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Besides the commandants, the most prominent individuals at these trading posts were the French merchants. The old French merchant, at his post, was the head man of the settlement. Careful, frugal, without much enterprise, judgment or rigid virtue, he was employed in procuring skins from the Indians or traders in exchange for manufactured goods. He kept on good terms with the Indians and frequently fostered a large number of half-breed children, the offspring of his licentiousness.

The Coureurs des Bois, or rangers of the woods, were either French or half-breeds, a hardy race, accustomed to labor and deprivation and thoroughly conversant with the character and habits of the Indians, from whom they procured their cargoes of furs. They were equally skilled in propelling a canoe, fishing, hunting, trapping, or sending a ball from their rifle "to the right eye of the buffalo." If of mixed blood, they generally spoke the language of their parents, the French and Indians, and had just enough of their religion to be regardless of both. Employed by aristocratic French fur companies as voyageurs or guides, their forms were developed to the fullest vigor, by propelling the canoe through the lakes and streams, and by carrying large packs of goods across the portage of the interior by straps suspended from

their foreheads or shoulders.

These voyageurs

knew every rock and island, bay and shoal of the

western waters.

The ordinary dress of the white portion of the Canadian French traders was a cloth passed about the middle, a loose shirt, a "molton" or blanket coat and a red milled, or worsted, cap. The half-breeds were semi-savage in their dress as well as their character and appearance. They sometimes wore a surtout of coarse blue cloth, reaching down to the mid-leg, elk-skin trousers, with seams adorned with fringes, a scarlet woollen sash tied around the waist, in which was stuck a broad knife, to be used in dissecting the carcasses of animals taken in hunting, buck-skin moccasins and a cap made of the same material with surtout.

The pilots of the lakes were active agents in the fur trade. Gliding in their canoes through the upper lakes, encamping with the Indians in the solitude of the forests, they returned to the posts, which stood like light-houses of civilization on the borders of the wilderness, as sailors from the ocean, to whom they were similar in character. They were lavish of their money in dress and licentiousness. They ate, drank and played all their earnings away, so long as their goods held out, and when these were gone, they sold their embroidery, their laces and clothes, after which

they were forced to go on another voyage for subsistence.

Such was the character of the French Canadian at the time of which we write. There were isolated spots where simplicity, culture and innocence ruled; but in most localities the French settlers were hard and brutal. One of the chief exceptions, perhaps, was Acadia. Grand Pre was noted for its mild inhabitants, its people who loved and worshipped God according to their own fashion, but who had little sympathy with the barbarous actions of Hertel de Rouville. One of the chief merchants and most wealthy and influential citizens of Grand Pre was a Monsieur De Vere, who, it was hinted, had powerful friends near the throne.

Monsieur De Vere was a widower with but one child, Adele, a bright-eyed, fair-faced maiden, noted for her beauty and gentleness. She was her father's pride and joy, and, notwithstanding she was badly petted and spoiled by her doting parent, who granted her every wish, her sweet disposition and strong common sense made her a favorite with all.

In the year 1711, Monsieur De Vere went to Quebec to learn if any effort was being made to dislodge the English at Port Royal, and, at her earnest solicitation, Mademoiselle Adele was per

mitted to accompany her father. One bright morning, late in August, the neat, trim little sloop of Monsieur De Vere came in sight of that now famous and impregnable city, Quebec. Adele, standing on the deck of her father's vessel, gazed on the scene with all the enthusiasm and delight characteristic of her youth and nationality. Quebec was then but a village, a frontier post; but its magnificent scenery was as picturesque and grandly sublime in that day as at present. The elevated promontory of table land, which forms the right bank of the St. Lawrence, with its precipitous face, but declining gradually to the St. Charles; Cape Diamond, with its crystal quartz glittering in the sun; Point Levi, the Island of Orleans, and the little town, with its quaint old towers, forts and cathedrals, with the historic plains of Abraham far in the background, formed a picture well calculated to fill the beautiful girl with enthusiasm.

The river was full of the quaint little crafts of the voyageurs and Coureurs des Bois, gliding hither and thither, filling the air with the melody of their song. The popular air of the French voyageur fell for the first time on Adele's ears, and distance lending softness to the harsh voices of the musicians, she eagerly drank in the following words:

"Tout les printemps

Tout de nouvelles

Tout les amants

Changent de maitresses

Jamais le bon vin ni endort

L'amour me réveille."

"Tout les amants

Changent de maitresses

Qu'ils changent qui voudront
Pour moi je garde la mienne
Le bon vin ni endort
L'amour me réveille."

The song seemed to have a strange effect on the beautiful creature, and, with her great soft eyes raised to the citadel so far above as to seem among the clouds, she repeated the last strain:

"L'amour me réveille."

as wax.

She was only sixteen and had never had a lover; but her young and tender heart was as susceptible The expressions of love by those rude voyageurs made their impression on the girl, and she was lost in thought, when her father told her they were going to disembark. She looked up and saw only the great, frowning rocks and houses like flakes of snow among the hills, while those historic heights, the plains of Abraham, had disappeared behind the frowning cliffs.

"We are going ashore, Adele," he said. "I am ready, father," she answered.

From one of the dragon-like castles on the bluffs above, there issued a white wreath of smoke, and

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