o France returned (1633) and remained in Canada
until his death, on Christmas Day 1635. Published several important
narratives describing his explorations and adventures. An intrepid
pioneer and the revered founder of New France.

Into some such terms as these would the writer of a biographical
dictionary crowd his notice of Champlain's career, so replete with
danger and daring, with the excitement of sailing among the uncharted
islands of Penobscot Bay, of watching the sun descend below the waves of
Lake Huron, of attacking the Iroquois in their palisaded stronghold, of
seeing English cannon levelled upon the houses of Quebec. It is not from
a biographical dictionary that one can gain true knowledge of Champlain,
into whose experience were crowded so many novel sights and whose
soul was tested, year after year, by the ever-varying perils of
the wilderness. No life, it is true, can be fitly sketched in a
chronological abridgment, but history abounds with lives which, while
important, do not exact from a biographer the kind of detail that for
the actions of Champlain becomes priceless. Kant and Hegel were both
great forces in human thought, yet throughout eighty years Kant was
tethered to the little town of Konigsberg, and Hegel did not know what
the French were doing in Jena the day after there had been fought just
outside a battle which smote Prussia to her knees. The deeds of such men
are their thoughts, their books, and these do not make a story. The life
of Champlain is all story. The part of it which belongs to the Wars
of the League is lost to us from want of records. But fortunately we
possess in his Voyages the plain, direct narrative of his exploits in
America--a source from which all must draw who would know him well.

The method to be pursued in this book is not that of the critical essay.
Nor will these pages give an account of Champlain's times with reference
to ordinances regulating the fur trade, or to the policy of French kings
and their ministers towards emigration. Such subjects must be touched
on, but here it will be only incidentally. What may be taken to concern
us is the spirited action of Champlain's middle life--the period which
lies between his first voyage to the St Lawrence and his return from
the land of the Onondagas. Not that he had ended his work in 1616. The
unflagging efforts which he continued to put forth on behalf of the
starving colony at Quebec demand all praise. But the years durin