Before leaving the Bay of Gaspe, Cartier planted a great
wooden cross at the entrance of the harbour. The cross
stood thirty feet high, and at the centre of it he hung
a shield with three fleurs-de-lis. At the top was carved
in ancient lettering the legend, 'VIVE LE ROY DE FRANCE.'
A large concourse of savages stood about the French
explorers as they raised the cross to its place. 'So soon
as it was up,' writes Cartier, 'we altogether kneeled
down before them, with our hands towards heaven yielding
God thanks: and we made signs unto them, showing them
the heavens, and that all our salvation depended only on
Him which in them dwelleth; whereat they showed a great
admiration, looking first at one another and then at the
cross.'

The little group of sailors kneeling about the cross
newly reared upon the soil of Canada as a symbol of the
Gospel of Christ and of the sovereignty of France, the
wondering savages turning their faces in awe towards the
summer sky, serene again after the passing storms,--all
this formed an impressive picture, and one that appears
and reappears in the literature of Canada. But the first
effect of the ceremony was not fortunate. By a sound
instinct the savages took fright; they rightly saw in
the erection of the cross the advancing shadow of the
rule of the white man. After the French had withdrawn to
their ships, the chief of the Indians came out with his
brother and his sons to make protest against what had
been done. He made a long oration, which the French could
not, of course, understand. Pointing shoreward to the