the prospect of Arcadian joys and exciting
adventures--beside such promptings hardship and danger
became negligible. And when exploring the wilderness
Champlain was in full command. Off the coast of Norumbega
his wishes, as geographer, had been subject to the special
projects of De Monts and Poutrincourt. At Fontainebleau
he waited for weeks and months in the antechambers of
prelates or nobles. But when conducting an expedition
through the forest he was lord and master, a chieftain
from whose arquebus flew winged death.

The story of Champlain's expeditions along these great
secluded waterways, and across the portages of the forest,
makes the most agreeable page of his life both for writer
and reader, since it is here that he himself is most
clearly in the foreground. At no point can his narrative
be thought dull, compact as it is and always in touch
with energetic action. But the details of fur trading at
Tadoussac and the Sault St Louis, or even of voyaging
along the Acadian seaboard, are far less absorbing than
the tale of the canoe and the war party. Amid the depths
of the interior Champlain reaped his richest experiences
as an explorer. With the Indians for his allies and
enemies he reached his fullest stature as a leader.

It is not important to dwell upon the minor excursions
which Champlain made from his headquarters at Quebec into
the country of the Montagnais. [Footnote: An Algonquin
tribe dwelling to the north of the St Lawrence, for the
most part between the Saguenay and the St Maurice.] He