The French Heritage: From Utopia to Eden - Literature and Painting in Quebec: From Imagery to Identity - page 24

beaux arbres pour y aller prendre de la fraîcheur' (73; a den with beau-
tiful trees to go and take fresh air)!
Like Cartier before him, Champlain sees the landscape in terms of
geometrical forms - 'cette île de Cap Breton est de forme triangulaire'
(116; this island of Cape Breton is triangular in shape) - but he goes much
further in imposing architecture on the landscape, especially in his fa-
mous habitations. Champlain's habitation at Quebec City, for example, is
a model of European 'place' in its symmetrical organization of 'space':
Je fis continuer notre logement qui était de trois corps de logis à deux éta-
ges. Chacun contenait trois toises de long et deux et demie de large. Le
magasin avait six toises de long et trois de large, avec une belle cave de six
pieds de haut. Tout autour de nos logements, je fis faire une galerie par-
dehors au second étage, qui était fort commode, avec des fossés de 15 pieds
de large et six de profondeur, et au-dehors des fossés, je fis plusieurs poin-
tes d'éperons qui enfermaient une partie du logement, là où nous mîmes
nos pièces de canon, et devant le bâtiment, il y a une place de quatre toises
de large et six ou sept de long, qui donne sur le bord de la rivière. Autour
du logement, il y a des jardins qui sont très bons, et une place du côté du
Septentrion qui a quelque cent ou cent vingt pas de long, 50 ou 60 de large.
[136; I continued to have work done on our lodging, which had three main
two-story buildings. Each was three toises in length and two and a half in
width. The store room was six toises in length and three in width, with a
fine cellar six feet high. All around our lodgings, I had an outdoor balcony
constructed on the second floor, which was very handy, and ditches 15 feet
wide and 6 feet deep; and beyond the ditches, I put several defence points,
which enclosed part of the lodgings and served as placements for our
canons, and in front of the building, there's a square four toises in width
and six or seven in length, which looks out on the river bank. Around the
lodgings, there are very good gardens, and a square to the north which is
about 100 or 120 paces in length by 50 or 60 in width.]
Its mathematical proportions, uniformity ('chacun contenait'), and espe-
cially concentricity ('tout autour,' 'enfermaient,' 'autour de') are obviously
due to military reasons, as is evident in the engraving L'Habitation de
Québec , presumably based on Champlain's sketches (Morisset, 11), which
accompanies the text in the 1613 edition (figure 1.2):
In the engraving, as in Champlain's writings, culture dominates na-
ture, which is flattened and literally squeezed out of the picture by its
very composition, which highlights place by reducing surrounding