Parkman Vol. 5, Chapter 20

He was greatly beloved by the humbler classes, who, days before his death, beset the château, praising and lamenting him. Many of higher station shared the popular grief.

Our special project presenting the definitive account of France in Canada by Francis Parkman, one of America’s greatest historians.

Previously in Count Frontenac and New France under Louis XIV.

Chapter 20

In November, when the last ship had gone, and Canada was sealed from the world for half a year, a mortal illness fell upon the governor. On the twenty-second, he had strength enough to dictate his will, seated in an easy-chair in his chamber at the château. His colleague and adversary, Champigny, often came to visit him, and did all in his power to soothe his last moments. The reconciliation between them was complete. One of his Récollet friends, Father Olivier Goyer, administered extreme unction; and, on the afternoon of the twenty-eighth, he died, in perfect composure and full possession of his faculties. He was in his seventy-eighth year.

He was greatly beloved by the humbler classes, who, days before his death, beset the château, praising and lamenting him. Many of higher station shared the popular grief. “He was the love and delight of New France,” says one of them: “churchmen honored him for his piety, nobles esteemed him for his valor, merchants respected him for his equity, and the people loved him for his kindness.” [1] “He was the father of the poor,” says another, “the protector of the oppressed, and a perfect model of virtue and piety.” [2] An Ursuline nun regrets him as the friend and patron of her sisterhood, and so also does the superior of the Hôtel-Dieu. [3] His most conspicuous though not his bitterest opponent, the intendant Champigny, thus announced his death to the court: “I venture to send this letter by way of New England to tell you that Monsieur le Comte de Frontenac died on the twenty-eighth of last month, with the sentiments of a true Christian. After all the disputes we have had together, you will hardly believe, Monseigneur, how truly and deeply I am touched by his death. He treated me during his illness in a manner so obliging, that I should be utterly void of gratitude if I did not feel thankful to him.” [4]

[1: La Potherie, I. 244, 246.]

[2: Hennepin, 41 (1704). Le Clerc speaks to the same effect.]

[3: Histoire des Ursulines de Québec, I. 508; Juchereau, 378.]

[4: Champigny au Ministre, 22 Dec., 1698.]

As a mark of kind feeling, Frontenac had bequeathed to the intendant a valuable crucifix, and to Madame de Champigny a reliquary which he had long been accustomed to wear. For the rest, he gave fifteen hundred livres to the Récollets, to be expended in masses for his soul, and that of his wife after her death. To her he bequeathed all the remainder of his small property, and he also directed that his heart should be sent her in a case of lead or silver. [5] His enemies reported that she refused to accept it, saying that she had never had it when he was living, and did not want it when he was dead.

[5: Testament du Comte de Frontenac. I am indebted to Abbé Bois of Maskinongé for a copy of this will. Frontenac expresses a wish that the heart should be placed in the family tomb at the Church of St. Nicolas des Champs.]

On the Friday after his death, he was buried as he had directed, not in the cathedral, but in the church of the Récollets, a preference deeply offensive to many of the clergy. The bishop officiated; and then the Récollet, Father Goyer, who had attended his deathbed, and seems to have been his confessor, mounted the pulpit, and delivered his funeral oration. “This funeral pageantry,” exclaimed the orator, “this temple draped in mourning, these dim lights, this sad and solemn music, this great assembly bowed in sorrow, and all this pomp and circumstance of death, may well penetrate your hearts. I will not seek to dry your tears, for I cannot contain my own. After all, this is a time to weep, and never did people weep for a better governor.”

A copy of this eulogy fell into the hands of an enemy of Frontenac, who wrote a running commentary upon it. The copy thus annotated is still preserved at Quebec. A few passages from the orator and his critic will show the violent conflict of opinion concerning the governor, and illustrate in some sort, though with more force than fairness, the contradictions of his character: —

The Orator. “This wise man, to whom the Senate of Venice listened with respectful attention, because he spoke before them with all the force of that eloquence which you, Messieurs, have so often admired, — “

[Alluding to an incident that occurred when Frontenac commanded a Venetian force for the defense of Candia against the Turks.]

The Critic. “It was not his eloquence that they admired, but his extravagant pretensions, his bursts of rage, and his unworthy treatment of those who did not agree with him.”

The Orator. “This disinterested man, more busied with duty than with gain, — ”

The Critic. “The less said about that the better.”

The Orator. “Who made the fortune of others, but did not increase his own, — ”

The Critic. “Not for want of trying, and that very often in spite of his conscience and the king’s orders.”

The Orator. “Devoted to the service of his king, whose majesty he represented, and whose person he loved, — ”

The Critic. “Not at all. How often has he opposed his orders, even with force and violence, to the great scandal of everybody!”

The Orator. “Great in the midst of difficulties, by that consummate prudence, that solid judgment, that presence of mind, that breadth and elevation of thought, which he retained to the last moment of his life, — ”

The Critic. “He had in fact a great capacity for political maneuvers and tricks; but as for the solid judgment ascribed to him, his conduct gives it the lie, or else, if he had it, the vehemence of his passions often unsettled it. It is much to be feared that his presence of mind was the effect of an obstinate and hardened self-confidence by which he put himself above everybody and everything, since he never used it to repair, so far as in him lay, the public and private wrongs he caused. What ought he not to have done here, in this temple, to ask pardon for the obstinate and furious heat with which he so long persecuted the Church; upheld and even instigated rebellion against her; protected libertines, scandal-mongers, and creatures of evil life against the ministers of Heaven; molested, persecuted, vexed persons most eminent in virtue, nay, even the priests and magistrates, who defended the cause of God; sustained in all sorts of ways the wrongful and scandalous traffic in brandy with the Indians; permitted, approved, and supported the license and abuse of taverns; authorized and even introduced, in spite of the remonstrances of the servants of God, criminal and dangerous diversions; tried to decry the bishop and the clergy, the missionaries, and other persons of virtue, and to injure them, both here and in France, by libels and calumnies; caused, in fine, either by himself or through others, a multitude of disorders, under which this infant church has groaned for many years! What, I say, ought he not to have done before dying to atone for these scandals, and give proof of sincere penitence and compunction? God gave him full time to recognize his errors, and yet to the last he showed a great indifference in all these matters. When, in presence of the Holy Sacrament, he was asked according to the ritual, ‘Do you not beg pardon for all the ill examples you may have given?’ he answered, ‘Yes,’ but did not confess that he had ever given any. In a word, he behaved during the few days before his death like one who had led an irreproachable life and had nothing to fear. And this is the presence of mind that he retained to his last moment!”

The Orator. “Great in dangers by his courage, he always came off with honor, and never was reproached with rashness, — ”

The Critic. “True; he was not rash, as was seen when the Bostonnais besieged Quebec.”

The Orator. “Great in religion by his piety, he practiced its good works in spirit and in truth, — ”

The Critic. “Say rather that he practiced its forms with parade and ostentation: witness the inordinate ambition with which he always claimed honors in the Church, to which he had no right; outrageously affronted intendants, who opposed his pretensions; required priests to address him when preaching, and in their intercourse with him demanded from them humiliations which he did not exact from the meanest military officer. This was his way of making himself great in religion and piety, or, more truly, in vanity and hypocrisy. How can a man be called great in religion, when he openly holds opinions entirely opposed to the True Faith, such as, that all men are predestined, that Hell will not last forever, and the like?”

The Orator. “His very look inspired esteem and confidence, — ”

The Critic. “Then one must have taken him at exactly the right moment, and not when he was foaming at the mouth with rage.”

The Orator. “A mingled air of nobility and gentleness; a countenance that bespoke the probity that appeared in all his acts, and a sincerity that could not dissimulate, — ”

The Critic. “The eulogist did not know the old fox.”

The Orator. “An inviolable fidelity to friends, — ”

The Critic. “What friends? Was it persons of the other sex? Of these he was always fond, and too much for the honor of some of them.”

The Orator. “Disinterested for himself, ardent for others, he used his credit at court only to recommend their services, excuse their faults, and obtain favors for them, — ”

The Critic. “True; but it was for his creatures and for nobody else.”

The Orator. “I pass in silence that reading of spiritual books which he practiced as an indispensable duty more than forty years; that holy avidity with which he listened to the word of God, — ”

The Critic. “Only if the preacher addressed the sermon to him and called him Monseigneur. As for his reading, it was often Jansenist books, of which he had a great many, and which he greatly praised and lent freely to others.”

The Orator. “He prepared for the sacraments by meditation and retreat, — ”

The Critic. “And generally came out of his retreat more excited than ever against the Church.”

The Orator. “Let us not recall his ancient and noble descent, his family connected with all that is greatest in the army, the magistracy, and the government; Knights, Marshals of France, Governors of Provinces, Judges, Councilors, and Ministers of State: let us not, I say, recall all these without remembering that their examples roused this generous heart to noble emulation; and, as an expiring flame grows brighter as it dies, so did all the virtues of his race unite at last in him to end with glory a long line of great men, that shall be no more except in history.”

The Critic. “Well laid on, and too well for his hearers to believe him. Far from agreeing that all these virtues were collected in the person of his pretended hero, they would find it very hard to admit that he had even one of them.”

[Oraison Funèbre du très-haut et très-puissant Seigneur Louis de Buade, Comte de Frontenac et de Palluau, etc., avec des remarques critiques, 1698. That indefatigable investigator of Canadian history, the late M. Jacques Viger, to whom I am indebted for a copy of this eulogy, suggested that the anonymous critic may have been Abbé la Tour, author of the Vie de Laval. If so, his statements need the support of more trustworthy evidence. The above extracts are not consecutive, but are taken from various parts of the manuscript.]

It is clear enough from what quiver these arrows came. From the first, Frontenac had set himself in opposition to the most influential of the Canadian clergy. When he came to the colony, their power in the government was still enormous, and even the most devout of his predecessors had been forced into conflict with them to defend the civil authority; but, when Frontenac entered the strife, he brought into it an irritability, a jealous and exacting vanity, a love of rule, and a passion for having his own way, even in trifles, which made him the most exasperating of adversaries. Hence it was that many of the clerical party felt towards him a bitterness that was far from ending with his life.

From Count Frontenac and New France under Louis XIV, Chapter 20 by Francis Parkman

The below is from Francis Parkman’s Introduction.

If, at times, it may seem that range has been allowed to fancy, it is so in appearance only; since the minutest details of narrative or description rest on authentic documents or on personal observation.

Faithfulness to the truth of history involves far more than a research, however patient and scrupulous, into special facts. Such facts may be detailed with the most minute exactness, and yet the narrative, taken as a whole, may be unmeaning or untrue. The narrator must seek to imbue himself with the life and spirit of the time. He must study events in their bearings near and remote; in the character, habits, and manners of those who took part in them, he must himself be, as it were, a sharer or a spectator of the action he describes.

With respect to that special research which, if inadequate, is still in the most emphatic sense indispensable, it has been the writer’s aim to exhaust the existing material of every subject treated. While it would be folly to claim success in such an attempt, he has reason to hope that, so far at least as relates to the present volume, nothing of much importance has escaped him. With respect to the general preparation just alluded to, he has long been too fond of his theme to neglect any means within his reach of making his conception of it distinct and true.

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