"
It cannot seem unworthy of the serious purpose of this book to let the
continent lie a few minutes longer in its savage slumber, or, as the
Jesuits thought it, "blasted beneath the sceptre of hell," while we
accompany Poutrincourt and Champlain, returning wounded and weather-beaten
from inspecting the coast of New England, to find the buildings of Port
Royal, under Lescarbot's care, bright with lights, and an improvised arch
bearing the arms of Poutrincourt and De Monts, to be received by Neptune,
who, accompanied by a retinue of Tritons, declaimed Alexandrine couplets
of praise and welcome, and to sit at the sumptuous table of the Order of
Good Times, of which I have just spoken, furnished by this same lawyer-
poet's agricultural industry. We may even stop a moment longer to hear his
stately appeal to France, which, heeded by her, would have made
Lescarbot's a name familiar in the homes of America instead of one known
only to those who delve in libraries:
"France, fair eye of the universe, nurse from old of letters and of arms,
resource to the afflicted, strong stay to the Christian religion, Dear
Mother .
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