The Jesuit Martyrs Of North America

271.5 98j 68-7^868

Wynne

The Jesuit mrtyrs of North

America

271.5 W98d 68-7^868

Wynne

The Jesuit martyrs of North

America

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THE JESUIT MARTYRS
OF NORTH AMERICA

The Jesuit Martyrs

of North America

Isaac Jogues, John de Brebeuf, Gabriel Lalemant

Noel Chabanel, Anthony Daniel, Charles Garnier

Rene Goupil, John Lalande

JOHN J. WYNNE, S. J.

THE UNIVERSAL KNOWLEDGE FOUNDATION
NEW YORK

Copyright 1925
The Universal Knowledge Foundation, Inc ,

All Rights Reserved

Copyright in England

Copyright under the articles of the Copyright

Convention of the Pan-American Republics and

The United States, Aug. 11, 1910

See Html page

J. B. LYON COMPANY, GENERAL PRINTERS, ALBANY, NEW YORK

To THE RIGHT REVEREND

EDMUND F. GIBBONS, D.D.,

BISHOP OF ALBANY;

THE DIOCESE IN WHICH THE MARTYRS CRIMSONED

WITH THEIR BLOOD THE SOIL OF NORTH

AMERICA, AND WHICH NOW HAS THE

HONOR OF HAVING OPENED THE ROLL

OF OUR BELOVED COUNTRY'S

CALENDAR OF THE

BLESSED.

CITY (MO.)

PREFACE

NEITHER myth nor legend is needed by our
country for the heroic story with which every
people loves to immortalize its origins. Our
earliest history is one of heroes who achieved their
wonders, not by physical prowess merely, but by
moral grandeur. Their most wonderful achieve-
ment is the incomparable devotion with which they,
all men of exquisite culture and refinement, labored
among human beings who had fallen from man's
high estate into the depths of barbarism and
depravity. In common with all heroes, they were
animated by the noblest passions ; but they excelled
in love, the greatest of all. They excelled also in
the objects of their love, entirely devoid as it was
of selfishness, and centred purely on the highest
things, on God and on human souls. They are
the heroes of the invisible, the spiritual, the super-
natural; and these, by word and work, they bring
vividly before our weaker vision.

The story of the Martyrs has been repeated so
often and by such skilful narrators that it has
become a household tale in this country and in
Canada. It cannot be told too often. Hitherto
it has appeared in books or chapters about one or
other of the principals, or as part only of a general
history to which it is subordinated. In this book

C vii 3

PREFACE

it is for the first time woven together into one
complete narrative. In doing this I have availed
of the writings of Martin, de Rochemonteix, and
Gilmary Shea; of Jones, Campbell, and Devine,
with whom I have been closely associated; of
Parkrnan, Bancroft, my friend Dr. John Finley,
and especially of the noble publication of the
Jesuit Relations by Thwaites and his scholarly
editorial staff.

I am indebted to the publishers of C The Jesuit
Relations and Allied Documents" for their cordial
permission to use their translation of the Relations
in the many quotations I have thought well to
make from that collection. No one can tell the
story of a Brebeuf or of a Jogues better than them-
selves. I am indebted also to Mr. C. F. Wemyss
Brown and Miss Catherine M. Neale for their
kindness in assisting me with the revision of both
manuscript and proof, and to Frank P. Seaman for
his valuable map of the Jesuit Missions in New
France.

THE AUTHOR.
Decoration Day, 1925.

[ viii

CONTENTS

CHAPTER ONE

A Half-Century of Names and Deeds Immortal
A. D. 1600-1650

PAGE

The first half^ of the Seventeenth Century Rulers and
Leaders Genius in literature Birthtime of modern science
Philosophy, Painting, Sculpture, Music, Education
Schools of the Jesuits Religion Great Saints Influence
in Civil life Missionary spirit, Organization Missions of
the Jesuits A Society baptized in blood Genius of sanctity
imperishable 1

CHAPTER TWO

Martyrs in Formation

A. D. 1617-1630

Jesuit Martyrs of North America The Priests, Jogues,
Brebeuf, Daniel, Garnier, Lalemant, Chabanel Their de-
voted companions, Goupil and Lalande, laymen The
Society of Jesus, spirit and training Life in the novitiate
The Spiritual Exercises Reformation not an ideal, but a
means to the following of Christ The Exercises and the
phobias, athletes of Christ After the novitiate, studies,
philosophy, teaching, theology, priesthood 11

CHAPTER THREE

The Missions of New France

A. D. 1608-1614

Exploration of Canada Religious motive of Cartier and of
the French Voyages, 1534-1543 Colonization suspended
for sixty years Henry IV, expedition of 1603 Dissensions
over^ religion Champlain, ideals as colonizer Lescarbot;
Abbe Fleche Baptizing uninstructed Indians Opposition
to Jesuits as missionaries for Acadia Madame de Guerche-
ville Fathers Biard and Masse Obstacles to their embark-
ing for New France de Guercheville comes to their aid
Friction with Biencourt The new colony at Saint-Sauveur
Argall, abductor of Pocahontas, pirates Acadia Ill-
treatment of missionaries Return to France Why mis-
sions often seem failures 26

CHAPTER FOUR

Missionaries Layman, Friar and Jesuit
A. D. 1615-1625

Champlain The Franciscans in New France A first horror
Colonists few Algonquins, Montaignais No aid from
exploiters of trade Friars call for Jesuits Brebeuf,
Masse and Charles Lalemant in Canada, 1625 Winter hunt
with the Montaignais 38

CONTENTS

CHAPTER FIVE
The Missionary's Fortune

A. D. 1626-1628

Huron Country, route from Quebec Journey under difficul-
ties Hurons, govejnment, beliefs, morals, sorcery A mis-
sionary's perplexities' English invasion of Canada-
French colony depopulated Missionaries return to France
Brebeuf signs a vow in blood 50

CHAPTER SIX
Missions and Civilization

A. D. 1632-1634

Failure of Huguenot invasion of New France Colonization
in earnest Its chief promoter, a Huguenot become Jesuit
Le Jeune's trumpet-call to France Missions a national
reawakening, not a conversion of heathen only The form
of his message, "The Jesuit Relations" Value as docu-
ments of North American history Incentive to mission-
aries Factor in the missions of New France, in the
foundation of Canada and of a new people 63

CHAPTER SEVEN
An Apostle and His Mission

A. D. 1634-1636

Brebeuf greets the Hurons at Quebec They visit his chapel,
feast and return to Huronia without him A year of min-
istry and patience Return to Ihonatiria in 1634 Ill-
treatment on the way Huron cabins unlike the Louvre
Assembly and catechism Zeal unrewarded Caution in ad-
mitting converts Children the hope of the Mission The
seminary for them in Quebec 79

CHAPTER EIGHT
Brebeuf 's Ideal Missionary 93

CHAPTER NINE
Arrival of Jogues and Garnier

A. D. 1636-1640

Recruits Voyage overseas A martyr and a Mother Bre-
beuf again isolated Four auxiliaries Arrival of Jogues
Illness in tribe and Mission A missionary's daily routine
An Indian's cabin Mission at Ossossane Vacation and
summer school 106

CHAPTER TEN
Brebeuf s Ideal Realized

A. D. 1639

Hostility to missionaries Imported prejudices Dream and
transport Baptism of first adult in health- Council de-
cides on death of missionaries A marvellous document
A new Mission An Indian census Conversions begin 120

CONTENTS

CHAPTER ELEVEN

More Missions and New Fields

A. D. 1639-1642

A change of policy A mission centre and more stations
The missions and greater New France Motive of the
missionaries Not after trade or land Personnel of the
head-quarters Individual characteristics Obedience Jesuit
auxiliaries Exploring new fields Tobacco Indians, Gar-
nier's report Jogues and the Ojibways The Neuters
Brebeuf at Quebec Failure and hope of the Mission 132

CHAPTER TWELVE
An Era of Martyrdom

Distress in Huronia Jogues leads relief expedition Captured
by Mohawks Two weeks trail in torture Gruesome vil-
lage spectacle A year in slavery A Martyr's Confessions
Goupil, first victim Death for the Sign of the Cross
A Martyr's interment 152

CHAPTER THIRTEEN
An Apostle in Slavery

The Dutch intervene A slave on the Mohawk The winter's
hunt A snow-bound oratory Life in the balance His
friends among the Dutch Final decision to seek freedom
Reformed Minister and Jesuit Reception at New Amster-
dam Return to France Return to Canada Back to the
Mohawks Death 175

CHAPTER FOURTEEN
A Supreme Holocaust

Hurons becoming Christian Example of devotion Iroquois
implacable Daniel their victim, Mart3 r r of Charity Acts
of the Martyrs Brebeuf and Lalemant An orgy of cruel-
ties 192

CHAPTER FIFTEEN
The Last of the Victims

The "Hurons exterminated Gamier at his post A true Shep-
herd His dying effort A sublime burial-scene Chabanel
betrayed His vow accepted 209

CHAPTER SIXTEEN
Fruits of Martyrdom

An exterminated people The Missions not a failure Virtues
of the Missionaries Their memory in veneration Influence
after death Monuments in their honor Protestant devotion
General Clark and Auriesville, site of Jogues's death

The long memory of the Church 222

REFERENCES 235

BIBLIOGRAPHY 239

INDEX 241

THE JESUIT MARTYRS
OF NORTH AMERICA

CHAPTER ONE

A Half-Century of Names and Deeds Immortal
ANNO DOMINI 1600-1650

The first half of the Seventeenth Century Rulers and Leaders
Genius in literature Birthtime of modern science Philosophy,
Painting, Sculpture, Music, Education Schools of the Jesuits
Religion Great Saints Influence in civil life Missionary spirit,
Organization Missions of the Jesuits A Society baptized in
blood Genius of sanctity imperishable.

DURING the first half of the seventeenth
century men were born and things done that
were destined to have a lasting influence. Ferdinand
II of Germany, in his successful struggle for the
Counter-Reformation and the restitution of church
properties to their rightful owners, had to sustain
the burden of the Thirty Years' War for more than
half its duration. Maximilian, Duke and Elector of
Bavaria, was ably supporting him, and consolidat-
ing in Bavaria the religious spirit for which it is
noted to this day. By maintaining peace in France
for twenty years, and promoting agricultural, in-
dustrial and commercial prosperity, Henry IV pre-
pared the way for Louis XIII, during whose
reign, favored as he was with ministers like Colbert
and Richelieu, genius was at its best in France. It
was the day of such brilliant leaders as Tilly, Wal-
lenstein, Gustavus Adolphus, Turenne, to whom
military science and strategy even in our time is
much indebted.

n 1 3

THE JESUIT MARTYRS

In England, Shakespeare was writing "Hamlet" ;
rare Ben Jonson, "Every Man in His Humor" ;
Fletcher, "The Faithful Shepherdess"; Massinger,
"A New Way to Pay Old Debts" ; blind old Mil-
ton, his "Paradise Lost" ; Lord Bacon, his "Novum
Organum". In Spain, Calderon was creating his
"El Principe Constante"; Alarcon, "La Verdad
Sospechosa" ; Lope de Vega, his "Comedies of the
Cloak and Sword"; De Castro, "Las Mocedades
del Cid" ; and the immortal Cervantes, the immor-
tal "Don Quijote de La Mancha". In France,
Corneille was producing "Le Cid"; Moliere had
begun his stage career; and Richelieu, in 1635, was
founding the Academy, which has since been the
inspiration of literary work all the world over, as
well as in its own country. Among its first mem-
bers were Boileau, Bossuet, La Fontaine and Ra-
cine.

In Italy Baldi was making idyllic poetry and
admirable monographs; Davanzati was translating
Tacitus; Tassoni parodied the heroic poets in his
comic epic; Chiabrera adapted Greek and Latin
metres to Italian verse; Testi wrote patriotic poems;
and the versatile Salvator Rosa indulged in satire.
In Germany, Arndt was writing widely-read books
of Protestant theology; the mystic shoemaker
Bohme was producing his profound though con-
fused notions; Ayrer and Heinrich, Duke of
Brunswick were writing plays; Opitz was bringing
forth his masterly treatise on German poetry;

OF NORTH AMERICA

Logan, his epigrams; Fleming, lyrics; Dach's
poetry lent lustre to the Konigsberg Circle; Gry-
phius was the chief dramatist of the period; the
Jesuit von Spee was intrepidly defending the vic-
tims of the witchcraft tribunals; Angelus Silesius
was giving noble expression to mysticism in poetry;
the Jesuit Balde sang in both German and Latin;
von Grimmelshausen achieved the prose classic of
the century in his "Simplicissimus".

It was the birthtime of the science we are cul-
tivating to-day, the age of Galileo and his teles-
cope, Torricelli and his barometer, Napier and his
logarithms, Huygens and his Saturn's rings, Mer-
senne and his laws of vibration, Gassendi the
Bacon of France, Gilbert and magnets, Harvey and
the circulation of the blood, Bacon and the process
of induction, Kircher the versatile Jesuit, with his
hieroglyphs, adding-machine, speaking-tube and
Aeolian harp, Malpighi and the microscope, Rober-
val the mathematician, Kepler and planets, Gas-
coigne and his micrometer, Van Helmont and
gases, Buonaventura Cavalieri and the geometric
method of indivisibles, Sydenham and epidemic
diseases, von Guericke and the air-pump.

Spinoza, Descartes, Pascal and Locke were pro-
pounding philosophies which still influence pro-
foundly the thought and conduct of multitudes.
Grotius was gleaning from the neo-Scholastics and
mediaeval jurisprudence principles of an interna-

THE JESUIT MARTYRS

tional law which, if honored in our day, would
facilitate the establishment of a world's court.

Painters like Velasquez, Murillo, Rembrandt,
Rubens, Grimaldi, Lorrain, Reni, Domenichino,
Dolci, Sassoferrato, Salvator Rosa, Maratta, Zur-
baran were creating their immortal masterpieces.
In sculpture, Montanez was enriching the cathe-
dral of Seville; Bernini was at work upon his
"Apollo and Daphne"; Maderna was elaborating
the death-like pose of his St. Cecilia; Algardi was
founding the School of Bologna. In music, the
Masters of the Golden Age included Sweelinck, the
talented brothers Anerio, da Vittoria, the English-
men Byrd, Wilbye, Morley, and Gibbons, the Ger-
mans Hassler and Aichinger. The first oratorio
was produced by Emilio Cavalieri; the first opera,
by Peri; Monteverde was the pioneer of modern
harmony. Schiitz elaborated polyphonic prin-
ciples in Church music; and Frescobaldi composed
for the organ.

Education, particularly in France, was in honor,
nowhere more than in the colleges at Clermont, La
Fleche and Rouen, which will be frequently men-
tioned in these pages. So much in favor were the
Jesuit colleges in France that from twenty in num-
ber before A. D. 1600 they increased to seventy
in these fifty years, an average of one a year. In
spite of the opposition of the Paris University and
the Parliament of Paris, and of false accusations of
political enemies, they became the popular schools

OF NORTH AMERICA

of the time, their average attendance approximat-
ing one thousand. For two centuries they educated
men who became leaders in every sphere of life,
Corneille, Moliere, Descartes, Mersenne, Bossuet,
Francis de Sales, Richelieu, Montesquieu, Buffon,
Malesherbes. These schools were in close touch
with the culture not of France only, but of the
learned world of the time. Nationalism had not
yet put up barriers to the companionship of schol-
ars of different countries; there was one language
in which scholars could converse; travel was
leisurely and as often for observation and the
exchange of ideas as for trade or pleasure; mem-
bers of a missionary order were constantly in con-
tact with those who had seen other lands and
known other peoples. It is surprising how quickly,
without railroad or radio, news got abroad and
mental work became common. There was a news-
paper in Frankfort in 1615, in Antwerp in 1616,
and in England in 1622. Corneille's "Le Cid"
appeared in France in 1636; it was produced in
England in 1637; that tragedy influenced the
European stage for two centuries. Drama was a
notable element in the Jesuit system of education,
and a point of contact between them and the
official and lettered world. It was not unusual
for the court and nobility to attend their college
plays, and for cities like Munich and Paris to
solemnize these productions. Jesuit professors
wrote these plays and directed their performance

THE JESUIT MARTYRS

and other similar public exhibitions. One of the
few facts recorded of Jogues as 'professor in the
college at Rouen is the reading of a Latin poem
on a legend from Evagrius to the student body,
numbering nineteen hundred, at the beginning of
the scholastic year 1632.

Arts and science were the main courses in these
colleges. In many places, as at Bordeaux, Cahors,
Bruges, Reims, Caen and Poitiers, they were affili-
ated to the universities of these cities, in some cases
constituting the university Faculty of Arts.
Clermont and Pont-a-Mousson had the complete
university courses of the period, theology, philos-
ophy, embracing natural philosophy or science, the
humanities, languages, history and literature. We
are not surprised, therefore, to find men trained in
these colleges, who afterward became missionaries,
versed in sacred science, familiar as Jogues and
Brebeuf with Holy Writ, but making their own ob-
servations astronomical and meteorological, charting
maps, noting what was peculiar in forestry, vegeta-
tion and animal life, recording the racial charac-
teristics of the Indians one of them, Lafitau, is
the founder of modern ethnology 1 studying their
languages not only as missionaries, but as philolo-
gists, and planning as true political economists,
like Le Jeune, the civilization that flourishes in
Canada to-day. The Ontario Government in 1920
published Potier's seven books on the Huron
language and grammar. 2

OF NORTH AMERICA

In those days, at least In countries which had
resisted the innovations of Luther, -Calvin and
Henry VIII, religion was not yet excluded from
ordinary life. France had resisted Lutheranism,
and Calvinism had not succeeded in winning over
many of its people. French Protestants, generally
known as Huguenots, were active in trade, and
especially in politics, until in 1628 Richelieu put
an end to their political pretensions, and to their
dealings with her ancient enemy, England, with a
view to making Protestantism a dominant factor in
the national life. Great saints were common. Like
de Sales, Vincent de Paul and Bellarmine, they
took prominent part in civil, social and scientific
affairs. De Sales wrote books on spiritual subjects
which to-day are read for style as much as for
content. De Paul organized public charities in a
manner and on a scale which no one had before
attempted. Bellarmine was the exponent of
genuine democracy, especially as we know it in
America, and he was the friend who favored con-
sideration for Galileo. Writers like Baronius,
Petavius, Bossuet, Lessius, de Paz were bequeath-
ing a heritage in history, positive theology, apolo-
getics, and mysticism which has not yet been
exhausted. Paul V had succeeded in making the
enactments of the Council of Trent the established
discipline of the Church.

So active was the missionary spirit at the time
that Gregory XV found it necessary to constitute

[73

THE JESUIT MARTYRS

a permanent congregation for the propagation of
the Faith, the Propaganda. Paul had solemnized
the beatification of many, like Ignatius Loyola,
Francis Xavier, Philip Neri, Teresa, Louis Ber-
trand, Thomas of Villanova, Isidore, and the canon-
ization of Charles Borromeo, Frances of Rome.
Gregory had canonized Ignatius, Francis, Philip,
Teresa and Isidore, and beatified among others
Albertus Magnus and Peter of Alcantara. It fell
to the lot of Urban VIII to issue the bulls for the
canonization of Ignatius and Xavier. He canon-
ized Elizabeth of Portugal and Andrew Corsini.
Indeed, so common was it to have petitions to
beatify and canonize distinguished servants of God,
that he found it necessary to regulate the canonical
processes for this purpose. It was an era of holi-
ness, and it was an era of missions likewise. Urban
was zealous in promoting both. Saints Peter
Fourier and Cousin Germaine, Francis Regis and
John Berchmans were actually living. The Church
in France needed no reforming agency from with-
out. Vincent de Paul, Olier, Condren, Eudes,
Bourdoise were re-creating the clergy and the
missionary spirit. The Oratorians under Berulle,
the Lazarists and the Capuchins were evangelizing
rich and poor, lettered and unlettered. De Sales
had brought the cloister close to the world with
his Visitandines; de Paul had organized his
Daughters of Charity, whom we konor to-day as
Sisters of Charity; Eudes his Good Shepherd; and

83

OF NORTH AMERICA

the Ursulines had three hundred and twenty houses
for the instruction of young girls, sharing with
Notre Dame the education of girlhood in France.
To the schools of the Jesuits, Condren was looking
for recruits to the Duke de Ventadour's Battalion
of the Holy Sacrament, the lay auxiliaries of this
true Catholic renascence and the generous sup-
porters of every good movement, especially of the
Missions Etrangeres, which were to develop in
1658 as a result of all this earnestness and
devotion.

Never before nor since was exploration so active.
To mention only what was happening in our own
world, a de Monts was occupying Port Royal in
Acadia in 1604. The English were in Virginia in
1607. Hudson was in New York Bay in 1609.
The Dutch were on Manhattan in 1614. By 1634
settlements were made in Massachusetts, New
Hampshire, Maine, Maryland, Connecticut, Rhode
Island, and Delaware.

Missionary orders had their men in every part of
the globe. The Jesuits alone were in China, India,
Japan, Cochin-China, Mingrelia (Transcaucasia),
Ceylon, Aethiopia, Sierra Leone, Congo, Tibet,
Paphlagonia, Persia, Armenia, Angola, Abyssinia,
Paraguay, Mexico, Peru, Quito, Maryland and
Quebec. From every quarter, word was being
received of sacrifices as well as of conquests for the
Faith. It was enough to warm the blood of any
young religious to hear that, in 1614 alone, one

THE JESUIT MARTYRS

hundred thousand were made Christians in Para-
guay, and then to learn that a Claver had died in
his heroism in Cartagena; that, one after another,
a Chimura, Ribera, Spinola, de Angelis, Andrada,
Carvalho had won the martyr's crown; that with-
out leaving Europe a Melchior and Stephen had
been put to death in Poland; that across the
Channel in England a Bennet, Bradley, Turner,
Jenison, Holland, Corbie, Morse, Owen, Oldcorne
and Garnet were being racked, drawn, hanged and
quartered, in a vain attempt to force them to
betray their brethren as well as to deny their Faith.
Truly the Society of Jesus, to which they
belonged, had been baptized in blood. Within
sixty years after its foundation, eighty-one of its
members had died for religion. Before it was
a half-century older, one hundred and seven
more had sealed their testimony with their lives.
Martyrdom was as much a prospect for its members
as any other, and the self-sacrifice that would lead
up to it was part of the training in its schools, as
much as excellence in arts or science. If men born
and things done in those days were destined by
virtue of genius in art or science to endure in fame
or influence, much more were those who excelled in
the genius of sanctity, to phrase the suggestion of
Aubrey De Vere 3 , elected by God to do things which
will never fade from memory, and to be immortal
themselves in happiness and influence.

CHAPTER TWO

Martyrs in Formation

A. D. 1617-1630

Jesuit Martyrs of North America The priests, Jogues,
Brebeuf, Daniel, Gamier, Lalemant, Chabanel Their devoted
companions, Goupil and Lalande, laymen The Society of
Jesus, spirit and training Life in the novitiate The Spiritual
Exercises Reformation not an ideal, but a means to the fol-
lowing of Christ The Exercises and the phobias, athletes of
Christ After the novitiate, studies, philosophy, teaching,
theology, priesthood.

AMONG the men of the distinguished half-
century outlined in the preceding chapter,
whose life-work has had a lasting influence, and
whose fame, exalted as it has been up to this, has
now become sacred and imperishable, are the eight
missionaries who are known as the Jesuit Martyrs
of North America.

The singular distinction of being the first in this
part of the New World to be so honored belongs
to Isaac Jogues, John de Brebeuf, Noel Chabanel,
Anthony Daniel, Charles Gamier, Gabriel Lale-
mant, priests, and their companions, Rene Goupil
and John Lalande, laymen. They were all born in
France. They left that country when equipped for
their life's work to dwell and labor in the vast and
unattractive wilderness known as Canada or New
France, three of them, Jogues, Goupil and Lalande,
penetrating into territory now part of the State of
New York and dying there for the Faith.

The sole object of these intrepid missionaries was

C 11 3

THE JESUIT MARTYRS

the conversion of the savages who occupied these
countries, principally the Hurons, Petuns, Neuters,
Algonquins and Iroquois. Never did mortal men
work so persistently, nor with such optimism amid
every form of privation, obstacle, hardship, danger
and reason for discouragement. Only for testimony
which inspires conviction, what they endured would
be incredible. Like giants they stand out even
among their own heroic associates. Their savage
tormenters ate the hearts and drank the blood of
Lalemant and Brebeuf, hoping to partake of their
courage and endurance.

With the exception of Brebeuf who was born
March 25, 1593, these martyrs were born and jjiied
in the first half of the seventeenth century. He
was the only one to exceed fifty years of age, dying
in 1649. In that brief space they accomplished the
work of long years. The preparation for their
arduous careers was the same for all. Of the
earliest years of some of them little is known prior
to their entrance into the Society of Jesus. After
that their manner of life is known minutely, in
their various habitations and occupations, up to the
time when those who were to become priests
received Holy Orders. Fortunately, the schools in
which they studied and taught, "the best schools
in the world," Bancroft says, 4 are still so celebrated
that one may, without surmise, appreciate the
seriousness of their formation and the quality of
the labor they were appointed to perform.

c 123

OF NORTH AMERICA

Jogues, the first of these priests to die a martyr,
was born in Orleans, January 10, 1607. Accord-
ing to Canon Hubert, genealogist of Orleans, he
was the child of his father's second marriage. The
father, who had occupied every prominent official
position in his native city, died soon after, leaving
the boy's education to the mother, Frangoise de
Saint-Mesmin. His name Isaac was apparently a
favorite one in his family, one of his uncles being
so named and two nephews also. Canon Hubert
records his name as Jacques, or James, but his
townsman and biographer, Forest, whom all follow,
names him Isaac, from the baptismal record of the
Church of St. Hilary, and the name has been con-
secrated by usage. 5 Holweck lists forty-eight saints
of that name, so that it is not a singularity in
Jogues' case. 6 The name fitted him perfectly,
predestined as he was to sacrifice. Finishing his
college course at seventeen, be became a Jesuit
novice at Rouen, leaving there in 1625 to study
philosophy three years at the royal college of
La Fleche, which Descartes, who studied there,
considered one of the most celebrated schools in
Europe. 7 After three years more given to teaching
he prepared for Holy Orders by the study of
theology. Ordained early in 1636, he celebrated his
first Mass on February loth, at Orleans, to the
great delight of his family. He departed for
Canada on April 2nd, in company with the
Governor of New France, Charles Huault de

n 133

THE JESUIT MARTYRS

Montmagny, appointed to succeed Champlain who
had died the year before.

The first-born of the group, Brebeuf, appears on
the scene only at his entrance into the Jesuit novi-
tiate at Rouen, already twenty-four years of age.
He was Norman, born at Conde-sur-Vire, near
Lisieux, home of the Little Flower, and not far
from Bayeux, famous for its tapestry. There had
been Crusaders in his family, and two centuries
before a Brebeuf had fought with William the
Conqueror at Hastings. Thence, no doubt, came
English descendants of the family, the Arundels,
with their own three illustrious martyrs, Philip
Howard, the Duke of Norfolk, his father, and
William Howard, Viscount Stafford. 8 This may
account for the memorial window in memory of
Brebeuf in the Anglican Church of St. Martin at
Brighton. 9 He had studied the humanities and
philosophy and moral theology also, each for two
years, when he entered the Jesuit novitiate in 1617.
His health was poor, and he could not make the
usual studies of the young Jesuit, nor could he
teach for any length of time. Obliged to rest in
the Jesuit residence, opened a few years before at
Pontoise, he studied theology sufficiently to qualify
for ordination in the unusually short time, for one
of his Order, of six years. He celebrated his first
Mass on the feast of the Annunciation, his natal
feast day, which was transferred that year to April
4th. No one would have predicted that two years

n H3

OF NORTH AMERICA

later, in 1625, this invalid consumptive would make
his first voyage to Canada, and, when driven out
by the English in 1629, return there in 1633 to
become the giant Apostle of the Hurons.

Next to Brebeuf in order of years was Daniel,
also Norman, from the seaport of Dieppe, bora
May 27, 1601. He had finished his rhetoric and
philosophy, and was studying law when he decided
to become a Jesuit, following Brebeuf in the Rouen
novitiate in 1621. After the customary two years
he began a four years' term of teaching in the
college in that city, leaving there to study theology
at Clermont College, Paris. After his ordination
to the priesthood in 1631, he taught humanities
again in the College at En, and then, with Brebeuf,
he assisted the rector there until he sailed for the
Mission of New France, arriving at Cape Breton in
1632, preceding Brebeuf who was to come back to
the mission the year following.

Four years younger than Daniel, Gamier was
a Parisian, born on May 25, 1605. He was edu-
cated at Clermont, then one of the most notable
colleges in France. His parents were rich, but the
money they allowed him went for the relief of
prison inmates. At nineteen he became a Jesuit,
following the usual training courses still at Cler-
mont, then teaching at Eu from 1629 to 1632.
Ordained priest three years later, he was assigned to
the Canada Mission, but out of consideration for
his father who, though a staunch benefactor of the

c 153

THE JESUIT MARTYRS

Jesuits, had reluctantly consented to Charles becom-
ing one of them, his departure was delayed a year.
He sailed at length with Jogues in April, 1636.

Paris was the birthplace of Gabriel Lalemant,
the last of the Martyrs to reach New France. He
was born October 10, 1610. Two of his uncles
were distinguished Canadian missionaries, Charles
and Jerome. After making his vows as a Jesuit,
in Paris, in 1632, he added a fourth vow to devote
his life to the Indians. He had to wait fourteen
years to fulfil that vow. Meanwhile, he was
reviewing his classical studies, reading philosophy,
teaching the classics and mastering theology. As
priest, owing to weak health he was chaplain for
a year at the college of La Fleche. Then he taught
philosophy at Moulins for a year and superintended
the studies at Bourges from 1644 to 1646, when he
embarked for Canada.

Youngest of all these missionaries was Chabanel,
born February 2, 1613, in southern France near
Mende, soon after the Huguenots had devastated
that region. A Jesuit at the age of seventeen, he
followed the usual courses of philosophy and
theology, teaching between them for an interval of
five years. In 1643 he embarked for Canada arriv-
ing there on August 15th, after a "three months'
voyage.

Goupil and Lalande, lay assistants of the mis-
sionaries, both died as companions of Jogues. They
were called donnes^ that is, given, or dedicated to

C 16]

OF NORTH AMERICA

their work, oblates as we would style them now,
a factor in the success of the priests which we
can scarcely appreciate. Goupil was born at
Angers, the same year as Jogues. Lalande's birth-
place was Dieppe : only that is known of him, and
where and how he died so nobly. Goupil tried hard
to be a Jesuit and he actually entered the novitiate,
but his health forced him to resign. He then
studied surgery and found his way to Canada,
where he offered his services to the missionaries,
matching the most heroic of them by his fidelity,
fortitude in suffering and martyrdom.

The Society of Jesus, of which the six priests
were members, was then nearing the completion of
the first century of its existence. Founded in 1540
by Ignatius Loyola, who had planned to restrict its
membership to sixty, in 1615 it numbered 13,112,
distributed over thirty-two provinces, with over
five hundred and fifty houses, and three hundred and
seventy-two of these attached to as many colleges.
It was governed from that year until 1645 ky
Mutius Vitelleschi. Before his death the member-
ship had increased by three thousand, and the num-
ber of houses had doubled, the colleges alone
exceeding five hundred and twenty-five. It was a
time of development in the character and quality of
work as well as of membership. Under the previous
General, Claudius Acquaviva, the entire body had
been so closely organized and its various activities
so well regulated, that it could adapt itself to the

C 173

THE JESUIT MARTYRS

needs of the time, in missionary as well as in
civilized countries, and assume new tasks without
impairing the spirit which animated it. To
preserve and strengthen this spirit was always a
prime consideration with its members as well as
with those who were appointed to govern it.
To this alone must be ascribed whatever the
Society as a whole or its individual members have
accomplished.

Whether Brebeuf and Daniel, as well as the
other four, came under the influence of this spirit
during their college course is not known. Before
entering the novitiate they had studied humanities
and philosophy, and they were fully prepared for
the formation they were to receive. It will be
observed that all these young men had finished
college when not much older than students finish-
ing in our high school today. Ranke remarks that
in the Jesuit schools in Germany of that time,
"young people learned more under them in half a
year than with others in two years." 10 This was
true of the schools in France also. Schwickerath
cites testimonies to the excellence of the French
Jesuit colleges, and says that nowhere was the Ratio,
the Jesuit system of education, better followed than
in La Fleche. 11

As novices their academic studies were inter-
rupted for a while, but this does not mean that
their minds were let lie fallow. On the contrary,
during that time their mental application was more

c 183

OF NORTH AMERICA

systematic and intense than would be required of
them in any school. They were engaged in medita-
tion twice daily, an hour in the morning and a
half -hour in the evening. Daily also they read
books by masters, not only in mystical and ascetical
knowledge, but also in biography, history, and
constantly the Holy Scripture. They were prac-
tised in the habit of analysing what they read, and
especially of what they heard in the instructions
given them every day by one skilled in spiritual
matters. They were taught to cultivate a vigilant
and correct conscience. Conversation for them was
not only the art of speaking with one another, but,
in its old and broader meaning, the manner of deal-
ing with everyone, the virtue of modesty, the
Roman moderation, always in control. They had
their times for manual labor, outdoors and indoors,
for walking, for recreation, for games. Perhaps it
was in these that Jogues learned to run swifter
than any Indian. Even in recreation they spoke
a great part of the time in Latin; their books were
in all the modern languages; they received letters
written by Jesuits already employed in every part
of the globe. They visited the hospitals and went
about on pilgrimages, often working their way and
begging bread or lodging. They were trained to
meet privation, hardship and occasional opposition
or humiliation, not stoically, as if such things were
a matter of course, but heroically and in Christian-

n *9 1

THE JESUIT MARTYRS

like manner, as things good to bear, and to bear
like Christ.

The chief factor in the training of a Jesuit is the
Spiritual Exercises, the system, or method, as it may
be called, of religious formation devised by
Ignatius. The name means activity of the soul or
spirit, just as manual or physical exercise means
activity of the body. This spiritual activity more-
over has a very definite purpose. Just as well-
regulated bodily exercise fits muscle and nerve, joint
and limb to perform various tasks with ease and
pleasure, so these spiritual exercises gradually
enable the faculties, mental and moral, to accom-
plish difficult things without failure or fatigue, even
with delight. For most people it is irksome and
even distasteful to meditate, especially when the
object of the meditation is unusual or above their
comprehension. They are content with words, with-
out weighing their meaning. God, life, soul, duty,
death, are known to them, but not so as to inspire
them. Christ is an object of veneration, but more
as if He were of the past rather than an animating
principle for the present. The Exercises of Ignatius
would change all this.

We can imagine these six ardent young men when
first they attempted this system of spiritual
athletics. They had been brought up piously. They
knew much about God and His Divine law, about
Christ, the Church, saints, sin and sacraments.
Now, however, for the first time they would apply

OF NORTH AMERICA

their reason calmly, leisurely, attentively and with-
out emotion, to think of God as Creator, of man
as creature endowed with life and faculties for a
purpose, and of his consequent obligation to work
out that purpose, that is, to serve God as perfectly
as possible; to consider this as the essential thing,
and all others, health, acquisition of wealth, honor,
success, longer or shorter life, as subservient to this.
It is one thing to repeat words, or to use them super-
ficially; another to reason profoundly about their
meanings, and to think correctly. What effect such
reasoning must have will appear later in a Jogues 5
meek submission to God's will when he was tortured
beyond mere human endurance by the Iroquois, or
in a Chabanel when urged to give up his missionary
career because of insurmountable difficulties, dedi-
cating himself by vow, even though it should
involve, as it did not long after, his death.

With a right estimate of God, of His goodness
and power, comes a new sense of the enormity of
evil, of one's responsibility and guilt in committing
it, and of one's own helplessness to overcome it.
The Exercises bring this helplessness home, not as
it is in others, but in oneself. This is the whole
difference between Ignatius as Reformer and the
multitude who have won that title by attempting
to reform in others what they would not change in
themselves. He leads one to realize the need of
self -reform, and he points the way to Christ as the
only means of achieving this because He is not only

THE JESUIT MARTYRS

the source of Divine grace, but also the model for
all genuine reformation. Indeed, reformation is
not the ideal to which He would have the soul
aspire. It is only a means to an end, and the end
is to follow Christ as leader closely, to know Him
intimately and to love Him with an affection for
which He set the measure the love greater than
which no man can have, even to the laying down
of life for a friend the friend Christ Himself.

Charles Lalemant, the novice-master of Jogues,
Brebeuf and Daniel, whose writings are to-day used
by those who value real mysticism, must have been
delighted with the response of these generous souls
as he made known to them the invitation of Christ
to help Him establish His Kingdom on earth, and
set before them the two standards, that of Christ
and that of Satan, not to bid them choose, but to
make them more ardently devoted to their Leader,
Christ. An appeal to the emotions! Yes, but to
emotions stirred by a calm and enlightened reason-
ing, emotions which no mind can resist that dares
reason rightly about Christ. It was this that
prepared them for their life's work. Some of them,
Gabriel Lalemant, for instance, had become Jesuits
with the purpose of becoming missionaries. Here
was an appeal to all. The appeal was not to the
enchantment of distant lands nor to the romance
of adventure, but to the task of preparation, the
slow, dull, relentless effort to qualify for fields
which needed the spirit of martyrs.

OF NORTH AMERICA

The Exercises animated Jogues and his com-
panions with this martyr spirit, the spirit of an
Order which since its foundation has been, like
Christ after whom it is named, a sign for contradic-
tion. They knew in France what it was to be the
scapegoat, to have the crime of the assassin Ravail-
lac charged against them; to have the University
of Paris and the Parliament of that and other cities
arrayed against them; to have been suppressed; to
witness their own Biard and Masse go forth in spite
of incredible annoyances and obstacles to the very
Mission to which they aspired and come back after
acting as Confessors of the Faith, only to find their
calumniators preceding them. They had no lack of
object lessons. Far from being moved by fear,
they were inspired to face similar ordeals or worse.
This is the characteristic negative effect of the
Exercises, the defiance and conquest of fear, of
the phobias, to use the slang of the psychology of
the day, and the consequent readiness to adopt a
course of life regardless of all that usually daunts
the human spirit. Free of its fears, the soul is in
a position to decide on any noble course, no matter
how arduous, and this decision is the culminating
act of the Exercises. All that goes before leads up
to it, all that follows confirms it. It becomes the
turning point of life. It fixes the principles on
which one will act for the future and it starts the
habits which will characterize one's whole existence.
It puts the will, guided by reason, in supremacy

r 2* i

THE JESUIT MARTYRS

over every other faculty and sense. With this
habit of decision come the precious habits of initia-
tive, resource, labor, order, system, energy, perse-
verance. In this way did Jogues, Brebeuf and
their future companions in New France pass an
entire month early in their novitiate. The experi-
ence of this month put a new spirit into their entire
after life. The Exercises, true to their title, form
not militant Christians only, as some would have
it, but genuine athletes of Christ.

After the novitiate Jogues, Chabanel and Gamier
received and extended their studies in philosophy
for three years. Lalemant, who had studied
philosophy for three years, and Daniel for two
years, before entering the novitiate, were appointed
to teach, Lalemant at Moulins, and Daniel at
Rouen. Brebeuf was physically unfit to teach or
follow exacting courses of study. Philosophy was
a live branch of knowledge in those days, especially
in the country in which Descartes, Malebranche and
Pascal were influencing thought and in a Society in
which the works of Suarez, Vasquez and Molina
were then the vogue. It was never a tame study
in Jesuit schools, nor one-sided. Every view, system,
opinion, school, theory is put before the students,
or scholastics, as they are called. They are
required not only to recite what they gather from
lectures, but to engage in disputation over it before
their assembled classes, to write occasional essays
on crucial questions and to pass each year oral

OF NORTH AMERICA

examinations in entire treatises. Precision of state-
ment is the chief requirement. No quarter is given
to vague terminology or wandering from the precise
point at issue. As in the Exercises so in the philo-
sophical studies, reason is paramount. Philosophy
was the general term, as it still is in Jesuit schools,
with its divisions of mental philosophy with sub-
divisions of logic, cosmology, metaphysics, psycho-
logy, epistemology, ethics, theology apart from
revelation; and natural philosophy, or science:
mathematics, mechanics, physics, biology, chemis-
try, astronomy. Jogues, and later Lalemant,
passed these three years at La Fleche, the favorite
college of Henry IV, noted for its courses in
mathematics and physics, with its two thousand
students; Gamier was at Clermont; Chabanel at
Toulouse. Daniel and Lalemant had studied
philosophy sufficiently before becoming Jesuits.

All but Brebeuf taught from three to five years
in the colleges of the Order prior to the study of
theology and immediate preparation for the priest-
hood ; Jogues at Rouen, where he was to live with
Brebeuf and Enemond Masse, both already back
from the missions in Canada and hoping to return
thither; Chabanel at Toulouse; Daniel at Rouen;
Gamier at Eu; and Lalemant at Nevers. The
five were engaged in teaching the humanities.
Each had the entire instruction of his class, taking
it as a rule through all the grades up to philosophy,
and associating intimately with his students, in their
recreations, games and pious practices.

25 3

CHAPTER THREE

The Missions of New France
A. D. 1608-1614

Exploration of Canada Religious motive of Cartier and of
the French 'Voyages, 1534-1543 Colonization suspended for
sixty years Henry IV, expedition of 1603 Dissensions over
religion Champlain, ideals as colonizer Lescarbot; Abbe
Fleche Baptizing uninstructed Indians Opposition to Jesuits
as missionaries for Acadia Madame de Guercheyille Fathers
Biard and Masse Obstacles to their embarking for New
France de Guercheville comes to their aid Friction with
Biencourt The new colony at Saint-Sa'uveur Argall, abduc-
tor of Pocahontas, pirates Acadia Ill-treatment of mission-
aries Return to France Why missions often seem failures.

ONLY men of hardy fibre would venture over-
seas in those days to lands where life was far
more difficult and beset with peril than it is in
Alaska to-day. Prior to the year 1608 none but
fishermen and fur-dealers, Breton, Norman and
Basque, would go there more or less regularly for
their profitable wares, and they only to the coast
line, always during milder seasons, and never to
remain. A stronger and more disinterested motive
was needed to allure men to penetrate a wilderness
inhabited by uncivilized peoples, and dwell there
during the fierce winters with no thought of return-
ing to the country which was then at the summit
of civilization. Such a motive it was that had
animated certain French explorers, during the reign
C26]

THE JESUIT MARTYRS

of Francis I, among them Jacques Cartier of Malo
who, when sailing for Canada, hoped to find a
route to India or China, not in quest of new land
or store of wealth, but "to make known the most
sacred name of God and our Holy Mother the
Catholic Church". This was why he requested the
king to provide six chaplains, in addition to the
two hundred and seventy-six passengers he proposed
to take on his third voyage. 12 On previous voyages
in 1534 he had preached to the Indians, whose
language he did not know, gathering them about a
tall cross and pointing from it to the heavens ; and
again, in 1535, warning those who lived about
Stadacon, site of the future Quebec, that the god
they invoked "was an evil spirit and that they must
believe only in Jesus Christ". 13 It was the custom
of discoverers in those days, when taking over new
lands, to place in some central spot a symbol of
possession. Carrier's symbol was the Cross.

Reading the story of Carrier's hardships and
mishaps, one wonders that he should have come
back there a third, and again a fourth time. He
had to suffer illness, lack of provisions, discontent
among his followers, not to speak of intense cold
and privation of every sort. His last voyage was
in 1543. He died in 1557. At his death New
France ceased as a colony for sixty years. Every
Frenchman left the country, leaving only among
the Indians their friendly dispositions, inspired by
Cartier' s dealings with them. Fisherman and fur-

C27 3

THE JESUIT MARTYRS

dealer continued /going as before on their very
profitable excursions. Frenchmen, however, were
poor colonizers. There was too much at home to
attract them. Moreover, conditions in France
during the last half of the sixteenth century did
not favor expeditions to other lands.

Henry IV was strongly in favor of re-colonizing
New France, but his minister Sully opposed him.
Among others, Henry had commissioned the
Marquis de La Roche, a Catholic, and Chauvin, a
Protestant trader, to establish in Canada Christian-
ity and New France. It was a strange combina-
tion of mixed religions and trade, and the crew
that sailed with them was made up of convicts who
had been condemned to death. Fortunately neither
they nor their descendants remained in Canada.
With this expedition was the Huguenot, de Monts.
In 1603 Aymar de Chastes organized a company
for the purpose of colonizing the new territory, but
he died during the voyage. When Champlain
urged a determined policy for the colonization of
Canada, the king commissioned de Monts to go
there in his name, as successor to Commander de
Chastes. In return for trading privileges, he was
to do all in his power to bring the Indians to a
knowledge of the Christian Faith. Champlain nar-
rates how the crew, a mixture of Catholics and
Huguenots, were in constant conflict over religion,
even priest and minister coming to blows. The
quarrels did not cease on their arrival at Acadia.

OF NORTH AMERICA

There even the Indians took part. When priest
and minister died, almost at the same hour, and
were buried in one grave, the mourners mocked
them, and wondered if death had put an end to
their encounters. Whereupon Champlain remarks
that two opposing religions will never do much for
the glory of God among infidels they would wish to
convert. 14

De Monts took with him Champlain, a priest,
Nicholas Aubry, a Protestant minister, and Font-
grave, Baron de Poutrincourt. To obtain money to
develop the colony, de Monts organized a company
of merchants. To protect their monopoly he took
every means to cut off the independent traders, who
had hitherto controlled the commodities of New
France. Like Cartier, Champlain excelled all this
motley company, not only by his experience as
navigator and ability as commander, but also by his
high and disinterested motives. He had sailed over
the central and southern Atlantic, looking for the
passage around the globe which all the navigators
of his time were seeking. He proposed over three
hundred years ago that the passage be made some-
what as has been done in our time by the Panama
Canal. He was seeking not to amass wealth or
personal advancement, but to transplant to a new
world the civilization of his mother country, and
the establishment there of the Christian religion.
The independent traders whom de Monts had
excluded from the colony could oppose his monop-

THE JESUIT MARTYRS

oly, and they did this so successfully as to have
him recalled. They could not oppose Champlain
with success, as their motives were so far below
his. De Monts, without due authorization it would
seem, had turned over his rights to Poutrincourt,
who was then back in France. Accompanied by
Marc Lescarbot, a lawyer who desired to take part
in the new colony, Poutrincourt returned to Port
Royal, and began at once to put the place in a
prosperous condition. Everything was provided
for, except the ministry of religion. There was no
priest. Lescarbot undertook to act as preacher and
catechist. He has often been called Huguenot, but,
as Goyau points out, in the preface of his transla-
tion of Baronius' "Discourse on the Reunion of the
Churches of Russia and Alexandria to the Holy
Catholic Church", he speaks in a manner that leaves
no doubt of his Catholicity. 10 He had the mission-
ary spirit, but he was not an admirer of Jesuits;
he did his best to keep them from New France. The
widow of Henry IV, Marie de Medicis, was bent
on carrying out the king's counsel to Poutrincourt
to have Jesuit missionaries, telling him: "I design
the structure; my son will build it". At the king's
request two Jesuits, Pierre Biard and Enernond
Masse, had been instructed to proceed to Port
Royal in 1608.

Poutrincourt did not want them. He had be-
come prejudiced against Jesuits by hearing the
charges made against them by the Reformers. He

OF NORTH AMERICA

would not provide for their journey to Acadia.
While they were waiting for a vessel, he sent a
priest from Langres, Abbe Fleche, to Port Royal,
with directions to his son Biencourt who was there
to hasten the instruction of the Indians, so that
some of them might be baptized as soon as possible.
It was done. In a few months twenty-one were
baptized. Whilst Biencourt was returning to
France with the good news, and hoping inciden-
tally to show that the mission could get on without
Jesuits, Henry IV was assassinated by Ravaillac.
The widowed queen was consoled by Biencourt' s
report, but she saw in it all the more reason for
the Jesuits 5 hastening to their mission. Biencourt,
seeing that he could not prevent them from going,
sought to procure passage for them, but then arose
another difficulty. The two priests had been gen-
erously provided with three thousand livres, by the
queen, and with a chapel, complete outfit and
every provision for the voyage by Madame de
Guercheville and other noble women. This gener-
osity to the missions of New France was to be
characteristic of the French, especially of the
women, as long as the missions lasted. The owners
of the cargo on the vessel, which was to carry the
Jesuits to their mission, were Calvinists. They
would not consent to taking the Jesuits aboard.
Madame de Guercheville started a subscription,
obtained enough, four thousand livres, to buy out
the owners of the cargo, gave it over to the mission-

C3i 3

THE JESUIT MARTYRS

aries, and still received contributions enough to
establish a fund which would yield a mission rev-
enue every year. Nothing better in a good enter-
prise than unreasonable opposition!

It is a matter of surprise to many that missionary
effort is often ineffective, or at least slow to produce
results. They do not appreciate the difficulties
inherent in the missionaries' work, and the obstacles
which are too commonly put in their path. The
privations, hardships, dangers they must encounter
are not by any means their most trying experience.
Imagine Biard leaving his chair of theology at
Lyons, and Masse giving up his place as assistant
to Father Coton at the French Court, to dwell
among the Souriquois on the island and the Etch-
emin Indians across French Bay, and attempt to
civilize ihd teach them Christianity without know-
ing a word of their language. Here is the first
barrier to their great message. Masse goes into the
woods to live with the roving bands, and pick up
now and then a word of their speech. Biard re-
mains with the few who stay at the settlement,
bribing them with food and sweets for the word
he needed. After a year they were able to com-
pose a catechism, and begin their lessons to the
natives. It was no easy task. These Indians were
nomadic, living by fishery and the chase. They
were fairly honest, intelligent and docile. The
men had several wives and they were not content
with that. They were given to drunkenness and

32 3

OF NORTH AMERICA

sorcery. The Etchemins, about five thousand in
number, were averse to Christianity. The Souri-
quois, less than four thousand, were gentle and more
favorable, but they lacked the religious sense. To
add to their indisposition, they had got the impres-
sion from Biencourt's twenty-one hasty converts
and the hundred or more who followed them, that
to be baptized meant to become like a Frenchman,
without, however, giving up any excess, whether in
the number of their wives or of their vices.

The attitude which Biard and Masse had to take
toward these ill-instructed converts was a constant
source of irritation for Biencourt. Aware of his
prejudices against them, they had done everything
in their power to conciliate him, but they could not
yield on this point. Sensitive about his jurisdic-
tion, now that his father had gone back to France,
he resented their insistence on having the Indians
who wished to be considered Christian, know and
practise their religion. Here was another impedi-
ment to the success of the missionaries, from a
source whence it should have been least expected. 17

Meanwhile Biencourt's father was in France,
seeking financial aid for the colony. When all
others failed him, he had recourse to Madame de
Guercheville. She offered to freight a vessel, on
the condition of sharing the profits and the lands
also, which the king had granted him. He would
agree to her receiving part of the profits on the
cargo, but no share in the land. Discovering that

[ 33 H

THE JESUIT MARTYRS

de Monts still really owned the lands, she obtained
title to them and the king confirmed her title to
all the land, which at that time was claimed as
Acadia, from Florida to the St. Lawrence; Port
Royal was excepted. No sooner in possession than
she fitted out an expedition, which reached Port
Royal late in January with provisions for the col-
onists, who had all, missionaries included, been liv-
ing for two months on a week's ration of eleven
ounces of bread, a half-pound of lard, three meas-
ures of beans, and one of prunes. There was
rejoicing, but there was also dishonesty on the part
of the leader of the expedition, Simon Imbert,
who, when detected, blamed the missionaries. Bien-
court at first sides with him. They without dif-
ficulty prove Imbert is the culprit. This strains
their relations with Biencourt. Madame de
Guercheville quickly decides that religion cannot
prosper under the control of men who have in view
trade and its profits only. She equips liberally a
new expedition to establish a colony where the mis-
sionaries can have a free hand. Two more Jesuit
priests and a lay-brother were among the thirty
men led by Saussaye, who arrived at Port Royal
March 12, 1613. Biencourt directed them to Mt.
Desert, where among the Etchemins the mission-
aries could labor unhampered, and evangelize also
the Abenakis.

The trials of Biard and Masse appeared to be
at an end. "It is now our autumn, our harvest

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time", wrote Biarcl. Saussaye devoted his energy
to planting and sowing, little dreaming that forts
would be even more needed than food. Just then
in the Virginia colony to the south, the captain of
a merchant vessel, Samuel Argall, had brutally ab-
ducted Pocahontas and demanded ransom from her
father, the Indian chief Powhatan. The father
declared war. Argall embarked on his vessel with
fourteen cannon and sixty men. Storms drove him
up the coast. Friendly Indians, believing he was
one of the French, told him of the new colony at
Saint-Sauveur, now Penobscot. Short of provisions,
his men discontented, intending at first to buy what
he needed, but finding the place so open to attack,
he opens fire, kills Brother Du Thet, wounds two
others, seizes three missionaries, pillages the settle-
ment, sets adrift fifteen of the colonists, among
them Masse, without chart or compass, and sails
back for Virginia with Biard and Quentin aboard.
Thomas Dale was then the colony's governor.
He was a beneficiary of Henry IV. 18 For that
reason alone, one might have looked to him for
civility, at least, to his venerable prisoners. At
first he spoke of destroying them. Then, on the
advice of his council, he determined to commission
Argall to seize Acadia, and to use the missionaries
as guides for the expedition. For refusing to do
so, Biard was treated ignominiously. Argall de-
cided to take them back with Quentin to Virginia,
to be tried and executed like traitors. Argall's

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three vessels were separated by a storm. His own
reached Virginia; a second was lost; the third, with
Biard and Quentin aboard, after a rough voyage
of several weeks reached the Azores. Rather than
get the captain into trouble with the Portuguese,
the two missionaries remained stowaways in the hold
for the three weeks the vessel remained at Fayal.
On arriving in England, he in return had them well-
received, and sent back to France. There they found
that calumniators had preceded them, blaming
them for the destruction of the colony. That was
their reward. They had little difficulty in clearing
themselves, and they went back to work, preaching
and teaching, waiting quietly for an opportunity
to go through the same ordeal again. Is there
reasonable ground for surprise at anything that
can happen to the missionary? That this apparent
failure is really only momentarv loss or defeat in
the ultimate move to victory is evident constantly
in these pages.

Biard and Masse were not satisfied with waiting
for an opportunity to return to their mission.
Masse retired to La Fleche, where he met a num-
ber of ardent young Jesuits whom he inspired with
his own zeal, Le Jeune, Ragueneau, Vimont and
Charles Lalemant, uncle of the martyr of that
name. Biard, at Lyons, writes his account of the
mission at Port Royal in such a manner as to dis-
prove the calumnies of the anonymous author of
a book on the differences between Biencourt and

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Its exiled missionaries, 19 and also to arouse the
national interest in New France. Although this
document was not originally one of the series of
the "Jesuit Relations", which will be described in a
later chapter, it is always classed with them. Biard
seized on every opportunity for recommending the
mission there. He died as chaplain of the king's
troops, in 1622. Three years later, his companion
Masse was to return to New France. The piracy
of Argall had interrupted for a time the coloniza-
tion of Acadia. In God's Providence it was to be
resumed, and to flourish abundantly.

C37H

CHAPTER FOUR

Missionaries Layman, Friar and Jesuit
A. D. 1615-1625

Chatnplain The Franciscans in New France A first horror
Colonists few Algonguins, Montaignais No aid from exploiters
of trade Friars call for Jesuits Brebeuf, Masse and Charles
Lalemant in Canada, 1625 Winter hunt with the Montaignais.

HAPPEN what might in New France there was
one man who would not desist from his
efforts to transplant thither the civilization of his
native country. He was not a priest, but he had
the missionary spirit. He was very devout. When
governor, as a means of telling the hours, when
timepieces were few, he introduced the custom of
ringing the Angelus morning, noon and evening.
Civilization for him meant religion as well as social
prosperity and trade. He had witnessed the dis-
asters brought about in Port Royal at the attempt
to make Christianity subservient to barter. Samuel
Champlain kept constantly urging that some good
religious should go to New France and that persons
of means should provide for their expenses. The
Franciscans were ready, and the cardinals and
bishops contributed fifteen hundred livres for their
mission. April 24, 1615, they embarked at Hon-
fleur. In one month they were at Tadoussac, in
time to witness a scene which made them realize
how much needed their services were. The Mon-

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taignais tribe of that place had captured two
prisoners from another tribe. They bound them,
bit off their thumbs, burned them with irons, had
the women scalp them, then stoned, and cooked and
ate them. It was the challenge of savagery to
civilization. The Franciscans could not prevent it.
However, what their Founder had done to the wild
beast at Gubbio, they would do for these beasts in
human form.

In June the friars Jamet, Le Caron and Dolbeau
were at Montreal. Jamet saw at once that they
could make little headway with the roving Mon-
taignais and Algonquins, but that they might make
some impression on the stay-at-home Hurons. In
August, Le Caron had penetrated into their lake
country and at Ihonatiria he was dwelling in his
combination cabin and chapel. Like the Jesuits at
Port Royal three years before, they found that the
French colonists needed spiritual care as much as
the Indians. How few Frenchmen there were then
in the colony we can gather from the fact that
between 1608 and 1640 only two hundred and
ninety-six men, women and children had arrived
there, less than ten per year, most of them coming
after 1633, chiefly from Normandy, Le Perche,
lle-de-France, and Aunis. The principal tribes
occupying territory from Quebec to the Huron
country at that time were the Algonquins, and a
special family of them known as the Montaignais.
The Algonquins were everywhere from the coast

THE JESUIT MARTYRS

to our Middle West, and they ranged from our
Kentucky border as far up as Hudson Bay. They
were the most numerous of the Indian peoples. The
Montaignais were on the lower St. Lawrence.
Biard calculated that of the tribe and family both,
there were not more than four thousand in this
region. 20 Both tribes were improvident, begging,
arrogant, superstitious, drunken, implacable as
enemies, polygamous. The Algonquins were cruel,
treacherous and given to foul language, but had a
certain modesty in manner, simplicity and patience.
The Montaignais were good-natured, peaceable,
hospitable, honest, and contented. There was a
sort of balance between their dispositions and their
habits. The missionaries all agreed that they could
be Christianized if they could be induced to settle
in one place.

The friars could look for little help from the
colonial commercial agents. Their financiers in
France had promised the king to aid the missions,
but they exacted from the agents all they made.
They did not want Canada to be colonized: that
would interfere with their monopoly. Champlain
and the Franciscans were bent on attracting to the
new country as many Frenchmen as possible, who
would clear the forests, build houses, till the soil,
trade honestly and thus give the natives an object
lesson which would recommend the teaching of the
missionaries. Le Caron spent ten months with the
Hurons. Part of the time Champlain was with

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him. They argued with the Indians in and out of
season. Their only rejoinder was that they could
not comprehend what was said to them about the
God adored by Christians. They too made it plain
that they wished to see first how belief in God and
the lives of Christians would make the lot of a
people better than their own. With Champlain,
Jamet and Le Caron returned to France in 1616.
in order to urge the need of peopling New France
on the Company of Associates. The Calvinists
among these Associates could not see why they
should help to send anyone to a new country for
the purpose of Catholicizing it. Others of the
group cared little for the appeal on behalf of civiliz-
ing a land whence they sought only fish and fur.
Their monopoly was menaced by the Huguenot
settlement which the Prince of Conde had
encouraged on the banks of the St. Lawrence.
Champlain and the Franciscans failed to move
them.

Like the Benedictines of the early Middle Ages,
the friars undaunted returned to their mission, de-
termined to do their part for the civilization which
others would not promote. They cut the forests
and brought the land under, and were soon feeding
their household without aid from abroad. They
opened a school for the Montaignais at Tadoussac;
a college for young Indian boys at Quebec. Several
of them they sent to their own schools in France.
They were generous beyond their resources and ener-

41 3

THE JESUIT MARTYRS

getic beyond their strength. Champlain, confirmed
as lieutenant by the new viceroy, Montmorency,
persisted in his endeavors to break the monopoly of
the Associates. This he succeeded in doing, but
only to have them supplanted by a new company
organized by the de Caen brothers, both Huguenot.
The fortunes of New France seemed to be bound
up with this sect. They managed to control in large
measure its trade and to impede its colonization.
Had they sought to realize Coligny's dream, they
might have established a Protestant France in
America. They preferred profit to population. The
new company promised, as had other financial
groups before them, to promote religion in Canada
among natives and colonists, but without perform-
ance. They would not even provide for the
defence of their own citadel, Quebec, on which
all depended for trade as well as security against
the inroads of the Iroquois. In vain another Fran-
ciscan, Le Bailiff, pleaded with the king to require
the de Caen Company to live up to its promises.
He recognized the justice of the plea; he ordered
the Company to send out every two years six
families of laborers, carpenters and masons ; but all
to no purpose. He was at the time too busily
engaged in suppressing Huguenot seditions at home
to exact an account from them for the neglect of
his ordinances at such a distance. 21

It was altogether a noble fight that the Fran-
ciscans made to minister to the Indians without the

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resources necessary. Le Caron stuck to his post.
There was every reason for discouragement, but that
is rarely a Frenchman's temptation. He knew all
the difficulties in the way of leading the Indians
to adopt Christianity, but he had the wisdom of
patience. Some day it would be done. He would
do his part. Other Franciscans came, a Sagard
who grew enthusiastic over the prospect of winning
a new people for Christ; a Viel who was to come to
Le Caron's relief, hold the fort at Huronia until
aid would come from a new source, and then perish
at the hands of those to whom he would give salva-
tion. Knowing they could not provide either men
or means enough to make the Indians Christian,
they decided to call on the Jesuits, and accord-
ingly Piat was commissioned to invite them into
the very territory in which they themselves were
working. This was in 1625. That year three
Jesuits arrived at Quebec in time to meet the Indian
traders from Huronia who had just murdered Viel
and his catechist, and thrown them into the rapids
at the spot which still bears the name Sault-au-
Recollet.

Brebeuf was one of this first group, with Masse
and Charles Lalemant. They did not go at once
to the Hurons, as they could not trust them at the
time. Instead, Brebeuf wintered with the Algon-
quins, learning their ways and their language.
What manner of life this was, we have from one
who was to lead it about ten years later and who

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THE JESUIT MARTYRS

describes it vividly in one of his famous e 'Rela-
tions". Le Jeune will write in 1634:

"Now, when we arrived at the place where we
were to camp, the women, armed with axes, went
here and there in the great forests, cutting the
framework of the hostelry where we were to lodge ;
meantime the men, having drawn the plan thereof,
cleared away the snow with their snowshoes, or
with shovels which they make and carry expressly
for this purpose. Imagine now a great ring or
square in the snow, two, three or four feet deep,
according to the weather or the place where they
encamp. This depth of snow makes a white wall
for us, which surrounds us on all sides, except the
end where it is broken through to form the door.
The framework having been brought, which con-
sists of twent}^ or thirty poles, more or less, accord-
ing to the size of the cabin, it is planted, not upon
the ground but upon the snow; then they throw
upon these poles, which converge a little at the
top, two or three rolls of bark sewed together,
beginning at the bottom; and behold, the house is
made. The ground inside, as well as the wall of
snow which extends all around the cabin, is covered
with little branches of fir ; and as a finishing touch,
a wretched skin is fastened to two poles to serve as
a door, the doorposts being the snow itself. Now
let us examine in detail all the comforts of this
elegant mansion.

"You cannot stand upright in this house, as much

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on account of its low roof as the suffocating smoke;
and consequently you must always lie down, or sit
flat upon the ground, the usual posture of the
savages. When you go out, the cold, the snow,
and the danger of getting lost in these great woods
drive you in again more quickly than the wind, and
keep you a prisoner in a dungeon which has neither
lock nor key.

"This prison, in addition to the uncomfortable
position that one must occupy on a bed of earth,
has four other great discomforts, cold, heat,
smoke, and dogs. As to the cold you have the snow
at your head with only a pine branch between, often
nothing but your hat, and the winds are free to
enter in a thousand places. . . When I lay down
at night I could study through this opening [m the
roof] both the stars and the moon as easily as if
I had been in the open fields.

"Nevertheless, the cold did not annoy me as
much as the heat from the fire. A little place like
their cabins is easily heated by a good fire, which
sometimes roasted and broiled me on all sides, for
the cabin was so narrow that I could not protect
myself against the heat. . . .

"But, as to the smoke, I confess to you that it
is martyrdom. It almost killed me, and made me
weep continually, although I had neither grief nor
sadness in my heart. It sometimes grounded all
of us who were in the cabin; that is, it caused us
to place our mouths against the earth in order to

THE JESUIT MARTYRS

breathe, ... I sometimes thought I was
going blind ; my eyes burned like fire, they wept or
distilled drops like an alembic; I no longer saw
anything distinctly, like the good man who said,
"I see men walking about like trees"; Mark, viii,
24. I repeated the psalms of my Breviary as
best I could, knowing them half by heart, and
waited until the pain might relax a little to recite
the lessons; and when I came to read them they
seemed written in letters of fire, or of scarlet. . . .
"As to the dogs, which I have mentioned as one
of the discomforts of the savages' houses, I do
not know that I ought to blame them, for they
have sometimes rendered me good service. True,
they exacted from me the same courtesy they gave,
so that we reciprocally aided each other, illustrat-
ing the idea of mutual benevolence. These poor
beasts, not being able to live outdoors, came and
lay down sometimes upon my shoulders, sometimes
upon my feet, and as I only had one blanket to
serve both as covering and mattress, I was not
sorry for this protection, willingly restoring to
them a part of the heat which I drew from them.
It is true that, as they were large and numerous,
they occasionally crowded and annoyed me so
much, that in giving me a little heat they robbed
me of my sleep, so that I very often drove them
away.. In doing this one night, there happened to
me a little incident which caused some confusion
and laughter; for, a savage having thrown him-

C46]

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self upon me while asleep, I thought it was a dog,
and finding a club at hand, I hit him, crying out,
Ache, Ache, the words they use to drive away the
dogs. My man woke up greatly astonished, think-
ing that all was lost ; but having discovered whence
came the blows, "Thou hast no sense," he said to
me, "it is not a dog, it is I." At these words I
do not know who was the more astonished of us
two; I gently dropped my club, very sorry at hav-
ing found it so near me. . . .

"When I first went away with them, as they
salt neither their soup nor their meat, and as filth
itself presides over their cooking, I could not eat
their mixtures, and contented myself with a few
sea biscuit and smoked eel; until at last my host
took me to task because I ate so little, saying that
I would starve myself before the famine overtook
us. ... It was not Our Lord's will that they
should be so long without capturing anything; but
we usually had something to eat once in two days,
indeed, we very often had a beaver in the morn-
ing, and in the evening of the next day a porcu-
pine as big as a sucking pig. This was not much
for nineteen of us, it is true, but this little sufficed
to keep us alive. When I could have, toward the
end of our supply of food, the skin of an eel for
my day's fare, I considered that I had breakfasted,
dined, and supped well.

"At first, I had used one of these skins to patch
the cloth gown that I wore, as I forgot to bring

THE JESUIT MARTYRS

some pieces with me; but, when I was so sorely
pressed with hunger, I ate my pieces; and, if my
gown had been made of the same stuff, I assure
you I would have brought it back home much
shorter than it was. Indeed, I ate old moose
skins, which are much tougher than those of the
eel; I went about through the woods biting the
ends of the branches, and gnawing the more tender
bark, as I shall relate in the journal. . . .

"So these are the things that must be expected
before undertaking to follow them; for, although
they may not be pressed with famine every year,
yet they run the risk every winter of not having
food, or very little unless there are heavy snowfalls
and a great many moose, which does not always
happen. .

"It remains to me yet to speak of their con-
versation, in order to make it clearly understood
what there is to suffer among these people. I had
gone in company with my host and the renegade,
on condition that we should not pass the winter
with the sorcerer, whom I knew as a very wicked
man. They had granted my conditions, but they
were faithless, and kept not one of them, involv-
ing me in trouble with this pretended magician, as
I shall relate hereafter. . . .

. . . ."Suffice it to say, that he sometimes
attacked God to displease me; and that he tried
to make me the laughingstock of small and great,
abusing me in the other cabins as well as in ours.

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He never had, however, the satisfaction of incit-
ing our neighboring savages against me; they
merely hung their heads when they heard the
blessings he showered upon me. As to the ser-
vants, instigated by his example, and supported by
his authority, they continually heaped upon me a
thousand taunts and a thousand insults; and I
was reduced to such a state, that, in order not to
irritate them or give them any occasion to get
angry, I passed whole days without opening my
mouth. Believe me, if I have brought back no
other fruits from the savages, I have at least
learned many of the insulting words of their
language. . . So these are some of the things
that have to be endured among these people. This
must not frighten anyone; good soldiers are ani-
mated with courage at the sight of their blood and
their ,wounds, and God is greater than our hearts.
One does not always encounter a famine; one does
not always meet sorcerers or jugglers with so bad
a temper as that one had; in a word, if we could
understand the language, and reduce it to rules,
there would be no more need of following these
barbarians. As to the stationary tribes, from
which we expect the greatest fruit, we can have our
cabins apart, and consequently be freed from
many of these great inconveniences. . . /' 22

CHAPTER FIVE

The Missionary's Fortune

A. D. 1626-1628

Huron country, route from Quebec Journey under difficulties

Hurons, government, beliefs, morals, sorcery A missionary's
perplexities English invasion of Canada French colony de-
populated Missionaries return to France Brebeuf signs a vow
In blood.

THE following year Brebeuf went with a
Recollet, de La Roche Daillon, and a fellow-
Jesuit, de Noue, to the Huron country. They had
difficulty getting there, Brebeuf especially, who had
grown so large by this time the Indians feared he
would sink the canoe. Some presents and a good
meal won the Indians over, and he was soon in the
land of his desires. The journey was no pleasure-
trip. The distance from Quebec is not more than
six hundred miles. The trail and water route, how-
ever, was fully nine hundred, owing to the need
of avoiding difficult country, and of keeping away
from the Iroquois, who were constantly seeking to
destroy the Hurons. Usually the convoys followed
the St. Lawrence to Montreal, then the La Prairie
River, and next the Ottawa as far as Lake Nipis-
sing, then down the French River to Georgian Bay
and thence to Lake Huron. Le Caron had made
this trip, but he did not describe it as vividly as
Brebeuf. We are fortunate in having his report,

THE JESUIT MARTYRS

not of this but of a later trip over the same trails
and waters. It occurs in his letter to Le Jeune:
". . . Of two ordinary difficulties, the chief
is that of the rapids and portages. Your Reverence
has Already seen enough of the rapids near Kebec
to know what they are. All the rivers of this
country are full of them, and notably the St.
Lawrence after that of the Prairies is passed. For
from there onward it has no longer a smooth bed,
but is broken up in several places, rolling and leap-
ing in a frightful way, like an impetuous torrent;
and even, in some places, it falls down suddenly
from a height of several brasses. I remember, in
passing, the cataracts of the Nile, as they are
described by our historians. Now when these
rapids or torrents are reached, it is necessary to
land, and carry on the shoulder, through woods or
over high and troublesome rocks, all the baggage
and the canoes themselves. This is not done with-
out much work, for there are portages of one, two,
and three leagues, and for each several trips must
be made, no matter how few packages one has.
In some places, where the current is not less strong
than in these rapids, although easier at first, the
savages get into the water, and haul and guide by
hand their canoes with extreme difficulty and
danger; for they sometimes get in up to the neck
and are compelled to let go their hold, saving them-
selves as best they can from the rapidity of the
water, which snatches from them and bears off

THE JESUIT MARTYRS

their canoe. This happened to one of our French-
men who remained alone in the canoe, all the
savages having left it to the mercy of the torrent;
but his skill and strength saved his life, and the
canoe also, with all that was in it. I kept count
of the number of portages, and found that we
carried our canoes thirty-five times, and dragged
them at least fifty. I sometimes took a hand in
helping my savages; but the bottom of the river
is full of stones, so sharp that I could not walk
long, being barefooted.

"The second ordinary difficulty is in regard to
provisions. Frequently one has to fast, if he
misses the caches that were made when descending;
and, even if they are found, one does not fail to
have a good appetite after indulging in them; for
the ordinary food is only a little Indian corn
coarsely broken between two stones, and some-
times taken whole in pure water; it is no great
treat. Occasionally one has fish, but it is only a
chance, unless one is passing some tribe where
they can be bought. Add to these difficulties that
one must sleep on the bare earth, or on a hard rock,
for lack of space ten or twelve feet square on which
to place a wretched hut; that one must endure con-
tinually the stench of tired-out savages; and must
walk in water, in mud, in the obscurity and
entanglement of the forest, where the stings of an
infinite number of mosquitoes and gnats are a seri-
ous annoyance.

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"I say nothing of the long and wearisome silence
to which one is reduced, I mean in the case of
newcomers, who have, for the time, no person in
their company who speaks their own tongue, and
who do not understand that of the savages. Now
these difficulties, since they are the usual ones,
were common to us as to all those who come into
this country. But on our journey we all had to
encounter difficulties which were unusual. The
first was that we were compelled to paddle con-
tinually, just as much as the savages; so that I
had not the leisure to recite my Breviary except
wlxen I lay down to sleep, when I had more need
of rest than of work. The other was that we had
to carry our packages at the portages, which was
as laborious for us as it was new, and still more
for others than it was for me, who already knew
a little what it is to be fatigued. At every portage
I had to make at least four trips, the others had
scarcely fewer. I had once before made the
journey to the Hurons, but I did not then ply
the paddles, nor carry burdens; nor did the other
religious who made the same journey. But, in this
journey, we all had to begin by these experiences
to bear the Cross that Our Lord presents to us for
His honor, and for the salvation of these poor bar-
barians. In truth, I was sometimes so weary that
the body could do no more, but at the same time
my soul experienced very deep peace, considering
that I was suffering for God; no one knows it if

THE JESUIT MARTYRS

he has not experienced it. All did not get off so
cheaply." 23

Daillon settled at Ossossane, the Jesuits at
Ihonatiria in the cabin which had been built for
the Recollet Le Caron in 1615. De Noue could
not master the language; he was too far advanced
in years. Without it to remain among the Indians
was time wasted. Accordingly, he returned to
Quebec, leaving Brebeuf at Ihonatiria. Daillon
was soon recalled to Quebec, and Brebeuf was
thus entirely alone with the Hurons. He could
not gain much headway in his efforts to make
them Christians, but he could acquire the knowledge
of their language, for which he was celebrated, and
he could also study their character and mode of
life. What he and others of the missionaries
wrote on this subject has come down to us, and
it may be thus summarized :

The Hurons were the original stock from which
sprung the Iroquois family, Mohawks, Onondagas,
Oneidas, Cayugas, Senecas and the Tuscaroras,
Cherokees and Andastes. This has been established
by all who have studied the derivation of the
language of these tribes from that of the Hurons.
Their real name was Wyandots, meaning 'lan-
guage [or land] apart". Huron was a nickname
given by French sailors who, on meeting some of
them at Quebec with their hair furrowed and
ridged like a boar's bristles, exclaimed Quelle Jiure!
(What boar heads!). At the beginning of the

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seventeenth century the Hurons dwelt within the
Province of Ontario, their main centre being within
Simcoe County. To the east and north were the
Algonquins, to the south-west the Neutrals and
Petuns, or Tobacco Nation. The number of
Indians in Huronia in 1636 Brebeuf estimated at
about thirty thousand, and the total number of
all the tribes, Iroquois included, at more than
three hundred thousand. It was not difficult to
enumerate them, as they were not a wandering
people. It was their settled habit of living that led
the missionaries to have great hopes of civilizing
and Christianizing them. War and pestilence were
continually decreasing their number.

Government, as we know it, was unknown among
them. They lived in cabins divided into compart-
ments on either side, like an enlarged sleeping car,
a family to each compartment; and in the passage
between the compartments a fire-place for every
two families. They had councils for deliberation
and political decisions, but there was no coercive
power. It depended on the leaders, or captains,
to persuade the tribesmen to submit to a decision,
and on their power of invective to shame the
guilty for his misdeeds. They had war chiefs to
determine when there should be war and when
peace. The affairs of each village, its games, festi-
vals, ceremonies, funerals, were regulated by cap-
tains. These were chosen sometimes by election,
sometimes by succession. They were all of equal

C553

THE JESUIT MARTYRS

grade: only mental or moral force, especially
bravery, entitled any of them to impose his views
on the others.

Some of the missionaries, the Recollet Brother
Sagard, for instance, and Jerome Lalemant, agreed
with Champlain that the Hurons knew no God;
that they worshipped a demon or Oki. Sagard
was of the opinion that they had a good and bad
Oki, and that they believed in a creator louskeha,
though they did not offer him sacrifice. Brebeuf
who lived closest to them concluded that they had
a faint and hazy notion of God, but not impressive
enough to make them serve or honor Him. They
believed that the soul survived the body, but soul
for them was not a spiritual substance. They did
not look forward to reward or punishment after
death. They did, however, fear in this life the
displeasure of the great Oki, the power which, in
their view, regulated seasons, storms, tempests and
other forces. They sought to propitiate this power
by throwing tobacco into the flames and pleading
for aid, for cures and for other needs. They appeased
it by offering the flesh of the victims of violent
death. They sacrificed living animals. This con-
firms Brebeuf s view that they had a perverted
notion of God, and that they were a degenerate
people who were clinging to the remnant of a
revelation their ancestors had once possessed.

The Hurons were depraved and degraded. Vice
ran riot among them. They were proud beyond

OF NORTH AMERICA

conception, lustful, deceitful, thieving, cruel,
brutal, filthy and repulsive. They were treacherous
and hypocritical. Lavish in hospitality, they
would feast to the full the victim they were to
torture like demons as soon as the repast was over.
The men wore scarcely anything; the women were
covered from shoulder to knee. They held to the
principle of marriage to one only, but they violated
it in practice by the most promiscuous licence.
They were jealous of their traditions, and bound
down by tribal customs and conventions. When
inclined to follow a better instinct of decency,
pity, honor, they were cowed into doing the oppo-
site by fear of the tribal usage and sentiment.
They taught their young to cultivate their vices.
They believed in sorcery, and practised it inces-
santly. Indeed they were constantly under the
influence of those who pretended to be sorcerers.
They were so given over to it, they believed that
the missionaries must live by it also. This for
many years was the chief obstacle to their conver-
sion to Christianity. Indeed, it was the cause of
the martyrdom of many a missionary at the hands
of the Iroquois, who believed in it even, if possible,
more than the Hurons. 24

Brebeuf showed extraordinary physical courage
in dwelling alone with these people. His moral
courage was greater still. Not only did he fail to
make any converts among them; he soon discovered
that they were suspicious of everything about him.

THE JESUIT MARTYRS

There was a drought, the crops were withering, and
a contagious disease attacked them. They attributed
their misfortunes to his presence and the most
sacred things in his cabin. The cross on top of the
chapel section of his cabin was the particular object
of their dread.

The captains of the village, having heard these
stories, sent for me and said, 'My nephew, here is
what so-and-so says; what dost thou answer to it?
We are ruined, for the corn will not ripen. If at
least we should die by the hands and arms of our
enemies who are ready to burst upon us, well and
good, we should not at any rate pine away; but
if, having escaped from their fury, we are exposed
to famine, that would be to go from bad to worse.
What dost thou think of it? Thou dost not wish
to be the cause of our death? besides, it is of as
much importance to thee as to us. We are of the
opinion that thou shouldst take down that Cross,
and hide it awhile in thy cabin, or even in the
lake, so that the thunder and the clouds may not
see it, and no longer fear it; and then after the
harvest thou mayest set it up again. 3 To this I
answered, 'As for me, I shall never take down nor
hide the Cross where died He who is the cause of
all our blessings. For yourselves, if you wish to
take it down, consider the matter well ; I shall not
be able to hinder you, but take care that, in taking
it down, you do not make God angry and increase
your own misery. Do you believe in this deceiver?

C583

OF NORTH AMERICA

He does not know what he says. This Cross has
been set up for more than a year, and you know
how many times there has been rain here since.
Only an ignorant person would say that the thunder
is afraid ; it is not an animal, it is a dry and burn-
ing exhalation which, being shut in, seeks to get
out this way and that. And then what does the
thunder fear? This red color of the Cross?
Take away then, yourselves, all those red figures
and paintings that are on your cabins. To this
they did not know .what to reply; they looked
at each other and said, Tt is true, we must not
touch this Cross; and yet, 5 added they, 'Tehoren-
Tiaegnon says so.' A thought came to me. 'Since,'
said I, 'Tehorenhaegnon says that the thunder is
afraid of this color of the Cross, if you like we
will paint it another color, white, or black, or any
other; and if, immediately after, it begins to rain,
you will be sure Tehorenhaegnon has told the
truth; but if not, that he is an impostor.' 'Well
said,' they replied, c we will do that.' The Cross
was therefore painted white, but one, two, three,
four days passed without any more rain than
before; and meanwhile all who saw the Cross
became angry at the sorcorer who had been the
cause of disfiguring it thus. Thereupon I went to
see the old men. 'Well, has it ruined any more
than before? Are you satisfied?' Tes, ? said they
c we see clearly enough that TeTiorenhaegnon is only
a deceiver; but now, do thou tell us what to do,

C593

THE JESUIT MARTYRS

and we will obey thee. 3 Then Our Lord inspired
me to instruct them in the mystery of the Cross,
and speak to them of the honor that was every-
where rendered to it; and to tell them that it was
my opinion that they should all come in a body,
men and women, to adore the Cross in order to
restore its honor; and, inasmuch as it was a matter
of causing the crops to grow, they should each
bring a dish of corn to make an offering to Our
Lord, and that what they gave should afterwards
be distributed to the poor of the village. The
hour is appointed for the morrow; they do not
wait for it, they anticipate it. We surround the
Cross, painted anew in its first colors, upon which
I had placed the Body of Our Lord crucified; we
recite some prayers; and then I adored and kissed
the Cross, to show them how they ought to do it.
They imitated me one after the other, apostrophiz-
ing Our Crucified Savior in prayers which natural
rhetoric and the exigency of the time suggested
to them. In truth, their fervent simplicity inspired
me with devotion; briefly, they did so well that
on the same day God gave them rain, and in the
end a plentiful harvest, as well as a profound
admiration for the Divine power." 25

Brebeuf did not have to endure these misunder-
standings long. The colony was in distress. The
Merchants' Company had used its monopoly to
impoverish colonizers and natives alike. Charles
Lalemant had gone back to France to implore aid.

OF NORTH AMERICA

He found that already Cardinal Richelieu had
revoked the Merchants' charter and instituted the
new Company of One Hundred Associates. It was
too late. The relief ships they sent out from
France were betrayed by David Kerkt and his two
brothers, refugees from France, and captured by the
English, who were seeking to take advantage of the
colony's destitution. After closing the St. Lawrence
to all relief from France, they compelled Champlain
to surrender, and forthwith missionaries and
colonists, all save one family, the Heberts, were
forced to return to their country, and Canada
became for the first time a British colony.

Brebeuf returned to Rouen, and while there made
his final year of probation, the crowning observance
of the Jesuit in preparation for his life's work. It
was a year of quiet, meditation and of planning
the future, not so much of what he hoped to do, but
rather of what he hoped to be as an instrument
in the hand of God, for his own perfection and for
the perfection of others. The year over, he
pronounced his last vows. He has left us this
extraordinary document of devotion. One would
imagine that after his experiences with the Indians
he might have turned his thoughts to other fields
where the harvest would be more promising. On
the contrary, suffering had only whetted his appetite
for more. Thus he wrote in his journals: "I have
felt an ardent desire to suffer something for Jesus
Christ. I fear I shall be refused, because Our Lord

C6i 3

THE JESUIT MARTYRS

has thus far treated me with kindness, whereas I
have grieviously offended His Divine Majesty. I
shall be more confident of salvation when God will
give me a chance to suffer". Then he made this
vow:

"Lord Jesus, my Redeemer ! You have redeemed
me by Your blood and Your most precious death.
This is why I promise to serve You all my life in
the Society of Jesus, and never to serve any other
than Thee. I sign this promise in my blood, ready
to sacrifice it all for Thee as willingly as this
drop. JEAN DE BREBEUF, Soc. J." 26

His offer was accepted, and he kept his promise.

C62]

CHAPTER SIX

Missions and Civilization
A. D. 1632-1634

Failure of Huguenot invasion of New France Colonization
in earnest Its chief promoter, a Huguenot, become Jesuit
Le Jeune's trumpet call to France Missions a national reawaken-
ing, not a conversion of heathen only The form of his mes-
sage, ^'The Jesuit Relations" Value as documents of North
American history Incentive to missionaries Factor in the
missions of New France, in the foundation of Canada and of
a new people.

ENGLAND'S first possession of Canada was not
of long duration. There was genuine regard
for treaties among nations in those days, and it was
not difficult to prove that England's tenure of the
colony was unjust. The Kerkt brothers had seized
it by an act of war committed while England and
France were at peace. Three months before, these
two nations had concluded the Treaty of Susa,
agreeing not to intermeddle in one another's affairs,
particularly when religion was concerned. England
had intermeddled to assist the Huguenots, sending
ninety vessels with 10,000 troops to La Rochelle
to strengthen the uprising of 1627 in the south of
France. Richelieu prevented the approach of this
fleet, forced the Huguenot stronghold to surrender,
and by 1629 had put an end to the political power
of the Huguenots and to all strife on the score of
religion in France.

The Kerkt seizure of Canada had been prompted
by a desire to wrest the colony from its Catholic

1631

THE JESUIT MARTYRS

owners. The Kerkts were of French, birth, from
Dieppe. To their vice-admiral, Jacques Michel,
Jesuits were "dogs from St. Malo". They had
acted for England, as England had attempted to
aid their fellow-revolutionists in France. The at-
tempt a failure, and the revolution at an end, the
question arose, would France reclaim Canada? The
Court was not keen on the subject. The people knew
too little about it to be interested. Champlain was
determined that the colony must come back to its
rightful owner. Single-handed at London he
pleaded his cause and won. In 1632 England
yielded, and he then pleaded with Louis XIII and
Richelieu to give once more to the restored territory
the light of faith and to confirm their possession
of it by an effective colonization.

The way was now clear. No longer would trade
or differences over religion be an obstacle. The
exploiting company of the de Caens was no more;
the Huguenots could no longer impede the work
of the missions. The traders had discouraged
immigration; the sectarians had fostered dissension
on grounds of religion. Henceforth the colony was
to be populated by those who would Christianize
the Indians, and so far only the Catholics had
earnestly attempted this. The Franciscans were
invited to return, but they had not men enough
for this purpose and very many were needed.
Accordingly the Jesuits resumed labors there.

By a strange irony the one who was to do most

OF NORTH AMERICA

to re-establish the missions, and even to develop
the colony, had himself been a Huguenot until
on attaining his majority he became a Catholic and
soon after a Jesuit. He was a man of extraordinary
ability, and it was not confined to purely ecclesias-
tical activity. As superior of the mission he, as a
rule, did first what he was afterwards to require
from others. The difficulty of learning the Indian
tongues was the chief obstacle in the way of the
missionaries, particularly for Le Jeune. To master
it, as described in the preceding chapter, he spent
his first winter among them on their hunt, braving
cold and every possible hardship, even famine, in
order to overcome this obstacle to his work. He
was a man of great spirit. Not only did he appre-
ciate the need of colonization in New France on a
large scale, as others Cartier, Champlain and the
Franciscans had urged it before him; he was
able so to impress it on all France as to arouse the
interest of the entire French people. Reading his
views on Canada, one realizes that he had already
conceived the Canada of the present day. He was
a political economist, a wise counsellor, and an
efficient executive not only in the affairs of his own
religious society, but in State affairs as well.
According to Kingsford, 27 as Champlain neared his
end, Le Jeune was appointed to act as governor in
case of emergency. He was also authorized
to deliver to Champlain' s temporary successor
Brasdefer, Sieur de Chasteaufort, his commission as

THE JESUIT MARTYRS

Governor. The Queen Mother, Anne of Austria,
expressed the wish seventeen years later that
Le Jeune might be named the first bishop in the
new country. In his broad view, the Mission was
not merely a task for a body of priests and of their
immediate assistants and patrons or supporters. It
was an enterprise in which the whole French nation
should be concerned. It was not merely for the
spiritual benefit of the Indians, but for the spiritual
benefit of every man, woman and child in France.
It was a means destined by God to create a new
spirit of faith and of fervor; to inspire a whole
people with new ideals; to arouse them to con-
tribute, not their money only, but their very souls.
Court and cloister and countryside were called on
to look beyond geographical horizons, to rise above
a false patriotism which kept the nation from
expanding and diffusing the gifts, spiritual and
material, which it possessed in plenty. 28

Le Jeune arrived in New France in 1632. Soon
after came Anthony Daniel in the ship of which his
brother Charles was captain. They remained for
a while at the new fort near Cape Breton. By the
time the governor, Champlain, arrived with
Brebeuf and Masse, in 1633, Le Jeune was ready
not only with his programme but with his plan of
campaign. It was very simple. As Goyau remarks,
he was not one to leave to God what he could do
himself. 29 He was a man of ways and means as
well as of large views. Others had seen as clearly
[66H

OF NORTH AMERICA

as he what was needed, like Biard and Sagard.
They had even exposed these needs in book and
pamphlet, as did the Franciscan Le Bailiff and the
Jesuit Noyrot, in conferences with king and
minister. Their writings reached only a few, and
long after the happenings they narrated. Some
of them, Lescarbot for instance, appealed to a
partisan element, and could not therefore evoke
a general sentiment. Le Jeune conceived the plan
for keeping the entire nation informed of actual
conditions and affairs in New France precisely as
they were, without delay and always so vividly as
to capture the imagination of his readers, hold their
interest, and convince them that they were pro-
foundly concerned in all he said. His first story
of his experiences, of his voyage to the new coun-
try, of the storms he encountered, of a great catch
of cod-fish over the deck on Pentecost, of his meet-
ing the Indians with painted faces at Tadoussac,
of his attempt to rescue Indian prisoners, of their
torture, of his own rescue from drowning in the
St. Lawrence, all written and despatched to France
within two months, and published before the end
of the year, was in that day what a radio message
from the earth's end is in our own. The effect was
electric. His words were not merely a news report;
they were a summons to action. The response was
immediate and, characteristic of Frenchmen, it was
also generous and enthusiastic.

"Shall the French alone of all the nations of

673

THE JESUIT MARTYRS

the earth, be deprived of the honor of expanding
and spreading over this New World? Shall France,
much more populous than all the other kingdoms,
have inhabitants only for herself? When her
children leave her shall they go here and there and
lose the name of Frenchmen among foreigners?" 30

Year after year these reports and appeals were
to go from Canada to France. The first nine years
Le Jeune was to write them, often embodying with
his own the writings of various Jesuits, Brebeuf,
Perrault and others. They are known as the
"Jesuit Relations". 31 Their influence then and
their importance still as documentary sources for all
who write about North America, its missions and
its martyrs, are a subject of never-ceasing interest.
Jesuit missionaries had always made it a point to
write from their distant stations accounts of their
labors in strange fields and of the character and
habits of the peoples they sought to enlighten.
Saint Francis Xavier was the first to recommend
to his associate, Joam Beira, to send to Ignatius in
Rome, and to Rodriguez in Lisbon, "such news as
when known in Europe would make everyone that
heard it give glory to God". 32 His own letters did
arouse all Europe, and they still inspire the mis-
sionary, Protestant as well as Catholic, to persever-
ance and self-sacrifice.

The letters of the missionaries of New France
were of three kinds. Some were very familiar and
personal, addressed to a relative, a friend, a
C683

OF NORTH AMERICA

superior, or to the Rev. Father General, and were
not to be given publicity at that time, if indeed it
could properly be done at any other time ; at most,
it was permissible to the person to whom they were
written to communicate them to a circle of discreet
friends, or to make public some inoffensive extracts.
Others, destined only for the members of the
Society of Jesus, were, in the beginning, sent in
manuscript to the different houses of the Order.
They served as a bond between the religious of the
Society, and kept them in touch with the works of
the apostolate, wherever it was carried on. Later
on, the letters of the missionaries were printed, but
after revision and correction, and even translation
into Latin, extracts and analyses were also made,
which were put in a volume, entitled: "Annual
Letters of the Society of Jesus to the Fathers and
Brothers of the Same Society". When the publica-
tion of the annual letters ceased in 1654, the
provinces and missions of the Society continued to
write and address them to the Father General.
Many are still being brought to light, especially
relating to New France. There was a third sort of
letters, those which the missionaries wrote for the
public and were intended for publication ; these were
generally called "Relations 33 . Such are the "Rela-
tions of New France", whose long series open with
that of Biard, in 1616, followed by the
"Relations" of Charles Lalemant, in 1626. The
series from 1632 to 1672 consists of forty-one

THE JESUIT MARTYRS

volumes, of which thirty-nine bear the title of
"Relations", and two (1654-55 and 1658-59) that
of "Letters". Other "Relations" exist, likewise
written for the public, but never printed.

It is evident that the contents of these various
classes of letters must differ according to the purpose
of the writer and the character of the receiver.
Prudence, discretion and charity would naturally
forbid the putting down in black and white for
general reading what might, however, with perfect
propriety be laid before a superior or a friend.
It was not the part of the missionary to publish
his views on political matters concerning the govern-
ment of the colonies, though it would be his duty
to warn his superior of past or future complications
which concerned the temporal as well as the spiritual
welfare of his mission. Hence Le Jeune well
remarks: "I do not undertake to record all that
takes place in this country; but only what concerns
the Faith and religion." From this very fact some
critics have arraigned the writers of the "Relations"
for the incompleteness of their writings, without
taking into account the scope which the Fathers
had laid down for their guide. This characterizes
the "Relations" not only of Canada, but those of
China and Japan as well. The missionaries had in
view the edification of their readers ; they, therefore,
recorded the progress of Christianity, the heroic
labors and combats of those engaged in these vast
mission fields. They kept silence about many

OF NORTH AMERICA

things that would not have served for edification,
yet without ever departing from the strict truth.
Incomplete, then, as the "Relations" intentionally
are, the best judges, Protestant as well as Catho-
lic, pronounce them to be of inestimable value for
the history of our country, of certain periods of
which they are the sole records.

Parkman writes : "The 'Relations' of the Jesuits
appeal equally to the spirit of religion and the
spirit of romantic adventure. . . . They hold
a high place as authentic and trustworthy docu-
ments". 32 No doubt Parkman himself was inspired
and encouraged by the heroic lives of the mission-
aries to labor as he did, in spite of his grievous
infirmity. Bancroft, whose own work shows an
intimate knowledge of the history contained in the
"Relations", says that "the history of the Jesuit
Mission is connected with the origin of every cele-
brated town in the annals of French America. Not
a cape was turned, not a river entered, but a Jesuit
led the way". 34 Kip remarks that: "There is no
page in our country's history more touching and
romantic than that which records the labors and
sufferings of the Jesuit missionaries." Field writes
that: "these 'Relations', for many years looked
upon through the haze of sectarian distrust, were
lightly esteemed by the students of American
history, but the more their character and statements
were investigated, the more important and valuable
they appeared. They have become the sources from

n?i 3

THE JESUIT MARTYRS

which we must draw almost all the historic material
of New York and Canada during the first century
and a half of their exploration by Europeans". 35

Reuben Gold Thwaites, in his estimable collec-
tion "The Jesuit Relations and Allied Documents,"
bears the following testimony: "The authors of
the journals which formed the basis of the dela-
tions' were, for the most part, men of trained
intellect, acute observers, and practised in the art
of keeping records of their experiences. They had
left the most highly civilized country of their times,
to plunge at once into the heart of the American
wilderness, and attempt to win to the Christian
faith the fiercest savages known to history. To
gain these savages, it was first necessary to know
them intimately their speech, their habits, their
manner of thought, their strong points and their
weak. These first students of the North American
Indian were not only amply fitted for their under-
taking, but none have since had better opportunity
for its prosecution. They were explorers, as well
as priests. . . .

"Many of the 'Relations' were written in Indian
camps, amid a chaos of distractions. Insects
innumerable tormented the journalists, they were
immersed in scenes of squalor and degradation, over-
come by fatigue and lack of proper sustenance,
often suffering from wounds and disease, maltreated
in a hundred ways by hosts who, at times, might
more properly be called jailers; and not seldom had

OF NORTH AMERICA

savage superstition risen to such a height, that to
be seen making a memorandum was certain to arouse
the ferocious enmity of the band. It is not sur-
prising that the composition of these journals of
the Jesuits is sometimes crude; the wonder is, that
they could be written at all. Nearly always the
style is simple and direct. Never does the narrator
descend to self-glorification, or dwell unnecessarily
upon the details of his continual martyrdom; he
never complains of his lot; but sets forth his
experiences in phrases the most matter-of-fact.
His meaning is seldom obscure. We gain from his
pages a vivid picture of life in the primeval forest,
as he lived it; we seem to see him upon his long
canoe journeys, squatted amidst his dusky fellows,
working his passage at the paddles, and carrying
cargoes upon the portage trail ; we see him the butt
and scorn of the savage camp, sometimes deserted
in the heart of the wilderness, and obliged to wait
for another flotilla, or to make his way alone as
best he can. Arrived at last, at his journey's end,
we often find him vainly seeking for shelter in the
squalid huts of the natives, with every man's hand
against him, but his own heart open to them all.
We find him, even when at last domiciled in some
far-away village, working against hope to save the
unbaptized from eternal damnation ; we seem to see
the rising storm of opposition, invoked by native
medicine men who to his seventeenth-century
imagination seem devils indeed and at last the

73:1

THE JESUIT MARTYRS

bursting climax of superstitious frenzy which
sweeps him and his before it. Not only do these
devoted missionaries never, in any field, has been
witnessed greater personal heroism than theirs
live and breathe before us in the 'Relations'; but
we have in them our first competent account of the
Red Indian at a time when relatively uncon-
taminated by contact with Europeans/' 36

Dr. Finley in his charming compilation, "The
French in the Heart of America", tells us :

"The 'Relations' of the Jesuits are among our
most precious chronicles in America. With these
the history of the north the valleys of the St.
Lawrence, the Great Lakes, and the Mississippi
begins. The coureurs de bois may have anticipated
the priests in some solitary places, but they seldom
made records. Doubtless, like Nicolet, they told
their stories to the priests when they went back to
the altars for sacrament, so that even their
experiences have been for the most part preserved.
But when we know under what distracting and dis-
couraging conditions even the priest wrote, we
wonder, as Thwaites says, that anything whatever
has been preserved in writing. . T know

not', says one of these apostles in an epistle to the
Romans (for this particular letter went to Rome),
C I know not whether your Paternity will recognize
the letter of a poor cripple, who formerly, when in
perfect health was well known to you. The letter
is badly written, and quite soiled, because, in addi-

H74H

OF NORTH AMERICA

tion to other inconveniences, he who writes it has
only one whole finger on his right hand; and it is
difficult to avoid staining the paper with the blood
which flows from his wounds, not yet healed; he
uses arquebus powder for ink, and the earth for a
table. 5 " 37

The "Relations" are not merely annual reports,
or dry records, but intimate revelations of life,
the story of civilized men lodging, eating and
consorting with peoples who were as savage as have
ever been known. As one of their writers, Chau-
monot, remarks, they had to be written clandes-
tinely, and carried secretly also to their destination
as the Indians given to sorcery looked upon writing
as magic and feared it meant harm for them. They
are a contribution not only to history but a most
important source of ethnography. In fact, as the
missionaries of the Society of the Divine Word are
proving in our own day, for real knowledge in this
science the missionary has the best opportunity,
since he knows the language and gradually gets
the confidence of the natives. The Jesuits in New
France made the most of this opportunity. Their
observations are completely and systematically set
forth in "Les Moeurs des Sauvages", by Lafitau,
whose own personal observations in this field were
guided by Charles Gamier. 38

Could the laudatory extracts already given leave
any room for doubt as to the merit of the "Rela-
tions," the zeal which book-collectors and historians

THE JESUIT MARTYRS

have shown, during the last half-century, in hunt-
ing after original copies, and the expense to which
they have gone in purchasing these, or even for
publishing reprints of them, are proofs of sincere
esteem of them, which the most sceptical cannot
question. Thwaites gives a most careful account
of the various series of these publications by Dr.
R. B. O'Callaghan, Gilmary Shea, and Rev. Felix
Martin; also of the reprint of the Cramoisy series
in three stout volumes by the Canadian Govern-
ment in i858. 39 Throughout his own seventy- three
volumes are found valuable information about
libraries and collectors who are in possession of the
complete edition or of one or more copies of the
originals, and also about the prices paid for them.

One need read only a page of these "Relations"
picked at random to come under their spell. To
stop reading requires an effort. The fascination is
lasting. They have been the delight and the incen-
tive of missionaries ever since they were written.
They inaugurated a new literature. "The Edify-
ing Letters" of the Jesuits, the "Annals of the
Propagation of the Faith" and the numerous mis-
sionary periodicals of our day are to a great extent
patterned on them.

Immediately on their appearance began the
immigration from France which was to be the
origin of a new people. Le Jeune had been happy
on his return to Quebec to find in the colony the
family of Hebert, whose widow, now married to

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Guillaume Hubou, was already grandmother. They
were practically the only Canadian family left, and
they too had thought of leaving but remained in
expectation that the missionaries would return.
The priest celebrated Mass in their home and
chanted a Te Deum. 40 One can imagine his happi-
ness two years later on receiving forty new-comers
from Le Perche and another group a year later,
Le Perche alone was to send five hundred families
to Canada in the next thirty years. Normandy
would vie with Le Perche. The tide once started
would flow in that direction until the middle of the
following century. The stock was of the best. The
new arrivals were not political or religious malcon-
tents seeking other shores to practise a greater
intolerance than that to which they had been subject
at home. Among them was Jean Bourdon, engineer,
who was later to be attorney-general for New
France and to accompany Jogues on his second
journey to the Iroquois country as an ambassador of
peace. Abbe Le Sueur was also one of them, the
first secular priest in Canada. With Montmagny
came the Norman families of Le Gardeur and
Le Neuf, Catherine de Corde with two sons and
daughter and Jeanne Le Marchant with two daugh-
ters and two sons. 41

France was actively interested. Young Indians
were sent over to its schools. Religious communi-
ties petitioned for some to instruct and baptize with
marked ceremonies, members of the nobility gladly

THE JESUIT MARTYRS

acting as godparents. The court itself received
similar object lessons, and many a story has grown
out of the experiences of the naive children of
nature adopted for a time into the advanced
civilization of France. The vision flashed on the
eyes of France attracted spirits of the highest order.
Madame Martin was among the first of these
Venerable Marie de Y Incarnation, as she has been
styled. She will lead over the Ursulines who will
become like guardian angels to the Indians and to
the colonists at Quebec. Madame de La Pel trie
will follow. From Dieppe will come three Daugh-
ters of Mercy to look after sick colonists. Le
Jeune's appeal had been heard. New France
through him had its mission for France, as the older
country had for the new. Meantime, he and his
fellow missionaries with Abbe Le Sueur had been
working among Indians and immigrants ; of the for-
mer he would report twenty-two baptized in 1635,
one hundred and fifteen in 1636, and three hundred
in i637. 42 The harvest was slender, but at least
the soil had yielded to cultivation and was begin-
ning to bear.

C783

CHAPTER SEVEN

An Apostle and His Mission
A. D. 1634-1636

Brebeuf greets the Hurons at Quebec They visit his chapel,
feast and return to Huronia without him A year of ministry and
patience Return to Ihonatiria in 1634 Ill-treatment on the way
Huron cabins unlike the Louvre Assembly and catechism Zeal
unrewarded Caution in admitting converts Children the hope
of the Mission The seminary for them in Quebec.

BREBEUF, with Masse, had arrived at Quebec
June 5th. He began at once to renew his
practice in the tribal languages, going out among
the Indians usually to visit the sick. On July 28th
the Hurons came for their annual market. This
year they were more numerous than ever, forty
canoes, with sixty of their captains, bent on greet-
ing their friend the new governor, and on resuming
relations with the French. With the English they
had not been on good terms. They built their
cabins, bartered their goods with the French agents,
feasted, and then the captains assembled in
council to hear Champlain's message to them.
Brebeuf spoke to them in Huron to their great
delight. He led them to the chapel. That casual
visit showed how next to impossible was the task
of teaching them the truths of faith. When they
were shown more than one statue of the Blessed
Virgin, and were told she was the Mother of Our
Lord, they wondered how anyone could have sev-
eral mothers. When they saw the dove represent-

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THE JESUIT MARTYRS

ing the Holy Spirit, they said it was the cause of
thunder, which they believed was the cry of a huge
wild bird. The picture of the flames of hell
appealed to them. They believed in some state of
existence after death, and they could grasp how
one would be either happy or unhappy in that state.
It was on this fact, therefore, the missionaries
would have to insist later, not however neglecting
other truths or facts. Parkman is impatient with
them for working on the fears of the Indians,
though Christ Himself had appealed to mankind
through fear as well as other passions. Champlain
feted the visitors. For them a feast was a gorge.
Sagard described one of these feasts for a very
much smaller group: fifty-six Canada geese, thirty
mallard, twenty teal-duck and a quantity of other
game the quarry of a three days' chase two bar-
rels of peas, one of sea-biscuit, twenty pounds
of prunes, six baskets of Indian corn all cooked
together in the big cauldron of the colony's brew-
ery. It would take a long time for the missionaries
to train such people to moderation.

Daniel and Davost had come to Quebec from
the fort on St. Anne's Bay near Cape Breton, where
they had been attending to the garrison stationed
there by Daniel's brother Charles. The Hurons
wanted to take them with Brebeuf back to Huronia.
Each captain strove for the honor of having a mis-
sionary at his own village. All was ready for the
journey when an Ottawa captain, Borgne, protested.
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Champlain having rejected his plea for the release
of a prisoner from a neighboring tribe who had
been convicted of murdering a Frenchman, Borgne
pretended that the tribe would be so incensed they
would destroy the Black Robes, blame this on the
Hurons, and start a feud between them and the
French. The Hurons were frightened. They
declined to take the Fathers, although Brebeuf said
they were ready for death and would have no one
suffer for their execution. Nothing could change
the decision. Brebeuf, therefore, and his com-
panions, greatly disappointed, had to wait for
another opportunity. They waited fully a year,
Brebeuf active among the neighboring Indian tribes,
his companions studying the language and doing
what missionary work they could among the Indians
about Quebec. It required no slight patience to
think of the Huron field waiting to be sown and
still be excluded from it. They knew, however,
that spiritual seed-time and harvest are not meas-
ured by the brevity and regularity of plant and
flower, nor by the same proportion as between the
sower's labors and his fruits. One of the sublime
traits of these men is their confidence, in spite of
their own poor results, that one day this wilderness
would flourish and blossom like the lily.

Next year no more than seven canoes came down,
and they ventured only as far as Tadoussac, but
the three priests were there to meet them. Shortly
before that, two hundred braves had been killed

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THE JESUIT MARTYRS

and two hundred taken prisoners by the fierce
peoples of the south, the Iroquois, and the Hurons
were downcast. They feared more than ever to
take the responsibility of harboring the Fathers, now
that the Iroquois might overtake and destroy them.
Their fears were quickly quieted by the assurances
of the three who were so eager to begin the work
to which they had looked forward for years. So
eager were Daniel and Davost that they actually
left behind their outfits and even the money (beads,
etc.) that would help them with the Indians, carry-
ing only their altar-ware and vestments. They
started, Brebeuf in one canoe, Daniel and Davost
in another. With them were three Frenchmen, who
later became companions to the missionaries, Pierre,
Martin and Baron. Usually the journey took
thirty days. The ordinary hardships of it have
been described in the previous chapter. This is
Brebeuf s account of the extraordinary sufferings
they had to undergo, owing to the meanness of
their guides, although, before starting, Daniel, see-
ing that these had received nothing, had them
rewarded with cloaks such as the Indians in the
boats had received. It was characteristic of Daniel
to give trouble to no one and to see that all were
properly considered.

"Father Davost, among others, was very badly
treated. They stole from him much of his little
belongings. They forced him to throw away a
small steel mill, almost all our books, some linens,

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and a good part of the paper that we were taking,
and of which we have great need. They abandoned
him at the island of the Alumettes among the
Algonquins, where he suffered very keenly. When
he reached the Hurons, he was worn-out and
dejected, and for a long time he did not recover.

"Father Daniel was abandoned, and forced to
seek another canoe, as also was Pierre, one of our
men. Young Martin was very roughly treated,
and at last left behind with the Bissiriniens, where
he remained some time, spend about two months
on the road, and arriving among the Hurons only
on the nineteenth of September.

"Baron was robbed of his things the very day
he arrived in these parts; and he would have lost
much more if he had not frightened them with
his arms, to give him back some things. In short,
all the Frenchmen suffered great hardships, incurred
great expense, considering what little they had, and
ran serious risks. Whosoever comes here must be
prepared for all this, and something more, even
death itself, whose image is every moment before
our eyes. Not knowing how to swim, I once had
a very narrow escape. As we were leaving the
Bissiriniens, while shooting a rapid we would have
gone over a high falls, had not my savages promptly
and skillfully leaped into the water to turn aside
the canoe which the current was sweeping. Very
likely the others might relate as much, and more,
so numerous are such incidents/* 43

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THE JESUIT MARTYRS

Brebeuf narrates how the Indians wanted to
hide somewhere a box belonging to his lay com-
panions; how the Algonquins tried to detain him
at their villages; how the captain of his canoe
wanted to abandon him. He offered to carry
the box they objected to carrying. Daniel was
shipwrecked twice. Baron was marooned, but the
captain of the island insisted that his canoe com-
pany should take him with them. The Indians
landed Brebeuf at Toanche, near Thunder Bay,
practically abandoning him. He had to hide his
luggage and wander about until at night he came
to the new site of the village of Ihonatiria. He
knew human nature, and his knowledge was kindly.
"I attribute", he writes, "all these extraordinary
difficulties to sickness among our savages. For we
know very well how sickness alters the disposition
and the inclinations of even the most sociable."

The first need of the missionaries was a cabin
and this the Indians built for them. As Parkman
remarks of the cabin made for Le Jeune at Quebec,
this cabin was the cradle of the great Jesuit mis-
sions among the Hurons. Here is Brebeuf s des-
cription of it:

"The cabins of this country are neither Louvres
nor palaces, nor anything like the buildings of our
France, not even like the smallest cottages. They
are, nevertheless, somewhat better and more com-
modious than the hovels of the Montagnais. I
cannot better express the fashion of the Huron

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dwellings than to compare them to bowers or
garden arbors some of which, in place of branches
and vegetation, are covered with cedar bark, some
others with large pieces of ash, elm, fir, or spruce
bark; and although the cedar bark is best, accord-
ing to common opinion and usage, there is, never-
theless, this inconvenience, that they are almost as
susceptible to fire as matches. Hence arise many
of the conflagrations of entire villages; and, with-
out going farther than this year, we have seen in
less than ten days two large ones entirely consumed,
and another, that of Louys, partially burned. We
have also once seen our own cabin on fire; but,
thank God, we extinguished it immediately. There
are cabins or arbors of various sizes, some twelve
feet in length, others of ten, others of twenty, of
thirty, of forty; the usual width is about twenty-
four feet, their height is about the same. There
are no different stories; there is no cellar, no cham-
ber, no garret. It has neither window nor chimney,
only a miserable hole in the top of the cabin, left
to permit the smoke to escape. This is the way
they built ours for us.

"The people of Oenrio and of our village were
employed at this, by means of presents given them.
It has cost us much exertion to secure its comple-
tion, not only on account of the epidemic, which
affected almost all the savages, but on account of
the connivance of these two villages; for although
the work was not great, yet those of our village

THE JESUIT MARTYRS

followed the example of those of Oenrio, who, in
hopes of finally attracting us to their village,
simply amused themselves without advancing the
work. We were almost into October before we
were under cover. As to the interior, we have
suited ourselves ; so that, even if it does not amount
to much, the savages never weary of coming to
see it, and, seeing it, to admire it. We have
divided it into three parts. The first compartment,
nearest the door, serves as an ante-chamber, as a
storm door, and as a storeroom for our provisions,
in the fashion of the savages. The second is that
in which we live, and is our kitchen, our carpenter
shop, our mill, or place for grinding the wheat, our
refectory, our parlor and our bedroom. On both
sides, in the fashion of the Hurons, are two benches
which they call endicha, on which are boxes to
hold our clothes and other little conveniences; but
below, in the place where the Hurons keep their
wood, we have contrived some little bunks to sleep
in, and to store away some of our clothing from
the thievish hands of the Hurons. They sleep
beside the fire, but still they and we have only the
earth for bedstead; for mattress and pillows, some
bark of boughs covered with a rush mat; for sheets
and coverings, our clothes and some skins do duty.
The third part of our cabin is also divided into two
parts by means of a bit of carpentry which gives
it a fairly good appearance, and which is admired
here for its novelty. In the one is our little chapel,

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in which we celebrate every day holy Mass, and
we retire there daily to pray to God. It is true
that the almost continual noise they make usually
hinders us, except in the morning and evening
when everybody has gone away, and compels us
to go outside to say our prayers. In the other part
we put our utensils. The whole cabin is only
thirty-six feet long, and about twenty-one wide.
That is how we are lodged, doubtless not so well
that we may not have in this abode a good share
of rain, snow and cold. However, as I have said,
they never cease coming to visit us from admira-
tion, especially since we have put on two doors,
made by a carpenter, and since our mill and our
clock have been set to work." 44

In the new cabin Brebeuf gave lessons in Huron
to his two associates. He writes that they were apt
pupils, especially Daniel, who knew more words
than Brebeuf himself, but could not connect them
promptly. 45 Soon Daniel had the Our Father in
Huron, and could lead the children chanting it
when Brebeuf had his assembly of the tribe in the
chapel of the cabin, at which he preached and
recited the prayers. He preached on faith, immor-
tality, heaven and hell. In return he was invited
to the Indian assemblies. He became very popular,
especially when, after a nine days' prayer he had
advised, rain fell and watered the soil. His import-
ance was increased when Champlain sent him let-
ters constituting him his representative among the

THE JESUIT MARTYRS

Hurons. Daniel went in and about the cabins
teaching the children, whether baptized or not,
Christian Doctrine. This was the method of teach-
ing it when the people were assembled in the cabin :

"We gave the instruction of catechism in our
cabin, for we had as yet no other suitable church.
This is often the most we can do; for their feasts,
dances, and games so occupy them that we cannot
get them together as we would like.

"The usual method that we follow is this : We
call together the people by the help of the captain
of the village, who assembles them all in our house
as in council, or perhaps by the sound of the bell.
I use the surplice and the square cap, to give more
majesty to my appearance. At the beginning, we
chant on our knees the Pater Noster, translated into
Huron verse. Father Daniel, as its author, chants
a couplet alone, and then we all together chant it
again; and those among the Hurons, principally
the little ones, who already know it, take pleasure
in chanting it with us, and the others in listening.
That done, when every one is seated, 1 rise and
make the Sign of the Cross for all; then, having
recapitulated what I said the last time, I explain
something new. After that we question the young
children and the girls, giving a little bead of glass
or porcelain to those who deserve it. The parents
are very glad to see their children answer well and
carry off some little prize, of which they render
themselves worthy by the care they take to come

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privately to get instruction. On our part to arouse
their emulation, we have each lesson retraced by
our two little French boys, who question each
other, which transports the savages with admira-
tion. Finally the whole is concluded by the talk
of the old men, who propound their difficulties, and
sometimes make me listen in rny turn to the state-
ment of their belief.

"We began our catechizing by this memorable
truth, that their souls, which are immortal, all go
after death either to paradise or to hell. It is thus
we approach them, either in public or in private.
I added that they had the choice, during life, to
participate after death in the one or the other,
which one, they ought now to consider. Where-
upon one honest old man said to me, "Let him
who will, go to the fires of hell; I want to go to
heaven 53 ; all the others followed and making use
of the same answer, begged us to show them the
way, and to take away the stones, the trees, and
the thickets therein, which might stop them.

"Our Hurons, as you see, are not so dull as one
might think them; they seem to me to have rather
good common sense, and I find them universally
very docile. Nevertheless, some of them are obsti-
nate, and attached to their superstitions and evil
customs. These are principally the old people; for
beyond these, who are not numerous, the rest know
nothing of their own belief. We have two or three
of this number in our village. I am often in con-

THE JESUIT MARTYRS

flict with them; and then I show them they are
wrong, and make them contradict themselves, so
that they frankly admit their ignorance, and the
others ridicule them; still they will not yield,
always falling back upon this, that their country
is not like ours, that they have another God, another
paradise, in a word, other customs." 46

A great drought parched the land and threatened
famine. The Indians were in despair. Their
sorcerers were impotent. The captains besought
Brebeuf for relief. He bade them pray, and he
opened a nine days' prayer in honor of the mis-
sion's patron, St. Joseph. The prayer was favored
by abundant rains. Late in that year, 1636, he
consecrated the mission to the Blessed Virgin under
the title of Immaculate, over two hundred years
before the Church pronounced this prerogative as
a point of Catholic faith. The Indians were
impressed by all this piety, but the older members
of the tribe stuck fast to their pagan traditions;
the middle-aged were indifferent and too fickle
to admit to baptism. Unfortunate as the hasty
baptism of the Acadians was under Biencourt, it
had the good effect of confirming the Jesuits in
the determination to confer baptism on adults only
after mature preparation and proof of constancy.
The sick near death, old or young, the Fathers
would baptize, but no others. Since epidemics were
frequent, such baptisms were also frequent. This
accounts for the low number of baptisms of adults

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in good health in the early days of their ministry,
but it also accounts for the steadfastness and rare
examples of Christian virtues on the part of those
who were finally adjudged worthy of the sacrament.
The children were the hope of the missionaries.
They took readily to instruction. They became
attached to the priests, who treated them with unal-
terable kindness. No sooner, however, did they
begin to show good dispositions than they were
spoiled by the example, and often by the
counsel of the elders. Vice was so rampant that
it was hopeless to protect the young from its con-
tamination. Accordingly the missionaries con-
cluded that the only remedy was to do what the
Franciscans already had attempted when they
opened a seminary for the young Indians at Quebec.
Daniel was a favorite with mothers and children.
There is a pleasant story of his quieting a little
child, crying in its mother's arms by having it make
the sign of the Cross. He and Davost were prom-
ised several children for the new seminary, a dozen
at least, but when the day came for departure
maternal instinct revolted against parting from the
little ones and they had to go down to Quebec
with three only. They were the foundation stones.
The hope of the missionaries was to remove a num-
ber of the young people from the contagious sur-
roundings of their village, bring them up unspoiled,
establish a Christian Indian settlement and gradu-
ally, no matter how slowly, establish a new civi-

91 3

THE JESUIT MARTYRS

lization among the Indians themselves, which
would attract even those who were habituated to
corrupt living. This seminary became the apple
of their eyes. Extraordinary things are narrated
in the "Relations" about the simplicity and inno-
cence of the young boys and of the constancy of
many of them afterwards. Similar results on a
larger scale were obtained at the seminary of the
Ursulines for young girls. Indeed the virtue
developed in these schools often mounted to hero-
ism. Le Jeune describes this boys' seminary at
length in the "Relation" of i637. 47 Daniel was
teacher, nurse and playmate with the children.
They looked upon him as their father, and very
touching are the evidences of their devotion to him.

CHAPTER EIGHT
Brebeuf s Ideal Missionary

BRfiBEUF was alone again after the departure
of his companions. He knew it would not be
for long. Other harvesters were soon to come into
the field. Indeed, it was a matter of constant soli-
citude among the missionaries to have assistants, and
in due time successors, who would come fully aware
of what was ahead of them, and yet fully prepared
not only to meet every privation and hardship, but
to labor and to encounter danger of every sort in
order to make the natives Christians. This no
doubt was in Brebeuf s mind when he wrote his
famous instruction for those who were to come to
the Huron mission. It sets forth so plainly the
trials of a missionary's life, and it appeals so elo-
quently for volunteers, not because of novelty, or
of adventure or of consoling ministerial occupation
and results, but solely because of the life of heroic
devotion to Christ, that it is well worth giving here
as a revelation of the spirit of the apostle himself
and of those who would come with their eyes wide
open to the prospect before them. Such souls could
evidently be satisfied with nothing short of heroism.
It is contained in the "Relation" of 1636. How
it reminds one of St. Francis Xavier! There is
a genius, and there is also a race also, of sanctity.

THE JESUIT MARTYRS

"When you reach the Hurons, you will indeed
find hearts full of charity ; we shall receive you with
open arms as an angel of paradise, we shall have
all the inclination in the world to do you good;
but we are so situated that we can do very little.
We shall receive you in a hut, so mean that I have
scarcely found in France one wretched enough to
compare it with; that is how you will be lodged.
Harassed and fatigued as you will be, we shall be
able to give you nothing but a poor mat, or at
most a skin, to serve you as a bed; and, besides,
you will arrive at a season when miserable little
insects that we call here taouhac, and, in good
French, pulces [fleas], will keep you awake almost
all night, for in these countries they are incom-
parably more troublesome than in France ; the dust
of the cabin nourishes them, the savages bring them
to us, we get them in their houses; and this petty
martyrdom, not to speak of mosquitoes, sandflies,
and other like vermin, lasts usually not less than
three or four months of the summer.

"Instead of being a great master and great
theologian as in France, you must reckon on being
here a humble scholar, and then, good God ! with
what masters ! women, little children, and all the
savages and exposed to their laughter. The
Huron language will be your Saint Thomas and
your Aristotle; and clever man as you are, and
speaking glibly among learned and capable persons,
you must make up your mind to be for a long

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time mute among the barbarians. You will have
accomplished much, if, at the end of a considerable
time, you begin to stammer a little.

"And then how do you think you would pass
the winter with us? After having heard all that
must be endured in wintering among the Mon-
tagnets savages, I may say that that is almost the
life we lead here among the Hurons. I say it
without exaggeration, and five and six months of
winter are spent in almost continual discomforts,
excessive cold, smoke, and the annoyance of the
savages; we have a cabin built of simple bark, but
so well jointed that we have to send some one out-
side to learn what kind of weather it is; the smoke
is very often so thick, so annoying, and so obstinate
that, for five or six days at a time, if you are not
entirely proof against it, it is all you can do to
make out a few lines in your Breviary. Besides,
from morning until evening our fireplace is almost
always surrounded by savages, above all, they
seldom fail to be there at mealtimes. If you
happen to have anything more than usual, let it
be ever so little, you must reckon on most of these
gentlemen as your guests; if you do not share
with them, you will be considered mean. As
regards the food, it is not so bad, although we
usually content ourselves with a little corn, or a
morsel of dry smoked fish, or some fruits, of which
I shall speak further on.

"For the rest, thus far we have had only roses;

THE JESUIT MARTYRS

henceforth, as we have Christians in almost every
village, we must count upon making rounds through
them at all seasons of the year, and of remaining
there, according to necessity, for two or three whole
weeks, amid annoyances that cannot be described.
Add to all this, that our lives depend upon a single
thread; and if, wherever we are in the world, we
are to expect death every hour, and to be prepared
for it, this is particularly the case here. For not to
mention that your cabin is only, as it were, chaff,
and that it might be burned at any moment, despite
all your care to prevent accidents, the malice of
the savages gives especial cause for almost perpetual
fear; a malcontent may burn you down, or cleave
your head open in some lonely spot. And then
you are responsible for the sterility or fecundity
of the earth, under penalty of your life; you are
the cause of droughts; if you cannot make rain,
they speak of nothing less than making away with
you. I have only to mention, in addition, the
danger there is from our enemies; it is enough to
say that, on the thirteenth of this month of June,
they killed twelve of our Hurons near the village
of Contarrea, which is only a day's journey from
us; that a short time before, at four leagues from
our village, some Iroquois were discovered in the
fields in ambuscade, only waiting to strike a blow
at the expense of the life of some passer-by. This
nation is very timid, they take no precautions
against surprise, they are not careful to prepare

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arms or to inclose their villages with palisades ; their
usual recourse, especially when the enemy is power-
ful, is flight. Amid these alarms, which affect the
whole country, I leave you to imagine if we have
any grounds for a feeling of safety.

"After all, if we had here the exterior attrac-
tions of piety, as they exist in France, all this might
pass. In France the great multitude and the good
example of Christians, the solemnity of the feasts,
the majesty of the churches so magnificently
adorned, preach piety to you; and in the houses of
our Order the fervor of our brethren, their modesty,
and all the noble virtues which shine forth in all
their actions, are so' many powerful voices which cry
to you without ceasing, 'Behold, and do likewise'.
You have the consolation of celebrating every day
the holy Mass; in a word, you are almost beyond
the danger of falling, at least, the falls are
insignificant, and you have help immediately at
hand. Here we have nothing, it seems, which
incites towards good; we are among peoples who
are astonished when you speak to them of God,
and who often have only horrible blasphemies in
their mouths. Often you are compelled to deprive
yourself of the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass; and,
when you have the opportunity to say it, a little
corner of your cabin will serve you for a chapel,
which the smoke, the snow, or the rain hinders you
from ornamenting and embellishing, even if you
had the means. I pass over the small chance of

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seclusion there is among barbarians, who scarcely
ever leave you, who hardly know what it is to speak
in a low tone. Especially I would not dare to
speak of the danger there is of ruining oneself
among their impurities, in the case of any one whose
heart is not sufficiently full of God to firmly resist
this poison. But enough of this; the rest can only
be known by experience.

" 'But is that all*?' some one will exclaim. c Do
you think by your arguments to throw water on
the fire that consumes me, and lessen ever so little
the zeal I have for the conversion of these peoples?
I declare that these things have served only to con-
firm me the more in my vocation ; that I feel myself
more carried away than ever by my affection for
New France, and that I bear a holy jealousy
towards those who are already enduring all these
sufferings; all these labors seem to me nothing, in
comparison with what I am willing to endure for
God; if I knew a place under heaven where there
was yet more to be suffered, I would go there. 7 Ah !
whoever you are to whom God gives these senti-
ments and this light, come, come, my dear Brother,
it is workmen such as you that we ask for here;
it is to souls like yours that God has appointed the
conquest of so many other souls whom the Devil
holds yet in his power; apprehend no difficulties,
there will be none for you, since it is your whole
consolation to see yourself crucified with the Son
of God; silence will be sweet to you, since you

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have learned to commune with God, and to con-
verse in the heavens with saints and angels; the
victuals would be very insipid if the gall endured
by Our Lord did not render them sweeter and
more savory to you than the most delicious viands
of the world. What a satisfaction to pass these
rapids, and to climb these rocks, to him who has
before his eyes that loving Savior, harassed by His
tormentors and ascending Calvary laden with His
Cross; the discomfort of the canoe is very easy to
bear, to him who considers the Crucified One.
What a consolation ! for I must use such terms,
as otherwise I could not give you pleasure what
a consolation, then, to see oneself even abandoned
on the road by the savages, languishing with sick-
ness, or even dying with hunger in the woods, and
of being able to say to God, c My God, it is to do
Your Holy Will that I am reduced to the state in
which You see me,' considering above all that
God-Man who expires upon the Cross and cries to
His Father, 'My God! My God! Oh, why hast
Thou abandoned me?' If God among all these
hardships preserve you in health, no doubt you will
arrive pleasantly in the Huron country with these
holy thoughts. 'Favorably sails he whom God's
grace urgeth on'.

"And now, as regards a place of abode, food, and
beds, shall I dare to say to a heart so generous,
and that mocks at all that of which I have already
spoken, that truly, even though we have hardly

THE JESUIT MARTYRS

more of those necessities than the savages have,
still, I know not how, the Divine Goodness renders
every difficult thing easy; and all and every one
of us find everything almost as comfortable as life
is in France. The sleep we get lying on our mats
seems to us as sweet as if we were in a good bed;
the food of the country does not disgust us, although
there is scarcely any other seasoning than that which
God has put into it; and, notwithstanding the cold
of a winter six months long, passed in the shelter
of a bark cabin open to the daylight, we have still
to experience its evil effects; no one complains of
his head or his stomach; we do not know what
diarrhoea, colds, or catarrh are. This leads me to
say that delicate persons do not know, in France,
how to protect themselves from the cold; those
rooms so well carpeted, those doors so well fitted,
and those windows closed with so much care, serve
only to make its effects more keenly felt; it is an
enemy from whom one wins almost more by holding
out one's hands to him than by waging a cruel war
upon him. As to our food, I shall say this further,
that God has shown His Providence very clearly
to our eyes; we have obtained in eight days our
provision of corn for a whole year, without mak-
ing a single step beyond our cabin. They have
brought us dried fish in such quantities that we are
constrained to refuse some of it, and to say that
we have sufficient; you might say that God, seeing
we are here only for His service, in order that all
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our work may be for Him, wishes to act Himself
as our provider. This same Goodness takes care
to give us from time to time a change of provisions
in the shape of fresh fish. We live on the shore of
a great lake, which affords as good fish as I have
ever seen or eaten in France; true, as I have said,
we do not ordinarily procure them, and still less
do we get meat, which is even more rarely seen here.
Fruits even, according to the season, provided the
year be somewhat favorable, are not lacking to us ;
strawberries, raspberries, and blackberries are to be
found in almost incredible quantities. We gather
plenty of grapes, which are fairly good; the
squashes last sometimes four and five months, and
are so abundant that they are to be had almost
for nothing, and so good that, on being cooked in
the ashes, they are eaten as apples are in France.
Consequently, to tell the truth, as regards pro-
visions, the change from France is not very great;
the only grain of the country is a sufficient nourish-
ment, when one is somewhat accustomed to it. The
savages prepare it in more than twenty ways and
yet employ only fire and water; it is true that
the best sauce is that which it carries with it.

"As for the dangers of the soul, to speak frankly,
there are none for him who brings to the country
of the Hurons the fear and love of God; on the
contrary, I find unparalleled advantages for acquir-
ing perfection. Is it not a great deal to have, in
one's food, clothing, and sleep, no other attraction

c ii n

THE JESUIT MARTYRS

than bare necessity? Is it not a glorious oppor-
tunity to unite oneself with God, when there is no
creature whatsoever that gives you reason to spend
your affection upon it? When the exercises you
practice constrain you without force to inward
meditation? Besides your spiritual exercises, you
have no other employment than the study of the
language, and conversation with the savages. Ah !
how much pleasure there is for a heart devoted to
God to make itself the little scholar of a savage
and of a little child, thereby to gain them for God,
and to render them disciples of Our Lord! How
willingly and liberally God communicates Himself
to a soul which practises from love to Him these
heroic acts of humility! The words he learns are
so many treasures he amasses, so many spoils he
carries off from the common enemy of the human
race; so that he has reason to say a hundred times
a day, C I will rejoice in thy words as one that hath
found great spoil'. Viewed in this light, the
visits of the savages, however frequent, cannot be
annoying to him. God teaches him the beautiful
lesson He taught formerly to Saint Catherine of
Sienna, to make of his heart a room or temple for
Him, where he will never fail to find Him, as often
as he withdraws into it; that, if he encounters
savages there, they do not interfere with his prayers,
they serve only to make them more fervent; from
this he takes occasion to present these poor wretches
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to this Sovereign Goodness, and to entreat Him
warmly for their conversion.

"Certainly we have not here that exterior
solemnity which awakens and sustains devotion.
Only what is essential to our religion is visible,
the Holy Sacrament of the Altar, to the marvels
of which we must open the eyes of our faith with-
out being aided by any sensible mark of its
grandeur, any more than the Magi were in the
stable. But it seems that God, supplying what
we lack, and as a recompense of grace that he
has given us in transporting it, so to speak, beyond
so many seas, and in finding a place for it in these
poor cabins, wishes to crown us with the same
blessings, in the midst of these infidel peoples, with
which he is accustomed to favor persecuted Catho-
lics in the countries of heretics. These good people
scarcely ever see either church or altar; but the
little they see is worth double what they would see
in full liberty. What consolation would there be,
in your opinion, in prostrating ourselves at times
before a cross in the midst of this barbarism! to
turn our eyes toward, and to enter, in the midst
of our petty domestic duties, even into the room
which the Son of God has been pleased to take in
our little dwelling! Is it not to be in paradise day
and night, that we are not separated from this
Well-Beloved of the Nations except by some bark
or the branch of a tree? 'Behold he stands at our
window. I sat under his shadow whom I desired 3 .

n 103 3

THE JESUIT MARTYRS

See what we have within. If we go outside our
cabin, heaven is open to us; and those great
buildings which lift their heads to the clouds, in
large cities, do not conceal it from our view; so
that we can say our prayers in full liberty before
the noble oratory that Saint Francis Xavier loved
better than any other. If the question is of the
fundamental virtues, I will glory not in myself, but
in the share which has fallen to me; or, if I must,
acknowledge it humbly beside the cross which Our
Lord in his grace gives us to bear after him. Certain
it is that this country, or our work here, is much
more fitted to feed the soul with the fruits of
heaven than with the fruits of earth. I may be
deceiving myself, but I imagine that here is a grand
means of increasing the soul in faith, in hope, and
in charity. Should we scatter the seeds of the Faith
without ourselves profiting by them? Could we
put our confidence anywhere but in God in a region
where, as far as man is concerned, everything is
lacking to us? Could we wish a nobler opportunity
to exercise charity than amid the roughness and
discomfort of a New World, where no human art
or industry has yet provided any conveniences? and
to live here that we may bring back to God men
who are so unlike men that we must live in daily
expectation of dying by their hand, should the
fancy take them, should a dream suggest it to them,
or should we fail to open or close the heavens to
them at discretion, giving them rain or fine weather
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at command. Do they not make us responsible for
the state of the weather? And if God does not
inspire us, or if we cannot work miracles by faith,
are we not continually in danger, as they have
threatened us, of seeing them fall upon those who
have done no wrong? Indeed, if He who is the
Truth itself had not declared that there is no
greater love than to lay down one's life, verily and
once for all, for one's friends, I should conceive
it a thing equally noble, or even more so, to do
what the Apostle said to the Corinthians, 'Daily I
die, I protest by your glory, brethren, whom I have
in Christ Jesus Our Lord 3 , than to drag out a
life full of misery, amid the frequent and ordinary
dangers of an unforeseen death, which those whom
you hope to save will procure for you. I call to
mind occasionally when Saint Francis Xavier once
wrote to Father Simon, and wish that it may please
God to so act that at least the same thing may be
said or written one day even of us, although we
may not be worthy of it. Here are the words:
The best of news comes from Molucca, that John
Beira and his companions are constantly in trial and
in danger of life, with much progress for the
Christian Religion 5 .

C 1053

CHAPTER NINE

Arrival of Jogues and Gamier

A. D. 1636-1640

Recruits Voyage overseas A martyr and a Mother
Brebeuf again isolated Four auxiliaries Arrival of Jogues
Illness in tribe and Mission A missionary's daily routine An
Indian's cabin Mission at Ossossane Vacation and summer
school.

BEFORE Brebeufs letter reached France
recruits were already on the way who would
soon be with him in Huronia. His dream was
to come true. No doubt in that isolation and soli-
tude, he spent long hours imagining and longing
and praying for the realization of his soul's desire.
The Jesuits in France had engaged to supply
missionaries, and their engagement was like that of
a nation pledging troops for war. The number
eager to enlist in this case made it difficult for
superiors to name who would be first to venture
overseas. Early in 1636 they chose five among
them, Jogues who was to be apostle to a new
Indian nation, and martyr also, along with Gamier,
another of the choice company. The others were
Adam, Ragueneau and Chastellain, with a brother
Cauvet. They came with the new Governor Mont-
magny in a fleet of eight vessels, leaving Dieppe on
April 8th, arriving in Chaleurs Bay June 1st, Jogues
moving up to Quebec July 2nd. Two months was

c 106 n

THE JESUIT MARTYRS

the usual time for the voyage. It often took four.
Lalemant spent three months on the way. Cartier
made his first trip in a ship of sixty tons, in twenty
days. It was always tedious, often stormy and very
dangerous. The missionaries were distributed
among the vessels. Jogues and Gamier were on
the same ship. The crew behaved far better than
the lot that went with Poutrincourt. One of them,
however, was a notorious backslider, and to him the
angelic Gamier paid every attention. Before many
days this man yielded to the good priest's influence
and sought reconciliation with his Church.
Gamier' s interest in prison inmates when a student
in Paris, led him to be concerned about difficult
cases. This will appear frequently in his dealings
with the Indians.

Our first intimate knowledge of Jogues is derived
from letters to his mother, which were quite fre-
quent. There was one before leaving Dieppe,
another on reaching Quebec, and a third within
another month before starting for the Huron coun-
try. To him she was, after the word of the Com-
mandment, Honored Mother, as he addressed her.
More than ever the title befits her now. The
first of these messages was :

" . . . Endeavor also, if you please, to con-
tribute something by your prayers to the safety of
our voyage, and chiefly by a generous resignation
of your will to that of God, conforming your desires
to those of the Divine goodness, which can be only

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most holy and honorable for us, since they spring
from the heart of a Father full of love for our
welfare.

"I hope, as I said on another occasion, that if you
take this little affliction in a proper spirit, it will
be most pleasing to God, for whose sake it would
become you to give not one son only, but all the
others, nay, life itself, if it were necessary. Men
for a little gain cross the seas, enduring, at least,
as much as we; and shall we not, for God's love, do
what men do for earthly interests?

"Good-by, dear mother. I thank you for all the
affection which you have ever shown me, and above
all at our last meeting. May God unite us in His
holy paradise, if we do not see each other again on
earth !

"Present my most humble recommendations to
my brothers and sisters, to whose prayers, as to
yours, I commend myself in heart and love.

"Your most humble son and obedient servant in
Our Lord,

ISAAC JOGUES.
DIEPPE, April 6, i6s6." 49

He wrote to her after arriving at Quebec:
"I do not know what it is to enter paradise ; but
this I know, that it is difficult to experience in this
world a joy more excessive and more overflowing
than that I felt on my setting foot in New France,
and celebrating my first Mass here on the day of

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the Visitation. I assure you it was indeed a day
of the visitation of the goodness of God and Our
Lady. I felt as if it were a Christmas day for me,
and that I was to be born again to a new life,
and a life in God." 50

Before leaving for the Huron mission he wrote
still another letter on August 2oth, as follows:

My health has been so good, thank
God, at sea and on land that it has been a matter
of wonder to all, it being very unusual for any
one to make such a long voyage without suffering
a little from sea-sickness or nausea. The vestments
and chapel service have been a great comfort to
me, as I have offered the holy sacrifice of Mass
every day the weather was favorable a happiness
I should have been deprived of, had not our family
provided me with them. It was a great consolation
to me, and one which our Fathers did not enjoy
the preceding years. Officers and crew have
profited by it; as but for that the eighty persons on
board could not have been present at the Holy
Sacrifice for two months, whilst, owing to the
faculties I enjoyed, they all confessed and received
communion at Whitsunday, Ascension, and Corpus
Christi. God will reward you and Madam Houde-
lin for the good you have enabled me to do.

"You shall have letters of mine every year, and I
shall expect yours. It will ever be a consolation for
me to hear from you and our family, as I have
no hope of seeing you in our lifetime. May God

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THE JESUIT MARTYRS

in His goodness unite us both in His holy abode
to praise Him for all eternity!" 51

It was not intended at first that Jogues should
go immediately to the Hurons. For a time Brebeuf
was there alone. He went through all the excite-
ment of a threatened Iroquois invasion, and he had
to witness the revolting scene of an Iroquois tortured
unto death. He was powerless to prevent this,
but as he had baptized the captive shortly before
his ordeal, he was determined to stand by, console
and encourage him through such hellish treatment.
It was then he witnessed an exhibition of Indian
character which was new to him. Their mockery
of the victim was fiendish. The more they burned
his flesh and crushed his bones, the more they flat-
tered and even coddled him. It was an all-night
tragedy. Brebeuf was witnessing what he himself
would afterwards suffer.

Le Mercier and Pi j art had gone up while Daniel
and Davost were on their way down; Gamier and
Chastellain went there directly, meeting Daniel on
the way. Five would be enough for the time being.
Providence had other designs. About August 2oth,
Daniel's canoe came into Three Rivers with his
young charges, and Jogues was there to witness his
arrival.

"Father Daniel was in this first company, Father
Davost in the rear guard, which did not yet appear;
and we even began to doubt whether the island
savages had not made them return. At the sight

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OF NORTH AMERICA

of Father Daniel, our hearts melted; his face was
gay and happy, but greatly emaciated; he was bare-
footed, had a paddle in his hand, and was clad in
a wretched cassock, his Breviary suspended to his
neck, his shirt rotting on his back. He saluted
our captains and our French people; then we
embraced him, and, having led him to our little
room, after having blessed and adored Our Lord,
he related to us in what condition was the cause
of Christianity among the Hurons, delivering to
me the letters and the Relation sent from that coun-
try, which constrained us to sing a Te Deum, as a
thanksgiving for the blessings that God was pour-
ing out upon this new Church. I shall not speak
of the difficulties of his voyage, all that has been
already told; it was enough for him that he baptized
a poor wretch they were leading to his death, to
sweeten all his trials/ 552

The Indians begged that a priest should accom-
pany them homeward, and Jogues was selected for
this errand. They left on St. Bartholomew's Day,
August 24th. At his first opportunity for getting a
letter through, June 1st the following year, he
wrote to his mother describing the journey with
the same detail as Brebeuf in Chapter Four, but
more briefly, and with a story in addition about a
sick Indian child whom he had to look after, lift-
ing him out of the canoe, carrying him over the
portages. Now he is with his Indians and he can
speak freely with a mother.

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THE JESUIT MARTYRS

". . . Nothing can equal the satisfaction
enjoyed in our hearts while we impart the knowledge
of the True God to these heathen. About two
hundred and forty have received baptism this year ;
among them I have baptized some who surely are
now in heaven, as they were children one or two
years old.

"Can we think the life of man better employed
than in this good work? What do I say? Would
not all the labors of a thousand men be well
rewarded in the conversion of a single soul gained
to Jesus Christ? I have always felt a great love
for this kind of life, and for a profession so excel-
lent, and so akin to that of the Apostles. Had I
to work for this happiness alone, I would exert
myself to my utmost to obtain a favor, for which
I would fain give a thousand lives.

"Should you receive these lines, I entreat you,
by the bonds of the love of Jesus Christ, to give
thanks to the Lord for this extraordinary favor He
has bestowed upon me a favor so earnestly
wished and craved by many servants of God
endowed with qualities far above what I possess." 53

If, instead, of writing, he had gone home to her,
one wonders if she could have greeted him more
affectionately than did his fellows at Ihonatiria.
As Ragueneau writes in the Relation for that year:

"I made all the preparations for his reception;
but oh, what a feast ! a handful of little dried
fish, with a sprinkling of flour. I sent for a few

112:3

OF NORTH AMERICA

ears of corn, which we roasted for him after the
fashion of the country. But it is true that at heart,
and to hear him, he never enjoyed better cheer.
The happiness felt at these meetings seems to
reflect in some sort the joy of the blessed on their
entrance into heaven, so full of sweetness is it!" 54

An epidemic was raging in the village and Jogues
was its first victim, among the missionaries.
Garnier, Adam, Ragueneau and Chastellain fol-
lowed. For a while Jogues lay at death's door.
As a desperate remedy bleeding was resorted to,
and Jogues acted successfully as his own surgeon.
He made a rapid recovery. In October he was
about again. The others came round more slowly.
All, even the convalescing, did what they could to
minister to the afflicted Indians. Even in that time
medical attention to the body was a way of
approach to the soul. The Indians took what relief
was afforded them, but ungratefully blamed the
Fathers for having brought on their illness. The
village sorcerer Tonneraouanont had offered to cure
the Fathers by his incantations. He resented their
declining. When he saw them grow well without
his aid, he was convinced that they were greater
sorcerers than himself. It was not difficult for him
and others like him to spread the impression that
by evil arts the priests had brought this affliction
on the village. Fortunately on this occasion the
missionaries could prove that the village was the

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THE JESUIT MARTYRS

source of the contagion, but they could not remove
every lurking suspicion, as the sequel will show.

The new arrivals were busy with the language.
In Brebeuf they had an excellent master and they
all made quick progress. They made regular visits
to the cabins, following as best they could the
daily order detailed in a letter of Frangois du
Peron three years later:

"The importunity of the savages, who are con-
tinually about us in our cabin, and who sometimes
break down a door, throw stones at our cabin, and
wound our people, this importunity, I say, does
not prevent our observance of our hours, as well
regulated as in one of our colleges in France. At
four o'clock the rising-bell rings; then follows the
orison, at the end of which the Masses begin and
continue until eight o'clock; during this period each
one keeps silent, reads his spiritual book, and says
his lesser hours. At eight o'clock, the door is left
open to the savages, until four in the evening; it
is permitted to talk with the savages at this time,
as much to instruct them as to learn their language.
In this time, also, our Fathers visit the cabins of
the town, to baptize the sick and to instruct the
well ; as for me, my employment is the study of the
language, watching the cabin, helping the Christians
and catechumens pray to God, and keeping school
for their children from noon until two o'clock,
when the bell rings for examination of conscience.
Then follows the dinner, during which is read some

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OF NORTH AMERICA

chapter from the Bible; and at supper Reverend
Father du Barry's Philagie of Jesus is read; the
Benedicite and grace is said in Huron, on account
of the savages who are present. We dine around
the fire, seated on a log, with our plates on the
ground. At noon I open the school for the children
who happen to be there up to two o'clock; some-
times I only have one, two, or three pupils. On
Sundays, Tuesdays, and Thursdays, school closes at
one o'clock, when instruction is given to the most
prominent people of the village, whether Christians
or not ; on Thursdays, to Christians and catechumens
only; on Sunday morning, to Christians only. Dur-
ing the parochial Mass, the sermon is preached;
before the Mass, the water is blessed while they are
singing; and at the offertory the bread, which the
savages present in turn, is blessed. On great holy
days, High Mass is celebrated. After dinner on Sun-
days, at one o'clock, vespers are sung; then follows
the instruction of Christians and catechumens;
at five o'clock complines are sung, and on Saturday
evening the Salve^ with the litanies of the Virgin.
On this same day, at the close of school, a short
catechetical instruction is given to the children;
and once a month a public catechism is given to
the whole village besides the daily instruction given
them in their cabins. At four o'clock in the
evening, the savages who are not Christians are sent
away, and we quietly say, all together, our matins
and lauds, at the end of which we hold mutual

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THE JESUIT MARTYRS

consultation for three-quarters of an hour about
the advancement of and the hindrances to the Faith
in these countries; afterwards we confer together
about the language until supper, which is at half-
past six; at eight o'clock, the litanies, examina-
tion of conscience, and then we retire to sleep/' 55

This is what a visit to the cabins meant:

"If you go to visit them in their cabins, and
you must go there of tener than once a day, if you
would perform your duty as you ought, you will
find there a miniature picture of hell, seeing
nothing, ordinarily, but fire and smoke, and on
every side naked bodies, black and half roasted,
mingled pell-mell with the dogs, which are held as
dear as the children of the house, and share the
beds, plates, and food of their masters. Everything
is in a cloud of dust, and, if you go within, you
will not reach the end of the cabin before you
are completely befouled with soot, filth, and dirt." 56

A pleasanter picture is that of the missionary's
mode of spending his vacation, and of his summer
school :

''Summer here is a very inconvenient season for
instructing the savages. Their trading expeditions
and the farms take every one away, men, women,
and children almost no one remains in the
villages. I will tell you how we spent last summer.

"In the first place, we all came together for
the spiritual exercises, as is the custom of our
Society. We had the more need of these exercises,

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as the high duties we are called upon to perform
need more union with God, and because we are
compelled to live in a continual bustle. For this
reason we often acknowledge that those who come
here should bring a good reserve fund of virtue, if
they wish here to gather the fruits thereof. After
our exercises we made a confused memorandum of
the words we had learned since our arrival, and
then we outlined a dictionary of the Huron language
which will be very profitable. In it will be seen
the various meanings; one will easily recognize in
it, when the words are grouped, their differences,
which consist sometimes in only a single letter, or
even in an accent. Finally we busied ourselves
in revising, or rather in arranging, a grammar. I
fear we shall often have to make similar revisions;
for every day we discover new secrets in this science,
which for the present hinders us from sending any-
thing to be printed. We know now, thank God,
sufficient to understand and to be understood, but
not yet to publish. It is indeed an exceedingly
laborious task to endeavor to understand in all
points a foreign tongue, very abundant, and as
different from our European languages as heaven
is from earth, and that without master or books.
I say no more about it here, as I shall write a
chapter about it, further on. We all work at it
diligently; it is one of our most common occupa-
tions. There is not one of us who does not already
talk a jargon, and make himself understood, the

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THE JESUIT MARTYRS

newly-arrived Fathers as well as the others. I
trust that Father Mercier, in particular, will soon
be master of it/ 557

Brebeuf will write to the General of his Order
in May, 1637:

". . . We are gladly heard, we have
baptized more than two hundred this year, and
there is hardly a village that has not invited us to
go to it. Besides, the result of this pestilence and
of these reports has been to make us better known
to this people; and at last it is understood, from
our actions and from our truths of religion], that
we have not come hither to buy skins or carry on
any traffic, but solely to teach them and win them
to Christ, and to procure for them their souls'
health, and finally everlasting and immortal life.
Furthermore, since some families, although not yet
baptized, rested all their hope in the Lord, and
therefore almost alone remained safe and unharmed,
it has resulted that they believe, and eagerly ask
for baptism, which, as we hope, they will receive,
when they shall have been sufficiently proved. We
have seen, too, no uncertain signs of present grace
in many whom we have purified through baptism;
and already many, both old and young, have, as we
believe, soared away to heaven, blessed intercessors
before God for their friends. Finally, we have
come to hope that this pestilence, which still
rages, once abated in due season, and the minds of
men restored to that tranquillity necessary to the

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OF NORTH AMERICA

hearing and understanding of the truths of the
Faith very many will be converted." 58

Later when the contagion was at an end, in 1639
Jogues wrote to his brother:

"During the epidemic the Fathers baptized more
than one thousand two hundred persons. Even
in the village where they were the most exposed to
the perversity of the people, there were always some
anxious to follow the instructions of our Fathers;
about one hundred have been regenerated in the
waters of baptism, amongst them twenty-two little
children." 59

n "93

CHAPTER TEN

Brebeuf s Ideal Realized

A. D. 1639

Hostility to missionaries Imported prejudices Dream and
transport Baptism of first adult in health Council decides on
death of missionaries A marvellous document A new Mission
An Indian census Conversions begin

THE plague was so persistent, the chiefs con-
voked a council at Ossossane to deliberate on
measures for eradicating it. Brebeuf and Jogues
were present. Brebeuf began with prayer, distri-
buted tobacco for the calumets, and backed with
presents his proposal that the Indians give up super-
stitious practices, implore God's mercy and adopt
the Faith. The immediate thing to do was to erect
a chapel. They all seemed to agree. They held
their banquet, but their resolution was by no means
stable. At Ihonatiria the missionaries had to face a
new outbreak of suspicion and prejudice. The hos-
tility to the Jesuits, especially in the Lutheran
countries of Europe, followed them into Huronia
through the Dutch settlement at Rensselaerswyck,
now Albany. The burghers did not mean to incite
the Hurons to molest their missionaries. This they
proved later by their persistent efforts to obtain
the release of Jogues from his Mohawk captors,
and their pride in aiding his escape. They meant
to warn them against accepting what they preached,

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THE JESUIT MARTYRS

giving as a reason that these men had brought on
a blight in every country that tolerated them. Some
of the Indians, who disliked the opposition of the
missionaries to their superstitions, interpreted this
to mean that the Jesuits had been the cause of their
misfortunes. Everything they had and everything
they did became suspect, their crucifix, their
Breviary, clock, magnetic needle, the Sign of the
Cross, kneeling to pray, writing a letter. Sorcerers
themselves, the Indians adjudged everyone else the
same. The situation became so trying that Jerome
Lalemant wrote in the "Relation" for 1639:

". . . I begin to doubt whether any other mar-
tyrdom is requisite for the end for which we labor;
and I have not the least doubt that many would
be found who would rather feel at once the keen
edge of a hatchet on their head, than endure for
years a life such as we have to live here every
day." 60

Dreams go by contraries. With all this agitation
against them the missionaries maintained their
usual calmness. Jogues 3 mind apparently was not
disturbed by it. Endeavoring to overcome sleep
one afternoon when in the chapel, he gave way for
a moment, and dreamed that he was singing Ves-
pers. The verse, "Give ear, O Lord, unto my
prayer", of the Fifth Psalm was sung, and then
as he tells us:

"When the verse was ended, I seemed to be no
longer in our cabin, but in a place I knew not, when

C i 3

THE JESUIT MARTYRS

all at once I heard verses sung (I forget which)
which had reference to the happiness of the Saints,
and the delights they enjoy in the kingdom of
heaven. The chanting was so beautiful, and the
melody of voices and instruments so harmonious,
that I have no recollection of ever having heard
the like, and it even seems to me that the most
perfect concerts are nothing compared to it. To
compare such harmony with that of earth would be
insulting.

"Meanwhile this most admirable concert of the
angels excited in my heart a love of God so great,
so ardent, so burning, that, unable to bear such an
overflowing of sweetness, my poor heart seemed to
melt and dilate under this inexplicable wealth of
Divine love. I experienced this feeling especially
as they sang the verse I so well remember, 'We will
go into His tabernacle, we will adore in the place
where His feet stood'. 61

This lasted but a moment. It suggests strongly
that his thoughts and aspirations were so far above
mundane things that neither persecution nor actual
torture could affect him even when dreaming.

Life at Ihonatiria became impossible for the
missionaries. Their work was hampered. The
people were decimated by the epidemic. They were
urged to settle in Ossossane (near Point Varwood
on Nottawasaga Bay), and also at Teanaustaye,
inland (near Hillsdale, in Medonte township),
known as St. Joseph II. A chapel was built for

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OF NORTH AMERICA

them at the former place, eighty feet in length,
with real boards and doors, and it was soon the
scene of the baptism of Tsiouendaentaha, the first
adult in good health admitted to baptism in that
mission, after three years' labor of an average of
five men! There was humor as well as fitness in
the name given him, Peter, since he was to be the
corner-stone of Christianity in that remote region.
The ceremony was solemn. The Indians, who loved
ceremonial, flocked to it. The enemies of the
missionaries made it an occasion of renewed hos-
tility. The Fathers were unmoved. Brebeuf had
the sachems call an assembly, appeared before it,
and convinced them, apparently at least, that they
were wrong in attributing sorcery to the priests.
With quiet restored for a time, the work of the
mission prospered.

Like all untutored minds, the Indian's was one
of fixed ideas. Once seized with a belief, right or
wrong, it was useless to argue with him. Early
in August another council was called, ostensibly
to consider tribal affairs, but in reality to deter-
mine the fate of the Jesuits. Twenty-eight vil-
lages were represented. Brebeuf was present. The
first day was given to indifferent matters; on the
second the session was in the evening, lasting until
midnight. It was plain to Brebeuf that he and
his companions were doomed. He was on trial.
They abused and accused him. He defended him-
self fearlessly. Their decision was deferred until

C "3 3

THE JESUIT MARTYRS

the return of their tribesmen from Quebec. An
attempt was made to burn the mission cabin; the
young men of the tribe harassed the Fathers where-
ever they met them. On October 4th, they were
summoned to meet the elders of the tribe and
informed that they should die. Brebouf went
about among the captains to obtain a stay of pro-
ceedings, but to no purpose. It was at this juncture
he indited a statement as heroic as any contained
in the Acts of the Martyrs. Everyone at the mis-
sion signed it. Those who were absent made known
their assent.

REVEREND FATHER,

The Peace of Christ.

"We are, perhaps, upon the point of shedding
our blood and of sacrificing our lives to the service
of our good Master, Jesus Christ. It seems that
His goodness consents to accept this sacrifice from
me for the expiation of my great and innumerable
sins, and to crown from this time on, the past
services and the great and ardent desires of all
our Fathers who are here.

"What makes me think that this will not hap-
pen is, on the one hand, the excess of my past
wickedness, which renders me utterly unworthy of
so signal a favor; and, on the other, that I do not
believe His goodness will permit His workmen to
be put to death, since through His grace there are
still some good souls who eagerly receive the seed

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OF NORTH AMERICA

of the Gospel, notwithstanding the evil speech and
persecutions of all men against us. And yet I fear
that Divine justice, seeing the obstinacy of the
majority of these barbarians in their follies, may
very justly permit them to come and take away
the life of the body from those who with all their
hearts desire and procure the life of their souls.

"Be this as it may, I will tell you that all our
Fathers await the outcome of this affair with great
calmness and contentment of mind. And, for my-
self, I can say to your reverence with all sincerity
that I have not yet had the least apprehension of
death for such a cause. But we are all sorry for
this that these poor barbarians, through their own
malice, are closing the door to the Gospel and to
grace. Whatever conclusion they reach, and what-
ever treatment they give us, we will try, by the
grace of Our Lord, to endure it patiently for His
service. It is a singular favor that His goodness
extends to us, to make us endure something for His
sake. It is now that we consider ourselves truly
to belong to His Society. May He be forever
blessed for having appointed us to this country,
among many others better than we, to aid Him in
bearing His Cross. In all things, may His holy
will be done! If He will that at this hour we
should die, oh, fortunate hour for us ! If He will
to reserve us for other labors, may He be blessed!
If you hear that God has crowned our insignificant
labors, or rather our desires, bless Him; for it is for

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THE JESUIT MARTYRS

Him that we desire to live and to die, and it is He
who gives us grace therefor. For the rest, if any
survive, I have given orders as to all they are to
do. I have deemed it advisable for our Fathers
and our domestics to withdraw to the houses of
those whom they regard as their best friends; I
have charged them to carry to the house of Pierre,
our first Christian, all that belongs to the sacristy,
above all, to be especially careful to put our dic-
tionary, and all that we have of the language, in a
place of safety. As for myself, if God grant me the
grace to go to heaven, I will pray Him for them,
for the poor Hurons, and I will not forget your
reverence.

"And finally, we supplicate your reverence and
all our Fathers not to forget us in your holy Sacri-
fices and prayers, to the end that, in life after
death, He may grant us mercy. We are all, in
life and in eternity,

YOUR REVERENCE'S

Very humble and very affectionate
servants in Our Lord,

JEAN DE BR BEUF.

FRANgois JOSEPH LE MERCIER.

PIERRE CHASTELLAIN.

CHARLES GARNIER.

PAUL RAGITENEAU.

In the Residence of la Conception
at Ossossane, this 28th of October.

C 1263

OF NORTH AMERICA

"I have left Fathers Pierre Pijart and Isaac
Jogues in the Residence of Saint Joseph, with the
same sentiments." 62

The Dictionary was the one precious possession
of the missionaries. In it was the fruit of years of
labor of many men. In it too was hope for the
future, as it would facilitate the work of those who
would still come to preach Christ to this people.
After that Brebeuf does the redoubtable thing
which meant in Indian custom that all was ready
for the execution. He invited them to his farewell
feast, his Atsataion^ the banquet they themselves
gave when they were near death. They filled the
cabin. He harangued them not about himself but
about life after death. They departed gloomy and
irresolute. The missionaries were left in peace.
Brebeuf was adopted by the tribe and made a cap-
tain. Occasional attacks were made on some of the
missionaries, on du Peron, Le Mercier, Chaumont
and Ragueneau, but they were the frenzy of individ-
uals, not of the tribe nor of its leaders.

In 1638, Mass was said in the cabin of Stephen
Totiri at Teanaustaye, and there a new mission
was established, with Brebeuf in charge. Jogues
was at that post. Stephen was to be later his com-
panion in captivity. The report for the first year
of that mission alone mentioned baptisms of forty-
eight children and seventy-two adults. Soon there
were nine missionaries in the two villages, among
them Le Moyne, who was to be the apostle of the

c 127 3

THE JESUIT MARTYRS

Onondagas and follow Jogues in his work among
the Mohawks. A census was taken. It was not a
difficult matter. An Indian village was a collection
of cabins, not all as well constructed as that of the
missionaries, but somewhat like it. These stood in
rows more or less regular, and they were as a rule
surrounded by a fence or palisade for protection
against assault by an enemy. There were thirty-
two villages and about twelve thousand inhab-
itants. Twenty years before they were forty
thousand, but war, famine and epidemics had
reduced their number. The baptism of Peter had
been followed by other conversions. Le Mercier
reports for the year 1638 more than one hundred
baptisms of adults and children, fifty-six of whom
were living when he wrote. Among these was
Joseph Chihwatenhwa of Ossossane, a man of great
natural goodness, who after baptism practised vir-
tue to an extraordinary degree. If the harvest was
slow in ripening, the yield was not disappointing.
Le Jeune gives this account of Joseph's solid Chris-
tianity :

". . . I will content myself with saying what
cannot often enough be said: i. That he has an
extreme horror of sin, hardly ever speaking to us
that he does not propose some question of con-
science, his being very sensitive. 2. That he
preaches Jesus Christ boldly and on all occasions,
both by example and by words; he made this con-
spicuous in the councils which I have mentioned

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OF NORTH AMERICA

above. He is especially admirable in the continual
instruction of those in his cabin, inculcating on
them at every opportunity the holy commandments
of God. 3. That he has special communication
with God, begging Him every day, with tears in
his eyes, that it may please Him to look with pity
upon his poor country, so that it is one of our
greatest consolations to be near him when he is
offering his prayers, above all, his thanksgiving
after the Communion. 4. Before and after the
instructions that are given him, it is a pleasure to
see him on his knees asking grace of the Divine
Spirit; even going so far as to force himself to
learn to write, this winter, that he may remember
and repeat what was said to him ; but, above all, to
indicate more clearly, he said, the number of his
sins. 5. He makes habitual an incredible purity
of conscience, often throwing himself at our feet to
confess, exhibiting scruples at the least thing, 6. He
will sometimes continue in prayer for three-quar-
ters of an hour, all the time on his knees, which
is a very difficult position for a savage. 7. Finally,
it is wonderful how much strength God gives him
to combat at every turn the great difficulties that
the Devil continues to raise for him through the
people of his nation, some by inviting him to
their infamous and superstitious feasts, others by
openly ridiculing him. He said to us one day with
his usual simplicity, 'Yes, my brothers, 1 am so
determined to maintain even unto death the fidelity

n 129 ]

THE JESUIT MARTYRS

I have vowed to my God, that if any one wished to
make me return to my former follies, he should
sooner take away my life/ In short, his devotion
may be summarized as a holy tenderness of heart
that God gives him, for the great and loving respect
that he shows to the holy Sacrament, for the honor
he renders to his guardian angel and his great
Patron, and for commending to the holy Virgin his
country and the souls of the faithful departed/ 363

Such were the rewards of the missionaries, who
would toil for months to win one soul. The souls
they won were often not the lost sheep they had
gone out to seek, but others who came in their way
haphazard, like this one, for instance.

"On our way to a place, we go astray unawares,
and find ourselves involved in routes that we were
not seeking. We meet two little children who are
dying, prostrate near their mother, who is all in
tears; they both receive baptism, and then take
flight to heaven. Was it not God who guided us?

"On the eve of All Saints, I am constrained to
run alone into two or three cabins, in the midst
of a dense forest, where the disease was ruining
them. I set foot in a poor little house where I
had never entered; I find a young lad in very great
danger of dying. I instruct him, and prepare him
for holy baptism; his father opposes it, and will
not allow me this, unless at the same time I baptize
another, who is still in the cradle. I object to that,
this smaller one being nowise sick; the father, on

[ 130 H

OF NORTH AMERICA

his side, also persists in his refusal, telling me that
he wished that, if his two children died, they should
go in company, either to heaven or to hell. I am
constrained to grant him what he desires, in order
not to lose a soul ; I then baptize them both. After
eight days I return; I find them no longer alive; I
am driven from the cabin, and they will hear no
further mention of God. Thus it is that Our Lord
uses even reprobates in order to possess His elect.
"I pass near a cabin where three little children
are dying; I am called, as if I were a great phys-
ician, to declare how much life was left to them.
On going in, I plainly see that they still had
enough left to make them live forever in heaven;
while feeling their pulses, I take my opportunity
secretly, and baptize them; they were awaiting
nothing but that in order to die to all their miseries.
In a word, we are transacting the affairs of God
here: is it a wonder that He takes part in them?" 64

CHAPTER ELEVEN

More Missions and New Fields

A.D. 1639-1642

A change of policy A mission centre and more stations
The missions and greater New France Motive of the mission-
aries Not after trade or land Personnel of the head-quarters
Individual characteristics Obedience Jesuit auxiliaries
Exploring new fields Tobacco Indians, Garnier's report
Jogues and the Ojibways The Neuters Brebeuf at Quebec
Failure and hope of the Mission.

THE year 1639 was marked by a complete
change of policy on the part of the Huron
missionaries. At his earnest solicitation, Brebeuf
had been relieved of his charge of the missions in
August, 1638, and Jerome Lalemant was appointed
in his place. His first move, early the following
year, with the agreement of all the Fathers, was to
establish a head-quarters, or central bureau for the
missions, at a distance from the Indian villages,
with a home to accommodate the priests, their at-
tendants and the Frenchmen, about fifteen in num-
ber, who served as soldiers or laborers. The new
location was named Ste-Marie. It was situated
on the Wye River which connected two lakes, on
a peninsula between Midland Bay and Victoria
Harbor, about eight miles from Ossossane, and
twelve from Teanaustaye. The pioneers had
bravely and self-sacrificingly lived with and like
the natives for five years. Experience taught them
that to identify themselves with any one village,

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THE JESUIT MARTYRS

no matter how central, made them less welcome
in the others; that they could not depend on any
group to remain long in the same place ; that with
their own cabin as a rendezvous they were not free
to attend to their work. From a central station
they could not only visit at due intervals all the
Huron tribes, but also make occasional excursions
or explorations into the countries of tribes to the
west and south. They built a commodious house
where all the priests could assemble and confer
from time to time; dwellings for their retainers;
a hospital for the sick from the villages and a recep-
tion-place for those who would come for instruction
or for the ceremonies. A fort was erected, the ruins
of which still show the skill of a military engineer;
and finally there was a God's acre for the burial
of all who would die members of the Church.

The new settlement was approved and aided by
the governor at Quebec, and by Richelieu, who saw
in it a station for developing exploration and trade
with the Indians west and south-west. It was really
the beginning of a greater New France. Its origi-
nator, Lalemant, had in view a northern Paraguay
Reduction ; its civil promoters looked to it for terri-
torial expansion and commerce. That was the dif-
ference in motive between missionary and
mercenary. Very soon the opponents of the former
would fail to see this difference and accuse the
priests of seeking land and fur. Fortunately, those
who had trade primarily in view came to their

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THE JESUIT MARTYRS

defence. The statement they issued is a remarkable
one, as Viinont the Jesuit Superior at Quebec gives
it in the Relation of 1642:

"Those who believe that the Jesuits go into this
end of the world in order to make traffic of skins
of dead beasts, account them very rash, and desti-
tute of sense, to go and expose themselves to such
horrible dangers, for a benefit so sordid. It seems
to me that they have more generous hearts ; and that
only God and the salvation of souls can make them
leave their native land, and the comfort of France,
in order to go in quest of fires and torments in the
midst of barbarism. Forasmuch, nevertheless, as
this error about commerce might slip into the minds
of those who are not acquainted with them, it has
been judged proper to affix here an authentic attes-
tation, which will show how far they are removed
from such thoughts. If they who speak of them
with freedom, for want of knowing them, chanced
to be with them in that new world, they would
certainly change their tone; and, becoming com-
panions in their sufferings and their zeal, they would
find themselves united and bound by like affections ;
and these chains might be eternal, since true love
and true charity pass beyond time. Enough; let us
conclude with a genuine and impartial testimonial,
which may be drawn from the lips of honorable
persons, who have stamped it with their names and
confirmed it with their signatures.

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OF NORTH AMERICA

DECLARATION OF MESSIEURS THE DIRECTORS AND
ASSOCIATES IN THE COMPANY OF NEW FRANCE.
The Directors and Associates in the Company of
New France, called Canada, having learned that
some persons persuade themselves, and circulate the
report, that the Society of the Jesuit Fathers has
part in the shipments, returns, and commercial
transactions which are made in the said country,
wishing by this device to disparage and destroy
the reputation and value of the great labors which
they undertake in the said country, with pains and
fatigues incredible, and in peril of their lives, for
the service and glory of God, in the conversion of
the savages to the faith of Christianity and the
Catholic, Apostolic, and Roman religion, in which
they have made and are making great progress every
year, whereof the said Society is very intimately
informed, have believed themselves obliged by
the duty of Christian charity, to undeceive those
who might have this belief, through the declaration
and certification which they make by these presents :
that the said Jesuit Fathers are not associated in
the said Company of New France, directly or indi-
rectly, and have no part in the traffic of merchan-
dise which is carried on by it. In witness whereof
the present declaration has been signed by the said
directors and associates, and sealed with the seal
of the said company, at Paris, in the regular assem-
bly of the same, the first day of December one
thousand six hundred and forty-three. Thus signed:

E1353

THE JESUIT MARTYRS

De la Ferte, Abbe de sainte Magdeleine, Bor-
dier, Margonne, Beruyer, Robineau, Tabouret,
Berruyer, Verdier, Fleuriau, Caset, Bourguet, and
Clarentin; and sealed with a Seal.

Collated with the original by me, Counsellor,
and Secretary of the King, house, and Crown
of France.

JOLLY," 65

No such statement was needed by those who
were acquainted with the actual work of the mis-
sionaries. Nor will anyone now repeat the accusa-
tion that they were seeking landed properties,
seigneuries, as they were called, for any purpose
except for reservations and for the maintenance of
the priests and of the many who were employed
with them at Quebec, Montreal and out on the
missions. Some of these concessions were never
even claimed, as, for instance, the one which
Governor de Lauson on April 12, 1656 granted to
the "Reverend Fathers of the Society of Jesus", to
wit, ten leagues (about thirty miles) square near
the Onondaga mission., then south of Manlius and
not far east of Syracuse. When under Prime Min-
ister Mercier of Quebec a settlement of the contro-
versy of these estates was finally effected, the
Jesuits were content with a small part of the
amount awarded, the balance going to the diocesan
authorities. This amount was $400,000, in partial
compensation for the properties which had been
taken over by the British Government on the death

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OF NORTH AMERICA

of the last Jesuit in Canada, prior to the restoration
of the Society. 66

The personnel of the mission was motley for
those who imagine that Jesuits are all men of a
mould, stripped of individuality. Lalemant was
a profound theologian, as Dr. O'Callaghan assures
us, but fond of teaching children and candidates for
baptism; "Father of the poor", Mary of the Incar-
nation styles him. Brebeuf had studied theology
enough to qualify for ordination. A very ox for
labor, of large physique and ardent temperament,
his self-restraint was remarkable. He was in de-
mand by the Indian captains, but he knew how to
accommodate himself to file as well as rank.
Chastellain never appears prominently in the story
of the missions. In the Relation of 1640 he is rep-
resented as persistent when a good work was to be
done. After eight years in Huronia, illness made
him retire, but he spent twenty years thereafter in
Quebec. Du Peron had a gay sense of humor ; every
letter, or part of a Relation, from his pen is en-
livening. Ragueneau impresses by his thoroughness,
his matter-of-fact attitude and sternness. Martyr-
dom was a part of the day's work for him. In his
annals for the public, deeds are mentioned, but
names scarcely ever. Still when the martyrdoms
were over, he gave very precious and very affec-
tionate accounts of them. Le Moyne was a man
of romance. He reaped where others sowed, but
he also sowed where others reaped abundantly.

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THE JESUIT MARTYRS

Then there was Le Mercier, over thirty years on
the mission, twice superior at Quebec, and for a
time vicar of Bishop Laval, writer of many Rela-
tions of a style all his own. Finally comes
Chaumonot, altogether baffling the pen-portrait,
imaginative, mystical, over-credulous some say,
without proving it, but as hardy in privation as
Brebeuf, and credulous to a fault concerning the
virtues and merits of all about him. Of the dis-
tinctive characters of Jogues, Daniel, Garnier it
would be superfluous to speak.

Out from the palisaded enclosure of St. Mary's
these men would venture in the autumn to the dif-
ferent villages, almost every one of which had now
become a mission centre. They would go as di-
rected by their chief, Lalemant, not, as some
imagine, in a spirit of abject or servile obedience
it is impossible to attribute such dispositions to such
men but with one thing only in mind, the saving
of souls. The obedience they had been trained to
was that of the children of God, given with the
utmost liberty and in a spirit of loyalty and allegi-
ance. By their Rule they were just as much under
obligation to make known to their superior what
they thought of his command, and of their own
ability or inability to obey it, as they were to carry
it out; or to do something else, should he deem pro-
per to change what he had ordered. The Relations
contain numerous instances, the "Journal des Jesul-
tes" especially, of the care with which superiors

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OF NORTH AMERICA

consulted their men, and considered from every
point of view what was best to do and who was
most fitted to do it. 67

A new factor appears in the mission at this time,
which engaged the attention of Jogues. He had
charge of the laymen occupied at Ste. Marie. As
the priests grew in number, their attendants also
increased. Among the colonists were young men
who had come to New France for trade, but who
had become attached to the missionaries, acting as
guides, interpreters, messengers, visitors, catechists,
nurses and servants. They took the place of lay-
brothers. At first they did not engage to serve for
any length of time, but gradually they acquired a
liking for the work and adopted it permanently. To
satisfy their devotion, the Fathers permitted them
to bind themselves by vow to the missions, engag-
ing in return to provide for them for life, and to
permit them to wear the religious habit. Neither
the vow nor the wearing of a habit were approved
by the General of the Order, but in 1644 he
approved of the contract between mission and
donne^ involving service and provision for life.
They were an important adjunct to the missionaries.
Of their number were Goupil, Lalande, Couture,
Guerin. Jogues with his kindly manner was particu-
larly useful in managing the six donnes or oblates
then at the new settlement, and the laborers who
helped to build palisade and fort. He had charge
also of four village missions. One advantage of

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THE JESUIT MARTYRS

the new arrangement for the mission became
apparent when small-pox broke out among the
Indians. Again they railed at the missionaries and
threatened them, calling Brebeuf the arch-sorcerer,
but this time the Fathers were too remote to suffer
this annoyance as they had the two years before.
The supreme advantage however was, as Chaumonot
states, that in every cabin of the thirty-two villages
instructions had been given by the Fathers. 68

It was now possible to broaden the horizon and
field of the missionaries. . In 1640 Jogues and Gar-
nier started on a special mission to the Petun
Indians, thirty miles to the south-west in the Blue
Mountains, between Lakes Huron and Ontario.
They were known as Tobacco Indians, because they
traded heavily in that commodity. As the braves
were usually absent trading or fishing in summer
and fall, winter was the only opportune season for
such journeys. The two priests had to travel on
snow-shoes. They were deserted by their guides.
They had to sleep overnight in the woods. When
they arrived at the first village they found that
their repute for sorcery had preceded them. They
were avoided and even abhorred by everyone. They
were threatened and ordered out of every village.
In none of them could they remain more than two
days. Part of Garnier's account of this experience
is as follows :

"Here we have at last arrived, thank God, at
the farthest and principal village of our district, to

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OF NORTH AMERICA

which we have given the name of Saint-Pierre et
Saint-Paul. Not having been able to find any
savage at the village of La Conception to come with
us, the roads being then too bad, for people who
are not seeking God, we were constrained to start
alone; taking our good angels for guides. About
the middle of the journey, not having been able
to find a certain detour which would have led us
to some cabins which are a little isolated, we were
surprised by night in a fir grove. We were in a
damp place, and could not go from it to seek a
drier one; we had trouble enough to pick up some
pieces of wood to make a little fire, and some dry
branches to lie down upon; the snow was threaten-
ing to put out our fire, but it suddenly ceased. God
be blessed, we spent the night very quietly. The
next morning we came across some poor cabins in
the fields, but they had no corn. Finding company
there to come into the country with, we were not
willing to lose it, because the roads were very diffi-
cult on account of the newly-fallen snows, which
had obliterated the trails. Accordingly, we set out,
and went by many bad roads, at a very bad season,
to a little village which we named St. Thomas ; we
made easily a league by the mere light of the snow,
and arrived about eight o'clock in the evening, with
good appetite, not having eaten all day, save
each a morsel of bread. We had no design on that
village, rather than on another; but having taken
what company of savages there offered, and having

i: HI 3

THE JESUIT MARTYRS

followed them, we arrived, no doubt, where God
was leading us, for the salvation of a predestined
soul which awaited nothing but our coming, in order
to die to all its miseries. While we were at a loss
to know whether there was not some person
critically ill, a young man came to beg us to go
and give some relief to one in his cabin. We go
thither, and find a poor woman at the last pass;
she was instructed, and happily received with the
Faith the grace of baptism; shortly after, she
beheld herself in glory. In the whole village there
was only that one who had need of our help. We
ran to some other little villages, where they told
us that there were sick people ; we baptized some of
them, Our Lord's sheep are much scattered,
hither and yon. We have met some persons who
at first indeed relish the Gospel; God grant them
the grace to embrace it altogether. We received con-
solation two or three days ago, seeing that a girl,
who came to pledge herself to a young man, having
a little later heard mention of God and the pains of
hell, went to lie down alone, saying, 'He sees us
even at night/

"On arriving in this village, we knew not that
there was a little child of the Neutral Nation, aged
five years, whom its parents have recently brought
here, where hunger causes them to take refuge; for
a long time, it was each day believed that that
would be the last of its life* Out of 45 or 50
cabins, without thinking of it, we first visited the

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one in which was this little stranger, and baptized
him; he straightway saw himself out of exile and
happy in his native land. Those are the first
fruits of this Neutral Nation, and this was the very
first one to be sprinkled with the blood of Jesus
Christ.

"This whole country is filled with evil reports
which are current about us. The children, seeing
us arrive at any place, exclaim that famine and
disease are coming; some women flee, others hide
their children from us; almost all refuse us the
hospitality which they grant even to the most
unknown tribes. We have not been able to find
a house for Our Lord, not having been able to
find any place where we can say Mass. Our host,
who is the chief captain of this country, and who
through a natural prudence had appeared quite
peaceable, on seeing us pray to God mornings
and evenings on our knees, finally could not
refrain, on one occasion, from revealing to us what
he had on his heart. He begins, therefore, to speak,
but in a council voice, that is to say, loud and
distinct: 'Truly, it is now that I fear and speak.
What are now these demons but spells to make us
die, and finish what the disease has left over, in
this cabin? They had told me, indeed, that these
were sorcerers, but I believe it too late. This is a
thing unknown that persons who come to lodge
at one's house pass the night in postures to which
our eyes are nowise accustomed. 5 Imagine with

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THE JESUIT MARTYRS

what looks they regard us in a cabin where they
have such fine ideas of us I We could hardly tran-
quilize this mind again. They treat us very ill,
in order to oblige us to leave. It is, in sooth, all,
if we have what suffices for life, our hunger
usually attends us from morning till evening; but
these simple people do not see that what retains
us here is more precious than all that they conceive
in the way of pleasures in this world. There is
hardly any com in this village, and, nevertheless,
every day some Attiouandarons arrive (they are
those of the Neutral Nation), bands of men,
women, and children, all pale and disfigured, whom
famine drives hither. Fleeing famine, they here
find death, or rather a blessed life, for we see to
it that not one dies without baptism. Among these
people was a little child of one year who seemed
rather a monster than a human being. It was
happily baptized; God, it seems, preserved its life
only by miracle, so that, being washed in the blood
of Jesus Christ, it might bless His mercies forever.
"While we try to render some honor to God,
the devil continues to be adored; even yesterday,
in our cabin, they made him a solemn sacrifice. All
the people being assembled there, they repeatedly
threw tobacco and fat into the fire, making several
invocations; and all that for the cure of a wretch
whom his private demon afflicts with a certain
disease, because he has not obeyed him in the matter
of some feasts which he had commanded him.

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"Is it a wonder that we are held in abomination
at a place where the devils are acknowledged as
masters? Our host orders that his door be barri-
caded every evening, fearing lest they do us some
violence by night; for, if they killed us in his house,
he would have the reproaches to bear for it, even
from those who desire naught but our death. It
is not this which assures us ; we have a more power-
ful protection, although less visible to these poor
infidels." 69

Their journey was a failure, but they knew well
the fickle character of the natives. Next year
Gamier would go there and establish a flourishing
mission of the Apostles, and soon it would have
nine stations, with an apostle's name for each. In
1649 he would die a martyr there.

These long-distance explorations became more
frequent, now that the missionaries had provided
for the home missions, and were free to move about.
They wei;e always in winter time. The "Relation"
of 1640 tells of the journey of Jogues and Raym-
bault as far as Sault Sainte Marie. They had been
invited by Ojibways from that region, who had
come over to the Ottawas to celebrate a Feast of
the Dead. This consisted in gathering together
the departed of all their villages for the ten years
previous and interring them in one great pit. It
was a solemn occasion for the Indians, and they
were religiously disposed. Jogues and his com-
panion had to travel two hundred and fifty miles

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THE JESUIT MARTYRS

for the most part along the northern shore of Lake
Huron. Two thousand Indians greeted them and
urged them to remain there. All they could do
was make known the Faith and plant a great cross
facing the Far West to which their successors would
go in after years. 70 Raymbault's health was broken
by this journey and he died the year following in
Quebec. It was the report of this exploration which
led Le Jeune to suggest that the vast fresh-water
sea Jogues and Raymbault discovered, Lake
Superior, might be the coveted route to China! 71
Brebeuf and Chaumonot visited the Neuters,
north of Lake Erie, with their forty villages and
twelve thousand people, starting in November,
1641. They were also deserted by their guides, and
as ill-received as Jogues and Gamier by the
Petuns. They were fortunate in finding a leader
and they were so persuaded that encouraging voices
were leading them, that they determined to call
this the Mission of the Angels. Theye were treated
as lepers; the very road they walked over was
avoided as, infected. They were threatened with
death. A council was summoned to decide their
fate. Brebeuf went boldly into it, and then retired
with his companion to await the verdict. Three
times it was adverse. The fourth ballot was favor-
able, but on condition they would leave the country.
It was about this time Brebeuf had a foresight of
what was to happen later to his cherished mission
among the Hurons. It came to him in the form

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OF NORTH AMERICA

of a huge cross, which had its stem in the heart of
the Iroquois country and its arms overshadowing
Huronia. "The cross was large enough to bear all
the missionaries among the Hurons." 72

They spent three hard winter months in this way,
permitted only to visit the sick, some of whom they
baptized. Heavy snows detained them for twenty-
five days on their homeward journey.- They were
harbored in a cabin by a woman of kindly manners,
who with her children ministered to them, but
would not listen to their instruction. Brebeuf fell
and broke his shoulder-blade soon after leaving the
cabin and he had to struggle painfully over ice and
through jungle until they reached home on St.
Joseph's Day. His report of this expedition is a
model of observation in ethnology. 73 For eighteen
months he suffered from this fall, until in the
summer of 1641 he was called to Quebec for rest
and medical attention. Here at last, after seven
strenuous years, he could witness consoling evi-
dences of religion. His own brethren had three
establishments: one at Sillery for the Indians who
were gradually becoming Christian; one at Notre
Dame des Anges for the French colonists; and the
school for young people, which was started in 1632,
developed into a college in 1636, and was provided
with suitable buildings in 1647. The work of the
Ursulines and Hospital Sisters would also interest
him, like as it was to similar works which he had
seen in France. He had the gratification of con-

n 1473

10

THE JESUIT MARTYRS

verting two prominent Hurons who had been
enemies of religion in Huronia. It was a well-
deserved Sabbatical year of rest. His next such
year would crown his labor with an everlasting rest.
Jogues would soon pass his first year off the mission
in far different surroundings. Each would have
time to ponder over the problems of the missions,
and one question that would interest them was;
why so few Christians among the Indians after such
long and arduous labor?

This problem was perplexing then. It is not so
now. Cardinal Newman remarks that God's hand
is not seen in events until they are over, and that
is why memory of the past is always so consoling
for the Church and for its individual members. 74
The missionaries very properly would admit no
adult to baptism without due instruction and with-
out due trial also in constancy. They knew the
fickle nature of their people, and they knew also
the vicious surroundings in which the newly-con-
verted would have to live. It required nothing
short of heroism for tribesman or woman to become
a consistent member of the Church. That was the
first obstacle to numerous conversions. There was
also the difficulty of language. No matter how
adept the missionary would become in the use of
any tongue, he had to coin new words for most of
the things he needed to convey to the Indian mind,
so lacking were their languages in terms to express
Divine and spiritual facts or thoughts.

C

OF NORTH AMERICA

It was hard also to acquire the confidence of a
people who believed the strangers were the cause
of their misfortunes, and who were confirmed in
that belief by settlers from other lands than France.
The Hurons as a tribe were in no mood to try new
things. Famished by drought, decimated by
disease, frightened by what they considered the
magic of Brebeuf and his associates, they clung all
the more fiercely to their own superstitious rites,
and indulged in the tribal vices of drinking,
gambling, lascivious dancing and other immorali-
ties. In these evil habits the missionaries felt that
they were face to face with the demons of hell.
Still they never gave up.

The first adult to be baptized in 1637, was fol-
lowed by over eighty, two years later, and by
sixty in 1641. That was little enough, but it
proved that genuine conversion was not impossible.
The missionaries knew they were doing the work
of God. They recalled what their fellow-Jesuits
had done and were doing in every part of the world d
how in Bordeaux, for instance, within seventeen
years (1572-1589), they reduced the Huguenots
from seven thousand to an inappreciable number; 75
how one hundred thousand in Paraguay had become
Christians after six years of labor on the part of
the Jesuit Ruiz de Montoya. Their keen joy over
one baptism, even of an infant, suggests also their
keen disappointment with the few adults in health
they could convert. They were sowing in labor

I 149 3

THE JESUIT MARTYRS

and in sorrow. They all agreed that something
more than the ordinary dews of grace was required
to fertilize such an arid soil. Among themselves
they repeated the adage as old as the Church: The
blood of martyrs is the seed of Christians. How
could it be verified in this instance? Happy as
they all were to live a life that had continual
martyrdom, as Jerome Lalemant termed it, not one
of them would presume to believe himself worthy
of being chosen as the victim. Lalemant had the
good sense to say in his "Relation'' for 1639:
"But if some one asks when we shall execute this
great plan for converting the Hurons], seeing
that hardly have we yet made a beginning, or
advanced one step in these countries since we have
been here, -my answer to this question is, first,
that even if this is not to be accomplished until
shortly before the end of the world, yet it is always
necessary to begin before ending. . . ," 76

"We have sometimes wondered whether we could
hope for the conversion of this country without
the shedding of blood; the principle received, it
seems, in the Church of God, that the blood of
martyrs is the seed of Christians, made me at one
time conclude that this was not to be expected,
yea, that it was not even to be desired ; considering
the glory that redounds to God from the constancy
of the martyrs, with whose blood all the rest of the
earth has been so lately drenched, it would be a
sort of curse if this quarter of the world should not

c 1503

OF NORTH AMERICA

participate in the happiness of having contributed
to the splendor of this glory." 77

Two at least of the missionaries were praying
constantly to have a share in the glory of suffering,
if not of martyrdom. Every morning when com-
municating at the sacrifice of the Mass, Brebeuf
repeated the vow which he had made when an
exile from the missions, in France. Jogues often
made a similar prayer. When in the summer of
1642, he was ordered down to Quebec to obtain
relief for the mission, which was then in destitute
condition, he went one day into the chapel, bent in
prayer to the ground, beseeching Our Lord to grant
him the favor of suffering for His glory. Engraved
in the depths of his soul was the answer: "Thy
prayer is heard. What thou hast asked is granted.
Be courageous and steadfast ". He was soon to
enter on his suffering, but not yet as a martyr.

CHAPTER TWELVE

An Era of Martyrdom

Distress in Huronia Jogues leads relief expedition Captured
by Mohawks Two-week trail in torture Gruesome village spec-
tacle A year in slavery A Martyr's Confessions Goupil, first
victim Death for the Sign of the Cross A martyr's interment.

HURONIA was in distress. The mission itself
was in great need. ];iarvests had been poor.
Illness abounded. Clothing was scarce. The new
mission stations needed vestments and altar-ware.
Quebec was the only source of supplies. Raym-
bault's illness required him to go there, but some
one must accompany him. The Iroquois were on
the warpath. They were willing to make peace
with the French, but not with the Hurons or Algon-
quins. The route lay through the villages of both.
Jogues was chosen to lead the expedition. He
started early in June, 1642, arriving safely about
mid- July. It took about two weeks for his Indian
companions to transact business and see what was
of interest. Many of them were Christians, or
preparing to be. They would naturally wish to see
the Indian Catholic settlement at Sillery, the con-
vents, hospitals, and churches. The Fathers
encouraged this, as it was an object lesson which
impressed on them the strength and dignity of
religion,

n 1523

THE JESUIT MARTYRS

On August 1st he started homeward with about
forty in the company, four of them Frenchmen, the
canoes heavily laden with goods for the Mission.
They were scarcely a day on the way when they
were ambushed and taken captive by the Iroquois*
The story of their ill-treatment, torture, captivity,
and, in some instances, death has been frequently
told, but never more impressively than by the prin-
cipal victim, Jogues. Comment or paraphrase would
spoil it. It is more like the "Confessions" of St.
Augustine than a description of torture. Usually
those who attempt to repeat the story in their own
words apologize fastidiously for depicting such
revolting cruelty. The language of Jogues lifts
the imagination above gross details and centres the
attention more on his own spiritual elevation than
on his bodily suffering. His letter was written to
his provincial, or chief superior, in France. It is
dated from the Mohawk village then located near
the site of the present village of Auriesville, New
York. To appreciate its contents one need only
recall that the Iroquois were the fiercest Indian
tribes in the east at that time, that they were
bitterly opposed to the French, implacable to the
Hurons, hateful of the Black Robe, as the mis-
sionary was called on account of his clerical
garment. There were five tribes or nations,
Mohawks, Onondagas, Oneidas, Cayugas and
Senecas, situated in this order along the Mohawk
Valley, between Schenectady and Lake Erie. They

n 153 3

THE JESUIT MARTYRS

numbered about twenty-five thousand and had
twenty-five hundred warriors. The Auriesville
village was the easternmost, and it was there Jogues
was tortured and kept in captivity for fourteen
months. It was near there he wrote what follows
of this chapter, being at the time in the Dutch settle-
ment Rensselaerswyck, now Albany.

"LETTER FROM FATHER ISAAC JOGUES TO HIS
PROVINCIAL JEAN FILLEAU.

dated August 5, 1643.]

"When desiring to write to Your Reverence, the
first doubt that I had was, in which language I
ought to do so, Latin or French; then, having
almost forgotten them both, I found equal difficulty
in each. Two reasons have moved me to use Latin.
The first, for the sake of being able sometimes to
employ certain sentences from the Sacred Scripture,
from which I have received great consolation in my
adversities. The second, because I desire that this
letter may not be too common. Your Reverence's
great charity will excuse, as it has done at other
times, my failings; especially since for eight years
now I have been living among barbarians, not only
in usages, but also in a costume similar to theirs.
But I fear 'that I am unskilled in speech and in
knowledge 5 ; not knowing the precious time 'of my
visitation 3 : first, then, I beg you, if this letter shall
come unto your hands, to aid me with your Holy
Sacrifices, and prayers by the whole Province, as

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OF NORTH AMERICA

being among people no less barbarous by birth than
in manners. And I hope you will do this gladly,
when you shall have seen by this letter the obliga-
tion under which I am to God, and my need of
spiritual help.

"We started from the Hurons on the 13th of
June, 1642, with four canoes and twenty-three
persons eighteen barbarians, and five Frenchmen.
The journey besides the difficulties, especially
of portages, was dangerous by reason of the
enemies, who, seizing every year the highways, take
many prisoners; and I know not how Father Jean
de Brebeuf escaped them last year. They, being
incensed against the French, had shortly before
declared that, if they should capture any one of
them, they would, besides the other torments, burn
him alive by a slow fire* The Superiors, aware of
the dangers of this journey, necessary, however,
for the glory of God, spoke to me of them, adding
that they did not oblige me thereto. But I did
not gainsay them, 'nor have I gone back 9 . I
embraced with good courage that obedience put
before me for the glory of God; and if I had
excused myself, some one else, of greater ability,
would have been substituted in my place, with more
detriment to the mission. We made the journey
not without fear, dangers, losses, and shipwrecks,
and, thirty-five days after our departure, we arrived
safe and sound at the residence of Three Rivers;
due thanks being there rendered to God, we spent

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THE JESUIT MARTYRS

twenty-five days partly there, partly at Kebek,
according to necessity. Having finished our busi-
ness, and celebrated the feast of our holy Father
Ignatius, we embarked again on the first of August
for the Hurons. On the second day of our journey,
some of our men discovered on the shore fresh
tracks of people who had passed there, without
knowing whether or not they were enemies.
Eustache Ahatsistari, famous and experienced in
war, believes them enemies. 'But, however strong
they may be deemed/ he says, 'they are not more
than three canoes; and therefore we have nothing
to fear.' We then continue the journey. But, a
mile beyond, we meet them to the number of
seventy, in twelve canoes, concealed in the grass
and woods. They suddenly surround us, and fire
their arquebuses, but without wounding us. The
Hurons, terrified, abandon the canoes, and many
flee to the deepest part of the woods ; we were left
alone, we four Frenchmen, with a few others,
Christians and catechumens, to the number of
twelve or fourteen. Having commended themselves
to God, they stand on the defensive; but, being
quickly overwhelmed by numbers, and a Frenchman
named Rene Goupil, who was fighting among the
first, being captured with some Hurons, they ceased
from the defense. I, who was barefoot, would not
and could not flee, not willing, moreover, to for-
sake a Frenchman and the Hurons, who were partly
captured without baptism, partly near being the

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OF NORTH AMERICA

prey of the enemies, who were seeking them in the
woods. I therefore stayed alone at the place where
the skirmish had occurred, and surrendered myself
to the man who was guarding the prisoners, that 1
might be made their companion in their perils, as I
had been on the journey. He was amazed at what
I did, and approached, not without fear, to place
me with them. I forthwith rejoiced with the
Frenchman over the grace which the Lord was
showing us : I roused, him to constancy, and heard
him in confession. After the Hurons had been
instructed in the Faith, I baptized them; and as
the number increased, my occupation of instructing
and baptizing them also increased. There was
finally led in among the captives the valiant
Eustache Ahatsistari, a Christian; who seeing me,
said: 1 praise God that He has granted me what
I so much desired, to live and die with thee.' I
knew not what to answer, being oppressed with
compassion, when Guillaume Cousture also came
up, who had come with me from the Hurons. This
man, seeing the impossibility of longer defending
himself, had fled with the others into the forests;
and, as he was a young man not only of courageous
disposition, but strong in body, and fleet in running,
he was already out of the grasp of the one who
was pursuing him. But, having turned back, and
seeing that I was not with him, 'I will not forsake/
he said to himself, c my dear Father alone in the
hands of enemies ;' and immediately returning to the

c 1573

THE JESUIT MARTYRS

barbarians, he had of his own accord become a
prisoner. Oh, that he had never taken such a resolu-
tion! It is no consolation in such cases to have
companions of one's misfortunes. But who can
prevent the sentiment of charity? Such is the
feeling toward us of those laymen who, without
any worldly interest, serve God and aid us in our
ministrations among the Hurons. This one had
slain, in the fight, one of the most prominent among
the enemies; he was therefore treated most cruelly.
They stripped him naked, and, like mad dogs, tore
off his nails with their teeth, bit his fingers, and
pierced his right hand with a javelin; but he
suffered it all with invincible patience, remember-
ing the nails of the Savior, as he told me after*
ward. I embraced him with great affection, and
exhorted him to offer to God those pains, for him-
self and for those who tormented him. But those
executioners although admiring me at the beginning,
soon afterward grew fierce, and, assailing me with
their fists and with knotty sticks, left me half dead
on the ground, and a little later, having carried me
back to where I was, they also tore off my nails,
and bit with their teeth my two forefingers, caus-
ing me incredible pain. They did the same to Rene
Goupil, leaving unharmed the Hurons, who were
now made slaves. Then, having brought us all
together again, they made us cross the river, where
they divided among themselves the spoil that is,
the riches of the poor Hurons, and what they

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carried, which was church utensils, books, etc.,
things very precious to us. Meanwhile, I baptized
some who had not yet received that rite, and,
among others, an old man of eighty years, who,
having had orders to embark with the others, said:
'How shall I, who am already decrepit, go into
a distant and foreign country?' Refusing, then, to
do so, he was slain at the same place where he had
been baptized, losing the life of the body where
he had received that of the soul. Thence, with
shouts proper to conquerors, they depart, to conduct
us into their countries, to the number of twenty-two
captives, besides three of our men already killed.
We suffered many hardships on the journey, wherein
we spent thirty-eight days amid hunger, excessive
heat, threats, and blows, in addition to the cruel
pains of our wounds, not healed, which had putre-
fied, so that worms dropped from them. They,
besides, even went to far a savage act as in
cold blood to tear out our hair and beards, wound-
ing us with their nails, which are extremely sharp,
in the most tender and sensitive parts of the body.
I do not mention the inward pains caused at the
sight of that funereal pomp of the oldest and most
excellent Christians of the new Church of the
Hurons, who often drew the tears from my eyes,
in the fear lest these cruelties might impede the
progress of the Faith still incipient there. On the
eighth day of our journey, we met two hundred
barbarians, who were going to attack the French at

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the fort which they were building at Richelieu;
these, after their fashion, thinking to exercise them-
selves in cruelty, and thus to derive prosperous
results from their wars, wished to travel with us.
Thanks being then rendered to the sun, which they
believe to preside in wars, and their muskets being
fired as a token of rejoicing, they made us dis-
embark, in order to receive us with heavy blows
of sticks. I, who was the last, and therefore more
exposed to these beatings, fell, midway in the
journey which we were obliged to make to a hill,
on which they had erected a stage; and I thought
that I must die there, because I neither could, nor
cared to, arise. What I suffered, is known to One
for Whose love and cause it is a pleasant and
glorious thing to suffer. Finally, moved by a cruel
mercy, wishing to conduct me alive to their coun-
try, they ceased beating me, and conducted me,
half dead, to the stage, all bleeding from the
blows which they had given me, especially in the
face. Having come down from it, they loaded me
with a thousand insults, and with new blows on
the neck and on the rest of the body. They burned
one of my fingers, and crushed another with their
teeth; and the others, already bruised and their
sinews torn, they so twisted that even at present,
although partly healed, they are crippled and
deformed. A barbarian twice took me by the nose,
to cut it off; but this was never allowed him by
that Lord Who willed that I should still live,

n 160 u

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for the savages are not wont to give life to persons
enormously mutilated. We spent there much of the
night, and the rest of it passed not without great
pain, and without food, which even for many days
we had hardly tasted. Our pains were increased
by the cruelties which they practised upon our
Christians, especially upon Eustache, both of
whose thumbs they cut off ; and, through the midst
of the wound made on his left hand they thrust
a sharp skewer, even to the elbow, with unspeakable
pain; but he suffered it with the same that is,
invincible constancy. The day following, we
encountered other canoes, which were likewise
going to war ; those people then cut off some fingers
from our companions; not without our own fear.
On the tenth day, in the afternoon, we left the
canoes, in order to make the remainder of the four
days' journey on foot. To the customary severities
was added a new toil, to carry their goods, although
herein they treated me better than I expected,
whether because I could not, or whether because I
retained in captivity itself, and near to death, a
spirit haply too proud. Hunger accompanied us
always; we passed three days without any food,
but on the fourth we found some wild fruits. I had
not provided myself sufficiently when we abandoned
the canoes, for fear lest my body should be too
robust and vigorous in the fire and in the torments,
not to dissimulate 'about my infirmities'. On the
second day, they put a kettle on the fire, as if to

n 161 3

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prepare something to eat; but there was nothing
in it but warm water, which each one was allowed
to drink at his pleasure. Finally, on the i8th day,
the eve of the Assumption of the Most Blessed
Virgin, we arrived at the first village of the
Hiroquois. I thanked the Lord that, on the day
on which the Christians celebrate so solemn a feast,
He had called us to share His pains. We had
anticipated that day as truly bitter and calamitous ;
and it had been easy for Rene Goupil and for me
to avoid it, because often, when unbound about mid-
night, we were able to flee, with the hope, if
not of returning to ours, at least of dying more
easily in the woods. But he refused to do so, and I
would rather suffer every pain than abandon my
French and Huron Christians to death, and deprive
them of the consolation which they could receive
from a priest at that time. So, on the eve of the
Assumption, about the twentieth hour, we arrived
at the river which flows past their village. Here
were awaiting us, on both banks of the river, the
old Huron slaves and the Hiroquois, the former to
warn us that we should flee, for that otherwise we
would be burned; the latter to beat us with sticks,
fists, and stones, as before, especially my head,
because they hate shaven and short hair. Two
nails had been left me; they tore these out with
their teeth, and tore off that flesh which is under
them, with their very sharp nails, even to the bone.
We remained there, exposed to their taunts a few

OF NORTH AMERICA

moments ; then they led us to the village situated on
another hill. Before arriving, we met the young
men of the country, in a line, armed with sticks,
as before; but we, who knew that, if we had
separated ourselves from the number of those who
are scourged, we would be separated from the num-
ber of the sons, 'for He scourgeth every son whom
He receiveth', offered ourselves with ready will to
our God, Who became paternally cruel to the end
that He might take pleasure in us, as in His sons.
We went one by one. First there walked a French-
man, altogether naked; Rene was in the middle; I
the last, in shirt and trousers. The Hiroquois had
placed themselves between us and the Hurons, in
order to moderate our pace, for the sake of giving
time to any one who struck us. A long time, and
cruelly, 'the wicked have wrought upon my back',
not only with sticks, but also with iron rods,
which they have from the Dutch; and one of the
first, with a piece of iron thick as a fist, attached
to a rope, gave us each a blow so fierce that I
would have fallen half dead, if the fear of another
like blow had not given me strength to pass on.
We hardly had strength to reach the stage erected
in the middle of the village. Rene, who was not
very nimble, received so many blows, especially
in the face, that nothing was seen of him but the
whites of his eyes, all the more beautiful, since
more like that one, 'as it were a leper and as one
struck by God, in whom there is neither beauty

n 1633

THE JESUIT MARTYRS

nor comeliness 5 . Hardly did we breathe upon the
stage when, with a great rod, we were three times
struck on the bare shoulders; and they began to
unsheathe knives, in order to cut off the rest of
our fingers. Because they esteemed me the most,
they began with me, whom they saw respected by
the French and the Hurons. There approach me
then an old man and a woman, whom he orders to
cut off my thumb; at first she refuses, but being,
as it were, compelled three or four times by the
old man, she finally does so. This woman was an
Algonquin, a Christian slave, captured a few
months before, and her name was Jeanne. What
consolation to suffer at the hands of those for whom
one dies rather than abandon them to visible and
invisible enemies. Then I, taking with my other
hand the amputated thumb, offered it to Thee, O
my Living and True God, mindful of the sacri-
fices which I had offered Thee in Thy Church,
until, admonished by one of my companions, I let
it fall, for fear that they might put it in my mouth,
in order to make me swallow it as they often do.
As for Rene, they cut off his right thumb at the
first joint. I thank God that they left me the one
on my right hand, so that by this letter I niay
pray my Fathers and brethren to offer prayers for
us in the Holy Church of God. Unto her we
are recommended with a twofold and new title,
since she is accustomed to pray c f or the afflicted and
captives'. The following day, the feast of the

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Blessed Virgin, after having kept us till noon
on the stage, they conducted us to another village,
five or six miles distant from the first; and the
barbarians who was leading me took away my shirt,
leaving me nothing, except a rag, which he could
not deny to decency, but a piece of sacking,
which I myself asked from him, in order to cover
my shoulders. But these, bent with so many beat-
ings, refused to sustain that rough and rude weight,
especially after a burning sun roasted my skin as
in an oven, on account of which, shortly after-
ward, that of the neck, the shoulders, and the arms,
being burned, fell off. At the entrance to this
village, they did not omit although contrary to
their custom to beat us once again, with blows
the more atrocious in proportion as the multitude
did not hinder them from measuring them; they
struck us especially on the bones of the legs, with
what pain may be imagined. The rest of the
day we remained upon the stage; at night, in a
cabin, naked on the bare ground, bound with chains,
exposed to the revilings of each sex and of every
age. They threw coals and live ashes on our bare
flesh, which, for us who were bound, it was diffi-
cult to throw off. We remained there two days and
two nights, almost without eating or sleeping,
tormented further by the sight of the torments
which they inflicted upon our Huron companions,
whose wrists they bound so tightly with cords that
they fainted therefrom. I regarded these as my

THE JESUIT MARTYRS

spiritual sons, shortly before regenerated to God
by holy baptism, that is to say, with the bowels
of a Father, to whom love served as executioner. I
consoled them, however, with the words of the
Apostle: 'Do not therefore lose your confidence,
which hath a great reward* Through many tribula-
tions we must enter the Kingdom of God. You
shall lament and weep', etc., 'but your sorrow will
be turned into joy. A woman, when she is in labor,
hath sorrow, but remembereth no more the anguish,
for joy', etc. In a word, 'for that which is at present
momentary and light of our tribulation, worketh for
us an eternal weight of glory'. The stages of the
barbarians had not yet seen either Frenchmen or
Christian Hurons: to satisfy, then, the curiosity of
all, we were led everywhere. At the third village,
we entered with great peace, but not without pain,
since we met there four other Hurons freshly cap-
tured, and mutilated like us. I found means of
instructing in the Faith and baptizing these prison-
ers, two upon the stage itself, with the dew,
which I found quite abundant in the great leaves
of Turkish corn, the stalks of which they gave us
to chew; the other two on the journey to another
village, at a brook which we encountered by the
way. Here the rain and the cold made our naked-
ness more keenly felt; therefore, trembling with
cold, I sometimes went down from the stage in
order to warm myself in some cabin, but I was
forthwith led back to it. To cut off Guillaume's
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OF NORTH AMERICA

right forefinger, a barbarian used, not a knife, but
a shell, like a saw; which could not cut the tough
and slippery sinews; and therefore he tore it off
by sheer force, which caused the sufferer's arm to
swell even to the elbow. A certain person, out of
pity, received him into a hut during those two days
that we stayed there, not without anxiety on my
side, as I knew not where he was. At night, they
led us into a cabin, where they commanded us to
sing, as was their wont. It is necessary to obey
and to sing, 'but of the canticles of the Lord in a
land of exile'. From singing they came to torments,
especially in the case of Rene and me ; they burned
me with coals and live ashes, especially on the
breast; and they bound me upright between two
stakes, set between the shoulders and the elbow,
with two pieces of bark, wherewith they often
bind those whom they bum, so that I thought that
I was to be burned. And that you may know
that, if I endured the rest with strength and with
patience, it was not my own courage, but that of
Him 'Who giveth strength to the weary' in that
torture, being almost left to myself alone, I wept
( C I will glory in the things that concern my infirm-
ity') ; and, on account of the great pain, I begged
that they would not tie me so tightly. But it so
happened that the Lord permitted that, the more
I besought Him, the more they bound me. They
kept me thus about a quarter of an hour, then they
loosed me; otherwise, I would have swooned. I

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THE JESUIT MARTYRS

thank Thee, O good Jesus, because I have learned
with some little experience what Thou didst con-
descend to suffer for me on the Cross, where Thy
most holy body was not even sustained with cords,
but hung by Thy hands and feet, transfixed with
hardest nails. For spending the rest of the night,
they bound us on the earth to several stakes; and
what did they not do to us, or try to do? But
again I thank You, O Lord, that You kept me pure
from the impure hands of the barbarians. Two
days later, they led us to the second village, in
order to take final counsel concerning us. Now for
seven days they had been leading us from village
to village, from stage to stage, being made a
spectacle to God and to the angels, the contempt
and sport of the barbarians, when finally we
were notified of death by fire news assuredly full
of horror, but softened by the thought of the Divine
Will, and by the hope of a better life. I spoke for
the last time, as I believed, to the French and the
Hurons to animate them by reminding them of the
sufferings of that One 'Who bore with such contra-
diction from sinners against Himself, of the brevity
of the torments, and the eternity of the glory, etc.
I also admonished them, especially Eustache, that
in the torments they should look at me, and made
some sign, so that I might bestow on them the
last absolution, as I did in his case, repeatedly; but
the French and almost all the other Hurons were
granted life. The fortitude of this man was

C

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marvelous; and whereas the others, while in the
fire, are wont to have the sentiment and use the
words of him who said, 'may an avenger arise from
our ashes', he, with Christian spirit, entreated the
Hurons present, that the thought of his death
should never prejudice the peace of the Hiroquois.
They also killed Paul Onnonhoaraton, a young
man of about twenty-five years, of great courage,
who laughed at death, being animated with the
hope of a better life, as he publicly declared. This
man, on the journey, when the Hiroquois were
coming to torment me, offered himself for me,
begging them that they should rather exercise
cruelty toward him. God will have rewarded him
for that notable charity wherewith 'he gave his life
for his friends', who amid bonds had begotten him
for Christ. Guillaume was given to a Hiroquois
family. When they spare the life of any slave,
they usually receive him into some family in the
place of some dead kinsman, whom the slave is said
to bring to life again, by taking the name and the
same degree of relationship; so that they call him,
like the dead man, 'father', 'brother 3 , 'son', etc.
But, in the case of Rene and myself, because we
were not so strong, the final decision was not taken,
but they left us together, as it were, in a free
slavery. Therein, as being half idle, we began to
feel more keenly the pains of unhealed wounds,
irritated by a thousand annoying little creatures,
from which our mutilated fingers did not permit us

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THE JESUIT MARTYRS

to defend ourselves. We observed, by necessity
more than convenience, that aphorism, c the food is
not good for the sick', especially Rene, who was
not accustomed to the Turkish corn without salt.
This diet perhaps availed to effect that, in the
space of three weeks, we began to use our hands.
Meanwhile, those two hundred returned, whom we
had encountered on the journey, overcome by
the French in lesser number, who were commanded
by the Chevalier de Montmagni, governor of the
country, whom they were intending to surprise. On
this account, it again began to be a question of
killing us; but we know not how God prevented
the execution of this threat. On the day of the
Nativity of the Blessed Virgin, one of the principal
persons among the Dutch, who have a colony about
forty miles distant from the barbarians, came to
treat for our ransom. He spent several days there,
and offered much, but obtained nothing, the
barbarians, in order not to offend him, feigning, by
way of excuse, that they would conduct us back to
the French, Perhaps the leaders had some such
intention; but, at the final council which assembled
for this affair, the crowd and those who were most
turbulent, prevented its accomplishment. Indeed, if
by special Providence of God we had not been out-
side the village when the council was ended, they
would have killed us; but, having sought us awhile
in vain, they finally returned each one to his own
village. Rene and I having gone back, and been

n 1703

OF NORTH AMERICA

warned of the danger, we withdrew without,
toward a hill, in order to perform our devotions
with more liberty ; we offered our lives to God, and
began the rosary of the Blessed Virgin. We were
at the fourth decade when we met two young men,
who commanded us to return to the village. 'This
encounter', I said to Rene, is not auspicious,
especially in these circumstances. Let us commend
ourselves to God and to the Blessed Virgin. 5 In
fact, at the gate of the village one of these two
draws a hatchet, which he has kept concealed, and
strikes Rene's head with it. He fell, half dead,
but remembered, according to the agreement made
between us, to invoke the most Holy Name of Jesus,
in order to obtain indulgence. I, expecting a like
blow, uncover myself, and cast myself on my knees ;
but the barbarian, having left me a little time thus,
commanded me to rise, saying he had not permis-
sion to kill me, as I was under the protection of
another family. I then arise, and give the last
absolution to my dear companion, who still
breathed, but whose life the barbarian finally took
away with two more blows. He was not more
than thirty-five years of age; he was a man of
unusual simplicity and innocence of life, of
invincible patience, and very conformable to the
Divine Will. He was worthy to be acknowledged
by Your Reverence as yours, not only because he
had been, with credit, for several months in our
novitiate, but also because here he had consecrated

n

THE JESUIT MARTYRS

himself, under obedience to the Superiors of the
Society, in the service of our neophytes and
catechumens, to whom with the art of surgery
he was of great assistance; and finally, because, a
few days before, he had consecrated himself with
the vows. The long prayers that he made had
rendered him odious to the barbarians, who for
this reason esteemed him a sorcerer; but the sign
of the cross, which he often made on the brows of
the children, was the last and true cause of his
death, an old man, grandfather of one of them,
having ordered the murderer to chastise with death
the Frenchman's superstition, as practised on the
person of one of his descendants; and I learned
this from the child's mother, and from many others
of the country. But I was given to another master,
who hated us mortally; in consequence, they
believed so surely that he would kill me, that he
who had lent me that wherewith to cover myself,
asked it from me again, in order not to lose it at
my death. I did not fail, however, on the follow-
ing day, to seek, even at the peril of my life, the
body of the deceased, for the sake of burying it.
They had tied a rope to his neck, and dragged him
naked through the whole village, and had then
thrown him into the river, at some distance away.
My first master warned me to withdraw, if I did
not wish to be killed like him; but I, who was weary
of that manner of living, would have reckoned it
great gain to die in the exercise of a work of mercy.

c 172 n

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I then pursued my journey, and, with the guidance
and aid of a man of the country, furnished me
for escort by the same person who, out of friend-
ship, was dissuading me from going thither, I
found him by the bank of the river, half eaten by
the dogs ; and there, at the bottom of a dry torrent,
I cover him with stones, intending to return thither
the following day alone, with a pickaxe, in order
to bury him securely. I found, at my return, two
armed young men, who were awaiting me to con-
duct me, as they said, to another village, but,
really, to kill me in some retired place. I told them
I could not follow them without orders from my
master, who would not consent. It was necessary
to hinder, on the following day, another, who had
come for this purpose, from seeking me in a field,
the Lord causing me to see by experience that He
was the protector of my life without Whom a hair
of our head will not perish. On the following day,
I return to the place with tools, but they had taken
away my brother. I go again, I seek everywhere,
and I myself go into the river up to my waist,
although it was swollen by the night's rains, and
cold, since it was the month of October. I seek
him with my hands and with my feet; they tell me
that the high water has removed him elsewhere.
I hold obsequies for him as best I can, singing
the psalms and prayers thereto appointed by
the Church ; I mingle my tears with the water of the
torrent; I groan and sigh. I can gain no news of

C

THE JESUIT MARTYRS

him before the following spring, when, the snows
being melted, the young men of the country notify
me that they have seen his bones on the same bank
of the river; these, together with the head, having
reverently kissed, I then finally buried as best I
could"/ 8

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

An Apostle in Slavery

The Dutch intervene A slave on the Mohawk The winter's
hunt A snow-bound oratory Life in the balance His friends
among the Dutch Final decision to seek freedom Reformed
Minister and Jesuit Reception at New Amsterdam. Return to
France Return to Canada Back to the Mohawks Death.

AS soon as news of the torture of Jogues and his
companions reached the Dutch fort, Arendt
van Corlaer, the commandant, Jean Labatie, his
interpreter, and Jacob Jansen of New Amsterdam
(now New York), went as ambassadors to the
Mohawk village in order to obtain their release.
This was on September 7. They were unsuccessful.
The Indians pretended they would give the prison-
ers their liberty, but they did not keep their word.
Jogues and Goupil became slaves. The other cap-
tives were distributed among the villagers farther
west. As Jogues relates in his narrative, Rene
Goupil was tomahawked by an Indian on Septem-
ber 29th for having made the sign of the Cross
and taught it to some children.

Jogues was then adopted by the Wolf Clan, one
of the three families or divisions of the tribe, the
others being known as the Bear and the Turtle. He
was given over to a family who had lost a son in
war. His life was in constant danger. Several times
attempt was made to decoy him beyond the village
in order to kill him. His master, who alone had

n 175]

THE JESUIT MARTYRS

right of life and death over him, warned him of
his danger. He, therefore, after attending to the
work of the cabin, making the fires, drawing the
water, and cooking, avoided crowded places and
spent his time reading and praying. He had saved
one book, the letter of St. Paul to the Hebrews,
with comments by Godeau. He had a picture of St.
Bruno with the device O Bonitas! (goodness) and
a little wooden cross made by himself. Among the
loot of the Indians he found a "Following of
Christ" and a Little Office of the Blessed Virgin
Mary. These were his consolation. He narrated
how in his solitude he had strange dreams, all of
them naturally having to do with persecution and
crosses.

He constantly recalls that he was born in Orleans
where the cathedral bears the name of Holy Cross,
and that, therefore, he should be a citizen of the
Cross. He learns as much of the language as the
Indians permit him to learn. He goes so far as to
preach to them and, whenever he can, baptizes
children at the point of death. He ministers to
the many captives, Algonquins and Hurons, who
were in the villages, and sometimes to an
unfortunate who was about to undergo tor-
ture and death. He accompanies the Indians
on their winter hunt, refuses, in spite of
his weakness, to partake of the game they got,
because they had offered it idolatrously to their
god Aireskoi, boldly telling them he would never

n 1763

OF NORTH AMERICA

live on food offered to the Devil. They in turn
treated him cruelly. Besides hunger and insult, he
had to suffer night and day from the intense cold,
having only a wretched skin for covering. His
whole consolation was in his remembrance of the
Scriptures, which sometimes he repeats word for
word, at other times in paraphrases ; in fact he was
accustomed to think in Biblical terms.

" C I thought', he writes, c of my dear companions,
whose blood had so lately covered me, and I heard
a report that good William had also ended his life
in most cruel torments, and that a like end was in
store for me on our return to the town. Then the
remembrance of my whole life rushed back to me,
with all its unfaithfulness to God, and all its faults.
I groaned to see myself die "in the midst of my
days", as if rejected by the Lord, deprived of the
sacraments of the Church, and with no good works
to propitiate my Judge. Thus tormented with a
desire to live and the fear of death, I groaned, and
cried to my God, "When shall my grief and
my anguish come to an end? When wilt Thou
c see my abjection and my labor' ? When wilt Thou
give me 'calm after the storm' ? When shall c my
sorrow be turned into joy 3 ?" Then he adds, in
a lively sentiment of humility and confidence: T
should have perished unless the Lord "had short-
ened the evil days" ; but I had recourse to my sup-
port and ordinary refuge, the Holy Scriptures, of
which I could recall some passages. They taught

C 177 3

THE JESUIT MARTYRS

me to see in God His goodness, and made me alive
to the fact that although deprived of all aids of
piety, "the just man liveth by faith". I often pon-
dered on these words: "I followed the running
waters" to endeavor to quench my thirst. On the
law of the Lord I meditated day and night, for
"unless Thy law had been my meditation, I had
then perhaps perished in my abjection" ; and "per-
haps the waters had swallowed us up" '.

" 'But "Blessed be the Lord, who hath not given
us to be a prey to the teeth" of my enemies, " for
now their hour seemed come and the power of dark-
ness". "I was pressed out of measure above my
strength, so that I was weary even of life". Mean-
while I repeated with Job, but in another sense,
"Although God should kill me, I will trust in
Him' ". 79

Jogues built an oratory a short distance from the
cabin where he was accustomed to pray, kneeling
before a large Cross which he had cut in the bark
of a tree. He even made his annual Retreat, or
Spiritual Exercises. On the way home from the
hunt he had to carry more than his share of the
burdens. Crossing a river, a woman and her child
fell off the tree-trunk that had been thrown over
for a bridge and were drowning, when Jogues
plunged in and rescued them. Arriving home, he
went from cabin to cabin, begging for something to
cover him, not merely because of the cold, but for
the sake of decency. Most of the Indians jeered

3

OF NORTH AMERICA

at him, one threw him a rag, but a Dutchman, who
was at the village trading, obtained clothes for him.
The Indians sent him on long and arduous errands,
carrying heavy parcels to members of other villages>
They put him to care for a tribesman who was
dying of a disease so loathsome that all shunned
him. It was precisely what Jogues was happy to
do.

Gradually, the mother of his master, and even
the master himself, became more kindly disposed to
him. They even helped him to learn the language.
As the cabin was a resort for the more prominent
members of the tribe, he learned many things about
them, and took occasion to speak to them about
religion. Ihey plainly agreed that he knew the
truth, but, like the Hurons, they asked: of what
use it would be to them? They left him free to
go about the villages, where he could instruct and
console many captives. They took him on a fishing
expedition over the Saratoga Lake. Difficult as
these trips were, Jogues liked them. They afforded
him time for greater union with God.

" c How often in these journeys', he writes, c and
in that quiet wilderness, "did we sit by the rivers
of Babylon, and weep while we remembered thee,
Sion", not only exulting that Sion in heaven, but
even thee, Jerusalem, praising thy God on earth.
'How often, though in a strange land, did we sing
the canticle of the Lord', and mountain and wild-
wood resounded with the praises of their Maker,

c 179 n

THE JESUIT MARTYRS

which from their creation they had never heard!
How often on the stately trees of the forest did I
carve the most sacred name of Jesus, that seeing it
the demons might fly, who tremble when they hear
it ! How often, too, did I not strip off the bark to
form on them the Most Holy Cross of the Lord,
/hat the foe might fly before it, and that by it Thou,
O Lord my King, "mightest reign in the midst of
Thy enemies" the enemies of Thy cross, the mis-
believers and the pagans who dwell in that land,
and the demons who rule so powerfully there! I
rejoiced, too, that I had been led by the Lord into
the wilderness, at the very time when the Church
recalls the story of His Passion, so that I might
more uninterruptedly remember the course of its
bitterness and gall, and my soul pine away at the
remembrance' ". 80

Life, however, for a prisoner among the Mohawks
was always precarious. A dream, a foolish sus-
picion, the report of bad news from traders or war-
riors who were out of the village, would at any
moment lead the sachems of the tribe to destroy
a victim. As Easter came near it was decided that
he should die, because ten Mohawk warriors who
had been on the warpath for some time had not
been heard of. Everything was prepared. The
torture was to be applied on Good Friday. Unex-
pectedly a group of Abenaki Indians were brought
In. Five of the men were doomed to torture, the
women and children were consigned to slavery. The

c

OF NORTH AMERICA

torture of Jogues was forgotten and he was even
allowed to prepare the prisoners, whom he suc-
ceeded in baptizing before their ordeal began. Not
long after three young women and some children
were brutally treated and burned to death. Jogues
had the consolation of baptizing one, having to rush
into the flames to do so. His life was thus spent in
witnessing such harrowing scenes and in constant
peril of being himself the victim in one of them.
Still, in his humility he considered himself in some
way responsible for all this evil.

" C I Certainly 5 , says he, c felt in my own person
this punishment deserved for my sins, and pro-
nounced of old by God to His people when He
said "their solemnities, their new-moons, and all
their festival-times . . . shall be turned into mourn-
ing and lamentation", as Easter, and Whitsuntide,
and the Nativity of St. John the Baptist each
brought sorrows on me, which increased to agony
.... "Wo is me, wherefore was I born to see
the ruin of my people?" Verily, in these and like
heart-rending cares, "my life is wasted with grief,
and my years with sighs" ; "for the Lord hath cor-
rected me for mine iniquity and hath made my soul
waste away as a spider". "He hath filled me with
bitterness, He hath inebriated me with worm-
wood"; "because the comforter, the relief of my
soul, is far from me" ; "but in all these things we
overcome", and by the favor of God will overcome,
"because of Him that hath loved us", until "He

3

THE JESUIT MARTYRS

come that is to come, and will not delay"; "until
my day like that of a hireling come", or "my change
be made" '. 81

Jogues had good neighbors at Rensselaerswyck,
now Albany* where Fort Orange, the Dutch trading
outpost, was situated. The Dutch had never ceased
to work for his release. The Governor of Quebec,
Montmagny, was earnest enough, but negotiation
on his part would be futile. He had not the mili-
tary force to compel a deliverance. Indeed, to
attempt this would have immediately resulted in
Jogues* torture and death. Not only were the Dutch
at Rensselaerswyck concerned about Jogues. The
States-General had commanded the Dutch Gov-
ernor at New Amsterdam to do all in his power
to free the prisoner. On his part Jogues was not
over eager to obtain his freedom. As he wrote
to Governor Montmagny on June 30, 1643, his
fourth letter, and his first to arrive at its destina-
tion, he begged that he should not be taken into
consideration. "Let no sympathy for me prevent
your taking any measure that seems to you best
fitted to advance the greater glory of God." 82 Soon
after he wrote to his Provincial in France that:

" 'Although I could in all probability escape
either through the Europeans or the Indian nations
around us, did I wish to fly, yet on this cross to
which/ Our Lord has nailed me, with Himself, am
I resolved by His grace to live and die. For who
in my absence would console the French captives?

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Who absolve the penitent? Who remind the
christened Huron of his duty? Who instruct the
prisoners constantly brought in? Who baptize
them dying, encourage them in their torments?
Who cleanse the infants in the saving waters? Who
provide for the salvation of the dying adult, the
instruction of those in health? Indeed I cannot
but think it a peculiar interposition of Divine good-
ness, that while a nation, fallen from the true
Catholic religion, barred the entrance of the Faith
to these regions on one side, and on the other, a
fierce war between savage nations and, on their
account, with the French, I should have fallen into
the hands of these Indians, who by the will of
God reluctantly, and I may say against their will,
have thus far spared my life, that through me,
though unworthy, those might be instructed, believe,
and be baptized, who are predestined to eternal
life. Since the time when I was taken, I have
baptized seventy persons, children, young people
and old, of five different nations and languages,
that of "every tribe, and people, and tongue, they
might stand in the sight of the Lamb' ", 83

It is true that he had some extraordinary conso-
lations. On one of his chance excursions with some
tribesmen, he came across the Indian who had
charitably cut the thongs which bound him when
he begged to be taken down from the gibbet to
which they had attached him. He had the satisfac-
tion of baptizing this man. On July 3 1st he went

183:1

THE JESUIT MARTYRS

with the Indians of the village to Fort Orange to
trade and fish. The fishery was about twenty miles
below Rensselaerswyck. Growing tired of the life
there, he told his "aunt' 3 that he would like to
return to their village, and she, who had grown
very kind to him, gave him some food and set
him on his way with some Indians. At the fort
he heard of the determination of the Mohawks
to do away with him. They considered him guilty
of causing every misfortune that had befallen their
warriors. The commandant of the fort urged him
to escape on a vessel that was lying at anchor.
He begged for time to consider the proposal. What
he really desired to do was to think and pray over
it, in order to do what would appear to be God's
will. After concluding that to remain a prisoner
now would mean speedy death, whereas escaping
he might some day return and with his knowledge
of the language and acquaintance with the tribes
help them as a missionary, he decided to accept the
commandant's offer.

It was not, however, so easy to get away. When
the Indians found that he was aboard the vessel,
they threatened reprisals. For peace's sake he came
back to the post and there had to wait, hidden in
a miserable barn, and comforted only by the genial
Dutch minister, John Megapolensis, fully aware
that braves had come down from Ossernenon to
demand his return. The commandant was imper-
turbable. "The Frenchman you are seeking is

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OF NORTH AMERICA

under my protection. I cannot give him up. If I
surrender him to you, I would be false to my own
honor and humanity. . . . The course I have fol-
lowed is sanctioned by all the Dutch; but to give
you full satisfaction, here is gold for the ransom
of your prisoner", offering him three hundred livres.

Jogues still had to wait some days hidden from
the Iroquois, lying motionless behind some casks
in the storehouse of the commissary. At last, by
command of William Kieft, Governor of New
Netherlands, he was taken aboard a vessel that
was about to sail down the Hudson. With him
was Domine Megapolensis, and some of the leading
inhabitants, who, with their proverbial good nature,
celebrated the deliverance of the captive, the
Domine giving an entertainment to the crew in his
honor, and the entire company joining in the fes-
tivities at an island in the river, which they wished
to christen after Jogues, as we are told, "amid the
noise of cannons and bottles".

Governor Kieft was particularly cordial to
Jogues, inviting him, with the pastor of New
Amsterdam, to his table, clothing him and pro-
viding for his passage home in a little vessel of
fifty tons. Jogues was honored by Protestants and
Catholics alike, though the latter were very few,
among them a Portuguese woman, the wife of an
ensign, and an Irishman who had come up from
Virginia on hearing that there was a Catholic priest
so near. Later Jogues will write his description

1 185 n

THE JESUIT MARTYRS

of Manhattan Island, under the name of New
Belgium, describing its rivers, Nassau to the north
and Maurice to the south (East River). Already
eighteen different languages were spoken there by
the inhabitants and almost as many religions were
practised, but the Calvinist was the only one recog-
nized. The Church of the Fort, still functioning
under the name of the Collegiate Reformed Church,
was the central place of worship. Megapolensis
was soon to be made its fourth pastor. 84 The descrip-
tion of the island and its people is quite minute, in
Jogues' usual manner, and it is one of the earliest
written accounts of the Dutch settlements.

The missionary's adventures were not entirely
over. He narrates how, after an uncomfortable
voyage, with the ropes on deck for cabin and berth,
he reached England. After many mishaps he
reached the French coast on Christmas Eve, had
the consolation of worshipping at a village church
the next morning, and then went on to the nearest
Jesuit establishment, which was at Rennes, a jour-
ney of five days on horseback. One can imagine
his reception. His survival of so much ill-treat-
ment, and his return to his native country excited
the keenest interest. At Paris, whither he went to
report to his Provincial, he was so much in demand,
as one who had suffered for Christ, that he longed
to escape from his notoriety and return to his mis-
sion. The queen, Anne of Austria, insisted on
seeing him and hearing his story. With mutilated
C 1863

OF NORTH AMERICA

fingers he could not celebrate Mass, and this pained
him grievously. It was not difficult to obtain from
Pope Urban VIII special permission to offer the
Holy Sacrifice, Urban remarking, "It would be
unjust that a martyr for Christ should not drink
the Blood of Christ".

Early in 1644 Jogues was at sea again, sailing
for New France. On the voyage he had to quiet
a mutiny of the sailors and calm them during
a severe storm. On arriving, he was sent to Mon-
treal, which had been founded on May lyth of
the year he was taken captive. He immediately
began to work among the Indians in that neighbor-
hood, awaiting the time when he could safely
venture back to Huronia. The journey thither had
every year become more hazardous. The Iroquois
warriors were everywhere along the route. In fact,
instead of waiting for the Hurons to come down
over their trails for trade, they had begun to enter
the Huron territory and to destroy the villages.
Even while Jogues was on his way back from
France, Bressani and his companions and interpret-
ers were seized and led in captivity to Ossernenon
to undergo the same tortures as Jogues and GoupiL
Bressani has left his narrative, "Brief Relation",
as it is called, of his for months' imprisonment. 85
He also wrote an account of the torture and cap-
tivity of Jogues, which is an explanation of the
Martyr's own narrative. 86

n 1873

THE JESUIT MARTYRS

Altogether unexpectedly, the Iroquois sent an
embassy to Three Rivers to sue for peace. They
arrived on July 5, 1644. The conferences were
almost as long and as elaborate as peace confer-
ences nowadays. They are described in the Rela-
tions of i644. 87 Peace was not finally concluded
until May, 1646.- Jogues had been present at the
conference. Knowing the Iroquois as he did, he
perceived that the embassy did not represent the
responsible captains of the tribe. No one was
present from the principal village, Ossernenon. It
was clear also that they wished to be at peace only
with the French, not with the Hurons. However,
it was considered proper to send an embassy from
New France to meet the chiefs of the Iroquois
at Ossernenon, and Jogues was selected as ambas-
sador on this occasion, with John Bourdon, who
had for ten years been active in the government of
the colony.

Jogues knew full well what his mission was to
be. Even the Indians about Three Rivers warned
him to be cautious, advising him especially while on
this errand not to mention religion, and even to
leave aside his clerical robes, as the Mohawks
hated the "black robe", as they called the mission-
ary. Jerome Lalemant was also aware of the peril
of the expedition. When referring to it in the
Relation of 1646, he wrote: "When I speak of an
Iroquois mission, it seems to me that I am talking
of some dream; and yet it is a reality. With good

C 188]

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reason we have given it the name of 'Mission of
the Martyrs'; for, besides the cruelty which these
savages have already inflicted on some persons
devoted to the salvation of souls, besides the pains
and hardships which those appointed for this mis-
sion must encounter, we can say in truth, that it
has already been ensanguined with the blood of a
martyr, inasmuch as the Frenchman [TRene Goupil]
who was killed at the feet of Father Jogues lost
his life for having formed the sign of our Faith on
some little Iroquois children. If we are permitted
to conjecture in matters that seem highly probable,
we may believe that the designs we have formed
against the empire of Satan will not bear fruit till
they are irrigated with the blood of some other
martyrs". 88

Jogues and Bourdon left Three Rivers May.
i6th, going down by the route of Lake Champlain
and Lake George. It was on this occasion he
christened it by its first name, Lake of the Holy
Sacrament. On the way he met Theresa Oiouhatan,
who had been captured with him in 1642 and given
in marriage to one of the captains. It consoled
him to find her so steadfast in her faith. On June
loth he met the sachems in general assembly. They
spent a week confirming their pact with New
France. On July 3rd Jogues was back in Quebec.

Determined to return to the Mohawks as mis-
sionary, Jogues had left at Ossernenon a box of
some pious articles. It was no slight relief not to

i: 1893

THE JESUIT MARTYRS

have to carry burdens over a trail that took so many
days. This box was to be the cause of his death.
The Mohawks had poor crops that year, and soon
after Jogues 3 departure an epidemic broke out
amongst them. They blamed the scarcity and the
disease upon the box, which they superstitiously be-
lieved had a devil in it. When, therefore, they
heard that Jogues was on his third visit to their
villages, they waylaid him two days before his
arrival, stripped and ill-treated him and John
Lalande, his companion, with the one Huron guide
that did not flee. His captors this time were mem-
bers of the Bear Clan. The other clans did all they
could to protect the prisoners, but to no purpose.
They insisted that the fate of the prisoners should
be decided in council, but the Bear family would
not wait. Traitorously some of them invited Jogues
to a meal on the evening of the i8th of October,
and tomahawked him as he was entering the cabin.
Cutting off his head, they put it on one of the pali-
sade poles, facing the route over which he had come.
The next day they tomahawked his companion,
Lalande, and the faithful Huron, beheading them
also, and throwing the bodies into the river.

The report of the martyrdoms reached Governor
Montmagny from the Governor of New Nether-
lands in a letter dated November 14, 1646, enclos-
ing the report of Labatie, secretary to the command-
ant at Fort Orange. The Indians carried to the

n 1903

OF NORTH AMERICA

Dutch some of Jogues' possessions, his missal,
ritual and cassock.

Lalemant's name for Ossernenon had been justi-
fied. It was now in reality the Mission of the
Martyrs. Jogues, Apostle of the Iroquois, had
been martyred by them there.

3

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

A Supreme Holocaust

Hurons becoming Christian Example of devotion Iroquois
implacable Daniel their victim, Martyr of Charity Acts of
the Martyrs Brebeuf and Lalemant An orgy of cruelties.

THE martyrdom of Jogues sealed the doom of
the Hurons. Their only hope of peace was his
success as missionary among their fierce enemies, the
Iroquois. That would lead them to give up their
habit of warfare and let the villagers to the north
live quietly and prosper. No doubt Jogues was
happy to throw himself into the breach with the
hope of saving his beloved Huronia. It would
appear, however, from a letter he wrote at the time
to a Jesuit friend, Castillon in France, that he had
a presentiment of what was to happen to him.

"My heart tells me that, if I have the blessing
of being employed in this mission, C I go not to
return 3 ; but I would be happy if Our Lord were
willing to finish the sacrifice where He has begun it,
and if the little blood which I have shed in that land
were as the pledge of that which I would give him
from all the veins of my body and my heart. In
fine, that people 'is espoused to me in blood: I
have espoused it in my blood'. Our Good Master
Who has acquired it by His blood, opens to it, if
He pleases, the door of His Gospel, as also to

n 192 3

THE JESUIT MARTYRS

four other nations, its allies, who are near to it.
Adieu, my dear Father ; entreat Him that He unite
me inseparably to Himself." 89

Since Jogues 5 departure from the Hurons in
1642, they began to embrace the Faith in increas-
ing numbers. The number of missionaries em-
ployed and needed amongst them was now twenty-
four. Daniel had returned in 1639, his seminary
at Quebec for young Indian boys having proved a
failure because the parents, who were still pagan,
could not bear separation from their children for
the sake of religious training which they could not
appreciate. After a year at Ossossane, he spent
eight years at St. John Baptist and the last year of
his life at the second village of St. Joseph. Every
"Relation" at this time reports not only a growth in
Christianity, but remarkable instances of constancy
and of singular virtue on the part of the new con-
verts. Thus, when Brebeuf writes to his General in
Rome, September 23, 1643, about the capture and
torture of Jogues, he adds:

"From these things it is evident in what a very
evil condition Canadian affairs are placed; but, on
another side, these unhappy afflictions are by so
much richer in heavenly gifts, as they are more
lamentable. Not vice rules here, but virtue and
piety; not only among ours, who everywhere show
themselves men, and true sons of the Society; but
also among our French and among the barbarians,
nor alone in the case of those barbarians who

C 193 3

THE JESUIT MARTYRS

have already enrolled their names for the Faith,
but also in the case of others who do not yet profess
the Faith. For they scarcely practise their former
superstitions; and we might hope, if we now
enjoyed peace, to bring all, in a short time, to the
Faith. . . ." 90

Vimont soon after the capture of Jogues
writes :

"As for our missions in the villages of the
Hurons, we have continued them as usual. We
were never so fortunate, nor ever so unfortunate
the capture of Father Jogues, of our Frenchmen,
of our Christian Hurons, and of our catechumens,
makes us realize our troubles; and what has
occurred this year for the enlargement of the Faith
publishes in the 'Relation' our blessedness. We are
entering more and more into the possession of the
goods which we come to buy in this end of the
world at the price of our blood and of our lives:
I see stronger tendencies than ever toward the total
conversion of these peoples, whom we are attacking
among the first, and whom we are undertaking to
carry away, in order to serve as models and as
examples to those who shall be subsequently con-
verted. In a word, our little churches are con-
tinually increasing in number of persons, and in
virtue; the affairs of Our Lord advance in propor-
tion to the adversities which He sends us. Hardly
could one find, hitherto, among our Christians two
or three warriors; but, since the capture of that

C 1943

OF NORTH AMERICA

worthy neophyte, named Eustache, the most valiant
of all the Hurons, we have counted in a single
band as many as twenty-two believers, all men
of courage, and mostly captains or people of
importance. 3593

Lalemant gives this description of one of the
captains converted in the mission where Gamier
and Le Moyne were at work:

' 'Father Charles Gamier and Father Simon Le
Moyne have had charge of this mission. The num-
ber of Christians in it has increased in a marked
degree. Among those who have received holy
baptism, were three captains who are persons of
consideration. The first is named Thomas Son-
dakwa. Some years ago he had already a desire
to become a Christian; he never felt anything but
love for us, and for the things of the Faith, and
has always lived in a state of moral innocence and
of goodness that made him loved by all. But as
he saw that there was ill will against the Christians,
and, moreover, as his office compelled him to uphold
the superstitions of his country, which constitute the
greater portion of their councils, his courage was not
strong enough to choose altogether what he only
partly desired. After the death of a friend of his,
who was a Christian, and of whom I have spoken
in one of the earlier chapters, God touched his
heart more deeply. He commenced to receive
instruction, he took pleasure in heavenly things, and
resolved publicly to embrace the Faith. There-

c 1953

13

THE JESUIT MARTYRS

upon the Devil frightens him in dreams. Some-
times he sees before his eyes a captain, who had
been one of his old friends, who comes back from
the other world, and reproaches him with his want
of affection in seeking thus to separate himself
forever from all those who had such affection for
him. On another occasion, he sees one whose face
he does not know, who puts in his mouth a morsel
that is to make him very fortunate; and indeed,
on awakening, he finds something on his tongue
that he cannot recogize, and that an infidel Huron
would have considered as a sign of good fortune,
and would have preserved as a gift from some
familiar demon. For it is thus that the demons
manifest themselves in these countries, under
assumed shapes, sometimes an owl's claw, some-
times the skin of a hideous serpent, or similar things,
that bring with them good luck in fishing and hunt-
ing, in trading and gambling. Some of them are
even used as philters to attract love.

"Our catechumen was already too far advanced
in the sentiments of the Faith to be frightened by
such threats, or to yield to the Devil's promises. He
renounces all such hellish intercourse; he has
recourse to God; and after his baptism all these
phantoms disappear. He at once makes a public
profession of faith, refuses to attend the councils
when anything forbidden by the laws of God is
to be discussed, and wishes the entire country to
know that he prefers the duty of a Christian to any-

c 196:1

OF NORTH AMERICA

thing else. And the best part of all is, that in all
this, although he has manifested a truly heroic
courage, by trampling on all human considerations,
which prevail here not less than in France, he
nevertheless acts with such loving gentleness that
those who are most hostile to the Faith can find
nothing to blame in him. For this reason, this
virtue of mildness is dear to his heart as the most
powerful means of winning the infidels to Jesus
Christ." 92

In fact, the Hurons were gradually becoming
Catholics, and as Brebeuf remarks, with a period
of peace, the whole people would have been con-
verted. The Iroquois, however, were unremitting
in their hostilities to their former tribal associates.
No longer content with attacking stray bands of
Hurons on the trail, they began to enter and pillage
their towns, sparing no one, neither women nor
children. As early as 1642 they had destroyed a
village on the outskirt, Kontarea. Their next
attack was on the village of St. John Baptist and
on July 4, 1648, they appeared at Teanaustaye
just as Daniel had finished celebrating Mass. As
Ragueneau narrates:

"Hardly had the Father ended Mass, and the
Christians who, according to their custom, had
filled the church after the rising of the sun were
still continuing their devotions there, when the cry
arose, To arms, and repel the enemy!' who, hav-
ing come unexpectedly, had made his approaches

n 197 3

THE JESUIT MARTYRS

by night. Some hasten to the combat, others to
flight: there is naught but alarm and terror every-
where. The Father, among the first to rush where
he sees the danger greatest," encourages his people
to a brave defense ; and as if he had seen paradise
open for the Christians, and hell on the point of
swallowing up all the infidels he speaks to them
in a tone so animated with the spirit which was
possessing him, that, having made a breach in hearts
which till then had been most rebellious, he gave
them a Christian heart. The number of these
proved to be so great that, unable to cope with it
by baptizing them one after the other, he was con-
strained to dip his handkerchief in the water (which
was all that necessity then offered him), in order
to shed abroad as quickly as possible this grace on
those poor savages, who cried mercy to him,
using the manner of baptizing which is called by
aspersion'.

"Meanwhile, the enemy continued his attacks
more furiously than ever; and, without doubt, it
was a great blessing for the salvation of some that,
at the moment of their death, baptism had given
them the life of the soul, and put them in possession
of an immortal life. When the Father saw that
the Iroquois were becoming masters of the place,
he, instead of taking flight with those who were
inviting him to escape in their company,
forgetting himself, remembered some old men and
sick people, whom he had long ago prepared for

n 1983

OF NORTH AMERICA

baptism. He goes through the cabins, and proceeds
to fill them with his zeal, the infidels themselves
presenting their children in crowds, in order to
make Christians of them. Meanwhile the enemy,
already victorious, had set everything on fire, and
the blood of even the women and children irritated
their fury. The Father, wishing to die in his
church, findsi it full of Christians, and of
catechumens who ask him for baptism. It was
indeed at that time that their faith animated their
prayers, and that their hearts could not belie their
tongues. He baptizes some, gives absolution to
others, and consoles them all with the sweetest
hope of the saints, having hardly other words
on his lips than these: c My brothers, to-day we
shall be in heaven.'

"The enemy was warned that the Christians had
betaken themselves, in very large number, into the
Church, and that it was the easiest and the richest
prey that he could have hoped for; he hastens
thither, with barbarous howls and stunning yells.
At the noise of these approaches, 'Flee, my brothers,'
said the Father to his new Christians, c and bear
with you your Faith even to the last sigh. As for
me' (he added), 'I must face death here, as long
as I shall see here any soul to be gained for Heaven ;
and, dying here to save you, my life is no longer
anything to me; we shall see one another again in
heaven/ At the same time, he goes out in the
direction whence come the enemy, who stop in

c 199 3

THE JESUIT MARTYRS

astonishment to see one man alone come to meet
them, and even recoil backward, as if he bore upon
his face the terrible and frightful appearance of a
whole company. Finally, having come to their
senses a little, and being astonished at themselves,
they incite one another ; they surround him on
all sides, and cover him with arrows, until, having
inflicted upon him a mortal wound from an arque-
bus shot, which pierced him through and through,
in the very middle of his breast, he fell. Pro-
nouncing the name of Jesus, he blessedly yielded up
his soul to God, truly as a good pastor, who
exposes both his soul and his life for the salvation
of his flock. It was then that those barbarians
rushed upon him with as much rage as if he alone
had been the object of their hatred. They strip
him naked, they exercise upon him a thousand
indignities; and there was hardly anyone who did
not try to assume the glory of having given him
the final blow, even on seeing him dead. The fire
meanwhile was consuming the cabins ; and when it
had spread as far as the church, the Father was
cast into it, at the height of the flames, which soon
made of him a whole burnt-offering. Be this as
it may, he could not have been more gloriously
consumed than in the fires and lights of a Chapelle
ardente.^

Ragueneau is the narrator of Daniel's martyrdom.
He had every means of ascertaining the facts from
those who witnessed them. Now that the era of

n 200 3

OF NORTH AMERICA

martyrdom was in progress, the greatest care was
taken to record in minute detail what each one
suffered and in what dispositions he met death,
Ragueneau's account of this is a veritable "Acts of
the Martyrs." No one could know better than the
missionary that the Iroquois were determined to
exterminate the Hurons. Every priest on that
mission knew what fate was awaiting him. The
government at Quebec was powerless to protect its
Huron wards. The certainty of death for the
natives and for themselves only made the mission-
aries cling more devotedly to their posts. They
would die one and all of them if need be, minister-
ing salvation to the Christian Indians as true
shepherds standing by their flocks.

Within a year, on March 16, 1649, *he Iroquois
attacked the village at which Brebeuf and Lalernant
were stationed. They perpetrated unspeakable
horrors upon the inhabitants, and their torture of
the two missionaries was as atrocious as any-
thing recorded in history. Ragueneau writes the
following account of their martyrdom to Jerome
Lalemant, then Superior at Quebec, in his "Rela-
tion of 1648-49":

"As early as the next morning, when we had
assurance of the departure of the enemy, having
had, before that, certain news, through some
escaped captives, of the deaths of Father Jean de
Brebeuf and of Father Gabriel Lalemant, we sent
one of our Fathers and seven other Frenchmen to

THE JESUIT MARTYRS

seek their bodies at the place of their torture. They
found there a spectacle of horror, the remains
of cruelty itself; or rather the relics of the love of
God, which alone triumphs in the death of martyrs.
I would gladly call them if I were allowed, by
that glorious name, not only because voluntarily,
for the love of God and for the salvation of their
neighbor, they exposed themselves to death, and to
a cruel death, if ever there was one in the world,
for they could easily and without sin have put their
lives in safety, if they had not been filled with love
for God rather than for themselves. But much
rather would I thus call them, because, in addition
to the charitable dispositions which they have mani-
fested on their side, hatred for the Faith and con-
tempt for the name of God have been among the
most powerful incentives which have influenced the
mind of the barbarians to practise upon them as
many cruelties as ever the rage of tyrants obliged
the martyrs to endure, who, at the climax of their
tortures, have trimphed over both life and death.
As soon as they were taken captive, they were
stripped naked, and some of their nails were torn
out; and the welcome which they received upon
entering the village of St. Ignace was a hailstorm
of blows with sticks upon their shoulders, their
loins, their legs, their breasts, their bellies, and
their faces, there being no part of their bodies
which did not then endure its torment. Father
Jean de Brebeuf, overwhelmed under the burden of

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these blows, did not on that account lose care for
his flock; seeing himself surrounded with Christians
whom he had instructed, and who were in captivity
with him, he said to them: My children, let us lift
our eyes to heaven at the height of our afflictions;
let us remember that God is the witness of our
sufferings, and will soon be our exceeding great
reward. Let us die in this faith; and let us hope
from His goodness the fulfilment of His promises.
I have more pity for you than for myself; but
sustain with courage the few remaining torments.
They will end with our lives; the glory which fol-
lows then will never have an end/ TEchon', they
said to him (this is the name which the Hurons
gave the Father), c our spirits will be in heaven
when our bodies shall be suffering on earth. Pray
to God for us, that He may show us mercy ; we will
invoke Him even until death/ Some Huron
infidels former captives of the Iroquois, natural-
ized among them, and former enemies of the Faith
were irritated by these words, and because our
Fathers in their captivity had not their tongues
captive. They cut off the hands of one, and pierced
the other with sharp awls and iron points; they
apply under their armpits and upon their loins
hatchets heated red in the fire, and put a necklace
of these about their necks in such a way that all
the motions of their bodies gave them a new torture.
For, if they attempted to lean forward, the red-
hot hatchets which hung behind them burned the

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14

THE JESUIT MARTYRS

shoulders everywhere; and if they thought to avoid
that pain, bending back a little, their stomachs and
breasts experienced a similar torment; if they stood
upright, without leaning to one side or the other,
these glowing hatchets, touching them alike on all
sides, were a double torture to them. They put
about them belts of bark, filled with pitch and
resin, to which they set fire, which scorched the
whole of their bodies. At the height of these tor-
ments Father Gabriel Lalemant lifted his eyes to
heaven, clasping his hands from time to time, and
uttering sighs to God, Whom he invoked to his aid.
Father Jean de Brebeuf suffered like a rock,
insensible to the fires and the flames, without utter-
ing any cry, and keeping a profound silence, which
astonished his executioners themselves ; no doubt, his
heart was then reposing in his God. Then, return-
ing to himself, he preached to those infidels, and
still more to many good Christian captives, who
had compassion on him. Those butchers, indignant
at his zeal, in order to hinder him from further
speaking of God, girdled his mouth, cut off his nose,
and tore off his lips ; but his blood spoke much more
loudly than his lips had done; and, his heart not
being yet torn out, his tongue did not fail to render
him service until the last sigh, for blessing God for
these torments, and for animating the Christians
more vigorously than he had ever done.

"In derision of holy baptism, which these good
Fathers had so charitably administered even at

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the breach, and in the hottest of the fight, those
wretches, enemies of the Faith, bethought them-
selves to baptize them with boiling water. Their
bodies were entirely bathed with it, two or three
times, and more, with biting gibes, which accom-
panied these torments. 'We baptize thee', said
these wretches, 'to the end that thou mayst be
blessed in heaven; for without proper baptism one
cannot be saved.' Others added, mocking, 'We
treat thee as a friend, since we shall be the cause
of thy greatest happiness up in heaven; thank us
for so many good offices, for, the more thou suffer-
est, the more thy God will reward thee/

"These were infidel Hurons, former captives of
the Iroquois, and, of old, enemies of the Faith,
who having previously had sufficient instruction for
their salvation, impiously abused it, in reality,
for the glory of the Fathers; but it is much to be
feared that it was also for their own misfortune.
The more these torments were augmented, the more
the Fathers entreated God that their sins should
not be the cause of the reprobation of these poor
blind ones, whom they pardoned with all their
heart. It is surely now that they say in repose,
c we have passed through fire and water, but Thou
hast led us into a place of refreshment/ When they
were fastened to the post where they suffered these
torments, and where they were to die, they knelt
down, they embraced it with joy, and kissed it
piously as the object of their desires and their love,
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THE JESUIT MARTYRS

and as a sure and final pledge of their salvation.
They were there some time in prayers, and longer
than those butchers were willing to permit them.
They put out Father Gabriel Lalemant' s eyes and
applied burning coals in the hollows of the same.
Their tortures were not of the same duration.
Father Jean de Brebeuf was at the height of his
torments at about three o'clock on the same day
of the capture, the i6th day of March, and rendered
up his soul about four o'clock in the evening.
Father Gabriel Lalemant endured longer, from six
o'clock in the evening until about nine o'clock the
next morning, the iyth of March.

"Before their death, both their hearts were torn
out, by means of an opening above the breast; and
those barbarians inhumanly feasted thereon, drink-
ing their blood quite warm, which they drew from
its source with sacrilegious hands. While still
quite full of life, pieces of flesh were removed from
their thighs, from the calves of the legs, and from
their arms, which those executioners placed on
coals to roast, and ate in their sight. They had
slashed their bodies in various parts; and, in order
to increase the feeling of pain, they had thrust into
these wounds red hot hatchets. Father Jean de
Brebeuf had had the skin which covered his skull
torn away; they had cut off his feet and torn the
flesh from his thighs, even to the bone, and had
split, with the blow of a hatchet, one of his jaws
in two. Father Gabriel Lalemant had received a

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hatchet-blow on the left ear, which they had driven
into his brain, which appeared exposed; we saw no
part of his body, from the feet even to the head,
which had not been broiled, and in which he had
not been burned alive, even the eyes, into which
those impious ones had thrust burning coals. They
had broiled their tongues, repeatedly putting into
their mouths flaming brands, and burning pieces of
bark, not willing that they should invoke, in
dying, Him for whom they were suffering, and Who
could never die in their hearts. I have learned all
this from persons worthy of credence, who have
seen it, and reported it to me personally, and who
were then captives with them, but who, having
been reserved to be put to death at another time,
found means to escape. But let us leave these
objects of horror, and these monsters of cruelty;
since one day all those parts will be endowed with
an immortal glory, the greatness of their torments
will be the measure of their happiness, and, from
now on, they live in the repose of the saints, and
will dwell in it forever.

"We buried these precious relics on Sunday, the
2 1st day of March, with so much consolation and
such tender feeling of devotion in all those who
were present at their obsequies, that I know none
who did not desire a similar death, rather than fear
it ; and who did not regard himself as blest to stand
in a place where, it might be, two days thence, God
would accord him the grace of shedding both his

I! 207 ]

THE JESUIT MARTYRS

blood and his life on a like occasion. Not one of us
could ever prevail upon himself to pray to God
for them, as if they had had any need of it; but
our spirits were at once directed toward heaven,
where we doubted not that their souls were. Be
this as it may, I entreat God that He fulfil upon
us His will, even to death, as He has done in their
persons." 94

CHAPTER FIFTEEN
The Last of the Victims

The Hurons exterminated Gamier at his post A true
Shepherd His dying effort A sublime burial-scene Chabanel
betrayed His vow accepted.

IT would seem that after this triumph, as the
Indians regarded an orgy of cruelties, they
would have been sated with blood and that they
would have been content with having broken the
spirit of the Hurons and decimated their numbers.
Still, it was not yet enough to satisfy their lust for
blood. Before that year was ended, on December
7th, the Iroquois went even as far as the Tobacco
Nation where Gamier had founded his Mission of
the Apostles in 1641. The village was taken by
surprise. It is Ragueneau again who tells of the
destruction wrought by this implacable enemy and
of the death of the missionaries Gamier and
Chabanel :

"In the mountains, the people of which we name
the Tobacco Nation, we have had, for some years
past, two missions; in each were two of our Fathers.
The one nearest to the enemy was that which bore
the name of Saint Jean ; its principal village, called
by the same name, contained about five or six hun-
dred families. It was a field watered by the sweat
of one of the most excellent missionaries who had

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THE JESUIT MARTYRS

dwelt in these regions. Father Charles Gamier,
who was also to water it with his blood, since there
both he and his flock have met death, he himself
leading them even unto paradise. The day approach-
ing in which God would make a church triumphant
of that which, up to that time, had always been in
warfare, and which could bear the name of a
church truly suffering, we received intelligence of it,
toward the close of the month of November, from
two Christian Hurons, escaped from a band of
about three hundred Iroquois, who told us that
the enemy was still irresolute as to what measures
he would take, whether against the Tobacco
Nation, or against the island on which we were.
Thereupon, we kept ourselves in a state of defense,
and detained our Hurons, who had purposed tak-
ing the field to meet that enemy. At the same
time, we caused the tidings to be speedily conveyed
to the people of the Tobacco Nation, who received
it with joy, regarding that hostile band as already
conquered, and as occasion for their triumph. They
resolutely awaited them for some days ; then, weary-
ing because victory was so slowly coming to them,
they desired to go to meet it, at least, the inhabit-
ants of the village of Saint Jean, men of enterprise
and valor. They hastened their attack, fearing lest
the Iroquois should escape them, and desiring to
surprise the latter while they were still on the road.
They set out on the fifth day of the month of
December, directing their route toward the place

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where the enemy was expected. But the latter,
having taken a roundabout way, was not met ; and,
to crown our misfortunes, the enemy, as they
approached the village, seized upon a man and
woman who had just come out of it. They learned
from these two captives the condition of the place,
and ascertained that it was destitute of the better
part of its people. Losing no time, they quickened
their pace that they might lay waste everything,
opportunity so greatly favoring them.

"It was on the seventh day of the month of last
December, in the year 1649, toward three o'clock
in the afternoon, that this band of Iroquois
appeared at the gates of the village, spreading
immediate dismay, and striking terror into all those
poor people, bereft of their strength, and finding
themselves vanquished, when they thought to be
themselves the conquerors. Some took to flight;
others were slain on the spot. To many, the flames,
which were already consuming some of their cabins,
gave the first intelligence of the disaster. Many
were taken prisoners; but the victorious enemy,
fearing the return of the warriors who had gone to
meet them, hastened their retreat so precipitately,
that they put to death all the old men and children,
and all whom they deemed unable to keep up with
them in their flight. It was a scene of incredible
cruelty. The enemy snatched from a mother her
infants, that they might be thrown into the fire;
other children beheld their mothers beaten to death

3

THE JESUIT MARTYRS

at their feet, or groaning in the flames, permission,
in either case, being denied them to show the least
compassion. It was a crime to shed a tear, these
barbarians demanding that their prisoners should go
into captivity as if they were marching to their
triumph. A poor Christian mother, who wept for
the death of her infant, was killed on the spot,
because she still loved, and could not stifle soon
enough her natural feelings.

"Father Charles Gamier was, at that time, the
only one of our fathers in that mission. When the
enemy appeared, he was just then occupied with
instructing the people in the cabins which he was
visiting. At the noise of the alarm, he went out,
going straight to the church, where he found some
Christians. c We are dead men, my brothers', he
said to them. Tray to God, and flee by whatever
way you may be able to escape. Bear about with
you your Faith through what of life remains; and
may death find you with God in mind'. He gave
them his blessing, then left hurriedly, to go to the
help of souls. A prey to despair, not one dreamed
of defence. Several found a favorable exit for
their flight; they implored the Father to flee with
them, but the bonds of charity restrained him. All
unmindful of himself, he thought only of the salva-
tion of his neighbor. Borne on by his zeal, he
hastened everywhere, either to give absolution to
the Christians whom he met, or to seek, in the
burning cabins, the children, the sick, or the catechu-

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metis, over whom, in the midst of the flames, he
poured the waters of holy baptism, his own heart
burning with no other fire than the love of God.
It was while thus engaged in holy work that he
was encountered by the death which he had looked
in the face without fearing it, or receding from it
a single step. A bullet from a musket struck him,
penetrating a little below the breast; another, from
the same volley, tore open his stomach, lodging in
the thigh, and bringing him to the ground. His
courage, however, was unabated. The barbarian
who had fired the shot stripped off his cassock, and
left him, weltering in his blood, to pursue the other
fugitives.

"This good Father, a very short time after, was
seen to clasp his hands, offering some prayer; then,
looking about him, he perceived, at a distance of
ten or twelve paces, a poor dying man, who, like
himself, had received the stroke of death, but had
still some remains of life. Love of God, and zeal
for souls, were even stronger than death. Mur-
muring a few words of prayer, he struggled to his
knees, and, rising with difficulty, dragged himself
as best he might toward the sufferer, in order to
assist him in dying well. He had made but three
or four steps, when he fell again, somewhat heavily.
Raising himself for the second time, he got, once
more, upon his knees and strove to continue on his
way; but his body, drained of its blood, which was
flowing in abundance from his wounds, had not the

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THE JESUIT MARTYRS

strength of his courage. For the third time he fell,
having proceeded but five or six steps. Further
than this, we have not been able to ascertain what
he accomplished, the good Christian woman who
faithfully related all this to us having seen no
more of him, being herself overtaken by an Iroquois,
who struck her on the head with a war-hatchet,
felling her upon the spot, though she afterwards
escaped. The Father, shortly after, received from
a hatchet two blows upon the temples, one on
either side, which penetrated to the brain. To him
it was the recompense for all past services, the rich-
est he had hoped for from God's goodness. His
body was stripped, and left, entirely naked, where
it lay.

"Two of our Fathers, who were in the nearest
neighboring mission, received a remnant of these
poor fugitive Christians, who arrived all out of
breath, many of them all covered with their own
blood. The night was one of continual alarm,
owing to the fear, which had seized all, of a similar
misfortune. Toward the break of day, it was ascer-
tained from certain spies that the enemy had retired.
The two Fathers at once set out, that they might
themselves look upon a spectacle most sad indeed,
but nevertheless acceptable to God. They found
only dead bodies heaped together, and the remains
of poor Christians, some who were almost con-
sumed in the pitiable remains of the still burning
village; others deluged with their own blood; and

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a few who yet showed some signs of life, but were
all covered with wounds, looking only for death,
and blessing God in their wretchedness. At length,
in the midst of that desolated village they descried
the body they had come to seek; but so little
cognizable was it, being completely covered with
its blood, and the ashes of the fire, that they passed
it by. Some Christian savages, however, recognized
their Father, who had died for love of them. They
buried him in the same spot on which their church
had stood, although there remained no longer any
vestige of it, the fire having consumed all. The
poverty of that burial was sublime, and its sanctity
no less so. The two good Fathers divested them-
selves of part of their apparel, to cover therewith
the dead; they could do no more, unless it were to
return entirely unclothed. It was truly a rich
treasure to deposit in so desolate a spot, the body
of so noble a servant of God; but that great God
will surely find a way to reunite us all in Heaven,
since it is for His sake alone that we are thus scat-
tered, both during life and after death". 95 Here is
the sixth victim whom God has taken to himself
from those of our Society whom He had called to
this Mission of the Hurons, there having been, as
yet, not one of us who has died there without shed-
ding his blood, and consummating the sacrifice in
its entirety.

"Father Noel Chabanel was the missionary com-
panion of Father Charles Gamier; and when the

THE JESUIT MARTYRS

village of Saint Jean was taken by the Iroquois,
there were but two days in which they were sepa-
rated, in accordance with the orders which they had
received, our Fathers and I having thought it
wiser not to keep two missionaries exposed to
danger; considering, besides, that the famine in that
quarter was so severe that sufficient food for both
could not be obtained. But it was not God's will
that, having lived and been yoked together in the
same mission, they should be separated in death.
This good Father, then, returning whither obedience
recalled him, had passed through the mission of
Saint Mathias, where were two other of our Fathers,
and had left them on the morning of the seventh
day of December. Having travelled six long leagues
over a most difficult road, he found himself over-
taken by night in the thick of the forest, being in
the company of seven or eight Christian Hurons.
His men were resting, and asleep; he only was
watching, and in prayer. Toward midnight, he
heard a noise, accompanied with cries, partly of a
victorious hostile force who occupied that road;
partly, also of captives , taken that very day in the
village of Saint Jean, who were singing, as was
their custom, their war-song. On hearing the noise,
the Father awoke his men, who fled at once into the
forest, and eventually saved themselves, scatter-
ing, some here, some there; and taking their route
toward the very place from which the enemy had
come out, though a little at one side of it. These

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Christians, escaped from the peril, arrived at the
Tobacco Nation, and reported that the Father had
gone some little way with them, intending to follow
them ; but that, becoming exhausted, he had fallen
on his knees, saying to them, It matters not that
I die; this life is a very small consideration; of the
blessedness of Paradise, the Iroquois can never rob
me'. At daybreak, the Father, having altered his
route, desirous of coming to the island where we
were, found himself checked at the bank of a river,
which crossed his path. A Huron reported the
circumstance, adding that he had passed him, in
his canoe, on this side of the stream; and that, to
render his flight more easy, the Father had dis-
burdened himself of his hat, and of a bag that
contained his writings; also of a blanket, which
our missionaries use as robe and cloak, as mattress
and cushion, for a bed, and for every other con-
venience, even for a dwelling-place, when in the
open country, and when they have, for the time,
no other shelter. Since then, we have been unable
to learn any other news of the Father."

In the narrative Ragueneau states that the man-
ner of his death was uncertain, but in a note
appended to the Memoir of 1652 he states that
it was learned from most trustworthy witnesses:
a Huron apostate Louis Honareenhax had admit-
ted he had killed Chabanel through hatred of the
Faith. 96

THE JESUIT MARTYRS

"Father Noel Chabanel had come to us from the
Province of Toulouse, in the year 1643, having
been received into our Society as early as the year
1630, when he was only seventeen years of age.
God had given him a strong vocation for these
countries; but, once here, he had much to contend
with; for, even after three, four, and five years
of effort to learn the language of the savages, he
found his progress so slight, that hardly could he
make himself understood even in the most ordinary
matters. This was no little mortification to a man
who burned with desire for the conversion of the
savages, who in other ways was deficient neither in
memory nor mind, and who had made this manifest
enough by having for some years successfully taught
rhetoric in France. In consequence of this, the
temper of his mind was so opposed to the ways and
manners of the savages, that he saw in them scarce
anything that pleased him; the sight of them, their
talk, and all that concerned them, he found irksome.
He could not accustom himself to the food of the
country; and residence in the missions did such
violence to his entire nature that he encountered
therein extraordinary hardships, without any conso-
lation, at least, of the character that we call
sensible. There, one must always sleep on the bare
ground, and live from morning to night in a little
hell of smoke; in a place where often, of a morning,
one finds himself covered with the snows that drift
on all sides into the cabin of the savages; where

1:218:1

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vermin abound; where the senses, each and all, are
tormented both night and day. One never has any-
thing but water to quench his thirst ; while the best
food usually eaten there is only a paste made with
meal of Indian corn boiled in water. One must
work there incessantly, though always so poorly
nourished; never have one moment in the day in
which to retire to any spot that is not public ; have
no other room, no other apartment, no other closet,
in which to prosecute his studies. One has not even
any other light than that of a smoky fire, sur-
rounded, at the same time, by ten or fifteen persons,
and children of all ages, who scream, weep, and
wrangle; who are busied about their cooking, their
meals, their work, about everything, in a word, that
is done in a house. When God, besides all this,
withdraws His sensible graces, and hides Himself
from a person who longs only for him, when He
leaves him a prey to sorrow, to disgusts, and
repugnances of nature, these are trials that are not
within the compass of ordinary virtue; and the
love of God must be strong in a heart, if it is not
to be stifled by them. Join to these the continual
sight of dangers, in which one finds himself at every
moment, of attack by a savage enemy who often
will subject you to the sufferings of a thousand
deaths, ere death itself ensues; who uses only fire,
and flames, and unheard-of cruelties. Doubtless a
courage is needed worthy of the children of God,

t 2.9 ]

THE JESUIT MARTYRS

if one is not to lose heart in the midst of such aban-
donment.

"It has been in this abandonment that God has
willed to put to the test, for five or six years, the
fidelity of this good Father; but assuredly the Devil
never having got the better of him upon that
account, although he represented to him every day
that, by returning to France, he would find there
the joy, repose, and comfort which during all his
past life he had received; that there he would not
lack employment better suited to his disposition,
employment in which so many saintly souls nobly
practise the virtue of charity in a zeal for souls,
and expend their lives for the salvation of their
fellow-men. Never, for all that, would he break
away from the Cross on which God had placed
him; never did he ask that he might come down
from it. On the contrary, in order to bind himself
to it more inviolably, he obliged himself, by a vow,
to remain there till death, so that he might die
upon the Cross. These are the terms of the vow,
as he conceived it, and its very words :

" "Jesus Christ, my Savior, why by a wonderful
dispensation of your paternal providence have
willed that I, though altogether unworthy, should
be a coadjutor of the holy Apostles in this vine-
yard of the Hurons ; impelled by the desire of min-
istering to the purpose which Your holy Spirit hath
respecting me, that I should help forward the con-
version to the faith of the barbarians of this Huron

C

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country : I, Noel Chabanel, being in the presence
of the most holy Sacrament of Your Body and
Your Precious Blood, which is the tabernacle of
God among men, make a vow of perpetual stabil-
ity in this Mission of the Hurons; understanding
all things as the superiors of the Society expound
them, and as they choose to dispose of me. I con-
jure You, therefore, O my Savior, to be pleased to
receive me as a perpetual servant of this Mission,
and to make me worthy of so lofty a ministry.
Amen.' " 97

C 221

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

Fruits of Martyrdom

An exterminated people The Missions not a failure Virtues
of the Missionaries Their memory in veneration Influence
after death Monuments in their honor Protestant devotion
General Clark and Auriesville, site of Jogues' death The long
memory of the Church.

THE Hurons were an exterminated people.
Gradually the missionaries gathered the
remnants of their race in reservations about Quebec.
In one sense the missions in Huronia and the sur-
rounding country were a failure. The Iroquois
mercilessly destroyed the Neutrals and the Eries.
They harassed the Algonquins and the Ottawas,
while all this time some of their warriors were
fighting with the Mohicans to the south and the
Illinois and Cherokees to the west.

Apparently the time, labor, self-sacrifice, suffer-
ing and even the death of the martyred priests and
their two companions had gone for naught. They,
of course, and their fellow-missionaries thought
otherwise. It was enough for the martyrs that for
them the mission was an occasion of sacrifice. It
had civilized and christianized many souls. It had
even cultivated many of them to extraordinary
devotion, Stephen Totiri, for instance, Teresa Oiou-
haton, Theondechoren, Tsondatsaa, Ahasistari, as
it would later, Tekakwitha, Lily of the Mohawks.
The martyrdoms themselves aroused a new fervor
both in New and Old France. They were an

THE JESUIT MARTYRS

inspiration to the missionaries who were already
working in the field, and to the three hundred and
twenty others of the Jesuits alone, who were to
work at saving the remnant of it, developing the
vast continent beyond the gate at Sault Ste. Marie,
which Jogues had happily opened.

The lay auxiliaries of the missionaries would
grow in number, whilst their two champions were
dying for the Faith, from six to twenty-three. No
sooner would word of the death of Goupil, "gallant
surgeon", as Vimont called him, reach Jogues'
native city, than another well known young surgeon
at Orleans would gallantly offer to take his place. 98

Could the humility of the Martyrs have allowed
them to dream of the glorious outcome of their
sacrifice, they would have entered into their bliss
before consummating their ordeal. They knew
their blood would not be an unfruitful seed, but
they could never have imagined how soon their
successors, Le Moyne and Le Mercier, Dablon and
Lamberville, Fremin and Bruyas, would be down
among their very executioners in their Mohawk
Valley strongholds, "taking captive their fierce con-
querors" in the toils of the Faith in Christ. Much
less could they have had the vision of Menard,
Allouez, Druillettes, and finally Marquette pushing
their way into the lakes, valleys and rivers of the
great west and south, developing the new French
civilization which Le Jeune had designed, and vis-
iting and Christianizing members of "every tribe,
C 223 3

THE JESUIT MARTYRS

and tongue, and people, and nation", 99 among the
Indians. This vision, as well as the vision of a
great new people in Canada, growing out of the
handful of colonists who were there when they
died, was reserved for them as part of their reward
where they rest from their labors in the vision of
God who hath accomplished all this with their aid
as His instruments. In it all endures, and will
endure for eternity, not only the memory of what
they did, but the fruit of it in the countless genera-
tions that hold them in honor.

Not only among the three million Canadians of
French origin, who are signed and sealed with the
tradition that the Martyrs and their associates
planted in them; not only among the Catholic peo-
ple in this part of North America and all the world
over, but among Protestants also, and men and
women of no faith, is the memory of Jogues,
Brebeuf and their companions alive today and a
source of inspiration to nobler ideals and apprecia-
tion of real religious faith. The missions in
Huronia were far from being a failure.

After reading Brebeuf s remarkable self-revela-
tion in his charge to missionary candidates, and
Jogues' pathetic confession during his captivity, it
is needless to dwell upon their extraordinary virtues.
All the missionaries who came to Canada were men
of superior training and character. Le Jeune, Rague-
neau, Vimont, Charles and Jerome Lalemant, Le
Moyne, towering as they are in moral stature, are

C 2243

OF NORTH AMERICA

only types of the rank and file, over three hundred
in number, who served on these missions for one
hundred and forty years. Seven others, besides the
martyrs mentioned in these pages, died at the hands
of the Iroquois, and two, Rasle and Delmas besides,
died for religion. Three were imprisoned, and
fifteen perished by shipwreck, drowning and attend-
ing the plague-stricken. They were imprisoned, and
finement and knowledge. They knew beforehand all
the hardships, the perils and the risk of death. Once
at their post, they clung to it as if their lot was an
enviable one. Their faith in God, their hope in
His goodness, their love of Him and of souls,
were extraordinary. They were men of singular
prudence and fortitude, necessarily most abstemious
of habit, with a fine sense of justice which led them
to see, even in their enemies, merits and rights
which they felt under obligation to respect. In all
these virtues the eight Martyrs excelled. Gamier
considered it a favor from Almighty God that he
was permitted to serve on such a mission, as did
Jogues. Daniel felt that he owed it to his Indians
not only to instruct them but to lead them along the
way of Christian perfection. Lalemant and Chab-
anel had little time on the missions to manifest
their special virtues, but Lalemant had shown his
by his many years of effort to be appointed mission-
ary before he was finally chosen. ChabaneFs vow
is sufficient evidence of his heroism. They were
all prayerful men, the lay auxiliaries as well as the

C 225 3

THE JESUIT MARTYRS

priests, and they not only faced the likelihood of
martyrdom with composure, but even desired it.

It is no wonder, therefore, that they have been
held in veneration by all who knew the story of the
birth of the New World. Immediately after the
death of Gamier and Chabanel, the Archbishop of
Rouen, who at that time claimed jurisdiction over
the Canadian Missions, instituted an inquiry into
their virtues and the heroic manner of their death
for religion. Father Paul Ragueneau, then Superior
of the Missions, collected from different sources his
famous 'Memoir' concerning the virtues of these
martyrs, and of others also of the missionaries who
had died in the discharge of their duties. It was to
be used as a plea for their beatification. So high
was the regard of the faithful both in New and Old
France for the saintliness of these men, that many
were moved to invoke their intercession with
Almighty God for needed temporal and spiritual
favors. Remarkable answers to such prayers were
occasionally recorded, as for instance, the cure ot
Marie Brevost at Poitiers, attributed to the inter-
cession of Jogues soon after his death, and
many similar remarkable cures since then, notably
that of a Sister of Mercy in Buffalo, November 1 7,
1906, and of numerous others which have been
recorded in the Tilgrim of Our Lady of Martyrs'
since i886. 100 In the annals of the Hospital Sisters
at Quebec is an account of one of their most dis-
tinguished members who with her sister was desir-

OF NORTH AMERICA

ous of leaving France for the Canadian Mission.
They could not prevail upon their father to give
his consent, ,but he changed his mind overnight after
reading the narrative of Jogues' sufferings and
death. Similar remarkable favors are believed to
have been received through the intercession of
Brebeuf and his companions. One of these, the
relief of a woman from demoniac possession, is
recorded in the archives of the Diocese of Quebec
under date of August 9, 1663. Others are men-
tioned in the 'Relations. 101 Indeed, the 'Relations'
contain numerous proofs of the veneration of these
Martyrs and of the belief in their power of
intercession.

Thus, in reporting one hundred and fifty-one
baptisms among the Mohawks during the years
1668 and 1669, the writer adds: 'The birth of
this flourishing Church is due, next to God, to the
death and the blood of the Reverend Father Jogues.
He poured out his blood on the same spot where
this new Christianity is beginning to be born; and
we seem to be able in our day to verify, in his
person, those beautiful words of Tertullian, that
'the blood of the Martyrs is the seed of the Chris-
tians'." 102 Again in the 'Relation' for 1648-1649, it
is stated:

"From the death of Father Antoine Daniel,

which occurred July Fourth of last year, 1648, up

to that of Father Jean de Brebeuf and of Father

Gabriel Lalemant, who were burned and eaten on

n 227 ]

THE JESUIT MARTYRS

the i6th and lyth of the month of March in the
present year, 1649, we baptized more than thirteen
hundred persons; and, from the latter murders up
to the month of August, we baptized more than
fourteen hundred. Thus, the Christian Church was
increased by more than two thousand seven hundred
souls in thirteen months, without counting those
baptized at the Breach (i.e., the storming of the
Huron villages), and those who were made Chris-
tians in other places. So true are those words,
Sanguis Marty rum semen est Chris tianorum^ 'The
blood of the Martyrs', if they may be so named, 'is
the seed and germ of the Christians'." 103

From the Mohawk Mission in 1670 Millet, after
telling how he had made a difficult conversion
through the help of Jogues, adds: "During
the year that I have spent here, I have baptized
nearly fifty persons, nine or ten of whom died
happily after baptism; three or four have escaped
me two children and an old woman who, notwith-
standing my efforts, died without baptism. My
heart bleeds for them, and I am inconsolable." 104

Le Jeune will account for the grace of baptism
to a dying Iroquois by the fact that he had been
one of those who attacked the village where
Brebeuf and Lalemant died and had actually for
a time saved the two Fathers from the fury of their
captors. One of the torturers of these two mission-
aries died a Christian, as also did the man who
tomahawked Jogues. Chauchetiere in 1672

C2283

OF NORTH AMERICA

says that of the Indians then living at La Prairie
the Mohawks took the first rank as Christians, and
he ascribes this to the death of Jogues and also of
Brebeuf who has been killed by members of that
tribe.

Evidences of veneration for these Martyrs are
found in many places. Their names are favorite
ones for many Catholic organizations. Near the
site of Ihonatiria at Penetanguishene is a church
erected to their memory. At Waubashene on the
site of one of the villages is a place of pilgrimage
and a House of Retreats. Brebeufs relics
are encased in a silver bust of natural size presented
to his fellow Jesuits by his family, and, from 1802
until now in possession of the Hotel Dieu at Que-
bec. On one of the family tombs, at Venoix near
Caen in France, is inscribed a record of his martyr-
dom, and there is a memorial window of him in the
Church of St. Martin (Anglican) at Brighton,
England.

There are memorials of Jogues at West-
port, on Lake Champlain, where he was tortured on
the way down to the Mohawk settlement. There
is an oratory dedicated to him at the home of the
Paulist Fathers on Lake George. One of the prin-
ciple statues at Dunwoodie Seminary is of
Jogues. His principle monument is at Auriesville,
the present name of the site of the village of Osser-
nenon where he was tortured and kept as a slave.
During the summer of every year since 1884 there

C 229 3

THE JESUIT MARTYRS

have been large pilgrimages from the cities along
the Valley and occasionally from more distant
centres, the pilgrims often exceeding five thousand
in number, all of them devoutly convinced that
Jogues is among the Blessed in heaven and more
powerful now to intercede with Almighty God than
when he was on earth.

The site at Auriesville was fixed by the late
General John D. Clark of Auburn, New York, with
the aid of the historian, Gilmary Shea, Reverend
Clarence Walworth of Albany, and others who
were expert in the study of Indian remains and
village sites. Fortunately, Jogues' descrip-
tion of the place and its surroundings had been so
detailed, and his estimate of distances so precise,
that there can be no doubt about the General's
conclusions. The pains which this devoted Protest-
ant took to determine the actual site of the Mohawk
village are only one instance of what has been done
for Jogues by men who, like Governor Kieft
of New Amsterdam, now New York, Commandant
of Fort Orange, now Albany, Arendt van Corlaer,
and the others who sought to rescue him, though not
of his Faith, venerated him even in life for his
Christian heroism. Since the Canadian Govern-
ment published its edition of the 'Jesuit Relation' in
18585 there has been a c cloud of testimony' from
writers of every creed, Parkman, Bancroft, Kip,
Thwaites, Finley, to speak only of those who are
of our own country, all testifying with affection to
C 230 3

OF NORTH AMERICA

the supreme devotion of Jogues and of his com-
panions to the cause of religion and civilization.

The reader may imagine the impressions of the
writer of this book on receiving in 1904 the follow-
ing letter from General Clark:

"It will give me great pleasure to aid in any man-
ner possible in the Beatification of Father Jogues
and his companions. The same charges that were
made against Jogues were made against the Huron
missionaries, against Brebeuf and Chaumont when
they visited the Neutrals in 1640, and against the
missionaries who visited the Tobacco Nation. They
were held responsible for all the public and private
calamities to which the people had been subject.
The box that Jogues left among the Mohawks is a
fine example of the ridiculous and absurd suspic-
ions that the enemies of the French and of the Faith
had succeeded in spreading everywhere, and natur-
ally a spirit of vengeance was aroused against the
man who was looked upon as the author of all their
woes. I say enemies of the Faith, because there
can be no question in regard to this matter. It was
'the doctrine' that caused their death by charms
and spells, it was this that caused the destruction
of their grain and produced contagious diseases."

Six years before, this same devout Indian anti-
quarian had written: "My philological researches
located the castle sites at the mouth of the river
and between the two rivers. My mythological
researches reveal why Jogues was condemned to

C 231 3

THE JESUIT MARTYRS

death. The Turtle and Wolf clans were brothers
and formed one side of the Council, the 'peace' side.
The Bear and Beavers were brothers and consti-
tuted the "war 5 side of the Council. The peace side
made every effort to save his life, but their efforts
could not prevail against those favoring the bloody
sacrifice. Agreskoui, whom Jogues has offended,
must be appeased by blood. He was sacrificed to
appease the Sun God, Agreskoui, or God of War."
With sentiments like that prevailing among
Christian people everywhere, it is not surprising
that the Catholic hierarchy of the United States
in 1884 authorized a formal preliminary inquiry
into the lives and deaths of these servants of God
with a view to ascertaining whether the result
would justify a petition to the Holy See for open-
ing the Apostolic process necessary for their beatifi-
cation. The wonder everywhere is that this had
not been done long before. Although an inquiry
was instituted after jthe death of the Martyrs,
many things conspired to prevent its completion
a change in the Episcopal jurisdiction of Canada;
the unsettled condition of the missions there; the
suppression of the Society of Jesus to which the
missionaries belonged; the disturbance caused by
the French Revolution; the interval between the
suppression and the restoration of the Jesuits in
Canada in 1842; the time it took to discover all
the 'Relations' of the Jesuits and make them avail-
able as testimony for the Martyrs; and, finally,

OF NORTH AMERICA

the patience and time required for the process of
beatification itself. Needless to say, that in the
course of this process, an important factor in help-
ing the Commission which conducted it to a con-
clusion in favor of the beatification of these
Martyrs, was the testimony of so many who are
not of the Catholic faith and who yet had publicly
testified in their writings to their veneration for
these noble men.

The Church of Christ has a long memory. It
ranges over the past, and views in detail its conflicts
and its conquests, its apparent failures and its
glorious triumphs. The heroes who have achieved
these triumphs are never forgotten. Out of annals
of remote times and obscure places it selects those
who best exemplified in their members as well as
in their spirit, their Divine exemplar Christ. These,
already immortal in supernal bliss, it endows with
an immortality among the faithful still striving
toward that goal. Our land is fortunate that the
first to be so favored were so heroic as to surpass
even the most extravagant and mythical heroes of
other lands; fortunate also in that their holiness
was such as to inspire veneration and imitation, to
some extent, by all who value what is noblest in
human life. The achievements in science, litera-
ture, art and politics of the men who lived in the
half-century during which our Martyrs lived and
died, still exert their influence and excite our admir-
ation. Excellent as these achievements were, they

C 233 3

THE JESUIT MARTYRS

are not to be compared with the heroic accomplish-
ments of these Martyrs. It is the difference between
mental and moral grandeur. As we benefit by the
science, art and literature, the mental genius of
that day, may we not hope to benefit also by its
examples of holiness, the moral and supernatural
genius of these men. The blood of these Martyrs
was to be Christian seed, not for races that are
now extinct, but for our own that is only in the
making. Why should it not so fructify that men
born and things done in our day be as immortal
as the men and things of the half-century which
produced our Martyrs?

C 234:]

REFERENCES.

IN quoting the translation of the Relations
in Thwaites 5 collection of "The Jesuit Rela-
tions and Allied Documents", we have omitted the
page references to the original editions of the
Relations. We have not followed the capitaliza-
tion, as the translators did in imitation of the
archaic French custom.

In the reference to Jogues 5 letter to his Pro-
vincial : those who are familiar with Biblical
language will recognize throughout this quotation
allusions, phrases and often complete texts. The
translators of the Thwaites collection left these in
their Latin expression; we have put them into
English.

REF.

No.

1. Bros, L'Ethnologie Religieuse, 126.

2. Fraser, Fifteenth Report of the Bureau of Archives for

the Province of Ontario, 1818-19; Rev. Pierre Potier's
collection.

3. De Vere, Essays Chiefly on Poetry, II, 240.

4. Bancroft, History of the U. S,, III, 120.

5. MS. Vie du R. P. Isaac Jogues, 1792, p. 5.

6. Hoi week, A Biographical Dictionary of the Saints.

7. Hanotaux, Histoire de la Nation Fran^aise, VI j Histoire

religieuse, by Goyau, p. 384.

8. Rochemonteix, II, 326.

9. Harris, Missions of Western Canada, p. 212.

10. Ranke, History of the Popes, tr. Kelly (London, 1843), IV,

188.

11. Schwickerath, Jesuit Education, 182, 484.

12. Rame, Documents in6dits sur Jacques Cartier au Canada,

pp. 12-17 (Paris, 1868), quoted by Goyau, Les origines
religeuses du Canada, CI, 3.

13. Goyau, ibid.

C 235 3

THE JESUIT MARTYRS

REF.
No.
14. Ferland, Hisloire du Canada, p. 5.

16. Ibid., p. 14.

17. Perrault, Relation, 1634-36, in Thwaites, Jesuit Relations,

VIII, 157.

18. Rochemonteix, Les Jesuites et la nouvelle France, I, 66.

19. Factum des proces entre Jean de Biencourt et les Peres

Biard et Masse, Jesuites; attributed to Lescarbot; repub-
lished, Paris, 1887,

20. Letter to the General of the Society of Jesus, Thwaites,

II, 73.

21. Thwaites, Jesuit Relations, IV, 255-260, for valuable and

judicious notes on this subject.

22. Le Jeune, Relation, 1634, Thwaites, VII, 35.

23. Brebeuf to Le Jeune, in Thwaites, Jesuit Relations, 1636,

VIII, 75-81.

24. Thwaites, Jesuit Relations 1635, 1636, VIII, 69-155 ; X, 125.

25. Thwaites, Jesuit Relations, X, 45.

26. Martin, Le P. Jean de Brebeuf, sa vie, ses travaux, son

martyre (Paris, 1877), 75.

27. Kingsford, Canada, I, 149.

28. Rochemonteix, Les Jesuites de la nouvelle France, I, 190,

sqq.

29. Goyau, Les origines religieuses du Canada, p. 70.

30. Thwaites, Jesuit Relations, 1634, VIII, 9.

31. Wynne, The Pilgrim of Our Lady of Martyrs, 1897, pp.

81, 121, 152.

32. Life and Letters of St. Francis Xavier, II, p. 167,

33. Parkman, The Jesuits in North America, preface, vi.

34. Bancroft, History of the U. S., Ill, chap, xx, 122.

35. Field, Indian Bibliography.

36. Thwaites, Jesuit Relations, I, 38-40.

37. Finley, The French in the Heart of America, p. 30.

38. Lafitau, Les Moeurs des Sauvages.

39. Thwaites, Jesuit Relations, I, pp. 41-44.

40. Thwaites, Jesuit Relations, 1682, V, 42.

41. Thwaites, Jesuit Relations, VIII, 308, note.

42. Thwaites, Jesuit Relations, 1637, XI, 81.

43. Brebeuf s Report to Le Jeune, in Thwaites, Jesuit Rela-

tions, 1636, VIII, 81.

44. Thwaites, Jesuit Relations, 1635, VIII, 105-9.

45. Thwaites, Jesuit Relations, VIII, 133.

46. Thwaites, Jesuit Relations, VIII, 143.

47. Thwaites, Jesuit Relations, XII, 61 sqq,

C 236;]

OF NORTH AMERICA

REF.
No.

48. Thwaites, Jesuit Relations, X, 89-111.

49. Martin-Shea, Life of Isaac Jogues, p. 24.

50. Ibid., Idem, p. 29.

51. Ibid., Idem, p. 28.

52. Thwaites, Jesuit Relations, L636, IX, 279.

53. Martin-Shea, Life of Isaac Jogues, p. 35.

54. Ibid., Idem, p. 37,

55. Thwaites, Jesuit Relations, XV, 165.

56. Ibid., Idem, XVII, 13.

57. Ibid., Idem, X, 53.

58. Ibid., Idem, XI, 15.

59. Martin-Shea, Life of Isaac Jogues, p. 45.

60. Ibid., Idem, p. 49.

61. Ibid., Idem, p. 50.

62. Thwaites, Jesuit Relations, XV, 61.

63. Ibid., Idem, XV, 95.

64. Ibid., Idem, XIX, 227.

65. Thwaites, Jesuit Relations, XXV, 75-79.

66. Ibid., Idem, LXXI, 393.

67. Ibid., Idem, LXXI, 393.

68. Ibid., Idem, XVIII, 23.

69. Ibid., Idem, XX, 43.

70. Ibid., Idem, XXIII, 225.

71. Ibid., Idem, XVIII, 237.

72. Ibid., Idem, XXXIV, 163.

73. Ibid., Idem, XXI, 187.

74. Newman, Parochial and Plain Sermons, IV, 258.

75. Brucker, La Compagnie de Jesus, no. 63, p. 235.

76. Thwaites, Jesuit Relations, XVI, 233.

77. Thwaites, Jesuit Relations, XVII, 13.

78. Thwaites, Jesuit Relations, XXXIX, 175. This letter is the

basis of the account given by Bressani in his "Brief Rela-
tion" and also of the Relation of 1647, XXI, 17.

79. Martin-Shea, Father Isaac Jogues, S. J., p. 114-5.

80. Ibid., Idem, p. 124.

81. Ibid., Idem, p. 127.

82. Ibid. Idem, p. 133-4.

83. Ibid., Idem, p. 135-6.

84. Thwaites, Jesuit Relations, XXV, p. 288.

85. Ibid., Idem, XXXVIII, p. 207.

86. Ibid., Idem, XXXI, p. 17.

87. Ibid., Idem, XXVII, p. 247.

88. Shea, p. 186.

C 237 H

THE JESUIT MARTYRS

REF.
No.

89. Thwaites, Jesuit Relations, XXXI, 113.

90. Ibid, Idem, XXIII, 251.

91. Ibid., Idem, XXV, 25.

92. Ibid., Idem, XXVI, 265.

93. Ibid, Idem, XXXIV, 87.

94. Ibid, Idem, XXXIV, 139.

95. Ibid., Idem, XXXV, 107, 163.

96. Ibid, Idem, XL, 255.

97. Ibid, Idem, XXXV, 151.

98. Ibid, Idem, XXV, 31-33.
99 Apocalypse, v, 9.

100. The Pilgrim of Our Lady of Martyrs (1910), XXVI, 134-

141.

101. Thwaites, Jesuit Relations, L, 123; LVI, 103.

102. Ibid, Idem, LII, 141.

103. Ibid, Idem, XXXIV, 227.

104. Ibid, Idem, LX, 181.

[238:]

OF NORTH AMERICA

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Richard, Edouard: Acadia, ed. Henri D'Arles (3 vols., Quebec,

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INDEX

Acadia, 34.

Adam, Nicolas, 106.

Agreskoui, (Aireskoi), 176, 232.

Ahatsistari, Eustache, 156 sq. ; torture, 161; death, 168.

Albany, 120, 154.

Algonquins, 39 sq., 55.

Apostle of the Iroquois, 191.

Argall, Samuel, 35.

Art, 1600-50, 4.

Associates, Company of, 41.

Atrocities, of Indians, 39, 110.

Auriesville, 153, 229 sq.

Baptism, of Indians, 77 sq., 90 sq., 119, 125, 127, 149, 156 sq., 159.

Baron, Simon, 82 sqq.

Battalion of the Holy Sacrament, 9.

Beatification, causes of, 232 sqq.

Beira, Joam, 68.

Biard, Pierre, 30 sqq., 67, 69.

Biencourt, Jean de, 31, 33 sq.

Bissiriniens, 83.

Borgne, Ottawa captain, 80 sq.

Bourdon, Jean, 77.

Brebeuf, John de, 12, 14, journey to Ihonatiria, 1626, 50 sqq.,
vow, 61 ; at Quebec, 1634, 79 ; trip to Huronia, 1634, 82 sqq. ;
among Hurons, 84 sqq., 110 sqq., instruction to missions can-
didates, 93 sqq.; farewell letter, 118; farewell feast, 127;
among Neuters, 146 sq. ; at Quebec, 1641, 147 sq., martyr-
dom, 201 sqq. ; relics, 229.

Bressani, Francesco G., 187.

Cabins, Indian, 44, 55, 116; of missionaries, 84 sqq.

Caen Company, 42, 64.

Canada, Le Jeune's conception of, 65.

Canonizations, 1600-1650, 8.

Captains, of villages, 55 sq.

Cartier, Jacques, 29.

Catechism, instruction of Indians, 88 sqq., 115.

Cauvet, Ambroise, 106.

Cayugas, 153.

Census, of Indians, 128.

INDEX

Chabanel, Noel, 16.

Champlain, Lake, 189.

Champlain, Samuel de, 28 sqq., 38, 40 sqq., 64 sqq.

Chastellain, Pierre, 106, 137.

Chastes, Aymar de, 28.

Chaumonot, Pierre- Joseph, 127, 138, 146 sqq.

Children, instruction of, 87 sqq.

Chihwatenhwa, Joseph, 128 sqq.

Clark, John, 230 sqq.

Cold, suffering from, 100.

Company of New France, vindicates Jesuits, 135 sq.

Contarrea (Kontarea), 96, 197.

Corde, Catherine de, 77.

Corlaer, Arendt van, 175.

Cousture, Guillaume, surrenders to Iroquois, 157; torture, 166 sq. ;

given to Iroquois family, 169.
Cramoisy Series, 76.
Cross, superstitious dread of, 58 sqq.
Daillon, Joseph de La Roche, 50, 54.
Dale, Sir Thomas, 35.
Daniel, Anthony, 15, 66, 87; at Quebec, 80; trip to Huronia, 1634,

82 sqq.; Indian Seminary, 91 sq.; at Three Rivers, 110 sq.;

return to Huronia, 193; martyrdom, 200.
Daniel, Charles, 66, 80.
Davost, Ambroise, 80 sq. ; trip to Huronia, 1634, 82 sqq.; Indian

seminary, 91 sq.
Devil-worship, 144 sq.
Dictionary, of Huron language, 117, 127.
Donnes, 16, 139.
Drama, at Jesuit colleges, 5.
Drought, 96; relieved by prayer, 87, 90.
Dutch colonists, and Jesuits, 120, 170, 175, 179.
English colonists, 63; and Indians, 79.
Eries, 222.

Etchemin Indians, 33 sq.
Exploration, 1600-50, 9.
Fear, as aid to conversion, 80.
Feast of the Dead, 145.
Fleche, Jesse, 31.

Food, scarcity, 47; of Indians, 80; of missionaries, 95, 100 sq.
Franciscans, mission to Canada, 38.
Francis Xavier, St., 68.
French colonists, 26 sqq., 38 sqq. ; abandon Canada, 61 ; and

Indians, 79.

C 242 3

INDEX

Gamier, Charles, 15, 107; wounded, 213; death, 214; burial, 215.
Go'upil, Rene, 16 sq. ; captured by Iroquois, 156; torture, 158,

163 sq. ; refuses to escape, 162; death, 171; burial, 172 sqq.
Grammar, of Huron language, 116.
Guercheville, Madame de, 31 sqq.
Hebert, family, 76 sq.
Hell, appeal to Indians, 80.
Henry IV, King of France, 28, 31.
Hubou, Guillaume, 77.
Huguenots, 7, 28 sq., 41 sq., 63 sq.
Huronia, 152.

Huron language, studied by missionaries, 94, 117; Potier's books, 6.
Hurons, 54 sqq., 149; and Franciscans, 39; timidity, 95; hostility

to Jesuits, 121, 124; conversions, 193 sqq.; and Iroquois,

96, 156, 158 sqq., 209 sqq.; exterminated, 222.
Ihonatiria, 84; life at, 112.
Imbert, Simon, 34.

Immaculate Virgin, mission dedicated to, 90.
Indian language, difficulties of translation, 148.
Insects, 94.

Invocation, of Jes'uit martyrs, 226 sq.
Iroquois, 152 sqq. ; peace conference, 188 sqq. ; hostility to

Hurons, 96, 197; cruelty to women, 211 sqq.
Jamet, Denis, 39, 41.
Jansen, Jacob, 175.
Jeanne, Algonquin, 164.
Jesuit Relations, 68 sqq.
Jesuits, 17 ; colleges in France, 1600, 4 sqq. ; missions, 9 ; martyrs

in Japan, Poland, England, 10; education, 18; novitiate, 18

sqq. ; obedience, 138.

Jogues, Isaac, 13; at Quebec, 1636, 33; letters to his mother, 107;
journey to Ihonatiria, 106 sq. ; dream, 121; at Quebec, 1642,
152 ; captured by Iroquois, 153 ; account of captivity, 154 sqq. ;
torture, 158 sqq.; as slave of Mohawks, 175 sqq.; escape, 184;
return to France, 186; return to Canada, 187; ambassador to
Iroquois, 188 sq.; death, 190; memorials, 229.

Kerkt, David, and brothers, 61, 63 sq.

Kieft, William, 185.

Labatie, Jean, 175.

Lalande, Jean de, 17; death, 190.

Lalemant, Charles, 22, 43; "Relations," 69.

Lalemant, Gabriel, 16, 137 ; martyrdom, 201 sqq.

Lalemant, Jerome, 121, 189.

Lay companions of missionaries, 16, 139, 156, 158.

C 243 3

INDEX

Le Baillif, George, 67.

Le Caron, Joseph, 39, 41.

Le Gardeur, family, 77.

Le Jeune, 65 sqq., life among Indians* 44 sqq.

Le Mar chant, Jeanne, 77.

Le Mercier, Frangois Joseph, 127, 138.

Le Moyne, Simon, 127, 137.

Le Neuf, family, 77.

Lescarbot, Marc, 30, 67.

Le Sueur, Jean, 77 sq.

Letters, of Jesuit missionaries, 68 sqq.

Literature, 1600-50, 2 sq.

Manhattan Island, description by Jogues, 185 sq.

Marie de Medici, 30.

Marie de L* Incarnation, Ven., 78.

Martin, companion of missionaries, 82 sq.

Martyrdom, desire for, 151.

Martyrs in Canada, 222 sqq.

Mass, in mission cabins, 97.

Masse, Enemond, 30 sqq.

Megapolensis, Domlne, 185.

Megapolensis, John, 184.

Mercy, Daughters of, 78.

Michel, Jacques, 64.

Missionary, ideal, 105.

Missions, 1600-1650, 9.

Mohawks, 153, 175 sqq., 227 sqq.

Montaignais, 38 sqq.

Montmagny, Charles Huault de, 77.

Monts, Pierre du Guast, Sieur de, 28 sqq.

Neutral Nation, 55, 142 sqq.; 222.

Newspapers, first, 5.

Notre Dame des Anges, 147.

Noue, Anne de, 50, 54.

Noyrot, Philibert, 67.

Oblates, 16, 139.

Oenrio, 85 sq.

Oiouhaton, Teresa, 189, 222.

O jib ways, 145 sq.

Onondagas, 153.

Onnonhoaraton, Paul, 169.

Ossossane, 122.

Ottawas, 145 sq.

Peltrie, Madeleine de La, 78.

Penetanguishene, 229.

C 244 3

INDEX

Penobscot, 35.

Perche, Le, 77.

Peron, Frangois du, 114, 127, 137.

Petun Indians, 55, 140 sqq.

Pierre, Jean, 82 sq.

Plague, 113, 120.

Pontgrave, Baron de Poutrincourt, 29 sqq.

Port Royal, 30 sq., 34.

Quebec, missionaries at, 79 sqq.; Jesuit establishments, 147;
Franciscan college, 41.

Quentin, Claude, 35 sq.

Ragueneau, Paul, 112, 137; attacked, 127; account of martyr-
doms, 200 sqq., 226.

Raymbault, Charles, 145 sq.; illness, 152.

Relations of New France, 69.

Rensselaerswyck, 120, 154.

Richelieu, Armand J. du Plessis, Cardinal, 64.

Sagard, Theodat-Gabriel, 43, 67.

St. Mary, mission, 132 sq.

St. Thomas, village, 141.

Saint- Sauveur, 35.

Sault-au-Recollet, 43.

Saussaye, 34 sq.

Schools, for Indians, 41, 91 sq., 115, 147.

Science, 1600-50, 3.

Seminary, for Indians, 9; failure, 193.

Senecas, 153.

Shea, Gilmary, 230.

Sillery, 152.

Sondakwa, Thomas, 195.

Sorcery, 57, 113; missionaries suspected of, 143 sqq., 149.

Souriquois, 33.

Spiritual Exercises, 20 sqq.; at missions, 114.

Summer, at missions, 116.

Superstitions, of Indians, 79 sq., 120 sq.

Susa, Treaty of, 63.

Tadoussac, Franciscans at, 38, 41.

Teanaustaye, 127, 197.

Tekakwitha, Catherine, 222.

Theondechoren, Joseph, 222.

Three Rivers, 155.

Thwaites, Reuben Gold, 72, 79.

Toanche, 84.

Tobacco Indians, 55, 14.

t M5 3

INDEX

Tonneraouanout, sorcerer, 113.

Totiri, Stephen, 127.

Travel, in Canada, 50 sqq. ; transatlantic, 107.

Tslo*uendaentaha, Peter, 123.

Tsondatsaa, Charles, 222.

Ursulines, 78, 92.

Veneration, of Jesuit martyrs, 229 sq.

Viel, Nicolas, Franciscan, -work of, 43.

Village, Indian, 128.

Walworth, Clarence, 230.

Waubashene, 229.

Winter, at missions, 95, 10O.

Wyandots, 54.

CORRIGENDA
FOR

THE JESUIT MARTYRS OF NORTH AMERICA

P. xii; insert:

ILLUSTRATIONS

T , - _ , t r FACING PAGE

John de Brebeuf 79

Isaac Jogues 152

Gabriel Lalemant 192

MAPS
Huronia 50

Sites of Mohawk Villages in 1642 175

Principal Jesuit Indian Missions of North America
East; 1611-1824 222

P. 3, line 8: for achieved the prose classic of the century in
his " Simiplicissimus," read, author of the prose
classic of the century " Simplicissimus," was
born in 1_625; line 13: for Huygens and his
Saturn's rings, read Huygens' astronomical dis-
coveries ; line 19: for the microscope, read his
physiology ; line 25 : for propounding philoso-
phies which, read born at the time; their
philosophies.

P. 8, line 25 : for Lazarists, read Vincentians.

P. 28, line 29: for coming to blows read taking part in it.

P. 29, line 1 : for even the Indians, read the Indians also ; line 3 :
for mourners mocked them, and wondered if
death had put an end to their encounters, read
obsequies did not put an end to the angry dis-
putes among mourners on both sides; line 9:
for a priest, Nicholas Aubry, read a priest
Nicholas Aubry.

P. 32, line 15 : for on the island, read at Port Royal.
P. 54, line 4: after Ihonatiria, insert at Todd's Point.
P. 83, line 11 : for spend, read spending.

P. 225, line 8 : for imprisoned, and finement, read all men of
refinement.

P. 229, line 25: for principle, read principal; line 27: for prin-
ciple, read principal.

Nihil obstat

REV, ARTHUR J. SCANLAN, S, T, D,,
Censor Librorm

Imprimatur

His EMINENCE, PATRICK CARDINAL HAYES,
Archbishop of New York

Pemism Superwmm

126155