2 ROYAL SOCIETY OF CANADA 



interesting and fertile Kection of the Acadian peninsula, and through 

 which the Atlantic pours its tides with such irresistible force into the 

 bays, harbours and estuaries of those parts of Nova Scotia and New 

 Brunswick. Baccaro, an islet on the southwestern coast of the peninsula, 

 is evidently a memorial of the Basque voyages, like the same name on 



SIEUR DE MONTS. ^ 



the eastern shores of Newfoundland, which was also called " Baccalaos " 

 centuries ago. The oldest French name on the North American continent 

 is " Cape Breton," which recalls the early maritime enterprise of the 

 Bretons. The first voyage of Do Monts and Champlain around the coasts 



' The portrait I Rive of Sieur dc Monts is taken from a copy of a water-colour 

 drawing in the " Documents Collected in France " (i., 441), found in the Massachu- 

 setts Archives, and said to he reproduced from an original at Versailles. Such a 

 portrait, however, on later examination, cannot he found at Versailles, and it is quite 

 possible that the picture above simply shows the cost\ime of a KenUc'^an of the 

 period. See Winsor's " Narrative and Critical History of America" (iv., 136 n), where 

 the same portrait is given with the foregoing explanation. 



