Their license and insubordination distressed him, and
he constantly complained of them to the king. For the Church and its
hierarchy his devotion was unbounded; and his government was a season
of unwonted sunshine for the ecclesiastics, like the balmy days of the
Indian summer amid the gusts of November. They exhausted themselves in
eulogies of his piety; and, in proof of its depth and solidity, Mother
Juchereau tells us that he did not regard station and rank as very
useful aids to salvation. While other governors complained of too many
priests, Denonville begged for more. All was harmony between him and
Bishop Saint-Vallier; and the prelate was constantly his friend, even
to the point of justifying his worst act, the treacherous seizure of
the Iroquois neutrals. [Footnote: Saint-Vallier, _Etat Present_, 91,
92 (Quebec, 1856).] When he left Canada, the only mourner besides the
churchmen was his colleague, the intendant Champigny; for the two
chiefs of the colony, joined in a common union with the Jesuits, lived
together in unexampled concord. On his arrival at court, the good
offices of his clerical allies gained for him the highly honorable
post of governor of the royal children, the young Dukes of Burgundy,
Anjou, and Berri.
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