Two incidents in his first administration may be picked out as illustrating the boldness of his character, and implying foresight and breadth of view unusual in a French Governor under Louis XIV. The first was his crude attempt, already noticed,[8] to form a kind of Canadian parliament on the old French model, with the three estates of clergy, nobles, and people. It was a rash step to take immediately after his arrival, when he could not have known the conditions of the colony, and must have known well the wishes of the King. {108} It brought upon him a severe reprimand from home, and his scheme came to nothing. But the step, if ill timed, was in the right direction. Some semblance of popular assembly would have done much for Canada, if only as tending to create a national sentiment and to allay local jealousies. For among the many elements of weakness in the colony in its early days was the semi-independence of Montreal. Montreal was the commercial dépôt for the upper St. Lawrence, the Ottawa, and the great lakes. It was the meeting-place of French and native fur-traders. In it centred the natural wealth of Canada, and to it resorted the most enterprising and the least settled part of the population. It was jealous of the older settlement of Quebec, which was the seat of government, the centre of law and order, and which, being nearer the sea, commanded the import and export trade with Europe. Under its feudal Seigniors, the Sulpician monks, Montreal claimed to have some voice in the appointment of the local Governor; and Perrot its Governor, in the early days of Frontenac's first administration, defied within the limits of his district the authority of the Governor-General, and imprisoned his officers. [Footnote 8: See above, p. 97, note.] [Sidenote: _Founding of Fort Frontenac._]