ier himself was deputed to bring home the relics of
the expedition; and, if so, this distinguished navigator must have made
a fourth voyage out to the regions which he had been the first to make
known to the world. Thus ended Roberval's abortive attempt to establish
a French colony on the banks of the St. Lawrence.

Of the principal actors in the scenes which have been described, but
little remains to be recorded. Roberval, after having distinguished
himself in the European wars carried on by Francis I, is stated to have
fitted out another expedition, in conjunction with his brother, in the
year 1549, for the purpose of making a second attempt to found a colony
in Canada; but he and all with him perished at sea. The intrepid
Cartier, by whose services in the western hemisphere so extensive an
addition had been made to the dominions of the King of France, was
suffered to retire into obscurity, and is supposed to have passed the
remainder of his days on a small estate possessed by him in the
neighborhood of his native place, St. Malo. The date of his decease is
unknown.[50]

FOOTNOTES:

[44] The courts of Spain and Portugal had protested against any fresh
expedition from France to the west, alleging that, by right of prior
discovery, as well as the Pope's grant of all the western regions to
themselves, the French could not go there without invading their
privileges. Francis, on the other hand, treated these pretensions with
derision, observing sarcastically that he would "like to see the clause
in old Father Adam's will by which an inheritance so vast was bequeathed
to his brothers of Spain and Portugal."

[45] The dates in this and subsequent pages are in accordance with the
"old style" of reckoning.

[46] It has not been satisfactorily settled to what tribe the Indians
belonged who were found by Cartier at Hochelaga. Some have even doubted
the accuracy of his description in relation to their numbers, the
character of their habitations, and other circumstances, under the
belief that allowance must be made for exaggeration in the accounts of
the first European visitors, who were desirous that their adventures
should rival those of Cortes and Pizarro. It has also been suggested
that the people were not Hurons, but remnants of the Iroquois tribes,
who might have lingered there on their way southward. At any rate, when
the place was revisited by Frenchmen more than half a century afterward,
very few savages were seen i