tieth of April, 1534, Cartier steered
for Newfoundland, passed through the Straits of Belle Isle, entered the
Gulf of Chaleurs, planted a cross at Gaspe, and, never doubting that he
was on the high road to Cathay, advanced up the St. Lawrence till he
saw the shores of Anticosti. But autumnal storms were gathering. The
voyagers took counsel together, turned their prows eastward, and bore
away for France, carrying thither, as a sample of the natural products
of the New World, two young Indians, lured into their clutches by an act
of villanous treachery. The voyage was a mere reconnoissance.

The spirit of discovery was awakened. A passage to India could be found,
and a new France built up beyond the Atlantic. Mingled with such views
of interest and ambition was another motive scarcely less potent. The
heresy of Luther was convulsing Germany, and the deeper heresy of Calvin
infecting France. Devout Catholics, kindling with redoubled zeal, would
fain requite the Church for her losses in the Old World by winning to
her fold the infidels of the New. But, in pursuing an end at once
so pious and so politic, Francis the First was setting at naught the
supreme Pontiff himself, since, by the preposterous bull of Alexander
the Sixth, all America had been given to the Spaniards.

In October, 1534, Cartier received from Chabot another commission, and,
in spite of secret but bitter opposition from jealous traders of St.
Malo, he prepared for a second voyage. Three vessels, the largest not
above a hundred and twenty tons, were placed at his disposal, and Claude
de Pontbriand, Charles de la Pommeraye, and other gentlemen of birth,
enrolled themselves for the adventure. On the sixteenth of May, 1535,
officers and sailors assembled in the cathedral of St. Malo, where,
after confession and mass, they received the parting blessing of the
bishop. Three days later they set sail. The dingy walls of the rude
old seaport, and the white rocks that line the neighboring shores
of Brittany, faded from their sight, and soon they were tossing in a
furious tempest. The scattered ships escaped the danger, and, reuniting
at the Straits of Belle Isle, steered westward along the coast
of Labrador, till they reached a small bay opposite the island of
Anticosti. Cartier called it the Bay of St. Lawrence,--a name afterwards
extended to the entire gulf, and to the great river above.

To ascend this great river, and tempt the hazards of its intricate
navigati