260 THE ROYAL SOCIETY OF CANADA 



Gatschet and M. Chamberlain both use the standard alphabet of 

 philologists, in which the vowels are sounded for the most part in the 

 continental manner. All of the words from Father Rasle's Dictionary 

 are to be read as French. 



Canso. 



Location and Application. — The name of a Harbour, an important fishing 

 center, at the extreme eastern end of the peninsular part of Nova Scotia; also a 

 Cape on an Island south of the entrance to the Habour; also a Town on the south- 

 west shore of the Harbour; also the Strait, or Gut, which separates the Island of 

 Cape Breton from the mainland of Nova Scotia; also formerly applied by the French 

 to the Bay now called Chedabucto Bay. Its spelling, CANSO, expresses precisely 

 its local pronunciation, the A being short, the O long, and the accent on the first 

 syllable. 



History of the Name. — It makes its first known appearance in 1609 in the 

 Histoire de la Nouvelle France of Lescarbot, where it occurs many times and always 

 in the form CAMPSEAU, applied especially to the Harbour, but also to the Bay 

 which we now call Chedabucto Bay, and to the Strait. As to the Strait, Lescarbot 

 uses in the explanation to his map this expression, — "Passage or Strait of the Bay 

 of Campseau," showing that the name did not belong originally to the Strait but was 

 applied thereto descriptively because it communicated with the Bay of Campseau. 

 The name next appears in Champlain's Voyages, of 1613, first in the form CANCEAU, 

 which spelling is used also on his map; but later, and oftener, as CAMPSEAU. He 

 applies the name, however, only to the Harbour, while he leaves the Bay unnamed, 

 and gives two different names to the Strait, — or Passage, as the French called it. 

 In a later edition of his works, in 1632, and upon his map of that year, he uses the 

 form CANCEAU for Harbour and Passage, and CAMPSEAU for the Bay. Both 

 Champlain and Lescarbot show that the Harbour was a place of resort for fishermen, 

 implying that the name had already been previously in use. Father Biard, in his 

 Relation, uses CAMPSEAU and CAMPSEAUX. De Laet, who follows Champlain 

 closely in most matters, adopts CAMSEAU for the Harbour, on his map of 1630; 

 Creuxius, on his map of 1664 in his Historia Canadensis uses the Latinized form 

 CAMPSEIUM for both Port and Strait; Denys, who knew this region well, and 

 describes it fully in his well known Description . . . .de l'Amérique septentrionale, of 

 1672, applies the name CAMPSEAUX to Port, Bay, and Passage, though on his map 

 the Baye is confused with the Port by the engraver. With Denys, however, the use 

 of the name for the Bay disappears. The published map of Canada by Du Val of 

 1677 uses CAMSEAU for the Passage and CANZEAU for the Port; Jumeau, in his 

 fine map of 1685 (published in the Champlain Society's edition of Father le Clercq's 

 New Relation of Gaspesia, 10) has CANCEAU, but applied only to the Cape, while 

 the great De Meulles-Franquelin map of Acadia, of 1686, still unpublished, has 

 CAMCEAUX for the Cape, though the Passage here bears its temporary name of 

 Fronsac, which appears also upon some later French maps. Naturally the later 

 maps by Franquelin, of which several exist in Ms., have the form CAMSEAU, which 

 appears also on the fine map of Canada by De l'lsle of 1703. With this map and 

 those that it influenced, however, the M disappeared, to be replaced by N, for Bellin, 

 in his very influential and widely-copied map of Acadia of 1744, in Charlevoix's 

 Historié de la Nouvelle France, adopted CANCEAU, and his authority soon made 

 this the prevailing form upon all of the later French maps. In thus abandoning the 



