60 ALL AFLOAT 



own cost he at once built a vessel of a hun- 

 dred and twenty tons. She was on the most 

 approved lines, and thus served as a model for 

 others. A French Canadian built an imitation 

 of her the following year. Talon vainly tried to 

 persuade this enterprising man to form a com- 

 pany and build a ship of four hundred tons for 

 the trade with the West Indies. Three smaller 

 vessels, however, successfully made the round 

 trip from Quebec to the West Indies, on to 

 France, and back again, in 1670. In 1671 

 Colbert laid aside for Talon a relatively large 

 sum for official shipbuilding and for the export 

 of Canadian wood to France. The next year 

 Talon had a five-hundred-tonner on the stocks, 

 while preparations were being made for an 

 eight-hundred-tonner, which would have been 

 a ' mammoth ' merchant vessel in contem- 

 porary France. Before he left Canada he had 

 the satisfaction of reporting that three hundred 

 and fifty hands, out of a total population of 

 only seven thousand souls, were engaged in 

 the shipyards. 1 But there were very few at 

 sea. 



The first vessel to sail the Great Lakes was 

 built by La Salle seventy years after their dis- 

 covery by Champlain. This was Le Chiffon, 



1 See in this Series The Great Intendant, chapters iv and ix. 



