He Sailed Up The St. Lawrence, And On The 30th Of June,
1665, Anchored In The Basin Of Quebec.
The broad, white standard, blazoned
with the arms of France, proclaimed the representative of royalty; and
Point Levi and Cape Diamond and the distant Cape Tourmente roared back the
sound of saluting cannon.
All Quebec was on the ramparts or at the landing
place, and all eyes were strained at the two vessels as they slowly
emptied their crowded decks into the boats alongside. The boats at length
drew near, and the Lieutenant-General and his suite landed on the quay
with a pomp such as Quebec had never seen before.
Tracy was a veteran of sixty-two, portly and tall, "one of the largest men
I ever saw," writes Mother Mary (Marie de l'Incarnation), but he was
sallow with disease, for fever had seized him, and it had fared ill with
him on the long voyage. The Chevalier de Chaumont walked at his side, and
young nobles surrounded him, gorgeous in lace and ribbons, and majestic in
leonine wigs. Twenty-four guards in the King's livery led the way,
followed by four pages and six valets; [82] and thus, while the Frenchmen
shouted and the Indians stared, the august procession threaded the streets
of the Lower Town, and climbed the steep pathway that scaled the cliffs
above. Breathing hard, they reached the top, passed on the left the
dilapidated walls of the Fort and the shed of mingled wood and masonry
which then bore the name of the Castle de St. Louis; passed on the right
the old house of Couillard and the site of Laval's new Seminary, and soon
reached the square betwixt the Jesuit College and the Cathedral.
The bells were ringing in a frenzy of welcome. Laval in pontificals,
surrounded by priests and Jesuits, stood waiting to receive the Deputy of
the King, and as he greeted Tracy and offered him the holy water, he
looked with anxious curiosity to see what manner of man he was. The signs
were auspicious. The deportment of the Lieutenant-General left nothing to
desire. A prie-dieu had been placed for him. He declined it. They
offered him a cushion, but he would not have it, and fevered as he was, he
knelt on the bare pavement with a devotion that edified every beholder.
Te Deum was sung and a day of rejoicing followed. [83]
In our day, we can recall but one pageant at all equal: the roar of
cannon, &c., attending the advent of the great Earl of Durham, [84] but
there were noticeable fewer "priests," fewer "Jesuits," and less
"kneeling" in the procession. There was something oriental in the vice-
regal pageantry. Line-of-battle ships - stately frigates, twelve in number
- the Malabar, Hastings, Cornwallis, Inconstant, Hercules,
Pique, Charybdis, Pearl, Vestal, Medea, Dee and Andromache
visited that summer our shores, a suitable escort to the able, proud,
humane, [85] but unlucky Viceroy and High Commissioner, with his clever
advisers - the Turtons, Bullers, Wakefields, Hansomes, Derbyshires,
Dunkins, cum multis aliis.
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