The arena is their temple, the players are their saviours, and those who worship them pray that the sacrifices made on the ice — of blood, sweat and tears

Certain religious behaviours, like praying, surround the Canadiens, Bauer pointed out.

n Bauer's class, students will compare and contrast the Montreal Canadiens and other religions.

n Prof. Olivier Bauer's class at the Université de Montréal, worshippers can argue that their team is their religion.

he arena is their temple, the players are their saviours, and those who worship them pray that the sacrifices made on the ice — of blood, sweat and tears — will lead them to glory.

he melee, which forced the game to be suspended, ushered in arevolution

The gray weather on that St. Patrick's Day mirrored Montreal'smood. Mayor Jean Drapeau telephoned Campbell at the NHL officein town and begged him not to attend the game that night. Theimperious Campbell not only ignored the mayor's advice but alsomade a diva's entrance at the Forum,

n a match the previous Sunday, Richard had twice viciouslyslashed his nemesis, Hal Laycoe of the Boston Bruins, and thenassaulted a linesman. Three days later Campbell suspendedRichard for the Canadiens' three remaining regular-season gamesand the entire playoffs

No athlete has embodied the soul of a city and the spirit of itspeople as Richard did in the 1940s and '50s in Montreal, my homefor the past 21 years.

he haze was aghostly yellowish white. Smoke from a tear-gas canister haddriven thousands of hockey fans into the streets, sparking afour-hour rampage that yielded the requisite fires, shatteredwindows, looted stores, overturned cars and 137 arrests. S

There are moments when life gets in the way, when sports and thereal world collide at some intersection--

There are moments when life gets in the way, when sports and thereal world collide at some intersection--

t is one of those moments when you realize you are part of something special, that this spontaneous moment is taking on a life of its own, and one of those moments that remind you sports can mean so much more than a game. He is giving them one final memory here in the Forum. The crowd begins to chant, “Ree-char, Ree-char!”

Even before Campbell could sit, they began shouting insults and throwing objects his way. The police were primarily occupied with the crowd outside, having underestimated the furor of their turnout. That left Campbell on his own, exposed.

Montreal’s finest link arms to hold back the protestors in front of the main entrance of the Forum at St. Catherine Street and Atwater Avenue. A television reporter says, “The police seem to have things well in hand.”

Rocket did not reserve his wrath only for other players; he struck out at anyone who crossed him, including officials. In 1951, a Detroit player knocked Richard to the ice with a wrestling move but the referee, Hugh McLean, did not whistle a penalty. Richard got in McLean’s face. The referee slapped him with a misconduct penalty for his profanity. The next day, when Richard spotted McLean in the hotel lobby, he grabbed the referee by the throat, but his teammates managed to pull him away before he could harm McLean.

Yet Richard had a dark side. His intensity sometimes provoked violence. His tantrums had become as legendary as his goals.

You’ve never seen a hockey player like Maurice Richard. Not Crosby. Not Gretzky. Not Orr, Beliveau, Howe. None of them had the talent, the intensity, the will to take over a game like Richard. And none of them meant to their fans what le Rocket meant to Canadien fans.

Incensed, Richard swings his stick with two-fisted fury at Laycoe. He hits him with such force across the shoulders that his stick splinters. Laycoe sheds his gloves and rushes at Richard, who drops his gloves. The two thrash at one another with their fists.

No one can know when the anger of men, whipped indefinitely, becomes sculpted into political revenge. And more, it is not just a matter of hockey.”

Before each game, I think about my temper and how I should control it, but as soon as I get on the ice I forget all that.”

Rocket did not reserve his wrath only for other players; he struck out at anyone who crossed him, including officials. In 1951, a Detroit player knocked Richard to the ice with a wrestling move but the referee, Hugh McLean, did not whistle a penalty. Richard got in McLean’s face. The referee slapped him with a misconduct penalty for his profanity. The next day, when Richard spotted McLean in the hotel lobby, he grabbed the referee by the throat, but his teammates managed to pull him away before he could harm McLean.

“He is God,” Frank Selke Sr. once said bluntly.

The Babe Ruth of hockey,”

or Richard was one of theirs. He was Ree-char-NOT Rih-shard — born and raised, a Catholic French-Canadian in a Catholic French-Canadian city in the heart of a Catholic French-Canadian province.

Richard stood 5’10, 180 pounds, with the fists of a former boxer, but his most distinguishing physical feature was his eyes, dark, focused, under a heavy brow.

The one after that, he joined Elmer Lach and Toe Blake to form the “Punch Line,” a name that spoke as much to their toughness

He had started playing this game as a 4-year-old on the backyard rink his father Onésime, a machinist at the Canadian Pacific Railway, built for him. It was quickly apparent he could play in ways other boys could not. By the time he reached his teens, his skills were in such high demand he played as often as he could, sometimes four games in a weekend, using aliases to play for multiple teams, often against grown men. The oldest of eight children, he quit school at 16 to work with his father in the factory. He began playing junior hockey the following year.

“RICHARD GOES INSANE”

The Garden crowd is angry. Boston police come to the locker room. They want to arrest Richard for assault, to throw him in jail for the night. Montreal coach Dick Irvin blocks the entry to the Canadiens’ dressing room.

For five minutes, the tempest rages. The crowd, on its feet, cannot believe the madness before them. They’ve seen fights over the Garden’s past three decades in the days when players swung their sticks and fists more liberally, but nothing like this, nothing as determined and wild.

Maurice Richard­-le Rocket, Montreal’s homegrown French-Canadian star from the city’s blue-collar Nouveau-Bordeaux neighborhood, the world’s greatest hockey player to that time — carries the puck in the Boston zone. Hal Laycoe steps in his way. The 12,023 fans brace themselves. It’s March 13, 1955. The tension between the two rivals in the six-team NHL has been building inside the Boston Garden all night. This is their 14th and final meeting of the regular season, plenty of games to enflame the animosity between the two teams, but what’s about to happen is even more personal. Laycoe, the Bruins forward had nailed Richard in the first period. He served two minutes for charging. But the hit lit the fuse of Richard’s infamous temper.

No one can know when the anger of men, whipped indefinitely, becomes sculpted into political revenge. And more, it is not just a matter of hockey.”

Since then, larger thinkers on the Quebec scene have argued whether this was the beginning of Quebec's Quiet Revolution — officially pegged for 1960 with the election of Jean Lesage as Premier — or perhaps just the end of a time when hockey was more important than politics, as the latter began to take hold among French Canadian youth.

Out on the street, the largest riot since Conscription was passed in 1944 (bringing in the draft for the final year of the Second World War) broke out along a seven-block length of Rue Ste. Catherine, featuring overturned cars, smashed windows, a shot fired from somewhere and 137 arrests.

The president really worked for the six owners, five of whom wanted the book thrown at Richard for the Boston incident.

At the Boston Garden on March 13, 1955, bespectacled Bruins defender Hal Laycoe had another of his endless run-ins with Richard, leaving the Habs' star cut on the head after a high stick. A brawl ensued, and the Rocket broke his CCM stick over Laycoe's back.

ow Richard himself, the Rocket, was so much a part of Quebec society that he transcended even organized religion. Red Storey, a former referee and long-time hockey commentator, once said of him that, in Quebec, "hockey was bigger than the Church, and Rocket Richard was bigger than the Pope." Roch Carrier perhaps explained it best in his famous book The Hockey Sweater.

Maurice Richard said many times that, in order to understand the events leading up to the riot of March 17, 1955 that forever bears his name, it was crucial to know how violent the National Hockey League was in those days.

Before departing the doctor gave Maria a little bottle with instructions. "Only if she should suffer greatly, so that she cries out, and never more than fifteen drops at a time. And do not let her have any cold water to drink."

For the first hour the horse could not go beyond a walk, sinking knee-deep in snow;

Raising his eyes to Maria he repeated with emphasis:—"He was a good man, you will not find his like."

"It is a queer thing," said Conrad Neron, "how every man finds it equally hard to rest content. Here are three who left their homes and came this long way to settle and farm, and here am I always saying to myself that nothing would be so pleasant as to sit quietly in an office all the day, a pen behind my ear, sheltered from cold wind and hot sun."

There is no better life than the life of a farmer who has good health and owes no debts. He is a free man, has no boss, owns his beasts, works for his own profit ...

"It is a beautiful country, new and so vast ... In the summer-time there are many flies, and the winters are trying; but I suppose that one gets used to these things in time."

this was February, with two long months of winter yet to come.

NEW YEAR'S DAY, and not a single caller!

Maria's thoughts were turning in another direction. "If the roads are as bad as they were last year," said she, "we shall not be able to attend the midnight mass. And yet I should so much have liked it this time, and father promised ..."

"In the woods they are better off than we are here," answers her father. "Up there where the trees stand close together one does not feel the wind. You can be sure that Esd

On such days as these the men scarcely left the house except to care for the beasts, and came back on the run, their faces rasped with the cold and shining-wet with snow-crystals melted by the heat of the house. Chapdelaine would pluck the icicles from his moustache, slowly draw off his sheepskin-lined coat and settle himself by the stove with a satisfied sigh. "The pump is not frozen?" he asks. "Is there plenty of

Oats and wheat took on a sickly colour ere attaining their growth; a merciless sun withered the grass and the clover aftermath, and all day long the famished cows stood lowing with their heads over the fences. T

hree or four times a day Maria or Telesphore brought them a bucket of water which they stood in a shady spot to keep it cool; and when throats became unbearably dry with heat, exertion and the dust of the hay, they went by turns to swallow great-draughts and deluge wrists or head.

Mosquitos swarmed and circled in the fervent afternoon heat. Every moment the hand must be raised to scatter them; after a panic-stricken flight they straightway returned, reckless and pitiless, bent only on finding one tiny spot to plant a sting; with their sharp note was blended that of the insatiate black-fly, filling the woods with unceasing sound. Living trees there were not many; a few young birches, some aspens, alder bushes were stirring in the wind among the rows of lifeless and blackened trunks.

Madame Chapdelaine foretold inevitable misfortune. "Mark my words, we shall not have good hay-making weather.

Maria is not at her best this evening," said Madame Chapdelaine by way of excusing her, "she is really not used to having visitors you see.

Between the games, Lorenzo Surprenant entertained Maria with a description of his life and his journeyings; in turn asking questions about her. He was far from putting on airs, yet she felt disconcerted at finding so little to say, and her replies were halting and timid.

"There! You are forever saying that we are buried in the woods and see no company,"

And he set himself to telling of the great American cities and their magnificence, of the life filled with ease and plenty, abounding in refinements beyond imagination,

"And are there many Canadians where you are living? Do the people speak French?"

"He has no wish to hold on to the land and cultivate it?"

The young folk were listening keenly to these tales of former times.

I had word through Ferdina Larouche, a son of Thadee Larouche of Honfleur, who got back from La Tuque last month. He said that things were going well; the men were not having too bad a time."

The place where they had worked in the morning was yet full of stumps and overgrown with alders. They set themselves to cutting and uprooting the alders, gathering a sheaf of branches in the hand and severing them with the ax, or sometimes digging the earth away about the roots and tearing up the whole bush together. The alders disposed of, there remained the stumps.

Thither the five men made their way one morning and set to work at once, without a word, for every man's task had been settled beforehand.

AFTER a few chilly days, June suddenly brought veritable spring weather. A blazing sun warmed field and forest, the lingering patches of snow vanished even in the deep shade of the woods; the Peribonka rose and rose between its rocky banks until the alders and the roots of the nearer spruces were drowned; in the roads the mud was incredibly deep. The Canadian soil rid itself of the last traces of winter with a semblance of mad haste, as though in dread of another winter already on the way.

but almost no farming; the men live by trapping and fishing

"Yes, I sold everything. I was never a very good hand at farming, you know. Working in the shanties, trapping, making a little money from time to time as a guide or in trade with the Indians, that is the life for me; but to scratch away at the same fields from one year's end to another, and stay there forever, I would not have been able to stick to that all my life; I would have felt like a cow tethered to a stake."

"It is raining!" he exclaimed. His hosts made toward the door to see for themselves; the rain had in truth begun, a spring rain with great drops that fell heavily, under which the snow was already softening and melting. "The sou'east has taken hold," announced the elder Chapdelaine. "Now we can say that the winter is practically over."

Her husband clenched his fists and shook his head with an obstinate gesture. "Only you wait a few months ... When the boys are back from the woods we shall set to work, they two, Tit'Bé, and I, and presently we shall have our land cleared. With four good men ax in hand and not afraid of work things will go quickly, even in the hard timber. Two years from now there will be grain harvested, and pasturage that will support a good herd of cattle. I tell you that we are going to make land."

Although he came to see Maria, as all knew, it was to the father of the house that he directed his remarks, partly through shyness, partly out of deference to the manners of the country. He t

elesphore busied himself with the dog-harness and made believe not to hear.

The great three-decked stove stood in the centre of the house; the sheet-iron stove-pipe, after mounting for some feet, turned at a right angle and was carried through the house to the outside, so that none of the precious warmth should be lost

"There is a little water on the ice," said he, "and the snow has melted; but we ought to be able to cross all the same.

After a couple of miles the road climbed a steep hill and entered the unbroken woods. The houses standing at intervals in the flat country all the way from the village came abruptly to an end, and there was no longer anything for the eye to rest upon but a wilderness of bare trunks rising out of the universal whiteness. Even the incessant dark green of balsam, spruce and gray pine was rare; the few young and living trees were lost among the endless dead, either lying on the ground and buried in snow, or still erect but stripped and blackened. Twenty years before great forest fires had swept through, and the new growth was only pushing its way amid the standing skeletons and the charred down-timber. Little hills followed one upon the other, and the road was a succession of ups and downs scarcely more considerable than the slopes of an ocean swell, from trough to crest, from crest to trough.

"You should be safe enough for crossing this evening," said Nazaire Larouche, "but it will be touch-and-go, and I think you will be about the last. The current is strong below the fall and alr

Meantime the women in their turn had begun to leave the church. Young or old, pretty or ugly, nearly all were well clad in fur cloaks, or in coats of heavy cloth; for, honouring the Sunday mass, sole festival of their lives, they had doffed coarse blouses and homespun petticoats, and a stranger might well have stood amazed to find them habited almost with elegance in this remote spot; still French to their finger-tips in the midst of the vast lonely forest and the snow, and as tastefully dressed, these peasant women, as most of the middle-class folk in provincial France.

He continued:—"Two men are up here with money to buy furs. If you have any bear, mink, muskrat or fox you will find these men at the store until Wednesday, or you can apply to François Paradis of Mistassini who is with them. They have plenty of money and will pay cash for first-class pelts." His news finished, he descended the steps. A sharp-faced little fellow took his place.

"I tell you that we shall have a lean year," asserted one old fellow, "the frost got in before the last snows fell."

The door opened, and the men of the congregation began to come out of the church at Peribonka.

Even in wars, where confusion often reigns, they do not fail to keep some order

They also punish Sorcerers severely, that is, those who use poisoning, and cause death by charms; [155] and this punishment is authorized by the consent of the whole Country, so that whoever takes them in the act has full right to cleave their skulls and rid the world of them, without fear of being called to account, or obliged to give any satisfaction for it.

Returning from this feast with a Captain who is very intelligent, and who will some day be very influential in the affairs [200] Of the Country, I asked him why they called the bones of the dead Atisken. He gave me the best explanation he could, and I gathered from his conversation that many think we have two souls, both of them being divisible and material, and yet both reasonable; the one separates itself from the body at death, yet remains in the Cemetery until the feast of the Dead,

After salutations, thanks for the trouble taken in coming, thanksgivings rendered, I know not to whom, that every one has arrived without accident, that no one has been surprised by enemies, nor has fallen into any stream or River, nor has been injured,—in brief, that every one has arrived happily, all are exhorted to deliberate maturely. Then the affair to be [page 255] discussed is brought forward, and Messieurs the Councilors are asked to give their advice.

Enditeuhwa, of thanksgiving and gratitude

The souls of those who died in war form a band by themselves; the others fear them,

All this, they say, is an indubitable sign of a very bad year.

Now in connection with this name Father I must not forget the difficulty there is in teaching to say Our Father who art in Heaven, to those who have none on earth; to speak to them of the dead whom they have loved, is to insult them. A woman, whose mother had died a short time before, almost lost her desire to be baptized because the command, Thou shalt honor thy Father and thy Mother, had been inadvertently quot

Now in connection with this name Father I must not forget the difficulty there is in teaching to say Our Father who art in Heaven, to those who have none on earth; to speak to them of the dead whom they have loved, is to insult them. A woman, whose mother had died a short time before, almost lost her desire to be baptized because the command, Thou shalt honor thy Father and thy Mother, had been inadvertently quote

As for the dangers of the soul, to speak frankly, there are none for him who brings to the Country of the Hurons the fear and love of God; on the contrary,

n explaining to Louys's relatives the commandment not to steal, and mentioning that in France thieves [page 65] were put to death, his father asked him if, when he became Captain, he would also put them to death. Louys replied that in that case the Country would very soon be depopulated, as it would be necessary to kill every one

On the twenty-first of March, a woman, who had been about twenty-four hours in travail, brought forth a child happily, as soon as we had applied to her a Relic of Our Blessed Father St. Ignatius. Her child lived only long enough to enable us to send it to Heaven by Baptism.

As for the dangers of the soul, to speak frankly, there are none for him who brings to the Country of the Hurons the fear and love of God; on the contrary,

During the day, the Sun burns you; during the night, you run the risk of being a prey to Mosquitoes. You sometimes ascend five or six rapids in a day; and, in the evening, the only refreshment is a little corn crushed between two stones and cooked in fine clear water; the only bed is the earth, sometimes only the rough, uneven rocks, and usually no roof but the stars; and all this in perpetual silence. If you are accidentally hurt, if you fall sick, do not expect from these Barbarians any assistance,

On the ninth of August, one of our men arrived from Kébec two months and twelve days after departing hence. God [38] knows how glad we were to hear of the state of all the French at Kébec and the three Rivers, who report had declared were all dead of the plague.

Summer here is a very inconvenient season for instructing the Savages. Their trading expeditions and the farms take every one away, men, women, and children—almost no one remains in the villages. I will tell you how we spent last Summer.

They seek Baptism almost entirely as an aid to health. We try to purify this intention, and to lead them to receive from the hand of Cod alike sickness and health, death and life; and teach them that the life-giving waters of Holy [6] Baptism principally impart life to the soul, and not to the body. However, they have the opinion so deeply rooted that the baptized, especially the children, are no longer sickly, that soon they will have spread it abroad and published it everywhere. The result is that they are now bringing us children to baptize from two, three, yes, even seven leagues away.

The Hurons are in constant dread of hostile incursions from the Iroquois; the missionaries promise to assist them in such emergencies, and instruct them how to improve the fortifications around their villages; for this, the Hurons are duly grateful.

The Hurons are in constant dread of hostile incursions from the Iroquois; the missionaries promise to assist them in such emergencies, and instruct them how to improve the fortifications around their villages; for this, the Hurons are duly grateful.

What we cannot doubt is, that he must have had much to suffer there: but what consoles us is, our certain knowledge that everywhere sufferings [20] have been the price due for the conversion of the Nations conquered for the Kingdom of Jesus Chris

While the enemy delayed around the Pastor of that Church, his poor scattered flock had at least more leisure to escape; and many, in fact, betook themselves to a place of safety,—indebted for their lives to the death of their father. The others could not escape promptly enough,—especially some poor distressed mothers, who succumbed beneath the burden of three [13] or four children; or who, having attempted to hide themselves in the depth of the forest, saw themselves discovered there through the innocent cries of an age which betrays itself, calling upon itself the misfortune which it most fears.

The fire meanwhile was consuming the cabins; and when it had spread as far as the Church, the Father was cast into it, at the height of the flames, which soon made of him a whole burnt-offering. Be this as it may, he could not have been more gloriously consumed than in the fires and lights of a Chapelle ardente.

We see a great number of our Christians, who have died by the edge of the sword; Others, who have suffered both the fires and the flames,

On the 3rd, father Bressany left 3 rivers again, with 4 Canoes.

The ship Næuf, which sailed from France in the month of march, not having arrived, was accounted lost. We lost thereby the value of 4000 livres.

The winter's Work was to pile sand for building, and wood for heating.

They tied both of their hands together. They tore the nails from their fingers. They beat them with a shower of blows from cudgels, on the shoulders, the loins, the belly, the legs, and the face,—there being no part of their body which did not endure this torment.

On March 16, 1649, a thousand Iroquois, well armed—" mostly with firearms, which they obtain from the Dutch, their allies "—make a sudden attack, at daybreak, on the village Of St. Ignace (not more than ten miles southeast of Ste. Marie itself). This place, although well fortified, is taken " almost without a blow, " the people being asleep; and nearly all of them are slain or captured. Not stopping here, the enemy immediately proceed to the attack of St. Louis,

n July, thirty Abenaki Indians come to Quebec; but they are forbidden to come hither again. They bring the first news of the year from France, for the fleet has not yet arrived.

Early in May, news comes from Three Rivers and Montreal that famine prevails there. There is also great scarcity at Quebec; but the Jesuits are able to aid the people there, with "more than 40 casks of grain," for seed and for food. On June 6, thirty-four Frenchmen are sent to the Huron country. A grant of two leagues of land, opposite Montreal, is made to the Jesuits.

he missionary returns thanks for promised aid, which is especially needed at this time, when the French are continually harassed by Iroquois raids. The little settlement of Three Rivers is so slightly defended that the French are in daily peril of their lives;

only the priests, but their servants—are ready to lay down their lives, if need be, for the sake of the little Indian church which they have there founded.