1689-1698

MONTREAL PROWESS AT HOME AND ABROAD

FRONTENAC'S SECOND TERM OF GOVERNMENT

FRONTENAC RETURNS—REVIEW AT MONTREAL—INDIANS FROM THE GALLEYS SENT WITH PEACE OVERTURES—NEW ENGLAND TO BE ATTACKED—THE MONTREAL LEADERS—THREE SUCCESSFUL EXPEDITIONS—RETALIATION MEDITATED BY THE ENGLISH—TRADE FLOWING BACK TO MONTREAL—THE GRAND COUNCIL IN THE MARKET—FRONTENAC LEADS THE WAR DANCE—JOHN SCHUYLER'S PARTY AGAINST MONTREAL RETIRES—SIR WILLIAM PHIPPS SEIZES QUEBEC—THE MONTREAL CONTINGENT—PETER SCHUYLER DEFEATED AT LA PRAIRIE—THE COLONY IN DIRE DANGER—MADELEINE DE VERCHERES, HER DEED OF ARMES—THE EXPEDITION VIA CHAMBLY—ARRIVAL OF FURS FROM MICHILLIMACKINAC—FRONTENAC, THE SAVIOUR OF THE COUNTRY—MONTREAL PROWESS EAST AND WEST—A PLEIAD OF MONTREAL NAMES—THE LE MOYNE FAMILY—NEWFOUNDLAND—HUDSON'S BAY—FORT FRONTENAC AGAIN—THE DEATH OF FRONTENAC.

On arriving at Quebec on October 25, 1689, Frontenac, learning that the colony was seized with a sort of paralysis caused by discouragement and stupor, set out by the boats for Montreal in spite of the incessant rains, and he found it a scene of desolation and dejection, [144] after the disaster of Lachine. Frontenac was now a man of seventy years, but it was felt that with all his imperious failings, now mellowed by age, he possessed in a high degree, military knowledge and valour and was the man to meet the desperate state of affairs. Encouraged by the consciousness of this, he accordingly left the gay court of Louis XIV, le Soleil, determined to prove his loyal attachment to his prince. On his arrival he was ostensibly welcomed on all hands. And on his part he was mindful of his charge dated June 7, 1689, to forget his former dissensions and to govern with moderation and wisdom and to favour the clergy, although he was to keep an eye on the Jesuits.

At Montreal he reviewed the troops, seven or eight hundred of whom were in garrison, the rest being scattered in the forts. Having restored confidence, he turned his attention quickly toward conciliating or subduing the Iroquois. His first move was to send a deputation to Onondaga from "the great Onontio, who as you all know has come back again." With it he sent three of the released Indians whom he had brought back from the galleys of France, to invite them to meet the Onontio at Fort Frontenac and to give back allegiance. These overtures were spurned.

Later came news to Montreal from Father Carheil, the Jesuit, saying that the Huron and Ottawa tribes, their allies, around Michillimackinac were on the point of revolt, going over to the Iroquois and the English. Nicholas Perrot was sent with a haughty message. "I am strong enough," says Onontio, "to kill the English, destroy the Iroquois and whip you if you fail in your duty." A temporary peace was secured by the adroitness of Nicholas Perrot.

Frontenac now turned his attention to the English and planned his descent on Albany and the border settlements of New Hampshire and Maine. Of the three war parties of picked men, organized at Quebec, Three Rivers and Montreal, the latter, which was to attack Maine, was first ready, consisting of 210 men, ninety-six of whom were Christian Iroquois from Sault St. Louis or the Mountain settlement, and the rest being hardy and venturesome bush rangers skilled in woodcraft and Indian warfare. Their leaders were men equal to the task, d'Ailleboust de Mantet and Le Moyne de St. HÉlÈne. Other brave sons of Charles Le Moyne also supported them, Le Moyne d'Iberville, Le Moyne de Bienville and others of the noblesse, men of nerve, and adventurous.

"It was the depth of winter," says Parkman, "when they began their march, striding on snowshoes over the vast white field of the frozen St. Lawrence, each with the hood of his blanket coat drawn over his head, a gun in his mittened hand, a knife, a hatchet, a tobacco pouch and a bullet pouch at his belt, a pack over his shoulders and his inseparable pipe hung at his neck in a leather case. They dragged their blankets and provisions over the snow on Indian sledges."

They crossed to Chambly. How on February 8, 1690, this party (Montreal losing but two men) put Corlaer (Schenectady), about fifteen miles from Albany and the furthest outpost of the colony of New York, to massacre and ashes, and finally, although victorious, had to retreat to Montreal across the ice of Lake Champlain, worn out and closely pursued almost to the very gates of the town by Iroquois and fifty men from Albany, so that fifteen or more of a party of stragglers were killed or taken prisoners, it is not necessary to relate in detail, nor is it necessary to recount the furthest story of the universal war now kindled like wildfire. The three expeditions were, however, victorious.

Retaliation was being prepared by the Iroquois and the English during the spring. A combined attack was to be made on Canada. The colonial militia of New York were to meet at Albany and thence advance on Montreal by way of Lake Champlain; Massachusetts and the other New England states were to attack Quebec under Sir William Phipps, the former coarse ship-carpenter, rough sailor-captain and brusque governor of Massachusetts, proud of his obscure origin and his career as a self-made man, blunt in speech and manner, doubtfully honest in private dealing, but believing that all was fair in war and business, patriotic and devoted withal to New England.

While these hostile preparations against Quebec and Montreal were being matured, Frontenac was at Quebec, sparring with the council as to the degree of dignity with which he was to be received at the meetings of the Supreme Council when he should visit it for the first time. Then he turned his attention to saving the country, which was his forte, strengthening the rear of Quebec, fortifying the settlements and keeping strong scouting parties in Montreal to guard the settlers, who were being occasionally broken in upon and burned and butchered as of old, by the war parties of their hereditary enemies, the Iroquois. Then, late in July, he left for Montreal, the chief point of danger, and with him went the Intendant Champigny, leaving Town Major Prevost to finish the fortifications of Quebec.

Montreal was reached on July 31st. A few days of August had passed when the commandant of Fort Lachine came in hot haste to report that Lake St. Louis was "full of canoes," as Frontenac wrote to the minister on November 9th and 12th. Fright gave way to pleasure when it was found that it was a friendly party of 300 Indians coming with 110 canoes, laden with beaver skins to the value of nearly a hundred thousand crowns from the upper lakes, descending from Michillimackinac to trade at Montreal. A few days later La Durantaye, the recent commander of Michillimackinac, arrived with fifty-five more canoes loaded with valuable furs and manned by French traders. The trade was flowing back from the English market to Montreal. [145] Frontenac was in high feather at the success of his policy, at least with the lake tribes.

Soon a grand council was prepared to precede the market, according to custom. Such a crowd there was of painted, greased and befeathered Hurons, Ottawas, Ojibways, Pottawattomies, Crees and Nipissings, mingling with the officials and traders around Frontenac. They talked of trade and war and politics, and they exhorted one another to fight the English and the Iroquois to the death. Then old Frontenac took a hatchet and brandishing it sang the war song and led the war dance, in which all the motley crowd joined, like a screeching mass of frenzied madmen, possessed by devils it would seem to judge by their wild contortions. Nor did Onontio lose caste with the Indians; he knew his people and he gained in estimation with them. Then came the solemn war feast—two oxen and six large dogs chopped into pieces and basted with prunes, and two barrels of wine and plenty of tobacco.

During the market days following there was an alarm of Iroquois and English coming down the Richelieu to attack Montreal. To La Prairie went Frontenac with 1,200 men to meet the attack. But he did not find the expected assailants; so leaving a small force he returned to Montreal and paid the final courtesies to his Indian guests, with whom he had ingratiated himself.

Hard on their departure, news came from La Prairie that the expected assailants had arrived and fallen on the soldiers and inhabitants as they were reaping in the fields, twenty-five being killed or captured, cattle being destroyed and houses burned. The news was quickly boomed around by the answering guns of Chambly, La Prairie and Montreal. Little damage was done, for it was but a small remnant, under Captain John Schuyler, of the vaunted expedition against Montreal, which had been reduced by dissension and disease; it soon retired.

On the 10th of October Major Prevost sent a note from Quebec telling of the advance of Sir William Phipps' navy against Quebec. That evening Frontenac departed for Quebec by canoe, ordering 200 men to follow him. On the next day a fresh message from Prevost confirmed the former saying that the English fleet was already above Tadoussac. Frontenac sent back Captain de Ramezay to de CalliÈres, the governor of Montreal, bidding him to descend to Quebec with all the force at his disposal, and to beat up the inhabitants on the way to join the muster. He arrived in Quebec on October 14th and on the 16th Phipps entered the harbour.

We must resist the temptation to describe the defence of Quebec. One incident in the siege, which must be related, is the arrival, on the evening of October 16th, of the Montreal contingent, the noise of the welcome in Upper Town being heard by Phipps as his vessels were lying idly at their moorings down below. The officers asked a French prisoner, Granville, the meaning of the noise. "Ma foi! Messieurs," said he, "You have lost the game. It is the governor of Montreal arriving with the people from the country above. There is nothing for you now but to pack and go home."

The Montreal contingent was a powerful body of 800 men, regulars and coureurs de bois and gay young volunteers spoiling for the fight. Nearly all the manhood of Canada was gathered in the precincts of the fortressed rock of Quebec. Finally, on October 24th, Phipps retired behind the Island of Orleans to mend his rigging and repair his ships. His expedition was a failure. To this the Montrealers had largely contributed. Among their noblesse were the gallant sons of Le Moyne, who distinguished themselves, although Jacques Le Moyne de Ste. HÉlÈne died of the wounds received in the siege, a great loss to the colony, for he was, says Charlevoix, one of its bravest knights and citizens. When Louis XIV wrote on the 7th of May, 1691, to Frontenac and Champigny, the intendant, the king gave Le Moyne de Longueuil, and his brother, de Maricourt, commands of companies and a promise of good things in store for d'Iberville and a commission to undertake the enterprise of Fort Nelson and Hudson Bay to drive the English away. Later de CalliÈres and others were to be remembered by the king for their good services. Frontenac himself received a gratification of 6,000 livres, which no doubt he needed, for he had consumed all his property.

Next spring, that of 1691, the Iroquois, after the winter hunting, gathered at the mouth of the Ottawa, and parties went forth to harass the settlements. Soon Pointe aux Trembles and the Mountain Mission were attacked. Near Fort Repentigny, young FranÇois de Bienville, one of Le Moyne's sons, was killed in an attack of the marauders.

In midsummer, a detachment of 266 men—120 English and Dutch and the rest Iroquois allies—under Major Peter Schuyler, advancing upon Montreal, met the French at La Prairie de la Madeleine, opposite Montreal. Thither, de CalliÈres had moved. At first the English had the day, but owing to the intrepid conduct of Valrennes they were forced to flee. For before reaching their canoes on the Richelieu they were intercepted by Valrennes, who gave Schuyler's party, according to Frontenac's statement, "the most hot and stubborn fight ever known in Canada."

Thus, was Montreal and Canada in a state of great trial in the summer of 1691 and the year of 1692. Frontenac wrote home, "What with fighting and hardship, our troops and militia are wasting away. The enemy is upon us by sea and land. Send us a thousand men next spring, if you want the country to be saved. We are perishing by inches; the people are in the depth of poverty; the war has doubled prices, so that nobody can live; many families are without bread. The inhabitants desert the country and crowd into the towns."

The fortifications of Montreal and Quebec needed strengthening but there was little money to further the work. Still something was done. The country round Montreal during these years of 1691 and 1692 was in fear and trembling. The farmers worked in the fields with sentinels, and a guard of regulars protected them, and at night they shivered in their huts in the rudely fashioned palisaded stockades reared to protect them. Their anger was so great that fearful reprisals took place. At Montreal a number of Iroquois captured by Vaudreuil were burned at the demand of the Canadians and the Mission Indians.

It was a troublous time around Montreal and even the women and children were called upon to fight. A picture has been preserved to us in the heroic story of the defence, of Fort VerchÈres, eight leagues from Montreal, by Madeleine de VerchÈres, the fourteen-year-old daughter of the seigneur of the place, who by her wonderful presence of mind, coolness and courage saved the lives of a number of women and children, two soldiers, her young brothers, aged twelve and ten, and an old man and kept the Iroquois at bay holding the fort for a week in the absence of her father at Quebec and her mother at Montreal. Then help arrived after the firing had been heard from Montreal and the Iroquois were driven off by the relief force from Montreal under M. de la Monnerie at the head of forty men. [146]

This deed of arms, beginning at eight o'clock in the morning of October 22, 1696, deserves to be commemorated among the noblest actions of heroic womanhood. There is room for the painter, the romancist, or the sculptor, justly to celebrate the glory of a national heroine in Marie-Madeleine de VerchÈres.

In 1693, in January, a great expedition which was largely followed by the Mission Indians of Sault St. Louis (Caughnawaga) and the Mountain, those from Lorette at Quebec, Abenakis from the ChaudiÈre and Algonquins from Three Rivers, left Chambly on snowshoes for the Iroquois towns—a party of 625 men under Mantet, Courtemanche and Noue. On February 16th they took three of these towns.

This year, there was again great rejoicing in Montreal. Frontenac had planned to escort the Indians with their furs to Montreal from Michillimackinac, and he came to Montreal to witness their arrival with canoes plentifully filled with beaver skins, the escort being under Commandant de Louvigny. Frontenac was the hero of the hour. "It is impossible," says the Chronicle, "to conceive the joys of the people when they beheld these riches. Canada had awaited them for years. The merchants and the farmers were dying of hunger. Credit was gone and everybody was afraid that the enemy would waylay and seize this last resource of the country. Therefore, it was that none could find words strong enough to praise and bless him, by whose care all the wealth had arrived. Father of the people, Preserver of the Country, seemed terms too weak to express their gratitude." [147]

We are not writing the history of Canada or of Frontenac, consequently we must pass over much contemporary history of this period. But we may be rightfully concerned with the history of notable Montrealers then consolidating New France. During the latter administration of Frontenac, Montreal's sons reached the height of their careers. These latter were here, there, and everywhere, engaging in the struggle for mastery in the West or for that of Hudson's Bay, or of Newfoundland or lastly of Acadia—these four regions all coming under the government of Frontenac and each of them being largely influenced by the Canadian noblesse whose center was at Montreal.

In the West, on the banks of the Mississippi, among the Illinois, there were to be found men who had at one time or other made Montreal their headquarters, and who had taken their share in the discovery of the Great River and had founded posts and cities and colonies and had become the governors of provinces such as that of Louisiana, which from 1678 to 1754 was ruled by d'Iberville, de Bienville, La Motte-Cardillac, and de Vaudreuil. Men like La Salle, the sons of Charles Le Moyne, the Montreal interpreter, viz., d'Iberville, de Bienville, de SÉrigny, de Chateauguay; de Tonti, du Luth, de la ForÊt and others—a pleiad of illustrious Montreal names—men of courage and audacity—are not only captains of whom any city may be proud but they belong to the history of the Continent of North America. Their discoveries, their adventures, their exploits, oftentimes heroic, are recorded in the pages of history, dealing with regions stretching from Hudson's Bay and Newfoundland to the Gulf of Mexico.

It is often forgotten that Montreal is the Mother of the West. These men, living in a time of faith, hope, and romantic chivalry, held their lives in daily peril, exposed themselves to unheard of privations led on by the desire, for glory or for gain, of conquering the unknown and acquiring territories for their beloved France and for the expansion of Christendom. [148] Thus they rose above the ranks of mere soldiers of fortune, vulgar adventurers, or careless coureurs de bois. We are fascinated by the story of their wanderings accompanied by their Jesuit, RÉcollet or Sulpician chaplains, [149] to primeval forests and plains, over lofty mountain peaks and through deep dales, nowploring mines of copper or land on the Mississippi or restlessly crossing the mighty rivers and lakes in their birch bark canoes or their flat bottomed bateaux; now as hunters or fishermen, sometimes in want and disease, but always gay; now trading in skins or acting as captains of vessels of war, or as commanders defending their far off posts, or attacking the Iroquois or the rival English. An atmosphere of the marvelous and heroic surrounds these makers of Canada and creates in one the desire to relate their histories and their wanderings by land and water, in detail. Out of all these one family stands out preËminently—that of Charles Le Moyne, settled in Montreal since 1646. He was the father of eleven sons, of whom the third, Pierre Le Moyne, d'Iberville (born in Montreal in 1662), was the most famous. Others were de Longueuil, de SÉrigny, de Maricourt, d'Assigny, Ste. HÉlÈne, the two Chateauguays, the two Bienvilles and Antoine Le Moyne, who died young—types of the hardy Canadian noblesse.

Seven of these sons lived long enough to die heroically on the field of battle or to become distinguished administrators of the colonies. These were native born and of obscure parentage, yet they aspired to positions which were in those days rarely given but to those of noble birth coming from France. From all these notable sons, d'Iberville stands out giantlike; his actions being almost legendary in their records of heroism.

We now treat of his invasion of Newfoundland made conjointly with de SÉrigny, his brother, after he had seized a frigate of twenty-four cannons at the entrance of the River St. Jean and captured Pemaquid on August 15, 1696, whither he had sailed in command of the Envieux; thence he sailed again to Placentia in Newfoundland. There he set out to take St. John, the chief port of the English, which he burned to the ground. During the winter he led a hardy party through hamlet after hamlet—each man provided with a musket, a battle axe, a dagger knife and snowshoes, and when the spring of 1697 opened all the English posts were destroyed according to orders received from the minister dated March 31, 1696, except those of Bona Vista and the Island of CarbonniÈre. Thus the safety from invasion of Canada by the English was hoped to be rendered secure. When d'Iberville had returned to Placentia, of which he had been appointed governor in advance, as well as of all the posts seized by him, and was preparing to attack the two remaining British strongholds, his brother de SÉrigny arrived, commissioner by the king in the March previously to thrust the English from Hudson's Bay. With him came five ships of war, the Pelican, the Palmier, the Profond, the Violent and the Wasp; the latter with the Dragon, not arrived apparently, was for d'Iberville. SÉrigny's instructions were to take the advice of his brother, who was undertaking the expense of the expedition. He was to destroy all the English forts in the bay and to leave no vestiges of them; the prisoners were to be sent to France or even England. It was to be a war of extermination of English influence and a strife for the possession by New France of the fur trade. Fort Bourbon (Fort York of today), or Fort Nelson, as the English called it, was the chief object of attack. Already the two brothers had captured it, three years before, but it had been retaken by the English, to whom it was valuable as it commanded the fur trade of the interior. How d'Iberville, sailing on the Pelican, and SÉrigny on the Palmier after storms arrived at the bay and steered mid the threatening ice of the bay into the open sea to Fort Nelson, 300 miles of those bleak inland waters, and how he triumphed over ice and storms and the English, this also takes us too far from Montreal to describe with justice.

Suffice it to say, this glorious campaign assured France for many years of the possession of the countries of the north and the intrepid sailor commandant left in a few days for Europe, leaving his brother de SÉrigny in command of the bay. On November 7th he reached the shores of France and having obtained from the government permission to reconnoitre the mouths of the Mississippi, he left in 1698 and never saw Canada again.

LÉon GuÉrin in his "Histoire Maritime de France," draws this picture of d'Iberville: "He was a hero in the full significance of the expression." He adds, "If his campaigns, prodigious in their results, obtained by the most feeble materials, had had Europe for their witness, instead of the echoless seas bounding the neighbourhood of the pole, he would have had, in life and after death, a name as celebrated as those of Jean Bart, Duguay, Trouin and des Tourvilles."

We must now turn to the conquest of the West which was being planned by Frontenac and the success of which meant continued prosperity for Montreal as the centre of the paltry trade rather than Albany. La Motte-Cardillac at Michillimackinac, Tonti and La ForÊt at the fortified rock of St. Louis on the Illinois, Nicholas Perrot, the voyageur, among the Mississippi tribes—all were trying to keep their allies at peace with one another and the French. Frontenac was determined to strike a blow up west against the resolute Iroquois who were the scourge of Canada, supplied with arms from Albany. Things had been going so badly that a memoir to Champigny and Frontenac on May 26th tells how the king for the present had decided to abandon Michillimackinac and all the posts of the West, to withdraw all the congÉs to the coureurs de bois and to return to the ancient custom of relying on the savages themselves to bring their peltries to Montreal.

On April 21, 1697, the king wrote to Frontenac from Marly, arranging for him to attack Boston and perhaps Manhattan; but on April 27th, while still outlining the same offensive measures against the English, he allowed the posts of Michillimackinac, St. Louis and Frontenac to be continued but forbade the soldiers to trade there. Meanwhile he had been considering Frontenac's plan of attacking the Iroquois, and it had his entire approval, expressed in his letter written next day. These conflicting instructions probably arrived by the same ship. Champigny and others had been writing to the king and directing his various policies. Fort Frontenac—his darling first love—it was the cherished hope of the governor to re-establish and repair. Others opposed him and wrote to the minister, who informed Frontenac that Fort Frontenac "must absolutely be abandoned." The letter arrived the day after the governor had sent 700 men to Lake Ontario to repair it. The Intendant Champigny wanted their early recall, but the inflexible Frontenac refused and the fort was repaired, garrisoned and victualed for a year. It would have been a blunder to give up these forest posts. They were necessary for the trade and the growth of the country. The early isolation of the colony could never be repeated. On July 4, 1697, 200 men set out with Frontenac from Montreal and on July 19th he reached Frontenac. With him was de CalliÈres, suffering from the gout and mounted on a horse, commanding the first line, and Vaudreuil the second, as they marched to Onondaga, with the aged governor carried in an armchair when they reached it; they found it burned by the inhabitants, who had saved themselves by flight. The campaign was not successful. Frontenac had not delivered his blow; but it was the forerunner of the peace of 1701 with the Iroquois, for they feared the old indefatigable man.

Early in May, 1698, a party of Dutch with "Sieur Abraham," an Iroquois, arrived in Montreal with the news that peace had been declared in Europe and at the end of May, Major Peter Schuyler arrived accompanied by Delius, the minister of Albany, with a copy of the treaty of Ryswick [150] in French and Latin and bringing back French prisoners in exchange for English, who nearly all preferred to remain. But the Iroquois free nations still remained unpacified and Frontenac was again prepared to direct his force against them to press the French claims to sovereignty over them as opposed to those of the British.

On November 22d the aged governor, now in his seventy-eighth year and seized with a mortal illness, was strong enough to make his last will and testament. On the 28th he died, having become reconciled to the Intendant Champigny, who wrote that the governor had died with the sentiments of a true Christian. He was buried by his desire on the Friday after his death in the church of the Recollects at Quebec, whom he had favoured so considerably. His great faults were overtowered by his many eminent qualities. He was the greatest captain in the seventeenth century in Canada. The Jesuit historian, Charlevoix, says: "New France owed to him all that it was at his death," "He found the colony enfeebled," says another cleric historian, AbbÉ Gauthier, "attacked on all sides, despised by its enemies; he left it in peace, increased and respected; again he has been called the Saviour of New France." He had succeeded in suppressing the Iroquois and had warred successfully against the English. He had encouraged and upheld the expedition of that brave son of Montreal, d'Iberville, in Acadia, Newfoundland and at Hudson's Bay and the enterprises of that intrepid explorer, La Salle, in the West; surely, he merits a tribute in the history of Montreal!

NOTE

We are indebted for the story of Madeleine de VerchÈres to a document found in the "Collection Moreau Saent-Mery," Vol. 6, entitled, "Relation des faits HÉroÏques de Mademoiselle Marie Madeleine de VerchÈres (ÂgÉe de 14 ans) contre les Iroquois en l'annÉe 1692, le 22 Octobre À huit heures du matin." This description was made by Madeleine VerchÈres herself on the request of the intendant (named April 1, 1702), M. le Marquis de Beauharnois, arriving from France to take possession of his office. The event it seems had caused a stir at court and therefore a more detailed account was desired. In a previous letter written on October 15, 1699, a modest account of the story had been told accompanying a petition to Madame la Comtesse de Maurepas, wife of the secretary of the marine department, requesting a pension of 50 crowns, as was commonly given to the widows of officers, in view of her father's poverty—"he has been fifty-five years in the King's service." In default she asked the promotion of one of her brothers, a cadet in the army, to be an ensign. "He knows service, he has been engaged in several expeditions against the Iroquois. I have even had one of my brothers burned by them." Thus even the very young fought. This young cadet was then only about nineteen years of age. At this period many of the sons of the noblesse were sent to France to enter the army or navy as cadets. There are to be found complaints from the ministers of these departments that youths as young as thirteen and fifteen years are being sent. These youths were early accustomed to bear arms; hence the haste to get into the regular service and to obtain commissions. D'Iberville was only fourteen years of age when he entered the French navy, and only twenty-five when he was sent by Denonville to Hudson's Bay.

The following version of the story of Madeleine de VerchÈres, based on her own description above, may be fitly recorded here. Not far from Montreal and the St. Lawrence stands the Village of VerchÈres, near which was the scene of Madeleine Jarret's heroism. In early years that countryside had been erected into a seigneury and at the time of the exploit, Madeleine Jarret's father was the Seigneur of VerchÈres. The defence of VerchÈres took place during the last week of October, 1692. At the time Seigneur Jarret was in Quebec on official business and his wife was in Montreal. The head of the household was the daughter Madeleine, a girl of fourteen years, the other members of the family in the fort being two brothers of Madeleine, who were mere lads, both younger than herself. On the morning of October 22d, the inhabitants of the seigneury went as usual to their work in the adjacent fields—and most of them never to return—leaving in the fort Madeleine, her two brothers, an old man of eighty and a number of women and children. Such were the conditions at the Seigneury of VerchÈres when the Iroquois suddenly burst upon the place.

During the forenoon, Madeleine went down to the little wharf, or landing place, not far from the fort, accompanied by a hired man named La Violette. Suddenly the sounds of firing came from the direction of the field where the settlers were at work, and the next instant the servant, La Violette, cried out, "Run, run, here come the Iroquois!" Turning, she saw forty or fifty Iroquois at a distance of a pistol shot. She and the man made a dash for the fort, and seeing that they could not overtake her, the Iroquois fired at the fleeting girl and man, but missed both. Reaching the fort, she caused the gates to be closed and fastened, and then set about making the place as secure as possible. A few palisades had fallen, through which an Indian could enter the enclosure. She helped to carry palisades, or pickets, to the places where they were required, and assisted in setting them up.

Then Madeleine went to the blockhouse where the ammunition was kept and here she said, "I found two soldiers, one hiding in a corner and the other with a lighted fuse in his hand. 'What are you going to do with that?' I asked. He answered: 'Light the powder and blow us all up.' 'You are a miserable coward,' said I, 'go out of this place.' I spoke so resolutely that he obeyed. I then threw off my bonnet and, after putting on a hat and taking a gun, I said to my brothers: 'Let us fight to the death. We are fighting for our country. Remember that our father has taught you that gentlemen are born to shed their blood for the service of God and the King."

To understand fully the courage of this girl of fourteen, it must be remembered that these words were addressed to mere lads, twelve and ten years of age respectively. The brothers were worthy of their heroic sister. They responded to the call, which also inspired the two soldiers with some courage, for they took up their guns and began firing from the loopholes upon the Iroquois, who, ignorant of the weakness of the garrison, and always reluctant to attack a fortified place, occupied themselves with chasing and butchering the people in the neighbouring fields.

Shortly after the appearance of the Iroquois, a settler with his family in a canoe, was seen approaching the landing. The soldiers would not venture from the fort, so Madeleine went to the landing alone, and with a musket in hand, escorted the family to the fort. The very boldness of the affair caused the Iroquois to think it was a ruse to draw them near the fort, so that the garrison could rush out upon them, and they did not dare to attack Madeleine and those she was conducting to the fort. The arrival of the settler added one to the fighting strength of the garrison, and Madeleine now gave orders that the Iroquois should be fired upon whenever seen within range. When night came on a gale began to blow, accompanied by snow and hail; and the Iroquois hoped to be able to climb into the fort under cover of darkness. Madeleine now made the distribution of her small force, upon whose vigilance the lives of all depended. The two soldiers she stationed in the blockhouse, and as it was the strongest part of the post, she led there the women and children. "If I am taken," she said to the two soldiers, "do not surrender, even if I am cut to pieces and burned before your eyes. The enemy cannot hurt you in the blockhouse, if you make the least show of fight."

The outer and chief defence of the fort was a wooden wall, or palisade, at each corner of which stood a small tower, or bastion. In two of these towers Madeleine placed her two young brothers, in the third tower she placed the old man of eighty, while she took the fourth tower herself. All night long, through the howling wind and driving snow, the cries of "All's Well" were kept up from the fort to the blockhouse. "One would have thought," related Madeleine to Governor Beauharnois, "that the place was full of soldiers. The Iroquois thought so, and were completely deceived, as they confessed afterwards." They had held a council to make a plan for capturing the fort in the night, but had done nothing because such a constant watch was kept.

"At last, the daylight came again; and, as the darkness disappeared, our anxiety seemed to disappear with it. Everybody took courage, except the wife of Sieur Fontaine, who, being extremely timid, asked her husband to carry her to another fort. He said: 'I will never abandon this fort while Mademoiselle Madeleine is here.' I answered him that I would never abandon it; that I would rather die than give it up to the enemy; and that it was of the greatest importance that they (the Iroquois) should never get possession of any French fort, because if they got one, they would think that they could get others and would grow more bold and presumptuous than ever. I may say with truth that I did not eat or sleep for twice twenty-four hours, but kept always on the bastion, or went to the blockhouse to see how the people there were behaving. I always kept a cheerful and smiling face and encouraged my little company with hope of speedy succour."

Seven days passed, and although the weather continued to be raw and cold, the Iroquois kept the field, still hoping to be able to capture the fort and scalp its garrison. "We were a week in constant alarm, with the enemy always about us," relates Madeleine in her narrative to Governor Beauharnois. "At last M. de la Monnerie, a lieutenant, sent by M. de CalliÈres (then commanding at Montreal), arrived in the night with forty men. As he did not know whether the fort was taken or not, he approached as silently as possible. One of our sentinels, hearing a strange sound, cried out, 'Qui Vive?' I was at the time dozing, with my head on a table and my gun lying across my arms. The sentinel told me he heard a voice from the river. I went up at once to the bastion to see whether it was Indians or Frenchmen. I asked, 'Who are you?' One of them answered, 'We are Frenchmen, it is La Monnerie, who comes to bring you help.' I caused the gate to be opened, placed a sentinel there and went down to the river to meet them. As soon as I saw M. de la Monnerie, I saluted him and said, 'Monsieur, I surrender my arms to you.' He answered gallantly, 'Mademoiselle, they are in good hands.' 'Better than you think,' I returned. He inspected the fort and found everything in order and a sentinel on each bastion. 'It is time to relieve them, Monsieur,' I said, 'We have not been off our bastions for a week.'"

So ended the siege of VerchÈres, for learning that the garrison had received reinforcements, the Iroquois abandoned the undertaking, and sneaked away to try their fortunes at other little posts, where there might be a garrison numerically stronger.