He hated the
English and their heresy, and he preached to his people against
them with frantic invective. He incited his Indians to bloodshed.
But he also knew pity. The custom of the Indians was to consider
prisoners taken by them as their property, and on one occasion Le
Loutre himself paid ransom to the Indians for thirty-seven
English captives and returned them to Halifax. It is certain that
the French government counted upon the influence of French
priests to aid its political designs. "My masters, God and the
King" was a phrase of the Sulpician father Piquet working at this
time on the St. Lawrence. Le Loutre could have echoed the words.
He was an ardent politician and France supplied him with both
money and arms to induce the Indians to attack the English. The
savages haunted the outskirts of Halifax, waylaid and scalped
unhappy settlers, and, in due course, were paid from Louisbourg
according to the number of scalps which they produced. The
deliberate intention was to make new English settlements
impossible in Nova Scotia and so to discourage the English that
they should abandon Halifax.
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