Picturesque Quebec : a Sequel to Quebec Past and Present

PART II.. The Environs of Quebec.

THE ENVIRONS OF QUEBEC. SILLERY OUR COUNTRY SEATS THE PLAINS OF ABRAHAM THE BATTLE-FIELD BATTLE-FIELD PARK THE DUKE OF KENT'S LODGE--MONTMORENCI L'ASYLE CHAMPÊTRE MARCHMONT--Anecdote of Wolfe's Army WOLFESFIELD--Carlyle's Account of the Capture of Quebec ELM GROVE THORNHILL SPENCER WOOD--The Perceval Family--A Fête Champêtre in 1809 SPENCER GRANGE--Audubon at Quebec BAGATELLE COTTAGE WOODFIELD SOUS LES BOIS SILLERY HOUSE ST. MICHAEL'S CHURCH--SILLERY MOUNT HERMON BARDFIELD--The Mountain Family BENMORE--The Sparrows and Quails CLERMONT THE WILD FLOWERS OF SILLERY BEAUVOIR MONTAGUE COTTAGE--The History of Emily Montague KIRK ELLA CATARACOUI ROSEWOOD RAVENSWOOD THE WOODS OF SILLERY LONGWOOD MEADOWBANKS--A Raid in 1775 THE HIGHLANDS WINTER FOX HUNTING IN CANADA CAP ROUGE COTTAGE BEAUSÉJOUR BELMONT--Irish Education in the Olden Time HOLLAND FARM THE HOLLAND TREE--A Scandal of the last Century HAMWOOD BIJOU--Anecdote of Wolfe's Army MORTON LODGE WESTFIELD COUCY-LE-CASTEL RINGFIELD--Journal of Chevalier Johnstone CASTOR VILLE THE JOYS OF WINTER THE MANOR HOUSE--BEAUPORT--The Inscription MOUNT LILAC--Beauport A VISIT TO INDIAN LORETTE TAHOURENCHE AND THE HURONS OF LORETTE INDIAN CUSTOMS CHÂTEAU BIGOT--The Algonquin Maid--Marmette's Romance THE FALLS OF THE CHAUDIÈRE

APPENDIX. Jacques Cartier's Officers and Crew Jacques Quartier, the Pilot Discovery of the Remains of Jacques Cartier's Vessel The Bronze Cannon The French who remained after the Capitulation of 1629 The Arms of the Dominion Militia Uniforms Horses Ship-building at Quebec under French Domination The Conquest of New York The French Refugees of Oxford, Mass. The Venerable Mother of the Incarnation Variation of the Needle at Quebec Our City Bells General Wolfe's Statue Vente d'une Négresse à Quebec The Ice-Shove--April 1874 The Pistols and Sash of General Wolfe The Post Office Monument to the Victims of 1837-8 Fines for Duelling Memorabilia Executions at Quebec Gaol Quebec Golf Club Quebec Snowshoe Club French Governors of Canada English Governors

MAPS. Plan of Quebec in 1759 Map to Illustrate the Siege of Quebec in 1759 Map to Illustrate Operations of Generals de Levis and Murray, 1759-60 Plan of the Links--Quebec Golf Club

The description of ASYLE CHAMPÊTRE was written by Dr. P. Bender, the biographer of Joseph Perrault, the founder of ASYLE CHAMPÊTRE.

PICTURESQUE QUEBEC

CHAPTER 1.. First Impressions of Quebec.

FIRST IMPRESSIONS OF QUEBEC.

Quebec, founded by Samuel de Champlain, in 1608, has certainly much to recommend her, by her monuments, her historical memories and her scenery, to the traveller--the scholar--the historian. The wintering of the venturesome Jacques Cartier on the banks of the St. Charles in 1535-6, by its remoteness, is an incident of interest, not only to Canadians, but also to every denizen of America. It takes one back to an era nearly coeval with the discovery of the continent by Columbus--much anterior to the foundation of Jamestown, in 1607--anterior to that of St Augustine, in Florida. Quebec, has, then, a right to call herself an old, a very old, city of the west.

The colonization of Canada, or, as it was formerly called, New France, was undertaken by French merchants engaged in the fur trade, close on whose steps followed a host of devoted missionaries who found, in the forests of this new and attractive country, ample scope for the exercise of their religious enthusiasm. It was at Quebec that these Christian heroes landed, from hence they started for the forest primeval, the bearers of the olive branch of Christianity, an unfailing token of civilization.

A fatal mistake committed at the outset by the French commanders, in taking sides in the Indian wars, more than once brought the incipient colony to the verge of ruin. During these periods, scores of devoted missionaries fell under the scalping knife or suffered incredible tortures amongst the merciless savages whom they had come to reclaim. Indian massacres became so frequent, so appalling, that on several occasions the French thought seriously of giving up the colony forever. The rivalry between France and England, added to the hardships and dangers of the few hardy colonists established at Quebec. Its environs, the shores of its noble river, more than once became the battle-field of European armies. These are periods of strife, happily gone by, we hope, forever.

In his "Pioneers of France in the New World," the gifted Francis Parkman mournfully reviews the vanished glories of old France in her former vast dominions in America:--

"The French dominion is a memory of the past; and when we evoke its departed shades, they rise upon us from their graves in strange romantic guise. Again their ghostly camp-fires seem to burn, and the fitful light is cast around on lord and vassal and black robed priest, mingled with wild forms of savage warriors, knit in close fellowship on the same stern errand. A boundless vision grows upon us: an untamed continent, vast wastes of forest verdure, mountains silent in primeval sleep; river, lake, and glimmering pool; wilderness oceans mingling with the sky. Such was the domain which France conquered for civilization. Plumed helmets gleamed in the shade of its forests; priestly vestments in its dens and fastnesses of ancient barbarism. Men steeped in antique learning, pale with the close breath of the cloister, here spent the noon and evening of their lives, ruled savage hordes with a mild, parental sway, and stood serene before the direst shapes of death. Men of a courtly nurture, heirs to the polish of a far-reaching ancestry, here, with their dauntless hardihood, put to shame the boldest sons of toil."

Of all this mighty empire of the past, Quebec was the undisputed capital, the fortress, the keystone.

It would be a curious study to place in juxtaposition the impressions produced on Tourists by the view of Quebec and its environs--from the era of Jacques Cartier, the discoverer of Canada, down to that of the Earl of Dufferin, one of its truest friends.

Champlain, La Potherie, La Houtan, Le Beau, Du Creux (Creuxius), Peter Kalm, Knox, Silliman, Ampère, Mrs. Moodie, Dickens, Lever, Anthony Trollope, Sala, Thoreau, Warburton, Marmier, Capt. Butler, Sir Charles Dilke, Henry Ward Beecher, have all left their impressions of the rocky citadel: let us gaze on a few of their vivid pictures.

"The scenic beauty of Quebec has been the theme of general eulogy. The majestic appearance of Cape Diamond and the fortifications, the cupolas and minarets, like those of an eastern city, blazing and sparkling in the sun, the loveliness of the panorama, the noble basin, like a sheet of purest silver, in which might ride with safety a hundred sail of the line, the graceful meandering of the river St. Charles, the numerous village spires on either side of the St. Lawrence, the fertile fields dotted with innumerable cottages, the abode of a rich and moral peasantry,--the distant falls of Montmorency,--the park like scenery of Point Levis,--the beauteous Isle of Orleans,--and more distant still, the frowning Cape Tourmente, and the lofty range of purple mountains of the most picturesque form, which, without exaggeration, is scarcely to be surpassed in any part of the world." (Hawkins' Picture of Quebec.)

"Quebec recalls Angoulême to my mind: in the upper city, stairways, narrow streets, ancient houses on the verge of the cliff; in the lower city, the new fortunes, commerce, workmen;--in both, many shops and much activity." (M. Sand.)

"Take mountain and plain, sinuous river, and broad, tranquil waters, stately ship and tiny boat, gentle hill and shady valley, bold headland and rich, fruitful fields, frowning battlement and cheerful villa, glittering dome and rural spire, flowery garden and sombre forest,--group them all into the choicest picture of ideal beauty your fancy can create; arch it over with a cloudless sky, light it up with a radiant sun, and lest the sheen should be too dazzling, hang a veil of lighted haze over all, to soften the lines and perfect the repose, --you will then have seen Quebec on this September morning." (Eliot Warburton.)

"I rubbed my eyes to be sure I was in the nineteenth century, and not entering one of those portals which sometimes adorn the frontispiece of old black-letter volumes. I though it would be a good place to read Froissart's Chronicles. It was such a reminiscence of the Middle Ages as Scott's Novels.

"Too much has not been said about the scenery of Quebec. The fortifications of Cape Diamond are omnipresent. You travel ten, twenty, thirty miles up or down the river's banks, you ramble fifteen miles among the hills on either side, and then, when you have long since forgotten them, perchance slept on them by the way, at a turn of the road or of your body, there they are still with their geometry against the sky....

"No wonder if Jacques Cartier's pilot exclaimed in Norman-French Que bec! ("What a peak!") when he saw this cape, as some suppose. Every modern traveller uses a similar expression....

"The view from Cape Diamond has been compared by European travellers with the most remarkable views of a similar kind in Europe, such as those from Edinburgh Castle, Gibraltar, Cintra, and others, and preferred by many. A main peculiarity in this, compared with other views which I have beheld, is that it is from the ramparts of a fortified city, and not from a solitary and majestic river cape alone that this view is obtained.... I still remember the harbour far beneath me, sparkling like silver in the sun,--the answering headlands of Point Levis on the south-east,--the frowning Cape Tourmente abruptly bounding the seaward view in the north-east,--the villages of Lorette and Charlesbourg on the north,--and farther west, the distant Val Cartier, sparkling with white cottages, hardly removed by distance through the clear air,--not to mention a few blue mountains along the horizon in that direction. You look out from the ramparts of the citadel beyond the frontiers of civilization. Yonder small group of hills, according to the guide-book, forms the portals of the wilds which are trodden only by the feet of the Indian hunters as far as Hudson's Bay." (Thoreau).

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