120 THE FRENCH BLOOD IN AMERICA 



main in Quebec, and permitted them their religious lib- 

 erty — an example which the Jesuit fathers, whom he per- 

 mitted to say mass, never reciprocated when they were in 

 . power. It is significant, also, that it was a Huguenot, 

 Emery de Caen, who was made the agent of France to re- 

 ceive back her American province. The truth seems to 

 be that the Huguenots were men of such ability and trust- 

 worthiness that they were chosen when public service de- 

 manding highest integrity and capacity was to be ren- 

 dered. We are constantly reminded of the fact that 

 France lost her best blood when her Protestant subjects 

 were massacred or exiled. They were the people who 

 had convictions and courage, capacitj^ and character such 

 as make nations powerful and influential. And while 

 New France was to cease to exist, the best of Old France 

 was to enter into the making of the New World. The 

 religious bigotry and crime and folly of the leaders of one 

 nation, inspired by a hierarchy as pitiless as it has ever 

 been shortsighted and grasping, were to contribute ele- 

 ments of inestimable value to other nations, particularly 

 to that new one that was destined to be the wonder of 

 them all. 

 1633, Canada May 23, 1633, was a decisive day for New France. On 



Catholic that day Champlain, again appointed governor, received 



the keys of the fort of Quebec from the Huguenot de Ca^n, 

 and from that hour Canada was closed to the Huguenot as 

 a colonist. None but Roman Catholic Frenchmen could 

 acquire permanent residence. Dr. Baird is undoubtedly 

 right when he says : "In this prohibition, religious in- 

 tolerance pronounced the doom of the French colonial 

 system in America. The exclusion of the Huguenots 

 France's from Ncw Fraucc was one of the most stupendous blunders 



Blunder " that history records. The repressive policy pursued by 

 the French government for the next fifty years, culminat- 

 ing in the Revocation of the Edict of Nantes, tended more 

 and more to awaken and to strengthen among the Protes- 

 tants a disposition to emigrate to foreign lands. Industri- 



