Heralds of Empire Being the Story of One Ramsay Stanhope, Lieutenant to Pierre Radisson in the Northern Fur Trade

M. Radisson had reckoned well. His warning to prepare for instant siege set all the young fire-eaters of our Habitation working like beavers to complete the French fort. The mar...

Sign-boards creaked and swung to every puff of wind. Great hackney-coaches, sunk at the waist like those old gallipot boats of ours, went ploughing past through the mud of mid-r...

"Why, sir," I made answer, picking my words not to trip his displeasure, "I get as much as I can--and I give as little as I can; and those be all the accounts that ever I intend...

'Twas cockcrow when I left pacing the shore where we had so often played in childhood; and through the darkness came the howl of M. Picot's hound, scratching outside the prison...

The landing was but a part of the labyrinthine trickery in which our leader delighted to play; for while Jean delayed the natives we ran overland through the woods, launched our...

The sea was touched to silver by the rising sun--not the warm, red sun of southern climes, nor yet the gold light of the temperate zones, but the cold, clear steel of that great...

Inside our Habitation all was the confusion of preparation for leaving the bay. Outside, the Indians held high carnival; for Allemand, the gin-soaked pilot, was busy passing dri...

M. Radisson had carried his rare furs to the king, and I was at Sir John Kirke's door to report the return of her husband to Madame Radisson. The same grand personage with sleek...

M. Radisson turned the sand-glass up to time our preparations. Before the last grain fell we seven were out, led by M. Radisson, speeding over the snow-drifted marsh through the...

'Twas midsummer before his busy flittings between Acadia and Quebec brought us to Isle Percée, at the mouth of the St. Lawrence. Here Chouart Groseillers (his brother-in-law) la...

How long I lay in the pirates' cave I could not tell; for day and night were alike with the pale-blue flame quivering against the earth-wall, gusts of cold air sweeping through...

My father--peace to his soul!--had been of those who thronged London streets with wine tubs to drink the restored king's health on bended knee; but he, poor gentleman, departed...

In the matter of fighting, I find small difference between white-men and red. Let the lust of conquest but burn, the justice of the quarrel receives small thought. Your fire-eat...

Filling the air with ghost-shadows, silencing earth, muffling the sea, day after day fell the snow. Shore-ice barred out the pounding surf. The river had frozen to adamant. Brus...

The higher one's hopes mount the farther they have to fall; and I, who had mounted to stars with Hortense, was pushed to the gutter by the king's dragoons making way for the roy...

For what I now tell I offer no excuse. I would but record what savagery meant. Then may you who are descended from the New World pioneers know that your lineage is from men as h...

So the happy childhood days sped on, a swift stream past flowered banks. Ben went off to sail the north sea in Captain Gillam's ship. M. Picot, the French doctor, brought a gove...

The fire had every appearance of a night bivouac, but there was remnant of neither camp nor hunt. Somewhere on my left lay the river. By that the way led back to M. Radisson's r...

Quick as tongue could trip off the orders, eyes everywhere, thought and act jumping together, Pierre Radisson had given each one his part, and pledged our obedience, though he b...

How much of those instructions we carried out I leave untold. Certainly we could not have been less grateful as guests than Ben Gillam's men were inhospitable as hosts. A more s...

In the daze of a misty dream, M. Picot was there with the foils in his hands; and Hortense had cried out as she did that night when the button touched home. A sweet, fresh gust...

'Twas as fair sailing under English colours as you could wish till Pierre Radisson had undone all the mischief that he had worked against the Fur Company in Hudson Bay. Pierre R...

So Sieur Radisson must fit out a royal flotilla to carry Mistress Hortense to the French Habitation. And gracious acts are like the gift horse: you must not look them in the mou...

"La, Pierre," she cries, with a tap of her fan, "anybody can go to the king's _levee_! But, dear heart!" she trills, with a sidelong ogle. "Ta!--ta! naughty devil!--to think of...

Royalist and Puritan, each had his lesson to learn, as I said before. Each marked the pendulum swing to a wrong extreme, and the pendulum was beating time for your younger gener...

So Ben Gillam must take M. Radisson aboard the Susan, or Garden, as she was called when she sailed different colours, the young fellow with a wry face, the Frenchman, all gaiety...

Rioting through London streets or playing second in M. Radisson's games of empire, it was possible to forget her, but not in Oxford with the court retinue all about and the hedg...

"'Tis early yet for the Grand Banks, Jack. Ben Gillam's ship keeled mast over hull from being ice-logged last spring. The spars were solid with frozen sleet from the crosstrees...

Below the hill on one side flickered the moving torches of the hostiles. On the other side, where the cliff fell sheer away, lay the red-dyed snows with misty shapes moving thro...

XXIII. A Change of Partners XXIV. Under the Aegis of the Court XXV. Jack Battle again XXVI. At Oxford XXVII. Home from the Bay XXVIII. Rebecca and I fall out XXIX. The King's Pl...

Now comes that part of a life which deals with what you will say no one man could do, yet the things were done; with wonders stranger than witchcraft, yet were true. But because...

VI. The Roaring Forties VII. M. de Radisson Acts VIII. M. de Radisson Comes to his Own IX. Visitors X. The Cause of the Firing XI. More of M. Radisson's Rivals XII. M. Radisson...