A new discovery of a vast country in America . r Hyacinth le Fevre. Mr. de la Salle had begun a Settlement in the Ifland ofMontreal in Canada, which is 25 Leagues about, and this fmallColony is fo much improved as to be now a great and populousVillage.^ They call it China, becaufe while Mr. de la Salle livedthere, and began the Settlement, he fpoke very often of the Minesof St. Barbe, and faid, that as foon as he had taken thofe Mines,he would go [xxii] into China and Japan without croffmg the Line,and to that end, find a Paffage into the South-Sea. This was thechief Subject of our Converfatio
A new discovery of a vast country in America . r Hyacinth le Fevre. Mr. de la Salle had begun a Settlement in the Ifland ofMontreal in Canada, which is 25 Leagues about, and this fmallColony is fo much improved as to be now a great and populousVillage.^ They call it China, becaufe while Mr. de la Salle livedthere, and began the Settlement, he fpoke very often of the Minesof St. Barbe, and faid, that as foon as he had taken thofe Mines,he would go [xxii] into China and Japan without croffmg the Line,and to that end, find a Paffage into the South-Sea. This was thechief Subject of our Converfations, and as the Difcoveries I havemade cannot be far from the Pacifick Sea, / dont queflion butMr. de la Salle, whofe great Courage was proof againfl all Diffi-culties and Misfortunes, would have fucceeded in his Defign. ^The village of La Chine. Hennepin exaggerates its growth; for the officialcensus of October, 1698, gives the total population of Lachine, Bout de Ilsle, andRiviere St. Pierre as but 270 souls (including children).— Ed. p.:?. The Unfortunate advcTttures (^ Wotz^^ dc ia Sa/lc The PREFACE. 373 Thofe who are skilld in Geography have long agoe fufpe£ledthat Japan is contiguous to the Lands of the Northern America;and the Learned Grasvius//o well known in the Commonwealth ofLearnings having carefully examined our Difcovery, was pleafedto tell me very lately in a meeting of Vertuofi, in this City ofUtrecht, That he was of my Opinion, and did not think thatJapan was an Ifland, as it is commonly faid, but that it joyns withthe large Country I had difcovered. I have made ufe of a proof in my lafl Volume, Chapter 27)which I crave leave to repeat in this place, becaufe it is a Matterof Fa5l: While I was amongji the Iffati and Nadoueffans therecame an Embaffy of Savages from a very remote Nation to theWeftward. / was in the Cabin when my Fofler Father Aqui-paguetin (for he had adopted me his Son) gave them Audience,and having asked them fome Quefiions by an Interpreter,
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