How out of the priceless hoard
Within their rough bosoms stored,
These towering mountains poured
Their treasures upon the strand.

Allured by the greed of gain,
Sieur Roberval turned again,
And sailing across the main,
Passed up the St. Lawrence tide.
He sailed by the frowning shape
Of Jacques Cartier's Devil's Cape,
Till the Saguenay stood agape,
With hills upon either side.

Around him the sunbeams fell
On the gentle St. Lawrence swell,
As though by some mystic spell
The water was turned to gold;
But as he pursued, they fled,
Till his vessels at last were led
Where, cold and sullen and dead,
The Saguenay River rolled.

Chill blew the wind in his face,
As, still on his treasure chase,
He entered that gloomy place
Whose mountains in stony pride,
Still, soulless, merciless, sheer,
Their adamant sides uprear,
Naked and brown and drear,