Marguerite De Roberval A Romance of the Days of Jacques Cartier

Excerpt

CHAPTER I

"These narrow, cramped streets torture me! I must get out of this place or I shall go mad. The country, with its rolling fields and great stretches of calm sky helps a little, but nothing except the ocean will satisfy my spirit. Five years have gone now, and I am still penned up in this miserable hole, with no power to go abroad, save for a cruise up the Channel, or a run south along the coast. If matters do not change, I think I shall quietly weigh anchor on La Hermine and slip across the Atlantic without leave of King or blessing of priest. I tell you, Claude, it would be rare sport to go that way, without a good-bye word to friend or lover. Gold is there in plenty, and diamonds are there, and a road to the Indies; and if we should bring back riches and new discoveries the King would forgive our boldness."

The speaker was a middle-aged man, with jet-black hair and beard, and piercing black eyes. He was as straight as a mid-forest pine, and tanned and wrinkled with years of exposure to sun and wind, but was a handsome, commanding fellow withal. His name was Jacques Cartier. He was the most famous seaman in France, and had already made two trips across the stormy Atlantic in boats in which nineteenth-century sailors would fear to cross the Channel.

His companion was Claude de Pontbriand, a young man of gentle birth, who had been with him on his second voyage. He was as dark as Cartier, with a lion-like neck and shoulders, a resolute mouth and chin, and a kindly eye, whose expression had a touch of melancholy. Among his companions he was known as their Bayard; and the purity of his life, the generosity of his disposition, and his dauntless courage made the title a fitting one.

The two men were walking along one of the winding thoroughfares of the French seaport of St Malo, on a glorious moonlight evening in the autumn of 1539. The hour, though still early, was an unusual one in those days for anybody to be abroad simply for pleasure; and the little town was quiet and deserted save for an occasional pedestrian whom business, of one kind or another, had compelled to leave his home.

There was a short silence after Cartier's remarks, before De Pontbriand replied:

"I thought you had had enough of the New World."

"Enough!" exclaimed Cartier. "That New World is mine. I first took possession of it. My cross still stands guarding my interests at Gaspé, and my memory is still dear to the red men from Stadacona to Hochelaga."

"I am not so certain of the friendship of the Indians," interrupted his companion. "If we had not carried off old Donnacona and his fellow-chiefs it might have been so, but now that they are dead you will have some difficulty in inventing a story that will regain you the confidence of their tribesmen. Ah! Cartier, I warned you then; and now I only regret that I did not oppose your action with my very sword. Poor devils! It was pitiful to see them droop and droop like caged birds, and finally die one by one. Poor old Donnacona! I expect we shall find his spirit back on the heights of Stadacona if we ever cross the ocean again."

"That was a mistake," replied Cartier, "but one never knows just what will be the results of an action. I did it for the best. I thought the Indians would enjoy a visit to Europe as much as did the two lads I brought over on my first voyage. They were too old, however, and seem to have been rooted to the soil. I am afraid we shall have to invent a way of explaining their absence should we return to Hochelaga. Would it not be well to marry them to noble ladies, and give them dukedoms in France to govern?"

"A good idea, with the one drawback that it is false; and there are enough false men already in France without an honest seaman swelling their numbers. But my impression of the savages is, that you will have a hard time to make them believe your story. They are a deep people, and, as we found them, a generous people; and once deceived, you will find that they will never again have perfect confidence in their betrayers."

"Perhaps so; I daresay you are right....