they came at length to Allumette Island. Here the
old Algonquin chief, Tessouat, received them; but he presently
convinced Champlain that there was no such northern route as he looked
to find. Whereupon Vignau confessed his imposture, and Champlain
generously let him go unpunished.

Meanwhile, De Monts had wearied of his New World enterprise, and to
secure the interests of his colony Champlain was constrained to make
annual voyages to France. In 1612 he found a protector in the Comte de
Soissons, who appointed the discoverer his deputy in New France.
Soissons, however, died in the same year; but fortunately the Prince
of Conde, by whom he was succeeded, was also well-disposed, and
retained Champlain as his lieutenant.

Up to this time Quebec had realised only an elementary form of
colonisation. The entire population numbered less than fifty persons,
and the city consisted of the fortified post at the foot of the cliff,
with a few cabins clustering about the log palisades. But on his
visit to France in 1615, Champlain took a step forward in his policy.
Hitherto the dwellers at Quebec had been transients. They came not to
take up residence, but to trade, intending to return again to France
as soon as possible. The fear of a death unshriven likewise
contributed to tentative settlement; and to meet the latter want,
Champlain resolved to establish a church in his colony. Four Recollet
friars--Franciscans of the Strict Observance--were easily persuaded to
return with him to Quebec. Burning with holy zeal, they confessed
their sins, received absolution, and embarked at Honfleur on the 24th
of April, 1615. A month later they arrived at Tadousac, and sailed on
to Quebec. Every new arrival increased the surprise of the bewildered
Indians, who gazed with suspicion upon the four mendicant friars, in
their coarse, gray _soutanes_ girt at the waist with the knotted cord
of St. Francis of Assisi, and wearing peaked _capotes_ and thick
wooden sandals.

The site of the first church in New France was selected without delay.
It stood on the strand near the Cul-de-sac, a little distance from the
Habitation. Its construction was simple and speedy, and before the end
of June the half-hundred citizens of Quebec knelt upon the bare ground
and reverently listened to the first Mass ever said in Canada. The
guns of the ship in the harbour, and the cannon on the ramparts,
boomed forth in honour of the event. That day the priesthood began its
l