Rhéaume, of the Seminary, the musical portion being rendered in a most impressive manner by the reverend mothers, to organ accompaniment. In the afternoon, at two o'clock, solemn vespers were chanted by the community, after which an eloquent and impressive sermon was preached by Rev. Father Lepinto, S.J., followed by the benediction of the Blessed Sacrament, which was given, by Rev. Mr. Fraser, of the Seminary, who had previously read a solemn form of "Reparation" in the name of all present, and in which all joined. The Tantum Ergo and other hymns were sung by the nuns, and after the chanting of the CXVI. Psalm, the relic was venerated, each one devoutly kissing it, during which the choir of nuns sang the Crux fidelis. Altogether the ceremony was a very impressive one, as was evidenced by the solemn, subdued manner of the large congregation assembled."—(Morning Chronicle, 2nd Oct., 1880.)