Having Realized A Large
Fortune In The West Indies, He Had Followed Champlain To Canada, Bent On
Devoting His Wealth To The Conversion Of The Aboriginal Tribes.
His manor
stood, according to the Abbe Ferland, on that spot in St Michael's Cove on
which the St. Michael's Hotel [175] - long kept by Mr. W. Scott - was
subsequently built, to judge from the heavy foundation walls there.
Such
was the magnificence of the structure that it was reckoned "the gem of
Canada' - "Une maison regardee dans le temps comme le bijou du Canada,"
says the old chronicler. Paul de Chomedey de Maisonneuve having arrived,
in 1641, with colonists for Montreal, the laird of Ste. Foye [176]
generously tendered him the use of his manor. Under the hospitable roof of
this venerable old gentleman, M. de Maisonneuve, Mlle. Mance, the founder
of the Hotel Dieu Hospital at Montreal, and Mdme. de la Peltrie spent the
winter of 1641-2, whilst the intended colonists [177] for Ville-Marie were
located close by in the Sillery settlement. During the winter, dissensions
took place between the future Governor of Montreal, M. de Maisonneuve, and
the then present Governor of Quebec, Chevalier de Montmagny. It appears
that on a certain festival a small cannon and also fifteen musket shots
had been fired without authority; His Excellency Governor Montmagny, in
high dudgeon at such a breach of military discipline, ordered Jean Gorry,
the person who had fired the shots, to be put in irons; Mlle. Mance had
furnished the powder for this military display The future Governor of
Montreal, Monsieur de Maisonneuve, is said to have, on this occasion,
publicly exclaimed:
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