Count Frontenac and New France under Louis XIV

Count Frontenac and New
France under Louis XIV [with
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Title: Count Frontenac and New France under Louis XIV
Author: Francis Parkman

Release Date: November, 2004 [EBook #6875] [Yes, we are more than
one year ahead of schedule] [This file was first posted on February 6,
2003]
Edition: 10
Language: English
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FRONTENAC AND NEW FRANCE ***

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[Transcriber's Note: Lengthy footnotes, or those consisting of more
than one paragraph, have been numbered and relocated to the end of the
chapter in which they occur. They are marked by [1], [2], etc.]

COUNT FRONTENAC
AND
NEW FRANCE
UNDER LOUIS XIV.
BY
FRANCIS PARKMAN,
AUTHOR OF "PIONEERS OF FRANCE IN THE NEW WORLD,"
"THE JESUITS IN NORTH AMERICA," "THE DISCOVERY OF
THE GREAT WEST," AND "THE OLD REGIME IN CANADA."

PREFACE.
The events recounted in this book group themselves in the main about a
single figure, that of Count Frontenac, the most remarkable man who
ever represented the crown of France in the New World. From
strangely unpromising beginnings, he grew with every emergency, and
rose equal to every crisis. His whole career was one of conflict,

sometimes petty and personal, sometimes of momentous consequence,
involving the question of national ascendancy on this continent. Now
that this question is put at rest for ever, it is hard to conceive, the
anxiety which it wakened in our forefathers. But for one rooted error of
French policy, the future of the English-speaking races in America
would have been more than endangered.
Under the rule of Frontenac occurred the first serious collision of the
rival powers, and the opening of the grand scheme of military
occupation by which France strove to envelop and hold in check the
industrial populations of the English colonies. It was he who made that
scheme possible.
In "The Old Regime in Canada," I tried to show from what inherent
causes this wilderness empire of the Great Monarch fell at last before a
foe, superior indeed in numbers, but lacking all the forces that belong
to a system of civil and military centralization. The present volume will
show how valiantly, and for a time how successfully, New France
battled against a fate which her own organic fault made inevitable. Her
history is a great and significant drama, enacted among untamed forests,
with a distant gleam of courtly splendors and the regal pomp of
Versailles.
The authorities on which the book rests are drawn chiefly from the
manuscript collections of the French government in the Archives
Nationales, the Bibliotheque Nationale, and, above all, the vast
repositories of the Archives of the Marine and Colonies. Others are
from Canadian and American sources. I have, besides, availed myself
of the collection of French, English, and Dutch documents published by
the State of New York, under the excellent editorship of Dr.
O'Callaghan, and of the manuscript collections made in France by the
governments of Canada and of Massachusetts. A considerable number
of books, contemporary or nearly so with the events described, also
help to throw light upon them; and these have all been examined. The
citations in the margins represent but a small part of the authorities
consulted.
This mass of material has been studied with extreme care, and peculiar
pains have been taken to secure accuracy of statement. In the preface of
"The Old Regime," I wrote: "Some of the results here reached are of a
character which I regret, since they cannot be agreeable to persons for

whom I have a very cordial regard. The conclusions drawn from the
facts may be matter of opinion: but it will be remembered that the facts
themselves can be overthrown only