The land in sight, they told Cartier, was a great island; south of it was Gaspe, from which country Cartier had taken them in the preceding summer; two days' journey beyond the island towards the west lay the kingdom of Saguenay, a part of the northern coast that stretches westwards towards the land of Canada.

The use of this name, destined to mean so much to later generations, here appears for the first time in Cartier's narrative.

The word was evidently taken from the lips of the savages, but its exact significance has remained a matter of dispute.

The most fantastic derivations have been suggested.
Charlevoix, writing two hundred years later, even tells us that the name originated from the fact that the Spaniards had been upon the coast before Cartier, looking for mines.

Their search proving fruitless, they kept repeating 'aca nada' (that is 'nothing here') in the hearing of the savages, who repeated the words to the French, thus causing them to suppose this to be the name of the country.