more convenient or better situated than the point of Quebec, so called
by the savages, which was covered with nut trees."

Champlain was accompanied by thirty men, amongst whom may be named
Nicholas Marsolet, Étienne Brûlé, Bonnerme, a doctor, Jean Duval,
Antoine Natel and La Taille. These names are specially recorded.
Champlain immediately employed some workmen to fell trees in order to
commence the construction of an _Habitation_. One party was engaged in
sawing timber, another in digging a cellar and some ditches, while
another party was sent to Tadousac with a barque to obtain supplies
which had been retained in the ships. Such was the beginning of
Champlain's city. Nothing great, it will be admitted, for a settlement
which its founder hoped before long would become the great warehouse of
New France.

Until this date the merchants had traded with the Indians only in those
places where they could easily be met, and even Chauvin, who was
mentioned in a previous chapter, had not gone further than Tadousac.
Neither Three Rivers, nor the islands of Sorel at the entrance of the
Iroquois River, now called the Richelieu River, were known to French
navigators at this period, and although these places were easily
accessible to the aborigines, they were not so available as Quebec.

Champlain well understood the advantages of founding his city on a spot
naturally fortified and where he could readily defend himself against
the attack of an enemy, whose approach he expected sooner or later. The
first foes, however, whom Champlain had to encounter were not the
Indians, but his own countrymen, members of his crew who under various
pretexts sought to kill their chief and give the command of the
settlement to the Basques. Jean Duval, the king's locksmith, was the