A. v<,\^> v>> IMAGE EVALUATION TEST TARGET (MT-^^) /. V' MP 7 <. % cp- ////, w. m. i/i fA 1.0 I.I IIM 112.5 IIIM ||m 2.0 1.8 1.25 1.4 .6 ■^ 6" — ► V] & //, ^/. ' ?5L I iiiiiiaii.iMiikliiiiiiiili EPT£MTJl O I ■JCLO a ^ o a6o 0,70 %oo igo 3ooJWjj^j3jo m ?Sl]Liniy^^ • ,i ■ i '; i 1 V' • ■.' ' II. i . i i J A, \ ! 1 1 \ ' - • i i»- T'r *-" V^.ii** %■ 1 PPBH|aPHH| J 'i^ DESCRIPTION LOUISIANA, By father LOUIS HENNEPIN, RriCOLLECT MISSIONARY. ^Mijl TIIANSlAT».n FKOM THI IPITION OF 1683, AND COMrAlIP WITH Till NOUVEI.I.I DicOUVtRTB, THE LA lALLE DOCUMENT! AND OTHER CONTEMPORANEOUa rAPERB. By JOHN GILMARY SHEA. I i V I NEW YORK I O H N G. S H F A. 1880. V /> \0BAJ CANADA. F 35*2. COI'YUIGHT lS8o, BY JOHN OII.MARY SHF.A. Rt. R.:v. JOHN IRELAND, D.D., J. FLETCHER WILLIAMS, rKKSn.PNT ANI. SECRKTARV OF THE MINNESOTA HISTORICAL SOCIF.TV, TMH WORKDJE TO THEIR FRIENDLY COMPULSION IS NOW DEDICATEI.. r I r . PREFACE. The work of Father Louis Hennepin here given is the most graphic account of La Salle's course of exploration as far as Illinois, and the only detailed narrative of Hennepin's own voyage up the Mississippi to the Sioux country during which he visited and named the Falls of Saint Anthony. Doubts thrown upon Hennepin by the evident falsity of a later work bearing his name, have led to a general charge of falsehood against him. In justice to him, it must be admitted that there are grounds for believing that his notes were adapted by an unscrupulous editor, and the second book altered even after it was printed. His original work h?re given in full for the first time in English, is supported to a remarkable degree by all contemporary authorities, by topography and Indian life. The charge made by Margry that it is a plagiarism is utterly absurd. PREFACE. To bring together in English matter scattered in various volumes bearing on the questions in regard to Hennepin, I have added the account of the pretended voyage down the Mississippi in the Nouvelle Decouverte ; an account of Henne- pin's capture from the Margry documents ; the account given by La Salle in his letter of August 22. 1682; the account given in the work ascribed to Tonty, and lastly the Report of Du Lhut to the Marquis de Seignelay of his visit to the Sioux country in which he relieved or rescued Hennepin. I must express my thanks for valuable aid re- ceived^ from Mr. H. A. Homes, George H. M ore, LL.D., and Gen. J. Watts de Peyster. JOHN GILMARY SHEA. Elizabeth, June 12, 1880. uf 1 CONTENTS kM Notice on Father Louis Hennepin, On the authentidty of Father Hennepin's work's,.'.".....'. oj Hennepin's Description of Louisiana ,' ." Dedication to Louis XIV, '^^ Royal Privilege, '^■^ La Salle's Earlier Explorations, '"'' ^ Obtains grant of Fort Frontenac, Prepares for his Western Exploration, l^ Sends men to Niagara, The Great Lakes — The Falls of Niagara........... 6q Begins fort and builds the Griffin, „ La Motte and Hennepin visit the Senecas,... '.'..'.'.'.". ^f Loss of La Salle's bark, ^."^ Launching of the Griffin, .'..'...'..'.'.'.. «^ She sails for the West, ^ At Lake St. Clare, ...........'....,. ^° At Missilimakinac .*....'.'.'.'...,'.'.' ^^ At Green Bay,.,. 97 Sails back, .'!!.'.".'.'!.'.'.'.'.'!!! '°* La Salle proceeds in canoes, j. Trouble with Outagamis, '...."......... ^ At the mouth of the river of the Miamis,... I!° Builds a fort, '^9 Joined by Tonty, ".'."..*..,........ '"^^ Ascends the river, '^^ Makes the portage to the Seignelay (iili'no'is)','.'.*.'.."!! !^o Reaches Illinois village, "" ^ Reaches Illinois camp, ^^l Begins Fort Crevecoeur and vessel,'.*.'.','.'.'.'.'.'.".* '^ Sets out to learn fate of the Griffin, J^o Hennepin and Accault set out, ... ' ••• 192 m ^^ 8 CONTENTS. Reich the Mississippi, 194 Account of the upper Mississippi, 196 Capture by Sioux, 205 Reaches and names Falls of St. Antnony, 220 Found by Du Lhut, 253 Return by way of the Wisconsin, 256 At Michilimakinac, 259 Returns to Quebec and France, 264. Latest intelligence of La Salle, 271 The Manners of the Indians, 273 Approbatory of the "Description of Louisiana," pub- • lished on the " Nouveau Voyage," Utrecht, 1G98,... 340 Account of a voyage down the Mississippi, from the Nouvelle Decouverte, 343 Account of Hennepin's capture, from the Margry papers, 360 Account of Hennepin's canoe exploration in La Salle's Letter of August 22, 1682, 3^' Account of Hennepin's expedition in the work pub- lished in 1697, as by the Chevalier Tonty, 372 Du Lhut's Report to Monseigneur the Marquis de Seignelay, 374 Description of Niagara Falls, from the Nouvelle De- couverte, 377 Bibliography of Hennepin, 3^^ Index, 393 " NOTICE OF FATHER LOUIS HENNEPIN, Recollect Missionary. Father Louis Hennepin was the first popular writer on the French in America. Champlain, Lescarbot, the Jesuits in their Relations had written indeed but their works found no currency beyond France. Hennepin's works caught the general fancy and were translated into almost all the languages of Europe. But for him the story of La Salle would scarcely have been known even in France. Of his early life he gives us little information. He was born at Ath in Hainaut, as he assures us, although Margry on the faith of documents, says that he was really born at Roy, of a family which came from Ath. While still pursuing his studies he felt " a strong inclination to leave the world and to live in the 2 U :v 10 SKETCH OF li |i' rule of pure strict virtue. With this view," says he, " I entered the order of Saint Francis, in order to spend my days there in a life of austerity. I accordingly took the habit with several of my fellow students,, whom I inspired with the same design." * He made his novitiate in the Recollect Con- vent at Bethune in the province of Artois, where his Master of Novices was Father Gabriel de la Ribourde, a man eminent alike for his high social position and for a most exemplary life f and who was destined at a later day to die for the faith, while laboring as a missionary in America. " As I advanced in age," says he, "an inclination for traveling in foreign parts strengthened in my heart. One of my sisters who was married at Ghent, and for whom I entertained a very strong affection, used every argument indeed, to divert me from this project, while I was in that great city to which I had gone in order to learn * Nouvelle Dccouverte, p. 8. ■\ Nouv. Decouv., pp. 488-9. HENNEPIN. , I Flemish. But I was urged by several of my Amsterdam friends to go to the East Indies, and my natural inclination to travel, supporting their entreaties, shook my resolution greatly, and I almost resolved to embark in order to gratify this desire."* " All my sister's remonstrances could not divert me from my first design. I accordingly set out to see Italy and by order of the General of our order, I visited the finest churches and the most important convents of our order in that country and Germany, in which I began to satisfy my natural curiosity. At last returning to our Nether- lands, the Rev. Father William Herinx, a Re- collect, who died not long since Bishop of Ipres f opposed my project of continuing my travels. He placed me in theconvent of Halles in Hainaut where I discharged the duty of a preacher for a \fter that with my superior's leave I went year lb. > PP- 9> 10. t He was bishop from Oct. 24,1677, to A Gams, Series Episcoporum. "g- 15, 1678, 12 SKETCH OF to Artois, and was thence sent to Calais, during the season for sahing herrings." " In this place my strongest passion was to list jn to the stories which sea captains told of their long voyages. I then returned to our convent of Biez by Dunkirk : but I often hid behind the tavern doors, while the sailors were talking over their cruises. While thus endeavoring to hear them the tobacco smoke sickened me terribly ; yet I listened eagerly to all that these men told of their adventures at sea, of the dangers they had en- countered, and the various incidents of their voyages in foreign parts. I would have passed whole days and nights without eating in this occupation, which was so agreeable to me, because I always learned something new about the manners and mode of life of foreign nations, and touching the beauty, fertility and riches of the countries where these men had been." " I accordingly was more and more confirmed in my old inclination. With the view of grati- fying it the more, I went as a missionary to most HENNEPIN. «3 of the cities of Holland, and at last halted at Maestricht, where I remained about eight months. There I administered the sacraments to more than three thousand wounded. While there en- gaged in this occupation, I was several times in great danger among these sick people. I was even myself taker down with purples and dysen- tery, and was within an inch of the grave. But God at last restored me my former health by the care and aid of a very able Dutch physician." " The following year, by an impulse of my zeal I again devoted myself to labor for the salvation of souls. I was then at the bloody battle of SenefF" (Aug. 1 1, 1674), "where so many men perished by fire and steel. There I had abundant occupation in relieving and comforting the poor wounded men. And at last after enduring great hardships and encountering extreme dangers in sieges of cities, in trenches and on the field of battle, where I exposed myself greatly for the salvation of my neighbor, while the soldiers breathed only blood and carnage, I beheld my- H SKKTt'H or self in a condition to satisfy my first inclina- tions.'* Canada had become for a second time a field of labor for the Recollect missionaries. The Count de Frontenac, Governo*- General, was especially anxious to have them in the colony as a balance to the Jesuits and the Bishop, who with his secular clergy held very strict rules of morality, especially on the point of selling liquor to the Indiarjs. The King of France, Louis XIV, yielding to the appeal of the Count de Frontenac, wrote to him on the 22d of April, 1675. "I have sent five Recollect religious to Canada to reinforce the community of these religious already estab- lished there."! Father Hennepin was one of those selected. " I then received orders," he continues, " from my superiors to proceed to Rochelle in order to em- bark as a missionary for Canada. For two months * Nouv, D6couv. pp. 10-12. t Margry i, p. 251, HRNNF.PIN. 15 I discharged the duties of parish priest two leagues from that city, because I had been requested to do so by the pastor of the place who was absent," " At last," proceeds Father Hennepin, " I abandoned myself entirely to Providence and undertook this great sea voyage of twelve or thir- teen hundred leagues, the greatest and perhaps the longest that is made on the ocean." " I accordingly embarked with Messire Francis de Laval, just then created Bishop of Petrse a in part thus injidelium and subsequently made Bishop of Quebec the Capital of Canada."* Another distinguished personage who made the voyage in the same vessel was Robert Cavelier, Sieur de la Salle, to whom Louis XIV, on the 13th of May, ^^7Sy granted Fort Frontenac and whose vanity he gratified with a patent of nobility. * The See of Quebec was erected Oct. i, 1674, and Mgr. Laval, had been Bishop of Petraea since 1658. This part of the Nouvelle Decouverte seems suspicious and in the same paragraph is the blunder which misled Greenhow, where the text says that Hennepin was a missionary in Canada while Fenelon, afterwards archbishop of Cambray resided there. It was really Fcnelon's broti ix. Hennepin himself could not have made these errors. i6 SKRTCH OF The name of the vessel is not given nor the date of sailing.* Hennepin speaks of the perils of the voyage, engagements in the Turkish vessels from Tunis and Algiers which did all they could to capture his vessel, but which were defeated. He saw a combat between a sword fish and a whale, and was filled with astonishment when he beheld the fishermen of many different countries taking cod off Newfoundland. " This sight," he adds, " gave great pleasure to our crew, who numbered about one hundred, to three-fourths of whom I administered the sacra- ments because they were Catholics. I performed the divine office every calm day, and we then sang the Itinerary in French set to music, after we had sa'd our evening prayers. "f * The Avis au Lecteur p. 4, says that Hennepin came over in 1676, but it is clear that he came in 1675, as Bishop Laval whose fellow voyager he was, reached Quebec, September 1675. Le Clercq, ii, p. 121, attended a meeting of the Council of Quebec, Oct. 7, 1675. Edits et Ordonnances ii, p. 64, and they must have sailed after May 19, 1675. See Edits et Ordon- nances, i p. 81. f Nouv. Decouv., p. 15. HENNEPIN. 17 Besides the sailors he had another little flock. This was a number of girls sent over to settle in Canada. His zeal for their spiritual good led to an angry passage between him and La Salle. " This charge one day obliged me, while we were at sea, to censure several girls who were on board and were sent to Canada. They made a great noise by their dancing and thus prevented the sailors from getting their rest at night ; so that I was obliged to reprimand them somewhat severely, in order to oblige them to stop, and to observe t^ue modesty and tranquility." "This afforded the Sieur Robert Cavelier de la Salle an occasion of anger against me, which he never forgot. He made a show of wishing to uphold these girls in their amusement. He could not refrain from telling me one day somewhat angrily, that I acted like a pedant to- wards him and all the officers, and persons of quality who were on the vessel, and who enjoyed seeing these girls dance, since I criticised them for trifles ; but Mgr Francis de Laval, created i I 8 SKF.TCH 0!< first Bishop of Quebec, who made the voyage with us, having given me the direction ot these girls, I thought I had a right to reply to the Sieur de la Salle, that I had never been a pedant, a term which, as all the world knows, signifies a man of a foolish and impertinent turn of mind, and who affects to display on all occasions, an ill digested learning. I added moreover, that these girls were under my direction, and that I thus had a right to rebuke them and censure them as they took on themselves too much liberty. " This answer which I made with no other view than to show the said Sieur de la Salle that I was doing my duty, made him livid with anger, and in fact he raged violently against me. I contented myself with telling him, seeing him thus disposed towards me, that he took things ill, and thcit I had no intention of ofi^ending him, as in fact it was not my design." " Monsieur de Barrois, who had formerly been P'.icretary to the French ambassador in Turkey, and who at this time filled the same post under ■1 ■ HENNEPIN. ^9 the Count de Fronrenac, seeing this affair, drew me aside, and told me that I had inadvertently put the Sieur de la Salle in a great passion, when I told him that I had never been a pedant, be- cause he had plied the trade for ten or eleven years while he was among the Jesuits and that he had really been regent or teacher of a class, among these religious." "I replied to the Sieur de Barrois that I had said this very innocently ; that I had never known that the Sieur de la Salle had lived in that famous order; that had I been aware of it, I should doubtless have avoided uttering that word pedant in addressing him ; that I knew it to be an offen- sive term, that, in fact, men generally expressed by it an "ill polished savant" according to the French expression of the Gentlemen of Port Royal ; that thus I should have avoided using that term, had I been better informed than I was in regard to the life of the said Sieur de la Salle.* *'Nouv. Dec. Avis an Lecteur. 2C SKETCH OF .' y To this affair Hennepin attributes a life long hostility of La Salle towards him, although we see no traces of it'in his Relation of Louisiana. On reaching Canada he assures us that Bishop Laval " considering that during the voyage I had displayed great zeal in my sermons and in my assiduity in performing the divine office, and had moreover prevented several women and girls, who were sent over with us, from taking too much liberty with the young men of our crew, to whose hostility I thus frequently exposed myself, — these reasons and several others obtained for me the encomiums and good will of this illustrious bish- op. He accordingly obliged me to preach the Advent and Lent in the cloister of the Hospital Nuns of St. Augustine, in Quebec."* " However, my natural inclination was not satisfied with all this. I accordingly often went twenty or thirty leagues from our residence to visit the country. I carried on my back a little * lb., p. 17, Mother Juchereau, in her Histoire de I'Hotel Dicu says nothing of Hennepin under this year. , ■■« HENNEPIN. it chapel service and walked with large snow shoes, but for which I should often have fallen into fearful precipices where I should have been lost. Sometimes, in order to relieve myself, I had my little equipage drawn by a large dog that I took along, and this I did the sooner to reach Three Rivers, Saint Anne, Cap Tourmente, Bourg Royal, Pointe de Levi and the Isle of St. Laurent.* There I gathered in one of the largest cabins of these places as many people as I could. Then I admitted them to confession and holy communion. At night I had usually only a cloak to cover me. The frost often penetrated to my very bones, I was obliged to light my fire five or six times during the night for fear of being frozen to death ; and I had only in very moderate quantities, the food I needed to live, and to prevent my perish- ing with hunger on the way." " During the summer I was forced to travel in * Besides the places here enumerated he mentions elsewhere " Isle Percee where I lived in quality of a missionary a whole summer for the benefit of the fishermen who came there every year with several ships." m rr 22 SKETCH OP a canoe to continue my mission," " because there are no practicable roads in that country." * " I was sent as it were to try me, to a mission more than ahundredand twenty leagues fromQuebec."f His voyage to Fort Frontenac is described in the following pages ; but in the Nouvelle De- couverte he says : "I made several different voyages, sometimes with Canadian settlers, whom we had drawn to our Fort Catarokouy to live, sometimes with Indians whom I had become acquainted with. As I foresaw that they would excite the suspicion of the Iroquois in regard to ou. discoveries, I wished to see the Indians of their five Cantons. I accordingly went among them with one of our soldiers from said fort, making a journey of about seventy leagues, and both having large snowshoes on our feet, on account of the snow which is abundant in that country during winter. I had * Nouv. Dec, pp. 17-19. t lb., p. 13. HENNEPIN. ^^ already some little knowledge of the Iroquois language."''' " We thus passed to the Honnehiouts Iroquois and to the Honnontagez,f who received us very well. This nation is the most warlike of all the Iroquois." " At last we arrived at the Ganniekez or Agniez.+ This is one of the five Iroquois nations situated a good day's journey from the neighborhood of New Netherland, now called New York." "We remained sometime among this last nation and we lodged with a Jesuit Father, born in Lyons, in order to ^'•anscribe a little Iroquois dictionary. The weather having cleared off, we one day saw three Dutchmen arrive on horseback, who came to the Iroquois as ambassadors for thJ beaver trade. They had gone there by order of Major Andris." .... - Theso gentlemen dis- * pp. 25-6, I can find nothing in Canadian documents as to his labors. t Oneidas and Onondagas. X Mohawks. ■^ H SKETCH OF (i, I'; f h \\ ( mounted from their horses to make us get on them and take us with them to New Orange in order to regale me there. When they heard me speak Flemish they showed me much friendship. They then assured me that they would have been glad to see me reside among them for the spiritual consolation of several Catholics from our Low Countries, who were in their settlements. I would have done so willingly since they requested it, but I feared to give umbrage to the Jesuits, who had received me very well, and moreover I feared I might injure the colony of Canada in its beaver and fur trade with the Indians, whom I knew. We accordingly thanked these worthy Hollanders, and returned to our ordinary abode at Catarokouy, with less difficulty than in going."* * This visit to the Mohawks and encounter with the Dutch was in April, 1677, and is confirmed by N. Y. Col. Doc, iv, p. 689, ix, p. 720. It has generally been inferred from the language that he visited Albany, but this is controverted by Brodhead, History of New York ii, p. 307. Historical Maga- zine 10, p. 268. The Jesuit missionary whom he visited was Father James Bruyas, and he copied his " Racines Agoieres," HENNEPIN. 25 From Fort Catarocouy his subsequent journey- ings are given in the following pages which describe La Salle's expedition to Niagara, Mich- ilimakinac, Green Bay, the Fort of the Miamis, and CreveccEur. Then after La Salle's departure, his own expedit'jn with Ako down the Illinois to the Mississippi and up to the falls of St. Anthony, descending then to the Wisconsinj thence by way of Green Bay back to the Saint Lawrence, and Quebec. Taking passage to France he reached that country again in 1681 or 1682. He wrote the following work in the latter year. It was regis- tered September 10, 1682, and the printing com- pleted on the 5th of January, thereafter. During this time he was apparently at the convent at St, Germain-en-Laye. After this he was Vicar and Acting Superior of the Recollects " Mohawk Radical Words," which nearly two centuries after I also copied and published in 1863. This work is the source of Hennepin's Iroquois, and an example in one of Bruyas' works, is made a ground of accusation against the Jesuits. See Margry i, p. 321, 394 3 mif'^itJUic'wiim.viti 'I 26 SKETCH OF at Chateau Cambresis, where he was visited by his old companion Fatiier Zenobius Membre. He was, he tells ^ s in the Nouvelle Decouverte, Guardian of the Recol ects at Renti in Artois for three years, and during that time almost rebuilt the convent, but having declined to return to the American mission at the request of F. Hyacinth le Fevre, Commissary Provincial of the Recollects of Paris, who claimed jurisdiction as Royal Com- missary over all the Recollects in the Netherland provinces captured from Spain, that Superior be- came his enemy. He prevented F. Hennepin from accompanying F. Alexander Voile, pro- minister of the Recollects of Artois to Rome to attend a chapter of the order, and then ordered him to return to the Recollect convent at St. Omer. This was followed by an order obtained from Mr. de Louvois, first minister of State, ordering Hennepin to leave French territory and return to the dominions of his own sovereign, the King of Spain. Hennepin appealed to King Louis XIV, pre- i HP^NNEPIN. 27 senting a placet to him, detailing his trials, while the king was encamped at the chapel of Harle- mont. Louis XIV, placed it in the hands of the Grand Provost of the Court and it was lost sight of. After this Father Hennepin was, he tells us. Confessor of the Recollect Nuns (Penitents) at Gosselies. During his nearly five years' stay here, he states that he built a very fine church, doubly vaulted, a very convenient parlor, and several other edifices. This was attested, he declares, by a certificate of the nuns and by their letters to the General Chapter. He was not however left in peace. F. Louis le Fevre wished to incorporate him in the province of Flanders, declaring that Gosselies was in French territory. This he denies and affirms that he was there by virtue of a lettre de cachet of the King of Spain. He gained the friendship of Blaithwayt, Sec- retary of War to William III who obtained a safeguard for the nuns, which saved their con- vent from pillage on several occasions. mmrmm 28 SKETCH OF / Blaithwayt wrote in the name of William III, to the Father Rennere de Payez, Commissary General of the Recollects at Louvain, asking him to send Hennepin to the American mission, but as there was no immediate response, Hennepin solicited the blessing of Monsignor Scarlati, in- ternuncio at Brussels, and receiving it at Ath, pro- ceeded to Louvain with a letter from Father Bonaventure Pderius, General of his order (Mar. 31, 1696), assuring the Father that the Commis- sary would do all that was fair. The Commissary wrote to the Baron de Mal- quenech, and to Mr. de Coxis and sent Hennepin to the Recollect Convent at Antwerp, where Mr. Hill, envoy extraordinary of his Britannic Maj- esty, furnished him money to purchase the ordinary clothing of gentlemen. Some allude to this as though Hennepin aban- doned his order, but he seems to have acted with the express permission of his superiors. He then set out for Amsterdam in company with a Venetian ship captain, but they were HENNEPIN. 29 Stopped between Antwerp and Mordick by six horsemen who robbed them of all their money. By the help of some friends he managed how- ever to reach Loo, and the Hague, where he was very well received by Blaithwayt and had an audience with William III. He finally reached Amsterdam and endeavored to obtain a publisher, but the volume, that was to prove one of the most popular yet issued on America, did not seem a safe venture and with the consent of the Earl of Athlone, Hennepin journeyed to Utrecht. There William Broedelet undertook the work, and it appeared in 1697, in a duodecimo of 586 pages with an engraved title page, in which as though he claimed the nobility that La Salle obtained for all his men, he is styled Louis de Hennepin, although on the printed title he is still the modest commoner Louis Hennepin. He dedicates the work to William III in terms of flattery as extravagant as those with which he placed his former volume under the protection of LouiXIV. 3c SKRTCH OF i Willing now to return to America as a mission- ary, he sought the support of William III, not as the ovcrthrower of the Catholic King of England, but as the ally of Catholic Spain and Catholic Bavaria, and the protector of the Spanish Nether- land. After publishing a third book at Amsterdam, in 1698, in which he complains of the hostility to him of some people in that city, he apparently made new efforts to return to Canada, a:, a dis- patch of Louis XIV, to the Governor of the province in 1699, orders that officer to arrest Hennepin and send him back to Rochefort.* The last allusion to him now traced is in a letter of J. B. Dubos to Thouinard, written at Rome, March i, 1701, in which Father Henne- pin is said to have been then at the convent of Aracceli in Rome, and to have induced Cardinal Spada, whose favor he enjoyed to found a new mission in the Mississippi country, where Father Hennepin hoped to renew his earlier labors.f * N. Y. Col. Doc, ix, p. 701. t Brunet, 2 p. 539. Historical Magazine, i p. 316. ;;. s: HENNEPIN. 31 J. B. Foppens, a bibliographer of the last century in his Bibliotheca Belgica, Brussels, 1739 (vol. ii, pp. 832-3) says that Hennepin wrote also " La Morale Pratique du Jansenisme avec un Appel comme d' abus au Pope Innocent XII." Researches in Belgium, Holland and Rome have failed to throw any further light on his personal history. The annalists of his order have gathered nothing, and the local histories of the places in which he passed an occasional term of years pre- serve no details as to him. My own efforts, like those of the Hon. Henry C. Murphy some years since, have been fruitless. Hennepin was from the first very freely attacked, and in our day scholars have impeached his character for truth with very little ceremony. La Salle in his letter of August, 1682, which gives no very high idea of his own veracity, wish- ing to forestal any representations of Hennepin that would make him a prisoner among the Sioux rescued by Du Lhut, when he wished him to appear as an explorer of the Sioux country before "ii 32 SKETCH OF Du Lhut, says: "It is necessary to know him somewhat, for he will not fail to exaggerate every- thing ; it is his character ;" '■^- yet La Salle else- where appeals to his testimony, f and in this letter shows a disposition to sacrifice Hennepin's cha- racter to further his own interested views. The eminent Sulpitian, the Rev. Mr. Tronson, writing to the Abbe Belmont at Montreal, speaking of Father Membre, says, in 1683 : "I do not know whether men will believe all he says, any more than they will all that is in the printed Relation of Father Louis, which I send you that you may make your reflections on it." J The Acta Eruditorum, Lcipsic, 1683, pp. 374, etc., gives a long summary of the Description de la Louisiane^ and raises no charge against it. Father Le Clercq refers to Hennepin and his first work in terms of praise in 1691 ; but De § * lb., p. 230. tMargry ii, p. 259. X Margry ii, p. 305. § Etablissement de la Foi, ii, pp. 114, 160, 161. HENNEPIN. 33 Michel, the editor of Joutel in 1713, says: " Father Hennepin, a Fleming, of the same order of Recollects, who seems io know the country well, and who took part in great discoveries ; although the truth of his Relations is very much contested. He is the one who went northward towards the source of the Missicipi, which he called Mechasipi, and who printed at Paris a Re- lation of the countries around that river under the name of Louisiana. He should have stopped there and not gone on, as he did in Holland, to issue another edition much enlarged, and perhaps not so true, which he dedicated to William HI, Prince of Orange, then king of Great Britain, a design as odd as it was ridiculous in a religious, not to say worse. For after great long eulogies which he makes in his dedication of this Pro- testant prince, he begs and conjures him to think of these vast unknown countries, to conquer them, send colonies there and obtain for the Indians, the knowledge of the true God and of his worship and to cause the gospel to be preached. This as? 1^ 1 3+ SKETCH OF ; I f I good religious whom many on account of his extravagance, falsely believed to have become an apostate, had no thought otsuch a thing. So he scandalized the Catholics and set the Huguenots laughing. P'or would these enemies of the Roman church pay Recollects to go to Canada to preach Popery as they called it? Or would they carry any religion but their own ? And Father Hennepin, can he in that case offer any excuse. ^ Still later Father Charlevoix says of his works : " All these works are written in a declamatory style, which offends by its turgidity and shocks by the liberties which the author takes and his un- becoming invectives. As for the substance of matters Father Hennepin thought he might take a traveler's license, hence he is much decried in Canada, those who had accompanied him having often protested that he was anything bur veritable in his histories." j- * Journal Historique, p. 363. f Histoire de la Nouvellc France, i, p. liv. " I HENNEPIN. 35 In our own time and country, Sparks showed how the Souvflle Decouvcrte was made up from Le Clercq, and Bancroft, Parkman, and most of our historical students agree in impeach- ing his veracity. This charge rested on the Nouvelle Decouverte, while the Description de la Louisiane was as generally received as authentic. Thomassy, in his Geologic Pratique de la Lou- isiane gave a narrative of the voyage down the Mississippi as La Salle's, which coincided with that given by Le Clercq, as written by Father Zenobius Membre. Then Margry gives a narra- tive covering the whole ground of Hennepin's first book, which he ascribes to La Salle, and he says : " It is certain that Father Hennepin knew this document, from which he made many ex- tracts, but this could be no reason for our not publishing it, first because the author of the Des- cription de la Ijouisiam often intermingles error with his statements =•= and also because he left * After studying the work carefully, I cannot discover the errors, unless the misprint of peroquets for pirogues justified the charge. But Margry's own blunders are even worse. J I- (' 36 SKETCH OF i . I' Cavelier de la Salle about twenty-two months before the time when our manuscript closes. There was moreover a real interest in verifying the plagiarisms of the man who was subsequently to attempt to deprive the discoverer of the honor of his labors," etc."'' Subsequently f in conse- qr.ence of a misprint in Hennepin of perroquets for pirogues he repeats the charge of plagiarism, though as he himself prints Gamier for Gravier, Le Noble for Zenobey and embuscade for amlass- ade he ought not to be too severe. This charge that the Description de la Louisiane was copied from the document now given by Margry has been taken up in this country with- out sufficient examination : but it is really too shallow even for such an utterly uncritical mind as Margry's to be pardoned for putting forth. This Relation des Descouvertes is anonymous and undated. Margry himself asks whether it was written by La Salle himself or " only by a * Margry ii, p. 435 n. t p. 467. n- HENNEPIN. 37 learned ecclesiastic, by means of letters addressed by the discoverer to some one of his friends or associates." Elsewhere he gives his opinion that it is the work of the Abbe Bernou ; but as he was never in America, he could only be a com- piler, and must have used Hennepin's work, and it is necessary only to read a letter of Bernou in Margry iii, p. 74, to see what an unscrupulous intriguer Bernou was. If wc analyze this Margry document we find it forms three dis- tinct divisions, ist an account of LaSalle's ope- rations down to his and Hennepin's departure from Fort Crevecceur ; 2d an account of Hen- nepin's voyage up the Mississippi and through the Wisconsin to Green Bay. 3d an account of La Salle's return to Fort Frontenac, his second visit to Illinois and his operations to 1681. Now as Hennepin was with La Salle or his party during the first period, he was competent to keep a journal of events, that might be written out in one form as Ld Salle's official report, and in another as the missionary's report to his own 38 SKETCH OF ^i '5 I m superiors. As to the second part Margry asks us to accept the preposterous idea that La Salle possessed by some supernatural means the know- ledge of all that Hennepin saw and did after leaving him at Fort CreveccEur, that La Salle committed this knowledge to writing, and that Hennepin, instead of describing what he saw and did as an eye witness, stole his account from this wonderful document of La Salle. La Salle him- self acknowledges the receipt of letters from Hennepin and insists on the reality of his dis- covery ; and to uphold it as against Du Lhut in- sists that Hennepin exaggerated in making out that he was a prisoner. As La Salle himself admits that his knowledge of this part came from Hennepin, he has already refuted Margry's absurd idea that Hennepin stole this from him. As to the third part, there is nothing of it in Hennepin, so that Margry's charge depends en- tirely on the first part ; and he utterly fails to explain how Hennepin refrained from any pla- giarism of the third part. ti ■■I HENNEPIN. 39 The reader will see in the following pages that Margry's document in the first part agrees pretty closely with Hennepin, omitting comparatively little, while it abridges the second part greatly. The whole question is confined therefore to the first part, and as to that there is a simple test. If the narrative descri' js in detail events that befel the party while La Salle was absent and alludes briefiy to what La Salle did, the narrative is Hennepin's ; if on the contrary it follows La Salle's actions day by day and alludes generally to what the party was doing in his absence, it must be La Salle's. Now the Margry Relation follows the party in which Hennepin was from Fort Frontenac to Niagara, gives La Motte's visit to the Senecas and then alludes briefly to La Salle's having been wrecked, but does not mention the fact that he had previously visited the Cenecas and effected what La Motte had failed to accomplish. Every person of sense will admit that this is not La Salle's account but Hennepin's. 40 SKETCH OF J ?- I^i Later on La Salle's return to Fort Frontenac, his troubles with his creditors, his visit to the colony are all noticed briefly, while the affairs on the Niagara are detailed. This part is evidently not La Salle's. The account of the portage leading to the Illinois river, where La Salle was separated from his party is not his personal account, but of one like Hennepin with the main body. These cases and minor ones all tend to show that it is not La Salle's narrative but Hennepin's. La Salle apparently took the Recollects to chronicle his doings. Hennepin kept a journal; Membre did also, as Le Clercq assures us ; Joutel tells us that he seized and destroyed memoirs of Father Maxime le Clercq."' Why La Salle always had such an array of priests with him is a mystery. If from first to last he was led by Penalosa's curious account of his journey to the Mississippi from New Mexico, to attempt the conquest of some of the rich mines, as he * Le Clercq ii, p. 167. Joutel p. 148. Hi HENNEPIN 41 undoubtedly was aiming at, when he landed in Texas, we can understand that the priests would help to relieve the expedition from suspicion, and prevent harsh measures on the part of the Spani- ards, as the priests were all Spanish subjects.* Otherwise it is not easy to understand why, when Frontenac was appealing for Recollects to serve in the colony and be more indulgent spiritual guides than the Jesuits and the secular clergy, he should send five off to accompany an exploring expedition thousands of miles. While Canada was suffering for want of priests. La Salle's grand army of eleven men including him- self and his valet, sailed from Green Bay with three Recollect priests, to minister to their spiritual wants. Every view of the question confirms the opinion that the narrative is really Hennepin's ; * The charge made by Hennepin that La Salle was aiming at the Santa Barbara mines was long put down as a falsehood and a slander on La Salle. Yet now with the official docu- ments of the French government, the papers of Beaujeu and Dainmaville's account, it is evident that Hennepin was right. 4 +2 * SKETCH OF V'i and that ii.^ document in Margry was compiled from it by an unknown hand. Only one question remains, and that is whether Margry's anonymous compiler plagiarized from a document drawn up by Hennepin in America, or from his printed work. Hennepin publishing his book at Paris, very naturally mentions the (act that his fellow trave- ler Antoine Auguelle, known by the soubriquet of Le Picard du Gay, was at that time actually in Paris, appealing as it were to his testimony in confirmation of his statements. Yet in the Margry Relation (i, p. 478), it mentions that the Picard " is at present in Paris." Now how could La Salle who did not see Hennepin or Auguelle after their return, know exactly in what part of France Auguelle was ? The state- ment is perfectly irreconcileable with the idea that this document was written by La Salle in America ; and the fact that it appears in the Margry Relation seems to show that its compiler used Hennepin's book without giving credit, and i . HENNEPIN 43 * used, not a draft or copy made in America, but the edition printed in Paris but had not the honesty to cite Hennepin and refer to him. A careful comparison of the first and second parts of Margry's Relation with Hennepin's Descrip- tion de k Louisiane, 1683, will satisfy any one that the vaunted Margry document is a mere plagiarism from Hennepin's first work as far as it goes. Now what is the credit to be given to Henne- pin's work here given ? It will not do to assert that it is not trustworthy and say that Margry's Relation is. They are so near alike that if one is not trustworthy, the other is not. In the following pages references are made to documents of La Salle, Tonti and others relating to the same events, in not a single case is Hen- nepin contradicted or shown to be in error. Mr. Parkman alluding to the claims set up in the Nouvelle Decouverte says : " they are not in the early editions of Hennepin which are compara- tively truthful." "Hennepin's account of the !¥ 1 -■WWMB* IJtlT.rW-^ +4-^ SKETCH OF I I I 11 falls and river of Niagara, especially his second account on his return from the west, is very minute and on the whole very accurate." " His distances on the Niagara are usually correct," 'Hennepin's account of the buffalo is interesting and true." " Fortunately there are tests by which the earlier parts of his book can be tried ; and on the whole they square exceedingly well with contemporary records of undoubted authenticity. Bating his exaggerations respecting the Falls of Niagara, his local descriptions, and even his estimates of distance are generally accurate."* " As for his ascent of that river (Mississippi) to the country of the Sioux, the general statement is fully confirmed by allusions of Tonty and other contemporary writers. For the details of the journey, we must rest on Hennepin alone ; whose account of the country and of the peculiar traits of its Indians afford, as far as they go, good evidence of truth." Such is the testimony of Parkman given at various points of his work. nV * Discovery of the Great West p. 124, 126, 133, 155, 228. HENNEPIN 45' Hennepin is certainly the first who gave Da- kota words : and he gives them accurately as will be seen by the reference to Riggs' Dakota Dictionary. Parkman who lived for some weeks in a Sioux lodge says that a variety of trivial in- cidents mentioned by Hennepin are perfectly in accordance with usage. In regard'to Hennepin's Dakota terms he says: "These words as far as my information reaches, are in every instance correct." Even the word Louis, which Hennepin says signifies the sun, is no invention. " The Yankion band of this people, however, call the sun oouee" which, it is evident, represents the French pronunciation of Louis, omitting the initial letter.* The only charges that remain are that he was vain, boastful and exaggerated. His vanity must be admitted. Not even superior of thelittle band of missionaries, he makes himself a kind of joint commander with La Salle: and his vanity leads him to exaggerate his own * lb., p. 228-9. 46=^ SKETCH OF I ■I I u deeds. But except ii. the estimate of the height of Niagara Falls, where Tonty is equally in error, his figures are accurate. The Descriptio'i de la Louisiane is valuable, though we must bear in mind the real position of the writer. His next book the '' Nouvelle Dkouverte" contains the famous addition where he claims to have descended to the mouth, before going up to the Sioux country. A careful examination of this volume, which is in the following pages compared closely with the Description reveals some points heretofore overlooked. The book was not published, as originally printed, and seems to have been set up in two different offices. From page 313 where the account of his voyage up to the Sioux begins, the chapters have arabic numbers, while in the pre- vious part of the book, they have Roman numerals : the line at the top of the page omits a letter and an accent, and the type generally seems more HENNEPIN. +7 * worn and the spacing is different. Practical printers and bibliographers alike agree that the two portions have every appearance of being printed in different offices. Before this point there are ten pages all num- bered 313'''; so that certainly these were printed after the book v is complete, and there is nothing to show but what much more was printed as an afterthought. This much is clear regarding the Nouvelle Z)/- couverte merely from the mechanical pointof view. Examining the matter, we find that the book introduces a great deal of personal detail and generally expands the narrative, but it substan- tially follows the Description de la Louisiane down top. 216. Then with no apparent reason six pages are taken from La Clercq's Etablissement de la Foi (ii, pp. 173-181), when Hennepin him- self could have given a better account. It then follows his first work to p. 247-8, where the pre- tended voyage down is introduced and the voyage described in terms taken from Le Clercq (ii, p. '\ : ■""vmuesti^ 48 * SKETCH OF I 2 1 6). This matter continues to the last of the pages marked 3 1 3'", and may all have been printed after the book had actually been completed in its original form. On Its very face Hennepin can scarcely be held absolutely responsible for a book thus tampered with. Hennepin had been on the Mississippi and had heard reports of the lower river from the Indians, he might easily have drawn up a plausible account of a voyage down ; he would have had no reason to take Membre's account and garble it. There are, moreover, actual errors in the book that Hennepin would not have made. He knew the country too well to make a nation Ouadebache, to give name to the river ; he would not have made "sasac»„uest," the Algonquin word for war- cry which the French had adopted, pass muster as a Chickasaw word meaning : " Who goes there ?" Hennepin might like La Salle dispute Jolliet's priority, but he would scarcely make JoUiet disavow having sailed down the Mississppi. HENEPIN. 49 * The place where he refers to his girdle as being worn as a cord of St. Francis would scarcely be written by a Franciscan. This intrusive matter cannot therefore abso- lutely be ascribed to Hennepin, and he be called a liar because it is false. Hennepin was disappointed in finding a pub- lisher at Amsterdam, and at Utrecht may have been required by Broedelet to put his book with the additional matter into the hands of some literary hack to edit. The whole book has been re-written and there are traces of another hand in various parts, in some cases making what is accurate and clear in the first book, unintelli- gible in the second. On p. 14 it reads: "I then embarked with Messire Francis de Laval then created Bishop of Petraa in partibus infide- lium." In the Avis au Lecteur it reads : " I was sent to Canada as a missionary in the year 1676." " I made it (iiiy travels) in North America from :t J i.l; 50* SKETCH OF ^1,1;; iU ':. ' the year 1679 to 1682, when I returned to Quebec." " I published a part of my voyage at Paris, in the year 1688." Now he really came over in 1675; Mgr. Laval had just been made Bishop of Quebec, and as Hennepin came in the same vessel he could not forget the fact. He returned to Quebec in 1681, and published his first book in 1683. We cannot suppose that Hennepin himself could possibly make such a series of blunders. He would not apply the recognized Protestant term pasteur to a Catholic cure, nor would he have altered his accurate account of the cove where the Griffin anchored at Michilimakinac, so as to lose all value in the second book. At this time English projects of expeditions to the mouth of the Mississippi were attracting attention,* and the careless irresponsible editor whose additions had already injured the work, See Coxe's Carolana, London 1727. Preface. HENNEPIN. 5' may have sought to increase the popularity of the book, by suppressing part and inserting a voyage down to the mouth of the Mississippi, so as to make the volume bear directly on a question of the day. That this addition really helped to commend It to public favor, will be readily seen by the result. The Nouvclle DkouverLe was reprinted at Amsterdam in 1698, in French, and issued in Dutch in 1698 and 1699. The Nouveau Voyage under his name came out at Utrecht in the same year 1698, made up from Le Clercq and con- taining the Indian matter of the " Description de la Louisiane " omitted in the " Nouvelle Decou- verte." The two books are embraced in the '* New Discovery:' of which two editions appeared in London in 1698, and another edition in 1699, in which year also a Spanish summary of the Nouvelle Decouverte appeared. h I \J II 52' SKETCH OF To sum up all, the case stands thus : " The Description of Louisiana " by Father Hennepin, is clearly no plagiarism from La Salle's account, and on the contrary the so called La Salle Re- lation, is an anonymous undated plagiarism from Hennepin's book, and moreover the Description of Louisiana, is sustained by contemporary evi- dence and by the topography of the country, and our knowledge of the language and manners of the Sioux. It shows vanity in its author, but no falsification. So far as it goes it presents Henne- pin as truthful and accurate. A later work shows a suppression after print- ing, introduction of new and untrue matter, and the evident hand of an ignorant editor. For this book as finally published, Hennepin cannot be held responsible, nor can he justly be stigmatized as mendacious by reason of its false assertions. The third book is evidently by the same editor as the second, and the defence which it puts HENNEPIN. 53 * forward in Hennepin's name cannot alter the facts, or make the original author responsible. In view of all this, it seems that now at least the case of Hennepin should be heard with more impartiality ; and we call for a rehearing in the view of documents now accessible, under the conviction that our earlier judgments were too hasty. I i ill mm^mmm 1 f '. ?' 1 1 Jm 1 1 ill! : I c^ DESCRIPTION Of { :^~ > i LOUISIANA 1 i f if ■I n J 3 a .y ,,, .1 V\.A{?.\ UO I -V( -.H A1, ■■'.-1 ■; ':'i.S.:'\ V.',V(''. I ". J-* ■; ):. f A r-, , ; ,-, . ■ '\ : a /^ a ■' ' ' ' % I! DESCRIPTION DE LA LOUISIANE, NOUVHLLBMENT DECOUVERT8 au SuaOli.ll dc la Nouvclic France, PAR ORDRE DU ROY, JivtcU Curtt du fay I • Let Mtenrt & /« Atttnitre it vivre det 6«HVAgts. DEDIE'E A SK MAJESTE* P«r/*R. P. Louis HE^^lE^>xK, Mi(fionnaire Recollct {jf NotAirt ApoJloUque. A PARIS, Ch« la Veuye Sibastiin Huri', rut? Saint Jacques, a i'lmagt S.judmc, pris S. Soverin, M. DC. I XXX in. :, I, DESCRIPTION LOUISIANA, RBCBNTLY DISCOVnitBD SOUTHWEST OP NEW FRANCE, BY ORDER OF THE KINO. WITH A MAP OF THE COUNTRVj THE MANNERS AND MODE OP LIFE OF THE INDIANS. DEDICATED TO HIS MAJESTY, By THE Rev. FATHER LOUIS HENNEPIN, RECOLLECT MISSIONARY AND NOTARY APOSTOLIC. PARIS. Th. Widow or Sebastian Hure, Rue St. jAc5« without their having ever since dreamed of carry- ing out their first design, the Providence of God having thus permitted it and reserved it to the religions of our order.* The Sieur de Courcelles and the Sieur Talon, the very vigilant Intendant of New France, wrote urging him to continue his discoveries, and a favorable opportunity offered. Atter the Sieur Tracy sent by the King to Canada in 1665, had forced the Iroquois to sue for peace, he deemed it necessary in order to keep in check these savages, to erect some forts in the places by which the Iroquois had been accustomed to pass, in order to come and attack our settle- ments. With this view, Forts Sorel and Cham- bly were built on Richelieu river, which empties into the Saint Lawrence ; and some years later Fort Frontenac was erected one hundred and twenty leagues further South near the outlet of * For this expedition see P'aillon, Histoire de la Colonic Franv'aise, 3 pp. 286-306, Dollier de Casson, Histoire de Mon- treal, pp. 198-9. An anonymous document in Margry (i, p. 377), misrepresents it most audaciously. See " Margry's La Salle Bubble Bursted." 54 A DRSt'RIPTION Lake Frontenac or Ontario which means Beauti- ful Lake.* Thisf fort was sodded and surrounded by palisades and four bastions by the care of the Count de Frontenac, governor general of the country, to resist the Iroquois and this gallant nobleman for the ten years of his administration has made himself beloved, by the awe with which he inspired these savages, by planting Fort Fron- tenac which is situated within their country, and by this fortress he has revived in America the name of his ancestors, who were the favorites of one of our greatest Kings, Henry IV, and gover- nors of the castle of St. Germain en Laye, and without disparaging the Governors General who preceded him, this one has been the father of the poor, the protector of the oppressed, and a perfect model of piety and religion. Those who come after us in Canada will regret him and admire ♦Ontara, lake ; Ontario, beautiful lake. t This paragraph is not in Margry. The barracks near the western end ot Cataraqui bridge, at Kingston, mark the site of the French fort. Parkman, p. 83. - OF LOUISIANA. 55 * *« 1 his wise administration and his zeal for the King's service in his perilous canoe voyages, on which this illustrious governor has often risked his life for the good and defense of the country.* The command of tort Frontenac falling vacant, the Sieur de la Salle, who had experienced great difficulties in ascending the frightful falls and rapids, which are encountered for more than thirty leagues between Montreal and Fort Fron- tenac, resolved to come to France to solicit this post from the King. He arrived at Rochelle in 1675,! and offered to complete this fort at his own expense, and to maintain a sufficient garrison and as the Count de Frontenac had advanced more than 15000 livres in establishing the fort and maintaining the garrison, he offered besides to reimburse him, provided the Court would grant him, the gov- ernorship and ownership of the fort. His pro- posals were accepted by Mr. Colbert, who caused * Father Gabriel de la Ribourde, was the first Chaplain at Fort Frontenac, LeClercq, Etabiissment de la Foi 2 p , 1,2. t Really in 1674. 1 S6 A DESCRIPTION the grants to be issued to him,-'' through the in- riuence of Mr. de Belizani, who greatly aided this noble enterprise, and the establishments that will be formed hereafter will owe him this obligation. As soon as he had returned to Canada, the Count de Frontenac proceeded to the spot, to aid him in demolishing the first fort, which was f enclosed only by stout palisades and turf. He erected another three hundred and sixty fathom in circumference, revested with four bastions of cut stone. They worked so diligently on it that it was brought to completion at the end of two years, although the Sieur de la Salle was not ob- liged to make so great an outlay. "j" This fort stands on the north side and near the outlet of Lake Frontenac on a peninsula, the isthmus of which he has dug through, the other three sides being surrounded by the lake and by * The rest of this paragraph not in Margry. See Le Clercq. Etablissement, 2 p. 117. The grant and patent of nobility are in N. Y. Colonial Documents, ix pp. 123-5. t Only 60 fathoms in circuit according to i Margry, r p. 437. I Compare Nouvelle Decouverte, pp. 30-2. OF LOUISIANA. 5^ a large har'oor, where vessels of all kinds can anchor in safety. Lake Frontenac is eighty leagues long and twenty-Hve or thirty wide ; it abounds in fish, is deep and navigable in all parts. The five cantons of the Iroquois live mainly south of this same lake, and some of them on the north. The Count de Frontenac having gone several years in succession to the fort escorted by soldiers and by forty canoes, managed by men of great resolution in action, his presence has impressed fear and respect for the whole French nation on the mind of the haughtiest of these savages. He annually convened the most influential of the Iroquois in council, explaining to them the means they should adopt in order to embrace Christianity, exhorting them to hear the voice of the mis- sionaries, giving them the bias that they should take to entertain friendly relations with him, and to maintain trade with the French, whom after the mode of expression of the Indians, he called his nephews, and the Iroquois his children. It 8 w^m :8 A DESCRIPTION is by these methods that this wise governor has preserved peace as long as he has been in Canada, making presents to the Indians in favor of the Missionaries. •f' The situation of this fort is so advantageous, that by means of it, it is easy to cut off the Iro- quois on their raids or their return, or to carry the war into their country in twenty-f ur hours, during the time that they are out on war parties, by means of barks from Fort Frontenac ; the Sieur de la Salle having built three, full decked, on the lake, has trained his men so well to manage canoes in the most frightful rapids, that they are now the most skillful canoemtn in America. As the land bordering on the lake is very fertile, he has cultivated several acres, where wheat, pulse and potherbs have succeeded very well, although the wheat was at first injured by grasshoppers, as generally happens in new clearings in Canada on account of the great humidity of the earth. He has raised poultry and horned cattle, of which he has now thirty-five head ; and as there are very * Briefly in Margry, i, p. 438. OF LOUISIANA. 59 rine trees there fit for house and ship building, and the winter is nearly three months shorter than in Canada, there is reason to believe ihat a considerable colony will be formed, there being already thirteen or fourteen families and a mission* house which I built with our dear Recollect Father. Lake Buisset, with the help of Sieur de la Salle, whereby we have attracted a pretty large village of Iroquois, whose children we teach to read with our little French children, and they teach each other their language in turn. This mamtains a good understanding with the Iro- quois, who clear the land in order to plant Indian corn so as to subsist all the year except the hunt- ing season. While the Sieur de la Salle was engaged in buildmg his fort, men envious of him, judging by this hne beginning what he might be able to do in the sequel,! with o"r Recollect missionaries, * The rest of the paragraph is omittted in Margry's Relation The Nou.,, Decou..ru^ p. 24, speaks of building' a'chtbu; on p. 60 calls it as here a mission house. ' t To " fo: t " omitted by Margry. Km 60 A DESCRIPTION who by their disinterested life, were attracting several families which came to settle at the Fort, put forward the Sieiir Joliet to anticipate him in his discoveries. He went by the Bay of the Puants to the river Meschasipi, on which he descended to the Islinois, and returned by the Lakes to Canada, without having then or after- wards attempted to form any post '^ or made any report to the Court. At the end of the year 1678 f the Sieur de la Salle came to France to report to Monsieur Col- bert, what he had done to execute his orders; he then represented to him that this Fort Frontenac gave him great advantages for making discoveries with our Recollects, that his main object in build- * Rest of sentence omitted by Margry. Joliet did make a report to Frontenac, see the letter of the Count to Colbert. N. Y. Col. Doc, ix, p. 121. Joliet applied for a grant and was refused. Joliet knew of the Mississippi and the routes to it before La Salle, and as early as i66g advised him and the Sulpiiians, Uollier de Casson and (lalinee, to go by way of the Wisconsin. Margry 1, p. 144. Faillon, Histoire, iii, p. 286. Hennepin here follows the general story of the La Salle party In regard to Joliet. t 1677, Margry, i, p. 439. OF LOUISIANA. 6i ing that fort had been to continue these dis- coveries in rich, fertile and temperate countries, where the trade merely in the skins and wool of the wild cattle, which the Spaniards call Cibola, might establish a great commerce, and support powerful colonies ; that nevertheless, as it would be difficult to bring these cattle skins in canoes, he petitioned Monsieur Colbert to grant him a commission to go and discover the mouth of the great river Meschasipi, on which ships could be built to come to France; and that in view of the great expense that he had incurred chiefly for building and keeping up Fort Frontenac, he would deign to grant him the privilege of carrying on exclusively the trade in bufl="alo skins, of which he had brought one as a sample. This was granted him. He set out from France in the month of July in the year 1678 with the Sieurs la Motte * and Tonty, a pilot, sailors and several others, to the number of about thirty persons, anchors and rig- * La Mottc omitted in Margry • p. 439. Compare Lc Clercq ii, p. 139. 62 A DESCRIPTION ging for the barks which he intended to build, and the necessary arms and goods. At the close of September he reached Quebec, whence he sent on his men to transport the goods and pro- visions to Fort Frontenac. He brought'-' me from France an order from our Reverend Father Germain Allart, who is at present Bishop of Vence.f and letters from the Very Reverend Father Hyacinth le Fevre, now provincial of our Recollects in Artois, by which he manifested to me great zeal for the progress of our American missions, and begged me to accompany the Sieur de la Salle in his discoveries. Father Valentine le Roux, our Commissary Provincial in Canada gave me a complete chapel for my voyage, I then went to obtain the blessing of Monsieur Francis de la Valle, first Bishop of Quebec, and his written sanction.;}; We then dined at the *Thisdown to words "'Mission House" does not appear in the Margry Relation. t He held the see from 1681 to 1685. X Nouvelle Decouverte, p. 62. Francis de Laval de Montmorency. he Bishop's name is OF LOUISIANA. 63 table of the Count de Frontenac Governor of the country, who during the repast did us the honor to say to the company that he would report to the court the zeal of the Recollects and the cour- age of our undertakings. We embarked to the number of three, in our little bark canoe with our portable chapel, a blanket and a rush mat which served as a bed. This composed our whole outfit. The people on the banks as we passed between Quebec and Monreal, earnestly begged me to say mass for them and administer the sacraments, explaining to me that they could be present at divine service only five or six times a year, inas- much as there were only four missionaries in a stretch of fifty leagues of country. At Saint Hour I baptized a child, giving notice to the missionary who was absent. We continued our route by Harpentinie=== where the Seigneur of the place would have given me one of his sons for the voyage, if our canoe had been large enough * St. Ours, and Arpentigny. 64 A DESCRIPTION H • (, ■ r for four men/'' On my arrival at Monreal.f they debauched my canoemen from me, which compelled me to take advantage of the offer of two other canoeman who gave me a little corner in their frail vessel, and after surmounting the rapids for thirty leagues, we arrived at Fort PVontenac on All Souls* Day, 1678, at eleven o'clock at night. Father Gabriel de la Ribourde and Father Luke Buisset, missionaries, received me with extraordi- nary zeal in our Mission house. ;{; The Sieur de la Salle arrived some time after us, as soon as he had completed his arrangements, and at the close of the same year he sent on fifteen of his men with goods to the amount of six or seven thous- * While at La Chine he gave rise to the ajf'aire Roland, an ecclesiastical case which embruiled Canada. See Margry i, pp. 3'0. 3>3> 3»5- t The Nouvelle Decouv. mentions his stopping at Three Rivers and officiating there, Oct. i, p. 64. \ Nouvelle Decouv. p, 66. Le Clercq, Etablisscment dc la Foi, 1 p. 1 14, adds that Father Hennepin, " made excursions among the Iroquois nations, attracted families to the fort and having perfected himself in the knowledge of their language and the means of gaining them to God, labored several years there with fruit." He eulogizes Father Luke. 1 OF LOUISIANA. 65 and livres, with orders to proceed in canoes, and await us at the Islinois, who live in the neigh- borhood of Meschasipi, in order to begin by establishing there a good understanding with these Indians, and to prepare provisions and other things necessary for the continuation of our discoveries.-^^ Wef had a conference with our two Religious at the Fort, on the measures necessary to be taken to extend the Kingdom of Jesus Christ among these numerous nations which had never heard the true God spoken of, or conversed with Europeans. On the 1 8th of November 1678 J I took leave of these Fathers, who accompanied us to the lake shore, and with sixteen men we entered a * Margry i, p. 440, says 7 or 8000. That Relation always writes Mississipi, t This down to " return to Fort Frontenac" is not in Margry. There is merely a brief statement of the sending of carpenters and other men under the direction of Sieur de la Motte and F. Louis Hennepin. Margry i, p. 440. The Nouv. Dec, p. 68, amplifies. JLe CIcrcq ii, p. 141. r 9 'f! 66 A DKSCRIPTION i. u- 1 !)) brigantine. The autumn winds and cold being then very violent, our men were afraid to embark in a craft of about ten tons. This obliged the Sieur de la Motte who commanded, to keep con- stantly along the north shore of Lake Frontenac so as to be sheltered from the Northwesters which would have driven us on the so utherii shore. On the 26th, our vessel being weather- bound two good leagues from land, we were compelled to anchor all night, with sixty fathoms of cable and in evident danger. At last the wind shifting from East to Northeast, we reached the upper end of Lake PVontenac at an Iroquois village called Teiaiagon, situated on the north about seventy leagues from Fort Frontenac.'"^ We bought some Indian corn of the Iroquois, who often came to visit us on our brigantine, which we had run up a river, j- and placed safely, but we ran aground three times before we got in, and we were obliged to land fourteen of our * The Nouv. Dccouv. p. 73 here gives Skamiailario as the Iroquois name of the lake. f Le Clercq, Etablissement, de la Foi, ii, p, 141. This was the Humber. Marshall, Building of the Griffon, p. 257. OK LOUISIANA. 67 men and throw our ballast overboard, to extricate ourselves. We were obliged to cut away with axes the ice that would have locked us in the river. As a suitable wind failed us, we could not pro- ceed till December 5th, 1678, and as we had fif- teen leagues passage to make from the land at the extremity of the lake to Niagara, we succeeded in making only ten leagues towards the southern shore, where we anchored about three leagues* from land, and were roughly tossed all night by the stormy weather. On the 6th, St. Nicho- las' day, we entered the beautiful river Niagara, which no bark had ever yet entered. After the Te Deum and ordinary prayers for thanksgiving, the Tsonnontouanf Indians of the whole lit- tle village situated at the mouth of the river, with one draught of the seine, took more than three hundred white fish, larger than carp, which are of excellent taste, and the least inju- rious of all fishes in the world. These savages gave them all to us, ascribing their luck in fish- ing to the arrival of the great wooden canoe. * Four or five. Nouv. Decouv. p. 257. t Senecas. ■,r- 'z nn 3 t- ■ > n I e < i ^ ■•i !^ ■ *L.- '•/ f- I I 68 A DESCRIPTION On the seventh we ascended two leagues up the river in a bark canoe,''^ to seek a place suitable for building and being unable to go any higher up in a canoe, nor to surmount some very violent rapids, we proceeded to explore on land three leagues further, and finding no earth fit to cultivate, we slept near a river which flows from the west, one league above the great fall of Niagara. f There was a foot of snow, which we removed to build a fire, and the next day we retraced our steps. On our way we saw a great number of deer, and Hocks of wild turkeys ; and after the first mass that had ever been celebrated in those places, the carpenters with other men were employed under the direction of the Sieur de la Motte, who was never able to endure the rigor of such a life of hardship. He was com- pelled to give up some time afterwards and return to Fort Frontenacj" * As far as the Mountain Ridge. Marshall, p. 258. t Chippewa Creek, lb. X Dec. II. Nouv. Decouv p. 76. He then continues, saying that tlie winds prevented their doing anything the three follow- OF LOUISIANA. 69 The Sieur de la Salle not having been able to build a bark at Fort Frontenac on account of a portage of two leagues at the great Fall of Niag- ara, but for which, one might sail in a large bark from Lake Frontenac to the end of Lake Dau- phin, through lakes which may justly be styled Fresh Seas. The great river St. Lawrence takes its rise from several large lakes, among which there are five of extraordinary size and which are all badly portrayed on the printed maps. These lakes are, first. Lake Conde or Tracy ; second. Lake Dauphin or Islinois ; third, Lake Orleans or of the Hurons ; fourth, Lake Conly or Erie, and fifth ing days. The 15th the ba-k was towed up to the great rock, he steering. On the 17th a cabin of logs was made for a storehouse. The 18th and 119th they had to pour boiling water in the ground to drive posts ir,i. From the 20 to 23d they were engaged in drawing the bark ashore to save it from the ice and Thomas Charpentier of Artois effected it. Marshall, p. 258 makes Lewiston the site of this cabin. The Great Rock since known as Hennepin's, though less conspicious and no longer separated from the bank by water is to be seen under the western end of the old Suspension Bridge, Marshall, p. 265. ■>%. o^. \t>T^^. IMAGE EVALUATION TEST TARGET (MT-3) 1.0 t I.I ;: iiiiiM 11^ 12.2 Itf 10 1.8 1.25 1.4 1.6 ^ 6" ► V] ^ /}. /a ^. VI ^ c^^ ^a '> ^!> 'w .'%" <$>^ c'J d? / /A Photographic Sciences Corporation i^ %^ s ^^ 23 WEST MAIN STREET WEBSTER, N.Y. MS80 (716) 87'?-4503 % ^V v \\ «i W >n*j > '«' OK LOUISIANA. 89 Recollects who resided there, in order to enjoy spiritual consolation with them, obtain wine for the celebration of masses, and make the Sieur de la Salle a report of affairs, and we proceeded with him,"'" we three Recollect missionaries, to Niagara, in the beginning of the month of August in the same year, 1679. He found his bark ready to sail, but his people told him that they had not been able to make it ascend beyond the entrance of Lake Conty, not having been able to stem with sails the strong current of Niagara river.f We * The Nouv. Decouv. mentions La Salle's assembling the missionaries, iennepin, Ribourde, Membre and Watteau, May 27, 1679, anc his grant of land for their residence and ceme- tery. They reached the Niagara July (June) 30. Tonty confirms this. Margry i, p. 578. The Nouv. Decouv, says they found the Griffin anchored a league from Lake Erie, p. 112. t The Nouvelle Dec. goes into details, describing the vessel with its flag bearing a Griffin and an Eagle above it. He returned to Lake Ontario July, 16-17, ^"'^ ^he bark from Frontenac went up to the Great Rock, where the poitage was made. All the anchors, rigging and arms were carried around the falls. Father Gabriel toiled up the rocky path in spite of his age and with Hennepin and La Salle visited the falls. La 10 90 A DESCRIPTION I! I embarked to the number of thirty-two persons, with our two Recollect Fathers who had come to join me, our people having laid in a good supply of arms, merchandise, and seven small iron cannon. At last, contrary to the pilot's opinion we suc- ceeded in ascending Niagara river. He made his bark advance by sails when the wind was strong enough, and he had it towed in the most difficult places, and thus we happily reached the entrance of Lake Conty. We made sail the 7th of the month of August, in the same year 1679, steering west by south. After;}; the " Te Deum " we fired all the cannon and wall pieces, in presence of several Iroquois warriors who were bringing in prisoners from§ Salle tried to make Hennepin acknowledge having criticized the Jesuits, pp. 1 1 2-6, La Salle set men to clear ground near his post for cultivation, Father Melithon Watteau was left as chaplain. Divine service was oftered on the Griffin, the people joining in from the shore, pp. 118-9. X Rest of the paragraph not in Margry. § Tintonha, that is to say the Nation of the Prairies, Nouv. Dec. p. I20. hf i r ■ OF LOUISIANA. ^I the nations on the prairies, situated more than five hundred leagues from their country, and these savages did not neglect to give a description of the size of our vessel to the Dutch of New Yjrk * with whom the Iroquois carry on a great trade in furs, which they carry to them i'j order to obtain fire arms and goods to clothe themselves. Our voyage was so fortunatef that on the morning of the tenth day, the feast of Saint Lawrence, we reached the entrance of the De- troit (strait) by which Lake Orleans empties into Lake Conty, and which is one hundred leagues distant from Niagara river. This strait is thirty leagues long and almost everywhere a league wide, except in the middle where it expands and forms a lake of circular form, and ten leagues in diame- * See Andros to Blathwayt, N. Y. Col. Doc. iii, 278. t The Nouv. Dec. says they ran 20 leagues the first night. On the 8th, 45 leagues, almost always in sight of land, the lake being 15 or 16 leagues wide. He mentions three point's running out into the lake, the first and largest of which he named St. Francis (Long Point, Marshall, p. 280). On the 9th they passed the other two points and saw an island at the mouth of the strait, sev^n or eight leagues from the north shore, pp. 12 1-2 1 i' 92 A DESCRIPTION ■ •' ter, which we called Lake St. Clare, on account of our passing through it, on that Saint's day. The country on both sides of this beautiful strait is adorned with fine open plains, and you can see numbers of stags, does, deer, bears, by no means fierce and and very good toeat, poules d'inde''' and all kinds of game, swans in abundance. Our guys were loaded and decked with several wild animals cut up, which our Indian and our Frenchmen killed. The rest of the strait is cov- ered with forests, fruit trees like walnuts, chest- nuts, plum and apple trees, wild vines loaded with grapes, of which we made some little wine. There is timber fit for building. Itf is the place in which deer most delight. We found the current at the entrance of this strait as strong as the tide is before Rouen. We ascended it nevertheless, steering north and north- east, as far as Lake Orleans. There is little depth as you enter and leave Lake St. Clare, * These are not hen turkeys, >s some have rendered it, nor prairie hens, but evidetitly water fowl. Charlevoix iii, p. 156; Lemoine, Ornithologie du Canada, p. 75. t This sentence not in iVIargry. The Nouv. Dec, says he tried to induce La Salle to establish a post here. OF LOUISIANA, 93 especially as you leave It. The discharge from Lake Orleans divides at this place into several small channels, almost all harred by sand- banks. We were obliged to sound them all, and at last discovered a very fine one, with a depth of at least two or three fathoms of water, and='= almost a league wide at all points. Our bark was detained here several days by head winds and this difficulty having been surmounted, we encountered a still greater one at the entrance of Lake Orleans, the north wind which had been blowing some time rather violently, and which drives the waters of the three great lakes into the strait, had so increased the ordinary current the e, that it was as furious as the bore is before Caude- bec.f We could not stem it under sail, although we were then aided by a strong south wind; but as the shore was very fine, we landed twelve of our men who towed it along the beach for * Here Margry inserts " beyond the sand bars." t Gravier refers to this mention of Caudebec as a proof that Hennepin tooic his matter from La Salle's Report, Decouvertes et Etablissements p. 104, as though Hennepin publishing at Paris could not refer to a French river. . 94 A DESCRIPTION 'i I i\ '! half a quarter of an hour, at the end of vvliich we entered Lake Orleans'^ on the 23d of the month of August, and for the second time we chanted a Te Deum in thanksgivini^, blessing God, who here brought us in sight of a great bi>v-j- in this lake, where our ancient Rccoile:' t ' resided to instruct the Hurons in the faith, ii. •' „ first landing of the PVench in Canada, and these Indians once very numerous have been for the most part destroyed by the Iroquois/}; The same day the bark ran along the east coast of the lake, with a fair wind, heading north by cast, till evening when the wind having shifted to southwest with great violence, we headed northwest, and the next day we found ourselves in sight of land, having crossed by night a great bay, called Sakinam,^ which sets in more than thirty leagues. On the 24th we continued to head northwest * Margry omits from here to " Iroquois." f Georgian Bay. J Nouv. Dec. pp. 128-9. § Saginaw Bay. 1 OF LOUISIANA. 95 till evening, when Me were becalmed among some islands, where there was only a fathom and a half or two fathoms of water. We kept on with the lower sails a part of the night to seek an anchor- age, but finding none where there was a good bottom and the wind beginning to blow from the west, we headed north so as to gain deep water and wait for day, and we spent the night in sounding before ihe bark, because we had noticed that our pilot was very negligent, and we continued to watch in this way during the rest of the voyage. On the 25th the calm continued till noon, and we pursued our course to the northwest, favored by a good southerly wind, which soon changed to southwest. At midnight we wore compelled to head north on account of a great Point which jutted out into the lake ; but we had scarcely doubled it, when we were surprised by a furious gale, which forced us to ply to windward with mainsail and foresail, then to lie to till daylight. On the 26th the violence of the wind obliged us to lower the topmasts, to fasten the yards at g6 A DESCRIPTFON the clew, to remain broadside to the shore. At noon the waves running too high, and the sea too rough, we were forced to seek a port in the evening, but found no anchorage or shelter. At this * crisis, th<; Sieur de la Salle entered the cabin, and quite disheartened told us that he commended his enterprise to God. We had been accustomed all the voyage to induce all to say morning and evening prayers together on our knees, all singing some hymns of the church, but as we could not stay on the deck of the vessel, on account of the storm, all contented themselves with making an act of contritior , There was no one but our pilot alone, whom we were never able to persuade. At this time the Sieur de la Salle adopted in union with us Saint Anthony of Padua as the pro- tector of our enterprises and he promised God if He did us the grace to deliver us from the tempest, that the first chapel he should erect in Louisiana should be dedicated to that great Saint. The wind having fallen a little we lay to, all * Down to "great Saint" not in Margry, i, p. 447. i OF LOUISIANA. 97 the night and we drifted only a league or tw'o at most. On the morning of the 27th we sailed north- west with a southwest wind, which changed towards evening into a light southeast trade wind, hy favor of which we arrived on the same day at Missilimakinac/'' where we anchored in six fathoms of water in a bay, where there was a good bottom of potter's clay. This bay is sheltered from south- west to north, a sand bank covers it a little on the northeast,! ^^^ ^^ ^^ exposed to the south which is very violent.^ Missilimakinac is a point of land at the entrance and north of the strait, by which Lake Dauphin * Derived according to Bishop Baraga, Diet., p. 243, from Misliinimakinago, a set of men in the woods, who are heard but seldom seen. t Northwest, Nouv. Decouv. X The bay where the Griffin anchored is that which is over- looked by the Buttes, two steep and rocky bluffs famous in Indian tradition and worshiped by the Indians who called them the He and She Rabbit. The former is also styled Sitting Rabbit or Rabbit's Back, Wabos Namadabid. The Kiskakons Ottawas were here in 1677 and their chapel is mentioned, Rel., 1673-9, pp. 42, 56. Very Rev. E. Jacker. k 1 1- in y i 1 .1 '! i i • 4 V : : ■ I t I .! i i8 A DESCRIPTION empties into Lake Orleans. This strait is a league wide and three long, and runs west northwest.* Fifteen leagues east of Missilimakinac you find another point which is ai the entrance of the channel by which Lake Conde empties into Lake Orleans. This channel has an opening of five leagues, and is fifteen in length. It is inter- spersed with several islands, and gradually narrows in down to Sault Sainte Marie, which is a rapid full of rocks, by which the waters of Lake Conde are discharged and are precipitated in a violent manner. Nevertheless -j" they succeed in poling canoes up one side near the land, but for greater security a portage is made of the canoe and the goods which they take to sell to the nations north of Lake Conde. There are Indian villages in these two places; those who are settled at Missilimakinac, on the ♦ Nouv. Dec, p. 133, has simply "west." f These sentences not in Margry, i, p. 448, with what follows down to " liollowcd out by fire." "I he Nouv. Decouv., adds : Those settled at the Point of Land of Michilimakinak are Hurons, and the others who are five or six arpents beyond are called the Outtaoiiactz. n OF LOUISIANA. 99 day of our arrival, which was August 26th, 1 678,* were all amazed to see a ship in their country, and the sound of the cannon caused an extraordi- nary alarm. We went to the Outtaoiiactz to say mass and during the service, the Sieur de la Salle, very well dressed in his scarlet cloak trimmed with gold lace, ordered the arms to be stacked along the chapel f and the sergeant left a sentry there to guard them. I he chiefs of the Outtaiio- actz paid us their civility in their fashion, on coming out of the church. And in this bay where the Griffin was riding at anchor, we looked with pleasure at this large well equipped vessel, amid a hundred or a hundred and twenty bark canoes coming and going from taking white fish,t * Noiiv. Dec, says 28th August, 1679. t Which was covered with bark, Nouv. Dec, p. loe. This chapel is evidently not the mission church, nor the bark chapel dedicated to St, Francis Borgia, erected in 1677, between the Kiskakons and the new Ottawa village. Relation i67'i-9 pp. 58-9, but the ch..pel at the KisUakon village near the Rabbit Buttes. Tonty in Margry, i, p. 579, mentions the two churches. The positions of all these points has been made a special study by the careful antiquarian V. Rev. E. Jacker. I And trout of 50 or 60 pounds, Nouv. Dec, p. 135. a ■i t{ I h ! H ,, lOO A DESCRIPTION which these Indians catch with nets, which they stretch sometimes in fifteen or twenty fathoms of water, and without which they could not subsist. The Hurons who have their village surrounded by palisades twenty-five feet high and situated ■=' near a great point of land opposite the island of Missilimakimac, proved the next day that they were more French than the Outtaoiiactz, but it was in show, for they gave a salute by discharging all their guns, and they all have them, and renewed it three times, to do honor to our ship, and to the French, but this salute had been suggested to them by some Frenchmen, who come there, and who often carry on a very considerable trade with these nations, and who designed to gain the Sieur de la Salle by this show, as he gave umbrage to them, only in order better to play their parts subsequently by making it known that the bark was going to be the cause of destruction * Very advantageously on an eminence. lb., Pointe St. Ignace. The Nouv. Dec, p. 135, er.-oneously makes more than one Huron village. If a ii OF LOUISIANA. lOI to individuals, in order to render the one who had built her odious to the people. The Hurons and the Ouattaouactz form alliances with one another in order to oppose with one accord the fury of the Iroquois, their sworn ei .my. They cultivate Indian corn on which they live all the year, with the fish which they take to season their sagamity. This they make of water and meal of their corn which they crush with a pestle in a trunk of a tree hollowed out by fire. The Indians of Sainte Marie du Long Sault are called by us the Saulteurs on account of the place of their abode, which is near the Sault, and where they subsist by hunting stags, moose or elk, and some beaver, and by the fishing of white fish, which is very good, and is found there in great abundance, but this fishery is very difficult to all but these Indians who are trained to it from childhood. These latter do not plant any Indian corn as their soil is not adapted to it, and the fogs on Lake Conde which are very frequent, stifie all the corn that they might be able to plant. }'t 102 A DESCRIPTION 'ii 9 I h Sault St. Marie and Missilimackinac are the two most important passes for all the Indians of the wesi and north who go to carry all their furs to the French settlements and to trade every year at Montrea with more than two hundred loaded canoes.* During our stay at Missilmakinac, we were extremely surprised to find there the greater part of the men whom the Sieur de la Salle had sent on ahead to the number of fifteen, and whom he believed to be long since at the Illinois. Those whom he had known as the most faithful, re- ported to him that they had been stopped by the statements made to them on their way at Missili- makinac ; that they had been told that his enter- prise was only chimerical, that the bark would never reach Missilimakinac, that he was sending them to certain destruction, and several other things of the kind, which had discouraged and seduced most of their comrades, and that they had been unable to induce them to continue their * Sentence not in Margry. OF LOUISIANA. 103 voyage ; that six of them ^ had even deserted and carried ofl-more than 3,000 livres worth of goods, under the pretext of paying themselves, saying that they would restore the surplus ovtr what was due them, and that the others had stupidly wasted more than twelve hundred livresf v^^orth, or spent it for their support at Missilimakinac,' where they had been detained, and where provis- ions are very dear. The Sieur de la Salle was all the more pro- voked at this conduct of his men, as he had treated them well, and made some advances to all. among the rest having paid on account of one of them 1200 livresj" that he owed various persons at Montreal. He had four of the most guilty arrested without giving them any harsher treatment. Having learned that two of the six§ deserters were at Sault Sainte Marie, he detached * Named Sainte Croix, Minime, le Barbier, Poupart, Hu- naut and Roussel dit la Rousseliere, Margry, i, p. 449. t Maigiy gives the amounts 4000 liv., 1300 liv. J La Rousseliere, 1800 liv. Margry, i, 449, § Hunaut and la Rousseliere, lb. m I 104 A DESCRIPTION 1'' I i the Sieur de Tonty with six men who arrested them and seized all the goods which they had in their hands, but he could not obtain any justice as to the others. The'*^ high winds at this season long retarded the return of the Sieur de Tonty, who did not reach Missilimakinac till the month of November, so that we were dreading the ap- proach of winter and resolved to set out without waiting till he arrived. On the 2ndf of the month of September, from Missilimakinac we entered Lake Dauphin, and arrived at an island^' situated at the entrance of the Lake or Bay of the Puants, forty leagues from Missilimakinac, and which is inhabited by Indians of the Poutouatami nation. We found some Frenchmen there, who had been sent among the Illinois in previous years, and who had brought back to the Sieur de la Salle a pretty fair amount of furs.§ * This is all abridged in the Nouy. Dec. pp. 138-9. Com- pare Tonty, Mcmoire, p. 6. La. Hist. Coll. i, p. 53. f Margry has 12th, Le Clercq ii, p. 150, has 2nd. Tonty reached Missilimakinac Sept. 17, Margry 1, p. 579. J Washington or Pottawatamie Island. § 1200 livres, Margry i, p. 450. What follows to ''took any one's advice," is not in Margry. HgS OP LOUISIANA. i05 The chief of this nation who had all possible affection for the Count de Frontenac, who had entertained him at Montreal, received us as well as he could, had the calumet danced to the Sieur de la Salle by his warriors; and during four days' storm while our vessel was anchored thirty paces from the bay shore, this Indian chief believing that our bark was going to be stranded, came to join us in a canoe at the risk of his life and in spite of the increasing waves, we hoisted him with his canoe into our vessel. He told us in a martial tone that he was ready and wished to perish with the children of Onnontio, the Governor of the French, his good father and friend. Contrary to our opinion, the Sieur de la Salle who never took any one's advice, resolved to send back his bark from this place,* and to continuf, his route by canoe, but as he had only four, he was obliged to leave considerable merchandise in the bark, a quantity of utensils and tools he * "To Niagara loaded with all his furs to pay his creditors." Nouv. Dec. p. 141, which abridges all this. 11 uaBBsan ' I 1 06 A DFSCRIPTION '1 ordered the pilot to discharge every thing at Missilimakinac, where he could take them again on his return. He also put all the peltries in the bark with a clerk and five good sailors. Their orders were to proceed to the great fall of Niagara, where they^*" were to leave the furs, and take on board other goods which another bark from Fort Frontenac, which awaited them near Fort Conty was to bring them, and that as soon as possible thereafter, they should sail back to Missilimakinac, where they would find instruc- tions as to the place to which they should bring the bark to winter. They set sail on the i8th of September, with a very favorable light west wind, making their adieu by firing a single cannon ; and we were never afterwards able to learn what course they had taken, and though there is no doubt, but that she perished, we were never able to learn any other circumstances of their shipwreck than the following. The bark having anchored in the * Margry has "to the storehouse which he had built at the end of Lake Erie." u m OF LOUISIANA. 107 north of Lake Dauphin, the pilot* against the opinion of some Indians, who assured him that there was a great storm in the middle of the lake, resolved to continue his voyage, without consider- ing that the sheltered position where he lay, prevented his knowing the force of the wind. He had scarcely sailed a quarter of a league from the coast, when these Indians saw the bark tossing in an extraordinary manner, unable to resist the tempest, so that in a short time they lost sight of her, and they believe that she was either driven on some sandbank,f or that she foundered. We did not learn all this till the next year, and it is certain that the loss of this bark costs more than 40000 livres in goods, tools and peltries as well as men and rigging which he had imported into Canada from France and transported from Montreal to Fort Frontenac in bark canoes. *"Luke who was a malcontent as we have remarked." Nouv. Dec. pp. 142-3. t Margry has : " which are near the Huron islands, where she was swallowed up." The whole account of the loss of the Griffin is in La Salle's letter, Margry ii, p. 73. T i ! \ l I toH A DESCRIPTION II This would appear impossible to those who know the weakness of this kind of craft, and the weight of anchors and cables,* on which he paid eleven livres per hundred pounds. We set out the next day, September I9th,f with fourteen persons in four canoes, I directing the smallest, loaded with five hundred pounds, with a carpenter just arrived from France, who did not know how to avoid the waves, during rough weather, I had every difficulty to manage this little craft. These four bark canoes were loaded with a forge and all its appurtenances, carpenter's, joiner's and pit sawyer's tools, arms and merchandise. We took our course southerly towards the mainland four good leagues distant from the island of the Poutouatamis.|* In the middle of the traverse and amid the most beautiful ca!m in the world, a storm arose which endangered our lives, and which made us fear for the * The rest not in Margry. t Le Clercq who abridges the voyage says i8th. I Still called Pottawatomie Island. OF LOUISIANA. 109 bark.^*" and more for ourselves. We com- pleted this great passage amid the darkness of night, calling to one another so as not to part company. The water often entered our canoes, and the impetuous wind lasted four days with a fury like the greatest tempests of ocean. We nevertheless reached the shore in a little sandy bay, and stayed rive days, waiting for the lake to grow calm. During this stay, the Indian hunter who accompanied us, killed while hunting only a single porcupine which served to season our squashes and the Indian corn that we had. On the 25th we continued our route all day, and a part of the night favored by the moon, along the western shore of Lake Dauphin, but the wind coming up a little too strong, we were forced to land on a bare rock, on which we endured the rain and snow for two days, sheltered by our blankets, and near a little fire which we fed with wood that the waves drove ashore. * For all from this to "that we had" Margry has only " because it lasted four days, with a fury like the greatest storms at sea. He nevertheless gained the shore, where he remained six days for the lake to calm." i II if ^ ' 'I ' ' 'I l\ I lO A DESCRIPTION On the 28th after the celebration of mass* we kept on until far into the night, and until a whirlwind forced us to land on a rocky point covered with bushes. Wc remained there two f days, and consumed the rest of our provisions, that is to say, the Indian corn and squashes that we had bought of the Poutouatamis and of which wc had been unable to lay ir a greater supply, because our canoes were too heavily laden, and because we hoped to find some on our route. We set out the first of October, and after making twelve |' leagu»,i> fasting, arrived near another village of the Foutouatamies§. These Indians all flocked to the lake shore to receive us and to haul us in from the w^ves which rose to an extraorai— -y height. The Sieur de la Salle fearing that his men would desert, and that suine * These four words omitted in Margry. t Three in Nouv. Decouv., p. 147. X Ten in Margry, i, p. 452. § Margry adds : " The bank was high and steep, and cxpused to the northeast, which was then bl')u''nj|, and increased to such a degree that the waves b"..'lce on :hv- jhorc in an extraordinary manner." What follows down to '■ tv'Crn. peril and " is not in Margry. OF LOUISIANA. I I I of them would carelessly waste some of the goods, pushed on and we were obliged to follow him three leagues beyond the v'llage of the Indians, notwithstanding the evident peril, and he saw no other alternative to take in order to land in safety than to leap into the water with his three canoemen, and all together take hold of the canoe and its load and drag it ashore in spite of the waves which sometimes covered them over their heads. He then came to meet the canoe, which I guided with this man who had no experience in this work, and jumping waist high into the water, we carried our little craft all at once, and went to receive the other two canoes in the same manner as the former. And* as the waves break- ing on the shore formed a kind of undertow, which drags out into the lake those who think they are safe, I made a powerful effort and took on my shoulders our good old Recollect who accompanied us, and this amiable missionary of Saint Francis, seeing himself out of danger, all * The rest of this paragraph is not in Margry. 1 12 A DI'.SCRIPTION II drenched as he was with water never failed to display an extraordinary cheerfulness. As we had no acquaintance with the Indians of this village, the Commandant first ordered all the arms to be got ready, and posted himself on an eminence where it was difficult to surprise us, and whence he could with a small force defend himself against a greater number. He then sent three of his men to buy provisions in the village, under the protection of the calumet of peace which the Poutouatamis of the Island had given the Sieur de la Salle, and which they had pre- viously accompanied with their dances and cere- monies, which they use in their feasts and public solemnities. This calumet * is a kind of large pipe for smoking, the head of which is of a fine red stone well polished, and the stem two feet and a half long is a pretty stout cane adorned with feathers of all sorts of colors, very neatly mingled and arranged, with several tresses of woman's hair, ♦The Nouv. Dec, p. 149, prefaces this with some remarks on the esteem in which the calumet was held. OF LOUISIANA. "3 braided in various ways, with-*^ two wings, such as are usually represented on the Caduceus of Mercury,! ^^^^ nation embellishing it according to its especial usage. A calumet of this kind is a sure passport among all the allies of those who have given it ; and they are convinced that great misfortunes would befall them, if they violated the faith of the calumet. And;}; all their enter- prises in war and peace and most important ceremonies are sealed and attested by the calumet which they make all smoke with whom they conclude any matter of consequence.^ * The rest of the sentence omitted in Margry. fNouv. Decouv. adds: This cane is inserted in necks of Hilars (loons) which are a kind of bird spotted white and black as large as our geese or in necks of woodducks which build their nests in the hollows of trees, although the water is their usual element. These ducks are striped with three or four different colors, p. 150. I This is omitted in Margry. § I should have perished several times during this voyage, if I had not used the calumet. This will be seen in the sequel of this history, where I shall have to speak of the monsters J had to overcome and the precipices where I have been obliged to piss in this discovery." Nouvelle Dccouv., p. 151. ''T'inriwi«i 114 A DESCRIPTION •I I I fVj I 1 ' 'M ; Bi s ; P f* 1 1 1 ■r- 1 These three men with this safeguard and their arms, arrived at the little village of the In- dians three leagues distant from the landing, but they found no one. These Indians, at the sight of our canoes, perceiving that we had not landed, on passing them, had taken fright and abandoned their village. Accordingly these men after using all endeavors in vain to speak to some one of these Indians, took what Indian corn they could carry from their cabins, and left goods there in place of what they appropriated ; and then took the road to return to us. Meanwhile twenty of these Indians armed with guns, axes, bows, arrows, and clubs which are called casse-tetcs, approached the place where we were. The Sieur de la Salle advanced to accost them with four of his men armed with guns, pistols and sabres. He asked them what they wished ; seeing that they appeared perplexed, he told them to come on, for fear his men, who, ^•• he pretended were out hunting, might kill them, if they found them out of the way. He made * Rest of sentence not in Margry. ^ OF LOUISIANA. 115 them sit down at the foot of the rising ground on which we had camped, and from which we could watch all their movements. We began to occupy them with different things, to amuse them till our three men got back from the village. These men appearing some time afterwards, as soon as the Tndians perceived the peace calumet which one of our men carried, they rose uttering a great cry of joy, and began to dance after their fashion. Far from being angry about the Indian corn which they saw and which had been taken from them, they on the contrary sent to the village to bring more, and gave us some also the next day, as much as we could conveniently put in our canoes. It was nevertheless deemed prudent to fell the trees around and to command our men to pass the night under arms, for fear of any surprise. About ten o'clock the next day, the oldmen of the village arri.ed with their peace calumet and feasted all the French. The Sieur de la Salle * thanked them by a present of some axes, knives * "We" Nouv. Dec, p. 154. i ii6 A DF.SCRIPTION 1 ■ i i k;! i ! ' and some masses of beads for their women's adornment, and left th'jm very well satisfied. We set out the same day, October 2d, and we sailed for four days along the shore. It was bordered by great hills running abruptly down to the lake, where there was scarcely place to land. We were even forced every evening to climb to the summit, and carry up there our canoes and cargoes, so as not to leave them ex- posed by night to the waves that beat the foot. W2 were also obliged by too violent headwinds, during these four days and very frequently after- wards, to land with the greatest hardship. To embark it required that two men should go waist high into the water, and hold the canoe head on to the wave, pushing it ahead or drawing it back as the wave rolled in or ran out from land until it was loaded. Then it was pushed out to wait till the others were loaded in the same way ; and we had almost as much trouble at the other land- ings. The Indian corn * that we ate very * The following to " timely aid " is almost all omitted in Margry. In the brief reference to FatherGabriel his age 64 is mentioned. \ti , n > OP LOUISInNA. II7 sparingly and provisions failing us, our good old Recollect had several times fainting fits. I twice brought him to, with a little confection of hyacinth, which I preserved preciously. For twenty-four hours we ate only a handfull of Indian corn cooked under the ashes or merely boiled in water, and during all this time we were obliged to keep on towards a good country and to paddle with all our strength whole days. Our men frequently ran for little haws and wild fruit, which they ate with great avidity. Several fell sick who thought that these fruits had poisoned them. The more we suffered, the more God seemed to give me especially strength, and I often outstripped in paddling our other canoes. During this scarcity. He who cares for the smallest birds, allowed us to see several crows and eagles, which were on the lake shore. Plying our paddles with redoubled zeal towards these carnivorous birds, we found there half a very fat deer which the wolves had killed and half eaten. We recruited ourselves on the flesh of this animal, blessing Providence which had sent us such timely aid. B A DESCRIPTION xhus our little fleet advanced toward the South where we found the country always finer and more temperate. On the 1 6th of October we began to find a great abundance of game, and our Indian, a very excellent hunter, killed stags and deer, and our Frenchmen very fat poules d'inde. And at last on the 28th * of the month of October we reached the extremity of Lake Dauphin, where the heavy wind forced us to land. We went out to scout, as we were accustomed to do in the woods and prairies. We found very good ripe grapes, the berries of which were as large as damson plums. To get this fruit wc had to cut down the trees on which the vines ran. We made some wine f which lasted us nearly three months and a half and which we kept in gourds. These we put every day in the sand to prevent the wine from souring, and in order to make it last longer, we said mass only * Nouv. Dec. p. 157 says i8th. t For the rest of this sentence and the two following, Margry's Relation says merely " in order to say mass." OF LOUISIANA. I I9 i on holidays and Sundays, one after the other. All the woods were full of vines which grow wild. We ate this fruit to make the meat palatable which we were forced to eat without bread. Fresh footprints of men were noticed at this place. This fort td the Sieur de la Salle to keep his men on their guard, and without making any noise. All our men obeyed for a time, but one of them having perceived * a bear, could not restrain him- self from firing his gun at it, ^^hich killed the animal and sent it rolling from the top of the mountain to the bottom to the very foot of our cabins. This noise revealed us to a hundred and twenty- five Indians of the nation of the Outouagamis,f who live near the extremity of the Bay of the \ Puants;}; who were cabined in our vicinity. The \ Sieur de la Salle was very uneasy about the trails we had seen. He blamed our men for their lack of prudence, and then to prevent surprises, \ * Margry's Relation for the rest of the sentence has " a bear ' and a stag, they could not forbear firing at them." \ t The Foxes. J Green Bay. ?s 120 A DESCRIPTION I. I it ii' '(ij he placed a sentinel near the canoes, under which all the goods were placed to protect them from the rain.* This precaution did not prevent thirty Outoua- gamis, under cover of the rain which was falling in torrents, and through the negligence of the sentinel who was on duty, from gliding by night with their usual dexterity, along the hill where our canoes were, and lying on their bellies near one another, succeed in stealing the f coat of the Sieur de la Salle's lackey,]and a part of what was under, which was passed from hand to hand. Our sentinel hearing some noise and rousing us, each one ran to arms. J; These Indians seeing themselves thus discovered, their chief called out that he was a friend. He was told in answer, * And another near the cabins, Margry, i p. 456, t For " the coat " etc., ..." and a " Margry's reads " a good." X For this sentence Margry's Relation gives a different state- ment. " The Sieur de \\ Salle awoke at this moment and having risen to ascertain whether his sentinels were discharging their duty, he saw something move which induced him to call his men to arms, and with them he occupied an eminence by which the Indians were compelled to pass." OF LOUISIANA. 121 that it was an unseasonable hour, and that people did not come in that way hy night except to steal or kill those who were not on their guard. He replied that in truth, the shot that had been fired, had made his countrymen all think that it was a party of Iroquois, their enemies, as the other Indians, their neighbors, did not use such fire arms, and that they had accordingly advanced with the intent of killing them, but having dis- covered that they were Frenchmen whom they regarded as their brethren, the impatience which they felt to see them, had prevented their waiting for daylight to visit us and to smoke in our calumet with us. This is the ordinary com- pliment of these Indians and their greatest marks of affection. We pretended to credit these reasons, and they were told to approach to the number of four or five only, because their young men were given to stealing and that our Frenchmen were in no humor to put up with it. Four or five old men having advanced we endeavored to entertain them 12 rr 122 A DESCRIPTION ! :^'! ) till daylight ; when day came we left ihem at liberty to retire. After their departure our ship carpenters per- ceived that they had been robbed and as we knew perfectly the disposition of the Indians, and we knew that they would form similar enterprises every night, if we dissembled on this occasion, we resolved to insist on redress. The Sieur de la Salle at the head of our men ascend M an eminence of peninsular form ; he tried in person to find some Indian off by himself He had scarcely marched three hundred paces, when he found the fresh trjiil of a hunter. He followed him pistol in hand and having overtaken him soon after ''''■ opposite a hill where I was gathering grapes with Father Gabriel, he called me and begged me to follow him. He seized and put him under guard of his men, after having learned from him all the circumstances of the theft. He again took the field with two of his men and having arrested one of the most important Indians of his nation, * Fioin here to " follow him " omitted in Maigry where " we •• is fe-Jnerally " he." OF LOUISIANA. 123 he showed him at a distance the one he already held as a prisoner, and sent him back to tell his p-ople, that he would kill their comrade, if they did not bring back ail that they had stolen during the night. This proposition embarrassed these savages, because they had cut the lackey's coat in pieces, and laken some goods with the buttons =^ to divide them among them. Thus unable to restore them whole, and not knowing by what means to deliver their comrade, as they have a strong friendship for one another, they resolved to rescue him by force. The next morning, 30th of the month of October, they all advanced arms in hand to begin the attack. The peninsula where we were en- camped, was separated from the wood where the Indians appeared, by a long sandy plain two gun shots wide. At the end of this plain towards the wood we noticed that there were several small mounds, and that the one nearest to us comman- * For " the lackey's coat the buttons " Margry has, " some goods." 124 A DFSCRIPTTON m I' 1. ded the others. This the Sieur de la Salle occu- pied and commanded five men who carried their hlankets half rolled around the left arm to shield themselves against the arrows of the Indians.* He followed his men immediately after, to sup- port the former, hut the youngest of the Indians seeing the French approach to charge on them drew off and took to cover under a large tree on the hill. This did not prevent their chiefs from continuing to remain near us. There were only seven or eight who had guns, the others had bows and arrows only ; and during all these manoeuvres on both sides, we three Recollects were there saying our office, and as I was the one of the three who had seen most iii matter of war, having served as King's chaplain iMider the direction of the Very Rev. Father Hyacinth le Fevre, I camef out of our cabin to * Maigry's Relation acids '• who had seized all these emi- nences," and instead of what follows down to 125 Indians reads " But these savages seeing the French approach to charge them abandoned the nearest and gave the Sieur de la Salle time to mount the highest. This action" f The Nouvelle Decouverte omits this name and adds " in sieges and battles." What precedes corresponds mainly in both editions. r" iil w^ OF LOUISIA:«.A. 125 see what figure our men made under arms and to encourage two of the youngest whom I saw grow pale, and who nevertheless made for all that a show ol being brave and haughty as much as their leader. I approached in the direction of the oldest Indians, and as they saw that I was unarmed, they readily inferred that I approached them with a view to part the combatants and to become the mediator of their differences. One of our men seeing a band of red stuff, which served as a head band to one of these Indians, went and tore it off his head, giving him to understand that he had stolen it from us. This bold act of eleven armed Frenchmen against a hundred and twenty-five Indians, so intimidated these savages that two of their old men near whom I was. presented the peace calumet, and having advanced on the assurance given that they could do so without any fear, they said that they had not resorted to this extreme course, except from the inability"^ they were in to restore what they had stolen from us, in the condition in which * The text has impatience^ evidently a misprint for impuissanct. msammoBBA ^^ 126 A DESCRIPTION II > they had taken it : that they were ready to restore what was whole, and to pay for the rest. At the same time they presented some beaver rohes to the Sieur de la Salle to dispose his mind to peace, excusing themselves for the small value of their present, as the season was too far advanced. We contented ourselves with their excuses, they fulfilled what they had promised, and thus peace was restored. The next day was spent in dances, in feasts and speeches,=^= and the head chief of these Indians turning towards the Recollects, said : " See, the Grey Gowns, for whom we feel great esteem ! they go barefooted like us, they despise the beaver robes whi :h we wish to give them, without any hope of return ; they have no arms to kill us : they flatter and caress our little children, and give them beads f for nothing, and those of our nation * The following is omitted in Margry down to " He added that " the connection being by the words " in which they ex- hc-ted the Sieur de la Salle to remain with them and not go among the Illinois whom it would be impossible to resist, and who had resolved to massacre all the French." t "And little knives" Nouv. Decouv., p. 166. ■^^ EWHN OK LOUISIANA. 127 who have carried furs to the villages of the French have told us that that Onnotio* the great chief of the French loves them, because they have left everything that the French esteem most precious, to come and visit us, and to remain with us. You who are the chief of those who are here, arrange so as to make one of the Gray gowns remain with us. We will give them part of all we have to eat, and we will take them to our village after we have killed some buffalo ; and you who are master, arrange so as to stay here also with us ; do not go to the Islinois, for we know that they wish to massacre all the French. f It will be impossible for you to resist that numerous nation. He added that since an Iroquois, whom the Islinois had burned, had assured them that the * Oiioiitio, Nouv. Decouv. Huron and Onondaga word meaning Beautiful mountain. Ononta^ meaning mountain, and to in composition meaning beautiful. The tern s given originally to Moritmagny, Governor of Canada, . parently in the sense of " Mont magnifique," " Beautiful mountain " and was subscqnentiv given to all the governors of Canada. The Nouv. Dec. has " Canadians " for " French " throughout this part. t Your followers. Nouv. Dec, p. 167. 12 8 A DESCRIPTION i I i m - ' war which the Iroquois made on them, had been advised by the French, who hated the Islinois. They added several like reasons which alarmed almost all our French men,='= and greatly disquieted the Sieur de la Salle, because all the Indians whom he had met on our whole route, had told him pretty nearly the same thing. Nevertheless as he knew that these reason might have been have been inspired by those who opposed our enterprise and by the jealousy of the Indians to whom the Islinois were formid- able by their valor, and who feared thaf they might become still more haughty, when by means of the Frenchf they had acquired the use of fire arms, we resolved to pursue our course, taking all necessary precautions for our safety. He accordingly answering the Outouagamis, told them that he thanked them for the infor- mation which they gave us, but that the French who are spirits (the Indians so style us, saying that they are only men, but that we are spirits) J * Canadians. Nouv. Dec, p. 167. f By our means Nouv. Dec. t For "the French ...spirit " Margry leads " he " For French, the Nouv. Dec. has " we." OF LOUISIANA. 129 did not fear the Islinois, and that we would bring them to reason by friendship or by force. The next day, the first of the month of No- vember, we all reembarked and we arrived at the rendezvous, which we had arranged with * twenty other Frenchmen who were to come and meet us by the other side of the lake. It was at the mouth of the river of the Miamis, which coming from the south empties into Lake Dauphin. We were surprised to find no one there, be- causef the French whom we expected, had had a much shorter route to make than we had, and their canoes were not heavily laden ]; We had resolved to make the Sieur de la Salle, see that he ought not to expose us unseasonably and not to wait for winter, to conduct us to the * Maigry reads " the Sieur de Tonty has had etc." Sec LcClercq, Etablissment de la Foi 2 p. 151. t Margrv adds: "nevertheless he profited by this conjunc- ture to gain time and carry out the design that he had formed. He had resolved not to expose himself" unseasonably." etc. I All the rest is omitted in Maigry, which reads, "and that having been joined by the Sieur de Tonty who was to bring him 20 men he would be able without danger," etc. I30 A DESCRIPTION Ili Islinois, because during that season these nations, in order to hunt more conveniently, brealc up into families or bands of two or three hundred persons each,]}; and that the longer we lingered in that spot, the greater difficulty we should find in getting there. That as the hunting began to fail where we were, his whole party ran a risk of starving to death, and that among the Islinois we should find Indian corn for our food, and that we should live better, being only fourteen men by our route, than if wj were thirty-two; that if the rivers should freeze over, we would not be able of ourselves to carry all the equipage, for a hundred leagues. He answered us that when the twenty men whom he expected had joined us, he would be able without danger to make himself knov/n to the first band of Islinois whom he should find huniimg, and gain them by kind treatment, and by presents, learning some tincture of the Islinois language, and that by this means he would easily form alliance with the rest of the nation. We* understood by similar remarks, that he * This sentence omitted in Margry. OF LOUISIANA. 131 regarded his own will alone as reason ; and he told us that if all his men deserted he would remain with our Indian hunter, and that he would easily find means by hunting to enable the three Recollect missionaries to live. In this thought, he availed himself of the delay of the Frenchmen * whom he expected ; he told his men that he was resolved to wait, and to amuse them by some useful occupation, he proposed to them to build a fort, and a house for the security of the bark and of the goods which she was to bring, in order to serve us as a refuge in case of need. There was at the mouth of the river of the Miamis,f an eminence with a kind of platform on top and naturally fortified. It was high and steep, of triangular figure, formed on two sides by the river, and on the other by a deep ravine. He felled the trees by which it was covered and cleared away the underbrush for two gun shots in the direction of the woods. Then he began * Our men. Nouv Jcc, p. 170. t Now known as the St. Joseph's. The mouth forms Benton Harbor. Beckwith's Historic Notes, p. 75. It: m p 132 A DESCRIPTION Mi •^ II a redoubt forty feet long by eighty "' broad, fortified by squared beams and joists, and musket proof, laid one on another : his design being to put inclined palisades around the two sides facing the river. He cut down palisades which he wished to plant en tenaille twenty-five feet high on the land side. The month of November was spent in these works,f during which time we ate nothing but bear meat that our hunter killed. There were at this place many of these animals, that were attracted to it, by the great quantities of grapes growing everywhere there ; but our people seeing the Sieur de la Salle all unmanned by the fear he entertained of the loss of his bark, and utterly annoyed also at the delay of his men, whom the Sieur de Tonty was to bring us, the rigorous set- ting in of winter as a climax disheartening them, the mechanics worked only reluctantly, storming * Margry has 30. •}■ Instead of what follows down to " perseverance " Mar- gry reads : "except the holidays and Sundays, when all the party attended divine service and the sermon which Fathers Gabrie] and Louis delivered alternately after Vespers." ..I ^ p OF LOUISIANA. 133 against the fat bear meat, and at their being de- prived of liberty to go and kill deer to eat with the bear fat, but their aim all tended to deser- tion.* We made a bark cabin during this halt, in order to say mass more conveniently, and on holi- days and Sundays Father Gabriel and I preached alternately, chosing the most impressive matters to exhort our men to patience and perseverance. From the commencement of the same month we had examined the mouth of the river. We had marked a sand bank there, and to facilitate the entrance of the bark, in case it arrived, the channel was marked out by two tall poles planted on either side of the entrance, with bear skinf pendants, and buoys all along. We had more- over sent to Missilimakinac two of our men, in- formed of all things to serve as guides to Lukef the pilot. On the 20th of November, the Sieur de Tonty * Le Clercq gives this briefly. Etablissemem de la Foi. ii, p. 151. t This word not in Margry. ■■ '34 A DESCRIPTION arrived* with two canoes loaded with several stags. This revived a little the drooping spirits of our workmen, but as he brought us only half of the men whom we expected, and had left the rest at liberty three days from our works, this gave the Sieur de la Salle some uneasiness ; our new comers said that the bark had not touched at Missilimakinac, and that they had heard no tidings of her from the Indians, coming from all sides of the lakes, nor from the two men who had been sent to Missilimakinac and whom they had met on the way. He feared and with reason that his bark had been wrecked. Nevertheless he kept his men working at the Fort of the Miamis, as he called it, and not seeing her appear after waiting so long, he resolved to set out, for fear of being stopped by the ice which began to close theriver,f and which broke up at the first light rain. Nevertheless we * Instead of the following to " new comers, said." Margry has simply " who said to the Sieur de la Salle." Tonty says he arrived Nov. 12 Margry i, p. 580. t The rest of the sentence and down to " deserted " is not in Margry. OF LOUISIANA. 135 had to wait for the rest of the men whom the Sieur de Tonty had left behind, and to repair the fault that he had committed, he retraced his steps to make them come on and join us at once. On the way he wished to hold a little, and re- sist the highwind, against the opinion of Sieur Dautray " and his other canoemen, and as he had only one hand and could not help his two men the waves made them yaw and threw them broad side on the lake shore, where they lost their guns and their little baggage. f This obliged them to come back to us, and fortunately the rest of our men followed soon after them, except two whom we most mistrusted and who, we believed, had deserted. We embarked on the 3d of December with thirty men in eight canoes and ascended the river of the Miamis, taking our course to the * John Francis Bourdon, Sieur d' Autray, son of John Bourdon, Attorney General and Chief Engineer of Canada, born at Quebec, Feb., 1647. Tanguay, Dictionaire, p. 78. t Tonty in Margry i, p. 581. Tonty, Memoire p. 7. La Hist. Coll. I, p. 54. II -_«-.^ -L. ^m •^■BP^iWPP I I ?' i r P Li 136 A DESCRIPTION southeast for about twenty-five* leagues. We f could not make out the portage which we were to take with our canoes and all our equipage, in order to go and embark at the source of River Seignelay,|* and as we had gone higher up in a canoe without discerning the place where we were to march by land to take this other river, which runs to the Islinois, we halted to wait for the Sieur de la Salle, who had gone exploring on land, and as he did not return, we did not know what course to pursue. I begged two of our * Margry say twenty. fThis down to "He told us that the marshes" is Henne- pin's account, the Margiy Relation has : " One day the Sieur de la Salle kcnt his canoes ahead and tullowed them on land accord- ing to his custom, hunting and seeking to make some profita- ble discovery. He gave chase to a stag that he had wounded and that he could not overtake till he plunged 4 or 5 leagues into the wood. He thought that the two men whom he had with him were following his trail on the snow and would soon overtake him ; but they got astray and turned back to their starting place in the morning instead of following the path that he took. Accordingly after wailing sometime in vain, he took his route to come up to the canoes again. Marshes. X The Nouv. Dec, say " River of the Illinois. This river empties and loses its name in the river Meschasipi which in the language of the Illinois means " Great River" p. 176. It was the Theakiki, now Kankakee branch of the Illinois. OF LOUISIANA. m most alert men to penetrate into the woods, and fire oft" their guns so as to give him notice of the spot where we were waiting tor him. Two others ascended the river hut to no purpose, for the night ohliged them to retrace their step.. The next day I took two of our men on a lightened canoe, to make greater expedition, and to seek him by ascending the river, but in vain, and at four o'clock in the afternoon we perceived him at a distance, his hands and face all black with the coals and the wood that he had lighted during the night which was cold. He had two animals of the size of musk rats, hanging at his belt, which had a very beautiful skin, like a kind of ermine, which he killed with blows of a stick, with- out these little animals taking flight, and which often let themselves hang by the tail from branches of trees, and as they were very fat, our canoemen feasted on them. He told us that the marshes he met with obliged him to make a wide sweep, and as moreover he was hindered by the snow which was falling rapidly, he was unable 13 MHttiiMiHi HHIHIIH 138 A DESCRIPTION to reach the bank of the river before two o'clock at night. He fired two gun shots to notify us, and no one having answered him, bethought that the canoes had gone on ahead of him, and kept on his way, along and up the river. After march- ing in this way more than three hours, he saw fire on a mound, which he ascended brusquely, and after calling two or three times but instead of finding us asleep as he expected, he saw only a little fire among some brush, and under an oak tree, the spot where a man had been lying down on dry herbs, and who had apparently gone off at the noise which he had heard. •=" It was some Indian who had gone there in ambush to surprise and kill some of his enemies along the river. He called him in two or three languages, and at last to show him that he did not fear him, he cried that he was going to sleep in his place. He renewed the fire and after warming himself well, he took steps to guarantee himself against sur- prise, by cutting down around him a quantity of bushes, which falling across among those that * Tonty describes this adventure briefly, Margry i, p. 581. OF LOUISIANA. 139 remained standing, blocked the way, so that no one could approach him without making considerable noise, and awakening him. He then extinguished his fire and slept although it snowed all night. Father* Gabriel and I begged the Sieur de la Salle, not to leave his party as he had done, show- ing him that the whole success of our voyage depended on his presence. Our Indian had remained behind us to hunt, and not finding us at the portage, he went higher up, and came to tell us that we would have to descend the river. All our canoes were sent with him, and I remained with the Sieur de la Salle, who was very much fatigued, and as our cabiu * Instead of the following to " their load of meat," the Margry Relation reads : " The next day he went to seek Indian trails and he found that some had come three or four times to his rampart of brush- wood, but that they had not dared to cross it for fear of being discovered. He returned to the bank of the river, where find- ing no sign of the passage of the canoes, he retraced his trail of the day before and was following the current when he met Father Louis who was coming in search of him in his canoe, in which he embarked to proceed to the spot where the rest of his little fleet awaited him." 14.0 A DESCRIPTION n was composed only of flag mats, it took fire at night and would have burnt us, had I not promptly thrown off the mat which served as a door to our little quarters, and which was all in flames. We rejoined our party the next day, at the portage where Father Gabriel had made several crosses on the trees, that we might recognize it. We found there a number of bufi^alo horns and the carcasses of those animals, and some canoes that the Indians had made, of buffalo skins to cross the river with their load of meat. This place is situated on the edge of a great plain, at the extremity of which on he western side is a v'.llage of Miamis, Maacontens* and Oiatinon gathered together. The river Seignelay f which flows to the * The Nouv. Dec. has Miamis Mascouteins, p. 181. The Ouiatenon are the Weas. f The portage was not far from the present city of South Bend, Indiana. " West of the city is Lake Kankakee, from which the Kankakee rivtr takes its rise. The distance inter- vening between the head of this little lake and the St. Joseph is about two miles, over a piece of marshy ground, where the OF LOUISIANA. 141 Islinois (Indians,) rises in a plain in the midst of much boggy land, over which it is not easy to walk. This river is only a league and a half dictant from that of the Miamis, and thus we transported all our equipage and our canoes by a road which ^" we marked for the benefit of those who might come after us, after leaving at the portage of the Miami river as well as at the fort which we had built at its mouth, letters § ' j serve as a guide to those who were to come and join us by the bark to the mimher of twenty-five. The river SeigweUy is navigable for canoes to withiu i. hundred paces of its source, and it increases to such an extent in a short time, that it is almost as broad and deeper than the Marne.|| It takes its course through vast marshes, where it elevation is so slight, " that," says Levette in his report on the Geology of St. Joseph County, " in the year 1832, a Mr. A. Croquillard dug i race and secured a flow of water from the lake to the St. Joseph, of sufficient power to run a grist and saw mill." Beckwith, Historic Notes, p. 24. X This marking is not in Margry i, p. 463. § Which were hung on trees at the pass. Nouv. Dec, p. 182. II The Sambre aud the Mcuse. Nouv. Die, p. 182. ' 1 ! I ; ! I 14.2 A DESCRIPTION K f winds about so, though its current is pretty strong, that after sailing on it for a whole day, we some- times found that we had not advanced more than two leagues in a straight line. As far as the eye could reach nothing was to be seen but marshes full of flags and alders. For more than forty leagues of the way, we could not have found a camping ground, except for some hummocks of frozen earth on which we slept and lit our fire. Our provisions ran out and we could find no game after passing these marshes, as we hoped to do, because there are only great open plains, where nothing grows except tall grass, which is dry at this season, and which the Miamis had burned while hunting buffalo, and '■• with all the address we employed to kill some deer, our hun- ters took nothing ; for more than sixty leagues journey, they killed only a lean stag, a small deer, some swans, and two wild geese for the subsist- ance of thirty-two men.f If our canoe men had found a chance, they would infallibly have all * The rest of the paragraph not in Margry. f Thirty or thirty-two, Nouv. Dec, p. 184. L. I w OF LOUISIANA. H3 abandoned us, to strike inland and join the Indians whom we discerned by the flames of the prairies to which they had set fire in order to kill the bufl^alo more easily. These animals are ordinarily in great numbers there, as it is easy to judge by the bones, the horns and skulls that we saw on all sides. The Miamis hunt them at the end of autumn * in the follow- ing manner : When they see a herd,f they gather in great numbers, and set fire to the grass every where around these animals, except some passage which they leave on purpose, and where they take post with their bows and arrows. The buffalo, seek- ing to escape the fire, are thus compelled to pass near these Indians, who sometimes kill as many as a hundred and twenty |' in a day, all which they * The Noiiv. Dec, here introduces the paragraph " We con- tinued " to " cable " which is in this edition after the account of the buffalo. f *' When the Indians see a herd of these cattle or bulls, they gather, etc." Nouv. Decouv., p. i86. J Margry has "two hundred in a day " and omits rest of paragraph. 144- A DESCRIPTION distribute according to the wants of the families ; and these Indians all triumphant over the massacre of so many animals, come to notify their women, who at once proceed to bring in the meat. Some of them at times take on their backs three hundred pounds weight, and also throw their children on top of their load which does not seem to burthen them more than a soldier's sword at his side. These cattle have very line wool instead of hair, and the females have it longer than the males. Their horns are almost all black, much thicker than those of cattle in Europe, but not quite so long. Their head is of monstrous size ; the neck is very short, but very thick,* and sometimes six hands f broad. They have a hump or slight ele- vation between the two shoulders. Their legs are very thick and short, covered with a very long wool. On the head and between the horns they have long black hair which falls over their eves and gives them a fearful look. The |' meat of * Rest of sentence omitted in Margry. t In the Nouv. Decouv., pants, apparently palmes or paumes. I All the description that follows down to "as commonly as in Europe," is omitted in Margry. OF LOUISIANA. '45 these animals is very succulent. They are very fat in autumn, because all the summer they are up to their necks in the grass. These vast countries are so full of prairies, that it seems this is the element and the country of the buffalo.* There are at near intervals some woods where these animals retire to ruminate, and to get out of the heat of the sun. These wild cattle or bulls change country according to the season and the diversity of cli- mate. When they approach the northern lands and begin to feel the beginning of winter, they pass to the southern lands. They follow one another on the way sometimes for a league. They all lie down in the same place, and their resting- ground is often full of wild purslain, which we have sometimes eaten. f The paths by which they have passed are beaten like our great roads in Europe, and no grass grows there. They cross * " The element of the buftalo and the country of the deer." Nouv. Dec, p. i88. t " This leads to the conjecture that it is introduced into these parts by the dung of these bulls and cows." Nouv. Dec, p. 189. IBilHilttli 1^6 A DESCRIPTION rivers and streams.* The wild cows go to the islands to prevent the wolves from eating their calves ; and f even when the calves can run, the wolves would not venture to approach them, as the cows would exterminate them. The Indians have this forecast not to drive these animals entirely from their countries, to pursue only those who are wounded hy arrows, and the others that escape, they suffer to go at liberty with- out pursuing them further, in order not to alarm them too much. And although these Indians of these vast continents are naturally given to des- troy the animals, they have never been able to exterminate these wild cattle, for however much they hunt them these beasts multiply so that they return in still greater numbers the following year. The Indian women spin on the distaff the wool of these cattle, out of which they make bags to carry the meat, bcucanned and some- times dried in the sun, which these women keep ♦ " Tliat they find in their way by swimming in order to pas- ture from one land to another." lb. t*' But when once the calves are large enough to run after their mothers, the wolves." lb. »« OF LOUISIANA. ^M frequently for three or four months of the year, and although they have no salt, they dry it so well that the meat undergoes no corruption, four months after they have thus dressed this meat, one would say on eating it that the animals had just been killed, and we drank the broth with them* instead of water which is the ordinary drink of all the nations of America, who have no intercourse with Europeans. The ordinary skins of these wild cattle weigh from one hundred to a hundred and twenty pounds. The Indians cut off the back and the neck part which is the thickest part of the skin, and they take only the thinnest part of the belly, which they dress very neatly, with the brains of all kinds of animals, by means of which they render it as supple as our chamois skins dressed with oil. They paint it with different color ., trim it with white and red porcrpine quills, and make robes of it to parade in their feasts. In winter they use them to cover themselves especially at night. * In which this meat had boiled, like the Indians. Nouv. Dec, p. 190. If 14.8 A DESCRIPTION I Their robes which are full of curly wool have a very pleasing appearance. When the Indians have killed any cows, the little calves follow the hunters, and go and lick their hands or fingers, these Indians sometimes take them to their children and after they have played with them, they knock them on the head to eat them. They preserve the hoofs ='' of all these little animals, dry them and fasten them to rods, and in their dances they shake and rattle them, according to the various postures and motions of the singers and dancers. This machine somewhat resembles a tambour. These little animals might easily be domesti- cated and used to plough the land. These wild cattle subsist in all seasons of the year. When they are surprised by winter and cannot reach in time the southern land and the warm country, and the ground is all covered with snow, they have the tact to turn up and throw aside the snow, to crop the grass hidden beneath. They are heard lowing, but not as commonly as in Europe. * In the Rel., it is ' argots ' but in the Nouv. Dec, ' ongles.' OF LOUISIANA. 149 These wild cattle are much larger in body than ours in Europe especially in the forepart. This great bulk however does not prevent their moving very fast, so that there are very few Indians who can run them down. These bulls often kill those who have wounded them. In the season you see herds of two and even of four hundred. Many other kinds of animals are found in these vast plains of Louisiana, stags, deer, beaver and otter* are common there, geese, swans, turtles,f poules d'inde, parrots, partridges,;}; and many other birds swarm there, the fishery is very abundant, and the fertility of the soil is extraordinary. There are boundless prairies interspersed with forests of tall trees, where there are all sorts of building timber, and among the rest excellent oak full like that in France and § very different from that in Canada. The trees are of prodigious girth and height, and you could find the finest * The rest 01 the sentence omitted in Margry. ■f The French has tortues, evidently " tourtres " wild pigeons. X There is a prodigious quantity of pelicans which have mon- strous beaks. Nouv. Dec, p. 193. § More solid and dense than that in Canada. Ibid 194. MHi I50 A DESCRIPTION i pieces in the world for ship building which can be carried on upon the spot, and wood could be brought as ballast in the ships to build all the vessels of France, * which would be a great saving to the State and would give the trees in our nearly exhausted forests time to grow again. Several kinds of fruit trees are also to be seen in the forests and wild grape vines which produce clusters about a foot and a half long which ripen perfectly, and of which very good wine can be made. There are also to be seen fields covered with very good hemp, which grows there naturally to a height of six or seven feet. To conclude, by the experiments f that we have made among the Islinois and the Issati, we are convinced that the soil is capable of producing all kinds of fruits, herbs and grain, and in greater abundance than the best lands in Europe.J The air there is very temperate and healthy, the country is watered * Europe, Nouv. Dec, p. 194. f In Margry it reads : " by the essays which the Sieur de la Salle made among the Miamis on returning from his second voyage we are convinced, etc." \ As two crops can be gathered a year. Nouv. Dec, p. 195. mi OF LOUISIANA. 15^ by countless lakes, rivers and streams, most of which are navigable. One is scarcely troubled at all by musquitoes or other noxious creatures,=^ and by cultivating the ground, people could subsist there from the second year, independent of provisions from Europe. This vast continent will be able in a short time to supply all our West India islands with bread, wine and meat, and our French buccaneers and fillibusters will be able to kill wild cattle in greater abundance in Louisiana than in all the rest of the islands, which they occupy. There are mines of coal, slate, iron, and the lumps of pure red copper which are found in various places, indicate that there are mines and perhaps other metals and minerals, which will one day be discovered, inasmuch as a salt and alum f spring has already been found among the Iroquois. We continued our route on the river Seignelay * The rest of this paragraph and the next omitted in Margry. t Margry has " salt, alum and sulphur," i p. 466. The Nouv, Dec, p. 196, reads "sah of alum." I'j. t .: f I • 152 A DESCRIPTION 'I . during the rest of the month of December ; and at last after having sailed for a hundred and twenty or a hundred and thirty leagues from Lake Dauphin on the river Seignelay, we arrived at the village of the Islinois towards the close of the month of December, 1679.* We killed on the river bank only a single buffalo, and some poules d'inde, because the Indians having set lire to the dry grass of all the prairies on our route, the deer had taken fright, and with all the skill adopted in hunting, we subsisted only by a pure Providence of God, who gives strength at one time that he does not at another, and by the greatest happiness in the world, when we had nothing any more to eat, we found an enormous buffalo mired on the bank of the river, that twelve of our men had difficulty in dragging to solid ground with a cable. This Islinois f village is situated at forty de- ♦Margry has January 1, 1680. He says two buffalo, ami omits from ' because " to " cable." fThe Nouv. Decouv., inserts here "The etymology of the word Illinois comes as we have said from the term Illini, which OF LOUISIANA. 15^^ grees of latitude in a somewhat marshy plain, and on the right bank of a river as broad as the Seine before Paris, which is divided^^ by very beautiful islands. It contains four hundred and sixty cabins, made like long arbors and covered with double mats of flat flags, so well sewed, that they are never penetrated by wind, snow or rain. Each cabin has four or five fires, and each fire has one or two families, who all live together in a good understanding. f As we had foreseen,^ we found the village e'"pty,.^ all the Indians having gone to pass the ill the language of this nation signifies a perfect or complete man just as the word Alleman signifies all men, as though they wished to intimate that a German has the heart and bravery of all the men of any nation whatever." lliniwek means "we are men." In the form irini, lenni, itcnters into many names of Algonquin tribes. * Meuse before Namur. Nouv. Dec, p. 197. For the position of the village, see Parkman's Disc, of the Great West p. 156. It was near the present village of Utica. t As to the population, compare Marquette, Discovery of the Mississippi, p. 56 ; Voyages p. 98 ; Allouez. Rel , 1673-9, p. 129 ; Discov., p. 74; Membre in LeClercq., ii, p. 173. I This is supported by La Salle's Letter, Sept. 29, 1680, Margry ii, p. 36. § Dec. 31, Tonty in Margry, i p. 581. He makes lat. 39° 14 w '54 A DESCRIPTION ; winter hunting in various places according to their custom. Their absence, nevertheless, put us in great embarrassment; provisions failed and we durst not take the Indian corn which the Islinois hide in trenches under ground to preserve it, and use on their return from the hunt for planting and subsistence till harvest. This stock is extremely precious in their eyes, and you could not give them greater offense than by touching it in their absence. Nc\'ertheless, as there was no possibility of our risking a further descent without food, and the lire that had been set to the prairies had driven off all the animals, the Sieur de la Salle resolved to take twenty ''^ bushels of Indian corn, hoping that he would be able to appease the Islinois by some means. The same day we reembarked with this new supply, and for four days we descended the same river, which runs south by west. On f the first day of the year 1679,]; discov- * Margry has 30, Tonty 40. f This paragraph not in Margry. :j: 1680 ill Nouv. Dec, p. 199, and down to "winters" omitted. Of LOUISIANA. 155 eringone of our deserters, of whom I have here- tofore spoken, and that he had returned to us, only to seduce our men, who, moreover, were dis- posed to abandon us, through the fear they had ot suffering hunger during the winter, I made an exhortation after the mass, wishing a Happy New Year to the Sieur de la Salle and all our party, and after the most touching words, I begged all our malcontents to arm themselves with patience, representing to them that God would provide for all our wants, and that if we lived in concert, he would raise up means to enable us to subsist. Father Gabriel, Father Zenobius and I embraced them with the most affectionate senti- ments, encouraging them to continue so important a discovery. Towards the end of the fourth day, while crossing a little lake formed by the river,* we observed smoke, which showed us that the In- * Lake Peoria. The Nouv. Dec. here abandons the original narrative and copies almost literally from Le Clercq, Etablisse- ment dc la Foi, ii, pp. 153-9, beginning "called Pimiteoui." Nouv. Decouv., np. aoo-7. See Discovery of the Mississippi, pp. 94-6, La Salle in Margry, ii, p. 37. ^. 156 A DESCRIPTION '^ : ; 1: dians were cabined near there. In fact, on the fifth,* about nine o'clock in the morning, we saw on both sides of the river a number of parrakeets f and about eighty cabins full of Indians, who did not perceive our canoes, until we had doubled a point, behind which the Islinois were camped within half gun shot. We were in eight canoes, abreast, all our men arms in hand, and allowing ourselves to go with the current of the river. We f first gave the cry according to the custom of these nations, as though to ask whether they wished peace or war, because it was very im- portant to show resolution at the outset. At first the old men, the women and children took flight across the woods by which the river is bordered, the warriors ran to arms, but with so much confusion, that before they recovered them- selves, our canoes had touched land. The Sieur de la Salle was the first to leap ashore. * Tonty in Margry, i p. 53, and Le Clercq., ii, p. 153, say Jan. 4, 1680, La Salle, ii, p. 37, has however 5th, fThe French printer put peroquets. but Margry's Relation gives the real word " pirogues," " canoes." Compare La Salle's letter Margry ii, p. 37. OF LOUISIANA. ^S7 The Indians might have been routed in the disorder they were in ; but as this was not our design, we hahed in order to give the Islinois time to regain confidence. One of their chiefs who was on the other side of the river and who had observed that we had refrained from firing on seven or eight Indians whom we might easily have killed, began a harangue to stop the young men who were preparing to discharge arrows across the river. Those who were encamped on the side where wc had landed, and who had taken flight at first, having understood the situa- tion, sent two of the chief men among them to present the calumet from the top of a hill, soon after those who were on tne other side did the same thing and then we gave them to understand that we accepted the peace ; and ^' at the same time I proceeded in haste with Father Zenobius in the direction of the Indians who had taken llight, taking their children by the hand, who * The following down to " missionaries " is not in Margry. 11 ! 1 158 A DESCRIPTION were all trembling with fear ; we manifested much affection for them, entering with the old men and the mothers ^ into the cabins, taking compassion on these souls, which are going to destruction, being deprived of the word of God and lacking missionaries. The joy of both was as great as their fear had been violent ; that of some having been such that it was two f days be- fore they returned from the places to which they had gone to hide. After;}; the rejoicings, the dances and feasts to which they devoted the day, we assembled the chiefs of the villages, which were on both sides of the river ; we^ made known by our interpreter, that we, Recollects, had not come among them to gather beaver, but to give them a knowledge ot the great Master of Life, and to instruct their * The Nouv. Dec, p. 202, has Maitres, here for meres. t " Three " in Margry, i p. 468, ii, p. 38. I Down to " friendship " omiued in Margry. § " We told them that we had come among them only to make known to them the true God, to protect them against their ene- mies and to bring them fire arms of which they had no knowl- edge, and the other comforts of life. We heard, etc." Nouv. Dec, p. 203. U OF LOUISIANA. *59 children ; that we had left our country which was beyond the sea to come and dwell among them, and to be of the number of their greatest friends. We heard a great chorus of voices, Tepatoui Nicka, which means : " See what is good, my brother, you have a mind well made to conceive this thought," and at the same time they rubbed our legs down to the sole of the feet near the fire with bear's oil and buffalo grease to relieve our fatigue. They put the first three morsels of meat in our mouth with extraordinary marks of friend- ship. Immediately after the Sieur de la Salle made them a present of tobacco and some axes. He told them that he had convoked them to treat of an affair, which he wished to explain to them, before he spoke to them of any other ; that he knew how necessary corn -^ was to them ; that nevertheless, the want of provisions in which he found himself on arriving at their village, and the * " The corn they had in reserve." Margry, i, p. 468, ii, p. 39. This account is substantially the same in La Salle's letter, ii, p. 32, etc. i6o A DESCRIPTION 1 ■ 1 ' 1 impossibility of rinding any game on the prairies, had obliged him to take a certain quantity of In- dian corn, which he had in his canoes, and which he had not yet touched; that it' they were willing to leave it in his hands, he would give them in ex- change axes and other things which they needed, and that if they could not spare it, they were free to take it back ; but that if they could not supply him the provisions necessary for his subsistence and that of his men, he would go to their neighbors the Osages, "•' who would furnish him some on paying for it, and that in return he would leave with them the blacksmith whom he had brought to mend their axes and other instruments.^ He spoke to them in this manner, because he was well aware that the Is!inois would not fail to bejealousof the advantages that the French might give their neighbors, and especially that they * These words omitte^l in Nouv. Dec, p. 205. f " Which we Europeans might give them in future. The Indians granted Mr. de la Salle what he wished and we made an alliance with them. To render this alliance firm and in. violable which we contracted with the Illinois, we had to take several necessary precautions." I > OF LOUISIANA. i6i would derive from a blacksmith, of whom they were themselves excessively in need. They accordingly accepted with great demonstrations of joy the payment that he offered them for their Indian corn. They even gave more and earnestly begged us to settle among them. We answered that we would do so willingly, but that as the Iroquois were subjects of the king and consequently our brethren, we could not make war on them ; that for this reason we exhorted them to make peace with that nation, that we would aid them to do so, and that if in spite of our remonstrances, that haughty nation came to attack them, we would defend them provided they permitted us to build a fort, in which we could make head against the Iroquois with the few Frenchmen that we had ; that we would even furnish them arms and ammunition, provided they used them only to repel their ene- mies, and did not employ against the nations that lived under the protection of the king whom the Indians call the Great Chief who is beyond the great lake. HM i 162 A DESCRIPTION i We then added that we also intended to bring over other P'renchmen who would protect them from the attacks of all their enemies, and would furnish all that they needed ; that we were hin- dered only by the length and difficulty of the way. That to surmount this obstacle, we had resolved to build a great wooden canoe to sail down to the sea, and bring them all kinds of merchandise by that shorter and more easy way. But as this enterprise required a great outlay, we wished to learn whether their rii'er was navigable to the sea, and whether other Europeons dwelt near its mouth. The Islinois replied that they accepted all our proposals, and that they would assist us as far as they could. Then they gave a description of the river Colbert or Meschasipi ; they told us won- ders of its width, and beauty, and they assured us that the navigation was free and easy, and that there were no Europeans near its mouth; but what most convinced us that this river was navi- gable, is that they named four nations to us, of whom there is mention in the Relation of the ' t ■I OF LOUISIANA. 163 Voyage of Ferdinand Soto, in Florida ; these are, the Tula, Casquin,* Cicaca and Daminoia. They added that prisoners whom they had taken in war in the direction of the sea, said that they had seen ships far out which made discharges, that re- sembled thunder, but that they were not settled on the coast, because if they were there, they (the Indians), would not neglect to go and trade with them, the sea being distant only twenty days in their canoes. The f day passed in this way to our mutual satisfaction, but things did not remain long in this state. * Ciuquh in Margry p. 470. For these places see Smith's Narratives of the Career of Hernando dc Soto, Tula, pp. 305 ; Casqui, no, 250 ; Chicasa. 92, 247; Aminoya, 167. The term Chitasa is easily identified, as the tribe held the same territory from the days of De Soto to the present century. Casqui may be Kaskaskia, but it is not easy to see how La Salle recognized Tula and Aminoya in any Indian tribe of his time. t Paragraph omitted in Margry, i p. 470, but appears partly in La Salle's letter, ii, p. 4 1. IMAGE EVALUATION TEST T ' RGET (MT-3) 1.0 I.I 1.25 la 125 iii IIIILM |||||22 ^ 2.0 1.4 1.8 1.6 V} i9 /}. A '<^. e. (TA % 6> V /A Photographic Sciences Corporation # :i>^ ^ \\ % .V 6^ % ^^^^ C^ <> 23 WEST MAIN STREET WEBSTER, N.Y. 14580 (716) 872-4S03 &^ fr' C<'< Q' Cp. \ m 164 A DESCRIPTION -■! It M >l 1 1 r The next day one of the chiefs of the Miamis * named Monso, arrived accompanied by five or six others loaded with kettles, axes, and knives in order by these presents to prepare the mind of the Islinois to believe what he was to say to them. He secretly assembled the sachems and assured them that we f intended to go and join their enemies, who live beyond the great river Colbert, ;|]that we would furnish them arms and ammunition, and that after having assembled them we would join the Iroquois, and hem them in on all sides to exterminate them entirely ; that we were friends of the Iroquois, that the French had a fort in the midst of the Iroquois country, that we would furnish them arms and powder, and that there was no other means of avoiding their ruin, than by preventing our voyage or at least delaying it, because a part of our men would * From F. Allouez's mission according to LaSalle's letter, Margry ii p. 41, 100, where Monso is said to mean a Deer, but the Chippewa Mons, is our Moose, Baraga p. 252. The Nouv. Dec, calls him a Maskoutens. t " The Sieur de la Salle " is here and generally in Margry substituted for Hennepin's " wc.' X Omitted in Margry. '!t OF LOUISIANA. i6s soon abandon us, and that they should not believe anything we might tell them. After having said many things of the kind, the Miami chief returned by night with as much secresy as he came lest we might discover all this mystery. Nevertheless one of the Islinois chiefs named Omaouha '■'•'• whom we had gained on arriving by a present of two axes and three knives, came to see us the next morning and secretly informed us of all that had passed. We thanked him and to induce him to keep us informed of all that went on, we made him a new present of powder and lead,f easily judging that this Miamis had been sent and instructed by other Frenchmen, jealous of our success, because this Monso did not know us, and had not even been within four hun- dred leagues of Fort Frontenac, and that never- theless, he had spoken of our affairs with as * Omoahoha, in Margry i p. 471, ii p. 42, where La Salle calls him chief of" the Koeracoenetanoii. He is not mentioned in the Nouv. Decouv. t "The Sieur de la Salle and all his men judged, etc.," in Margry, and " us, our," reads " him, his." T 1 66 A DESCRIPTION m ^•'^ in mt' «■»• iii^ J. il : I- 1 ' i ■ ' i .H:| |; ;:■ |,| l'iM\ mE much detail and circumstantiality as though he had known us all his life. This affair gave us all the more uneasiness, because we knew that Indians are naturally sus- picious and because many bad impressions had already been made on our men to induce them to desert, as •* six of their comrades had already done at one stroke. In the afternoon of the same day, Nicanape, brother of Chassagouasse,| the most important of the Islinois chiefs, who was then absent, invited us all to a feast, and when all were seated in the cabin, Nicanape took the word, and made us 'I an address very different from those which the sachems had made us at his arrival, saying that he had not invited us, so much to give us good cheer as to cure our mind of the disease which we had, wishing to descend the great river, * " Their comrades had done at Missilimakinak," Margry. t Chassagoac. lb. He accompanied F. Marquette from Green Bay. Disc, of the Mississippi, p. 259. I Margry has ''the Sieur de la Salle," and apparently this was Hennepin's original reading. T IVBHW ■■MP ■■■«■■ OF LOUISIANA. 1 67 which no one had ever yet done without perish- ing there, that its banks were inhabited by an infinite number of barbarous nations, who would overwhehn the French by their numbers, what- ever arms and whatever valor they might possess; that this river was full of monsters, tritons,* crocodiles, and serpents, and even if the size of our canoe should protect us from this danger, there was another and inevitable one, that the lower part of the river was full of falls and preci- pices with a current above them so evident,f that men go down helplessly, and that all these precipices ended in a gulf where the river was lost under ground, without any one's knowing whither it went. He added to this so many circumstances and pronounced his address so seriously with so many marks of good will, that our men who were not all accustomed to the manners of the Indians and two I of whom understood the language, were shaken by it. We marked their apprehension in their faces, but as * Tritons, crocodiles omitted in Margry. t " Violent," in Margry. X Two or three, Margry i, p. 472. i68 A DESCRIPTION IP I'll ii. 1=-:.! I -1; it is not the custom to interrupt Indians, and by doing so, we should only have increased the sus- picion of our men, we let liim finish his speech in peace, and then we replied without any emo- tion, that we were very much obliged to him tor the information he gave us, and that we should acquire all the more glory, if we found difficulties to overcome ; that we all served * the great Master of the life of men, and him f who was the greatest of all the chiefs who commanded beyond the sea : that we esteemed ourselves happy to die, while bearing '^ the name of both to the very end of the earth ; but that we feared that all that he had told us, was only an invention of his friendship to prevent our leaving his nation, or rather that it was only an artifice of some evil spirit who had given them some distrust of our * Down to "who was '' omitted. Margry. t Of our chiefs ; that he commanded the sea and all the world i that we should deem ourselves happy to die bearing the name of the great chief of heaven and of him who had sent us to the end of the world. Nouv. Dec, p. 210, J His name. lb. OF LOUISIANA. 169 plans, although they were full of sincerity ; that if the Islinois had any real friendship for us, they should not dissemble the grounds of their uneasi- ness; from which we should endeavor to deliver them, that otherwise we should have reason to believe, that the friendship they manifested for us on our arrival was only on their lips. Nicanape remained unable to reply, and pre- senting us food changed his discourse.* After the meal our interpreter f took up the word again, and told him that we were not sur- prised that their neighbors became jealous of the advantages, that they would receive from the trade which they were going to have with the French, nor that they should spread reports to our damage, but that he was astonished to see them so easy to give them credence, and that they concealed them from the French,+ who had so frankly revealed to them all their designs. * All this is substantiated by La Salle's letter, Margry ii, p 43-4- t The Si.'ur de la Salle, lb. I A man, lb. 16 " ^f'^^^WWWP^?*^ ' li 170 A DESCRIPTION }f " We were not asleep, brother," he added, addressing Nicanape, "when Monso spoke to you in secret at night to the prejudice of the French, whom he depicted to you as spies of the Iroquois. The presents that he made you to convince you of his Hes are still secreted in this cabin. Why did he take flight imnrediately afterwards ? Why did he not show himself by day, if he had only truth to tell ? Have you not seen that at our arrival we might have killed your nephews, and that in the confusion prevailing among them, we might have done alone, what they wish to per- suade you, we will execute with the help of the Iroquois, after we are settled among you, and have formed a friendship with your nation ? At this moment that I am addressing you, could not our French, kill all of you, old men that you are, while your young men are off at the hunt ; do you not know that the Iroquois, whom you fear, have experienced the valor of the French, and that consequently we should not need their help, if we intended to make war on you. But to cure your mind entirely, run after this imposter, whom OF LOUISIANA. 171 we will wait here to convict and confound. How does he know us,^= since he has never seen us, and how can he know the plots which he says we have formed with the Iroquois, whom he knows as little as he does us ? Look at our stores, they are only tools and goods that can but serve us to do you good, and which are not suited either for attacking or for retreating." These words influenced them and induced them to dispatch runners after Monso to bring him back, but the heavy sno\Y that fell by night before and which covered his tracks, prevented th.iir overtaking him ; nevertheless our French- men who had been alarmed already, were not relieved of their false fears. Six of them who were on guard, and f among them two pit-saw- yers, without whom we could not make a bark to go to the sea, fled the next night, after having carried ofl^ whatever they thought likely to be necessary to them, and exposed themselves to a danger of perishing and dying of hunger much * All this is in the first person in Margry, " mv " " mv people," "me." " ^ t Margry omits to " sea." T '•I 172 A DESCRIPTION ;): I ' I 'h ^ ■w T r (, i f 1 more certain than that which they sought to avoid.* The Sieur de la Salle having gone out of his cabin in the morning and finding no one on duty, he entered the cabins of his men, and found one where there was only a single man left, whom his comrades had not notified, because he was suspected by them. He called them all together and asked for information in regard to these deserters. Then he expressed his displeasure that they should have deserted against the King's orders and all justice, and abandoned him at the time when they were most necessary to him, after he had done everything for them. To counteract the bad impression that this desertion might produce in the mind of the Islinois he ordered them to say that their comrades had gone off by his order, and said that he was well able to pursue and punish them as an example, but that he did not wish to let the Indians know how little fidelity there was among the French. He * The proceedings against these deserters will be fouud in Margry 2 p. 1Q3, etc. 1- OP LOUISIANA. ^7Z exhorted them to be more faithful to him than these runaways, and not to go to such extremes through fear of the dangers which Nicanap6 had falsely exaggerated to them ; that he did not in- tend to take with him any but those who would wish to accompany him willingly, and that he would give them his word to leave the others at liberty in the spring to return to Canada, whither they might go without risk and by canoe, whereas they could not then undertake it but with evident peril of their lives, and with the disgrace of having basely abandoned him, by a conspiracy which could not remain unpunished on their arrival in Canada. * He endeavored to reassure in this way, but knowing their inconstancy, and dissembling the chagrin he felt at their lack of resolution, he re- solved to remove them from the Indians, to pre- clude any new subornations, and in order to make them consent without murmuring, he told them that they were not in security among the Islinois ; that moreover such a stay exposed them to the * At Quebec, Margry i, p. 475. HI irfi43S!j1ip«(S^«SSIBss I' I' •Il IM 174 A DESCRIPTION arms of the Iroquois, who perhaps might come before * winter to attack the village, that the Islinois were not capable of making any resistance to them, that apparently they would take flight at the first shock, and that th«. Iroquois would not be able to overtake them, because the Islinois run much faster than they do ; they would vent their rage on the French whose small number would be incapable of making head against these savages ; that there was only one remedy, and that was to fortify themselves in some post easy of defence ; that he had found one of this kind near the village, where they would be proof aj,''inst the insults of the Islinois and the arms of the Iroquois, who would not be able to storm them there, and who for this reason would not under- take to attack them.f These reasons and some others of that kind which J I made them, persuaded them, and h * Margry reads: " During the," " Villages." f All this confirmed by La Salle's letter. Margry ii, p. 47 I This clause not in Margry. (li T w OF LOUISIANA. 175 brought all to work with a good grace * in building a fort which was called Crevecoeur f situated four days' journey from the great village of the Islinois descending towards the river Colbert.]; * For the rest of this sentence Marjory reads : " on a very •cvere undertaking for so small a party." Tonty in Margry i, p. 583, makes the fort begun Jany. 15, 1680. t The name is not given in the Nouv. Dec. The account of this council there, pp. 207-216, is substantially the same as here given. It is commonly supposed that La Salle dejected at the loss of the Griffin and his increasing difficulties called this fort Crcvecoeur, Broken Heart, on that account. TheTonty of 1697, so asserts ; but at a moment when La Salle sought to encourage his men he would not be likely to do this. As Louis XIV, had recently demolished Fort CreveccEur, a stronghold in the Netherlands near Bois-lc-Duc, captured by him, in 1672, Zedler's Univ. Lexicon vi, p. 161 2-3, the name may have been a compliment to that monarch ; and this would explain the omission of the name in the Nouv. Decouverte published in Holland. Parkman, Discovery, p. 168, says that the site of the fort is still recognizable a little below Peoria, It was on the east side of the river. Franquelin's map. I The Nouv. Decouv., pp 217-222, here introduces matter from LeClercq ii pp. 1 73-181. Discovery of the Miss- issippi, pp. 150-2, making however Miamis southwest of Lake Michigan where LeClercq has south by east. ■li I I :''i 'PI i ■ ! t 176 A DESCRIPTION A great* thaw having set in on the 15th of January, and rendered the river free below the village, the Sieur de la Salle begged f me to accompany him, and we proceeded with one ot our canoes to the place which we were going to select to work at this little fort. It was a little mound about two hundred paces distant from the bank of the river, which in the season of the rains, extends to the foot of it ; two broad deep ravines protected two other sides and a part of the fourth, which we completely entrenched by a ditch which united the two ravines. Their exterior slope which served as a counterscarp, was fortified, we made |" chevaux de frise and cut this eminence down steep on all sides, and the earth was supported as much as was necessary with strong pieces of timber, with thick planks,§ * From this place to " after our departure," is substantially the same in the Nouv. Decouv, pp. 223-9. f " Proceeded with all his canoes to the spot which he had selected to build a fort." Margry t, p. 176. t For " we made," Margry reads " with good." § The Nouv. Dec, omits to " barracks." I'' OF LOUISIANA. 177 and for fear of any surprise, we planted a stockade around, the timbers of which were twenty-five feet long and a foot thick.* The summit of the mound was left in its natural figure, which formed an irregular square, and we contented ourselves with putting on the edge a good parapet of earth capable of covering all our force, whose barracks were placed in two of f the angles of this fort, in order that they might be always ready in case of attack. Fathers Gabriel, Zenoble and 1 1' lodged in a cabin covered with boards, which we ad- justed with the help of our workmen and in which we retired after work,§ all our people for evening and morning prayer, and where, being unable any longer to say mass, the wine which we had made from the large grapes of the country having just failed us, we contented ourselves with * Twenty teet long and stout in proportion, Margry. t Margry omits "two of." J The Recollects were lodged in the ihird. The store house solidly constructed was placed on the fourth, and the forge along the curtain, which, etc., Margry i, p. 477, compare La Salle's letter ii, p. 49. § Supply " and gathered." 1 } u 'I I If. p.' l- ¥' •it it m: ■'I 178 A DRSCRIPTION singing Vespers on holidays and Sundays, and preaching after morning prayers. The forge was set up along the curtain which faced the wood. The Sieur de la Salle posted himself in the middle with the Sieur de Tonty ; and * wood was cut down to make charcoal for the blacksmith. While they were engaged at this work, we were thinking constantly only of our exploration, and we saw that the building of a bark would be very difficult on account of the desertion of »:he pit sawyers. It occurred to us one day, to tell our people that if there was a man of good will among them, who was willing to try and make sheathing planks there was hope of succeed- ing, with a little more labor and time, and that at the worst we should after all only spoil a few. Im- mediately two of our men offered to work at it. The trial was made and they succeeded pretty well, although they had never before undertaken a similar piece of work. We began a bark of forty-two feet keel, and only twelve broad. We * Rest of sentence not in Margry. SLaKagj Bag-raJ OF LOUISIANA. 179 pushed on the work with so much care, that not- withstanding the building of Fort Crevecoeur the sheathing was sawed, all the wood of the bark ready and curved * in the first of the month of March. f It is to be remarked that in the country of the Islinois, the winter is not more severe than in Provence, but that of the year 1679,^ the snow * Hennepin reads "en bois tors." Margry "en chantier,'' on the stocks. f Instead of the following down to confortetur cor tuum, the Margry Rel i p. 477, has merely': "At the same time the Sieur de la Salle proposed to have the route he was to take to the riverMississippi explored in advance, and the course of that river above and below the mouth of the Divine river or cf the Illinois. Father Louis Henpin offered to take this ', oyage in order to begin and make acquaintance with the nations among whom he soon proposed to go and settle in order to preach the faith there. The Sieur de la Salle was reluctant to impose this task on him, but seeing that he was resolute, he consented. He gave him a calumet and a canoe with two men, one of whom called le Picard is now in Paris, the other named Michael Accault, unrlcistood moderately the Illinois and Nadouessioux languages. He entrusted the latter with some goods intended to make presents and valued at 1000 or 1200 livres." Compare Margry 11, p. 246. J 16P0, in Nouv. Dec, p. 226. i^ i8o A DESCRIPTION M i I* ^! lasted more than twenty days, which was an extraordinary surprise to the Indians, who had not yet experienced so severe a winter, so that the Sieur de la Salle and I saw ourselves exposed to new hardships, which will perhaps appear in- credible to those who have no experience in great voyages and new discoveries. Fort Crevecceur* was almost completed, all the wood had been prepared to complete the bark, but we had neither rigging nor sails, nor iron enough ; we heard no tidings of the bark which we had left on Lake Dauphin nor of the men who had been sent to learn what had become of her. Meanwhile the Sieur de la Salle saw that summer was approaching, and that if he waited uselessly some months more, our enterprise would be retarded a year, and perhaps two or three, because being so far from Canada, he could not put his affairs in any order or cause the things he needed to be forwarded. In this extremity f we both adopted a resolu- * This paragraph is substantially in Margry, i p. 483. t Margry i, p. 484, has : In this extremity, he adopted a OF LOUISIANA. i8i tion, as extraordinary as it was difficult to carry out, I to go with two men into unknown coun- tries, where one is at every moment in a great danger for his life, and he to proceed on foot to Fort Frontenac itself, a distance of more than five hundred leagues. We were then at the close of winter which had been, as we have said as severe in America as in France, the ground was still covered with snow which was neither melted nor able to bear a man in snow shoes. It was necessary to load ourselves with the usual equipage on these occasions, that is to say, a blanket, a kettle, an axe, a gun, powder, and lead, dressed skins to make Indian shoes, which often last only a day, those which are worn in France being of no use in these western countries. Besides this he must resolve to push through bushes, to walk in marshes, and melting snow, sometimes waist high, and that for whole days, sometimes even with nothing to eat; because he and three others who resolution as extraordinary as it was difficult to execute, namely to proceed on foot to Fort Frontenac more than live hundred leagues distant. We were there etc. itfiiie l82 A DESCRIPTION ! I f- accompanied him, could not carry provisions, being compelled to depend for all iheir subsistence on whst they might shoot, and expect to drink only the water they might find on the way. To conclude he A^as exposed every day and especially night to be surprised by four or five nations which made war on each other, with this difference, that these nations where he was to pass, all know the French, and that those where I was going had never seen Europeans. Nevertheless all these difficulties did not astonish him * any more than they did me. Our only trouble was to find among our force, some men robust enough to go with us» and to prevent the others, already greatly fluctua- ting, from all deserting after our departure. Some t days after we fortunately found means to disabuse our people of the false impressions which the Islinois had produced on them at the instigation of Monso, chief of the Miamis.J Some Indians arrived at the village of the Islinois * Margry continues " and his only trouble was, etc. t This is virtually in Margry, i p. 485. tMaskoutens. Nouv. Dec, p. 230. OF LOUISIANA 183 from these remote nations, and one of them assured us of the beauty of the great river Colbert or Meschasipi. We were confirmed in it by the report of several Indians, and by a private Islinois, who told us in secrtt on our arrival that it was navigable. Nevertheless this account did not suffice to disabuse our people and completely reassure them. We wished to make the Islinois themselves avow it, although we had learned that they had resolved in council always to tell us the same thing. Soon after a favorable occasion presented itself A young Islinois warrior who had taken some prisoners in the direction of the south and who had come on ahead of his comrades, passed to our shipyard. They gave him some Indian corn to eat. As he was returning from the lower part of the river Colbert, of which we pretended to have some knowledge, this young man traced for us with coal, a pretty exact map, assuring us that he had been everywhere in his periagua ; that there was 1 ot down to the sea, which the Indians call the great lake, either falls or rapids. 184 A DESCRIPTION But that as this river became very broad, there were in some places sand banks and mud which barred a part of it. He also told us the name of the nations that lived on its bank, and of the rivers which it receives. I wrote them down and I will be able to give an account thereof in a second volume of our Discovery.* We thanked him by a small present, for having revealed to us the truth, which the chief men of his Islinois nation had disguised from us. He begged us not to tell them, and an axe was given to him to close his mouth after the fashion of the Indians when they wish to enjoin secrecy. The next morning after our public prayers, we went to the village where we found the Islinois assembled in the cabin of one of the most impor- tant who was giving a bear feast, which is a meat that they esteem highly. They made place for us among them on a fine mat of flags, which they spread for us. We told them through one of their men, who knew the language, that we wished to make known to them, that He who * This is in La Salle's letter. Margry, ii p. 54. OF LOUISIANA. 185 has made all, whom we call the great Master of Life, takes a particular care of the French, that he had done us the favor to instruct us as to the condition of the great river, called by us Colbert, as to which we had difficulty in ascertaining the truth, since they had rendered it impcosible for us to navigate, and then we informed them what we had learned the day before. These savages thought that we had learned all these things by some extraordinary way ; and after having closed the mouth with their hand, which is a way that they often employ to express their surprise, they told us that it was only the desire which they had to retain our chief with the Greygowns or Bare feet (as all the Indians of of America call our Religious of Saint Francis) to remain with them, had obliged them to con- ceal the truth. They confirmed all that we had learned from the young warrior, and have since always persisted in the same opinion. This affair greatly diminished the fears of our Frenchmen, and they were entirely delivered 16 ■T i86 A DESCRIPTION i from them by the arrival of several Osages, Ciccaca and Akansa,* who had come from the southward in order to see the French and to buy axes. They all bore witness that the river was navi- gable to the sea, and that as the coming of the French was made known,f all the nations of the lower part of the river Colbert would come to dance the Calumet of Peace to us, in order to maintain a good understanding, and trade with the French nation. The Miamis came at the same time to dance the calumet to the Islinois, and made an alliance with them against the Iroquois their common enemy. The Sieur de la Salle made some presents to unite these two nations more firmly together. Seeing that we were three Recollect mission- aries with the few Frenchmen whom we had at Fort CrevecoEuf, and having no more wine to * The Osages from the Missouri ; the Chickasaws and Akansas or Quappas from the lower Mississippi. Akansa, Alkansas, Arkansas is the Aljronquin name for the Quappas a Dacota tribe driven from the Ohio river. Gravier's Journal. ■j- "They would be very well received " Margry i, p. 487. OF LOUISIANA. 187 say mass, Father Gabriel who had need of relief at his advanced age, declared that he would willingly remain alone at the fort with our Frenchmen. Father Zenoble * who had desired to have the great mission of the Islinois, composed of about seven or eight thousand souls, began to weary of it, finding it difficult to adapt himself to the importunate manners of the Indians, with whom he dwelt. We spoke about it to the Sieur de la Salle, who made a present of three axes to the Father's host, by name Oumahouha, that is to say, the Wolf, who was the chief of a family or tribe, in order that he might take care tr, maintain the Father, whom this chief called his son, and who lodged him and considered him as one of his children. This Father who was only half a league from the fort, came to explain to us the subject of his troubles, telling us, that he was not yet accustomed to the ideas of the Indians, that nevertheless he already knew a part of their language. I oftbred * Zenobe is frequently written thus in documents of this time. Margry by a blunder in one place makes another man Le Noble.' i88 A DFSCRIPTION to take his mission, provided he would go in my place to the remote nations of whom we had as yet no knowledge, as that which the Indians had given us was only superficial. This set the Father thinking, and he preferred to remain wit)' the Islinois, of whom he had some knowledg rather than expose himself to go among unknown nations. The Sieur de la Salle left in Fort CrevecoL'ur the Sieur de Tonty as commandant, with some soldiers and the carpenters who were employed building the bark intended for the attempt to descend to the sea by the river Colbert, in order to be by this means, protected from the arrows of the Indians in this vessel. He left him powaer and lead, a blacksmith, guns and other arms to defend themselves, in case they were attacked by the Iroquois. He gave him instructions to re- main in his fort, and before returning to Fort Frontenac, to go and get a reinforcement, cables and rigging for the last bark, which he left built up to the ribband,* he begged me to consent * See proceedings against Deserters. Margry ii, p. 103. It had four planks on each side. OF LOUISIANA. 189 to take the pains to go and explore in advance the route which he would have to take to the river Colbert on his return from Canada,* but as I had an abscess in the mouth, which suppurated continually, and which had continued for a year and a half, I manifested to him my repugnance, and told him that I needed to return to Canada to have it treated. He replied that if I refused this voyage, that he would write to my superiors, that I would be the cause of the want of success of our new missions. The Reverend Father Gabriel de la Ribourde who had been my lAither Master in the Novitiate, begged me to proceed, saying that if I died of this infirmity, God would be one day glorified by my apostolic labors. " It is true, my son," said this venerable old man to me ; who had whitened more than forty years in the austerity * La Salle, MaVgry ii, p. 54, says that Indians called Cbaa who lived up the Mississippi visited him and invited him to their country, and that Hennepin offered to go with two of" his bravest men. It is not easy to tell who the Chaa were, unless we take it to be a misprint for bsan, one Algonquin name for the Sioux. igo A DESCRIPTION Wi ^ of penance, " thac you will have many monsters to overcome, and precipices to pass in this enter- prise, which demands the strength of the most robust. You do not know a word of the language of these nations, whom you going to try and gain to God, but courage, you will gain as many victories as combats." Considering that this Father had at his age volunteered to come and aid me in my second year of our new discovery, in the view that he had to announce Jesus Christ to the unknown nations, and that this aged man was the only male child and heir of his father's house, who was a gentleman of Burgundy, I offered to un- dertake this voyage to endeavor to go and form an acquaintance with the nations among whom I hoped soon to settle in order to preach the faith. The Sieur de la Salle told me that I gratified him. He gave me a peace calumet and a canoe with two men, one of whom was called the Picard du Gay, who is now in Paris, and the other Michael ^* ;i V •rtBi S t- .T ■ •f^ ^j ^i w r^ OF LOUISIANA. 191 Ako.* He entrusted this latter with some goods intended to make presents, which were worth a thousand or twelve hundred livres, and he gave me ten knives, twelve awls, a small roll of tobacco, to give the Indians, about two pounds of black and white beads, and a small package of needles, assuring me that he would have given me more, if he had been able. In fact he is very liberal to his friends. * Compare La Salle's letter, Margry ii, p. 55, Moyse Hil- laret (lb. p. 108) says Aug. 17, 1680: "Feb. 28, the Recollect F. Louis and the said Accault and Picard went to trade with the Sioux," showing that this was the opinion in the fort of the object of their voyage. Tonty in Margry i, p. 583, says : " Sometime after the Reverend Father Louis Hen- nepin set out with Michael and Picard for the country of the Sioux." See too Tunty, Memoire, p. 8. La Salle in Margry i'l P- 24 , etc., gives an account and justifies sending them, see Appendix. Of his two companions Michael Accau.t is deemed by some the real head oi the party. After La Salle's force were ennobled by his discoveries, this man became the Sieur d' Accault, (d'Ako d'acau, Dacan) just a:, honest Pierre You, blossomtd out into Picri e You d'Youville dc la Decou verte. The Picard's real name was Anthony Auguelle. In this volume, printed at Paris, Henne- pin very naturally mentions Auguelle's being there. The Mar gry document says the same, but La Salle would have referred to Hennepin, not to Augnellc, had he known where they were. 192 A DESCRIPTION hi Having received the blessing of the reverend Father Gabriel and leave from the Sieur de la Salle, and after having embraced all our men who came to escort us to our place of embarking Father Gabriel finishing his adieus by these words : Viriliter age et confortetur cor tuujn^\ we set out from Fort Crevecoeur the 29th of February, 1680, and toward evening, while descending the river Seignelay, we met on our way several parties of Islinois returning to their village in their periaguas or gondolas, loaded with meat. They would have obliged us to return, our two boatmen were strongly influenced, but as they would have had to pass by Fort Crevecoeur, where our Frenchmen would have stopped them, we pursued our way the next day, and my two men afterward con- fessed the design which they had entertained. The river Seignelay on which we were sailing, is as deep and broad as the Seine at Paris, and in two or three places widens out to a quarter of a fThis from " Some days after " is reproduced with some ab- ridgment in the Nouv. Dec, ch. xxxv, pp. 230-240. OF LOUISIANA. 193 league.* It is skirted by hills, whose sides are covered with fine large trees, Some of these hills are half a league apart, leaving between them a marshy strip, often inundated, especially in the autumn and spring, but producing, nevertheless, very large trees. On ascending these hills, you discover prairies further than the eye can reach, studded, at intervals, with groves of tall trees, apparently planted there intentionally. The current of the river is not perceptible, except in time of great rains ; it is at all times navigable for large barks about a hundred leagues,! from its mouth to the Islinois village, whence its course almost al'v.ays runs south by west. On the 7th of March, we found, about two leagues from its mouth, a nation called Tamaroa, or Maroa, composed of two hundred families. They would have taken us to their village lying west of the river Colbert, six or seven leagues below the mouth of the river Seignelay ; but our two canoemen, in hopes of still greater gain, pre- * One or two leagues. Margiy i, p. 478. The Nouv. Dec, says at the Meuse at Namur. 11 194- A DESCRIPTION .-^if fcrred to pass on, according to the advice I then gave them. These* last Indians seeing that we carried iron and arms to their enemies, and unable to overtake us in their periaguas, which arc wooden canoes, much heavier than our bark one, which went much faster than their boats, des- patched some of their young men after us by land, to pierce us with their arrows at some narrow part of the river, but in vain ; for soon after discover- ing the fire made by these warriors at their am- buscade, we promptly crossed the river, gained the other side, and encamped in an island, leaving our canoe loaded and our little dog to wake us, so as to embark more expeditiously, should the Indians attempt to surprise us by swimming across. Soon after leaving these Indians, we came to the mouth of the river Seignelay, fifty leagues distant from Fort Crevecceur, and aboyt a hun- dred f leagues from the great Islinois village. It lies between 36° and 37° J N. latitude, and * Omitted in Margry. f Ninety, Margry i, p. 479, ii, p. 247. I 35° and 36°. Nouv. Dec, p. 245. OF LOUISIANA. 195 consequently one hundred and twenty or thirty leagues from the gulf of Mexico. In the angle formed on the south by this river, at its mouth, is a flat precipitous rock, about forty feet high, very well suited for building a fort. On tb- northern side, opposite the rock, and on tha west side beyond the river, are fields of black earth, the end of which you can not see, all ready for cultivation, which would be very advantageous for the existence of a colony. The ice which floated down from the north kept us in this place till the 1 2th of March, whence we continued our route, traversing J the river and sounding on all sides to see whether it was navi- gable. There are, indeed, three islets in the middle, near the mouth of the river Seignelay, which stop the floating wood and trees from the north, and form several large sand-bars, yet the channels are deep enough, and there is sufficient water for barks ; large flat-boats can pass there at all times. X " Ascending along the river " concludes the paragraph, in Margry i, p. 479. 196 A DESCRIPTION m The River Colbert runs south southwest, and comes from the north and northwest ; it runs betwee>- two chains of mountains, very small here, which wind with the river, and in some places are j >retty far from the banks, so that be- tween the mountains and the river, there are large prairies, where you often see herds of wild cattle browsing. In other places these eminences leave semi- circular spots covered with grass or wood. Beyond these mountains you discover vast plains, but the more we approach the northern side ascending, the earth did not appear to us so fertile, nor the woods so beautiful as in the Islinois country. This great river is almost everywhere a short league * in width, and in some place, two leagues; it is divided by a number of islands covered with trees, interlaced with so many vines as to be almost impassable. It receives no con- siderable river on the western side except that of the Otontenta,f and another, which comes from * " One or two leagues in width and is divided, etc." Margry I, p. 479. t Outoutanta, in Margry who omits the rest of the sentence. ^ OF LOUISIANA. 197 the west northwest, seven or eight leagues from the Falls of St. Anthcny of Padua.* On the eastern side you meet first an j- incon- siderable river, and then further on another, called by the Indians Onisconsin, or Misconsin, which comes from the east and east-northeast. Sixty leagues up you leave it, and make a portajje of half a league to reach the Bay of the Puans by another river which, near its sourse, meanders most curiously. It is almost as broad as the river Seignelay, or Islinois, and empties into the river Colbert, a hundred leagues above the river Seignelay. ,. Twenty-four 'j^ leagues above, you come to the Black river called by the Nadouessious, or Islati, Chabadeba, or Chabaoudeba, it seems inconsider- * After this paragraph the Nouv. Decouv. introduces the voyage down the Mississippi at)i then repeats the paragraph, p. 313, after an introductory statement. Appendix B. f Margry omits to " another " and has " first the river " called, etc. The Nouv. Dec. has Ouisconsin, LaSalle (Margry ii, p. 249) gives also the name Meschetz Odeba and mentions the rock at the south and prairie north of its mouth. I Twenty-three or twenty-four. Margry. <:; it 198 A DESCRIPTION able. Thirty leagues higher up, you find the lake of Tears,* which we so named, because the Indians who had taken us, wishing to kill us, some of them wept the whole night, to induce the others to consent to our death. This lake which is formed by the river Colbert, is seven leagues long, and about four wide ; there is no considerable current in the middle that we could perceive, but only at its entrance and exit.f Half a league below the lake of Tears, on the south side, is Buffalo river, full of turtles. It is so called by the Indians on account of the numbers of buffalo found there. We followed it for ten or twelve leagues; it empties with rapidity into the river Colbert, but as you ascend it, it is always gentle and free from rapids. It is skirted by mountains, far enough off in some places to form prairies. The mouth is wooded on * Lake Pepin. t Margry omits down twenty five leagues," « Issati." It makes the Lakes Dec. has " to "BufFalo river." The Nou\ of Tears three leagues wide and the distance to the R Wild Bulls a good league. iver of OF LOUISIANA. 199 both sides, and is full as wide as that of the Seig- nelay. Forty leagues above is a river full of rapids, by which, striking northwest, you can proceed to Lake Conde, as far as Nimissakouat * river, which empties into that lake. This first river is called Tomb river, f because the Issati left there the body of one of their warriors, killed by a rattlesnake, on whom according to their cus- tom, I put a blanket. This act of hu- manity gained me much importance by the gratitude displayed by the men of the deceased's tribe, in a great banquet which they gave me in their country, and to which more than a hundred Indians were invited. Continuing to ascend this river ten or twelve t * Nemitsakouat, Margry. Nissipikouet, Nouv. Dec This is probably the St. Louis of the map of the Jesuit Relation of i670-'7i, marked as the way to the Sioux, sixty leagues west, being nearly the distance here given by Hennepin between Mille Lake and Lake Superior. t St. Croix. t Margry i, (p. 480,) says 80. i! 200 A DESCRIPTION U i leagues more, the navigation is interrupted by a cataract which I called the Falls of St. Anthony of Padua, in gratitude for the favors done me by the Almighty through the intercession of that great saint, whom we had chosen patron and protector of all our enterprises. This cataract is forty or fifty ''" feet high, divided in the middle of its fall by a rocky island of pyramidal form.f The high mountains which skirt the river Colbert last only as far as the river Onisconsin, about one hundred and twenty leagues ; at this place it begins to flow from the west and northwest without our having been able to learn from the Indians, who have ascended it very far, the spot where this river rises. They merely told us, that twenty or thirty leagues below, \ there is a second fall, at the foot of which are some villages of the prairie people, called Thinthonha,^ who * Margry says 30 or 40. The Nouv. Dec. 50 or 60, p. 313. f Margry carries the mountains up to the falls of St. Anthony. X For "below"' (dessous) the Nouv. Dec. has '"above" (dessus). § The Titonwan, Minnesota Hist. Coll. i, p. 297. OF LOUISIANA. 20I live there a part of the year. Eight leagues above St. Anthony of Padua's falls on the right, you find the river of the Issati or Nadoussion,* vi^ith a very narrow mouth, which you can ascend to the north for about seventy f leagues to Lake Buade or of the Issati J where it rises. We gave this river the name of St. Francis. This last lake spreads out into great marshes, producing wild rice, like many other places down to the ex- tremity of the Bay of the Puans. This kind of grain grows in marshy places without any one sowing it : it resembles oats, but tastes better, and the stalks are longer as well as the ear. The Indians gather it in due season. The women tie several ears together with white wood bark to prevent its being all devoured by the flocks of duck and teal found there. The Indians lay in * Rum River, t fifty, Margry. X Here the Nouv. Dec. strangely adds " where I was made a slave by these savages." The lake is Mille Lake. • ' 17 r 2C2 A DESCRIPTION a stock for part of the year, and to eat out of the hunting season.* Lake Buade, or Lake of the Issati, is situated about seventy f leagues west of Lake Conde ; it is impossible to go from one to the other by land on account of the marshy and quaggy nature of the ground ; you might go, though with difficulty on the snow in snowshoes ; by water there are many portages and it is a hundred and fifty leagues, on account of the many turns to be made. From Lake Conde, to go conveniently in canoe, you must pass by Tomb river, where we found only the skeleton of the Indian whom I mentioned above, the bears having eaten the flesh, and pulled up poles which the deceased's relatives had planted in form of a monument. One of our boatmen found a war-calumet beside the grave, and an earthen pot upset, in which the Indians had left fat buffalo meat, to assist the departed, as they say, in making his journey to the land of souls. * Abridged in Margry. f Sixty in Margry and he omits the rest of tiie paragraph. ■■■4- OF LOUISIANA. 203 In the neighborhood of Lake Buiide are many other lakes, whence issue several rivers, on the banks of which live the Issati, Nadouessans, Tinthonha (which means prairie-men), Ouade- bathon * River People, Chongaskethon f Dog, or Wolf tribe (for chonga among these nations means dog or wolf), and other tribes, all which we comprise under the name Nadonessiou.|" These Indians number eight or nine thousand warriors, very brave, great runners, and very good bowmen. It was by a part of these tribes that I and our two canoemen were taken in the follow- ing way. We scrupulously said our morning and evening prayers every day on embarking, and the Angelus at noon, adding some paraphrases on the Response of St. Bonaventure, Cardinal, in honor of St. * Onadebaton, Margry. The Warpetonwan. Minn. Hist. Coll., I, p. 296. t The Sissitonwan. Minn. Hist. Coll. i, p. 296. J Nadouessiou is not a Dakota word, but the Chippewa name for this tribe. Nadowessiwag, Baraga, Diet. p. 250. The Algonquin name for the Iroquois Nadowe, Nottoway, is nearly the same and probably means Cruel. 204 A DESCRIPTION Anthony of Padua. In this way we begged of God to meet these Indians by day, for when they discover people at night, they kill them as enemies, to rob those whom they murder secretly of some axes or knives which they value more than we do gold and silver ; they even kill their own allies, when they can conceal their death, so as afterward to boast of having killed men, and thus pass for soldiers.* We had considered the river Colbert with great pleasure, and without hindrance, to know whether it was navigable up and down : we were loaded with seven or eight large turkeys, which multiply of themselves in these parts. We wanted neither buffalo nor deer, nor beaver, nor rish, nor bear meat, for we killed those animals as they swam across the river. Our prayers were heard when, on the nth of * This paragraph omitted by Margry. The narrative of the captivity and deliverance as given in Margry, will be found in the appendix B. OF LOUISIANA. 205 April, 1680,* at two o'clock in the afternoon, we suddenly perceived thirty-three bark canoes, manned by a hundred and tvventy Indians, com- ing down with extraordinary speed, to make war on the Miamis, Islinois, and Maroha.f These Indians surrounded us, and while at a distance, discharged some arrows at us ; but as they ap- proached our canoe the old men seeing us with the calumet of peace in our hands, prevented the young men from killing us. These brutal men leaping from their canoes, some on land, others into the water with frightful cries and yells, ap- proached us, and as we made no resistance, being only three against so great a number, one of them wrenched our calumet from our hands, while our canoe and theirs were made fast to the * The Nouv. Decouv. says 12th. His men were cooking a turkey and he was patching the canoe, p. 314. He says 50 canoes. La Salle in his letter ot Aug. 22, 1682, makes them meet the Sioux above St. Anthony's Falls ! As Hennepin says later that they had made 200 leagues since leaving the Illinois Indians, and makes the Illinois camp one hundred from the mouth, a like distance on the Mississippi will bring the c.ipture about the Desmoines. f Tamaroas. 2o6 A DESCRIPTION shore. We first presented them a piece of Petun or French tobacco, better for smoking than theirs, and the eldest among them uttered these words Miamiha, Miamiha As we did not understand their language, we took a little stick, and by signs which we made on the sand, showed them that their enemies, the Miamis whom they sought, had fled across the river Colbert to join the Islinois ; when then they saw themselves dis- covered and unable to surprise their enemies, three or four old men laying their hands on my head, wept in a lugubrious tone, and I with a wretched handkerchief I had left, wiped away their tears. These savages would not smoke our ptace-calumet. They made us cross the river with great cries, which all shouted together with tears in their eyes ; they made us paddle before them, and we heard yells capable of striking the most resolute with terror. After landing our canoe and our goods, some part of which they had been already stolen, we made a fire to boil our kettle ; we gave them two large wild turkeys that we had killed. These savages having called t f imi OF LOUISIANA. 207 their assembly to deliberate on what they were to do with us ; the two head chiefs of the party approaching, showed us, by signs, that the warriors wished to tomahawk us. This com- pelled me to go to the war chiefs with one of my men, leaving the other by our property, and throw into their midst six axes, fifteen knives, and six fathom of our black tobacco, then bowing down my head, I showed them, with an axe, that they might tomahawk us, if they thought proper. This present appeased several individuals among them, who gave us some beaver to eat, putting the three first mors.^ls in our mouth according to the custom of the country, and blowing on the meat which was too hot, before putting their bark dish before us, to let us eat as we liked ; we spent the night in anxiety, because before retiring at night, they had returned us our peace-calumet. Our two canoemen were, how- ever, resolved to sell thtir lives dearly, and to resist if attacked ; they kept their arms and swords ready. As for my own part, I deter- mined to allow myself to be killed without « t ': i r 208 A DESCRIPTION i ■ ■ any resistance, as I was going to announce to them a God, who had been falsely accused, unjustly condemned, and cruelly crucified, with- out showing the least aversion to those who put him to death. In our uncertainty, we watched one after the other, so as not to be surprised asleep. In the morning, April 12th,* one of their cap- tains named Narrhetoba, with his face and bare body smeared with paint, asked me for our peace- calumet, filled it with tobacco of his country, made all his band smoke first, and then all the others who plotted our ruin. He then gave us to understand that we must go with them to their country, and they all turned back with us ; having thus broken off their voyage. I was not sorry in this conjuncture + to continue our dis- coveries with these people. But the greatest trouble I had was, that I found it difficult to say mv office;]; before these savages, many of whom * Nouv. Decouv. p. 319 has 13th. t " Conjecture " in the text. I Daily portion of the Breviary which priests have to read. OF LOUISIANA. 209 seeing me move my lips said, in a fierce tone, Ouackanche ; ''' and as we did not know a word of their language, we believed that they were angry at it. Michael Ako, all out of counte- nance, told me, that if I continued to say my breviary we should all three be killed, and the Picard begged me at least to conceal myself for my devotions, so as not to provoke them further. I followed the latter's advice, but the more I concealed myself, the more I had the Indians at my heels, for when I entered the wood, they thought I was going to hide some goods under ground, so that I knew not on what side to turn to pray, for they never let me out of sight. This obliged me to beg pardon of my two canoemen, assuring them that I ought not dispense with saying my office, that if we were massacred for that, I should be the innocent cause of their death, as well as of my own. By the word Ouakanche, thes" savages meant that the book I was reading was a spirit ; but by their gesture * Wakan-de. This is wonderful. Minn. Hist. Coll., i p. 308. i \ i It; 2IO A DESCRIPTION ^ 1 they nevertheless showed a kind of aversion, so that to accustom them to it, I chanted the Litany of the Blessed Virgin in the canoe with my book open. They thought that the breviary was a spirit which taught me to sing for their diversion, for these people are naturally fond of singing. The outrages done us by these Indians during our whole route were incredible, for seeing that our canoe was much larger and more heavily laden than theirs (for they have only a quiver fnll of arrows, a bow, and a wretched dressed skin, to serve two as a blanket during the night, which was still pretty cold at that season, always going north), and that we could not go faster than they, they put some warriors with us to help us row, to oblige us to follow them. These Indians sometimes make thirty or forty leagues by water, when at war and pressed for time, or anxious to sur- prise some enemy. Those who had taken us were of different villages and of different opinions as to us ; we cabined every night by the young chief who had asked for our peace-calumet, and put ourselves under his protection ; but jealousy arose mam OF LOUISIANA. 211 among these Indians, so that the chief of the party named Aquipaguetin, one of whose sons had been killed by the Miamis, seeing that he could not avenge his death on that nation which he sought, turned all his rage on us. He wept through almost every night him he had lost in war, to oblige those who had come out to av6nge him, to kill us and seize all wc had, so as to be able to pursue his enemies ; but those who liked European goods were much disposed to preserve us, so as to attract other Frenchmen there and get iron, which is extremely precious in their eyes ; but of which they knew the great utility only when they saw one of our French canoemen kill three or four wild geese or turkeys at a single gun shot, while they can scarcely kill even one with an arrow. In consequence, as we afterward learned, that the words Manza Ouackange,* mean " iron that has understanding," and so these nations called a gun which breaks a man's bones, while their arrows only glance through the flesh * Hennepin uses the French nasals. In the nutation now adopted it is Maza Wakande, that is " The supernatural metal." Minn. Hist. Socy., i p. 308. Rigg's Dakota Diet., p. 138. MMHme!Hr^t>,-v M u : ( « ^ w A DESCRIPTION they pierce, rarely breaking the bones of those whom they strike, and consequently producing wounds more easily cured than those made by our European guns, which often cripple those whom they wound. We had some design of proceeding down to the mouth of the river Colbert, which more probably empties into the gulf of Mexico than into the Red sea ; but these tribes that seized us, gave us no time to sail up and down this river. We had made about two hundred leagues f by water since our departure from the Islinois, and wc sailed with these Indians who took us during nineteen days, sometimes north, sometimes north- west, according to the direction which the river took. By the estimate which we formed, since that time, we made about two hundred and fifty leagues, or even more on Colbert river ; for these Indians paddle with great force, from early in the morning till evening, scarcely stopping to eat f This clause of course is omitted in the Nouv. Decouveite. The Red Sea, in Spanish Mar Bermejo, was the Gulf of Cali- fornia. Compare this clause with the conclusion of the volum e . m ^i. OF LOUISIANA. 213 during the day. To oblige us to keep up with them, they gave us every day four or five men to increase the paddling of our little vessel, which was much heavier than theirs. Sometimes we cabined when it rained, and when the weather was not bad, we slept on the ground without any shelter. We had all the time to contemplate the stars and the moon when it shone. Not- withstanding the fatigue of the day, the youngest of these Indian warriors danced the calumet to four or five of their chiefs till midnight, and the chief to whom they went, sent a warrior of his family in ceremony to those who sang, to let them in turn smoke his war calumet, which is distin- guished from the peace- calumet by different feathers. The end of this kind of pandemonium was terminated every day by two of the youngest of those who had had relations killed in war ; they took several arrows which they presented by the points all crossed to the chiefs, weeping bitterly ; they gave them to them to kiss. Not- withstanding the force of their yelling, the fatigue of the day, the watching' by night, the old men ■■.i'r^hj^'^^^''r^-:^^'^^^--r^-*'- ■'v^-:.^';s--;f;H-^ ■ -M-ftii-'n-T' ii- i''iiiiTf"iii«i^i'rtiifiaitili1Mthirt <'•!'' 2 14- A DESCRIPTION 'ii: m -i IHi ir almost all awoke at daybreak for fear of being surprised by their enemies. As soon as dawn appeared one of them gave the cry, and in an instant all the warriors entered their bark canoes, some passing around the islands in the river to kill some beasts, while the most alert went by land, to discover whether any enemy's fire was to be seen. It was their custom always to take post on the point of an island for safety sake, for their enemies have only periaguas, or wooden canoes, in which they cannot sail as fast as they do, on account of the weight of their craft. Only northern tribes have birch to make bark canoes ; the southern tribes who have not that kind of tree, are deprived of this great convenience. The result is that birch bark wonderfully facilitates the northern Indians in going from lake to lake, and by all rivers to attack their enemies, and even when discovered, they are safe if they have time to get into their canoes, for those who pursue them by land, or in periaguas, cannot attack or pursue them quickly enough.* *■ The Nouv. Decouv. p. 328, here introduces a paragraph on Indian ambuscades. OF LOUISIANA. 215 During one of these nineteen days of our very jpainful navigation, the chief of a band by name Aquipaguetin, resolved to halt about noon in a large prairie ; having killed a very fat bear, he gave a feast to the chief men, and after the repast all the warriors began to dance. Marked in the face, and all over the body, with various colors, each being distinguished by the figure of different animals, according to his particular taste or in- clination ; some having their hair short and full of bear oil, with white and red feathers ; others besprinkled their heads with the down of birds which adhered to the oil. All danced with their arms akimbo, and struck the ground with their feet so stoutly as to leave the imprint visible. While one of the sons of the master of ceremo- nies, gave each in turn the war-calumet to smoke, he wept bitterly. The father in a doleful voice, broken with sighs and sobs, with his whole body bathed in tears, sometimes addressed the warriors, sometimes came to me, and put his hands on my head, doing the same to our two Frenchmen, sometimes he raised his eyes to heaven and often I! i I mm r •( ■. m i Hi} ' ' ''.\ z I- . 2l6 A DESCRIPTION Uttered the word Louis, which means sun, com- plaining to that great luminary of the death of his son. As far as we could conjecture this cer- emony tended only to our destruction ; in fact, the course of time showed us that this Indian had often aimed at our life ; but seeing the opposition made by the other chiefs who prevented it, he made us embark again, and employed other devices to get by degrees the go^ds of our canoe- men, not daring to take them openly, as he might have done, for fear of being accused by his own people of cowardice, which the bravest hold in horror. This wily savage had the bones of some im- portant deceased relative, which he preserved with great care in some skins dressed and adorned with several rows of black and red porcupine quills ; from time to time he assembled his men to give it a smoke, and he made us come several days in succession to cover the deceased's bones with goods, and by a present wipe away the tears he had shed for him, and for his own son killed by the MJamis. To appease this captious man, we ;/ ! ^ ♦■■■ OF LOUISIANA. 217 threw on the bones of the deceased several fathoms of French tobacco, axes, knives, beads, and sottie black and white wampum bracelets. In this way the Indian stripped us under pretexts, which we could not reproach him with,^as he declared that what he asked was only for the de- ceased, and t(i give the warriors. In fact, he dis- tributed among them all that we gave him. By these feints he made us believe that being a chief, he took nothing for himself, but what we gave him of our own accord. We slept at the point of the lake of Tears, which we so called from the weeping and tears which this chief shed there all night long, or which were shed by one of his sons, whom he caused to weep when tired him- self, in order to excite his warriors to compassion, and oblige them to kill us and pursue their ene- mies to avenge his son's death. These Indians at times sent their best runners by land to chase the herds of wild cattle on the water side; as these animals crossed the river, they sometimes killed forty or fifty, merely to 18 ■I ■■ •.:|'l t . m III n /I >■ .1 'I 2l8 A DESCRIPTION take the tongue, and most delicate morsels, leav- ing the rest with which they would not burthen themselves, so as to travel more rapidly. We sometimes indeed eat good pieces, but without bread, wine, or salt, and without spice or other seasoning. During our three years' * travels we had lived in the same way, sometimes in plenty, at others compelled to pass twenty-four hours, and often more, without eating ; because in these little bark canoes you cannot take much of a load, and with every precaution you adopt, you are, for most part of the time, deprived of all necessaries of life. If a religious in Europe un- derwent as many hardships and labors, and prac- tised abstinences like those we were often obliged to suffer in America, no other proof would be needed for his canonization. It is true that we did not always merit in such cases and if we suffered it was only because we can not help it. During the niglit some old men came to weep piteously, often rubbing our arms and whole * The Nouvelle Decouv., p. 334, has "durinr; the four years of iieaily twelve that I remained in Ameiica." i ''/ snanan T j or- LOUISiMN.\, 2 19 bodies with their hands, which they then put on our head. Besides being hindered from sleeping by these tears, I often did not know what to think, nor whether these Indians wept because some of their v/arriors would have killed us, or whether they wept out of pure compassion at the ill treatment shown us. On another occasion, Aquipaguetin relapsed into his bad humor : he had so gained most of the warriors that one day when we were unable to encamp near Narhetoba, who protected us, we were obliged to go to the very end of the camp, these Indians making it appear to us, that this chief insisted positively on killing us. We accord- ingly drew from a box twenty knives and some tobacco, which we angrily flung down amid the malcontents; the wretch regarding all his soldiers one after another hesitated, asking their advice, whether to ref ise or take our present ; and as we bowed our head and presented him with an axe to kill us, the young chief who v/as really or pretendedly our protector took us by the arm, and all in fury led us to his cabin. One of his i •' llli ■ i \ ) if 220 A DESCRIPTION brothers taking some arrows, he broke them all in our presence, showing us by this action, that he prevented their killing us. The next day they left us alone in our canoe, without putting in any Indians to help us, as they usually did ; all remained behind us. After four or five leagues sail another chief came to us, made us disembark, and pulling up three little piles of grass, for us to sit upon, he took a piece of cedar full of little round holes in one of which he put a stick, which he spun round 'between the two palms of his hands, and in this way made fire to light the tobacco in his great calumet. After weeping some time, and putting his hands on my head, he gave me his peace-calumet to smoke, and showed us that we should be in his country in six days. Having arrived on the nineteenth day of our navigation five leagues below the Falls of St. Anthony, these Indians landed us in a bay and assembled to deliberate about us. They distri- buted us separately, and gave us to three heads of families in place of three of their children who OF LOUISIANA. 221 had been killed in war. They first seized all our property, and broke our canoe to pieces, for fear we should return to their enemies. Their own they hid all in some alders to use when going to hunt; and though we might easily have reached their country by water, they compelled us to go sixty leagues by land, forcing us to march from daybreak to two hours after nightfall, and to swim over many rivers, while these Indians, who are often of extraordinary height, carried our habit on their head ; and our two canoemen, who were smaller than myself, on their shoulders, because they could not swim as I cou'd. On leaving the water, which was often full of sharp ice, I could scarcely stand ; our legs were all bloody from the ice which we broke as we advanced in lakes which we forded, and as we eat only once in twenty- four hours some pieces of meat which these barbarians grudgingly gave us, I wa; > weak that I often lay down on the way, resolved to die there, rather than follow these Indians who marched on and continued their route with a celerity which surpasses the power of Euro- ( Br ■ i o o o *>• ^ A« A DESCRIPTION % I n \ h-':. peans. To oblige us to hasten on, they often set fire to the grass of the prairies where we were passing, so that we had to advance or burn. I had then a hat which I reserved to shield me from the burning rays of the sun in summer, but I often dropped it in the flames which we were obliged to cross. As we approached their village, they divided among them all the merchandise of our two canoemen,* and were near killing each other for our roll of French tobacco, which is very pre- cious to these tribes, and more esteemed than gold among Europeans. The more humane showed by signs that they would give many beaver-skins for what they took. The reason of the violence was, that this party was made up from two different tribes, the more distant of whom, fearing lest the others should retain all the goods in the first villages which they would have to pass, wished to take their share in ad- vance. In fact, some time after they offered peltries in part payment ; but our canoemen would * Margry, i p. 482. See Appendix B. Si iinfflto OF LOUISIANA. 223 not receive them, until they gave the full value of all that had been taken. And in course of time I have no doubt they will give entire satis- faction to the French, whom they will endeavor to draw among them to carry on trade. These savages also took our brocade chasuble, and all the articles of our portable chapel, except the chalice, which they durst not touch ; for seeing that glittering silver gilt, they closed their eyes, saying that it was a spirit which would kill them.* They also broke a little box with lock and key, after telling me, that if I did not break the lock, they would do so themselves with sharp stones ; the reason of this violence was that from time to time on the route, they could not open the box to examine what was inside, having no idea of locks and keys ; besides, they did not care to carry the box, but only the goods which were inside, and which they thought more numer- ous but they found only books and papers. After five days' march by land, suffering hunger, thirst, and outrages, marching all day long with- * Margiy i, p. 482, Nouv. Decouverte, p. 344. 224. A DESCRIPTION 7, I 4. r n out rest, fording lakes and rivers, we descried a number of women and children coming to meet our little army. All the elders of this nation assembled on our account, and as we saw cabins, and bundles of straw hanging from the posts of them, to which these savages bind those whom they take as slaves, and burn them ; and seeing that they made the Picard du Gay sing, as he held and shook a gourd full of little round pebbles and seeing his hair and face were filled with paint of different colors, and a tuft of white feathers attached to his head by the Indians, we not unreasonably thought that they wished to kill us, as they performed many ceremonies, usually practised, when they intend to burn their enemies. The worst of it was, too, that not one of us three could make himself understood by these Indians ; nevertheless, after many vows, which every Chris- tian ought to make in such straits,* one of the principal Issati chiefs gave us his peace-calumet to smoke, and accepted the one we had brought. He then gave us some wild rice to eat, presenting * " Conjectures" in text, for " conjonctures." IM SSE9P' MMHliMM a OF LOUISIANA. 225 it to us in large bark dishes, which the Indian women had seasoned with whortleberries, which are black berries that they dry in the sun in summer, and are as good as currants.=^ After this feast, the best we had had for seven or eight days, the heads of families who had adopted us instead of their sons killed in war, conducted us separately each to his village, marching through marshes, knee deep in water, for a league, after which the five wives of the one who called me Mitchinchi,f that is to say, his son, received us in three bark canoes, and took us a short league from our starting place to an island where their cabins were. On our arrival, which was about the Easter * " Our Flemings call them in their lanfruagc Clakehesien." Nouv. Decouv., p. 347. It then says there was a great con- test between Aquipaguetin and the rest in regard to them Aquapaguetin succeeded, gave him the calumet to smoke, adopted him as his son, while Nar hetoba and another took away the canoemen. The Picard du Gay went to confession but it adds " I should have been charmed to see Michael Ako in similar dispositions," p. ^48. Compare Gravier, Illinois Re- lation, p. 20. Jesuit 1 Recollect agreeing as to Ako. t Not \\y the Nouv. Dec. iMfiirrrtiiiirii iniwiiiTiimfiii'i l!)- I'' 226 A DESCRIPTION 1 1 ? ft n Jii ; t -'f holidays in the year 1680,* one of these Indians who seemed to me decrepid with age, gave me a large calumet to smoke, and weeping bitterly, rubbed my head and arms, showing his com- passion at seeing me so fatigued, that two men were often obliged to give me their hands to help me to stand up. There was a bearskin near the fire, on which he rubbed my thighs, legs and the soles of my feet with wild-cat oil. Aquipaguetin's son, who called me his brother, paraded about with our brocade chasuble on his bare back, having rolled up in it a dead man's bones, for whom these people had a great venera- tion. The priest's girdle made of red and white wool, with two tassels at the end, served him for braces, carrying in triumph what he called Pere Louis Chinnien,f which means, as I after- *This is somewhat vague; Easter Sunday, in 1680, fell on the 2ist of April ; he was taken on the I ith of April, traveled nineteen days in canoe, and five by land, which brings him to the 5th of ^ y. The Nouv. Dec, says, that he arrived at the beginning of May, and enters into long explanations. f Shinna or Shina, a blanket. Rigg's Dakota Diet., p. 189. Shinna or Shinnan means a buffalo robe. iMinn. Hist., Coll. I, p. 3J0. it' OF LOUISIANA. 227 wards ascertained " the robe of him who is called the sun." After these Indians had used this cha- suble as an ornament to cover the bones of their dead in their greatest ceremonies, they presented it to some of their allies, tribes situated about five hundred ''^ leagues west of their country, who had sent them an embassy and danced the calumet. The day after our arrival, Aquipaguetin, who was the head of a large family, covered me with a robe made of ten large dressed beaver-skins,f trimmed with porcupine quills. This Indian showed me five or six of his wives, telling them, -IS I afterward learned, that they should in future regard me as one of their children '^ He set before me a bark dish full of fish, and ordered all those assembled, that each should call me by the name I was to have in the rank of our new rela- tionship; and seeing that I could not rise from the ground but by the help of two persons, he *Four or five hundred. Nouv. Dec, p. 352. t Dressed buffalo belly skins, Nouv. Dec, p. 352, and adds that he gave him one of ten beaver skins. The wives become six or seven. J Nouv. Voy. (Voy. au Nord., v. p. 284.) me^Miatilatmai fga^ttrnmntitm ■ I ' ii V<- .. I.^i lh» i < > I ^SnSSSaSc I n. if f !! ■' r 228 A DESCRIPTION had a sweating cabin made, in which he made me enter quite naked with four Indians who all tied the end of their yard with white wood bark before beginning to sweat. This cabin he cov- ered with buffalo-skins, and inside in the middle he put stones heated to a red heat. He made me a sign to do like the others before beginning to sweat, but I merely concealed my nakedness with a handkerchief As soon as these Indians had sev- eral times drawn their breath very violently, he began to sing in a thundering voice, theothers sec- onded him, all putting their hands on my body, and rubbing me, while they wept bitterly. I began to faint, but I came out of the cabin, andcould scarcti^ take my habit to put on. When he had made me sweat thus three times in a week, I felt as strong as ever. I often spent wretched hours among these cavages; for, besides their only giving me a little wild rice and smoked fish roes to eat five or six times week, which they boiled in water in earthen pots, Aquipaguetin took me to a neighboring island with his wives and children to till the [^iSBS!^^ ii jMig i JJJL '^Hf ^ OF LOUISIANA. 229 ground, in order to sow some tobacco seed, and seeds of vegetables that I had brought, and which this Indian prized extremely. Sometimes he assembled the elders of the village, in whose presence he asked me for a compass that I always had in my sleeve ; seeing that I made the needle turn with a key, and believing justly that we Europeans went all over the habitable globe, guided by this instrument, this chief, who was very eloquent, persuaded his people that we were spirits, and capable of doing anything beyond their reach. At the close of his address, which was very animated, all the old men wept over my head, admiring in me what they could not under- stand. I had an iron pot with three lion feet which these Indians never dared touch, unless their hand was wrapped up in some robe. The women had it hunii^ to the branch of a tree, not daring to enter the cabin where this pot was. I was some time unable to make myself under- stood by these people, but feeling myself gnawed by hunger, I began to compile a dictionary of their language by means of their children, with ' fe 230 A DESCRIPTION ■!,i whom I made myself familiar, in order to learn. As soon as I could catch the word Taketchi- abihen,* which means in their language, " How do you call that," I became, in a little while, able to converse with them on familiar things. At first, indeed, to ask the word run in their language, I had to quicken my steps from one end of their large cabin to the other. The chiefs of these savages seeing my desire to learn, often "j* made me write, naming all the parts of the human body, and as I would not put on paper certain indelicate words, about which these people have no scruples, it afforded them an agreeable amuse- ment among themselves. They often put me questions, but as I had to look at my paper, to answer them, they said to one another : " When we ask Pere Louis (for so they had heard our two Frenchmen call me), he does not answer * Talcn kapi he, Minn. Hist. Coll., i p. 311. Takn kipan he. Riggs' Dakota Diet., p. 130, 194. \ " Often said to me f^atchhon egagah'c^ that is to say : Spirit you take great pains, put black on the white." Nouv. Decouv., P< 359? (Pi-'rliaps, wotehike, trouble ; icagopi, mark. Riggs' Diet., p. 334, 310.) ■1:1 OF LOUISIANA. 231 US ; but as soon as he has looked at what is white (for they have no word to say paper), he answers us, and tells us his thoughts ; that white thing," said they, " must be a spirit which tells Pere Louis all we say." They concluded that our two Frenchmen had not so much intelligence as I, because they could not work like me on what was white. In consequence the Indians believed that I could do everything ; when the rain fell in such quantities as to incommode them, or pre- vent their going to hunt, they told me to stop it ; but then I knew enough to answer them by pointing to the clouds, that he who was great chief of heaven, was master of everything, and that what they bid me do, did not depend on me. These Indians often asked me how many wives and children I had, and how old I was, that is, how many winters, for so these nations always count. These men, never illumined by the light of faith, were surprised at the answer I made them ; for pointing to our two Frenchmen whom I had then gone to visit three leagues trom our village, I told them that a man among us could mm mftaim mm i^SSSBBSSSBBi I 232 A DESCRIPTION i have only one wife till death ; that as for me, I had promised the Ma^tev of life to live as they saw me, and 10 come and dwell with them to teach them * that he would have them be like the French ; that this great Master of life had sent down fire from heaven, and destroyed a nation given to enormous crimes, like those committed among them. But that L^ross people till then, lawless and faithless, turned all I said into ridicule. " How," said they, " would you have those two men with you get wives ? Our women would not live with them, for they have hair all over the face, and we have none there or elsewhere."+ In fact, they were never better pleased with me, than when I was shaved ; and from a complais- ance certainly not criminal, I shaved every week. All our new kinsfolk seeing that I wished to leave them, made a packet of beaver skins worth more than six hundred livres among the French. * From this to " abundant country " is omitted in the Nouv. Decouverte. f Brother Sagard, a Recollect like Hennepin, but whose works Hennepin seems not to have used, gives a similar remark as made by the Hurons. Histoire. du Canada, p. 377. 3 m OF LOUISIANA. 233 These peltries they gave me to induce me to re- main among them, to introduce me to strange nations that were coming to visit them, and in restitution for what they had robbed me of; but I refused these presents, telHng them that I had not come among them to gather beaver-skins, but only to make known to them the will of the great Master of life, and to live wretchedly with them, after having left a most abundant country. " It is true," said they, " that we have no game in these parts, and that you sp'fer, but wait till summer, then we will go and kill buffalo in the warm country." I should have been satisfied had they fed me as they did their children, but they eat secretly at night unknown to me. Although women are, everywhere more kind and com- passionate than men, they gave what little fish they had to their children, regarding me as a slave made by their warriors in their enemies' country, and they reasonably preferred their children's lives to mine. There were some old men who often came to 19 ? I 1 i I ; ■ 23 + A DESCRIPTION weep over my head in a sighing voice, one saying, " my grandson," another, " my nephew, I feel sorry to see you without eating, and to learn how badly our warriors treated you on the way ; they are young braves, without sense, who would have killed you, and have robbed you of all you have. Had you wanted buffalo or beaver-robes, we would wipe away your tears, but you will have nothing of what we offer you." Ouasicoude, that is, the Pierced-pine,* the greatest of all the slati chiefs, being very indig- nant at those who had so maltreated us, said, in open council, that those who had robbed us of all we had, were like hungry curs that stealthily snatch a bit of meat from the bark , and then fly ; so those who had acted thus toward us, de- served to be regarded as dogs, since they insulted men who brought them iron and merchandise, which they had never had for their use; that he would find means to punish the one who had so * Wazilcute, The Shooter of the Pines. Minn. Hist. Coll., i p. 316. Long in 1823, met a Dakota at Red Wing who bore this same name. Long's Travels. Wazi, pine ; Icutc, to shoot. Riggs' Dakota Diet. pp. 239, 134. ,: hESh^S -.-Sr«4£BH OF LOUISIANA. 235 outraged us. This is what the brave chief showed to all his nation, as we shall see hereafter. As I often went to visit the cabins of these last nations, I found a sick, child, whose father's name was Mamenisi ; having a moral certainty of its death, I begged our two Frenchmen to tell me their opinions, informing them I believed myself obliged to go and baptize it. Michael Ako would not accompany me, the Picard du Gay alo*- ^ followed me to act as sponsor, or rather as witness of the baptism.* I christened the child Antoinette in honor of St. Anthony of Padua, as well as from the Picard's name which was Anthony Auguellc. He was a native of Amiens, and a nephew of Mr. de Cauroy, procurator -general of the Premon- stratensians,"-' both now at Paris. Having poured natural .water on the head of this Indian child, and uttered these words : " Creature of Go*:!, I baptize thee in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost," I took half an altar cloth which I had wrested from the hands * And attei wards Abbot of Bcaulieu. Nouv. Decouv., p. 365. Margry i p. 478, mentions the Picard's being at Pisar. 11 J I * i "'I 236 A DESCRIPTION of an Indian who had stolen it from me, and put it on the body of the baptized child ; for as I could not say mass for want of wine and vest- ments, this piece of linen could not be put to a better use, than to enshroud the first Christian child among these tribes. I do not know whether the softness of the linen had refreshed this newly baptized one because she was smiling the next day in her mother's arms, who believed that I had cured her child, but she died soon after to my great consolation.* During our stay among the Issati or Nadou- es iou, we saw Indians who came as ambassadors from about five hundred leagues to the west. They informed us that the Assenipovalacs f were then only seven or eight days distant to the north- east of us ; all the other known tribes on the west and north-west inhabit immense plains and liries abounc prai ing peltri( ♦ He expatiates on this subject in the Nouv. Decouv., p. 367, as he does on Michael Ako's religious indifterence. f Assiniboins. OF LOUISIANA. 237 they are sometimes obliged to make fires with buffalo dung, for want of wood.* TLreemonthsf after, all these nations assembled, and the chiefs having regulated the places for hunting the buffalo, they dispersed in several bands so as not to starve each other, Aquipa- quetin, one of the chiefs, who had adopted me as his son, wished to take me to the west with about two hundred families ; I made answer that I awaited spirits (so they called Frenchmen), at the river Oiiiscousin, which empties into the river Colbert, who were to join me to bring them merchandise, and that if he chose to go that way, I would continue with him ; he would have gone there but for those of his nation. In the be- ginning of July, 1680, we descended in canoe I This paragraph is in Margry i, p. 483. See Appendix B. The Nouv. Dccouv., says they were four moons on the way without stopping and knew no strait liice that of Anian, or sea, p. 369. He enters into details of what they saw and offers to accompany an English or Dutch expedition and reach the Pacific bv the riven he discovered. I I Two months, Nouv. Decouv., p. 374. I f 238 A DESCRIPTION southward with the great chief named Ouasi- coude,* that is to say, the Pierced-pine, with about eighty cabins, composed of more than a hundred and thirty iamilies, and about two hundred and fifty warriors. Scarcely would the Indians give me a place in their little craft, for they had only old canoes. They went four days' journey lower down to get birch bark t' make some more. Having made a hole in the ground to hide our silver chalice and our papers till we returned from the hunt, and keeping only our breviary, so as not to be burthensome, I stood on the bank of a lake formed by the river we had called by the name of St. Francis, and stretched out my hand to the canoes as they rapidly passed in succession; our French- men also had one for themselves, which the Indians had given them ; they would not take me in, Michael Ako saying that he had taken me long enough to satisfy him. I was much hurt at this * In the Nou •. Voy. (Voy. au Nord., v. p. 286, this chie is said to have adopted Hennepin as a brother. His power was absolute, and was actiuircd by valor in war against seventeen or eighteen hostile tribes. T^H OF LOUISIANA. 239 answer, seeing myself thus abandoned by * Chris- tians, to whom I had always done good, as they both often acknowledged ; but God having never abandoned me in that painful voyage, prompted two Indians to take me in their very small canoe, where I had no other employment than to bale out with a little bark platter the water which entered by little holes. This I did not do without getting all wet. This boat might, indeed, be called a coffin, trom its lightness and fragility. This kind of canoe does not generally weigh over tifty pounds ; the least motion of the body upsets them, unless you are long habituated to that kind of navigation. On dis-mbarking in the evening, the Picard, as an excuse, told me that their canoe was half rotten, and that, had we been three in it, we should have run a great risk of remaining on the way. Notwithstanding this excuse I told hin, that being Christians, they should never act so, especially among savages, more than eight hundred * The Nt»uv. Dec, has caiioemsn or some similar term to avoid the word French, bat here says "men of m/ o,v.i naiion and religion," p. 376. { 240 A DESCRIPTION 11 Ji leagues from the French settlements ; that if they were well received in this country, it was only in consequence of my bleeding some asthmatic Indians, and my giving some orvietan ■•' and other remedies which I kept in my sleeve, and by which I had saved the lives of some of these Indians who had been bit by rattlesnakes, and because I had neatly shaved their tonsure, which Indian children wear to the age of eighteen or twenty, but have no way of making it themselves except by burning the hair with flat stones heated red hot. I reminded them that by my ingenuity I had gained the friendship of these people, who would have killed us or made us suiler more, had they not discovered about me those remedies which they prize, when they restore the sick to health. However, the Picard only, as he retired to his host's, apologised to me.f * An antidote for poison said by some to have been invented by Orvistano an Italian. f According to the Nouv. Decouv., Ouasicoude was indig- nant and was going to punish and even kill Hennepin's com- panions for their treatment of him. 't OF LOUISIANA. 241 Four days after our departure for the buffalo hunt, we hahed eight leagues above the Falls of St. Anthony of Padua on an eminence opposite the mouth of the river St. Francis ; here the Indian women made their canoe frames, while waiting for tnose who were to bring bark to make canoes. The young men went to hunt stag, deer, and beaver, but killed so few animals for such a large party, that wc could very rarely get a bit of meat, having to put up with a broth once in every twenty-four hours. The Picard and myself went to look for haws, gooseberries, and little wild fruit, which often did us more harm than good when we ate them ; this obliged us two to go alone, as Michael Ako refused, in a wretched canoe to Oviscousin* river, which was more than a hundred f leagues off, to see whether the sieur de la Salle had not sent to that place a reinforce- ment of French men, \ ith powder, lead, and other * Wisconsin. f One hundred and thirty. Nouv. Dec, p. 382. i Wl>i|WH I. " WI. «>l l'««g'-'>' 'it I \\ 242 A DESCRIPTION munitions, as he had piomised us on our departure from the Islinois.* The Indians would not have suffered this voy- age, had not one of the three remained with them ; they wished me to stay, but Michael Ako abso- lutely refused. Our whole stock was fifteen charges of powder, a gun, a wretched little earthen pot which the Indians had given us, a knife, and a beaver robe, to travel about two hundred f leagues, thus abandoning ourselves to Providence. As we were making the portage of our canoe at the Falls of St. Anthony of Padua, we perceived five or six of our Indians who had taken the start ; one of whom had cli ubed an oak opposite the great fall where he was weeping bitterly, with a well-dressed beaver robe, whitened inside and trimmed with porcupine quills which this savage was offering as a sacrifice to the falls, which is in itself admirable and frightful. I heard him while shedding copious tears say, addressing this great cataract : " Thou who art a spirit, grant that * He mentions this arrangement with La Salle. Nouv. Dec, pp. 375 and 382. It is also in Margry's Rel., ii, p. 257. f Two hundred and fifty. Nouv. Dec, p. 383. J' ,! OF LOUISIANA. 243 the men of our nation may pass here quietly without accident, that we may kill buffalo in abundance, conquer our enemies, and bring slaves here, some of whom we will put to death * before thee; the Messentcqr.f (so they call the tribe named by the French Outouagamis), have killed our kindred, grant that we may avenge them." In fact, after the heat of the buffalo-hunt, they invaded their enemies' country, killed some, and brought others as slaves. If they succeed a single tim., even after repeated failures, they ad- here to their superstition. This robe offered in sacrifice served one of our Frenchmen, who took it as we returned.|' A league be'.ow the Falls of St. Anthony of P:idua, the Picard was obliged to land and get his * " After making them sufFer greatly." Nouv. Decouv., p. 384- t Riggs in his Dakota Diet., p. 34, gives " Besdeke, the Fox Indians." If Hennepin's qz. was the old fashioned contraction for que, the word is almost identical except in the first letter. X Parkman, Discovery, p. 246, makes this an offering to Oanktayhee, the principal deity of the Sioux, who was supposed to live under these falls. See Carver. T I ;f i rl i- I m ill 244 A DESCRIPTION powder-horn which he had left at the falls. On his return, I showed him a snake ahout six feet * long crawling up a straight and preciptous moun- tain and which gradually gained on some swallow's nests to eat the young ones ; at the foot of the mountain, we saw the feathers of those he had apparently eaten, and we pelted him down with stones. As we descended the river Colbert, we found some of our Indians cabined in the islands, loaded with buffalo-meat, some of which they gave us, and two hours after our landing, fifteen or sixteen warriors of the party whom we had left above the Falls of St. Anthony of Padua, entered tomahawk in hand, overthrew the cabin of those who had invited us, took all the meat and bear's oil that they found, and greased themselves with it from head to foot ; we at first took them to be enemies, but one of those who called himself my uncle, told me, that having gone to the buffalo-hunt before the rest, contrary to the maxims of the country, any one had a right to plunder them, * In the Nouv. Dec, p. 385, seven or eight feet. ;j OP LOUISIANA. 245 because tlity put the buftaloes to flight before the arrival of the mass of the nation. During sixty leagues that we sailed down the river, we killed only one deer, swimming across, but the heat was so great that the meat spoiled in twenty-four hours. This made us look tor turtles, which we found hard to take, as their hearing is so acute, that as soon as they hear the least noise, they jump quickly into the water. We, however, took one much larger than the rest, with a thinner shell and fatter meat. While I was trying to cut off his head, he all but cut off one of my fingers. We had drawn one end of our canoe ashore, when a violent gust of wind drove it into the middle of the great river ; the Picard had gone with a gun into the prairie to try and kill a buffalo ; so I quickly pulled off our habit, and threw it on the turtle with some stones to prevent its escaping, and swam after our canoe which went very fast down the stream, as the current was very strong at that point. Having reached it with much difliculty, I durst not git in for fear of upsetting it, so I either pushed it before me. T rr 246 A DESCRIPTION or drew it after me, and thus little by little reached the shore about one eighth of a league from the place where I had the turtie. The Picard finding only our habit, and not seeing the canoe, naturally believed that some Indian had killed me. He retired to the prairie to look all around whether there were no people there. Meanwhile I re- mounted the river with all diligence in the canoe, and had just put on my habit, when I saw more than sixty buffalo crossing the river to reach the south lands ; I pursued the animals, calling the Picard with all my might ; he ran up at the noise and had time to reenter the canoe, while the dog which had jumped into the water had driven them into an island. Having given them chase the^e, they were crossing back when he shot one, which was so heavy that we could get it ashore only in pieces, being obliged to cut the best morsels, while the rest of the body was in the water. And as it was almost twice twenty-four hours since we had eaten, we made a fire with the drift-wood we often found on the sand ; and while the Picard was skinning the animal, I I 3^' it OF LOUISIANA. 247 cooked the pieces of this fat meat in our little earthen pot ; we eat it so eagerly that we both fell sick, and had to stay two days in an island to recover. VVe could not take it uch of the meat witl us, our canoe was so small, and besides the excessive heat spoiled it, so that we were all at once deprived of it, as it was full of worms ; and when we embarked in the morning, we did not know what we should eat during the day. Never have we more admired God's providence than during this voyage, for we did not always find deer, and could not kill them when we would ; but the eagles, which are very common in these vast countries, scMiietimes dropped from their claws bream, or large carp, which they were carrying to their nests. Another time we found an otter on the bank of the river Colbert eating a large fish, which had, running from the head, a kind of paddle or beak,'^' five fingers broad and a foot and a half long, which made our Picard say, that he thought he saw a devil in the paws of that otter : but his fright did not prevent our * The spade fish. II ti w •" ^ in* ill ^ k n' !' u\ if % i'l 248 A DESCRIPTION ^ eating this monstrous ftsh which we found very good. While seeking the Oviscousin river, Aquipag- uetin, that savage father, whom I had left, and whom we believed more than two hundred leagues away, suddenly appeared with ten warriors, on the I ith * of July, 1680. We believed that he was coming to kill us, because we had left him, with the knowledge indeed of the other Indians, but against his will. He first gave us some wild-rice, and a slice of buffalo-meat to eat, and asked whether we had found the Frenchmen who were to bring us goods ; but not being sat- isfied with what we told him, he started before us, and went himself to Oviscousin to try and carry off what he could from the French; this savage found no one there, and came and rejoined us three days after. The Ficard had gone in the prairies to hunt, and I was alone in a ittle cabin on the bank of the river, which I had made to screen us from the sun, with a blanket that an Indian had given me back. Aquipaguetin seeing • About the middle. Nouv. Dec, p. 395. OF LOUISIANA. 249 me alone came up, tomahawk in hand : I laid hold of two pocket-pistols, which the Picard had got back from the Indians, and a knife, not in- tending to kill this would be Indian father of mine but only to frighten him, and prevent his crushing me, in case he had that intention. Aquipaguetin reprimanded me for exposing my- self thus to the insults of their enemies, saying that I should at least take the other bank of the river for greater safety. He wished to take me with him, telling me that he was with three hun- dred hunters, who killed more buffalo than those to whom I had abandoned myself I would have done well to follow his advice, for the Picard and myself ='= ascending the river almost eighty leagues on the way, ran great risk of perishing a thousand times. We had only ten charges of powder left which we were obliged to divide into twenty to kill wild pigeons, or turtle-doves ; but when these * According to the Nouv. Dccouv. p. 396, they kept on to the Wisconsi 1, but not finding La Salle's men, sailed up again, as is implied here. 20 I i ■is i 1 ! ! 250 A DESCRIPTION at last gave out we had recourse to three hooks, which we baited with bits of putrid cattish dropped by an eagle. For two whole days we took nothing, and were thus destitute of all sup- port when, during night prayer, as we were re- peating these words addressed to St. Anthony of Padua, " Pereunt pericula, cessat et necessitas," the Picard heard a noise, left his prayers, and ran to our hooks which he drew from the waters with two catfish so large that I had to go and help him.* Without cleaning the slime from these monstrous fish we cut them in pieces, and roasted them on the coals, our only little earthen pot having been broken. Two hours after night- fall, Mamenisi, the father of the little Indian girl, that I had baptized before she died, joined us and gave us buffalo meat at discretion. The next day the Indians whom we had left with Michael Ako, came down fromf Buffalo * In the Nouv. Decouv p. 398, they first took a small turtle, and took the cattish after reaching BulTalc liver. t Instead of" "from" the Nouv. Dec, has " this." I, (* I , OF LOUISIANA. 251 river with their flotilla of canoes loaded with meat. Aquipaguetin had, as he passed, told how exposed the Picard and I had been while on our voyage, and the Indian chiefs represented to us the cowardice of Michael Ako, who had refused to undertake it, for fear of dying by hunger. And had I not stopped him, the Picard would have insulted him. All the Indian women hid their stock of meat at the mouth of Buffalo river, and in the islands, and we again went down the river Colbert about eighty leagues way to hunt with this multitude of canoes; from time to time the Indians hid their canoes on the banks of the river and in the is- lands ; then struck into the prairies seven or eight leagues beyond the mountains, where they killed, at different times, as many as a hundred and twenty buffaloes.. They always left some of their old men on the tops of the mountains to be on the lookout for their enemies. One day when I was dressing the foot of one who called him- self my brother, and who had run a splinter deep into his foot, an alarm was given in the camp, rs's^'wfw fi ! i' I I » 'i 252 A DESCRIPTION two hundred bowmen ran out ; and that brave Indian, although I had just made a deep incision in the sole of his toot to draw out the wood, which had been driven in, left me and ran even faster than the rest, not to be deprived of the glory of righting, but instead i-f enemies, they found only abouteightystags,which took flight, 'ihe wounded man could scarcely regain the camp. During this alarm, all the Indian women sang in a lugu- brious tone. The Picard left me to join his host, and I remaining with one called Otchimbi, was subjected to carrying in my canoe an Indian woman more than eighty years old. For all her great age, this old woman threatened to strike with her paddle three children who troubled us in the middle of our canoe. The men treated me well enough, but as the meat was almost entirely at the disposal of the women, I was compelled, in order Ko get some, to make their children's ton- sures about as large as those worn by our religious, for these little savages wear them to the age of fifteen or sixteen, and their parents make them with red hot stones. * I' OF LOUISIANA. 253 We had another alarm in our camp : the old men on duty on the top of the mountains an- nounced that they saw two * warriors in the distance; all the bowmen hastened there with speed, each trying to outstrip the others ; but they brought back only two women of their own nation, who came to report that a party of their people who were hunting near the extremity of Lake Cond6, had found five spirits (so they call the French) ; who, by means of one of their slaves, had expressed a wish to come on, knowing us to be among them, in order to find out whether we were English, Dutch, Spaniards, or Frenchmen, being unable to understand how we could have reached those tribes by so wide a circuit. On the 25th f of July, 1680, as we were ascending the river Colbert after the buffalo-hunt, to the Indian villages we met the Sieur de Luth, * Omitted in Nouv. Dec. f Nouv. Dec, p. 407, says 28th., Du L'hut confirms Hennepin's account ; and the Jesuit Father Rafteix in 1688, refers to it as a fact. See Appendix, C, Du L'hut, gives no date. He makes hi» party four. ■■. uu-V ' ^:^ — -■»■». »-»-.-».— ^ — «> , ...^ . J l . »TS^WH 254- A DESCRIPTION .^ I,: ij;l i, I ' ^ •' •