the hill, and opposite the residence of the Honourable Mr. Justice Caron." "Amongst the French gentlemen of note who then owned lands at Sillery may be mentioned. François de Chavigny, _sieur de Berchéreau qui_," adds Abbé Ferland, "_occupait un rang élevé dans le colonie. En quelques occasions, il fut chargé de remplacer le Gouverneur, lors que celui-ci s'absentait de Québec_." Now, dear reader, let it be known to you that you are to look with every species of respect on this worthy old denizen of Sillery, he being, as the Abbé has elsewhere established beyond the shadow of a doubt, not only the ancestor of several old families, such as the Lagorgendières, the Rigaud de Vaudreuils and Tachereaus, but also one of the ancestors of your humble servant the writer of these lines. "The Sillery settlement contained during the winter of 1646-7, of Indians only, about two hundred souls. Two roads led from Quebec to the settlement, one the Grande Allée or St. Louis Road, the other the Cove Road, skirting the beach. Two grist mills stood in the neighbourhood: one on the St. Denis streamlet which crosses the Grande Allée road (from Thornhill to Spencer Wood)--the dam seems to have been on the Spencer Wood property. 'This mill, and the _fief_ on which it was built, belonged to M. Juchereau,' one of the ancestors of the Duchesnays. 'Another mill existed on the Bell Borne brook,' which crosses the main road, the boundary between Spencer Grange and Woodfield. Any one visiting these two streamlets during the August droughts will be struck with their diminutiveness, compared to the time when they turned the two grist mills two hundred years back: the clearing of the adjoining forests, whence they take their source, may account for the metamorphosis." The perusal of the Rev. Mr. Ferland's work brings us to another occurrence, which, although foreign to the object of this sketch, deserves notice:-- "The first horse [179] seen in Canada was landed from a French vessel about the 20th June, 1647, and presented as a gift to His Excellency Governor Montmagny." Another incident deserving of mention occurs under date of 20th August, 1653. The Iroquois [180] surprised at Cap Rouge Rev. Father J. Antoine Poncet and a peasant named Mathurin Tranchelot, and carried them off to their country. For three days the rev. missionary was subjected to every kind of indignity from the Indian children and every one else. A child cut off one of the captive's fingers. He was afterwards, with his companion, tied up during two nights, half suspended in the air; this made both suffer horribly; burning coals were applied to their flesh. Finally, the missionary was handed over to an old squaw; he shortly after became free, and returned to Quebec on the 5th of November, 1653, to the joy of everybody.