Voyages of Samuel De Champlain — Volume 02

by Samuel de Champlain

ENDNOTES:

262. Vide antea, p. 9 and note 22.

263. Sesambre. This name was probably suggested by the little islet, Cézembre, one of several on which are military works for the defence of St. Malo. On De Laet's map of 1633, it is written Sesembre; on that of Charlevoix. 1744, Sincenibre. It now appears on the Admiralty maps corrupted into Sambro. There is a cape and a harbor near this island which bear the same name.

264. The islands stretching along from Cap de la Hève to Sambro Island are
called the Martyres Iles on De Laet's map, 1633.

265. The bay into which this river empties still retains the name of
St. Margaret.

266. Halifax Harbor. Its Indian name was Chebucto, written on the map of the English and French Commissaries Shebûctû. On Champlain's map, 1612, as likewise on that of De Laet, 1633, it is called "Baye Senne," perhaps from saine, signifying the unobstructed bay.

267. Eight leagues from the Island Sesambre or Sambro Island would take them to Perpisawick Inlet, which is doubtless Le Port Saincte Helaine of Champlain. The latitude of this harbor is 44° 41', differing but a single minute from that of the text, which is extraordinary, the usual variation being from ten to thirty minutes.

268. Nicomtau Bay is fifteen leagues from Perpisawick Inlet, but La Baye
de Toutes Isles is, more strictly speaking, an archipelago, extending
along the coast, say from Clam Bay to Liscomb Point, as may be seen by
reference to Champlain's map, 1612, and that of De Laet, 1633,
Cruxius, 1660, and of Charlevoix, 1744. The north-eastern portion of
this archipelago is now called, according to Laverdière, Island Bay.

269. Rivière de l'Isle Verte, or Green Island River, is the River
St. Mary; and Green Island is Wedge Island near its mouth. The
latitude at the mouth of the river is 45° 3'. This little island is
called I. Verte on De Laet's map, and likewise on that of
Charlevoix; on the map of the English and French Commissaries, Liscomb
or Green Island.

270. This inlet has now the incongruous name of Country Harbor: the three islands at its mouth are Harbor, Goose, and Green Islands. The inlet is called Mocodome on Charlevoix's map.

271. There are several islets on the east of St. Catharine's River, near the shore, which Laverdière suggests are the Isles Rangées. They are exceedingly small, and no name is given them on the Admiralty charts.

272. Tor Bay.

273. Le Port de Savalette. Obviously White Haven, which is four leagues from the Rangées and six from Canseau, as stated in the text. Lescarbot gives a very interesting account of Captain Savalette, the old Basque fisherman, who had made forty-two voyages into these waters. He had been eminently successful in fishing, having taken daily, according to his own account, fifty crowns' worth of codfish, and expected his voyage would yield, ten thousand francs. His vessel was of eighty tons burden, and could take in a hundred thousand dry codfish. He was well known, and a great favorite with the voyagers to this coast. He was from St. Jean de Luz, a small seaport town in the department of the Lower Pyrenees in France, near the borders of Spain, distinguished even at this day for its fishing interest.

274. The Indians were in the habit of selecting from day to day the best of Savalette's fish when they came in, and appropriating them to their own use, nolens volens.

275. Canseau. Currency has been given to an idle fancy that this name was derived from that of a French navigator, but it has been abundantly disproved by the Abbé Laverdière. It is undoubtedly a word of Indian origin.

276. The variation of the magnetic needle in 1871, fifteen miles South of the Harbor of Canseau, was, according to the Admiralty charts, 23 degrees west. The magnetic needle was employed in navigation as early as the year 1200, and its variation had been discovered before the time of Columbus. But for a long period its variation was supposed to be fixed; that is to say, was supposed to be always the same in the same locality. A few years before Champlain made his voyages to America, it was discovered that its variation in Paris was not fixed, but that it changed from year to year. If Champlain was aware of this, his design in noting its exact variation, as he did at numerous points on our coast, may have been to furnish data for determining at some future day whether the variation were changeable here as well as in France. But, whether he was aware of the discovery then recently made in Paris or not, he probably intended, by noting the declination of the needle, to indicate his longitude, at least approximately.

277. Chedabucto Bay.

278. The Strait of Canseau. Champlain gives it on his map, 1612. Pasage du glas; De Laet, 1633, Passage du glas; Creuxius, 1660, Fretum Campseium; Charlevoix, 1744, Passage de Canceau. It appears from the above that the early name was soon superseded by that which it now bears.

279. Now called La Bras d'Or, The Golden Arm.

280. There is, in fact, no passage of La Bras d'Or on the south-west; and Champlain corrects his error, as may be seen by reference to his map of 1612. It may also be stated that the sea enters from the north-east. Nordouest in the original is here probably a typographical error for nordest. There are, indeed, two passages, both on the north-east, distinguished as the Great and the Little Bras d'Or.

281. Le Port aux Anglois, the Harbor of the English. On De Laet's map, Port aux Angloix. This is the Harbor of Louisburgh, famous in the history of the Island of Cape Breton.

282. Roscofs, a small seaport town. On Mercator's Atlas of 1623, it is written Roscou, as in the text.

283. According to Lescarbot, they remained at St. Malo eight days, when they went in a barque to Honfleur, narrowly escaping shipwreck. Poutrincourt proceeded to Paris, where he exhibited to Henry IV. corn, wheat, rye, barley, and oats, products of the colony which he had so often promised to cherish, but whose means of subsistence he had now nevertheless ungraciously taken away. Poutrincourt also presented to him five oustards, or wild geese, which he had bred from the shell. The king was greatly delighted with them, and had them preserved at Fontainebleau. These exhibitions of the products of New France had the desired effect upon the generous heart of Henry IV.; and De Monts's monopoly of the fur-trade was renewed for one year, to furnish some slight aid in establishing his colonies in New France.