H. Bedford-Jones

“ The term Canadian is constantly used by Bacqueville and by Baudouin; a statement by the latter infers that it was likewise employed by the English to differentiate the born Canadians from the French proper. The entire history of North America at this period is largely written in names of Canadian families; as though the terrific struggle of the French pioneers against man and nature had aroused in the ensuing generation all the dormant blood of knightly and heroic ancestry, so that the same names etched in the icy annals of Hudson Bay are to be found burned into the cypress of Louisiana. ”

“ A letter from the missionary Bobé, himself a student and memorialist of Canadian affairs, has informed us of Sieur Bacqueville's great exactitude. He had a share in much that he described; for the remainder, he drew by document or word of mouth on Baudouin, Perrot, the Le Moynes, Joliet and the Jesuits. The manner in which these sources can be traced through the internal evidence of his work is most interesting; the work itself cannot be translated satisfactorily, owing to its disregard of historical sequence and its jumble of unrelated documents and dictation. ”

“ The prime sources utilized are both contemporary, both French, and both untranslated; namely, the diary of Sieur Baudouin, once a soldier and later chaplain under Iberville, and the amazing "Histoire de l'Amérique Septentionale" of Bacqueville de la Potherie.
The former work, furnished me in MS. by kindness of the Newfoundland Historical Society, yielded full details regarding the Newfoundland raid. In abridged form, it was utilized by Sieur Bacqueville, whose work is astounding because of its remarkably distinct, yet wildly confused, combination of sources. ”