The Seigneurs of Old Canada: A Chronicle of New-World Feudalism | Page 5

regime have much to answer for. They and their
work were not least among the causes which brought upon the crown
and upon the privileged orders that terrible retribution of the Red Terror.
Not with the mediaeval institution of feudalism, but with its emaciated
descendant, the seigneurial system of the seventeenth and eighteenth
centuries, ought men to associate, if they must, their notions of grinding
oppression and class hatred.
Out to his new colony on the St Lawrence the king sent this seigneurial
system. A gross and gratuitous outrage, a characteristic manifestation

of Bourbon stupidity--that is a common verdict upon the royal action.
But it may well be asked: What else was there to do? The seigneurial
system was still the basis of land tenure in France. The nobility and
even the throne rested upon it. The Church sanctioned and supported it.
The people in general, whatever their attitude towards seigneurialism,
were familiar with no other system of landholding. It was not, like the
encomienda system which Spain planted in Mexico, an arrangement cut
out of new cloth for the more ruthless exploitation of a fruitful domain.
The Puritan who went to Massachusetts Bay took his system of socage
tenure along with him. The common law went with the flag of England.
It was quite as natural that the Custom of Paris should follow the
fleurs-de-lis.
There was every reason to expect, moreover, that in the New World the
seigneurial system would soon free itself from those barnacles of
privilege and oppression which were encrusted on its sides at home.
Here was a small settlement of pioneers surrounded by hostile
aborigines. The royal arm, strong as it was at home, could not well
afford protection a thousand leagues away. The colony must organize
and learn to protect itself. In other words, the colonial environment was
very much like that in which the yeomen of the Dark Ages had found
themselves. And might not its dangers be faced in the old feudal way?
They were faced in this way. In the history of French Canada we find
the seigneurial system forced back towards its old feudal plane. We see
it gain in vitality; we see the old personal bond between lord and vassal
restored to some of its pristine strength; we see the military aspects of
the system revived, and its more sordid phases thrust aside. It turned
New France into a huge armed camp; it gave the colony a closely knit
military organization; and, in a day when Canada needed every ounce
of her strength to ward off encircling enemies both white and red, it did
for her what no other system could be expected to do.
But to return to the little cradle of empire at the foot of Cape Diamond.
Champlain for a score of years worked himself to premature old age in
overcoming those many obstacles which always meet the pioneer.
More settlers were brought; a few seigneuries were granted; priests
were summoned from France; a new fort was built; and by sheer

perseverance a settlement of about three hundred souls had been
established by 1627. But no single individual, however untiring in his
efforts, could do all that needed to be done. It was consequently
arranged, with the entire approval of Champlain, that the task of
building up the colony should be entrusted to a great colonizing
company formed for the purpose under royal auspices. In this project
the moving spirit was no less a personage than Cardinal Richelieu, the
great minister of Louis XIII. Official France was now really interested.
Hitherto its interest, while profusely enough expressed, had been little
more than perfunctory. With Richelieu as its sponsor a company was
easily organized. Though by royal decree it was chartered as the
Company of New France, it became more commonly known as the
Company of One Hundred Associates; for it was a co-operative
organization with one hundred members, some of them traders and
merchants, but more of them courtiers. Colonizing companies were the
fashion of Richelieu's day. Holland and England were exploiting new
lands by the use of companies; there was no good reason why France
should not do likewise.
This system of company exploitation was particularly popular with the
monarchs of all these European countries. It made no demands on the
royal purse. If failure attended the company's ventures the king bore no
financial loss. But if the company succeeded, if its profits were large
and its achievements great, the king might easily step in and claim his
share of it all as the price of royal protection and patronage. In both
England and Holland the scheme worked out in that way. An English
stock company began and developed the work which finally placed
India in the possession of the British crown; a similar Dutch
organization