white with a faint flush, white with a golden-creamy heart, pure
snow-white, sunrise pink and deep glowing crimson with a purple shade.

If Lescarbot had been a superstitious man, he might have been inclined
to gloom during his first sea-voyage, for the ship in which he and
Poutrincourt set sail from Rochelle on the thirteenth of May, 1606, was
called the _Jonas_. But instead he joined in all the diversions possible
in their two months' voyage--harpooning porpoises, fishing for cod off
the Banks, or dancing on the deck in calm weather,--and in his leisure
kept a lively and entertaining journal of the adventure. They ran into
dense fog in which they could see nothing; they saw, when the mist
cleared, a green and lovely shore, but before it fierce and dangerous
rocks on which the breakers pounded. Then a storm broke, with rolling
thunder like a salute of cannon. At last on July 27 they sailed into the
narrow channel at the entrance of the harbor of Port Royal.

The flag of France, with its golden lilies on a white ground, gleamed in
the noon sunlight as they came up the bay toward the little group of
wooden buildings in the edge of the forest. Not a man was to be seen on
the silent shore; a birch canoe, with one old Indian in it, hovered near
the landing. A great fear gripped the hearts of Bienville de
Poutrincourt and Marc Lescarbot. Were Pontgrave and Champlain all dead
with their people? Had help come too late?

Then from the bastion of the rude fortifications a cannon barked salute,
and a Frenchman with a gun in his hand came running down to the beach.
The ship's guns returned the salute, and the trumpets sang loud greeting
to whoever might be there to hear.

When they had landed they learned what had happened. There were only two
Frenchmen in the fort; Pontgrave and the others, fearing that the supply
ship would never arrive, had gone twelve days before in two small ships
of their own building to look for some of the French fishing fleet who
might have provisions. The two who remained had volunteered to stay and
guard the buildings and stores. There was a village of friendly Indians
near by, and the chief, Membertou, who was more than a hundred years
old, had seen the distant sail of the _Jonas_ and come to warn the white
men, who were at dinner. Not knowing whether the strange ship came in
peace or war, one of the comrades had gone to the platform on which the
cannon were mounted, and stood ready to do what he c