Iberville was, above all else, a sailor. The easiest route to
Hudson Bay was by way of the sea. More than once after his first
experience he led to the Bay a naval expedition. His exploits are
still remembered with pride in French naval annals. In 1697 he
sailed the Pelican through the ice-floes of Hudson Straits. He
was attacked by three English merchantmen, with one hundred and
twenty guns against his forty-four. One of the English ships
escaped, one Iberville sank with all on board, one he captured.
That autumn the hardy corsair was in France with a great booty
from the furs which the English had laboriously gathered.
The triumph of the French on Hudson Bay was short-lived. Their
exploits, though brilliant and daring, were more of the nature of
raids than attempts to settle and explore. They did no more than
the English to ascend the Nelson or other rivers to find what lay
beyond; and in 1718, by the Treaty of Utrecht, as we have already
seen, they gave up all claim to Hudson Bay and yielded that
region to the English.
Pierre Gaultier de Varennes, Sieur de la Verendrye, was a member
of the Canadian noblesse, a son of the Governor of Three Rivers
on the St.
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