Narrative of a Voyage to the West Indies and Mexico in the years 1599-1602, by Samuel Champlain

With Maps and Illustrations

Alice Wilmere, Norton Shaw, Norton Shaw

• Publisher: Hakluyt Society
• Year: 2017
• ISBN:
  9781317090601
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Geschichte
• Subtopic: Frühneuzeitliche Geschichte

'Translated from the Original and Unpublished Manuscript, with a Biographical Notice and Notes', by Alice Wilmere. Edited by Norton Shaw. Text written c. 1602 (now considered an invention). The supplementary material consists of the 1858 annual report. This is a new print-on-demand hardback edition of the volume first published in 1859.

BIOGRAPHICAL NOTICE OF CHAMPLAIN.

IT will be well, perhaps, to preface the notice of Champlain’s career with a rapid sketch of the various expeditions, discoveries, and attempts at colonisation, of the French in North America, from the discoveries of Sebastian Cabot, in 1497, to the beginning of the seventeenth century.

The errors, disasters, and failures of his predecessors will throw out in stronger relief the sound common sense and sagacity, the determined courage and unfaltering resolution, and the prudent wariness, which enabled Champlain to note and avoid their errors, to meet and to overcome difficulties, to foresee and to prepare for possible evil contingencies.

It is certain that the French were among the first, if not the very first, who followed in the track, and profited by the discovery, of Cabot. The Basques, Bretons, and Normans, as early as 1504, practised the cod fishery along the coast and on the Great Bank of Newfoundland¹—the ancestors, probably, of the Basques and Bretons who, a century later, so stoutly resisted the pretensions of the companies which were then forming, to the exclusive privilege of the fishery and trade in those parts.

In 1506, Jean Denys, of Harfleur, published a map of the newly known country, and, two years after, a pilot of Dieppe, named Thomas Aubert, commanding a vessel named the “Pensée,” belonging to Jean Ange, father of the celebrated Vicomte de Dieppe, brought a North American Indian with him to France.¹

In the year 1518, the Baron de Léry undertook a voyage to North America with the intention of forming a settlement; but, being detained at sea for a long time, was obliged to return to France without accomplishing his object, leaving on the Isle des Sables (Sable Island) and at Campseau (Canso) his cattle and pigs, which multiplied considerably, and were subsequently of the greatest service to certain of the Marquis de la Roche’s people, who, about eighty years later, were left on Sable Island, without any other resource but fish and the flesh of the cattle they found there.¹

In 1524, Francis I sent Giovanni Ferazzano, a Florentine, on an expedition of discovery to the coast of North America. The only document extant of this (first) voyage is a letter from Ferazzano to the king, dated the 8th July, 1524,² wherein he supposes that His Majesty is acquainted with his progress, the events of the voyage, and the success of this first attempt. In the following year he again sailed, and in March arrived at the coast of Florida. He ranged the coast from about the 30th to the 50th degree north latitude, as far as an island which the Bretons had before discovered.³ Ferazzano took possession, in the name of the most Christian king, of all the country which he visited. The next year he undertook a third voyage, of which nothing authentic was ever known, save that he perished in it.⁴

In 1534, Jacques Cartier, of St. Malo,¹ sailed thence on the 20th April, with two vessels of the burthen of sixty tons each, furnished by Philippe Chabot, admiral of France, and the Comte de Brion, for the purpose of continuing the discoveries of Ferazzano, and on the 10th May arrived at Cape Bonavista, in Newfoundland. After some discoveries in that island he proceeded to the southward, and entering the great gulf, explored a bay, which he named La Baye des Chaleurs. The rigour of the season prevented his pursuing his discoveries that year, and he returned to France.

At the instance of Charles de Moïry, sieur de la Maillères, then vice-admiral of France, Cartier returned in the following year to the gulf, to which he gave the name of Saint Lawrence, subsequently extended to the great river which flows into it, and which the natives called the river of Canada. On the 15th August, he discovered the island of Naliscolet, calling it Isle de l’Assomption, now Anticosti. On the 1st September he arrived at the Saguenay river, flowing into the St. Lawrence. He ascended the latter stream to an island about a hundred and twenty leagues from the sea, which he named Isle d’Orléans, and wintered at a little river which he called Ste. Croix, afterwards rivière St. Charles. He then continued his voyage up the St. Lawrence to a place called Hochelaga, a large Indian village on an island at the foot of a mountain which he called Mont Royal, and which, altered to Montréal, is now the name of the whole island. Finding it impossible (according to his report) to surmount the rapids (Sault St. Louis), he returned to his vessels, but was obliged again to winter on the banks of a small river falling into the Ste. Croix, and which he named “the river Jacques Cartier.” The greater part of his people died of scurvy, and Cartier, discontented and disappointed at the little progress he had made, and grieved for the loss of his people, returned to France. “And thinking the air was so contrary to our nature that we could hardly live there, having so suffered during the winter from the disease of the scurvy, which he called ‘mal de terre,’ he so made his relation to the king and the vice-admiral de Maillères, who not looking deeply into the matter, the enterprise was fruitless. And, to say truth, those who have the conduct of discoveries are often the cause of the failure of the best plans, if their reports are too implicitly trusted; for in thus entirely confiding in them, enterprises are judged to be impossible, or so traversed by difficulties, that they cannot be carried out, save with almost insupportable expenses and pains.”¹

In 1541, Jean François de la Roque, sieur de Roberval, a gentleman of Picardy, was named viceroy of Nouvelle France, and renewed the attempt to form a colony in Canada. He first sent out Cartier as his deputy, to commence a settlement in the island of Mont Royal, and despatched one of his pilots, Jean Alphonse, of Saintonge, one of the best French navigators of his time, to reconnoitre the coast beyond Labrador, and to endeavour to find a shorter passage for Eastern commerce than round Cape Horn or the Straits of Magellan; but, meeting with great obstacles and risk from the ice, Alphonse was obliged to return. The proposed settlement had no better success. Cartier remained nearly eighteen months abandoned to his own resources, as De Roberval, who was to have shortly followed him, delayed his departure, and when at last he set out on his voyage, he met Cartier on his way back to France, having lost many of his people, and suffered extreme distress from famine. De Roberval wished to force him to return to Canada, but Cartier refused.

The next expedition was that of Jean Ribaut, of Dieppe, a Protestant, and one of the best sea captains in France. He was despatched under the auspices of the Admiral de Coligny to establish a colony in that part of Florida visited by Ferazzano in his second voyage. Ribaut set sail on the 18th February, 1562, and landed at a cape which he named Cape François. Pursuing his course towards the north, he disembarked at the “Rivière de Mai,” setting up a stone pillar with the arms of France affixed, in token of taking possession of the country. Continuing about sixty leagues more to the northward, he built a fort, which he styled Charles fort, on about the spot where Charleston was subsequently founded by the English. The fort finished, Ribaut found that his provisions were running short, and that he could not that year make the purposed settlement. He therefore left eighteen men in the fort, under the command of a Captain Albert, with all the supplies that he could spare, and set sail for France in July, promising to return to revictual his people and establish the colony. Unfortunately, on his arrival in France he was employed in the war which had just broken out with Spain, and could not accomplish his promise.

Captain Albert and his men, trusting to Ribaut’s coming back with ample stores, did not trouble themselves to clear and cultivate land, so as to be prepared in case of delay or accident, but consumed their provisions without order or care, so that in a short time they were reduced to great scarcity. The men mutinied, hung one of their comrades for some trifling cause, and becoming more violent from want and impunity, killed their commander Albert, electing in his place one Nicolas Barré, “a good sort of a man !” No succour arriving, they built a small vessel to endeavour to return to France, and put to sea with the scanty remains of their stock of provisions. In a very few days that was exhausted, and the famine became so terrible and reduced them to such extremity that they were obliged to cast lots which of them should be killed to support the others. “And,” says Fournier, “what is greatly to be admired, the lot fell on the man who had been the cause of the mutiny against Captain Albert.” Fortunately, the survivors were picked up by an English ship and carried to England.

In 1564 René de Laudonnière was sent to Florida by Admiral de Coligny. He sailed on the 22nd of April, and duly arrived at the Rivière de Mai, where he built a fort, which he named La Caroline, rechristened by the Spaniards “San Matteo.” As in the case of Captain Albert, a conspiracy was formed against Laudonnière, his men mutinied, and threatened to kill him if he would not allow them to go to sea and pillage the Virgin Islands and the coast of St. Domingo: Laudonnière was forced to consent. The mutineers fitted out a small vessel, captured and plundered some Spanish ships, but after cruising for some time were obliged to return to La Caroline, where Laudonnière, resuming his authority, had four of them hanged. In addition to these troubles, before the winter was past, their provisions began to fail, and after subsisting for more than six weeks on roots, and no supplies arriving from France, they determined to build a vessel, so as to be able to return there in August; but the famine becoming more and more severe, the men were too weak to finish their barque. Many went among the Indians, who mocked and ill treated them, upon which they attacked the savages and obtained some maize, which strengthened and gave them courage to work at their vessel. They then prepared to demolish the fort before setting sail for Europe; but while thus occupied, four ships were seen off the coast, which proved to be English, who, on seeing the extremity to which the French were reduced, assisted them with provisions, and helped them to complete their vessel. When ready to embark, Laudonnière again descried some ships approaching the coast; this time they were French, commanded by Ribaut, who was bringing succour and the means of increasing the settlement.

Ribaut had been again despatched by the Admiral de Coligny with six ships and about six hundred men, chiefly Protestants, to complete the establishment of the long-desired colony. He set sail from Dieppe in June, 1565, and arrived at his destination on the 25th August. The Spaniards had doubtless been informed of this expedition, as before Ribaut could disembark his men and stores, a squadron of large ships was seen in the offing. He sent his son to reconnoitre, following shortly with his other vessels. A violent tempest arose, his ships were driven on shore, and many of his men drowned. With the remainder he retired to his little fort, almost without arms or ammunition. The Spaniards (although then at peace with France) stormed it, and massacred all in it, men, women, and children. Ribaut, although promised his life, was at last stabbed in cold blood by a Spanish captain, named Vallemande, and his body treated with atrocious barbarity,—his head and face were flayed; the skin, with the hair and beard attached, dried, and sent to the nearest Spanish colony. The Spaniards then hung the bodies of the slain, and all the French whom they could catch, on the nearest trees, with an inscription to the effect that “these men are not hung as Frenchmen, but as heretics.”

Laudonnière with a few men escaped into the woods, and returned after some time to France. The son of Ribaut also, escaping both the storm and the Spanish squadron, arrived there in safety. The king of France made some remonstrances about this horrible affair to his brother sovereign, the king of Spain, who disavowed the deed, but gave no redress.

Ribaut was, however, well avenged by one of his own creed. In 1567, Dominique de Gourgues, a Calvinist gentleman of Gascony, fitted out two (some say three) ships, at his own cost, and proceeded to Florida. Assisted by the natives, with whom he formed an alliance, he attacked and took by assault the Spanish forts, treating the Spaniards as they had treated the French, by hanging them all on the same trees, altering the inscription to the purport that “these men are not hung as Spaniards, but as traitors, robbers, and murderers.” He then demolished the forts, and returned to France in 1568, performing the voyage, it is said, in seventeen days.

The king of Spain in his turn complained, and De Gourgues, disavowed and threatened with condign punishment by his sovereign, was obliged to absent himself. He seems, however, to have kept his ire warm against the Spaniards, as in 1582 we find him in the service of Don Antonio, of Portugal, who named him admiral of the fleet which he was equipping against Spain; but, on the point of sailing, De Gourgues was seized with a mortal malady, and died,—thus disappointing the hopes of his old enemy the king of Spain, who had offered a large sum for his head.

In the year 1591, a voyage to Canada was undertaken by the sieur du Court Pré llavillon, in a vessel called the Bonaventure, to endeavour to establish a trade in moose-skins and teeth. Whether he succeeded in his adventure or not, history is silent.

The Marquis de la Roche fitted out some vessels in 1591, embarking a number of men and a large quantity of stores of all kinds requisite for forming a colony in Canada. Not having, it appears, any personal knowledge of the country or of navigation, he engaged a Norman pilot, of the name of Chédotel, for the voyage. The details of this enterprise are not very clear, but it is certain that the expedition reached the Isle des Sables, and, for some reason or other, seventeen of the people were sent on shore and abandoned. The poor fellows remained there for seven years, living in holes in the ground, and subsisting on fish and the cattle which they found wild in considerable numbers—the descendants of those left there in 1518 by the Baron de Léry.¹

At the expiration of seven years, the pilot Chédotel was condemned by the Parliament of Rouen to go and fetch away the unfortunate men,—with the condition, however, that he was to have half of all the property, hides, oil, seal and black fox skins, etc., which the wretched creatures might have collected during their banishment.

On their arrival in France, the poor men were presented to the king, Henry IV, who ordered the Duke de Sully to give them some relief,—which the worthy Duke did, to the amount of fifty crowns each, “to encourage them to return there !”

The poor Marquis de la Roche, unfortunate in his expedition, was equally so at court in his endeavours to obtain the aid which the king had promised him. “It being denied him,” says Champlain, “at the instigation of certain persons who had no wish that the true worship of God should increase, or to see the Catholic, Apostolic, and Roman religion flourish in those parts.”.

The Marquis took all this so much to heart that he fell sick and died, having consumed all his property, and wasted his time and labour, in vain.

In the year following (1599), the sieur Chauvin, de Ponthuict, captain in the Royal Marine, at the persuasion of Captain du Pont Gravé of St. Malo, (both Protestants), obtained a privilege for ten years, at the charge of forming a company for the colonization of Canada. Having equipped his vessels, he gave the command of one of them to Du Pont Gravé, and proceeding to the river St. Lawrence, arrived in safety at Tadoussac, at the junction of the Saguenay with that river. One of the objects which they were bound mainly to follow was the propagation of the Roman Catholic religion among the savages. Chauvin’s people were for the most part Catholics, but the chiefs were Calvinists, which was not precisely adapted for the fulfilment of the projected purpose, “but that,” again says Champlain, “was what they thought of the least.”

Chauvin resolved to remain at Tadoussac, in spite of the remonstrances of Du Pont Gravé, who wished him to proceed higher up the river, having already been to “Three Rivers” in a previous voyage, trading with the Indians. M. de Monts (of whom we shall hear more hereafter), who had made the voyage with them for his pleasure, agreed with Du Pont Gravé, but Chauvin was obstinate, and set about erecting a habitation in the most disagreeable and unproductive spot in the country,—full of rocks, fir and birch trees, the land unfit for cultivation, and the cold so excessive, that “if there be an ounce of cold forty leagues up the river, there is a pound at Tadoussac.”¹

Chauvin posted sixteen men at a little stream near the house, to which they might retire upon occasion. The stores (little enough) were at the mercy of all, and soon began to run short, whereupon Chauvin returned to France, taking Du Pont Gravé and De Monts with him.

The men remaining at the intended settlement, quickly consumed the little provision left, and “the winter coming on soon taught them the difference between France and Tadoussac,—it was the court of king Petault, where every man commanded.”² Indolence and carelessness, with sickness, soon did their work, and they were reduced to the necessity of giving themselves up to the Indian tribes around, who received them kindly. Many died, and all suffered extremely.

Chauvin, in 1600, prepared another expedition, which from the same causes was as fruitless as the first. He fitted out a third on a larger scale, but was not able to carry out his new plans, being attacked by a malady “which sent him to the other world.”¹

We have now arrived at the period of Champlain’s first connection with Canadian discovery and colonization. The difficulties, dangers—not to say horrors—of the previous expeditions were enough to deter any but the most confident and resolute from attempting such an apparently hopeless task; but the hour and the man were come, and from the date of Chauvin’s death a new era was to arise for Canada, and French colonization in North America was at last—to be.

Samuel Champlain, descended from a noble family of ...