fortitude, both
physical and moral. In times of crisis the conscript sets his teeth
and dies without a murmur. But Champlain enlisted as a volunteer for a
campaign which was to go on unceasingly till his last day. How incessant
were its dangers can be made out in full detail from the text of the
Voyages. We may omit the perils of the North Atlantic, though what they
were can be seen from Champlain's description of his outward voyage in
the spring of 1611. The remaining dangers will suffice. Scurvy, which
often claimed a death-roll of from forty to eighty per cent in a single
winter; famine such as that which followed the failure of ships from
home to arrive at the opening of navigation; the storms which drove the
frail shallop on the rocks and shoals of Norumbega; the risk of mutiny;
the chances of war, whether against the Indians or the English; the
rapids of the wilderness as they threatened the overloaded canoe on
its swift descent; the possible treachery of Indian guides--such is a
partial catalogue of the death-snares which surrounded the pathway of an
explorer like Champlain. Every one of these dangers is brought before
us by his own narrative in a manner which does credit to his modesty no
less than to his fortitude. Without embellishment or self-glorification,
he recites in a few lines hairbreadth escapes which a writer of less
steadfast soul would have amplified into a thrilling tale of heroism.
None the less, to the discriminating reader Champlain's Voyages are an
Odyssey.

Bound up with habitual fortitude is the motive from which it springs.
In Champlain's case patriotism and piety were the groundwork of a
conspicuous and long-tested courage. The patriotism which exacted such
sacrifices was not one which sought to define itself even in the form of
a justifiable digression from the recital of events. But we may be sure
that Champlain at the time he left Port Royal had made up his mind that
the Spaniards, the English, and the Dutch were not to parcel out the
seaboard of North America to the exclusion of the French. As for the
religious basis of his fortitude, we do not need Le Jeune's story of
his death-bed or the record of his friendship with men of religion.
His narrative abounds throughout with simple and natural expressions of
piety, not the less impressive because they are free from trace of the
theological intolerance which envenomed French life in his age. And not
only did Champlain's trust in the Lord f