Preconfederation Ornithology

(c1590-c1680)

Wikipedia: Le Grand Voyage du Pays des Hurons, Friar Gabriel Sagard, O.M.R. (1632)

In the formative period of the founding of New France, the natural history writings of the Franciscan Recollet, Gabrel Theodat Sagard are of greatest importance.

The only observer writing on the ornithology of New France of greater consequence in the 17th century was the Jesuit, Louis Nicolas.

Sagard, accompanied by Pere Nicolas Viel, left Dieppe on May 18, 1623 and arrived in the Quebec in June 28th. After a short residency he returned to France in the autumn of 1624.

Sagard spent most of his time in Canada at the main Huron settlements around Penetanguishine, Ontario. He travelled to Huronia by canoe via Montreal and the Ottawa River. Other than Champlain, the adventurer, Etienne Brule, and Father Le Caron, Sagard was the first European to travel to what is now the province of Ontario. Sagard’s writings during his residence are the most important contribution to the ornithology of Ontario in the 17th Century.

Sagard wrote three works about his experiences in New France. These include Le gande voyage au pays des Hurons in 1632, L’histoire du Canada, published in 1636, and finally a short work entitled Dictionnaire de la langue huronne, in which Sagard attempted to translate some french expressions into the Huron language.

Le grande voyage was written in two parts, the first five chapters of Part II, contain his writings about the natural history of the new colony. Chapter 1 is entirely devoted to birds, Chapter 2 (Land Animals); Chapter 3 (Fishes and Aquatic Animals); and Chapter 4 (Fruits, plants, trees and natural wealth of the country).

Sagard’s observations were the first important descriptions to be made about the wildlife and birds in the Colony. As noted by his biographer, Jean de la Croix Rioux, in the Dictionary of Canadian Biography, Sagard was a “reliable, competent and honest witness”. Unfortunately for Canadian ornithology he was very focused on his mission of understanding the ways of the Hurons and converting them. As a result he did not apply his formidable powers of observation and description of the birds. As he states:

There also I saw several other kinds of birds that I had not seen elsewhere as it seemed to me, but as I did not ask their names, and it was a matter of very little consequence itself, I am content to admire and to praise God that in every land there is something peculiar and not to be found elsewhere.

Sagard’s careful observations of the birds were much more precise and detailed than anyone who came before, and the Jesuit brethren who came after. They reflect the keen eye of a monk educated in Aristotelian natural philosophy. Even with his economical style, Sagard’s descriptions of the landscape and of its wildlife allow us to identify ten species of birds including: Canada Goose, Sandhill Crane, Wild Turkey, Ruffed Grouse, Passenger Pigeon, Ruby-throated Hummingbird, Red-headed Woodpecker, Northern Flicker, American Goldfinch and Snow Bunting.

His description of the Wild Turkey is consistent with his engaging style. He manages in a few short sentences to imply that he already knows the bird from Europe (turkeys were introduced from America and widely used as food in Europe by this time), presumably accounting for his lack of description and yet still manages to impart knowledge about where it is common, its physical appearance, escape tactics and Indian hunting practices:

In some districts and especially near the Tabacco tribe [an ill-defined area on the north shore of Lake Erie], there are turkeys, which they call Ondettontaque, not tame, but migrating wild birds. The son-in-law of the great chief of our town chased one for a long time near our hut but was unable to catch it. For though these turkeys are heavy and clumsy they can fly, and in spite of their weight make their escape from tree to tree, and in this way avoid the arrows.

Like all visitors who followed him to North America Sagard noted the masses of Passenger Pigeons:

...[they have] an immense number of turtle-doves which they call Orittey. These feed in part on acorns, which they easily swallow whole, and in part on other things.

Some of Sagard’s observations are significant and surprising. His incidental mention of “swans” may very well refer to Trumpeter Swans which inhabited the Great Lakes prior to European settlement but were soon extirpated from eastern Canada. His description of “cranes” in Huronia and subsequent description of their habitat leaves little doubt that he was observing Sandhill Cranes in central Ontario rather than Great Blue Herons:

In the season all the fields are covered with cranes or Tochingo which come to eat the corn at seed time and when it is ready to harvest.

Sagard’s description of the landscape of Huronia, which we might assume was dense forest, makes his recording of Sandhill Cranes much more plausible:

It is a well-watered country, pretty and pleasant, and crossed by streams that empty into the great Lake [Georgian Bay]. There is no ugly surface of great rocks and barren mountains such as one see in many place in the Canadian and Algonquin territory. The country is full of fine hills, open fields, very beautiful broad meadows bearing much excellent hay, which is of no use except to set fire to as an amusement when it is dry.

Sagard marvels at how the Hurons could have cleared the land:

Clearing is very troublesome for them since they have no proper tools. They cut down the trees at the height of two or three feet from the ground, then they strip off all the branches, which they burn at the stump of the same tree in order to kill them, and in course of time they remove the roots. They the women clean up the ground between the trees thoroughly, and at distance a pace apart dig round holes or pits [where they plant their crops].

In fact it is now well known that the European perception of the eastern North American landscape as nothing but unbroken forest was somewhat of a myth. Indeed we now know that areas of natural prairie existed in south-western Ontario, that oak-savannah was widespread between Toronto and Peterborough, and that the southern part of eastern Ontario was regularly burnt by aboriginals to maintain habitat suitable for deer. This practice was also widely carried out in New England as chronicled in William Cronon’s fascinating book, Changes in the Land, Indian, Colonists, and the Ecology of New England.

In the circumstances it is possible that the Sandhill Crane was one of a number of prairie or grassland species resident in Ontario prior to European clearing and settlement. This subject is discussed in more detail in the papers of Charles Fothergill under 19th Century Ontario.

While Jesuit writings on natural history were typical of the era, one would never characterize Sagard’s writings in this way. The best example of Sagard’s style can be found in his description of the Ruby-throated Hummingbird. Like many European observers fascinated by the New World, this tiny bird, held particular fascination. I have included his lengthy description for what it reveals about what an educated, and interested, early 17th century observer, thought worth commenting on:

I will first first begin with the most beautiful, the rarest, and the smallest bird in the world perhaps, the Vicilin or humming-bird, which the Indians call in their language the Resuscitated. The body of this bird is no bigger than a cricket, the beak is long and very slender, as thick as the point of a needle, and its legs and feet are as small as the lines in handwriting. Once the nest with the birds in it was weighed and found to weigh not more than twenty-four grains. It feeds on dew and on the scent of flowers, not alighting upon them, but merely hovering over them. The plumage is as fine as down, and very pleasing and pretty to look at for the variety of its colouring. This bird, they say, dies, or, so to speak more accurately, goes to sleep in the month of October, remaining attached by its feet to some little tree-branch, and awakes in the month of April when flowers are plentiful, and sometimes later, and for this reason its is called in the Mexican language the Resuscitated. Many come to our garden in Quebec when the flowers and the peas are in bloom, and I used to enjoy seeing them there. But they fly so swiftly that were it not that one can sometimes get quite near them one would hardly take them as birds, but rather for butterflies. But if you observe them at close quarters you can distinguish them and recognize them (as birds) by their beak, their wings, feathers, and all the rest of their tiny well-shaped body. They are very hard to get because of their small size and because they take no rest. But if you wish to catch them you must come near flowers and keep silent, holding a long-handled switch, with which you must strike them if you can; this is the easiest means and way of getting them. Our brothers had one alive, shut up in a chest, but it did nothing but hum inside the chest, and a few days later it died, for there was no possible means of feeding it or keeping it alive for long. 

This long narrative on the hummingbird is by far the most detailed of Sagard’s writings about birds. It reveals a surprisingly sophisticated interest in numerous aspects of modern day ornithology, including a basic description of the bird, its weight, behavior, and its feeding and migratory habits. It is interesting that Sagard includes the name that Mexicans attached to hummingbirds. The fact is that this very early date the Wild Turkey was widely reared as food in Europe, hummingbirds and many other exotic flora and fauna of the Spanish and American colonies had already been described in books, many species were widely collected in European menageries and private collections.

We can forgive him the reference to the hummingbird’s “going to sleep in October”. His recounting and apparent acceptance of the Huron’s explanation for the bird’s disappearance in winter was a widely held European view until much later times.

Bibliography

• Cronin, William. 1983. Changes in the Land, Indian, Colonists, and the Ecology of New England New York: Hill and Wang
• Rioux, Jean de la Croix 1966-2025 “Nicolas, Louis” Dictionary of Canadian Biography Toronto/Quebec: University of Toronto & Université Laval
• Sagard, Gabriel. 1632. Le grande voyage au pays des Hurons in 1632, Paris/Chez Denis Moreau
• Sagard, Gabriel. 1968. The Long Journey to the Country of the Hurons New York: The Greenwood Press