Count Frontenac / Makers of Canada, Volume 3

by William Dawson LeSueur

CHAPTER IV

THE COMMENCEMENT OF TROUBLES

It is difficult in the present advanced condition of all the arts and sciences which converge on the perfecting of our means of transport and communication to form an adequate idea of the toils, inconveniences, and perils encountered by those who in the seventeenth century attempted the task of colonizing this continent. To say nothing of the difficulties of land travel, the colonist, by the mere fact of crossing the ocean, placed a barrier of two or three months of perilous navigation between himself and the land that had been his home. To the dangers of the sea were added the yet more serious danger of infection on ill-ventilated and pest-breeding vessels. A ship coming to the St. Lawrence could in those days make but one trip to and fro in the year. It is easy to see, therefore, in how critical a position a colony would be that depended in any large measure on supplies brought from the other side. The wreck or capture of one or two vessels might bring it to the verge of starvation. Success in agriculture, again, can only be looked for where there is peaceable and secure possession of the land. If all the results of laborious tillage are liable to be carried off or destroyed at any moment by marauding foes, there is little encouragement to engage in that kind of industry. The population will, by preference, turn to the search for metals, or seek to trade in articles easily marketed. Thus it was that, in the early days, the Canadian settlers gave themselves up almost wholly to hunting and fur-trading. Later, when the French government began to interest itself directly in the settlement of the country, strong efforts were made to induce the colonists to apply themselves to agriculture. Lands were conceded on condition that they should be cleared and cultivated within a specified time, failing which, they should revert to the Crown. The same condition applied to any portion of a grant remaining unimproved after the stipulated period. Under these inducements agriculture began to make a little headway, particularly, as we have seen, after the lesson given to the Iroquois by Tracy.

Still, there was too much hunting and too much trading with the Indians in the woods, as distinguished from legitimate trading in the settlements. Mention has already been made of the coureurs de bois. These were men who, instead of awaiting the arrival of the Indians at the posts of Montreal, Three Rivers, or Quebec, went out to meet them, in order that they might get the pick of the skins they possessed, and perhaps also get the better of them in a trade by first making them drunk. Two classes of coureurs de bois have been distinguished: on the one hand, the men who merely traded in the woods in the way described, and, on the other, those who attached themselves to different Indian bands, and lived the common life of their savage companions. This reversion to savagery had a great fascination for many of the Canadian youths; and, as it led to great moral disorder, the clergy were quite as much opposed to it as the civil governors. As a convert is generally more zealous than one born in the faith, so these converts from civilization to barbarism seemed bent on outdoing the original sons of the forest in all that was wild and unseemly. Like their bronzed associates they would sometimes spurn clothing altogether, even when visiting settlements, and would make both day and night hideous with their carousing and yelling.[13]

Frontenac had received from the king strict instructions to repress the coureurs de bois by all means in his power. The law against them was severe, for the punishment was death. One of the first things Frontenac learnt on arriving in the colony was that Montreal was the headquarters of these lawless men, and that not only did the local governor, Perrot, make no effort to reduce them to order, but that he was commonly understood to be a sharer in their illicit gains. It was further stated that he had an establishment of his own on an island, which still bears his name, at the confluence of the Ottawa and St. Lawrence, where his agents regularly intercepted the Indians on the way to Montreal, and took the cream of the trade. The king's instructions, it was well known, forbade any trading on the part of officials; but Perrot, whose family, as already mentioned, was influential, and whose wife was a niece of the late Intendant Talon, did not think that such a regulation was made for him. In passing through Montreal at the time of his expedition to Cataraqui, Frontenac had requested Perrot to see that the king's instructions respecting the coureurs de bois were obeyed. The latter promised compliance, but the promise was not redeemed. Frontenac at first thought he could get round the difficulty by appointing M. de Chambly as local governor for the district surrounding the Island of Montreal—Perrot's jurisdiction being limited strictly to the island—and thus establishing a kind of cordon by which the comings and goings of the coureurs de bois might be controlled. This arrangement was never put into operation, for the reason that, just about the same time, M. de Chambly received from the king the appointment of governor of Acadia. Perrot, however, accompanied him as far as Quebec, and this gave Frontenac the opportunity of placing under the eyes of the Montreal governor the orders he had received from the court, and urging him to co-operate in giving them effect. Again Perrot promised to do his duty in the matter, but with what degree of sincerity events quickly showed. He had hardly returned to Montreal when the local judge, Ailleboust, who had received personal instructions from Frontenac in regard to carrying out the law, tried to effect the arrest of two offenders who were lodging in the house of one Carion, an officer. Carion refused to permit the arrest, and was upheld therein by Perrot, whereupon the judge took the only course open to him, namely, to notify the governor-general. It was now mid-winter; but, without a moment's hesitation, Frontenac deputed one Bizard, a lieutenant of his guard, to go to Montreal with three men, effect the arrest of Carion, and bring him to Quebec. He gave Bizard at the same time a letter to Perrot, but instructed him not to deliver it till he had first made sure of his prisoner. The lieutenant carried out his instructions, so far as the arrest of Carion was concerned; but, before he could leave Montreal, Perrot pounced down upon him and made him prisoner in turn, asking him how he dared to make an arrest in the limits of the government of Montreal without first notifying him. The scene was witnessed by two prominent residents of Montreal, Lebert, the merchant, and La Salle, of whom we have already heard; and a report of the matter, attested by them, was despatched to Quebec. The choleric Perrot, hearing of this piece of officiousness, as he regarded it, put Lebert also into prison. La Salle, thinking the same treatment might be meted out to him, lost no time in taking the road to Quebec.

The rage of Frontenac at this open defiance of his authority may be imagined. Was it for this that he had come to Canada, to be flouted and set at nought by a subordinate officer? The worst of it was that there was no immediate remedy. The only thing to do at the moment was to summon the culprit to appear before the Sovereign Council at Quebec. But would he come? If he refused, Frontenac had no force to compel him. The force was all on the other side; the governor-general had but his body guard, whereas Montreal was full of men accustomed to Indian warfare, who would probably obey Perrot's orders, especially as there was a standing jealousy between Montreal and Quebec. At this point in his reflections, the count bethought him of writing a letter to the Abbé de Fénelon, Sulpician, of Montreal, who had accompanied him to Cataraqui, and with whom he was on very friendly terms, asking him to represent to Perrot what a serious thing it would be if he aggravated his former misconduct by refusing to go to Quebec. Rightly or wrongly, M. de Fénelon understood this letter as signifying that the governor, while desirous of vindicating his authority, was prepared to compromise the difficulty to some extent, and consequently gave Perrot to understand that, if he would obey the order to go to Quebec, the matter would in all probability be amicably adjusted. He offered to accompany him; and the two set out towards the close of January on a snowshoe tramp to Quebec over the frozen St. Lawrence. They arrived at the capital on the 29th of the month. Perrot at once sought an interview with the governor; but the discussion, far from taking a friendly turn, soon became extremely violent; and the result was that Perrot found himself in an hour's time placed under arrest.

The surprise and chagrin of the Montreal official may be imagined. As for the abbé, his indignation at what he regarded as a breach of faith knew no bounds.[14] Sharp words passed between him and the governor, and he returned to Montreal in a most agitated and rebellious state of mind. A few weeks later, having to preach on Easter Sunday in the parish church, he slipped into his sermon some observations which could only be construed as an attack on the king's representative. Speaking of those who are invested with temporal authority, he said—according to a summary of his discourse given by the Abbé Faillon—that the magistrate who was animated by the spirit of the risen Christ would be strict, on the one hand, to punish offences against the service of his Prince, and prompt, on the other, to overlook those against his own dignity; would be full of respect for the ministers of the altar, and would not treat them harshly when, in the discharge of their duty, they strove to reconcile enemies and establish general good-will; would not surround himself with servile creatures to fill his ears with adulation, nor oppress under specious pretexts persons also invested with authority who happened to oppose his projects; further that such a ruler would use his power to maintain the authority of the monarch, and not to promote his own advantage, and would content himself with the salary allowed him without disturbing the commerce of the country or ill-using those who would not give him a share of their gains; finally, that he would not vex the people by unjustly exacting forced labour for ends of his own, nor falsely invoke the name of the monarch in support of such proceedings.

In every sentence there was a sting. The last words referred to the expedition to Lake Ontario, and the unpaid labour of the men by whom the fort at Cataraqui had been constructed. The preacher, in fact, may be said to have summed up the charges which certain Montrealers were at the time making against the governor, and which the Abbé Faillon, swayed perhaps in some measure by sympathy with a fellow Sulpician, does not hesitate to say were well founded.

The church on that Easter Sunday was filled to its utmost capacity, over six hundred persons being present. Amongst these was the watchful La Salle, who, not only took it all in himself, but by his gestures and movements called the attention of as many persons as possible to what was being said, and its obvious import. It was not only the friends of Frontenac, however, who recognized the drift of the sermon, for the curé of the parish, the Rev. M. Perrot, said to M. de Fénelon as he came down from the pulpit: "Really, sir, you have entered into details which have caused me a great deal of trouble." Other ecclesiastics were affected in the same manner, amongst them La Salle's own brother, an ecclesiastic of the Seminary, who went at once to the Superior, the excellent M. Dollier de Casson, to tell him what had happened. The latter, in turn, foreseeing trouble, sent to tell La Salle that the Seminary had no responsibility whatever for M. de Fénelon's sermon, as it had not been submitted beforehand for approval, and no one had the least notion what he intended to say. The same communication was made in the most earnest terms to M. de la Nauguère, who was temporarily filling the place of governor of Montreal by Frontenac's nomination, with a request that he would convey the assurance to the governor-general.