After this, when they went amongst the Iroquois, cross and breviary in hand, Jesuit missionaries met with no danger or refusal. They made many converts. Not content with their labours amongst the tribes close at hand, they pierced the distant forests north of Lake Superior, established permanent missions at Michilimackinac and Sault Ste. Marie, which joins the Lakes Huron and Michigan. On the banks of the St. Lawrence a new era began. For when the Carignan-Callières regiment was disbanded, the soldiers turned their swords into ploughshares, and the wise and prudent Intendant, Talon, had the satisfaction of seeing farms arise in the wilderness and yield abundant harvests. Talon's hand was seen everywhere; he spared no pains to make Canada prosperous and self-supporting. He set about establishing the fisheries in the St. Lawrence river and gulf, and encouraged the seal-hunts, by which much oil was obtained and exported to France. He ordered the people to grow hemp, and taught the women to spin wool. He also devoted much attention to the {91} timber trade, and to him is owing the first tannery seen in Canada. By the year 1688 as many as 1100 vessels had in a single season anchored in the Quebec roadstead, laden with every kind of merchandise. According to a letter written by one of the chief nuns, "M. Talon studied with the affection of a father how to succour the poor and cause the colony to grow; entered into the minutest particulars; visited the houses of the inhabitants and caused them to visit him; learned what crop each was raising; taught those who had wheat to sell it at a profit; helped those who had none, and encouraged everybody." But in nothing were Talon's efforts so extraordinary to us as in his providing wives for the colonists of New France. In his first few years of office 1200 girls were shipped out from France. These French maidens were chosen from the country rather than from the city, strong and accustomed to work. But there was also a consignment of "select young ladies" as wives for the officers. When they arrived in Quebec or Montreal, the girls, tall and short, blonde or brunette, plump and lean, were gathered in a large building, and the young Canadian came and chose a wife to his liking. A priest was in readiness, and they were married on the spot, in batches of thirty at a time. Next day, we are told, the Governor caused the couple to be presented with an ox, a cow, a pair of swine, a pair of fowls, two barrels of salted meat, and eleven crowns in money. Besides this bounty, twenty livres were given to each youth who married before he was twenty years old, and to each girl who married before {92} sixteen. All bachelors were heavily taxed. To be unmarried was regarded by the Intendant and the King as a crime. In short, as has been said, the new settler was found by the King, sent over by the King, and supplied by the King with a wife, a farm, and even a house.