Great Epochs in American History Volume I Part 6

And when they had the response from us, they came quickly, and having stood awhile to look, hearing the noisy clamor of the sailor crowd, sent the Queen with her damsels in a very light barge to stay on a little island distant from us a quarter of a league; himself remaining a very long time, discoursing by signs and gestures of various fanciful ideas, examining all the equipments of the s.h.i.+p, asking especially their purpose, imitating our manners, tasting our foods, then parted from us benignantly. And one time, our people remaining two or three days on a little island near the s.h.i.+p for various necessities as is the custom of sailors, he came with seven or eight of his attendants, watching our operations, asking many times if we wished to remain there for a long time, offering us his every help.

Then, shooting with the bow, running, he performed with his attendants various games to give us pleasure.

Many times we were from five to six leagues inland, which we found as pleasing as it can be to narrate, adapted to every kind of cultivation--grain, wine, oil. Because in that place the fields are from XXV to x.x.x leagues wide, open and devoid of every impediment of trees, of such fertility that any seed in them would produce the best crops. Entering then into the woods, all of which are penetrable by any numerous army in any way whatsoever, and whose trees, oaks, cypresses, and others are unknown in our Europe. We found Lucallian apples, plums, and filberts, and many kinds of fruits different from ours. Animals there are in very great number, stags, deer, lynx, and other species, which, in the way of the others, they capture with snares and bows, which are their princ.i.p.al arms. The arrows of whom are worked with great beauty, placing at the end, instead of iron, emery, jasper, hard marble, and other sharp stones, by which they served themselves instead of iron in cutting trees, making their barges from a single trunk of a tree, hollowed with wonderful skill, in which from fourteen to XV men will go comfortably; the short oar, broad at the end, working it solely with the strength of the arms at sea without any peril, with as much speed as pleases them.

Going further, we saw their habitations, circular in form, of XIIII to XV paces compa.s.s, made from semi-circles of wood [_i.e._, arched saplings, bent in the form of an arbor], separated one from the other, without system of architecture, covered with mats of straw ingeniously worked, which protect them from rain and wind. There is no doubt that if they had the perfection of the arts we have, they would build magnificent edifices, for all the maritime coast is full of blue rocks, crystals and alabaster; and for such cause is full of ports and shelters for s.h.i.+ps. They change said houses from one place to another according to the opulence of the site and the season in which they live. Carrying away only the mats, immediately they have other habitations made. There live in each a father and family to a very large number, so that in some we saw XXV and x.x.x souls. Their food is like the others: of pulse (which they produce with more system of culture than the others, observing the full moon, the rising of the Pleiades, and many customs derived from the ancients), also of the chase and fish. They live a long time and rarely incur illness; if they are opprest with wounds, without crying they cure themselves by themselves with fire, their end being of old age. We judge they are very compa.s.sionate and charitable toward their relatives, making them great lamentations in their adversities, in their grief calling to mind all their good fortunes. The relatives, one with another, at the end of their life use the Sicilian lamentation, mingled with singing lasting a long time. This is as much as we were able to learn about them.

The land is situated in the parallel of Rome, in forty and two-thirds degrees, but somewhat colder on account of chance and not on account of nature, as I will narrate to Your Majesty in another part, describing at present the situation of said port. The sh.o.r.e of said land runs from west to east. The mouth of the port looks toward the south, half a league wide, after entering which between east and north it extends XII leagues, where, widening itself, it makes an ample bay of about XX leagues in circuit. In which are five little islands of much fertility and beauty, full of high and spreading trees, among which any numerous fleet, without fear of tempest or other impediment of fortune, could rest securely. Turning thence toward the south to the entrance of the port, on one side and the other are very charming hills with many brooks, which from the height to the sea discharge clear waters, which on account of its beauty we called "Refugio."

In the midst of the mouth is found a rock of Petra Viva produced by nature, adapted for the building of any desired engine or bulwark for its protection, which on account of the nature of the stone and on account of the family of a gentlewoman we called "La Petra Viva"; on whose right side at said mouth of the port is a promontory which we called "Jovio Promontory."

Being supplied with our every necessity, the 6th day of May we departed from said port, following the sh.o.r.e, never losing sight of the land. We sailed one hundred and fifty leagues, within which s.p.a.ce we found shoals which extend from the continent into the sea 50 leagues. Upon which there was over three feet of water; on account of which great danger in navigating it, we survived with difficulty and baptized it "Armellini," finding it of the same nature and somewhat higher with some mountains, with a high promontory which we named "Pallavisino,"[7] which all indicated minerals. We did not stop there because the favorableness of the weather served us in sailing along the coast: we think it must conform to the other. The sh.o.r.e ran to the east.

In the s.p.a.ce of fifty leagues, holding more to the north, we found a high land full of very thick forests, the trees of which were pines, cypresses and such as grow in cold regions. The people all different from the others, and as much as those pa.s.sed were of cultivated manners, these were full of uncouthness and vices, so barbarous that we were never able, with howsoever many signs we made them, to have any intercourse with them. They dress with the skins of bear, lynxes, sea-wolves, and other animals. The food, according to that which we were able to learn through going many times to their habitations, we think is of the chase, fish, and some products which are of a species of roots which the ground yields by its own self. They do not have pulse, nor did we see any signs of cultivation, nor would the ground, on account of its sterility, be adapted to produce fruit or any grain.

If, trading at any time with them, we desired their things, they came to the sh.o.r.e of the sea upon some rock where it was very steep, and--we remaining in the small boat--with a cord let down to us what they wished to give, continually crying on land that we should not approach, giving quickly the barter, not taking in exchange for it except knives, hooks for fis.h.i.+ng, and sharp metal. They had no regard for courtesy, and when they had nothing more to exchange, at their departing the men made at us all the signs of contempt and shame which any brute creature could make. Contrary to their wish, XXV armed men of us were inland two and three leagues, and when we descended to the sh.o.r.e they shot at us with their bows, sending forth the greatest cries, then fled into the woods. We do not know any value of any moment in this land, except the very great forests, with some hills which possibly have some metal, because on many [natives] we saw "paternosters" of copper in the ears.

We departed, skirting the coast between east and north, which we found very beautiful, open and bare of forests, with high mountains back inland, growing smaller toward the sh.o.r.e of the sea. In fifty leagues we discovered x.x.xII islands, among which we called the three larger "The Three Daughters of Navarra," all near to the continent, small and of pleasing appearance, high, following the curving of the land, among which were formed most beautiful ports and channels, as are formed in the Adriatic Gulf, in the Illyrias, and Dalmatia. We had no intercourse with the peoples and think they were, like the others, devoid of morals and culture.

Navigating between east-southeast and north-northeast, in the s.p.a.ce of CL leagues, we came near the land which the Britons found in the past, by the Cabots,[8] which stands in fifty degrees, and having consumed all our naval stores and victuals, having discovered six hundred leagues and more of new land, furnis.h.i.+ng ourselves with water and wood, we decided to turn toward France.

[1] From a letter addrest to Francis I, King of France, on July 8, 1524. Three copies of Verazzano's letter exist. One was printed by Ramusio in 1556 and translated for Hakluyt's "Voyages" in 1583.

The second was found in the Strozzi Library in Florence, and published in 1841 by the New York Historical Society with a translation by J.G. Cogswell.

The third copy is the one now owned by Count Gulio Macchi di Cellere, of Rome. It was first published in Italy in 1909, and the first English translation of it was made by Dr. Edward Hagaman Hall, secretary of the American Scenic and Historic Preservation Society, and published in the report of that society for 1910.

This copy has the distinction of being contemporaneous. Dr. Hall says its value "consists not only in confirming the voyage itself, but also in supplying a wealth of names and details not previously known to exist." Verazzano's account of his visit to New York harbor here given is taken from Dr. Hall's translation.

Giovanni de Verazzano was born in Italy about 1480, and died about 1527. He early became a Florentine navigator and afterward a corsair in French service. His expedition to America was of French origin and sailed in 1523.

[2] Off the coast of Virginia or Maryland.

[3] This river is now known as the Hudson.

[4] Verazzano's Bay, St. Margarita, was New York Bay.

[5] Aloysia is now called Block Island.

[6] Newport.

[7] Cape Cod.

[8] A Reference to the discovery of Newfoundland in 1497.

CARTIER'S EXPLORATION OF THE ST. LAWRENCE

(1534)

I

THE ACCOUNT GIVEN BY JOHN A. DOYLE[1]

Jacques Cartier was a brave and experienced sea captain from St. Malo.

In 1534, Cartier made a preliminary voyage of exploration. Touching at Newfoundland, he sailed through the straits of Belle Isle and explored the east sh.o.r.e of the island, a region which for the barrenness of its soil and the severity of its climate seemed the very spot whither Cain had been banished. The coast of New Brunswick held out a more inviting prospect. The fertility of the soil reminded the voyagers of their native Brittany, and one field there seemed worth more than the whole of Newfoundland. Thence Cartier sailed into the Gulf of St. Lawrence, and would have explored the great river of Canada, but storms arose and he deemed it prudent to return to France before bad weather set in. His report of the country was encouraging. The soil, as we have seen, promised well, and the voyagers had not yet learned the terrors of a Canadian winter. The natives were rude in their habits, but they were uniformly peaceful and ready to trade on easy terms for such goods as they possest. There seemed good reason to hope, too, that they might be converted to Christianity, and one of them had shown confidence enough in the strangers to trust them with his two children, who were easily reconciled to their captivity by the gift of red caps and colored s.h.i.+rts.

In the next year Cartier again went forth with three s.h.i.+ps. After confessing and taking the sacrament in the church of St. Malo, the adventurers set sail on Whit Sunday. Among them was the cup-bearer to the Dauphin, Claudius de Pont-Briand. As before, the strangers were well received by the Indians, and landed safely at Quebec. There Cartier left his sailors with instructions to make a fortified camp, while he himself, with the greater part of his men-at-arms and his two Indian captives of the year before, should explore the upper banks of the St. Lawrence, and penetrate, if possible, to the great Indian city of Hochelaga.[2] The Indians, tho outwardly friendly, seem either to have distrusted the French, or else grudged their neighbors at Hochelaga such valuable allies, and would have dissuaded Cartier from his expedition. When their remonstrances proved useless, the savages tried to work on the fears of the visitors. Three canoes came floating down the river, each containing a fiendish figure with horns and blackened face. The supposed demons delivered themselves of a threatening harangue, and then paddled to the sh.o.r.e, and whether to complete the performance, or through honest terror, fell fainting in their boats. The Indians then explained to Cartier that their G.o.d had sent a warning to the presumptuous strangers, bidding them refrain from the intended voyage. Cartier replied that the Indian G.o.d could have no power over those who believed in Christ. The Indians acquiesced, and even affected to rejoice in the approaching discomfiture of their deity. Cartier and his followers started on the voyage.

After a fortnight's journey they came in sight of the natural citadel of Hochelaga, the royal mount, as they fitly called it, which has since given its name to the stately city below. The site of that city was then filled by a village surrounded by maize fields and strongly fortified after the Iroquois manner. There the French were received with hospitality and with a reverence which seemed to imply that they were something more than mortal. The sick were laid before them to be healed, and when Cartier read portions of the Gospel in French, the savages listened reverently to the unknown sounds. On his return, Cartier found his fort securely palisaded, and decided there to await the winter. So far all had gone well, but the settlers were soon destined to see the unfavorable side of Canadian life. The savages, after their fickle nature, began to waver in their friends.h.i.+p. A worse danger was to come. Scurvy broke out, and before long twenty-five men had died, and not more than three or four remained well. At length the leaf of a tree whose virtues were pointed out by the Indians restored the sufferers to health. When winter disappeared and the river again became navigable, Cartier determined to return. He was anxious that the French king should learn the wonders of the country from the mouths of its own people. Accordingly, with a characteristic mixture of caution, subtlety, and conciliation, he allured the princ.i.p.al chief Donnacona, and some of his followers into the fort. There they were seized and carried to the s.h.i.+ps, nominally as honored guests, like Montezuma among the followers of Cortez. Cartier then set sail with his captives, and in July reached St. Malo. The Indians, as was usually the fate of such captives, pined under a strange sky, and when Cartier sailed again not one was alive.

Four years elapsed before another voyage was undertaken. In 1540 a fleet of five s.h.i.+ps was made ready at the expense of the king, who reserved to himself a third of the profits of the voyage. Cartier was appointed captain-general, with instructions to establish a settlement and to labor for the conversion of the savages. With Cartier was a.s.sociated a man of high birth, the Sieur de Roberval, who was appointed Viceroy and Lieutenant-general of Newfoundland, Labrador, and all the territory explored by Cartier, with the t.i.tle of Lord of Norumbega. This division of command seems to have led to no good results. Another measure which probably contributed to the failure of the expedition was the mode employed for raising the necessary crews.

Cartier, like Frobisher, was empowered to search the prisons for recruits. Even before the voyage began things took an unfavorable turn. Roberval's ammunition was not ready at the stated time, and the departure of the fleet was thereby hindered.

At length, lest further delay should give offense at court, Cartier sailed, leaving Roberval to follow. The first interview with the savages was a source of some fear, as it was doubtful how they would receive the tidings of Donnacona's death. Luckily, the chief to whom the news was first told was Donnacona's successor, and, as might have been expected, he showed no dissatisfaction at Cartier's story. The French then settled themselves in their old quarters at Quebec. Two of the four s.h.i.+ps were sent home to France to report safe arrival of the expedition, while Cartier himself, with two boats, set out to explore the river above Hochelaga. After his departure the relations between the settlers and the Indians became unfriendly, a change probably due in part to the loss of Donnacona and his companions. Whatever the cause, the danger seemed so serious that Cartier on his return decided to abandon the colony and to make for France. From later events it would seem as if Cartier had no friendly feeling toward Roberval, and jealousy may have had some share in leading him to forsake the enterprise for which he had endured and risked so much. On his homeward voyage he put into the harbor of St. John, in Newfoundland.

There he met Roberval with three s.h.i.+ps and 200 men. Their meeting seems to have been friendly, but Cartier, instead of obeying Roberval's orders and returning with him to Canada, quietly weighed anchor in the night and sailed away to France.

With this inglorious departure ends the career of the first great French colonizer. Robervai resumed his voyage and landed above Quebec.

There he built a single abode for the whole colony on the model of a college or monastery, with a common hail and kitchen. Of the doings of the settlers we have but scanty accounts, but we learn enough to see that the colony was ill-planned from the outset, and that either Roberval was unfit for command or singularly unfortunate in his subjects. The supplies were soon found to be inadequate, and scurvy set in, the colonists became disorderly, and Roberval ruled them with a rod of iron. Trifling offenses were punished with fearful severity; men and women were flogged, and if we may believe one account, the punishment of death was inflicted with no sparing hand. How long the colony lingered on is unknown. Roberval himself returned to France only, it is said, to die a violent death in the streets of Paris.

There is nothing to tell us whether his colonists returned with him or whether, like White's unhappy followers, they were left to fall victims to the horrors of the wilderness. Whatever was their fate, no attempt was made to restore the colony, and the St. Lawrence was left for more than fifty years to the savages and wild beasts.

[1] From Doyle's "_English Colonies in America_." By permission of the publishers, Henry Holt & Co. Jacques Cartier was born at St.

Malo, France, in 1494, and died some time after 1552. He made three voyages to Canada, the first in 1534, the second in 1535, the third in 1541.

[2] The site is now occupied by Montreal.

II

CARTIER'S OWN ACCOUNT[1]

Vpon Thursday being the eight of the moneth, because the winde was not good to go out with our s.h.i.+ps, we set our boates in a readinesse to goe to discouer the said Bay[2], and that day wee went 25 leagues within it. The next day the wind and weather being faire, we sailed vntil noone, in which time we had notice of a great part of the said Bay, and how that ouer the low lands, there were other lands with high mountaines: but seeing that there was no pa.s.sage at all, wee began to turne back againe, taking our way along the coast and sayling, we saw certaine wilde men.... and by and by in cl.u.s.ters they came to the sh.o.r.e where we were, with their boates, bringing with them skinnes and other such things as they had, to haue of our wares.... til they had nothing but their naked bodies; for they gaue vs all whatsoeuer they had, and that was but of small value. We perceiued that this people might very easily be conuerted to our Religion. They goe from place to place. They liue onely with fis.h.i.+ng. They haue an ordinarie time to fish for their prouision. The countrey is hotter than the countrey of Spaine, and the fairest that can possibly be found, altogether smooth, and leuel. There is no place be it neuer so little, but it bath some trees (yea albeit it be sandie) or else is full of wilde corne, that hath an eare like vnto Rie: the corne is like oates, and smal peason as thicke as if they had bene sowen and plowed, white and red Roses, with many other flouers of very sweet and pleasant smell. There be also many goodly medowes full of gra.s.se, and lakes wherein great plentie of salmons be. They call a hatchet in their tongue Cochi, and a knife Bacon: we named it The bay of heat....

The Sat.u.r.day following, being the first of August, by Sunne rising, wee had certaine other landes, lying North and Northeast, that were very high and craggie, and seemed to be mountaines: betweene which were other low lands with woods and riuers: wee went about the sayd lands, as well on the one side as on the other, still bending Northwest, to see if it were either a gulfe, or a pa.s.sage, vntill the fift of the moneth. The distance from one land to the other is about fifteene leagues. The middle between them both is 50 degrees and a terce in lat.i.tude. We had much adoe to go fiue miles farther, the winds were so great and the tide against vs. And at fiue miles end, we might plainely see and perceiue land on both sides, which there beginneth to spread it selfe.

After we had sailed along the sayd coast, for the s.p.a.ce of two houres, behold, the tide began to tame against vs, with so swift and raging a course, that it was not possible for vs with 13 oares to row or get one stones cast farther, so that we were constrained to leaue our boates with some of our men to guard them, and 10 or 12 men went ash.o.r.e to the sayd Cape, where we found that the land beginneth to bend Southwest, which hauing scene, we came to our boats againe, and so to our s.h.i.+ps, which were stil ready vnder salle, hoping to go forward; but for all that, they were fallen more then four leagues to leeward from the place where we had left them, where so soone as we came, wee a.s.sembled together all our Captaines, Masters, and Mariners, to haue their aduice and opinion what was best to be done; and after that euery one had said, considering that the Easterly winds began to beare away, and blow, and that the flood was so great, that we did but fall, and that there was nothing to be gotten, and that stormes and tempests began to reigne in Newfoundland, and that we were so farre from home, not knowing the perils and dangers that were behind, for either we must agree to reture home againe, or els to stay there all the yeere. More ouer, we did consider, that if the Northerne winds did take vs, it were not possible for vs to depart thence. All which opinions being heard and considered, we altogether determined to addresse our selues homeward. Nowe because vpon Saint Peters day wee entred into the sayd Streite, we named it Saint Peters Streite....

In the yeere of our Lord 1535, vpon Whitsunday, being the 16. of May, by the commandement of our Captaine Iames Cartier, and with a common accord, in the Cathedrall Church of S. Malo we deuoutly each one confessed our selues, and receiued the Sacrament: and all entring into the Quier of the sayd Church, wee presented our selues before the Reuerend Father in Christ, the Lord Bishop of S. Malo, who blessed vs all, being in his Bishops roabes. The Wednesday following, being the 19. of May, there arose a good gale of wind, and therefore we hoysed seyle with three s.h.i.+ps.... We staied and rested our selues in the sayd hauen, vntill the seuenth of August being Sonday: on which day we hoysed sayle, and came toward land on the South side toward Cape Robast, distant from the sayd hauen about twentie leagues Northnortheast, and Southsouthwest: but the next day there rose a stormie and a contrary winde, and because we could find no hauen there toward the South, thence we went coasting along toward the North, beyond the abouesayd hauen about ten leagues, where we found a goodly great gulfe, full of Islands, pa.s.sages, and entrances, toward what wind soeuer you please to bend: for the knowledge of this gulfe there is a great Island that is like to a Cape of lande, stretching somewhat further foorth than the others, and about two leagues within the land, there is an hill fas.h.i.+oned as it were an heape of corne. We named the sayd gulfe Saint Laurence his bay. The twelfth of the sayd moneth wee went from the sayd Saint Laurence his Bay, or gulfe, sayling Westward, and discouered a Cape of land toward the South, that runneth West and by South, distant from the sayd Saint Laurence his Bay, about fiue and twenty leagues....

Moreouer, I beleeue that there were neuer so many Whales seen as we saw that day about the sayd Cape. The next day after being aur Ladie day of August the fifteenth of the moneth, hauing pa.s.sed the Straight, we had notice of certaine lands that wee left toward the South, which landes are full of uery great and high hilles, and this Cape wee named The Island of the a.s.sumption, and perceuived to be higher than the Southerly, more then thirty leagues in length. We treaded the sayd landes about toward the South: from the sayd day vntill Tewesday noone following, the winde came West, and therefore wee bended toward the North, purposing to goe and see the land that we before had spied.

Being arriued there, we found the sayd landes as it were ioyned together, and low toward the Sea. And the Northerly mountaines that are vpon the sayd low lands stretch East, and West, and a quarter of the South. Our wild men told vs that there was the beginning of Saguenay, and that it was land inhabited, and that thence commeth the red Copper, of them named Caignetdaze.

There is between the Southerly lands, and the Northerly about thirty leagues distance, and more then two hundredth fadome depth. The sayd men did moreouer certifie vnto vs, that there was the way and beginning of the great riuer of Hochelaga and ready way to Canada, which riuer the further it went the narrower it came, euen vnto Canada, and that then there was fresh water, which went so famine vpwards, that they had neuer heard of any man who had gone to the head of it, and that there is no other pa.s.sage but with small boates....

Vpon the first of September we departed out of the said hauen, purposing to go toward Canada; and about 15 leagues from it toward the West, and Westsouthwest, amidst the riuer, there are three Islands, ouer against the which there is a riuer which runneth swift, and is of great depth, and it is that which leadeth, and runneth into the countrey and kingdome of Saguenay, as by the two wild men of Canada it was told vs. This riuer pa.s.seth and runneth along very high and steepe hills of bare stone, where uery little earth is, and notwithstanding there is a great quant.i.ty of sundry sorts of trees that grow in the said bare stones, euen as vpon good and fertile ground, in such sort that we haue seene some so great as wel would suffise to make a mast for a s.h.i.+p of 30 tunne burden, and as greene as possibly can be, growing in a stony rocke without any earth at all....

The seuenth of the moneth being our Ladies euen, after seruice we went from that Iland to go vp higher into the riuer, and came to 14 Ilands seuen or eight leagues from the Iland of Filberds, where the countrey of Canada beginneth, one of which Ilands is ten leagues in length, and fiue in bredth, greatly inhabited of such men as onely liue by fis.h.i.+ng of such sorts of fishes as the riuer affordeth, according to the season of them.... The next day following, the Lord of Canada (whose proper name was Donnacona, but by the name of Lord they call him Agouhanna) with twelue boats came to our s.h.i.+ps, accompanied with many people, who causing ten of his boates to goe backe with the other two, approched vnto vs with sixteene men ... Our Captaine then caused our boates to be set in order, that with the next tide he might goe vp higher into the riuer, to find some safe harborough for our s.h.i.+ps: and we pa.s.sed vp the riuer against the streame about tenne leagues, coasting the said Iland, at the end whereof, we found a goodly and pleasant sound, where is a little riuer and hauen, where by reason of the flood there is about three fadome water. This place seemed to us very fit and commodious to harbour our s.h.i.+ps therein, and so we did very safely, we named it the holy Crosse, for on that day we came thither. Neere vnto it, there is a village, whereof Donnacona is Lord, and there he keepeth his abode: it is called Stadacona [Quebec] as goodly a plot of ground as possibly may be seene.