Daily Kennebec journal. [microfilm reel] (Augusta, Me.) 1870-1975, 1908-03-21
The Quebec TereentenniaI.

The city of Quebec is making plans
for the celebration during the coming
summer of the Booth anniversary of its
founding and of course such a celebra-
ton in the quaint and historic old city
is a matter of far more than local i'm
portance. Tourists who visit Quebec
often speak of it as a type of medieval
town and as a bit of old Europe trans
planted in the New World, and while
both of these characterizations are
true to some extent it is also true that
few cities of this continent have
figured more prominently than Quebec
in the making of American history.
The picturesque old city is fortunate
in the fact that its historical sites have
never been effaced or altered, and
those in charge of the proposed cele-
bration will make the most OF this
fortunate circumstance.
The city will have the assistance of
the navies of the three great countries
that had part in her history, France
which founded her, Great Britain
which won her after years of bloody
warfare, and the United States which
shed at her gates some of the colonies
whole northern half of the continent
under one flag. All three navies will
be represented by modern battleships
which will salute with their guns a
of the tiny little craft Of
100 tons in which Champlain sailed up
the ST. Lawrence in 1908 and founded
Quebec.
The chief feature of the tercen-
tennial celebration will be a grand
historical pageant, and what a wealth
of material there will be for the his
torical floats and figures in the pro-
cession. There are the heroes of the
plains of Abraham, Montcalm who
died when died the hopes of his
country on the stricken field and
Wolfe who gave up his life in the
of victory. There is Abra-
ham, the old Scotch sailor who set
tied among the French and gave his
name to the plains on which the bat
tie was fought. Then there is Lord
Nelson, who nearly ended in disgrace
in Quebec a career destined to be a
most glorious one, who, having be-
come infatuated with an innkeepers
deserted when ordered to
sea to return to his lady love, and was
saved from his folly by being forcibly
by his friends and returned
to his ship.
The infamous Intendant Bigot, the
CRATER of history, will un-
doubtedIy be represented; the Ameri-
cans. Montgomery and Arnold, who
came within an ace of capturing the
old stronghold during a blizzard in
1775: those two Scotchmen, De
Ramezay who handed over the keys
of the city at the surrender in 1853,
and Murray who received them: the
Jesuit priests who endured hardships
and fortunes understandable in carrying
the story of the cross to the Indians of
the Canadian and Maine wilderness;
the coureurs de bois who went on foot
from Quebec to Hudson's Bay to cap
ture some English ships that had been
frozen in there: the stately seigneur
and the simple habitant over whom he
had rights Of high, low and middle jus
tice; the fierce Iroquois who cast in
his lot with the English, and the
Hurons who stood by the French.
savages who filled the history of the
war with massacre and rapine. Last
ly there will be the famous Capt.
Cook. who narrowly escaped death at
the hands of the Indians while sound
ing for the advance of the ships sup
porting Gen. Wolfe's attack.
What an array of famous historical
characters Quebec has to choose from,
The very ground over which the pro-
cession will pass will be famous. too,
every foot of it stained with the blood
of heroes, Franch, English and Amerl-
can. from the Church of Notre Dame
des Victories. erected to commemorate
victories over the English. past the
monuments to the memory of Mont
gomery, Wolfe and Montcalm. and out
to the plains where Laval made a vain
endeavor to recover the country for
France. 1t should be the pageant of
the century. 1t will be emblematic
of the history of the whole CONT
nent, for the capture Of Quebec by the
British made possible the foundation
of the United States.