40 PHILOLOGY OF THE OUANANICHE 



built, or of the Indian settlement close by, " Kepec," 

 01- " Quebec," it has remained ever since, though its 

 Montagnais name was and is still Opishtikoiat, or 

 Ouapishtikoiats, or " White Cape," the French equiva- 

 lent of which, " Cap Blanc," is still applied to a por- 

 tion of the city lying in the shadow of the great rock 

 crowned by the Citadel. Stadacona, or Stadahona, 

 another name applied by the Indians to the environs 

 of Quebec, signifies "the crossing over the floating 

 wood," and was so employed because, upon the site 

 of what is now a part of Saint Rochs suburbs, the 

 mouth of the St. Charles W'as usually encumbered with 

 driftwood, upon which the natives were in the habit 

 of crossing the bay. 



The popular translation of the Montagnais ouana- 

 niche is " little salmon." Wot until very recently did 

 it occur to me to investigate the correctness of a habit 

 which upon more than one occasion I have followed, 

 and that upon the authority of some of the Indians 

 themselves. I am now in a position to assert that the 

 Montagnais name for salmon — the salmon of the sea 

 ■ — is not ouanan at all, but ouchachoumac, or ou-sha- 

 shu-mcik. It is true that iche is a Montagnais diminu- 

 tive, but the Montagnais equivalent for "little sal- 

 mon " would rather be ouohaGhoumaciohe than ouana- 

 niche, and the Indians even now often apply their 

 name for the Salmo sala/f to particularly dark-colored 

 and extra large specimens of the ouananiche found in 

 certain lakes, as we shall see later. -To tlieir ordinary 

 fresh-water salmon they applied a specific name, call- 

 ing it oucMians, or the abbreviated foi'm, unans — each 

 pronounced " wannan," " whonnan,"' or " whennan." 



