in the fur trade. This was forbidden by the court but was almost
a universal practice. Some of the governors carried trading to
great lengths and aroused the bitter hostility of rival trading
interests. The fur trade was easily controlled as a government
monopoly and it was unfair that a needy governor should share its
profits. But, after all, such a quarrel was only between rival
monopolists. Better a trading governor than one who plundered the
people or who by drunken profligacy discredited his office.

While all Canada was devoted to the Roman Catholic Church, the
diversity of religious beliefs in the English colonies was a
marked feature of social life. In Virginia, by law of the colony,
the Church of England was the established Church. In
Massachusetts, founded by stern Puritans, the public services of
the Church of England were long prohibited. In Pennsylvania there
was dominant the sect derisively called "Quakers," who would have
no ecclesiastical organization and believed that religion was
purely a matter for the individual soul. Boston jeered at the
superstitions of Quebec, such as the belief of the missionaries
that a drop of water, with the murmured words of baptism,
transformed a dying Indian child from an outcast savage into an
angel of light. Quebec might, however, deride Boston with equal
justice. Sir William Phips believed that malignant and invisible
devils had made a special invasion of Massachusetts, dragging
people from their houses, pushing them into fire and water, and
carrying them through the air for miles over trees and hills.
These devils, it was thought, took visible form, of which the
favorite was that of a black cat. Witches were thought to be able
to pass through keyholes and to exercise charms which would
destroy their victims. While Phips and Frontenac were struggling