No man in the annals of Church history has shown greater personal heroism than Father Jean Brébeuf. He was tall and strong, well fitted to withstand the hardships of his chosen calling and to impress the Indians with his power. The square cap and surplice which he donned when he assembled them for instruction, in order, as he naïvely writes, to “give more majesty” to his appearance, were never less needed. With natural dignity he combined the power of a life consecrated with the utmost fervor to God and his Church. Never during long years of service did he waver in his devotion nor shrink from anything that lay before him in his work. From his reports sent home to his superiors it is evident that he made a deep impression on the Indians. In these detailed accounts of his experiences and of the savages among whom he worked we get a clear idea of the man. We see him on the long canoe journeys, sharing in the labor of paddling and portages, till even he, who already knew, as he says, “a little what it is to be fatigued,” was so weary that his body could do no more. But he tells us how at these very times his soul experienced a deep peace such as it had never known before. In the most matter-of-fact way he accepts and records the continual hardships, never complaining of his lot, but writing with rare modesty because his whole attention is centred on the work instead of on himself. From his vivid pictures we learn, however, the truth of one of his casual statements. “Truly,” he says, “to come here much strength and patience are needed; and he who thinks of coming here for any other than God will have made a sad mistake.” In 1634 Father Brébeuf and his companions started on the northern journey by the Ottawa River and Lake Nipissing to the Huron country. They accompanied a party of Hurons who were returning from their annual summer trading visit to Quebec. This nine-hundred-mile trip took thirty days. Brébeuf kept count and found that they carried their canoes thirty-five times on portages one, two, and even three leagues long, covering the distance three and four times to transport even their small amount of baggage, and that they dragged the canoes through rapids at least fifty times, plunging into the icy water and cutting their feet on the rocky bottom. At night they slept on the bare earth or on hard rocks, stung by clouds of mosquitoes. Their only food was a small portion of Indian corn coarsely broken between two stones, which, though better than fasting, was regarded by the Jesuits as “no great treat.” Yet, denying themselves the ordinary necessaries of life, these priests transported the precious vessels for the mass over all this weary way.