Chapter VII: A French Canadian Village (1)

Life at Murray Bay after Captain Nairne's death.--Letters from
Europe.--Death of Malcolm Fraser.--Death of Colonel Nairne's widow
and children.--His grandson John Nairne, seigneur.--Village
life.--The Church's influence.--The habitant's tenacity.--His
cottage.--His labours.--His amusements.--The Church's missionary
work in the villages.--The powers of the bishop.--His
visitations.--The organization of the parish.--The powers of the
_fabrique_.--Lay control of Church finance.--The curé's tithe.--The
best intellects enter the Church.--A native Canadian clergy.--The
curé's social life.--The Church and Temperance Reform.--The
diligence of the curés.--The habitant's taste for the
supernatural.--The belief in goblins.--Prayer in the family.--The
habitant as voter.--The office of Churchwarden.--The Church's
influence in elections.--The seigneur's position,--The habitant's
obligations to him.--Rent day and New Year's Day.--The seigneur's
social rank.--The growth of discontent in the villages.--The evils
of Seigniorial Tenure.--Agitation against the system.--Its
abolition in 1854.--The last of the Nairnes.--The Nairne tomb in
Quebec.

With the death of Thomas Nairne almost end the dramatic events in the history of the family. It remains briefly to bring this to its conclusion, and to add to it some general account of a village of French Canada in the past and in the present. Captain Nairne's mother was now the owner of the property and it continued in her competent hands until her death in 1828. "Polly's" marriage had taken that daughter away and, though there was a reconciliation, no longer was the Manor House her home. Mrs. McNicol (with her husband and children) and Christine Nairne still lived there with the widow of Colonel Nairne, and life went on much as before, save that its interests were now narrowed to Murray Bay; no more was there an outside career, such as the young Captain's, to watch.

When Thomas Nairne was killed the struggle against Napoleon in Europe had reached a supreme crisis. Occasional letters to Murray Bay give glimpses of great events. On March 16th, 1814, an Edinburgh friend writes to Christine: "The Castle was fired to-day in honour of the successes of our allies in France who have again routed Bonaparte, who has retreated to Paris. His enemies are within twenty-five miles of that capital so we must hope that the Tyrant's fate is at the Crisis and that we shall soon enjoy the blessings of a permanent peace; much has Bony to answer for." Ker wrote a little later from Edinburgh to say that Bonaparte "is now a prisoner on board of one of our 74 gun ships," and to express the hope that by his fall Britons will soon get quit of the property tax.

On March 17th, 1815, we hear from another correspondent of the renewed firing of the Castle guns at Edinburgh, this time to announce the arrival from America of the ratification of Peace with the United States. "We only regret this had not been settled before the disastrous affair at New Orleans where we have lost so many brave men and able generals, but such are the horrors of war." Just as this peace came in America renewed war broke out in Europe. "That monster Bonaparte a fortnight since landed and raised the standard of rebellion in the south of France. The accounts from there are very contradictory." On March 22nd the news seems better. "Troops are assembling in defence of France and the traitor does not seem to have any adherents, so we would fain hope all may go well." The writer, a Miss Beck, sends, for the amusement of Murray Bay, the book "Guy Mannering," which is "in very high repute ... the author unknown, but very generally thought to be Walter Scott, the Poet."

The hope that all would go well in regard to Bonaparte was soon dissipated. Ker wrote on April 10th, 1815, a bitter letter:

We were flattering ourselves with being at Peace with the whole
world when like a thunderbolt, the tremendous news of the monster
Buonaparte's Escape from Elba, his landing and rapid progress
through France, and the second Expulsion of the unhappy Bourbons
burst upon us!... We have the immediate prospect of being involved
in a bloody and interminable war, the consequences of which no man
can foretell. The French army, Marshalls, and Generals have covered
themselves with indelible Disgrace and shewn themselves, what I
always thought them, the most perfidious and perjured traitors and
miscreants that the world ever produced, and the rest of the French
Nation are a set of the most unprincipled Knaves and Cowards that
ever were recorded in history. I trust however that their
punishment is at hand and that the Almighty will speedily hurl
vengeance on their guilty heads. Among other evils, a new tax on
Property, with additions, is said to be in immediate contemplation
and God knows how we shall bear all the accumulating Burdens to
which this Country must be subjected.

Just at this time came old Malcolm Fraser's end. At the age of 82 he died on June 17th, 1815, the day before the battle of Waterloo. He had entered the army in 1757 and apparently was still serving in the Canadian militia at the time of his death so that his military career covered well nigh sixty years. One instruction given in his will is characteristic; it is that his body might "be committed to the earth or water, as it may happen, and with as little ceremony and expense as may be consistent with decency." His removal was a heavy blow to the family at the Manor House. It was Christine who kept most in touch with the outside world and to her the letters of the period are nearly all addressed. They contained the gossip of Quebec,--how in December, 1814, a Mr. Lyman--"a bad name for a true story to come from,"--had brought word of peace negotiations at Ghent; news of General Procter's Court Martial and of a fee of £500 paid to Andrew Stuart, one of the lawyers in the case. The letters are few and in 1817 they cease altogether. During the spring of the year Christine had been ailing. On a June day she drove out for an airing and, as she alighted from the carriage, expired instantly. The feeling of the Protestant family towards the Roman Catholic Church is shown in the fact that she left a small legacy to the curé, Mr. Le Courtois.

There now remained but two daughters. In May, 1821, "Polly" died in Quebec at Judge Bowen's house. Her old mother followed in 1828. Of Colonel Nairne's large family but one child remained, Mrs. McNicol. Her husband, Peter McNicol, appears to have been a quiet and retiring man and of him we hear little. He was an officer in the local militia and, in 1830, became a Captain in the second Battalion of the County of Saguenay. There were two sons, Thomas and John. Thomas, the elder, was to get the estate at Murray Bay; for John India was talked of; but his mother could not let him go--"our family has been too unlucky by going there." In 1826, when a youth of twenty, Thomas made a tour in Europe. Then, or later, the young man fell into dissipated habits and he died in early manhood. There remained only John. When he came of age in 1829 he too travelled in Europe; in April he was at Rome and there saw the newly-elected Pope, Pius VIII. He returned to Canada quite a man of the world and for a time lived in Quebec, engaged in business. But in 1834 when his father Peter McNicol died[25] John's prospects changed. The seigniory belonged to his mother, during her lifetime, but he was the heir. It seemed desirable that the name of the first seigneur should be continued and, in 1834, by royal warrant, John McNicol adopted the name and arms of Nairne. Once more was there a John Nairne. In 1837 we find him empowered to take the oath of allegiance from the habitants--to show that they were not in sympathy with the rebel Papineau. His mother, the old Colonel's last surviving child, died in 1839. She was a kindly woman, of genial temper, with a fine faculty for friendship; so intimate was she with Malcolm Fraser's daughter that she wrote "I do believe, nay am sure, she has not a thought with which I am not made acquainted." She never lost her sympathy with young people and her delight in their "innocent gaiety."

As in 1762, so now again in 1839, a John Nairne ruled at Murray Bay. The young seigneur soon took a wife. In 1841 he married Miss Catherine Leslie, of a well known Canadian family, a bride of only seventeen, and then settled down at Murray Bay to live the life of a country gentleman. He became Colonel in the militia, took some part in politics on the Conservative side, and studied agriculture. He was resolved to keep up the dignity of his position and set about rebuilding the manor house. The work was begun in 1845 and completed by the autumn of 1847; the new structure with little change is the present Manor. It is of stone covered with wood, a capacious dwelling with some fine rooms, and admirably suited to its purpose. To John Nairne an heir was born in 1842 and named John Leslie Nairne and the prospect seemed excellent for the final establishment of a Nairne dynasty in the seigniory. But, alas, this was not to be. The child died in his third year and the last of the Nairnes ruled at Murray Bay knowing that with himself the family should become extinct.

We must turn now to study the type of community of which he was the chief. A singular type it is, French in speech, Roman Catholic in faith, half feudal in organization, in a land British in allegiance, if not in origin. Long the determined rival of the Briton in America the French Canadian, though worsted in the struggle, remains still unconquered in his determination to live his own separate life and pursue his own separate ideals. When the British took Canada they fondly imagined that in a few years a little pressure would bring the French Canadians into the Protestant fold.[26] Immediately after the conquest preparations for this gradual absorption were made. The Roman Catholics were to be undisturbed but, as soon as a majority in any parish was Protestant, a clergyman of that faith would be appointed and the parish church would be given over to the Protestant worship. The minority would, it was hoped, acquiesce, and, in time, adopt the creed of the majority. The most illuminating comment upon these expectations is the fact that, during the half century after the conquest, Protestantism made probably not more than half a dozen converts among the Canadians, while of Protestants coming to the country during that time hundreds went over to the Church of Rome. In other ways too the type in French Canada has proved curiously persistent. A Lowland Scot of twenty-five married an Irish woman of twenty-three and went to live in a French Canadian parish. Hitherto they had spoken only English but after twenty-five years they could not even understand it when heard. They explained that at first they spoke English to each other but when the children went to school they used only French. So the parents yielded "_C'était les enfants, M'sieu!_"

A modern critic of France[27] has announced, as a sounding paradox, that the French, even of present-day anti-clerical France, are a profoundly religious people. Certainly this appears in France's efforts in Canada. When the Roman Catholic faith was first planted there the ground was watered with the blood of martyrs, done to death by brutal savages. At the very time when in France Pascal's satire and scorn were making the spiritual sincerity of the Jesuits more than doubtful, in Canada these same Jesuits were dying for their faith almost with a light heart. They and others, like-minded, won New France for the Catholic Church and to that Church the conquered habitant has since clung with a tenacity really heroic. He accepts its creed, he believes in its clergy. Whatever license of conduct marked the clergy of France in the bad days before the Revolution, the clergy in Canada during the 300 years of its history have been notable for a severity in morals so austere that hardly once in that long period has there been a whisper of scandal. In consequence, they have always retained the respect of the people and to-day, in every village, the curé commands extraordinary influence.

It may be that to the Church chiefly does the habitant owe the preservation of his identity. Inferior to the heretic conqueror in social status, the habitant yet retained in religion the sense of his own superiority. Was he not a member of an ancient body, in the presence of which Protestantism represented a mushroom growth of yesterday? The Church taught him that wealth, honour, and worldly power were not always given to the faithful; they had the truer riches of spiritual privileges and spiritual hopes. What mattered the pride of life in the face of these eternal treasures? So the habitant went his way. Led by his teachers he showed striking tenacity of character. He would not follow the customs of the English. He looked with suspicion upon their methods. Even in agriculture, where he had everything to learn, he would not imitate him. Their language he would not learn, their religion he abhorred; so he remained, and he remains still, true to his own traditions, a Gallic island in the vast Anglo-Saxon sea of North America.

The habitant has not proved a pliable person. The very name shows his sense of his own dignity. Though he held his land under feudal tenure he would not accept a designation that carried with it some sense of the servile status of the feudal vassal in old France. So the Canadian peasant, a feudal tenant _en censive_ or _en roture_, yet wished not to be called _censitaire_ or _roturier_, names which he thought degrading; he preferred to be called a habitant, an inhabitant of the country, a free man, not a vassal. The designation obtained official recognition in New France and has come to be the characteristic word for the French Canadian farmer among English-speaking people.

In other respects too the Canadian has been hardly less assertive. Earlier writers, while they call him obliging, honest and courteous, speak also of his self-conceit, boastfulness, fondness for drink. At Malbaie Nairne found him defiant when his spirit was aroused. Not less tenacious than the men were the women. Malcolm Fraser tells how when he was stationed at Beaumont, near Quebec, in January, 1761, he sent one of his men to cut wood on the property of a certain habitant, the man himself consenting. But Madame, his wife, was not pleased. She abused Fraser, called him opprobrious names, and, in a war of words, remained, he admits, mistress of the field. The wrathful virago carried her appeal to Murray in Quebec, who, she said, had passed many officers under the rod and Fraser found himself called upon to explain the matter. In a petition he humbly begs that some "recompence" (of punishment of course) may be made to the woman for "the insolent expressions used by her as well against the general, as the officers, who have the honour to serve under His Excellency."

Even when he knows only rude frontier life the French Canadian often retains something of the politeness and deference in manner of the nation from which he springs. But, unlike them, he has retained little sense of what is artistic. No thought of beauty of situation seems to determine his choice of the site for his dwelling. What he has in mind is protection from the prevailing wind, if this is possible, and, for the rest, convenience. So he puts his house close to the highway, in many cases even abutting upon it. He shows no taste in grouping his farm buildings. He plants few trees and his house stands bare and unattractive by the road side. The absence of trees near his dwelling is sometimes accounted for by the need, in earlier times, of clearing away everything that might offer a chance of ambush to his Indian enemies. If this is the true origin of the habit, an instinct survives long after the need which developed it has disappeared. The houses are persistent in type and nearly always of wood. The principle doorway opens into the living room, usually of a good size. It is kitchen, diningroom, parlour, often even workshop. In this chamber cooking, sewing, repairing of tools, all the varied family activities, take place. One large guest chamber or two small bedrooms open off it. In the corner there is a rude staircase and up under the sloping roof are two more rooms; one a bed-room probably with three or four beds, the other a general lumber room. Often there are two families in a household. As always with the French, family feeling is very strong. As soon as they are old enough the elder sons may go out into the world; it is usually a younger son whom the father selects to remain with him on the family property. This son is free to marry and to him, when the old father dies, the land goes on condition that he will always keep the door open to members of the family who may seek its refuge. It is not easy to see how so small a cottage can discharge these hospitable functions; in addition to adults there are often, in a French Canadian family, from ten to fifteen, sometimes twenty or twenty-five children. Through the long winters, doors and windows remain closed. The family gets on without fresh air and it gets on also without baths.

Since there are often many hands to do the work habitant farming is greatly diversified. But improvements come only slowly. Some of the most fertile areas in Quebec have been half ruined because the habitant would not learn the proper rotation of crops. Of the value of fertilizing he has had only a slight idea. His domestic animals are usually of an inferior breed, except perhaps the horses. Of these he is proud and, no matter how poor, usually keeps two, an extravagance for which he was rebuked by successive Intendants under the French régime. In recent times the French Canadian farmer has been making great progress. He is pre-eminently a handy man. Though his versatility is lessening, to this day, in some of the remoter villages, he buys almost nothing; he is carpenter, farmer, blacksmith, shoemaker; and, if not he, his wife is weaver and tailor. The waggon he drives is his handiwork; so is the harness; the home-spun cloth of his suit is made by his wife from the wool of his own sheep: it is an excellent fabric but, alas, the young people now prefer the machine-made cottons and cloths of commerce and will no longer wear homespun. Sometimes the habitant makes his own boots, the excellent _bottes sauvages_ of the country. The women make not only home-spun cloth, but linen, straw hats, gloves, candles, soap. When there are maple trees, the habitant provides his own sugar; he makes even the buckets in which the sap of the maple tree is caught. Tobacco grows in his garden, for the habitant is an inveterate smoker: sometimes the boys begin when only five years old or less. The women and the girls, indeed, do not smoke and an American visitor, who declares that he saw pretty French Canadian brunettes of sixteen puffing clouds of smoke as they worked in the harvest field, is solemnly rebuked by a French Canadian writer; the brunettes must have been Indian women.[28]

Though nearly all the children now go to school, yet reading can hardly be considered one of the amusements of the habitant. In the neighbourhood of Malbaie, at least, rarely does one see other than books of devotion in a habitant household; the book-shelf is conspicuous by its absence. Of course newspapers are read but many of the habitants are still illiterate, or nearly so, and read nothing. Not less gay are they for this deprivation. They are endless talkers, good story tellers, and fond of song and dance. They have preserved some of the popular songs of France,--_Malbrouck s'en va-t-en guerre_, _En roulant ma Boule roulant_, _A la Claire Fontaine_, and others--and these airs simple, pleasing, a little sad, have become characteristic of French Canada. Nearly every house has its violin, often home-made, and though this music is rude it suffices for dancing. But some of the bishops are as severe in regard to dancing as is the Methodist "Book of Discipline" and in their dioceses the practise is allowed only under narrow restrictions. The short Canadian summer makes that season for the habitant one of severe labour. Winter, though it has its own labours, such as cutting wood, is the great season of social intercourse. For a long time the habitant would not consider a mechanic his social equal; perhaps, still, the daughters of a farmer would spurn the advances of the village carpenter. But whatever the social distinctions, baptisms, marriages, anniversaries, are made the occasions for festivity. There are _corvées récreatives_, such as parties gathered for taking the husks off Indian corn, when there is apt to be a good deal of kissing as part of the game. At New Year, the _jour de l'an_, the feasting lasts for three days. Hospitality is universal and it is almost a slight not to call at this time upon any acquaintance living within a distance of twenty miles. Every habitant has his horse and sleigh and thinks little of a long drive.

Often in the foreground of the habitant's life, always in the background at least, stand the Church and the priest. Malbaie, like a hundred other populous, present-day Roman Catholic parishes, was nursed in the first instance by the travelling missionary. In winter he could go on snow shoes but his usual means of travel in a country, covered by forests, but with a net-work of lakes and rivers, was by canoe. Malbaie could be reached either from Tadousac, at the mouth of the Saguenay, one of the earliest mission stations in Canada, or from Baie St. Paul in the other direction. The St. Lawrence was oftentimes a perilous route. Its waves rise at times huge as those of Ocean itself; a frail canoe could only hug the shore and at times would be storm bound for days. The missionary travelled usually with an attendant. They carried a portable chapel with the vessels necessary for the celebration of the mass. We have a description of the arrival of one of these missionaries, the Abbé Morel, as long ago as in 1683, at Rivière Ouelle where one now takes the ferry to cross to Murray Bay. A group of people stand on the shore watching a small black object round a distant point. As it comes nearer they see it is a birch bark canoe, paddled by two men. In a short time the bow of the canoe has touched the sandy beach where stands the waiting group. As the figure in the bow rises a long black cassock falls down to his feet; he is the long expected missionary come to celebrate mass. With the sun sinking behind the mountains of the north shore, a kind of triumphal procession escorts the missionary to one of the neighbouring houses. The evening is spent in preparation for the service of the morrow. The priest hears confessions and imposes penances. At daybreak on the following morning the people begin to gather, some coming by land from the neighbouring clearings, others, in birch bark canoes, from points more distant. Perhaps fifty persons gather before the house. Meanwhile in its best room the portable altar has been arranged. Silence falls upon the people as they enter the door. The mass begins; after the gospel the priest preaches a practical sermon with impressive solemnity. The mass over, a second service, vespers, soon follows. Then the people separate. Before the priest leaves he says the office of the dead over a grave made, it may be, many weeks ago, he baptizes children born since his last visit, and perhaps marries one or more bashful couples. "How beautiful upon the mountains," says a Canadian historian of the work of these devoted men, "are the feet of those who bring the gospel of peace."[29] Such a scene we may be sure was enacted many a time for the benefit of the scattered sheep at Malbaie before and after the arrival of Colonel Nairne.

It was not until 1797 that these occasional services ceased and Murray Bay secured a resident priest. Then was fully established in the parish the imposing church system that to-day probably retains its original vigour more completely in the Province of Quebec than in any other country in the world. At its head is the diocesan bishop. Subject only to the distant authority of the Pope he reigns supreme. With one or two exceptions, such as that of the curé of Quebec, he appoints and he can remove any and every priest in his diocese, a right, it is said, almost never exercised arbitrarily. He fixes the tariff to be paid for masses. It is he who determines whether such a practise as, for instance, dancing shall be permitted in the diocese. He watches over the Church's rights and gives the alarm when a political leader proposes anything that seems to menace them. If a newspaper adopts a course dangerous to the Church it has often happened that the bishop gives it one or two warnings; in case of continued obstinacy his last act is to forbid the faithful to read the paper; and since most of them will obey, this involves ruin for the recalcitrant journal.

The bishop visits each parish at least every third year and sometimes even annually. A mounted cavalcade will probably meet him as he crosses its boundary. A procession is formed. The roads have been cleared and decorated with boughs of ever-green trees stuck in the ground. The people watch the cavalcade from their doors and all kneel as the procession passes. The bishop goes at once to the church where he gives his benediction and holds confirmation. He remains for some days. There is daily communion and spiritual instruction. He inspects everything--the church and its furnishings, the registers, the accounts, the inventory of effects, the cemetery. He has already given notice that he is ready to hear any complaints or grievances even against the curé. We may be sure that when he comes there is a general clearing up of parochial difficulties. A wise bishop is a great peacemaker; an arbitrary one commands an authority not lightly to be disregarded.

The church that towers over the humble cottages of a French Canadian village invariably seems huge. But we need to remember how large are the parishes and how few in number relatively are the churches; it is probable that in English-speaking Canada there are half a dozen churches, or more, to every one in the Province of Quebec. In all Canada, rural and urban, there is probably not a Protestant parish to which are attached as many, or perhaps half as many, people as the five thousand who dwell in the parish of St. Etienne de la Malbaie, one of secondary importance in the Province of Quebec. In a whole diocese there are often not more than forty or fifty parishes. In the country the churches are usually built at intervals of not more than three leagues (nine miles) so that no one may have to travel more than a league and a half to mass. The life of the people centres in the Church. In its registers, kept with great accuracy, is to be found the chief record of the village drama, the story of its births, marriages and deaths. True to the tastes of old France the French Canadian has an amazing interest in family history, and genealogies, based upon these ample records, are closely studied. In the olden days the habitant brought his savings to be kept in the Church's strong chest. The church edifice, its pictures and its other furnishings, are things in which to take pride. Each village aspires to have its own chime of bells. To chronicle baptisms, marriages, burials, anniversaries, the chimes are rung for a longer or shorter time according to the fee paid. Every day one hears them often and a considerable revenue must come from this source. Whatever the habitant knows of art, painting, sculpture, music, he learns from the Church and it is all associated with religious hopes and fears. "Dwellers in cities," says a French Canadian writer, "have concerts, theatres, museums; in the rural communities it is the Church that provides all this. During her services the most fervent among the faithful taste by anticipation the joys of heaven and murmur, enchanted: 'Since here all is so beautiful in the house of the Lord how much more so will it be in his paradise!'"[30]

Thus it happens that here the parish and its church have a significance not felt where, as now in practically all English speaking countries, each community represents a variety of religious beliefs. At Malbaie, as in dozens of other parishes, there is not, except in summer, a single Protestant. So strong is the pressure of religious and social opinion, that even persons with no belief in Christianity are constrained to join outwardly at least in the church services. In the villages, at least, nearly every one confesses and partakes of the communion many times in the year; at Easter there are practically no abstentions from the sacrament. With this unanimity it has been possible to establish by legislation a most elaborate system providing for the support of the priests, for keeping up cemeteries and other parish needs. Elsewhere left largely to voluntary action, in Quebec such duties become a tax on the community as a whole. Whether a parishioner likes it or not, he must, if the taxpayers so determine, pay his share for building a church or for other similar expenditure decided upon.

We will suppose that a new residence for the priest is desired. A majority of ratepayers must address to the bishop of the diocese a petition with a plan of what is proposed. The commission of five members which exists in every diocese then gives ten days' public notice in order that objectors may have every opportunity to express their views. When, in the end, a decision to build is reached, the commissioners announce this by public proclamation. The next step is for the ratepayers of the parish to meet and vote the necessary money. Trustees are then appointed to carry out the work with power to collect the required funds from the Catholic ratepayers. This assessment is a first charge on the land; it must be divided into at least twelve equal instalments and the payments are spread over not less than three, or more than eight, years. To be quite safe the trustees levy fifteen per cent. more than the estimated cost. If ready money is not on hand for the work the church property may be mortgaged. When the building is completed the trustees render their accounts with vouchers and take oath that they are correct. All is precise, clearly defined, business-like.

No expenditure of money can be made for building without the consent of the people. Always in French Canada a trace of old Gallican liberties has remained, in the power over Church finances left in the hands of churchwardens (_marguillers_) elected by the people. But in the old days when the habitant was more ignorant and less alert than now he is, no doubt the voice in this respect might be the voice of the churchwarden, but the hand was the hand of the curé. No doubt, also, it is still true that any project upon which the curé sets his heart he will in the end probably get a majority of the parishioners to adopt. But he must persuade the people. Sometimes they oppose his plan strenuously and feeling runs high. Then when a churchwarden is elected, as one is annually, the curé may have his candidate, the opposing party theirs. At Malbaie recently there was a sharp difference of opinion between the curé and the people on a question relating to the cemetery. The parties divided on the choice of a churchwarden and the curé's candidate was defeated.

Yet the curé's position is one of great strength and authority. He has his own income uncontrolled by the _fabrique_, which is master of the rest of the church finances. The curé's tithe consists of one twenty-sixth of the cereals produced by the parishioners. A further tithe he has: the twenty-sixth child born to any pair of his parishioners is by custom brought to the priest and he rears it; sometimes, strange to say, this tithe is offered! From his tithe on cereals the income is not large; at Malbaie it is probably never more than from $1000 to $1200 a year; sometimes much less. The average income of a curé is not more than $600. It is the custom for the parishioner to deliver duly at the priest's house one twenty-sixth of his grain and in the autumn a great array of vehicles may be seen making their way thither. Usually there is considerable variety in the grain thus brought but sometimes the curé is almost overwhelmed by a single product such as peas; one of their number, thus paid, the neighbouring clergy christened the "_curé des pois_." The French Canadian farmer is often narrowly penurious and if he will not pay, as sometimes happens, the curé rarely presses him or takes steps to recover what the law would allow. In any case a bad harvest is likely to leave the curé poor. Changes in the type of farming may also curtail his income. Of the products of dairy farming he gets no share, yet it is a creditable fact that many priests have urged their people to adopt this kind of farming. Fees for weddings which, in Protestant Churches, go usually to the minister, are in the Province of Quebec handed over to the general church fund. Of course the priest has sources of income other than the tithe. He receives fees for masses but the sums chargeable for these ceremonies are determined by the bishop; the priest himself has no power of undue exaction. There is indeed no evidence of a desire for such exaction. Whatever personal differences may arise, the French Canadian curé is usually one in thought and aim with his people. Wherever he goes he is always respectfully saluted. To him the needy turn and there are heavy calls upon his charity. Few curés have any surplus income. They keep up a large house and have constant need of one or more horses. Most curés, it is said, die poor.

It is the complaint in Great Britain and the United States that, rather than enter the Christian ministry, the best intellects are seeking secular pursuits. This is not the case in the Province of Quebec. The curés watch the promising boys in the schools. The Church has many boarding schools where boys are led on step by step to the final one of entering the priesthood. A promising boy, if he needs it, is given a scholarship. When the time comes he is sent to complete his education at Rome or elsewhere. The Church has selected him, trained him in her service, and, for the rest of his life, his best powers are at her call. Every family is ambitious to have a representative in the priesthood and this becomes the most notable thing not merely in the family but also in the parish. The Province of Quebec has many parish histories. These volumes are rather dreary reading, it must be admitted, consisting chiefly of the record of the building or improvement of the church and of the coming and the going of the curés. But one chief record is always found--that of the sons of the parish who have entered the priesthood. They are its glory. Not merely pride in the success of their offspring leads parents to wish for a son in the priesthood. He may bring to them more substantial benefits. He is the interpreter of sacred mysteries, the intercessor in some respects between God and man, and he will plead for them in the court of Heaven.

This ambition to get sons into the priesthood has made it possible now for the Church to rely wholly upon priests Canadian in origin. Not always was this the case. After the British conquest it was not easy to get priests. The British government frowned upon the introduction of priests from France, still Britain's arch-enemy. Irish priests were thought of, but they could not speak French and, besides, the Bishop of Quebec did not find in them the submissive obedience of the Canadian priest. For a time it was seriously proposed to supply Canada with priests from Savoy, since of them Britain could have no political fears. But for the time the French Revolution solved the question. Emigré priests, driven from France, could be in Canada no political danger to Great Britain since, like her, they desired the overthrow of the existing French government. So a good many emigré priests were brought out, among them Mr. Le Courtois, so long the curé of Malbaie. This movement soon spent itself. In time the Church in Canada had a number of seminaries for training priests and it now levies a heavy tithe upon the best intellects of the country. Recently a new emigration of French priests to Canada has taken place. But they have not been wholly welcome; their tone is not quite that of the Canadian priesthood; sometimes they assume patronizing airs and they are felt to be foreigners. I have even heard a French Canadian priest say in broken English to a Protestant from the Province of Ontario: "I feel that I have more in common with you than I have with the French priests who are flocking into this country."

The Canadian curé is the priest always. Unlike the clergy in other parts of Canada he wears his cassock even when he goes abroad; one sees dozens of these black robes in the streets, on the steamers and trains. He does not share in the amusement of other people. In Quebec Anglican clergymen play golf and tennis; probably if a curé did so he might be called to account by the bishop. Occasionally priests ride bicycles, but even this is looked upon with some suspicion. Into general society the priests go but little. They come together in each other's presbyteries for mutual counsel and to celebrate anniversaries, such as the 25th year of the ordination of one of their number. The large presbyteries, which one sees even in remote parishes, are necessary to house the visiting clergy on such occasions. They assist each other when their parishes have special fêtes. But their social intercourse is chiefly with each other. The courtly abbé of old France, a universal guest in salons and at dinner tables, is hardly found at all in the Province of Quebec. Nor is the scholar usual. Even in small parishes there are rarely less than 500 or 600 communicants and the calls upon the curé's time are heavy. There are, of course, priests of literary tastes; as there are those with a taste for art, to whom are due the occasional good pictures found in the parish churches. Some priests interest themselves in agriculture and give wise guidance to their people. But behind everything is the solemn, severe, exacting, conception of the priest's high function as the medium of God's speech to man. He is almost sexless--a being apart consecrated to an awe-inspiring office. A mother will sometimes quiet an unruly child by threatening the portentous intervention of the curé.

Yet he is the universal friend. His relation to his people is not merely official; it is affectionate, personal. The confessional makes him familiar with the intimate details of nearly every one's life. On all the joyous and sad crises, at births, marriages, and deaths, he is at hand with sympathy, comfort and support. When he goes on a journey he looks up not merely his own but his parishioners' friends and is welcome everywhere. He is the general counsellor, the reconciler of family quarrels, the arbitrator in differences, the guardian of morals. The seigneur at Malbaie found the priest enquiring as to the manner in which the male and female servants of the Manor were lodged.

Colonel Nairne thought that the Church was too willing to see the people remain ignorant; with her the primary virtue is obedience. But it is not less true that on moral questions, such as sobriety and purity, the Church has always shown great vigilance and zeal. In the old days there was a mighty struggle between the Bishop of Quebec and the governor Frontenac as to the sale of intoxicating liquors, and the Church is still keen for temperance. It is due to her that public drinking places are unknown in most Canadian villages. At Murray Bay it happened recently that, by some lapse in vigilance, the party favourable to the granting of licenses got the upper hand. The results were immediate and deplorable. Summer visitors frequently found their drivers under the influence of liquor and the habitant, usually courteous and respectful, was now often rude and quarrelsome. The sudden fall made one realize how slight might be the strength of virtue due merely to the absence of temptation. The Church saw the danger. In the following winter she began a systematic temperance campaign. For some ten days daily services were held at which eloquent denunciations of intemperance roused the people. Every effort was made to ensure attendance at these services and the parish church, a great structure, was well filled daily. Hundreds signed the pledge and by the next summer all was changed. No one was licensed to sell liquor and the community was sober. If the relapse had been rapid it must be admitted that the recovery was not less so.

The curé and his assistants do their work with the precision and regularity of a business man in his office. They watch education, and have their own educational ideals. In the public schools of the English-speaking world in America, manners and religion receive, alas, but slight attention. But in Quebec one need only pass along a country road to see that the children are taught respect and courtesy. The chief subject of instruction is religion and to prepare the children for the first communion seems to be the main aim of education. In the parish the priest is never far away. Nearly always one or other of the clergy is at the presbytery to answer calls of urgency, and their duties begin at an early hour. "I am very busy until nine o'clock in the morning," a curé once said to me. My comment was that most of us are only beginning the serious duties of the day at that hour. "But I am tired by that time," he said, rather sadly, "for already, so early in the day, I have heard much of human sin." The people come early in the morning to confess and by nine o'clock the curé was weary of the tale of man's frailty. Thursday is his day of recreation. Only on that day usually does he leave his parish and then he always arranges that a neighbouring priest shall be within call. This oversight is not spasmodic; it is persistent, alert, universal, and hardly varies with the individual curé. In human society there is no institution more perfectly organized than the Roman Catholic Church and in Quebec her traditions have a vitality and vigour lost perhaps in communities more initiated. Of course not every one accepts or heeds the curé's ministry. Many a _mauvais sujet_ is careless or even defiant but, when his last moments come, at his bedside stands the priest to show to the repentant sinner the path of blessedness, and, when he is gone, his wayward course will give ground to call the living to earlier obedience.

In the Canadian parishes faith is simple, with a pronounced taste for the supernatural. In the year 1907 a Jesuit priest, M. Hudon, published at Montreal the life of Marie Catherine de Saint Augustin, 1632-1668, a Quebec nun. This devout lady lived in an atmosphere charged always with the supernatural. She knew of events before they happened; with demons who tempted her she had terrific combats; she read the thoughts of others with divine insight. Perhaps the climax of her experiences is found when she has regularly, as confessor and mentor, the Jesuit father and martyr Bréboeuf, dead for some years. M. Hudon declared that he had submitted the evidence for these wonders to all the tests that modern scientific canons could require and that they were undoubtedly true. The Archbishop of Quebec, Mgr. Begin, wrote a prefatory note approving of the teaching of the book, and adding that Mother Marie Catherine's life could not fail to be an inspiration to young girls to live nobly. This simple belief in the constant occurrence of the supernatural is not found only in the remoter parishes of the Province of Quebec as a French Canadian writer seems to indicate;[31] it appears everywhere. All Christians believe in a God who shapes human events and hears and answers prayer. But many, Catholic and Protestant alike, believe that the energy of God, in response to man's appeal, is applied through the ordinary machinery of nature's laws. Modern thought is pervaded with the conception of nature's rigour. I have seen good Catholics shrug their shoulders at the wonders narrated by Marie Catherine de Saint Augustin. But others, and these not only the ignorant, think that this attitude shows the lack of a deeper faith. Must God and his saints, they ask, be confined within the narrow framework of nature's laws? Cannot He do all things?

So it is not strange that the Canadian peasant dwells in a world charged with the supernatural. Night furnishes the opportunity for goblins to be abroad; the flickering lights on the marshes are goblin fires. Then, too, the vagrant dead wander about restlessly, sinful souls refused entrance to Heaven until they have sought and secured adequate prayers for their pardon and relief. To cross a cemetery at night might attract the fatal vengeance of the dead thus disturbed. The grumbling mendicant at the door may really be an evil spirit bent on mischief. With a few, magic and the gift of the evil eye are still dreaded forces and it is well to know some charm by which evil may be averted. Since night is the time of danger, if abroad then be watchful; if at home close doors and windows, ere you go to sleep. I was once on a fishing expedition with habitant guides when we had to share the same _cabane_. The air becoming insufferable, I got up quietly, opened the door and went back to bed. Presently I heard one of the guides steal softly to the door and close it. When I thought he was asleep I opened it again. But in vain; once more it was closed. In the morning nothing was said about it. Certainly not cold was what he feared, for the weather was hot. I do not think it was the mosquitoes. Was it the goblins?

A simpler and touching faith is common. Every one has noticed in the Province of Quebec the numerous crosses by the way side. These Calvaires are of rough wood, usually eight or ten feet high; sometimes with the cross are the dread implements of Christ's pain--the crown of thorns, the hammer and nails, the executioner's ladder, the Roman soldier's spear. Often at the foot is a box for alms to help the forgotten dead who are in purgatory. As the habitant passes them he usually lifts his hat. The Calvaires are a kind of domestic altar to which the people come. In the summer evenings one may see a family grouped about them in prayer. When there is need for special prayers, several families will come across the fields to meet at the Calvaire. Dr. Henry, of whom more later, tells how at Malbaie some eighty years ago he found in the cottages social family worship night and morning. It is to be feared that the present generation at Malbaie is less devout, corrupted it may be by the heretic visitors' bad influence and example. But still the guide with whom one goes camping rarely neglects his evening devotions. In some families prayer sanctifies all the actions of the day. There is prayer at rising, prayer at going to bed. Though here, as in France, women are spoken of as only _créatures_, the mother is usually better educated than the father and often leads these devotions, the others joining in the responses. Before meals is recited a prayer, usually the _Benedicite_. There is often a family oratory and here at the appropriate seasons, in the month consecrated to the special family saint and guardian, in May, the Virgin's month, in June, that of the Sacred Heart, in November, "the month of the dead," special prayers are said. On Sunday evenings the family chant the Canticles. The Church's feasts are marked by festal signs such as the laying of the best rugs on the floor. If there is drought groups gather frequently at the Calvaires to pray for rain. Occasionally such supplications have a curiously commercial basis in frugal minds. A habitant's wife, learning that a near neighbour had made an offering to the curé for prayers for rain, declared that she would give nothing, since if rain fell on the neighbour's farm it would not stop there: "_S'il mouille chez les Pierrot Benjamin, il mouillera ben icitte_."[32]

In each year, if he chooses, the habitant has a good many chances to cast his vote. The Church, the greatest institution of the village has its annual election--that for a churchwarden; of the three churchwardens one retires every year. An annual election there is also for the municipal council, two or three of whose members retire each year. This body looks after the highways, the granting of licenses to sell spirituous liquors and so on. Annually also are elected school commissioners, who have charge of education. The municipal council and the school commission are comparatively new institutions in the Province of Quebec. They have been borrowed from the Anglo-Saxon world, but the habitant takes kindly to the elector's privileges and struggles are sometimes keen. The innovation of the ballot not having been adopted, as yet, in municipal elections, the voting is open. Every voter must thus show his preferences and when a moral question, such as the licensing of drinking places, is before the electors this open voting aids the Church's influence. Usually the curé is an ardent temperance man and to vote for a license against his wishes, made known perhaps from the pulpit, needs great strength of conviction. It thus happens that a very large number of parishes in the Province of Quebec have no licensed drinking places.

Of offices in the gift of the village voter those in the Church are the most highly esteemed. To be a municipal councillor or a school commissioner is indeed all very well. But the village council is not really very important. It spends only a few hundred dollars a year and to keep up the roads is not an exciting task. The village council rarely has even the "town hall" usual in other communities; it meets in the "salle publique," or the vestry, of the Church, or in the school house. The school commissioners too have no very dazzling work to do. The curé is sometimes their chairman and thus in some degree they come under the control of the Church. The commissioners appoint the teachers in the schools and keep up the school buildings, but their outlay is also very small, for the salaries of teachers, usually women, are appallingly low. The really important elective office in the parish is that of churchwarden (_marguiller_). In the church the churchwardens have a special seat of honour assigned to them. They control the temporalities and may beard even the curé himself. Large sums of money pass through their hands. They receive the pew rents,--and every habitant has a pew; they receive the voluntary offerings. It often happens that the Church accumulates large sums of money and that, if the building of a _presbytère_ or parish church is decided upon, there is enough on hand to pay for it outright. The municipal council and the schoolboard, on the other hand, are always poor. The habitant watches their taxation with a parsimonious scrutiny and it is a thankless task to carry on their work.