A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P R S T U V W X Z

The Jesuits in North America in the Seventeenth Century

F >> Francis Parkman >> The Jesuits in North America in the Seventeenth Century




[ 1 Ragueneau, Relation des Hurons, 1648, 77. Compare Lettre du P. Jean
de Brébeuf au T. R. P. Vincent Carafa, Général de la Compagnie de Jésus,
Sainte Marie, 2 Juin, 1648, in Carayon. ]

[ 2 See Introduction. ]

First of all, the Huron chiefs summoned the Jesuits to meet them at a
grand council of the nation, when an old orator, chosen by the rest,
rose and addressed Ragueneau, as chief of the French, in the following
harangue. Ragueneau, who reports it, declares that he has added nothing
to it, and the translation is as literal as possible.

"My Brother," began the speaker, "behold all the tribes of our league
assembled!"--and he named them one by one. "We are but a handful; you
are the prop and stay of this nation. A thunderbolt has fallen from the
sky, and rent a chasm in the earth. We shall fall into it, if you do not
support us. Take pity on us. We are here, not so much to speak as to
weep over our loss and yours. Our country is but a skeleton, without
flesh, veins, sinews, or arteries; and its bones hang together by a
thread. This thread is broken by the blow that has fallen on the head of
your nephew, [ 1 ] for whom we weep. It was a demon of Hell who placed
the hatchet in the murderer's hand. Was it you, Sun, whose beams shine
on us, who led him to do this deed? Why did you not darken your light,
that he might be stricken with horror at his crime? Were you his
accomplice? No; for he walked in darkness, and did not see where he
struck. He thought, this wretched murderer, that he aimed at the head of
a young Frenchman; but the blow fell upon his country, and gave it a
death-wound. The earth opens to receive the blood of the innocent victim,
and we shall be swallowed up in the chasm; for we are all guilty.
The Iroquois rejoice at his death, and celebrate it as a triumph; for
they see that our weapons are turned against each other, and know well
that our nation is near its end.

"Brother, take pity on this nation. You alone can restore it to life.
It is for you to gather up all these scattered bones, and close this
chasm that opens to ingulf us. Take pity on your country. I call it
yours, for you are the master of it; and we came here like criminals to
receive your sentence, if you will not show us mercy. Pity those who
condemn themselves and come to ask forgiveness. It is you who have given
strength to the nation by dwelling with it; and if you leave us, we shall
be like a wisp of straw torn from the ground to be the sport of the wind.
This country is an island drifting on the waves, for the first storm to
overwhelm and sink. Make it fast again to its foundation, and posterity
will never forget to praise you. When we first heard of this murder,
we could do nothing but weep; and we are ready to receive your orders and
comply with your demands. Speak, then, and ask what satisfaction you
will, for our lives and our possessions are yours; and even if we rob our
children to satisfy you, we will tell them that it is not of you that
they have to complain, but of him whose crime has made us all guilty.
Our anger is against him; but for you we feel nothing but love. He
destroyed our lives; and you will restore them, if you will but speak and
tell us what you will have us do."

[ 1 The usual Indian figure in such cases, and not meant to express an
actual relationship;--"Uncle" for a superior, "Brother" for an equal,
"Nephew" for an inferior. ]

Ragueneau, who remarks that this harangue is a proof that eloquence is
the gift of Nature rather than of Art, made a reply, which he has not
recorded, and then gave the speaker a bundle of small sticks, indicating
the number of presents which he required in satisfaction for the murder.
These sticks were distributed among the various tribes in the council,
in order that each might contribute its share towards the indemnity.
The council dissolved, and the chiefs went home, each with his allotment
of sticks, to collect in his village a corresponding number of presents.
There was no constraint; those gave who chose to do so; but, as all were
ambitious to show their public spirit, the contributions were ample.
No one thought of molesting the murderers. Their punishment was their
shame at the sacrifices which the public were making in their behalf.

The presents being ready, a day was set for the ceremony of their
delivery; and crowds gathered from all parts to witness it. The assembly
was convened in the open air, in a field beside the mission-house of
Sainte Marie; and, in the midst, the chiefs held solemn council. Towards
evening, they deputed four of their number, two Christians and two
heathen, to carry their address to the Father Superior. They came,
loaded with presents; but these were merely preliminary. One was to open
the door, another for leave to enter; and as Sainte Marie was a large
house, with several interior doors, at each one of which it behooved them
to repeat this formality, their stock of gifts became seriously reduced
before they reached the room where Father Ragueneau awaited them.
On arriving, they made him a speech, every clause of which was confirmed
by a present. The first was to wipe away his tears; the second, to
restore his voice, which his grief was supposed to have impaired; the
third, to calm the agitation of his mind; and the fourth, to allay the
just anger of his heart. [ 1 ] These gifts consisted of wampum and the
large shells of which it was made, together with other articles,
worthless in any eyes but those of an Indian. Nine additional presents
followed: four for the four posts of the sepulchre or scaffold of the
murdered man; four for the cross-pieces which connected the posts; and
one for a pillow to support his head. Then came eight more,
corresponding to the eight largest bones of the victim's body, and also
to the eight clans of the Hurons. [ 2 ] Ragueneau, as required by
established custom, now made them a present in his turn. It consisted of
three thousand beads of wampum, and was designed to soften the earth,
in order that they might not be hurt, when falling upon it, overpowered
by his reproaches for the enormity of their crime. This closed the
interview, and the deputation withdrew.

[ 1 Ragueneau himself describes the scene. Relation des Hurons, 1648,
80. ]

[ 2 Ragueneau says, "les huit nations"; but, as the Hurons consisted of
only four, or at most five, nations, he probably means the clans.
For the nature of these divisions, see Introduction. ]

The grand ceremony took place on the next day. A kind of arena had been
prepared, and here were hung the fifty presents in which the atonement
essentially consisted,--the rest, amounting to as many more, being only
accessory. [ 1 ] The Jesuits had the right of examining them all,
rejecting any that did not satisfy them, and demanding others in place of
them. The naked crowd sat silent and attentive, while the orator in the
midst delivered the fifty presents in a series of harangues, which the
tired listener has not thought it necessary to preserve. Then came the
minor gifts, each with its signification explained in turn by the
speaker. First, as a sepulchre had been provided the day before for the
dead man, it was now necessary to clothe and equip him for his journey to
the next world; and to this end three presents were made. They
represented a hat, a coat, a shirt, breeches, stockings, shoes, a gun,
powder, and bullets; but they were in fact something quite different,
as wampum, beaver-skins, and the like. Next came several gifts to close
up the wounds of the slain. Then followed three more. The first closed
the chasm in the earth, which had burst through horror of the crime.
The next trod the ground firm, that it might not open again; and here the
whole assembly rose and danced, as custom required. The last placed a
large stone over the closed gulf; to make it doubly secure.

[ 1 The number was unusually large,--partly because the affair was
thought very important, and partly because the murdered man belonged to
another nation. See Introduction. ]

Now came another series of presents, seven in number,--to restore the
voices of all the missionaries,--to invite the men in their service to
forget the murder,--to appease the Governor when he should hear of
it,--to light the fire at Sainte Marie,--to open the gate,--to launch the
ferry boat in which the Huron visitors crossed the river,--and to give
back the paddle to the boy who had charge of the boat. The Fathers,
it seems, had the right of exacting two more presents, to rebuild their
house and church,--supposed to have been shaken to the earth by the late
calamity; but they forbore to urge the claim. Last of all were three
gifts to confirm all the rest, and to entreat the Jesuits to cherish an
undying love for the Hurons.

The priests on their part gave presents, as tokens of good-will; and with
that the assembly dispersed. The mission had gained a triumph, and its
influence was greatly strengthened. The future would have been full of
hope, but for the portentous cloud of war that rose, black and wrathful,
from where lay the dens of the Iroquois.




CHAPTER XXV.

1648, 1649.

SAINTE MARIE.


THE CENTRE OF THE MISSIONS.--FORT.--CONVENT.--HOSPITAL.--CARAVANSARY.--
CHURCH.--THE INMATES OF SAINTE MARIE.--DOMESTIC ECONOMY.--MISSIONS.--
A MEETING OF JESUITS.--THE DEAD MISSIONARY.


The River Wye enters the Bay of Glocester, an inlet of the Bay of
Matchedash, itself an inlet of the vast Georgian Bay of Lake Huron.
Retrace the track of two centuries and more, and ascend this little
stream in the summer of the year 1648. Your vessel is a birch canoe,
and your conductor a Huron Indian. On the right hand and on the left,
gloomy and silent, rise the primeval woods; but you have advanced
scarcely half a league when the scene is changed, and cultivated fields,
planted chiefly with maize, extend far along the bank, and back to the
distant verge of the forest. Before you opens the small lake from which
the stream issues; and on your left, a stone's throw from the shore,
rises a range of palisades and bastioned walls, inclosing a number of
buildings. Your canoe enters a canal or ditch immediately above them,
and you land at the Mission, or Residence, or Fort of Sainte Marie.

Here was the centre and base of the Huron missions; and now, for once,
one must wish that Jesuit pens had been more fluent. They have told us
but little of Sainte Marie, and even this is to be gathered chiefly from
incidental allusions. In the forest, which long since has resumed its
reign over this memorable spot, the walls and ditches of the
fortifications may still be plainly traced; and the deductions from these
remains are in perfect accord with what we can gather from the Relations
and letters of the priests. [ Before me is an elaborate plan of the
remains, taken on the spot. ] The fortified work which inclosed the
buildings was in the form of a parallelogram, about a hundred and
seventy-five feet long, and from eighty to ninety wide. It lay parallel
with the river, and somewhat more than a hundred feet distant from it.
On two sides it was a continuous wall of masonry, [ 1 ] flanked with
square bastions, adapted to musketry, and probably used as magazines,
storehouses, or lodgings. The sides towards the river and the lake had
no other defences than a ditch and palisade, flanked, like the others,
by bastions, over each of which was displayed a large cross. [ 2 ]
The buildings within were, no doubt, of wood; and they included a church,
a kitchen, a refectory, places of retreat for religious instruction and
meditation, [ 3 ] and lodgings for at least sixty persons. Near the
church, but outside the fortification, was a cemetery. Beyond the ditch
or canal which opened on the river was a large area, still traceable,
in the form of an irregular triangle, surrounded by a ditch, and
apparently by palisades. It seems to have been meant for the protection
of the Indian visitors who came in throngs to Sainte Marie, and who were
lodged in a large house of bark, after the Huron manner. [ 4 ] Here,
perhaps, was also the hospital, which was placed without the walls,
in order that Indian women, as well as men, might be admitted into it.
[ 5 ]

[ 1 It seems probable that the walls, of which the remains may still be
traced, were foundations supporting a wooden superstructure. Ragueneau,
in a letter to the General of the Jesuits, dated March 13, 1650, alludes
to the defences of Saint Marie as "une simple palissade." ]

[ 2 "Quatre grandes Croix qui sont aux quatre coins de nostre enclos."--
Ragueneau, Relation des Hurons, 1648, 81. ]

[ 3 It seems that these places, besides those for the priests, were of
two kinds,--"vne retraite pour les pelerins (Indians), enfin vn lieu plus
separé, où les infideles, qui n'y sont admis que de iour au passage,
y puissent tousiours receuoir quelque bon mot pour leur salut."--Lalemant,
Relation des Hurons, 1644, 74. ]

[ 4 At least it was so in 1642. "Nous leur auons dressé vn Hospice ou
Cabane d'écorce."--Ibid., 1642, 57. ]

[ 5 "Cet hospital est tellement separé de nostre demeure, que non
seulement les hommes et enfans, mais les femmes y peuuent estre
admises."--Ibid., 1644, 74. ]

No doubt the buildings of Sainte Marie were of the roughest,--rude walls
of boards, windows without glass, vast chimneys of unhewn stone. All its
riches were centred in the church, which, as Lalemant tells us, was
regarded by the Indians as one of the wonders of the world, but which,
he adds, would have made but a beggarly show in France. Yet one wonders,
at first thought, how so much labor could have been accomplished here.
Of late years, however, the number of men at the command of the mission
had been considerable. Soldiers had been sent up from time to time,
to escort the Fathers on their way, and defend them on their arrival.
Thus, in 1644, Montmagny ordered twenty men of a reinforcement just
arrived from France to escort Brébeuf, Garreau, and Chabanel to the
Hurons, and remain there during the winter. [ 1 ] These soldiers lodged
with the Jesuits, and lived at their table. [ 2 ] It was not, however,
on detachments of troops that they mainly relied for labor or defence.
Any inhabitant of Canada who chose to undertake so hard and dangerous a
service was allowed to do so, receiving only his maintenance from the
mission, without pay. In return, he was allowed to trade with the
Indians, and sell the furs thus obtained at the magazine of the Company,
at a fixed price. [ Registres des Arrêts du Conseil, extract in Faillon,
II, 94. ] Many availed themselves of this permission; and all whose
services were accepted by the Jesuits seem to have been men to whom they
had communicated no small portion of their own zeal, and who were
enthusiastically attached to their Order and their cause. There is
abundant evidence that a large proportion of them acted from motives
wholly disinterested. They were, in fact, _donnés_ of the mission, [ 3 ]
--given, heart and hand, to its service. There is probability in the
conjecture, that the profits of their trade with the Indians were reaped,
not for their own behoof, but for that of the mission. [ 4 ] It is
difficult otherwise to explain the confidence with which the Father
Superior, in a letter to the General of the Jesuits at Rome, speaks of
its resources. He says, "Though our number is greatly increased, and
though we still hope for more men, and especially for more priests of our
Society, it is not necessary to increase the pecuniary aid given us."
[ 5 ]

[ 1 Vimont, Relation, 1644, 49. He adds, that some of these soldiers,
though they had once been "assez mauvais garçons," had shown great zeal
and devotion in behalf of the mission. ]

[ 2 Journal des Supérieurs des Jésuites, MS. In 1648, a small cannon
was sent to Sainte Marie in the Huron canoes.--Ibid. ]

[ 3 See ante, chapter 16 (page 214), "donnés". Garnier calls them
"séculiers d'habit, mais religieux de cœur."--Lettres, MSS. ]

[ 4 The Jesuits, even at this early period, were often and loudly
charged with sharing in the fur-trade. It is certain that this charge
was not wholly without foundation. Le Jeune, in the Relation of 1657,
speaking of the wampum, guns, powder, lead, hatchets, kettles, and other
articles which the missionaries were obliged to give to the Indians,
at councils and elsewhere, says that these must be bought from the
traders with beaver-skins, which are the money of the country; and he
adds, "Que si vn Iesuite en reçoit ou en recueille quelques-vns pour
ayder aux frais immenses qu'il faut faire dans ces Missions si éloignées,
et pour gagner ces peuples à Iesus-Christ et les porter à la paix,
il seroit à souhaiter que ceux-là mesme qui deuroient faire ces despenses
pour la conseruation du pays, ne fussent pas du moins les premiers à
condamner le zele de ces Peres, et à les rendre par leurs discours plus
noirs que leurs robes."--Relation, 1657, 16.

In the same year, Chaumonot, addressing a council of the Iroquois during
a period of truce, said, "Keep your beaver-skins, if you choose, for the
Dutch. Even such of them as may fall into our possession will be
employed for your service."--Ibid., 17.

In 1636, La Jeune thought it necessary to write a long letter of defence
against the charge; and in 1643, a declaration, appended to the Relation
of that year, and certifying that the Jesuits took no part in the
fur-trade, was drawn up and signed by twelve members of the company of
New France. Its only meaning is, that the Jesuits were neither partners
nor rivals of the Company's monopoly. They certainly bought supplies
from its magazines with furs which they obtained from the Indians.

Their object evidently was to make the mission partially self-supporting.
To impute mercenary motives to Garnier, Jogues, and their co-laborers,
is manifestly idle; but, even in the highest flights of his enthusiasm,
the Jesuit never forgot his worldly wisdom. ]

[ 5 Lettre du P. Paul Ragueneau au T. R. P. Vincent Carafa, Général de
la Compagnie de Jésus à Rome, Sainte Marie aux Hurons, 1 Mars, 1649
(Carayon). ]

Much of this prosperity was no doubt due to the excellent management of
their resources, and a very successful agriculture. While the Indians
around them were starving, they raised maize in such quantities, that,
in the spring of 1649, the Father Superior thought that their stock of
provisions might suffice for three years. "Hunting and fishing," he says,
"are better than heretofore"; and he adds, that they had fowls, swine,
and even cattle. [ 1 ] How they could have brought these last to Sainte
Marie it is difficult to conceive. The feat, under the circumstances,
is truly astonishing. Everything indicates a fixed resolve on the part
of the Fathers to build up a solid and permanent establishment.

[ 1 Lettre du P. Paul Ragueneau au T. R. P. Vincent Carafa, Général de
la Compagnie de Jésus à Rome, Sainte Marie aux Hurons, 1 Mars, 1649
(Carayon). ]

It is by no means to be inferred that the household fared sumptuously.
Their ordinary food was maize, pounded and boiled, and seasoned, in the
absence of salt, which was regarded as a luxury, with morsels of smoked
fish. [ Ragueneau, Relation des Hurons, 1648, 48. ]

In March, 1649, there were in the Huron country and its neighborhood
eighteen Jesuit priests, four lay brothers, twenty-three men serving
without pay, seven hired men, four boys, and eight soldiers. [ 1 ]
Of this number, fifteen priests were engaged in the various missions,
while all the rest were retained permanently at Sainte Marie. All was
method, discipline, and subordination. Some of the men were assigned to
household work, and some to the hospital; while the rest labored at the
fortifications, tilled the fields, and stood ready, in case of need,
to fight the Iroquois. The Father Superior, with two other priests as
assistants, controlled and guided all. The remaining Jesuits,
undisturbed by temporal cares, were devoted exclusively to the charge of
their respective missions. Two or three times in the year, they all,
or nearly all, assembled at Sainte Marie, to take counsel together and
determine their future action. Hither, also, they came at intervals for
a period of meditation and prayer, to nerve themselves and gain new
inspiration for their stern task.

[ 1 See the report of the Father Superior to the General, above cited.
The number was greatly increased within the year. In April, 1648,
Ragueneau reports but forty-two French in all, including priests.
Before the end of the summer a large reinforcement came up in the Huron
canoes. ]

Besides being the citadel and the magazine of the mission, Sainte Marie
was the scene of a bountiful hospitality. On every alternate Saturday,
as well as on feast-days, the converts came in crowds from the farthest
villages. They were entertained during Saturday, Sunday, and a part of
Monday; and the rites of the Church were celebrated before them with all
possible solemnity and pomp. They were welcomed also at other times,
and entertained, usually with three meals to each. In these latter years
the prevailing famine drove them to Sainte Marie in swarms. In the
course of 1647 three thousand were lodged and fed here; and in the
following year the number was doubled. [ Compare Ragueneau in Relation
des Hurons, 1648, 48, and in his report to the General in 1649. ]
Heathen Indians were also received and supplied with food, but were not
permitted to remain at night. There was provision for the soul as well
as the body; and, Christian or heathen, few left Sainte Marie without a
word of instruction or exhortation. Charity was an instrument of
conversion.

Such, so far as we can reconstruct it from the scattered hints remaining,
was this singular establishment, at once military, monastic, and
patriarchal. The missions of which it was the basis were now eleven in
number. To those among the Hurons already mentioned another had lately
been added,--that of Sainte Madeleine; and two others, called St. Jean
and St. Matthias, had been established in the neighboring Tobacco Nation.
[ 1 ] The three remaining missions were all among tribes speaking the
Algonquin languages. Every winter, bands of these savages, driven by
famine and fear of the Iroquois, sought harborage in the Huron country,
and the mission of Sainte Elisabeth was established for their benefit.
The next Algonquin mission was that of Saint Esprit, embracing the
Nipissings and other tribes east and north-east of Lake Huron; and,
lastly, the mission of St. Pierre included the tribes at the outlet of
Lake Superior, and throughout a vast extent of surrounding wilderness.
[ 2 ]

[ 1 The mission of the Neutral Nation had been abandoned for the time,
from the want of missionaries. The Jesuits had resolved on concentration,
and on the thorough conversion of the Hurons, as a preliminary to more
extended efforts. ]

[ 2 Besides these tribes, the Jesuits had become more or less acquainted
with many others, also Algonquin on the west and south of Lake Huron; as
well as with the Puans, or Winnebagoes, a Dacotah tribe between Lake
Michigan and the Mississippi.

The Mission of Sault Sainte Marie, at the outlet of Lake Superior,
was established at a later period. Modern writers have confounded it
with Sainte Marie of the Hurons.

By the Relation of 1649 it appears that another mission had lately been
begun at the Grand Manitoulin Island, which the Jesuits also christened
Isle Sainte Marie. ]

These missions were more laborious, though not more perilous, than those
among the Hurons. The Algonquin hordes were never long at rest; and,
summer and winter, the priest must follow them by lake, forest, and
stream: in summer plying the paddle all day, or toiling through pathless
thickets, bending under the weight of a birch canoe or a load of
baggage,--at night, his bed the rugged earth, or some bare rock, lashed
by the restless waves of Lake Huron; while famine, the snow-storms,
the cold, the treacherous ice of the Great Lakes, smoke, filth, and,
not rarely, threats and persecution, were the lot of his winter
wanderings. It seemed an earthly paradise, when, at long intervals,
he found a respite from his toils among his brother Jesuits under the
roof of Sainte Marie.

Hither, while the Fathers are gathered from their scattered stations at
one of their periodical meetings,--a little before the season of Lent,
1649, [ 1 ]--let us, too, repair, and join them. We enter at the eastern
gate of the fortification, midway in the wall between its northern and
southern bastions, and pass to the hall, where, at a rude table, spread
with ruder fare, all the household are assembled,--laborers, domestics,
soldiers, and priests.

[ 1 The date of this meeting is a supposition merely. It is adopted
with reference to events which preceded and followed. ]

It was a scene that might recall a remote half feudal, half patriarchal
age, when, under the smoky rafters of his antique hail, some warlike
thane sat, with kinsmen and dependants ranged down the long board,
each in his degree. Here, doubtless, Ragueneau, the Father Superior,
held the place of honor; and, for chieftains scarred with Danish
battle-axes, was seen a band of thoughtful men, clad in a threadbare garb
of black, their brows swarthy from exposure, yet marked with the lines of
intellect and a fixed enthusiasm of purpose. Here was Bressani, scarred
with firebrand and knife; Chabanel, once a professor of rhetoric in
France, now a missionary, bound by a self-imposed vow to a life from
which his nature recoiled; the fanatical Chaumonot, whose character
savored of his peasant birth,--for the grossest fungus of superstition
that ever grew under the shadow of Rome was not too much for his
omnivorous credulity, and miracles and mysteries were his daily food; yet,
such as his faith was, he was ready to die for it. Garnier, beardless
like a woman, was of a far finer nature. His religion was of the
affections and the sentiments; and his imagination, warmed with the ardor
of his faith, shaped the ideal forms of his worship into visible
realities. Brébeuf sat conspicuous among his brethren, portly and tall,
his short moustache and beard grizzled with time,--for he was fifty-six
years old. If he seemed impassive, it was because one overmastering
principle had merged and absorbed all the impulses of his nature and all
the faculties of his mind. The enthusiasm which with many is fitful and
spasmodic was with him the current of his life,--solemn and deep as the
tide of destiny. The Divine Trinity, the Virgin, the Saints, Heaven and
Hell, Angels and Fiends,--to him, these alone were real, and all things
else were nought. Gabriel Lalemant, nephew of Jerome Lalemant, Superior
at Quebec, was Brébeuf's colleague at the mission of St. Ignace. His
slender frame and delicate features gave him an appearance of youth,
though he had reached middle life; and, as in the case of Garnier,
the fervor of his mind sustained him through exertions of which he seemed
physically incapable. Of the rest of that company little has come down
to us but the bare record of their missionary toils; and we may ask in
vain what youthful enthusiasm, what broken hope or faded dream, turned
the current of their lives, and sent them from the heart of civilization
to this savage outpost of the world.

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