It was cold with a consistency and ferocity that people accustomed to the milder climate of France would have found immediately, physically shocking.

The Gulf of St.

Lawrence in winter is characterized by sea ice, temperatures well below freezing for months at a stretch, and winds off the Atlantic that carry a chill that no amount of shelter can entirely defeat without proper construction and preparation.

Marguerite did not arrive with proper construction and preparation.

She arrived with what a sailing ship could spare in the moment of abandonment, at the direction of a man who was not, at that particular moment, primarily concerned with her comfort or survival.

She had no experience of wilderness survival in the European sense.