The Mariner of St. Malo : A chronicle of the voyages of Jacques CartierLeacock, Stephen
History
The Mariner of St. Malo : A chronicle of the voyages of Jacques Cartier
Leacock, Stephen
America -- Discovery and exploration -- French; Cartier, Jacques, 1491-1557; New France -- Discovery and exploration
It has been asserted that this landing on a point called
Cap-des-Sauvages by Cartier, in memory of the incident, took place on
the New Brunswick shore. But the weight of evidence is in favour of
considering that North Cape in Prince Edward Island deserves the
honour. As the event occurred on July 1, some writers have tried to
find a fortunate coincidence in the landing of the discoverer of Canada
on its soil on the day that became, three hundred and thirty-three
years later, Dominion Day. But the coincidence is not striking. Cartier
had already touched Canadian soil at Brest, which is at the extreme end
of the Quebec coast, and on the Magdalen Islands.
Cartier's boats explored the northern end of prince Edward Island for
many miles. All that he saw delighted him. 'We went that day on shore,'
he wrote in his narrative, 'in four places, to see the goodly sweet and
smelling trees that were there. We found them to be cedars, yews,
pines, white elms, ash, willows, With many other sorts of trees to us
unknown, but without any fruit. The grounds where no wood is are very
fair, and all full of peason [peas], white and red gooseberries,
strawberries, blackberries, and wild corn, even like unto rye, which
seemed to have been sowed and ploughed. This country is of better
temperature than any other land that can be seen, and very hot. There
are many thrushes, stock-doves, and other birds. To be short, there
wanteth nothing but good harbours.'
On July 2, the ships, sailing on westward from the head of Prince
Edward Island, came in sight of the New Brunswick coast. They had thus
crossed Northumberland Strait, which separates the island from the
mainland. Cartier, however, supposed this to be merely a deep bay,
extending inland on his left, and named it the Bay of St Lunario.
Before him on the northern horizon was another headland, and to the
left the deep triangular bay known now as Miramichi. The shallowness of
the water and the low sunken aspect of the shore led him to decide,
rightly, that there was to be found here no passage to the west. It was
his hope, of course, that at some point on his path the shore might
fold back and disclose to him the westward passage to the fabled
empires of the East. The deep opening of the Chaleur Bay, which
extended on the left hand as the ships proceeded north, looked like
such an opening. Hopes ran high, and Cartier named the projecting horn
which marks the southern side of the mouth of the bay the Cape of Good
Hope. Like Vasco da Gama, when he rounded South Africa, Cartier now
thought that he had found the gateway of a new world. The cheery name
has, however, vanished from the map in favour of the less striking one
of Point Miscou.
Cartier sailed across the broad mouth of the bay to a point on the
north shore, now known as Port Daniel. Here his ships lay at anchor
till July 12, in order that he might carry on, in boats, the
exploration of the shore.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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