he died January 12,
1700. Her heart, which had beaten with pain at the cry of suffering
childhood, with agony at the shriek of the tortured victim of Iroquois
cruelty, with shame at the contentions of Christian brotherhoods, and
with rapture when even one little child received the anointing drops of
baptism, that heart, encased in its silver covering, now rests in the
chapel of a convent where she so long labored and loved."

These were the triumphs of peace, won by heroines of endurance and
patience rather than of fiery physical courage; but of the latter
quality there were many brilliant examples among the women of the French
settlers of Canada. Madeleine de Vercheres is both famous and typical
among these sterner heroines. She was but fourteen years old when she
found herself in charge of her father's fort, that fort suddenly burst
upon by the savage Iroquois, and she with a garrison consisting of two
soldiers, two boys, and an old man of eighty. There were women and
children also, but these were detriments, not aids. The gallant girl,
though actually surprised in the fields by the marauders, managed to
close the gates, took command of the panic-stricken company,--the
soldiers were as frightened and helpless as the rest,--and soon
organized a defence which lasted for a week, and was ended by the
arrival of a succoring force. Her little brothers, but ten and twelve
years of age respectively, nobly seconded her efforts; but the whole
glory of the splendid defence was due to Madeleine, whose account of the
occurrence is extant. She inherited heroic blood on the distaff side,
for her mother, two years before, had held the same fort with but four
armed men against an attack by the Iroquois, the siege lasting two days.

The conditions of the first half century of Canadian colonization were
generally similar to those existing in New England, of course, with a
difference of racial impulses and customs. That half century saw but
slow development of the country; but between 1665 and 1667 the coming of
the Carignan regiment, sent by Louis XIV. to establish firmly his hold
upon the new dominion, brought about a change. In order to prevent
desertion and make the soldiers truly at home in the land, it was soon
found necessary that there should be established homes, and to this end
women were necessary. But women were precisely the rarest treasure in
the Canadas, and there was therefore adopted the plan, already executed
in the En