Читать книгу The Lord of Lanoraie: A Canadian Legend - Richard Griffin Starke - Страница 3

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Clinging to the seigniorial mansions of the old Province of Quebec are tale and legend, often of a highly romantic character,—remains of a period in our Colonial history but little known or understood by the general reader, especially from a social point of view. The transition from French to British rule left the old feudal system of land tenure undisturbed, and retained until a much later period many of the quaint usages of the past; and the seigniories were not infrequently acquired by early British colonists by purchase, and occasionally through the marriage tie.

The abandoned, but picturesquely situated Manor-House of Lanoraie, near the village of that name on the North shore of the St. Lawrence, seen many years since by the writer, and which has now entirely disappeared, suggested, with some fragments of legendary lore, the tale embodied in the following pages.

The incidental visit of Prince William Henry, Duke of Clarence, to the St. Lawrence, in command of the warship Pegasus in the summer of 1787, and his sojourn at Sorel, on the opposite shore, and in the vicinity of Lanoraie, afforded further interesting material with which to embellish the story; especially as the Prince had been entertained, if not by the Seigneur of Lanoraie, of which there is nothing now certain, at least by one or more of the neighboring squires. For the purposes of poetry this appears to the writer to be sufficient, his object not being to write history, but as far as may be an interesting fiction.

The author desires further to state that the hero of the tale, the Seigneur of Lanoraie, is not drawn from the life, and has no reference whatever to any real person.

The reader conversant with Canadian history, will also readily understand the writer has used the names Le Moyne d’Iberville, d’Hertel de Rouville, Chartier de Lotbinière, de Ramezay, etc., merely as representative Seigniorial names, and not historically, as to date.

To those of antiquarian tastes it will not be out of place to state that Lanoraie derives its name from Sieur Louis Niort de la Noraye, who, with others, first settled on these lands in 1688, under a patent from Louis XIV. It remained in possession of their heirs till 1724, was acquired by Sieur Jean Baptiste Neveu, and was purchased from his son François Neveu in 1771, by the Honorable James Cuthbert, the then Seigneur of Berthier, who bequeathed it to his third son, the late Honorable Ross Cuthbert, from whom it has descended to his several heirs and still remains in their possession.

As the poem is in the narrative form, and refers to a period which has long passed away, the author has found it more convenient and judged it more effective that the characters themselves should relate the whole story in their proper persons than if it were told in the person of the writer.

If the poem of Lanoraie should induce other writers, more gifted and youthful, to enter this rich field of Canadian romance, one purpose of its publication will at least have been served.

The Author desires warmly to express literary obligations to Mr. and Mrs. William D. Lighthall for enthusiastic interest and friendly criticism in the course of writing and preparing the poem for publication.

The Author.

Montreal, 1898.