This is a picture of an old Quebec-City. It has its cathedral. Every little town in Quebec had a magnificent church. However, in the days of New France, the population lived mostly on each side of the St Lawrence River, on narrow but deep land tracts called Seigneuries. Quebec consisted of seigneuries, a feudal system. The Seigneur collected “rentes” (rent) and the Church, la dîme (tithe). There were three main cities: Québec, Trois-Rivières and Montréal, each located on the North bank of the St. Lawrence River. During the winter, one could travel on thick ice from one of the cities to another. One used a cart and horses. When summer came, boats could be used. However, there was a road, le chemin du Roy/Roi.

The Seigneurial system survived until 1854, but it had been established in 1627. This was a “peau de chagrin.” La Peau de chagrin (1831) is the title of a novel by Honoré de Balzac. The peau (skin) grows smaller and smaller and its owner runs out of luck.

Similarly, thirty acres grow smaller and smaller with each generation. The children have to find a job. When the system was abolished, censitaires were given a choice. They could purchase their thirty acres, or pay rent for life. Le Seigneur did not lose anything, but those who paid a rente were impoverished. The amount of money renters had to pay is enormous:

In 1928, an inquiry launched by the Bureau de la statistique du Québec (Statistics Québec) showed that rentes were still being collected in 190 seigneuries (for a total capital value of $3,577,573). The annual payments made by nearly 60,000 families amounted to more than $200,000.

(Canada. Dept. of Mines and Technical Surveys / Library and Archives Canada / PA-020260)
1928

(Seigneurial System, The Canadian Encyclopedia)

When an « habitant » (usually a farmer) saw the priest arrive, he wanted to hide. He knew it was time to pay the tithe. The Church collected money at mass and through the tithe. Quebec literature tells this drama in Ringuet’s Trente arpents, but also in other novels. (See Canadiana.2, one of my pages.) The Internet kept my writings. Would you believe I have been an influencer?

Conclusion

On these words, I must leave. United Empire Loyalists were given plenty of land, while our little habitant could not survive on the ancestral acres. There was a huge exodus to the United States. One million French-speaking Canadians left Canada. My grandfather did. He did not speak French. His wife stayed in Canada, living next to the railroad. The men in the train threw what they could, so the one cast iron stove had something to burn.

Louis Hémon’s Maria Chapdelaine (1913) depicts the three choices of French Canadians. Go north and clear land, work as a king of voyageur, or move to the United States. My father could not remember his father. So, my mother found where he lived and we traveled to Massachusetts. The trip was a great success. We met a wonderful man and his wife and continued to go to Athol two or three times a year. We learned never to judge a man, unless we had walked in his moccasins.

My grandfather had seven cats and a large dog. He also had a cow and une basse-cour, a yard for the hens. He married the woman who sold him her property. She was in charge of the house.

© Micheline Walker
21 August 2020
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