6 NOTRE-DAME DES ANGES. [1634. 



and maize.' De None had charge of the eight 

 or ten workmen employed by the mission, who 

 gave him at times no little trouble by their repin- 

 ings and complaints.^ They were forced to hear 

 mass every morning and prayers every evening, 

 besides an exhortation on Sunday. Some of them 

 were for returning home, while two or three, of a 

 different complexion, wished to be Jesuits them- 

 selves. The Fathers, in their intervals of leisure, 

 worked with their men, spade in hand. For the 

 rest, they were busied in preaching, singing ves- 

 pers, saying mass and hearing confessions at the 

 fort of Quebec, catechizing a few Indians, and 

 striving to master the enormous difS.culties of the 

 Huron and Algonquin languages. 



Well might Father Le Jeune write to his Su- 

 perior, " The harvest is plentiful, and the laborers 

 few." These men aimed at the conversion of a 

 continent. From then- hovel on the St. Charles. 

 they surveyed a field of labor whose vastness might 

 tire the wings of thought itself; a scene repellent 

 and appalling, darkened with omens of peril and 

 woe. They were an advance-guard of the great 

 army of Loyola, strong in a discipline that con- 



1 " Le p. Masse, que je nomme quelquefois en riant le Pere Utile, est 

 bien cognu de V. R. II a soin des choses domestiques et du bestail que 

 nous avons, en quoy il a tres-bien reussy." — Lettre du P. Paul le Jeune 

 an R. P. Provincial, in Carayon, 122. — Le Jeune does not fail to send an 

 inventory of the " bestail " to his Superior, namely : " Deux grosses truies 

 qui nourissent chacune quatre petits cochons, deux vaches, deux petites 

 genisses, et un petit taureau." 



'^ The methodical Le Jeune sets down the causes of their discontent 

 under six different heads, each duly numbered. Thus : — 



'* 1°. C'est le naturel des artisans de se plaindre et de gronder." 



" 2°. La diversite des gages les fait murmurer," etc. 



