oncealed. From the cavity thus disclosed he drew forth a large wooden
medallion, about twenty inches across, with the portrait of a man
carved in relief. Here again are the tufted hat, the bearded face, and
the features of the picture of St Malo. On the back of the wood, the
deeply graven initials J. C. seemed to prove that the image which had
lain hidden for generations behind the woodwork of the old Canadian
house is indeed that of the great discoverer. Beside the initials is
carved the date 1704.. This wooden medallion would appear to have once
figured as the stern shield of some French vessel, wrecked probably
upon the Gaspe coast. As it must have been made long before the St Malo
portrait was painted, the resemblance of the two faces perhaps
indicates the existence of some definite and genuine portrait of
Jacques Cartier, of which the record has been lost.

It appears, therefore, that we have the right to be content with the
picture which hangs in the town hall of the seaport of St Malo. If it
does not show us Cartier as he was,--and we have no absolute proof in
the one or the other direction,--at least it shows us Cartier as he
might well have been, with precisely the face and bearing which the
hero-worshipper would read into the character of such a discoverer.

The port of St Malo, the birthplace and the home of Cartier, is
situated in the old province of Brittany, in the present department of
Ille-et-Vilaine. It is thus near the lower end of the English Channel.
To the north, about forty miles away, lies Jersey, the nearest of the
Channel Islands, while on the west surges the restless tide of the
broad Atlantic. The situation of the port has made it a nursery of
hardy seamen. The town stands upon a little promontory that juts out as
a peninsula into the ocean. The tide pours in and out of the harbour
thus formed, and rises within the harbour to a height of thirty or
forty feet. The rude gales of the western ocean spend themselves upon
the rocky shores of this Breton coast. Here for centuries has dwelt a
race of adventurous fishermen and navigators, whose daring is
unsurpassed by any other seafaring people in the world.

The history, or at least the legend, of the town goes back ten
centuries before the time of Cartier. It was founded, tradition tells
us, by a certain Aaron, a pilgrim who landed there with his disciples
in the year 507 A.D., and sought shelter upon the sea-girt promontory
which has since borne