and on the St Lawrence must be utterly destroyed. By
March 1629 a fleet much more powerful than the one of
the previous year was ready for sea. It consisted of the
Abigail, Admiral David Kirke, the William, Captain Lewis
Kirke, the George, Captain Thomas Kirke, the Gervase,
Captain Brewerton, two other ships, and three pinnaces.
On the 25th of March it sailed from Gravesend, and on
the 15th of June reached Gaspe Bay without mishap. All
save two of the vessels were now sent to destroy the
trading-posts on the shores of Acadia, while David Kirke,
with the Abigail and a sister ship, sailed for Tadoussac,
which was to be his headquarters during the summer. The
raiders did their work and arrived at Tadoussac early in
July. Kirke then detached the William and the George and
sent them to Quebec under the pilotage of French traitors.

At Quebec during the winter the inhabitants had lived on
pease, Indian corn, and eels which they obtained from
the natives; and when spring came all who had sufficient
strength had gone to the forest to gather acorns and
nourishing roots. The gunpowder was almost exhausted,
and the dilapidated fort could not be held by its sixteen
half-starved defenders. Accordingly Champlain sent the
Recollet Daillon, who had a knowledge of the English
language, to negotiate with the Kirkes the terms of
capitulation; and Quebec surrendered without a shot being
fired. For the time being perished the hopes of the
indomitable Champlain, who for twenty-one years had
wrought and fought and prayed that Quebec might become
the bulwark of French power in America. On the 22nd of
July the fleur-de-lis was hauled down from Fort St Louis
to give place to the cross of St George. The officers of
the garrison were treated with consideration and allowed
to keep their arms, clothing, and any peltry which they
possessed. To the missionaries, however, the Calvinistic
victors were not so generous. The priests were permitted
to keep only their robes and books.

The terms of surrender were ratified by David Kirke at
Tadoussac on the 19th of August, and on the following
day a hundred and fifty English soldiers took possession
of the town and fort. Such of the inhabitants as did not
elect to remain in the colony and all the missionaries
were marched on board the waiting vessels [Footnote:
There were in all eighty-five persons in the colony,
thirty of whom remained. The rest were taken prisoners
to England; these included the Jesuit fathers Ennemond
Masse, Anne de Noue, and Jean de Brebeuf; the Recollet
fathers Joseph Le Caron and Joseph de la Roche de Daillon;
and several lay brothers of both orders.] and taken to
Tadoussac, where they remained for some weeks while the
English were making ready for the home voyage.

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.

The vessels appeared at Quebec on the 23rd of May, and
landed their passengers amid shouts of welcome from the
settlers, soldiers, and Indians. Presently Champlain's
lieutenant, Duplessis-Bochart, on behalf of the Hundred
Associates, received the keys of the fort and habitation
from Emery de Caen; and at that moment ended the regime
of the Huguenot traders in Canada. Thenceforth, whether
for good or for evil, New France was to be Catholic.

During the English occupation the Indians had almost
ceased to visit Quebec. At first the fickle savages had
welcomed the invaders, for they ever favoured a winner,
and had thronged about the fort, expecting presents galore
from the strong people who had ousted the French. But
instead of presents the English gave them only kicks and
curses; and so they held aloof. Now, however, on hearing
that Champlain had returned, the Indian dwellers along
the Ottawa river and in Huronia flocked to the post.
Hardly more than two months after his arrival, a fleet
of a hundred and forty canoes, with about seven hundred
Indians, swept with the ebb tide to the base of the rock
that frowned above the habitation and the dilapidated
warehouses. Drawing their heavily laden craft ashore,
the chiefs greeted Champlain and proceeded to set up
their camp-huts on the strand. Among them were many
warriors, now grown old, who had been with him in the
attack on the Iroquois in 1615. There were some, too,
who had listened to the teaching of Brebeuf. For the
eager missionaries this was an opportunity not to be
lost; and, resolved to go up with the Hurons, who willingly
assented, Brebeuf, Daniel, and Davost got ready for the
journey to Huronia. On the eve of departure the three
missionaries brought their packs to the strand, and lodged
for the night in the traders' storehouse, hard by the
Indian encampment. But they had an enemy abroad. All in
this party were not Hurons; some were Ottawas from
Allumette Island, under a one-eyed chief, Le Borgne. This
wily redskin wished for trouble between the Hurons and
the French, in order that his tribe might get a monopoly
of the Ottawa route, and carry all the goods from the
nations above down to the St Lawrence. At this time an
Algonquin of La Petite Nation, a tribe living south of
Allumette Island, was held at Quebec for murdering a
Frenchman. His friends were seeking his release; but
Champlain deemed his execution necessary as a lesson to
the Indians. Le Borgne rose to the occasion. He went
among the Hurons, urging them to refuse passage to the
Jesuits, warning them that, since Champlain would not
pardon the Algonquin, it would be dangerous to take the
black-robes with them. The angry tribesmen of the murderer
would surely lay in wait for the canoes, the black-robes
would be slain or made prisoners, and there would be war
on the Hurons too. The argument was effective; Champlain
would not release the prisoner; and the Jesuits were
forced to return to their abode, while the Indians embarked
and disappeared.

There were now six fathers at Notre-Dame-des-Anges. They
kept incessantly active, improving their residence,
cultivating the soil, studying the Indian languages, and
ministering to the settlers and to the red men who had
pitched their wigwams along the St Charles and the St
Lawrence in the vicinity of Quebec. In spite of Noue's
failure among the Montagnais, the courageous Le Jeune
resolved personally to study the Indian problem at first
hand; and in the autumn of 1633 he joined a company of
redskins going to their hunting ground on the upper St
John. During five months among these savages he suffered
from 'cold, heat, smoke, and dogs,' and bore in silence
the foul language of a medicine-man who made the
missionary's person and teachings subjects of mirth. At
times, too, he was on the verge of death from hunger.
Early in the spring he returned to Quebec, after having
narrowly escaped drowning as he Crossed the ice-laden St
Lawrence in a frail canoe. He had made no converts; but
he had gained valuable experience. It was now more evident
than ever that among the roving Algonquins the mission
could make little progress.

In 1634 the Hurons visited the colony in small numbers,
for Iroquois scalping parties haunted the trails, and a
pestilence had played havoc in the Huron villages. Those
who came to trade this year gathered at Three Rivers;
and thither went Brebeuf, Daniel, and Davost to seek once
more a passage to Huronia. The Indians at first stolidly
refused to take them; but at length, after a liberal
distribution of presents, the three priests and four
engages were permitted to embark, each priest in a separate
canoe. They had the usual rough experiences. Davost and
Daniel, who had no acquaintance with the Huron language,
fared worse than Brebeuf. Davost was abandoned among the
Ottawas of Allumette Island, his baggage plundered and
his books and papers thrown into the river. Daniel, too,
was deserted by his savage conductors. Both, however,
found means to continue the journey. When Brebeuf reached
Otouacha, on the 5th of August, his Indian guides, in
haste to get to their villages, suddenly vanished into
the forest. But he knew the spot well; Toanche, his old
mission, was but a short distance away. Thither he hurried,
only to find the village in ruins. Nothing remained of
the cabin in which he had spent three years but the
charred poles of the framework. A well-worn path leading
through the forest told him that a village could not be
far distant, and he followed this trail till he came to
a cluster of cabins. This was a new village, Teandeouiata,
to which the inhabitants of his old Toanche had moved.
It was twilight as the Indians caught sight of the
stalwart, black-robed figure emerging from the forest,
and the shout went up, 'Echon has come again!' Presently
all the inhabitants were about him shouting and
gesticulating for joy.

Daniel and Davost arrived during the month, emaciated
and exhausted, but rejoicing. The missionaries found
shelter in the spacious cabin of a hospitable Huron,
Awandoay, where they remained until the 19th of September.
Meanwhile they had selected the village of Ihonatiria,
a short distance away near the northern extremity of the
peninsula, as a centre for the mission. There a cabin
was quickly erected, the men of the town of Oenrio vying
with the men of Teandeouiata in the task. This residence,
called by Brebeuf St Joseph, was thirty-five feet long
and twenty wide and contained a storehouse, a living-room
and school, and a chapel.

For three years this humble abode was to be the headquarters
of the missionaries in Huronia. During the first year of
the mission all went smoothly. To the Indians the fathers
were medicine-men of extraordinary powers; moreover, the

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