Some Doubt Is Expressed Whether The Savages Fully
Understood What It Was All About, And What Their Confession Of Faith
Fully signified; as one chief, on being instructed in the Lord's Prayer,
objected to asking for bread alone, saying that
He wished for moose
flesh and fish also; and when one of the priests deliberately set to
work, with notebook and quill, to learn the language of the aborigines
by asking one man the Indian words for various French ones (to him
totally incomprehensible), the savage, with malice aforethought,
purposely gave him words of evil signification, which did not assist
the Frenchman in enlightening other members of this benighted race.
Perceiving the trick which had been played upon him by the savage, who
had been so perplexed by his questioning, the priest declared that
Indian possessed by the Devil! However, with all its discouragements,
this was the opening of the work of the Jesuits in America; in which
even those who might have thought their zeal at times mistaken could not
but respect them for the noble heroism, displayed during so many years,
in their work of civilizing and enlightening the savages. Even in these
olden times there were turbulent marauders abroad; and one such, Argall,
from Virginia, after destroying the settlement at Somes Sound (Mt.
Desert), pounced upon this peaceful station, destroying the fort and
scattering the colonists (1613).
The section known as Virginia was granted in 1606 to the London and
Plymouth Companies; and as that portion embraced the country between 34
degrees and 43 degrees north latitude, it seems that Argall pretended
that the French at Port Royal were interlopers, usurping his rights; but
as De Monts had received in 1604 a charter for the country deemed as
lying between 40 degrees and 46 degrees north latitude, Argall had no
right to dispossess De Monts or his successor.
Notwithstanding that a member of Argall's company speaks of him as "a
gentleman of noble courage", that does not prevent us from considering
him a rascal; for at this time France and England were at peace, and he
was unauthorized in his base and tyrannous invasion of Port Royal.
Before his attack on this quiet, peaceful station, he had shown greatest
treachery at Somes Sound, Mt. Desert, where he stole Saussaye's
commission and cast adrift in an open boat fifteen of the colonists.
Poutrincourt's son, Biencourt, was now Governor of Acadia, and stationed
at Port Royal. He endeavored to make terms with Argall, and offered to
divide with him the proceeds of the fur trade and the mines; but this
was refused, and the settlement broken up, some of the unfortunate
Frenchmen joining Champlain at Quebec, some scattering into the woods
among the Indians, while others were carried to England and from thence
demanded by the French ambassador. Thus, after only a little more than
eight years from the time of settlement, the colony was entirely broken
up.
En passant: A friend of ours, who with his family passed a summer in New
Hampshire, "at the roots of the White Mountains", as someone expressed
it, surprised an old farmer by asking the names of hills in sight from
that particular locality.
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