explorer like Champlain. Every one of these dangers is brought before us by his own narrative in a manner which does credit to his modesty no less than to his fortitude. Without embellishment or self-glorification, he recites in a few lines hairbreadth escapes which a writer of less steadfast soul would have amplified into a thrilling tale of heroism. None the less, to the discriminating reader Champlain's Voyages are an Odyssey. Bound up with habitual fortitude is the motive from which it springs. In Champlain's case patriotism and piety were the groundwork of a conspicuous and long-tested courage. The patriotism which exacted such sacrifices was not one which sought to define itself even in the form of a justifiable digression from the recital of events. But we may be sure that Champlain at the time he left Port Royal had made up his mind that the Spaniards, the English, and the Dutch were not to parcel out the seaboard of North America to the exclusion of the French. As for the religious basis of his fortitude, we do not need Le Jeune's story of his death-bed or the record of his friendship with men of religion. His narrative abounds throughout with simple and natural expressions of piety, not the less impressive because they are free from trace of the theological intolerance which envenomed French life in his age. And not only did Champlain's trust in the Lord fortify his soul against fear, but religion imposed upon him a degree of self-restraint which was not common among explorers of the seventeenth century. It is far from fanciful to see in this one of the chief causes of his hold upon the Indians. To them he was more than a useful ally in war time. They respected his sense of honour, and long after his death remembered the temperance which marked his conduct when he lived in their villages. As a writer, Champlain enjoyed the advantage of possessing a fresh, unhackneyed subject. The only exception to this statement is furnished by his early book on the West Indies and Mexico, where he was going over ground already trodden by the Spaniards. His other writings relate to a sphere of exploration and settlement which he made his own, and of which he well merited to be the chronicler.