Canada -- History -- 1763-1867; Canada -- History -- To 1763 (New France)
Lawrence to Hochelaga, but now they became traitors
to their word and refused him even two guides for such a journey.
There was nothing else to do: Champlain was obliged to go back with
them and spend the whole of the succeeding winter in their lodges.
On the way they made many halts to allow the Hurons time to procure
stores of fish and game, which were very plentiful in the region
north of Lake Ontario. Not until two days before Christmas was the
journey ended.
Champlain was not idle that winter, for when his {40} wounds had
healed he moved amongst the tribes, making himself acquainted with
the country and the language. The woods were filled with June
flowers ere he returned to Quebec, where he had been mourned as one
dead. You can imagine how rejoiced were the band of martial pioneers
there to see their leader once more alive and well. They cheered and
sang songs and waved flags in his honour, and even discharged the
great cannon, whose echoes startled the Indians prowling afar on the
green banks of the St. Lawrence.
Verily the part which Samuel de Champlain and his little band of
Frenchmen had played in giving armed assistance to the Hurons and
Algonquins was to have terrible results. It threw the Iroquois into
friendship with the Dutch and other enemies of the French, who
supplied them with firearms. It caused them to bear a hate to
Champlain and all his countrymen almost as great as the hate they
bore to the dusky Hurons.
All this time Champlain, great as was his ambition, can only be
regarded as the agent or manager of a company of men in France whose
first wish was to make money out of the fur trade. These men in
their hearts had very little sympathy for Champlain's schemes of
colonisation and conversion of the savages, and, becoming
dissatisfied with the profits Champlain was making for them, they
tried repeatedly to procure his recall. In order to baffle the
intrigues against him and explain to the King himself the importance
of Canada to the kingdom of France, Champlain sailed away yet again
for home, {41} leaving sixty men, the entire French population of
Canada, behind him in Quebec. By his zeal and eloquence he was able
to obtain some fresh supplies for his colony, and also some more
soldiers and workers. Amongst these was an apothecary named Louis
Hébert, who is often spoken of as the first emigrant to Canada,
because he took with him his wife and two children, intending to
settle as a farmer on the land. Direct descendants of Hébert are
alive in Canada to this day. Two years later Champlain managed to
bring a body of eighty colonists out to New France, and the next year
(1620) his own wife, Helen de Champlain, accompanied him for the
first time to the colony. This time he had triumphed over those who
wished to depose him, and was now confirmed in his title of Viceroy
of New France, and all seemed in the general rejoicings on his return
to promise well for his enterprise. Not only the French in Quebec,
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
Reviews
Reviews
No reviews yet
Be the first to share your thoughts on this work.
Join the Discussion
Join the discussion
Sign in to leave a comment or review.
Sign InorCreate an account