"His absence keeps this country, as it were, in mourning, and makes us
languish in the too long separation from a person so necessary to these
growing churches. He was the soul of them, and the zeal which he showed
on every occasion for the welfare of our Indians drew upon us favours of
Heaven most powerful for the success of our missions; and since, however
distant he be in the body, his heart is ever with us, we experience the
effects of it in the continuity of the blessings with which God favours
the labours of our missionaries." Accordingly, he did not lose a moment
after receiving the decrees appointing him Bishop of Quebec. On May
19th, 1675, he renewed the union of his seminary with that of the
Foreign Missions in Paris. "This union," says the Abbé Ferland, "a union
which he had effected for the first time in 1665 as apostolic bishop of
New France, was of great importance to his diocese. He found, indeed, in
this institution, good recruits, who were sent to him when needed, and
faithful correspondents, whom he could address with confidence, and who
had sufficient influence at court to gain a hearing for their
representations in favour of the Church in Canada." On May 29th of the
same year he set sail for Canada; he was accompanied by a priest, a
native of the city of Orleans, M. Glandelet, who was one of the most
distinguished priests of the seminary.

To understand with what joy he was received by his parishioners on his
arrival, it is enough to read what his brother, Henri de Laval, wrote to
him the following year: "I cannot express to you the satisfaction and
inward joy which I have received in my soul on reading a report sent
from Canada of the manner in which your clergy and all your people have
received you, and that our Lord inspires them all with just and true
sentiments to recognize you as their father and pastor. They testify to
having received through your beloved person as it were a new life. I ask
our Lord every day at His holy altars to preserve you some years more