The capital, indeed, had no rival.
Only a small part of the population, however, lived in the towns. At
the beginning of the eighteenth century the census (1706) showed
a total of 16,417, of whom less than 3000 were in the three chief
settlements. The others were scattered along both banks of the St.
Lawrence, but chiefly on the northern shore, with the houses grouped
into _cotes_ or little villages which almost touched elbows along the
banks of the stream. In each of these hamlets the manor-house or home
of the seigneur, although not a mansion by any means, was the focus of
social life. Sometimes built of timber but more often of stone, with
dimensions rarely exceeding twenty feet by forty, it was not much more
pretentious than the homes of the more prosperous and thrifty among
the seigneur's dependents. Its three or four spacious rooms were,
however, more comfortably equipped with furniture which in many cases
had been brought from France. Socially, the seigneur and his family
did not stand apart from his neighbors. All went to the same church,
took part in the same amusements upon days of festival, and not
infrequently worked together at the common task of clearing the lands.
Sons and daughters of the seigneurs often intermarried with those of
habitants in the seigneury or of traders in the towns. There was no
social _impasse_ such as existed in France among the various elements
in a community.
As for the habitants, the people who cleared and cultivated the lands
of the seigneuries, they worked and lived and dressed as pioneers are
wont to do.
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