There were many Huguenots serving under the Kirkes, and the Huguenots, as we have seen, were bitterly hostile to the Jesuits. On the voyage to England Brebeuf, Noue, and Masse had to bear insult and harsh treatment from men of their own race, but of another faith. And they bore it bravely, confident that God in His good time would restore them to their chosen field of labour.
The vessels reached Plymouth on the 20th of November, to learn that the capture of Quebec had taken place in time of peace. The Convention of Susa had ended the war between France and England on April 24, 1629; thus the achievement of the Adventurers was wasted. Three years later, by the Treaty of St Germain-en-Laye, the Adventurers were forced not only to restore the posts captured in North America, but to pay a sum to the French for the property seized at Quebec.
Towards the end of November the missionaries, both Recollets and Jesuits, left the English fleet at Dover roads, and proceeded to their various colleges in France, patiently to await the time when they should be permitted to return to Canada.
CHAPTER V
THE RETURN TO HURONIA
After the Treaty of St Germain-en-Laye, which restored to France all the posts in America won by the Adventurers of Canada, the French king took steps to repossess Quebec. But, by way of compensation to the Caens for their losses in the war, Emery de Caen was commissioned to take over the post from the Kirkes and hold it for one year, with trading rights. Accordingly, in April 1632, Caen sailed from Honfleur; and he carried a dispatch under the seal of Charles I, king of England, addressed to Lewis Kirke at Quebec, commanding him to surrender the captured fort.
On the 5th of July the few French inhabitants at Quebec broke out into wild cries of joy as they saw Caen's ship approaching under full sail, at its peak the white flag sprinkled with golden lilies; and when they learned that the vessel brought two Jesuit fathers, their hearts swelled with inexpressible rapture. During the three years of English possession the Catholics had been without priests, and they hungered for their accustomed forms of worship. The priests now arriving were Paul Le Jeune, the new superior-general, and Anne de Noue, with a lay brother, Gilbert Burel. They hastened ashore; and were followed by the inhabitants to the home of the widow Hebert, the only substantial residence in the colony, where, in the ceremony of the Mass, they celebrated the renewal of the Canadian mission.
Quebec was in a sad condition. The English, knowing of the negotiations for its return to the French, had left the ground uncultivated and the buildings in ruins. The missionaries found the residence of Notre-Dame-des-Anges plundered and partly destroyed; but they went to work cheerfully to restore it, and before autumn it was quite habitable. Meanwhile Le Jeune had begun his labours tentatively as a teacher. His pupils were an Indian lad and a little negro, the latter a present from the English to Madame Hebert. The class grew larger; during the winter a score of children answered the call of Le Jeune's bell, and sat at his feet learning the Credo, the Ave, and the Paternoster, which he had translated into Algonquin rhymes. In order to learn the Indian language Le Jeune was himself a pupil, his teacher a Montagnais named Pierre, a worthless wretch who had been in France and had learned some French. Le Jeune passed the winter of 1632-33 in teaching, studying, and ministering to the inhabitants at the trading-post. Save for a short period, he had the companionship of Noue, a devoted missionary, eager to play his part in the field, but, as we have seen, without the necessary vigour of mind or body. Though Noue had failed in Huronia, he thought he might succeed on the St Lawrence. And in the autumn, just as the first snows were beginning to whiten the ground, when a band of friendly Montagnais, encamped near the residence, invited him to their wintering grounds, he bade farewell to Le Jeune and vanished with the Indians into the northern forest. But the rigours of the wigwams were too much for him, and after three weeks he returned to Notre-Dame- des-Anges in an exhausted condition.
In the meantime the Hundred Associates were getting ready to enter into the enjoyment of their Canadian domain, but now without the hopeful ardour and exalted purpose which had characterized their first ill-fated expedition. The guiding hand in the revival of the colony, under the feudal suzerainty of Richelieu's company, was Champlain. He was appointed on March 1, 1633, lieutenant-general in New France, 'with jurisdiction throughout all the extent of the St Lawrence and other rivers.' Twenty-three days later he sailed from Dieppe with three armed ships, the St Pierre, the St Jean, and the Don de Dieu. These ships carried two hundred persons, among them the Jesuit fathers Jean de Brebeuf and Ennemond Masse. At Cape Breton they were joined by two more Jesuits, Antoine Daniel and Ambroise Davost, who had gone there the year before.
There were no Recollets in the company, for, greatly to their disappointment, the Recollets were now barred from the colony. For this the Jesuits have been unjustly blamed. It was, however, wholly due to the policy of the Hundred Associates. At one of their meetings Jean de Lauzon, the president, afterwards a governor of New France, formally protested against the return of the Recollets. The Associates desired to economize, and did not wish to support two religious orders in the colony; and so the mendicant Recollets were excluded.