liberty, which, lawless as it was, gave scope to his energies, till these
savage wastes became the field of his most noteworthy achievements.

Canada was divided between two opposing influences. On the one side were
the monarchy and the hierarchy, with their principles of order,
subordination, and obedience; substantially at one in purpose, since both
wished to keep the colony within manageable bounds, domesticate it, and
tame it to soberness, regularity, and obedience. On the other side was the
spirit of liberty, or license, which was in the very air of this wilderness
continent, reinforced in the chiefs of the colony by a spirit of adventure
inherited from the Middle Ages, and by a spirit of trade born of present
opportunities; for every official in Canada hoped to make a profit, if not
a fortune, out of beaverskins. Kindred impulses, in ruder forms, possessed
the humbler colonists, drove them into the forest, and made them hardy
woodsmen and skilful bushfighters, though turbulent and lawless members of
civilized society.

Time, the decline of the fur-trade, and the influence of the Canadian
Church gradually diminished this erratic spirit, and at the same time
impaired the qualities that were associated with it. The Canadian became a
more stable colonist and a steadier farmer; but for forest journeyings and
forest warfare he was scarcely his former self. At the middle of the
eighteenth century we find complaints that the race of _voyageurs_ is
growing scarce. The taming process was most apparent in the central and
lower parts of the colony, such as the Cote de Beaupre and the opposite
shore of the St. Lawrence, where the hands of the government and of the
Church were strong; while at the head of the colony,--that is, about
Montreal and its neighborhood,--which touched the primeval wilderness, an
uncontrollable spirit of adventure still held its own. Here, at the
beginning of the century, this spirit was as strong as it had ever been,