The building of a parish church and providing a priest, both difficult tasks in this poverty-stricken time, were delayed for some time. The seminary meanwhile sent out its missioners to conduct services at Lachine and Pointe aux Trembles and the surrounding district. A temporary chapel was made in the rooms of farmers' houses as is done in country districts in the Northwest today. It was not till November 18, 1674, that the people of Pointe aux Trembles took definite steps for church erection, which resulted in the church of L'Enfant Jésus, blessed by the superior of the seminary on March 13, 1678, with the assistance of the curé of the new church and M. Jean Cavelier, brother of La Salle and a priest of the seminary. The feudal system, prefigured by Richelieu long ago in his commission to the Marquis de la Roche and "following the custom of Paris," based on the tenure of land, was established as soon as peace was obtained, as the best method of building up the colony and of looking after private interests. It was a most suitable method for the time. The feudal absolutism then created, both of church and state, were necessary for the French at a period when they had not learned the first elements of self-government. The pity was that this system of leading strings was too prolonged and overdone, especially as later the French government did not do its duty by the people, thus preventing its progress by ruining its initiative. Had not the bolder spirits broken through it, we should not have had the redeeming point in the history of these times--the brilliant geographical discoveries. But in those early wild times the military civilization now forming and the paternal influence of the clergy at Montreal, seigneurs and parish priests, did much for that distinctively Canadian love of discipline and order, which is the foundation of the great and mighty people Canada is destined to be. Talon, writing to Colbert on November 13, 1666, says: "I have already commenced the enfiefments by Montreal, the principal fief of this country, in receiving its 'foi et hommage' as also its 'aveux et dénombrements.'" A _papier terrier_, or land roll, was ordered to be made and a list of all the lands, houses and other properties accurately defined and registered. Uncertain titles were made clear and others made out that had been neglected. The condition of land tenure was not onerous; the "cens and rentes" paid annually were not an equivalent for value received but a simple recognition of the legal primitive right of the seigneurs, on property given. Thus at Montreal, land sites on the portion reserved for the future town, had been given on the annual payment of five _sous_ an arpent, while on those in the town itself all the annual revenue demanded was a _liard_ for each fathom.