The Jesuit Missions | Page 8

smoky, vermin-infested abodes
of the savages. But an iron constitution stood him in good stead, and he
rejoined his fellow-missionaries none the worse for his experience. He
had acquired, too, a fair knowledge of the Montagnais dialect, and had
learned that boldness, courage, and fortitude in suffering went far
towards winning the respect of the savages of North America.
On the 5th of July the eyes of the colonists at Quebec were gladdened
by the sight of a fleet of vessels coming up the river. These were the
supply-ships of the company, and on the Catherine, a vessel of two
hundred and fifty tons, was Champlain, on whom the Jesuits could
depend as a friend and protector. In the previous autumn Lalemant had

selected a fertile tract of land on the left side of the St Charles, between
the river Beauport and the stream St Michel, as a suitable spot for a
permanent home, and had sent a request to Champlain to secure this
land for the Jesuits. Champlain had laid the request before the viceroy
and he now brought with him the official documents granting the land.
Nine days later a vessel of eighty tons arrived with supplies and
reinforcements for the mission. On this vessel came Fathers Philibert
Noyrot and Anne de Noue, with a lay brother and twenty labourers and
carpenters.
The Jesuits chose a site for the buildings at a bend in the St Charles
river a mile or so from the fort. Here, opposite Pointe-aux-Lievres
(Hare Point), on a sloping meadow two hundred feet from the river,
they cleared the ground and erected two buildings--one to serve as a
storehouse, stable, workshop, and bakery; the other as the residence.
The residence had four rooms--a chapel, a refectory with cells for the
fathers, a kitchen, and a lodging-room for the workmen. It had, too, a
commodious cellar, and a garret which served as a dormitory for the lay
brothers. The buildings were of roughly hewn planks, the seams
plastered with mud and the roofs thatched with grass from the meadow.
Such was Notre-Dame-des-Anges. In this humble abode men were to
be trained to carry the Cross in the Canadian wilderness, and from it
they were to go forth for many years in an unbroken line, blazing the
way for explorers and traders and settlers.
Almost simultaneously with the arrival of Noyrot and Noue a flotilla of
canoes laden deep with furs came down from the Huron country.
Brebeuf had made up his mind to go to far Huronia; Noue and the
Recollet Daillon had the same ambition; and all three besought the
Hurons to carry them on the return journey. The Indians expressed a
readiness to give the Recollet Daillon a passage; they knew the
'grey-robes'; but they did not know the Jesuits, the 'black-robes,' and
they hesitated to take Brebeuf and Noue, urging as an excuse that so
portly a man as Brebeuf would be in danger of upsetting their frail
canoes. By a liberal distribution of presents, however, the Hurons were
persuaded to accept Brebeuf and Noue as passengers.

Towards the end of July, just when preparations were being made to
break ground for the residence of Notre-Dame-des-Anges, the three
fathers and some French assistants set out with the Hurons on the long
journey to the shores of Georgian Bay. Brebeuf was in a state of
ecstasy. He longed for the populous towns of the Hurons. He had
confidence in himself and believed that he would be able to make the
dwellers in these towns followers of Christ and bulwarks of France in
the New World. For twenty-three years he was to devote his life to this
task; for twenty-three years, save for the brief interval when the English
flag waved over Quebec, he was to dominate the Huron mission. He
was a striking figure. Of noble ancestry, almost a giant in stature, and
with a soldierly bearing that attracted all observers, he would have
shone at the court of the king or at the head of the army. But he had
sacrificed a worldly career for the Church. And no man of his ancestors,
one of whom had battled under William the Conqueror at Hastings and
others in the Crusades, ever bore himself more nobly than did Brebeuf
in the forests of Canada, or covered himself with a greater glory.
The journey was beset with danger, for the Iroquois were on the
war-path against the Hurons and the French, and had attacked settlers
even in the vicinity of Quebec. The lot of the voyagers was incessant
toil. They had to paddle against the current, to haul the canoes over
stretches where the water was too swift for paddling, and to portage
past turbulent rapids and falls. The missionaries were forced to bear
their share of