"

"It is just because I am a soldier and have seen something of war that I
know how hard it is to penetrate into a country much larger than the
Lowlands, all thick with forest and bog, with a savage lurking behind
every tree, who, if he has not learned to step in time or to form line,
can at least bring down the running caribou at two hundred paces, and
travel three leagues to your one. And then when you have at last
reached their villages, and burned their empty wigwams and a few acres
of maize fields, what the better are you then? You can but travel back
again to your own land with a cloud of unseen men lurking behind you,
and a scalp-yell for every straggler. You are a soldier yourself, sire.
I ask you if such a war is an easy task for a handful of soldiers, with
a few _censitaires_ straight from the plough, and a troop of
_coureurs-de-bois_ whose hearts are all the time are with their traps
and their beaver-skins."

"No, no; I am sorry if I spoke too hastily," said Louis. "We shall look
into the matter at our council."

"Then it warms my heart to hear you say so," cried the old governor.
"There will be joy down the long St. Lawrence, in white hearts and in
red, when it is known that their great father over the waters has
turned his mind towards them."

"And yet you must not look for too much, for Canada has been a heavy
cost to us, and we have many calls in Europe."

"Ah, sire, I would that you could see that great land. When your
Majesty has won a campaign over here, what may come of it? Glory, a few
miles of land Luxembourg, Strassburg, one more city in the kingdom; but
over there, with a tenth of the cost and a hundredth part of the force,
there is a world ready to your hand. It is so vast, sire, so rich, so
beautiful! Where are there such hills, such forests, such rivers?
And it is all for us if we will but take it. Who is there to stand in
our way? A few nations of scattered Indians and a thin strip of English
farmers and fishermen. Turn your thoughts there, sire, and in a few
years you would be able to stand upon your citadel at Quebec, and to say
there is one great empire here from the snows of the North to the warm
Southern Gulf, and from the waves of the ocean to the great plains
beyond Marquette's river, and the name of this empire is France, and her
king is Louis, and her flag is the _fleurs-de-lis_."

Louis's cheek had flushed at this ambitious picture, and he had leaned
forward in h