robbers of the state and people in the days when the country was on the
verge of war, and Montcalm, a brave, incorruptible man, was fighting
against tremendous odds to save this unfortunate country to which he
gave up his own life in vain.

So long as France governed Canada, education was entirely in the hands
of the Roman Catholic Church. The Jesuits, Franciscans, and other
religious orders, male and female, at an early date, commenced the
establishment of those colleges and seminaries which have always had so
important a share in the education of Lower Canada. The Jesuits founded
a college at Quebec in 1635, or three years before the establishment of
Harvard, and the Ursulines opened their convent in the same city four
years later. Sister Bourgeoys of Troyes founded at Montreal in 1659 the
Congrégation de Notre-Dame for the education of girls of humble rank;
the commencement of an institution which has now its buildings in many
parts of Canada. In the latter part of the seventeenth century Bishop
Laval carried out a project for providing education for Canadian priests
drawn from the people of the country. Consequently, in addition to the
great seminary at Quebec, there was the lesser seminary where boys were
taught in the hope that they would take orders. In the inception of
education the French endeavoured in more than one of their institutions
to combine industrial pursuits with the ordinary branches of an
elementary education. But all accounts of the days of the French régime
go to show that, despite the zealous efforts of the religious bodies to
improve the education of the colonists, secular instruction was at a
very low ebb and hardly reached the seigniories. One writer tells us
that "even the children of officers and gentlemen scarcely knew how to
read and write; they were ignorant of the first elements of geography
and history." Still, dull and devoid of intellectual life as was the
life of the Canadian, he had his place of worship where he received a