We have two accounts of the condition of Canada at this time; one from the pen of the bishop designate, the other from that of the new governor after a residence of a little over three months in the country. Strange to say, the two do not in the very least agree. Saint Vallier sees everything _couleur de rose_, and detects the odour of sanctity everywhere. Denonville, on the contrary, sees license, insubordination, idleness, luxury, debauchery, running riot throughout the land. "The Canadian people," says Saint Vallier, "is, generally speaking, as devout as the clergy is holy. One remarks among them something resembling the disposition which we recognize and admire in the Christians of the early centuries." Even in the distant settlements where a priest is rarely seen, the people are constant in the practice of virtue, the fathers making up for the lack of priests, so far as the training of their children is concerned, "by their wise counsels and firm discipline."[26] Denonville, just about the same time, undertakes to give the minister an account of the disorders prevailing not only in the woods, but, as he states, in the settlements as well. "These arise," he says, "from the idleness of young persons, and the great liberty which fathers, mothers, and guardians have for a long time given them of going into the forest under pretence of hunting or trading. One great evil," he continues, "is the infinite number of drinking-shops. . . . All the rascals and idlers of the country are attracted into this business of tavern-keeping. They never dream of tilling the soil; on the contrary, they deter other inhabitants, and end by ruining them." Of the two pictures, it is probable that the governor's was nearer the truth; though probably his ascetic turn of mind led him to exaggerate the evils that existed. Saint Vallier, when he came to the country as bishop in 1688, was not long in discovering how greatly he had overrated the virtue and piety of the inhabitants. He took an early opportunity of repairing his error as far as possible by preaching a sermon on the sins which he found prevailing. "We thought," he said, "before we knew our flock, that the Iroquois and the English were the only wolves we had to fear; but, God having opened our eyes, we are forced to confess that our most dangerous foes are drunkenness, luxury, impurity, and slander." We cannot think very highly of the judgment of a man who has to repudiate his own statements so completely in regard to facts fully open to observation.