erst, Murray, Vaudreuil, de
Lagauchetiere, Olier, Mance, Longueuil, and others equally well named,
will carry down to future generations the memory of those who were
prominent in the making and moulding of Canada. It is strange that one
of the most insignificant streets in the city, a mere lane, of a single
block in length, should bear the name of Dollard, the hero of one of
the most illustrious deeds recorded in history, an event which has
rightly been called the Thermopylae of Canada. The facts were as
follows:--In 1660 the Colony was on the eve of extinction by the
Iroquois, the whole of the tribes being on the war-path with the
intention of sweeping the French from the St. Lawrence. Dollard des
Ormeaux and sixteen young men of Montreal determined upon a deed which
should teach the savages a lesson. They bound themselves by an oath
neither to give nor take quarter. They made their wills and took the
sacrament in the Chapel of the _Hotel-Dieu_, and then started up Lake
St. Louis. They were not accustomed to the management of the frail
canoes of bark, and day after day struggled to pass the currents of St.
Anne's, at the head of the island, where now the pleasure yacht spreads
its white sails to the breezes of summer, and on whose shores the
huntsmen and hounds gaily gallop when in the woods of autumn the leaves
turn crimson and gold under the mellow hunter's moon. At last, after a
week had been thus spent, they entered the Ottawa River, proceeding by
the shores until they descried the remains of a rough palisaded fort
surrounded by a small clearing. It was only a circle enclosed by trunks
of trees, but here they "made their fire and slung their kettles. Being
soon joined by some friendly Hurons and Algonquins they bivouacked
together. Morning, noon and night they prayed, and when at sunset the
long reaches of forest on the opposite shore basked peacefully in the
level rays, the rapids joined their hoarse music to the notes of their
evening hymn." As their young voices floated through the forest glades,
and they lay down to sleep under the stars of the sweet May skies, they
thought of the bells tinkling in the still air of their loved
_Ville-Marie_, where those they had come to die for sent up for them
_Aves_ around hearth and altar. In the words of a Canadian poet, it is
thus described:--

"Beside the dark Uttawa's stream, two hundred years ago,
A wondrous feat of arms was wrought, which all the world should k