e austerity of their rule.] and the little farm of Louis Hebert.
The Recollets first came to New France in 1615, and began at once
by language study to prepare for their work among the Montagnais and
Hurons. It was a stipulation of the viceroy that six of them should
be supported by the company, and in the absence of parish priests they
ministered to the ungodly hangers-on of the fur trade as well as to the
Indians. Louis Hebert and his admirable family were very dear to the
Fathers. In 1617 all the buildings which had been erected at Quebec
lay by the water's edge. Hebert was the first to make a clearing on the
heights. His first domain covered less than ten acres, but it was well
tilled. He built a stone house, which was thirty-eight feet by nineteen.
Besides making a garden, he planted apple-trees and vines. He also
managed to support some cattle. When one considers what all this means
in terms of food and comfort, it may be guessed that the fur traders,
wintering down below on salt pork and smoked eels, must have felt much
respect for the farmer in his stone mansion on the cliff.

We have from Champlain's own lips a valuable statement as to the
condition of things at Quebec in 1627, the year when Louis Hebert died.
'We were in all,' he says, 'sixty-five souls, including men, women, and
children.' Of the sixty-five only eighteen were adult males fit for
hard work, and this small number must be reduced to two or three if we
include only the tillers of the soil. Besides these, a few adventurous
spirits were away in the woods with the Indians, learning their language
and endeavouring to exploit the beaver trade; but twenty years after the
founding of Quebec the French in Canada, all told, numbered less than
one hundred.

Contrast with this the state of Virginia fifteen years after the
settlement of Jamestown. 'By 1622,' says John Fiske, 'the population
of Virginia was at least 4000, the tobacco fields were flourishing
and lucrative, durable houses had been built and made comfortable with
furniture brought from England, and the old squalor was everywhere
giving way to thrift. The area of colonization was pushed up the James
River as far as Richmond.'

This contrast is not to be interpreted to the personal disadvantage of
Champlain. The slow growth and poverty of Quebec were due to no fault of
his. It is rather the measure of his greatness that he was undaunted by
disappointment and unembittered by the pettiness of spir