Godspeed, the ships moved slowly down the harbor towards the broad ocean
and the New World that lay beyond.

For many weeks they sailed ever westward, seeing no ship save their own,
and becoming every day more weary of the vast, endless expanse of sea and
sky. It is no wonder, then, that when on the morning of the 22d of June
the welcome cry of "Land, ho!" rang through the flag-ship every soul on
board rushed on deck with joyous exclamations to catch once more a
glimpse of the blessed land. The cry that had brought them such pleasure
had come from the mast-head, and it was some time before those on deck
could detect the dim blue cloud, low-lying in the west, that was said to
be land. Even then one man, who was known as Simon the Armorer, was
heard to mutter that it might be land and then again it might not; for
his part, he believed the whole world had been drowned in a flood, as in
the days of Noah, and that the only land they should ever see would be at
the bottom of the ocean.

As the day wore on, and before a light breeze the ships were wafted
towards the blue cloud, it was proved beyond a doubt to be land, for some
palm-trees and tall pines became distinguishable, and above all other
sounds came, faint but distinct, the heavy, regular boom of surf.

By noon the ships had approached as near to the coast as was deemed
prudent, and for the first time since leaving France their anchors were
dropped and their sails were furled.

They had come to anchor off the mouth of an inlet, before which extended
a bar upon which the great seas were breaking and roaring so frightfully
that no passage for the ships among them seemed to offer itself.
Laudonniere thought he recognized the inlet as one leading into a broad