( 128 ) 



but even of rendering it more flourilhing, and iof 

 thatpurpofe to make fome French fettlements iri 

 proper places, where it would be eafy to affembfe the 

 Indians, at jfeaft for certain feafons of the year. By 

 this means, this vaft country would be infenfibly 

 filled with inhabitants, and perhaps, this is the only- 

 method by which that projed which the court has 

 fo long had at heart of Frenchifying the Indians, 

 that is the term they make ufe of, could be brought 

 about. I believe, I may at lead affirm, that if 

 this method had been followed, Canada would have 

 been at prefent much better peopled than it is ; that 

 the Indians drawn and kept together by the com- 

 forts and conveniencies of life* which they would 

 have found in our fettlements, would not have been 

 fo miferable, nor fo much addicted to a wandering 

 life, and confequently their numbers would have 

 encreafed, whereas they have diminifhed at a fur- 

 prifing rare, and would have attached themfelves to 

 us in fuch a manner that we might now have dif- 

 pofed of them as of the fubjects of the crown ; be- 

 fides, that the milTionaries would have had fewer 

 obftacles to encounter with in their converiion. 

 "What we now fee at Loretto, and amongft a fmall 

 proportion of the Iroquoife, Algonquins, and Abe- 

 naquis, fettled in the colony, leaves no room to 

 doubt the truth of what I have advanced, and there 

 are none of thofe who have had the greater! inter- 

 courfe with the Indians, who do not agree, that 

 thefe people are not to be depended on, when they 

 are not Chriftians. I want no other example, but 

 that of the Abenaquis, who, though far from be- 

 ing numerous, have been during the two laft wars 

 the chief bulwark of New France againft New 

 England, 



Befides 



