The political history of the governors, bishops, and intendants has been done many times before; it is as uninteresting to Greer as it is to most modern students. These men wrote the laws, preached the sermons and sent the reports to the French colonial officials. The Catholic church's predominance was undeniable, and only the vision of the Bourbon kings was recognized in New France. However, the absolutist theoretical conceptions of the elite classes were not always practical in the colonial environment. Consequently, without overly stretching his point, Greer speaks to a multi-dimensional and multicultural perspective of early Canada instead of the traditional homogenous state interpretation. He focuses on colonial society "as it was" by examining the "frameworks of ordinary life" - death, birth, marriage, food, race, class. True, his Canada is not a paradise; in many ways it did not differ from the old world - people worked hard, died young, and women, the poor, and slaves were often humiliated and brutalized by their husbands and social masters. However, it was different and, in some aspects, unique.

      Colonial administrators and nobility mixed with all classes of people in the "amazing diverse" colonial cities. Although there was no pretext of social equality, there were no rigid class structures. Merchants and traders had opportunities to climb the ladder of social respectability and even purchase a noble title. For most colonists, life on the farms was generally a prosperous, free peasant existence. They had few seigniorial obligations, and church interference in their daily life was limited. There was high infant mortality, but surviving children could be guaranteed adequate farm land. Women had special rights under the law; they could not be put off the land or lose the family business if their husbands died.

      Greer shows that New France's society was composed of a diverse population making up a complex and dynamic social organization. Those holding power had to make accommodations with the ordinary people in every settlement because of economic interests and social conditions. New France is generally equated with the "Canadian" settlements along the St. Lawrence River; however, Greer's chapter analyzing life in Acadia, Ile Royale, and Louisiana, indicates how life differed in these important colonies.

      This is a fine example of the best work being done in Canadian social history. If all historians could write as elegantly as Allan Greer, classes would be full of burgeoning Canadianists.

Highly recommended.