associate, if they must, their notions of grinding
oppression and class hatred.

Out to his new colony on the St Lawrence the king sent
this seigneurial system. A gross and gratuitous outrage,
a characteristic manifestation of Bourbon stupidity--that
is a common verdict upon the royal action. But it may
well be asked: What else was there to do? The seigneurial
system was still the basis of land tenure in France. The
nobility and even the throne rested upon it. The Church
sanctioned and supported it. The people in general,
whatever their attitude towards seigneurialism, were
familiar with no other system of landholding. It was not,
like the encomienda system which Spain planted in Mexico,
an arrangement cut out of new cloth for the more ruthless
exploitation of a fruitful domain. The Puritan who went
to Massachusetts Bay took his system of socage tenure
along with him. The common law went with the flag of
England. It was quite as natural that the Custom of Paris
should follow the fleurs-de-lis.

There was every reason to expect, moreover, that in the
New World the seigneurial system would soon free itself
from those barnacles of privilege and oppression which
were encrusted on its sides at home. Here was a small
settlement of pioneers surrounded by hostile aborigines.
The royal arm, strong as it was at home, could not well
afford protection a thousand leagues away. The colony
must organize and learn to protect itself. In other words,
the colonial environment was very much like that in which