CHAP. XXXI. JESUIT MISSIONS. 171 



again, and among tlie young who have never camped in the 

 woods, the feeling grows until it becomes a passion, which 

 must be gratified at any risk, and in spite of any loss. 



The Eoman Cathohc missionaries in former times, and 

 to a certain extent at the present day, supported them- 

 selves by exacting furs from the Indians in compensa- 

 tion for their services, and their teaching was confined to 

 rehgion. Charles Tache the elder, in his evidence before 

 the committee of the House of Assembly of Lower Canada 

 in 1824, states that 'it appears from the reports of the 

 Indians, that the Jesuits who went to settle at Lake St. 

 John in the reign of Louis XIV., at wliich time the 

 Montagnais nation was in its highest prosperity, were 

 six in number ; that they liad settled there under pretence 

 of diffusing Christianity among the Indians. They only 

 cultivated the soil for the wants of their settlement. They 

 prevailed on almost all the Indians to become Christians, 

 and had the greatest influence over them.' In a very 

 satirical strain Mr. Taclie continues : ' All was well for 

 some years, but the Company of the Indies having per- 

 ceived that the reverend fathers, with rosaries, small 

 crosses, relics, and an abundance of prayers, procured 

 more furs, and of a quality superior to that of those 

 which the Company could purchase with merchandise 

 which they imported at great expense from Europe, 

 succeeded in sending the reverend fathers to sell their 

 merchandise elsewhere.' * 



The origin of the Jesuit missions in Canada is in keep- 

 ing with the customs and modes of thinking common at 



* Appendix. Leg. Ass. Lower Canada, 1823-24. 



