“ If Your Eminence continues your favors to us, and these Gentlemen their kindness, I hope that, as soon as we shall know the language, you will see and taste the fruits of a new Church, so much sweeter and more savory as these poor barbarians are now in so pitiable a State. We have already, in our first stammerings, sent some souls to heaven, bathed in the blood of the lamb. ”

“ At this time, our hunters having followed a Moose, and not having been able to capture it, the Apostate began to blaspheme, saying to the Savages, "The God who is sorry when we eat, is now very glad that we have not anything to dine upon." And another time, seeing them bringing some Porcupines, "God," said he, "will be angry because we are going to fill ourselves up." Oh, blasphemous tongue, how wilt thou be chastised! Oh, brutal spirit, how wilt thou be confounded, if God does not take pity on thee! ”

“ For the Sorcerer having begun to lift the mask, and the Apostate to refuse me his consideration, all the hopes I had of helping this sick woman, and of teaching the others, commenced to vanish. I have often wished that a Saint were in my place, to act the Saint; small souls cry out a great deal, and do very little, but one must be content with one's own insignificance. ”

“ When a young Savage of our cabin was dying of hunger, as I shall relate in the following Chapter, they often asked me if I was not afraid, if I had no fear of death; and seeing me quite firm, they were astonished, on one occasion in particular, when I saw them almost falling into a state of despair. When they reach this point, they play, so to speak, at "save himself who can;" throwing away their bark and baggage, deserting each other, and abandoning all interest in the common welfare, each one strives to find something for himself. ”

“ In addition to the Shallop, we had a little bark Canoe, and the tide, rising higher than usual through the force of the wind, robbed us of that; 85 and there we were, more than ever prisoners. I neither saw tears nor heard complaints, not even among the women, upon whose shoulders this disaster fell more particularly, as they are like beasts of burden, usually carrying the baggage of the Savages; on the contrary, everybody began to laugh. ”

“ It is thyself, it is thy own body which will live again, and which will be as beautiful as the day, if thou hast had Faith; if not, it will be horrible, all deformed and destined to the eternal flames. ”

“ I have been told, and have heard it only with great regret, that a large part of the artisans in Spain are Frenchmen. How then! must we give men to our enemies to make war upon us, when we have here so many lands, so beautiful and good, where colonies can be introduced which will be loyal to His Majesty and to Your Eminence? The son of a french artisan born in Spain is a Spaniard; but, if he is born in New France, he will be a Frenchman. ”

“ He is a slave to the Sorcerer, in whose presence he would not dare to move. His brothers and the other Savages have often told me that he has no sense, that he is a buzzard, that he resembles a dog, that he would die of hunger if they did not feed him, that he gets lost in the woods like a European; the women make fun of him,—if some child cries because it does not have enough to eat, they say to it, "Hush, hush, do not cry, Petrichtrich (they call him this in sport) will bring back a Beaver, and then thou shalt have something to eat." ”

“ TWENTY-TWO savages have been baptized this year. If we were acquainted with the languages, I believe the faith would be widely extended. We dare not yet trust baptism to any except those whom we see in danger of death, or to children who are assured to us; for, not yet being able to fully instruct these Barbarians, they would soon show a contempt for our holy Mysteries, if they had only a slight knowledge of them. It is quite true that, if these people were as desirous of learning as are all civilized nations, some [22] of us have a good enough knowledge of their language to teach them. ”

“ A great many of the sick men never cared to ask God to restore their health, saying these words with great resignation: "He is our Father; he knows better than we what is good for us; leave it all to him, his holy will be done." ”

“ As to the chase, the snows not being deep in comparison with those of other years, they could not take the Elk, and so brought back only some Beavers and Porcupines, but in so small a number and so seldom that they kept us from dying rather than helped us to live. My host said to me during this time of scarcity, "Chibiné, harden thy soul, resist hunger; thou wilt be sometimes two, sometimes three or four, days without food: do not let thyself be cast down, take courage; when the snow comes, we shall eat." ”

“ The weather promising to clear up, we embarked again, but scarcely had we gone three leagues when the wind, growing stronger, cast us upon the ice which the tide was bringing back, and caused us to glide quickly through a little stream, and all three to leap upon these great blocks of ice which were along its edge, and thus to gain land, our Savages carrying our bark ship upon their shoulders. ”

“ Alas, what misfortunes would have befallen her in these past years, if this poison had retained its strength in the midst of the State!16 The friends and allies of the most noble crown in the universe have not words enough to acknowledge your kind deeds, and its enemies no longer have courage in your presence. You know when to make both peace and war, as you possess equally goodness and Justice. ”

“ One thing would touch me keenly, were it not that we are not expected to walk before God, but to follow him, and to be contented with our own littleness; it is that I almost fear I shall never be able to speak the Savage tongues with the fluency necessary to preach to them, and to answer at once, without stumbling, their demands and objections, being so greatly occupied as I have been up to the present. It is true that God can make from a rock a child of Abraham. ”

“ You cannot stand upright in this house, as much on account of its low roof as the suffocating smoke; and consequently you must always lie down, or sit flat upon the ground, the usual posture of the Savages. When you go out, the cold, the snow, and the danger of getting lost in these great woods drive you in again more quickly than the wind, and keep you a prisoner in a dungeon which has neither lock nor key. ”

“ Our Savages, having no food for a feast here, made a banquet of smoke; each inviting the others to his cabin, they passed around a little earthen plate containing Tobacco, and every one took a pipeful, which he reduced to smoke, returning his hand to the dish if he wanted to smoke any more. The fondness they have for this herb is beyond all belief. They go to sleep with their reed pipes in their mouths, they sometimes get up in the night to smoke; they often stop in their journeys for the same purpose, and it is the first thing they do when they reënter their cabins. ”

“ I replied, "I have dreamed just the opposite; for in my sleep I saw two Moose, one of which was already killed and the other still living." "Good," said the Sorcerer, "that's very nice; have hope, thou tellest us good news." In truth, I had had this dream some days before. "Well, then," I said to my host, "which of our two dreams will be found to be true? Thou sayest we shall die of starvation, and I say we shall not." ”

“ Behold these tender and delicate Virgins all ready to hazard their lives upon the waves of the Ocean, to come seeking little souls in the rigors of an air much colder than that of France, to endure hardships at which even men would be appalled ”

“ Beat thy drum for ten days, sing and make all the others sing as much as thou wilt, do all thou canst to recover thy health, and if thou art not cured in that time confess that thy din, howls and songs cannot restore thee to health. ”

“ The seas acknowledge your power, for it is you who have joined the New France to the old; and all these peoples, who do not yet know the true God, begin to acknowledge and admire your authority, and to enjoy the sweet fruits of your benevolence. ”

“ I might say the same to those in whom God inspires the thought and desire to cross over the seas, in order to seek and to instruct the Savages. It is for their sake that I shall pen this Chapter, so that, knowing the enemy they will encounter, they may not forget to fortify themselves with the weapons necessary for the combat, especially with patience of iron or bronze, or rather with a patience entirely of gold, in order to bear bravely and lovingly the great trials that must be endured among these people. ”

“ Who has ever come back from that country to bring us news of it?" I answered him that one cannot see the Sky, without recognizing that there is a God; that one cannot conceive that there is a God, without conceiving that he is just, and that consequently he renders to each one according to his works, whence it follows that there are great rewards or great punishments. ”

“ It is a great truth that no one goes to Jesus Christ until the father extends to him the hand. How wonderful a gift is this faith! When these simple Barbarians see that a poor invalid no longer speaks, or that he has fainted, or been seized by a frenzy, they say that the spirit is no longer in the body ”

“ When thou seest the beauty and grandeur of this world,—how the Sun incessantly turns round without stopping, how the seasons follow each other in their time, and how perfectly all the Stars maintain their order,—thou seest clearly that men have not made these wonders, and that they do not govern them ”

“ As I am truthful in speaking about things of the earth, also thou shouldst persuade thyself that I am not lying when I speak to thee about the things of Heaven; and therefore thou oughtst believe what I have told thee about the other life. ”

“ What thou seest with the eyes of the soul may be just as true as what thou seest with the eyes of the body." "No," said he, "I see nothing except with the eyes of the body, save in sleeping, and thou dost not approve our dreams." ”

“ Besides this, some of us are making an arduous and thorough study of the language, an occupation which will some day be so much the more useful as it is now difficult. We also visit the Savages, and 269 through our stammerings try to cast into their souls some little grain of Gospel seed, which will ripen in its time, God willing. These are our more ordinary occupations, besides the observances of Religion, which must never be omitted. In regard to our French people, they are occupied in fortifying, in building, in clearing and cultivating the land. ”

“ These are the very words of the Reverend Mother Elizabeth of saint François, Superior of this Hospital, one of the best regulated in Europe; it is only necessary to enter the hall of the poor patients, to see [36] the modesty of the sisters who serve them, to consider their kindness in the most annoying cases of sickness, to cast the eyes over the cleanliness of this house, to go hence full of affection and to offer a thousand praises to our Lord. If a Monastery like that were in New France, their charity would do more for the conversion of the Savages than all our journeys and our sermons. ”

“ Some women, having thrown to the dogs, either unintentionally or otherwise, some bits of hide from which they make the strings for their snowshoes, I gathered them up and made a good dinner of them; although the dogs themselves, when they have ever so little else to eat, will not touch them. I have often eaten, especially during that month, scrapings of bark, bits of leather, and similar things, and yet they have never made me ill. ”

“ In the third stage, men of intellect, seeing that the world was enjoying things that were necessary and pleasant in life, gave themselves up to the contemplation of natural objects and to scientific researches; whereby the great Republic of men has little by little perfected itself, necessity marching on ahead, politeness and gentleness following after, and knowledge bringing up the rear. ”

“ May God be forever blessed. Now, at last, New France is about to experience the blessings of the mother country; and right, triumphing over injustice, will cause these countries to cease being what they have been for so many centuries,—boundless forests, the abode of [2] barbarism, and the land of infidelity. We begin to see some open country, through the clearings that have been made in different places. The families who come over every year are beginning to change the barbarism of the Savages into the courtesy natural to the French ”

“ Monseigneur, you are the heart and soul of this company and of all New France. You not only can give physical life to an infinite number of poor french workmen, who go begging it among strangers for lack of 245land; but you can give spiritual life to a great number of barbarous people, who die every day in the slavery of Satan for lack of preachers of the Gospel. ”