Attempts Were Made To Establish Settlements, But The Natives Proved
Unfriendly; The Foreigners Had Not A Sufficient Force To Subdue Them;
And, As De Monts Was Obliged To Return To France, De Poutrincourt And
His Companions Established Themselves Again At Port Royal.
Here, to
while away the long winter, the gay adventurers established a burlesque
court, which they christened "L'Ordre de Bon Temps"; and of the merry
realm each of the fifteen principal persons of the colony became supreme
ruler in turn.
As the Grand Master's sway lasted but a day, each one, as
he assumed that august position, prided himself on doing his utmost to
eclipse his predecessor in lavish provision for feasting. Forests were
scoured for game; fish were brought from the tempest-tossed waters of
the Bay, or speared through the ice of L'Équille; so the table fairly
groaned with the luxuries of these winter revelers in the wilds of
Acadia. With ludicrous caricature of court ceremonial, the rulers of
the feast marched to the table, where their invited guests, the Indian
chiefs, sat with them around the board; the squaws and children
squatting on the floor, watching for bits which the lively company now
and then tossed to them. "They say" that an aged sachem, when dying,
asked if he should have pies in heaven as good as those which he had
eaten at Poutrincourt's table!
To the Indians, the greatest delicacy of all on the table was bread.
This, to them a dainty viand, they were always ready to consume with
gusto; but were invariably averse to grinding the corn, although
promised half of the meal as recompense for their labor. The grinding
was performed with a hand-mill, and consequently so laborious and
tedious that the savages would rather suffer hunger than submit to such
drudgery, which they also seemed to think degrading to the free sons of
the forest.
Proverbially fickle are princes; and of this De Monts was convinced on
his return to France, for during his absence he had lost favor with his
sovereign, Henry IV., who revoked his commission; still he succeeded,
after many difficulties, in procuring supplies for his colony, and
arrived just in time to prevent his people from leaving Port Royal
discouraged and disheartened. One member of the little community of
Frenchmen was Lescarbot, a lawyer, who was talented, poetical, and did
much to enliven the others during the absence of their leader, who, on
his return, was received by a procession of masqueraders, headed by
Neptune and tritons, reciting verses written by Lescarbot. Over the
entrances to the fort and to the Governor's apartments were suspended
wreaths of laurel and garlands surrounding Latin mottoes, - all the work
of the pastimist (if one may coin such a word). The relief and
encouragement brought by De Monts were but temporary, and in the spring
(1606) news was received that nothing more could be sent to the
colonists, and they must be disbanded.
Imagination portrays the strange picture presented at this time in this
remote region, the gay French courtiers vanishing from the sight of
their Indian comrades almost as suddenly and mysteriously as they had
appeared but three years before, and leaving their dusky boon companions
lamenting on the shore. The eyes of the savages - that race who pride
themselves on their stoicism - were actually dimmed with tears as they
watched the vessel fading away in the distance.
For four years "ye gentle sauvage" pursued the even tenor of his way,
and consoled himself as best he could for the absence of the lively
revelers who had cheered his solitude; then, presumably to his delight
(in 1610), he saw Poutrincourt returning. That nobleman had promised the
king to exert himself for the conversion of the Indians. Three years
later a company of Jesuits sailed for this port with the same object in
view; but, losing their reckoning, they founded settlements at Mt.
Desert instead.
Madame de Guercheville, a true woman indeed, who was honored and
respected in a dissolute court where honor was almost unknown, had
become a zealous advocate of the conversion of Indians in America; and
through her means and influence several priests of the Jesuit order were
sent out in 1612 to this settlement. The sachems, with members of their
tribes living at Port Royal, were baptized, twenty-one at one time, with
much show of rejoicing typified by firing of cannon, waving of banners,
blaring of trumpets. 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.
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