History of the Discovery of the Northwest by John Nicolet in 1634. Charlotte Butterfield
Hurons, and labor for their spiritual welfare. His departure from the St. Lawrence was on the first day of July. Nine days afterward, Champlain, with two Frenchmen and ten Indians followed him. Both parties traveled up the Ottawa to the Algonquin villages; passed the two lakes of the Allumettes; threaded their way to a well-trodden portage, crossing which brought them to Lake Nipissing; thence, they floated westward down the current of French river, to what is now known as Georgian bay; afterward, for more than a hundred miles, they journeyed southward along the eastern shores of that bay to its head; and there was the home of the Hurons.
Champlain, with a naked host of allies, was soon on the march against the Iroquois from the Huron villages, moving down the river Trent, as since named, to its mouth, when his eyes were gladdened with the view of another of the fresh water seas – Lake Ontario. Boldly they crossed its broad expanse, meeting the enemy at a considerable distance inland from its southern shores. Defensive works of the Iroquois defied the assaults of the besiegers. The Huron warriors returned in disgust to their homes, taking Champlain with them. He was compelled to spend the winter as the guest of these savages, returning to the St. Lawrence by way of the Ottawa, and reaching Quebec on the eleventh of July, 1616. He had seen enough of the region traversed by him to know that there was an immense country lying to the westward ready to be given to his king the moment he should be able to explore and make it known. Father le Caron, who had preceded Champlain on his outward trip to the Huron villages, also preceded him on his return; but he remained long enough with those Indians to obtain a considerable knowledge of their language and of their manners and customs.
Quebec, at this period, could hardly be called a settlement. It contained a population of fur-traders and friars of fifty or sixty persons. It had a fort, and Champlain was the nominal commander. In the interest of the infant colony he went every year to France. His was the duty to regulate the monopoly of the company of merchants in their trade with the Indians. In the summer of 1622, the Iroquois beset the settlement, but made no actual attack. A change was now at hand in the affairs of New France. Two Huguenots, William and Émery de Caen, had taken the place of the old company of St. Malo and Rouen, but were afterward compelled to share their monopoly with them. Fresh troubles were thus introduced into the infant colony, not only in religious affairs, but in secular matters. The Récollets had previously established five missions, extending from Acadia to the borders of Lake Huron. Now, three Jesuits – among their number John de Brébeuf – arrived in the colony, and began their spiritual labors. This was in 1625. When the year 1627 was reached, the settlement at Quebec had a population of about one hundred persons – men, women, and children. The chief trading stations upon the St. Lawrence were Quebec, Three Rivers, the Rapids of St. Louis, and Tadoussac. Turning our eyes to the western wilds, we see that the Hurons, after the return of Le Caron, were not again visited by missionaries until 1622.
In the year 1627, the destinies of France were held by Cardinal Richelieu as in the hollow of his hand. He had constituted himself grand master and superintendent of navigation and commerce. By him the privileges of the Caens were annulled, and a company formed, consisting of a hundred associates, called the Company of New France. At its head was Richelieu himself. Louis the Thirteenth made over to this company forever the fort and settlement at Quebec, and all the territory of New France, including Florida. To them was given power to appoint judges, build fortresses, cast cannon, confer titles, and concede lands. They were to govern in peace and in war. Their monopoly of the fur-trade was made perpetual; while that of all other commerce within the limits of their government was limited to fifteen years, except that the whale-fishery and the cod-fishery were to remain open to all. They could take whatever steps they might think expedient or proper for the protection of the colony and the fostering of trade. It will thus be seen that the Hundred Associates had conferred upon them almost sovereign power. For fifteen years their commerce was not to be troubled with duties or imposts. Partners, whether nobles, officers, or ecclesiastics, might engage in commercial pursuits without derogating from the privileges of their order. To all these benefits the king added a donation of two ships of war. Of this powerful association, Champlain was one of the members.
In return for these privileges conferred, behold how little these hundred partners were compelled to perform. They engaged to convoy to New France, during 1628, two or three hundred men of all trades, and before the year 1643 to increase the number to four thousand persons of both sexes; to supply all their settlers with lodging, food, clothing, and farm implements, for three years; then they would allow them sufficient land to support themselves, cleared to a certain extent; and would also furnish them the grain necessary for sowing it; stipulating, also, that the emigrants should be native Frenchmen and Roman Catholics, and none others; and, finally, agreeing to settle three priests in each settlement, whom they were bound to provide with every article necessary for their personal comfort, and to defray the expenses of their ministerial labors for fifteen years. After the expiration of that time, cleared lands were to be granted by the company to the clergy for maintaining the Roman Catholic Church in New France. It was thus that the Hundred Associates became proprietors of the whole country claimed by France, from Florida to the Arctic Circle; from Newfoundland to the sources of the St. Lawrence and its tributaries. Meanwhile, the fur-trade had brought a considerable knowledge of the Ottawa, and of the country of the Hurons, to the French upon the St. Lawrence, through the yearly visits of the savages from those distant parts and the journeyings of the fur-trader in quest of peltry.
In April, 1628, the first vessels of the Hundred Associates sailed from France with colonists and supplies bound for the St. Lawrence. Four of these vessels were armed. Every thing seemed propitious for a speedy arrival at Quebec, where the inhabitants were sorely pressed for food; but a storm, which had for some time been brewing in Europe, broke in fury upon New France. The imprudent zeal of the Catholics in England, and the persecution of the Huguenots in France, aroused the English, who determined to conquer the French possessions in North America, if possible; and, to that end, they sent out David Kirk, with an armed squadron, to attack the settlements in Canada. The fleet reached the harbor of Tadoussac before the arrival of the vessels of the Company of New France. Kirk sent a demand for the surrender of Quebec, but Champlain determined to defend the place; at least, he resolved to make a show of defense; and the English commander thought best not to attack such a formidable looking position. All the supplies sent by the Hundred Associates to the St. Lawrence were captured or sunk; and the next year, after most of its inhabitants had dispersed in the forests for food, Quebec surrendered. England thus gained her first supremacy upon the great river of Canada.
The terms of the capitulation were that the French were to be conveyed to their own country; and each soldier was allowed to take with him furs to the value of twenty crowns. As some had lately returned from the Hurons with peltry of no small value, their loss was considerable. The French prisoners, including Champlain, were conveyed across the ocean by Kirk, but their arrival in England was after a treaty of peace had been signed between the two powers. The result was, the restoration of New France to the French crown; and, on the 5th of July, 1632, Émery de Caen cast anchor at Quebec to reclaim the country. He had received a commission to hold, for one year, a monopoly of the fur-trade, as an indemnity for his losses in the war; after which time he was to give place to the Hundred Associates. The missions in Canada which by the success of the British arms had been interrupted, were now to be continued by Jesuits alone. De Caen brought with him two of that order – Paul le Jeune and Anne de la Nouë.
On the twenty-third of May, 1633, Champlain, commissioned anew by Richelieu, resumed command at Quebec, in behalf of the Hundred Partners, arriving out with considerable supplies and several new settlers. With him returned the Jesuit father, John de Brébeuf. The Récollets had been virtually ejected from Canada. The whole missionary field was now ready for cultivation by the followers of Loyola. New France was restored to Champlain and his company, and to Catholicism.
Champlain's first care was to place the affairs of the colony in a more prosperous condition, and establish a better understanding with the Indians. In both respects, he was tolerably successful. His knowledge of the western country had been derived from his own observations during the tours of 1613 and 1615, but especially from accounts given him by the Indians. At the beginning of 1634, the whole French population, from Gaspé to Three Rivers, was hardly one hundred and fifty souls, mostly engaged in the trading business, on behalf of the Hundred Partners, whose operations were carried on principally at the point last