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August TELESCOPE 172 f . By Gordon P. Bugbee As this is written, two astronauts are orbiting the earth in what has become the longest manned space trip yet achieved. Today's space story is one of those epics that men take up from time to time, extending their grasp on the earth, and now beyond it. In a world bored with achievements created verbally, it is small wonder that this genuine hero- ism captures the public imagination. One such venture into the unknown world took place three-andâ€"aâ€"half centuries ago. when the French exâ€" plorers gained a foothold in Canada. In 1608, Samuel de Champlain led a small band of men up the St. Lawâ€" rence River to build a permanent settlement at Quebec. Cruel odds frowned on this undertaking. In the winter that followed, twenty of the twenty-eight men at Quebec died of scurvy. These lost men were not cheap human resources if the men who survived are any measure, for in spite of their small numbers, the survivors went on to great things. When spring came, for example, Champlain and two other Frenchmen gave spirit to a war party of Huron and Algonquin Indian allies. Near what became Lake Champlain, the forces drove to flight an army of Iroquois Indians, who were normally the terror of their neighbors. We must agree, however, that since the Iroquois had never before experi- enced gunfire, they were understand- ably awed by three men with guns. And, 350 years ago this month, in early August of 1615, Champlain journeyed far inland, all the way to Georgian Bay. This trip followed seven years after his settling at Quebec, and five before the Pilgrims landed at Plymouth Rock. And, as we shall see, Champlain was not the first Frenchman to see Lake Huron. TO THE FRESHWATER SEA It may be unfair to belittle thus the British colonists of North Amer= ica. They moved inland slowly since they were making towns and farms as they went. French "civilization" remained growing slowly along the St. Lawrence, generally no further west than Montreal. Further west, excepting a village at Michilimackâ€" inac and later one at Detroit, were found only forts, trading posts and miésions/ in the Great Lakes area. The Frenchmen seem quite "modern" in the way they worked in relatively good faith in partnership with the natives of this most underdeveloped of nations. Away from the St. Law- rence towns, Frenchmen often took on the habits of the Indians, both to survive in the forest and to secure the Indians' confidence and coopera- tion. The Spaniards in the new world, by contrast, erased a learned but "pagan" civilization to enslave the natives for building fortunes. The British tried to ignore the na= tives as being vexing irritants to transplanted European civilization. The enlightened example of Cham= plain, himself, probably guided the French to this policy. Champlain has left his own descriptions of his expeditions and discoveries in Can= ada. Modern readers of his collecâ€" tive Voyages will find him immensely likeable. W. L. Grant quotes one writer's evaluation of Champlain: "He is particularly interesting to Americans because he is a Frenchman ' with those qualities which a wayward English tradition denies to the French-â€"patience, sobriety, calm self-control and a complete absence of vanity." Grant, himself, goes on to say, "In him the valor and the religious ardor of a crusader were unsullLed by the intolerance and superstition which marked so many of his contemporaries.1 * * * original interest in had lain Champlain's what he heard of the lakes