



Produced by David Widger from page images generously
provided by the Internet Archive







FRANCE AND ENGLAND in NORTH AMERICA

FOURTH PART

THE OLD REGIME IN CANADA

TWENTY-SIXTH EDITION

BY FRANCIS PARKMAN

BOSTON: LITTLE, BROWN, AND COMPANY

1874


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GEORGE EDWARD ELLIS, D.D.

My dear Dr. Ellis:

When, in my youth, I proposed to write a series of books on the French
in America, you encouraged the attempt, and your helpful kindness has
followed it from that day to this. Pray accept the dedication of this
volume in token of the grateful regard of

Very faithfully yours,

FRANCIS PARKMAN.




PREFACE.

“The physiognomy of a government,” says De Tocqueville, “can best
be judged in its colonies, for there its characteristic traits usually
appear larger and more distinct. When I wish to judge of the spirit and
the faults of the administration of Louis XIV., I must go to Canada. Its
deformity is there seen as through a microscope.”

The monarchical administration of France, at the height of its power
and at the moment of its supreme triumph, stretched an arm across the
Atlantic and grasped the North American continent. This volume attempts
to show by what methods it strove to make good its hold, why it achieved
a certain kind of success, and why it failed at last. The political
system which has fallen, and the antagonistic system which has
prevailed, seem, at first sight, to offer nothing but contrasts; yet out