Chronicles of Canada Volume 04 - Jesuit Missions: A Chronicle of the Cross in the Wilderness

Thomas Guthrie Marquis (1864-1936) was a Canadian author, educator and journalist who wrote on historical subjects. His Jesuit Missions: A Chronicle of the Cross in the Wilderness was published in 1916 as the fourth volume of the Chronicles of Canada, a series of short books edited by George M. Wrong and Hugh H. Langton. The series aimed to cover the whole of Canadian history in a manner that was both scholarly and accessible to the general reader.

The volume deals with the missionary work of religious orders in New France in the seventeenth century. It begins with the arrival of the Recollet friars and goes on to describe the work of the Jesuits at Quebec and among the Huron peoples. The author writes from the standpoint of his own time, and modern readers will notice the assumptions about indigenous peoples and about the missionaries' success. Even so, the book gives a clear outline of events and draws on the sources then available, notably the reports the Jesuits themselves sent home.

The recording has eleven chapters and lasts about three hours and twelve minutes. Several LibriVox volunteers share the reading, among them Esther, Robin Cotter and Kevin McAsh. It is best approached as a period piece, a snapshot of how early twentieth-century Canadians told their own history, and as an introduction to a fascinating and often painful chapter in the story of European contact with North America.