Thus until 1589, when the King of Navarre, the leader of the Huguenots,
entered into a truce with Henry III., from Champlain's birth through the
whole period of his youth and until he entered upon his manhood, the little
town within whose walls he was reared was the fitful scene of war and
peace, of alarm and conflict.

But in the intervals, when the waves of civil strife settled into the calm
of a temporary peace, the citizens returned with alacrity to their usual
employment, the manufacture of salt, which was the absorbing article of
commerce in their port.

This manufacture was carried on more extensively in Saintonge than in any
other part of France. The salt was obtained by subjecting water drawn from
the ocean to solar evaporation. The low marsh-lands which were very
extensive about Brouage, on the south towards Marennes and on the north
towards Rochefort, were eminently adapted to this purpose. The whole of
this vast region was cut up into salt basins, generally in the form of
parallelograms, excavated at different depths, the earth and rubbish
scooped out and thrown on the sides, forming a platform or path leading
from basin to basin, the whole presenting to the eye the appearance of a
vast chess-board. The argillaceous earth at the bottom of the pans was made
hard to prevent the escape of the water by percolation. This was done in
the larger ones by leading horses over the surface, until, says an old
chronicler, the basins "would hold water as if they were brass." The water
was introduced from the sea, through sluices and sieves of pierced planks,
passing over broad surfaces in shallow currents, furnishing an opportunity
for evaporation from the moment it left the ocean until it found its way
into the numerous salt-basins covering the whole expanse of the marshy
plains. The water once in the basins, the process of evaporation was
carried on by the sun and the wind, assisted by the workmen, who agitated