south, and doubtless the ardent wish to be the first to
traverse these unknown waters was a moving impulse in his
ready assent.

With the opening season the warriors gathered, Hurons and
Algonquins, a numerous band. They paddled to Quebec; gazed
with surprise on the strange buildings, the story of which
had already been told in their distant wigwams, and on their
no less strange inmates; feasted, smoked, and debated; and
shrank in consternation from the piercing report of the
arquebuse and the cannon's frightful roar.

Their savage hearts were filled with exultation on learning
the powers of their new allies. Surely these wonderful
strangers would deal destruction on their terrible foes.
Burning with thirst for vengeance, they made their faces
frightful with the war-paint, danced with frenzied gestures
round the blaze of their camp-fires, filled the air with
ear-piercing war-whoops, and at the word of command hastened
to their canoes and swept in hasty phalanx up the mighty
stream, accompanied by Champlain and eleven other white
allies.

Two days the war-party remained encamped at the place where
we have seen them, hunting, fishing, fasting, and
quarrelling, the latter so effectually that numbers of them
took to their canoes and paddled angrily away, scarce a
fourth of the original array being left for the march upon
the dreaded enemy.