1642.] M. PUISEAUX. 203 



the Governor of Quebe,c, Montmagny, saw a rival 

 governor in Maisonneuve. Every means was used 

 to persuade the adventurers to abandon their pro- 

 ject, and settle at Quebec. Montmagny called a 

 council of the principal persons of his colony, who 

 gave it as their opinion that the new-comers had 

 better exchange Montreal for the Island of Orleans, 

 where they would be in a position to give and 

 receive succor ; wiiile, by persisting in their first 

 design, they would expose themselves to destruc- 

 tion, and be of use to nobody.^ Maisonneuve, who 

 was present, expressed his surprise that they should 

 assume to direct his affairs. " I have not come 

 here," he said, " to deliberate, but to act. It is my 

 duty and my honor to found a colony at Montreal ; 

 and I would go, if every tree were an Iroquois ! " ^ 

 At Quebec there was little ability and no incli- 

 nation to shelter the new colonists for the winter ; 

 and they would have fared ill, but for the generos- 

 ity of M. Puiseaux, who lived not far distant, at a 

 place called St. Michel. This devout and most 

 hospitable person made room for them all in his 

 rough, but capacious dwelling. Their neighbors 

 were the hospital nuns, then living at the mission 

 of Sillery, in a substantial, but comfortless house of 

 stone ; where, amidst destitution, sickness, and ir- 

 repressible disgust at the filth of the savages whom 

 they had in charge, they were laboring day and 

 night with devoted assiduity. Among the minor 



1 Juchereau, 32 ; Faillon, Colonie Frangaise, I. 423. 



2 La Tour, Memoire de Laval, Liv. VIII; Belmont, Histoire du Ca- 

 nada, 8. 



