n could create a law, and the stroke of the King's pen annul
it. Laws are passed forbidding men, who are not nobles, assuming the
title of Esquire or Sieur on penalty of what would be a $500 fine. "Wood
is not to be piled on the streets." "Chimneys are to be built large
enough to admit a chimney sweep." "Only shingles of oak and walnut may
be used in towns where there is danger of fire." Swearing is punished by
fines, by the disgrace of being led through the streets at the end of a
rope and begging pardon on knees at the church steps, by branding if the
offense be repeated. Murderers are punished by being shot, or exposed in
an iron cage on the cliffs above the St. Lawrence till death {122} comes.
No detail is too small for the Sovereign Council's notice. In fact, a
case is on record where a Mademoiselle Andre is expelled from the colony
for flirting so outrageously with young officers that she demoralizes the
garrison. Mademoiselle avoids the punishment by bribing one of the
officers on the ship where she is placed, and escaping to land in man's
clothing.

The people of New France were regulated in every detail of their lives by
the Church as well as the Sovereign Council. For trading brandy to the
Indians, Bishop Laval thunders excommunication at delinquents; and Bishop
St. Valliere, his successor, publicly rebukes the dames of New France for
wearing low-necked dresses, and curling their hair, and donning gay
ribbons in place of bonnets. "The vanity of dress among women becomes a
greater scandal than before," he complains. "They affect immodest
headdress, with heads uncovered or only concealed under a collection of
ribbons, laces, curls, and other vanities."

[Illustration: LAVAL (After the portrait in Laval University, Quebec)]

The laws came from the King and Sovereign Council. The enforcement of
them depended on the Intendant. As long as he was a man of integrity,
New France might live as happily as a family under a despotic but wise
father. It was when the Intendant became corrupt that the system fell to
pieces. {123} Of all the intendants of New France, one name stands
preeminent, that of Jean Talon, who came to Canada, aged forty, in 1665,
at the time the country became a Crown Province. One of eleven children
of Irish origin, Talon had been educated at the Jesuit College of Paris,
and had served as an intendant in France before coming to Canada.
Officially he was to stand between the King and