The Jesuit Relations and Allied Documents, Vol. 1: Acadia, 1610-1613
History
The Jesuit Relations and Allied Documents, Vol. 1: Acadia, 1610-1613
Canada -- History -- To 1763 (New France); Indians of North America -- Canada; Jesuits -- Missions; Jesuits -- North America
In truth we left Dieppe the 26th of January this year, 1611, and
arrived May 22nd of this same year. I am giving to the Reverend Father
Provincial the narrative in French of our whole undertaking, and of the
condition in which we found things here. This seemed to me the more
necessary and useful, as it was impossible for me to write it at the
same time in Latin. I have not yet been settled a week in Port Royal,
and all the time has [42] been taken up by continual interruptions and
in providing the necessities of life. As to ourselves, Father Masse
and I, we are feeling very well, thank God; but we have been obliged
to take a servant to do the drudgery. We could not dispense with one
without a great deal of anxiety and trouble.
M. de Potrincourt, who commands here in the name of the King, loves and
esteems us in proportion to his piety.
We shall take the first opportunity to impart to you what may be, by
the grace of God, our prospects of success in this country.
The ship has already gone. I shall be obliged to overtake it in a
canoe, that it may not leave without my letters.
I conjure Your Reverence, through the merits of Jesus Christ, to
remember us and these solitary lands, and to come to our aid in so far
as you are able, not only by the fervent prayers of our Society, but
also by the blessing and favor of our Holy Father the Pope (which I
have already invoked). Surely we sow in great poverty and in tears; may
the Lord grant that we some day reap in joy. Which will come to pass,
as I hope and have said, [43] through the prayers and blessings of Your
Reverence, which are humbly solicited by your
Unworthy son and servant,
PIERRE BIARD, S. J.
Port Royal, New France, or Canada, June 11, 1611.
[Illustration: FIGVRE DE LA TERRE NEVVE, GRANDE RIVIERE DE CANADA, ET
CÔTES DE L'OCEAN EN LA NOVVELLE FRANCE
_Ian Swelinc fecit I Millot excudit_ MARCVS: LESCARBOT _nunc primum
delin'auit publicauit donauit Avec privilege du Roy_
FROM LESCARBOT'S HISTOIRE DE LA NOVVELLE FRANCE; PARIS, 1612.
[Reduced to 2/3 the dimensions of original.]]
VII
JOUVENCY'S CANADICÆ MISSIONIS RELATIO
ROME: GIORGIO PLACKO, 1710
SOURCE: We follow the general style of O'Callaghan's Reprint No.
4. The Title-page, Eulogy of Biard, and Table of Contents, are the
work of that Editor. The Text, and List of Missions in 1710, he
reprinted from Jouvency's _Historia Societatis Jesu_ (Rome, 1710),
part v., pp. 321-325, 961, 962; the proof of these we have read
from a copy of that work, found in the library of the College of
St. Francis Xavier, New York. The bracketed pagination in Arabic
figures is that of Jouvency; that in Roman, of O'Callaghan.
CANADICÆ
MISSIONIS
RELATIO
_Ab anno 1611 usque ad annum 1613, cum statu ejusdem Missionis,
annis 1703 & 1710_,
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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