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Updated: June 2, 2025
Tourville wanted to wait for the squadrons of Estrees and Rochefort; Pontchartrain had been minister of finance and marine since the death of Seignelay, Colbert's son, in 1690; he replied from Versailles to the experienced sailor, familiar with battle from the age of fourteen, "It is not for you to discuss the king's orders; it is for you to execute them and enter the Channel; if you are not ready to do it, the king will put in your place somebody more obedient and less discreet than you."
One realizes the anguish to which the population must have been a prey when one reads the following letter from the Bishop of Quebec: "Sire, the Marquis de Seignelay will inform your Majesty of the war which the Iroquois have declared against your subjects of New France, and will explain the need of sending aid sufficient to destroy, if possible, this enemy, who has opposed for so many years the establishment of this colony.... Since it has pleased your Majesty to choose me for the government of this growing Church, I feel obliged, more than any one, to make its needs manifest to you.
Accordingly, Seignelay presented La Sale to the king, who caused letters of nobility to be prepared for him, granted him the Seignory of Catarocouy, and the government of the fort which he had built, with the monopoly of commerce in the countries which he might discover.
Louis XIV. had lost Conde and Turenne, Luxembourg, Colbert, Louvois, and Seignelay; with the exception of Vauban, he had exhausted the first rank; Catinat alone remained in the second; the king was about to be reduced to the third: sad fruits of a long reign, of an incessant and devouring activity, which had speedily used up men and was beginning to tire out fortune; grievous result of mistakes long hidden by glory, but glaring out at last before the eyes most blinded by prejudice!
Cavelier de la Sale could not allow himself to remain exposed to these calumnious imputations. On the one side, honour prompted him to return to France to exculpate himself; on the other, he would not leave others to reap the profit of his discoveries. He set out, therefore, and received from Seignelay a kindly welcome.
He inspected the harbours and diverted himself by taking a sail in a wherry. He then betook himself to Dunkirk, where the Marquis de Seignelay son of Colbert had made ready a very fine man-of-war with which to regale their Majesties. The Chevalier de Ury, who commanded her, showed them all the handling of it, which was for those ladies, and for the Court, a spectacle as pleasant as it was novel.
A French man-of-war, the Seignelay, which was carrying a Roman Catholic bishop on a cruise round his oceanic diocese, arrived at Levaka, and its officers making the acquaintance of Miss Cumming, courteously invited her to accompany them on the remainder of their cruise. There was a delightful originality in the invitation, and a no less delightful originality in the acceptance of it.
He had, with an excess of scrupulousness, abandoned the display of all the fire that burned within him; but beauty never ceased to rouse him to irresistible enthusiasm. Whilst reading the Psalms to M. de Seignelay, when lying ill, he could not refrain from paraphrasing them aloud. He admired Sophocles so much that he never dared touch the subjects of his tragedies.
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