1642.] ARRIVAL OF THE COLONISTS. 207 



real, — of these who bestowed their wealth, and, 

 far more, of these who sacrificed their peace and 

 risked their lives, on an enterprise at once so ro- 

 mantic and so devout] Surrounded as they were 

 with illusions, false lights, and false shadows, — 

 breathing an atmosphere of miracle, — compassed 

 about with angels " and devils, — urged with stimu- 

 lants most powerful, though unreal, — their minds 

 drugged, as it were, to preternatural excitement, — 

 it is very difficult to judge of them. High merit, 

 without doubt, there was in some of their num- 

 ber ; but one may beg to be spared the attempt 

 to measure or define it. To estimate a virtue 

 involved in conditions so anomalous demands, per- 

 haps, a judgment more than human. 



The Roman Church, sunk in disease and corrup- 

 tion when the Reformation began, was roused by 

 that fierce trumpet-blast to purge and brace herself 

 anew. Unable to advance, she drew back to the 

 fresher and comparatively purer life of the past ; 

 and the fervors of mediaeval Christianity were re- 

 newed in the sixteenth century. In many of its 

 aspects, this enterprise of Montreal belonged to the 

 time of the first Crusades. The spirit of Godfrey 

 de Bouillon lived again in Chomedey de Maison- 

 neuve ; and in Marguerite Bourgeoys was realized 

 that fair ideal of Christian womanhood, a flower of 

 Earth expanding in the rays of Heaven, which 

 soothed with gentle influence the wildness of a 

 barbarous age. 



On the seventeenth of May, 1642, Maisonneuve's 

 little flotilla — a pinnace, a flat-bottomed craft moved 



