Some days after the buildings were completed, I went to the river St. John to find the savage named Secondon, the same that conducted Prevert's party to the copper mine, which I had already gone in search of with Sieur de Monts, when we were at the Port of Mines, though without success. [181] Having found him, I begged him to go there with us, which he very readily consented to do, and proceeded to show it to us. We found there some little pieces of copper of the thickness of a sou, and others still thicker imbedded in grayish and red rocks. The miner accompanying us, whose name was Master Jacques, a native of Sclavonia, a man very skilful in searching for minerals, made the entire circuit of the hills to see if he could find any gangue, [182] but without success. Yet he found, some steps from where we had taken the pieces of copper before mentioned, something like a mine, which, however, was far from being one. He said that, from the appearance of the soil, it might prove to be good, if it were worked; and that it was not probable that there could be pure copper on the surface of the earth, without there being a large quantity of it underneath. The truth is that, if the water did not cover the mines twice a day, and if they did not lie in such hard rocks, something might be expected from them. After making this observation, we returned to our settlement, where we found some of our company sick with the _mal de la terre_, but not so seriously as at the Island of St. Croix; although, out of our number of forty-five, twelve died, including the miner, and five were sick, who recovered the following spring. Our surgeon, named Des Champs, from Honfleur, skilful in his profession, opened some of the bodies, to see whether he might be more successful in discovering the cause of the maladies that our surgeons had been the year before. He found the parts of the body affected in the same manner as those opened at the Island of St. Croix, but could discover no means of curing them, any more than the other surgeons. On the 20th of December, it began to snow, and some ice passed along before our Settlement. The winter was not so sharp as the year before, nor the snow so deep, or of so long duration. Among other incidents, the wind was so violent on the 20th of February, 1605, [183] that it blew over a large number of trees, roots and all, and broke off many others. It was a remarkable sight. The rains were very frequent; which was the cause of the mild winter in comparison with the past one, although it is only twenty-five leagues from Port Royal to St. Croix.