Charlevoix affirms that Roberval made another attempt to colonize Canada in 1549;[249] Thevet says that he was murdered in Paris: at all events he soon passed from sight.[250]
There is no evidence to prove that Cartier gave any name to the country which he explored. The statement found at the end of Hakluyt’s version of the second voyage,[251] to the effect that the Newfoundlands “were by him named New France,” originated with the translator. It is not given in connection with the text of Ramusio, nor in the French edition of 1545, though that Relation (p. 46) employs the language, “Appellée par nous la nouvelle France.” In the same folio we find the writer stating of Cape St. Paul, “Nous nommasmes le cap de Sainct Paul,” though the name had been given at an early period, appearing upon the Maijolla map of 1527.
“Canada” was the name which Cartier found attached to the land,[252] and there is no evidence that he attempted to displace it. It is indeed said, in Murphy’s Voyage of Verrazzano,[253] that the name “Francisca” was due to Cartier. He says, “This name Francisca, or the French Land,”—found on a map in the Ptolemy printed at Basle in 1540,—was “due to the French under Jacques Cartier, and which could properly belong to no other exploration of the French.” This statement was made in rebuttal of that by Brevoort in his Verrazano the Navigator (p. 141), where he says that “the first published map containing traces of Verrazano’s exploration is in the Ptolemy of Basle, 1530, which appeared four years before the French renewed their attempts at American exploration. It shows the western sea without a name, and the land north of it called Francisca.” As it appears, there is no edition of Ptolemy bearing date of 1530; yet the student is sufficiently correct in referring the name “Francisca” to the voyage of Verrazano, especially as the Maijollo map, 1527, applies “Francesca” to North America, this map having been made only three years after the voyage of Verrazano, performed in 1524. Evidently, however, Verrazano was not more anxious than Cartier about any name, since on the map of his brother Hieronymus da Verrazano (1529), this region is called “Nova Gallia, sive Yucatania.”
Nor did Roberval attempt to name the country, while the commission given him by the King does not associate the name of Francis or any new name therewith. The misunderstanding on this point is now cleared up.[254]
Cartier did not give any name to the Gulf, simply applying the name of St. Lawrence to what may have been the St. John’s River, on the Labrador coast, where he chanced to be on the festival of that saint in 1535. Gomara thus writes in 1555: “A great river, named San Lorenço, which some consider an arm of the sea. It has been navigated two hundred leagues up, on which account many call it the Straits of the Three Brothers (los tres hermanos). Here the water forms a square gulf, which extends from San Lorenço to the point of Baccallaos, more than two hundred leagues.”[255]
Little is known at present of the personal history of Jean Allefonsce. D’Avezac, in the Bulletin de géographie,[256] attempted to give an account of the man and his work; and Margry, in his Navigations Françaises, added substantial information. At one time he was claimed by the Portuguese as of their nation, because he voyaged to Brazil; but his French origin is now abundantly proved out of the book published by Jean de Marnef in 1559, entitled Les voyages avantureux du Capitaine du Alfonce Saintongeois. It is a small volume in quarto, numbering sixty-eight leaves, the verso of the last one bearing the epilogue: “End of the present book, composed and ordered [?] by Jan Alphonce, an experienced pilot in things narrated in this book, a native of the country of Xaintonge, near the city of Cognac. Done at the request of Vincent Aymard, merchant of the country of Piedmont, Maugis Vumenot, merchant of Honfleur, writing for him.”
Allefonsce appears to have been of a brave, adventurous, and somewhat haughty spirit. We are even told that he was once imprisoned at Poitiers by royal orders.[257] He was considered a man of ability, and was trusted on account of his great skill. In Hakluyt[258] it is said, “There is a pardon to be seene for the pardoning of Monsieur de saine terre, Lieutenant of the sayd Monsieur de Roberval, giuen in Canada in presence of the sayde Iohn Alphonse.”
The sailor of Saintonge met his death in a naval engagement, though most writers appear to have overlooked the fact. It is indicated in a sonnet written by his eulogist, Melin Saint-Gelais, and prefixed to the first edition of the Voyages avantureux, 1559. The allusion was pointed out by Harrisse in his Notes sur la Nouvelle France, Paris, 1872 (p. 8), indicating that this event must have taken place before March 7, 1557,—the date of the imprimatur of the edition of 1559.[259] Mr. Brevoort, in his Verrazano the Navigator, quoting Barcia’s Ensayo, etc., Madrid, 1723, fol. 58, shows that he fought Menendez, the Spaniard, near the reef of Rochelle, and was mortally wounded.[260]
There is no true connection between the manuscript of Allefonsce, now preserved in the Bibliothèque Nationale, Paris, catalogued under Secalart, and the volume of Voyages avantureux which bears his name. This latter work we owe, in some not understood sense, to the enterprise of a publisher who brought it out after the old mariner’s death. The erroneous character of certain of its statements excited the criticism of Lescarbot;[261] yet several descriptions of our coast are recognizable, and very interesting. In this printed book the matter relating to the North Atlantic coast occupies only about three pages,—the chief points for which were taken, it appears, from the manuscript of Allefonsce, though several particulars not found in his manuscript are given.
The manuscript itself must be judged leniently, as Secalart was concerned in the composition, and appears to have written some portions from the notes of Allefonsce.[262] The part of the Cosmographie applying to the North Atlantic coast begins with a description of the Island of St. John and Cape Breton. Three points south of Cape Breton, if not a fourth, are defined in connection with that cape. We read: “Turning to the Isle of St. John, called Cape Breton, the outermost part of which is in the ocean in 45° from the Arctic pole, I say Cape of St. John, called Cape Breton, and the Cape of the Franciscans, are northeast and southwest, and there is in the course one hundred and forty leagues; and here it makes a cape called the Cape of Norumbega. The said cape is by 41° from the height of the Arctic pole.” For the writer to call Cape Breton by another name is consistent with old usage.[263] Where, however, it is said, “here it makes a cape,” the language is obscure, as the writer seems to mean that on this coast there is a cape between the Franciscan Cape and Cape Breton, since on the map the Franciscan Cape is placed south of the Bay of the Isles, which the description places south of the Cape of Norumbega. The latter cape is not laid down on the map; but we have there the River of Norumbega, north of which is “Une partie de la Coste de la Norombegue,” while south of the river is “Terra de la Franciscaine.” The Cape of Norumbega should therefore have been marked on the map at the southern extremity of the Norumbega coast, near the Bay of the Isles. “Cap de la Franciscaine” would then stand for Cape Cod. If this interpretation is correct, the clause, “the said cape is by 41° from the height of the Arctic pole,” would denote the Franciscan cape.[264]