error was bitterly and fiercely avenged, and for every Indian who fell
on the morning of that 30th of July, in this, the first battle fought on
Canadian soil between natives and Europeans, a tenfold penalty was exacted.
"Thus did New France rush into collision with the redoubted warriors of the
Five Nations. Here was the beginning, in some measure doubtless the cause,
of a long succession of murderous conflicts, bearing havoc and flame to
generations yet unborn. Champlain had invaded the tiger's den; and now, in
smothered fury the patient savage would lie biding his day of blood."

Six weeks after the performance of this exploit, Champlain, accompanied by
Pontgrave, returned to France. Upon his arrival at court he found De Monts
there, trying to secure a renewal of his patent of monopoly, which had
been revoked in consequence of loud complaints on the part of other French
merchants who were desirous of participating in the profits arising from
the fur trade. His efforts to obtain a renewal proving unsuccessful, De
Monts determined to carry on his scheme of colonization unaided by royal
patronage. Allying himself with some affluent merchants of Rochelle, he
fitted out another expedition and once more despatched Champlain to the New
World. Champlain, upon his arrival at Tadousac, found his former Indian
allies preparing for another descent upon the Iroquois, in which
undertaking he again joined them; the inducement this time being a promise
on the part of the Indians to pilot him up the great streams leading from
the interior, whereby he hoped to discover a passage to the North Sea,
and thence to China and the Indies. In this second expedition he was
less successful than in the former one. The opposing forces met near the
confluence of the Richelieu and St. Lawrence Rivers, and though Champlain's
allies were ultimately victorious, they sustained a heavy loss, and
he himself was wounded in the neck by an arrow. After the battle, the
torture-fires were lighted, as was usual on such occasions, and Champlain
for the first time was an eye-witness to the horrors of cannibalism.