the St. Lawrence of the commercial capabilities of the country watered by it, that he returned in 1603, this time accompanied by Samuel Champlain, an eager and intelligent student of geography, with whose aid a very thorough survey of the great water highway was made.
Provided with trustworthy maps of Canada, Pontgravé and Champlain soon returned to France, and, as one result of their work, a new expedition was sent out in 1604, led by De Monts, a Huguenot nobleman, who was empowered by Henri IV. to take possession of and colonize in his name, all districts between 40° and 46° N. lat., collectively known as Acadia.
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LAKE CHAMPLAIN.
De Monts left France on the 9th March, 1604, taking Champlain with him as a confidential adviser. A short visit to Nova Scotia was succeeded by a cruise in the Bay of Fundy, dividing that Peninsula from the mainland; and after much hesitation, a small island near the mouth of the St. Croix, a river of New Brunswick, was chosen as the site for the first settlement. It turned out an unlucky selection, and as soon as the first winter was over, De Monts and Champlain went down the coast to try and find a more favorable situation. The harbors of Maine were visited one after another, and in any one of them a delightful refuge for the little band of Frenchmen might have been found but for the hostility of the Indians, who, since the time of Thevet, had learned to suspect the sincerity of the white man.
Finally the colony was removed to a port of Nova Scotia now known as Annapolis, but then called Port Royal, where it feebly struggled for exist-
