Teachers of it, whenever any one of their friends is prostrated by some severe complaint, and urge them to anticipate the death of the patient by sprinkling him with the saving waters, before he shall perish. And, indeed, these emotions of the mind, in men who are in other respects most savage, two Fathers have created by a training of two years, and that indeed not continuous, but interrupted by numerous difficulties, which is certainly no light incentive toward propagating the seed of the Gospel among that race with flourishing increase. To this propagation, the unaccustomed power of holy prayers and of Baptism, [603] sometimes disclosed among this people in several remarkable instances, seems likely to be no small incentive in the future. When Father Biard was occupied one day at the river of the Eplan fish, a message was brought to him from a sick woman at the point of death, who was very anxious to see and converse with him, at Bay Ste. Marie, two leagues from that river. He had one of the colonists as a guide thither, and found the woman lying, according to the manner of her race, near the hearth, and now miserably languishing in the third week of her illness. He instructed the invalid, as far as her disease permitted, in the necessary parts of the Catechism; strengthened her by prayers adapted to the circumstances, and a cross hung upon her breast; and directed that he should be called, if she should thereafter grow worse. The next day the woman arose from the hearth entirely well, and, loaded with a heavy bag, started briskly for her husband, who was at a distance of four leagues. A Calvinist from Dieppe first of all observed this cure, and immediately ran to Father Biard to announce the wonderful event. The same Father was with Biencourt on the banks of the Pentegoët, where, according to his custom, he was going about among the cabins of the Savages, visiting and comforting the sick and aiding them with prayers and Christian instruction. There a sick man was lying, who had already been ill three months, whose recovery had been despaired of, and whom the Savages brought to the Father's notice. He was completely bathed in cold perspiration, an almost certain sign of death, since a heavy fever had taken possession of him. After prayers had been said and a short lesson in the faith given, when the Father had held out a cross to him to be repeatedly kissed, and had left it hanging about his neck, many Savages listening to him, and heartily [604] approving what was done, he returned to the ship and Biencourt. But the next day, when Biencourt was engaged upon the ship in trading with the natives, that sick man, yesterday at the point of death, came on board in a state of health, and, joyfully and reverently displaying the cross, went to Father Biard,