drew upon them persecution and death. The savages discovered them to be of the white flesh of Quebec, by the fortitude which they evinced in enduring the most excruciating torments. Heaven, satisfied with their virtues, bestowed on several of them that palm which they so anxiously desired, and which has raised them to the rank of the primitive apostles. The Huron village where Father Daniel1 officiated as missionary was surprised by the Iroquois on the morning of July 4, 1648. The young warriors were absent. The Jesuit was just at that moment saying mass, surrounded by his converts; he had only time to finish the consecration and to run to the place whence the shrieks proceeded. A horrid scene met his view: women, children, and old men, lay promiscuously in the agonies of death. All who yet survived fell at his feet soliciting baptism. The father dipped a napkin in water, and with it sprinkled the kneeling crowd, thus procuring everlasting life for those whom he was unable to rescue from temporal death. He then recollected having left in the huts some sick persons who had not yet received the seal of Christianity. He flew thither, enrolled them among the number of the faithful, returned to the chapel, hid the sacred vessels, gave a general absolution to the Hurons who had betaken themselves to the altar, exhorted them to attempt their escape, and, to give them time to accomplish it, went forth to meet the enemy. At the appearance of this priest advancing alone against an army, the astonished barbarians paused and fell back a few steps; not daring to approach the saint, they pierced him at a distance with their arrows. "Though transfixed with them in every part," says Charlevoix, "he still continued to speak with extraordinary emphasis, sometimes addressing the Almighty, to whom he offered up his blood for his flock, and sometimes his murderers, whom he threatened with the wrath of heaven, assuring them, nevertheless, that they would always find the Lord willing to forgive them if they had recourse to his clemency." He expired, and, by thus attracting the attention of the Iroquois to himself, saved part of his congregation. Father Garnier displayed equal heroism in another settlement. 1 The same person described by Charlevoix. He was but a very young man, and had recently torn himself from his weeping friends for the purpose of saving souls in the forests of Canada. Having received two balls on the field of carnage, he fell senseless, and was stripped by an Iroquois who supposed him to be dead. Some time afterward the father came to himself; he raised his head and beheld at some distance a Huron just expiring. The apostle mustered all his strength to go and absolve the converted Indian; he crawled toward him, but fell down again by the way. A barbarian, perceiving him, ran and dispatched him with his hatchet. "He breathed his last," observes Charlevoix, "in the exercise, and, as it were, in the very bosom, of charity."1 Lastly, Father Brebœuf, uncle to the poet of that name, was burned with those excruciating torments which the Iroquois inflicted on their prisoners. "This missionary-who had endured for twenty years hardships the most likely to extinguish the sentiments of nature,-who possessed a courage which nothing could appal, a virtue familiarized with the prospect of a speedy and cruel death, and so elevated as even to make it the object of his most ardent wishes,-who had moreover been apprised by more than one celestial token that his prayers were heard-was equally proof against menaces and tortures; but the sight of his dear disciples cruelly treated before his face, mingled no small degree of pain with the joy which he felt on finding his hopes accomplished.. .... "The Iroquois were fully aware that they had to do with a man from whom they should not have the pleasure of extorting the least sign of weakness; and, as if they were apprehensive that he would communicate his intrepidity to others, they separated him, after a while, from the rest of the prisoners, made him ascend the scaffold alone, and were so exasperated against him that they seemed beside themselves with rage and despe ration. "All this did not prevent the servant of God from speaking in a loud voice, sometimes to the Hurons, who, though they could not see him, were within hearing; sometimes to his executioners, whom he warned that they would incur the wrath 1 Hist. de la Nouv. Fr., tome ii. lib. vii. p. 24. of heaven, if they continued to persecute the worshippers of the true God. This boldness astonished the barbarians. Having endeavored, but in vain, to reduce him to silence, they cut off his lower lip and the end of his nose, held lighted torches to every part of his body, and burned his gums," &c. Another missionary, named Lallemant, was tortured at the same time with Father Brebœuf. He had but just entered upon the ministerial career. The pain sometimes forced from him involuntary cries. He applied to the aged apostle to strengthen his fortitude; but the latter, unable to speak, could merely nod his head and smile with his mangled lips to encourage the young martyr. The smoke of the two funeral piles ascended together toward heaven, and excited in angelic bosoms mingled emotions of joy and grief. The savages made a collar of red-hot hatchets for Father Breboeuf; they cut from him pieces of flesh, which they devoured before his face, telling him that the flesh of Frenchmen was excellent eating.1 Then, continuing their railleries, "Thou assuredst us just now," cried the barbarians, "that the more a person suffers on earth the more happy he is in heaven; it is, therefore, out of kindness to thee that we study to increase thy tortures.' When, during the reign of terror, the hearts of priests were paraded on the tops of pikes through the streets of Paris, the rabble exclaimed, Ah! il n'est point de fête quand le cœur n'en est pas! "Ah! there is no festivity where the heart does not partake of it!" At length, after enduring many other torments, which we dare not transcribe, Father Brebœuf breathed forth his soul, which winged its flight to the mansions of Him who healeth all the wounds of his servants. It was in 1649 that these events occurred in Canada; that is to say, at the moment of the highest prosperity of France and during the fêtes of Louis XIV. All then triumphed, the missionary as well as the soldier. Those to whom a priest is an object of hatred and of ridicule will rejoice in these torments of the confessors of the faith. Certain wise men, with a greater spirit of prudence and modera 1 Hist. de la Nouv. Fr., tome i. livre 7. Ibid. tion, will observe that, after all, the missionaries were the victims of their fanaticism. With a disdainful pity they will ask, What business had those monks in the wilds of America? We must admit, indeed, that they did not visit those regions, after the manner of men of science, to attempt some great philosophical discoveries; they went merely in obedience to the injunction of that Master who said to them, "Go ye and teach all nations." Complying in perfect simplicity with this command, they relinquished all the attractions of their native. country, and undertook, even at the risk of their lives, to reveal to a barbarian whom they had never seen .. what? In the opinion of the world, nothing-a mere nothing:-the existence of God and the immortality of the soul! CHAPTER IX. CONCLUSION OF THE MISSIONS. WE have thus indicated the course taken by the different missions, which shows that they were characterized by a spirit of simplicity and heroism, and, at the same time, evinced a great devotion to science and the highest wisdom of legislation. In our opinion it was a just subject of pride for Europe, and, in particular, for France, which furnished the greater number of missionaries, to behold these men annually quitting her shores to display wonders of the arts, of laws, of humanity, and of courage, in the four quarters of the globe. Hence proceeded the high idea which strangers formed of our nation and of the God whom we adore. The inhabitants of the remotest regions sought our alliance; the ambassador of the savage of the West met at our court the envoy of the nations of the East. We pretend not to the gift of prophecy; but you may rest assured (and experience will prove it) that never will men of science, despatched to distant countries with all the instruments and all the plans of an academy, be able to effect what a poor monk, setting out on foot from his convent, accomplished singly with his rosary and his breviary.1 pince the first publication of this work, the Catholic missions have expanded over a much vaster field, and have admitted a fifth geographical division, embracing the islands of Oceanica. They also continue to exhibit all the admirable features here sketched by our author. In China, Tongking, Siam, Oceanica, and even in the western wilds of our own United States, we still behold the apostle, the martyr, and the man of science, among the missionaries of the Catholic Church. The support and extension of missionary enterprise are chiefly due to the aid furnished by the Association for the Propagation of the Faith, whose receipts annually exceed $700,000. For full details, in confirmation of these statements, see Annals of the Association, &c. T. |