ne of which more than five
hundred soldiers had been crowded together. As might have been
expected, sickness was not long in breaking out among them; more than
one hundred and fifty of these unfortunates died, and their bodies were
cast into the sea.

Immediately after his arrival the grand vicar visited all the religious
establishments of the town, and he observed everywhere so much harmony
and good spirit that he could not pass it over in silence. Speaking with
admiration of the seminary, he said: "Every one in it devoted himself to
spiritual meditation, with such blessed results that from the youngest
cleric to the highest ecclesiastics in holy orders each one brought of
his own accord all his personal possessions to be used in common. It
seemed to me then that I saw revived in the Church of Canada something
of that spirit of unworldliness which constituted one of the principal
beauties of the budding Church of Jerusalem in the time of the
apostles." The examples of brotherly unity and self-effacement which he
admired so much in others he also set himself: he placed in the library
of the seminary a magnificent collection of books which he had brought
with him, and deposited in the coffers of the house several thousand
francs in money, his personal property. Braving the rigours of the
season, he set out in the winter of 1685 and visited the shore of
Beaupre, the Island of Orleans, and then the north shore as far as
Montreal. In the spring he took another direction, and inspected all
the missions of Gaspesia and Acadia. He was so well satisfied with the
condition of his diocese that he wrote to Mgr. de Laval: "All that I
regret is that there is no more good for me to do in this Church."

In the spring of this same year, 1686, a valiant little troop was making
a more warlike pastoral visit. To seventy robust Canadians, commanded by
d'Iberville, de Sainte-Helene and de Maricourt, all sons of Charles Le
Moyne, the governor had added thirty good soldiers under the orders of
MM. de Troyes, Duchesnil and Catalogne, to take part in an expedition
for the capture of Hudson Bay from the English. Setting out on
snowshoes, dragging their provisions and equipment on toboggans, then
advancing, sometimes on foot, sometimes in bark canoes, they penetrated
by the Ottawa River and Temiskaming and Abitibi Lakes as far as James
Bay. They did not brave so many dangers and trials without being
resolved to conquer or die; accordingly, in sp