Storms and strong tides now decided Cartier to return to France. He knew nothing of the Cabot Strait between Newfoundland and the land afterwards called Nova Scotia, so he guided his little ships right through the Straits of Belle Isle, and after being "much tossed by a heavy tempest from the east, which we weathered by the blessing of God," he arrived safely home on 5th September, after his six months' adventure. He was soon commissioned to continue the navigation of these new lands, and in May 1535 he safely led three ships slightly larger than the last across the stormy Atlantic. Contrary winds, heavy gales, and thick fogs turned the voyage of three weeks into five--the ships losing one another not to meet again till the coast of Labrador was reached. Coasting along the southern coast, Cartier now entered a "very fine and large bay, full of islands, and with channels of entrance and exit in all winds." Cartier named it "Baye Saint Laurens," because he entered it on 10th August--the feast of St. Lawrence. Do any of the English men and women who steam up the Gulf of St. Lawrence in the great ocean steamers to-day, on their way to Canada, ever give a thought to the little pioneer French ships that four hundred years ago thought they were sailing toward Cathay? "Savages," as Cartier calls the Indians, told him that he was near the mouth of the great river Hochelaga (now the St. Lawrence), which became narrower "as we approach towards Canada, where the water is fresh." "On the first day of September," says Cartier, "we set sail from the said harbour for Canada." Canada was just a native word for a town or village. It seems strange to read of the "lord of Canada" coming down the river with twelve canoes and many people to greet the first white men he had ever seen; strange, too, to find Cartier arriving at "the place called Hochelaga--twenty-five leagues above Canada," where the river becomes very narrow, with a rapid current and very dangerous on account of rocks. For another week the French explorers sailed on up the unknown river. The country was pleasant, well-wooded, with "vines as full of grapes as they would hang." On 2nd October, Cartier arrived at the native town of Hochelaga. He was welcomed by hundreds of natives,--men, women, and children,--who gave the travellers as "friendly a welcome as if we had been of their own nation come home after a long and perilous absence." The women carried their children to him to touch them, for they evidently thought that some supernatural being had come up from the sea. All night they danced to the light of fires lit upon the shore. [Illustration: CANADA AND THE RIVER ST. LAWRENCE, SHOWING QUEBEC (KEBEC). From Lescarbot's _Histoire de la Nouvelle France_, 1609.]