hereafter that he was in the army several years during the civil war,
probably from 1592 to 1598, his experience in navigation must have been
obtained anterior to that, in the years of his youth and early manhood.

Brouage offered an excellent opportunity for such an employment. Its port
was open to the commerce of foreign nations, and a large number of vessels,
as we have already seen, was employed in the yearly distribution of the
salt of Saintonge, not only in the seaport towns of France, but in England
and on the Continent. In these coasting expeditions, Champlain was
acquiring skill in navigation which was to be of very great service to him
in his future career, and likewise gathering up rich stores of experience,
coming in contact with a great variety of men, observing their manners and
customs, and quickening and strengthening his natural taste for travel and
adventure. It is not unlikely that he was, at least during some of these
years, employed in the national marine, which was fully employed in
guarding the coast against foreign invasion, and in restraining the power
of the Huguenots, who were firmly seated at Rochelle with a sufficient
naval force to give annoyance to their enemies along the whole western
coast of France.

In 1592, or soon after that date, Champlain was appointed quarter-master in
the royal army in Brittany, discharging the office several years, until, by
the peace of Vervins, in 1598, the authority of Henry IV. was firmly
established throughout the kingdom. This war in Brittany constituted the
closing scene of that mighty struggle which had been agitating the nation,
wasting its resources and its best blood for more than half a century. It
began in its incipient stages as far back as a decade following 1530, when
the preaching of Calvin in the Kingdom of Navarre began to make known his
transcendent power. The new faith, which was making rapid strides in other
countries, easily awakened the warm heart and active temperament of the