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Cartier's Grande Hermine was more than twice as large, and, if the accepted illustrations and descriptions of her may be relied upon, she probably was not unlike a smaller and simplified Santa Maria, the ship which bore Columbus on his West Indian voyage of 1492.
On Cartier's return to Stadacona he found that his officers had become suspicious of the intentions of the Indians and had raised a rude fort near the junction of the river of St. Croix and the little stream called the Lairet. Here the French passed a long and dreary winter, doubtful of the friendship of the Indians, and suffering from the intense cold to which they were unaccustomed.
They were, however, nervous, and when, as they came near, Cartier's men let off two muskets they were terrified; 'with great haste they began to flee, and would no more follow us. But the next day after the boat had returned to the ships, the savages came near to the anchorage, and some parties landed and traded together.
I was present at a farewell dinner to Sir Edmund Head at Mr. Cartier's, at Quebec, in the winter of 1861-2. In response to the toast of his health, he alluded to his infirmity of temper, admitted his suffering before concealed from outside people and expressed his apologies in a manner so feeling and so gentle that the tears came into everybody's eyes.
Three days of easy and prosperous navigation was sufficient for the journey, and on October 2, Cartier's boats, having rowed along the shores of Montreal island, landed in full sight of Mount Royal, at some point about three or four miles from the heart of the present city. The precise location of the landing has been lost to history.
Lawrence as far as the island of Montreal, where they found only a few wandering Algonquins of the Ottawa and its tributaries, in place of the people who had inhabited the town of Hochelaga in the days of Cartier's visits. Champlain attempted to pass the Lachine rapids but was soon forced to give up the perilous and impossible venture.
For a half century after Cartier's home bringing of Roberval the very year that De Soto's men quitted in misery the lower valley of the Mississippi there is no record of a sail upon the river St. Lawrence. Hochelaga became a waste, its tenants annihilated or scattered, and Cartier's fort was all but obliterated.
It was true no men could be spared to form a new colony, and the few he had induced to emigrate would do better service in the old settlement. In Cartier's time there had been the village of Hochelega.
He also wished for native witnesses at Court, when he reached France, to testify to the truth of his discoveries, and even more to convince the King of France that there was great profit to be obtained from giving effect to Cartier's explorations. The chief, Donnacona, was full of wonderful stories of the Saguenay region, and of the great lakes to the northwards of Quebec.
The village so graphically described by that navigator had ceased to exist, and the tribe which had inhabited it at the time of his visit had given place to a few Algonquin Indians. Our adventurers essayed to ascend the river still farther, but found it impossible to make headway against the rapids of St. Louis, which had formerly presented an insuperable barrier to Cartier's westward progress.
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