ther it were
by the side of Blanche of Castile, attacked by the rebellious nobles, or
in the terrible holocaust of Crecy; whether it were in the _fight of the
giants_ at Marignan, or after Pavia during the captivity of the
_roi-gentilhomme_; everywhere where country and religion appealed to
their defenders one was sure of hearing shouted in the foremost ranks
the motto of the Montmorencys: _"Dieu ayde au premier baron chretien!"_

Young Laval received at the baptismal font the name of the heroic
missionary to the Indies, Francois-Xavier. To this saint and to the
founder of the Franciscans, Francois d'Assise, he devoted throughout his
life an ardent worship. Of his youth we hardly know anything except the
misfortunes which happened to his family. He was only fourteen years old
when, in 1636, he suffered the loss of his father, and one of his near
kinsmen, Henri de Montmorency, grand marshal of France, and governor of
Languedoc, beheaded by the order of Richelieu. The bravery displayed by
this valiant warrior in battle unfortunately did not redeem the fault
which he had committed in rebelling against the established power,
against his lawful master, Louis XIII, and in neglecting thus the
traditions handed down to him by his family through more than seven
centuries of glory.

Some historians reproach Richelieu with cruelty, but in that troublous
age when, hardly free from the wars of religion, men rushed carelessly
on into the rebellions of the duc d'Orleans and the duc de Soissons,
into the conspiracies of Chalais, of Cinq-Mars and de Thou, soon
followed by the war of La Fronde, it was not by an indulgence synonymous
with weakness that it was possible to strengthen the royal power. Who
knows if it was not this energy of the great cardinal which inspired the
young Francois, at an age when sentiment is so deeply impressed upon the
soul, with those ideas of firmness which distinguished him later on?

The future Bishop of Quebec was then a scholar in the college of La
Fleche, directed by the Jesuits, for his pious parents held nothing
dearer than the education of their children in the fear of God and love
of the good. They had had six children; the two first had perished in
the flower of their youth on fields of battle; Francois, who was now the
eldest, inherited the name and patrimony of Montigny, which he gave up
later on to his brother Jean-Louis, which explains why he was called for
some time Abbe de Montigny, and resum