Company. [ 1 ] The grantees took the land, but rarely fulfilled the
condition. Some of these grants were corrupt and iniquitous. Thus,
a son of Lauson, president of the Company, received, in the name of a
third person, a tract of land on the south side of the St. Lawrence of
sixty leagues front. To this were added all the islands in that river,
excepting those of Montreal and Orleans, together with the exclusive
right of fishing in it through its whole extent. [ 2 ] Lauson sent out
not a single colonist to these vast concessions.

[ 1 This appears in many early grants of the Company. Thus, in a grant
to Simon Le Maitre, Jan. 15, 1636, "que les hommes que le dit . . . fera
passer en la N. F. tourneront a la decharge de la dite Compagnie," etc.,
etc.--See Pieces sur la Tenure Seigneuriale, published by the Canadian
government, passim. ]

[ 2 Archives du Seminaire de Villemarie, cited by Faillon, I. 350.
Lauson's father owned Montreal. The son's grant extended from the River
St. Francis to a point far above Montreal.--La Fontaine, Memoire sur la
Famille de Lauson. ]

There was no real motive for emigration. No persecution expelled the
colonist from his home; for none but good Catholics were tolerated in New
France. The settler could not trade with the Indians, except on
condition of selling again to the Company at a fixed price. He might
hunt, but he could not fish; and he was forced to beg or buy food for
years before he could obtain it from that rude soil in sufficient
quantity for the wants of his family. The Company imported provisions
every year for those in its employ; and of these supplies a portion was
needed for the relief of starving settlers. Giffard and his seven men on
his seigniory of Beauport were for some time the only settlers--excepting,