The navigator did not describe with sufficient
clearness, or with a due differentiation of the important from the
trivial, those things which ethnologists would now like to know.
It must have been a disappointment not to be able to lay before the
King any promise of great mineral wealth to be found in the new
territory. While at Hochelaga Cartier had gleaned from the savages
some vague allusions to sources of silver and copper in the far
northwest, but that was all. He had not found a northern Eldorado, nor
had his quest of a new route to the Indies been a whit more fruitful.
Cartier had set out with this as his main motive, but had succeeded
only in finding that there was no such route by way of the St.
Lawrence. Though the King was much interested in his recital of
courage and hardships, he was not fired with zeal for spending good
money in the immediate equipping of another expedition to these
inhospitable shores.
Not for five years after his return in 1536, therefore, did Cartier
again set out for the St. Lawrence. This time his sponsor was the
Sieur de Roberval, a nobleman of Picardy, who had acquired an ambition
to colonize a portion of the new territory and who had obtained the
royal endorsement of his scheme. The royal patronage was not difficult
to obtain when no funds were sought. Accordingly in 1540 Roberval, who
was duly appointed viceroy of the country, enlisted the assistance of
Cartier in carrying out his plans.
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