A Not-So-New World: Empire and Environment in French Colonial North America

When Samuel de Champlain founded the colony of Quebec in 1608, he established elaborate gardens where he sowed French seeds he had brought with him and experimented with indigenous plants that he found in nearby fields and forests. Following Champlain's example, fellow colonists nurtured similar gardens through the Saint Lawrence Valley and Great Lakes region. In A Not—So—New World, Christopher Parsons observes how it was that French colonists began to learn about Native environments and cl...