But Canada was a long way from France and the St Lawrence was larger than the Seine. It is hard to fight against nature, and in Canada there were natural obstacles which withstood to some extent the forces of despotism. It is easy to see how distance from the court gave both governor and intendant {11} a range of action which would have been impossible in France. With the coming of winter Quebec was isolated for more than six months. During this long interval the two officials could do a great many things of which the king might not have approved, but which he was powerless to prevent. His theoretical supremacy was thus limited by the unyielding facts of geography. And a better illustration is found in the operation of the seigneurial system upon which Canadian society was based. In France a belated feudalism still held the common man in its grip, and in Canada the forms of feudalism were at least partially established. Yet the Canadian habitant lived in a very different atmosphere from that breathed by the Norman peasant. The Canadian seigneur had an abundance of acreage and little cash. His grant was in the form of uncleared land, which he could only make valuable through the labours of his tenants or _censitaires_. The difficulty of finding good colonists made it important to give them favourable terms. The habitant had a hard life, but his obligations towards his seigneur were not onerous. The man who lived in a log-hut among the stumps and could hunt at will through the {12} forest was not a serf. Though the conditions of life kept him close to his home, Canada meant for him a new freedom. Freest of all were the coureurs de bois, those dare-devils of the wilderness who fill such a large place in the history of the fur trade and of exploration. The Frenchman in all ages has proved abundantly his love of danger and adventure. Along the St Lawrence from Tadoussac to the Sault St Louis seigneuries fringed the great river, as they fringed the banks of its tributary, the Richelieu. This was the zone of cultivation, in which log-houses yielded, after a time, to white-washed cottages. But above the Sault St Louis all was wilderness, whether one ascended the St Lawrence or turned at Ile Perrot into the Lake of Two Mountains and the Ottawa. For young and daring souls the forest meant the excitement of discovery, the licence of life among the Indians, and the hope of making more than could be gained by the habitant from his farm. Large profits meant large risks, and the coureur de bois took his life in his hand. Even if he escaped the rapid and the tomahawk, there was an even chance that he would become a reprobate. {13}