In Paris, Champlain moved his household to the faubourg Saint-Germain-des-Prés, rue de Vaugirard, parish of Saint-Sulpice. It was a neighborhood much favored by courtiers and the king’s ministers, not to be confused with the palace at Saint-Germain-en-Laye, which was one of the king’s favorite residences, and the birthplace of the dauphin, the future Louis XIV.56
Champlain spent much of his time at court. He went to work again, returning to the perennial problem of building support for New France. He did it in several ways at once, always with the object of reaching the king, and keeping America in his thoughts. While Champlain was at court, New France began to appear in court entertainments, in which Louis XIII took a great interest. The court ballet was an elaborate art form, developed in Italy during the Renaissance. It became very fashionable in France, and it was written that “the art of the dance [itself] is perfectly French.”57
Abraham Bosse’s genre scene of the “galerie du palais” shows fashionable “courtisans” at a stall that sold ribbons, gloves, lace, and fans, while a “cavalier” browses in a bookstall such as those of Jean Berjon and Claude Collet, who sold Champlain’s works “at the palace,” and helped him to promote the cause of New France.
A leading French scholar, François Moureau, has described it as a form of belle danse as distinct from danse de bal. The ballet du cour required a full orchestra with winds and brass, in addition to the traditional twenty-four violins of the king. It used complex scenery and gave much attention to creative costume-design, in which Italians had long been masters.
The center of these productions was the king himself. Louis XIII made the court ballet his hobby. He participated actively as a composer, designer, and dancer. He never played himself but usually appeared in other allegorical roles, such as Apollo, “or as the sun,” as later did his son, Louis XIV.58 Many of the high nobility followed his lead, and joined with professional dancers in these spectacles. Great nobles competed with one another for royal favor by dancing “before the king in ballets heroic, allegoric and farcical.”59
Champlain did not appear as a character in these ballets. One scholar has written that “none of the founders of New France appear there,” but Indians were very prominent. These works were marked by “the presence of a new exoticism, that of America, at the center of a form that was ritualized and politicized.”60 Moureau writes, “If one analyzed this repertory over a long period, which runs from the last decade of the reign of Henri IV to the death of his successor (1643), for half a century the American thread is clearly visible in the fabric of the spectacle.”61
In the reign of Louis XIII, the humanity of American Indians became a dramatic theme in elegant court ballets. The King himself produced these spectacles, and often appeared as Apollo or the Sun, shining above all the people of the world. Nobles and courtiers performed them with the help of professional dancers.
The interpretation of the Indians changed in an interesting way. In the late sixteenth century, they appeared in court ballets mostly as stylized figures from New Spain and Brazil. During the reign of Louis XIII, they became more prominent and more North American. The Court Ballets were advertisements for New France and its native people. In this effort, the king himself, the high nobility, choreographers, and set designers dramatized Champlain’s grand design.
Champlain also tried to win a large public to the cause of New France by publishing another volume of his Voyages, with striking illustrations of many tribes of North American Indians. While he had been at sea in 1618, Champlain had used the time to draft another book about New France. It was finished in the fall, and published as Voyages et descouvertures faites en la Nouvelle France, depuis l’année 1615. As with all Champlain’s books, this one was written for a very special purpose and it was addressed mainly to a single reader, Louis XIII, who held the success of New France in his hands. Champlain dedicated his book to the king, with gratitude for his past support and an appeal for his continued sponsorship of New France.
It was an honest book, entirely open in its promotional purposes, straightforward in its history, and candid in its account of problems in the colony. Champlain wrote that the king’s subjects had been working hard in the new world, “so that Your Majesty may be declared the lawful Lord of our labors, and of the good that shall result therefrom, not only because the land belongs to you, but also because you have protected us against so many kinds of persons who had no other design than by troubling us, to hinder the success of so sacred an undertaking.”62
Champlain appealed to the king’s interest in the Indians, and described them in very sympathetic ways. He wrote in the preface that his last books had given more attention to the land and its exploration. This one centered on “manners and mode of life of the Indians, narrated with many particulars of such a nature as to satisfy an inquiring mind.”63 The book was an argument that France should “send out people and colonies to instruct them in the knowledge of God, the glory and the triumphs of Your Majesty, so that with French speech they may also acquire a French heart and spirit.”64 For that attitude, some ethnographers have condemned Champlain. But the Indians understood and respected this extraordinary man, even as they preferred to keep their own beliefs.
Much of the work was about religion, the missionary activities of the Récollets, and the progress of the Christianity in the new world. Champlain also wrote about the problems of founding a colony in America, and was painfully honest about the battle at the Onondaga fort. He also wrote plainly about the difficulties of reconciling large purposes in New France with the very different goals of merchants in France.65
Champlain’s book circulated as a manuscript at court. It was read and approved by members of the Royal Council, and published by the king’s printer, Claude Collet, in the palace at the “Galerie des Prisonniers,” with the “privilege of the King.” The date of publication by royal license was May 18, 1619.
Other good things happened as Champlain’s star rose at court. On Christmas Eve, December 24, 1618, the author received a welcome present from His Majesty, a pension for 600 livres a year. Three weeks later, January 14, 1619, Champlain also received the unpaid balance of his wife’s dowry, another 1,500 livres from her father, Nicolas Boullé, secretary of the king’s chamber. It was yet another sign of how the winds were blowing. Champlain’s long campaign to win the support of Louis XIII was producing results.
Title page of Champlain’s Voyages et Decouvertures. This, Champlain’s third published book, was published in 1619 as part of a successful effort to win the king’s support. It was dedicated to Louis XIII, described events from 1615 to 1618, and gave close attention to the Indians. The king was fascinated from the moment when as a child he was given a red canoe by de Mons and Champlain.
This success at court did not help Champlain with his investors in the west of France. Champlain was having more trouble with the old company, especially with the merchants in Rouen. As he had pointed out in his new book, their goals were fundamentally opposed to the founding purpose of New France. Champlain noted that some merchants “aimed only at their private gain.”66 He wrote that he had “no other purpose than to see the country inhabited by industrious people, for the clearing of land,” so that the colony could support itself. He had seen too much hunger and even starvation when the ships were late in the spring, particularly “when the ships had been nearly two months behind their usual date, and there had been almost a tumult and revolt.”67 Champlain and the merchants differed not merely in their purposes, but also in the time frame of their thinking. Merchants planned very precisely one season at a time. They complained that “affairs in France were so unsettled that although they had gone to great expense they held no position of security to themselves, since they had seen what had happened in the case of the sieur de Mons.” They were very intolerant of political uncertainty and had little interest in planning for the long run.68 They also sought to lower the costs of their operations, in hope of increasing their returns. They felt that col
onizing ventures added heavy expenses. But that was only part of the problem. Champlain knew that they were also “afraid of something more serious, if the country became inhabited their power would wane,” and “a little later they would be driven away by those whom they had installed at great cost.”69
In New France itself, a different sort of conflict rose between the company’s employees and Champlain’s colonists such as the Hébert family, who complained of exploitation, and justly so. This animosity became a major discouragement to migration and a friction-point between colonizers and investors. Yet another problem was religion. Some of the investors in the western towns were Protestant. As Champlain noted, “they had anything at heart rather than that [the Catholic religion] should be established there, but they agreed to maintain friars because they knew it was His Majesty’s desire.”70
Champlain tried to work with the investors. He thought they had an agreement for the number of new colonists “besides those already there.” On December 21, 1618, he drew up an aide-mémoire in elaborate detail: eighty people to be brought to Quebec and maintained there for the year 1619, with clothing, bedding, weapons, tools, two tons of lime, 10,000 curved roof tiles or 20,000 flat, ten thousand bricks, livestock including bulls, heifers and sheep; seeds and other supplies; weapons and officers to control arms and ammunition, and on top of everything else a dinner service for the leaders with thirty-six table settings. The document was signed by investors Le Gendre, Vermulles, Bellois, Dustrelot, and also Pierre Dugua. The sieur de Mons was becoming more visible in his continuing support of the grand design for New France, as Louis XIII warmed to the enterprise.71
Unhappily, the support that Champlain received from several merchants was strongly opposed by others. In the spring of 1619, Champlain’s agreement with the merchants came apart, just as he was preparing to move his wife and their servants to America for an extended stay. Hélène had at last agreed to accompany her husband. Together they went to Honfleur and prepared to board a ship for America. They were stopped by agents of the company and told that the directors would not allow Champlain to be in command of its ships or the colony. He wrote that the prime mover was again his enemy Daniel Boyer, who had persuaded the merchants that Champlain was unfit to lead the colony. They insisted that the “sieur de Pont must remain in command over the people of their settlement.” Champlain would be allowed to serve only as an explorer, mapmaker, and artist.72
Champlain refused to agree. He took his family to Rouen, and met with the merchants. “I showed them the articles,” he wrote, and he insisted that “as the Lieutenant to the Prince I had the right of command over the settlement, and over all the men who might be there, save and except only the store where their head clerk was.”73 The merchants were defiant. Champlain showed them the king’s letter. To Champlain’s amazement they refused again, and the ship sailed without him.74
With his family Champlain returned to Paris. While his wife and servants unpacked, he went directly to the Royal Council and reported that the merchants of Rouen had defied a direct order from the king himself. The council gave complete support to Champlain. They confirmed him as lieutenant for New France, and expanded his powers to include full command “at Quebec and in other parts of New France.”75
Now the merchants were in trouble. Louis XIII did not take kindly to subjects who defied his royal will. This was a capital crime, and the punishment was to be broken on the wheel before a howling mob in Paris. The directors of the company were quick to reverse themselves, and laid the blame entirely on Daniel Boyer. Suddenly Champlain was acceptable to them as commandant in Quebec. It was too late to sail in 1619, but he began to make preparations for the following year. He did not ask the merchants for their support. Champlain demanded it in the name of the king and they obeyed. Once more, Helen Boullé and the servants began to pack.76
17.
A FRAMEWORK FOR NEW FRANCE
Two Models, 1620–24
CHAMPLAIN … It is my pleasure to write you this letter, to assure you that I shall be very agreeable to the service that you will render me, especially if you keep the country in obedience to me, making the people there live as closely in conformity with the laws of my kingdom as you can.
—Louis XIII to Champlain, May 7, 16201
We must give fortune a trial sometimes…. With the assistance of the people of these lands, one should be able to do something worthy of record.
—Samuel Champlain, ca. 16202
IN THE YEAR 1619 the destiny of New France lay in the hands of two people. One was Samuel Champlain, now in middle age and a veteran of long service in America. The other was King Louis XIII, aged eighteen and already with nine years on the throne of France. Each had a vision of the new world. Champlain and his American circle shared a dream of humanity and peace, in an age of cruelty and violence. The king and his ministers served an ideal of order and justice, under the absolute authority of an all-powerful monarch who claimed the name of Louis le Juste. Together, these leaders framed a set of institutions for New France.3
In the fall of that year, Louis XIII and his advisers took up the problem of organizing their disordered American dominion. The king himself began that process by making peace in his own family. On October 20, he ordered his cousin the prince de Condé to be released from prison after three years’ confinement. On November 9, Condé was received at Chantilly. In a formal ceremony he swore an oath of obedience, and the king solemnly proclaimed his innocence. All of Condé’s many privileges were restored, including his former office as viceroy for New France. He was granted 3,000 livres, and gave half the money to the Récollet friars for their work in America. Everybody was happy except the man who had put him in the Bastille and taken his job. The maréchal de Thémines was dismissed as viceroy.4
Henry, second duc de Montmorency at Dampville, succeeded Condé as viceroy of New France from 1620 to 1625, and was one of the most able men in that office. He shared Champlain’s purposes, resisted the absolutism of Richelieu and Louis XIII, supported the rights of parlements, and was executed for treason in 1632, at the age of 38.
Condé had lost interest in New France, and he sold the office to his brother-in-law for 30,000 livres. The new viceroy was Henri de Montmorency, duc of Damville and Montmorency, governor of Languedoc, and admiral of France. He came from one of the ancient noble families of France and was described as “brave, rich, gallant, and liberal,” in the old sense of liberal as generous and large-spirited. Montmorency was much admired for his style. It was said that he danced well, looked splendid on a horse, and had “the most agreeable manners in the world.” He was also intelligent and well informed about world affairs. In his office as admiral, Montmorency took a serious interest in commerce and colonies as a way of strengthening the maritime power of France. He was sympathetic to Champlain’s large purposes.5
Champlain thought it an excellent appointment and believed that “everything would be better managed for the honor of God, the service of the King, and the good of the Country.” Champlain himself may have helped to arrange it, working with another powerful man at court, the sieur de Villemenon, intendant of the French Admiralty in 1620 and a key figure in the events that followed.6 Immediately after Montmorency became viceroy of New France, he made two appointments. On March 8, 1620, he chose Champlain as his lieutenant for New France, and commandant in Quebec. At Villemenon’s urging, he also created a new office of intendant for New France.
The office of intendant was becoming very important in France by 1620. The word itself has no English equivalent and is inadequately translated as “steward” in bilingual dictionaries. French intendants functioned as instruments of royal absolutism. They were responsible for seeing that the wishes of the king and his council were carried out. They kept higher authorities informed about the performance of officials, the enforcement of edicts, the review of accounts, and the supervision of administration. Intendants were not what we would call line officers; they were not in the chain of comman
d, but they had great influence.7
Champlain understood the importance of intendants, and was quick to see that they could be useful for the purposes of his grand design. Rather than thinking of them as rivals or threats, Champlain perceived them as potential allies, and he formed a good working relationship with men such as Villemenon. Here again, he was very flexible and highly skilled at the art of working within the developing institutions of royal absolutism in France.
On March 12, the job of intendant in New France went to Jean-Jacques Dolu, a man of strength and presence who was highly placed as one of the king’s advisers, and also as grand audiencier (chief usher) at court. Champlain and Dolu appear to have known each other, and got on well. Dolu supported Champlain’s vision and strengthened his powers as commandant. Champlain in turn was careful to respect Dolu. They began to work comfortably together even before their appointments were confirmed by the king.8
An early test of their relationship came in the spring of 1620. Champlain went to Honfleur and made arrangements for the dispatch of two ships to New France. Once again he met strong opposition from the merchants of the old company of Rouen and Saint-Malo. Champlain wrote that “there was still some dispute about the command I was to exercise in the country.” After a confrontation that he described as a bit of a brouillerie, or free-for-all, he called for help. The new intendant Dolu came quickly to his support and told the merchants in no uncertain terms that the king himself intended Champlain to have “entire and absolute command over the entire settlement and everything in it, except what concerned the storehouse for their goods.” He added a stern warning that “if their men were unwilling to obey the wishes of his Majesty,” Champlain had full authority and power to “arrest their ship.”9
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