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Updated: May 31, 2025
Vessels were taking on cargoes of furs as soon as they were inspected. The river as far as Tadoussac looked thriving enough. Antoine met old friends, but he was more level-headed than some, and did not get tipsy. Lalotte held her head higher than ever. When it was getting rather too rough they made their way out. "Oh, the child!" she exclaimed, with a sudden twinge of conscience.
Champlain had spent the winter at Quebec and was, of course, expecting his usual supplies with the opening of navigation. Instead came Lewis Kirke, sent from Tadoussac by his brother David, to demand surrender. Champlain made a reply which, though courteous, was sufficiently bold to convince the Kirkes that Quebec could be best captured by starvation.
Immediately on his arrival in Canada, about the beginning of June, he took steps for establishing regular religious services at the three principal trading-posts Quebec, Three Rivers, and Tadoussac at the first of which places a sort of council was held, consisting of himself, the four Récollets, and "the most intelligent persons in the colony."
Captain Pontgrave kept up his courage, and "when they brought their battered craft into the harbor of Tadoussac they fired a cannon shot in joyous salute," says history. Seventy-four days had their journey lasted. The country was still white with snow, although it was May.
Lawrence River, stopping first at Tadoussac, where Du Pont Gravé proceeded to take very strong measures with the Basque seamen, who were infringing his monopoly by trading with the natives in furs. Apparently they were still allowed to continue their whale fishery.
Tadoussac was at the mouth of an important river, called by the French the Saguenay, a name which they also applied to the mysterious and wonderful country through which it flowed in the far north; a country rich in copper and possibly other precious metals. Champlain ascended the Saguenay River for sixty miles as far as the rapids of Chicoutima.
There were annual fairs at Three Rivers for the Indians of the St. Maurice region; at Sorel, for those of the Richelieu; and at Quebec and at Tadoussac, for the redskins of the Lower St. Lawrence. But Montreal, owing to its situation at the confluence of the St. Lawrence and Ottawa trade routes, was by far the greatest fur mart of all.
The buildings had been burned, the cattle killed, the crops laid waste. No doubt they were now pillaging Tadoussac. Champlain began to prepare for defense with all the force available. Muskets were loaded, cannon trained down the river, the fort manned. Friendly Indians offered their services. All was wild alarm, the blow was so unexpected.
He spent another winter of extreme hardship with the Algonquins on their winter rovings, and during summer instructed the wandering savages of Tadoussac. It was not until the autumn of 1650 that he again descended the Kennebec. This time he went as an envoy charged with the negotiation of a treaty.
The only other agriculturist in the colony was Louis Hebert, who had come to Canada in 1617 with a wife and three children, and who made a house for himself on the rock, at a little distance from Champlain's fort. Besides Quebec, there were the three trading-stations of Montreal, Three Rivers, and Tadoussac, occupied during a part of the year. Of these, Tadoussac was still the most important.
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