We have already seen that Talon had begun the establishment of three villages in the vicinity of Quebec.  Let us briefly enumerate the principles which guided him in erecting these settlements.  First of all, in deference to the king’s instructions relative to concentration, he contrived to plant the new villages as near as possible to the capital, and evolved a plan which would group the settlers about a central point and thus provide for their mutual help and defence.  In pursuance of this plan he made all his Charlesbourg land grants triangular, narrow at the head, wide at the base, so that the houses erected at the head were near each other and formed a square in the centre of the settlement.  In this arrangement there was originality and good sense.  After more than two centuries, Talon’s idea remains stamped on the soil; and the plans of the Charlesbourg villages as surveyed in our own days show distinctly the form of settlement adopted by the intendant.

Proper dwellings were made ready to receive the new-comers.  Then Talon proceeded with the establishment of settlers.  To his great joy some soldiers applied for grants.  He made point of having skilled workmen, some, if possible, in each village—­carpenters, shoemakers, masons, or other artisans, whose services would be useful to all.  He tried also to induce habitants of earlier date to join the new settlements, where their experience would be a guide and their methods an object-lesson to beginners.

The grants were made on very generous terms, The soldiers and habitants, on taking possession of their land, received a substantial supply of food and the tools necessary for their work.  They were to be paid for clearing and tilling the first two acres.  In return each was bound by his deed to clear and prepare for cultivation during the three or four following years another two acres, which could afterwards be allotted to an incoming settler.  Talon proposed also that they should be bound to military service.  For each new-comer the king assumed the total expense of clearing two acres, erecting a house, preparing and sowing the ground, and providing flour until a crop was reaped—­all on condition that the occupant should clear and cultivate two additional acres within three or four years, presumably for allotment to the next new-comer.

Such were the broad lines of Talon’s colonization policy.  But to his mind it was not enough that he should make regulations and issue orders; he would set up a model farm himself and thus be an example in his own person.  He bought land in the neighbourhood of the St Charles river and had the ground cleared at his own expense.  He erected thereon a large house, a barn, and other buildings; and, in course of time, his fine property, comprising cultivated fields, meadows, and gardens, and well stocked with domestic animals, became a source of pride to him.