The police said they would not release the name of the suspect, who was taken to a hospital after complaining of an undisclosed illness, until he appeared before a judge, which was expected Thursday.

Several news outlets in Quebec, however, identified him as Richard H. Bain, the owner of an outdoor outfitting business near the popular Mont Tremblant resort. He will turn 62 on Saturday, the police said.

A motive was unclear. Officials in Mr. Bain’s hometown, La Conception, said that while he sometimes complained about the local government bureaucracy, he did speak French, if imperfectly, and never complained to them about provincial laws mandating the use of the language in many commercial settings.

Expanding those language laws to include small businesses was among Ms. Marois’s prominent campaign pledges. But the fact that the Parti Québécois did not capture a majority of legislative seats makes realizing that pledge difficult and is likely to thwart any significant actions by her government to secede from the rest of Canada.

Neither of the two major opposition parties, particularly the Liberals, who have been in power for nine years and who oppose separation, is likely to vote with the Parti Québécois. (The Liberal leader, Jean Charest, who lost his seat in Tuesday’s vote, said Wednesday that he would leave politics.)

“She’s going to be very circumscribed,” said Antonia Maioni, a professor of political science at McGill University in Montreal.

Pierre Martin, a political scientist at the Université de Montréal, said that Ms. Marois does have at least one way to maintain a high profile for separatism. She has already promised to demand that the federal government turn over its control of unemployment insurance and foreign aid to the province, which Professor Martin said would most likely be the first of many such demands.