198 ROYAL SOCIETY OF CANADA 



FlEURY MeSPLET, THE FIRST PRINTER AT MONTREAL.^ 



Printing, it may be claimed, was introduced into Canada in three 

 well defined instalments; all truly original, catering, as they did, for 

 widely divergent classes as well as sections of the country. Each in 

 its own' way is a record making epoch, as it marked the beginning of — 

 aye, rather introduced the means of awakening — literary instincts 

 amongst those of different thoughts and aspirations. 



The first of these dates back to 1751, when Bartholomew Green, 

 son of the man who printed the first American newspaper, came from 

 Boston and set up a press in Halifax, the newly founded capital of 

 Xova Scotia. He died a few months after his arrival, but his place 

 was taken by John Burshell who, in March, 1752, commenced the 

 Halifax Gazette, the first Canadian newspaper. 



The second of these epochs was introduced by the firm of Brown 

 & Gilmore, which came from Philadelphia in 1764, and opened up 

 an establishment in Quebec, to print the Quebec Gazette, and other 

 official matter for the government organized under British auspices. 

 As this publication set out more especially to supply the English ele- 

 ment and British interests, although printed in both languages, the 

 French being mainly translations, the whole tone was English in idiom 

 and thought. 



The third introduction, notwithstanding having come twenty-five 

 years later than the first, was even more important for ever since, nay, 

 even some years before they came under British rule, the " new sub- 

 jects," as they were then called, had been altogether isolated from 

 La Mère patne. In the meantime, having been accorded a greater 

 measure of liberty than they had hitherto enjoyed, they began to 

 develop in a different direction. Thus the two French-spealdng peo- 

 |;les grew wider and wider apart so that, after sixteen years of this 

 separation, the Canadian section was found without an indigenous liter- 

 ature — it never had a press of its own — voicing its own thoughts 

 and aspirations, or the means of developing and recording such ten- 

 dencies. Thus it was, that, when Mesplet came to Montreal and set 

 lip his press, although under the auspices of the high priest of their 

 erstwhile enemies — the hated Bastonnais — he, as one speaking their 

 own language and one who could reproduce in print their own senti- 

 ments, was welcomed by the people with open arms. 



Although very little has been recorded of Mesplet's early history, 

 yet, having come across a number of documents bearing on his sojourn 

 in Canada and the difficulties with which he had to contend as a pioneer 

 printer out of sympathy with the government, I reproduce them here 



