This was in November, 1638. So rapidly did all progress that early in spring two pious companies gathered at Dieppe to found amid the unbroken wilderness of Canada the first convents of religious women—the first, indeed, between the Mexican frontier towns and the icy ocean.
On a vessel devoted to St. Joseph, already designated to Mother Mary as the patron of Northern America, embarked May 4, 1639, Mme. de la Peltrie and her attendant, Mother Mary of the Incarnation, and Mother St. Joseph, the only Ursuline of Tours who was permitted to join her, though all desired to do so; with Mother Cecilia of the Holy Cross from the Ursuline convent at Dieppe, three Hospital Nuns of the order of St. Augustine, Father Vimont, Superior-General of the Jesuit Missions in Canada, with two missionaries for that field, Father Chaumonot and Father Poncet.
The voyage was menaced at first by pirates and cruisers; was long and stormy, and the vessel escaped as by a miracle being crushed by a mountain-like iceberg. Yet, amid storm and blast, the vessel was a monastery and chapel; Mass was said, and the nuns, in two choirs, chanted the office of the day. On the 15th of July they reached Tadoussac, at the mouth of the Saguenay, and the passengers in a smaller vessel then ran up the river to Quebec.
At daybreak on the 1st of August the whole population of the little settlement was gathered on the height, their eyes fixed on Ile Orleans. At last boats were seen putting out. The Chevalier de Montmagny, Knight of Malta, Governor of Canada, marched to the water-side with his garrison, followed by all the settlers, and the cannons of the fort saluted the sisters as their barks touched the strand.
Mother Mary of the Incarnation had reached the field of her labors, designated so long by heaven. It was a land endeared to her by the will of God. When she stepped ashore she and her companions prostrated themselves and kissed with respect the land so long desired. They were then escorted to the Church of Our Lady of Recouvrance, where a Te Deum was chanted and Mass offered up. All communicated, and Mother Mary remained long before the altar in a holy ecstasy.
The work of building up her convent began. After visiting the Indian mission at Sillery the Ursulines took up their temporary residence in a little house in the lower town. One of the two rooms was choir, dormitory, and refectory; the other a school, where their first pupils were six Indian and some French girls born in the colony. A little chapel was erected beside this rude convent, and here this little community spent three years amid trials, hardships, and suffering, awaiting the completion of the new structure. Quebec was but a hamlet of two hundred and fifty souls, and, though Mme. de la Peltrie generously devoted her fortune, the work made but slow progress. In the selection of the site Mother Mary showed not only a superior judgment and prudence but a holy submission of her will. When the question of the site was raised their director, Mme. de la Peltrie, and the sisters fixed upon a spot. Mother Mary alone recommended a different one, and gave her reasons. Her opinion was rejected almost without examination, and the building was begun at the proposed place; but the difficulties and disadvantages were soon seen. The work was stopped, and the site suggested by the servant of God was adopted as really the only practicable one.
When the Ursulines were installed in this temporary convent Mother Mary of the Incarnation was at once elected their superior. The instruction of the Indian girls being one of the principal objects of the foundation, Mother Mary commenced the study of the Algonquin language, spoken by all the tribes on the St. Lawrence. It was no easy task, but she acquired it with an ease that astonished all.
The discomforts of these pioneer nuns were not yet completed. Their little convent was crowded to its fullest extent with Indian girls, whom they washed and clothed, and were endeavoring to form to European life, when the good nuns were dismayed to find the smallpox make its appearance in the Indian villages. Their school became an hospital, and the Ursulines stripped themselves of all their linen for the use of the sick.
The arrival of two sisters from the Ursuline convent at Paris gave the holy superior great joy, but the members of the little community were now from three different houses, each with special rules of its own, and great diversity of opinion prevailed as to the rule to be adopted. The patience, piety, and caution displayed by Mother Mary were those of a saint; and her really great mind and thorough knowledge of nature and grace enabled her to blend all into one happy community actuated by the same spiritual instinct.
But the very existence of the house was menaced. The expenses, especially in the great multitude of articles that it was necessary to import constantly from France, and the aid given to the Indians in health and sickness, exceeded all their income, and Mme. de la Peltrie withdrew for a time to Montreal, depriving them of her usual and stipulated contribution. Their agent in France assured them that the establishment must be abandoned, that there was no way left except to return to France. But Mother Mary was undisturbed. Her holy soul never lost its calm, its union with God. She wrote incessantly, and her appeals to hundreds of charitable souls in France brought alms that saved the convent.