Thanks to the activity displayed by all, the "habitation" was quickly finished. It was composed of three main houses of two stories, each measuring fifteen by eighteen feet. The magazine was thirty-six by eighteen feet, with a six foot cellar. Champlain lodged in the same building with part of the workmen, but on the first story. The other buildings served for the workmen and for storing the arms and munitions. In an ell back of Champlain's quarters, several artisans slept beside their forge. All around the buildings a gallery six feet wide served as a promenade. A ditch fifteen feet wide and six feet deep served to protect the colonists from the aggressions of the savages. Champlain had several breastworks thrown up outside the ditch where he placed his cannon. There remained, between the habitation and the river, only a strip of land about twenty-five feet wide, and behind, on the side of the cape, a plot of cultivated ground about 100 to 120 paces by 60 paces. There Champlain had wheat and rye planted and also set out vines. [188] =Journal des Philatélistes=, 5th Series, page 298. As with the Jubilee stamps, some special sets were made up for presentation purposes. The following press clipping gives the details:[189]-- As the Prince of Wales is an enthusiastic collector of stamps, His Royal Highness will no doubt be very pleased to receive the set of the special tercentenary stamps which will be presented to him at Quebec. The stamps will be held in small gold boxes, enclosed in a handsome large box of Morocco leather. A second set accompanies the gift in a special gold box. On the cover of the large box is the Prince's crest and a gold plate inscribed as follows: "Set of Canadian postage stamps issued upon the occasion of the Quebec tercentenary, 1908. Presented to His Royal Highness the Prince of Wales by Hon Rodolphe Lemieux, Postmaster-General of Canada." Sets of these stamps, in boxes with appropriate crests and monograms, will be presented to Earl Grey, Sir Wilfred Laurier and Hon. Rodolphe Lemieux. [189] =Mekeel's Weekly Stamp News=, XXII: 265. Unlike the Jubilee issue, no advance information concerning quantities printed was given out. Many attempts were made to get this interesting detail, but without result. Even an interpellation of the Postmaster-General in the House of Commons was unproductive, as witness the following excerpt:[190]--