The whole undertaking was difficult and complicated. A
great many perplexing questions arose, and a special
court had to be created to deal with them. [Footnote:
This court was constituted of four judges of the Court
of the Queen's Bench and nine judges of the Superior
Court of Lower Canada, as follows: Sir Louis H. La
Fontaine, Chief Justice; Justices Duval, Aylwin, and
Caron of the Court of the Queen's Bench; the Hon. Edward
Bowen, Chief Justice; Justices Morin, Mondelet, Vanfelson,
Day, Smith, Meredith, Short, and Badgley of the Superior
Court.] On the whole however, the commissioners performed
their tasks carefully and without causing undue friction.
Class prejudice was strong, and by most of the seigneurs
the whole scheme was regarded as a high-handed piece of
legislative confiscation. They opposed it bitterly from
first to last. Among the habitants, however, the abolition
of the old tenure was popular, for it meant, in their
opinion, that every one would henceforth be a real
landowner. But in the long run it signified nothing of
the sort. Very few of the habitants took advantage of
the provision which enabled them to pay a lump sum in
lieu of an annual rental. Down to the present day the
great majority of them continue to pay their rente
constituee as did their fathers before them. With due
adherence to ancient custom they pay it each St Martin's
Day, and to the man whom they still call 'the seigneur.'
Seigneur he is no longer; for the act of 1854 abolished
not only the emoluments, but the honours attaching to
this rank.
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