NOTES.

EXPLANATORY NOTES.

THE CAPTURED FLAG.

The incident described in these verses took place during the unsuccessful siege of Quebec by Admiral Sir William Phipps, in 1690. Admiral Phipps, after capturing Port Royal, now Annapolis, Nova Scotia, sailed up the St. Lawrence, in October, arriving at Quebec on the 5th. Frontenac, then Governor of New France, was taken almost by surprise, yet, when summoned to surrender, he haughtily refused to do so, using the words attributed to him in the ballad. Phipps was beaten off, leaving with the French the cannon of his troops and this flag, which had been shot away, and which was picked up by a Canadian, who swam out after it. A medal was struck in France, and a church erected in Quebec, in honor of this victory.

PÈRE BROSSE.

A full account of this pious legend will be found in Mr. J. Lemoine's Chronicles of the St. Lawrence, pages 242, 243, and 244. Father de La Brosse was, at the time of his death, a priest at Tadousac, at the mouth of the Saguenay, and about seventy miles below the Isle aux Coudres, where he celebrated the first mass, in 1765. He died at midnight, on the 11th April, 1782, and, so says the legend, his death was preceded and followed by miraculous occurrences. He is said to have foretold it, and to have bidden his people seek Père Compain on the Isle aux Coudres, and bring him to perform the funeral offices. There would be a storm, which they were not to heed, for he guaranteed them against harm, and they were to find Père Compain awaiting them. All came true: Père Brosse was found dead at midnight with his head on the altar of his chapel; the men set out, and though the waves rolled mountains high on every side, there was peace where their canoe floated. They found Père Compain awaiting them, for he had been supernaturally informed of his colleague's death, and he went with them to Tadousac. All the bells of the missions where Père Brosse had labored are said to have been rung without hands that night.

L'ORDRE DE BON TEMPS.

This company of Bon Vivants was formed in 1606, during the sojourn of Champlain and de Poutrincourt at Port Royal. An account of its organization and doings will be found in Parkman's Champlain and His Associates, Chapter iv.

CHAMPLAIN.

This poem is a resumé of the life of him whom Parkman calls "The Æneas of a destined people." "Yon fair town" alludes to Quebec, which Champlain founded July 3rd, 1608. His defiance of Admiral Kirkt took place in 1628, and was successful for a season, but a second summons from Kirkt next summer led to the first surrender of Canada to England. Champlain died on Christmas Day, 1635, after twenty-seven years of labor for the country in which his name can never be forgotten.

THE PRIEST AND THE MINISTER.

In the opening paragraphs of the third chapter of Parkman's Champlain and His Associates, will be found an account, of which these verses are little more than a paraphrase. When de Monts was commissioned to settle New France, the Roman Catholic clergy insisted that they be given charge of the souls of the heathen in the new land. De Monts was, himself, a Huguenot, and brought his own ministers with him, so that the ship that sailed to Acadia in 1604 bore with it clergy of both sects. This was the cause of ceaseless quarrels. "I have seen our curé and the minister," says Champlain, "fall to with their fists on questions of faith. I cannot say which had the more pluck, or which hit the harder; but I know the minister complained to the Sieur de Monts that he had been beaten." Sagard, the Franciscan friar, gives an account of the death of two of the disputants and of their burial in one grave. I have taken the liberty of making them the central figures of the dispute, though, actually, they were subordinates.

PILOT.

Pilot was one of a number of dogs sent from France to Montreal shortly after its foundation, in order to assist the brave colonists in their warfare with the savages. She and her offspring were invaluable in detecting ambuscades. An account of her useful life will be found in Parkman's Jesuits in North America, chap. xviii.

THE SECRET OF THE SAGUENAY.

Although one legend, and, perhaps, the best substantiated one, asserts that Roberval was assassinated in Paris, there is another to the effect that, fired by the recitals of Cartier of untold wealth to be found in the Saguenay district, he sailed up the river of that name, and was never heard of again. This legend will be found in the Illustrated History of Canada.

JULES' LETTER.

The date of this letter would be about 1670. From 1665 to 1673, bachelors in Canada underwent a martyrdom of great severity, and Jules' fear lest he find himself married in spite of himself is hardly an exaggeration. From 1665 to 1673, about one thousand girls were sent out from France to find husbands in Canada. Each couple married was given an ox, a cow, a pair of swine, a pair of fowls, two barrels of salted meat, and eleven crowns in money. Girls under sixteen and youths under twenty were given twenty livres when they married, and were encouraged to marry at fourteen and eighteen respectively. To such an extent was this rage for marriage carried that, it is said, a widow was married before her first husband's body had been consigned to the grave. Large bounties were paid to parents having from ten to fifteen children, and the slightest sign of courtship between the unmarried officers and ladies of Quebec and Montreal, was chronicled in official documents and transmitted to France. For further particulars, the reader is referred to Parkman's The Old Regime in Canada, chapter xiii.

THE OAK.

The two villages referred to are Hochelaga and Ville Marie, now Montreal. The latter place was founded by Maisonneuve in 1642. In Sir William Dawson's Fossil Men is a picture of Hochelaga as seen by Cartier, with an oak tree near it. This oak is sketched from one in the McGill University grounds, and it needs but a little stretch of the imagination to consider them identical, though actually this is not so. The poem traces the history of Montreal from its foundation up to the present time. Jacques Cartier's visit was made in October, 1535, when he was well received by the Hochelagans. When Champlain came, in 1611, Hochelaga had disappeared. The reference to the flood occurs again in "Nelson's Appeal for Maisonneuve." The incident took place in 1642, and Maisonneuve actually fulfilled his vow and bore a heavy cross to the mountain top, where it was planted. Dollard, with seventeen Frenchmen and fifty Indians, by heroic self-sacrifice, in 1660, saved Canada from destruction by the Iroquois. Vaudreuil surrendered Canada to the English on September 8th, 1760. He had been driven to Montreal, and was surrounded by 17,000 men, under General Amherst. The Americans took Montreal in 1775, and were defeated at Chateauguay, October 26th, 1813, and at Chrysler's Farm, November 11th, of the same year. In both cases, the Canadians were greatly outnumbered.

NELSON'S APPEAL FOR MAISONNEUVE.

This is supposed to be spoken by Horatio, Lord Nelson, whose statue, standing on Jacques Cartier Square, by the magnificent river St. Lawrence, is, with the exception of the bronze image of our Queen, the only one in the city of Montreal. In five years, Montreal will see its 250th anniversary. Shall it be said that we have forgotten its founder, when that day comes? The pages of Parkman may again be referred to for an explanation of any points in this poem. The Jesuits in North America, chapter xv., contains a long account of the foundation of Montreal, and subsequent pages chronicle the life of Maisonneuve.

THE SPIRIT WIFE.

This is a free paraphrase of a prose tale by Israel G. Owen.

LACHINE.

Misled by the information given him by the Indians, and also by the size of the St. Lawrence, Jacques Cartier [La Salle?] gave to Lachine its present name, thinking that by it a western passage to China was possible. The Canadian Pacific Railway has furnished this passage by land, and now a large portion of China's merchandise comes overland to Montreal for shipment to Europe.

DE SALABERRY AT CHATEAUGUAY.

During the Anglo-American War of 1812, the brunt of the fighting fell upon the Canadian Volunteers, and one of their most notable exploits is that which I have striven to portray in this poem. Hearing of the advance of the Americans, De Salaberry, with 400 Voltigeurs, entrenched himself at the junction of the Chateauguay and Outarde rivers, not many miles from Montreal. On the morning of October the 26th, this little band of heroes was attacked by 3,500 Americans. In spite of the most determined bravery, the Canadians would have been overcome by sheer force of numbers, but for the ruse described in the poem, assisted by a rapid discharge of musketry from new ambuscades. The Americans withdrew, and Lower Canada was saved.

TENNYSON.

This poem was written shortly after the appearance of "Sixty Years After," by Lord Tennyson, and while the critics on both sides of the Atlantic were, for the most part, tearing him to pieces.

A GREATER THAN HE.

Glooskap is to the Penobscot Indians much what Hiawatha was to those of Longfellow's wonderful poem. He is supposed to be making arrows in a long hut, waiting for the time, when, like Barbarossa, he shall come to save his countrymen. The only time that he was defeated was when he strove to conquer a baby. The story will be found in C. G. Leland's Algonquin Legends.

DAUNTLESS.

This is a true episode of the Hungarian rebellion of 1849. The young man's name was Ferenz Renyi, and he died recently in the asylum at Buda-Pesth. Haynau was attacked in Barclay's Brewery, London, in 1850, for cruelties of this kind, and barely escaped with his life from the infuriated employes.