In The Centre Of A Diamond-Shaped Figure, Made Up Of
Scores Of Sabres Pointing Inwards, Was A Large Glittering Star Of
Silvery Steel Bayonets.
In chronological order were pink and gilt
tablets, containing each one the names of the Lieutenant-Governors of
Canada,
Commencing with Carleton, in 1775, and proceeding through the
noble list, which includes Haldimand, Dorchester, Dalhousie, Gosford,
Colborne, Durham, Sydenham, Bagot, Cathcart, Elgin, Head, Monk,
Lisgar, down to the present glorious epoch, when this prosperous
country is vice-regally and right royally presided over by Lord
Dufferin, in the year of grace, 1875 - on the opposite side of the
room, under a similar spiky coronet of bristling steel, was hung the
sword of the dead and vanquished, but honoured and revered hero, the
trusty blade which only left Montgomery's hands, when in his death-
throes he 'like a soldier fell,' and the pitiless snow became his
winding-sheet. On a table below this interesting and valuable historic
relic, now in possession, as an heirloom, of J. Thompson Harrower,
Esq., of this city, was exhibited the full uniform of an artillery
officer of the year 1775. Several quaint old sketches and paintings
were placed around the Library, which, with the Museum, was converted
for the time into an extempore conversazione hall, and while the
melodies of the 'B' Battery band were wafted hither and thither
through the building, the dames and cavaliers gossiped pleasantly over
their tea or coffee and delicacies provided by the members for the
guests, and declared, with much show of reason, that the Literary and
Historical Society's centennial entertainment was a red-letter day in
the annals of that learned and well-deserving body."
THE JESUITS' CHURCH.
This little church, of which the corner stone was laid by the Marquis de
Tracy, "Lieutenant du Roi, dans toutes ses possessions Francaises en
Amerique," on 31st May, 1666, existed until 1807. "It is built," says
Kalm, "in the form of a cross. It has a round steeple, and is the only
church that has a clock." The oldest inhabitant can yet recall, from
memory, the spot where it stood, even if we had not the excellent drawing
made of it with a half dozen of other Quebec views, by an officer in
Wolfe's fleet, Captain Richard Short. It stood on the site recently
occupied by the shambles, in the Upper Town, facing the Russell House.
Captain Short's pencil bears again testimony to the exactitude, even in
minute things, of Kalm's descriptions: his Quebec horses, harnessed one
before the other to carts. You see in front of the church, in Captain
Short's sketch, three good sized horses, harnessed one before the other,
drawing a heavily laden two-wheeled cart. The church was also used until
1807 as a place of worship for Protestants. Be careful not to confound the
Jesuits' Church with the small chapel in the interior of their college
(the old Jesuit Barracks) contiguous thereto. This latter chapel had been
commenced on the 11th July, 1650.
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