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diff --git a/25556-8.txt b/25556-8.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..5474801 --- /dev/null +++ b/25556-8.txt @@ -0,0 +1,3559 @@ +Project Gutenberg's Heroes of the Middle West, by Mary Hartwell Catherwood + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: Heroes of the Middle West + The French + +Author: Mary Hartwell Catherwood + +Release Date: May 22, 2008 [EBook #25556] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK HEROES OF THE MIDDLE WEST *** + + + + +Produced by Juliet Sutherland, David Garcia and the Online +Distributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net + + + + + +[Illustration: Front Cover.] + + +[Illustration: COUNT FRONTENAC. +From a Statue at Quebec.] + + + + + + +HEROES OF THE MIDDLE WEST + +The French + +BY + +MARY HARTWELL CATHERWOOD + + + GINN AND COMPANY + + BOSTON · NEW YORK · CHICAGO · LONDON + ATLANTA · DALLAS · COLUMBUS · SAN FRANCISCO + + + + + Copyright, 1898 + By MARY HARTWELL CATHERWOOD + + ALL RIGHTS RESERVED + 317.8 + + The Athenĉum Press + GINN AND COMPANY · PROPRIETORS · BOSTON · U. S. A. + + + + +PREFACE. + + +Let any one who thinks it an easy task attempt to cover the French +discovery and occupation of the middle west, from Marquette and Jolliet +to the pulling down of the French flag on Fort Chartres, vivifying men, +and while condensing events, putting a moving picture before the eye. +Let him prepare this picture for young minds accustomed only to the +modern aspect of things and demanding a light, sure touch. Let him +gather his material--as I have done--from Parkman, Shea, Joutel, +Hennepin, St. Cosme, Monette, Winsor, Roosevelt--from state records, +and local traditions richer and oftener more reliable than history; +and let him hang over his theme with brooding affection, moulding and +remoulding its forms. He will find the task he so lightly set himself +a terribly hard and exhausting one, and will appreciate as he never +before appreciated the labors of those who work in historic fields. + + + + +CONTENTS. + + + PAGE + + I. The Discoverers of the Upper Mississippi 1 + + II. Bearers of the Calumet 19 + + III. The Man with the Copper Hand 44 + + IV. The Undespairing Norman 71 + + V. French Settlements 102 + + VI. The Last Great Indian 117 + + + + +HEROES OF THE MIDDLE WEST. + + + + +I. + +THE DISCOVERERS OF THE UPPER MISSISSIPPI. + + +The 17th of May, 1673, Father Jacques Marquette, the missionary priest +of St. Ignace, on what is now called the north shore of Michigan, and +Louis Jolliet, a trader from Montreal, set out on a journey together. + +Huron and Ottawa Indians, with the priest left in charge of them, stood +on the beach to see Marquette embark,--the water running up to their +feet and receding with the everlasting wash of the straits. Behind them +the shore line of St. Ignace was bent like a long bow. Northward, beyond +the end of the bow, a rock rose in the air as tall as a castle. But very +humble was the small mission station which Father Marquette had founded +when driven with his flock from his post on the Upper Lakes by the +Iroquois. A chapel of strong cedar posts covered with bark, his own +hut, and the lodges of his people were all surrounded by pointed +palisades. Opposite St. Ignace, across a league or so of water, rose +the turtle-shaped back of Michilimackinac Island, venerated by the +tribes, in spite of their religious teaching, as a home of mysterious +giant fairies who made gurgling noises in the rocks along the beach or +floated vast and cloud-like through high pine forests. The evergreens +on Michilimackinac showed as if newborn through the haze of undefined +deciduous trees, for it was May weather, which means that the northern +world had not yet leaped into sudden and glorious summer. Though the +straits glittered under a cloudless sky, a chill lingered in the wind, +and only the basking stone ledges reflected warmth. The clear elastic +air was such a perfect medium of sight that it allowed the eye to +distinguish open beach rims from massed forests two or three leagues +away on the south shore, and seemed to bring within stone's throw those +nearer islands now called Round and Bois Blanc. + +It must have wrung Marquette's heart to leave this region, which has +an irresistible charm for all who come within its horizon. But he had +long desired to undertake this journey for a double purpose. He wanted +to carry his religion as far as possible among strange tribes, and he +wanted to find and explore that great river of the west, about which +adventurers in the New World heard so much, but which none had seen. + +[Illustration: Totem of the Illinois.] + +A century earlier, its channel southward had really been taken +possession of by the Spaniards, its first discoverers. But they made no +use of their discovery, and on their maps traced it as an insignificant +stream. The French did not know whether this river flowed into the Gulf +of California--which was called the Red Sea--or to the western ocean, +or through Virginia eastward. Illinois Indians, visiting Marquette's +mission after the manner of roving tribes, described the father of +waters and its tributaries. Count Frontenac, the governor of Canada, +thought the matter of sufficient importance to send Louis Jolliet with +an outfit to join the missionary in searching for the stream. + +The explorers took with them a party of five men. Their canoes, we are +told, were of birch bark and cedar splints, the ribs being shaped from +spruce roots. Covered with the pitch of yellow pine, and light enough +to be carried on the shoulders of four men across portages, these canoes +yet had toughness equal to any river voyage. They were provisioned with +smoked meat and Indian corn. Shoved clear of the beach, they shot out +on the blue water to the dip of paddles. Marquette waved his adieu. +His Indians, remembering the dangers of that southern country, scarcely +hoped to see him again. Marquette, though a young man, was of no such +sturdy build as Jolliet. Among descendants of the Ottawas you may still +hear the tradition that he had a "white face, and long hair the color +of the sun" flowing to the shoulders of his black robe. + +The watching figures dwindled, as did the palisaded settlement. Hugging +the shore, the canoes entered Lake Michigan, or, as it was then called, +the Lake of the Illinois. All the islands behind seemed to meet and +intermingle and to cover themselves with blue haze as they went down +on the water. Priest and trader, their skins moist with the breath +of the lake, each in his own canoe, faced silently the unknown world +toward which they were venturing. The shaggy coast line bristled with +evergreens, and though rocky, it was low, unlike the white cliffs of +Michilimackinac. + +Marquette had made a map from the descriptions of the Illinois Indians. +The canoes were moving westward on the course indicated by his map. +He was peculiarly gifted as a missionary, for already he spoke six +Indian languages, and readily adapted himself to any dialect. Marquette, +the records tell us, came of "an old and honorable family of Laon," in +northern France. Century after century the Marquettes bore high honors +in Laon, and their armorial bearings commemorated devotion to the +king in distress. In our own Revolutionary War it is said that three +Marquettes fought for us with La Fayette. No young man of his time had +a pleasanter or easier life offered him at home than Jacques Marquette. +But he chose to devote himself to missionary labor in the New World, +and had already helped to found three missions, enduring much hardship. +Indian half-breeds, at what is now called the "Soo," on St. Mary's +River, betwixt Lake Huron and Lake Superior, have a tradition that +Father Marquette and Father Dablon built their missionary station on +a tiny island of rocks, not more than two canoe lengths from shore, on +the American side. But men who have written books declare it was on the +bank below the rapids. + +[Illustration: Autograph of Jolliet.] + +Jolliet had come of different though not less worthy stock. He was +Canadian born, the son of a wagon-maker in Quebec; and he had been well +educated, and possessed an active, adventurous mind. He was dressed for +this expedition in the tough buckskin hunting suit which frontiersmen +then wore. But Marquette retained the long black cassock of the priest. +Their five voyageurs--or trained woodsmen--in more or less stained +buckskin and caps of fur, sent the canoes shooting over the water with +scarcely a sound, dipping a paddle now on this side and now on that, +Indian fashion; Marquette and Jolliet taking turns with them as the +day progressed. For any man, whether voyageur, priest, or seignior, +who did not know how to paddle a canoe, if occasion demanded, was at +sore disadvantage in the New World. + +The first day of any journey, before one meets weariness or anxiety and +disappointment, remains always the freshest in memory. When the sun went +down, leaving violet shadows on the chill lake, they drew their boats +on shore; and Pierre Porteret and another Frenchman, named Jacques, +gathered driftwood to make a fire, while the rest of the crew unpacked +the cargo. They turned each canoe on its side, propping the ends with +sticks driven into the ground, thus making canopies like half-roofs to +shelter them for the night. + +"The Sieur Jolliet says it is not always that we may light a camp-fire," +said Pierre Porteret to Jacques, as he struck a spark into his tinder +with the flint and steel which a woodsman carried everywhere. + +"He is not likely to have one to-night, even in this safe cove," +responded Jacques, kneeling to help, and anxious for supper. "Look now +at me; I know the Indian way to start a blaze by taking two pieces of +wood and boring one into the other, rubbing it thus between my palms. +It is a gift. Not many voyageurs can accomplish that." + +"Rub thy two stupid heads together and make a blaze," said another +hungry man, coming with a kettle of lake water. But the fire soon +climbed pinkly through surrounding darkness. They drove down two forked +supports to hold a crosspiece, and hung the kettle to boil their hulled +corn. Then the fish which had been taken by trolling during the day were +dressed and broiled on hot coals. + +The May starlight was very keen over their heads in a dark blue sky +which seemed to rise to infinite heights, for the cold northern night +air swept it of every film. Their first delicious meal was blessed and +eaten; and stretched in blankets, with their feet to the camp fire, the +tired explorers rested. They were still on the north shore of what we +now call the state of Michigan, and their course had been due westward +by the compass. A cloud of Indian tobacco smoke rose from the lowly roof +of each canoe, and its odor mingled with the sweet acrid breath of +burning wood. Jolliet and the voyageurs had learned to use this dried +brown weed, which all tribes held in great esteem and carried about with +them in their rovings. + +"If true tales be told of the water around the Bay of the Puans," one of +the voyageurs was heard to say as he stretched himself under the canoe +allotted to the men, "we may save our salt when we pass that country." + +"Have you ever heard, Father," Jolliet inquired of the missionary, "that +the word Puan meant foul or ill-smelling instead of salty?" + +"I know," Marquette answered, "that salt has a vile odor to the Indians. +They do not use it with their food, preferring to season that instead +with the sugar they make from the maple tree. Therefore, the bay into +which we are soon to venture they call the Bay of the Fetid, or +ill-smelling salty country, on account of saline water thereabout." + +"Then why do the Winnebago tribe on this bay allow themselves to be +called Puans?" + +"That has never been explained by the missionaries sent to that post, +though the name seems to carry no reproach. They are well made and tall +of stature. I find Wild Oats a stranger name--the Menomonies are Wild +Oats Indians. Since the gospel has been preached to all these tribes for +some years past, I trust we may find good Christians among them." + +"What else have you learned about the country?" + +"Father Dablon told me that the way to the head of that river called +Fox, up which we must paddle, is as hard as the way to heaven, specially +the rapids. But when you arrive there it is a natural paradise." + +"We have tremendous labor before us," mused Jolliet. "Father, did you +ever have speech with that Jean Nicollet, who, first of any Frenchman, +got intimations of the great river?" + +"I never saw him." + +"There was a man I would have traveled far to see, though he was long a +renegade among savages, and returned to the settlements only to die." + +"Heaven save this expedition from becoming renegade among savages by +forgetting its highest object!" breathed Marquette. + +His companion smiled toward the pleasant fire-light. Jolliet had once +thought of becoming a priest himself. He venerated this young apostle, +only half a dozen years his senior. But he was glad to be a free +adventurer, seeking wealth and honor; not foreseeing that though the +great island of Anticosti in the Gulf of St. Lawrence would be given +him for his services, he would die a poor and neglected man. + +When, after days of steady progress, the expedition entered the Bay +of Puans, now called Green Bay, and found the nation of Menomonies or +Wild Oats Indians, Marquette was as much interested as Jolliet in the +grain which gave these people their bread. It grew like rice, in marshy +places, on knotted stalks which appeared above the water in June and +rose several feet higher. The grain seed was long and slender and +made plentiful meal. The Indians gathered this volunteer harvest in +September, when the kernels were so ripe that they dropped readily into +canoes pushed among the stalks. They were then spread out on lattice +work and smoked to dry the chaff, which could be trodden loose when the +whole bulk, tied in a skin bag, was put into a hollow in the ground made +for that purpose. The Indians pounded their grain to meal and cooked it +with fat. + +The Menomonies tried to prevent Marquette and Jolliet from going +farther. They said the great river was dangerous, full of frightful +monsters that swallowed both men and canoes; that there was a roaring +demon in it who could be heard for leagues; and the heat was so intense +in those southern countries through which it flowed, that if the +Frenchmen escaped all other dangers, they must die of that. Marquette +told them his own life was nothing compared to the good word he wanted +to carry to those southern tribes, and he laughed at the demon and +instructed them in his own religion. + +The aboriginal tribes, by common instinct, tried from the first to keep +the white man out of countries which he was determined to overrun and +possess, regardless of danger. + +At the end of a voyage of thirty leagues, or about ninety miles, the +explorers reached the head of the Bay of Puans, and a region thickly +settled with Winnebagoes and Pottawotomies between the bay and Winnebago +Lake, Sacs on Fox River, and Mascoutins, Kickapoos, and Miamis. Fox +River, which they followed from the head of the bay, and of which the +lake seemed only an expansion, was a rocky stream. A later traveler has +told us that Fox River in its further extent is very crooked, and while +seeming wide, with a boundary of hills on each hand, it affords but a +slender channel in a marsh full of rushes and wild oats. + +The Kickapoos and Mascoutins were rude, coarse-featured Indians. Though +the missionary exhorted them as seriously as he did their gentler +neighbors, he could not help remarking to Jolliet that "the Miamis were +better made, and the two long earlocks which they wore gave them a good +appearance." + +It was the seventh day of June when the explorers arrived in this +country of cabins woven of rushes; and they did not linger here. +Frenchmen had never gone farther. They were to enter new lands untrodden +by the white race. They were in what is now called the state of +Wisconsin, where "the soil was good," they noted, "producing much corn; +and the Indians gathered also quantities of plums and grapes." In these +warmer lands the season progressed rapidly. + +Marquette and Jolliet called the chiefs together and told them that +Jolliet was sent by the governor to find new countries, and Marquette +had been commissioned of Heaven to preach. Making the chiefs a present, +without which they would not have received the talk seriously, the +explorers asked for guides to that tributary which was said to run into +the great river. + +The chiefs responded with the gift of a rush mat for Marquette and +Jolliet to rest on during their journey, and sent two young Miamis with +them. If these kindly Indians disliked to set the expedition further on +its way, they said nothing but very polite things about the hardihood +of Frenchmen, who could venture with only two canoes, and seven in their +party, on unknown worlds. + +The young Miamis, in a boat of their own, led out the procession the +tenth morning of June. Taking up paddles, the voyageurs looked back +at an assembled multitude--perhaps the last kindly natives on their +perilous way--and at the knoll in the midst of prairies where hospitable +rush houses stood and would stand until the inmates took them down and +rolled them up to carry to hunting grounds, and at groves dotting those +pleasant prairies where guests were abundantly fed. + +Three leagues up the marshy and oats-choked Fox River, constantly +widening to little lakes and receding to a throat of a channel, brought +the explorers to the portage, or carrying place. The canoes then had +to be unloaded, and both cargo and boats carried overland to a bend of +the Miscousing, which was the Indian name for Wisconsin River. "This +portage," says a traveler who afterwards followed that way, "is half a +league in length, and half of that is a kind of marsh full of mud." In +wet seasons the head of Fox River at that time seemed not unlikely to +find the Wisconsin, for Marquette has set it down in his recital that +the portage was only twenty-seven hundred paces. + +When the two Miamis had helped to carry the goods and had set the French +on the tributary of the great river, they turned back to their own +country. Before the men entered the boats Marquette knelt down with +them on the bank and prayed for the success of the undertaking. It was +a lovely broad river on which they now embarked, with shining sands +showing through the clear water, making shallows like tumbling discs +of brilliant metal,--a river in which the canoes might sometimes run +aground, but one that deceived the eye pleasantly, with islands all vine +covered, so when a boat clove a way between two it was a guess how far +the Wisconsin spread away on each side to shores of a fertile land. +Oaks, walnuts, whitewood, and thorn trees crowded the banks or fell +apart, showing prairies rolling to wooded hills. Deer were surprised, +stretching their delicate necks down to drink at the margin. They looked +up with shy large eyes at such strange objects moving on their stream, +and shot off through the brush like red-brown arrows tipped with white. +The moose planted its forefeet and stared stolidly, its broad horns set +in defense. + +"Sieur Jolliet," said the missionary, once when the canoes drew +together, "we have now left the waters which flow into the great lakes +and are discharged through the St. Lawrence past Quebec to the sea. +We follow those that lead us into strange lands." + +"This river Miscousing on which we now are," returned Jolliet, "flows, +as we see by our compass, to the southwestward. We know it is a branch +of the great river. I am becoming convinced, Father, that the great +river cannot discharge itself toward the east, as some have supposed." + +The explorers estimated the distance from the country of the Mascoutins +to the portage to be three leagues, and from the portage to the mouth +of the Miscousing forty leagues. This distance they covered in a week. +Drawing their canoes to the shore at night, they pitched camp, varying +the monotony of their stores with fish and game. Perhaps they had +learned that wild grapes then budding were not really fit to eat until +touched by frost. Pierre Porteret said in Marquette's hearing, "the +Indians could make good wine of grapes and plums if they desired." + +The 17th of June, exactly one month from the day on which they had left +St. Ignace mission, the explorers paddled into a gentle clear river, +larger than the Miscousing but not yet monstrous in width, which ran +southward. High hills guarded the right-hand shore, and the left spread +away in fair meadows. Its current was broken with many little islands, +like the Miscousing, though on sounding, Jolliet found the water to +be ten fathoms, or sixty feet, deep. The shores receding, and then +drawing in, gave unequal and irregular width to the stream. But it was +unmistakably the great river they had sought, named then as now by the +Indians, Mississippi, though Marquette at once christened it Conception, +and another Frenchman who came after him gave it the name of Colbert. +It was the river of which Nicollet had brought hints from his wanderings +among northwestern tribes: the great artery of the middle continent, or, +as that party of explorers believed, of the entire west. Receiving into +itself tributaries, it rolled, draining a mighty basin, to unknown seas. + +The first white men ventured forth upon its upper channel in two birch +canoes. Five hardy voices raised a shout which was thrown back in an +echo from the hills; five caps were whirled as high as paddles could +raise them. But Marquette said, "This is such joy as we cannot express!" +The men in both canoes silenced themselves while he gave thanks for the +discovery. + +[Illustration: FATHER JACQUES MARQUETTE. +From a Statue in the Capitol at Washington.] + + + + +II. + +BEARERS OF THE CALUMET. + + +Moving down the Mississippi, league after league, the explorers noted +first of all its solitude. Wigwam smoke could not be seen on either +shore. Silence, save the breathing of the river as it rolled on its +course, seemed to surround and threaten them with ambush. Still, day +after day, the sweet and awful presence of the wilderness was their only +company. Once Pierre Porteret dropped his paddle with a yell which was +tossed about by echoing islands. A thing with a tiger's forehead and a +wildcat's whiskered snout, holding ears and entire gray and black head +above the water, swam for the boat. But it dived and disappeared; and +the other voyageurs felt safe in laughing at him. Not long after, +Jacques bellowed aloud as he saw a living tree glide under the canoe, +jarring it from end to end. The voyageurs soon learned to know the huge +sluggish catfish. They also caught plenty of sturgeon or shovel fish +when they cast in their nets. + +The river descended from its hilly cradle to a country of level +distances. The explorers, seeing nothing of men, gave more attention to +birds and animals. Wild turkeys with burnished necks and breasts tempted +the hunters. The stag uttered far off his whistling call of defiance to +other stags. And they began to see a shaggy ox, humped, with an enormous +head and short black horns, and a mane hanging over low-set wicked eyes. +Its body was covered with curly rough hair. They learned afterwards from +Indians to call these savage cattle pisikious, or buffaloes. Herds of +many hundreds grazed together, or, startled, galloped away, like thunder +rolling along the ground. + +The explorers kindled very little fire on shore to cook their meals, +and they no longer made a camp, but after eating, pushed out and +anchored, sleeping in their canoes. Every night a sentinel was set to +guard against surprise. By the 25th of June they had passed through +sixty leagues of solitude. The whole American continent was thinly +settled by native tribes, many in name indeed, but of scant numbers. +The most dreaded savages in the New World were the Iroquois or Five +Nations, living south of Lake Ontario. Yet they were never able to +muster more than about twenty-two hundred fighting men. + +The canoes were skirting the western bank, driven by the current, when +one voyageur called to another: + +"My scalp for the sight of an Indian!" + +"Halt!" the forward paddler answered. "Look to thy scalp, lad, for here +is the Indian!" + +There was no feathered head in ambush, but they saw moccasin prints in +the low moist margin and a path leading up to the prairie. + +Marquette and Jolliet held the boats together while they consulted. + +"Do you think it wise to pass by without searching what this may mean, +Father?" + +"No, I do not. We might thus leave enemies behind our backs to cut off +our return. Some Indian village is near. It would be my counsel to +approach and offer friendship." + +"Shall we take the men?" debated Jolliet. "Two of them at least should +stay to guard the canoes." + +"Let them all stay to guard the canoes. If we go unarmed and unattended, +we shall not raise suspicion in the savages' minds." + +"But we may raise suspicion in our own minds." + +Marquette laughed. + +"The barbarous people on this unexplored river have us at their mercy," +he declared, "We can at best do little to defend ourselves." + +"Let us reconnoitre," said Jolliet. + +Taking some of the goods which they had brought along for presents, +Jolliet bade the men wait their return and climbed the bank with the +missionary. The path led through prairie grass, gay at that season +with flowers. The delicate buttercup-like sensitive plant shrank from +their feet in wet places. Neither Frenchman had yet seen the deadly +rattlesnake of these southern countries, singing as a great fly might +sing in a web, dart out of its spotted spiral to fasten a death bite +upon a victim. They walked in silence, dreading only the human beings +they were going to meet. When they had gone about two leagues, the +path drew near the wooded bank of a little stream draining into the +Mississippi which they had scarcely noticed from the canoes. There +they saw an Indian village, and farther off, up a hill, more groups of +wigwams. They heard the voices of children, and nobody suspected their +approach. + +Jolliet and Marquette halted. Not knowing how else to announce their +presence, they shouted together as loud as they could shout. The savages +ran out of their wigwams and darted about in confusion until they saw +the two motionless white men. The long black cassock of Marquette had +instant effect upon them. For their trinkets and a few garments on their +bodies showed that they had trafficked with Europeans. + +Four old Indians, slowly and with ceremony, came out to meet the +explorers, holding up curious pipes trimmed with many kinds of feathers. +As soon as they drew near, Marquette called out to them in Algonquin: + +"What tribe is this?" + +"The Illinois," answered the old man. Being a branch of the great +Algonquin family, which embraced nearly all northern aboriginal nations, +with the notable exception of the Iroquois, these people had a dialect +which the missionary could understand. The name Illinois meant "The +Men." + +Marquette and Jolliet were led to the principal lodge. Outside the door, +waiting for them, stood another old Indian like a statue of wrinkled +bronze. For he had stripped himself to do honor to the occasion, and +held up his hands to screen his face from the sun, making graceful and +dignified gestures as he greeted the strangers. + +"How bright is the sun when you come to see us, O Frenchmen! Our lodges +are all open to you." + +The visitors were then seated in the wigwam, and the pipe, or calumet, +offered them to smoke, all the Indians crowding around and saying: + +[Illustration: Calumet.] + +"You do well to visit us, brothers." + +Obliged to observe this peace ceremony, Marquette put the pipe to his +lips, but Jolliet, used to the tobacco weed, puffed with a good will. + +The entire village then formed a straggling procession, gazing at the +Frenchmen, whom they guided farther to the chief's town. He also met +them standing with a naked retinue at his door, and the calumet was +again smoked. + +The Illinois lodges were shaped like the rounded cover of an emigrant +wagon, high, and very long, having an opening left along the top for +the escape of smoke. They were made of rush mats, which the women wove, +overlapped as shingles on a framework of poles. Rush mats also carpeted +the ground, except where fires burned in a row along the middle. Each +fire was used by two families who lived opposite, in stalls made of +blankets. The ends of the lodge had flaps to shut out the weather, but +these were left wide open to the summer sun. During visits of ceremony a +guest stood where he could be seen and heard by all who could crowd into +the wigwam. But when the Illinois held important councils they made a +circular inclosure, and built a camp-fire in the center. Many families +and many fires filled a long wigwam, though Jolliet and Marquette were +lodged with the chief, who had one for himself and his household. + +Whitening embers were sending threads of smoke towards a strip of blue +sky overhead when the missionary stood up to explain his errand in the +crowded inclosure, dividing his talk into four parts with presents. +By the first gift of cloth and beads he told his listeners that the +Frenchmen were voyaging in peace to visit nations on the river. By the +second he said: + +"I declare to you that God, your Creator, has pity on you, since, when +you have been so long ignorant of him, he wishes to become known to you. +I am sent on his behalf with this design. It is for you to acknowledge +and obey him." + +By the third gift they were informed that the chief of the French had +spread peace and overcome the Iroquois. And the last begged for all the +information they could give about the sea and intervening nations. + +When Marquette sat down, the chief stood up and laid his hand on the +head of a little slave, prisoner from another tribe. + +"I thank you, Blackgown," he said, "and you, Frenchman, for taking so +much pains to come and visit us. The earth has never been so beautiful, +nor the sun so bright, as to-day; never has the river been so calm and +free from rocks, which your canoes removed as they passed! Never has our +tobacco had so fine a flavor, nor our corn appeared so beautiful as we +find it to-day. Here is my son. I give him to you that you may know my +heart. Take pity on us and all our nation. You know the Great Spirit who +made all: you speak to him and hear him; ask him to give us life and +health and come and dwell with us." + +When the chief had presented his guests with the Indian boy, and again +offered the calumet, he urged them, with belts and garters of buffalo +wool, brilliantly dyed, to go no farther down the great river, on +account of dangers. These compliments being ended, a feast was brought +in four courses. First came a wooden dish of sagamity or corn-meal +boiled in water and grease. The chief took a buffalo-horn spoon and fed +his guests as if they had been little children; three or four spoonfuls +he put in Marquette's mouth and three or four spoonfuls in Jolliet's. +Three fish were brought next, and he picked out the bones with his own +fingers, blew on the food to cool it, and stuffed the explorers with +all he could make them accept. It was their part to open their mouths +as young birds do. The third course was that most delicate of Indian +dishes, a fine dog; but seeing that his guests shrank from this, the +chief ended the meal with buffalo meat, giving them the fattest parts. + +The Illinois were at that time on the west side of the Mississippi, +because they had been driven from their own country on the Illinois +River by the Iroquois. The Illinois nation was made up of several united +tribes: Kaskaskias, Peorias, Kahokias, Tamaroas, and Moingona. Flight +scattered them, and these were only a few of their villages. They +afterwards returned to their own land. Their chief wore a scarf or belt +of fur crossing his left shoulder, encircling his waist and hanging in +fringe. Arm and leg bands ornamented him, and he also had knee rattles +of deer hoofs. Paint made of colored clays streaked his face. This +attractive creature sent the Indian crier around, beating a drum of deer +hide stretched over a pot, to proclaim the calumet dance in honor of the +explorers. + +Marquette and Jolliet were led out in the prairie to a small grove +which sheltered the assembly from the afternoon sun. Even the women +left their maize fields and the beans, melons, and squashes that they +were cultivating, and old squaws dropped rush braiding, and with +papooses swarming about their knees, followed. The Illinois were nimble, +well-formed people, skillful with bow and arrow. They had, moreover, +some guns among them, obtained from allies who had roved and traded with +the French. Young braves imitated the gravity of their elders at this +important ceremony. The Illinois never ate new fruits or bathed at the +beginning of summer, without first dancing the calumet. + +A large gay mat of rushes was spread in the center of the grove, and +the warrior selected to dance put his god, or manitou--some tiny carven +image which he carried around his person and to which he prayed--on +the mat beside a beautiful calumet. Around them he spread his bow and +arrows, his war club, and stone hatchet. The pipe was made of red rock +like brilliantly polished marble, hollowed to hold tobacco. A stick +two feet long, as thick as a cane, formed the stem. For the dance these +pipes were often decked with gorgeous scarlet, green, and iridescent +feathers, though white plumes alone made them the symbol of peace, and +red quills bristled over them for war. + +[Illustration: War Club.] + +Young squaws and braves who were to sing, sat down on the ground in a +group near the mat; but the multitude spread in a great circle around +it. Men of importance before taking their seats on the short grass, each +in turn lifted the calumet, which was filled, and blew a little smoke +on the manitou. Then the dancer sprang out, and, with graceful curvings +in time to the music, seized the pipe and offered it now to the sun and +now to the earth, made it dance from mouth to mouth along the lines of +spectators, with all its fluttering plumes spread. The hazy sun shone +slanting among branches, tracing a network of flickering leaf shadows +on short grass; and liquid young voices rising and falling chanted, + + "Nanahani, nanahani, nanahani, Naniango!" + + +[Illustration: Stone Hatchet.] + +The singers were joined by the Indian drum; and at that another dancer +sprang into the circle and took the weapons from the mat to fight with +the principal dancer, who had no defense but the calumet. With measured +steps and a floating motion of the body the two advanced and attacked, +parried and retreated, until the man with the pipe drove his enemy from +the ring. Papooses of a dark brick-red color watched with glistening +black eyes the last part of the dance, which celebrated victory. The +names of nations fought, the prisoners taken, and all the trophies +brought home were paraded by means of the calumet. + +The chief presented the dancer with a fine fur robe when he ended; and, +taking the calumet from his hand, gave it to an old man in the circle. +This one passed it to the next, and so it went around the huge ring +until all had held it. Then the chief approached the white men. + +"Blackgown," he said, "and you, Frenchman, I give you this peace-pipe +to be your safeguard wherever you go among the tribes. It shall be +feathered with white plumes, and displaying it you may march fearlessly +among enemies. It has power of life and death, and honor is paid to it +as to a manitou. Blackgown, I give you this calumet in token of peace +between your governor and the Illinois, and to remind you of your +promise to come again and instruct us in your religion." + +The explorers slept soundly all night in the chief's lodge, feeling as +safe as among Christian Indians of the north, who stuck thorns in a +calendar to mark Sundays and holy days. Next morning the chief went with +several hundred of his people to escort them to their canoes; but it +was three o'clock in the afternoon before the voyageurs, dropping down +stream, saw the last of the friendly tribe. + +Day after day the boats moved on without meeting other inhabitants. +Mulberries, persimmons, and hazelnuts were found on the shores. They +passed the mouth of the Illinois River without knowing its name, or +that it flowed through lands owned by the tribe that had given them +the peace-pipe. Farther on, the Mississippi made one of its many bends, +carrying them awhile directly eastward, and below great rocks like +castles. As the canoes ran along the foot of this east shore, some of +the voyageurs cried out. For on the face of the cliff far up were two +painted monsters in glaring red, green, and black; each as large as a +calf, with deer horns, blood-colored eyes, tiger beard, a human face, +and a body covered with scales. Coiled twice around the middle, over the +head, and passing between the hind legs of each, extended a tail that +ended like a fish. So startling was this sight, which seemed a banner +held aloft heralding unseen dangers, that the men felt threatened by a +demon. But Marquette laughed at them and beckoned for the canoes to be +brought together. + +"What manner of thing is this, Sieur Jolliet?" + +"A pair of manitous, evidently. If we had Indians with us, we should see +them toss a little tobacco out as an offering in passing by." + +"I cannot think," said Marquette, "that any Indian has been the +designer. Good painters in France would find it hard to do as well. +Besides this, the creatures are so high upon the rock that it was hard +to get conveniently at them to paint them. And how could such colors be +mixed in this wilderness?" + +"We have seen what pigments and clays the Illinois used in daubing +themselves. These wild tribes may have among them men with natural skill +in delineating," said Jolliet. + +"I will draw them off," Marquette determined, bringing out the papers on +which he set down his notes; and while the men stuck their paddles in +the water to hold the canoes against the current, he made his drawing. + +One of the monsters seen by the explorers remained on those rocks until +the middle of our own century. It was called by the Indians the Piasa. +More than two centuries of beating winter storms had not effaced the +brilliant picture when it was quarried away by a stupidly barbarous +civilization. The town of Alton, in the state of Illinois, is a little +south of that rock where the Piasa dragons were seen. + +As the explorers moved ahead on glassy waters, they looked back, and the +line of vision changing, they saw that the figures were cut into the +cliff and painted in hollow relief. + +They were still talking about the monsters when they heard the roar of a +rapid ahead, and the limpid Mississippi turned southward on its course. +It was as if they had never seen the great river until this instant. +For a mighty flood, rushing through banks from the west, yellow with +mud, noisy as a storm, eddying islands of branches, stumps, whole trees, +took possession of the fair stream they had followed so long. It shot +across the current of the Mississippi in entering so that the canoes +danced like eggshells and were dangerously forced to the eastern bank. +Afterwards they learned that this was the Pekitanoüi, or, as we now call +it, the Missouri River, which flows into the Mississippi not far above +the present city of St. Louis; and that by following it to its head +waters and making a short portage across a prairie, a man might in time +enter the Red or Vermilion Sea of California. + +Having slipped out of the Missouri's reach, the explorers were next +threatened by a whirlpool among rocks before they reached the mouth of +Ouaboukigou, the Ohio River. They saw purple, red, and violet earths, +which ran down in streams of color when wet, and a sand which stained +their paddles like blood. Tall canes began to feather the shore, and +mosquitoes tormented them as they pressed on through languors of heat. +Jolliet and Marquette made awnings of sails which they had brought as a +help to the paddles. They were floating down the current of the muddy, +swollen river when they saw Indians with guns on the east shore. The +voyageurs dropped their paddles and seized their own weapons. Marquette +stood up and spoke to the Indians in Huron. They made no answer. He held +up the white calumet. Then they began to beckon, and when the party drew +to land, they made it clear that they had themselves been frightened +until they saw the Blackrobe holding the calumet. A long-haired tribe, +somewhat resembling the Iroquois, but calling themselves Tuscaroras; +they were rovers, and had axes, hoes, knives, beads, and double glass +bottles holding gunpowder, for which they had traded with white people +eastward. + +They fed the French with buffalo meat and white plums, and declared it +was but a ten days' journey to the sea. In this they were mistaken, for +it was more than a thousand miles to the Gulf of Mexico. + +[Illustration: Wampum Girdle.] + +To each tribe as he passed, Marquette preached his faith by the belt of +the prayer. For each he had a wampum girdle to hold while he talked, and +to leave for a remembrance. His words without a witness would be +forgotten. + +Three hundred miles farther the explorers ventured, and had nearly +reached the mouth of the Arkansas River, floating on a wide expanse of +water between lofty woods, when they heard wild yelling on the west +shore, and saw a crowd of savages pushing out huge wooden canoes to +surround them. Some swam to seize the Frenchmen, and a war club was +thrown over their heads. Marquette held up the peace-pipe, but the wild +young braves in the water paid no attention to it. Arrows were ready +to fly from all sides, and Marquette held the peace-pipe on high and +continually prayed. At once old Indians restrained the young ones. In +their turmoil they had not at first seen the calumet; but two chiefs +came directly out to bring the strangers ashore. + +Not one of the missionary's six languages was understood by these +Indians. He at last found a man who spoke a little Illinois, and Jolliet +and he were able to explain their errand. He preached by presents, and +obtained a guide to the next nation. + +On that part of the river where the French came to a halt, the Spanish +explorer De Soto was said to have died two hundred years before. In this +region the Indians had never seen snow, and their land yielded three +crops a year. Their pots and plates were of baked earth, and they kept +corn in huge gourds, or in baskets woven of cane fibers. They knew +nothing of beaver skins; their furs were the hides of buffaloes. +Watermelons grew abundantly in their fields. Though they had large +wigwams of bark, they wore no clothing, and hung beads from their +pierced noses and ears. + +These Akamsea, or Arkansas Indians showed traits of the Aztecs under +Spanish dominion; for what is now the state of Texas was then claimed +by Spain. Marquette and Jolliet held a council. They were certain that +the great river discharged itself into the Gulf of Mexico. If they +ventured farther, they might fall into the hands of Spaniards, who would +imprison them; or they might be killed by fiercer tribes than any yet +encountered, and in either case their discoveries would be lost. So they +decided to turn back. + +All day the Arkansas feasted them with merciless savage hospitality, and +it was not polite to refuse food or the attention of rocking. Two stout +Indians would seize a voyageur between them and rock him back and forth +for hours. If the motion nauseated him, that was his misfortune. + +Pierre Porteret crept out behind one of the bark lodges looking very +miserable in the fog of early morning. His companion on many a long +journey, never far out of his shadow, sat down to compare experiences. + +"Did they rock thee all night, Pierre?" + +"They rocked me all night, Jacques. I can well endure what most men can, +but this is carrying politeness too far." + +"I was not so favored. They would have saved you if they had killed the +rest of us. And they would have saved the good father, no doubt, since +the chief came and danced the calumet before him." + +"Were these red cradle-rockers intending to make an end of us in the +night?" + +"So the chief says; but he broke up the council, and will set us safely +on our journey up river to-day." + +"I am glad of that," said Pierre. "Father Marquette hath not the +strength of the Sieur Jolliet for such rude wanderings. These southern +mists, and torturing insects, and clammy heats, and the bad food have +worked a great change in him." + +"We have been gone but two months from the Mission of St. Ignace," said +Jacques. "They have the bigness of years." + +"And many more months that have the bigness of years will pass before we +see it again." + +They grew more certain of this, when, after toiling up the current +through malarial nights and sweltering days, the explorers left the +Mississippi and entered the river Illinois. There, above Peoria Lake, +another Illinois town of seventy-four lodges was found, and these +Kaskaskias so clung to the Blackrobe that he promised to come back +and teach them. From the head waters of the Illinois a portage was +made to Lake Michigan, and the French returned to the Bay of the Puans +alongshore. They had traveled over twenty-five hundred miles, and +accomplished the object of their journey. + +Jolliet, with his canoe of voyageurs, his maps and papers, and the young +Indian boy given him by the Illinois chief, went on to Montreal. His +canoe was upset in the rapids of Lachine just above Montreal, and he +lost two men, the Indian boy, his papers, and nearly everything except +his life. But he was able to report to the governor all that he had seen +and done. + +Marquette lay ill, at the Bay of the Puans, of dysentery, brought on by +hardship; and he was never well again. Being determined, however, to go +back and preach to the tribe on the Illinois River, he waited all winter +and all the next summer to regain his strength. He carefully wrote out +and sent to Canada the story of his discoveries and labors. In autumn, +with Pierre Porteret and the voyageur Jacques, he ventured again to the +Illinois. Once he became so ill they were obliged to stop and build him +a cabin in the wilderness, at the risk of being snowed in all winter. +It was not until April that he reached what he called his Mission of the +Immaculate Conception, on the Illinois River, through snow, and water +and mud, hunger and misery. He preached until after Easter, when, his +strength being exhausted, Pierre and Jacques undertook to carry him home +to the Mission of St. Ignace. Marquette had been two years away from his +palisaded station on the north shore, and nine years in the New World. + +It was the 19th of May, and Pierre and Jacques were paddling their canoe +along the east side of that great lake known now as Michigan. A creek +parted the rugged coast, and dipping near its shallow mouth they looked +anxiously at each other. + +"What shall we do?" whispered Jacques. + +"We must get on as fast as we can," answered Pierre. + +They were gaunt and weather-beaten themselves from two years' tramping +the wilderness. But their eyes dwelt most piteously on the dying man +stretched in the bottom of the canoe. His thin fingers held a cross. +His white face and bright hair rested on a pile of blankets. Pierre and +Jacques felt that no lovelier, kinder being than this scarcely breathing +missionary would ever float on the blue water under that blue sky. + +He opened his eyes and saw the creek they were slipping past, and a +pleasant knoll beside it, and whispered:-- + +"There is the place of my burial." + +"But, Father," pleaded Pierre, "it is yet early in the day. We can take +you farther." + +"Carry me ashore here," he whispered again. + +So they entered the creek and took him ashore, building a fire and +sheltering him as well as they could. There a few hours afterward he +died, the weeping men holding up his cross before him, while he thanked +the Divine Majesty for letting him die a poor missionary. When he could +no longer speak, they repeated aloud the prayers he had taught them. + +They left him buried on that shore with a large cross standing over his +grave. Later his Indians removed his bones to the Mission of St. Ignace, +with a procession of canoes and a priest intoning. They were placed +under the altar of his own chapel. If you go to St. Ignace, you may see +a monument now on that spot, and people have believed they traced the +foundation of the old bark chapel. But the spot where he first lay was +long venerated. + +A great fur trader and pioneer named Gurdon Hubbard made this record +about the place, which he visited in 1818:-- + +"We reached Marquette River, about where the town of Ludington now +stands on the Michigan shore. This was where Father Marquette died, +about one hundred and forty years before, and we saw the remains of a +red-cedar cross, erected by his men at the time of his death to mark his +grave; and though his remains had been removed to the Mission, at Point +St. Ignace, the cross was held sacred by the voyageurs, who, in passing, +paid reverence to it, by kneeling and making the sign of the cross. It +was about three feet above the ground, and in a falling condition. We +reset it, leaving it out of the ground about two feet, and as I never +saw it after, I doubt not that it was covered by the drifting sands of +the following winter, and that no white man ever saw it afterwards." + + + + +III. + +THE MAN WITH THE COPPER HAND. + + +One day at the end of August, when Marquette's bones had lain under +his chapel altar nearly two years and a half, the first ship ever seen +upon the lakes was sighted off St. Ignace. Hurons and Ottawas, French +traders, and coureurs de bois, or wood-rangers, ran out to see the +huge winged creature scudding betwixt Michilimackinac Island and Round +Island. She was of about forty-five tons' burden. Five cannon showed +through her port-holes, and as she came nearer, a carved dragon was seen +to be her figurehead; she displayed the name Griffin and bore the white +flag of France. The priest himself felt obliged to receive her company, +for three Récollet friars, in the gray robe of St. Francis, appeared on +the deck. But two men, one in a mantle of scarlet and gold, and the +other in white and gold French uniform, were most watched by all eyes. + +[Illustration: THE BUILDING OF THE GRIFFIN. +From the Original Engraving in Father Hennepin's "Nouvelle Découverte," +Amsterdam, 1704.] + +The ship fired a salute, and the Indians howled with terror and started +to run; then turned back to see her drop her sails and her anchor, and +come up in that deep crescent-shaped bay. She had weathered a hard storm +in Lake Huron; but the men who handled her ropes were of little interest +to coureurs de bois on shore, who watched her masters coming to land. + +[Illustration: La Salle.] + +"It is the Sieur de la Salle in the scarlet mantle," one coureur de bois +said to another. "And this is the ship he hath been building at Niagara. +First one hears that creditors have seized his fort of Frontenac, and +then one beholds him sailing here in state, as though naught on earth +could daunt him." + +"I would like service with him," said the other coureur de bois. + +His companion laughed. + +"Service with La Salle means the hardest marching and heaviest labor +a voyageur ever undertook. I have heard he is himself tough as iron. But +men hereabouts who have been in his service will take to the woods when +they hear he has arrived; traders that he sent ahead with goods. If he +gets his hand on them after he finds they have squandered his property, +it will go hard with them." + +"He has a long gray-colored face above his broad shoulders. I have heard +of this Sieur Robert Cavelier de la Salle ever since he came to the +province more than ten years ago, but I never saw him before. Is it true +that Count Frontenac is greatly bound to him?" + +"So true that Sieur de la Salle thereby got favor at court. It was at +court that a prince recommended to him yon swart Italian in white and +gold that he brought with him on his last voyage from France. Now, there +is a man known already throughout the colony by reason of his hand." + +"Which hand?" + +"The right one." + +"I see naught ailing that. He wears long gauntlets pulled well over both +wrists." + +"His left hand is on his sword hilt. Doth he not hold the right a little +stiffly?" + +"It is true. The fingers are not bent." + +"They never will be bent. It is a hand of copper." + +"How can a man with a copper hand be of service in the wilderness?" + +The first ranger shrugged. "That I know not. But having been maimed in +European wars and fitted with a copper hand, he was yet recommended to +Sieur de la Salle." + +"But why hath an Italian the uniform of France?" + +"He is a French officer, having been exiled with his father from his own +country." + +The coureur de bois, who had reached the settlement later than his +companion, grunted. + +"One would say thou wert of the Griffin crew thyself, with the latest +news from Quebec and Montreal." + +"Not I," laughed the first one. "I have only been in the woods with +Greysolon du Lhut, who knows everything." + +"Then he told thee the name of this Italian with the copper hand?" + +"Assuredly. This Italian with the copper hand is Sieur Greysolon du +Lhut's cousin, and his name is Henri de Tonty." + +"I will say this for Monsieur Henri de Tonty: a better made man never +stepped on the strand at St. Ignace." + +[Illustration: Autograph of Tonty.] + +Greysolon du Lhut was the captain of coureurs de bois in the northwest. +No other leader had such influence with the lawless and daring. When +these men were gathered in a settlement, spending what they had earned +in drinking and gaming, it was hard to restrain them within civilized +bounds. But when they took service to shoulder loads and march into the +wilderness, the strongest hand could not keep them from open rebellion +and desertion. There were few devoted and faithful voyageurs, such +as Pierre Porteret and Jacques had proved themselves in following +Marquette. The term of service was usually two years; but at the first +hardship some might slip away in the night, even at the risk of +perishing before they reached the settlements. + +St. Ignace made a procession behind La Salle's party and followed them +into the chapel to hear mass--French traders, Ottawas, Hurons, coureurs +de bois, squaws, and children. When the priest turned from the altar, he +looked down on complexions ranging from the natural pallor of La Salle +to the black-red of the most weather-beaten native. + +[Illustration: Totem of the Hurons.] + +The Hurons then living at St. Ignace, whom Father Marquette had led +there from his earlier mission, afterwards wandered to Detroit and +Sandusky, the priests having decided to abandon St. Ignace and burn the +chapel. In our own day we hear of their descendants as settled in the +Indian Territory, the smallest but wealthiest band of all transplanted +Indians. + +Having entered the lake region with impressive ceremonies, which he +well knew how to employ before ignorant men and savages, La Salle threw +aside his splendor, and, with his lieutenant, put on the buckskins for +marching and canoe journeying into the wilderness. Some of the men he +had sent up the lakes with goods nearly a year before had collected +a large store of furs, worth much money; and these he determined to +send back to Canada on the Griffin, to satisfy his creditors and to give +him means for carrying on his plans. He had meant, after sending Tonty +on to the Illinois country, to return to Canada and settle his affairs. +But it became necessary, as soon as he landed at St. Ignace, to divide +his party and send Tonty with some of the men to Sault Ste. Marie after +plunderers who had made off with his goods. The others would doubtless +desert if left any length of time without a leader. It was a risk also +to send his ship back to the colony without standing guard over its +safety himself. But he greatly needed the credit which its load of furs +would give him. So he determined to send it manned as it was, with +orders to return to the head of Lake Michigan as soon as the cargo was +safely landed; while he voyaged down the west side of the lake, and +Tonty, returning from the Sault, came by the east shore. The reunited +party would then have the Griffin as a kind of floating fort or refuge, +and by means of it keep easily in communication with the settlements. + +La Salle wanted to build a chain of forts from Niagara to the mouth of +the Mississippi, when that could be reached. Around each of these, and +protected by them, he foresaw settlements of French and Indians, and +a vast trade in furs and the products of the undeveloped west. Thus +France would acquire a province many times its own size. The undertaking +was greater than conquering a kingdom. Nobody else divined at that time +the wonderful promise of the west as La Salle pictured it. Little +attention had been paid to the discoveries of Marquette and Jolliet. +France would have got no benefit from them had not La Salle so soon +followed on the track of missionary and trader, verified what had been +done, and pushed on. + +He had seen Jolliet twice. The first time they met near Niagara, when +both were exploring; the second time, Jolliet is said to have stopped +with his maps and papers before they were lost at Fort Frontenac, on +his return from his Mississippi voyage. La Salle, then master of Fort +Frontenac, must have examined these charts and journals with interest. +It does not appear that the two men were ever very friendly. Jolliet +was too easily satisfied to please La Salle; he had not the ability to +spread France's dominion over the whole western wilderness, and that was +what La Salle was planning to do before Marquette and Jolliet set out +for the Mississippi. + +St. Ignace became once more the starting point of an important +expedition, though La Salle, before sending the Griffin back, sailed in +her as far as the Bay of Puans, where many of his furs were collected. +He parted with this good ship in September. She pointed her prow +eastward, and he turned south with fourteen men in four canoes, carrying +tools, arms, goods, and even a blacksmith's forge. + +Through storm, and famine, and peril with Indians they labored down the +lake, and did not reach the place where they were to meet Tonty until +the first of November. La Salle had the three Récollet friars with him. +Though one was a man sixty-four years old, he bore, with his companions, +every hardship patiently and cheerfully. The story of priests who helped +to open the wilderness and who carried religion to savages is a +beautiful chapter of our national life. + +Tonty was not at the place where they were to meet him. This was the +mouth of the St. Joseph River, which La Salle named the Miamis. The men +did not want to wait, for they were afraid of starving if they reached +the Illinois country after the Indians had scattered to winter hunting +grounds. But La Salle would not go on until Tonty appeared. He put the +men to work building a timber stockade, which he called Fort Miamis; +thus beginning in the face of discouragement his plan of creating a line +of fortifications. + +Tonty, delayed by lack of provisions and the need of hunting, reached +Fort Miamis with his men in twenty days. But the Griffin did not come +at all. More than time enough had passed for her to reach Fort Niagara, +unload her cargo, and return. La Salle watched the lake constantly for +her sails. He began to be heavy-hearted for her, but he dared wait no +longer; so, sending two men back to meet and guide her to this new post, +he moved on. + +Eight canoes carried his party of thirty-three people. They ascended the +St. Joseph River to find a portage to the head waters of the Illinois. +This brought them within the present state of Indiana; and when they had +reached that curve of the river where South Bend now stands, they left +St. Joseph to grope for the Theakiki, or Kankakee, a branch called by +some Indians the Illinois itself. + +La Salle became separated from the party on this portage, eagerly and +fearlessly scouring the woods for the river's beginning. Tonty camped +and waited for him, fired guns, called, and searched; but he was gone +all night and until the next afternoon. The stars were blotted overhead, +for a powder of snow thickened the air, weirdly illuminating naked trees +in the darkness, but shutting in his vision. It was past midnight when +he came in this blind circle once more to the banks of the St. Joseph, +and saw a fire glinting through dense bushes. + +"Now I have reached camp," thought La Salle, and he fired his gun to let +his people know he was approaching. Echoes rolled through the woods. +Without waiting for a shot in reply he hurried to the fire. No person +was near it. The descending snow hissed, caught in the flames. Here was +a home hearth prepared in the wilderness, and no welcome to it but +silence. La Salle called out in every Indian language he knew. Dead +branches grated, and the stream rustled betwixt its edges of ice. A heap +of dry grass was gathered for a bed under a tree by the fire, and its +elastic top showed the hollow where a man had lain. La Salle put some +more wood on the fire, piled a barricade of brush around the bed, and +lay down in a place left warm by some strolling Indian whom his gun had +frightened away. He slept until morning. In the afternoon he found his +own camp. + +From the first thread of the Kankakee oozing out of swamps to the Indian +town on the Illinois River where Marquette had done his last missionary +work, was a long canoe journey. It has been said the rivers of the New +World made its rapid settlement possible; for they were open highways, +even in the dead of winter guiding the explorer by their frozen courses. + +The Illinois tribe had scattered to their hunting, and the lodges stood +empty. La Salle's men were famished for supplies, so he ventured to open +the covered pits in which the Indians stored their corn. Nothing was +more precious than this hidden grain; but he paid for what he took when +he reached the Indians. This was not until after New Year's day. He had +descended the river as far as that expansion now called Peoria Lake. + +The Illinois, after their first panic at the appearance of strange white +men, received La Salle's party kindly, fed all with their own fingers, +and, as they had done with Jolliet and Marquette when those explorers +passed them on the Mississippi, tried to coax their guests to go no +farther. They and other Indians who came to the winter camp told such +tales of danger on that great river about which the French knew so +little, that six of La Salle's men deserted in one night. + +This caused him to move half a league beyond the Illinois camp, +where, on the southern bank, he built a palisaded fort and called it +Crèvecoeur. He was by this time convinced that the Griffin was lost. +Whether she went down in a storm, or was scuttled and sunk by those to +whom he intrusted her, nothing was ever heard of her again. The furs he +had sent to pay his creditors never in any way reached port. If they +escaped shipwreck, they were stolen by the men who escaped with them. + +Nothing could bend La Salle's resolution. He meant in some way to +explore the west through which the southern Mississippi ran. But the +loss of the Griffin hurt him sorely. He could not go on without more +supplies; and having no vessel to bring them, the fearful necessity was +before him of returning on foot and by canoe to Fort Frontenac to bring +them himself. + +He began to build another ship on the Illinois River, and needed cables +and rigging for her. This vessel being partly finished by the first of +March, he left her and Fort Crèvecoeur in Tonty's charge, and, taking +four Frenchmen and a Mohegan hunter, set out on the long and terrible +journey to Fort Frontenac. + +The Italian commandant with the copper hand could number on its metal +fingers the only men to be trusted in his garrison of fifteen. One +Récollet, Father Louis Hennepin, had been sent with two companions by +La Salle to explore the upper Mississippi. Father Ribourde and Father +Membré remained. The young Sieur de Boisrondet might also be relied +on, as well as a Parisian lad named Étienne Renault, and their servant +L'Esperance. As for the others, smiths, shipwrights, and soldiers were +ready to mutiny any moment. They cared nothing about the discovery of +the west. They were afraid of La Salle when he was with them; and, +though it is said no man could help loving Tonty, these lawless fellows +loved their own wills better. + +The two men that La Salle had sent to look for the Griffin arrived at +Fort Crèvecoeur, bearing a message from him, having met him on the +way. They had no news, but he wrote a letter and sent them on to Tonty. +He urged Tonty to take part of the garrison and go and fortify a great +rock he had noticed opposite the Illinois town. Whatever La Salle wanted +done Tonty was anxious to accomplish, though separating himself from +Crèvecoeur, even for a day, was a dangerous experiment. But he took +some men and ascended the river to the rock. Straight-way smiths, +shipwrights, and soldiers in Crèvecoeur, seizing powder, lead, furs, +and provisions, deserted and made their way back to Canada. Boisrondet, +the friars, and L'Esperance hurried to tell Tonty; and thus Fort +Crèvecoeur and the partly finished ship had to be abandoned. Tonty +dispatched four men to warn La Salle of the disaster. He could neither +hold this position nor fortify the rock in the midst of jealous savages +with two friars, one young officer, a lad, and one servant. He took the +forge, and tools, and all that was left in Crèvecoeur into the very +heart of the Indian village and built a long lodge, shaped like the +wigwams of the Illinois. This was the only way to put down their +suspicion. Seeing that the Frenchmen had come to dwell among them, the +Indians were pleased, and their women helped with poles and mats to +build the lodge. + +For by this time, so long did it take to cover distances in the +wilderness, spring and summer were past, and the Illinois were dwelling +in their great town, nearly opposite the rock which La Salle desired to +have fortified. Tonty often gazed at it across the river, which flows +southwestward there, with a ripple that does not break into actual +rapids. The yellow sandstone height, rising like a square mountain out +of the shore, was tufted with ferns and trees. No man could ascend it +except at the southeast corner, and at that place a ladder or a rope was +needed by the unskillful. It had a flat, grassy top shut in by trees, +through which one could see the surrounding country as from a tower. +A ravine behind it was banked and floored with dazzling white sand, and +walled at the farther side by a timbered cliff rising to a prairie. +With a score of men Tonty could have held this natural fortress against +any attack. Buckets might be rigged from overhanging trees to draw up +water from the river. Provisions and ammunition only were needed for a +garrison. This is now called Starved Rock, and is nearly opposite the +town of Utica. Some distance up the river is a longer ridge, yet known +as Buffalo Rock, easy of ascent at one end, up which the savages are +said to have chased buffaloes; and precipitous at the other, down which +the frightened beasts plunged to death. + +The tenth day of September a mellow autumn sun shone on maize fields +where squaws labored, on lazy old braves sprawled around buffalo robes, +gambling with cherry stones, and on peaceful lodges above which the blue +smoke faintly wavered. It was so warm the fires were nearly out. Young +warriors of the tribes were away on an expedition; but the populous +Indian town swarmed with its thousands. + +Father Ribourde and Father Membré had that morning withdrawn a league up +the river to make what they called a retreat for prayer and meditation. +The other Frenchmen were divided between lodge and garden. + +Near this living town was the town of the dead, a hamlet of scaffolds, +where, wrapped in skins, above the reach of wolves, Illinois Indians of +a past generation slept their winters and summers away. Crows flapped +across them and settled on the corn, causing much ado among the papooses +who were set to shout and rattle sticks for the protection of the crop. + +Suddenly a man ran into camp, having just leaped from the canoe which +brought him across the river. When he had talked an instant old braves +bounded to their feet with furious cries, the tribes flocked out of +lodges, and women and children caught the panic and came screeching. + +"What is the matter?" exclaimed Tonty, unable to understand their rapid +jargon. The Frenchmen drew together with the instinct of uniting in +peril, and, led by old men, the Indian mob turned on them. + +"What is it?" cried Tonty. + +"The Iroquois are coming! The Iroquois are coming to eat us up! These +Frenchmen have brought the Iroquois upon us!" + +"Will you stand off!" Tonty warned them. And every brave in the town +knew what they called the medicine hand in his right gauntlet, powerful +and hard as a war club. They stood in awe of it as something more than +human. He put his followers behind him. The Frenchmen crowded back to +back, facing the savage crowd. Hampered by his imperfect knowledge of +their language, he hearkened intently to the jangle of raging voices, +his keen dark eyes sweeping from face to face. Tonty was a man of +impressive presence, who inspired confidence even in Indians. They held +back from slaying him and his people, but fiercely accused him. Young +braves dragged from the French lodge the goods and forge saved from Fort +Crèvecoeur, and ran yelling to heave everything into the river. + +"The Iroquois are your friends! The Iroquois are at peace with the +French! But they are marching here to eat us up!" + +"We know nothing about the Iroquois!" shouted Tonty. "If they are coming +we will go out with you to fight them!" + +Only half convinced, but panic-stricken from former encounters with a +foe who always drove them off their land, they turned from threatening +Tonty and ran to push out their canoes. Into these were put the women +and children, with supplies, and all were paddled down river to an +island, where guards could be set. The warriors then came back and +prepared for fighting. They greased their bodies, painted their faces, +made ready their weapons, and danced and howled to excite one another +to courage. All night fires along shore, and leaping figures, were +reflected in the dark river. + +About dawn, scouts who had been sent to watch the Iroquois came running +with news that the enemy were almost in sight across the prairie on the +opposite side, slipping under cover of woods along a small branch of the +Illinois River. They had guns, pistols, and swords, and carried bucklers +of rawhide. The scouts declared that a Jesuit priest and La Salle +himself led them. + +The Frenchmen's lives seemed hardly a breath long. In the midst of +maddened, screeching savages Tonty and his men once more stood back to +back, and he pushed off knives with his copper hand. + +"Do you want to kill yourselves?" he shouted. "If you kill us, the +French governor will not leave a man of you alive! I tell you Monsieur +de la Salle is not with the Iroquois, nor is any priest leading them! +Do you not remember the good Father Marquette? Would such men as he +lead tribes to fight one another? If all the Iroquois had stolen French +clothes, you would think an army of Jesuits and Messieurs de la Salle +were coming against you!" + +"But some one has brought the Iroquois upon us!" + +"I told you before we know nothing about the Iroquois! But we will go +with you now to fight them!" + +At that the Illinois put their knives in their belts and ran shouting to +throw themselves into the canoes. Warfare with American Indians was +always the rush of a mob, where every one acted for himself without +military order. + +"It is well the good friars are away making their retreat," said Tonty +to Boisrondet and Étienne Renault while they paddled as fast as they +could across the river with the Illinois. "Poor old L'Esperance must be +making a retreat, too." + +"I have not myself seen him since last night," Boisrondet remembered. + +"He put out in a canoe when the Indians were embarking their women and +children," said Étienne Renault. "I saw him go." + +And so it proved afterwards. But L'Esperance had slipped away to bring +back Father Membré and Father Ribourde to tend the wounded and dying. + +[Illustration: Long House of the Iroquois.] + +Having crossed the river and reached the prairie, Tonty and his allies +saw the Iroquois. They came prancing and screeching on their savage +march, and would have been ridiculous if they had not been appalling. +These Hodenosaunee, or People of the Long House, as they called +themselves, were the most terrible force in the New World. Tonty saw +at once it would go hard with the Illinois nation. Never at any time +as hardy as their invaders, who by frequent attacks had broken their +courage, and weakened by the absence of their best warriors, they +wavered in their first charge. + +He put down his gun and offered to carry a peace belt to the Iroquois to +stop the fight. The Illinois gladly gave him a wampum girdle and sent a +young Indian with him. Boisrondet and Étienne Renault also walked at his +side into the open space between two barbaric armies. The Iroquois did +not stop firing when he held up and waved the belt in his left hand. +Bullets spattered on the hummocky sod of the prairie around him. + +"Go back," Tonty said to Boisrondet and Renault and the young Indian. +"What need is there of so many? Take the lad back, Boisrondet." + +They hesitated to leave him. + +"Go back!" he repeated sharply, so they turned, and he ran on alone. The +Iroquois guns seemed to flash in his face. It was like throwing himself +among furious wolves. Snarling lips and snaky eyes and twisting sinuous +bodies made nightmares around him. He felt himself seized; a young +warrior stabbed him in the side. The knife glanced on a rib, but blood +ran down his buckskins and filled his throat. + +"Stop!" shouted an Iroquois chief. "This is a Frenchman; his ears are +not pierced." + +Tonty's swarthy skin was blanching with the anguish of his wound, which +turned him faint. His black hair clung in rings to a forehead wet with +cold perspiration. But he held the wampum belt aloft and spat the blood +out of his mouth. + +"Iroquois! The Illinois nation are under the protection of the French +king and Governor Frontenac! I demand that you leave them in peace!" + +A young brave snatched his hat and lifted it on the end of a gun. +At that the Illinois began a frenzied attack, thinking he was killed. +Tonty was spun around as in a whirlpool. He felt a hand in his hair and +a knife at his scalp. + +"I never," he thought to himself, "was in such perplexity in my life!" + +"Burn him!" shouted some. + +"But he is French!" others cried. "Let him go!" + +Through all the uproar he urged the peace belt and threatened them with +France. The wholesome dread which Governor Frontenac had given to that +name had effect on them. Besides, they had not surprised the Illinois, +and if they declared a truce, time would be gained to consider their +future movements. + +The younger braves were quieted, and old warriors gave Tonty a belt +to carry back to the Illinois. He staggered across the prairie. Father +Ribourde and Father Membré, who had just reached the spot, ran to meet +him, and supported him as he half fainted from loss of blood. + +Tonty and his allies withdrew across the river. But the Iroquois, +instead of retreating, followed. Seeing what must happen, Tonty thought +it best for the Illinois to give up their town and go to protect their +women and children, while he attempted as long as possible to keep the +invaders at bay. Lodges were set on fire, and the Illinois withdrew +quietly down river, leaving some of their men in the bluffs less than a +league from the town, to bring them word of the result. The Frenchmen, +partially rebuilding their own lodge, which had been wrecked when their +goods were thrown in the river, stood their ground in the midst of +insulting savages. + +For the Iroquois, still determined on war and despoiling, opened maize +pits, scattering and burning the grain; trampled corn in the fields; and +even pulled the dead off their scaffolds. They were angry at the French +for threatening them with that invisible power of France, and bent on +chasing the Illinois. Yet Tonty was able to force a kind of treaty +between them and the retreating nation, through the men left in the +bluffs. As soon as they had made it, however, they began canoes of elm +bark, to follow the Illinois down river. + +Two or three days passed, while the Frenchmen sat covering the invaded +tribe's retreat. They scarcely slept at night. Their enemies prowled +around their lodge or celebrated dances on the ruins of the town. +The river flowed placidly, and the sun shone on desolation and on +the unaltered ferny buttresses of the great rock and its castellated +neighbors. Tonty heard with half delirious ears the little creatures +which sing in the grass and fly before man, but return to their singing +as soon as he passes by. The friars dressed and tended his fevered +wound, and when the Iroquois sent for him to come to a council, Father +Membré went with him. + +Within the rude fort of posts and poles saved from ruined lodges, which +the Iroquois had built for themselves, adding a ruff of freshly chopped +trees, the two white men sat down in a ring of glowering savages. Six +packs of beaver skins were piled ready for the oration; and the orator +rose and addressed Tonty. + +With the first two the Indian spokesman promised that his nation would +not eat Count Frontenac's children, those cowardly Illinois. + +The next was a plaster to heal Tonty's wound. + +The next was oil to anoint him and the Récollets, so their joints would +move easily in traveling. + +The next said that the sun was bright. + +And the sixth and last pack ordered the French to get up and leave +the country. + +When the speaker sat down, Tonty came to his feet and looked at the +beaver skins piled before them. Then he looked around the circle of hard +weather-beaten faces and restless eyes, and thanked the Iroquois for +their gift. + +"But I would know," said Tonty, "how soon you yourselves intend to +leave the country and let the Illinois be in peace?" + +There was a growl, and a number of the braves burst out with the +declaration that they intended to eat Illinois flesh first. + +Tonty raised his foot and kicked the beaver skins from him. In that very +way they would have rejected a one-sided treaty themselves. Up they +sprang with drawn knives and drove him and Father Membré from the fort. + +All night the French stood guard for fear of being surprised and +massacred in their lodge. At daybreak the chiefs ordered them to go +without waiting another hour, and gave them a leaky boat. + +Tonty had protected the retreat of the Illinois as long as he could. +With the two Récollets, Boisrondet, young Renault, and L'Esperance, and +with little else, he set out up the river. + +[Illustration: SITE OF FORT ST. LOUIS OF THE ILLINOIS. +From a Recent Photograph.] + + + + +IV. + +THE UNDESPAIRING NORMAN. + + +"The northward current of the eastern shore of Lake Michigan and +the southward current of the western shore," says a writer exact in +knowledge, "naturally made the St. Joseph portage a return route to +Canada, and the Chicago portage an outbound one." But though La Salle +was a careful observer and must have known that what was then called the +Chekago River afforded a very short carrying to the Desplaines or upper +Illinois, he saw fit to use the St. Joseph both coming and going. + +His march to Fort Frontenac he afterwards described in a letter to one +of the creditors interested in his discoveries. + +"Though the thaws of approaching spring greatly increased the difficulty +of the way, interrupted as it was everywhere by marshes and rivers, to +say nothing of the length of the journey, which is about five hundred +leagues in a direct line, and the danger of meeting Indians of four or +five different nations, through whose country we were to pass, as well +as an Iroquois army which we knew was coming that way; though we must +suffer all the time from hunger; sleep on the open ground, and often +without food; watch by night and march by day, loaded with baggage, such +as blanket, clothing, kettle, hatchet, gun, powder, lead, and skins to +make moccasins; sometimes pushing through thickets, sometimes climbing +rocks covered with ice and snow; sometimes wading whole days through +marshes where the water was waist deep or even more,--all this did not +prevent me from going to Fort Frontenac to bring back the things we +needed and to learn myself what had become of my vessel." + +Carrying their canoes where the river was frozen, and finally leaving +them hidden near where the town of Joliet now stands, La Salle and his +men pushed on until they reached the fort built at the mouth of the St. +Joseph. Here he found the two voyageurs he had sent to search for the +Griffin. They said they had been around the lake and could learn nothing +of her. He then directed them to Tonty, while he marched up the eastern +shore. This Michigan region was debatable ground among the Indians, +where they met to fight; and he left significant marks on the trees, to +make prowlers think he had a large war party. A dozen or twenty roving +savages, ready to pounce like ferocious wildcats on a camp, always +peeled white places on the trees, and cut pictures there of their totem, +or tribe mark, and the scalps and prisoners they had taken. They +respected a company more numerous than themselves, and avoided it. + +Stopping to nurse the sick when some fell ill of exposure, or to build +canoes when canoes were needed, La Salle did not reach Fort Niagara +until Easter, and it was May when Fort Frontenac came into view. + +No man ever suffered more from treachery. Before he could get +together the supplies he needed, trouble after trouble fell upon him. +The men that Tonty had sent to tell him about the destruction of Fort +Crèvecoeur were followed by others who brought word that the deserters +had destroyed his forts at the St. Joseph River and Niagara, and carried +off all the goods. The Griffin was certainly lost. And before going back +to the Illinois country he was obliged to chase these fellows and take +from them what could be recovered. But when everybody else seemed +to be against him, it was much comfort to remember he had a faithful +lieutenant while the copper-handed Italian lived. + +La Salle gathered twenty-five men of trades useful to him, and another +outfit with all that he needed for a ship, having made new arrangements +with his creditors; and going by way of Michilimackinac, he reached the +St. Joseph early in November. + +Whenever, in our own day, we see the Kankakee still gliding along its +rocky bed, or the solemn Illinois spreading betwixt wooded banks, it is +easy to imagine a birch canoe just appearing around a bend, carrying La +Salle or Tonty, and rowed by buckskin-clad voyageurs. On the Kankakee +thousands of buffaloes filled the plains, and La Salle's party killed +many, preparing the flesh in dried flakes by smoking it. + +The buffaloes were left behind when they approached the great town on +the Illinois. La Salle glanced up at the rock he wanted fortified, but +no palisade or Frenchman was to be seen. + +"It seems very quiet," he said to the men in his canoe, "and we have not +passed a hunter. There--there is the meadow where the town stood; but +where is the town?" + +Heaps of ashes, charred poles, broken scaffolds, wolves prowling where +papooses had played, crows whirling in black clouds or sitting in rows +on naked branches, bones,--a horrible waste plain had taken the place of +the town. + +The Frenchmen scattered over it, eagerly seeking some trace of Tonty and +his companions. They labored all day, until the sun set, among dreadful +sights which they could never forget, without finding any clue to his +fate. + +They piled charred wood together and made a fire and camped among ruins. +But La Salle lay awake all night, watching the sharp-pointed autumn +stars march overhead, and suffering what must have seemed the most +unendurable of all his losses. + +Determined not to give up his friend, he rose next morning and helped +the men hide their heavy freight in the rocks, leaving two of them to +hide with and guard it, and went on down the Illinois River. On one bank +the retreat of the invaded tribe could be traced, and on the other the +dead camp-fires of the Iroquois who had followed them. But of Tonty and +his Frenchmen there was still no sign. + +La Salle saw the ruins of Fort Crèvecoeur and his deserted vessel. And +so searching he came to the mouth of the Illinois and saw for the first +time that river of his ambitions, the Mississippi. There he turned back, +leaving a letter tied to a tree, on the chance of its sometime falling +into the hands of Tonty. There was nothing to do but to take his men and +goods from among the rocks near the destroyed town and return to Fort +Miamis, on the St. Joseph, which some of his followers had rebuilt. The +winter was upon them. + +La Salle never sat and brooded over trouble. He was a man of action. +Shut in with his men and goods, and obliged to wait until spring +permitted him to take the next step, he began at once to work on Indian +hunters, and to draw their tribes towards forming a settlement around +the rock he meant to fortify on the Illinois. Had he been able to attach +turbulent voyageurs to him as he attached native tribes, his heroic life +would have ended in success even beyond his dreams. Tonty could better +deal with ignorant men, his military training standing him in good +stead; yet Tonty dared scarcely trust a voyageur out of his sight. + +While Tonty and La Salle were passing through these adventures, the +Récollet father, Louis Hennepin, and his two companions, sent by La +Salle, explored the upper Mississippi. One of these was named Michael +Ako; the other, Du Gay, a man from Picardy in France. + +They left Fort Crèvecoeur on the last day of February, twenty-four +hours before La Salle started northward, and entered the Mississippi on +the 12th of March. The great food-stocked stream afforded them plenty of +game, wild turkeys, buffaloes, deer, and fish. The adventurers excused +themselves from observing the Lenten season set apart by the Church for +fasting; but Father Hennepin said prayers several times a day. He was +a great robust Fleming, with almost as much endurance as that hardy +Norman, La Salle. + +They had paddled about a month up river through the region where +Marquette and Jolliet had descended, when one afternoon they stopped to +repair their canoe and cook a wild turkey. Hennepin, with his sleeves +rolled back, was daubing the canoe with pitch, and the others were busy +at the fire, when a war whoop, followed by continuous yelling, echoed +from forest to forest, and a hundred and twenty naked Sioux or Dacotah +Indians sprang out of boats to seize them. It was no use for Father +Hennepin to show a peace-pipe or offer fine tobacco. The Frenchmen were +prisoners. And when these savages learned by questioning with signs, and +by drawing on the sand with a stick, that the Miamis, whom they were +pursuing to fight, were far eastward out of their reach, three or four +old warriors laid their hands on Hennepin's shaven crown and began to +cry and howl like little boys. + +[Illustration: Totem of the Sioux.] + +The friar in his long gray capote or hooded garment, which fell to his +feet, girt about the waist by a rope called the cord of St. Francis, +stood, with bare toes showing on his sandals, inclining his fat head +with sympathy. He took out his handkerchief and wiped the old men's +faces. Du Gay and Ako, in spite of the peril, laughed to see him daub +the war paint. + +"The good father hath no suspicion that these old wretches are dooming +him to death," said Ako to Du Gay. + +It appeared afterwards that this was what the ceremony meant. For +several days the Frenchmen, carried northward in their captors' boats, +expected to die. No calumet was smoked with them; and every night one +of the old chiefs, named Aquipaguetin, who had lost a son in war and +formed a particular intention of taking somebody's scalp for solace, +sat by the prisoners stroking them and howling by the hour. One night +when the Frenchmen were forced to make their fire at the end of the +camp, Aquipaguetin sent word that he meant to finish them without more +delay. But they gave him some goods out of the store La Salle had sent +with them, and he changed his mind and concluded to wait awhile. He +carried the bones of one of his dead relations, dried and wrapped in +skins gaily ornamented with porcupine-quill work; and it was his custom +to lay these bones before the tribe and request that everybody blow +smoke on them. Of the Frenchmen, however, he demanded hatchets, beads, +and cloth. This cunning old Sioux wanted to get all he could before the +party reached their villages, where the spoil would be divided. + +Nineteen days after their capture the prisoners were brought to a place +which is now the site of St. Paul in the state of Minnesota, where the +Sioux disbanded, scattering to their separate towns. They had finally +smoked the peace-pipe with the Frenchmen; and now, fortunately without +disagreement, portioned their white captives and distributed the goods. +Father Hennepin was given to Aquipaguetin, who promptly adopted him +as a son. The Flemish friar saw with disgust his gold-embroidered +vestments, which a missionary always carried with him for the impressive +celebration of mass, displayed on savage backs and greatly admired. + +The explorers were really in the way of seeing as much of the +upper Mississippi as they could desire. They were far north of the +Wisconsin's mouth, where white men first entered the great river. +The young Mississippi, clear as a mountain stream, gathered many small +tributaries. St. Peter's joined it from a blue-earth channel. This +rugged northern world was wonderfully beautiful, with valleys and +heights and rocks and waterfalls. + +The Sioux were tall, well-made Indians, and so active that the smaller +Frenchmen could hardly keep up with them on the march. They sometimes +carried Du Gay and Ako over streams, but the robust friar they forced to +wade or swim; and when he lagged lame-footed with exhaustion across the +prairies, they set fire to grass behind him, obliging him to take to his +heels with them or burn. By adoption into the family of Aquipaguetin +he had a large relationship thrust upon him, for the old weeper had +many wives and children and other kindred. Hennepin indeed felt that +he was not needed and might at any time be disposed of. He never had +that confidence in his father Aquipaguetin which a son should repose +in a parent. + +He was separated from Ako and Du Gay, who were taken to other villages. +By the time he reached father Aquepaguetin's house he was so exhausted, +and his legs, cut by ice in the streams, were so swollen that he fell +down on a bear robe. The village was on an island in a sheet of water +afterwards called Lake Buade. Hennepin was kindly received by his new +family, who fed him as well as they were able, for the Sioux had little +food when they were not hunting. Seeing him so feeble, they gave him an +Indian sweating bath, which he found good for his health. They made a +lodge of skins so tight that it would hold heat, and put into it stones +baked to a white heat. On these they poured water and shut Hennepin in +the steam until he sweated freely. + +The Sioux had two kinds of lodges--one somewhat resembling those of the +Illinois, the other a cone of poles with skins stretched around, called +a tepee. + +Father Hennepin did little missionary work among these Indians. He +suffered much from hunger, being a man who loved good cheer. But the +tribes went on a buffalo hunt in July and killed plenty of meat. All +that northern world was then clothed in vivid verdure. Honeysuckles and +wild grapevines made the woods fragrant. The gentian, which jealously +closes its blue-fringed cup from the human eye, grew close to the lakes. +Captive though the Frenchmen were, they could not help enjoying the +evening camp-fire with its weird flickerings against the dark of savage +forests, the heat-lightning which heralded or followed storms, the +waters, clear, as if filtered through icebergs, dashing in foam over +mossy rocks. + +They met during the buffalo hunt, and it was about this time that some +"spirits," or white men, were heard of, coming from Lake Superior. These +proved to be the great ranger Greysolon du Lhut and four other +Frenchmen. + +This man, cousin to Tonty, passed nearly his whole life in the woods, +going from Indian town to Indian town, or planting outposts of his +own in the wilderness. Occasionally he went to France, and the king's +magnificence at Versailles was endured by him until he could gain some +desired point from the colonial minister and hurry back. The government +relied on him to keep lawless coureurs de bois within bounds, and he +traded with nearly all the western tribes. When Greysolon du Lhut +appeared, the Sioux treated their prisoners with deference; and from +that time Hennepin, Du Gay, and Ako went where they pleased. + +They seemed to have had no thought of returning to Fort Crèvecoeur. +In those days when each man took his individual life in his hands and +guarded it in ways which seemed best to him, it was often expedient to +change one's plan of action. About the time that Tonty was obliged to +abandon Fort Crèvecoeur, Hennepin and his companions set off eastward +with Greysolon du Lhut's party. Hennepin sailed for France as soon as he +could and wrote a book about his adventures. It was one of La Salle's +misfortunes that this friar should finally even lay claim to discovering +the mouth of the Mississippi, adding the glory of that to these real +adventures on its upper waters. + +The first of March, La Salle, with a number of the men he had gathered, +started from Fort Miamis to the Illinois country. The prairies were one +dazzling expanse of snow, and as the party slid along on the broad, +flat snowshoes to which their feet were strapped, some of them were +so blinded that the pain in their eyes became unendurable. These were +obliged to camp in the edge of some woods, while the rest went on. + +La Salle himself was sitting in darkness while the spring sun struck a +million sparkles from a world yet locked in winter. The wind chilled +his back, and he spread his hands to the camp blaze. In the torment +of snow-blindness he wondered whether Tonty was treading these white +wastes, seeking him, or lying dead of Indian wounds under the snow +crust. The talk of the other snow-blinded men, sitting about or +stretched with their feet to the fire, was lost on his ear. Yet his one +faithful servant, who went with him on all his journeys, could not see +anything but calm fortitude on his face as he lifted it at the approach +of snowshoes. + +"I cannot see you, Hunaut," said La Salle. "Did you find some pine +leaves?" + +"I found some, monsieur." + +"Steep them as soon as you can for the men's eyes." + +"I wish to tell you, monsieur," the man said as he went about his task +with a snow-filled kettle, "that I found also a party of Fox Indians +from Green Bay, and they gave me news of Monsieur de Tonty." + +Hunaut looked at the long, pale face of his master and saw the under lip +tremble and twitch. + +"You know I am much bound to Monsieur de Tonty. Is he alive?" + +"He is alive, monsieur. He has been obliged to pass the winter at Green +Bay. Father Hennepin has also passed through that country on his way to +Montreal." + +La Salle felt his troubles melt with the unlocking of winter. The brief +but agonizing snow-blindness passed away with a thaw; and, overtaking +his other men, he soon met the returning Illinois tribe and began the +Indian settlement around the rock he intended to fortify. + +Already the Miami tribe was following him, and he drew them into an +alliance with the Illinois, impressively founding the principality soon +to grow there. This eloquent Norman Frenchman had gifts in height and +the large bone and sinew of Normandy, which his Indian allies always +admired. And he well knew where to impress his talk with coats, shirts, +guns, and hunting-knives. As his holdings of land in Canada were made +his stepping-stones toward the west, so the footing he gained at Fort +Miamis and in the Illinois country was to be used in discovering the +real course of the Mississippi and taking possession of its vast basin. + +It was the end of May before he met Tonty at St. Ignace; Italian and +Frenchman coming together with outstretched arms and embracing. Tonty's +black eyes were full of tears, but La Salle told his reverses as calmly +as if they were another man's. + +"Any one else," said Father Membré, who stood by, "would abandon the +enterprise, but Monsieur de la Salle has no equal for constancy of +purpose." + +"But where is Father Ribourde?" La Salle inquired, missing the other +Récollet. + +Tonty told him sorrowfully how Father Ribourde had gone into the woods +when his party camped, after being driven up river in a leaky boat by +the Iroquois; how they had waited and searched for him, and were finally +made aware that a band of prowling Kickapoos had murdered him. + +Tonty had aimed at Green Bay by the Chicago portage, and tramped along +the west shore of Lake Michigan, having found it impossible to patch the +boat. + +"We were nearly starved," he said; "but we found a few ears of corn and +some frozen squashes in a deserted Indian town. When we reached the bay +we found an old canoe and mended it; but as soon as we were on the water +there rose a northwest wind with driving snow, which lasted nearly five +days. We ate all our food, and, not knowing what to do, turned back to +the deserted town to die by a warm fire in one of the wigwams. On the +way the bay froze. We camped to make moccasins out of Father Membré's +cloak. I was angry at Étienne Renault for not finishing his; but he +excused himself on account of illness, having a great oppression of the +stomach, caused by eating a piece of an Indian rawhide shield which he +could not digest. His delay proved our salvation, for the next day, as I +was urging him to finish the moccasins, a party of Ottawas saw the smoke +of our fire and came to us. We gave them such a welcome as never was +seen before. They took us into their canoes and carried us to an Indian +village only two leagues off. All the Indians took pleasure in sending +us food; so, after thirty-four days of starvation, we found our famine +turned to abundance." + +Tonty and La Salle, with their followers, paddled the thousand miles to +Fort Frontenac, to make another start into the wilderness. + +La Salle was now determined to keep his men together. He set down many +of his experiences and thoughts in letters which have been kept; so we +know at this day what was in the great explorer's mind, and how dear he +held "Monsieur de Tonty, who is full of zeal." + +On his return to the wilderness with another equipment, he went around +the head of Lake Michigan and made the short Chicago portage to the +Desplaines River. Entering by this branch the frozen Illinois, they +dragged their canoes on sledges past the site of the town and reached +open water below Peoria Lake. La Salle gave up the plan of building a +ship, and determined to go on in his canoes to the mouth of the +Mississippi. + +So, pausing to hunt when game was needed, his company of fifty-four +persons entered the great river, saw the Missouri rushing into it--muddy +current and clear northern stream flowing alongside until the waters +mingled. They met and overawed the Indians on both shores, building +several stockades. The broad river seemed to fill a valley, doubling and +winding upon itself with innumerable curves, in its solemn and lonely +stretches. Huge pieces of low-lying bank crumbled and fell in with +splashes, for the Mississippi ceaselessly eats away its own shore. + +A hundred leagues below the mouth of the Arkansas they came to a swamp +on the west side. Behind this swamp, they had been told, might be found +the Arkansas tribe's great town. La Salle sent Tonty and Father Membré, +with some voyageurs, to make friends with the Indians and bring him word +about the town. + +Tonty had seen nothing like it in the New World. The houses were large +and square, of sun-baked brick, with a dome of canes overhead. The two +largest were the chief's house and the temple. Doors were the only +openings. Tonty and the friar were taken in where the chief sat on a +bedstead with his squaws, and sixty old men, in white mulberry bark +cloaks, squatted by with the dignity of a council. The wives, in order +to honor the sovereign, yelled. + +The temple was a place where dead chiefs' bones were kept. A mud wall +built around it was ornamented with skulls. The inside was very rough. +Something like an altar stood in the center of the floor; and a fire of +logs was kept burning before it, and never allowed to go out, filling +the place with smoke, and irritating the eyes of two old Indians who +tended it in half darkness. The Frenchmen were not allowed to look into +a secret place where the temple treasure was kept. But, hearing it +consisted of pearls and trinkets, Tonty conjectured the Indians had got +it from the Spanish. This tribe was not unlike the Aztecs of Mexico. +The chief came in barbaric grandeur to visit La Salle, dressed in white, +having fans carried before him, and a plate of burnished copper to +represent the sun, for these lower Mississippians were sun-worshipers. + +With gifts and the grave consideration which instantly won Indians, La +Salle moved from tribe to tribe towards the Gulf. Red River pulsed upon +the course like a discharging artery. The sluggish alligator woke from +the ooze and poked up his snout at the canoes. "He is," says a quaint +old writer who made that journey afterwards, "the most frightful +master-fish that can be seen. I saw one that was as large as half a +hogshead. There are some, they say, as large as a hogshead and twelve +to fifteen feet long. I have no doubt they would swallow up a man if +they caught him." + +[Illustration: La Salle at the Mouth of the Mississippi.] + +In April La Salle reached his goal. He found that the Mississippi +divided its current into three strands and entered the Gulf through +three mouths. He separated his party; La Salle took the west passage, +and Tonty and another lieutenant the middle and the east. At the Gulf of +Mexico they came together again, and with solemn ceremonies claimed for +France all the country along the great river's entire length, and far +eastward and westward, calling it Louisiana, in honor of King Louis XIV. +A metal plate, bearing the arms of France, the king's name, and the date +of the discovery, was fixed on a pillar in the shifting soil. + +Hardy as he was, La Salle sometimes fell ill from the great exposures +he endured. And more than once he was poisoned by some revengeful +voyageur. It was not until the December following his discovery of the +Mississippi's mouth that he realized his plan of fortifying the rock +on the Illinois River. He and Tonty delighted in it, calling it Fort +St. Louis of the Illinois. Storehouses and quarters for a garrison rose +around its edges, protected by a palisade. A windlass was rigged to draw +water from the river below. On the northeast corner of the rock a low +earthwork remains to this day. + +Around this natural castle the Indian tribes gathered to La Salle, as to +a sovereign,--Miamis, Abenakis, and Shawanoes, from countries eastward, +and the Illinois returned to spread over their beloved meadow. Instead +of one town, many towns of log, or rush, or bark lodges could be seen +from the summit of the Rock. Years afterwards the French still spoke of +this fortress as Le Rocher. A little principality of twenty thousand +inhabitants, strong enough to repel any attack of the Iroquois, thus +helped to guard it. La Salle meant to supply his people with goods and +give them a market for their furs. At this time he could almost see the +success of his mighty enterprise assured; he could reasonably count on +strengthening his stockades along the Mississippi, and on building near +its mouth a city which would protect the entire west and give an outlet +to the undeveloped wealth of the continent. + +[Illustration: Louis XIV., King of France.] + +In the flush of his discovery and success La Salle went back to France, +leaving Tonty in charge of the Rock and the gathering Indian nations, +and laid his actual achievements before the king, asking for help. This +was made necessary by the change in the colonial government, which had +removed his friend Count Frontenac and left him at the mercy of enemies. + +The king was not slow to see the capacity of this wonderful man, so shy +of civilization that he lodged in a poor street, carrying with him the +very breath of the wilderness. La Salle asked for two ships; the king +gave him four; and many people and supplies were gathered to colonize +and stock the west. + +It was La Salle's intention to sail by way of the West Indies, cross the +Gulf of Mexico, and enter the mouth of the Mississippi. But the Gulf of +Mexico is rimmed with low marshy land, and he had never seen the mouth +of the Mississippi from seaward. His unfamiliarity with the coast, or +night, or fog cheated him of his destination, and the colony was landed +four hundred miles west of it, in a place called Matagorda Bay, in +Texas, which then belonged to the Spaniards. Although at the time of +discovery he had taken the latitude of that exact spot where he set the +post, he had been unable to determine the longitude; any lagoon might be +an opening of the triple mouth he sought. + +La Salle's brother, a priest, who sailed with him on this voyage, +testified afterwards that the explorer died believing he was near the +mouth of the Mississippi. Whatever may have been his thoughts, the +undespairing Norman grappled with his troubles in the usual way. +One of his vessels had been captured by the Spanish. Another had been +wrecked in the bay by seamen who were willing to injure him. These +contained supplies most needed for the colony. The third sailed away and +left him; and his own little ship, a gift of the king for his use along +the coast, was sunk by careless men while he was absent searching +northward for the Mississippi. + +Many of the colonists fell sick and died. Men turned sullen and tried to +desert. Some went hunting and were never seen again. Indians, who dare +not openly attack, skulked near and set the prairie on fire; and that +was a sight of magnificence, the earth seeming to burn like a furnace, +or, far as the eye could follow them, billows of flame rushing as across +a fire sea. But La Salle was wise, and cut the grass close around his +powder and camp. + +[Illustration: La Salle's Map of Texas.] + +Water, plains, trees combined endlessly, like the pieces of a +kaleidoscope, to confuse him in his search. Tonty was not at hand to +take care of the colony while he groped for the lost river. He moved his +wretched people from their camp, with all goods saved off the wreck in +the bay, to a better site for a temporary fort, on rising ground. The +carpenters proved good for nothing. La Salle himself planned buildings +and marked out mortises on the logs. First a large house roofed with +hides, and divided into apartments, was finished to shelter all. +Separate houses were afterwards built for the women and girls, and +barracks or rougher cells for the men. A little chapel was finally +added. And when high-pointed palisades surrounded the whole, La Salle, +perhaps thinking of his invincible rock on the Illinois and the +faithfulness of his copper-handed lieutenant guarding it, called this +outpost also Fort St. Louis. Cannon were mounted at the four corners of +the large house. As the balls were lost, they were loaded with bullets +in bags. + +Behind, the prairies stretched away to forests. In front rolled the bay, +with the restless ever-heaving motion of the Mexican Gulf. A delicious +salty air, like the breath of perpetual spring, blew in, tingling the +skin of the sulkiest adventurer with delight in this virgin world. +Fierce northers must beat upon the colonists, and the languors of summer +must in time follow; and they were homesick, always watching for sails. +Yet they had no lack of food. Oysters were so plentiful in the bay that +they could not wade without cutting their feet with the shells. Though +the alligator pushed his ugly snout and ridgy back out of lagoons, and +horned frogs frightened the children, and the rattlesnake was to be +avoided where it lay coiled in the grass, game of all kinds abounded. +Every man was obliged to hunt, and every woman and child to help smoke +the meat. Even the priests took guns in their hands. Father Membré +had brought some buffalo traditions from the Illinois country. He was +of Father Hennepin's opinion that this wild creature might be trained +to draw the plow, and he had faith that benevolence was concealed +behind its wicked eyes. + +As Father Membré stalked along the prairie with the hunters, his capote +tucked up out of his way on its cord, one of the men shot a buffalo and +it dropped. The buffaloes rarely fell at once, even when wounded to +death, unless hit in the spine. Father Membré approached it curiously. + +"Come back, Father!" shouted the hunters. + +Father Membré touched it gently with his gun. + +"Run, Father, run!" cried the hunters. + +"It is dead," asserted Father Membré. "I will rest my gun across its +carcass to steady my aim at the other buffaloes." + +He knelt to rest his gun across its back. + +The great beast heaved convulsively to its feet and made a dash at the +Récollet. It sent him revolving heels over head. But Father Membré got +up, and, spreading his capote in both hands, danced in front of the +buffalo to head it off from escaping. At that, with a bellow, the shaggy +creature charged over him across the prairie, dropping to its knees and +dying before the frightened hunters could lift the friar from the ground. + +"Are you hurt, Father?" they all asked, supporting him, and finding it +impossible to keep from laughing as he sat up, with his reverend face +skinned and his capote nearly torn off. + +"Not unto death," responded Father Membré, brushing grass and dirty hoof +prints from his garment. "But it hath been greatly impressed on my mind +that this ox-savage is no fit beast for the plow. Nor will I longer +counsel our women to coax the wild cows to a milking. It is well to +adapt to our needs the beasts of a country," said Father Membré, wiping +blood from his face. "But this buffalo creature hath disappointed me!" + +La Salle was prostrated through the month of November. But by Christmas +he was able to set out on a final search from which he did not intend +to return until he found the Mississippi. All hands in the fort were +busied on the outfit necessary for the party. Clothes were made of sails +recovered from one of the wrecked vessels. Eighteen men were to follow +La Salle, among them his elder brother, the Abbé Cavelier. Some had on +the remains of garments they had worn in France, and others were dressed +in deer or buffalo skins. He had bought five horses of the Indians to +carry the baggage. + +At midnight on Christmas Eve everybody crowded into the small fortress +chapel. The priests, celebrating mass, moved before the altar in such +gold-embroidered vestments as they had, and the light of torches +illuminated the rough log walls. Those who were to stay and keep the +outpost, literally lost in the wilderness, were on their knees weeping. +Those who were to go knelt also, with the dread of an awful uncertainty +in their minds. The faithful ones foresaw worse than peril from forests +and waters and savages, for La Salle could not leave behind all the +villains with whom he was obliged to serve himself. He alone showed the +composure of a man who never despairs. If he had positively known that +he was setting out upon a fatal journey,--that he was undertaking his +last march through the wilderness,--the mass lights would still have +shown the firm face of a man who did not turn back from any enterprise. +The very existence of these people who had come out to the New World +with him depended on his success. Whatever lay in the road he had to +encounter it. The most splendid lives may progress and end through what +we call tragedy; but it is better to die in the very stress of achievement +than to stretch a poor existence through a century. The contagion of his +hardihood stole out like the Christmas incense and spread through the +chapel. + + + + +V. + +FRENCH SETTLEMENTS. + + +"It was the establishment of military posts throughout this vast valley +that eventually brought on a life struggle between the English and the +French," says a historian. + +At first the only spot of civilization in boundless wilderness was +Tonty's little fort on the Illinois. Protected by it, the Indians went +hunting and brought in buffalo skins and meat; their women planted +and reaped maize; children were born; days came and went; autumn haze +made the distances pearly; winter snow lay on the wigwams; men ran on +snowshoes; and papooses shouted on the frozen river. Still no news came +from La Salle. + +[Illustration: MAP OF THE FRENCH SETTLEMENTS.] + +Tonty had made a journey to the mouth of the Mississippi to meet him, +after he landed with his colony, searching thirty leagues in each +direction along the coast. La Salle was at that time groping through a +maze of lagoons in Texas. Tonty, with his men, waded swamps to their +necks, enduring more suffering than he had ever endured in his life +before. This was in February of the year 1686. Finding it impossible to +reach La Salle, who must be wandering somewhere on the Gulf of Mexico, +Tonty wrote a letter to him, intrusting it to the hands of an Indian +chief, with directions that it be delivered when the explorer appeared. +He also left a couple of men who were willing to wait in the Arkansas +villages to meet La Salle. + +Two years passed before those men brought positive proof of the +undespairing Norman's fate. The remnant of the party that started with +La Salle from Fort St. Louis of Texas spent one winter at Fort St. Louis +of the Illinois, bringing word that they had left their leader in good +health on the coast. The Abbé Cavelier even collected furs in his +brother's name, and went on to France, carrying his secret with him. + +La Salle had been assassinated on the Trinity River, soon after setting +out on his last determined search for the Mississippi. The eighteenth +day of March, 1687, some of his brutal voyageurs hid themselves in +bushes and shot him. + +So slowly did events move then, and so powerless was man, an atom in the +wilderness, that the great-hearted Italian, weeping aloud in rage and +grief, realized that La Salle's bones had been bleaching a year and a +half before the news of his death reached his lieutenant. It was not +known that La Salle received burial. The wretches who assassinated him +threw him into some brush. It was a satisfaction to Tonty that they all +perished miserably afterwards; those who survived quarrels among +themselves being killed by the Indians. + +The undespairing Norman died instantly, without feeling or admitting +defeat. And he was not defeated. Though his colony--including Father +Membré, who had been so long with him--perished by the hands of the +Indians in Texas, in spite of Tonty's second journey to relieve them, +his plan of settlements from the great lakes to the mouth of the +Mississippi became a reality. + +Down from Canada came two of the eleven Le Moyne brothers, D'Iberville +and Bienville, fine fighting sons of a powerful colonial family, with +royal permission to found near the great river's mouth that city which +had been La Salle's dream. Fourteen years after La Salle's death, while +D'Iberville was exploring for a site, the old chief, to whom Tonty had +given a letter for La Salle, brought it carefully wrapped and delivered +it into the hands of La Salle's more fortunate successor. + +Tonty was associated with Le Moyne D'Iberville in these labors around +the Gulf. + +[Illustration: Autograph of Le Moyne D'Iberville.] + +A long peninsula betwixt the Mississippi and Kaskaskia Rivers, known +since as the American Bottom, lured away Indians from the great town on +the Illinois. The new settlement founded on this peninsula was called +Kaskaskia, for one of the tribes. As other posts sprung into existence, +Fort St. Louis was less needed. "As early as 1712," we are told, "land +titles were issued for a common field in Kaskaskia. Traders had already +opened a commerce in skins and furs with the remote post of Isle +Dauphine in Mobile Bay." Settlements were firmly established. By 1720 +the luxuries of Europe came into the great tract taken by La Salle in +the name of King Louis and called Louisiana. + +Twelve years after La Salle's death a missionary named St. Cosme (Sant' +Come) journeyed from Canada in a party guided by Tonty. St. Cosme has +left this record of the man with the copper hand:-- + +"He guided us as far as the Arkansas and gave us much pleasure on the +way, winning friendship of some savages and intimidating others who from +jealousy or desire to plunder opposed the voyage; not only doing the +duty of a brave man but that of a missionary. He quieted the voyageurs, +by whom he was generally loved, and supported us by his example in +devotion." + +On the Chicago portage a little boy, given to the missionary perhaps +because he was an orphan and the western country offered him the best +chances in life, started eagerly ahead, though he was told to wait. The +rest of the party, having goods and canoes to carry from the Chicago +River to the Desplaines, lost sight of him, and he was never seen again. +Autumn grass grew tall over the marshy portage, but they dared not set +it afire, though his fate was doubtless hidden in that grass. The party +divided and searched for him, calling and firing guns. Three days they +searched, and daring to wait no longer, for it was November and the +river ready to glaze with ice, they left him to some French people at +the post of Chicago. But the child was not found. He disappeared and no +one ever knew what became of him. + +Like this is Henri de Tonty's disappearance from history. The records +show him working with Le Moyne D'Iberville and Le Moyne de Bienville to +found New Orleans and Mobile, pushing the enterprises which La Salle had +begun. He has been blamed with the misbehavior of a relative of his, +Alphonse de Tonty, who got into disgrace at the post of Detroit. Little +justice has been done to the memory of this man, who should not be +forgotten in the west. So quietly did he slip out of life that his +burial place is unknown. Some people believe that he came back to the +Rock long after its buildings were dismantled and it had ceased to be +Fort St. Louis of the Illinois. Others say he died in Mobile. But it is +probable that both La Salle and Tonty left their bodies to the +wilderness which their invincible spirits had conquered. + +After the settlement of Kaskaskia a strong fortress was built sixteen +miles above, on the same side of the Mississippi. The king of France +spent a million crowns strengthening this place, which was called Fort +Chartres. Its massive walls, inclosing four acres, and its buildings and +arched gateway were like some medieval stronghold strangely transplanted +from the Old World. White uniformed troops paraded. A village sprang up +around it. Fort Chartres was the center of government until Kaskaskia +became the first capital of the Illinois territory. Applications for +land had to be made at this post. Indians on the Mississippi, for it was +a little distance from the shore, heard drumbeat and sunset gun, and +were proud of going in and out of its mighty gateway under the white +flag of France. + +Other villages began on the eastern bank of the river--Cahokia, opposite +the present city of St. Louis, and Prairie du Rocher, nearer Kaskaskia. +Ste. Genevieve also was built in what is now the state of Missouri, on +land which then was claimed by the Spaniards. There was a Post of +Natchitoches on the Red River, as well as a Post of Washita on the +Washita River. Settlements were also founded upon La Fourche and Fausse +Rivière above New Orleans. + +"The finest country we have seen," wrote one of the adventurers in those +days, "is all from Chicago to the Tamaroas. It is nothing but prairie +and clumps of wood as far as you can see. The Tamaroas are eight leagues +from the Illinois." Chicago was a landing place and portage from the +great lakes long before a stockade with a blockhouse was built called +Fort Dearborn. + +"Monjolly," wrote the same adventurer, "or Mount Jolliet, is a mound of +earth on the prairie on the right side of the Illinois River as you go +down, elevated about thirty feet. The Indians say at the time of the +great deluge one of their ancestors escaped, and this little mountain is +his canoe which he turned over there." + +La Salle had learned from the Iroquois about the Ohio River. But the +region through which it flowed to the Mississippi remained for a long +while an unbroken wilderness. The English settlements on their strip of +Atlantic coast, however, and the French settlements in the west, reached +gradually out over this territory and met and grappled. Whichever power +got and kept the mastery of the west would get the mastery of the +continent. + +The territory of Kentucky, like that of Michigan, was owned by no tribe +of Indians. "It was the common hunting and fighting ground of Ohio +tribes on the north and Cherokees and Chickasaws on the south." + +There was indeed one exception to the uninhabited state of all that land +stretching betwixt the Alleghanies and the Mississippi. Vincennes, now +a town of Indiana, was, after Kaskaskia, the oldest place in the west. +This isolated post is said to have been founded by French soldiers and +emigrants. Five thousand acres were devoted to the common field. De +Vincennes, for whom it was named, was a nephew of Louis Jolliet. And +while it is not at all certain that he founded the post, he doubtless +sojourned there in the Indiana country during his roving life. A small +stockade on the site of the town of Fort Wayne is said to have been +built by him. + +French settlements began to extend southward from Lake Erie to the head +waters of the Ohio, like a chain to check the English. Presqu' Isle, now +Erie, Pennsylvania, was founded about the same time as Vincennes. + +A French settler built his house in an inclosure of two or three acres. +The unvarying model was one story high, with porches or galleries +surrounding it. Wooden walls were filled and daubed with a solid mass of +what was called cat-and-clay, a mixture of mortar and chopped straw or +Spanish moss. The chimney was of the same materials, shaped by four long +corner posts, wide apart below, and nearer together at the top. + +As fast as children grew up and married they built their cottages +in their father's yard; and so it went on, until with children and +grandchildren and great-grandchildren, a small village accumulated +around one old couple. + +The French were not anxious to obtain grants of the rich wild land. +Every settlement had its common field, large or small, as was desired. +A portion of this field was given to each person in the village for his +own, and he was obliged to cultivate it and raise food for his family. +If a man neglected his ground, it was taken from him. A large tract of +land called the common pasture was also inclosed for everybody's cattle +to graze in. + +Sometimes houses were set facing one court, or center, like a camp, for +defense. But generally the French had little trouble with their savage +neighbors, who took very kindly to them. The story of western settlement +is not that dreadful story of continual wars with Indians which reddens +the pages of eastern colonies. The French were gay people. They loved to +dance and hunt and spend their time in amusements. While the serious, +stubborn English were grubbing out the foundations of great states on +the Atlantic coast, it must be confessed these happy folks cared little +about developing the rich Mississippi valley. + +During all its early occupation this hospitable land abounded with game. +Though in November the buffaloes became so lean that only their tongues +were eaten, swans, geese, and ducks were always plentiful, and the fish +could not be exhausted. + +On a day in February, people from Kaskaskia hurried over the road which +then stretched a league to the Mississippi, for the town was on the +Kaskaskia River bank. There were settlers in blanket capotes, shaped +like friars' frocks, with hoods to draw over their heads. If it had +been June instead of February, a blue or red kerchief would have covered +the men's heads. The dress of an ordinary frontiersman in those days +consisted of shirt, breech-cloth, and buckskin leggins, with moccasins, +and neips, or strips of blanket wrapped around the feet for stockings. +The voyageur so equipped could undertake any hardship. But in the +settlements wooden shoes were worn instead of moccasins, and garments of +texture lighter than buckskin. The women wore short gowns, or long, full +jackets, and petticoats; and their moccasins were like those of squaws, +ornamented with beautiful quill-work. Their outer wraps were not unlike +the men's; so a multitude of blanket capotes flocked toward the +Mississippi bank, which at that time had not been washed away, and rose +steeply above the water. They had all run to see a procession of boats +pass by from Fort Chartres. + +A little negro had brought the news that the boats were in sight. Black +slaves were owned by some of the French; and Indian slaves, sold by +their captors to the settlers, had long been members of these +patriarchal households. Many of them had left their work to follow their +masters to the river; the negroes pointing and shouting, the Indians +standing motionless and silent. + +The sun flecked a broad expanse of water, and down this shining track +rushed a fleet of canoes; white uniforms leading, and brick-colored +heads above dusky-fringed buckskins following close after. This little +army waved their hands and fired guns to salute the crowd on shore. The +crowd all jangled voices in excited talk, no man listening to what +another said. + +"See you--there are Monsieur Pierre D'Artaguette and the Chevalier De +Vincennes and excellent Father Senat in the first boat." + +"The young St. Ange and Sieur Lalande follow them." + +"How many of our good Indians have thrown themselves into this +expedition! The Chickasaw nation may howl when they see this array! +They will be taught to leave the boats from New Orleans alone!" + +"But suppose Sieur De Bienville and his army do not meet the Commandant +D'Artaguette when he reaches the Chickasaw country?" + +"During his two years at Fort Chartres has Sieur D'Artaguette made +mistakes? The expedition will succeed." + +"The saints keep that beautiful boy!--for to look at him, though he is +so hardy, Monsieur Pierre D'Artaguette is as handsome as a woman. I have +heard the southern tribes sacrifice their own children to the sun. This +is a fair company of Christians to venture against such devils." + +The Chickasaws, occupying a tract of country now stretching across +northern Mississippi and western Tennessee, were friendly to the English +and willing to encroach on the French. They interrupted river traffic +and practiced every cruelty on their prisoners. D'Artaguette knew +as well as the early explorers that in dealing with savages it is a +fatal policy to overlook or excuse their ill-behavior. They themselves +believed in exact revenge, and despised a foe who did not strike back, +their insolence becoming boundless if not curbed. So he had planned with +Le Moyne de Bienville a concerted attack on these allies of the English. +Bienville, bringing troops up river from New Orleans, was to meet him in +the Chickasaw country on a day and spot carefully specified. + +[Illustration: Autograph of Bienville.] + +The brilliant pageant of canoes went on down the river, seeming to grow +smaller, until it dwindled to nothingness in the distance. + +But in the course of weeks only a few men came back, sent by the +Chickasaws, to tell about the fate of their leaders. The troops from +New Orleans did not keep the appointment, arriving too late and then +retreating. D'Artaguette, urged by his Indians, made the attack with +such force as he had, and his brave array was destroyed. He and the +Chevalier Vincennes, with Laland, Father Senat, and many others, a circle +of noble human torches, perished at the stake. People lamented aloud in +Kaskaskia and Cahokia streets, and the white flag of France slipped down +to half-mast on Fort Chartres. + +This victory made the Chickasaw Indians so bold that scarcely a French +convoy on the river escaped them. There is a story that a young girl +reached the gate of Fort Chartres, starving and in rags, from wandering +through swamps and woods. She was the last of a family arrived from +France, and sought her sister, an officer's wife, in the fort. The +Chickasaws had killed every other relative; she, escaping alone, was +ready to die of exposure when she saw the flag through the trees. + +But another captain of Fort Chartres, no bolder than young Pierre +D'Artaguette, but more fortunate, named Neyon de Villiers, twenty years +afterwards led troops as far east as the present state of Pennsylvania, +and helped his brother, Coulon de Villiers, continue the struggle +betwixt French and English by defeating, at Fort Necessity, the English +commanded by a young Virginia officer named George Washington. + +[Illustration: INDIAN GAME OF BALL. +After Catlin.] + + + + +VI. + +THE LAST GREAT INDIAN. + + +The sound of the Indian drum was heard on Detroit River, and humid May +night air carried it a league or more to the fort. All the Pottawatomies +and Wyandots were gathered from their own villages on opposite shores +to the Ottawas on the south bank, facing Isle Cochon. Their women and +children squatted about huge fires to see the war dance. The river +strait, so limpidly and transparently blue in daytime, that dipping a +pailful of it was like dipping a pailful of the sky, scarcely glinted +betwixt darkened woods. + +In the center of an open space, which the camp-fires were built to +illuminate, a painted post was driven into the ground, and the warriors +formed a large ring around it. Their moccasined feet kept time to the +booming of the drums. With a flourish of his hatchet around his head, a +chief leaped into the ring and began to chase an imaginary foe, chanting +his own deeds and those of his forefathers. He was a muscular rather +than a tall Indian, with high, striking features. His dark skin was +colored by war paint, and he had stripped himself of everything but +ornaments. Ottawa Indians usually wore brilliant blankets, while +Wyandots of Sandusky and Detroit paraded in painted shirts, their heads +crowned with feathers, and their leggins tinkling with little bells. +The Ojibwas, or Chippewas, of the north carried quivers slung on their +backs, holding their arrows. + +The dancer in the ring was the Ottawa chief, Pontiac, a man at that +time fifty years old, who had brought eighteen savage nations under his +dominion, so that they obeyed his slightest word. With majestic sweep of +the limbs he whirled through the pantomime of capturing and scalping an +enemy, struck the painted post with his tomahawk, and raised the awful +war whoop. His young braves stamped and yelled with him. Another leaped +into the ring, sung his deeds, and struck the painted post, warrior +after warrior following, until a wild maze of sinewy figures swam and +shrieked around it. Blazing pine knots stuck in the ground helped to +show this maddened whirl, the very opposite of the peaceful, floating +calumet dance. Boy papooses, watching it, yelled also, their black eyes +kindling with full desire to shed blood. + +Perhaps no Indian there, except Pontiac, understood what was beginning +with the war dance on that May night of the year 1763. He had been +laying his plans all winter, and sending huge black and purple wampum +belts of war, and hatchets dipped in red, to rouse every native tribe. +All the Algonquin stock and the Senecas of the Iroquois were united with +him. From the small oven-shaped hut on Isle Cochon, where he lived with +his squaws and children, to Michilimackinac, from Michilimackinac to the +lower Mississippi, and from the eastern end of Lake Erie down to the +Ohio, the messengers of this self-made emperor had secretly carried and +unfolded his plan, which was to rise and attack all the English forts on +the same day, and then to destroy all the English settlers, sparing no +white people but the French. + +Two years before, an English army had come over to Canada and conquered +it. That was a deathblow to French settlements in the middle west. +They dared no longer resist English colonists pushing on them from +the east. All that chain of forts stretching from Lake Erie down to the +Ohio--Presqu' Isle, Le Boeuf, Venango, Ligonier--had been given up to +the English, as well as western posts--Detroit, Fort Miami, Ouatanon on +the Wabash, and Michilimackinac. The settlements on the Mississippi, +however, still displayed the white flag of France. So large was the +dominion in the New World which England now had the right to claim, +that she was unable to grasp it all at once. + +[Illustration: The White Flag of France.] + +The Indians did not like the English, who treated them with contempt, +would not offer them presents, and put them in danger of starvation +by holding back the guns and ammunition, on which they had learned to +depend, instead of their bows and arrows. For two years they had borne +the rapid spread of English settlements on land which they still +regarded as their own. These intruders were not like the French, who +cared nothing about claiming land, and were always ready to hunt or +dance with their red brethren. + +All the tribes were, therefore, eager to rise against the English, whom +they wanted to drive back into the sea. Pontiac himself knew this could +not be done; but he thought it possible, by striking the English forts +all at once, to restore the French power and so get the French to help +him in fighting back their common foe from spreading into the west. + +Pontiac was the only Indian who ever seemed to realize all the dangers +which threatened his race, or to have military skill for organizing +against them. His work had been secret, and he had taken pains to appear +very friendly to the garrison of Detroit, who were used to the noise of +Indian yelling and dancing. This fort was the central point of his +operations, and he intended to take it next morning by surprise. + +Though La Motte Cadillac was the founder of a permanent settlement on +the west shore of Detroit River, it is said that Greysolon du Lhut set +up the first palisades there. About a hundred houses stood crowded +together within the wooden wall of these tall log pickets, which were +twenty-five feet high. The houses were roofed with bark or thatched with +straw. The streets were mere paths, but a wide road went all around the +town next to the palisades. Detroit was almost square in shape, with +a bastion, or fortified projection, at each corner, and a blockhouse +built over each gate. The river almost washed the front palisades, and +two schooners usually anchored near to protect the fort and give it +communication with other points. Besides the homes of settlers, it +contained barracks for soldiers, a council-house, and a little church. + +About a hundred and twenty English soldiers, besides fur traders and +Canadian settlers, were in this inclosure, which was called the fort, to +distinguish it from the village of French houses up and down the shore. +Dwellers outside had their own gardens and orchards, also surrounded by +pickets. These French people, who tried to live comfortably among the +English, whom they liked no better than the Indians did, raised fine +pears and apples and made wine of the wild grapes. + +The river, emptying the water of the upper lakes into Lake Erie, was +about half a mile wide. Sunlight next morning showed this blue strait +sparkling from the palisades to the other shore, and trees and gardens +moist with that dewy breath which seems to exhale from fresh-water seas. +Indians swarmed early around the fort, pretending that the young men +were that day going to play a game of ball in the fields, while Pontiac +and sixty old chiefs came to hold a council with the English. More than +a thousand of them lounged about, ready for action. The braves were +blanketed, each carrying a gun with its barrel filed off short enough +to be concealed under his blanket. + +About ten o'clock Pontiac and his chiefs crossed the river in birch +canoes and stalked in Indian file, every man stepping in the tracks +of the man before him, to the fort gates. The gates on the water side +usually stood open until evening, for the English, contemptuously +careless of savages, let squaws and warriors come and go at pleasure. +They did not that morning open until Pontiac entered. He found himself +and his chiefs walking betwixt files of armed soldiers. The gates were +shut behind him. + +Pontiac was startled as if by a sting. He saw that some one had betrayed +his plan to the officers. Even fur traders were standing under arms. +To this day it is not known who secretly warned the fort of Pontiac's +conspiracy; but the most reliable tradition declares it to have been a +young squaw named Catherine, who could not endure to see friends whom +she loved put to death. + +It flashed through Pontiac's mind that he and his followers were now +really prisoners. The captain of Detroit was afterwards blamed for not +holding the chief when he had him. The tribes could not rush through +the closed gates at Pontiac's signal, which was to be the lifting of a +wampum belt upside down, with all its figures reversed. But the cunning +savage put on a look of innocence and inquired:-- + +"My father," using the Indian term of respect, "why are so many of your +young men standing in the street with their guns?" + +"They have been ordered out for exercise and discipline," answered the +officer. + +A slight clash of arms and the rolling of drums were heard by the +surprised tribes waiting in suspense around the palisades. They did not +know whether they would ever see their leader appear again. But he came +out, after going through the form of a council, mortified by his failure +to seize the fort, and sulkily crossed the river to his lodge. All his +plans to bring warriors inside the palisades were treated with contempt +by the captain of Detroit. Pontiac wanted his braves to smoke the +calumet with his English father. + +"You may come in yourself," said the officer, "but the crowd you have +with you must remain outside." + +"I want all my young men," urged Pontiac, "to enjoy the fragrance of the +friendly calumet." + +"I will have none of your rabble in the fort," said the officer. + +Raging like a wild beast, Pontiac then led his people in assault. +He threw off every pretense of friendliness, and from all directions +the tribes closed around Detroit in a general attack. Though it had +wooden walls, it was well defended. The Indians, after their first +fierce onset, fighting in their own way, behind trees and sheltered by +buildings outside the fort, were able to besiege the place indefinitely +with comparatively small loss to themselves; while the garrison, shut +in almost without warning, looked forward to scarcity of provisions. + +All English people caught beyond the walls were instantly murdered. But +the French settlers were allowed to go about their usual affairs unhurt. +Queer traditions have come down from them of the pious burial they gave +to English victims of the Indians. One old man stuck his hands out of +his grave. The French covered them with earth. But next time they passed +that way they saw the stiff, entreating hands, like pale fungi, again +thrust into view. At this the horrified French settlers hurried to their +priest, who said the neglected burial service over the grave, and so put +the poor Englishman to rest, for his hands protruded no more. + +One of the absent schooners kept for the use of the fort had gone down +river with letters and dispatches. Her crew knew nothing of the siege, +and she narrowly escaped capture. A convoy of boats, bringing the usual +spring supplies, was taken, leaving Detroit to face famine. Yet it +refused to surrender, and, in spite of Pontiac's rage and his continual +investment of the place, the red flag of England floated over that +fortress all summer. + +Other posts were not so fortunate in resisting Pontiac's conspiracy. +Fort Sandusky, at the west end of Lake Erie; Fort Ouatanon, on the +Wabash, a little south of where Lafayette, in the state of Indiana, now +stands; Fort Miami, Presqu' Isle, Le Boeuf, Venango, on the eastern +border, and Michilimackinac, on the straits, were all taken by the +Indians. + +At Presqu' Isle the twenty-seven soldiers went into the blockhouse of +the fort and prepared to hold it, lining and making it bullet-proof. + +A blockhouse was built of logs, or very thick timber, and had no +windows, and but one door in the lower story. The upper story projected +several feet all around, and had loopholes in the overhanging, floor, +through which the men could shoot down. Loopholes were also fixed in the +upper walls, wide within, but closing to narrow slits on the outside. +A sentry box or lookout was sometimes put at the top of the roof. With +the door barred by iron or great beams of wood, and food and ammunition +stored in the lower room, men could ascend a ladder to the second story +of a blockhouse and hold it against great odds, if the besiegers did not +succeed in burning them out. + +Presqu' Isle was at the edge of Lake Erie, and the soldiers brought +in all the water they could store. But the attacking Indians made +breastworks of logs, and shot burning arrows on the shingle roof. +All the water barrels were emptied putting out fires. While some men +defended the loopholes, others dug under the floor of the blockhouse and +mined a way below ground to the well in the fort where Indians swarmed. +Buildings in the inclosure were set on fire, but the defenders of the +blockhouse kept it from catching the flames by tearing off shingles +from the roof when they began to burn. The mining party reached the well, +and buckets of water were drawn up and passed through the tunnel to the +blockhouse. Greatly exhausted, the soldiers held out until next day, +when, having surrendered honorably, they were all taken prisoners as +they left the scorched and battered log tower. For savages were such +capricious and cruel victors that they could rarely be depended upon to +keep faith. Pontiac himself was superior to his people in such matters. +If he had been at Presqu' Isle, the garrison would not have been seized +after surrendering on honorable terms. However, these soldiers were not +instantly massacred, as other prisoners had been in war betwixt French +and English, when savage allies could not be restrained. + +Next to Detroit the most important post was Michilimackinac. + +This was not the island in the straits bearing that name, but a +stockaded fort on the south shore of Michigan, directly across the +strait from St. Ignace. To this day, searching along a beach of deep, +yielding sand, so different from the rocky strands of the islands, +you may find at the forest edge a cellar where the powder house stood, +and fruit trees and gooseberry bushes from gardens planted there more +than two hundred years ago. + +Michilimackinac, succeeding St. Ignace, had grown in importance, and was +now a stockaded fort, having French houses both within and outside it, +like Detroit. After Father Marquette's old mission had been abandoned +and the buildings burned, another small mission was begun at L'Arbre +Croche, not far west of Fort Michilimackinac, such of his Ottawas as +were not scattered being gathered here. The region around also was full +of Chippewas or Ojibwas. + +All these Indians hated the English. Some came to the fort and said to a +young English trader named Alexander Henry, who arrived after the white +flag was hauled down and the red one about to be hoisted:-- + +"Englishman, although you have conquered the French, you have not +conquered us. We are not your slaves. These lakes, these woods and +mountains were left to us by our ancestors. They are our inheritance, +and we will part with them to none!" + +Though these Ottawas and Chippewas were independent of those about +Detroit, they had eagerly taken hold of Pontiac's war belt. The +missionary priest was able for a while to restrain the Ottawas. The +Chippewas, gathered in from their winter's hunting, determined to strike +the first blow. + +On the fourth day of June, which was the English king's birthday, they +came and invited the garrison to look at a game of ball, or baggattaway, +which they were going to play on the long sandy beach, against some +Sac Indians. The fortress gates stood open. The day was very warm and +discipline was relaxed. Nobody noticed that squaws, flocking inside the +fort, had tomahawks and scalping knives hidden under their blankets, +though a few Englishmen afterward remembered that the squaws were +strangely huddled in wrappings on a day hot for that climate. + +The young English trader, Alexander Henry, has left a careful account of +the massacre at Fort Michilimackinac. He did not go out to see the ball +game, because he had important letters to write and send by a canoe just +starting to Canada. Officers and men, believing the red tribes friendly, +lounged about unarmed. Whitewashed French houses shone in the sun, and +the surge of the straits sounded peacefully on the beach. Nobody could +dream that when the shouting Indians drove the ball back from the +farthest stake, their cries would suddenly change to war whoops. + +At that horrid yell Henry sprang up and ran to a window of his house. +He saw Chippewas filling the fort, and with weapons snatched from the +squaws, cutting down and scalping Englishmen. He caught his own gun from +its rack, expecting to hear the drum beat to arms. But the surprised +garrison were unable even to sound an alarm. + +Seeing that not a Frenchman was touched, Henry slipped into the house of +his next neighbor, a Canadian named Langlade. The whole family were at +the front windows, looking at the horrible sights in the fort; but an +Indian slave, a Pani, or Pawnee woman, beckoned to him and hid him in +the attic, locking the door and carrying away the key. + +The attic probably had one or two of those tunnel-like dormer windows +built in the curving roof of all French houses. Henry found a place +where he could look out. He saw his countrymen slaughtered without being +able to help them, and it was like a frightful nightmare from which +there was to be no awakening. Presently the cry rose:-- + +"All is finished!" + +Then the Indians crowded into Langlade's house and inquired whether any +Englishmen were hid there. So thin was the attic floor of planks laid +across joists, that Henry could hear every word. + +"I cannot say," answered the Frenchman. "You may examine for +yourselves." + +Henry looked around the attic for some place to hide in. Moccasined feet +were already coming upstairs. Savage hands shook the attic door, and +impatient guttural voices demanded the key. While some one went for the +key, Henry crept into a kind of tunnel made by a heap of birch-bark +vessels, used in the maple-sugar season. The door was opening before he +could draw himself quite out of sight, and though the pile was in a dark +corner, he dreaded displacing some of the birch troughs and making a +noise. + +The Indians trod so close to him he thought they must hear him breathe. +Their bodies were smeared with blood, which could be seen through the +dusk; and while searching they told Monsieur Langlade how many +Englishmen they had killed and the number of scalps they had taken. + +Not finding any one, they went away and the door was again locked. +Henry crept out of hiding. There was a feather bed on the floor and he +stretched himself on it, so worn out by what he had seen and endured +that he fell asleep. + +He was roused by the door opening again. Madame Langlade came in, and +she was surprised and frightened at finding him. It was nearly night and +a fierce summer rain beat upon the roof, dripping through cracks of the +heat-dried bark. Madame Langlade had come to stop a leak. She told Henry +that all the English except himself were killed, but she hoped he would +escape. She brought him some water to drink. + +As darkness came on, he lay thinking of his desperate state. He was four +hundred miles from Detroit, which he did not then know was besieged, +and with all his stores captured or destroyed by the Indians, he had no +provisions. He could not stay where he was, and if he ventured out, the +first red man who met him would kill him. + +By morning the Indians came to the house inquiring for Henry, whom they +had missed. Madame Langlade was in such fear that they might kill her +children if they found Henry sheltered in the house, that she told her +husband where he was and begged to have him given up. This the Frenchman +at first refused to do; but he finally led the Indians again to the +attic. + +Henry stood up, expecting to die. + +The Indians were all partially drunk and had satisfied themselves with +slaughter. One of them seized Henry by the collar and lifted a knife to +plunge into his breast. White man and red man looked intently at each +other, and the savage, perhaps moved by the fearless despair in the +young Englishman's eyes, concluded to take him prisoner. Henry began +to think he could not be killed. + +He found that the captain and lieutenant of Michilimackinac were also +alive and prisoners like himself. The missionary priest was doing all +he could to restrain his maddened flock. At a council held between +Chippewas and Ottawas, Henry was bought with presents by a Chippewa +chief named Wawatam, who loved him, and who had been absent the day of +the attack Wawatam put Henry in his canoe, carried him across the strait +to Michilimackinac Island, and hid him in a cave, which is now called +Skull Rock by the islanders, because Henry found ancient skulls and bones +in the bottom of it. As the island was held sacred by the Indians, this +was probably one of their old sepulchres. Its dome top is smothered in a +tangle of evergreens and brush. There is a low, triangular entrance, and +the hollow inside is shaped like an elbow. More than one island boy has +since crept back to the dark bend where Henry lay hidden on the skulls, +but only a drift of damp leaves can be found there now. + +The whole story of Alexander Henry's adventures, before he escaped and +returned safely to Canada, is a wonderful chapter in western history. + +The Indians were not guilty of all the cruelties practiced in this war. +Bounties were offered for savage scalps. One renegade Englishman, named +David Owen, came back from adoption and marriage into a tribe, bringing +the scalps of his squaw wife and her friends. + +Through the entire summer Pontiac was successful in everything except +the taking of Detroit. He besieged it from May until October. With +autumn his hopes began to dwindle. He had asked the French to help him, +and refused to believe that their king had made a treaty at Paris, +giving up to the English all French claims in the New World east of +the Mississippi. His cause was lost. He could band unstable warriors +together for a common good, but he could not control politics in Europe, +nor defend a people given up by their sovereign, against the solidly +advancing English race. + +[Illustration: North America at Close of French Wars, 1763.] + +But he was unwilling to own himself defeated while the French flag waved +over a foot of American ground. This clever Indian, needing supplies to +carry on his war, used civilized methods to get them on credit. He gave +promissory notes written on birch bark, signed with his own totem, or +tribe-mark--a picture of the otter. These notes were faithfully paid. + +When he saw his struggle becoming hopeless eastward, he drew off to the +Illinois settlements to fight back the English from taking possession of +Fort Chartres, the last French post. They might come up the Mississippi +from New Orleans, or they might come down the Ohio. The Iroquois had +always called the Mississippi the Ohio, considering that river which +rose near their own country the great river, and the northern branch +merely a tributary. + +Pontiac ordered the Illinois Indians to take up arms and stand by him. + +"Hesitate not," he said, "or I will destroy you as fire does the prairie +grass! These are the words of Pontiac." + +They obeyed him. He sent more messengers down as far as New Orleans, +keeping the tribes stirred against the English. He camped with his +forces around Fort Chartres, cherishing it and urging the last French +commandant, St. Ange de Bellerive, to take up arms with him, until that +poor captain, tormented by the savage mob, and only holding the place +until its English owners received it, was ready to march out with his +few soldiers and abandon it. + +It is told that while Pontiac was leading his forlorn hope, he made his +conquerors ridiculous. Major Loftus with a detachment of troops came up +the Mississippi to take possession according to treaty. Pontiac turned +him back. Captain Pittman came up the river. Pontiac turned him back. +Captain Morris started from Detroit, and Pontiac squatted defiantly in +his way. Lieutenant Frazer descended the Ohio. Pontiac caught him and +shipped him to New Orleans by canoe. Captain Croghan was also stopped +near Detroit. Both French and Spanish people roared with laughter at +the many failures of the coming race to seize what had so easily been +obtained by treaty. + +Two years and a half passed between Pontiac's attack on Detroit and +the formal surrender of Fort Chartres. The great war chief's heart, with +a gradual breaking, finally yielded before the steadily advancing and +all-conquering people that were to dominate this continent. + +The second day of winter, late in the afternoon, Pontiac went into +the fort unattended by any warrior, and without a word sat down near +St. Ange de Bellerive in the officers' quarters. Both veteran soldier +and old chief knew that Major Farmar, with a large body of troops, +was almost in sight of Fort Chartres, coming from New Orleans. Perhaps +before the low winter sun was out of sight, cannon mounted on one of +the bastions would have to salute the new commandant. Sentinels on +the mound of Fort Chartres could see a frosty valley, reaching to the +Mississippi, glinting in the distance. That alluvial stretch was, in +the course of years, to be eaten away by the river even to the bastions. +The fort itself, built at such expense, would soon be abandoned by +its conquerors, to sink, piecemeal, a noble and massive ruin. The +dome-shaped powder house and stone quarters would be put to ignoble +uses, and forest trees, spreading the spice of walnut fragrance, or the +dense shadow of oaks, would grow through the very room where St. Ange +and Pontiac sat. Indians, passing by, would camp in the old place, +forgetting how the last hope of their race had clung to it. + +The Frenchman partly foresaw these changes, and it was a bitter hour to +him. He wanted to have it over and to cross the Mississippi, to a town +recently founded northward on the west shore, where many French settlers +had collected, called St. Louis. This was then considered Spanish +ground. But if the French king deserted his American colonies, why +should not his American colonists desert him? + +"Father," spoke out Pontiac, with the usual Indian term of respect, +"I have always loved the French. We have often smoked the calumet +together, and we have fought battles together against misguided Indians +and the English dogs." + +St. Ange de Bellerive looked at the dejected chief and thought of Le +Moyne de Bienville, now an old man living in France, who was said to +have wept and implored King Louis on his knees not to give up to the +English that rich western domain which Marquette and Jolliet and La +Salle and Tonty and many another Frenchman had suffered to gain, and +to secure which he himself had given his best years. + +"The chief must now bury the hatchet," he answered quietly. + +"I have buried it," said Pontiac. "I shall lift it no more." + +"The English are willing to make peace with him, if he recalls all his +wampum belts of war." + +Pontiac grinned. "The belts are more than one man can carry." + +"Where does the chief intend to go when he leaves this post?" + +Pontiac lifted his hand and pointed east, west, north, south. +He would have no settled abode. It was a sign that he relinquished the +inheritance of his fathers to an invader he hated. His race could not +live under the civilization of the Anglo-Saxon. He would have struck +out to the remotest wilderness, had he foreseen to what a burial place +his continual clinging to the French would bring him. For Pontiac was +assassinated by an Illinois Indian, whom an English trader had bribed, +and his body lies somewhere to-day under the pavements of St. Louis, +English-speaking men treading constantly over him. But if the dead +chief's ears could hear, he would catch also the sound of the beloved +French tongue lingering there. + +A cannon thundered from one of the bastions. St. Ange stood up, and +Pontiac stood up with him. + +"The English are in sight," said St. Ange de Bellerive. "That salute is +the signal for the flag of France to be lowered on Fort Chartres." + + * * * * * + + + + +ANNOUNCEMENTS + + + + +INTRODUCTION TO AMERICAN HISTORY + +EUROPEAN BEGINNINGS + +By Alice M. Atkinson + +12mo, cloth, xvi + 303 Pages, illustrated, 75 cents. + + +This volume has been prepared to meet the need of the sixth grade +of the grammar school for a short and simple introduction to the +history of the United States to accord with the recommendations of the +Committee of Eight of the American Historical Association. In a clear, +straightforward story full of interest for young readers it tells about +some of the events that make up the history of Europe from the days of +Greece and Rome to the colonization of America. The wealth of pertinent +illustrations adds to the interest and value of the book, and the open, +attractive type page makes easy reading. Teachers will find the material +well arranged for class purposes, each section being of suitable length +for one lesson and fully provided with helps in the way of suggestive +questions and references for further reading in class. + +The purpose throughout has been to tell vividly, simply, and fully about +a few great persons and events; to maintain strict historical accuracy; +and to bring the past into relation with the present at as many points +as possible. Primitive man, Rome and Greece, the Northmen, the Church, +the Crusades, medieval life in town and country, and discoveries and +inventions are among the subjects treated. The narrative ends with the +death of Queen Elizabeth and the movement toward the colonization of +America. + +English history, wherever possible, forms the basis of the story, giving +the clearness and simplicity of treatment necessary in a history for the +grammar grades. Altogether, this book in a new field is admirably +adapted to successful use in American schools. + +GINN AND COMPANY Publishers + + * * * * * + + + + +BLAISDELL'S + +BOOKS ON HISTORY + +By ALBERT F. BLAISDELL + + +STORIES FROM ENGLISH HISTORY + +12mo, cloth, 191 pages, illustrated, 40 cents. + +Forty of the most interesting events in English history, from the +earliest times to the present day, form the subjects of these chapters, +which have been carefully edited and rewritten from standard writers for +the use of pupils in grades five to eight. + + +THE STORY OF AMERICAN HISTORY + +12mo, cloth, 440 pages, illustrated, 60 cents. + +The story of our country is here told in twenty-six short chapters. +Each one connects some leading event with an important historical +character. Picturesque accounts are given of dramatic events, manners +of olden times, and exceptional deeds of valor. The book provides +suitable reading for pupils in the middle grades of the grammar school. + + +HERO STORIES FROM AMERICAN HISTORY + +By Albert F. Blaisdell and Francis K. Ball, formerly Instructor in +The Browne, and Nichols School, Cambridge, Mass. 12mo, cloth, 259 +pages, illustrated, 50 cents. + +This book may be used either as a supplementary reader in American +history for the fifth and sixth grades in elementary schools or for +collateral reading in connection with a formal textbook of a somewhat +higher grade. + + +SHORT STORIES FROM AMERICAN HISTORY + +By Albert F. Blaisdell and Francis K. Ball, formerly Instructor in +The Browne and Nichols School, Cambridge, Mass. 12mo, cloth, 146 +pages, illustrated, 40 cents. + +This collection of interesting stories is designed for supplementary +reading in the fourth and fifth grades of elementary schools. It +contains eighteen vivid narratives of dramatic events which took place +during the first two hundred years in the history of our country. Each +story will appeal to the young reader because of its human interest and +because of its presentation of the picturesque life of our forefathers. + + +GINN AND COMPANY Publishers + + * * * * * + + + + +FROM TRAIL TO RAILWAY THROUGH THE APPALACHIANS + +By ALBERT PERRY BRIGHAM + +Professor of Geology in Colgate University, Hamilton, N.Y. + +12mo, cloth, 188 pages, with maps and illustrations, 50 cents. + + +This volume is designed to aid the study of American history and +geography in the upper grades of grammar and first year of high schools. +It gives the story of the great roads across the Appalachians, telling +where they are, why they run as they do, and what their history has +been. 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