BEAVER AND CANADIAN HISTORY 185 



later, there is another account of a poor woman 

 eighty years of age whose son had been slain, 

 sending in her little offering of " six beaver skins 

 in order to have prayers offered to God for his 

 soul." 



It appears that the beaver skins caused serious 

 difficulties to the priests, who were practically 

 forced to use them as money and in many other 

 ways. Apparently private persons were unable to 

 send the skins to France, in fact they could not 

 dispose of them for shipment except through the 

 French company, which had such unlimited powers 

 and which presumably did not pay anything like 

 the price offered in Europe, so that the Jesuits 

 were forced to lose heavily in the transaction. 

 Father Le Jeune writes very strongly on this 

 question, and I quote rather fully from him as his 

 account has a direct bearing on the beaver and the 

 way in which the use and sale of the skins crept in 

 to all the dealings between France and Canada. 

 He begins with the statement, " The 7th general 

 congregation of our Society which absolutely for- 

 bids all kinds of commerce and business under any 

 pretext whatever," and further on, " Some of our 

 Fathers send me word that we must not even look 

 at from the corners of our eyes, or touch with ends 

 of our ringers, the skins of any of these animals 

 which are of great value here ; what can be the 

 cause of this advice ? " He then relates how they 

 have been slandered in France and says, " Peltry is 



