The potion was duly administered, and the cure that it effected was so rapid and so complete that the pious Cartier declared it a real and evident miracle.

'If all the doctors of Lorraine and Montpellier had been there with all the drugs of Alexandria,' he wrote, 'they could not have done as much in a year as the said tree did in six days.' An entire tree--probably a white spruce--was used up in less than eight days.

The scourge passed and the sailors, now restored to health, eagerly awaited the coming of the spring.
Meanwhile the cold lessened; the ice about the ships relaxed its hold, and by the middle of April they once more floated free.

But a new anxiety had been added.

About the time when the fortunes of Cartier's company were at their lowest, Donnacona had left his camp with certain of his followers, ostensibly to spend a fortnight in hunting deer in the forest.