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 It appears from the above that the early name was soon superseded by that which it now bears.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.