CT a { ERY eae) ay Sct outs Sure To pE NTS Cornell lniversity Library BOUGHT WITH THE INCOME FROM THE SAGE ENDOWMENT FUND THE GIFT OF Henry W. Sage P Bp Justin CWingor. NARRATIVE AND CRITICAL HISTORY OF AMER- ICA. With Bibliographical and Descriptive Essays on its Historical Sources and Authorities. Profusely illus- trated with portraits, maps, facsimiles, etc. Edited by Justin Winsor, Librarian of Harvard University, with the codperation of a Committee from the Massachusetts Historical Society, and with the aid of other learned Societies. In eight royal 8vo volumes. Each volume, net, $5.50; sheep, xet, $6.50; half morocco, et, $7.50. (Sold only by subscription for the entire set.) READER'S HANDBOOK OF THE AMERICAN REV- OLUTION. 16mo, $1.25. WAS SHAKESPEARE SHAPLEIGH? 16mo, rubri- cated parchment paper, 75 cents. CHRISTOPHER COLUMBUS, and how he received and imparted the Spirit of Discovery. With portraits and maps. 8vo, gilt top, $4.00. CARTIER TO FRONTENAC. A Study of Geographical Discovery in the interior of North America, in its his- torical relations, 1534-1700. With full cartographical Illustrations from Contemporary Sources. 8vo, gilt top. HOUGHTON, MIFFLIN AND COMPANY, Boston anp New York. Cartier to Frontenac HISPANIA “INS, SYLVANUS, [511 FRANQUELIN, 1684 GEOGRAPHICAL DISCOVERY IN THE INTERIOR NORTH AMERICA IN ITS HISTORICAL RELATIONS 1534—1700 WITH FULL CARTOGRAPHICAL ILLUSTRA- TIONS FROM CONTEMPORARY SOURCES BY JUSTIN WINSOR BOSTON AND NEW YORK HOUGHTON, MIFFLIN AND COMPANY Che Riverside Press, Cambridge 1894 A.c7 24 UGH se me Copyright, 1894, By JUSTIN WINSOR. All rights reserved. The Riverside Press, Cambridge, Mass., U. 8. 4A. Electrotyped and Printed by H. O. Houghton and Company. eee To JAMES B. ANGELL, LL. D., PRESIDENT OF THE UNIVERSITY oF MICHIGAN. Dear Doctor : — Your fortune took you from the seaboard of New England to the valley of the St. Lawrence, and on the banks of that lake where Champlain first invoked the enmity of the Iroquois, you took your place among those who preside over our American colleges. Thence you went to a distant verge of that same valley, and near the path which La Salle followed in the boldest action of his life, you have developed the greatest university which we have beyond the moun- tains. No one knows better than yourself how the great valley which the American people shares with others on the north, and the greater valley of the interior which is all ours, and which almost becomes one with the other at various points, carry the streams of national life back and forth between the gulf which Cartier opened and that other gulf which Columbus failed to comprehend. This book cannot be more fitly inscribed than to you, by an adopted son of your university, and your friend, ~ ~ HARVARD UNIVERSITY, al | September, 1898. CONTENTS AND ILLUSTRATIONS. CHAPTER I. From CoLtumsBus TO CARTIER. 1492-1534 ILLUSTRATIONS : Canerio Map (1503), 1; La Cou Map (1500), 2; Chart (Kunstmann), 3; Reinel Chart (1503), 5, 6; Portu- guese Mappemonde (1502), 7; Ruysch’s Map (1508), 8 ; Denys’s alleged Map (1506), 9; Sylvanus’s Map in Ptolemy (1511), 11; Lazaro Luiz’s Map (1563), 12; Portuguese Chart (1520), 15 ; Coppo’s Map (1528), 16; Verrazano’s Map, 17; Maiollo’s Map (1527), 19; Lok’s Map (1582), 20; Franciscus Monachus’s Globe (1526), 22. CHAPTER II. CARTIER, ROBERVAL, AND ALLEFONSCE. 1534-1542 ILLusTRATIONS: Gaspar Viegas’s Chart, 25; Ramusio’s Hella. laga, 32 ; Lesearbot’s Heckeans, 34 ; Allefonsee’ s Sketch Maps, 42, 43; Cartier, Portrait, 45 ; Garfiers Manor House, 46. CHAPTER III. Tue RESULTS OF CaRTIER’S ExpLoraTions. 1542-1603 se ILLustrations : Mercator’s Cordiform Map (1538), 49; Rotz’s Charts (1452), 50, 51; Cabot’s Mappemonde (1544), 53; Des- celier’s Map (1546), 54; Nicolas Vallard Map, 55 ; Medina’s Map (1545), 59 ; Gastaldo’s Map in Ramusio, 60, 61 ; Homem’s Map (1558), 62; Mercator’s Map (1569), 64; Ortelius’s Map (1570), 65; Judaeis’s Map (1593), 67 ; Quadus’s Map (1600), 68; Molineaux’s Map (1600), 69; John Dee’s Map (1580), 71; Hakluyt-Martyr Map (1587), 72. CHAPTER IV. ABORTIVE ATTEMPTS AT COLONIZATION. 1600-1607 . IttusTRations : Tadoussac, after Champlain, 79 ; Champlain, 81; The Ottawa Route (1642), 87. PAGE 23 48 77 vi CONTENTS AND ILLUSTRATIONS. CHAPTER V. COLONIZATION ESTABLISHED AT QuEBEC. 1608-1613. . . . . Ittustrations : Champlain’s Fight near Ticonderoga, 97 ; Cham- plain’s Map of the Gulf of St. Lawrence (1612), 102; of the Great Lakes (1612), 104, 105 ; another (1613), 106, 107 ; Map of Hudson’s Explorations, 108,109 ; Map from the Delectio Freti Hudsoni (1613), 110 ; Champlain’s Astrolabe, 111; Ship (1613), 113. CHAPTER VI. War, TRADE, AND Missions. THe FALt or Quespec. 1614-1629 . Iniustrations : Champlain’s Route (1615), 118 ; The Onondaga Fort, 119; Map of the Huron Country, 120; Map by Jacobsz (1621), 125; Alexander’s Map (1624), 128. CHAPTER VII. QueEBEC ReEstTorRED. ExpLoraTions or Nicotet. DeEaTH oF CHAMPLAIN. 1630-1635 . Bee Sinn We I> he a ILLusTRATIONS : Champlain’s Gulf of St. Lawrence (1632), 140; Hondius’s Map (1635), 141; The Great Lakes, by Champlain (1632), 142, 143 ; James’s Map of Hudson Bay, 145. CHAPTER VIII. From THE Dreata or CHAMPLAIN TO THE REORGANIZATION OF THE GOVERNMENT. 1635-1663 eh en ae pee hr Inrustrations : Le Jeune, 157; Bellin’s Map of Montreal and Vicinity (1744), 162, 163 ; Maisonneuve, 164; Jeanne Mance, 165 ; Madame de la Peltrie, 166 ; Montreal and Vicinity, 168 ; Dudley’s Map (1647), 170, 171; Brébenf, 172 ; Visscher’s Map (1652), 178 ; Sanson’s Map (1656), 179 ; Heylyn’s Cosmographie (1656-62), 180; Visscher’s Map (1660), 181; Blaeu’s Map (1652, 1665), 182 ; Creuxius’s Map (1660), 184, 185. CHAPTER IX. ReorGanizep Canapa. 1663-1672 . ie wi ist, 4a : IttustRations : Colbert, 190; Lake St. Pierre and the Sorel River (1666), 192 ; Hudson’s Bay (1662), 196; Jesuit Map of Lake Superior (1672), 208, 209 ; Ogilby’s Map (1670), 210; La Salle, 212 ; Laval, 215 ; Duval’s Map of Canada, 216; Galinée’s Map (1669), 221; Joliet’s Larger Map (1674), 225; Joliet’s Smaller Map, 226, 227. 93 114 . 136 156 . 189 CONTENTS AND ILLUSTRATIONS. vii CHAPTER X. Tue Mississiprr Reacuep. 1673. . . . . 229 I:tustrations : La Hontan’s — of Mackinas (1688), 235 ; n] al et’s Earliest Map (1673-74), 245 ; his Carte Générale (1681 ?), 246 ; Marquette’s Maps, 248, ee CHAPTER XI. CATARAQUI AND CREVECEUR. 1673-1680 ... . 251 Intustrations : Hennepin’s Drawing of a Buffalo, 259 ; Naga River, 260 ; Hennepin’s View of Niagara Falls, 261. CHAPTER XII. DuLutH AND HENNEPIN ON THE Mississippi. 1678-1683. . . . 273 IntustratTions : Building of the “Griffon,” 275 ; Hennepin’s Map (1683), 279; Terre de Jesso, 281 ; Hennepin’s Map (1697), 284, 285. CHAPTER XIII. La SALLE, Frontenac, AND La Barre. 1681-1683 . 288 Intustrations: Basin of the Great Lakes (1683 ?), 291 ; Franque- lin’s Map (1684), 294; his Map of the Mississippi’s Mouths (1684), 296 ; Starved Rock, 303; Fort St. Louis de Quebec (1683), 306. CHAPTER XIV. La Sauir’s Texan Corony. 1684-1687 . . . 308 ILLusTRATIONS : Map of La Salle’s Camp, 314; Minet’s Sketch Map of Matagorda Bay, 315 ; Minet’s Map of Louisiana, 316 ; Joutel’s Map, 318, 319. CHAPTER XV. DENONVILLE AND Doncan. 1683-1687 . . . . 326 Intustrations : Ruins of the Intendant’s Palace in Buena: 327 ; Jailot’s Map (1696), 332 ; Plan of Fort Frontenac, 335 ; i gram of Denonville’s Mazel, 336 ; Map of Iroquois Center by Raffeix (1688), 338 ; Map of the Genesee Country (1687), 339. CHAPTER XVI. FRONTENAC RECALLED. 1687-1698 . . . 341 Ixiustrations: Franquelin’s Map (1688), “344 ; “Ghuanelli tell Tillemon’s Map (1688), 345; Map * Nouvelle Angleterre et vili CONTENTS AND ILLUSTRATIONS. Nouvel York,” from Blome’s America (1688), 346 ; Map of the Great Lakes by Raffeix (1688), 347 ; The Fox-Wisconsin River Route, 349 ; La Hontan’s Maps of Canada, 352, 353, 354; Ships from La Hontan, 357 ; The Larger Hennepin Map (1697), 358, 359 ; Edward Well’s Map (1698-1699), 362; Chateau de St. Louis (1698), 363 ; Frontenac after Death, 364. A STUDY OF GEOGRAPHICAL DISCOVERY IN THE INTERIOR OF NORTH AMERICA. CHAPTER I. FROM COLUMBUS TO CARTIER. 1492-1534. Ir was not long after the discovery of Columbus before it became evident to some, at least, that the great Discoverer had not found any part of the world neighboring to Cathay, qf 8 yf 3] Tyttpiaay yada ya 4 THE CANERIO MAP, 1503. [From the Sketch in Ruge’s Karlographie von Amerika.] FROM COLUMBUS TO CARTIER. PRorphaye Diy O43 ue opi) & ue) *p ae wAaEOnT PMs wee eet “Aly 0 [-yoqeug saploquing taqyy] | ‘00ST ‘YSOO WT SISITINA WOd VLWFIENI SIC YH, fan > | caste Oo oyu wln'B 2@ pyxond prus ohef xy afer Py rg uen A NEW WORLD SUSPECTED. 3 however remotely connected with the Orient of Marco Polo the new regions might prove to be. After the return of 4 joy word Columbus in 1493, it is apparent that Peter Martyr ‘pected. hesitated to believe that Asia had been reached. It was quite clear that Columbus, on his second voyage, himself felt uncer- tain of his proximity to Asia, since, to preserve his credit with the Spanish sovereigns, he forced his companions, against the will of more than half of them, and on penalty of personal violence if they recanted, to make oath that Cuba was an Asiatic peninsula. He even took steps later to prevent one of the re- calcitrant victims going back to Spain, for fear his represen- tations would unsettle the royal faith that the fabled Orient had been reached. When his pilot, Juan de la Cosa, who was one of those forced to perjure themselves, found himself free to make Cuba an island in his map of 1500, the fact that he put no Asiatic names on the coast of a continent west of Cuba has fi: RIK Cas wa) = Si. Se 7 PART OF CHART NO. II. IN KUNSTMANN. (Also in Bull. de Géog. Hist. et Descriptive, 1886, pl. iv.] been held to show that the doubt of its being Asia had already possessed that seaman’s mind. The makers of the Cantino and Canerio maps in 1502 and 1508 respectively, in putting in a coast for Asia distinct from this continent which La Cosa had 4 FROM COLUMBUS TO CARTIER. delineated, establish the point that as early as the first years of the sixteenth century the cartographers whose works have come down to us had satisfied themselves that areas of land of continental proportions had blocked further progress to the west. The geographical question then uppermost was thus reduced to this: Was this barrier a new continent, or had the islands which it was supposed would be found in the path to Asia proved to be larger than was imagined? It was Colum- bus’s purpose in his fourth voyage to find an opening in this barrier through which to reach the territories of the Asiatic po- tentates, and then to continue the cireumnavigation of the earth. It may, then, well be questioned if the statement ordinarily made, that Columbus in 1506 died in ignorance of the true geographical conditions pertaining to a new continent, is true, whatever may have been his profession in the matter. There is, as we have seen, good ground for the belief that he did not mean the Spanish sovereigns to be awakened from a delu- sion in which he deemed it for his interests that they should remain. When Balboa, twenty years after Columbus’s discovery, made Balboa ana it more palpable that south of the Isthmus of Pan- Magellan. ama there was a substantial barrier to western prog- ress, and when ten years later Magellan pierced this southern barrier at its Antarctic extremity, it still remained a problem to find out the true character of the northern barrier to such a progress, and to find a place to enter the land, along a northern parallel, far enough to reach the historic India. There were two waterways by which this northern land could The two have been explored far inland; but for forty years Grovien after the landfall of Columbus, it is not safe to af- waterways firm positively that any one had attempted to follow their channels. A local pride among the rugged sea-folk of the north of France has nevertheless presented claims for our con- sideration that one at least of these passages had been tried at different times early in the sixteenth century. Similar claims have been made for Portuguese mariners a little later, and be- fore the attempt of Cartier. Hakluyt even mentions that the English had known at this early date something of the St. Law- rence region; but it is safe to say that no such record is known to-day. These great waterways lay within the two great valleys THE GREAT WATERWAYS. 5 of the yet uncomprehended continent of the north, — the Mis- sissippi and the St. Lawrence, — which at the west were so closely connected that tidal waves arising in Lake Michigan sometimes overflowed the dividing ridge. The early explorers of the Great Lakes are known to have passed, during the spring freshets, in their canoes from one valley to the other, by that route which enables the modern Chicago to discharge its sewage into the Gulf of Mexico instead of the Gulf of St. Lawrence. The striking experiences of the Spaniards at the south served to draw their attention from a due examination of the north- PY y Safortuna y p.da tormenta 2 Oh C.b0 marco @ w& ~~e~aoo~ Bem Johan A aoeahee ay” Sos faues eG das gamas A.C de boaventura "Goad » Se boaventira A bo marco 2 Oy. de rer lus Pr) Se fanta aria y dos bacalbas a comcerca | Vramora REINEL CHART, 1503. [After the Sketch in Kretschmer’s Atlas, ix.?] ern shores of the Gulf of Mexico; so that Pineda in 1519, in finding a great river flowing from the north, which we now identify with the Mississippi, was not prompted to enter it in search of gold, “because it is too far from the tropics,” as the Spanish cosmographer Ribero afterwards expressed it in a legend on his map of 1529. Moreover, this metal was not asso- ciated in their minds with such low regions as this river ap- parently drained ; and the white and turbid flow of its waters well out into the gulf, as La Salle later noticed, seems to have raised no conception of the vast area of its tributary watershed. Almost two centuries were to pass before its channel was to be 6 FROM COLUMBUS TO CARTIER. fairly recognized as a great continental waterway; and then the explorations which divulged its extent were from the north and down the stream. The voyages of the Cabots and the Cortereals had been the ; outcome of a national rivalry which had sought for Aims of Eng- é iandand ~ England and Portugal some advantage in the north Portugal. 5 me * to counterbalance that of Spain in the south. It will be remembered that the line of demarcation moved westerly by the treaty of Tordesillas had thrown, it was supposed, these ONS A \ PEDRO REINEL’S CHART. (From Fac-similes in Kunstmann, and in Bull. de Géog. Hist. et Descriptive, 1886, pl. iii.] northern regions beyond the reach of Spain. Whether the Cabots had discovered at the north a gulf to correspond with the Mexican gulf at the south, and had found an expanse of water which had already coursed another great continental val- ley, and by which it was practicable to go a long distance CONTEMPORARY MAPS. 7 towards the west, must probably remain uncertain. Investiga- tion in critical hands has produced a divided opinion. Just what the Portuguese, who soon followed the English into these waters, did, is also not quite certain; and though it can hardly be proved that the Cortereals entered the great northern gulf, it seems to be evident from a Portuguese portolano of 1504, FROM A PORTUGUESE MAPPEMONDE, 1502. (An Extract from the Fac-simile in E. T. Hamy’s Paper, in the Bull. de Géog. Hist. et Descrip- tive, 1886, p. 147 and pl. ii. It is sometimes called ‘‘ The King Map.’’] which Kunstmann has reproduced, that at this time they had not developed the entrances to this gulf north and west of Newfoundland; while it is clear by the Reinel chart of 1505 that they had discovered but had not penetrated these passages. The student in Europe who curiously watched the progress of geographical development beyond the sea during the sixteenth century naturally followed the revelations in the successive editions of the Geographia of Ptolemy, with the new maps of recent progress made to supplement those long familiar as pertaining to the Old World. The man who made the map for the Roman Ptolemy of 1507-8 is believed to have been a companion of Cabot in these northern Ravens voyages; and this work of Johann Ruysch is the ™P 17 earliest engraved map which we have showing the new discover- Ptolemy. 8 FROM COLUMBUS TO CARTIER. ies. This map is interesting as making more apparent than La Cosa, seven or eight years before, had done, that these new discoveries might have been in part along the coast of Asia, but not altogether so. There is no sign in it of the landlocked region where now we place the Gulf of Mexico; and in this respect it is a strong disproof of the alleged voyage of Vespu- cius in 1497; but it may give the beginning of a continental area which was soon to develop, adjacent to the West Indies, into what we call North America. But at the north Ruysch places the discoveries of the English and Portuguese unmistak- Ye ®Ven ° Lan, Bere ose? AZORES Vanrieia INS. 5, oy Of C.VERDE Tera SANCTE CRUCIS SIVE MUNDUS NovUS RUYSCH, 1508. [From the earliest engraved Map showing the discoveries in the west, in the Ptolemy of 1508 (Rome).] ably on the upper Asiatic coast; and while he does not dissever Newfoundland from the mainland, he goes some way towards doing it. So we may say that in 1507, one working in Rome with the BASQUES AND NORMANS. 9 available material which had been gathered from the Atlantic seaports had not yet reached a conception of this great watery portal of a continent which lies back of Newfoundland. That there could not have been knowledge of this obscure gulf in some of the seaports of northern and western France Cee a Ss Park, " Re eee © Pe Tide AnAcosr, eS litte aS Ph, = Pe 2tesr meron, <. Sg ye te Ca. 8 ey ance Chelle de 20 Lieut Tancastet =] _ 20 é 40 se Embouchure 9u Honus et LlanventSur'Ime co ree Le Row Eruorte 02 CanSa ; S82 es ay 06 JEAN DENYS (alleged Map), 1506. [Reduced from a Tracing furnished from the Archives at Ottawa.] may indeed admit of doubt; and perhaps some day a dated chart may reveal the fact. We need not confidently trust the professions of Michel and other advocates of the pasoues Basques, and believe that a century before Cabot their 24 Nor hardy fishermen had discovered the banks of New- foundland, and had even penetrated into the bays and inlets of 10 FROM COLUMBUS TO CARTIER. the adjacent coasts. There seems, however, little doubt that very early in the sixteenth century fishing equipments for these regions were made by the Normans, as Bréard chronicles them in his Documents relatifs & la Normand. In the very year when the Ruysch map became known in Europe (1508), it is claimed by Desmarquets and other Diep- ‘hithacks pese, solicitous for the credit of their seaport, that Denys, Thomas Aubert went eighty leagues up the St. Law- rence River. If this be true, the great northern portal was entered then for the first time, so far as we have any record ; but such pretensions, even with the support of Ramusio, hardly rest on indisputable documents. We learn from Charlevoix — too late an authority to be assuring — that Jean Denys had made a chart of the Gulf of St. Lawrence two years earlier (1506) ; but the evidence to prove it is wanting. This map is said to have been formerly preserved in the Paris Archives, but is not found there or elsewhere at this day. What passes for a copy of it, treasured at Ottawa, shows names of a palpa- bly later period. If the original could be discovered, it might be found, possibly, that this nomenclature has been added by amore recent hand. There does not seem to be anything in the configuration of its shore lines that might not have been achieved in 1506 by an active navigator. If the outlines freed from the names are genuine, it would show that there had thus early been explorations to the west of Newfoundland, which might account for the otherwise surprising delineation of the “Golfo Quadrado,” or Square Gulf, which appeared on the mappemonde of Sylvanus in his edition of Ptolemy in 1511. This represents in mid-ocean in the north Atlantic a large island, little resembling Newfoundland, how- ever, with a landlocked gulf to the west of it, shut in by a coast which in the north and south parts bends so as nearly to touch the island. That it is intended for Newfoundland and the neighboring parts admits of no question; for the strange interior coast is considered to be the region of the Cortereal discoveries, since there is upon it a Latinized rendering of that name, Legalis Domus. Some explorations developing such a gulf, whether Denys’s or those of others, must have already taken place, then, before 1511. There is some evidence in Navarrete’s documents (iii. 42) that the Spaniard, Juan de Sylvanus, 1511. THE SQUARE GULF. 11 Agramonte, had been engaged in 1511 to go to the Newfound- land region; but we are ignorant of the sequel. After this date, for a score of years and more, this landlocked water of Sylvanus absolutely disappears from all the maps which have come down to us,—nothing remaining but indications of entrances to the gulf by the Straits of Belle Isle and by the southern passage. It is noticeable that Gomara, describing this f : sHrvrey prem egy? oF “pods qe Py Ny [IES se aynb) qe jip 2odapyodde 14" gc renrotp spree eb og | he yyw ATT {From the Ptolemy of 1511.] water so late as 1555, speaks of it in the same way, as the “ Square Gulf.” France was now to find rivalry in these waters in the renewed efforts of the Portuguese. The French had established a fish- ing-station in Bradore Bay, just within the Straits of Belle Isle, which they called Brest. This was early in the century, but its precise date is difficult to determine. Showing some of the activity of the Portuguese, we have a chart of that nunaes, people, of not far from 1520, which indicates that they had looked within the gulf both at the north and at the 12 FROM COLUMBUS TO CARTIER. south, but not far enough to discover its open and extensive channels. If we are to believe the interpretation which some have put upon a voyage ascribed to Joim Alvarez Fagundes at this time, the Portuguese had attained far more knowledge of this inner gulf than this anonymous chart indicates. Indeed, a map, made in 1563 by Lazaro Luiz, has been put forward as indicating just what Fagundes had done; and this clearly gives him the credit of unveiling the hydrography of the gulf, so that his results might be considered to exceed in accuracy those of Cartier in his first voyage. This map of Luiz makes the shores of the gulf complete, except a portion of the inner coast of Newfoundland, and even gives the St. Lawrence River for a long distance from its mouth. Being made forty years and more after Fagundes, the draftsman had the temptation to embody later results ; and the map naturally starts the question of how much a LAVRADOR g descobris Joaom Alverez LAZARO LUIZ. [A Sketch of the Map in Bettencourt’s Descobrimentos dos Portuguezes (Lisbon, 1881-82).] of this posterior knowledge was embodied in it. Since Betten- court in his Descobrimentos dos Portuguezes brought forward this map, in 1881-82, its pretensions in this respect have been studied, and often questioned ; but Dr. Patterson, a recent Nova Scotian writer, has advocated its claims; and Harrisse in his last book, The Discovery of North America, has committed him- THE FAGUNDES VOYAGE. 13 self to a belief in the Fagundes explorations. The unques- tioned facts are these: Ancient documents mention the voyage as being for the purpose of establishing a fishing-station. . The Portuguese king had also promised Fagundes control by patent of the regions which in this tentative voyage he should dis- cover. On Fagundes’s return he reported what he aca had found; and in accordance with his report, his report, king, March 18, 1521, granted to him these lands, ~~ supposed to be a new discovery. This patent describes them, presumably in accordance with Fagundes’s report; and it is this description, taken in conjunction with the Luiz map, which must enable us to say where Fagundes had been. The language of the patent, not as clear as we might wish, says that the coast which he had found lay north of those known to the Spaniards and south of that visited by Cortereal, which would put it between Newfoundland and perhaps the Chesapeake, or possibly a region a little farther north than the Chesapeake. The assigned country includes, as the patent says, the Bay of Auguada, which contains three islands; a stretch of coast where are other islands, which Fagundes had named St. John, St. Peter, St. Ann, St. Anthony, and an archipelago, also named by him the Eleven Thousand Virgins ; an island “close to the bank,’ which he called Santa Cruz, and a second island called St. Ann. The patent closes with grant- ing all these islands and lands to their discoverer. On a coast so crowded with islands and bays as that of Maine and New Brunswick, — apparently the “firm land” of the description, we need more details than the patent gives us to determine beyond dispute the geographical correspon- dences of these names. The inscription ‘‘ Lavrador J descobrio Joaom Alverez [Fagundes]” is on the Luiz map, placed on the peninsula formed by the St. Lawrence Gulf and the Atlantic. This, in the opinion of Harrisse, requires the Baya d’ Auguada, which is described as having a northeast and southwest exten- sion, to be none other than the St. Lawrence Gulf. That writer is convinced that the bay was named the Watering Bay, be- cause Fagundes must have gone through it to the outlet of its great river to fill his water-casks. He also allows that the three islands of this bay may possibly have been Prince Ed- ward, Anticosti, and Orleans; since these islands in the Luiz 14 FROM COLUMBUS TO CARTIER. map are all colored yellow, like a Portuguese escutcheon placed on the map. This, however, would have carried Fagundes up the St. Lawrence River farther than Harrisse is inclined to be- lieve; and he would rather substitute for the island of Orleans the Magdalen group or some peninsula of the gulf mistaken for an island. Harrisse also applies rather neatly what may be termed the “liturgical” test in respect to all the names men- tioned in the patent; and he finds that the corresponding saints’ days in the Roman calendar run from June 21 to October 21. This would seem to indicate that it was in the summer and autumn, probably in 1520, when these names were applied, in accordance with a habit, common with explorers in those days, of naming landmarks after the saint on whose day they were discovered. Another proof of the voyage, also worked out by the same writer, is that names which appear on no map ante- dating this patent are later found for this coast on the maps known by the name of Maiollo (1527), Verrazano (1529), Vie- gas (1534), Harleyan (1542), Cabot (1544), Freire (1546), and Descelliers (1550). This is the nature of the evidence which makes Harrisse give Fagundes's @ map, tracking the progress of Fagundes from the pees time he passed near the islands of St. Pierre and Miquelon. By this it would appear that he coasted north the west shore of Newfoundland, and at the Straits of Belle Isle turned and followed the Labrador coast well within the St. Lawrence River, and then returning, skirted the New Bruns- wick coast, that of Prince Edward Island, Cape Breton, and Nova Scotia to the entrance of the Bay of Fundy, where he bore away seaward, and returned to Portugal. Few, we sus- pect, will accept this route of Fagundes as proved. Most will be content to acknowledge the fact of an acquaintance with the gulf and its neighboring waters rather than such an extent of the acquaintance. The advocates of these Portuguese anticipations of Cartier point to the melons and cucumbers which that navigator found among the natives of the gulf region as indicating that Euro- peans had left the seeds of such fruits among them. They also think that Cartier’s own recitals leave the impression that the Indians of the St. Lawrence had become used to European contact before his advent. It is known, however, that the In- THE WESTERN BARRIER. 15 dians of the interior had long been used to resort to the shores of the gulf and its vicinity during the summer season ; and it is not unlikely that by this habit, as well as by a common cus- tom of intertribal communication, the ways of Europeans were not unknown in the interior. A belief in a comparatively short stretch of unknown sea sep- ISLANDA or-\o o barram 15ta latpe rag slens es videron. ~ oltanedt DOLAVRAOR. Gece LATA se “Ci irk i pba gee ¢ TE rabininid i wom s5 2 apd } 2 3 : : gz }. ahanuay 3 ; = BP year : Ss casforrs A Ess j An ° 25% em a a “Sha Spanhore oo oagontiqué " ee az) 2% Dsq AT i HAS: OTCASTELRY oe of Bee Peo a g | \ MARIS TO-PELOS ah CASTELHANOS. BRasiL (am Francisco Gi fro PORTUGUESE CHART, 1520. [After a Sketch ia Ruge’s Kartographie von Amerika.] Aa arating the Azores from Cathay had been no small inducement to Columbus to make his hazardous voyage. Now that ale oe the land to the west had proved so far a barrier to a teats bar: farther westward way, it was in turn no small induce- ment to those prompted to pierce this barrier to believe that the land which confronted them was even narrower than the 16 FROM COLUMBUS TO CARTIER. ocean had been thought to be. Balboa had proved how nar- row the land was at Panama, and Cortes had shown that it was not wide in Mexico. How wide was it farther north? Columbus had suspected that South America was of conti- nental extent, because of the great volume of water which the Orinoco poured into the Gulf of Paria. Ships when out of sight of land had filled their water-casks from the water poured out by the Amazon, which told of an immense inland drainage. None of the early navigators remarked upon anything of the kind at the north. The flow of the Mississippi did not seem to impress them as indicating an enormous valley towards its source. The early maps given to portraying its supposed sys- ola uerde Ss So) 2 G0 2000 2a Goo0%e ° Sve . ~ . “Ss o o ° mor oo oh Serndia’o ies So 80 eo oo as te Lf mar oceans i im ost mada, roaege Bs a0 bona Spe ronga oO Be A sai ee tfola pocho cognuita COPPO, 1528. [After Kretschmer. ] ° 90 tem of drainage represent it as very scant. On the eastern sea- board of the northern continent the Alleghany range rendered it impossible for any river to have a very large volume of water. It was only when one got as far north as the St. Lawrence Gulf, and even into its inner reaches, that evidence such as had been indicative on the coast of South America could have suggested a vast continental area at the north. Therefore, before this revelation was made in the St. Lawrence River, it is not strange that there were current views against the continental character of the region lying north of the Mexican gulf and west of the country discovered by Cabot and the Cortereals. Some would THE SEA OF VERRAZANO. 17 believe that it was no continent at all, but only an immense archipelago, filled with passages, if they could only be found. Coppo had mapped it in this way in 1528. Others had followed Oviedo in supposing that the land at the north, at one place at least, was as narrow as it was at Panama; for this historian, in 1526, in his Sumario, had first given published indication of what was for many years following known as the Sea of Verra- zano. This expanse of water was imagined to fill the space VERRAZANO. [A part of Brevoort’s Fac-simile.] now known to be occupied by the two great valleys of the upper Mississippi and the Great Lakes; while its easternmost waves nearly broke through the land, to mingle its waters with the Atlantic somewhere along the eastern seaboard of the pres- ent United States. The supposition of this mysterious sea arose from an inter- pretation of Verrazano’s experiences on the coast in yorrazano, 1524, which constitute the first decided and official !** 18 FROM COLUMBUS TO CARTIER. manifestation of French activity in the new regions. This navi- gator is supposed to have become acquainted with the coast from Spanish Florida to the seaboard of Maine; and his ex- plorations were held in later times to be the basis of the French claim to territory in the New World. Freville, in his /é- moire on the commerce of Rouen, prints a paper by Admiral Chabot, which shows that for a while it had been the inten- tion of Francis I. to follow up this voyage of Verrazano. The political exigencies in which that French king found himself involved had caused delays; and his attention was not again seriously given to such efforts until he commissioned Cartier, ten years later. During this decade Verrazano’s notion of this sea beyond the barrier had become the belief of a school of geographers; and the believers in it found it not difficult to count the chances good of reaching it by a strait at some point along the Atlantic coast. There have been two maps brought into prominence of late years, which reflect this belief. One is the map of Maps of the x : Verrazano THieronomo da Verrazano, preserved in the College oe of the Propaganda at Rome, made by his brother not long after the voyage of that navigator. His chart shows this sea as a great watery wedge lying athwart the interior of the undeveloped North America, and pointing with its apex to a narrow strip of land somewhere in the latitude of Carolina. Indeed, one might suppose that the sailor brother of the cartog- rapher had described to him a stretch of sea with an obscure distance, as he saw it above the dunes in the neighborhood of Cape Hatteras; while the cartographer himself had given his fancy play in extending it to the west. The other map has been brought within ten years to help elucidate this transient faith in such a western sea. This second chart had long been known in the Ambrosian Library at Milan as the work of the Visconte Maggiolo (Maiollo) ; but its full import had not been suspected, since it bore the apparent date of 1587. The Abbé Ceriani had discovered its true date to be 1527, and that some- body had changed, in sport or in mischief, the figure 2 into 8. Signor Desimoni, the archivist of Genoa, who was at this time working on the Verrazano problem, happening in the library, was struck with the coast lines and legends on the map as being similar to those of the Propaganda map, with which he was THE SEA OF VERRAZANO. 19 familiar; and he first brought the Maggiolo map to the atten- tion of students in 1882. The Sea of Verrazano is much the same in the two maps, and Kagel gyorrang yagyery 9 sraqua20g xx 1g AUS {ug ouur vnur| ul J uigy.wer sug AnsolUor OOIWW 2g %UO0ISAG "1 Coens cf unas, (rnaquereen i z by v5 oy e gr : ab a ye © "2 . ey SF ee Py of? G 27 v s 3 9 > a > eee 3 nn Q 7 < MLN CRI) aD WW emir Fy eyotoy w C. wathansg Cnet nipped snwerg et weemgiey 29 TYCB [-qoqexs s,10ur ApPsyrY Jo uoryonpar y] ‘OTOISDVN YO OTIOIVIT “Sk e = ut a 8 q their delineations of this oceanic delusion marked for a good many years yet to come a prevailing opinion as to the kind of goal the searchers for a western passage were striving to reach. 20 FROM COLUMBUS TO CARTIER. , eee ee 4, 4 e d 4 ‘ 4 Utd, LOE PD ST USS i) yy AM i Wi tD wy hs Wie wet, oy ee Ww ON \ VANES MICHAEL LOK, 1582. ASIATIC EXTENSION OF AMERICA. 21 The same sea is found in the well-known English map of Mi- chael Lok, published by Hakluyt so late as 1582, — or nearly forty years after the close of the series of explorations which Cartier conducted. While it is probable that such supposed conditions as this Sea of Verrazano supplied were a considerable incentive to Francis J. to renew his interest in explorations, the problem was complicated by another view which an eminent German geographer had espoused, and which had already been engaging attention for some ten years. The conditions of political and social life which Cortes had found in Mexico had revived the old hope that Cathay had at last been found; and the reports of the conquerors which were sent to Europe, with all their exaggerations, were welcomed as far more nearly conforming to the descriptions of Marco Polo than anything which had been discovered among the West Indies or on the South American coasts. If the region, then, which Cortes had subdued was in truth Asia, the ocean which Magellan had crossed made an in- dependent continent of South America only; while the north- ern spaces, instead of being an archipelago or a continental barrier, must be simply an eastern extension of Asia, and its coast must border on the north Atlantic. It is known from the text of a little geographical treatise (1533) which has survived, that Schéner,a famous __ globe-maker of Germany, had made a terrestrial Scan” sphere in 1523; but it has not probably come down mera to us. Some gores which were discovered a few years ago have been held by Henry Stevens and others to belong to this globe ; but they delineate North America as a distinct continent, just as it was delineated in other globes by Schoner of an earlier date, which are well known. It is denied, however, by Norden- skidld, that these gores can be of so early a date as 1523, and he places them more than twenty years later. Harrisse has later still examined the claim, and contends that the gores can- not possibly be those by Schoner of this date, because it seems apparent from his treatise that the globe of 1523 must have been made in accordance with the theory of an Asiatic exten- sion for North America. If this was so,—and Harrisse’s reasons are not without effect,— this theory of an Asiatic ex- tension in North America is traced to Schéner as its originator, 22 FROM COLUMBUS TO CARTIER. so far as is known. If it is a matter of contention as respects Schoner, it is certain as regards a little figure of a globe made by Franciscus Monachus in 1526, which unmistakably repre- sents North America as a part of Asia. This the- ory got a firm advocate in Orontius Finzeus in 1531, who, however, so far departed from the view held by Francis- cus as to unite South America to the northern continent by the Isthmus of Panama, while the other had placed a strait to the north of that connection. This theory was made prominent in so well known a treatise as the Novus Orbis of Grynzus, Franciscus Monachus. NAVIGATIONID VS FRANCISCUS MONACHUS, 1526. [After Sketch in Kretschmer’s Adélas.] where the map of Orontius appeared ; and at intervals through that century and into the next, other expressions of this view appeared in prominent maps. If Cartier or his royal master had entertained the expecta- tion that his expedition might penetrate into the heart of north- ern Asia when it started for the gulf back of Newfoundland, it is altogether probable that its equipment would not have been undertaken. It is far more likely that the faith which the ear- lier expedition of Verrazano had developed in the narrowness of the northern continent prevailed at Paris and St. Malo when Cartier started on his fateful voyage. CHAPTER II. CARTIER, ROBERVAL, AND ALLEFONSCE. 1534-1542. Tue story of the personal career of Cartier, separate from his American explorations, is not an extended one. Mod- ern writers have in the main gone back to the JMeé- moire which Charles Cunat prepared for a general biographical account of the Breton race. Here Hoefer went for details used in his great dictionary, and D’Avezac and Ramé for what they have said in editing the documents pertaining to Cartier’s ca- reer. Harrisse in his Cabots has done something to elucidate the bibliography of the subject; but the most important criti- cal examination of Cartier’s life is made in Francois Jotion des Longrais’s Jacques Cartier (Paris, 1888). The researches of this writer were too late for the use of Dr. De Costa in the Narrative and Critical History of America (vol. iv.), but have been followed by three recent prize essayists on the theme: Joseph Pope (Ottawa, 1890), in English; Hiram B. Stephens (Montreal, 1890), also in English; and N. E. Dionne (Quebec, 1889), in French. Longrais’s inquiries show Cartier to have been an older man by three years than had been supposed, or a man of forty-three instead of forty, when he sailed from St. Malo, April 20, 1534, with the aim of raising the French arms, as an act of posses- sion, in the neighborhood of the Square Gulf of Sylvanus. Norman, Breton, and Basque had been frequenters of its shores for many years. These mariners were to find it hereafter within the jurisdiction of their common monarch. Just what constituted Cartier’s fitness to carry out the behests of the French king is only apparent as an inference Garters from the fact that Admiral Chabot, eager companion °'¥ cr. of Francis, and sharing his ambition and confidence, hit upon Sources, 24 CARTIER, ROBERVAL, AND ALLEFONSCE. Cartier as the instrument to place France on an equality with her maritime rivals. Some of the contemporary records call Cartier a corsair, which means that he had roved the seas to despoil the enemies of France. There is a probability that he had voyaged at one time to Brazil. When he was married, in 1519, he had risen high enough in his profession to be called a master pilot. We know that when Cartier shipped his crew, a voyage of discovery had fewer attractions than the better paying occupations of fishing and trading on the Newfound- land coasts. They preserve at St. Malo to-day a list of those finally brought to sign the ships’ papers, which were made out in Cartier’s own hand. He superintended the equipment of his two vessels of sixty tons each, and when all his men were piped to duty they numbered sixty-one souls. That Cartier was bound for the land lying beyond the New- foundland banks, and for the water which that island inclosed, conveyed, very likely, varying notions to the crews of the fishing craft then afloat in this Norman harbor. We have no know- ledge that Cartier started with any charts; but he could hardly have been denied the help of the rough sketches of the coasts, which many a fisherman, habituated to the region, could have made for him. If such charts embodied information which they had shared with the Portuguese, whom they were accustomed to meet on those fishing-grounds, we may look to the chart of Vie- gas of this same year (1584), which has come down to us, as indicating, perhaps, the notions then prevalent respecting this inner sea at the back of Newfoundland. This chart certainly shows but an inadequate conception of its great expanse, and makes the gulf open to the sea at the south, and not at the north. Cartier’s course in his voyage hardly accords with such a belief on his part. It was a rugged port, this St. Malo, with its crowded pe- ninsular town, jutting out to form a harbor, in and out of which thirty or forty feet of water rushed with the tide, leaving the vessels at the ebb keeled upon the ribbed sand. The place had a reputation for hardy seamen, and Jacques Car- tier was then its boast, and has been ever since. When his ves- sels, that April day, righted with the flood and their booms creaked to the vigorous pull of their crews, and the gazing His voyage, 15 St. Malo. NEWFOUNDLAND. 25 idlers along the shore waved their farewells to St. Malo’s mari- time hero, it was doomed that he should give the great interior of a new continent to an aspiring rival of Spain, Portugal, and England. Newfoundland and the Gulf of St. Lawrence by GASPAR VIEGAS. [After a Sketch in Kohl’s Discovery of Maine.] Cartier experienced rough weather as he made the coast of Newfoundland, in the neighborhood of Cape Bona- at yew. vista (May 10), and he was obliged to seek a harbor {7qg" to make repairs. Kohl, in his Discovery of Maine, a thinks that if Cartier had known of the southern entrance to the gulf, with its seventy-five miles of breadth, he would now have sought it. After he had completed his repairs he did, in fact, turn north and not south, and on May 27 he was at the 26 CARTIER, ROBERVAL, AND ALLEFONSCE. opening of the Straits of Belle Isle. This was a region familiar to the fishermen, although one would not suspect it from the Viegas chart, and in the harbors of the Labrador coast within the passage their ships had been long accustomed to find ref- uge in bad weather. It was somewhere here that Cartier met a ship from La Rochelle. He saw also some of the natives of the region. The country seemed to him to be forbidding, so he turned his prows south, and tracked the inner coast of Newfoundland till near the point opposite Cape Breton. Cartier was thus the earliest to define this coast, and if the explorations of Fagundes are allowed, that Portuguese navigator seems not to have outlined this repellant shore. Car- tier now steered westerly and, passing the Magdalene Islands, reached the shore of Prince Edward Island; whence, heading north (July 2), he made the Bay of Chaleur, a name which he now gave to that inlet in recognition of the great heat which he experienced (July 8). Still proceeding northward, he struck the coast of Anticosti Island, and, round- ing its eastern point, followed its northern shore almost to its western head. Here the ships turned and, skirting backward the dreary shores of Labrador, finally emerged into the ocean by the strait which had led them in, and bore away for France. There are landmarks along this passage through the gulf which earlier visitors had perhaps named. Others still bear the designations which Cartier bestowed. His own account and these geographical traces make pretty clear the general direction which he took; but in parts the record is obscure as to details, and there is much difference of opinion among investigators, particularly as to his track across the gulf from New- foundland to Prince Edward Island and the mainland of New Brunswick. Kohl, De Costa, Ganong, Bourinot, and others have exercised their ingenuity upon the problem. It seems probable that familiarity with these waters and a close study of Cartier’s text are safer for an inquiry than the deduc- tions of the European cartographers, even of the earlier time. The study, however, is curious rather than important. Just where the coast of Gaspé juts to sever the gulf from its great affluent, Cartier erected a cross and took possession of the country for his king. It was at this point that he entrapped two Indians, who were to serve him as interpreters during his In the gulf. July, 1534. His track. CARTIER’S FIRST VOYAGE. 2T next voyage, for they were natives of a region high up the St. Lawrence, who had come down for the fishing season. It was on the passage from this point to Anticosti, in which he struck across the great tide rolling from the St. Lawrence, that he seems to have been unconscious of missing the portal that opened two thousand miles of waterway through the interior of - the continent. When he went to the north of Anticosti and reached its western end, he failed to discover that he had nearly circumnavigated an island, and was again at a lesser portal of the great river. Cartier was nearly two months and a half in making this circuit of the gulf. He passed out to sea on August pack in st, 15, and early in September he reéntered the harbor of Mal. $e" St. Malo. He could report little success in discov- °* ering a passage to Cathay, but he had done more, perhaps, to map the gulf than any of his predecessors, and he had laid the foundations of its future cartography. So the expedition was not altogether futile, and he returned with some enthusiasm left, — enough at least to throw spirit into his story, and reas- sure his superiors that the prospect was still hopeful. One would like to think that, in following the events of this voyage, he had beyond a doubt been depending on a recital by Cartier himself. If Ramé, a recent editor of the documents, is not deceived, they preserve at St. Malo the actual register of his companions, to which reference has already been made. A similar authentication can hardly be held to attach to yarative of that one of several manuscripts, professing to tell the ‘evov#s* story of this initial voyage of Canadian discovery, upon which we are most inclined to depend. It was placed first before the public in 1867, and if there is here and there a demur to its being Cartier’s own text, it can at least be trusted better than any other. We trace other contemporary accounts in the main back to the narrative in Ramusio; but no one of all these is so distinctly phrased that the student can be quite sure in all details of Cartier’s course when once he had entered the gulf. Within two months after Cartier’s return to St. Malo, he had interested the vice-admiral, Charles de Mouy, in a new voyage, and the king had been induced to sign a commission at the end 28 CARTIER, ROBERVAL, AND ALLEFONSCE. of October (1534) giving Cartier authority to make further explorations. He was told to take fifteen months for the trial. Voyage of He was allowed three vessels, the “‘ Grande Hermine,” me of perhaps a hundred and twenty tons, which car- ried his flag; the ‘* Petite Hermine,” of sixty tons, under Macé Jalobert; and a small galley, the ‘“ Emerillon,” of forty tons, of which Guillaume le Breton Bastille had the command. Cartier mustered for this cruise a company of one hundred and ten persons, of whom we know the names of eighty-four. This crew was not altogether a worthy one, for the dangerous plan of impressing criminals had been followed. It is a little incongruous with such a following to find the commander writ- ing to his sovereign that he looked upon his enterprise as one likely to open new fields for Christian endeavor. The looker-on must have beheld a motley crowd when Cartier led his men to church on Whit-Sunday (May 16, 1535) to make confession and receive the benediction of the bishop. Three days later the little fleet sailed. The season was bois- Sails, May terous, and they had not made land when the vessels 19, 1585. were scattered in a gale. The little harbor of Blane Sablon, well within the Straits of Belle Isle on the Labrador side, had been made the rendezvous. Cartier reached it first, late in July, and his other ships were not long behind. After three days he led the way westward along the Labrador coast, and passed into the channel between Anticosti and the main. Here on the northern shore he entered a har- bor and named it the Bay of St. Lawrence, — the first appear- ance of a name (Sainct Laurens) in this region, which was in time to be extended to the great gulf and to the river which feeds it. On August 14, he sailed still westward, with spouting whales about his track. He seems now first to have comprehended from the two Indians whom he had kid- napped during the previous year, and who had picked up enough French to be communicative, that the southern shore of this channel belonged to an island whieh divided the great pas- sage to the interior. Cartier was thus enabled to mark on his chart the westernmost end of this island, which he called As- sumption (August 15). Passing on, he found himself at last in the great river, with hopes brightening at the prospect of its great volume of water proving to be the long-sought passage to the Orient. July. August. THE ST. LAWRENCE RIVER. 29 As he passed from one shore to the other, on his westward way, Cartier noted distant mountains to the south, and saw the two banks of the river gradually drawing together. He ques- tioned his Indians, and learned that as he went on farther the water would begin to freshen. It was not a welcome thought ; and as behind him there was a stretch of the northern shore of the river, which he had missed in crossing to the south, he went back on his course in the hope that he had thus over- looked the main salt-water passage. His quest was futile, and by the 24th he had doubled on this backward track and was once more stemming the current of the great river. On September 1, he was opposite the mouth of the Saguenay. He met here some natives in canoes, who were em- boldened by the voices of Cartier’s Indians to come alongside and parley. Cartier left the Saguenay without exploring it, and continued up the main stream to the Isle aux Coudres. Here he remained some days, beguiled with the sports of the natives as they caught the white whales. A religious service was held on Sunday (September 7), though he seems to have had no priest to con- duct it. Another stretch up the river brought him to a con- ference with Donnacona, the leading chieftain of the region, who told Cartier that he dwelt in Stadacona, a place still higher up. The savage received the strangers with words which, so far as the Frenchmen could interpret them, were becoming and friendly. At last the ships reached what is now known as the Island of Orleans, just below the basin of Quebec. Cartier saw vines festooning the trees, and called it the Island of Bacchus. An- choring his vessels here, he proceeded in boats to find a good wintering place, and discovered a spot to his liking just up the stream which, flowing into the St. Lawrence, forms the head- land of Quebec, — the modern St. Charles River. In the north- ° ern parts of the modern town, outside the walls, and where the streets cover the lowlands south of the St. Charles, there is a peninsula formed by a loop of the stream. Opposite the head of this curve, north of the St. Charles, lay the Indian village of Stadacona, the home of the savage chieftain. Adjacent to it a small rivulet came from the north, and at this point it seemed to Cartier that his ships could be September. Stadacona. 30 CARTIER, ROBERVAL, AND ALLEFONSCE. moored in security, and easily protected. So upon September 14 the vessels were brought from below and warped into posi- tion. It is the general belief that this little stream is the modern Lairet, and as the result of an agitation beginning as far back as 1835, and seeking also to honor the memory of the Jesuits, who in 1625 built their abode on the same site, there was erected a monument here in 1889 to commemorate the so- journ of Cartier,— not, however, without some protest from such as believed that the exact spot was at the confluence of the St. Michel, a little farther up the St. Charles. The fact that remains of a vessel were found in 1848 at the mouth of the St. Michel has been held by the advocates of that spot as showing Cartier to have abandoned the “ Petite Hermine ” there, presumably near his fort; but on the other hand it is strenuously denied that the hulk there found could be as old as the early part of the sixteenth century. De Caze and Di- onne, two of the later Canadian antiquaries, have taken issue on the problem. Cartier’s two native interpreters, finding themselves now among friends, communicated to Donnacona the intention of Cartier to leave his vessels at this spot and go himself higher up the St. Lawrence to a place called Hochelaga. The Indian chieftain much preferred to snatch the opportunity of barter for the Frenchmen’s trinkets, instead of letting it fall into the hands of a rival at Hochelaga, — or at least such an interpre- tation of Donnacona’s discontent at Cartier’s proposal seems the most reasonable. The savage’s opposition to Cartier’s pur- pose of ascending the river, not a little urged on by the atti- tude of the interpreters, seemed likely, for a while, to embroil all parties in a hostile outbreak. Though this was avoided and a sort of friendly pact was formed, Donnacona resigned himself to the thought very slowly, and not till after he had tried the effect of artifice to enforce his powers of persuasion. THe made some of his people dress and caper like devils, as if they were messengers sent from Cudragmy, the local deity of Hochelaga, to persuade the French not to venture on the hazard of the trip. There is a portrait of Cartier in the town hall of St. Malo which the townspeople cherish. It has often been engraved, CARTIER’S SECOND VOYAGE. 31 and the fearless leader has been confidently seen in it. Park- man, who saw it in 1881, found it recent in origin and a ques- tionable likeness. It looks, however, like a man of courage, whom it would take much to intimidate, and he stands in con- templation, as if he might have been caught at this moment as his mind strengthened with a determination to ascend the river in spite of obstacles. So, leaving the body of his followers in good plight to resist attack, Cartier took the “ Emerillon ” and two boats, with fifty men for an escort, and on September 19 pulled out g.itemper into the St. Lawrence and began to breast the current. 1% Something of the autumnal joy conspicuous in the foliage buoyed the spirits of the adventurers, and they went on suc- cessfully. On the 28th, they reached a place where the river expanded into a lake, and in recognition of his sovereign, he named it the Lake of Angouléme, which recalls the birthplace of Francis I. As the river narrowed again, the currents be- came too strong to force the “ Emerillon” against them ; so she was left behind, while Cartier and a body of picked men went on in two boats. On October 2, he drew his boats up beside a piece of level land, out of the current here known as St. Mary’s, and found that he was about three miles be- gctorer, low Hochelaga. The news of his coming soon spread, Mechel. and the natives in large numbers gathered on the shore, offer- ing food and manifesting delight. Accompanied by five of his principal officers and with a de- tail of twenty men, Cartier went the next day to the Indian town, and was graciously received by the chieftain of these sav- age hordes. The intruders found the settlement situated near the base of a high hill, and surrounded by cultivated fields. Cartier and his companions were led to a gate in a circular pal- isaded village. Along this palisade they found on the inner side a gallery from which missives could be hurled at assailants, and piles of stones lay ready for use. There is a bird’s-eye view of this town in Ramusio. It neither corresponds very ex- actly with Cartier’s description, nor is it wholly comprehensible in itself. We know that nearly seventy years later Champlain found people and town alike wanting, and another race possessing the land. Who the people were that Cartier met is a question upon CARTIER, ROBERVAL, AND ALLEFONSCE. 32 "S HOCHELAGA. 510 RAMU AT MONTREAL. 33 which there has been some difference of opinion. The decision rests mainly upon the ethnic relations of the scant vocabulary which Cartier picked up and recorded. Dawson has held that the words in Cartier’s list have Algonquin roots. The Abbé Faillon holds them to be Huron, and the weight of opinion seems to sustain the abbé. The Hurons had given place to Algonquins in the time of Champlain, as we shall later see. When Cartier was conducted within the gate of this Huron village, he found a public square, round which the huts of its inhabitants were grouped. In this space he was welcomed by men, women, and children, with signs of emotion and confidence. The white strangers were evidently looked upon as superior be- ings, capable of healing by the hand, for the palsied were brought to be touched. The chieftain of the savages was borne into the throng upon the shoulders of men, and he offered a shrunken limb to be stroked. In recognition of the potency of the Frenchman’s charm, the Indian lifted his wreath of authority from his own head and placed it upon the brow of his visitor. Cartier, in fulfillment of the missionary spirit which he had avowed to the French king, began to repeat the Gospel of St. John. Then, making the sign of a cross, he uttered a prayer, and afterwards read the Passion of Christ. It was mere necro- mancy to the astonished savages. There was something they could better understand when the French leader caused a dis- tribution of trinkets. Hatchets and knives were passed out to the dusky applicants amid a flourish of trumpets. In view of the forebodings of Donnacona, it was not the most prudent of actions to distribute such dangerous largesses. Cartier’s eyes must all the while have wandered away to the conspicuous lookout which the neighboring eminence afforded. He tells us of its imposing character, when he says that he gave it the name of Mont Royale. The capital town, which the trav- eler finds to-day on the site of Hochelaga, is a reminder of the first European who surveyed the site of Montreal. As Cartier gazed from the summit of this hill, — for his new-found friends soon conducted him thither, — he scanned the hazy distance, in which on the one hand the St. Lawrence and on the other the Ottawa lost themselves, and we can well imagine that he asked, “ Which way must I go to seek Cathay?” There needed an earlier start in the season than was possible 34 CARTIER, ROBERVAL, AND ALLEFONSCE. now, to solve this pregnant question. October, with its short October, days, was already advancing, and it was not prudent na to tarry longer with his new-found friends. There was provision yet to make for the winter in Stadacona. So ex- changing courtesies with the savages, he pushed off his boats LESCARBOT’S HOCHELAGA. mK ht Aa ‘eS Nusa bs a ASEWAOD TY Fed a and started down the river with the current. He reached his Havrede galley on October 4, and on the 11th he was once Sainte Croix. wore in the Havre de Sainte Croix, as his station on the St. Charles had already been named. During his three WINTER OF 1585-86. 35 weeks’ absence, his men had worked to some advantage. They had completed a fort and had mounted some guns, and other preparation had been made for the winter; but his peace with Donnacona had still to be strengthened. He cultivated the friendship of the savages by going freely from one native hut to another. In this he did not fail to see that they sometimes overcame their enemies, for they had a habit of decorating their walls with scalps. He found, too, they had provident habits, for winter was not at hand without their having laid in stores of supplies. He fancied, too, they were docile enough to re- ceive Christian teaching, and he was sorry he had not a priest with him to administer the rites of the Church. He told them that he would come again, and bring with him holy men, who could render them such service. The winter had hardly come on in its severity before a pes- tilence like scurvy broke out among the natives. It soon spread to the French fort. At one time there were but ten sound Frenchmen to minister to the sick, and twenty-five of the company died. They tried to appease what they thought an offended Deity by erecting crosses. Weak and well alike prostrated themselves in the snow before these holy symbols. They sought content for the mind in penitential hymns, and they supported each other with mutual vows. All this, however, seemed to less purpose —if we may believe their own accounts —than a concoction of which they drank freely, after the habit of the natives. It was probably made from the bark of the white pine (ameda). “If all the physi- cians of Montpelier and Louvain had administered all the drugs of Alexandria, the effect would not have been so good in a year as the draughts of ameda caused in six days.” So runs their record, — and it is very likely. As the spring came on, this little company of Frenchmen re- covered its tone. On May 3 they set up a new cross, 4535, with more jubilation than before, and put upon it a SP*ns legend that noted formal possession of the country for the French crown: Franciscus Primus, Der gratia FRANCORUM Rex recnat. The first act of sovereignty exercised by the representative of that absent monarch was to lure the ponnacona local chieftain into a snare, and to carry him and other savages on board the ships. The act was resented by Sickness. 36 CARTIER, ROBERVAL, AND ALLEFONSCE. Donnacona’s people, and they offered ransoms. The majesty of France could not condescend to bargain, and the savages were put off with a promise of having their chieftain restored to them the next year. The French had received special kindnesses from the people of a neighboring village, and in their weakened condition, find- ing it necessary for want of a crew to abandon one of their ves- sels, they gave the Petite “ Hermine” to this people, in order that they might profit by the metal spikes in the hulk. If the vessel which was found in 1848—as already stated — had shown that the fastenings had been removed from her timbers, there would be more ground for supposing it a relic of Cartier’s fleet. On the 6th the French floated into the St. Lawrence, and set = sail for their downward voyage. After a while they ay, 1536. : Return voy- anchored, just out of the current, when the savages’ oe canoes, which were following, came up. The poor creatures had not yet got over clamoring for Donnacona. Car- tier now put the chieftain forward to tell his people that he was content, and would return in a year. Meanwhile the French- men tossed into the hovering canoes some hatchets in return for beaver and wampum. The savages were satisfied enough with the exchange to forget their grievance, and Cartier tried to get away while they continued in so happy a mind. The wind, however, did not serve him, and he was obliged to linger till the 20th. When once started, he found no obstacle till he reached the gulf. Here he buffeted awhile with adverse gales, and finally found a haven at the little island of St. Pierre. At the anchorage he found many ships from France and Britain, as he says, and may have learned more than he knew before of the southerly outlet of the gulf, for he shortly after passed to sea by rounding Cape Race. Early in July he was once es with the flood into the basin of St. Malo. = Cartier was at once ordered by the king to make a written The Bree account of the voyage, and it has come down to us, sola and is usually cited, as the Bref Récit. It has been surmised, as four years elapsed before a new expedition was sent out, that the report which Cartier now made was not, on the whole, encouraging. He had not, indeed, discovered any July. ROBERVAL. 87 mines, as had been hoped; but a copper knife which he had obtained from an Indian might indicate that his futile quest was rather unfortunate than decisive. This implement was said to come from the Saguenay region. And where was gamuenay this region? Dr. Shea thinks it evident that it did 7" not mean the banks of the Saguenay River, but a country be- yond, to which that river opened the way. The Saguenay had not yet been explored, and there was a chance of mines being found in that direction. There might indeed be revelations in reserve along those valleys up which Cartier had looked so longingly from Mont Royale. Then the natives had also spoken to him of an inhabited country to the south, where the climate was milder. This was, perhaps, a monition of the Lake Cham- plain country, which led him to imagine that a water passage was yet to be discovered, running south, which might lead to Florida, — a region, it must be remembered, broader than the present designation covers, and meaning all that the Spaniards claimed in what is now the southern and even the middle United States. As we read the Bref Récit, we feel that Cartier at least was rather cheerful over future prospects; but the person necessary to be impressed with hope was Francis I. This monarch was embarrassed in making any prompt decision by the wars in which he was involved. He had listened, however, to Cartier, had read his written account, had talked with Donnacona and the other kidnapped savages, and grew to be confident in the chances of better success. To emphasize his claim to the country in a way to impress his rival potentates, Francis now determined to create a vice- royalty in the new country, and selected for his representative a Picard seigneur, Jean Francois de la Roche, better porerva, known as Roberval, from his estates. He was a gen- ‘'r*: tleman of some consideration in his province, —g,sort of petty king, if we may believe what Charlevoix give he sportive designation of him, often on the royal lips. It was at gis commis. Fontainebleau, January 15, 1540, that the king signed %™ 7° the commission, giving his subject and friend full vicegeral powers, while he placed at the same time at his lieu- tenant’s disposal, the sum of 45,000 livres. On Feb- ruary 6, Roberval took the oath before Cardinal de Tournon, February. 38 CARTIER, ROBERVAL, AND ALLEFONSCE. and on the next day he was commanded to follow the luckless habit of searching the jails for recruits. There is no certainty that through all these preliminaries the king had determined to have Cartier as the active spirit of the expedition, and it may rather have been an after-thought, when he found the Picardy gentleman not pushing the enterprise to suit his royal wishes. octover, At all events, on October 17, Henry the Dauphin tivcaptan. Signed the paper making Cartier captain-general and Snes pilot of the fleet. It was now sure that some spirit would be given to the undertaking. The outfit of the fleet was more imposing than anything France had before arranged, and accordingly it excited the sus- picion of Spain. While the rivals of the Spanish monarch were merely hovering about the coasts of Newfoundland, Spain was not prepared to say that her rights under the bull of de- marcation had been infringed, for it had long been allowed that the northern regions which the Cortereals had visited, as well as the eastern limits of Brazil, were exterior to the Spanish ap- portionment. But here was something that looked like a rival claim west of Pope Alexander’s line of partition. How far the public or the emissaries of Spain had learned of what Car- tier had accomplished on his second voyage does not appear, — certain it is that some years were to pass before any publication was made concerning the voyage, for the Bref fécit was still in manuscript. Further, if a type of all the maps issued before 1541 has come down to us, it is equally certain that there had been no cartographical recognition of it up to this time. The general impression was that the Baccalaos—as Newfoundland and the neighboring lands were usually called — was a sterile region, out of which little could come in compensation for any considerable outlay. So the Spanish ambassador in Paris re- ported to his master that it was best to let the French king spend his m . The Spaniards seem at any rate to have exaggerated preparations which Roberval was making, for they imagined that thirteen ships were fitting for the voyage, while in fact Cartier had been instructed to prepare five only, and among them we find the familiar “Grande Hermine” and the “ Emerillon.” It was the king’s wish that the fleet should be at sea by April 15, 1541; but when the time came April, 1541. AWAITING ROBERVAL. 39 Roberval was far from ready. It was therefore decided that a part of the expedition should go ahead, and on May 28, Car- tier hoisted sail on three ships. He soon ran into foul weather, during which his vessels were separated. They all later vendezvansed at Carpunt on the Newfoundland coast. Here they waited six weeks for Roberval, and had abundant leisure to repair damages. But the viceroy came not. Weary of the delay, Cartier again put to sea, and gust 23, entering the Gulf of St. Damienes, pushed across it 1odl at’ and up the great river. It was August 23 when he reached his ald camp at Stadacona. The expectant natives at once asked for Donnacona and his fellows, only to be told that the chieftain had died a Chris- tian, and that the others had married and were now great lords. There is evidence that three at least of these Indians had been baptized at St. Malo in 1538, and that all, excepting one girl, had died. The bold deceit appeased the native anxiety, and Agona, who had in the interval worn Donnacona’s wreath, felt quite content with a new lease of power. In fact, he was somewhat effusive in his joy, and did his best to make Cartier share in his festive delight. For some reason Cartier felt it best to leave his old harbor of Sainte Croix and to proceed four leagues higher up the St. Lawrence to a position near the modern Cap Rouge. eee Here he began a fort which he called Charlesbourg. 14. He was still without tidings of the viceroy, and on_ bourg at a ss ap Rouge. September 2 he dispatched two of his ships to carry word to France of what he had done and of Roberval’s non- appearance. One of these messenger ships was commanded by his brother-in-law, Jalobert, the other by his nephew, Noél. After these had started homeward, Cartier left Beaupré in charge at Charlesbourg, and proceeded up the river. He had a conference with a petty chieftain at Hochelay, a spot apparently near the Richelieu Rapids. He be- stowed upon this savage a red cloak with bright trimmings. Passing on through the rapids to Hochelaga, he learned that its chieftain was plotting mischief, and had gone to Stadacona as if to further some evil design. So without tarrying long, Car- tier returned to Charlesbourg and made preparations for the win- ter. Perhaps the situation of his new fort was not favorable for Hochelay. 40 CARTIER, ROBERVAL, AND ALLEFONSCE. intercourse with the natives, or the savages may have kept pur- Winter, posely aloof; at all events, he saw little of them dur- bi. ing the winter. His men had found some supposed diamonds and flakes of what he thought gold, — evidently de- ceived by a mock metal as the pioneers of Virginia later were, —and with such promises of wealth he was ready in the spring to abandon the fort and sail for France. Whether he encoun- tered Roberval on the way is a question which we may pres- ently consider, as we follow the fortunes of the viceroy. We left this royal representative preparing to follow Cartier with the rest of the fleet. It is to be acknowledged at the outset that the itineraries of Roberval and Car- tier during the progress of this divided expedition are difficult to reconcile one with another. Some writers have contended that the viceroy made but a single voyage to the gulf, and then failed to go up the river to join Cartier, but wintered some- where on the gulf shores. Others contend that he made a brief preliminary voyage and then returned to France, only to start the next spring on his chief explorations. The truth can hardly be determined beyond dispute; nor can it be satisfactorily established whether the viceroy and his master pilot met at all in American waters, so as to be for any period together in these wild regions. We have distinct statements that Roberval sailed from Honfleur, August 22, 1541, and again from La Rochelle, April 16, 1542. Whether this was one embarkation with a confusion of dates, as has been often believed, or two distinct ones, is a subject of controversy. If the voyage of 1541 was a preliminary one, Roberval could hardly have gone beyond the gulf so as to add anything to geographical know- ledge. He would have returned to France by the year’s end. Meanwhile Jalobert and Noél, as already stated, had been sent home by Cartier with dispatches to the king, and their dispatches may have given new encouragement, so that Rober- val was — on the supposition of two voyages — again at sea on April 16, 1542. This time it seems certain — whether it be AtNew. the true date of a single voyage, or the date of a sec- fomndiand, ond one — that Roberval departed from La Rochelle. After a stormy passage he anchored at St. John, New- foundland, June 8, 1542. Jean Allefonsce, whose story and Roberval. ALLEFONSCE. 41 charts help us to rehearse their experiences, was in one of his ships. We have seen that Cartier, in the spring of this year, had abandoned his post at Cap Rouge and come down the river. It has been usually said that in one of the harbors near the gulf he encountered Roberval and his fleet. We may allow it to be true, and that the meeting was not altogether a grateful one to Cartier, who could have had little disposition to return up the river fora repetition of the winter’s miseries. If Cartier exhibited his supposable gold and diamonds, Roberval may have been more eager to make trial of new chances in the same field. We only know —as the story goes — that after an interview of the two, one night Cartier hoisted anchor, and when the dawn broke, Roberval found himself left to his own resources and Cartier out of sight on his way to France. Such is Hakluyt’s narrative of their meeting and parting, and his name carries a measure of assurance to make it true. It has been intimated that a part of Cartier’s discontent was with the necessity of leading a colony which offered no better material than the scouring of the jails. Mention has been made of Allefonsce as in Roberval’s train. This seaman was at this time a man well on in years, — in fact not much short of sixty, — and of so great experience in navigation that his name is a prominent one in the maritime annals of the Norman seaports. Despite some rival claims as to his nativity, the French can best boast of his fame, for he was most likely born at Saintonge, which is a vil- lage near that Cognac which gives its name to French brandy. Champlain, who lived with a generation that had not forgotten the associates of Allefonsce, called him the hardiest mariner of his time. Roberval apparently took Allefonsce to serve him as pilot after he had sent Cartier ahead; and it was by Roberval’s orders, after reaching Newfoundland, that Allefonsce went north along the Labrador coast to find, if possible, a passage to the west. The ice proved so dense that he gave up the search. How thoroughly he then, or at any later day, sailed about the St. Lawrence gulf is not clear. The little sketch-maps which he made, and which are preserved in his manuscript Allefonsce. 42 CARTIER, ROBERVAL, AND ALLEFONSCE. Cosmographie, now in the great Paris library, seem to indicate personal acquaintance with its waters, even so far inland as the mouth of the Saguenay. He seems to have embraced the belief that these regions were near, or possibly identical with, Cathay, and he represents the Saguenay as broadening in its upper parts into the Sea of Cathay. If these maps of Alle- fonsce are the result of his own observation in part at least, | ——gngenonyT nO TeeLNT Q ‘S7DVTISTIALNINNTA NKGAVE YT} 9 LA TERRA Co oD ogo GULF OF ST. LAWRENCE. [Two Sketches by Allefonsce.] they may be looked upon as the earliest we have of any portion of the St. Lawrence valley made by an actual explorer. Roberval himself ascended the St. Lawrence and reached the Cap Ronee, Neighborhood of Cap Rouge by the middle of July, July, GE. 1542, and began defenses where Cartier in the pre- vious year had established his fort. The communal building — tenement, castle, or whatever it was—makes a good show in the description, with its halls, chambers, storehouses, kitchens, and cellar. The whole group of structures constituted a little intrenched camp, where the company was huddled together. ROBERVAL AT FRANCE-ROI. 43 Nothing but the outer danger could have brought such incon- gruous elements into subjection or made life endurable. The question of sustenance soon harassed them. The huge house- hold was rough and prodigal. The stores were not of the best, and there was small chance of increasing them from the neigh- boring tribes, even if they could be counted on as friends. It became therefore, be- fore long, necessary to deal out allotted ra- = = tions, and it was done an ‘S rigorously. In this way = Dy famine, which at one > Ns ; ; a time was alarmingly Q = i , Daz near, was kept at a dis- om tance. Disease, how- Ss ever, could not be & & barred out, and scurvy began to make sad in- roads upon a company weakened by many trials, and not in the past bred to whole- some ways. As exigencies came, Roberval showed him- self quite equal to his duty. He used the gib- bet and lash effectively to preserve peace and insure safety to the community at Fran- cois-Roi, as the post was now. called, transformed to France-Roi by Alle- fonsce, and France-Prime by Hakluyt. Fortunately Roberval, as Cartier had before him, escaped hostile attacks from the savages, and it does not appear that the French were even threatened during that perilous winter. With the coming of spring, a better feeling pervaded the company, and Roberval had the courage to think of something beside disciplining his followers. He determined to discover, if possi- THE ST. LAWRENCE AND THE SAGUENAY. (A Sketch by Allefonsce.] Frangois-Roi. 44 CARTIER, ROBERVAL, AND ALLEFONSCE. ble, what all the stories of various mines in the country were based upon. Roberval would have given much to know what the assayers had made of the sparkling fragments which Car- tier had carried to France. Possibly in their treacherous in- terview, which in Hakluyt’s narrative is made to precede Car- tier’s stealthy escape, that pilot may have laid before his chief the identical map which a descendant of Cartier possessed nearly fifty years later. Roberval would then have descried upon it the legend: “The Saguenay country is a rich land, abounding in precious stones.” Roberval now determined to push an expedition farther into the interior. Accordingly on June 5, 1548, — Hak- Roberval ex- ‘ < i plores, June, luyt gives us the date, — he started with a flotilla of eight boats and seventy men. We are told that he left thirty men to guard the fort, and this total of a hundred would indicate that the winter and its diseases had claimed many victims. He expected to return to France-Roi by July 1. Whither he went it is difficult to say. Some interpret the scant account in Hakluyt as signifying an ascent of the St. Lawrence. Others make him plunge through the deep shad- ows of the Saguenay. It has been even stated that he estab- lished a fort on the river Mistassini, and that its remains were still traceable; but the most trustworthy explorers have never found them (Bull. Amer. Geog. Soc., September, 1891). At all events, he found the task of exploration, in whatever direction it lay, greater than he anticipated, and he sent back word to Royéze, who had been left in command at the fort, not to expect his return till July 20, after which, if nothing more was heard of him, Royeze was at liberty to sail for France. The failure of Hakluyt to continue the story leaves us with- out a guide to the subsequent fortunes of a colony which, as the Abbé Ferland contends, could hardly have left worthy descendants, if it had established a foothold for its jail-birds. The reader needs to be apprised that in what we have gone over, the present recital is more or less forced. The dates of the several accounts are confusing. Hakluyt is more than usu- ally uncertain, and Allefonsce is sparing of dates. Late writ- ers, whether near or remote from the time of Cartier, have not done much to render clearer the dependence of events. In what is to follow, the most certain element of dates comes CARTIER AT ST. MALO. 45 from the somewhat surprising fondness and opportunities which Cartier, after his return to St. Malo, had for standing spon- sor at baptisms, and giving evidence in court. Longrais has CARTIER. [The usual Portrait, but of doubtful authenticity, following the Engraving in Sulte’s Canadiens- Francais, Montreal, 1882.] delved assiduously in the hidden sources of this kind of evi- dence, and there seems to have been no church or other records in St. Malo to which his scrutiny has not been applied. In this way it is made to appear that Cartier arrived at St. 46 CARTIER, ROBERVAL, AND ALLEFONSCE. Malo before October 21, 1542. In the following spring — cartier in SAY in April or May, 1543 — his name is absent from St Malo, local records, and does not reappear till autumn. Lescarbot says that Cartier made a fourth voyage to Canada to rescue Roberval, and there was a sufficient interval Pome PEtWeen the spring of 1543 and October or November Sarthe: of the same year for him to have done so. Lescarbot’s unsupported statement and this opportune interval are all we have upon which to rest any such final voyage of Car- tier. Concerning his remaining years at home we have a few tangible facts. It was probably in the interval between his second and third voyage, and perhaps about the time he was summoned in order to impart a little force to the dilatory performance of Roberval, CARTIER’S MANOR. {From Sulte’s Canadiens-Frangais, vol. ii.] that the king bestowed upon Cartier a manor, situated on the coast a few miles out of St. Malo, which has given rise, in some writers, to the belief that this lordship of Limoilon had made him a noble. If such an honor could be indubitably estab- lished, it might be cited as another proof of the way in which Cartier basked in the royal favor. It was from this abode, or from his town house in St. Malo, that he occasionally issued in his retirement to attend upon legal transactions, as the records show. The most important of these citations for our purpose DEATH OF CARTIER. 47 is when he is summoned with Roberval (April 3, 1544) be- fore the king, to settle the accounts of their joint expe- dition. The referees gave an award of nearly eighty- four livres to Cartier, which he never received, and which his heirs at a later day contended for. With this item these two men pass out of sight in the story of Canadian exploration. We know little of the life of Cartier subsequently, till he died at his seashore estate on September 1, 1557, eee probably of an epidemic then prevailing. Roberval’s September ‘ end is more uncertain. Perhaps he died later at sea, 7 perhaps he was assassinated in Paris, — we have both stories given to us, — but at all events he was still living in the year of Cartier’s death, and thenceforth he eludes us. April 3, 1544. CHAPTER III. THE RESULTS OF CARTIER’S EXPLORATIONS. 1542-1603. THE results of Cartier’s explorations came slowly to the knowledge of contemporary cartographers. In the year of Cartier’s return from his second voyage (1536), Alonso de Chaves, the official cosmographer of Spain, made a plot of the North American coast, using, it seems probable, maps of ex- plorations of which we have no other trace, and which gave it some trends of the coast differing from the well-known Ribero map of a few years before. Although the Spaniards were keep- ing close watch on the northern explorations of their rivals, it is apparent that Chaves had not heard of Cartier’s movements, and this means, most likely, that the hydrographers in the ser- chavesana Vie Of Spain were equally ignorant of what France the ¥adron had been doing, and that nothing from Cartier’s re- ‘ports had been embodied in the Padron General, ordered in 1526, with the intention of portraying year by year the latest results of discovery. By this time Ribero, who had begun such a map, had died, and Chaves had been placed in charge of it. This map of Chaves is not preserved; but there isa map by Gutierrez (1550), known to us, which is held to be based on Chaves. This Gutierrez map gives no trace of the French voyages; nor does Oviedo, the Spanish historian, who wrote the next year (1537) with Chaves’s map before him, give us any ground for discrediting the map of Gutierrez as indicating the features of that by Chaves. The next year (1538), the rising young Flemish map-maker, Gerard Merca- tor, made his earliest map, which shows that no tidings of the Cartier voyages had yet reached the Low Countries. He did not even recognize the great Square Gulf, which had appeared in the Ptolemy of 1511, as premonitory of the gulf which MAPS OF THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY. 49 Cartier had circumnavigated, though three years later Merca- tor affords a faint suspicion of it in his gores of 1541. MERCATOR, 1538. [Northern Hemisphere. } We do not find any better information in the best of the contemporary cosmographers. Sebastian Miinster in ; Germany (1540) widened a little the passage which fetth to severed Newfoundland from the main, and so did the “™ 50 CARTOGRAPHICAL RESULTS, 1542-1603. Italian Vopellio; but Ulpius, making the globe at Rome, in 1542, which is now owned by the New York Historical Society, seems not to have been even thus imperfectly informed. The French globe-maker, who not far from the same time made the sphere preserved at Nancy, knew only enough to make a group jof islands west of the Newfoundland banks. We turn to something more intimately connected with Car- tier’s own work. It might go without saying that Cartier would plot his own tracks; but we have no written evidence that he did, other than a letter of his grand-nephew fifty years later, who says that he himself had inherited one such map. We cay, be 9 Hu 9° RB . 3 9, uv ae Ts RS a\ Nf a 02 < $ 7 wes he : > eee pte paste >» J?CABO ARENAS The New fonde Londe qwhat men goeth a fisching ROTZ, 1542. [East Coast.] must look to three or four maps, made within five years of Cartier’s last voyage, and which have come down to us, to find how the lost charts of Cartier affected cartographical know- ledge in certain circles in France, and placed the geography of the St. Lawrence on a basis which was not improved for sixty years. Those who have compared the early maps find the oldest cartographical record which we have of Cartier’s first voyage (1584) in a document by Jean Rotz, dated eight years later, and preserved in the British Museum. Har- risse thinks that back of this Rotz map there is another, known Rotz, 1542. JEAN ROTZ. 51 as the Harleyan mappemonde, which is deposited in the same collection ; and it is possible that a map of Jean de Clamorgan, known to have comprehended details of the earlier Cartier voy- ages, which has disappeared from the collection at Fontaine- bleau, may also have been useful to Rotz, who is held to be a Frenchman, which may also account for his acquaintance with Malouin sources. Hamy, in a recent paper (Budletin de Géographie historique, etc., 1889), makes him identical with Jean Roze of Dieppe. This Boke of Idrography, as Rotz calls it, contains two maps which interest us. One shows the Gulf of St. Lawrence and the opening into the river, which The lang of kag fe i RPl.de Joan Bermuda éstez2 eo ns 4? & ROTZ, 1542. [Western Hemisphere. ] indicates an acquaintance with the extent of Cartier’s first ex- plorations (1534), and may well have been made some years before the date of the manuscript which contains it. If its outline is interpreted correctly, in making Anticosti ‘a penin- sula connecting with the southern shore of the St. Lawrence River, it is a further proof that a foggy distance prevented Cartier from suspecting that he was crossing the main chan- nel of the St. Lawrence, when he sailed from Gaspé to the Anticosti shores. The other map may be nearer the date of the manuscript, for it carries the river much farther from the gulf, and indicates a knowledge of Cartier’s second voyage. So skillful a cosmographer as Santa Cruz— whose map is pre- 52 CARTOGRAPHICAL RESULTS, 1542-1608. served in Stockholm, as Dahlgren has lately informed us — was certainly at this period (1542) utterly ignorant of the then recent explorations up the St. Lawrence. Two years later (1544), there was the first sign in an en- graved map of Cartier’s success, — the now famous Cabot mappemonde, — and this was a year before any narrative of his second voyage was printed. As but a single copy is known of both map and narrative, it is possible that the publications were not welcome to the government, and the editions of the two were suppressed as far as could be. The solitary map was found in Germany, and is now in the great library at Paris. The sole copy of the Bref Récit, published at Paris in 1545, is in the British Museum, among the books which Thomas Grenville collected. To test this published narrative, scholars have had recourse to three manuscripts, preserved in the Paris Library, varying somewhat, and giving evidence that, before the text was printed, it had circulated in hand-written copies, all made apparently by the same penman. It was probably from the printed text that both Hakluyt and Ramusio made their versions to be pub- lished at a later day. The suppression, if there was such, of the Cabot map is more remarkable; for this Paris copy is the only one which has come down to us out of several editions — Harrisse says four —in which it appeared. This multiplicity of issue is inferred from the descriptions of copies varying, but it is not clear that these changes indicate anything more than tentative conditions of the plates. That the map embodies some con- ception of the Cartier explorations is incontestable. It gives vaguely a shape to the gulf conformable to Cartier’s track, and makes evident the course of the great tributary, as far as Car- tier explored it. There are many signs in this part of the map, however, that Cartier’s own plot could not have been used at first hand, and the map in its confused nomenclature and antiquated geographical notions throughout indicates that the draft was made by a ’prentice hand. The profession of one of its legends — of late critically set forth from the study of them by Dr. Deane in the Proceedings of the Massachusetts His- torical Society (February, 1891) — that Sebastian Cabot was its author is to be taken with some modification at least. The Cabot map, 1544. THE CABOT MAPPEMONDE. pride \ ‘Molson 1G ie Reggio rabine = 2 ee bi PAE wba yjjrnrra. liar, 4 Peg ba! ee . Te Pi ‘TET ‘ACNONTdIVN LOGVO DHL WOUd ee jirenliggn ay oe mee- eonf} 8 I Peele = LY : hos, et a l A mae LR LL basen Yas Wormsacts A he ofp inte aaa te aderintpeniug | ade fy. rif. i (OR AR at ha bY baal. suse! Hinol- ! Be hae tf Ho ara weed; “ cof deftran. a Fowl S TP o sig eet BEAL \ 54 CARTOGRAPHICAL RESULTS, 1542-1608. map is an indication that the results of Cartier’s voyages had within a few years become in a certain sense public property. It happens that most of what we know respecting the genesis of the map is from English sources, or sources which point to England; but the map, it seems probable, was made in Flan- ders, and not in France, nor in Spain, the country with which Cabot’s official standing connected him. It looks very much like a surreptitious publication, which, to avoid the scrutiny of the Spanish Hydrographical Office, had been made beyond their reach, while an anonymous publication of it protected Canada. Terre des Brelorns DESCELIERS OR HENRI Il. MAP, 1546. Key: 1. Ochelaga. 2. R. du Sagnay. 3. Assumption. 4. R. Cartier. 5. Bell Isle. 6. Bacalliau. 7. C. de Raz. 8. C.aux Bretons. 9. Encorporada. 10. Yedu Breton. 11. Ye de Jhan estienne. 12. Sete citades. 13. C. desisles. 14. Arcipel de estienne Gomez. the irresponsible maker or makers from official annoyance. This may account for its rarity, and perhaps for the incomplete- ness of its information. Harrisse, however, in his latest publi- cation, The Discovery of North America, is inclined to recog- nize Cabot’s direct connection with the map, and suggests that Cabot used it to enforce the claim of England to the regions which the French were now exploring, by placing the landfall of 1497 at Cape Breton. In doing so Cabot negatived all the earlier implied and positive statements, that the land- fall of John Cabot had been ten degrees farther north on the VALLARD AND DESCELIERS. 55 Labrador coast. This position outside the water-shed of the St. Lawrence valley was of course less favorable to an English claim than one commanding the entrance of the valley. Better information, mixed apparently with some knowledge derived from the Portuguese voyages, — and certainly chroni- cling Portuguese discoveries in other parts of the globe, — and so presenting some but not great differences, appears in another map of about the same date, known as the Nicolas Vallard map. When Dr. Kohl brought it anew to the attention of scholars, it was in the collection of Sir Thomas Phillipps in England; but there is reason to suppose that not far from the date of its making, it had been owned in Dieppe. The LOY Redo gamns ee er ae NICOLAS VALLARD. maker of it may have profited directly from French sources, particularly in the embellishment upon it, which seems to rep- resent events in Roberval’s experiences. There is, likewise, another map of this period which is still more intimately connected with Cartier’s movements ; indeed, it can hardly have been made independently of material which he furnished, though very likely for neighbor- ing regions it was based on Portuguese sources. This is the one fashioned by the order of the king for the Dauphin’s instruc- tion, just before the latter succeeded his father as Henry IT. A few years ago Mr. Major, of the British Museum, deciphered a legend upon it, which showed that it was the handiwork of Pierre Desceliers, a Dieppe map-maker then working at Arques. Desceliers. 56 CARTOGRAPHICAL RESULTS, 1542-1603. This fact, as well as its official character, brings it close to the prime sources ; and the map may even identify these sources in the representations of Roberval and his men, as they are grouped on the banks of the St. Lawrence. I am informed by the present owner, the Earl of Crawford and Balcarres, that an attempt at one time to efface the legend which discloses its authorship has obscured but has not destroyed the lettering. The map formerly belonged to Jomard, the geographer. There are only the sketch maps of Allefonsce which can be traced nearer the explorers themselves than the maps already mentioned. What this pilot of Roberval made on the spot we know not, but he attempted, in 1545, in a rude way to draw upon his experiences in a little treatise. This manuscript Cosmographie, in which the coast-lines are washed in at the top of its sheets, is preserved in the National Library at Paris. Several modern writers have used them, and the sketches have been more than once copied. Bibliographers know better, however, a little chapbook, which ran through at least four editions in the interval before new interest in Canada was awakened by Champlain. It was first published in 1559, after the death of Allefonsce ; and his name, which appears in the title, Les Voyages avantureux du Capitaine Alfonce Sainton- geots, was apparently made prominent to help the sale of the book, rather than to indicate the intimate connection of the redoubtable pilot with it. His manuscript Cosmographie had been prepared by himself for the royal eye, while this printed production, which was issued at Poictiers, was dressed up by others for the common herd, without close adherence to the manuscript. A popular local bard sets forth pretty much all we know of its hero in some preliminary verses. Like all chapbooks, the little volume has become rare; and when a copy was sold in Dr. Court’s collection (1885), it was claimed that only three copies had been sold in France in thirty years. The most prolific map-maker of this period in Europe was Baptista Agnese of Venice. He had a deft hand, which made his portolanos merchantable. The dex- terity of their drawing has perhaps enhanced their value enough to prevent careless wear of them, so that they are not infre- quent in Italian libraries, and will be found in almost all the large collections in Europe. One certainly has found its way Allefonsce. Agnese. AGNESE AND RAMUSIO. oT to America, and is preserved in the Carter-Brown Library at Providence. Though Agnese was making these maps for over a quarter of a century, beginning about the time of Cartier’s activity, he never much varied from the conventional types which successively marked the stages of geographical know- ledge. He has hardly a map which can be accounted a turn- ing-point in American geography, and his drafts simply follow the prevailing notions. Thus it was that for sixteen years after Cartier and Rober- val had finished their work, the French public was made ac- quainted only with the Bref Récit and the scant narrative to which the popularity of Allefonsce’s name had given a forced currency. The European scholar fared better than the provincial Frenchman, for the third volume of the accolta of Ramusio, which was devoted wholly to Ameri- can discovery, had appeared in Venice in 1556. It is a chief source still to be consulted for the earliest explorations of the St. Lawrence region. It is here that we find an account of that “Gran Capitano,” identified with the Dieppese navigator, Jean Parmentier, who visited the Baccalaos region in the early years of that century. Here, too, we derive a scant knowledge of Denys and Aubert, as already mentioned. But it is concerning the first voyage of Cartier that Ramusio helps us most. Where he got his records of that enterprise of 1534, it is not easy to conjecture, and what he says remained for a long while the sum of all that was known concerning it. That there were origi- nally several manuscript texts of this narrative, varying enough in the copying to make differences that became distinguisha- ble, appears to be certain; but it is not so easy to trace them distinctively in the various printed texts which have been published. The text in Ramusio was without doubt used by John Florio in making the early English translation (London, 1580), which is the source of most that has appeared in that language respecting the voyage. A Norman publisher at Rouen printed a French text, and it is not quite certain that he used Ramusio. It has been suspected that, in pretending to make a translation, this editor may possibly have used an offi- gartier nar- cial narrative, and that his pretense was intended to conceal a surreptitious use of a forbidden paper. When Tross reprinted this little book (Paris, 1865), he could find only one Ramusio. 58 CARTOGRAPHICAL RESULTS, 1542-1608. copy, and that was in the great Paris Library; but Harrisse later discovered a copy in the Sainte Genevieve Library. The fact that the book has nearly passed out of sight might indi- cate, as with the Bref /?écit, that there was either a suppres- sion of it, or an inordinately hard use of it by readers. Two years after publishing this Discours du Voyage (1867), Tross surprised the critics by publishing a Lelation originale, as if it were Cartier’s own narrative of this first voyage. The argu- ments of Michelant, the editor, in supporting this view of its authenticity are strong, but hardly conclusive. This precious manuscript was discovered in the Paris Library in 1867, having previously escaped notice. In the year before the appearance of the American section of Ramusio, and probably two years after that Italian editor had gathered his material, the Spanish historian, Go- mara, showed in his Historia General (Saragossa, 1555), that intelligence of Cartier’s exploits had reached him in some confused form. Indeed, Gomara is rarely critical in what he offers. It will be remembered that Cartier had given the name of “ Sainct Laurens” to a small estuary in the gulf, and it has never been quite established when the same name gained currency as the appellation of the gulf itself, and of the great river of Canada. Nevertheless, Gomara writes in 1555, or perhaps a year earlier, that “a great river called San Lorenco, which some think an arm of the sea [%. e. leading to Cathay], has been sailed up for two hundred leagues, and is called by some the Strait of the Three Brothers.” Gomara. We may consider that from the Rotz, Vallard, Cabot, and Desceliers maps, pretty nearly all the ground that Cartier’s own maps could have disclosed is deducible by the careful stu- dent, and that a large part of our history of this obscure period is necessarily derived from such studies. Now, what was the effect of these cartographical records upon the maps of the St. Lawrence for the rest of that century ? This question brings us to consider nearly all the leading Cartogr. European cartographers of the sixteenth century, to eth aa. Whatever maritime peoples they belong. The most pany famous and learned of the German cosmographers, Sebastian Minster, contented himself with insularizing a region PEDRO MEDINA. 59 which he associated with the earlier Cortereal. Pedro Medina, the leading Spanish writer on seamanship, in his Arte de Nave- gar, and in other books, for a score of years after this, used a S oe ee ea [ase PART OF MEDINA’S MAP, 1545. map on which there was merely a conventional gulf and river. Baptista Agnese was continuing to figure the coast about New- foundland in absolute ignorance of the French discoveries of ten years before. CARTOGRAPHICAL RESULTS, 1542-1603. 60 WOaCvwua UVL AG Vw At GASTALDO IN RAMUSIO (about 1550). GASTALDI. 61 We are in 1546 first introduced to Gia- como Gastaldi, a Venetian map-maker of reputation throughout Italy. He gives us a map which was in- cluded in Lafreri’s atlas. It looks like a distinct recognition of Cartier, in a long river which flows into a bay behind an island. This is the more remarkable be- cause, when he was employed two years later to make the maps for the Venetian edition of Ptolemy (1548), he reverted to the old pre-Cartier notions of an archipel- ago and rudimentary rivers. When Ramusio was gathering his Amer- ican data at this time, he depend- ed on an old friend, Frascastoro, to supply the illustrative maps. This gen- tleman, now in advanced years, was living on his estate near Verona, and in correspon- dence with geographical students through- out Europe. Oviedo had sent some nav- igator’s charts to him from Spain, and Ramusio tells us that similar information had come to him from France relative to the discoveries in New France. These charts, placed by Frascastoro in Ramusio’s hands, were by this editor committed to Gastaldi. The result was the general map of America which appears in the third volume of the Raccolta. This map is singularly inex- pressive for the Baccalaos region. Some- thing more definite is revealed in another map, more confined in its range. A study of this last map makes one feel as if the rudimentary rivers of the Ptolemy map (1548) had suggested a network of rivers, stretching inland. It has one feature in the shoals about Sable Island so peculiar and so closely resembling that feature in Rotz’s map, that Gastaldi must have worked with Gastaldi. Frascastoro. 62 CARTOGRAPHICAL RESULTS, 1542-1603. that map before him, or he must have used the sources of that map. With this exception, there is absolutely nothing in the map showing any connection with the cartography of the Cartier- Roberval expeditions. These features stand, in fact, for earlier notions, and are made to illustrate the narrative of the ‘Gran Capitano.” There is a Portuguese map by Johannes Freire, which must have been based on Cartier’s second voyage, for it leaves undeveloped the west coast of Newfoundland, which Cartier followed in 1534. Another Portuguese map, which at one time was owned by Jomard, shows acquaintance with both the first and second voyages of Cartier, as does the Portuguese atlas with French leanings, which is preserved in the Archives of the Marine at Paris, and is ascribed to Guil- laume le Testu. A popular map by Bellero, used in various Antwerp publications of this period, utterly ignores the French discoveries. Freire, etc. S=Bez usle Q a 2 ao cs D C= ‘ty pee? de Bacalhao 0 C Rase! C des vertoemns 0 ar { ENS le tae Mechas 5 “ ens, HOMEM, 1558. The map of Homem in 1558 is an interesting one. It is in an atlas of this Portuguese hydrographer, preserved in the British Museum. It is strongly indicative of in- dependent knowledge, but whence it came is not clear. He worked in Venice, a centre of such knowledge at this time; and Homem’s map is a proof of the way in which nautical in- telligence failed to establish itself in the Atlantic seaports, but Homem. HOMEM, RUSCELLI, ETC. 63 rather found recognition for the benefit of later scholars in this Adriatic centre. Itis in this map, for instance, that we get the earliest recognizable plotting of the Bay of Fundy. But with all his alertness, the material which Ramusio had already used respecting Cartier’s first voyage seems to have escaped him, or perhaps Homem failed to understand that navigator’s track where it revealed the inside coast of Newfoundland. What he found in any of the accounts of the Cartier voyages to warrant his making the north bank of the St. Lawrence an archipelago skirting the Arctic Sea is hard to say; but Homem is not the only one who developed this notion. We have seen that Alle- fonsce believed that the Saguenay conducted to such a sea, and there are other features of that pilot’s sketches which are con- sonant with such a view; while a network of straits and chan- nels pervading this Canadian region is a feature of some en- graved maps at a considerably later day. Homem, living in Venice, most probably was in consultation with Ramusio, and may have had access to the store of maps which Frascastoro submitted to Gastaldi. Indeed, Ramusio intimates, in the in- troduction to his third volume, that this Canadian region may yet be found to be cut up into islands, and he says that the reports of Cartier had left this uncertainty in his mind. The stories which Cartier had heard of great waters lying beyond the points he had reached had doubtless something to do with these fancies of the map-makers. When the learned Italian, Ruscelli, printed his translation of Ptolemy at Venice (1561), he added his own maps, for he was a professional cartographer. He also ap- parently profited by Ramusio’s introduction to the collection of Frascastoro; for the map which he gave of “Tierra nueva” reverted to the same material of the pre-Cartier period which had been used by Gastaldi, showing that he either was ignorant of the claims of Cartier’s discoveries, or that he rejected them. Ruscelli clung to this belief pertinaciously, and never varied his map in successive editions for a dozen years; and during this interval Agnese (1564) and Porcacchi (1572) copied him. We have two maps in 1566 in which the Cartier voyages are recognized, but in quite different ways. The map of Nicolas des Liens of Dieppe was acquired by the great library of Paris in 1857, and the visitor there to-day can see it Ruscelli. Des Liens. 64 CARTOGRAPHICAL RESULTS, 1542-1608. under glass in the geographical department. It is very pro- nounced in the record of Cartier; for his name is displayed along the shore of a broad sound, which is made to do duty for the St. Lawrence. The other is the map of Zal- tieri, with an inscription, in which the author claims to have received late information from the French. In this map the St. Lawrence is merely a long, waving line, and the river is made to flow on each side of a large island into a bay studded with islands. de gan ee 4 3 Zaltieri. diy ’ eteecen VIGNETTE EL MAR PAGIFICO sige MERCATOR, 1569. Three or four years later, we come to the crowning work of Mercator. Gerard Mercator in his great planisphere of 1569; Ortelius. and_a year later to the atlas of the famous Flemish geographer who did so much to revolutionize cartography, — Abraham Ortelius. The great bay has now become, with Mer- MERCATOR, ORTELIUS. 65 cator, the Gulf of St. Lawrence (Sinus Laurentii); but the main river is left without a name, and is carried far west be- yond Hochelaga (Montreal) to a water-shed, which separates At apy Ut Ui, WW yyy a TYPVS ORBI y MERI \ AS QVID EI POTEST VIDERI MAGNVM INR 72a | OMNIS, TOTIVSQVE MVNDI NO’ = ORTELIUS, 1570. the great interior valley of the continent from the Pacific slope. Here was what no one had before attempted in interpre- tation of the vague stories which Cartier had heard from the Indians. Mercator makes what is apparently the Ottawa open 66 CARTOGRAPHICAL RESULTS, 1542-1608. a waterway, as Cartier could have fancied it, when he gazed from the summit of Mont Royale. This passage carried the imagination into the great country of the Saguenay, which the Indians told of as bounding on a large body of fresh water. It seems easy to suppose that this was an interpretation of that route which in the next generation conducted many a Jesuit to the Georgian Bay, and so developed the upper lakes long be- fore the shores of Lake Erie were comprehended. Not one of the earlier maps had divined this possible solution of Cartier’s problem; and Mercator did it, so far as we can now see, with nothing to aid him but a study of Cartier’s narrative, or possi- bly of Cartier’s maps or data copied from them. It was one of those feats of prescience through comparative studies which put that Flemish geographer at the head of his profession. By a similar insight he was the first to map out a great interior valley to the continent, separated from the Atlantic slope by a moun- tainous range that could well stand for the Alleghanies. Dr. Kohl suggests that Mercator might have surmised this eastern water-shed of the great continent by studying the reports of De Soto in his passage to the Mississippi, during the very year when Cartier and Roberval were developing the great northern valley. There was yet no conception of the way in which these two great valleys so nearly touched at various points that the larger was eventually to be entered from the lesser. Before Mercator’s death (1594), he felt satisfied that the great mass of fresh water, to which the way by the Ottawa pointed, connected with the Arctic seas. This he made evident by his globe-map of 1587. Earlier, in 1570, he had conven- iently hidden the uncertainty by partly covering the limits of fateas such water by a vignette. Hakluyt in the same year ae (1587) thought it best to leave undefined the connec- tions of such a fresh-water sea. The map-makers struggled for many years over this uncertain northern lake, which Mercator had been the first to suggest from Cartier’s data. Ortelius also (1570, 1575, ete.) was induced to doubt the fresh character of this sea, and made it a mere gulf of the Arctic Ocean, stretched toward the south. In this he was followed by Popel- liniére (1582), Galleus, (1585), Miinster (1595), Linschoten (1598), Botero (1603), and others. It is fair to observe, how- THEORETICAL LAKES. 67 ever, that Ortelius in one of his maps (1575) has shunned the conclusion, and Metellus (1600) was similarly cautious when he used the customary vignette to cover what was doubtful. There was at the same time no lack of believers in the fresh-water theory, as is apparent in the map of Judaeis (1593), De Bry (1596), Wytfliet (1597), and Quadus (1600), not to name others. These theorizers, while they connected it with a salt northern sea, made current for a while the name of Lake Coni- bas, as applied to the fresh-water basin. This body of water seemed in still later maps after Hudson’s time to shift its posi- tion, and was merged in the great bay discovered by that navi- Ss CIA NOVA . ar mee OT Abra eee eS a woclia oo Sp ee or Le OAccatas & ee WA aS pipe go ae ro wot ea SEPTUM CITA AG. a _ i) CEYOLA “ 3 CRAM OG OL oAmaS ive te SMa RIA APACHE oe se : 2 DBs 3 oe hy, to JUDAEIS, 1593. gator. It was not tilla suggestion appeared in one of the maps of the Arnheim Ptolemy of 1597, made more emphatic by Molineaux in 1600, that this flitting interior sea was made to be the source of the St. Lawrence, while it was at the same time supposed to have some outlet in the Arctic Ocean. The great interior lakes were then foreshadowed in the “ Lacke of Tadenac, the bounds whereof are unknown,” as Molineaux’s legend reads, The English seamen had become active in this geographical quest very shortly after Mercator and Ortelius had gygis, well established their theories in the public mind. Sir te Humphrey Gilbert had indeed penetrated this region ; but when 68 CARTOGRAPHICAL RESULTS, 1842-1603. he published his map in 1576, he had helped to popularize a belief in a multitudinous gathering of islands in what was now called the land of Canada. Frobisher’s explorations were farther to the north, and his map (1578) professed that in these higher latitudes there was a way through the continent. Hak- luyt, in his Westerne Planting, tells us that the bruit of Frobisher’s voyage had reached Ortelius, and had induced that geographer to come to England in 1577, “to prye and looke into the secretes of Frobisher’s Voyadge.” Hakluyt further says that this “ greate geographer” told him at this time “ that if the warres of Flaunders had not bene, they of eee cee cee wr seats Pie Ope eee ie en 9 ae a lan ee e So : cay CS Hakluyt. hs t anna, Sept Crtez, QUADUS, 1600. the Lowe Countries had meant to have discovered those partes of America and the northweste straite before this tyme.” Hak- luyt had it much at heart to invigorate the English with a spirit of discovery, and the treatise just quoted was written for that purpose. “Yf wee doe procrastinate the plantinge,” he says, “the Frenche, the Normans, the Brytons or the Duche or some other nation will not onely prevente us of the mightie Baye of St. Lawrence, where they have gotten the starte of us already, thoughe wee had the same revealed to us by bookes published and printed in Englishe before them.” It is not easy to satisfy one’s self as to what Hakluyt refers, when he implies that pre- HAKLUYT, MOLINEAUX. 69 vious to Cartier’s voyage there had been English books mak- ing reference to the St. Lawrence Gulf. Modern investiga- tors have in fact found in English books only the scantiest mention of American explorations before Eden printed his translation of Miinster in 1553, nearly twenty years after Car- tier’s first voyage. The late Dr. Charles Deane, in commenting on Hakluyt’s words, could give no satisfactory explanation of what seems to be their plain meaning. The year before Hakluyt wrote this sentence, he had given up an intention of joining in Gilbert’s last expedition, and had a | 1 T ' T S YY [pid 6\ E what ot akong Ye, ae : Fi fe C oY . eet OE &. a SS So5 i se é ‘e, MOLINEAUX’S MAP, 1600. gove to Paris (1583) as chaplain to Sir Edward Stafford. While in that city we find him busy with “ diligent inquiries of such things as may yeeld any light unto our westerne discov- erie,” making to this end such investigations as he could re- specting current and contemplated movements of the Spanish and French. In this same essay on Westerne Planting Hakluyt drew attention to what he understood Cartier to say of a river that can be followed for three months “ southwarde from Hoche- laga.” Whether this refers to some Indian story of a way by Lake Champlain and the Hudson, or to the longer route from the Iroquois country to the Ohio and Mississippi, may be 70 CARTOGRAPHICAL RESULTS, 1542-1603. a question; if indeed it may not mean that the St. Lawrence itself bent towards the south and found its rise in a warmer clime, as the cartographers who were contemporaries of Hak- luyt made it. Hakluyt further translates what Cartier makes Donnacona and other Indians say of these distant parts, where the people are “clad with clothes as wee [the French] are, very honest, and many inhabited townes, and that they had greate store of golde and redde copper; and that within the land beyonde the said firste ryver unto Hochelaga and Saguy- nay ys an iland envyroned rounde aboute with that and other ryvers, and that there is a sea of freshe water founde, as they have hearde say of those of Saguenay, there was never man hearde of, that founde vnto the begynnynge and ende thereof.” Here is the warrant that Mercator and his followers found for their sea of sweet water. Hakluyt adds: “In the Frenche origi- nall, which I sawe in the Kinge’s library at Paris, yt is further put downe, that Donnacona, the Kinge of Canada, in his barke had traueled to that contrie where cynamon and cloves are had.” Hakluyt, with the tendency of his age, could not help associat- ing this prolonged passage with a new way to Cathay, and he cites in support “the judgmente of Gerardus Mercator, that excellent geographer, in a letter of his,” which his son had shown to Hakluyt, saying, “There is no doubte but there is a streighte and shorte waye open unto the west, even to Cathaio.” Hakluyt then closes his list of reasons for believing in this ulti- mate passage by adding, in the words of Ramusio, that “if the Frenchmen in this their Nova Francia woulde have discovered upp farther into the lande towardes the west northwest partes, they shoulde have founde the sea and have sailed to Cathaio.” Before Hakluyt published any map of his own, there were gon dee, *WO English maps which became prominent. In 1580, Mtok Dr. John Dee presented to Queen Elizabeth a map which is preserved in the British Museum. It has nothing to distinguish it from the other maps of the time, which show a St. Lawrence River greatly prolonged. The second map was far more distinctive and more speculative. Ruscelli in 1561 and Martines in 1578 had represented the country south of the Lower St. Lawrence as an island, with a channel on the west of it, connecting the Atlantic with the aa DEE AND LOK. 71 great river of Canada. This view was embodied by Master Michael Lok in this other map, in union with other prevalent hy gouNc ra) Mowey s 2¢ DAVY 2v8zo] 322) 229 ‘ Pp o 2 5 S 3S ze Pde ues a C \es ¢ ® y e 3 S ye ° % a g ‘e oF notions, already mentioned, of a neighboring archipelago be- tween the St. Lawrence and the Arctic waters. In this way Te CARTOGRAPHICAL RESULTS, 1542-1603. Lok made the great river rather an ocean inlet than an affluent of the gulf. MHakluyt adopted this map in his little Divers Voyages (1582) to illustrate an account of the voyage of Ver- razano, and curiously did so, because there is no trace of Verra- zano in the map except the great western sea, which had long passed into oblivion with other cartographers, although there was a curious reminder of it in 1585, when Ralph Lane on the Carolina coast learned that the Roanoke River at its springs sometimes got the spray of the western ocean. We have already presented this Lok map to the reader [ante, p. 20]. Aes. Remi Sen ae INOK TIALTI HAKLUYT-MARTYR MAP, 1587. When Hakluyt again came before the public in an edition of the eight decades of Peter Martyr’s De Orbe Novo, which he printed at Paris in 1587, he added a map bearing the initials “F.G.” This map may be supposed to embody the conclusions which Hakluyt had reached after his years of collecting material. He had, as we have seen, already reviewed the field in his Westerne Planting, where he had adopted the Mercator theory of the access by the Ottawa to_ the great fresh-water lake of the Indian tales. Jacques Noél, a grand-nephew of Cartier, writing from St. Cartier’s Malo in 1587, refers to this F. G. map of Hakluyt as une putting down “the great lake” of Canada much too Hakluyt. HAKLUYT AND ORTELIUS. 73 far to the north to be in accordance with one of Cartier’s maps which he professed to have. This Noél had been in the coun- try, and reported the Indians as saying that the great lake was ten days above the rapids (near Montreal). He had been at the rapids, and reported them to be in 44° north latitude. In 1590, Hakluyt was asking Ortelius, through a relative of the Antwerp geographer then living in London, to publish a map of the region north of Mexico and to- wards the Arctic seas. Ortelius signified his willingness to do so if Hakluyt would furnish the data. In the same year, the Eng- lish geographer wrote to Ortelius at Antwerp, urging him, if he made a new map, to insert “the strait of the Three Brothers in its proper place, as there is still hope of discovering it some day, and we may by placing it in the map remove the error of those cosmographers who do not indicate it.” It is apparent by Hakluyt’s accompanying drawing that he considered the “ Fretum trium fratrum ” to be in latitude 70° north. There was a temptation to the geographer to give a striking character to the reports or plots of returned navigators. Mer- cator compliments Ortelius on his soberness in using such plots, and complains that geographical truth is much corrupted by map-makers, and that those of Italy are specially bad. The maps that succeeded, down to the time when Champlain made a new geography for the valley of the St. Lawrence, added. little to the conceptions already mastered by the chief cartographers. The idea of the first explorers that America was but the eastern limits of Asia, revived by Schoner and Franciscus Monachus before 1530, may be said to have van- ished at the same time; for the map of Myritius of near this date (1587, 1590) is one of the latest maps to hold to the belief. Ortelius. While all this speculative geography was forming and disap- pearing with an obvious tendency to a true conception of the physical realities of the problems, there was scarcely ee any attempt made to help solve the question by explo- of explore ration. There was indeed a continuance of the fishing voyages of the Normans and Bretons to the Banks, and not unlikely the English may have participated in the business. Such fishermen doubtless ran into the inlets near the gulf to 74 CARTOGRAPHICAL RESULTS, 1542-1603. dry their fish and barter trinkets with the natives for walrus tusks; but we find no record for many years of any one turning the point of Gaspé and going up the river. There was at the same time no official patronage of exploration. The politics of France were far too unquiet. Henry II. had as much as he could do to maintain his struggles with Charles V. and Philip II. St. Quentin and Gravelines carried French chivalry down to the dust. The persecution of the Protestants in the brief reign of Francis I., the machinations of Catharine de’ Medici and the supremacy of the Guises, kept attention too constantly upon domestic hazards to permit the government to glance across the sea. All efforts under Charles LX. to secure internal peace were but transient. Every interval of truce between the rival religions only gave opportunities for new conspiracies. The baleful night of St. Bartholomew saw thirty thousand Huguenots plunged into agony and death. The wars of the League which followed were but a prolonged combat for Huguenot existence. Henry IIL., during fifteen years of blood, played fast and loose with both sides. Henry IV. fought at Arques and Ivry to preserve his crown, and abjured his faith in the end as a bet- ter policy to the same end. At last these tumultuous years yielded to the promulgation of the famous edict at Nantes (April 15, 1598), and in the rest which came later the times grew ripe for new enterprises beyond the sea. We have seen that it was to the labors of Hakluyt and Ra- musio during these sixty years that we owe a large part of the current knowledge of what were then the last official expedi- tions to Canada. That private enterprise did not cease to con- nect the French ports with the fishery and trade of the gulf and its neighboring ports is indeed certain, though Garneau speaks of this interval as that of a temporary abandonment of Canada. Gosselin and other later investigators have found entries made of numerous local outfits for voyages from Honfleur and other harbors. Such mariners never, however, so far as we know, contemplated the making of discoveries. Old fishermen are noted as having grown gray in forty years’ service on the coast ; and there is reason to believe that during some seasons as many as three or four hundred fishing-crafts may have dipped to their anchors hereabouts, and half of them French. Some of them added the pursuit of trade, and chased the wal- LA ROCHE AND CARTIER’S HEIRS. 75 rus. Breton babies grew to know the cunning skill which in leisure hours was bestowed by these mariners on the ivory tri- fles which amused their households. Norman maidens were decked with the fur which their brothers had secured from the Esquimaux. Parkman found, in a letter of Menendez to Philip of Spain, that from as far south as the Potomac, Indian canoes crawled northward along the coast, till they found Frenchmen in the Newfoundland waters to buy their peltries. Bréard has of late, in his Marine Normande, thrown consider- able light upon these fishing and trading voyagers, but there is no evidence of a customary passing into the great river. Once, indeed, it seemed as if the French monarch, who had occasionally sent an armed vessel to protect his sub- 1, poche, jects in this region against the English, Spanish, and ** Portuguese, awoke to the opportunities that were passing ; and in 1577 he commissioned Troilus du Mesgonez, Marquis de la Roche, to lead a colony to Canada, and the project commanded the confidence of the merchants of Rouen, Caen, and Lisieux. Captain J. Carleill, writing in 1583, in his Entended Voyage to America, tells us that the French were trying to overcome the distrust of the Indians, which the kidnapping exploits of Cartier had implanted. Whether any such fear of the native animosity stood in the way of La Roche’s enterprise or not is not evident; but certain it is that he did not sail, and the king remained without a representative on the St. Lawrence. This sovereign gave, however, in 1588, in requital of claims made by the heirs of Cartier for his unrewarded services, a charter to two of that navigator’s nephews, Etienne Charton and Jacques Noél, in which he assigned to them for twelve years the right to trade for furs and to work mines, with the privilege of a commercial company. The grant was made partly to enable the heirs to carry out Cartier’s injunctions to his descendants not to abandon the country of Canada. Such reserved privileges were a blow to the merchants of St. Malo, and they drew the attention of thc Breton parliament to the monopoly in such a way that the king found it prudent to rescind the charter, except so far as to allow mining at Cap de Conjugon. No one knows where that cape was, or that any mining was done there. So a second royal project came to naught. 76 CARTOGRAPHICAL RESULTS, 1542-1603. It would have been better if the first expedition that really got off had never started. A few years later, La Roche, who had had much tribulation since his last luckless effort, was commissioned (January 12, 1590) to lead once more a colony to the St. Lawrence. By this act that king re- vived the powers which Francis I. had conferred on Roberval. Chartering two vessels and, in default of better colonists, fill- ing them with convicts, La Roche sailed west and made Sable Island. Such portion of his company as he did not need while exploring for a site, he landed on this desert spot, not without raising the suspicion that he did not dare to land them on the mainland, for fear of their deserting him. While searching for a place to settle, heavy gales blew his exploring ships out to sea, and back to France. Those whom he had abandoned at Sable Island were not rescued till 1603, when twelve had died. This is the last scene of that interval which we have been considering; but in the near future other spirits were to ani- mate New France, in the persons of Pontgravé, Champlain, and their associates, and a new period of exploration was to begin. 1590. CHAPTER IV. ABORTIVE ATTEMPTS AT COLONIZATION. 1600-1607. Iv was in the person of Francois Gravé— who is usually called Pontgravé or Dupont Gravé, for he was Sieur du Pont — that France at last undertook the coloni- zation of Canada. Pontgravé was a trading mariner of St. Malo. He had already, during his voyaging, ascended the St. Lawrence as far as Three Rivers. Being now desirous to back a petition which he had rendered for the privilege of trading for furs in Canada, he sought the patronage of a rich Honfleur merchant, Pierre Chauvin, seigneur of Tontuit. This person was a man of consideration and good connec- tions. He was a Calvinist, and had lived in Dieppe at one time. It was even averred that Henry IV. had rewarded him with a patent of nobility for his loyalty. His standing in the king’s eyes was not, it would seem, an uncertain element in the chances of royal support when he allied himself with Pont- gravé to promote them. But Pontgravé was not without a merit of his own, for he was no stranger in the new country, and he was not unfitted to be the agent of the monarch in strengthening the French claim in that region, to which the royal will was by no means averse. Looking for further capi- tal to put their purpose beyond financial embarrassment, the two partners found a willing contributor in Pierre du ¢.,., ae Guast, Sieur de Monts. It was given out that five Mo™® hundred men would be carried to Tadoussac, and that a fort would be built at that point. This was a footing which might much conduce to the establishment of a government, and the royal concession readily followed. The plan was no sooner developed than it created a jealousy similar to that which followed the combination of Noél and Pontgravé. Chauvin. 78 ATTEMPTS AT COLONIZATION, 1600-1607. Chaton, ten years or more earlier. The citizens of St. Malo promptly represented that such a monopoly would abridge the rights which they claimed to have acquired through protecting the royal interests in Canada for many years. These Malouin merchants appealed to the Breton parliament, and through it to the throne, but with no effect. Accordingly Pontgravé and his associates went on without interruption in preparing for the voyage. Four vessels were made ready, and in the largest one, the “ Don de Dieu,” of four hundred tons, the three leaders em- barked. The five hundred men which were promised dwindled to a single hundred, and Chauvin seems to have been respon- sible for this, as he was for all matters which could be made to demand less expenditure and more profit. The expedition made its landfall and passed up to Tadoussac ae without disaster. Here the scene from the little ves- at Tadous- sels riding in the roadstead was not a very attractive : one to anybody bent on making a settlement. Over the stretch of waters there was nothing but a dim, foggy dis- tance, for the potent river covers in its breadth at this point a score of miles, as it moves on to the gulf. Silvery porpoises mingling with the white crests of the vexed waves were all that met the eye which tried eagerly to find something to rest upon throughout the monotonous waste. A. rocky point stretching to the southwest formed a bay, where trading-vessels could find an anchorage. From far up the Saguenay, in the deep shadows of its lofty crags, the savage canoeists could come down to bar- ter their burdens of fur. The adjacent shores had no aspect to allure the agriculturist, and Pontgravé, recalling the grassy meadows and swelling upland about Three Rivers, would much rather have gone thither. Chauvin, however, only looked to the chances of trade, and he felt that at the junction of these two great rivers there was the better chance of an exchange for peltries. Accordingly, here it was determined to stay, and the people were set on shore. It was not long before a storehouse was constructed just by the brink of the harbor. Champlain found the building standing eight years later, and delineated it upon his map of Tadoussac. Once at work, Chauvin stuck steadily to his commerce for furs, and soon filled his ships. This done, he left sixteen men to encounter the rigors of the winter, with such protection as CHAUVIN ON THE ST. LAWRENCE. 79 a crazy hut could afford. Even the pitying attentions of the neighboring Indians did not prevent most of this forlorn little company dying before the coming of spring. On the return of Chauvin and the other leaders to France, they made some show of their trafficking gains; but ghauyinin there was little assurance to be given of a permanent T° colonization, or of results from discovery. Had the ravages of death among those who had been left behind been sus- pected, the satisfaction in the results would have been still less. Brorgde tadoucae TADOUSSAC (after Champlain). This ig Champlain’s plan in his edition of 1613. Key: A, Round Mountain. B, harbor. C, fresh-water brook. D, camp of natives coming to traffic. 2, peninsula. F, Point of All Dev- ils. G, Saguenay River. A, Point aux Alouettes. J, very rough mountains covered with firs and beeches. ZL, the mill Bode. J, roadstead. V, pond. O, brook. /, grassland. Precisely what there was to prevent Chauvin hinself the next year (1601) from going to the St. Lawrence |... does not appear; but he is known to have dispatched thither one of his ships with similar commercial success. In April, 1602, he himself made a voyage in command of two barks, and having had four months’ trading at Tadoussac, he returned to Honfleur in October, to find the merchants of St. Malo still using every device to deprive him of the continuance of his privileges. Chauvin contrived to 1602. 80 ATTEMPTS AT COLONIZATION, 1600-1607. . maintain his influence with the king, and succeeded (Decem- ber 28, 1602) in having his concessions reaffirmed. But the matter did not rest there, and pending a still further decision, all French vessels were forbidden to proceed beyond Gaspé. When March (1603) came, the king had reached a determination to send to Canada Captain Coulombier of St. Malo, either separately or in conjunction with Pont- gravé and the Sieur Prévert, in a single vessel, for trade and discovery, but only for one season. By this time Chauvin had Amyarae ied, and Amyar de Chastes, succeeding to the priv- Chastes. —__ jleges, entered into a partnership for prosecuting Canadian enterprise with sundry merchants of Rouen and St. Malo. It was a good deal to Henry IV. that De Chastes was strong in the faith to which the king had been converted; and it was a good deal more to the king that this governor of Dieppe had been one of the first to give him allegiance. These were two very good reasons why De Chastes had little difficulty in get- ting the new patent to establish himself in Canada. 1603. At this point the most commanding figure in the early his- Samuelde tory of Canada comes upon the scene, — Samuel de Champlain’ Champlain. Those who have searched the archives of Brouage, seeking to find a date for his birth, have for good reason always turned to about the year 1570; but they have always looked in vain. If the hero, in later years, was reticent about his birth, we do not find him more helpful in other par- ticulars of his childhood. The authority is perhaps hardly irrevocable which makes him the son of a fisherman; but it seems clear his father was a mariner, very likely a master mar- iner, and the family was respectable enough to secure honorable mention in contemporary documents. The Abbé Faillon is not without a suspicion that the forename Samuel, uncommon among Catholies and usual with Protestants, may indicate that Champlain was born in a Huguenot household. It is certain that Brouage, the place of his birth, was quite within the circle of the Protestant influence that surrounded La Ro- Perhaps sae . : ces chelle. The suspicion is not a welcome one to his Catholic biographers, and they point to his father’s name, Antoine, and his mother’s, Marguerite, as being conspicu- CHAMPLAIN’S YOUTH. 81 ously of Catholic savor. The latest Canadian historian, Kings- ford, does not admit even a doubt that Champlain was born a Protestant. The salt-works of Brouage, long the source of its prosperity, naturally attracted buyers who were interested in the fisheries of the new world. This mercantile concourse kept pictures of that daring industry on those distant shores fresh in the A zs TN TAT LE HALE WH Ha MLL ‘ Hy Hig / Eo CHAMPLAIN. [After Moncarnet in the Laval Champlain.] minds of its people. Amid such influences the infant Cham- plain grew into youth and glided on into maturity. There was occasion in the preceding chapter to picture the martial and political turmoil of France in these latter years of the sixteenth century. It was shown to have withdrawn atten- tion from those fields of discovery to which Cartier had led the way. It was among these scenes that Champlain passed his early manhood, seasoning his formative years in the restraints and activities of the camp, when not at home. At other times 82 ATTEMPTS AT COLONIZATION, 1600-1607. he was accustomed to look out with a longing eye upon the Bay of Biscay, suggestive of so much that was daring and dangerous in seamanship. Speaking of life at sea, Champlain later said: “I was ad- dicted to it in my early years, and through my whole life I have met its perils, on the ocean and on the coasts of New France, with the hope of seeing the lily of France able to protect there the holy Catholic religion.” Whatever the religion which rocked his cradle, Champlain as an historical character indu- bitably stands as the champion of the Roman Church. The peace of Vervins in 1598 had brought all France into peaceful subjection to Henry of Navarre, and Champlain, in his Early capacity as quartermaster in the army, had been in the eee last movements which suppressed the opposition in Brittany. A year later (1599), he went to Spain in charge of a French ship, carrying home some of the Spanish allies of the League. While in the peninsula he had been placed, as an ex- perienced seaman, in command of one of the vessels forming a fleet which the Spanish government dispatched to their West Indian possessions. He was absent on this service for more than two years. It does not concern our present purposes to follow him in his strange experiences in these southern waters. Inthe West Ley are all set forth in a manuscript written by dndies: his own hand, and embellished with passable colored drawings, which of late years has been added to the unexam- pled Americana in the Carter-Brown Library at Providence, Rhode Island. Once, thirty years ago, when this manuscript was owned in Dieppe, the Hakluyt Society published a trans- lation of it, and twenty years ago the Laval University, in their sumptuous edition of Champlain’s writings, printed for the first time the original text and gave fac-similes of the drawings. There is one passage in this little narrative which may detain us for a moment, since it prefigures Champlain’s conceptions of that great northern passage to Cathay, to the finding of which he devoted his later years. He is describing his experience at the Isthmus of Darien. He says: ‘* One may judge that if the four leagues of land which there are from Panama to the little river which rises in the mountains and descends to Porto Bello were cut through, one might pass from the South Sea to the ocean on the other side, and thus shorten the route by CHAMPLAIN ON THE ST. LAWRENCE. 83 more than fifteen hundred leagues; and from Panama to the Straits of Magellan would be an island, and from Panama to the New-found-lands would be another island, so that the whole of America would be in two islands.” It has been suggested that Champlain, after his return to France from this southern voyage, had made some report of it to the king, in a way to attract the royal attention. At all events, since De Chastes was much about the court after he had got his patent from the king, it is not improbable Giese that in its precincts a sturdy mariner of Champlain’s 108 oii experience would have easily made himself conspicu- ous to a patentee in search of a hardy coadjutor. That Cham- plain had attracted the attention of the king would seem to be certain from the fact that when De Chastes invited him to join the enterprise, Champlain deferred accepting till the royal assent was given. This, when given, was accompanied by an in- junction which made Champlain responsible for a report of the completed explorations. Champlain himself later says, in dedi- cAting one of his narratives to Henry IV., that he was com- missioned by that king to make the most exact researches and explorations in his power. There was much in Champlain to fit him to become a pioneer in such work. His person was rugged. His strength was equal to almost any physical task. His constitution did not succumb to exposure either of cold or heat. His senses were keen and sharpened by experience. His spirit knew not what it was to falter, when facing danger. Perhaps we must add — even if we do not go to the extent of the Abbé Faillon — that he enjoyed a hunt too much to be over-scrupulous whether the game was a squirrel or an Iroquois. Two vessels having been made ready at Honfleur, they sailed on March 15, 1603, in command of Pontgravé, who ; ° a . Expedition was accompanied by Champlain in the “ Bonne ails, March, Renommée,” while the Sieur Prévert had charge of a the lesser craft, the ‘‘ Frangoise.” The latter was to stop at Gaspé, while Pontgravé went on to Tadoussac. The little fleet had a tedious passage of forty days. After landing, they found themselves at once mingling in the filthy revelries of a camp 84 ATTEMPTS AT COLONIZATION, 1600-1607. of Indians, who were celebrating a victory over the Iroquois. Reeking scalps were conspicuous in the scene, and they were © At Tadous. the first reminders of savage warfare which Champlain on had seen, —a warfare that a few years later he was to turn upon himself, and which was to become a heritage for his successors. But these horrors did not long divert him from a purpose which he was so strenuously to pursue for thirty years. On oe June 11, he started to explore the Saguenay. It is Saguenay, not clear what knowledge of this forbidding stream , had been handed down to him from earlier adventurers. Cartier had passed it by, and it is not quite sure how far its ap- pearance in one of Allefonsce’s rude charts indicates a personal knowledge of it. It does not seem certain that the traders who had perhaps been up and down the main river of late years had ever tempted the gloomy depths of the Saguenay. If they did, they have left no record of it. Champlain went up the stream, perhaps thirty or forty miles, but not far enough to determine of his own knowledge its geographical relations. The Indians contrived to let him know that the Saguenay flowed out of a large lake, —the modern St. John,— and that there was an affluent water-system above it. It would take a canoe ten days, the Indians said, to make the trip back to Tadoussac from these upper waters. There were tribes about the lake who had told these informants that beyond the divide, still farther to the north, lay a great salt sea. Champlain grasped the idea of a gulf stretching south from the Arctic Ocean, and divined the bay that Hudson was yet to make evi- dent, and many years later he was cruelly deceived in an attempt to find it by another route. In a week’s time Champlain was back at Tadoussac, and on ages June 18, accompanied by Pontgravé, he started up the St.Law- St. Lawrence in a small bark, taking with him a oe boat for use in shallow waters. On the 23d, he ob- served the cataract which drops in feathery confusion from its upper level, and gave it the name of Montmorency, which is so familiar to the modern tourist. He saw the lofty promon- tory of Quebec, and supposed, as he went on, that he was pass- ing beyond the goal of Cartier’s explorations. At Three Rivers he remarked, as Pontgravé had, how fit a place it was CHAMPLAIN AT MONTREAL. 85 for a settlement. On the 29th, he was skimming the variegated surface of a broadened expanse of the river, and as it was St. Peter’s day, he applied that enduring name to the lake. Here he was for a while arrested at the mouth of a tributary on the south side, where he found an encamp- ment of Algonquins, gathering for an incursion up the stream, into the country of their enemies, the Iroquois. In attempting to ascend this river, the rapids of Chambly checked his prog- ress. He learned from the Indians that the river flowed from a large lake, and that there was a smaller sheet still beyond. From these southern heads of the water a portage led to another river, —the Hudson, — by which the voyager would be carried south towards what Champlain supposed must be the coast of Florida, taking that name, as it was then understood, as covering a region stretching far north of the modern penin- sula, until it reached the territory claimed by the French. Five years later, Champlain was to make this more apparent, with the mysteries of the distant mountains, which he saw bounding the distance on either hand, unsolved. Reaching once more the main river, these venturesome French still breasted the current and made a way among the devious channels to the island where Montreal now stands, and looked upon its sentinel mountain. They were stopped at the Sault St. Louis, —the Lachine Rapids, — and Champlain tried in vain to get round them by a portage. Finding that he was at the end of his course, he endeavored to deduce from the bewildering statements of the savages some notion of what lay above that long plunge of waters. He got in this way a tolerably clear conception of at least a portion of the waters, which some years later he was to follow. His dusky informants took him in imagination up a large affluent of the St. Lawrence, coming from the west, and they told him that it threaded the country of the Algonquins, as later, under the name of the Ottawa, he found it todo. Following up the St. Lawrence and passing rapids and expansions of the stream, he was told he could reach a large body of water, fed eters through a channel, blocked by a cataract, which flowed western out of a salubrious lake. A river flowed into this lake “""" at its farther end, through which the boatman stemming the current could push his skiff eventually into an immense sea of Sorel River. At Montreal, 86 ATTEMPTS AT COLONIZATION, 1600-1607. salt water. This last particular the Indians were frank enough to acknowledge was derived from the reports of remoter tribes, since they themselves had never seen this ominous sea. This hydrography is not difficult to follow. The fancy of Champlain was led in the description along the waters of Ontario, which he was yet to know by experience; up the Niagara, whose falls he never saw, and whose magnitude he failed to comprehend to the last; along Lake Erie, of which also he remained through life in much ignorance; thence by the Detroit River to Lake Huron, which he learned later to know in that portion of it called the Georgian Bay. His subse- quent experience (1615) certainly showed him that it was not salt ; but in his present uncertainty he could but think, as every Canadian explorer in those days thought, that the great western Sea of Cathay lay almost within his ken. He never quite divested himself of his hope to see it. Champlain had at this time, as above intimated, derived from the accounts of the Indians a very inadequate notion of the torrent which plunges at Niagara. He speaks of it as having a volume not large enough for the main outflow of a lake, and was therefore forced to argue that the waters of Lake Erie flowed for the most part in another direction, perhaps to the south. The description presented to him by the Indians, as recorded in his Sawvages, is far from clear; but it seems to indicate that Lake Huron delivered the great body of its water through some other channel than Lake Erie, and that it found its way thereby into the St. Lawrence. There is an early map, made indeed at a somewhat later day, which interprets this belief by making the Ottawa this alternative channel. The geologist will observe that its configuration is curiously like what is now known to have been the water-shed of the region after the melting of the great glacier. Champlain was himself to discover that this course of the Ottawa was far from being uninterrupted. With such vague glimpses of the unknown west, Champlain and his party returned to Tadoussac, not without hoping that the salt water reported to them could one day be reached on the way to China. It is one of the striking features in the accounts which we have of these early days of exploration that the frequenting of THE LOWER ST. LAWRENCE 87 a coast for traffic or fishing counts so little in contributing geo- graphical knowledge. It can hardly be possible that no more was observed by such mercantile adventurers than was put on record; but there must have been a scant degree of serviceable value in what they did, or the official explorers would not have FOIWOU V7 Stee # 28. LAN Holtanadr \ ¥ i 4 (syaeg qv omavyy ony ur deyg v wor] *(10PXT JO GFIT) ALNOU VAVLLO AL a) NVYOT £ 7077707 rele mp sought so often to cover the same fields. The shores of the Lower St. Lawrence and the margins of the gulf had been for nearly a century at least the haunts of Normans, Bretons, and Biscayans, but Champlain felt that his record for the king would not be what it ought to be unless his official eye could survey those shores. We accordingly find him, shortly after his return to Tadoussac, making ready to follow the sin- 88 ATTEMPTS AT COLONIZATION, 1600-1607. uosities of these lower river banks towards the gulf. It is Lowers, LO Our purpose now to give his experience in this Lawrence work in detail. He has set them down in his Sau- vages. Returning to the mouth of the Saguenay, Champlain found the ships laden with the furs gathered in his absence, and the expedition was ready for the homeward voyage. They had em- mantles barked several natives, and the weary voyagers daily serie: beguiled themselves with Indian grammar and vocab- ulary. On the 2d of September (1603), the stag- gering vessels were thumping their prows against head seas off Cape Race, and on the 20th they ran into the basin of Havre ais de Grace. Here it was soon learned that, a few Chastes months before, their chief patron, Amyar de Chastes, had died, and the colonization scheme on which they had returned to make report was left without a sponsor. Pending a new movement, Champlain was busy in preparing a map of the region, as best he could, from observation and the ‘ _ Indian testimony, and in putting his notes in shape hamplain . inities for a report to the king. Just what the map which he made was, we are not informed, for it was not pub- lished with his report. There could have been little in earlier cartography to help him beyond the description of Cartier. It is indeed possible that he might have known the maps of that navigator and of Allefonsce. Current published maps gave nothing but varying impressions of Cartier’s results, as has been shown in the previous chapter. The world just at this time was getting the same vague sort of treatment of this car- tographical theme in such publications as the combination J/er- contem. clitor Atlas of 1602, or in such special chance issues porary as the Relaciones of Botero, only just published at oe Valladolid. There was much in all this that would hardly comport with Champlain’s newer knowledge. But if the map fails us, we have the text of Champlain’s report, pub- Des Sox. Ushed with the royal sanction as Des Sawvages, late vages, 1604. in 1604. It was the first time he had given the world the chance to measure his powers of observation. The narrative was devoted to the country, its geography and phy- sical condition, its products, its natives, and its promises. One must determine from the way in which the book has disap- PONTGRAVE AND CHAMPLAIN. 89 peared, that either the avidity of commercial speculation or the thumbing of the lovers of the marvelous, or both, has almost deprived posterity of the record, for when the Abbé Laverdiere sought to reprint it twenty years ago, he had to have the copy in the great Paris Library — the only one then known to him — transcribed for the printer. Its rarity is not so great as the abbé imagined, for there are copies in more than one American library, and a comparison of the copies in Harvard College Library and the Carter-Brown Library show that it was set up twice in the same year, indicating unusual currency. The voyage of 1603 had brought Champlain and Pontgravé into cordial relations, which were never relaxed. The Avante greater age of that Malouin navigator gave to the and Cham friendly feelings of Champlain a tinge of filial obedi- Pays ence. They were one in the belief that the great river of Can- ada was a channel that must be followed if a New France was to arise. Tadoussac as a goal was not to their mind. Its for- bidding sterility gave no promise for colonization, and Cham- plain’s heart was set on dreams of colonization that he was never permitted to realize to their full extent. Columbus, at the south, had accounted for the low grade of peoples which he found by supposing that he was on the out- skirts of the East, among coast tribes less susceptible to the lures of civilization than interior peoples. He argued that if he would find the wealth and luxury which Europeans dreamed of, he must get at the inland races. We know that the Geno- ese on his last voyage was bending all his energies to seek a passage through the barriers which he had found. " which glides by the present Point Allerton, or the current which sweeps around the northerly end of the Boston peninsula, matters little. He gave to this river the family name of De Monts, and accordingly on his and on other French maps the stream bears the name of Riviére du Guast, —a name which did not entirely disappear from the Dutch and other contem- porary maps till after Boston was founded in 16380. “This river extends,” says Champlain, “ toward the land of the Iroquois, a nation which is the constant foe of the Montagnais, who live on the St. Lawrence.” One judges from this that the river of which the Indians had told him at the Chambly rapids, and which he thought ran towards Florida, —in fact a premo- nition of the Hudson, — was now identified in his thought with what we in this day know as the Charles, a meandering coast stream, which empties into Boston harbor. For over three years, Champlain was in various parts of this Atlantic coast, and it was he who took the first steps towards an intelligible cartography of the shore line of Nova Scotia and New England. The St. Lawrence was not meanwhile wholly neglected. Pontgravé, who was scouring it in 1606 to arrest intruders, seized a vessel which De Monts and others had sent there for trade, — an action which compelled a resort to a legal * settlement in France. But a greater shock was in store for De Monts. His commission had been revoked some qe expeai- time before, and when Champlain heard of it, the 92h" news was accompanied by a recall of the expedition, ' and in October, 1607, all were back in St. Malo. There is no evidence that the French were aware at the time of the Virginia movement, which had followed the peace which 92 ATTEMPTS AT COLONIZATION, 1600-1607. had been made between England and Spain in 1605. While Champlain had been searching the inlets of the New England coast, Captain John Smith was exploring the waters of the Chesapeake to find a passage to the western sea, as Captain Newport did a little later, and for near a century there were those among the English who were not prepared to believe that Virginia was other than an island, which might afford a way along its seaboard to this occidental goal. The year before Champlain left the more northern waters, the English king had granted (1606) to the London and Plymouth companies a stretch of territory along the coast from 34° in the south to 45° in the north, which was sure before long to raise a question of jurisdiction between these rival nations, and actually did bring them in conflict at Mt. Desert the same season in which Cham- plain left the coast. CHAPTER V. COLONIZATION ESTABLISHED AT QUEBEC. 1608-1613. THE year 1608 opened with a transient change of fortune for De Monts. He had listened to Champlain’s recital of his three years’ experience with a renewed zest for exploration, and he was prepared to abandon the coast for the St. Lawrence. Under the same narrative, and by reason of persuasions that profit and glory could yet be found, the king so far relented that on January 7 he signed a patent allowing De , montss Monts a renewal of his fur-trade monopoly for a sin- Pei "y. gle year. He coupled a condition with it, very likely %77 716 at the instigation of Champlain, that an attempt should be again made to penetrate farther into the interior of the continent. The salt western sea of Champlain’s first report had not been forgotten, and there were hopes, if it could be reached, of its affording the coveted way to India. De Monts was not without hopes of an extension of his trading privilege at the end of the year. Buoyed by this anticipation, and animated by the enthusiasm which projects of hazard often contribute, De Monts fitted out two ships. To Pontgravé was assigned the command of the trading part of the expedition, with orders to return at the expiration of the season. To Champlain, who was now created lieutenant-governor, was given the task of holding the country permanently, and developing its geography. This meant that an opportunity should be taken to put to the test what he had already explained to the king in his Sauvages, namely, “the practicability of finding a way to China, avoiding at iacuky the same time the cold of the north and the heat of tonreh a may the south,” and he believed this route lay through the yew St. Lawrence. 94 COLONIZATION ESTABLISHED AT QUEBEC. On the 5th of April, 1608, Pontgravé sailed from Honfleur in aaa the “ Levrier,” and a week later Champlain embarked, noes it is supposed, in the “Don de Dieu,” then under the : command of Henri Couillard, an old associate of Pont- gravé and Chauvin. On June 8, Champlain reached Tadous- June, at Ta. Sac, and was at once called upon to settle a dispute douse. which had already been begun between Pontgravé and a Basque fisherman. A little blood had been drawn, and as it would not do to risk the main enterprise by delays, the governor-general composed the quarrel temporarily, and left the ultimate decision to the authorities at home. This contest arranged, Champlain set to work building a small shallop of about fourteen tons, and it was not long before he was on his pt way up the St. Lawrence. The bold headland of founded, Quebec had attracted his attention in 1603, and he now determined to lay the foundations of a town be- neath its cliffs, and very soon the level strand along the river presented a busy scene. Champlain had not completed the laying out of his garden, when he was startled at a disclosure from one of his men. A mechanic among his followers, thinking to gain the sympathy of the Basques at Tadoussac and some consequent advan- tage, plotted with some accomplices to murder Champlain and offer the new settlement as a lure to the rivals down the river. Plottoki Such a secret, requiring passive complicity in many Champlain. others, being hard to keep, was opportunely betrayed. Champlain, while his knowledge of the plot was not suspected, enticed the ringleaders on board a bark lying in the stream, where they were easily overpowered. The body of the princi- pal plotter soon dangled from a tree, and three of the other chief conspirators were put in irons. Champlain now explored the little tributary of the St. Law- rence, which causes the promontory of Quebec to jut out like acape. On this stream he came upon traces of the fort which Cartier had built, and in his journal he enters into an argu- ment to prove the identification, which at that time was at variance with the common opinion that the St. Croix River of Cartier was higher up the St. Lawrence. Pontgravé having completed the lading of his ships, Cham- plain placed under that commander’s charge the three accom- CHAMPLAIN AND THE IROQUOIS. 95 plices of the recent plot, who were destined to expiate their crime in the galleys. On September 18, Pontgravé goptember sailed for France. The little colony was left to pre- ™ 1 pare for winter and its hard experiences. There was a long and harrowing wait till spring opened and the ice-floes began to jostle in the river. All in nature was more blooming than the spirits of the imprisoned col- onists, when on June 15, 1609, Champlain learned that a week before, Pontgravé had returned to Tadoussac. Two days later, the governor started down the river to confer with this bringer of succor. It was a sad story which Champlain had to tell his friend. Only eight of the twenty-eight whom Pontgravé had left behind a year ago were living, and half of these were broken down. The winter’s horrors were too sick- ening to dwell upon, for, to increase the miseries of the French, the famished savages had hung about the settlement all the interval. With the store of provisions which Pontgravé had brought, and with fresh men to take up the toil, the little com- pee munity began to improve in the summer air. Stories _ brings suc- had reached the governor, during the winter, of the extent and beauty of that lake which lay towards the country of the Iroquois, and something in the nature of a pact was ap- parently made with the Montagnais, who inhabited the country about Quebec. It was agreed that if these warriors would con- duct Champlain on an exploration in that direction, he would fight in their defense if any of their enemies were encountered. On June 18, 1609, Champlain ascended the St. Lawrence with a party of French and savages, and found two ¢hamptain or three hundred Hurons and Algonquins encamped f27e0nst., not far from the river that led to this southern lake, %™* 1% These Indians were preparing to proceed with the Montagnais on a war-path towards the Iroquois. It was a bodeful meeting. The Indian chief, at a council which was held, gave Champlain to understand that he must needs cement the alliance which their friendly intercourse in 1603, and his recent promises to the Montagnais, had foreshadowed. He did not hesitate to do so by agreeing to join in their enterprise. There is nothing in Champlain’s career which has exposed him to so much censure as this prompt desertion of the part of June, 1609. 96 COLONIZATION ESTABLISHED AT QUEBEC. a mediator and pacificator among the peoples with whom he had deliberately cast his lot. Such censors are the Abbés Faillon and Ferland. His defenders point to the necessity of his mak- ing a promise to those whom he needed for allies, and allege that none but a dastard could have shunned abiding by it. By thus ingratiating himself with his savage neighbors, he could make sure of their protection, and so advance his purpose of western discovery, and make it easier for the Recollect and Jesuit to venture among distant villages. Thus much he indeed gained ; but he rendered the western path unceasingly hazard- ous, in acquiring the enmity of the ablest and most redoubtable warriors of the Indian race. For over a century, the Iroquois found no pastime equal to rendering life in Canada miserable. They kept in perpetual anxiety every settler along the great valley who dared to occupy a farmstead away from the palisaded settlements. The shrieks of murdered children, the moans of tortured parents, and devastation of households, mark the course of French-Canadian history as long as the Iroquois main- tained an aggressive confederacy. Thus it was that in making enemies of these affiliated tribes, Champlain exposed the long valley of the St. Lawrence to constant inroads on its southern flanks, and no preparation for many years that the French could make was able to check these disasters. Champlain could hardly indeed have anticipated the century and more of border warfare which was to follow upon the strengthening of these savage southern hordes by an alliance with the Dutch and English. We need not dwell on the actual conflict of 1609, which opened this interminable warfare. Champlain and his savage allies sped up the river and along the lake, and at a point Figntat 1dentified as the modern Ticonderoga they met in the Ticonderoga. ni¢ht a war party of the Iroquois. Waiting till day- light, they began the battle. Champlain describes the fight, and shows how the apparition of the Frenchmen, with their arque- buses, leveling their enemies with unseen bolts amid deadly noises, struck terror into the ranks of the adversary and secured an easy victory for the invaders. Colden’s later narrative may in a certain sense be supposed to present the traditional account of the Iroquois. It confirms the powerful agency which the sud- den display of the Christians’ marvelous weapons had in deciding the issue of the fight. FIGHT NEAR TICONDEROGA. 97 ( i é Ui + aha be CHAMPLAIN’S FIGHT NEAR TICONDEROGA. (From Champlain, ed. of 1613.] Key: A (wanting), the fort. B, enemy. C, oak bark canoes of the enemy, holding ten, fifteen, or eighteen men each. JD, two chiefs who were killed. FE, an enemy wounded by Champlain’s musket. J (wanting), Champlain. G (wanting), two musketeers. , canoes of the allies, Montagnais, Ochastaiguins, and Algonquins, who are above. J (also on the), birch-bark canoes of the allies. J (wanting), woods. 98 COLONIZATION ESTABLISHED AT QUEBEC. The combat took place on July 30, 1609, on the shore where each party had landed from their canoes, and the curious reader may see how the governor depicts him- self in armor and plumed helmet, firing his arquebus, if he will look at the drawing that Champlain set before his countrymen in the narrative printed for their edification. To his royal master this expedition had given a title to a fair lake and its water-shed; but while its commander was leading it, he little suspected how, not many weeks from the same time, Henry Hudson, in a search for a western passage, ascended from the Dutch ana ocean, by the river which now bears his name, to the Troquois: country of the Mohawks, establishing claims which for fifty years the Dutch held against both French and English. Thus was prepared the way for that later league of the Iroquois and the Dutch, by which the savages acquired the European weapon. Champlain’s successors were to discover to their cost what this league and that with the later English meant, when the lake to which we still apply its discoverer’s name was often alive with the bustle of war. Returned to Quebec, Champlain prepared to depart for Champlain France, leaving Pierre Chauvin in charge; and on Octove,’” October 13, 1609, he landed at Honfleur. Though mee De Monts’s privileges had expired, the governor found him by no means discouraged, and quite ready for another venture. The public had no occasion to forget these recent experiences. The lively Lescarbot, a lawyer of Paris and a society wit, had, a few years before, joined the colonists of Acadia. He had not Ducods been unobservant of Champlain’s career in the new a world, and was now prepared to give his La Nouvelle ' France to the reading public. In it he aimed to re- count what the French had so far done in securing a foothold for the king in these northern regions. The publication did not escape the notice of Hakluyt in London. This English chronicler was anxious to make it clear that his countrymen were quite ready to launch their barges beyond the divide at the head of the James River, and lead the way to Asia. He also would show that they possessed in Virginia a region of far greater attractiveness for the emigrant. His way to make this evident was to familiarize the English public with what the July 30, 1609. THE IROQUOIS ATTACKED. 99 French had suffered in the north; and with this end in view a portion of Lescarbot’s book was translated and published in London. Lescarbot did not leave his readers uncertain of those upon whom credit should be bestowed for what the French had already done. “Let us say,” he admits, “that France owes these discoveries to the Sieur de Monts, at whose expense they have been made; and she is likewise indebted to the courage of Champlain in exposing his life in these explorations, and in bearing some part of the charge. Champlain promises never to cease his efforts until he has found either a western sea or a northern sea, opening the route to China, which so many have thus far sought in vain.” As to the western sea, Lescarbot adds: “I believe it beyond the remoter parts of that very great lake, which we hear of.” He further expressed the ever- constant opinion of a school of contemporary geographers, that the great river of Canada issued from a lake which also poured its waters by another channel to the South Sea. He recalled how in Europe and Africa such a diverging flow was not un- known, instancing the lake at the source of the Nile, as such an example. With such prestige as Champlain had acquired, increased possibly by Lescarbot’s account of him, it was not surprising that he was again selected to take recruits to the yoyase of colony. Pontgravé went with him, and their two ves- 1° sels, after some misfortunes in working off the coast, —for the spring was a boisterous one, — finally reached Tadoussac on April 26, 1610. Champlain had laid ont plans for new explo- rations, for the secrets of the Saguenay and the Ottawa were still undivulged. He found, however, the Indians too intent on their yearly invasion of the Iroquois country to be diverted from it, and without their aid exploration was not to be thought of. He joined their camp near the mouth of the attoccsthe Richelieu River, and led them to an attack on an Powes. Iroquois barricade, which had been hastily constructed, not far up the river. The attack was so successful that not a hostile savage escaped. It was after this June onset, and while he was encamped with his allies on an island in Lake St. Peter, that he and they made 100 COLONIZATION ESTABLISHED AT QUEBEC. a mutual exchange of hostages, in giving and taking a young man on each side. Champlain received the savage Savignon, Hostages Whom he later took to France, and he gave them a exchanged. Young Frenchman, —there is reason to believe he is the same who later became known as Etienne Brulé. Both of these hostages, after a mutual restitution was made the next year, became of manifest value to Champlain in his later inter- course with the savages, for this interchange of interpreters enabled him to reach better conclusions as to the great lakes of the west, and as to the passages towards Florida on the south. When Champlain parted with his savage friends, two other Frenchmen voluntarily accompanied them, and one of them, Nicolas de Vignau, who went off with the Algonquins, we shall encounter again. A few weeks later, a ship brought news of the assassination _ of Henry IV. The death of the king was a calamity Champlain : zi * returns to to the colony. Having invested the Sieur du Pare France, aj . e Aug.-Sept. with the command, and leaving sixteen men to hold the post, Champlain, with some feelings of uncertainty as to the effect in France of a change in the monarch, sailed from Tadoussac on August 13, and reached Honfleur on Sep- tember 27. It was now, while in France, that Champlain agreed with _ Nicolas Boullé upon a dower of 4500 livres, to be paid Champlain 3 . . ei . . receives by Boullé to him, in anticipation of Champlain’s mar- anintended riage with Boullé’s daughter, then a child. It was ums ten years later that he married her. Meanwhile, the dower was such an addition to his pecuniary resources that he now manifested increased devotion to the commercial side of the colony, for it had not before interested him much. His next voyage to the St. Lawrence, in 1611, was almost wholly in the interests of the fur trade. He went up the river to the rapids, and selected a position for a trading- post near the site of the later Montreal. He met here his Indian allies, and the hostages on both sides were mutually restored. He listened to new stories of distant western lakes, and got reports from other savages who had followed up the trail towards Florida. His barter for furs made him more familiar with the traders. Voyage of 1611. A VICEROYALTY ESTABLISHED. 101 He found their pursuits a competition which diminished their own profits, and hampered his efforts for discovery. Referring to these traders, he says: “ All they want is that the explorers should face danger in discovering new peoples and new lands for their trade, while they may find profit where the others found hardship.” It was evident that the trade in peltries, if to be worth pursuing, must be put on a different basis. On his return to France in September, 1611, he undertook 4 taaing the organizing of the Canadian experiment on a better ommny commercial basis, and with this task he was occupied 1 for the greater part of the following year. The whole trading interests of the Norman towns during the early years of the fur trade in Canada were much complicated by rivalries and jealousies. The study of the subject involves pretty closely the consideration of such books as the G'lanes and Nouvelles Glanes historiques Normandes of E. H. Gosselin. Champlain’s plans at this time provoked opposition from the merchants of St. Malo and Rouen. He had undertaken in a measure to diminish the advantages of individual enterprise by compelling all who joined in the new undertaking to share in proportion to their contribution of capital. But aspects other than commercial were daily emphasized in public. The Mercure Francois had been established, and began its work in rendering popular the labors of the priests. In the introduc- tion, which prepared the way, its editor had gone over the results of the expeditions of De Monts, Pontgravé, and Cham- plain (1604-1608), rendering them better known. A new edi- tion of Lescarbot, and still another issue of the same Garrent book, before Champlain was ready for sea, testified to intres;™ the growing interest. But the newer knowledge had “™ little effect on prevailing views of the geography of the region, and the contemporary edition of Wytfliet’s atlas showed no im- provement upon the notions which had been developed out of the narratives of Cartier. The distractions which had followed upon the death of the king had begun to subside. Champlain found that a renewal of political quiet conduced to draw more attention to his plans, despite the opposition that their first promulgation had raised. One feature that he insisted upon was to give dignity to the COLONIZATION ESTABLISHED AT QUEBEC. 102 te i ia y Po we Py i st _ CHAMPLAIN’S MAPS. 103 enterprise by putting it under a viceroy of enlarged powers, and on October 8 the Count de Soissons was appointed count ae to that position. He commissioned Champlain as his fists deputy, a few days later. With a newly awakened 7° zeal Soissons set about the task of familiarizing himself with the project. Champlain had hardly begun to show wees and explain his maps when the viceroy suddenly died. The Prince de Condé was soon selected to succeed as viceroy, and more authority was assigned to him than had been aia aoe before given to any royal representative in the Cana- Condé dian region. There was little in respect to civil, mili- ‘ tary, and religious administration that his instructions did not permit him to undertake. His letters-patent were signed at Paris, November 13, 1612, and they were registered at yovember Rouen, a few months later. Under these instructions 1 !°!* the viceroy was commanded to prevent the selling of Euro- pean weapons to the natives, and he was expected to do his utmost to find and open a way to China. He was enjoined also to discover the mineral resources of the country. As a compensation for the considerable outlay which he might be called upon to make in furthering the equipment and business of the new expedition, the prince was to be allowed a twelve years’ lease of the trade and mines of the country, with ample powers to manage it by deputy and to prevent intruders. A new commission was issued to Champlain on November 22. Of the maps which Champlain showed to the viceroy, two were prepared to accompany the account of his expe- ghamplain’s riences in the new world since 1604; and a third wags ™P* perhaps one owned by Harrisse, dated in 1607, showing the coasts and harbors of New France, which has not yet been en- graved. Of the maps published in it, one, dated 1612, is larger than the other, but shows a lesser extent of territory, and Champlain explains that it was “ constructed according to com- passes of France, which vary to the northeast.” Its interior geography makes clear what conceptions respecting the great western waters Champlain had derived from the stories with which the Indians had regaled him. We find in this map Lake Champlain and the river stretching west from Boston harbor brought into close conjunction, as he had supposed them when on the New England coast. Lake Ontario is in nearly its exact 104 COLONIZATION ESTABLISHED AT QUEBEC. position. The small lakes south of it in New York State are coalesced into a single expanse of water, which he calls the Lake of the Iroquois. Farther west a little stream flows into faite tee Cat Bhi s fsilite ais has at a i ay fie ert t fol pe aie ‘$ po ee en HW manigue avs par tc fuse ed pao be ce fir fesse tape aya re ta cLebussowsde labmact ! LOTTO SSHUT b ifaw des ae _alnio ud teats pe PO Const, 8 aunages Accuvdbee npelles rand by fot: arth oe ben ng” si 2 Lac Gntrant We Toumaces =f (pry des cana des sesaaacs SS oes Pc 4 = gt i Looe yy eb CHAMPLAIN’S CONCEPTION the lake, conveying the waters of a natural reservoir not far off. Tts position would make it stand for the inadequate conception, which Champlain had and never dispelled, of the Niagara River and Lake Erie. At its extreme western end, Ontario THE GREAT LAKES. 105 receives by a connecting channel, broken by a fall, the waters of Lake Huron, —and farther west the map does not go. His suspicions of the course of the Ottawa were far from correct ; ot P. = “¢C, baturie ae OF THE GREAT LAKES, 1612. he made it little more than an archipelago which fringed Ontario. The other of the two maps he calls “a geographical map of New France in its true meridian,” and there is reason to be- 106 COLONIZATION ESTABLISHED AT QUEBEC. lieve that, dated a year later (1613) than the larger map, it was made even after the book which was to contain it was nearly ready to leave the press. The changes in it from the other map are marked. Lake Ontario has disappeared, and a network of rivers distinct from the course of the Ottawa appears in its place, — a conception which beguiled Blaeu and other cartog- CHAMPLAIN’S MAP, raphers at a later day. Another distinguishing feature is a great salt sea brought out at the north in something like its true proportions. In this delineation he profited by the report of Hudson’s explorations, which had laid open the straits named after that navigator, with the great bay beyond, where Hudson had wintered. That navigator’s mutinous crew, having set their commander adrift in the great bay, had brought back to Europe one of the charts which he had made. This had just appeared HUDSON’S MAP. 107 when Champlain was revising this map, in an account of Hudson’s voyage which was published at Amsterdam yuason’s (1612), under the editing of Hermann Gerritsz, —a *”" book usually cited by the title of the Latin edition, the Detectio Freti Hudsoni. Its chart gave an approximately true deline- ation of the great northern bay, which forced an easy conjecture BE ces a 4 2 2 Se . ca ‘= c a WL Res en 4 marine t . Foolgzro | gis 1 2s IT] ST IT] FES PIG] ITa [G1 8/S 19 72 0} 7 219224723] 32.4172. 91325/ 52717 28]3 29, DATED IN 1613. that it would reveal a westerly connection with the Pacific. Champlain must have felt that it confirmed his conception of that great North American island which he had dreamed of at Panama. It was a conception much in advance of the views which Hondius, the most popular geographer of his day, was inculcating in the different editions of the Mercator Atlas. We know that such professional cartographers as Johannes Oliva of Marseilles were still clinging to the old notions of Sebastian Miinster. 108 COLONIZATION ESTABLISHED AT QUEBEC. There was one aspect of the Hudson map which Champlain eagerly seized upon, and he was inspired by it with a new hope The north. that he might yet reach this northern water, either by Sea the Saguenay, by the rivers that debouched at Three | q (i Es ee BETO onga nimis longy vie dividit quar Nic patens tanta cs1 mers goicrosa orcore * kite prciduos peti, imperterritur Inhs F Hudsonus, ut methods rem Breviore parece « — dang, feet fuy rare novi» ja erat Bf n ‘remia fponiere ac pame pidere fuis? . hei : remoran.tantis inject nautica robes Tirba, neo in onti parceregmareviroe — Sed remoram. engit noster, wel vinzere cera el 5 quedo avertant rumma fancta) mort Y ds votz Deus, fee. Bunt adde Britannis is Se ervalo nuper. Eiacigg clare, dim + Y HUDSON’S EXPLORATIONS. Rivers, or by the Ottawa. We find him possessed by such a hope in the dedicatory letter to the Prince of Condé, which he prefixed to his new book. In this he speaks of his desire to follow more persistently a search for this northern sea, which he expected to find at a point not much beyond those which he VIGNAU’S DECEIT. 109 had already reached. His mind was accordingly prepared to receive any statement which confirmed this expectation. It was just at this time that Champlain’s credulity in this respect was put to atest. It will be remembered that a year Bredems’ Cenigen PES Soffin CRombort op Denemarthshavgo fArgnes C. we Sy [From Gerritsz’s Tabula Nautica.] or two before, he had allowed a young man, named Nicolas de Vignau, to winter among the Algonquins, where he was ex- pected to pick up what he could of their tongue and yisotas ae their geographical secrets. This youth now appeared Viso™ in Paris. He had returned from the wilderness to Quebec, and 110 COLONIZATION ESTABLISHED AT QUEBEC. taken passage in one of the ships coming home after the sum- mer trading. Whether he started from Quebec with the pur- pose of ingratiating himself with the home authorities by mak- ing up a story to flatter the prevailing geographical hopes, or whether he was induced to his deceit by finding Champlain ready for anything which confirmed his hopes, may not be clear. At any rate, he told his tale. It was that leaving his Algonquin hosts, he had made his way up the Ottawa to a lake which by another outlet led him to the shores of a salt sea, HUDSON'S BAY AND THE ST. LAWRENCE. [As delineated in 1613 in the Delectio Freti Hudsoni (Amsterdam).] where he had seen the wreck of an English ship. This story and the narrative of the Hudson voyage obviously confirmed each other. The effect was natural. Champlain and the gen- tlemen of the court interested in his enterprise readily took Vignau’s story to mean the discovery of a way to these northern waters, and a consequent path to China. No time was to be champhin lost. So in the early spring (March) of 1613, Cham- Gute, plain, accompanied by Vignau, was once more at sea. March, 1613. Arrived at Quebec (May 8), he lost little time in preparations, and, still accompanied by Vignau and a few others, he was speedily on his way up the Ottawa. CHAMPLAIN ON THE OTTAWA. 111 On the little flotilla went. They paddled or poled their canoes by day, and camped on the banks at night. pyptores the The broken current often compelled them to bear their °“*"* CHAMPLAIN’S ASTROLABE, 1603. [After Cut in O. H. Marshall’s Historical Writings.] burdens by the portages, which the Indians had long used. Champlain noted all along in his pocket-book the latitude of his camps, and his figures are found to agree pretty well with the topographical features which he describes, Suddenly, at a 112 COLONIZATION ESTABLISHED AT QUEBEC. certain portage near Muskrat Lake, his entries of altitudes be- come more inaccurate. Five and twenty years ago, a farmer working in the field at this point turned up a brass astrolabe bearing the date of 1603, and of Paris make. These errors of his altitudes and the line of his progress render it almost certain that this relic was Champlain’s, and that his loss of it had left him without the means of accurate determination of his latitude. Champlain stopped at a village to procure an audience with its chief. He describes the festivals which were made in his honor. It was in this village that Vignau had spent his winter, and the youth was now among his old companions. When Champlain asked for an escort to take him the rest of Vignau’s last year’s journey to the salt sea, the fellow’s rascally deceit was exposed, for the savages knew that he had never left them on any such journey, during his sojourn among them. The youth could but confess his mendacity, and throw himself on his leader’s mercy. There was nothing left for Champlain but to lead his party soberly back to the St. Lawrence, under escort of a crowd of canoes going down for the annual trade. During this visit to Canada, Champlain spent but little more than two months. He had failed in his search at the north, but he had at last got an intelligent notion of the course of the Ottawa, and was able to correct his tentative maps. When he reached the great river, he found seven ships trading at Mon- treal. The scene gave him a new conception of the growth which the fur trade was making. Going to Tadoussac, he embarked there on July 8, and on Pack in He 26th of the next month, his ship floated with the Beane, ty tide into the basin of St. Malo. sake France had now transferred her chief interests to the vast northern valley. She saw there the best chance of progress to the west, and the allurements of the trade in peltries were rapidly growing upon her commercial sense. Her settle- ments along the Maine coast easily lost their hold. The Dutch indeed did not now reach them, but Adrian Block, in the little “ Onrust,” sailing from Manhattan, had pushed around Cape Cod, and established the northern claims of that people at Nahant. It is to Block and the Dutch that Vignau’s deceit. 1613. CHAMPLAIN’S DESCRIPTIONS. 113 we now begin to look for developments in the hydrography of Massachusetts Bay. The English were more enterprising, and a party from Virginia in an armed vessel, under Samuel Argall, hovering about Mount Desert, found a convenient moment to take a settlement of the Jesuits unawares. They fell upon it, and carried off some of the French to James- town, and made a like raid the next year. SHIP OF 1613. [From the Delectio Freti Hudsoni, Amsterdam, 1613.] Champlain had been licensed on January 9, 1613, to print the book which contained his maps. The narrative, beside enabling us to follow his adventures, gives us one of the earliest deserip- tions of the animals and plants of our northern coasts. Men of science, however, to-day find his accounts far less satisfactory than those of the Englishmen, Hariot and White, on the Vir- ginia coast twenty years before. CHAPTER VI. WAR, TRADE, AND MISSIONS. THE FALL OF QUEBEC. 1614-1629. CHAMPLAIN now remained in France for the better part of two years. He was chiefly employed in strengthening the com- mercial plans of the colony, and in arranging for the introduc- tion of priests. The fur company saw little profit in assuming the expenses of the proposed missions, and Champlain’s efforts to get money for their support were necessarily turned in other directions. The sending of Catholic missionaries was not grateful to a company in which Protestant interests were still paramount, and in which there must naturally be other grounds of dislike of such associations. The priests saw the best chance of con- verting the natives in making them first sedentary. The trad- ing instinct knew that this meant a diminution of fur hunters. on So for some years there was a struggle at court. On Missions é : : . : and the — the one side, the priests and their friends aimed to secure royal recognition of the spiritual needs of the Indians. On the other, the trading associates claimed a longer lease of their mercenary project, on the plea that they were working the country on the best terms for France and her pros- perity. While the traders maintained their advantage, Cham- plain had nothing to do but to get along with his plans as best he could without their assistance. Champlain succeeded on his own account in making some arrangement with a few priests of the Recollect order, and it was agreed that Dennis Jamay, Jean d’Olbeau, and Joseph Le Caron should accompany him to Quebec. A lay brother, Pacifique du Plessis, accompanied the priests. Champlain Champlain and his new supporters sailed, in a vessel sue AP") commanded by his old friend, Pontgravé, on April 24, 1615. Recollects. THE IROQUOIS. 115 The Recollect stood for the strictest discipline that the Fran- ciscan could endure. His loose and coarse gray vestment was girt at the waist with a cord, and his pointed hood, if not protecting his crown, hung behind. His feet were uncovered except by a wooden sole; and he passed among men, seeming holy and patient, and he clung to poverty and humility. It was May when the ship reached Quebec. A chapel was at once built, and on June 15 the priests celebrated yray at their first mass. It was the first since the colonization °° of the country, though there is some reason to believe that the early explorers may have listened to the holy words at Brest in 1534, and possibly on the rock of Quebec two years later. It was now arranged that Jamay should remain at the settle- ment. D’Olbeau was soon on his way to sojourn among the Montagnais, and Le Caron started to set up his altar in the Huron villages. Sagard, in speaking of these Canadian tribes, classes the Hurons as the nobility, and the Montagnais as the rabble of the woods. To the Algonquins, who were called the burghers of the forest, no priest was yet assigned. Champlain, in dealing with the Indian problem of his day, found himself confronted by an ethnological anomaly. jnaian This part of the continent was in the main occupied “sttbution. by tribes of the Algonquin stock; but in the midst of this expansion of a common blood there was a sort of linguistic island, bounded on all sides by foreign races. Within this island the core was held by the Iroquois, a confed- eracy which represented the ideal of savage existence. They occupied the region immediately south of the Upper St. Lawrence and Lake Ontario. Skirting their somewhat irregu- lar domain on all sides but the north and east lay the con- geners of the Iroquois, known as the Hurons, the Tobacco nation, the Neuters, the Eries, and the Andastes,— this range of people making a sweep from the northwest at Georgian Bay to the headwaters of the Susquehanna on the south. Thus these cousins of the Iroquois pressed in upon the country of the confederates on all sides. They had found their positions by no means comfortable, for their brethren at the core, the Iroquois people, were cruelly hostile to all of them, forcing them not only to band together, but also to form alliances with the remoter Algonquins. The only exception was with the Troquois. 116 WAR, TRADE, AND MISSIONS. Neuters, who suffered both the Hurons and Iroquois to raid across their territory along the Niagara, but compelled them to be amicable if they met in their villages. We have seen that Champlain had already provoked the hostility of the Iroquois, and the further alliance which he was now seeking with the Hurons through priestly service was sure to serve as a new pretext for the confederates’ fierce persecutions of the latter tribe. Champlain was quite ready to meet this hostility, and was Campaigm Prompt even to anticipate it. Accordingly, he planned nes «with the St. Lawrence Indians an invasion of the 101b: Iroquois country. The route by Lake Champlain in- volved too long a march through the enemy’s country, for the stronghold of the confederates, which they intended to attack, lay south of the easterly end of Lake Ontario. Moreover, the French leader expected that, by a circuitous route through the country of his allies, he could increase his force as he proceeded. The path marked out, however, lengthened the march to not much short of a thousand miles. He started on this recruiting service accompanied by Brulé, the interpreter, a French servant, July. Onthe 2Nd several savages. On July 9, with such com- Otiawa: panions, and in two canoes, he began the ascent of the Ottawa. His passage of it with Vignau had already familiar- ized him with some of its harassing obstacles, and it was because of that bootless expedition to the delusive northern sea that the tribes through whose territory he now passed recognized one whom they had already known, and would now readily serve. From the valley of the Ottawa he crossed the divide and reached Lake Nipissing, whence he continued by its outflowing stream to the Georgian Bay. Geologists have recently pointed out that a subsidence of about a hundred feet near Lake Nipissing would turn the water of the Great Lakes for the most part into the Ottawa, and make a practicable route for navigation 270 miles shorter than by Lake Erie and Ontario; indeed, the evidence seems to be that this was the channel to the sea in the geological period, and it has been in historic times the easiest route to the upper lakes known to the Indians, followed by Champlain, and adopted by the engineers of the Canadian Pacific Railway. Champlain next crept by the lake shore along the extreme CHAMPLAIN’S CAMPAIGN. 117 southern part of this arm of Lake Huron, to the neighborhood of the Huron villages. Here that leader found Le Caron at his missionary work, and eight Frenchmen from the Recollects’ com- pany joined in the march. Word now reached this gathering host that a body of Andastes, living about the headwaters of the Susquehanna, were, to the number of five hundred, anxious to take part in this attack upon their common enemy. The Andastes villages lay beyond the Iroquois country to the south, and they could approach the confederates’ fort from the side opposite to the Huron attack. It was accordingly necessary that communication should be opened with these proposed allies, in order that their attack should be well-timed. Brulé volunteered to reach them. He succeeded in passing the hos- tile villages of the Iroquois, possibly by the route indicated by the dotted line in Champlain’s map of 16382, but was not able to get the reinforcement to the attack in season, as we shall see. Moving on from the Huron country, the savage force, accom- panied by Champlain and his compatriots, turned towards the southeast, and finally struck the course of the Trent, which easily conducted them to the borders of Lake Ontario. They reached its shores in the neighborhood of the modern Kingston. Here they embarked in their canoes, and crossing the lake by skirting a line of intervening islands, the native flotilla made a variegated show on the mirroring water. There is not an agreement among investigators upon the exact route which was taken, but somewhere on the shore which stretches south of Sackett’s Harbor, the party landed, and concealed their canoes in a neighboring thicket. There was before them a march inland and almost due south. The local antiquaries have en- deavored by examining the ground, and by following Cham- plain’s details of his march, to determine the precise site of the fortified town of the Onondagas, which they sought. Mr. O. H. Marshall and others turn the route after crossing the out- let of Lake Oneida to the southwest, towards a position on Onon- daga Lake. General John S. Clark, who has secured a more general acceptance for his views, shapes the invaders’ course rather to the southeast, and brings them to a point on a small pond, where he finds remains on the ground which serve, as he thinks, to identify the spot. These traces conform in the main 118 WAR, TRADE, AND MISSIONS. to a plan of the fortress, which Champlain depicts in one of the plates accompanying his narrative. The later writers, like Shea, Slafter, and Park- man, follow General Clark’s lead with scarce- ly any hesitation. The Indian stronghold was hexagonal in form, with four rows of lofty pali- sades, interlaced with withes. These walls sup- ported a gallery for war- riors, which ran around the top. From the side next the pond, water was introduced and conducted to gutters, which could be discharged upon fires, if built against the outer palisades. It was before this for- _s ee tress that Champlain and Oe a. his allies appeared on i nado, October 10, 1615. The *"2 attack on the part of the savages was a wild hurry- seurry of boisterous movement, and some time passed before Ocksiie Champlain could temper their frenzied zeal. He Mere caused a tower to be built, and put some of his marks- attacked. men in it, to be pushed up to overtop the palisades. This worked very well; but all his precautions to regulate the attempts to fire the timbers of the outer defenses failed, through the misdirected precipitancy of his Indians. Some of the be- siegers were wounded, and Champlain himself had to draw hostile arrows from his own knee and ankle. When the assailants found they had made no impression on the defenses, they shrank as Indians always do at a repulse, and the disabled Champlain was unequal to the task of hold- ing them to the attack. The whole mass of shrieking savages accordingly fell back under cover of the woods. They were CHAMPLAIN’S ROUTE, 1615. CHAMPLAIN'’S RETREAT. 119 ready, however, to renew the onset, if Brulé and his five hun- dred Andastes should come to their assistance. Brulé was three days away among the villages of that people, who had not yet finished their revelries at the prospect of punishing the Iroquois. Brulé proved powerless to move them on. THE ONONDAGA FORT. (After Champlain’s Sketch.] Five days of inaction or of paltry skirmishing followed, and the Andastes not appearing, a retreat was begun. If gpamptain the shattered horde had waited two or three days ™**'* longer, the succor would have come. The wounded Champlain, unable to bear his weight, was placed in a basket slung from men’s shoulders, and in this mode he was borne away from a disheartening failure. It was his last expedition, and a sad contrast to his heedless onset at Ticonderoga six years before. That foolish precipitancy was avenged. His straggling force reached the lake without serious interruption from its pursuers. 120 WAR, TRADE, AND MISSIONS. The fugitives found their canoes untouched, and embarked ; and were soon on the northern shore of Ontario. The Hurons seem to have had a purpose in keeping Cham- plain with them through the winter; or at least he was not able to find any guide to accompany him to the settlements. The savages tarried for a while on the border of the lake, to kill a winter’s supply of deer. The rest gave Champlain’s wounds Dec., 1615, time to heal. When the frosts of December ensued, The Hurons and the ground was frozen, the trails became easier to — traverse, and the Hurons with their guest departed for their towns. SW ee —_ “PARS _, CHOROGRAPHIA ; a Kat Or Taruercte 7 SY q rettigter a @ $0 tang LACUS 3 ‘6 S Lau ae . On 7 eS 4 4 rea, A afey , See a Huro: : one: J, mri chaales i pan Eterm += MAID HEAL, acess ; Cnacuces- 9 Silegipndle oe anatare THE HURON COUNTRY. [From Creuzius.] It was thus that Champlain spent the winter of 1615-16 in the Huron country, in the neighborhood of Lake Simcoe. The passing months gave him opportunities to visit the adjacent and allied tribes, where he found much matter for his note-books. He records that the Indians could give him no knowledge of Champlain What lay beyond the Mer Douce (Lake Huron), ex- reas ofa cept that prisoners taken from the more distant tribes Beople: had said that still farther on towards the setting sun there was a people who had light-colored hair and looked like the French. When the spring came, Champlain took advantage of a party ETIENNE BRULEE. 121 of Indians going eastward to accompany them. On reaching Montreal, he found Pontgravé just arrived from a France, and got the latest news. On July 11, he was ‘Again in again in Quebec, after an absence of nearly a year. In per the few succeeding days, he made plans for enlarging and repair- ing the buildings of the post, and on July 20 was on gent. m his way to Tadoussac. Embarking there on August 8, 7° he arrived at Honfleur on September 10. Champlain was again in the colony in 1617, but he has left no record of what he did. Pacifique du Plessis founded a mis- sion at Three Rivers which served to give stability to 617, qn a trading-post which had been maintained there for ©™*4* some years; and the settlement soon became and long remained a chief centre for the hardy voyageurs of the country. This class did little, however, to introduce family life, and it was hoped that, when Louis Hébert and his household ,,,:. arrived at Quebec, not far from the same time, a Hert beginning was made in the more permanent elements of colo- nial life; but Hébert remained for a long time the only con- spicuous example of a farmer in the valley. He was an apoth- ecary by training, but he had exhibited while domiciled in Acadia a liking for the soil and its labors. He stands in the Canadian genealogies to-day as the progenitor of numerous representatives who rejoice in their descent from the man who first practically grasped the essential truth of colonial policy, and worked the soil like one bound to it. It was during Champlain’s sojourn in the valley in 1618 that his old interpreter, Etienne Brulé, returned to the settlement. The governor had last seen him when he ae was dispatched from the Huron company to bring the ‘ Andastes to the attack on the Iroquois fort, three years before. Brulé had now the opportunity to disclose the cause of his fail- ure, and to explain his later wanderings. It appeared that when Brulé finally brought the Andastes to the neighborhood of the Iroquois stronghold, it was only to learn that the Hurons had departed, and there was no alternative left but a like retreat on their part. Brulé remained the following winter with his savage friends, but later, it would appear, he passed down the Susquehanna to Chesapeake Bay, and by this ad- venture he had established the direction of its course. If Sa- 122 WAR, TRADE, AND MISSIONS. gard’s account is to be trusted, Brulé had in some manner also made his way westward, so as to find the shores of Lake Supe- rior. He averred that it took nine days to reach the western extremity of some such water. The stories which he told of a region of copper mines point to this lake, and Sagard says that Brulé showed to him an ingot of that metal which was found there. In making his return journey, the wanderer fell among the Iroquois. He was wont to point to his wounds to show that he had undergone tortures at their hands. His own story betrays an abundance of tact in ingratiating himself with sav- ages wherever he went. His spirit and facile habit served to convert the Iroquois enmity into a liking for him, and they made it easy for him to reach the Huron country, whence he could join the summer flotilla, descending the Ottawa. One of the most conspicuous of the pioneers to follow up these discoveries of Brulé— whatever they may have been — was a young Norman, Jean Nicolet, who arrived just at this time in the valley, and was sent by Champlain among the Algonquins to inure himself to hardship and to learn their language. We shall encounter him again. Early the next spring, Champlain, once more in Paris, pro- aC cured (May 18, 1619) a license to print a new vol- pay ume of his experiences. It was to cover the interval narrative. since his incursion into the Iroquois country in 1615. The book was better calculated, perhaps, than either of those preceding it to awaken the curious reader. It covered a larger field of exploration, and gave better glimpses of the country and what it could produce. It mingled the excitements of war with the horrors of torture. It afforded greater details of life among the natives. The drawings, whose production had be- guiled weary hours during his confinement in the Huron vil- lages, had passed the hand of the engraver, and helped to give a lively interest to the book. Its publication was successful enough, if we may judge by its passing to a second edition the following year. In the autumn of 1619, the Recollects began to make prepa- 1000, the ations for building on the St. Charles, opposite Que- Recollects bee, and on June 3, 1620, six months before the Pil- church at grims began their meeting-house on the Burial Hill at Quebec. 5 5 Plymouth, these priests laid the corner-stone of the Jean Nicolet. THE FRENCH OCCUPATION. 128 earliest church erected in French America. It was palisaded like a stronghold, and there proved to be need of it. The Eng- lish Separatists at Plymouth constructed their gathering-place with battlements for their small guns, and there was no need of it. For fifty years and more they lived in peace with their savage neighbors. The Indians surrounding the settlement on the St. Lawrence were in a fair way to attain the Christian mode of warfare. If we may believe Champlain, two vessels from Rochelle, trad- ing in the river this very season, began the practice of | ona selling arms and ammunition to the natives. Matters fs iene had been growing more and more trying for Cham- plain. His colonizing purpose and the trading aims of the merchants were greatly at variance, and grew more so. Such practices as this of supplying weapons to the savages could but prove dangerous to a community which was left to pass the winters in small numbers, after the fur-ships had departed in the autumn and the traders had plunged into the wilderness. This danger was presented to the council of state, and an in- junction was served on the traders to prevent the selling of arms. In 1620, the vice-royal office was transferred to the Duke of Montmorency, who at once recommissioned Champlain, with ampler powers to enforce measures of safety. Champlain, leav- ing France in May, 1621, found the colony on his ‘eon. arrival in a sadly disorganized state. He saw that ieenlsin such a promise of stability as would come from greater permanence of living would do much to encourage the drooping spirits. He endeavored, therefore, to arrange for a more sys- tematic cultivation of the soil; but he naturally encountered the opposition of the trading interest. The purely mercantile character of the French occupation of the St. Lawrence did not escape the notice of their ee English rivals. Sir William Alexander, in a tract the Frencn which he published in 1624 to induce a more active eer immigration to his province of New Scotland (Nova Scotia) on the part of his countrymen, accounts for the want of stabil- ity in the French colony, in that they were “ only desirous to know the nature and quality of the soil and did never seek to have [its products] in such quantity as was requisite for their 124 WAR, TRADE, AND MISSIONS. maintenance, affecting more by making a needless ostentation that the world should know they had been there, more in love with glory than with virtue. . . . Being always subject to divi- sions among themselves, it was impossible that they could sub- sist, which proceeded sometimes from emulation or envy, and at other times from the laziness of the disposition of some, who, loathing labor, could be commanded by none.” This thwarting of the aims of true colonization by the trad- Montme. 12S associates induced Montmorency to dissolve the yee old company and create a new one. He again placed Champlain in charge, with renewed powers of ad- ministration, while the control of the business interests was committed to the Huguenots, Guillaume de Caen and _ his nephew Emeric. The older company proved too strong to be suppressed, and a rivalry between the two followed, only to result in the end in a consolidation under a single organization. Amid all these intestine disputes, Champlain could but Champlain’s Observe signs of larger rivalries. With Calvert at coe = Ferryland, in Newfoundland, and that island become neighbors. a base for operations, the English were not likely to remain as inactive as they had been. Champlain must have heard, moreover, how busy his neighbors on the New England coast had become. Dermer had just before this been exploring south from Monhegan; and perhaps it was at Boston harbor that he fancied he had stumbled on a western passage “ which may hereafter be both honorable and profitable to His Majesty.” When this same commander was at Manhattan, he had similar hopes from stories of inland watercourses which came to his ears. Not far from the same time, Purchas in England was learning that the Indians about the Chesapeake were reporting upon ships seen at the northwest, supposed by those who heard the tales to have come from Japan. And so along a northern and southern parallel there was a race for the China Seas. Nor was it the English alone who gave him uneasiness. The ships for Quebec ran the gauntlet of the Basques, Flemings, and Spaniards in the St. Lawrence Gulf, and Champlain’s supply- vessels were even occasionally brought under the guns of the little Basque stronghold at the Island of St. John. Once, indeed, a hardy intruder had dared to run his ship up to Tadoussac. If Champlain had chanced to see the Dutch map of Jacobsz, just TREATY WITH THE INDIANS. 125 now (1621) made public, he would have read with some solici- tude the legend of “Nouvelle Bisquaye” about the mouth of the Saguenay. We can understand, then, why it was that Champlain thought of the insecurity of Quebec, and planned a larger fortress on the summit of Cape Diamond. LT > op) oO w S By ou we RE oO, RRS B Shy wm xX Re. Ee 2 Cc § 9 S ne “yy a, See Sy, 2 oy a yy @, a 0 2 8 & o @ yO PO . : f oo g But there were other more immediate dangers for the little colony, which hardly ever numbered in these years above a few score souls. During the summer of 1622, thirty Iroquois 4999. yo. canoes were observed to pass Three Rivers, proceeding qoisor towards Quebec. Their subsequent attack on the "°* 126 WAR, TRADE, AND MISSIONS. Recollect convent on the St. Charles is not mentioned either by Champlain or Sagard, which has thrown some doubt on the recital given in Le Clereg. Champlain indeed was absent at the time, and the Recollect father who tells us how the savages were repulsed says that he got his information from Madam Couillard, who was within the palisades all the while. This pos- sible danger passed, it was not long before two Iroquois envoys 1004, Treaty CAMe to Quebec and began negotiations, which in the . Treaty im . withthe "spring of 1624 ended in a large concourse of Hurons, Algonquins, Montagnais, and Iroquois coming to Three Rivers to light their council fires and confirm a pact. If the peace had come earlier, Champlain might have profited by the quiet, and had the opportunity to confirm the stories of Brulé; but he had followed his last trail, and the mysteries of the west were left for others to solve. The governor soon weleomed (1623) two more Recollects to the colony, one of whom was Gabriel Sagard, upon whose printed account of Canada we must in some measure depend, as our story goes on. With the satisfaction of being able to carry home good news of the quiet which had set- tled along the borders of his government, and prepared to tell roe the king the story of a four years’ devotion to his 1624. Cham- interests, Champlain left Quebec on August 15, 1624. Queeewnitn His wife was with him, for he had married Héléne * Boullé, on his last visit to France, and she had passed these four years of novel experiences amid associations for which her early life had little fitted her. He landed at Dieppe, Oc- tober 1, 1624. Sagard. During the two years which Champlain now passed in France, there were some important movements touching the future of Canada. In the first place, the Duke of Montmorency sold his _ viceroyalty to the Duke of Ventadour, and February 1625. Again . < % commie- 15, 1625, Champlain was created the new viceroy’s representative. It is claimed that his new commission affords the earliest official record of a purpose to find a way to China. Kingsford, in his recent History of Canada, suggests that the language was inserted by Jesuit influence; yet in a petition in 1621 the Recollects reminded the king that “by a continuation of former explorations a passage to go to China could be opened.” SIR WILLIAM ALEXANDER. 127 By 1624, when Sir William Alexander published his Encowr- agement to Colonies, the theoretical geography of Guantenenty Champlain respecting the western waters had become theoretical geography. known in England. Alexander, referring to it, says that at the western end of a range of lakes, the French “did find salt water,” and that great ships seen there had made Champlain believe “ that a passage might be there to the Bay of California, or to some part of the South Sea, opening a near way to China.” It was at this very time that the Spanish geographers were beginning to detach California from the main- land, and to open channels inland from the Pacific, so that spec- ulative geographers found little difficulty in connecting the French reports of western waters approached by the St. Law- rence valley with these supposed developments along the Pacific coast. At this time, moreover, Alexander was interested in a politi- cal movement somewhat ominous for New France. In micgens 1621 (September 10), the English king had granted em to him all that territory betwecsi the St. Lawrence ™ and the sea, which lies east of the St. Croix River. “To be holden of us, from our kingdom of Scotland as a part thereof,” ran this kingly purpose to carve a province of about 54,000 square miles out of disputed territory. Alexander was thus expected to colonize, and under the name of New Scotland or Nova Scotia to hold, and govern as lieutenant-general, a region that had already been included in the French king’s grants to De Monts in 1603. The English patentee had not been able to start settlements when in 1624 he issued the tract to which we have already referred, as a means of propa- gating a colonizing spirit. As a further inducement to the same end, and to give dignity and some financial standing to his project, Alexander prevailed upon King James, and afterwards upon King Charles, to create an order of tributary Knights- Baronets, who should pay each a thousand marks into the trea- sury of the colony, and receive in return a grant of land to support their dignity, and these baronies were to include some at Anticosti, directly in the approach to Canada. The rank was further tokened in an “orange tawny silk ribbon with a pendent escutcheon,” which they were privileged to wear. Sir William speaks of this grant to him as “the first national 128 WAR, TRADE, AND MISSIONS. patent that ever was clearly bounded within America, by pavr- ticular limits upon the earth.” The patent had certainly a distinctive limitation which told the French just what they 4 j d ye S235 “ uy ¥ : aR) \ rem yt oc ry a % a ; me y ED sin ror & 2 % 2 + = oo ALEXANDER’S MAP, 1624. had to encounter, and made the bounds of Acadia a bone of contention between the rival powers for many generations. Unfortunately, Alexander’s scheme was embarrassed by the very dignity which he secured for it. His plan of manorial RECOLLECTS AND JESUITS. 129 rights in New Scotland was an attempt to plant medizvalism in the new world. They shut out the manly endeavor of self- respecting, though lowly owners of the soil, and the absence of such attributes in the settlers made them in the end the sport of political exigencies. Ventadour, the new viceroy of Canada, was under the influ- ence of the Jesuits. Champlain had always favored yentagour the Recollects. The members of this last order had “T° prospered under the eye of the governor, and in 1624 some recruits from Gaspé had joined the little body. They res Recollect had already created five missions, — Tadoussac, Que- missions, bee, Three Rivers, with others among the Nipissings and Hurons. They had, as we have noted, raised the first stone structure in the colony, the church of Notre Dame des Anges. We have seen how there is some reason to believe that in 1622 this palisaded edifice had successfully resisted an Iroquois attack. Success had emboldened the fathers, and they had petitioned the king to exclude the Calvinists from the colony ; but Louis XIII. was not prepared for such a step. It came a few years later, when the strong spirit of Richelieu willed it. If the Recollects were in this matter denied the aid of the crown, there were willing abettors in their schemes, which they could engage, and so they invited the Jesuits to make common cause with them. On June 19, 1625, the Jesuits, 405 sean- Charles Lalemani, Jean de Brébeuf, Enemond Massé, #8 *™ ve Francois Charton, Gilbert Burel, and a sixth of unknown name, appeared in Quebec. Being denied hospitality by the civic authorities, they were at once received under the roof of the Recollect monastery, and began to look about to establish a house of their own. The spot they selected was beyond the St. Charles, at the confluence of the Lairet, where Champlain believed Cartier to have wintered, and where after ninety years there were still some traces of the earlier occupancy. It was the 1st of September, 1625, when the Jesuits with due cere- mony took possession of the ground, and on April 6, : 1626, they found themselves in their new abode. Two anestablish- days later, the Pere Brébeuf, who had been among the ma Indians during the winter, studying their manners and tongue, and preparing for larger experiences, rejoined his companions. The Jesuits began their labors amid dissensions, which their 130 WAR, TRADE, AND MISSIONS. coming had created. The return of Champlain to Quebec in 1626 did much to smooth asperities. A letter which the Pere Charles Lalemant sent to Paris, and which appeared in the Mercure Frangois, did not tell a comforting story. Champlain had arrived on July 5, 1626, accompanied by his Sante, brother-in-law, Eustache Boullé. He found the colony alter, only just recovering from the distresses of the win- ter. A famine had threatened the settlement, and the struggling settlers had been forced to send to Gaspé for succor. The persistency of their leaders had alone made the company desist from a purpose to abandon the place. That eighteen years of occupancy had so little served to give stability to New France was a fact forcibly pressed upon the Richeliew’s Spirit which was now animating France. Cardinal Helley Richelieu had with an evil eye marked out his policy, and Canada was to receive the impress of feudalism. The institutions of the European past were to be. evolved amid the American forests, and just at a time when there was already planned among the neighboring English, in the compact of the “ Mayflower,” a departure from the old-world principles of entail and primogeniture in the elevation of equal rights. The English sympathy with the Huguenots and the pretensions of the English king to territory along the St. Lawrence, as well as the mongrel combination which was now carrying on the trade of Canada, were not signs to be received passively by a man like Richelieu. The old trading companies were swept off the board, and a new company, which was commonly called Hunareq oe Hundred Associates, was promptly formed. The Associates, cardinal gave it his approval on April 29, 1627, in , camp before Rochelle, the last of the Huguenot strongholds. On the 6th of May, 1628, the Council of State ratified the charter, and thenceforth no Calvinist was to be allowed to enter New France. These principles were hazardous in the struggle with the Dutch and English for the conquest of the continent. The Dutch West India Company was planting along the Hudson a sturdy colony of Walloons, in sympathy with the Huguenots, which Richelieu would expel. Their spirit was to live, while the manorial rights of the Van Rensselaers and the rest, com- pelling the people to scatter dangerously, sowed the evils that THE HUNDRED ASSOCIATES. 131 made the country fall easily in due time into English hands, by which a free tenure of the soil was added to the advantages pos- sessed by these other rivals of the French. The royal articles of 1627, creating the powers of Richelieu’s company, — which we may read in the Mercure Frangois, — gave it jurisdiction over a territory extending from Florida — wherever that may end, for in defining bounds there was no at- tempt to decide it — to the arctic circle ; and east and west from Newfoundland to the great fresh lake, omitting, for a wonder, to extend it to any salt water. Charlevoix and most of the writ- ers following him make the grant to include Florida, but the articles seem to be plain that the extension of the territory was from Florida, which the Spaniards at that time actu- ally possessed. The conditions of this southern coun- try had not indeed changed since the time when Champlain wrote of it in the journal of his West Indian voyage, as “ one of the best lands that can be desired; very fertile if it were cultivated ; but the king of Spain does not care for it, because there are no mines of gold or silver.” What was of more mo- ment to the French of the north, there were no furs there. The principal Associates of the Company of a Hundred were Parisians, and Richelieu was its constituted head. =, new There was at least a quarter of the number to be ‘my: found in Normandy, and three hundred thousand livres had been contributed to carry the project on. The company prom- ised to reinforce the feeble colony by a strong contingent of artisans and laborers, to be sent at once, with all necessary tools and supplies. Within fifteen years they purposed to send over four thousand other colonists, whose support for three years was to be guaranteed by the Associates. In the spring of 1628 their first expedition sailed, consisting of four armed vessels convoying eighteen transports. They carried thirty-five can- non to increase the defenses of Quebec. This fleet, under the command of Claude de Roquemont, fell into the hands of the exasperated Huguenots and their allies, or, as Parkman ex- presses it, Roquemont succumbed to “ Huguenots fighting under English colors.” Roquemont had sailed in April, but an English fleet had got the start of him, for under the pretext of relieving the Hugue- nots at Rochelle, the English government had declared war Florida. 132 WAR, TRADE, AND MISSIONS. against France. So the occasion was seized to dispatch an ar- England Wament against Quebec. The instigator of the move- ara"? ment seems to have been a French Calvinist, Michel, — but the men who gave the enterprise character were Sir William Alexander and a Derbyshire gentleman, Gervase Kirke. Alexander naturally looked upon the lordly territorial claims of Richelieu as aimed in part at his own colony of New Scotland. Kirke, who had lived awhile in Dieppe and had Haas married a French woman, knew what a task was be- nee fore him. The king supplied letters of marque, and Kirke’s eldest son, David, was made admiral of the fleet, with two other sons in subordinate commands. This fleet was far enough ahead of Roquemont to be able to land a Scotch colony in the territory of Sir William Alexander, and to sweep the St. Lawrence of all the French afloat, before Roquemont was ex- pected. After this it lay in wait for its prey at Tadoussac. On July 9, two little towers of the fort in Quebec fell down, and in the anxious state of the garrison the sign seemed omi- nous. On the same day some half-famished men were scanning the distant reach of the river to catch sight of Roquemont with his expected succor. While their hopes were proving vain, two refugees from Cape Tourmente emerged from the woods beyond the St. Charles, and brought word that some Indians had come to that post from below, who reported large ships at Tadoussac. Shortly after, a canoe came bringing the wounded commander of the French post at Cape Tourmente. He said that he had escaped a party which had been set ashore from some strange ships to assail that fort. The next day, some Basque fishermen pulled in under the cliff at Quebec, and delivered a message from the English admiral, which they had undertaken to deliver cei ee Champlain. It was a courteous demand from monedto Kirke for the surrender of Quebec. Champlain had neither provisions nor powder adequate to a defense, but he answered as if he had, and the messengers rowed back with a reply as courteous as Kirke’s summons, and quite as confident. This show of firmness had its effect, and Champlain was given a respite, not, however, free from suspense. Meanwhile Roquemont with his fleet had advanced up the river almost to Tadoussac, and had dispatched ahead a boat to CAPTURE OF QUEBEC. 1383 warn Champlain of his coming. This messenger, approaching Tadoussac, saw the English ships glide out of the Saguenay and turn down the St. Lawrence. He found cover for his boat on the bank, and Kirke’s ships passed without discovering him. They were scarcely out of sight, when reverberations of cannon told him that Kirke and Roquemont had grappled in a fight. Speeding on to Quebec, the dismayed messenger carried the news to Champlain. The governor remained in a trying state of uncertainty till some Indians brought him word that the fight had ended in disaster to the French fleet. Kirke indeed had captured such of the ships as he did not sink, and, finding both glory and booty in the victory, ee he gave up Quebec, and sailed for England with the the French prizes. The winter of 1628-29 was a weary and disheartening one for Champlain. There was little to eat, and by spring 4909.99, this little became nothing. The only hope of sustain- 222. ing life was in digging roots and gathering acorns. When even these failed, the colonists clung to a hope of seizing, if they could, one of the palisaded granaries of the Iroquois. Here they could perhaps defend themselves till relief came. Most of the sufferers stood fast by their settlement; a few sought asylums among the Indians. Meanwhile Champlain was without any tidings of the effect in Europe of Kirke’s enterprise. It had indeed excited a new cupidity among the English trading adventurers. In Febru- ary, 1629, a royal patent was made out for Sir William Alex- ander, to constitute him the “sole trader” of the St. Lawrence valley, to authorize him to settle a plantation anywhere along the river from below Tadoussac to Quebec, to confiscate the property of interlopers, and to seize French or Spanish ships, and drive off the French that might be found on the banks. One morning in July, 1629, an Indian saw some masts above the trees on the island of Orleans. Other savages ees came in and reported that they had seen English ships Quebec sur- moving up the channel. Champlain could doubt no : longer that the enemy had returned. Before long, the hostile vessels glided into the basin, and looked like cockboats as the governor with a little squad of pallid and ragged adherents looked down upon them from the ramparts of the feeble fort. 134 WAR, TRADE, AND MISSIONS. They saw a boat with a white flag row to the strand. The officer bore a new demand for surrender. Champlain asked for a fortnight to consider it; but an immediate compliance was insisted on. Kirke was not unreasonable in his terms. He offered honorable privileges, and engaged to transport all who desired it to Europe. There was no alternative, and the demand was met. The next day, the red flag of England floated from Cape Diamond. The English admiral had sent his brothers to arrange for the capitulation, while he remained at Tadoussac. Under these commanders, the troops which had come in the ships were landed, and quartered in casemate and barrack. Provisions were at once put ashore, and the storehouses were filled with unwonted supplies. Thirteen of the French colonists, looking perhaps on the change as a deliverance, as Charlevoix intimates, were induced to live under the English rule. Of these there were seven who were of importance to the victors, because of their woodcraft and experience with the Indians. Those who preferred to leave embarked with Champlain on one of the English ships, and on July 24 started for Tadoussac. Champlan This vessel ran ahead of her consorts, and while thus embarks. unsupported she met a French ship under Emeric de Caen. This vessel had slipped by Tadoussac unnoticed. The hostile crafts cleared for action, and it seemed for a while that De Caen would avenge the fall of Quebec; but British pluck prevailed, and the Frenchman struck his colors. The prize was taken to Tadoussac, where on August 19 the terms of the sur- render were ratified by the English admiral. It seemed now to one in Quebec as if the English domination of North America was likely to be assured, and not to be left, as was the case, to the uncertainties of a hundred and thirty years yet to come. Lord Baltimore at Avalon, in Newfoundland, had indeed seen a sorry time with his colony in the face of the French, to say nothing of English enemies, and he had just carried his people to the Chesapeake. Here he found that the chartered rights of the Virginia company, with all the extensions to a sup- posable western ocean, had been surrendered to the crown, and under a royal governor, the most ancient of the English settle- ments was to gather new vigor, a part of which he was to feel. In the region which lay towards the French, and had been called North Virginia, but which, since Captain John Smith had THE ENGLISH COLONIES. 135 described the country, was more commonly known as New Eng- land, there was an ominous movement. In March, 1629, while Champlain and his stricken followers were dragging their emaciated bodies into the sun on the rock at Quebec, Charles the First was confirming the Massachusetts charter, as granted by the company at Plymouth in Devon, which since 1620 had claimed to 48° north latitude. In the interpretation which the colonists gave to the new charter, it carried its northern limits above the source of the Merrimac, well within a region which the French had claimed. The charter gave also to the grant an indefinite extension to the western sea, whose shores both French and English were anxious to reach. Smith had complained that with all his praises of the New England soil, it had hardly lured the emigrant like the more fertile south. But the year in which Quebec was lost to the French was the same in which Puritan- ism claimed New England. The party which Endicott brought to Salem in 1629, with instruction to buy the land of the natives, were the precursors of a race unequaled as colonists. They differed from the French in the north in many respects, but in none more potently than in bringing to these American wilds the life of families. The long struggle they sustained along the New England frontiers with the horrors of savage war showed how stubbornly they could cling to their ideal. A few days before the English fleet which bore Champlain was descried from the Hoe at Plymouth, the council for New England, sitting in that town, made a grant to Gorges and Mason, which assured the control of the country on “ the Iro- quois lakes” to their associates of the Laconia company. This, with all its mistaken geography, would have meant to the English in Quebec, had they known it, a close contiguity to their con- quered post. But all visions of a compacted English territory were soon dispelled. ‘CHAPTER VII. QUEBEC RESTORED. EXPLORATIONS OF NICOLET. DEATH OF CHAMPLAIN. 1630-1635. On the return of the English fleet to Plymouth, November 20, Nov. 20, 1629, it was discovered that before Quebec had capitu- = lated, a treaty of peace between England and France had been signed on April 23. On November 29, Champlain was in London, endeavoring with the aid of the French ambas- sador to arrange for the restitution of the untimely conquest ; but there were complications to be removed. On the preced- ing 2d of February, the English king, in anticipation of the Alexander's conquest of Canada, had granted, as we have seen, to charter, Sir William Alexander, a charter of “ the county and lordship of Canada in America.” This document spoke of the “expected revealing and discovery of a way or passage to those seas which lie upon America on the west, commonly called the South Sea, from which the head or source of that great river or gulf of Canada, or some river flowing into it, is deemed to be not far distant.” The charter granted jurisdiction over the islands in and over fifty leagues of territory on each side of this river, “up to the source thereof, wheresoever it be, or to the lake whence it flows, which is thought to be towards the Gulf of California, called by some the Vermilion Sea.” This also in- cluded all the lands adjacent to the passage from the source of the river to the Gulf of California, — ‘ whether they be found a part of the continent or main land or an island (as it is thought they are) which is commonly called by the name of California, —which are not really and actually possessed by others, our subjects, or the subjects of any other Christian prince or consti- tuted orders in alliance and friendship with us.” But all this was a short-lived or rather premature colonial DIPLOMACY. 137 grandeur. Not many weeks later, it was agreed, in ignorance of what was happening on the St. Lawrence, that all conquest made by either English or French after April 24, 1629, should be restored to the condition existing before such cap- ganaaato de ture. It was because of this agreement that Cham- + plain was now making his protestations in London. Alexander and the Kirkes, with all who had ventured their money on the success of the Quebee expedition, were not in good humor when they saw that the lordship of Canada, and all the royal protestations which had encouraged them, were likely to vanish in thin air. These disappointed gentlemen had influence enough to protract the negotiations for the restitution, and when Champlain at last came to Paris, by the end of De- cember, the issue was not reached, nor did the negotiations move rapidly during the following year (1630). Alexander and his friends lost no occasion to urge that the French had always been intruders within the limits of New Scotland. The English king, never willing to acknowledge the French rights to Canada, was making up his mind to such a qualified restitution as would not prejudice the English claim to the country. : King Charles had married, in 1625, a sister of Louis XIII., and only a part of the dower agreed upon had as yet been paid to him. It was a good time now to demand ee the rest. On June 12, 1631, he informed his ambas- sador in Paris that if the French court did not pay this deficit there would be no restitution of Port Royal and Quebec. Here was substantial ground for diplomacy, and we can read the cor- respondence in the report of the Canadian archivist for 1874. The outcome was the treaty of St. Germain-en-Laye, on March 29, 1632. The agreement embodied in this st Genmin treaty was very likely hastened by the fact that De Razilly, a leading member of the Hundred Associates, was ° known to be fitting out a fleet, which might be intended to wrest from the English by force the object of the lingering negotiations. The treaty which Charles thus concluded was easily advanced by his pressing need of money, and the promise of the remain- ing dower. The king’s letter, preserved in the Harleyan col- lection, and only printed by Mr. Brymner of the Canadian 1630. 138 QUEBEC RESTORED. archives, in 1889, has made this manifest. The terms for restitution of the French posts in Canada bore hard on those faithful subjects who had used his letters of marque to add to his dominions, and who saw their conquests given up for his royal necessities. Accordingly, the satisfied monarch was quite willing to send ten thousand pounds sterling to Alexander as a sop, while he ordered the evacuation by Alexander’s son of the region in the vicinity of Port Royal, where Charles La Tour had earlier been installed as a representative of French in- .terests. Charles was at the same time not inclined to throw too much doubt on the numerous charters which under his royal signature had covered all the region in dispute, and with char- acteristic duplicity professed to his subjects that he intended to carry on the plantation of New Scotland by the creation of more baronets. Further than this, the rights of the Council of Plym- outh, established in 1620, going as high as 48° north latitude, and the patents given to De Monts in 1608, still remained to keep alive a conflict of jurisdiction. The dispute was not finally settled till Wolfe perished on the Plains of Abraham. Charles was nevertheless quite ready to fulfill the new obli- gations of the treaty, and so the restitution of Quebec soon fol- lowed. As the De Caens had suffered from the inability of the Emeric de French government to protect them while at Quebec, tcgnciee, Emeric de Caen was sent out to receive the surrender. ae At the same time he was allowed a year’s privilege of trade, to recoup himself in his barter for furs. In July, 1632, the French reached Quebec. They found the English occu- pants had passed the period of their possession not without tribulations. During the first winter, forty of the ninety men who held the place had died. Those who ruled them had no vigor to prevent illegal trading on the river, and the Basques had plied their traffic with small hindrance. During the second summer, they had received some recruits, and there were about ine seventy English in the town when De Caen, on July 18, Quebeo sur- received its surrender. The French accounts say that the English commander sailed down the river with his ships heavily laden with furs. Some of the hatchets which Kirke had used in the barter for skins were recognized two years later by Henry Fleet among the tribes of the Potomac. Richelieu had in mind to control, as his wont was in most THE JESUITS. 139 things, the religious missions in Canada. He tried first to in- duce the Capuchins to take charge of them, but for some reason that order found its way to Acadia instead. The Recollects had appealed to Rome to have a bishop in Canada, which was not a way to ingratiate their order with Richelieu, and in a spirit both of defiance and defense that min- ister sent the Jesuits instead. This exclusion of the Recollects has sometimes been said to have been the result of Jesuit intrigue. At all events, on April 18, 1632, two Jesuit 1699, sesuits fathers, Le Jeune and De Noiie, sailed from Havre for #™* Quebec. Some weeks later, at Tadoussac, Le Jeune saw for the first time, as they came on board the ship, some of the uncouth and filthy creatures whose interests, as he understood them, were to fill so large a part of his devoted life. A heedless cru- elty was at once mated in his mind with their squalor, for he labored in vain to induce them a few days later to spare some Iroquois prisoners from the horrors of the stake. The Jesuits perhaps realized how fit an introductory experience all this was to the work they had come to do. Shortly afterwards, we find the two priests restoring the dilapidated mission house on the bank of the St. Charles. The policy of the Jesuits was reasonable, and it was not savage. “The power of the priest established,” says Parkman, ‘that of the temporal ruler was secure. . . . Spanish civilization crushed the Indian, English civilization scorned and neglected him; French civilization embraced and cherished him.” On August 28, 1632, Le Jeune wrote to the provincial of his order in France detailing his experiences. It was the josuit pete. earliest of that series of wonderful letters, known “?”* as the Jesuit Relations. These reports for forty years and more supplied the most that was known of life in the Canadian wilds to the great mass of French readers. Charlevoix speaks of the avidity with which they were read, and Parkman praises the good faith of their authors, —a Protestant recognition of good intent that their contemporary rivals in other ecclesias- tical orders did not accord. There are few allusions to these narratives in the writers of their day, though Creuxius used them in writing his account of Canada in 1664, as Chaulmer had done in his Vouveau Monde in 1659. Although the final edition of Champlain’s narratives bears the Missions. QUEBEC RESTORED. 140 ‘ ‘col ‘NIVIGNVHO Ad TONTUMVI “LS FO ATNS Boge, B7 BNO, Sy ae Coe ee ag e a dary mae sis gr 1 8) BAe boo aff it cde 3 i) cohen Hons ase ty AD. RIC ns reg mee CHAMPLAIN’S LAST BOOK. 141 date of 1682, there are some reasons to think that it was really issued the following year (1633), after Champlain had hyde returned to Quebec. This book, in which several final edition, Paris publishers seem to have been conjointly inter- ested, contains in the first part a condensation of his pre- vious publications, and in the second a continuation of his experiences from 1620 to 1631. The last year’s doings were apparently not written by Champlain himself. Indeed, it is manifest to more careful critics that the volume, including its map, failed to receive Champlain’s personal supervision, and was prepared for the press by another hand. Some have been Oc, HONDIUS, 1635. led to believe that a Jesuit father — possibly one who had been in Canada — edited the book in the interests of his own order, and issued it, notwithstanding the date on the title, after Cham- plain had departed from France in March, 1633. These critics rely upon a difference in style in what they claim are Jesuit interpolations, and they point to inaccuracies and obscurities which could not have come from one so well informed as Cham- plain. The obscuration of the Recollects, which the book shows, is something, too, in such judgments, that could not have originated with Champlain. This edition, says the mod- ern historian, Kingsford, ‘was an engine to influence opinion, so that Canada, restored to France, should be given over en- QUEBEC RESTORED. See Mer douce Defcouwertures de ce, 2 grand lac, et de toutes s fes terre dopus amecs 3 yronde rauera rg A muGfdy =A : j Ler gear de J aft aguerono oy = iif Carte de la hie eens ougmentee depuss la lernmerc,feruant a pag De fee en fon vray eo Meridien par lef" de Champlain apilane pour teRey, \ 2 en la Mee quel depurs lon s 603 sufques en-lannee < e 1629 adefcouuert plificurs cofles, terres, lacs, rusieres, et Nabons de fauuages per cy deunnt meognues,comme ul fe vort en fer relations yusl 2 fact Sraprimeren 1632. oul fe worst cette maryue P ce fort bobwatione quont fact les francow Le foule S Lous por lef “de Champlain. e: 614. 1615- wufques en fars6 SM hedpus rele. © a? ee ee ge, 2 x € ? x AAS? a eS Ah oe ae ai re wT Le oF em 2 88 289 [20° J ue [3 EL ay5 E 29 [ DOF l Z THE GREAT LAKES, CHAMPLAIN’S GREAT MAP. 143 { nee tt tiofere Dawe Wfcenfon » OE ye 7 297 [ 298 TFL ee Le eae pee see ey Pe BY CHAMPLAIN, 1632. 144 QUEBEC RESTORED. tirely to the Jesuits.” In most copies a certain passage which is thought to reflect on Richelieu, the Jesuits’ patron, is can- celed. In the large map there is perhaps some, but less reason to suspect an alien hand. We get from it the first cartographical intimation of a great lake beyond the Mer Douce. In an explanatory legend Champlain says that the Saut du Gaston, commemorating a brother of Louis XIIIL., was near two leagues in width, —it represents the present Sault Ste. Marie, — with its waters coming from a very large lake beyond; and in the map we find its western extension cut off by the margin of the sheet, —a convenient limitation to the vague know- ledge which was then current. It will be observed that we get in the stream which enters Lake Ontario at the west end the first fairly accurate location of the Niagara cata- racts. Champlain never comprehended the magnitude of these falls any more than Cartier did when he seems to have heard of them, a hundred years before. Sanson, when he published his map in 1656, represented the conception of Champlain ; but we get no particular description of the cat- aract till we find one, drawn from hearsay, however, as we shall see in Galinée’s journal, when this priest accompanied La Salle along Lake Ontario in 1669. This stream, which shows the falls near its outlet in Ontario, comes from Lake Huron through a region which with better knowledge is made the basin of Lake Erie. Very curiously, there seems to be the beginning of the Straits of Mackinaw, with its island, nearly in the proper place, while the inlet which stands for Green Bay, amid the country of the Puants, is thrown over to the northern side of Huron. Champlain’s 1632 map. Niagara. Champlain, on returning to his Canadian government, had borne with him a new commission, representing all the prestige with which Richelieu and his Hundred Associates could clothe 1698. Cham. their representative. He sailed from Dieppe on plain in March 23, 1633, and on the 23d of May the morn- Canada. . ing gun at the fort on Cape Diamond boomed a wel- come to the restored governor. The salvos stirred many an echo, but none in nature was more responsive than that in the heart of Le Jeune, when his attention was first arrested by the sound as he was stirring with the early duties of the day at JAMES’S MAP. 145 the Notre Dame des Anges. He knew that it meant a friend had come to take command in place of a Huguenot. Perhaps he did not know that in the train of the returned governor came ‘QOUdIMCT “4g oy pur Avg s,uospny Jo AymSyQU0I pesod -dns aq} pur ‘Ze-TEgT ‘saltaaoostp sty Sutmoys ‘egy ‘uopuoy ‘abnfioy abunug s,semep WO men of his own order; but it was not long before he found the Jesuit missions strengthened in the coming of Brébeuf, Massé, Daniel, and Davost. But it was in his civil rule that Champlain had most to fear. The English, thinking to improve their trade in the gulf, mani- fested a purpose to advance to Tadoussac and begin a compe- Jesuits. 146 QUEBEC RESTORED. tition with the French for the native trade. In May, 1638, fee one representatives of the Canadian tribes assembled at Indian coun- Quebec to sit with Champlain round the council fire. : The French governor urged his allies to repel the advances of the English. An Indian from Three Rivers, Capi- tanal, impressed the listening Jesuits with oratorical powers that they had not associated with the native tongue. Cham- plain in reply was allured inte picturing that good time when the French and the Indians should be one, giving and taking inmarriage. If such a consummation were possible, Champlain was aware that much must be done to hedge the little colony about, so that such feelings of mutual trust might grow. A post must be established somewhere below on the river to prevent the English coming up and the Indians going down. A fort must be built at Three Rivers, strong enough to check the raids of the Iroquois; and a light troop of three hundred French soldiers needed to be kept ready for quick movement along the river. Champlain’s letter of August 15, 1633, Richelien 4 Urging these measures upon Richelieu, produced little apathetic. effect. The self-reliant governor soon became con- vinced that he had not much more to hope from the new com- pany than he had experienced from the old. A year later, he renewed the representations, but with no better result. It is not probable that Champlain was aware of the move- ments which the English were making from the Atlantic side, or he would have been even more solicitous of succor from France. The Indians had impressed on the minds of the Eng- lish, as they had done upon the French, the same faith in a great interior basin of water. Captain Thomas Young, in 1638, sailing up the Delaware, where the Swedes were conduct- ing a lucrative fur trade, speaks of that “ Mediterranean Sea, which the Indian relateth to be four days’ journey beyond the mountain.” Young had resolved to find it. He expected first to reach a smaller lake, connected with the larger by a strait. The rapids of the Delaware checked his progress. He now desisted for the season, with the expectation of building a ves- sel above the falls during the following year. He supposed that, setting out from such new point, he would still have a voy- age of a hundred and fifty or two hundred leagues to overcome. He apparently harbored the same notion as prevailed in Can- ENGLISH AND FRENCH. 147 ada, that this intermediate lake would, when reached, disclose passages both to the North and to the South Sea, and gupposea in- in this event the conflict of rivalry could not be far ‘mr basin off. Two years later, an English edition of the great Mercator- Hondius Atlas shows this great interior water lying west of Ontario. In June, 1634, a fleet arrived at Quebec, and in it came Father Buteux and two other priests. The whole yg34 —gesu. population of Canada at this time was scarcely more “*°™* than sixty souls, and of this number only two households could be said to have fastened themselves on the soil. In fact, all results of consequence in the colony’s life could be traced to the summer traffic in furs, and development stopped with that. The neighboring English and Dutch were pursuing the same trade. Half the people in Albany lived by it. The skins came from New England as well as from the Iroquois and be- yond, and large shipments were made to Holland from Man- hattan. But there was this difference, that these people were generally becoming a product of the soil, and were rapidly in- creasing, particularly along the New England coast. There were at this time near four thousand English settled about Massachusetts Bay, and the great immigration was begun which before 1640 was to bring something like twelve thousand colo- nists to the country. The people founded a college, |, and began to build ships, and were trading in the re- Tenglish col- ‘ 7 : n ee onization. moter inlets, and bringing wheat from Virginia. The little colony of New Plymouth were supporting a trading- post on the Kennebee, close up to the divide which separated them from the French, and were maintaining it against French privateers, not always successfully. All this meant with such a people permanence and colonial growth. Though there was some wildness in contemporary opinions among the English as to the westward geography which they were slowly developing, there was not in official circles the same confident expectation of reaching by western exploration the great China Sea, which prevailed in Paris and Quebec. When, in 1635, the Plymouth Company of Devon surrendered its charter, which had carried their claim to 48° north latitude, they distinctly averred that the “sea to sea” limits of its terms were the equivalent of about 148 QUEBEC RESTORED. three thousand miles. The colonies of Maryland and Virginia, backed by the Alleghanies, were more prone to imagine a western sea not very remote beyond the darkened ridges of those mountains. Life on the St. Lawrence, with almost a generation of colo- nization behind it, was quite another thing, and Champlain was not a man to be blinded to its essential failure. With some- thing of chagrin, but with a determination to make one more 1634, Three Stride in the western march, he sent off in July, 1634, Evers: an expedition prepared to start a new settlement at Three Rivers, which in all these years since Pontgravé had dis- cerned its advantages had been left untried. He directed a fort to be built on the very site where the Iroquois had in the past destroyed a stronghold of the Algonquins, and one step more was taken on the way to Cathay. This step meant that the church should once more send still farther west its pre- cursors of civilization, and, after much persuasion, the Hurons, who had come down on one of their trafficking visits, were at Jesuits go length prevailed upon to take back with them some of TEES the Jesuit priests. “The savages much preferred men with packs and arquebuses to those in cassock and hood. The French, in bidding Brébeuf and his companions good-by, grati- fied the savage humor by a discharge of cannon. Brébeuf was not without some military fervor himself, and we soon hear of him, teaching the Hurons to build their palisades in a square with flanking towers at the angles, as better fitted than their round inclosures to give the French arquebus its best effect in helping repel an attack. Late in July, Champlain went to Three Rivers to observe the progress of the fort. It was his last journey so far west, and on August 8 he was back in Quebec. Shortly after- wards he gave a God-speed to Le Jeune, who went to assume charge of the new post, taking Father Buteux with him. They arrived at Three Rivers on September 8, and three months later found themselves in the midst of an epidemic, which put their courage to a severe test. While it was raging, Le Jeune began with his own hand a reg- ister of baptisms and deaths, which now remains the sole doc- Ewly ree © Ument transmitted to us of these old Canadian days. ane The early records of Quebec were destroyed a few August. September. CHAMPLAIN AND NICOLET. 149 years later, when the Chapel of Notre Dame de Recouvrance, which Champlain had erected to commemorate the recovery of the town from the English, was burned in 1640. The establishment of the first seigneury at Beauport marked a new stage in the progress of the French scheme of g.igneury at colonization. A seigneurial tenure to tract after Pere tract was given in the following years to any enterprising per- son who would undertake to plant settlers on the land, and accept in return a certain proportion of the grist, furs, and fish which the occupant could secure by labor. It was on July 22 that Champlain held his last council at Quebec, inviting the Hurons, who had come down the eee river with their customary constancy, to participate. plain’s tast The burden of the governor’s address to them was that if they would only worship the Frenchman’s God, they would flourish under his benignant protection and have no dif- ficulty in overcoming the Iroquois. He told them that they only needed to embrace the white man’s faith, if they would have the white man take their daughters in marriage. There was room, he said, in Quebec for a goodly number of their young children, if they would only commit them to the custody of the kind French, who would give them shelter and food in their holy houses, and be like grandparents to their tender wards. It was probably late in July, 1635, that Champlain learned of the return of Nicolet from the mission on which he had dispatched him the previous year. It will be remembered that in 1618, not long after this young Norman had arrived in the valley, Champlain had sent him among the Indians to prepare him for future service as an interpreter. Nicolet may have made an occasional visit to the settlements in all these intervening years, but there is no definite evidence of it. It seems likely that his was not a familiar face when he appeared at Three Rivers in the summer of 1638, in the train of the Algonquin traders, come thither for their summer traffic. By the next June (1634) he was ready for new labors. These many years among the Algonquins and Nipissings, suffering their perils, had quickened his senses for the hardiest tasks of the forest. Nicolet. 150 EXPLORATIONS OF NICOLET. The Canadian writer, Benjamin Sulte, has shown it to be reasonably certain that Champlain had started Nicolet at this time in the train of Brébeuf and Daniel, who left Three Rivers for their missions on July 1, 1634. Nicolet’s intention was to go far enough west to learn something more definite than had yet been acquired from the Indian stories, as Sagard tells us, of those distant western people, who had neither hair nor beards, and who journeyed in great canoes. It was the common tale that these stories had passed eastward from a distant nation who lived by water that was not fresh, and who had mi- grated to their present homes from the shores of a great sea. Such were the geographical and ethnological riddles that Nicolet was now expected to unravel. Parkman suggests that the brocaded gown which he is known to have taken with him was in reference to this hairless people who, in the prevalent opin- ion, must have been thought a race of the Asiatic Orient. Nicolet’s course lay up the Ottawa, and by Lake Nipissing to Georgian Bay, and thence to the Huron villages. Here he renewed old friendships, and secured the services of seven of the tribe for guides. Launching their canoes at the head of Georgian Bay, the party skirted the eastern and northern shores of Lake Huron, and found at last their progress checked gault ste. at Sault Ste. Marie. Nicolet was the first European Mane: who had reached this point, and, encamping on the southern bank of the passage and in the present State of Michi- gan, he opened the first communication which white men had with the ancestors of the modern Ojibways. There is no clear evidence that he pushed by land beyond the rapids, so as to get a satisfactory view of the great lake beyond. Its existence, con- jectured by Champlain, was yet to be proved by others. From the Sault, Nicolet and his companions retraced their way, and, following the shore of what is now called the northern Straitsot peninsula of Michigan, they came to the Straits of Mackinaw. Mackinaw, — that dominant position in the geography of North America, reached in just a century from the time when Cartier tried the great northern portal of the interior at the Straits of Belle Isle. Nicolet could hardly have suspected the commanding stand at which he had at last arrived. With all his surmises, he even did not know the great channel which led to it from the landfall of Cartier, for the existence of Lake STRAITS OF MACKINAW. 151 Erie was but faintly conceived; and the route by the Ottawa, with all its obstruction, was the only passage which he knew. To the south of him lay the great lake whose position Champlain had so recently misconceived in placing it to the north; and at the head of Lake Michigan and the extremity of Green Bay — shortly to be tested by Nicolet himself —lay the inviting por- tages which were in due time to conduct the French into that great valley which the English had not dared to enter over the Appalachians, nor the Spaniards to invade from the Gulf of Mexico. There was no dream yet of the great affluents of the Mississippi, which by the Missouri were to conduct the explorer to the Columbia and the Pacific, and by the Arkansas were to open a way along the Colorado to the Gulf of California. All this was shadowy in men’s minds, and the speculative geographer of the time had not yet made it clear whether the canoe which was carried over the southern portages would float to the Atlan- tic, the Mexican Gulf, or the South Sea. Nor could our adventurous explorer have divined what lay in the farther west, — that channel of the Sault, where the rapids had baulked him, leading to the long stretch of Lake Superior, which the Jesuits, who were now at Three Rivers, were yet to unfold; the devious passage to the Lake of the Woods and Lake Winnipeg, and the Indian trail which would have led him ' equally to Hudson’s Bay or along the Mackenzie River to the Arctic Ocean; and the turn off at Lake Athabasca, which would have conducted him to the northern tributaries of the Columbia. These were the possibilities to be made clear in coming years, — the route to China was to dissolve to this. From the Straits of Mackinaw Nicolet passed on to Green Bay, and proceeded to its southern extremity. Here he encoun- tered the tribe whom we know as the Winnebagoes. yinne. His damask robe and his pistols, belching fire as he ™8°* stalked to meet the savages, made them look upon him as a strange spirit. The explorer soon found that his familiarity with the Algonquin and Huron tongues availed him little, for the Winnebagoes were the first of the Dacotah stock that the white man had seen. The messages of good-will and peace which Nicolet brought to them were not rejected; and mutual professions were enforced by speech and feast. 152 EXPLORATIONS OF NICOLET. Leaving his new-found friends behind him, Nicolet pushed up the Fox River, threaded its tortuous ways, passed its frequent lakes, and reached the villages of the Mascoutins, — a tribe whose name had been familiar, by report, twenty years before, for they had a fame for daring courage which had extended far to the east. He was now among a folk of the Algonquin stock, and was better able to understand the stories which they told him of other water away towards the south, three days off. It was to be reached by ascending the Fox still higher, and then by crossing a short portage, whence he could gene descend to the “great water.” This designation, in water.” the misconception of its import, long nurtured a be- lief in some expansive sea. The story which Nicolet heard in reality prefigured the channel of the Wisconsin, flowing into the great central stream of the Mississippi valley, destined to remain a mystery for forty years yet to come. For some reason Nicolet did not attempt to make this mo- mentous passage of the low lands, which here constitute the ridge between the great valleys of North America, and it was left for Joliet and Marquette to establish the truth. We follow Nicolet in these wanderings mainly from his story, as repeated by Vimont in the Jesuit Felation, published six years later. That we find no published record till 1640 has led writers on the subject to assume that this exploit of Nicolet Dakoe must have taken place in 1639 instead of 1634. It wots, was Sulte who made the earlier date a certainty. a He published his conclusions in 1876 in a volume of miscellanies, and reinforced his argument in the Collections of the Wisconsin Historical Society in 1879. Later students have hardly questioned his conclusions, but some popular writers have been ignorant of them. We have not represented that Nicolet passed into the Wis- consin River. It is fair to say that the language as given by Vimont has sometimes been interpreted to mean that Nicolet actually did float his canoe on that tributary of the Mississippi. Instead of this, however, it seems far more certain that Nicolet Llinois ana Pushed directly south and reached the tribe of the Sioux. Illinois, where he saw something of the Sioux, who were in that neighborhood on an expedition from the country farther west. Mascoutins. DEATH OF CHAMPLAIN. 153 On his return down Green Bay, Nicolet is known to have exchanged friendly courtesies with the Pottawattamies, potrawatta- scattered along the western shores of Lake Michigan. ™*- It was probably in the early summer of 1635 that, having parted with his faithful Hurons in their villages, Nicolet joined the customary flotilla descending the Ottawa for the summer trade, and reached Three Rivers some time in July. Unfortunately, we are without any knowledge of the effect which Nicolet’s story may have had on Champlain, and we are left without any conception of the reason why such portentous events should have failed of any recognition which has come down to us, till Vimont recounted the story. It was left for Sagard to condense the narrative in his subsequent history. It may have been in recognition of his services that Nicolet received one of Champlain’s last appointments, in being made commis- sary and interpreter at Three Rivers. We soon find in the con- temporary records evidence of Nicolet’s unmistakable activity in that region. The last letter preserved to us which Champlain wrote makes no mention of the great exploit which we have just Sie baie been recording. This missive is dated Angust 15, plain’s last 1685, and in it he still tries to impress upon Richelieu the necessity of further succoring the colony. He speaks of the English as haunting the lower St. Lawrence, and professing to do so with their king’s permission. The Dutch and the Iroquois to the south still troubled him ; but thoughts of them did not harass him Jong. About the middle of October, Champlain fell under a stroke of paralysis. For two months and a half he suffered, eee and at last on Christmas Day, 1635, the end came. 25. “Cham. The intrepid governor lay dead in his own Quebee, Pee the incipient city of blasted hopes. Trade had supported it, and had stunted it. A summer of activity and a winter of inaction was its story, year in and year out. In the long and hot July days the people had found enough to do, and there was enough for their amusement in the varying procession of Huron canoes which came down the St. Lawrence and emptied the living and furry burdens on the strand beneath the cliffs for the annual traffic. The merchants sold implements and trinkets to the say- 154 DEATH OF CHAMPLAIN. ages, loaded their barks with peltry, and sailed away, to leave those who remained, despondent, listless, nursing their misfor- tunes, and too few for generous enterprises. The merchants’ ships took their factors back: to France, to a constituency which counted gains, and cared nothing for those who rendered profits possible. The dream of empire which Champlain had cherished had come to this. There was a fortress with a few small guns on the cliffs of Cape Diamond. Along the foot of the precipice was a row of unsightly and unsubstantial buildings, where the scant population lived, carried on their few handicrafts, and stored their winter’s provisions. It was a motley crowd which in the drear days sheltered itself here from the cold blasts that blew along the river channel. There was the military officer, who sought to give some color to the scene in showing as much of his brilliant garb as the cloak which shielded him from the wind would permit. The priest went from house to house with his looped hat. The lounging hunter preferred for the most part to tell his story within doors. Occasionally you could mark a stray savage, who had come to the settlement for food. Such characters as these, and the lazy laborers taking a season of rest after the summer’s traffic, would be grouped in the narrow street beneath the precipice whenever the wintry sun gave more than its usual warmth at midday. It was hardly a scene to inspire confidence in the future. It was not the beginning of empire. If one climbed the path leading to the top of the rugged slope, he could see a single cottage, that looked as if a settler had come to stay. There were cattle-sheds, and signs of thrift in its garden plot. If Champlain had had other colonists like the man who built this house and marked out this farmstead, he might have died with the hope that New France had been planted in this great valley on the basis of domestic life. The widow of this genuine settler, Hébert, still occupied the house at the time when Champlain died, and they point out to you now, in the upper town, the spot where this one early house- holder of Quebec made his little struggle to instill a proper spirit of colonization into a crowd of barterers and adventurers. From this upper level the visitor at this time might have glanced across the valley of the St. Charles to but a single other sign of CHAMPLAIN’S BURIAL. 155 permanency in the stone manor house of Robert Gifart, which had the previous year been built at Beauport. We know that the Jesuit Lalemant did the last service, and Le Jeune spoke a eulogy when they laid the dead hero away. As time rolled on, the place of his burial was forgotten, and it is not many years since the growing fame of one who has not been inaptly called the Father of Canada prompted the antiquary to search for the sacred resting-place of the dead. Theories as regards the identity of its site have been more than once advanced and abandoned within the last thirty years. It seems, after all has been said and done, that the present better judgment allows that every trace of the mortuary chapel where he was laid to rest has been swept away. It was in what is now an open square in the upper town. If Champlain’s remains were taken to another place when the chapel was de- stroyed, the act was done without any record which has been preserved. CHAPTER VIII. FROM THE DEATH OF CHAMPLAIN TO THE REORGANIZATION OF THE GOVERNMENT. 1635-1663. Wir the death of Champlain, Canada was left without a ruler, except for the supervision exercised by the governor of Three Rivers. Charles Huault de Montmagny had been appointed in Champlain’s place as early as March, 1636. It does not seem probable that the death of Champlain, at a season when the St. Lawrence was ice-bound, could have been known in Paris so early in the year. If it was not known, the superseding of Champlain must already have been determined upon, and very likely at the instigation of the Jesuits. It was June when the new governor reached Quebec. Almost immediately Le Jeune and his brotherhood felt that they had gained a sympathizing friend. Montmagny had scarcely set foot to ground before he fell prostrate at the sight of a cross. He lost no time in stand- ing godfather to a converted heathen. A neophyte had but just died, and Montmagny conspicuously walked in the funeral procession. When his piety was thus manifested, the governor turned to more worldly affairs. Quebec had become a rather pitiable home for some two hundred souls, but such as it was, it made the centre of the interest which France had in the new world. The ruler who had arrived was a far less enterprising man than the one whom these two hundred Frenchmen, barring the Jes- uits, were mourning. If Champlain had lived and continued in office, there would probably have been early occasion to chroni- cle some expedition to the west to follow out the hopes which the story of Nicolet had raised. As it was, that adventurer’s story seems hardly to have met any immediate response, and Montmagny. Arrives, 1636. MONTMAGNY AND THE JESUITS. 157 it was not till several years had passed that it found, as we have seen, a record in the chronicles of the priests. A triumph of the church might have been sooner recognized. Montmagny’s purpose was rather to consolidate the colony and render it more defensible with the scant force at his com- mand. So he strengthened the fort, and marked out an upper town on the adjacent plateau. This project was quite beyond what seemed to be necessary ; for there was very little of per- manent interest in the town among the scant population which Le JEUNE. [From an old Print.] filled the tenements along the lower strand. This population was largely made up of the fur traders, who only came and went. The priest was a steadier denizen, but he was likely to wander back and forth through the wilderness. It was his career to keep the missions in fitful, if not constant, communication with the town. The gliding nuns were barely more than birds of passage alighted on the way to heaven, and flitted from cabin to hospital. The black-robed Jesuits exercised an influence that will be viewed differently according to the measure of sympathy which 158 CANADA, 1635-1663. attaches to their devotion and dominance. These qualities in Jesuits ana that body have been held to be concomitants of hardi- Franciscans. hood and heroism, but an age less addicted to senti- mentalism, and a faith more imbued with spiritualism, are apt to diminish reputations once exalted. The exclusion of the Franciscans accounts for much that is lacking which might have made life more endurable under their balmier and strength- giving influences. It was only those that shunned the settle- ments and lost themselves in the woods, and became in some respects more skilled in wooderaft than their Indian compan- ions, who breathed the fresh air that supports reliant men, — or at least the enemies of the Jesuits thought so, when they con- templated those who fled from their priestly influence. The missions which Brébeuf and his companions had insti- tuted among the Hurons in 1634 were still the outposts of the church, and for some years we have the reports respecting them annually sent to Quebec by Lemercier. It has been reck- oned that these adventurous missionaries had gathered into what they called the fold of Christ perhaps a hundred out of the sixteen thousand souls making up the Huron communities. It was not theirs to reckon the cost against so paltry a gain. The happiness of a single soul was enough. Every attempt to preserve communications between these remote stations and the main settlement was a hazardous one. The Iroquois were a danger both seen and unseen, and their fierce ubiquity stood appallingly in the way of exploration out- side of the Huron country. In 1637, the authorities at Quebec began to gather a few fam- 1637. st, ilies of the Montagnais in a little settlement at St. Joseph's. — Joseph’s (Sillery), the better to protect them from the savage Iroquois. The trembling creatures were not safe even there, and by 1640 some nuns who had been admin- istering to the sick among them were withdrawn to Quebee for safety. The confederates were everywhere on the war-path. Letters from the remoter missions were not infre- quently intercepted by them. The black-robes in Quebec, anx- ious for the safety of their brothers afar, had frequent intervals of suspense that only good luck relieved. A report from the Huron country at this time makes men- tion of a map which the Pére Ragueneau had drawn of this 1640. MISSIONS. 159 western country, but it has unfortunately not come down to us. It might have shown in truer position than Champlain pagueneau’s had given it, the great cataract, which Vimont was ™” now calling Onguiaahra. This director of the Canadian mis- sions also forwarded to Paris a letter of Le Jeune, written in September, 1640, in which it is said that an Englishman, com- ing by the Kennebec route, accompanied by a single servant and some Abenaki Indians, had reached Quebee, in the pre- vious June, on the way to find a western sea; but that the French governor had turned him back. In the same Relation it is reported that a prisoner to the Fire or Tobacco eae: nation, coming from the southwest, had represented ietaee that a region beyond his home was so mild that corn could be planted twice a year, the last crop being gathered in December. It was such stories as these that both created and answered the yearning of the geographical sense in its uneasy moods. Every hint of a salubrious climate and a possible western way was comforting and reassuring. While the Jesuit Relations were making such stories cur- rent, they offered something much less vague in the reports, which showed that Nicolet had already reached regions which were unknown before, and that a new mission had gant ste. been established at the Sault Ste. Marie. Communi- ™"* cation with this distant station was evidently to be maintained by chance and at long intervals, if maintained at all. The priests who had accomplished this exploration in 1641 were the Fathers Raymbault and Jogues. They had da Smt started for the mission of Ste. Marie at the foot of baultand Georgian Bay, near the Huron villages. Leaving in ce June, they were in September at the rapids between Huron and Superior, where only Nicolet had preceded them. They found two thousand savages encamped there, or about ten times the number usually abiding at the Sault. Among them were the Pottawattamies, who had fled north before wandering bands of the Iroquois, and were now fraternizing with the pottawatta- Ojibways. The priests heard from them of the great mes Oiib- river and of a valorous people along its banks. This ‘~- unknown tribe, by a clipping of their full name, we know to-day under the designation of Sioux. It was while here at 160 CANADA, 1685-1663. the rapids that one of the Jesuits — Father Raymbault — passed Raymbaut away, and Vimont, in reporting the occurrence to his ae superior in Paris, said that Raymbault hoped to reach China across the wilderness, but God diverted his path to heaven ! By this time the French were beginning to perceive that the possession of the shores of Lake Erie would render the passage from Ontario to Huron safer and easier, and without the loss of time required for the route by the Ottawa. But an impend- ing Iroquois war put off the fortunate day. With the firearms which the confederates had obtained of the Dutch at Albany, — the main station of that people, for New Amsterdam had at this time little more than a score of dwellers, — they had increased both their daring and their power of offense. An appalling stroke soon came. In August (1642), twelve Huron canoes, returning from their summer traffic with the French, aes were waylaid by a band of Iroquois in ambush, and Jogues Father Jogues and some adherents, again on their way to the missions, fell into the hands of those savages. The victors with their prisoners made a circuit through the woods near the mouth of the Richelieu, to avoid the fort which the French had constructed on its banks. Their canoes were soon dashing against the stream on the way to Lake Cham- plain. South they passed, and entering the passage near where Champlain had taught the Iroquois the value of firearms thirty- three years before, the victorious party pushed out into the upper tributary lake. Father Jogues was perhaps the first of Europeans to see the untamed glories of Lake George. Blaeu’s Atlas of 1635 shows how much at fault the Dutch a2 8 were at this time as to the position of Lake Cham- egire plain; indeed, taking the English notion as expressed Geographi- in the Laconia patent, it seems almost as if before cal errors. s, . this experience of Jogues, and even afterwards, both the Dutch and the English were inclined te confound the waters on the west of Vermont with Lake Winnepesaukee in New Hampshire. At the same time they brought in their maps the Lacus Ivrocociensis too far south. This notion long pre- vailed in the Dutch maps, taking the hint doubtless from that of Champlain in 1613, and was accepted by Ogilby and other English cartographers for forty or fifty years after Jogues’s FOUNDING OF MONTREAL. 161 adventures. The map of the Mercator-Hondius Atlas in 1636 seems to indicate that a conception of this water tributary to Lake Champlain, now known as Lake George, had been derived from some source before that date, though the basin of the two lakes is placed after the prevailing misconception. We have no occasion at this point to depict that sort of martyrdom, emulating the stoical endurance of the pagan, which the Jesuit historians delight to honor, in the tortures which these captive priests experienced. The scene of this suffering is of more importance to us now, as that of the first eepaee acquaintance of the French with the southern water- watershed shed of Ontario. We have Jogues’s own account of it, both in what he wrote and in the personal testimony which he gave his countrymen, when, the next year (1643), he was rescued by the neighboring Dutch from his savage tormentors. He was sent by them to France, and returned once more, after an absence of two years, to other miseries. It was while at one of the Iroquois villages (June, 1643) that Jogues de- 1638. Seats scribed the seven hundred warriors which he found among fhe about him, and said that they had three hundred i Dutch arquebuses among them, and that their war parties were departing to the north to make havoc along the St. Lawrence. Before Jogues had returned to Quebec, a brother Jesuit, Bressani, endeavoring to open communication with the Huron mission, which had been shut off for three years, was likewise captured by one of these marauding bands of the confederates, and went through the same miserable ex- perience of torture, to be rescued in his turn by the Dutch in much the same way. In another year this Italian zealot also was facing once more the perils of a mission life. Bressani. There is a strange story to tell of the way in which a new and permanent settlement was pushed forward to an island Founding of at the mouth of the Ottawa, gaining another step in Montel: the westward occupation. To see the piety of those who were instrumental in the founding of Montreal, one needs to be in the spirit of the movement. Without such sympathy, it is not difficult to perceive its grotesqueness sooner than its religious fervor. Different persons in France, having no knowledge or inter- 162 CANADA, 1635-1663. CARTE DE LISLE DE MONTREAL ET DE SES ENVIRONS Dresfe'e far les Manuscrits du Depost des Cartes Plans et Journaux de la Marne ParN Belluligenieur et Hudrogeaphe. de laMurne, 1744 LAC DES DEUX” Sn MonraGnes te mae = = le puerre: = e tParouses Anne a a ase ¥ Nort dela, O° tun S | Pointe larg £ Vee On PRS Sault. ie Trou. % Me Gi, ALE Rye MONTREAL MONTREAL. 163 LrenSey rau bil é duadsenunitle Quebec, gf 6 WF ate wa Trani g sur Trem bles 3 UE fart Jesus Uf ‘arene hfs a ey " } ~s Eda Soult aoa tid ik Darosse due ef ¢ Salt x) “ee Suutt du Keeotet Vine \ S"Loneent te 2 ae A # YN nant TOE levi a LaMussvon- din Sault StL ais et auourdiuy ue Gua, H eiuaane. S LCHEILES oe Leenes communes de France de 2282 Toses a A 3 33. 4 Grandes Lewes de France de 2853 Towses i ¥ 1 ios tt = Dheutland Seulp AND VICINITY. 164 CANADA, 1635-1663. course with each other, behold visions of a spot in the Cana- dian wilds where they are separately impelled to found hospi- tals and establish religious orders. The Jesuit Relations had indeed told their readers something of what this spot was, where now stands the chief commercial city of Canada; but MAISONNEUVE. 4 : " ave , vol. iii. [From Sulte’s Canadiens-Frangais, vol. iii.] the story loses something of its lesson to the faithful, if each enraptured visionary knew anything of it in so obvious a way. As it happened, two of these ecstatic men met by a miracle, em- braced like old friends, and took a walk together to outline their conjoined plans. The Abbé Faillon, who tells us of it, might have walked with them, he knows so much of it all, and in this nineteenth century tells us the whole story in more than one of FOUNDING OF MONTREAL. 165 his books, with a pleasing and unquestioning faith. We read in his pages how Olier and Dauversitre, with others who were allured by the ecstasy, got what money was needed, and secured the island by a grant from the Hundred Associates. These JEANNE MANCE. (From Sulte’s Canadiens-Frangais, vol. iii.] astute fur traders, however, were careful enough in their grant to guard the perpetuity of their own rights of trade from the infringements of priest, nun, and invalid. At this juncture, Paul de Chomedy, Sieur de Maisonneuve, stepped gienr ac forward, sword in one hand and psalter in the other, M*semeure. 166 CANADA, 1635-1663. as the commanding spirit who was to govern this little colony. With equal opportuneness Mademoiselle Jeanne Mance, fit Sie governess for those of her sex, appeared at Rochelle, Mances ready to embark with this strange embryo colony. Where she was going she neither knew nor cared; she was im- pelled to do the work of the Lord, and would fain attempt it. So with this miraculously compounded company, Maisson- neuve and the lady were wafted to sea in one of the ships, while Olier and the other leaders stayed behind to make other worldly preparations. When the pioneer ship arrived at Que- bee, it was too late to ascend the river beyond, and, obliged to delay, the eager colonists did not find a ready welcome at the hands of the constituted author- ities. The soli- citude which was expressed at the dangers pictured for them in so ex- posed a situation as Montreal was evi- dently not so much the result of anxi- ety for their wel- fare, as jealousy of their movement. This ungracious- ness did not wear off during the win- ter, and Maison- neuve’s company, quartered at Sil- lery, were quite ready, when the MADAME DE LA PELTRIE. spring opened, to move up to their destined plantation. In the mean while their Madamede Supreme faith had attracted the attention of Madame loPeltrie. de la Peltrie, and she was ready to leave the Ursu- lines at Quebec and join the new-comers. In May, 1642, the flotilla of the enthusiasts reached the site THE HUNDRED ASSOCIATES. 167 of Montreal. Father Vimont welcomed them to the spot with a holy ceremonial, accepting them as a charge of the order of Jesus. So Montreal was begun on the green grass of the river-side, skirted about with a screen of the forest, just as the buds were swelling. The experiment curiously reversed ordinary ways of settle- ment. The town was not founded to invite the erection of a hospital as the ills of life demanded it, but a hospital was to be put up to invite settlers to put a town about it. It was a piece of good luck that the Iroquois let them alone for the interval while they were constructing their buildings and pali- sading their ground. The river itself proved a bitterer foe than the savage, and at one time nearly drowned them out. It was to celebrate their deliverance from this disaster that they marched out to the mountain which had attracted Cartier, and set up a cross on its summit. Montreal, thus placed and fortified, under the zealous cap- taincy of a man like Maisonneuve, proved an important post for the western progress of civilization. It was suitably situ- ated to form a base for the protection of the Ottawa route on the one hand, and on the other hand it was well planned for an advance of population by the main stream of the St. Law- rence. There was little hope for the future, however, with the Hun- dred Associates still farming out the resources of the gy. Hunared country. The piety of the religious orders was 4®:viates shocked at the company’s inertness in all that might conduce to the conversion of the heathen. Those who had the good of the colony most at heart failed to see any purpose in the Associates to increase the colony or improve its condition. Its spirit had manifested no purpose but to fill its coffers. The charter of the company had given power to establish fiefs or seigneuries, with the obligation upon those who received them to settle immigrants upon the soil. It was a gift which compelled the possessors of the grants to incur outlays and per- form duties which were variously fulfilled. Up to 1641, there had been eight seigneuries established, and we have seen how at Champlain’s death the erection of a stone manor house at Beauport had marked one of them. When mene the abolition of the company took place in Febru- ae 1642. 168 CANADA, 1635-1663. ary, 16638, there had been sixty-five such manorial grants of im- portance, beside some of little account. This all signified an . VaulduBusvon i CARTE Saut au trou , Rapides Gs du Gouvernement dy es z / MONTREAL , : ene, i) MONTREAL AND VICINITY. old-world and disjointed way of settling the country, subversive of homogeneous activity. The result was what might have been PEACE AND WAR. 169 expected, and in striking contrast to that union of sentiment among the English colonists which, at this time (1643), brought about the New England confederacy, representing in Massa- chusetts Bay alone something like twenty thousand souls, throw- ing off their bondage to the traditions of the mother land, and enacting of themselves their code of laws in a “ Body of Liberties.” Canada had seant hope in the peace with the Iroquois, which was close at hand. Couture, who had been captured with Jogues, had been adopted by the Mohawks, and had used his exertions to foster among them a spirit of amity towards the French. It so happened that a number of the Iroquois had been taken by the Algonquins, and clemency had been shown to them at the instigation of the French. This incident gave persuasiveness to Couture’s appeals, and the Mohawks ees were induced to send an embassy to Three Rivers to propose a ~~ peace. propose a peace. With much parade the emblematic belts were hung up and counted, and the hatchet was thrown away. But the peace proved delusive. Unfortunately, the Mohawks only had proposed and concluded it. If the Senecas and the other confederates refused to abide by it, there was some gain in holding the Mohawks alone to their agreement. |... , . Jogues Jogues, who had now come back from France, was bent t sent, in May, 1646, to try to hold that tribe to their pledge. In a month he was back in Quebec, but no great con- fidence resulted. In August, he was sent again, but he was waylaid in his path by a wandering band of Mohawks and led as a prisoner to their town, only to be struck down as he jypues entered a lodge, whither he had been invited to a feast. “et: 1616. Brained by a hatchet which had not been thrown very far in token of amity, a soul singularly dear to Catholic hearts passes from history. There was no longer any doubt that the Mohawks were deter- mined for war in alliance with their brothers. The confederates at this time numbered perhaps three thousand warriors, — such is Parkman’s estimate, —and_ this horde must have been much less in extent than the Huron and Algonquin could oppose to them in combination, to say no- War opens. 170 CANADA, 1635-1663. thing of what the French might add. The Iroquois superiority consisted rather in an indomitable fierceness concentrated by a union of energies. \\ i Horkelaga \% La coniaa SS o o XQ Q ° & 00) colle ie Nou. ® al rom i) poe Shy} 2 RS Marie wp ¢ sv . Golfo de 5 Lucze LX 9 oO DUDLEY’S MAP, With allies so ineffectual as the northern tribes were, the French could hardly hope for a successful issue of the war. They certainly had no force of their own to protect the country CANADA EXPOSED. 171 which they claimed to possess. Their whole line, from the St. Lawrence Gulf to Lake Huron, was particularly vul- ,, | sie nerable. The church had pushed her missionaries exposed to up the Saguenay to the nations of SANGUENAL the Porcupine and the White Fish, and if the traders of these distant tribes carried back from Tadoussac, season after season, some remnant of the priests’ instructions, the new faith was far less abiding than the fear of the Troquois, from which they did not escape even in their northernmost limits. The passing of these marauding bands was constantly break- ing the peace along the Frenchmen’s northern bounds. Canada was scarcely less endangered , along its southern flank. The English were seated along the coast of Maine, and no one yet was quite certain that, among the valleys stretching from the sea towards the St. Law- rence, there might not be a feasible approach és for an enemy. Robert Dudley, indeed, was La Gran Bala = showing at this time, in his maps, that there was a waterway to connect the Bay of Fundy 9 with the St. Lawrence. Farther west, the ap- sy > proach to Canada by Lake Champlain was a The French had not yet dared to confront ® these foes along the shores of Ontario and lea SSS. Erie, and the Canadian bushranger knew as a canecad little of these shores as Champlain had known fifteen years before. Lalemant had described the Niagara River in 1641 without even refer- ring to the great cataract; but Ragueneau in his Pelation of 1648 first mentioned it as of : Ph “ frightful height.” The French knew much more of Winnebago Lake, far more distant as 1647. it was, and their pioneers had possibly walked from the Fox to the Wisconsin, to mingle the water of the St. Lawrence valley, dripping from their leggings, with the current that reached in its flow the tropical south. The great western track still lay along the Ottawa, and among Z deadly opportunity for her inveterate enemies. go Shs 172 CANADA, 1635-1663. the friendly Hurons. While this tribe protected the route, its villages at the same time invited the Iroquois attack. It was soon to come. In 1648, a band of the confederates, chiefly Mohawks and Senecas, invaded the Huron country in the absence of The Hurons , ° . attacked, its warriors. They devastated one of their chief towns ’ and scattered its inhabitants. This was in midsum- mer. Winter came on and gave a false security, and before it was over the enemy fell upon St. Ignace (1649) and made a more dreadful havoe. Two of the most conspicuous of the black-robes were here among their neophytes. | Gabriel Lalemant, Paris- ian by birth, a professor by training, had carried into the wilderness the delicacy and air of a stu- dent. Father Brébeuf, quite the reverse in ap- pearance, a giant in frame, | brawvy and active, was fit to measure strength with | the hardiest savage whom Z| he taught. Both mission- aries summoned an almost || immeasurable courage to | bear the tortures which || they suffered amid the li) burning town. BREBEUF. The blow could not be (His bust in silver at Quebec. His skull can be seen parried, and one after one through the oval in front.] the fifteen Huron towns succumbed or were abandoned. The dispersal of the sufferers eas was complete. The Hurons were destroyed as a peo- stroyed. ple. Such as survived fled east and west, — some will vet be encountered as we follow future explorers towards the distant west ; some gathered under the protection of the French in the neighborhood of Quebec; while others purchased immu- nity from further spoliation by migrating to the Seneca country and merging themselves in the Iroquoian confederacy. DRUILLETTES AND ELIOT. 173 The Huron country never again knew the traces of this peo- ple, and only the modern archeologist, wandering between the latter-day villages of an alien race, finds in the forests the evi- dences of the former occupants. No event in Canadian history had heretofore attracted so much attention in Europe as this foreboding dispersal of the Hurons. The Relations of Ragueneau, which gave the details of this disaster, were eagerly enough sought to warrant editions in French at Lille as well as at Paris, and for European schol- ars in general there was demand for a third edition in Latin. The Canadians themselves had never before felt so distress- ingly the results which followed in the train of Champlain’s infelicitous onset at Ticonderoga half a century before. Their rulers were even ready to turn to the English for help. Four years before (1647), Winthrop of Massachusetts had made advances looking to a treaty of commerce with the powers at Quebec, prompted perhaps by the presence there of La Tour of Acadia, who had had, a few years before, some pleasant rela- tions with Boston. The English governor’s death, however, had intervened to prevent any such consummation. There was now an opportunity for even a closer alliance than trade could sug- gest, and Father Druillettes, who was serving at a mission near the sources of the rivers in Maine, was ileties sent sent (1651) down their courses to the sea, with in 2” struction to make his way to Boston for a conference. He was well received at the Puritan capital. His ambassado- rial office protected him from laws which that community had sought to level against Romanists. A Boston merchant even provided a locked chamber for Druillettes’s devotions, where he could set up his altar unobserved. Eliot, the New England apostle to the Indians, quite opened his heart the Apostle to the priest, and the two mutually and with apparent male interchange of sympathy rehearsed their experiences in a com- mon. vocation, for Eliot had been five years preaching to the Naticks, and he had now four hundred neophytes in his fold. The contrasts of this meeting of the Jesuit and the Puritan are some of the most striking in our colonial history. With kindred aims, they leaned far from each other in their repre- sentative methods. It was the kind of opposition which Doyle describes in his Puritan Colonies. “The French missionary 174 CANADA, 1635-1663. well-nigh broke with civilization; he toned down all that was spiritual in his religion and emphasized all that was sensual, till he had assimilated it to the wants of the savage. The better and worse features of Puritanism forbade a triumph won on such terms.” When, just before this (1649), Parliament ‘had established the “Society for the Propagation of the Gospel in New England,” the new organization expected to act largely through the federal commissioners of the colonies, for the min- isters and magistrates were one in their life. The story of civil and religious exertion in New France is largely one of variance. Druillettes on his part was struck both in his intercourse at His obser. boston and Plymouth — where Governor Bradford on vations. a, Friday gave him a dinner of fish—with the thrift of the New England character. He marked their numbers, which in contrast with Canada seemed prodigious to him, and saw how their population was now increasing by nature and not by immigration. He found such a people an instructive contrast to the thin settlements at a few points along the St. Lawrence. “The zeal of propagandism,” says Parkman, in commenting upon this observation of the Jesuit, “and the fur trade were the vital forces of New France. Of her feeble pop- ulation, the best part was bound to perpetual chastity, while the fur traders and those in their service rarely brought their wives to the wilderness. The fur trader, moreover, is always the worst of colonists, since the increase of population, by dimin- ishing the number of the fur-bearing animals, is adverse to his His mission interests.” Druillettes’s mission, however, failed. The fails. commissioners of the united New England colonies, to whom the appeal ultimately went, considered it bad policy to divert the Mohawk from his northern path, and to expose their own frontiers to his ferocity. Not only had the Huron villages been destroyed, but the Iro- quois had depopulated the Indian country all along the water- way from Montreal to Georgian Bay. They had rendered passage so unsafe between the rapids above Montreal and Ta- Iroquois Aoussac that the fur-trade stations from Three Rivers ae to the Saguenay were in effect abolished. The Iro- quois had pushed with more audacity than ever up the gloomy channel of the Saguenay, and had driven the upper Montagnais IROQUOIS MISSIONS. 175 back to Hudson’s Bay. Everywhere north of the St. Lawrence and Ontario, Algonquin and French alike shuddered at the name of the confederates. The missionaries had withdrawn from their outposts, and they told in the settlements of the horrible sufferings which their brothers had undergone at the Iroquois stake. ‘When commerce and the missionary spirit was at this low ebb, and the fugitive French from exposed positions had thronged into the settlements, an Iroquois embassy appeared with a proposition for peace. They further offered an invita- tion to the inactive missionaries once more to set up the cross in the villages of the confederates. This unexpected step had not been taken without some motive. The Hurons whom the Iroquois had adopted had brought among them a faith drawn from Christian teaching, which adversity had not wholly oblit- erated. Such sharers of this belief had in some degree ac- customed the proud Iroquois to the emotions which they had never succeeded in subduing by torture, and the constancy of the missionary had become to their savage mind a virtue, worth acquiring even from a foe. There was another more prudent impulse. The Iroquois had now turned their warring energies against the Eries and Sus- quehannas, so that they could no longer be the middlemen of those tribes in furnishing furs to the Dutch at Albany. They were thus cut off from the profits of such a commerce. Their only compensation lay in restoring such a trade with their northern neighbors along the St. Lawrence and beyond. The peace gave an opportunity, heretofore denied, for a recon- naissance of the southern shores of Ontario. Father Poncet, who had been one of the first of the missionaries to answer the appeal of the Iroquois, returning (1653) in the in- p,,.., clement season from the Mohawk villages, passed by 1°: trail along the lake shore and then descended the river to Mon- treal, — the first of white men it is thought to view the Thou- sand Islands of the St. Lawrence. The next year (July, 1654), Father Simon Le Moyne entered for the first time igs r¢ the Oswego River, and passed thus into the heart of Meme... the Iroquois country. During Le Moyne’s sojourn Pou among these savages, he found a Christian’s delight —as the 176 CANADA, 1635-1668. term was understood —in urging the Iroquois to further dar- ing against the Eries. In September, he was back in Mon- treal, and found his warring impulse approved, in the belief that such diplomacy would keep the confederates to their pact with the French. Iroquois constancy was hardly of such stable quality, and the Mohawks, who had kept aloof from the final agreement, felt themselves as free as ever to fall as they could on anything human along the borders of the St. Lawrence. Faith and con- fidence could not long subsist under such a fast-and-loose policy. 1650, Mo. 10 1656, the Mohawks, jealous of a movement by the payesa® — Onondagas to receive a French colony, intercepted its French. pioneers on their way thither. They feigned regret after they had done their mischief, and then went skulking down the St. Lawrence to fall unsuspected upon the poor Hurons, who were clustered at the Island of Orleans, in fancied security. The same vagabonds plundered some outlying houses of the French, near the rock of Quebec. During the few years of the Jesuits’ missions in New York, the priests had not failed to notice the departure of Iroquois Tales of the bands towards the southwest. They learned that this southwest. route took their warriors to the affluents of a stream which emptied finally into that great river of the west so often magnified in the Indian speech. It led, as they told the mis- sionaries, to a region where other white people lived, who said prayers like the black-robes, and called their flocks to mass by a bell. Did this mean the Spaniards of that indefinite region which was called Florida, and skirted the Mexican Gulf, or that other region known to other brothers of the Society of Jesus along the Gulf of California? It was the great geographical problem of the vast interior of North America. The Dutch dominie, Megapolensis, tells us that the Jesuit Le Moyne had, in his wandering among the missions, found a spring where oil flowed on the water. This has been supposed to refer to the modern Oil Creek, a tributary of the Alleghany River. This, if true, establishes the fact that the Jesuit had at this date passed the divide, and had reached a part of the great valley of the Mississippi. This brief ocewpancy of the Iroquois field by the Jesuits Oil springs. PRIEST AND TRADER. 177 served to make it apparent that these confederates held in their country one of the most striking geographical vantage-grounds on the continent. The northern incline of their ter- Geographical ritory swept its waters into the broad basin of the St. manatee a Lawrence and thelakes. Eastward, the Mohawk could bear their canoes to the Hudson and the Atlantic. Southward, the sources of the Delaware and Susquehanna rippled onward to the great bays that indented the coast at Pennsylvania and Virginia. To the southwest lay the channels that fed the Ohio and the vaster stream which gathered its waters from the Rocky Mountains and beyond Lake Superior, and glided on to the Mexican Gulf. This enormous reach of diverging waterways did much to give the Iroquois their dominance as a confederation; and it was thus perceived by the French. When later the aa Jesuits were driven out of the country, this geographic by the French. conception was well understood by Talon, the most enterprising and ambitious leader which the French in America ever knew. But the time was not come for the exploration westward along these tributaries of the Ohio. It was mainly the priest who had thus far watched the west- ering paths from the Iroquois haunts. It was the trader who was to lead by the more northern routes. “ Not a cape was turned,” says Bancroft, in speaking of these western adventures, “nor a river entered, but a Jesuit led the way.” The rhetoric is too sweeping. It was not always the Jesuit when a sho priest, and oftener than not, the trader rather than trader as the priest. What gold was at the south among the aoe Spaniards, beaver-skins were at the north among the French. The Canadian gentilhomme devoted himself to the venturesome pursuit for furs, and became a roving bushranger, followed by men with packs. The priest sought the trader’s escort, and fol- lowed as occasion provided him a seat in the canoe. Sometimes, indeed, the man with a pack and the man in a cassock were rivals in the advance, and followed the same trail; but oftener the trader was ahead. Most of the Catholic writers are fond of claiming this pioneer work for the missionaries; but the Abbé Hovland? is better informed when he allows that it was oftenest the wood-ranger who opened the track for the priest. 178 CANADA, 1635-1663. The dispersion of the Hurons affected both the priest and the trader. That portion of this afflicted people which had gone west sought the islands of Green Bay, but only to be aye surons pushed farther by their pursuers. They went on till ¥™4 they reached the Iowas of the plains. Here, in the open coun- try, they longed for the forest, and turned north to the region of the Sioux. Provoking the enmity of that tribe, they turned again south, and found temporary respite on an island in the Mississippi, below Lake Pepin. Passed by their dispersion beyond the reach of the priest, the missionaries sought the omine Regis \ciws2 ea = eM, x 10. 23M Cheba 72 Ps mw VISSCHER, 1652. distant west to find others to convert. The old country of the Hurons stripped of its population, the trader also sought the more distant west, to open his trade with other peoples. But before following new adventurers to the west, let us look at affairs as they were going on in the settlements. 1658. D’Ar- : : : genson, gov- A new governor, the Vicomte d’Argenson, had arrived ernor. a a in 1658 to enter upon a difficult task. He found the Troquois again on the alert, and he had scarce a hundred men to bear arms against them. He found the priestly orders which ruled at Montreal and Quebec by no means at peace with each 179 LAVAL. There had been a struggle between the Sulpitians and Jesuits to secure a partisan bishop, and the Jesuits had been other. Novuverirzt BRETAGNE Sa, FD up ES NG os LE = tz eS oH 4 Oueyioxiqua ” alii 2 ; D 4 LE SaGuE =: “2m dous ° LeGueme, NAY — Cacouchsendt Laval, the titular bishop of Petra, arrived in June, 1659, to assume the chief yaya) ar He entered upon his "1 Aciatocrononte Alistae - oe Couacronon® ronons ou lady ix du Fi ‘le Mer Oy vu tu Af Aictaerenon f° Squenquiore 5 4 noo the most influential with the Pope. ecclesiastical power in Canada. Under the influence of the Relations which The country which Laval would lay at his feet if he could duties in a militant spirit, and the civil rule did not wait long was hardly comprehended by Europe, except in France, and not to feel the severity of his power. everywhere there. 180 CANADA, 1635-1663. the Jesuits had annually printed in Paris, the royal cartographer ieindattese had improved upon the geography as Champlain had France, left, it. Sanson, who had been for nearly ten years : the official geographer of France, embodied in his American map of 1656 all the material which he could com- mand. His configuration of the lower lakes had entirely su- perseded the drafts of Champlain; but he had not ventured HEYLYN’S COSMOGRAPHIE, 1656-62. upon more than a vague extension of those waters farther to the west, leaving these parts to be improved in his later revi- Sanedn, sions, ten years afterwards. The Gottfried map of fa’ 1655 showed how great an advance Sanson’s better Creuxius. knowledge could accomplish in 1656 ; but such promi- CARTOGRAPHY. 181 nent cartographers among Sanson’s contemporaries as the Englishman, Heylyn, and Blaeu and Visscher of the Low Coun- tries and Germany, were apparently ignorant of what even Champlain had done. Blaeu for some years continued to make a mere lace-work of rivers stand for the great basin of the St. Lawrence. When Creuxius summarized the narratives of the Jesuits and made a map to accompany his Histoire du Ca- nada, he found that Sanson had in the main done the work for him. He still left Michigan and Superior incomplete. He was late enough (1660-1664) to have made something out of the stories of the Ohio, which Le Moyne had brought from the 2 Wye ath a “ABR ado ra Con P keneants. af ira wh éy 5, ONE] Ps st ff 4! rig ‘a fp “ge & 4 So Se 6 Siow Bee Be AS A f =~ acceler onlay poet tre: iy Y pS conta mt ranarion rlet ra we T,onageteale op a : VISSCHER, 1660 (?). Iroquois country, but he passed them all by. He even failed to recognize the divide which those who passed to Huron by the Ottawa route had made so well known. These were small faults compared with the entire absence of every development since Champlain, which Du Val in the same year rep- . . : Du Val. resented in his map. This contemporary cartographer shows how slowly the map-makers of Europe moved forward to aconception of this great northern valley. The time had come to carry still farther the western verge of the map, as Sanson and Creuxius had left it. 182 CANADA, 1635-1663. Medard Chouart, Sieur des Grosseilliers, had come as a lad to Canada, and his young manhood was passed in learning woodcraft as a trader at Lake Huron. As early as 1645, he seems to have dreamed that a route from the Great Lakes to Hudson Bay could be found. By 1658, he had 9 Grosseilliers. Quebec, >, Vos havent ~ BLAEU, 1652, 1665. married and settled down among the voyageurs who congre- gated at Three Rivers. Here, two years earlier, Pierre d’Esprit, the Sieur Radisson, had arrived, a lad when Grosseilliers had reached man’s estate. In one of Ra- disson’s expeditions the Iroquois had captured him, and had Radisson. LAKE SUPERIOR. 183 tried to hold him by adoption; but he eluded their watch, and escaped to the Dutch at Albany. Here he was sent down to Manhattan, and, going to Europe, he had returned to Three Rivers in 1654, to find that his sister had become the wife of Grosseilliers. This brought the two men into close relations. At this juncture, there were fresh stories of a great river at the west flowing to the China Sea. The Mére del’ In- | carnation says that the reports had come from distant * tribes. This was, perhaps, the earliest mention of such a river obtained from the western tribes, since Nicolet had Stories of a reported it, twenty years before. We read in the westem Relation of 1654 that it was only nine days from the country about Green Bay to the sea which separates America from China. We know that in August, 1654, two French traders went west and penetrated the country beyond Lake Mich- igan, and in August, 1656, they led back an Ojibway flotilla with a burden of furs, and reached Quebec. It has been a question who these daring Frenchmen were. Sulte con- jectures they were the two brothers-in-law from Three Rivers. They may have been of the party of thirty Frenchmen who started for Lake Superior in 1656, accompanied by the priests Garreau and Druillettes. These last were attacked on the way by Iroquois ; Garreau was killed, and the expedition failed. There is much less certainty that at about the same time, as is claimed, some Englishmen pushed west from the ,._ 4 headwaters of the J ames River in Virginia, and English passed the mountains. The story is told in Coxe’s ee Carolana as coming from a memorial presented to the Eng- lish monarch in 1699, and the exploit is ascribed to a Colonel Abraham Wood, who had been ordered to open trade with the western Indians, which he did in several successive journeys. No satisfactory confirmation of the tale has ever been pro- duced. There is no question that Grosseilliers wintered on the shores of Lake Superior in 1658- ‘59, where he had fallen in pare gupe- with some of the Sioux and had heard of the great 7" 18-69. river. He was again on the St. Lawrence in 1659, and was there joined by Radisson. A new expedition was t559 New planned, and the two started once more with an es- °*Pedition. 1656. 184 CANADA, 1635-1663. cort. They were too conspicuous a band to escape the Iroquois, and it was soon decided that the savages could be better eluded by a smaller following. So with a few Indian guides the two traders pushed on together. The narrative of their journey g 8 L_ACVS ys VPERIOR a ry 222 j a altue, x = 3 ct ¢2 49 Slee ie Se a ae H route é H = , ares hes ee FE rela. - ogy | ogee DVLCE emia ee A ee Pee Cee acute gre LACVS Une (XY uroce ys ? fa, \yiade is pw OE HVRONY MS} eo 4 “§ Se pd Can p-Eeghera andes secon” AX \ os eae = Pe 2 ; ee ee piendso tied J AOS 0 fp =o VPI = gt = ‘ 4 = rE Mh ae K pov 0 S/F, -f > “Pe - + 8 Se Feely a NLA On aby nop 0G. 208 207 ONO CREUXIUS, enables us to follow them along the southern shore of Lake Su- perior, where the pictured rocks excited their wonder. Radis- son records that he was the first Christian who had seen them. LA POINTE. 185 They went on to La Pointe, — the modern Ashland, — and here tarried awhile for their Huron guides to visit some kinsmen at the south, where we have seen those Indian wanderers had already been gathered. Hy ny ‘ i Le Z ERLE. of ONTARIVS © Jiudowee + ott Lied ae 4 0 fs . r the Pogue: plimnidia ay sp so ie gz uf 7 wa hrm DATED 1660. Where the two Frenchmen went after this is in dispute. There are those who have held that they pushed directly south from Superior, and others have contended that they returned by 186 CANADA, 1635-1663. the Sault Ste. Marie, and, passing the Straits of Mackinaw, went up Green Bay and took the route by the Fox and Wisconsin. Radisson himself says: “ We went to the great river which divides itself in two, where the Hurons had retired. The river is called the Forked because it has two branches, one towards the west, the other towards the south, which we believe runs towards Mexico.” They seem to have encountered a band of: these fugitive Hurons, who represented the river which passed Atthemis. the island where they lived to be as large as the St. sissippi. Lawrence. If the two traders reached the true Mis- sissippi, as some have conjectured, they saw it a dozen years before Joliet floated on its waters. They did not push very far in this direction, as it would ap- Lake Supe. pear, but turned north and wandered about the ex- nhs treme western end of Lake Superior, and were thus the earliest to define its western limits. Here they found them- selves among the Sioux, and heard their strange tongue. Charlevoix at a later day intimates that in their first contact with the language of this Dacotah family, the French had fan- cied they perceived a Chinese accent. They thought also that they observed in the customs of the Sioux something like the habits of the Tartars. There was a story circulating at the time, as a part of the argument to prove the close connection of Asia and the Asiatic people with the more distant American tribes, which the French reached. It was to the effect that a Jesuit, Father Grelon, after having served at a mission on Lake Huron, had later been stationed in Chinese Tartary, where he had met a woman who had belonged to his flock in Canada. The theory was that she had been sold from tribe to tribe, and so had passed on to Asia, which could only have happened, as was contended, by the two continents approaching each other nearly, somewhere in the north, or being in fact one. The result of this intercourse of Radisson and Grosseilliers ico. ar With the Indians of this remote west was that in the Three Riv- summer of 1660 they led a flotilla of sixty Lake Su- : perior canoes back to Three Rivers. The crews of the summer ships awaiting their cargoes were glad of the furs. The voyageurs lingering about the post found much interest in the stories which were told: of these remoter tribes, and of their strange tongue. GROSSEILLIERS AND RADISSON. 187 Grosseilliers, making a new outfit, started west once more in August (1660). He was accompanied by several |... 4... Frenchmen, and gave escort to an aged Jesuit mis- seilliers sionary, René Ménard. The party passed the winter with Me- among some Ottawas on the southern bounds of Lake = Superior. These Indians did not prove very tractable converts, and the missionary determined to seek a remnant of the Hurons to the south, which he had heard of as living somewhere in what is now the State of Wisconsin. Ménard started with a single servant. ‘The route was.intricate and laborious, by slug- gish streams, through tangled swamps, and it involved many portages. In crossing one of them, the aged priest lost the trail of his companions, and was never seen again. A camp kettle which he carried with him, together with his breviary and cassock, were later found in different places among the western tribes. It was never known whether he died by exposure or was killed by wandering savages. If Perrot can be correctly interpreted, Ménard and his compan- ions had already gota sight of the great river. ‘We learn from Boucher that all of the party who accom- panied Grosseilliers in 1660 to the wilderness, and grocsei who were still alive, returned in the summer of 1663 fsresparty to the settlements, with new conceptions of the geog- 1° raphy of that remote region. who dies. It was in 1660 that the earliest census of Canada was made, and this shows a total of 3,418 souls, and an appreciable part of this number had been born on the soil. The inhabitants of New England, at the same time, numbered not far from eighty thousand. The Indian element was not included in either calculation; and in Canada, taking the valley below Lake Huron, the savages had never before borne so small a proportion to those of European origin. The statement may ° possibly be exaggerated that neither along the Ottawa route, nor on the shores of Lake Huron, was there an Indian to be found; but it is certain that there could be but few. ‘To such an extent,” says Father Jocker, “the daring and resoluteness of a few thousand savages had prevailed over an qroquois enemy more than ten-fold their own numbers and not Prove wanting in warlike qualities, but incapable of combined action 188 CANADA, 1635-1662. and destitute of able leaders.” This had been accomplished by a body of Iroquois, reduced at this time to scarcely more than twelve hundred warriors, with perhaps a thousand savage asso- ciates, made by adoption their helpers and dependents. Even such a depletion of their numbers did not prevent their still in- vesting the vicinity of Montreal, and even Quebec, with their prowlers, so that for the denizens of those posts to venture be- yond support was to invite destruction. Fathers Dablon and Druillettes, ascending the Saguenay to its sources in 1660, found that beyond the Lake of St. John and along the shores of Mis- tassin, the Montagnais crouched in fear of the Iroquois. CHAPTER IX. REORGANIZED CANADA. 1663-1672. MEANWHILE, a political change had come over Canada. Mazarin had died in 1661, and Colbert, then a man goer, somewhat over forty, had been made comptroller of finance and minister of marine. He was a forceful character. He brought administrative clearness and pluck to bear on industrial and commercial problems. New France was soon to feel the influence of a controlling spirit in old France. In 1661, an old soldier, Baron Dubois d’Avaugour, had arrived at Quebec as governor. He was a brisk p»gvaugour administrator, of unceremonious habits. He was not °°" the man to stand in awe of Laval, and the two held adverse views as respects the propriety of selling liquor to gis contest the Indians. A struggle was the consequence. The Wi? taval ecclesiastic sought to coerce the governor by the terrors of ex- communication, but the soldier was not alarmed. So Laval went to Paris and succeeded in getting D’Avaugour recalled. The Sieur de Mézy was appointed in his place, — a man Sas. destined in turn to become Laval’s tormentor. The Mezy gov. ecclesiastic and his civil associate reached Quebec past September 15, 1663, and on the 18th the governor carried out the churchman’s policy by an edict against the liquor traffic. The Jesuits had righteously triumphed. D’Avaugour had in his short term of service risen to a high conception of what Canada under fitting patronage might be- come. Such a portal as the St. Lawrence, he said to Colbert, belonged to the grandest empire of the world. He urged the minister to send out soldiers. They could build forts, root out the Iroquois, he said, and then be turned into colonists. Though a hundred families — counting five hundred souls — were for- warded by the king, with the view of maintaining them a year, 190 REORGANIZED CANADA, 1663-1672. it was yet some years before the necessary military force to put the colony in security could be spared from France. Just at this time (1663), the great change in the administra- 1663. The tive control of the country took place. The Hundred Hundred _ Associates abandoned their charter, and (February 24) Associates abandon New France was restored to the crown. In April the ebarver: king created a sovereign council to administer the COLBERT. [From Sulte’s Canadiens-Frangais, vol. iii.] government of the new royal province. Quebec, which was made the capital, was then a town of 800 people, out of the 2500 which constituted the population of the colony. But a more comprehensive plan was ripening, under Colbert's instigation, and on May 24, 1664, the monarch instituted the great Company of the West, to govern “for the glory of God TRACY, COURCELLES, AND TALON. 191 and the honor of the French king” the vast range of lands in America, to which the king laid claim. This extentin- |... 40... cluded in North America all New France from Hud- pany of the son’s Bay to Virginia and Florida, embracing the spaces back of the Alleghanies preémpted in the English char- ters, and throughout which the new company was to receive the monopoly of trade for forty years. It was not long before the Canadians themselves saw that the country was not worth main- taining in the face of such a monopoly of its commerce. The company, to quiet the discontent, made concession of the trade of the Upper St. Lawrence ; but retained that of the lower parts of the river. To exercise the general control over all his American posses- sions, the king dispatched Alexander de Prouville, starquis Marquis de Tracy, to be lieutenant-general over that °° part of America possessed by France. For the more immediate control of New France he created Daniel de Rémy, Reads Sieur de Courcelles, governor, and made Jean Baptiste Courcelles Talon intendant. This last office made an associate faton ruler share in some respects the governor’s responsi- ee bility, and in others hold him in check. In the early summer of 1665, Tracy, having made a circuit by the West Indies, reached the St. Lawrence, and on June 30 he landed beneath the rock of Quebec. He was now a man of sixty-two. He brought with him some of the troops which D’Avaugour had pleaded for, a few companies of the Carignan-Saliéres regiment, and these were joined by other companies shortly afterwards. A final quota came in Septem- ber in the train of Courcelles and Talon. Beside these veterans of the Turkish and other wars, the ordinary accessions to the colony of late had been large, for at least two thousand persons had come over at the royal charge. It seemed as if a new invigoration was in store for the colony. With a force of twelve hundred veterans there was a chance that the frontiers towards the Iroquois could be defended. Within three weeks, Tracy began the erection of forts on the Richelieu, and later he forti- fied an island in Lake Champlain, where Fort St. Anne became the base in time of still other forward movements. But New France was to gain more from the intendant Talon, who had Colbert for his supporter, and his abilities as an ener- 1665. 192 REORGANIZED CANADA, 1663-1672. LAKE 8T. PIERRE AND THE SOREL RIVER, 1666. [After Sulte’s Canadiens-Frangais, vii.] WESTERN DISCOVERY. 193 getic reformer soon showed that he could, in some ways, overtop the vice-regal power of the governor. In gorgeous Gourceties state, Courcelles was supreme; he outranked the in- ™¢7™ tendant as a military leader, and was vested with powers to treat for foreign relations; but in matters of police, justice, and finance, the intendant was clothed with a power which grew strong under such vigilance as Talon bestowed. The administration of Canada had never before known so alert an eye. Everywhere the people were thrilled by the intendant’s energy. No one had had, in this wilderness, such an ambition for France, and the French lilies must go wherever man could carry them. Talon hoped that immigration would follow the symbol, and he strove to promote it. He went in his purposes further than even Colbert dared to go, and the home minister was forced to intimate to his agent that France could not be drained of its life-blood to furnish settlers for the St. Lawrence. The English had just captured New Amsterdam, and Talon fancied that French gold would tempt them to sell it. There was some- thing to the English more alluring than French gold, and that was an alliance with the Iroquois, and they succeeded easily to this inheritance from the Dutch. The vantage-ground which Nicolet had secured at the west was never fairly appreciated till Talon became intendant of Canada. He now entered upon the task of proving that ex- plorer’s prevision to be worth confirming. The intend- Page ant showed that he had a wonderful faculty of making western others work for him, and support themselves while “°"™” doing it, and he manifested this in nothing more than in his prosecution of western discovery. Margry prints various extracts from Talon’s letters, showing his determination to make French rule pervade the great interior of the continent, and we know that the Spaniards manifested not a little jealousy at Talon’s projects. They knew that he intended to awe them at the south, if only he could find a continental stream flowing to the Gulf of Mexico, with a convenient strategical point near its debouchement where he could build a fort. Talon in due time impressed upon the king the necessity of establishing posts towards the south by which the rivals of 194 REORGANIZED CANADA, 1663-1672. France could be kept from working westward. A renegade Frenchman, one Louis de Page, was at the same time striving to make the English king occupy in force the Isle 4 Coudres, just below Quebec, so as to prevent succor of the upper country by a French armament, while an English force raided the lakes and secured the country lying towards the Mississippi. Talon held that somewhere in Ontario a fortified station was necessary as the base of an advance towards Florida. The governor entered into the spirit of Talon’s purpose, and undertook in 1666, Jan. January, 1666, an armed reconnoissance of the Mo- Coureelles ix hawk country, for this tribe seemed little disposed to hawk country. respect the peace which the other confederated tribes had made with the French. Courcelles’s force increased as he passed Three Rivers, and he commanded not far from five hun- dred men when he reached Fort Thérése, well up the Richelieu. He lacked efficient guides, however, and led his force too far to the east, so that on February 20 he found himself at Schenec- tady. Here he learned that the Dutch rule on the Hudson had given place to the English. This, and the time which his mis- take had given to the Mohawks for preparation to receive him, as well as the inclemency of the weather, rendered it prudent for him to retrace his steps, and his baffled force turned to the north. The Mohawks’ escape from what might have been a heavy chastisement hardly conduced to incline them to peace, while the increased power which the French had shown convinced them that it was not to be so easy in the future as in the past to deliver a rapid blow on the St. Lawrence and then retreat. So not one of the uncertain offers of peace which the Mo- hawks made were as assuring as was expected, and Tracy resolved to deal a blow himself, before the season was over. October. Ln October he was on his way up Lake George, with New ime six hundred troops, as many Canadians, and a hundred eye Indians. No such force had been seen in Canada before. He fell upon the Mohawk villages one after another, only to find them deserted. He consequently encountered not the least resistance in his devastating march. The dispersion 166T. ‘The of the Hurons was avenged. In the spring of 1667, a eeetee Mohawk embassy came to Quebec suing for peace, and Peet there was a respite from danger for twenty years all along the St. Lawrence valley. When Tracy returned to GROSSEILLIERS. 195 France, — as he did shortly afterwards, —he could carry the comforting assurance that he had conquered a peace. It had long been a complaint of Colbert that the horrors of an [roquois war sprang largely from the habit of the settlers in pushing their cabins too far from support, in order to meet the fur trader nearer his supply. With a peace assured, the remon- strance lost its force, and the increase of the colony for the next two years shows how the field of habitation was growing constantly wider. The census which marked 3,418 j6¢¢, souls at the end of the Iroquois war (1666) two years ™* later had run up to 5,870. Cen- The peace opened new prospects, and there were chances now to solve the geographical doubts in every direction. We will look first at the one respecting the north. Twenty years before this, Ragueneau had been questioning the pyprorations northern Indians hanging about the Huron missions, ™"'" and had learned that their hunters had reached the North Sea in their quest for furs, and that it lay in a straight line towards the pole more than three hundred leagues away. In October, 1660, when Grosseilliers and Radisson had followed up a northern tributary of Lake Superior to Lake emai Nepigon, one of their party, named Peré, had dis- “"* covered beyond the divide a stream, by which it was supposed they could descend to Hudson’s Bay. Ata later day, Grosseilliers had sought to test all these conjec- tures, and during his wanderings it has been asserted, but with no definite proof, that he had actually reached James’s Bay, the southern bend of Hudson’s Bay, and found that the English, seeking a passage westward farther north, had not yet been there. Returning to Quebec with Radisson, full of enthusiasm for the opening of a new trade, if he had not discovered its exact chan- nel, Grosseilliers had proposed an expedition, by water, descend- ing the St. Lawrence and rounding the Labrador coast. There was not only no response to his enthusiasm by the managers of the company, but he was even fined for trading in the north without a license. The rebuff was enough to make him eager to seek other masters, and he went to Boston to find Gosseiniers them. Here he fell in with a Captain Zachary Gillam, ™ Bt". who was quite ready to make a hasty run in his ketch to James’s 196 REORGANIZED CANADA, 1663-1672. Bay, and Grosseilliers went (1664-65) with him. They ac- complished little more than to find the way and re- 1664-65, Sails to Hud. turn to Boston. Here they met Colonel Carr, one So's Bay LN of ~— o HUDSONS STREIGHTS) sllsua ad ert BA Qt ~~ of —_4+_ Boaffins (Davis STREIGHTS, and Bay BAFFIN’'S BA(: ) as ate in the Year1062. d s New North ae e Wales SS Dope Ldoances yh a COryere- cD “eres Buttons ‘ Bay New South — Wales Code a gia LF eAR, HUDSON’S BAY. of the royal commissioners to receive Manhattan from the Dutch, and so impressed him with the chance of a new access HUDSON BAY COMPANY. 197 to the trade for peltries that Carr wrote about it to Lord Arlington. Carr undertook to secure for the two Frenchmen — for Radisson was with Grosseilliers—a passage to England, and in August, 1665, they sailed from Boston. While |, es in London, they had the favor of an interview with 1665, from yi 5 . Boston to Prince Rupert, and this conspicuous personage and his Englana, friends combined to give the adventurers an outfit in Hason's two ships, one of which was the “ Nonsuch,” Captain Gillam, with whom they had sailed to the north from Boston two years before. It was to the New England capital that the expedition, after a successful venture at the north, re- turned, and we find Wait Winthrop, in December ed (1671), writing from Boston that Zachary Gillam” had come back “from the northwest passage with abundance of beaver.” Thence the ships sailed for England, where it be- came known that the explorers had built and equipped a fort on what they called Rupert’s River, thus making a lodgment in the country. This was success enough to give form to that great commer- cial enterprise which had a long history as the Hud- yuason Bay son Bay Company. It was soon chartered by the Copy: king, and we find the aristocratic names of Prince Rupert and others among its corporators. The future of this monopoly was hardly then divined. The secretary of the Royal Society, when he heard of a grant of vessels to Grosseilliers, wrote to Boyle just as if a northwest passage had already been discovered. There seems to have been no serious purpose in the conduct of the affairs of the company beyond the fur trade and its profits, and neither dis- covery nor the conversion of the Indians proved to have that share in its interests which was the pretense of its charter. In November, 1670, word had somehow come to Talon in Quebec that two English vessels were in Hudson’s Nov., 1670. Bay. The Montagnais at this time had been pressed aie so hard by the Iroquois that they had abandoned the 1 ships. lower Saguenay. So it happened that hunters of the Mon- tagnais had probably sought security in the direction of the northern waters. From them, through the missionaries, it is probable that the news had reached Talon. The natives of this bay region had heretofore traded with the French through the 198 REORGANIZED CANADA, 1663-1672. intermediate Ottawas, and Talon was anxious to dispense with such middlemen. He was quite sure, moreover, that the present movement of the English to divert that trade was under the instigation of Grosseilliers. The next year (1671), the intend- 1671. Senas 20t sent Father Albanel up the Saguenay to open the the Saaucee Way for a French occupation by founding a mission nay: near the bay. In the following June (1672), that priest pushed on from the upper waters of that river, and by the 28th he was on the shores of the bay. The coun- 1672, June é . 28. At Et try was now taken possession of for the French king, perhaps within sight of vessels flying the English col- ors, for the Jesuit reported seeing them. We get some account of this undertaking in Father Dablon’s elation of 1671-72. Talon at the same time informed the king that he was consider- ing a proposition to send a small bark to the bay by water; but he seems to have been no better prepared for the task then than when Grosseilliers had proposed it. It was not long before the factors of the Hudson Bay Company heard of Albanel’s doings, and the officers of the company in England were memorializing the government in the matter of encroachments, and still later La Barre took his turn in complaining to the ministry in Paris of English encroachments. Let us turn now to the explorations towards the west. The 1008. Ex, SWmer of 1665 had brought down to the settlements plorations a flotilla of canoes from Lake Superior for the annual west. trade. In August, they were to go back, and under an escort of about four hundred of these savages, a few Frenchmen, including Father Allouez, who was sent to take the place of the luckless Ménard, started on the long return journey. On Sep- tember 2, he was at the Sault Ste. Marie, and, passing into the great lake beyond, he bestowed upon it the name of Tracy, “in ai acknowledgment of the obligations we are under to ouez on . Lake Supe- that man.” Later in the same month, Allouez was at the bay where the modern town of Ashland stands, and on the principal island near the inlet, which the French called La Pointe, he founded the mission of the Holy Spirit, with a village of the Chippewas near by, and built a bark chapel for his altar. There were about eight hundred warriors in the neighbor- MARQUETTE AND DABLON. 199 hood, made up of wandering bands of the Algonquin stock, and the father lost no time in making the savages feel that the new representative of his royal master was determined to pursue their old enemy, the Iroquois, until that hated foe was either exterminated or should succumb. It was in his inter- course with these various tribes that the name of the “great water,” of which the savages had so often spoken, took form in the phonetic rendering of Allouez as “ Missipi,” in years of the his enumeration of the tribes which were said to “™ spi.” live along its banks. The priest was inclined from what he heard of that stream to suppose that it entered the Sea of Vir- ginia, as the Chesapeake and its neighboring oceanic waters were sometimes called. It was during some of his excursions hereabouts, in which he sought to find the great mass of native copper, often de- gious coun- scribed, that Allouez fell in with parties of the Sioux "™ (Nadouesiouek). They represented their country as lying to the west of Lake Superior, forty or fifty leagues towards the “ Missipi,” and as being a prairie region. The savages seemed to speak of their home as the extremity of the earth, but yet represented another people to be still farther west, while beyond the latter lay the great fetid ocean. To the north of them were other tribes, with some that eat meat raw beyond; and still farther was the North Sea, bordering a country which confined the water-shed of Hudson’s Bay. These descriptions were in due time to find their way to the public in the Jesuit Relations, and the geographers recognized in them a decided progress in the development of this great Western Mystery. In 1668, Marquette had founded a mission on the southern side of the Sault Ste. Marie, the earliest in what is : ee 1668-69. now the State of Michigan. Here he was soon joined Marquette by Dablon, and in September, 1669, Marquette was : sent to La Pointe to take the place of Allouez, who had other work to do. There had been for some time among the tribes on the Fox River, near the head of Green Bay, a few young Frenchmen seeking trade, and yielding to their unbridled passions. They were of a class now beginning to be felt, which has ooreursde passed into history as the Coureurs de bois,—alaw- > 200 REORGANIZED CANADA, 1663-1672. less gang, half trader, half explorer, wholly bent on divertise- ment, and not discouraged by misery or peril. They lived in a certain fashion, to which the missionaries themselves were not averse, as Lemercier shows when he commends the priests of his order as being savages among savages. Charlevoix tells us that while the Indian did not become French, the Frenchman became a savage. Talon speaks of these vagabonds as living as banditti, gathering furs as they could, and bringing them to Albany or Montreal to sell, just as it proved the easiest. If the intendant could have controlled them, he would have made them marry, give up trade and the wilderness, and settle down to - work. It was his attempts to do this that drove them into the woods and threw them into the English trade. Their alienation helped the English and embarrassed the French. It was left for Frontenac later to regulate what could not be suppressed. Father Allouez tells us how he was urged by the savages themselves to go among the tribes at Green Bay and influence to soberer practices a group of these men who congregated there. It was on this mission that he left La Pointe, with the further hope of making some converts among the neighboring Indians. He returned first to the Sault, and left there for his new post on November 38. Here he spent the winter, and founded 1669-70. see z 5 Allouer, an the mission of St. Francis Xavier among the Potta- wattamies. In April (1670), he ascended the Fox, and found Indians on Lake Winnebago mourning the losses they had experienced ina recent attack by the Senecas. On the Wolf River, an affluent of the Fox, he founded another mission, that of St. Mark, and for a while administered at both missions. In some of his further explorations he reached the head of the Wisconsin, and records that it led to the great river “ Messi- sipi,” six days off. The Relation of 1669-70 repeats this new story of the great river in speaking of it as more than a league wide, and flowing from the north to the south. It adds that the savages had never reached its mouth, and it was not certain whether it flowed into the Gulf of Florida or into that of California. Marquette, whom Allouez had left at La Pointe, was living Marquetteat @ Gisappointed life. He had the remnants of the Hu- 1a Pointe. rons and Ottawas about him, who had settled here to RUMORS OF THE GREAT RIVER. 201 be, as they hoped, beyond the reach of the Iroquois. Wander- ing bands of a multitude of tribes came to the post to trade with the French, and among them were parties of the Illinois, living at this time apparently to the west of the Mississippi. Bands of the Sioux, who came too, said to Marquette, as they had to his predecessor, that they lived on the banks of this same broad river. While the poor priest was pondering how he could make his way to this great water, and was picturing more fruitful fields for his labors, a feud was gathering between the Hurons and the ferocious Sioux, these Iroquois of the west, as Marquette called them. This warfare for a time interfered with a cherished scheme which Marquette had formed of going south to the Illinois, and establishing a mission among that people. He had already undertaken to acquire their tongue from some wanderers of the tribe, and from these Indians he had learned that in coming to La Pointe they had passed a great river, which flowed towards the south, but none of their tribe had ever reached its mouth. According to the stories which Marquette heard from them, there was to the south of the Illinois a people who gathered corn twice a year. The Shawnees had told them, they said, that this distant people wore glass beads, and Marquette con- jectured that this fact indicated contact with Europeans. It took thirty days to reach this other people, going south from the Illinois country. There were other stories which came to his ears, as of a river at the west flowing to a sea where large canoes under sail had been seen, and where the tide came and went. Marquette, in reasoning upon such statements, reached a dif- ferent conclusion from Allouez, in supposing that the peeves the mouth of this river must be, not on the Atlantic side, sat river, but on the Pacific, at the Gulf of California. “If I get Pacific. the canoe,” he adds, *\ which the Indians have promised to make me, I intend with another Frenchman, who can speak with these lower people in their own tongues, to navigate this stream and come in contact with these lower tribes, and so decide the question of the ultimate direction of this great river’s flow.” The reports which at this time were coming in to the Jesuit councils at Quebec, and which were embodied in their Relation of 1670-71, speak of the Mississippi, as they had now learned to call the great water, as flowing south either into the Vermilion 202 REORGANIZED CANADA, 1663-1672. Sea (California), or into that of Florida, “since what is known of great rivers in that direction is that they flow into one or the other of these seas.” ‘The Indians say,” the report goes on, “that for more than three hundred leagues from its mouth it is wider than the St. Lawrence at Quebec, and that it flows through a treeless prairie land, where the only fuel is turf or dried excrements. As it nears the sea, the woods again grow, and in this region the inhabitants seem like the French, have houses in the water, and cut trees with large knives.” This is interpreted by the writer in the [elation to mean that the peo- ple have ships and hew out planks. ‘“ All along the river from the Nadouesse [Sioux] to the south there are many tribes of different customs and tongues, and they make war on each other.” The feud with the Sioux had so extended that the Huron and Marquette Ottawa fugitives, unused to victory, moved away from Hua, La Pointe to avoid a conflict, and Marquette followed 1070-71. them. We shall see that Dollier found him at the Sault Ste. Marie, in 1670. The next year (1671), we find him among the Hurons on the north shore of the Straits of Macki- naw, where they had stopped in their flight, and here Marquette founded the mission of St. Ignace. At the same time another Anaré with PViest, Louis André, who had first joined Marquette the Ottawas. a+ Ta Pointe, settled with the Ottawas in their re- treat at the Great Manitoulin Island. The chastisement which had been given by Tracy to their inveterate enemies, and of which they had heard, seemed now to embolden the Ottawas to move toward their old country, west of Lake Huron. But before this there had been an imposing ceremonial at Nicolas Per. the Sault Ste. Marie. Among the better class of the rot, 1670. wild wanderers of the woods was one Nicolas Perrot, who had been long enough among the Indians to acquire some ascendancy over them. His countrymen had confidence in him, — another point in his favor. He was now in the full prime of physical vigor; young enough to endure and show others how to endure. He was twenty-six or thereabouts. In the summer of 1670, after he had spent a winter among the western tribes, a long line of fur-laden canoes trailed along the Ottawa route under his guidance. ENGLISH EXPLORERS. 2038 Perrot came to Quebec at a time which was opportune for Talon’s projects. The intendant had, before this, dispatched Joliet to the extreme west to seek for the mines of copper, said to lie thereabouts, but that pioneer had failed to discover them. Talon was now ready to send an official expedition of larger aims, with the certainty, as he thought, of establishing such relations with the tribes of that region as would serve, in some measure at least, to balk the English in their efforts to draw the Indian trade to stations on Hudson’s Bay. There might well have been in Talon’s mind other plans of the English which troubled him. The scheme of the rival crown in granting charters along the Atlantic seaboard during the preceding sixty years could hardly have been unknown to the French government. The charter of Virginia Virginia formulated a claim for extension “up into the land throughout from sea to sea west and northwest,” and this de- scription stretched their claim, as later discoveries had shown, over the very country which for nearly forty years the French wood-rangers and priests had been exploring. The opinion which has been since advanced, that the annulling of the Vir- ginia charter in 1624 by quo warranto was equivalent to an abandonment of this right of extension beyond the Alleghanies, was hardly in mind then, and the English Commonwealth, in 1651, certainly reaffirmed this inordinate sea-to-sea pretension. The later charters of Massachusetts and Connecticut recognized this extravagant right, though the subsequent grants to the Duke of York and Penn were in disregard of it. It has been asserted that the authorities in Virginia just at this time were giving practical expression to their alleged rights beyond the mountains in sending out expeditions to find and determine the direction of the streams of the great inland water-shed. We need not regard stories trumped up at a much later pe- riod to enforce the English claim along the Ohio, such as that which Thomas Hutchins tells of a Captain Bolt reaching the Mississippi by this route in 1670. It is to be feared that there is no weightier ground for believing that in Septem- ber, 1671, just after the French had made the cere- leged English monial at the Sault Ste. Marie, soon to be described, crerthe Alle Governor Berkeley of Virginia sent Captain Thomas ©" Batts, with a party of English and Indians, over the mountains 204 REORGANIZED CANADA, 1663-1672. to observe the course of these western currents. We shall re- vert to this story in the next chapter. Of the sufficiently accredited and far more imposing effort at continental occupation, to which in the very same year Talon was giving direction along the Great Lakes, Simon Francois aerietis Daumont, Sieur St. Lusson, had been selected the syeespe leader. He had been commissioned the previous pe year, September 3, 1670. In October, the party started. There was a small retinue, but what was vastly more important, the indispensable Perrot was of the number. When the party reached the Manitoulin Islands, St. Lusson remained there in camp for the winter. Toward spring, Perrot, who had instructions both from Courcelles and Talon, went on to the more distant regions to prepare the Indians for the scene they Perrot’s Were to witness. We get the story in good part from _ memoirs. Perrot’s own memoirs. This narrative served Charle- voix in his account of the events; but it was not given to the modern scholar till Father Tailhan edited it from the manu- script in Paris in 1864, It had been in good part used by La Potherie, and the English reader had known something of it be- fore in such parts of it as Colden included in his Five Nations. This memoir makes reference to other writings of Perrot, in- volving his knowledge of savage life and history, but no other manuscript has come down to us. It was the purpose of the authorities to have an august cere- mony at the Sault Ste. Marie in the following summer, and Perrot’s mission in going ahead was to arrange with the tribes neighboring to Green Bay that they should accompany him to the Sault in the spring (1671). He seems to have elicited a showy welcome among these tribes, where he was regaled with feasts and exhilarated with mock fights. By May, a large concourse of savages had assembled at the appointed place. There were not only those who had come with Perrot from Green Bay, but others had responded to the call of messengers sent west and north, and even from the east, they came, as far as from Lake Nipissing, — fourteen tribes in all, as their repre- sentatives were counted. St. Lusson had come, as was ex- pected, and in his train was Louis Joliet, a name already be- come conspicuous in this western exploration, as we have seen, ST. LUSSON’S PAGEANT. 205 and he had apparently been the earliest to visit Green Bay (1668) since the time of Nicolet. It was on the 14th of June that all was ready, and we may follow the felation of 1671 in describing what took place. To the top of a hill near the Sault, St. Lusson led the mot- ley throng, — soldier, priest, and savage, all in their 4671, june holiday array. We have the signatures of those who iemony at were conspicuous in the ceremonials, attached to the ‘e*™" instrument, recording their assumption of power for the French king over all the territory from the North to the South Sea, and extending to the ocean on the west. What such a range meant, not one of them knew. Among these signatures we vead the names of four Jesuits, Claude Dablon, Gabriel Druil- lettes, Claude Allouez, and Louis André. Druillettes was the most interesting of this group, both from the experience which a long life had given him, and from his knowledge of the English, whom he had known a score of years before when he had been sent to Boston to gain their alliance against the Troquois, and whose rights they were on the point of contest- ing in a regal act of possession. It devolved upon Dablon as the superior of the lake missions to bless a wooden cross which had been prepared. The dusky faces of the encircled savages, with glimmering eyes, wide with wonder, were turned from all sides towards this central group of Europeans. As the huge cross was lifted from one end and dropped into its cavity, the uncovered French chanted a hymn of the seventh century, — “Vexilla Regis proderunt Fulget crucis mysterium,” ete. This done, a plate on which was engraved the royal arms was set on a post close by the cross, while the Hxaudiat was sung and a priest offered a prayer for the king. St. Lusson then, lifting a sod and holding forth his sword, took formal possession of the soil in the name of His Most Christian Majesty. Vive le Roi was the shout of the Frenchmen in recognition of this claim of sovereignty ; and the wild Indians howled in concert. Father Dablon has preserved for us the curious speech which Allouez made to the assembled savages. Allouez was, on more than one such occasion, the preferred spokesman of his order. He was not unused to the Indian method of harangue. He told 206 REORGANIZED CANADA, 1663-1672. them that the great monarch of France fought amid his warriors until he was gory with the blood of those he had slain. The mighty king of the French did not resort to scalping to score the number of his victims, because the streams of blood which he caused to flow were a much better reckoning! There was much else of like grimness in the Jesuit’s speech. There was something fortuitously grand in the geographical The geo. conception of these Frenchmen at the Sault Ste. Marie. oariacot Lhere was hardly a spot on the continent that opened the Sault. more striking vistas of domination along such lines of transit as nature had provided here. Marquette had divined it in relation to the missionary service. ‘“ Mackinac,” he says, “is the portal of the southern tribes, as the Sault Ste. Marie is of those of the north and west, and many nations pass these gates to reach the settlements of the French.” Talon could but have an inadequate conception of what his representative had done. In making a report to the home gov- ernment of what St. Lusson had accomplished, the intendant had expressed the opinion that this officer had penetrated to a point not more than three hundred leagues from the “ extremity of the land” at the Vermilion or South Sea, and that thence one would have to sail fifteen hundred leagues to reach China and Japan. From Lake Superior as a centre, the French had reached at this time some pretty definite conclusions as to a route to Hud- son’s Bay ; but of the great tracts of the Canadian northwest with its icy sea towards the pole, and rocky barriers towards the setting sun, there was yet nothing, even in the Indian reports, to shape the ideas of its future. To the south and southwest the expectation was more definite, and it was not long before the great water of the Mississippi was to be revealed, if it had not already been glimpsed. The same Relation (1671) which had given an account of tort. Jens tHe Ceremonials under St. Lusson contained the ear- aan ot ake liest map of a completed Lake Superior, which in a few details as to missions was rectified in a part of the edition of the Relation for the next year. Parkman holds that this Jesuit map has been unduly praised for accuracy in CARTOGRAPHY. 207 comparison with other Canadian maps of that day; but it is doubtful if any better was engraved. It was certainly a sur- prising improvement upon what the leading cartographers of Europe at this time were letting pass for the geography of this region. The Dutch Montanus a year before (1670) had reached no conclusions from all that had come to his knowledge, except that there was some sort of a big sea thereabouts. After the Jesuit map was published, a German editor of Montanus, in 16738, reéngraved the Dutch map, and let it stand as before. Ogilby, though he based his English work on Mon- ypontanus, tanus in its text, seems for the whole western region °8"Y- to have advanced scarcely beyond Champlain. This English geographer had not even heard of the Ottawa route which ?e- lation after Relation had emphasized, and neither Michigan nor Superior, in even a rudimentary shape, appear in his map, showing how little recourse was had by the northern geographers of Europe to the records of the French missionaries. This neglect of opportunities is nowhere more apparent than in the map of his province of Maryland, which was made for Lord Baltimore in the very year of St. Lusson’s pageant. This was a survey by Augustine Hérman, a Bohemian engineer, who paid for a tract of land assigned to him by the lord proprietor, by this cartographical service. The map was published in London, in 1670, and in a legend upon it we read: “These mighty high and great mountains [meaning the Appalachians] are supposed to be the very middle ridge of Northern America. And, as Indians report, from the other side, westward do the rivers take their original issuing out into the west sea.” Ogilby had made of Lake Erie a mere river, — but we need now to show how quite other notions had prevailed for a year or two, of this last of the Great Lakes to be developed. When Talon wrote to Colbert, in 1670, that he had sent reso- lute people to go farther west than any one had gone before, it is supposed —and indeed it may be held to be certain — that he meant to refer to St. Lusson, as he added that one such had gone to the west and northwest. He probably also had La Salle in mind when he said that another had gone south and south- west. We get upon debatable ground at this time in trying to find out precisely what this new actor on the scene did in these Lake Erie. 208 REORGANIZED CANADA, 1663-1672. Kilstons “: i) g Sina ‘ial {ii EO i oe — LAKE SUPERIOR. LAKE SUPERIOR. 209 je das Garres SVPERIEVR ; oo ey + ‘Eschedle de sq Litas (From the Jesuit Relation, 1672.] 210 REORGANIZED CANADA, 1663-1672. years before Marquette and Joliet made their unquestioned visit to the Mississippi in 1678. ZI 38 je 32 339 320 CC ee CR eer a a PO Re Load ed hig a New vor of? OGILBY, 1670. René Robert Cavelier, of an old and rich burgher family at Rouen, is known in American history as the Sieur de la Salle, LA SALLE. 211 from an estate of his family near that Norman town. Early in life he was a Jesuit novice, or at least the evidence is suggestive, if not conclusive, that he was; and it is usually said that he left the order because of his unwilling- ness to curb his independent spirit. A defection of this sort — grant it true — would naturally deprive him of the sympathies of that order, and that it did has been sometimes in- en ferred from the studious absence of all reference to with the him and his doings in the published Relations of the Canadian Jesuits. The only direct statement that he had been connected with the Jesuits comes from Hennepin, — a dubious authority, — and some writers on Canadian history, like Kings- ford, have failed to find any corroborative evidence. His own nature hardly fitted him for the servility of the Jesuits, for he had an ardent temperament difficult to restrain, and gis char. an ambition suited better to independency than toa ** religious subjection. His enthusiasm made friends for him; but his headlong conduct sometimes lost them. Having a brother in Canada of the Sulpitian fraternity, he was led to join him. He was about twenty-three when we first find him at Montreal. It will be remembered that this town had been founded by priests of the Sulpitian order, not far from the time when La Salle was born, and that order’s incorporated seminary was now the feudal lord of a large landed property thereabouts. The Iroquois wars had operated to hinder settle- ment of their outlying lands, but now that peace had come there were eager bidders for grants of lands, and among them was the young LaSalle. From this source he received a tract a¢-montreal, of territory just at the head of the rapids above Mon- 1°" treal, admirably fitted as a station for the fur trade, as Cham- plain had pointed out over thirty years before. The spot was several miles from the thinly peopled squares of the town, sur- rounded by forests, and fit to be converted into an outpost of the settlement, and such the Sulpitian fathers expected La Salle to make it. It was apparently near the close of 1667 that he secured his land, and during the winter he began to clear it. By the end of 1668, he had ten or twelve acres under cultivation, and had begun a palisaded village. He granted land both within and without these defenses to such as could be induced La Salle. 1668. 212 REORGANIZED CANADA, 1663-1672. to become his tenants, and a large common was set aside for the public use. He began buildings for his own occupancy, evidently with the intention of leading the life of a resident seigneur, and he protected himself from over-neighborly intrusion by leaving broad unoccupied acres — more than four hundred, it is said — about his homestead, wherever this was, for there is some contro- LA SALLE. [From a copy of an old Engraving given by Gravier.] versy as to its exact position in his grant. Here he lived for a while, by no means inactively. He went on excursions towards the north, and we are told that he became satisfied there was no practicable communication to be had that way with any western sea. Heconned the Indian tongues, and gained some proficiency in such studies. La Salle, however, was too much fascinated with the visions LA SALLE. 213 of an explorer to make a good settler, and when some Senecas, in the winter of 1668-69, visited his post, he was .. .... freshly aroused by the way in which they depicted to as at his : : eo. ° . post him the course of a great river, rising in their country tell ofa and making its way to the southward for such a dis- tay the tance that it would take eight or nine months for a , canoe io follow it to the sea. The story is comprehensible to- day by combining in one the courses of the Alleghany, the Ohio, and the Mississippi, but to La Salle’s imagination it was a vision of the great waterway which had been looked for from the time of Cartier. In the turn which geographical con- ceptions respecting the interior of North America had been for some years taking, it seemed probable then that this outlet of the long river must be in the Gulf of California. It was a grateful thought that this would make it a ready channel to the South Sea, and give the French access to a route to China, quite as convenient as that of the Spaniards from Acapulco. To embark on such an enterprise as to search for this river accorded quite with La Salle’s temper; but as he had : . . . ‘ La Salle invested all he had in his seigneury, he was without the plans an necessary funds for an equipment. With the hope Gua, that he could secure countenance, and perhaps more active aid, from the authorities at Quebec, he went thither. Courcelles gave him letters patent, authorizing him to make discoveries, and commended him to the kind notice of the rulers in Virginia and Florida, if he should chance to come within their jurisdic- tions. With these credentials La Salle returned to Montreal, and began a treaty for the sale of his estate; but before it was concluded, he entered into certain contracts with those who were to accompany him, including the Sieur de la Roussilitre, who was to be the surgeon of the expedition. These contracts indi- cate that he was not at all sure what direction he should ulti- mately take, whether to the north or the south, and he evidently meant to leave himself free to profit by circumstances as they might arise, for his men bound themselves to follow him in either direction. Meanwhile, there were other considerations to enter into his plan. Dollier de Casson, a Sulpitian priest, had passed ponier ae a winter in the Nipissing country. He had a daring © habit, which had been nurtured in early life as a trooper of 214 REORGANIZED CANADA, 1663-1672. Turenne’s army, and more recently under Courcelles in his inroad into the Iroquois country. During this winter in the wilderness, Dollier had seen a slave of the Indians, whose own country was afar off towards the southwest, and he had sent the savage to Montreal. Here the fellow inspired Queylus of the Sulpitian mission with a desire to reach with his missionaries this distant land, of which its native spoke so glowingly. In the autumn of 1668, that Sulpitian had estab- lished a mission station for his order at the Bay of Quinté, on the northern verge of Lake Ontario, and he was quite in the mood of adding to the Sulpitian agencies another in this dis- tant region, some seven or eight hundred leagues away, as they understood the slave’s story. Queylus represented to Dollier that the chance of guidance thither, which this man offered, was an opportunity not to be lost in the service of the church. Dollier had agreed to the proposition, when Laval opportunely came to Montreal, and gave Dollier a letter of author- ity (May 15, 1669), and commended him to the assist- ance of the Jesuits, wherever he might encounter them. Laval recommended him to work among the Ottawas of the Missis- sippi region, using that tribal name in a generic way, and ap- plying it to all that people’s kindred, wherever they might be found. Just here it occurred to Courcelles to strengthen the chances of success by uniting La Salle’s and the Sulpitians’ La Salle and e : s Heat parties in one enterprise, and he urged upon the Sul- ’ pitians to abandon the direct western route, which they had proposed, and to follow the more southerly direction which La Salle intended. Galinée, another Sulpitian, some- what versed in surveying processes, had been joined with Dol- lier, and the two now came into Courcelles’s plan. The expe- dition thus took on a sort of double control, which did not argue well for its success. Queylus, not having great faith in La Salle’s proficiency in the native tongues, added a Dutchman to the company, who could talk in Iroquois, but who unfortu- nately had little knowledge of French. On July 6, 1669, La Salle concluded the contract for the andstart, Sale of his landed property, and on the same day the 1669, July 6. Jittle flotilla floated out into the St. Lawrence and headed upstream. The party was more than half of La Salle’s Queylus. 1669. GALINEE’S JOURNAL. 215 choosing. The twenty men which constituted it, in their seven eanoes, looked back to those who wished them God-speed with not all the assurance that sometimes emboldens doubtful enter- prises, for there was by no means a certainty that the peace with the Iroquois was stable enough to last till their intended LAVAL. [From Sulte’s Canadiens-Franguis, vi.] intercourse with those Indians was passed. Two canoes of Senecas returning to their homes led the way as guides. In following the events of the expedition, we must depend upon the journal which Galinée has left, now pre- é : 2 Galinée’s served in the great library at Paris. Of the map jouma ana which accompanies it there is a copy in the library of — Harvard College, from which the annexed sketch is made. 216 REORGANIZED CANADA, 1663-1672. The contents of this journal were first made known to American scholars by Mr. O. H. Marshall in 1874, but the full text ap- peared later in Margry’s documentary publication. 4 ss Pa ah Oe ule a : af A’ 2 SEPTEMTRION iy DB SB. whee aw te q ae : wy Sipe : 3 ‘ w § ge ee Qo RRS Ss & 4 s ty a? Be\Ve z eae si) 4 a 5 in my . * | Nie a a Pe epugire : By i © ‘ ‘2S. & WE, soa - ee A TL [From P. Duval’s Géographie Universelle. This atlas of a French Geographer Royal served to keep up the notion (1658-1682) that the Ottawa and not the Niagara conducted the waters of Lake Erie to the sea.] The object of La Salle was first to go to the Seneca villages, where he hoped to obtain guides for further progress. The canoes passed into Lake Ontario, and, following the southern pong shore, they reached Irondequoit Bay on August 26, Bi teopter 1669. On this same day, Fremin and Garnier, who were holding the Jesuit mission among the Senecas, LA SALLE ON LAKE ONTARIO. 217 left their post for Onondaga to attend a general council of the Jesuits then working in the Iroquois country. It has been sus- pected that they got word of the landing at Irondequoit and absented themselves conveniently, in order to harass the Sulpi- tians by depriving them of the means of communication with the Indians. From the landing, La Salle, Galinée, and a few others made their way to the mission, only to find that the Jes- uits, to whom the letter of Laval accredited them for kind offices, were gone. What Fremin and his companion had anticipated — if the theory of willful desertion is allowed — was soon ap- parent, for it does not appear that La Salle’s acquaintance with the Iroquois tongue was of much service, and the strangers were sadly at a loss in trying to communicate their desire to secure guides. The savages could do nothing but feast the new- comers. They after their own fashion added to the entertain- ment by putting to the torture a prisoner whom it was supposed they had captured on the bank of the very river of which La Salle was dreaming. What intelligent intercourse the French had seems to have been brought about by the aid of a servant of Fremin, whom that missionary had left behind, and through him La Salle tried to ransom the poor prisoner, as likely to be such a guide as he wanted, but he could offer no inducement equal to the joys of torturing. Through the same interpreter the French got new descriptions of a broad prairie land to the south, which stretched a long distance without trees; aiong the and they heard, as Galinée’s journal tells us, of a ones. people who lived in a warm and fertile country, hard °™* by a river which flowed so that it must run ultimately, as was thought, into the Mexican Gulf or the Vermilion Sea. Such were the reports of the yet undiscovered Ohio. The feasts, in which the visitors shared, resulted in drunken orgies, and the Frenchmen began to be alarmed at the possible dangers of inflamed passions. They had heard, moreover, that there was farther to the west a better way of finding this river. All this easily moved them to return to the lake, which they did without mishap. Once more afloat, the little flotilla moved on towards the set- ting sun. They passed the Niagara River without | entering it, and noted the sound of the distant cata- sound of ract, and Galinée’s account of it is perhaps the earli- 218 REORGANIZED CANADA, 1663-1672. est we have, except from Indian sources. They reached at last the extreme western end of Ontario, and found welcome at an Indian village. Here La Salle came in contact with a prisoner from the Shawnee tribe held by these villagers, and this man told the French that it was a six weeks’ journey from where they were to the great river, and that he could lead them there. It was contrived to make this fellow’s captors offer him as a gift, and La Salle gladly accepted him. Just at this juncture, word came from a neighboring village that two Frenchmen had arrived there from the west. We must go back a little to account for their appearance. In February, 1669, Talon, who was then in France, informed Colbert that he had brought with him from Canada a young voyageur who felt confident of finding a way from Lake Hu- ron either to the South Sea or to Hudson’s Bay, and that the man had already gone to a greater distance west than any one else, and was ready to go still farther. This was Peré, a frequent figure in these western explorations, and when Talon shortly after returned to Canada, Peré was with him. With Colbert’s countenance, the intendant was prepared to make new efforts to probe the secrets of the west. Plans were soon made, and Joliet, then at the settlements, together Joliet sent With Peré, was sent with the chief object of discovering meets the deposits of copper near Lake Superior, of which there had been many stories afloat. He was also expected to discover if there was not a way of bringing the ore to Quebec better than that by the Ottawa route, with its laborious por- tages. Colbert had not failed to make Talon understand that to discover and make merchantable at a profit such copper de- posits was of more importance than to find any passage to the South Sea, and for some time after this Talon fed the minis- terial cupidity with such stories as he could gather of huge lumps of copper lying exposed on the shores and islands of Lake Superior. It now turned out that the Frenchmen whom La Salle found to be in his vicinity were Joliet and his companion, on their return from this copper-seeking expedition. La Salle and Joliet were not long in establishing friendship, and the young explorer, who was not far from the age of La Salle, had much to say that interested the other. Joliet Peré and They meet La Salle. GALINEE AND DOLLIER. 219 told these new friends about his journey, and though, as it seemed, he was not to carry back to the intendant any extrava- gant hopes about copper, he could tell him of a new way which he had opened for the growing communications with the west. He had descended the strait which led from Huron to Erie, and had for the first time followed eastward the northern shore of that lake. Fearing if he continued to its outlet by the Niagara River that he would encounter the Iroquois, Joliet had turned up the valley of the Grand River, — an affluent on its northern shore, — and by this route had struck the shores of Ontario near its western extremity. He exhibited to La Salle a map which he had made of his route, extending in its most western limit to the land of the Pottawattamies and other more remote tribes, which the missionaries had not yet reached. This map appealed more to the Sulpitians than it did to La Salle, who was little inclined to abandon his purpose of finding a more direct south- western route. So it was resolved that the party going west should be divided, and the two divisions parted company, not without ry, gane sep- some sarcasm on Galinée’s side, who would have us be- @ai5370" lieve that La Salle’s determination to stay behind was Pl quite as much due to an illness brought on by the sight of some rattlesnakes as by any choice of route. Before separating, however, they all joined in the celebration of mass, and then the Sulpitians took the trail to the Grand River and Lake Erie, as they had learned it from Joliet. On reaching the lake shore, Dollier and his companion found a sheltered place for a winter’s sojourn, and built their Pe ae bark huts and closed in their solitary altar. The om Lake months passed quietly. They found food, and suffered — ’ nothing from intruders. They had looked during these weary weeks across the great lake, and gazed wistfully upon its limit- less waters, gentle or in turmoil as the storms came and went. ' But not an object along that southern horizon helped them to picture that distant unseen shore of the lake where, as yet, no white man had trod. It was to remain, as it proved, for many long yéars, almost unknown to the explorer, if for no other reason, because a passage following it westward is thirty leagues longer than the route which skirts the northern shore. As the spring approached, these solitary wanderers made 920 REORGANIZED CANADA, 1663-1672. ready to move on; but before departing they raised a cross and formally took possession of the country in the name of and take . . : ppeeesioniat the French king. The instrument which they sub- scribed is still preserved, and is printed by Margry. This ceremony over, they bade adieu to what had been to them on the whole a fortunate retreat, and, packing their altar service and munitions in their canoes, they paddled to the west, facing the balmy air of the spring. This was on March 26. But a mishap overtook them. One night, landing for their rest, they failed to secure their canoes properly, and, the wind rising while they slept, one of their boats was washed out into the lake, and disappeared. It contained their religious symbols and their store of powder. The dilemma of being in the wilderness without sacred vessels and with no defense was enough to make it apparent that they must abandon their pur- pose of establishing missions, and seek to return as best they could. The obvious course was to make their way to one of the western posts and seek an escort of the annual flotilla down the lakes. If Joliet had been the first white man to pass the Detroit River, going east, Dollier and his companion, taking that track im a reverse way, were the earliest to paddle by the same river from Erie to Huron. They now passed to the Sault Ste. Marie, and reached its mission in May, 1670. Here they found two priests, Dablon and Marquette, in a palisaded inclosure, with a chapel within. These missionaries had started a garden close at hand, and were thus the earliest to begin to develop the agricultural resources of that region. Laval’s commendations of the new-comers to the Jesuits seemed likely to produce no better welcome here than in the Seneca country, and the Sul- pitians hardly cared to tarry in order to make larger trial of their hosts’ hospitality. So, securing a French guide, they did not wait for the annual flotilla, but followed at once the Ot- tawa route, and by June 18 they were again in Montreal. Galinée took this first respite from his labors to prepare a plot of the region which he and Dollier had traversed. It is the earliest map which has come down to us of the upper lakes, constructed a year before St. Lusson, as we have seen, made his ceremonial at the Sault. One of the marked features of this Galinée map is a sketch of the northern shores of Lake 1670. 221 GALINEE’S MAP. MICHIGANE Ow MER DOUCE des HURQNS [Huron ond Miichivan Comp ined] G alinee’s DTA (O [G49 222 REORGANIZED CANADA, 1663-1672. Erie, never before comprehended, and henceforward the narrow river of Champlain was to give place to something like an ade- quate conception of this last of the Great Lakes to be mapped. It is somewhat surprising to find an entire absence of the Straits of Mackinaw, and apparently Michigan and Huron are made one expanse. It is also clear that Galinée had not yet surmised what the Jesuit map of Lake Superior was so soon to make clear, that the great water beyond the Sault Ste. Marie was larger than the Mer Douce, on the hither side of that strait. Dablon and Marquette, during the stay of Dollier and Galinée at the Sault, had apparently been reticent as to what had been done towards developing the outline of the larger lake. This map of Galinée is supposed to be the one to which reference is made in the felation of 1670-71, as showing the missions among the Ottawas, where it is described as “‘ very curious and very exact, inasmuch as they have set down nothing but what these two fathers, who made the journey, had seen.” We need now to try to discover what was done by La LaSales alle after he parted with the Sulpitians, and after movements. he had had his interview with Joliet at the western end of Ontario. It is not quite certain that his particular com- panions stood by him in what subsequently happened, and some of them at least are supposed by Faillon to have deserted La Salle, returning to Montreal, perhaps, with Joliet. It is not easy to account for the lack of definite information as to the way in which La Salle, with what following he kept, now turned, unless it be supposed that his maps and journals for the next two years have never come to the knowledge of those who could use them in making a record of his movements. There are somewhat vague statements as to such papers being in ex- istence about the middle of the last century ; but the tale is shrouded with doubt. Indeed, every statement which we have about La Salle’s wanderings at this time is open to suspicion. Perrot says that he met La Salle on the Ottawa in 1670; but there is nothing known to corroborate such an assertion, and it seems improbable. What purports to be a record of talks, which La Salle later made at Paris, in 1678, re- ferring to this obscure period of his life, is found in a Histoire de Monsieur La Salle, which Margry prints. Who La Salle’s 1670. LA SALLE’S ROUTE. 223 interlocutor was is not known, and this and other doubtful as- pects of the paper have caused divided opinions as to its trust- worthiness, and there is strong tendency among careful inves- tigators to give it scant credence. Margry, who does not waver in his trust in the document, used it, to his own satisfaction at least, in presenting ites a claim for La Salle to have found the Ohio in 1670, Sey reaching the Mississippi by it, and in 1671 to have the Miseis- gone by Lake Michigan to the Chicago portage, and si so to have reached the “ great water” once more by the channel of the Illinois. This, if true, places to La Salle’s credit the discovery of both the Ohio and the Mississippi. It is note- worthy that this claim for La Salle, a Norman, has found its chief supporters in Margry and Gravier, both natives of the same part of France. Some other writers, like Butterfield, have given it a qualified adhesion. It has not, however, been accepted by most of those entitled to be heard, and indeed Margry’s reputation has been pretty severely handled Margry’s in general by those who have tracked his historical °° methods. Suspicion has more than once arisen both as to his honesty and official fidelity as a keeper of records held for the public advantage. Eminent assailants like Major and Shea have not been tender in their blows. This Histoire makes La Salle leave the spot where he parted with Dollier, and return to the Iroquois country, and pass thence south by Onondaga. It is not easy to discover what water route through the wilderness could have taken him by Onondaga, and various conjectures have been advanced to open a probable way for him. Denonville, at a later day, posts says that La Salle had been at Niagara in 1668, and 7°... this has been supposed to refer to his passage by the °us portage of the great cataract at this time. There is also the route which we may conjecture he took by French Creek, and that by Chautauqua Lake, both known later to the French; or possibly, as Gravier holds, he may have gone up the river from where Cleveland now stands, and so reached the Muskingum River, —any of which would ultimately have led him to the Ohio. The truth, it is to be feared, is likely forever to elude search. The document to which we have referred states in addition 224 REORGANIZED CANADA, 1663-1672. that at the farthest point which La Salle reached, his men de- serted him, and left him to wend his way back alone. Where was this point of desertion? Margry contended for a while that La Salle had reached the Mississippi when he was thus for- saken. Parkman thinks, for various reasons, that it might have been at the rapids of the Ohio opposite the modern Louisville, but it is difficult to suppose the descriptions of the Histoire could apply to those rapids, or that he could have viewed the country below them as the morass which that narrator declares it to be. The account says of the descent of the water, ‘Ou elle tombe de fort haut dans de vastes ma- rais.” This presents two difficulties in view of the conditions, as now understood. The fall at Louisville is only twenty-seven feet in two and a half miles, and those who would reconcile the statement prefer to render “de fort haut” by “after a long course.” As to the vast marshes, it has been suggested that a high state of the river may have produced “ drowned lands.” In Marcel’s additions to Harrisse’s Cartography of New France, General J. 8. Clark — one of the most assiduous of our students in this field —is quoted as believing that La Salle’s course was in the first instance by Lake Michigan and the portage to the Wabash, which La Salle called the Ohio, and that the falls which stopped him were those of the Wabash at Logansport, while in 1671-72 he went by the Chicago port- age to the Illinois, descending it to Peoria, still calling it the Ohio. In what is known as Joliet’s larger map, made four years after- wards (1674), there was originally no Ohio River laid down ; but a later hand has apparently sketched its course, and marked it as the river “ by which the Sieur La Salle had gone to Mex- ico.” This addition, if authentic, would confirm La Salle’s dis- covery of the Ohio, but would not settle the extent of his trav- ersing it. But the alteration in the Joliet map is awkward, and General Clark is not alone in supposing that the change was fraudulent, in order to make good the claim for La Salle. Stopped by falls. Since 1862, when Margry first formulated the claim for La Salle, he has found some supporters and more detractors. Under the pressure of adverse criticism, Margry has ceased of late years to claim that La Salle reached the Mississippi by the MARGRY AND LA SALLE. 225 Ohio, but is content to assert that he did nothing more than to follow the latter stream for some distance. That La Salle reached the Ohio and pursued it for a while is conceded by Parkman and others, and it is contended that La Salle’s later memorial to Frontenac (1677) carries a certain confirmation of the claim. Dr. Shea’s latest judgment left the question thus: “La Salle by way of Lake Erie reached the Illinois or some other affluent of the Mississippi, but made no report and made no claim, having failed to reach the main river.” This decision of the learned author of The Catho- lic Church in Colonial Days puts the conclusion very fairly. F = # GupeRIEUR © LR ¥ > ay 2\ Wee ow “) oe to & 4 \ PUAN € A frm” oy. 38 =a pe S zt RIE Meonsing " y~ & “a . wv . LA COLBERTIE a J : v py) . ies a yy [Lac verre] — Ri NNGe Spree a Cae pour anes SAS < exigue If Margry has wavered in his position as respects the Ohio route of La Salle, he has persistently contended for La “ Salle’s passage to the Illinois by the Chicago River, makes La and thence to the Mississippi. That he reached the scend the head of Lake Michigan is not unlikely, but it may be a question whether it was the Chicago or St. Joseph River which he entered; and it is still more debatable whether he reached by either route the Mississippi itself. Margry claims that he did, and that he descended it to latitude 86°, which was far enough to satisfy him that its course thence was south to the Gulf of Mexico, and not southwest to the Gulf of Cali- fornia. 226 REORGANIZED CANADA, 1663-1672. There are some embarrassing facts for Margry and his ad- herents to surmount in any endeavor to put La Salle before Marquette as the actual discoverer of the Mississippi. It was notorious at the time when this Histoire purports to have been es Pai o t Ye Lac aas Jilinors JOLIET’S written (1678), that Marquette had first reached the great river in 1673, and in the intervening years there had been no denial of the fact. If this paper: produced by Margry is genuine, it is strange that La Salle’s brother and other kindred, when making, after La Salle’s death, a memorial to the king for com- JOLIET’S MAP. 227 pensation on account of their kinsman’s services, do not men- tion any such expedition of 1671. The inference is hardly to be avoided, either that the ques- tionable document has deceived Margry, or that he knows more Fdes Ovl2o2acs. SMALLER MAP. of its history than he cares to disclose. It is unfortunate tliat there is any suspicion attached to any paper in the important collection of documents which the United States government has assisted M. Margry to publish. 228 REORGANIZED CANADA, 1663-1672. That La Salle’s projects had failed of fruition in the opin- ion of those who knew the man at Montreal seems to be indi- cated by the mocking name of La Chine, which they were in- duced to apply to the estate he had parted with, in derision of his abortive attempt to find his way to China. CHAPTER X. THE MISSISSIPPI REACHED. 1673. THERE have been opinions at times entertained, but upon no recognized authority, that the Jesuit fathers, Deguerre in 1652, Drocoux in 1657, Allouez in 1668, and Pinet in 1670, as well as a priest of the seminary of Quebec, Augustine p,.1, a. Meulan de Circe, also in 1670, had visited the Illinois leeed visits and the Mississippi previous to the expedition of Jo- iP? liet and Marquette. The late Dr. Shea, who was for many years an ardent student of everything connected with the fame of Marquette, long ago, in the Collections of the Wisconsin Historical Society (vol. iii.), set such stories at rest. They apparently originated in the confused brain of a comparatively recent and irresponsible chronicler of Catholic missions in the west. There is also a story (referred to in the preceding chapter) of some explorers going from Virginia beyond the anesedex- Appalachians, in 1671, sent by Governor Berkeley, Plortions under the direction of General Wood, “for the find- 8 1671. ing out the ebbing and flowing of the water on the other side of the mountains, in order to the discovery of the South Sea.” This account is in a diary, beginning September 1, 1671, which was first printed in the Vew York Colonial Documents (vol. iii.). It was originally sent to the Royal Society in London, and read before it in August, 1688. The explorers reached their most westerly point on September 17, where they marked some trees with the king’s name. From an eminence they then saw “a glimmering light as from water,” which they supposed to be a great bay. A certain Mohican Indian informed them of avery large number of Indians living thereabouts upon a great water. Mr. Clayton, who communicated this journal to 230 THE MISSISSIPPI REACHED, 1673. the Royal Society, said in a letter dated August 17, 1688, that Colonel Byrd declared the glimmer seen by the explorers not to be a bay with ebb and flow, but a lake then (1688) possessed by the French, who had “ seated themselves in the back of Vir- ginia,” where there were several large lakes “ betwixt that and Canada.” John Mitchell, the later geographer of the conti- nent, in some remarks on this story in 1755, made no doubt of its truth, saying that it had already been mentioned, but with less distinctness, by Robert Beverly in his History of Virginia, and that the water seen was probably Wood River, as it was later called, or the Great Kenawha, as it is now named. This same journal records that initials were found cut on trees; and it is assumed that these traces were left by earlier explorers, who had been sent out by the same General or Colo- nel Wood, as early as 1654, and that their visits were contin- ued till 1664. It is fair to say that the whole story has no suf- ficient attestation, and is open to a suspicion that the incidents were simply intended to give color to English claims beyond the mountains, of earlier date than the French. It was used certainly for this purpose in tracts by the English at the time of the treaty of 1763. Mitchell also adds in much the same spirit that a party of Atleged ex. New Englanders in 1678 coursed down the Ohio, and Kovine crossed the Mississippi; but he produces no proofs, Jand, 1878, though he asserts that it was the fruit of such exploit which sent La Salle to the Ohio in 1680, certain Indian guides of the English party having later gone to Canada, and accom- panied the French explorer. Somehow he ignores the explo- rations of La Salle in 1669, which he might well never have heard of. We have seen that there is the best of reasons for believing that Nicolet had at least heard of the Mississippi as early as 1634, and that it is not unlikely that Grosseilliers, in 1659, had come in contact with the stream in its upper courses. Parkman seems to credit a map which does not indeed show , the Mississippi, but gives the Ohio to a point a little below Louisville, that stream bearing the legend, “ By which La Salle descended.” This historian considers the map to have been made before the voyage of Joliet, and that a small section of the upper waters of the Illinois which it shows stands for the exploration which La Salle made of them, in the year following TALON AND DISCOVERY. 231 his visit to the Ohio. This would place the map, if Parkman is right, early in 1673. There is a legend on it, which shows that the maker of it believed the Mississippi to flow into the Mexi- can gulf. Parkman’s conclusion as to such priority is disputed, however, by Shea, who claims that a similar map found in the Paris archives was drawn by Joliet himself, after his own ex- ploration. His inference consequently is that La Salle’s exploits were simply added at a later day. This objection has not in- duced Parkman to change his views, as they are repeated in his revised edition. We come to more certain ground when we reach the indubi- table expedition of 1673. There was no cavil heard when the State of Wisconsin placed, in 1885, in the capitol at Washing- ton, a statue of Marquette, as the first explorer of that affluent of the Mississippi which gives a name to the State. Talon had determined to signalize his administration before it closed by the settlement of two geographical ques- paton ana tions. He had sent, as we have seen, Father Albanel, ‘very: in August, 1671, to find an easy route north by the Saguenay. On September 17, the priest and his party had reached Lake St. John, and there the Indians told them of Atbanel two English ships trading in Hudson’s Bay. When cde the spring opened, the explorers pushed on, and soon found an English trading-house on the shores of the bay. Avoiding con- tact, they erected the usual pillar of possession. Charlevoix tells us that it was the chief ambition of the in- tendant to solve the problem of the great western river, and this was Talon’s second geographical problem. In jon arlene June, 1672, Colbert had written to the intendant that there was no more important movement to be started, after all efforts had been made to insure the increase of the colony, than to make it certain that this great river of the west flowed into the Gulf of California, so that a passage could be opened to the South Sea. At the same time, this French minister was sending threatening messages to’ Spain, that the French flag in the Gulf of Mexico could not be disregarded without hazard, as if there might yet be a conflict over the mouth of this same river, should it prove to flow more directly south. The English, as yet, were hardly observant of this ambitious aim of the French, and, as 232 THE MISSISSIPPI REACHED, 1678. Colden tells us, they accounted the pushing energy which car- ried the Canadians so far west as only the yearning for more productive soils than Canada had been found to possess. While the urgency of Colbert and the hopes of Talon were thus plan- ning for the future, Father Dablon returned from the upper lakes and rehearsed his glowing descriptions, and they were not without effect in giving shape to the skirring notions of the hour. But there was a new and vigorous spirit just come to the Pin ripening task. Louis de Buade, Comte de Frontenac, governor, had been appointed governor in April, 1672, even before Colbert was sending to Talon his renewed in- structions about western explorations. Frontenac did not arrive till the autumn, and Talon soon discovered that he was not a man to his liking, and had time to transmit his adverse criticism Res before the government named a new intendant, and recalled. = Talon was recalled. Talon was not alone in feeling the dislike which Frontenac soon succeeded in evoking on all hands. The new governor was too marked a character every way to Frontenac’s make things easy. He was now fifty-two years old, character. and a successful life as a soldier with honorable wounds made him imperious. His blood was good, with a strong dash in it of Basque virility. His estate was ruined, and he had made an unfortunate marriage. If he could not endure his wife, she never ceased to have a certain pride in him. He by no means gave her the exclusive effects of his prejudices. If thwarted he grew red and chafed, and he made, if he did not find, opportunities for his anger. His will was headstrong. His habits of life were extravagant; so he had sometimes little scruple about using his position to make money. He was consequently continually confronted with disagreeable allega- tions against his official conduct. He knew how to meet them unblushingly. His language could be at times as full of acerb- ity as his heart was, when fe was aroused; and his conduct had a vindictiveness by which passion sometimes usurped the rights of foresight. Yet he had his merits, and he served New France as hardly another could at a trying time. He was vigorous, robust, hardy, and when necessary he could draw himself up in grandeur. FRONTENAC AND EXPLORATION. 233 He was too liberal in his Catholicism to please the ascetics, but whether this was because he was impelled by wider sympathies, or because he saw some gain in it, may be questioned. He cer- tainly hated the Jesuits, and they bore no love towards him. He was like Talon in one respect, —he would have packed the fathers off to France summarily, if he had dared to do it. The last of their Relations which was printed announced gy gesuit Frontenac’s arrival in Canada, and that the publica- eee tion of these annals then ceased has been charged "i" upon his influence. His quarrels with the governor of Montreal and with the Sulpitians were quite as violent as his hate of the Jesuits, and it was only towards the Recollects that he was tolerant, and that perhaps for the reason that he could play them off conveniently against the Jesuits. This enmity of the Jesuits he never quieted, and it played a fateful part in his sus- taining the ambition of La Salle. He could be an Indian with the Indians, and the priests never forgave him when he divided with them a control of the savage nature, and welcomed native children into his household. Frontenac began his administration with an act that drew upon him the reproof of his king. He held a convocation of the three estates, the clergy, the nobles, and the commons, and sought to mete out their powers in a community of government. The king was prompt to disapprove, and the whole machinery of the government, under royal coercion, fell back into the old ruts. Never was there a more fatal infraction of the rule that colonies, to succeed, need to be let alone. The new life of a colony can only become virile by self-reliance and self-asser- tion. That ancient policy, always lurking in church if not in state, has successfully cultivated respect for absolutism in French-speaking Canada even to the present moment. The site of Quebec had impressed the new governor, as he approached it for the first time, as fit to be the lordly seat of an empire of courageous men. He found he must make the colony under his master’s wand one of subservient subjects. The rebuff turned his thoughts from the scenes around tine io him to distant fields, and he set his heart on the success So of exploration. Talon already, before the arrival of Frontenac, had selected Joliet for the new task, — a choice which Frontenac confirmed. 234 THE MISSISSIPPI REACHED, 1678. This leader was now a little less than thirty years old. He was ree a Canadian by birth, a son of a wagon-maker. He character. had been educated under Jesuit influences. A passion for trade had led him into a roving life, and we have seen that the government had selected him a few years before to discover a new route to Lake Superior. In this work he had proved in- telligent and useful. His whole career showed that he could be faithful to his charge, without evincing in any way exceptional powers of command. Frontenac, after Joliet had started on his mission, wrote to Colbert that the man had had great experience, Hisaimsin @0d that he promised to find the Mississippi by way discovery. of Green Bay, and that he would probably make it clear that its outlet was in the Gulf of California. Dablon at the same time, in reporting to his superior in Paris, counted upon the expedition opening a way to China and Japan. La Salle was absent at this period on his somewhat obscure LaSale’s errand in the direction of Lake Michigan. It has been doings. claimed that he had traversed the Chicago portage, and had coursed the upper affluent of the Illinois, if he had not actually, as Margry would have us believe, descended to the Mississippi itself. As he did not return to Montreal till Sep- tember, 1672, and as Joliet had left a month before, the latter could not have known anything of La Salle’s efforts, unless se ee 8 they had met on the way, and of this there is no geet ae record. Joliet, by December 8, had reached Mackinac (Michillimackinac, as it was then invariably called), and here he passed the rest of the winter in preparing for the undertaking and deriving what information he could from the Indians who hung about that post. He found in the priest Marquette, who kept the mission there, a prompt and natural sympathy. This Jesuit was eight years the senior of his companion, and had come of a good family in the north of France. He had at this time been two years minister- ing to the vagabond Hurons, who were still trying to keep to- gether under all sorts of adverse circumstances. For five years before he began his work among this tribe, he had had divers experiences at other missions. While at St. Esprit, he had come in contact with wandering bands of the Illinois, and he continued ever after to harbor the hope that he might at some time find a way to settle among them, as they had expressed a wish to have Marquette. MACKINAC. ° 235 him. Joliet’s project therefore appealed strongly to the Jesuit’s inclination, as the intended route must lead to the Illinois coun- OTT TTT SSS 1 SS) LC Isle: du bs, £ . lage des B; cons BT der ipiites Cc Vilage lesions D.C ams der Sausage MACKINAGC, 1688. (From La Hontan’s Nouveaux Voyages.) try, of which so much had been heard in pleasant contrast to the deadly heat and forbidding monsters that this people insisted 236 THE MISSISSIPPI REACHED, 1678. on apportioning to the lower country beyond them. Dr. Shea holds that there are reasons for believing that before Joliet left the settlements, Laval had picked out Marquette for the ex- plorer’s companion ; but the evidence is not clear. That Mar- quette did decide to join Joliet seems to imply that some higher authority had permitted his leaving his post at Mackinac. Marquette’s own assertion to that effect is explicit enough ; but any conclusion must certainly leave Joliet as the recognized official head of the expedition. During the winter, the two drew from the Indians informa- tion enough to enable them to map out their route prospec- tively, but this map is not preserved, unless indeed we have it in some one of the several maps ascribed to Joliet, which are known. All these maps have usually been placed after his ex- perience of 1678. It was not till May 17, 1678, that the party set out in two 1673, May, canoes, — Joliet, Marquette, and five companions. It Musuette Was nearly forty years since Nicolet had started on nian, the same course, and had been the first to enter what is now known as Green Bay. Late in 1669, Allouez had opened a mission on its west shore, in the midst of a motley population of Indians, a strange mixture of the three great stocks of the Dacotahs, the Huron-Iroquois, and the Algon- quins. This “ Grand Baye,” perverted by the later English to Green eee Bay, was not inviting in the name it then bore, for from Baye des the earliest knowledge which the French had had of it, they had in the Baye des Puans associated it with what to an inland Indian was an odor far from agreeable, that of the salt sea. In a then recent elation of the Jesuits, the writer had thought to account for the appellation through the fetid effluvia from the marshes which bordered the bay in some parts. Marquette says he hunted for salt springs, to see if their existence could have suggested the name; but he could find none, and came to the conclusion that the name was given be- cause of the slime and mud “ constantly exhaling noisome va- pors, which cause the loudest and longest peals of thunder”! The violent and almost oceanic storms which sometimes swept across it might possibly have been sufficient to suggest the name. JOLIET AND MARQUETTE. 237 By the end of the first week in June, 1673, the adventurers had ascended the Fox River, and found themselves in Gabe 2 the country of the Mascoutins, the Miamis, the Kicka- Qn the Fox poos, and the Foxes, — the latter, of all tribes which , the French encountered, the most averse apparently to Chris- tian influences. From among these tribes the party secured guides to lead them across the portage. It is another proof that Nicolet had not passed to the Wisconsin, that Marquette be- lieved he had now reached the limits of the early French efforts. The carry they found an easy one, through a level region, and somewhat less than two miles across, through marshes and ponds filled with wild rice. The Fox, indeed, at the point they left it, was but five feet lower than the Wisconsin, and in high stages of water the current of the latter was sometimes diverted to- wards Green Bay. Once over, and parting with their guides, they launched their canoes on that affluent which the Mascou- tins had said would conduct them in a west-southwest course to the great river. Following an obscure and devious channel through a growth of wild oats, they only extricated themselves from its mazes to find their canoes grating upon the sandbars which perplex the navigation of the Wisconsin. If 9, ine wis. such were their perplexities, there was much about °™™ them to command their praise. They soon ran into a region of rich bottom lands, diversified by undulations that were topped with trees. Festooning vines hung from branches which here and there flecked the gentle current with their shadows. Now a dense copse of walnut and oak, as well as trees that were new to them, stretched along the bank. They swept round islands in the stream as it broadened, and saw tangled climbers bearing down the imprisoned bushes. In the opens they espied the roebuck, and encountered singly or in herds “ the Illinois oxen clothed in wool,” for the buffalo had been more or less familiar to the French for ten years, and now roamed in this region, though destined to be pushed beyond the Mississippi, where the mature man of to-day can remember how they stopped by their surging masses the progress of railway trains, and compelled the steamboats to slow up as they swam the waters of the Missouri; and where the child of to-day may possibly never see them more. As the canoes went on, the sun glinted upon fluttering wings Buffaloes. 238 THE MISSISSIPPI REACHED, 1673. among the wild rice in one place; and a rocky scarp made shadows in another, where cedars caused a jagged bristling edge to run along the sky. Marquette calls the stream the Mescon- sing, for so he had caught the Indian utterance, but the name was later made more liquid in the Ouisconsin of Hennepin, out of which our modern Wisconsin was naturally evolved, and fixed at last by legislative sanction. It was the 17th of June when their canoes shot out into the Onthe Mis. Parent current and they were afloat on the Mississippi. sisipp They sounded and found nineteen fathoms of water, and they might well have believed, had they suspected it, that this mighty channel poured to the sea a greater volume of water than all the united rivers of Europe, if the Volga be omitted. Not forgetting the haughty man at Quebec, whose fortunes he felt he was bearing, Joliet named the river La Buade, in recognition of the governor’s family stock. The de- votion of Marquette to the great dogma of his church scarcely allowed him to recognize any but the religious motives influ- encing his share in the adventure, and he fulfilled a promise which he had formed in giving the great river, on his part, the name of Conception, — with something of the fervor which had warmed the Spaniard a century and a half before, when he be- stowed upon it at its mouth the name of the Holy Spirit, —a name, however, which had some latitude of application along the gulf shore. Marquette at the same time records its native name as “ Missipi.” It must have been with strange and swelling sensations that these wondering men saw the night fall about them. On the one hand a range of high hills lay darkening the declining day. On the other the light of the dropping sun rose from the variegated meadows, and gleamed upward from cloud to cloud ; and when all was dark and the stars shone, one may well ima- gine the immensity of the hope which animated them, and a sense of the uncertainty of the future upon which they had entered. Neither Joliet nor the priest could have had, in the then exist- ing geographical conceptions of the interior of North America, any adequate idea of the vastness of the valley which they were aiming to acquire for France. The latest geographical conjec- tures were shown in the map which Sanson published in 1669. THE MISSISSIPPI VALLEY. 239 Lake Michigan was depicted in this as of uncertain extent, and from a large bay on the north side of the Gulf of Mexico a group of radiating streams drained the southern part of the val- ley, while all else was void. The proclamation of St. Lusson two years before, seeking to embrace a region that stretched between bounding eameiey oceans, north, west, and south, was simply audacious graphical > e conceptions. and not based on knowledge, —the immensity of the area would have appalled them, had it been suspected. Fron- tenac, with the inheritance which had officially come to him, had attained perhaps some idea of the half million square miles of territory which afforded two thousand miles of navigable water from the east to the west, in the St. Lawrence and the lakes. He knew that its dividing ridges bordered upon the great in- terior valley beyond the country of the Iroquois, and again at the head of Lake Michigan, and at no great distance from points which missionaries and traders had reached at Lake Superior. But even Frontenac’s imperial eagerness had little conception of a water-shed five times as large as that whose waters flowed before Quebec, and whose central streams could conduct a canoe to the sea over a course three thou- qye missis. sand miles in extent from the country of the Senecas ; "Pi valley. and over another of more than four thousand miles from the head of its greatest affluent, far in the northwest. Thirty- five thousand miles of navigable waters converging into one in the midst of this great valley, and seeking the sea, was a wonder that exceeded even the imagination of Allouez in his astounding speech to the Indians at the ceremonial of St. Lus- son, when he was picturing the magnificence of the Grand Monarch. There was a vastly disproportionate extent in it for the paltry six or seven thousand Frenchmen whom Frontenac ruled from the rock of Quebec, and who were to be made the people of this magnified New France. It was an easy matter for. the adventurous explorers to go with the current as they sped downstream by day, and anchored away from shore by night. Each morning early astir, they were prepared with freshened energies to come, as they leisurely pad- dled along, within the range of new surprises. Now they saw a formidable fish. Now the current swept them round bluffs 240 THE MISSISSIPPI REACHED, 1673. or between divided islands, fresh in the early summer’s diversity of verdure. They had been a week or more on the great river, observing deer, elk, bison, and turkey, but they had not seen a 1673, J : 5 25. ‘They, sign of man, when on June 25 they espied human see human “ tracks, footprints on the western bank. A well-used path and see the s 5 Dinois conducted the two leaders to a native village of the T1be Illinois, where they were welcomed and made to feel safe. They saw French cloth on some of the savages, and learned that intertribal traffic had probably passed it along from the French traders on the lakes. This people told them the same stories of demons and dangers to which a persistence in going farther would subject them ; but neither the trader nor the Jesuit could be intimidated by such rehearsals. Once more on their way, they passed the mouth of the Illinois ee (to be better known a few weeks later), and wondered Hineis at the mocking castles which Nature had made of the stratified rock, and gazed upon the rude strokes of pigment which the Indians had combined into a demoniac figure on a rocky scarp above them. After some days, their canoes were tossing in the broken They pss | Water of a muddy current, which poured into the clear theMissouri_ Mississippi with such a volume that they naturally looked to the northwest, from which it came, as to some large water-shed. It was clear that the divide which held it was to- wards the great ocean of the west, the bourne of the hopes so long delayed. They learned from the Indians near at hand what seemed a confirmation of their belief. “I do not doubt,” says Marquette, “that this other ocean is the Vermilion Sea, and I hope some day to be able to follow this inviting channel.” It was the commingled currents of the Missouri and the Mississippi which they had reached, and this flood of water from the west convinced Marquette that the united streams must find an outlet in the Gulf of Mexico. It was to be a hundred and thirty years and more before the wonderful interlacing of the springs of the Missouri and the Columbia, and of the La Platte and Colorado, was to be discovered. The Indians called this singularly intrusive and polluting stream the Pekitanoui, or THE OHIO RIVER. 241 the muddy river; but a little later, when more was known of the tribes which lived on its banks, it was generally known as the river of the Osages. The adventurers were all the way on the watch for other indi- cations of some such western passage, for it soon became more and more evident that the general direction of the Mississippi was towards the south. A little later on, Joliet says, he heard of a tribe lying only five days away to the west, which traded with others from the coast of California. They passed by the site of St. Louis, then covered with for- est, and as they went on they occasionally held out the calumet to Indians whom they saw, but as yet there was no hostile ac- tion in any of them. They came to the mouth of the Ohio, which Joliet calls on his map the Ouabouskigon, —a name apparently al- aa the lied to the later Ouabache, or as we have it in an 0 English guise, Wabash, for this stream and the Ohio below the other’s mouth continued to be accounted one during the long interval yet to ensue before the placating of the Iroquois per- mitted the French to follow the upper reaches of the true Ohio. The low and marshy shores which bound the mouth of this branch of the Mississippi allow it to mingle its waters with the main current with less impressiveness than is suited to its im- portance, and add a sort of mystery to the sources of its capa- cious flow. If La Salle had followed it from the Iroquois coun- try some years before, there is nothing in anything that Joliet or Marquette say of it now to lead one to suspect that they connected it with any exploit of an earlier discoverer. Indeed, in their maps, they fail to associate it with any previous know- ledge. The stories which had come to the French of the sav- age onsets of the Iroquois in this direction were vague, but the unavoidable inference was that the river whose mouth they now were passing was the theatre of these rancorous wars, in which wandering Shawnees and the confederates’ bands met aes in deadly struggle. Joliet, we know, had seen a Shaw- raids: along nee prisoner in the hands of the savages at the end of Lake Ontario, when he met La Salle there in 1669, and he knew that the prisoner’s country Jay in this direction; but since then the implacable Iroquois had driven the Shawnees from both banks of the river, and forced them back into the 242 THE MISSISSIPPI REACHED, 1673. valley of the Tennessee. It was within a very few years that the Iroquois had thus successfully raided this tributary valley. The Arkansas, whom Joliet was soon to meet lower down the Mississippi, had also fled before these savage confederates. The Illinois, whom he had visited, as we have seen, in their vil- lages west of the great river, had been pressed along before the same inveterate enemies, who had used this valley of the Ohio as the main channel of their approach. Our explorers could now have little suspected what risks this same channel was to open to their successors in these western parts, when their Indian allies were hounded to the death by those same tireless foes. June passed into July, and the French canoes were still pass- ing on with the current, by marsh and wood. The Indians, who now and then confronted them on the banks were more inclined to be hostile, but the calumet never failed to appease them, though it sometimes looked as if the hazards were great. Some savages whom they saw on the east bank had guns and wore European cloth, and it is surmised that they had got these articles directly or by intermediate traders from the English of Carolina or Virginia. At a village on the east bank, opposite the mouth of a river which Joliet named the Bazire after a fur trader in Montreal, but Mouth of x the Arkan- which we know as the Arkansas, they found a young Indian who could make himself understood in the I- linois tongue. From him they learned that the tribes farther down the river were enemies of his people, and had firearms from Europeans. They raised, he said, three crops of corn a year. When asked if they had ever seen the Europeans who supplied the guns, they replied that they had not, as the inter- vening tribes were always able to prevent their reaching them. This savage interpreter represented that the outlet of the river which they were following was a ten days’ voyage farther on, but with extraordinary speed they might shorten the task by half. This led the French to think it nearer than it really was, for it was still seven or eight hundred miles away. Their almost unvarying southerly course — for the bend of the river one way had always been met by a corresponding reverse — had rendered it now hardly susceptible of doubt that it was neither to the Atlantic nor to the South Sea that they were tending, but to the great gulf of middle America, which, if their infor- July. THE CHICAGO PORTAGE. 248 mation was correct, placing its northern shores in latitude 31° 40’, was not far distant. They had thus in effect, by an infer- ence which was unavoidable, solved the problem of the great river’s course. If they went on they could scarce do more than confirm their belief, and they would do it at the risk of losing the fruits of their discovery, should they fall into the hands of the Spaniards. A resolve was accordingly taken to stop at this point (which Marquette calls 33° 40’), and return. pect It was therefore on July 17 that they reémbarked at 17. They Akamsea, as the friendly village was called, and be- gan their arduous ascent. It is not worth while to follow their laborious journey back in detail. Onreaching the mouth of the Illinois, they yielded to the representations of the neighboring Indians, that it would lead them more directly to Mackinac, and turned into ggcena the its alluring current. It was a pleasant change for "!™°* the weary voyagers, for the stream was placid, there was attrac- tive shade under its umbrageous banks, and rich plains opened between the hillocks, dotted with bison and deer. They tarried awhile at Kaskaskia, — not the modern town of that name, but an Indian village of the Illinois tribe, whose country it is not always easy to designate at different periods, but which lay in the main, after they came back from over the Mississippi, between the Wabash and the banks of the great river. This people were now very friendly. They tried to propitiate Joliet, in the hopes of securing French aid against the Iroquois, of whose ravages they were in constant dread, and towards Mar- quette they turned with wishes that he might abide with them for their spiritual comfort. Joliet, with that policy which had actuated him in naming the great river after Frontenac’s fam- ily, now complimented the governor’s wife with naming this tributary stream as the Divine or the Outrelaise, which La ‘Salle later was to supplant with the name of the French colo- nial secretary, Seignelay. Going on, the weary voyagers turned into the Des Plaines River, and passed the elevation which the trader p,; pisines named Mont Joliet, and which alone of all the names ®¥*™ bestowed by Joliet preserves his memory in that region to- day. This eminence lies near Joliet city, forty miles y. onicago southwest of Chicago. The stream led them to the Ps Chicago portage. 244 THE MISSISSIPPI REACHED, 1678. The cutting of the gorge at Niagara had opened in pre- historic times a channel for the outflow of the upper lakes, in place of the older channel by the Illinois from the head of Lake Michigan, where there is scarce eight feet of rise at the divide in ordinary seasons. In wet seasons, even since the present century came in, heavily laden boats have floated from the lake to the Des Plaines. In the days of Joliet, the branches of the Chicago River and the headwaters of the Ilinois interlaced so nearly that in ordinary springs the portage was scarce a mile and a half, and was obliterated in the actual waterway which, in very wet seasons, existed in the shape of an expanded lake. It was for a while in ordinary seasons dead water on either side, rippling as the paddle stirred it, when the spreading cir- cles broke against the crowded stalks of the wild rice. In very dry weather it was sometimes necessary to carry the canoe to the confluence of the Kankakee, thirty miles below. , There is no clear proof that any white man had preceded Joliet and his party in the passage of this portage, when now its practicability readily suggested to him the ultimate making of a canal. One cannot be sure, however, that some adven- turous trader had not preceded them; and we certainly find such traders at no great distance in Joliet’s rear. The theory of La Salle’s passage of it the year before has already been mentioned. Once on Lake Michigan, the returning canoes found their way to Green Bay by the end of September. The adventure had cost them four months and more, and they had traversed a route of something like twenty-five hundred miles. Leaving Marquette at Mackinac, in much need of rest, for At Mackinac, he had been grievously ill on the return trip, Joliet = passed on to the Sault Ste. Marie. The following summer, Joliet took his way to Quebec. His 1674. last appoeianity of showing his papers was probably Summer. at Fort Frontenac, where he briefly tarried, and where he found LaSalle. At least such is Dr. Shea’s belief, though Joliet ana Aarrisse sees no satisfactory evidence that La Salle LaSalle. gould have been at Fort Frontenac at this time. That the interview, if allowed, produced any results, is far from clear. La Salle at this juncture was engrossed with his trading tours and with the care of his Seigneury of Cataraqui. If Denon- JOLIET’S MAPS AND PAPERS. 245 ville’s memoir is to be believed, La Salle in these expeditions was accustoming himself to some of the affluents of the Ohio, acquiring that knowledge of this approach from the Mississippi tq Ontario which was later in his mind when he was himself on the great river in 1680. It was only at this later day, when his mercantile speculations were at a low ebb, that he had begun to raise visions of a traffic in buffalo skins on the Mis- sissippi. Joliet passed on to the St. Lawrence. All went well till he reached the rapids above Montreal, where his canoe upset. Baye o _.8 HUDSON Nouv. Suede. La Flovide, Uy JOLET'S EARLIEST MAP. Two of his men — one an Indian from the Mississippi — were drowned, and a box containing his journals and other 5,;.45 os was lost. He himself barely escaped with his Papers 1st. ife. Joliet did what he could to repair the loss of his journals by reviewing his recollections, and Frontenac later sent, ap- parently without success, to the Sault Ste. Marie to recover the copies of the lost papers which Joliet had left there with the priests. Dablon tells us that Joliet had also given a copy of his journal to Marquette before parting with him, but no such 246 THE MISSISSIPPI REACHED, 1678. transcript has come down to us. Dablon himself, at this time ei at Quebec, had apparently talked over the adventur- of theex- ey’ experience with Joliet himself, and on the 1st of sia August he embodied what he learned in a communica- tion to his superior in Paris, and later, in an amplified form, it was included in one of his annual reports, which was first printed when Martin gave it in his Mission du Canada (1861). The narrative as Joliet fashioned it upon his recollections is also to be found in two forms in Margry’s collection, and Har- ALY A MER SuNVor§ i a a S ot Gotphe Oe. SLOLLQue JOLIET’S CARTE GENERALE. [Sketched from a copy in the Parkinan collection (16817), and signed by Franquelin.] risse gives us a brief summary which the explorer offered in a letter dated October 10, 1674. Joliet had been back three months before Frontenac drew up (November 14, 1674) an official report upon the trader’s discoveries, and it was doubtless with small expectations that he forwarded it to France, for during the summer he had had a pretty sharp intimation from the king that he had better let projects of discovery alone. Both Frontenac and Dablon, however, made the most they could of the new hopes which the expedition had created, — Dablon with a more intelligent appreciation of the case than the OS RENTER Te mT om ae erm me eee Se ee Se et eer eee MARQUETTE’S NARRATIVE. 247 governor seemed to possess. The Jesuit alleged that it was now proved that if a bark was built on Lake Erie, there would only need to be a cut or canal made at Chicago for one to sail through to the Mississippi and the sea; and if it was not for the falls at Niagara, the vessel could start from Fort Frontenac. The governor was apparently most impressed with the possibil- ity of a way being discovered to the South Sea by some of the western valleys of the Mississippi; but he was also struck with the ease with which one could pass from the St. Lawrence to the Gulf of Mexico with only the portage of half a league at Niagara! He urged, in consequence, that a settlement should be formed near that cataract, and that a vessel be built on Lake Erie, which he thought in ten days could reach the gulf. It seems clear that Frontenac had not quite understood what Jo- liet had communicated, or that explorer’s enthusiasm had spir- ited away the obstructions at Chicago. The governor at the same time sent a map which Joliet had constructed with such observations as his memory supplied, and this has come down to us, being first introduced to scholars about ten years ago by Gabriel Gravier at Rouen. It is probably the earliest j,i ear- map to define the course of the Mississippi by actual Ues*™?- observation, although Joliet connected it with the gulf merely by an inference which he felt he could not avoid. Mar- yyarquette’s quette’s contribution to our knowledge is more im- ™™tive portant on the whole, and not so dependent on recollection as what we learn from Joliet. His recital is in two forms as given by Margry, but it was originally sent by the priest to Dablon in Quebec. Dablon used it in his elation, and sent a copy to Paris, while the original seems to have remained in the Jesuit archives at Quebec till, some time after the dispersion of the order, it was deposited by Father Cazot, the last survivor of the order in Canada, in the Hotel Dieu, not far from 1800, whence it was transferred, apparently about 1842, to the College of Ste. Marie in Montreal. From its nuns, Martin, a returned Jes- uit, received it and committed it to Dr. Shea, who published it first in English in his Discovery of the Mississippi (1853), and two years later separately and in the original tongue (New York, 1855). It had been prepared for publication by Dablon, apparently in 1678; but had remained unedited in its complete form till Shea secured it. The Mission du Canada has since THE MISSISSIPPI REACHED, 1679. 248 ‘LONGAGHEL NI NAAID SV ‘AVN S.ALLAAONVIT TE he DP. 6e Ro Le Fe oe Fe stounyy Purely Pp wT — srry a fe te Pr apouorsyi79 dys Peforpnd abn ray) sucp ihyt ug pf? yaaanisep cp TLU¥ ) v ruordon gz crouse nb Verge cra divoy @ MOSS . Ls moaning \ PSE ne eleryo yy UES rare boyy Ki somnurys sop 29 EIS Qs enon op ru0 rib suowey MPD ue . vn ee) A rrsaricra 7 PTCYL Pope iH mong FP orm ote < errr cn hy MARQUETTE’S MAP. 249 given it in a somewhat changed form, very likely as it was re- ceived in Paris, whither it was sent by Marquette at Fronte- nac’s request. Thevenot in 1680 included an imperfect form of it, with curtailments and omissions, in his Recueil de Voy- ages, and also issued it separately, and it is in this shape that it has been used before the present generation, and was made familiar to English readers by Hennepin (1698) and at a later day by Sparks. There was one feature in Thevenot’s publication that deceived scholars for a hundred and seventy years, and that yyarquette’s was the map which he gave as Marquette’s. That ™” editor had somehow got hold of a contemporary Jesuit map, now well known, and supposed it Mar- quette’s. It may in fact have been that EES which Joliet had ee cacnurom drawn from recollec- ~, oN: qyPerievR ou DE TRACY c ub hate ae tion, as Dr. Shea oe suggests. The genu- he ‘ ine plot was discov- DES WINDS ered by Shea with the ori- / ginal manuscript, and has a since been repeatedly repro- duced. Marquette, who had for some years dreamed of a missionary field among the Illinois, and who had welcomed the oppor- tunity which the companionship of Joliet gave him, was not destined to enjoy a long fulfillment of his hopes. He had lingered at Green Bay on his return till, finding himself in the spring of 1674 in ROE oAP. better condition of health, he organ- auetie re ized a party of Indians, and with Iihmots cous ten canoes started for the Ilinois country. He fol- lowed up the western shore of Lake Michigan, which he de- scribes in his journal in the oldest account of this shore which we have; but at the site of the modern Chicago, or near it, he grew sick, and found it necessary to remain for the winter. He 250 THE MISSISSIPPI REACHED, 1673. was cheered in his weariness by the kind attentions of every- body about him. Indian and trader passing that way, and hearing of his prostration, turned aside to give him any com- fort in their power. The spring restored his strength enough 1675, at to give him courage, and on the last of March, 1675, Kaskaskia. he passed the portage and went on to Kaskaskia. The savage community gathered at this point welcomed him as a missionary would like to be received, and he turned in his min- istrations from hut to hut amid such interest as he had never found before among Indian converts. But his frame was not equal to his spiritual energy. His strength failed, and it became evident that he should get back if possible to more civilized care. He started on his way with some companions. The party crossed the portage and followed the eastern shore of Lake Michigan. On May 19, in a quiet spot, they bore the prostrate May19. man ashore and left him to his devotions, as he re- ia quested. In a short time they sought him, and found him dead. They dug his grave on the spot, and went their way, bearing the sad tidings to Mackinac. The next year toot. Fina. (L076), some Ottawa Indians exhumed the body, and tuts melancholy procession of thirty canoes accompanied the holy remains to St. Ignace. Here, beneath the chapel of the mission, they gave him a last resting-place. Two hundred years later (1877), some excavations were made on the spot where the chapel is supposed to have stood, and a few fragments of a skeleton were found and gathered for a new burial; but the pious act was not consummated without doubt being thrown upon the identity of the bones, inasmuch as the uncertain descriptions of the position of the mission which have been preserved do not render it clear beyond doubt whether its shrine was on the north or south shore of the strait, or on the intermediate island. Father Jacker, who performed the act of reburial, felt that he had sufficient ground for his belief. Allouez was appointed (1675) to succeed Marquette in the isis, av Lllinois mission; but interest in the new discovery jouer had largely ceased with the death of Marquette and ee the withdrawal of Talon. The petition of Joliet to be allowed to establish a trading-post on the Mississippi was promptly negatived in a letter of Colbert to Duchesneau, writ- ten on April 28, 1677. But events were already shaping for new scenes and new actors. CHAPTER XI. CATARAQUI AND CREVECQ@UR. 1673-1680. FRrontTENAC had conceived the plan of establishing an ad- vanced post on the northern shore of Ontario. It was partly with the expectation of intercepting the Indian trade with the English at Albany, and partly to bring a mart for skins nearer the sources of supply. The project disturbed the merchants of Montreal as likely to affect their own interests, and it was by no means satisfactory to the Jesuits, who dreaded its influence on the Indians. These priests were even accused of starting ill-omened rumors, such as an intended attack by the Dutch, — now temporarily in possession of New York, — in the hope of keeping Frontenac’s attention occupied nearer home. The governor was not a man to be intimidated; and he soon sent La Salle, between whom and Frontenac much 4675, pron cordiality had arisen, to visit the Iroquois, and to invite ey.invites the confederates to send delegates to a council near ‘come the site of his intended fort. Frontenac was aware that the recent successes of the Iroquois in diverting the western trade to the factors at Albany rendered some attempt to propitiate or alarm the confederates highly necessary. The governor had made many preparations for his journey to the rendezvous. With a large array of guards and a parade of staff officers, Frontenac left Quebee on June 3, 1673. syne. an His reception at Montreal was hearty enough to con- Montreal. ceal the real feelings of opposition which pervaded that settle- ment, and when he left that place to move forward, on June 28, it was with a considerable increase of retinue. He had about four hundred men in his train, manning or oceupying a flotilla of one hundred and twenty canoes and two flatboats. The pro- cession had hardly passed into Lake Ontario when an Iroquois 252 CATARAQUI AND CREVECEUR. canoe was met, bringing letters from La Salle, with guides to lead them to the spot on the northern shore which had been july. as Selected for the council. It was the 12th of July when Cataraqui. Wyontenac disembarked his followers at Cataraqui. It was done with a pageantry which animated with delight the assembled Iroquois. On the next day, July 13, Raudin, the engineer, was set to work in laying out the fort, which in a few days was ready for occupancy. La Salle, who had mean- while arrived, was put in command. Frontenac, who knew how to gratify the Indian pride, made everything pleasant for the grand council, which was held on the 17th. In his speech, which formed the principal feature of the convocation, the governor said everything to them that was agreeable, and promised them in the storehouse, which they saw in progress, the opportunity of getting everything they wished. He did not forget to remind them of their Great Father’s power to punish as well as to re- ward. When, a few days later, the parting came, and the Iro- quois started to cross the lake, they carried with them the con- ception of a white man quite different in his dealings from any they had hitherto known. Frontenac had vividly impressed his sturdy and emphatic personality upon them, and it did much for some years to hold them in check. The governor was back in Montreal on August 1, and he had time to consider whether the 10,000 francs which his display had cost — a draft upon a treasury far from full — was to pro- duce an equivalent return. To insure what he hoped for, he had formed plans of still another fort at Niagara, and the build- ing of a vessel on Lake Erie. He had written to this effect to the king in November, and if allowed to carry out his plans, he had hopes to bar the Dutch and English effectually from the waters of the upper lakes. He had already ordered the con- struction of a vessel on Ontario to be used as an auxiliary force se to Fort Frontenac, as the post at Cataraqui had been Frontenac. named. La Salle, at the same time, was informing his friends (November 18) that they would not be disappointed in his efforts to carry out all that Frontenac had looked for. It was not long, however, before Frontenac’s powers of controlling the Iroquois were put to a test. The Dutch on the Hudson were thought to be instigating them afresh. Fron- tenac wrote to Colbert that only his flatteries and presents LA SALLE’S GRANT. 253 to the Indian chiefs could keep the confederates quiet. The prospect was not better when, in February, 1674, the j674. new York again treaty of Westminster restored New York to the Eng- gngisn lish. Grosseilliers and Radisson, who, as we have seen, had been serving the English at Hudson’s Bay, had not found a compli- ance with the rules of the new company agreeable, and had returned to France discontented, and quite ready to reénter the service of Colbert, if he would pay their debts and provide for the future. Both returned to Canada, but Frontenac was not in a temper to dally with renegades. He had raised pyontenac's up too large a number of recalcitrants among the 6,700 “°™e* inhabitants which Canada now showed, to open careers for others. He had leagued the whole body of bushrangers against him by his endeavor to break up their wild and independent systems of trade. He had an active quarrel with Perrot, the governor of Montreal, who was their avowed abettor. The Sulpitians had been provoked by him, and thwarted him when they could. The Jesuits, if their accusers may be believed, did not look with complacency upon any system of organized traffic which shut them off from a participation, clandestine it may be, in the profits of a trade which their missions might bring to them. But Frontenac got some relief from all these bickerings by reverting to other thoughts. He had taken Perrot into cus- tody, and had sent him to France for the king to de- ‘ ee 1674. La cide upon their differences; but he had sent over quite Salle goes . . . to France, another sort of man, with other aims, in La Salle, who , had sailed in the autumn of 1674. It is said that La Salle had been pondering of late on Joliet’s reports, and had made up his mind that the Mississippi must find an outlet in the Gulf of Mexico. He had formed this theory not without some ambition to prove it fact. On Novem- ber 14, Frontenac wrote to Colbert that La Salle was a man worth his listening to, and so the king heard from that aspiring adventurer a proposition that Fort Frontenac and the adjacent lands should be granted to him as a seigneury. On gna obtains his part, La Salle offered to reimburse Frontenac for *&*- the outlay already made on the fort, and to maintain a garrison in it. In recognition of the service which he proposed to ren- 254 CATARAQUI AND CREVECGUR. der to New France, he also solicited a patent of nobility. Col- bert acquiescing, all went as well as LaSalle had wished, but it became necessary that he should agree to rebuild the fort in masonry. This was settled, and the weight of debt which this undertaking drew upon him was not an unimportant factor in later obstructions. The tide of emigration towards the St. Lawrence was already beginning to grow slack, and Colbert suspected that the six months in which the river was icebound had something to do with it. Accordingly, he had already informed Frontenac how desirable it was that some ingress to the interior of the conti- nent should be opened in a warmer region than Canada. If such intimation gave Frontenac some heart for further explo- ration, the king’s adjudication in the dispute between him and Perrot was not equally comforting. This tormentor was sent back to his post at Montreal, and both he and Frontenac were given some sharp reproof, and told to be friends for the future. They equally deserved the censure. In September, 1675, a ship arrived in Quebec, bringing four fea notable persons. The conjunction was an unhappy tember. La- commingling of incompatible natures. One was La- val, Duches- e . . neau, Hen- val, returning to the episcopate, and full of his head- La Salle at strong devotion to what he believed to be his duty, — Quebec. 8 5 ey: : not unused or disinclined to a militant churchmanship, which Colbert and the governor must soon deal with. Another was Duchesneau, Talon’s successor as intendant, and a stickler for his rights, the more vigorous when these rights collided with what Frontenac conceived to be his own. A third was Louis Hennepin, the Recollect friar, a man to be played off against the Jesuits to Frontenac’s content. This restless priest had been smitten with travelers’ tales from his early youth. He had re- cently been an army chaplain, but was now eager for a life as hazardous and as uncertain as he could make it. There were on the same ship a company of girls, coming to seek husbands and homes. They grew at times merry, and were not very compla- cent when the priest, to prove his holy vigilance, sought to check them. The fourth of these strange companions sided with the girls against the Recollect’s austerity, and Hennepin certainly, in telling us of it, does not expect us to doubt his own sincerity. This defender of the merry damsels was the austere La Salle LA SALLE AND HENNEPIN. 255 himself. Perhaps the buoyancy of his hopes, now that he had gained the royal recognition, had softened his temper, and he was not averse to making the bishop and the Jesuits hate him more than ever, since he knew the governor to be his friend. In 1676, we find La Salle at Fort Frontenac, deeply engaged in increasing its efficiency as a trading-post. He eae builé new walls to the fort, planted other palisades, Salle atFort brought cattle from Montreal, and laid the keels of the vessels which he depended upon to frighten the English. Neither he nor Frontenac was quite clear yet as to what they might venture to undertake to the westward. The king was not willing to weaken the older settlements by such western schemes, and he did not hesitate to enjoin upon Frontenac his duty of being mindful of the royal wish. Frontenac, though he had been warned not to carry on any trade of his own, was known to have much sympathy with La Salle, and to have sent Raudin to Lake Superior with presents for the Sioux. No such transaction could escape the Jesuits, and what the Jesuits knew they shared with Duchesneau and, in turn, with the king. Frontenac, on the other hand, did not let the court remain in ignorance of the service that La Salle was doing. This faith- ful subject, the monarch was told, had spent 35,000 livres on Fort Frontenae, and was gathering settlers about its walls. The two or three small vessels which he had launched on the lake were bringing him in something like 25,000 livres yearly profit, as many believed. Hennepin had found occupation in ministering to a colony of Iroquois, who had come across the lake and had set pemepin up their huts near the fort. It was not long before {rover the priest felt enough at ease with their language to 1°" make a winter pilgrimage over the lake into the confederates’ own country (1677). He found them not altogether dissatisfied with the neutrality they were now maintaining with both French and English. They had recently subdued the Andastes, and there was no neighboring foe to fear. Their two thousand warriors were recuperating. Their raids as far south as the borders of Maryland and Virginia had harassed the whites equally with the Indians who were assailed, as such incursions always do. Representatives of those colonies had come to Albany to induce the Iroquois to fetter such roving bands of 256 CATARAQUI AND CREVECGUR. their young men; but the treaty proved little more than one in name. La Salle was perhaps induced to believe that his command of Lake Ontario and this wavering of the Iroquois meant a stay to English scheming, but he counted too surely. There is some reason for supposing that by this time La Salle had come to expect it easy to open a channel to the Mississippi vay "walle by the Maumee and Wabash, and to extend plans of his trade beyond Niagara in that direction. To ap- pease the Iroquois and keep them quiet was particu- larly necessary if a portage so accessible to the confederates as that of the Maumee should be made a channel of commerce. It proved that nearly forty years were yet to pass before the enmity of the Iroquois was assuaged enough to permit that portage to be used. With such dreams floating in his mind, La Salle once more, ae in November, 1677, embarked for France. His pur- tums to, Pose was soon manifest, and Margry preserves for us snopes ters the paper in which he outlined his aims in a memorial to the king. He professed in it that his work at Fort Frontenac was intended to form a base for a western trade that should extend to the Mississippi, — and he seems to have believed that this river flowed into what at this time stood for Mobile Bay in the Spanish maps, — where buffalo, wool, and skins would make the staple of a new traffic. These peltries he represented as being so exceptionally heavy that it would be much for the advantage of the trade if he could be allowed to pursue exploration along the route which Joliet had opened, and find the mouth of the great river. That being done, the trans- porting of this heavy traffic could be carried on directly by ships from the Illinois country. To this end he asked to have his seigneurial tenure of Fort Frontenac confirmed, and to be allowed to establish other posts towards the south and west for m the space of five years. On May 12, 1678, his wishes 78. And : fae . gets a were complied with in a patent signed at St. Ger- Be main-en-Laye. By this he was allowed to build forts in the coveted country, “through which,” as the patent ran, ‘it would seem that a passage to Mexico can be found.” A reser- vation was imposed in that he was forbidden to engage in trade with such tribes as would naturally carry their furs to Montreal. All this enterprise was to be carried on without expense to the LA SALLE AND THE JESUITS. 25T crown. La Salle seems to have called successfully upon his relatives in France for capital. What was more important to him, he secured the fealty of a remarkable man. This was Henri Tonty, the son of an Italian refugee domiciled | peaty in Paris, whose fame is associated with the system of joins La Tontine insurance. No man ever had a more faith- ful servitor than Tonty was to La Salle, and it is one of the proofs that the discoverer of the mouth of the Mississippi had something in him for a loyal and courageous man to respect, that Tonty became and remained his fast friend. For La Salle had not learned to make as many friends as a man of his ambition needed, and he was often found insupportably harsh and haughty. This want of tact, fatal in great enterprises, as La Salle found to his cost, has given some warrant for the opinion, which, for instance, Dr. Shea has zealously entertained, that La Salle was an incapable leader, and has been 1, ganers prodigiously overrated for his services. Such opinions 727°. are, it must be confessed, not wholly free from the ™*Pty- prejudices which have been sent down to us by Jesuit antipa- thies. La Salle on his part was no lenient judge of that order, and he was prone to find ulterior and sinister purposes in all they did. He supposed their zeal in thwarting him in his pro- jects was a wish to bar all laymen from having influence among the Indians, and to establish such an exclusive system in New France as had been formed by them in Paraguay. It was in August, 1678, that La Salle sailed from Rochelle. He was accompanied by Tonty, and they took with ak ; : : 1678, Au- them shipwrights and mechanics. Their shipments gust! La included anchors, sails, and cordage for a vessel which for Quebe, was to be built on Lake Erie. They reached Que- Fort Pronte- bee in September, and there found Hennepin awaiting ” their arrival. The priest was soon sent ahead to prepare mat- ters at Fort Frontenac, and after an interview with the gov- ernor La Salle followed. During this interval, it was arranged that a party should go in advance to trade and collect food in the Illinois country, and prepare for the reception of La Salle, who might be expected the next year. a Mothe and Hen- nepin were at once dispatched in a small vessel to Hijiwiew ana Niagara, and a fort was planned at the mouth of that te Senecas. river. It was soon apparent that the neighboring Senecas 258 CATARAQUI AND CREVECGUR. felt uneasy at such signs of occupation. They were carry- ing on a lucrative trade as middlemen between the more distant tribes and the English at Albany, and they saw in the movements of the French an attempt to prevent such commerce. Therefore La Mothe and his companion visited the nearest Seneca village to make explanations. They were kindly received, and an In- dian prisoner was burned for their enjoyment. They in turn outlined a plan of opening communication with Europe through the great river, so that goods could be brought with less ex- pense, and could be sold cheaper than it was possible with the English. Their argument availed little, and the Frenchmen returned to camp with small encouragement. Meanwhile La . Salle was coasting along the southern shore of Ontario, a Salle 6 1% . . diane tte and on his way he visited the same village, which was, in fact, the identical one where he had in vain sought a guide ten years before. He was more successful than his precursors had been, and succeeded, as he thought, in making the tribe content with his projects, So with better heart he went on to Niagara and joined La Mothe, whom he found encamped near the Niagara rapids. La Salle, accompanied by Tonty, was soon on his way to discover beyond the cataract a suitable Sects, 8P0t to lay the keel of his intended vessel. There has Gippeed oe been some diversity of opinion as to the precise spot . which he selected, but there is little doubt that it was just within or possibly on one side of the mouth of Cayuga Creek, where an island lying off the shore diverts part of the current towards the easterly bank of the river. Mr. O. H. Marshall of Buffalo, whose name is connected with many care- ful studies of the history of the Niagara region, first pointed out (1845) this spot as answering best the conditions of the con- temporary narratives. Schoolcraft gave Mr. Marshall’s views currency two years later, and they are now generally accepted. Though there is some disagreement as to the precise spot, there is none as to the general location. It had already been found that the portage around the cata- ara ract was not so favorable on the western side, and in Poe the latter part of January, 1679, the party began to the “Gri-” carry the material which they had brought from Fort Frontenac up the steep which leads to the plateau of the Niagara gorge, and to bear it along the portage track for BUFFALOES. u - anal aN & wT 2 HENNEPIN’S DR AW IN OF A BUFFALO. G 260 CATARAQUI AND CREVECGUR. twelve miles. It was not all the material they had hoped to have, for after La Salle had left his vessel on the lake to make by land the latter part of his way to La Mothe’s camp, the craft encountered bad weather and was wrecked. Fortunately, they saved the anchors and cables intended for the new vessel, and it was under the burden of these, with some rejoicing over their good fortune in saving so much, that the party now struggled along the portage of the falls. The new vessel was planned to be about fifty tons burden, as we should now reckon, and the keel being laid, La Salle himself drove the first bolt. Putting the charge of the construction upon Tonty, La Salle returned to the mouth of the river, where he began the construction of a block-house. This well started, he undertook with a few companions to find his way back to Fort Frontenac by land saves through the Iroquois country. He had to cross the Fort Fron- eastern end of the lake on the ice, and reached his destination exhausted and famished. He was in poor condition to encounter the aggravated attacks which his creditors were making upon his character, and to avoid the embarrassments with which his enemies sought to entangle his projects. It has been said that La Salle’s creditors had already seized his property, but Kings- ford, the latest Canadian investigator, can find no evidence of actual seizure. While La Salle was gone, Tonty pushed the ship well on toward completion, but with constant apprehension that the Senecas might burn her on the stocks. These Indians hardly concealed their hostility, and could not be induced to supply the camp with food, so that two Mohegan Indians whom the French had with them were kept out to hunt for game. By May the vessel was ready NIAGARA RIVER. to launch. Once afloat, she was towed pe ee ee into the stream and anchored. It was , vase Cree) the first moment her builders had had when they felt secure from possible mischief on the part of the NIAGARA FALLS. 261 Indians. The savages could now prowl about and look on with wonder without exciting apprehension. Frontenac 679 pray, bore as supporters to his arms two griffins, and the ji. arr workmen had carved the figure of one and placed it P** at the prow. They had given, indeed, to the ship the corre- sponding name of ‘Griffon.’ She was pierced for five guns, and the little pieces grinned ominously from their ports. The fitting and rigging of the vessel went on, and when it was nearly complete Tonty started ahead (July 22) ju, conty with a small party to the outlet of the Detroit River. 8°e hea4. HENNEPIN’S VIEW OF NIAGARA FALLS. [From the Nouvelle Découverte, Utrecht, 1697. The cut in this edition shows the ‘‘ Griffon” on Lake Erie.] A few days later, La Salle arrived from Fort Frontenac, where he had made the best arrangement of his affairs which was pos- sible, and brought with him the priest Membré, whose journal is to help our narrative henceforward. Early in August, the “ Griffon ” was made ready for a start, and amid a discharge of guns, and with the crew e es August. The chanting the Ze Deum, she was towed against the ‘ Griffon” current till she could bear away with spread canvas = 262 CATARAQUI AND CREVECQGUR. upon the waters of Lake Erie. Three days later (August 10), La Salle saw the three columns of smoke which Tonty gave as a signal at the Detroit River, and took his staunch friend and companions on board. Passing up the straits, with green slopes and verdant groves on either hand, they crossed on Ste. Clare’s day the expansion of the stream which now bears a similar but perverted name (Lake St. Clair), and on the 23d the “ Griffon” Onlake Was bounding over the waves of Lake Huron. The EOD wind was rapidly freshening, and the flying vapors drove in upon her course. It grew to a gale, and the green timbers of the ship creaked ominously. Vows were made to St. Anthony of Padua, and as the seas broke over them hope was nearly abandoned. The crazy ship, however, rode out the AEE. storm, and on the 27th she rounded to under the point pene of St. Ignace, and dropped anchor in its quiet shelter. Here the strange community gathered within the palisades of the Jesuit’s house, and scattered through the startled Indian village, poured out upon the strand. Presently a hundred canoes were hovering about the weird and appalling “ Griffon.” La Salle, robed in scarlet and gold, landed with his companions, and heard mass in the bark chapel of the mission. This over, he lingered long enough among the huts of the village to discover that mischief was brewing. Some of the party which he had sent forward, as we have seen, to trade among the Illinois, had preferred to linger hereabouts, and were scattered among the bushrangers, who were loitering away their time in the indul- gences of this frontier life. These faithless pioneers had im- bibed something of the distrust and enmity which existed in this wild community against any organized method of trade, and were plotting sedition against their leader. La Salle caused the arrest of a few, and sent a party to the Sault to seize some who had wandered thither. Such peremptory de- mands on La Salle’s part might stifle, but they did not eradi- cate, the poisonous opposition which his presence created. Arranging for the coming back of the “ Griffon ” from Green Bay to Mackinac, whence she was to return to Niagara with such furs as could be gathered, to satisfy the demands of his creditors, La Salle set sail once more on her for his destination. At Green Bay, he found other of his men, and they had secured a welcome store of peltries. He seemed to forget that the THE “GRIFFON.” 263 shipment of them would expose him to the charge of having traffic with the Ottawas, whose trade his commission warned him not to divert from Montreal. Hennepin tells us that in determining to send the “ Griffon” back with these furs, La Salle did not deign to consult with anyone. The act was sure to turn against him any traders at Mackinac who were not already estranged. But La Salle never looked far ahead for the effects of any indiscretion. On September 18, La Salle saw the * Griffon,” thus laden with an ill-gotten booty, sail out of Green Bay on her |. si way to Mackinac and Niagara. There were a pilot, a 18. The é business agent, and five other men on board. She ee directed her course to the northeast, and was seen no more. La Salle’s mind was soon made uneasy when a gale arose and swept along the course of the ship. The people at St. Ignace felt it, and feared the little vessel might be buffeting its violence. The storm passed, and while the sun shone, priest and trader at Mackinac began to peer up the straits for the white sail that was never to come. In all probability the “ Griffon” foundered in the gale, and no one survived to tell the tale. There were stories of foul play, of Indians boarding her and murdering the crew, and of a faith- less pilot, who ran her ashore and endeavored to escape with his plunder, but only to be stricken down by the savages, — but there is no evidence to substantiate any of them. La Salle indeed, at a later day, by talking with a Pana Indian, whom he represents as coming from a region two hundred leagues west of the Mississippi, was satisfied that the youth had seen the pilot of the “ Griffon,” whom his people had captured while he was on the Mississippi, endeavoring to reach Duluth in the Sioux country. La Salle was led to believe that if the renegade missed Duluth he was intending to go to the English at Hudson’s Bay. La Salle was confident also that to reach the spot where he was captured, he must have passed near the Jesuit stations on Green Bay, and its priests were accordingly not so ignorant of the fate of the vessel as they pretended. The ill-fated ship out of sight, La Salle was soon on his way up Lake Michigan toward the southern portages. He sent Tonty and a party across the lake, with instructions to follow up the eastern shore of Michigan, and to join his leader at St. Joseph. 264 CATARAQUI AND CREVECGUR. La Salle himself led a party of fourteen in four canoes, by the western shore. The way proved perilous. His canoes were too deeply laden with forges and tools to buffet easily the gales they encountered, and their food gave out. Unless the shore Indians had supplied them with corn they would have perished, and there was a village of Maskoutens and Outagamies at the river Melleoki (Milwaukee) which proved hospitable. They were glad at one point to feast on the carcass of a deer which they rescued from the crows. Their Mohegans hunted to keep them in food, as they had done at Niagara. They discovered some wild grapes, —an unexpected feast. They found some- times that their camp was robbed by lurking savages while they slept. Occasionally, a band of native vagabonds would manifest a hostile air. Once they thought they must fight for their lives, confronted by eight or ten times their own number of capering savages ; but the danger passed. When the assailants came to a parley, La Salle was advised that he would find implacable foes in the Illinois if he went on, for they had been taught to believe by the traders, who were already warning them against La Salle, that the raids which the Iroquois had made into the Illinois country had been instigated by the French. It was November 1, 1679, when La Salle reached the St. 1679,Nov.1, Joseph River. He was some time ahead of Tonty, and feat 72 he employed the interval in building a timber fort. It seph River. was nearly three weeks before his lieutenant appeared with only half his party, for the difficulties of feeding them all along one route had compelled him to divide his followers, and the two sections had taken different ways. Tonty brought no tidings of the “ Griffon,” as La Salle had hoped he would ; and so two men were dispatched to Mackinac, to be there when she returned from Niagara, and guide her to the St. Joseph, where four men were left in the fort. On December 3, La Salle, with eight canoes and thirty-three men, started up the St. Joseph River. There was nothing to cheer them in the stretch of dreary fields and bare woods which lined the river’s channel. His anxiety about the “Griffon” weighed him down throughout these seventy sad miles. For a while he despaired of finding the portage. At last it was discovered, and there was a severe haul over five miles of stiffened ooze. When they once more December 3. LA SALLE ON THE ILLINOIS. 265 launched their canoes on the Kankakee, they slipped along with the welcome current through open prairies, which were the range of the buffalo. At last they shot out upon the Illinois. They came to a large village of the Ottawas, but the huts were empty, for it was the period of the winter hunt. They searched the spot till they found a store of buried corn, and took in their need fifty bushels of it. They had passed under the ribbed precipice of what was later known as Starved Rock, not yet suggestive of future trials. Around them lay the broad plains of the Illinois, stretching between its bordering ridges. On January 1, 1680, they landed, and celebrated the feast of the Circumcision. On the 5th, they darted into the 1630, ganu- expansion of water now known as Peoria Lake. As ** they approached its lower end they discovered some thin films of smoke writhing above the woods, and, doubling a point in the contracted stream, an Indian village was before them. LaSalle slackened his speed enough to draw out his little flotilla in line across the river, and floated on amid the shouts and cries of the disturbed savages. The aspect for a while was threatening, but La Salle boldly landed as if for conference, and the chiefs ad- vanced with calumets. The peaceful pipe removed distrust, and tobacco and hatchets were soon exchanged for hospitality, while the rubbing of the Frenchmen’s feet with unguents marked the savage civilities. The taking of corn from their village garners was explained and payment offered. With faltering interpre- tation the visitors tried to make evident that they had come to do their hosts a service. They promised to open a route by which to bring them the articles of European traffic, which were so acceptable. If they would generously allow the French to build a fort among them, such trade and reciprocity would be increased. The tribe, said the visitors, could not wisely deny such a privilege, for it would only force their guests to pass on to other more hospitable people. Such were, as Hennepin tells us, the persuasions the Frenchmen offered. But the golden offers were not doing all that La Salle ex- pected, and he thought he saw that the demeanor of the savages was growing more and more uneasy. He began to suspect that some of the disappointed and vagrant Mackinac traders who were determined to thwart his purposes had their Indian emis- saries in the dusky throngs which surrounded him. Hennepin 266 CATARAQUI AND CREVECQGUR. charges Allouez, the Jesuit priest who succeeded Marquette in the Illinois mission, and who had been a good deal among these people for the last two or three years, with having instigated these distrusts, and La Salle later professed himself confident of Allouez’s intrigues. At all events, it was apparent that some evil purpose had possessed the savages, and was extending even among La Salle’s own followers. Two of his best carpenters, upon whom he was depending for future work, deserted him at this juncture, and others less valuable had slunk away. It is even affirmed that some tried to poison their leader, but a good deal of caution must be exercised in interpreting the morose forebodings of La Salle. A certain rigorous silence which sometimes came over him was associated in the minds of the mistrustful savages with what they imagined to be some purpose to favor the Iroquois, and no thought could be more disquieting among them. It was amid such mutterings that La Salle resolved upon boldly placing a fortified post among these lowering savages. He selected a spot on a knoll on the eastern bank of the river. This little elevation was flanked by ravines and marshes, and they easily dug a ditch to complete the circuit of defense. e Within this they threw up earthworks, protected by a Salle 5 % builds Fort palisades. La Salle named his fort Crévecceur, — ’ broken heart! It has been commonly said that this name was given in recognition of cruel mishaps, which perplexed him, and none of which was more disheartening than the dis- appearance of the “ Griffon,” for his followers, left at St. Jo- seph, had never been able to send him the grateful tidings of her appearance. It may well be doubted if any but a foolish leader could have so clearly emphasized his misfortunes, when his querulous adherents needed so much to be inspirited. Shea is accordingly forced to believe that the name was chosen rather in reminis- cence of the Fort Crévecceur in the Netherlands which had been captured by Louis XIV. a few years before (1672). The fort well planned, La Salle laid the keel of a small ves- __ selof forty tons,— she was to be forty-two feet long and begins " 6 workona with twelve feet breadth of beam,—which was to serve with her high rails as a floating breastwork in his intended voyage to the mouth of the Mississippi. Though ACCAULT AND HENNEPIN. 267 he was embarrassed by the defection of some of his carpenters, the work went bravely on. He kept his party as closely within his fort as the work permitted, for he could hardly feel that his position was a safe one. Membré, however, lived among the Indians, ministering his holy calling, and we owe to his journal some part of our knowledge of these precarious days. The story which Sagean told after La Salle’s death of his partici- pation in this expedition has little or no claims for belief. The Indians had not ceased to picture the horrors of the lower Mississippi, in their efforts to dissuade the French from going farther down; but the construction of the ship showed that their intimidations were useless. La Salle soon had the oppor- tunity to impress them with something like a miraculous pres- cience. He chanced to intercept a young Illinois, bound to the village, but yet some distance afield. From him he gleaned a sufficiently accurate account of the leading landmarks in the great river’s southern course. With this knowledge La Salle sought an interview with the chiefs, and told them what he ex- pected to find. His descriptions so closely corresponded with what they knew, rather than what they represented, that they were embarrassed, and acknowledged they had had the purpose to deceive him. This moral victory served to make matters more promising, and La Salle determined to return to his manor at Cataraqui, and secure equipments for his ship. But one thing was yet to be done before leaving, and that was to dispatch a party to explore the upper waters of the Mississippi, as comple- menting his own project of exploring the lower parts to 60, pep. thesea. To this end one Accault was put in command ty. Ac cault and . : Hennepin of a party,and Hennepin was detailed to accompany Hennerin him. On the last day of February, 1680, La Salle Mississippi. saw the little expedition start on its way. A recital of its ad- ventures must be reserved for another chapter. We must also omit for the present to follow La Salle himself, when a few days later, bidding Tonty good-by, and investing him with the command, he also left for his visit to the distant settlements. It is only necessary now to record that he had not gone far when his eye measured the natural strength of the eminence now called Starved Rock, and making an examination of it, he determined it was a better post than Créveceur, if a siege was to be withstood. Accordingly, later in his progress, he sent back instructions to Tonty to occupy it. 268 CATARAQUI AND CREVECQUR. These messengers delivered La Salle’s instructions ; but that was not all. They aroused the lurking spirit of sedition which La Salle thought he had quieted. They told stories of the financial ruin which had overtaken their leader’s affairs in Montreal, and of his consequent inability to succor them. The pay of La Salle’s men was long in arrears, and there seemed no hope. Tonty, very likely not aware of the feelings of Tonty at . . . . Biarred revolt which these stories were creating, did not delay to carry out La Salle’s commands about the Rock, and left with a few men to visit the spot and begin his occupation of the heights. He was no sooner gone than the smothered pas- sions broke into fury, and the fort was gutted and abandoned. Word of all this soon reached Tonty at the Rock, and he dis- patched two small parties by different routes to carry intelli- gence to LaSalle of the ill luck which had befallen Crévecceur. One of the parties, as we shall see, reached its destination. The sending of these messengers depleted Tonty’s force so much that he was left with only three companions beside the two friars, to meet what seemed an inevitable fate. There was no- thing for the solitary Frenchmen to do but to mingle confidently with the Indian community which surrounded the Rock, and disarm enmity by a seeming trustfulness. In these straits, and with recurring apprehensions, the spring and summer passed. Early in September, a Shawnee straggler came into the vil- 1680, Sep. lage and reported a war party of Iroquois and Miamis unos not far off. The community was exasperated at the autach sudden danger. It was thought that this new attack of the dreaded confederates was set on by the French, and some scouts who had been out to watch the enemy’s advance reported that they had seen La Salle and a black-robe among the approaching foe. The truth was that some leader among them was arrayed in European clothes, and the real secret of their renewed hostility was to break up the French plans of establishing traffic in the great valley. If there was any spur upon their movements, it was applied by the English at Albany, who looked to the Iroquois as middlemen in keeping up their peltry trade with these western tribes. The Miamis had an old grudge against the Illinois, and the confederates had readily enticed them into joining in the raid. Tonty thus found himself unexpectedly put to a test both of TONTY’S ESCAPE. 269 his audacity and tact. His apparent eagerness to join in the fray at last dispelled the suspicions of his Indian allies. The Illinois hurriedly embarked their women and children for an island retreat down the river, and gave the night to making ready for the morrow’s fight. With the day the Illinois advanced to meet the attack, and in the midst of the confusion Tonty stepped to the front, hold- ing a wampum belt as an invitation to parley. On his being recognized as a Frenchman, the conflict was partially stilled about him, but it was not checked enough even then to save Tonty from a wound in the surging of the combatants. He succeeded at last in warning the enemy that in attacking the Illinois they were warring upon the French, of whom there was a force of sixty, as he professed, not far off, ready to avenge any disaster. This effrontery gained time, and the Illinois, suspecting the confederates’ hesitancy to be only a disguise for something worse, set fire to their town and joined their wo- men down the stream. The Iroquois immediately swarmed over the ground, and began to devastate what the fire had spared. Tonty’s position was growing more critical. It was evident that nothing but a policy of peace with Frontenac, which the Iroquois were practicing, saved these appalled Frenchmen from the old fury of their former foes. Tonty soon yielded poity to the Iroquois advice, and saw that he must leave the °°? Illinois to their fate. He embarked in canoes with his com- panions, and paddled upstream out of sight and earshot of the hideous revelries. Tonty gone, there was no restraint upon the furious Iroquois, and they started down the river in pursuit of the flying Illinois. The savage demons fell upon their victims wherever they could come up with them, and left the revolting traces of their fiendish fury all along their track. Tonty, the day after his escape, stopped to repair his canoe, when Father Ribourde, wandering off from the party, was mur- dered by a marauding band of Kickapoos. There were four Frenchmen now left beside their leader, and they pushed on, buoyed by a hope which promised little. They suffered hard- ships that there was no chance of escaping. They passed the Chicago portage and followed down the western shores of Michigan, little suspecting that La Salle was at the same time 270 CATARAQUI AND CREVECGUR. following up the opposite shore to succor them. It was now Nov, Dec., November, and early in December Tonty met a party AGE: of Ottawas, who took them in their canoes. Famished, and weakened almost to exhaustion, they found at last hospita- ble entertainment in a Pottawattamie village. Tonty was too ill to go farther, and there happened to be some Frenchmen in the village to nurse him. Membré was left to proceed alone to Green Bay and report the horrible details of these tragic experiences. We may turn now to follow La Salle after he had parted with ee Tonty. It was in March, 1680, when, accompanied by Lasalie’s ~~ his faithful Mohegan hunter and four Frenchmen, La Salle’s two canoes glided out into the icy stream and began to ascend the Illinois. It was dreary weather, and nothing but severe hardship could be in store for them; but it was necessary to undergo everything if he was to launch his new vessel at Crévecceur the next season, since the anchors and other equipments must be brought from the St. Lawrence. They found in some places the ice in the river too thick to break, and were obliged to sledge their canoes. The snow lay ‘deep enough to embank the buffalo, and they got some meat by killing the struggling creatures. Towards the end of March they reached the fort on the St. Joseph. Here they found some of the men who had been left there, but they had heard nothing of the “ Griffon.” Two of them were ordered to join Tonty and carry the message about fortifying the Rock, to which reference has been made. There now lay before them 270 miles of an unexplored path across the neck of the lower Michigan peninsula to the Detroit River. They encountered trials and dangers enough to make the stoutest quail. Shea, who is much inclined to belittle and disparage all of La Salle’s acts, looks upon this fearful tramp as “ the only really bold and adventurous act” in his career. They waded through drowned lands. They were obliged to thaw their stiffened clothes in the morning before they could move. Where they found a path in the open they burned the grass to destroy their trail, for warring savages invested the country, little discriminating as regards their human prey. They fortunately escaped them, or appeased them if encountered. On reaching the Detroit River, along which the Hurons were LA SALLE ON THE ST. LAWRENCE. 271 now gathering into a permanent settlement, two of La Salle’s men were sent to Mackinac to report his movements. The leader with his remaining men now made from elm bark a canoe in which the reduced party finally reached Niagara. He here found other of his men holding the post near the shipyard of the “Griffon.” These dependants were equally without tidings of the ill-fated vessel, and had new misfortunes to report, for a ship which La Salle had expected with supplies had been wrecked in the St. Lawrence. Such was the dismal condition which confronted him at Niagara. La Salle had borne up under the hardships of the march better than his men. He bravely stood all these failures of his hopes. Taking three fresh men in place of his prostrate com- panions, he again started for Fort Frontenac, and stad Ae reached that post on May 6; he had traveled a thou- Fert Fron- sand miles, and had been sixty-five days in doing it. There was little to inspirit him about the condition in which he found his affairs. Inquiries disclosed that some of his trusted agents had appropriated the profit of his furs. He learned that others had deserted his interests and had taken his skins to Albany. Somebody had started a report of his death, and on the strength of it, a forced sale had been made of some of his effects. There was yet, however, something more than a reed to depend on. Frontenac was still his support, and La Salle found on going to Montreal that he could yet get credit and supplies. During the two months in which La Salle addressed himself to the improving of his affairs, he succeeded in accom- plishing much, and was on the eve of again departing for the Illinois when one of the parties which Tonty had sent off with the news of the revolt at Crévecceur reached Fort Frontenac. These men also brought tidings of the later riotous conduct of the mutineers, plundering where they could, and that they were now on the way to Cataraqui, scattering reports as they came on of the death of Tonty, and harboring vengeance on La Salle. It was towards the end of July, 1680, when La Salle aor was awakened to these new dangers. His decision ©” was prompt. He mustered some faithful men, and started to meet the vagabonds. He ambushed his party on the track of the marauders, and easily captured the two canoes which were in advance, and later he seized a third, and returned with all his prisoners to the fort. 272 CATARAQUI AND CREVECGUR. La Salle had twenty-five men with him when, a few days later, 4680, he left the fort. He followed the Humber River, and August. thence crossing to Lake Simcoe, he tracked its outlet again. to Georgian Bay. Reaching Mackinac, he divided his party, and leaving La Forest, now his lieutenant, to follow with the rest, he pushed on with only twelve men. October with its variegated charms had come when La Salle was moving with his canoes along the eastern shore of Lake Michigan, — just at the moment, we have seen, when Tonty, faltering with his burdens, was being borne along the western. Neither was conscious of the movements of the other. Sieh In November, La Salle was at the fort on the St. at St. Jo- Joseph, which he found had been abandoned. He wrote here for Frontenac a statement of his belief in pursuing this western discovery. He left five men to repair and occupy the post, and went on with six others and a single Indian. The prairie, as they passed along the Kankakee, was dark in places with hordes of buffaloes. They killed twelve and dried the meat. They passed Starved Rock; it was silent. They came to the great town of the Illinois, but it was a scene of black desolation. Wolves and buzzards were feeding upon the half-buried bodies of its defenders. The skulls which were grinning upon poles here and there told the old story of Iroquois ferocity. In the Illinois fort they found a few bits of French cloth, — that was all. The skulls were examined, — they were all Indian. Where was Tonty ? La Salle left three men to conceal themselves near the town Gok for the present, and with four others he went on. He Ilinois fort. found where the camps of the Illinois and the invaders had been on opposite sides of the river; but everything was abandoned. He reached Crévecceur; it was demolished, but the vessel was still on the stocks, though the Iroquois had drawn out the iron spikes. He still went on, and reached the Missis- sippi. It was his first sight of it. Here he tied a letter for Tonty to a tree, and turned back. It was now the early days of December, 1680. He rejoined the men whom he had left near the Illinois town, and a great comet hung ominously over the scene of desolation, and with its baleful impressiveness following him, La Salle went back to the Miami country. October. December, 1680. First sees the Mis- sissippi. CHAPTER XII. DULUTH AND HENNEPIN ON THE MISSISSIPPI. 1678-1683. DvuLurs was a cousin of Tonty with the silver hand, as La Salle’s friend was designated because of his metal member. There is preserved in the Archives of the Marine at Paris an account which Duluth wrote in 1683 of his experiences in the Sioux country. He was an adventurous young fellow, who had found, off and on, attractions in the Ca- nadian wilderness, till on September 1, 1678, he was jog. among allowed to start on explorations to see what he could ‘Si find among the Sioux. The priests and traders had known this people as wanderers and loiterers about the Lake Superior sta- tions for several years. Duluth took with him three French- men and three Indians, and wintered somewhere on Lake Huron. In the following spring (1679), he was in the woods not far from the Sault Ste. Marie, and on April 5 he wrote to Frontenac that he was preparing to forestall the English, and to get ahead of any Spanish who might come from the South Sea to explore the region west of Lake Superior. He also informed the governor that he intended to set up the king’s arms among the Sioux who inhabited this country. This act he performed on the 2d of the following July, in the midst of the Mille Lacs region. In the autumn (1679), he was near the head of Lake Superior, using his good offices to year taxe establish a peace between the Sioux and the Assini- Speier boines. This was about September 15, and the site of his mediation seems to have been the spot where later Fort William stood. The enemies of Frontenac were not backward in insinuating that clandestine trade for the governor’s advantage had not a little to do with this movement of Duluth; and it was not Duluth. 1679. 274 DULUTH AND HENNEPIN ON THE MISSISSIPPI. unknown that a trader named Pierre Moreau, but commonly Be called La Taupine, was at this time wandering about Moreau, —_ this very region, perhaps with Frontenac’s protection Taupine. in his pocket. Some years before, Joliet had found Moreau in the Illinois country, and when afterwards in Mon- treal the fellow boasted of his success in trading for furs, and the intendant sought to arrest him for illicit traffic, he produced orders from Frontenac appointing him to secret service among the Ottawas. In the summer of 1680, Duluth was once more in this region, eae: and this time he sought to find a waterway to the sekinga ‘Sioux country, which he had reached before by land. waterway He had two canoes, and with him were an Indian interpreter and four Frenchmen. He passed from Lake Supe- rior into the Bois Brulé River, a narrow stream with an ob- structed channel, and then crossing a portage he reached the Dahil Gate St. Clair Lake, and so descended by its outlet to the sissippi, Mississippi. Duluth had learned from the Sioux that where he < 2 ; eee party of their tribe had gone down the river to hunt, and that some Europeans were with them. Duluth had intended on this expedition to push on westward to salt water, which he expected would prove to be the Gulf of California, and he supposed it was distant only twenty days’ journey. It was the prevailing notion at this time that the line of the upper Mississippi was from two thirds to three quarters across the continent, when in reality it is about midway. This is the geographical view which we find was cherished by Joliet and Hennepin, and appears in the maps of Franquelin, who was at this time living in Quebec, and embodying in his maps the latest reports of the western explorers. Who these Europeans were, thus following the hunting party of the Sioux, was an interesting question, which Duluth was anxious to solve, for it was possible that his planting of the royal column amid the Mille Lacs was none too soon, if English or Spaniard had penetrated to its neighborhood. So leaving two of his men to guard his wares, and taking the other two with him, Duluth started down the river. We have seen that just before La Salle left Crévecceur to go back to Cataraqui, in the early spring of 1680, he had dis- patched Michel Accault, a Picard man, whose name is variously BUILDING OF THE “GRIFFON.” 275 o q Sq c oO S Zz Q ° y 8 a a a my & 5 3 ° 4 COLT ‘erepaaqsury ‘ajsaanoaay anoanoar s,mmdeuuay } 276 DULUTH AND HENNEPIN ON THE MISSISSIPPI. spelled, with Hennepin and another Picard man, Du Gay, as companions. Their purpose was to conduct an expe- 1680. Ac- 1. ; : : a dition to the region where we have just parted with Duluth. The trip is mostly associated with Henne- pin, because we depend on his account of their wanderings; but Accault, as the better linguist, seems to have been in charge by La Salle’s appointment. Passing down the Illinois, the little party turned up the Mississippi, and went on amid the floating ice. They paddled . up beyond the Wisconsin, and when near the Black April. a s . Encounter River, on April 11, they met a party of Sioux, a hun- the Sioux. . . . : dred and more in number, in thirty-three birch canoes. The savages came down upon the little exploring party with precipitation, and soon surrounded them. The Frenchmen seemed for a while in great danger, but the Sioux had already profited by the French trade, and whatever passions for plun- der stirred them now, there was prudence enough in the savage leaders to check the murderous impulse. They therefore car- ried the captives to their villages. The whole flotilla struggled up against the current, till, coming to the widening of the stream below the modern St. Paul, their canoes were hidden, and the party made the rest of the journey by land, and found a halt at last, and relief from a march which proved weary and painful to the prisoners, on the shores of Lake Buade. Here the Frenchmen were detained for some weeks, being distributed to separate masters ; but all three were at last brought together, to accompany a party of their captors down the Mississippi on a buffalo hunt. Later, Accault preferring to stay with the In- dians, Hennepin and Du Gay were allowed to depart in a canoe 1080, Jury, 1° try to join some French, who, as La Salle had prom- Hemepin ised, were to be at the mouth of the Wisconsin. They went off in the slumbrous air of summer, — for it was July, 1680,— and floated with the current till the falls near the modern St. Paul confronted them. This cataract owes the name of St. Anthony to Hennepin, who now first saw it. Carrying their canoe to the quiet water below, they still went on, wondering at the seamy towers of nature’s architecture everywhere around them. At last they cast a longing gaze upon the festooned trees which marked the approach to Lake Pepin, and were smoothly floated out upon its waters. THE TWO EXPLORERS MEET. 277 In this neighborhood Hennepin encountered the Indian whose adopted son he had become during his stay at Lake Bu- ade, and from him he learned that a band of the Sioux were not far off, hunting on atributary of the Mississippi. The French- men’s ammunition was well-nigh spent, and they found it im- possible to keep from one meal to another the game which they were fortunate enough to kill. With powder gone they would be in danger of famishing. The lesser evil was to join these hunting Sioux, which they did, and they found Accault among them. While in company with these Sioux, two squaws came from the east and reported meeting a war party of % " "s : Soon hears their tribe, accompanied by five white men. Henne- of white pin was as curious as Duluth had been to know what other Europeans were so near him. They were in fact Duluth and his companions. The party which Hennepin had joined, having now ended their hunt, started northward towards their homes, aoe and it was not long before the two Sioux parties met, Bee and Hennepin and Duluth encountered one another. It was represented later both by Hennepin and Duluth that at the time of their meeting Hennepin was in forcible deten- tion by the Sioux, and that it was Duluth’s intervention which released him. The story is not altogether credible, and La Salle at least did not believe it. At all events, the two French- men parted with the Indians in company, and with their com- panions, eight in all, they passed up the Wisconsin, where the traders which La Salle had intended to meet them were not to be found, as the reader might readily suppose from the evil fortune which had overtaken that leader. They passed unmolested by the Fox River to Green Bay, and win- Be cae. tered at Mackinac. In May, 1631, Duluth reached ttn at Que- Quebec, and was arrested for illegal trading at the “* west. The suppression of clandestine traffic had proved so difficult that the home government made a virtue of necessity, and sent orders that the treasury should profit froma freer dis- tribution of licenses. It was directed that twenty-five such permits should be given annually, each covering a single canoe and three men. The spirit of the order was enough to estab- lish greater leniency for such transgressions as had gone by, and Duluth was released. 978 DULUTH AND HENNEPIN ON THE MISSISSIPPI. In the same spring (1681), Hennepin appeared among his _. old companions at Fort Frontenac, almost as an appa- Bod one, rition, for it was believed, as the report ran, that the are savages had hanged him with his own waist-rope. At Montreal he met Frontenac and interested him in his story, and then sailed for France. By the following summer he had prepared a manuscript of his adventures, and, September 8, permission was 1683. Pub men ; ‘ lisheshis given to him in Paris to put it to press, and on Jan- Paris, with, uary 5, 1683, it was issued as a Description de la an Louisiane. It is probable that at this time the priest was abiding in the convent at St. Germain-en-Laye. The book is accompanied by a map, which has some noteworthy features. One is that the southern shore of Lake Evie is carried so far south as to cover the proper latitude of the Ohio, of which river the map shows no sign. Indeed, Hennepin seems to have missed a true conception of that stream, for he says it is in the country of the Iroquois, and affords a passage to the Sea of Florida. It is surprising that Hennepin could have been the companion of La Salle and not have heard of the latter’s visit to that river fourteen years before, unless, indeed, La Salle at this time had no conception that the river which he then followed flowed into the Mississippi. If the southern shore of Lake Erie had ever been tracked by explorers, equipped after the usual fashion of the time with astrolabes, it is also surprising that some record of its approximate latitude should not have been known, for Hennepin could hardly have failed of converse with Franquelin when he was at Quebee on his way to France, and that car- tographer studiously kept abreast of the increasing knowledge of these distant parts. That European axemen had been in this region just about this time has been claimed by Colonel Whittle- sey, because of the discovery in numerous places of trees show- ing the cuts of broad-bitted axes under the annual rings, which had begun as early as this period to overlay the wound. It is of course possible that such implements might have been wielded by the savages themselves, and procured through the Iroquois from the English mart at Albany. Another noticeable point of the map is the representation of a mission station far north of the source of the Mississippi, where it is certain that none had been established, or at least MAP OF 1683. 279 there is no record of such. The placing of it there seems to have been a pretension on the part of the Recollect Hennepin { Ss pe Ry ee) = Se = b RS s gph eo SEE? She ey i i mk e Cétber | iene Baas ied é q oS e RAs —— i wu ff or he a lode Bes baba ge sos; 3 b ES mie 2 9 ® ’ TEP BF U ce 9 = | UN 2 e 3 Ce i & : & ¢ § a t Ra g g a5 S eg & f < id a HENNEPIN, 1683. that his order had outstripped the venturesome Jesuits, but he prudently removed it from his later maps. 280 DULUTH AND HENNEPIN ON THE MISSISSIPPI. In the book itself, Hennepin speaks of encountering four Indians on his route who had come from a place four hundred leagues farther west, and had been four months on the way, and they had assured him that there was no place like the Straits ot traits of Anian, such as was put down on the maps. een: Here was a reference to an old problem that had puz- zled many generations of geographers. If Humboldt has cor- rectly divined the origin of the mystery, — it is hard to be satisfied that he has, —the notion had arisen as early as 1500, when Cortereal had found the opening of Davis’s Straits, that it was in some way the ingress to Asia, and was called the Straits of Anian. It is certainly a long time after that before we meet the name, or the passage itself, in cartographical con- jecture, and, indeed, it was hardly possible that it could have existed on the maps before the substantial insularity of North America was established. It was then placed so as to prefigure the later-found Bering’s Straits, only considerably farther south. Running in a general north and south direction, it was made to form a passage to the wide expanse of water which in the sixteenth century was generally believed to lie along the north- ern confines of Canada. It is found in this position in the map of Zalterius in 1566. The interval from the days of Cartier to the coming of Champlain, when almost nothing was done to clear up the geography of the northern verge of Canada, was when conceptions of the Straits of Anian, traversing or opening to this region from the Pacific side, were most rife. It got recognition from Mercator, Ortelius, Porcacchi, and Furlano, who were leading geographers of those days. It appeared in the maps of Sir Humphrey Gilbert and Frobisher, and the straits called after the latter were supposed to connect with it. Drake sought it in 1578; and six years later, when Gali made a northern sweep from the Philippines to Acapulco, he was thought to have disproved its existence by the breadth which he found the North Pacific to have. The tendency was to move the posi- tion of the straits farther north, and Wytfliet in the first Ameri- ean atlas (1597) reverted to the old notion, which was kept up later by Hondius (1613). Thirty years afterwards the explo- rations of De Vries, the Dutch navigator, induced people to think for a while that where Gali had supposed a broad ocean, there was really a huge island, which the Spanish navigator did not go LAND OF JESSO. 281 far enough north to see. This was thought to be of almost con- tinental extent, barring access to the boreal regions except at its eastern and western extremities. The channel on the American side of this island thus became the straits so long searched for. This was perhaps the prevalent belief when Hennepin ques- ficieersrin eH lan i nr zim ag ar 7 2 g t PS fe J Hn eekly NT > pr ees ae, Fy — el 8 BP 3 tl Rel teres H i a Ie iN 19 tam A NN on fy Sy a5 i ‘t a of GH. 3 " | Ste | 2 oN qi HS H we e PH H a1 LR 2 ter id aan Gl re re oO = H° 1c] F] Hi Ee Os Ltt 2a wy c $ s i | ye iN a Oo | bi ‘ i SS A —far fi HE i i} hy iG ua ae = its A Hao ceeatnge yl Mie = $ ze 2 re _ Ff PA aa Se Ss = tioned these hardy wanderers from the distant west on the upper waters of the Mississippi. While recording this denial of the straits’ existence, Henne- pin refers to the failure, as he understood it, of both the Eng- lish and the Dutch to find such a passage at the north, but expresses a faith that by pursuing some of his own discaveriss, 282 DULUTH AND HENNEPIN ON THE MISSISSIPPI. a river would yet be found capable of floating large vessels to the South Sea, where without crossing the equator, Asia could be reached. ‘It is most likely,” he adds, “that Japan and America are one continent,’ and such was not an infrequent belief in some form, before the severance of Asia and America was finally established by Bering nearly fifty years later. Hen- nepin wavered in his dissent, or perhaps his editor did for him, for when in 1697 his new edition appeared, he adopted the Dutch notion of Jesso — as the intervening island already men- tioned was called — in a map of the north Pacific which is given in that book. Hennepin’s reputation with posterity has rested rather upon Hennepin’s this later edition than upon his original of 1683, and veracity. not to his advantage. In this earlier book, except- ing his forcible detention by the Sioux, which La Salle found it worth while to discredit, there is not much to question. Parkman calls it ‘‘ comparatively truthful.” It stands reason- ably well a critical test, and the internal evidence is in its favor. It has been alleged by Margry that the correspondence in the text shows a closer relation to an account written by La Salle than is consistent with an independent relation; but this cor- respondence extends to events of which Hennepin had personal knowledge, and La Salle had not. It is therefore reasonable to suppose that Hennepin may have acted as a scribe for La Salle, and that each used the same record for his own purposes. It is hardly worth while to go to the other extreme adopted by Shea in charging La Salle with pilfering from Hennepin. The map which accompanied this Description omitted the lower parts of the Mississippi where it connected itself with the gulf, and this connection was only suggested by a dotted line. ere The Nouvelle Décowverte of 1697 is the Descrip- Nouvelle tion de la Louisiane of 1683, enlarged. It purports also to be a more truthful account of Hennepin’s discoveries than he felt at liberty to make while La Salle, whom he looked upon as an enemy, was alive. These suppressed state- ments, no longer withheld, were to substantiate his new map, which boldly represented the Mississippi throughout its entire course to the gulf. There is some reason to believe that about the time of issuing his first book, he orally professed to have descended the Mississippi ; but that book contains only a regret HENNEPIN AND MEMBRE. 283 that he had not the time to do so. The statement which he now printed represented that when he and Accault went down the Illinois to its mouth, they then turned downstream and proceeded to the outlet of the Mississippi. After this, return- ing to the starting-place, they went up, and pursued the course which had induced the narrative of the earlier book. This meant, provided the dates given in the Description were cor- rect, that Hennepin had, within the thirty days which were al- lowed for the exploit, paddled thirty-two hundred miles, down and up stream, and that he had made sixty miles a day, when only an average of perhaps twenty to twenty-five was possible. La Salle, in one of his papers, says that a day’s travel on the river means seven or eight leagues. It was certain this difficulty would be noted, as well as the remarkable secrecy which had been maintained in his first book regarding the undertaking. Some bluster was sufficient to meet the charge respecting the secrecy, and this was abundantly offered in the Mouw- ais vouvete velle Voyage, which was printed as a sort of supple- '!°% ment the next year. In this a violent preface defended his claim to have gone down the Mississippi. To support his anda- city, he had two resources: one was to assert that the distance was not what it was supposed to be, and the other was so to change his dates that he could make it appear that he had forty-three days instead of thirty for the task. Curiously enough, he boldly in the Nowvelle Voyage shifted the charge of plagiarism — which followed upon its being dis- covered that the account of La Salle’s own voyage to the mouth of the Mississippi bore a close resemblance to Hennepin’s narrative — upon Leclercq, in whose Premier Htablissement de la Foy, Hennepin’s text, with little change, had recently ap- peared, as a journal of Membré, the companion of La jyempres Salle. It was now asserted that Hennepin had left in 3: Quebec an account of his own experience while descending the river in 1680, to which Leclercq got access, and converted it to his purpose in describing the adventures of La Salle for the fol- lowing year. Dr. Poole, who, in an address before the American Historical Association in 1888, was inclined to look charitably on the charges ordinarily preferred against Hennepin, frankly acknowledged that if he was the author of this statement, a defense of his reputation is hopeless. 284 DULUTH AND HENNEPIN ON THE MISSISSIPPI. Sparks, in his Life of La Salle, made a thorough exposure of the correspondences of Hennepin’s narrative with the journal of Membré as given by Leclercq. From that day to Parkman’s Hennepin has usually been held up to the modern reader’s scorn. Shea, not long after Sparks’s exposure, went so far as to Qe a Ba} Y re a 1O dE? Me ( ' Oe WE of, o “i : 3 = ppt a ™m A ~ a e uw 'S 3 =e » = 2 yg & A 2 » a 2 = ey i > by, -m ; L throw discredit upon what Hennepin says of the upper Missis- sippi, and to doubt if he ever went upon its waters at all. Of late there have been persistent efforts to restore the good name of Hennepin, and Shea, to make amends for his early mistrust, has been the chief advocate of these Defense of Hennepin. MAP OF 1697. 285 later views. The argument which has been relied upon is this: Hennepin having prepared a new edition of his Description, the copy was left with the publisher, who, to add to the attractive- ness of the book, and to give some surprises that would induce a larger sale, ein it to further remodeling by an irre- “A 4 ee oe Hat il iG ae ae ~ HENNEPIN, 1697. month, they were at the Rock. They were received at the fort by Belleforest, then in command, for Tonty had gone east at the summons of the governor, to join an expedition against the Senecas. A Ze Deum was sung in the chapel, but Allouez, the missionary, lay ill in the fort. Joutel tells us that this priest was uneasy when they told him that La Salle was on his way to join them, being conscious of many efforts to thwart La Salle’s purposes, and that it was a fear of meeting one whom he had wronged that induced Allouez shortly after to leave the fort. It is fair to add that the Jesuit writers deem such a story an injustice to a devoted missionary, long resident among the Illinois. Why were Allouez and all the other occupants of the fort given to understand that La Salle was still alive, and was soon to appear? There is no wholly satisfactory reason why such a misrepresentation was practiced. The truth was not long after to be known, when Couture came up the river with the tale as he had learned it from those who were now falsifying its par- ticulars. The only reasons which have been offered for the deceit are that Joutel and the rest dreaded to abate the joy which their coming created ; that in getting supplies to go on, they could not have got the same credit with La Salle known to be dead, and that for La Salle’s relatives, at least, there 824 LA SALLE’S TEXAN COLONY. were reasons why they should get to France in advance of the news of his death, to secure some property rights. Leaving this deceitful story behind them, Joutel and his party pushed on to Lake Michigan, where, being overtaken by a gale, they found it prudent to return to the fort in order to recover for a new start. In the interval, Tonty had come back, and pen he, too, was kept in the same ignorance of the truth. April, 1688. Fe fitted them out with new supplies, and they passed on and reached Mackinac in safety. Here some furs which Cavelier had received from Tonty were sold on La Salle’s ac- count. With the burning burden on their conscience, they at last embarked at Quebec. The truth was not disclosed when they reached France in October, till after a delay which caused suspicion; and then when the worst was known, the king did nothing to rescue the poor colony on the gulf shore. It was at last determined by the government that the murderers should be apprehended if they appeared in Canada, and such an order was sent to the governor; but no one ever suffered at the hands of the law. The fate of the colony is not unknown. The vessel which the Spaniards had captured near San Domingo revealed to them the object of La Salle. During the next three years, four expeditions were sent by Spanish authority to discover the French, but without success. They surmised something of disaster when they found the wrecks of the “ Aimable” and “ Belle.” It is probable that one of La Salle’s deserters finally tried to destroy the colony, for an overland expedition from Mexico at last discovered their fort, and this party was thought to be led by a Frenchman. It was too late, however, for rescue or revenge. Three dead bodies lay on the ground. It was otherwise a scene of devastation and solitude. A crowd of sav- ages hovered around, but gave no sign. A few days later, two men presented themselves to the Spanish force. They were in native guise, but proved to be two of the colony, — L’Archevéque and Grollet. This was in May, 1689, and according to their story, the remnant of the French had been attacked three months before by Indians, and all were either killed or carried off. It has been said that these two Frenchmen were sent to Spain and thrown into prison; but Bandelier claims to have found in the records of Santa Fé traces of L’ Archevéque’s later TONTY’S MEMOIRS. 325 career among the Spaniards, and says that his descendants are still living in that region. The same investigator affirms that he has discovered traces in the archives of New Mexico of two others of La Salle’s colony. We learn from a report of the viceroy of New Spain that measures were taken about 1690 to occupy the Texan country against the French, and that missions were established there by the Spaniards, who afterwards suc- ceeded in rescuing the few survivors of the French who were found among the native tribes. A few years later (1693), when Tonty was living at Fort St. Louis, he prepared the Jfemoirs relating to his own and La Salle’s discoveries which is now accessible in the Margry col- lection. It is an excellent guide to the historian; but the same cannot be said of the Dernitres Découvertes, published in Paris in 1697, and in the next year in an English version at London. This publication was charged upon Tonty, but he disowned it, and well he might. Whoever compiled it doubtless used the memoir which Tonty prepared in 1693, but other less trust- worthy material was embedded in it. The putting of it together was done without close knowledge of the events, and manifests, moreover, no skill. With Tonty’s own narrative preserved, the book has little value. CHAPTER XV. DENONVILLE AND DONGAN. 1683-1687. Wirx La Salle gone to France and the governor’s emissaries 1683, La iM possession of what that projector had left behind eae him, La Barre closed the year (1683) with a pros- pect of doing something; at least, so people thought before he had time to show his timidity. The next year (1684) opened with renewed activity on the part of the Iroquois. War par- ties of the Senecas were moving west, and there were suspicions that English packmen were following in their rear and making trade among the Shawnees and Choctaws. By March, some of La Barre’s agents on their way to the Ihi- nois were robbed on the Kankakee, and before the month was over a party of Senecas broke upon the Indian camp near the Rock, and Tonty and De Baugis worked together successfully in defending their stronghold for nearly a week, before the . assailants retired. When La Barre heard of this, the exigency seemed for a while to arouse him, and he sent off messengers to the upper lakes to ask his lieutenants there to come and help him punish the Senecas in their own country. At the same time he wrote to Dongan, asking him to prohibit the sale of firearms to the Iroquois. The English governor reminded him that the Iroquois whom it was proposed to chastise were British subjects, and that he was quite willing to make recompense for their misdeeds, if the French had any charges to prefer against them. If the French armed the Illinois, why should not the English put guns in the hands of the Iroquois? Dongan knew that English firearms were seen almost everywhere through North America, carried by these same confederates. He was at this time writing home that the Iroquois, having no beaver in their March, 1684. MOHAWKS AND ONEIDAS. 327 own country, sent parties, both for trade and war, as far as the northwest passage, on the one side, and to the South Sea, — wherever he supposed that to be, — and even to Florida, on the gulf side. Only recently Lord Effingham had come from Vir- ginia to make the Iroquois agree to spare the frontiers of that colony, and by treaty Dongan himself had been hanging the armorial bearings of the Duke of York in the villages of the RUINS OF THE INTENDANT’S PALACE IN QUEBEC. [Originally built, 1684; reconstructed at different times, and finally destroyed in 1785. After a sketch in Lemoine’s Quebec, Past and Present, p. 105.] Mohawks and Oneidas. Father de Lamberville, at this time, writing from the Onondaga mission to La Barre, said that the governor of New York had sent a shabby flag with the English arms on it, to be hoisted among the Mohawks, but that people had shut it up in their treasure-box. Dongan had nevertheless arranged with the confederacy to take the country south of Lake Erie under the English protection. The Canadian intendant knew well enough what all this meant, and wrote to the king that La Barre would bluster, but would not fight. Perhaps 328 DENONVILLE AND DONGAN. some of the lookers-on thought differently when La Barre in July set out for Fort Frontenac. The Jesuits had already recalled Father Milet from the Oneida country, where he had kept a mission for seventeen years. The governor’s bluster ended as the intendant had predicted. The’ French leader went very peaceably across the lake, and accepted a truce, in which the Senecas would not abate one jot of their purpose to destroy the western allies of the French if they could. This was the news which reached Niagara when Durantaye, Duluth, and Perrot arrived there with a hundred and fifty bushrangers and five hundred Indians, whom they had led down from the upper lakes for some savage work, as La Barre had proposed. This western rabble turned back indignantly, and La Barre’s lieutenants had no easy task to hold them together. In October, the intendant, who had no confidence in the peo- Octover, ple, could boast to his government that he had not 10s misjudged their governor. The king, who was just at this time looking forward to La Salle’s suecesses over the Spaniards on the Mississippi, was prompt to decide that a different leader must be given to the Canadians, if the English were to be restrained on the lakes. Dongan in New York had proved an adversary that no common man could wrestle with, and the French were beginning to understand that their move- ments beyond the mountains were now watched by a man who 1685. De. ad a decided western policy for his government. It . e- . . nonville was to struggle with such a man that Denonville, in ee the autumn of 1685, came to Quebec as governor, fol- lowed by a fresh accession of troops, not all of whom, however, survived the tumultuous voyage. With a vigilant antagonist in New York, the commandant at Quebec was not in an enviable position. The town was but a nest of inflammable tenements, and had not a gate that would shut. The revocation of the Edict of Nantes had just taken place (October 18), and there was no hope in a resuscitated strength through immigration, while the Huguenots were instill- ing new and vigorous blood throughout the English colonies. The new governor, in the midst of this condition of affairs, was writing home of the dangers. He wanted Fort Frontenac strengthened, the vessels on Ontario repaired, and new ones put on Erie. ‘These precautions,” he said, “are necessary, THEIR CHARACTERS. 329 if we are to keep the English from securing the western fur trade.” It was the belief in Canada that Dongan was inciting the Iroquois to further strife. He himself denied that he penonvitte followed any clandestine methods, and it seems quite ™¢?"s™ clear that the French Jesuits, who were still among the Onon- dagas, did not have any such suspicions. Denonville, as a devotee of the Jesuits, may perhaps have known what these priests thought. As representatives of their respective royal masters, Denonville was far more fortunate than Dongan. The French governor had behind him in Louis XIV. a potentate whose ambition he could share. The timidity of James II. in every way in which he was brought to measure capacity with his neighbor across the channel] left his American representa- tive with only the shadow of support. In his own province, Dongan had a population half as large again as that of Canada, to say nothing of the moral support of a much larger prepon- derance of numbers in the adjacent English colonies. Dongan was the only governor along the Atlantic slope who was a constant source of anxiety to the French. The Canadians knew that the Iroquois dealt their strokes at the Illinois with greater security because these English of New York were their allies. Denonville felt that by the instructions which Louis had given him (March 10, 1685), it had become his duty to dispell the disquiet which La Barre’s abandonment of the Illinois had occasioned. He was expected to show that the power of France must and could protect her Indian allies. The English intentions were always a doubtful quantity. “We have always the English to warn us both on the north and on the south,” said Duchesneau a little while before, “and the Iroquois are a constant threat. Perhaps we can placate the Indians ; perhaps destroy them; but a great deal of uncertainty would be cleared up, if we could only buy the region dependent ° on Albany.” And this wish remained as constant as the trouble- someness of the English and Iroquois. Denonville expressed the tiresome uncertainty of the situation when he declared it impos- sible to know just what to expect of a neighbor who was, as he phrased it, both lawless and infidel. He could see no remedy but in an increase of the Canadian population, and bringing into more compact settlements what they already had. The 330 DENONVILLE AND DONGAN. mischief lay in everybody trying to advance his little trading- post into the wilderness to catch the fur trader all the sooner. It was clearly a part of the English policy to confront the French traders at the west wherever they could, and to outbid them in offers for the Indian fur. They even went to Mackinac, and were known among the Foxes near Green Bay, and were successful in diverting a good deal of trade from the French. Dongan did not hesitate to give English passes to Frenchmen and send them among the Ottawas, who, in the main, were middlemen in the peltry trade, having few beaver in their own territory. In May,1686, Denonville was complaining to Seignelay that French renegades were leading Eng- lish parties across Ontario. This was in defiance of the royal order, issued in April, 1684, which made it death for a Cana- dian to emigrate to Albany or Manhattan. To frustrate this audacity, the French governor tried to inter- pose armed posts in their way. He ordered Duluth to the Detroit River with fifty men, and Durantaye built a stockade at the Chicago portage. Nothing disturbed Denonville more than the reckless and abandoned dispersement of the woods- Bact men, — bandits he called them,—who under some rangers; —_ organization might become a help, but in their lawless- ness were only a mischief. It was not always they could be forced to offer resistance to an enemy. When by combination they could have protected the region of their trade, their wanton independency left the Iroquois to raid the country about Lake Superior so effectively that the marts at Montreal were without peltry from that district. It was to remedy this that the government instituted some active movements on the one side toward Hudson’s Bay, and on the other toward the upper waters of the Mississippi. In the last direction, they had in the field a vigilant leader in oa Nicolas Perrot. He had been in command at Green Ferotiat Bay, and thence with a small party he struck across the country which Duluth and Hennepin had traversed, and planted the French flag on forts and stockades. He built one such post just below the mouth of the Wisconsin, and an- other on the shores of Lake Pepin. He kept his ears open for reports of more remote regions, and heard of a distant people to the west, who wore ornaments of stone in their ears and noses. 1686. HUDSON’S BAY. 331 When he heard that there were others among them who used horses and looked like the French, he knew them to be the Spaniards of New Mexico, whom the French might yet encoun- ter in the southwest. Hearing of some Iowas up the river, a tribe which the French had not yet met with, he went to seek them. From this direction there came stories of men in houses which walked on the water, and he knew that the English were still pressing their trade in Hudson’s Bay. Duluth, meanwhile, was directly facing this impending as A uth tend- danger. He had been among the tribes which sought ing towara the English of the great bay, giving presents, and al- luring them to the French posts. He had written to Quebec that in two years he could break up this English trade. At last an overland expedition from Montreal set out in March, 1685, going from the Ottawa River, along a route which some hardy bushrangers had found the year before. The force was placed under the command of the Chev- alier De Troyes, and with him, as his lieutenant, went proves ana Iberville, an indomitable spirit, in whom New France }porville at and Louisiana were to have much confidence for some ™*- years to come. Troyes scoured the shores of James’s Bay with great alacrity, capturing Forts Hayes and Rupert. He com- pleted his round of devastation at Fort Albany. The Canadian Company of the North had got its revenge on the Hudson Bay Company, and it was by no means certain that this success was not as gratifying to the Catholic king of England as to the grand monarch himself. When the specious treaty of neutrality was signed between the two powers at Whitehall (No- |... ta vember 16, 1686), Troyes was back in Quebec. The Treaty be. few survivors of the captured garrisons, crowded in a Tage single small vessel, entered English waters to learn i how they had been abandoned by such a peace. The Bay Com- pany had ground enough for redress, and petitioned the crown; but as long as Louis was keeping James on his throne, there was no remedy. ‘There must, however, be some show of resent- ment, and the French busied themselves with proving before a commission that the English were but interlopers in the great bay, and were properly expelled. The controversy ended as might have been expected. The French remained in possession till the vexed question of priority could be settled, and the Eng- The Iowas. March, 1685, 332 DENONVILLE AND DONGAN. lish king warned the American colonies by a circular letter (January, 1688) not to mar the prosperity of the French mean- while. The war which followed the expulsion of James, the connec- *3 Bay.] 1696 JAILOT, [Supposed water tion with Hudson wages & SSAC 4 ‘ g ra a SRE <5 aay No awe gy Se ssg4 2 Bag < = 5 ° i fy % < f q E A é < & a B 9 dy a j 2 at] i d gies > ay wv § eS , > q dj g TT Ai. : a 5 ‘ ( Rf SFE sf bie? |. S er® a bg 6 gy oe Ng a 2 aE Ny ‘ ; 6 Fe next year, threw this vast territory of the north once more, as we shall see, in the scales of contention. Meanwhile this success under Troyes found a contrast less pleasant for the French to the south of the St. Lawrence. THE [ROQUOIS. 333 Louis could bid the English king to instruct Dongan to keep the peace, but there was no commission to be intrusted with settling the question of interloping in the Troquois giya aims country; indeed, Denonville soon found that the (otie 70. documentary registry of the evidences of early French “Y expeditions to the country south of Ontario was nowhere to be discovered in the archives of Canada, and he informed Seigne- lay that Talon must have taken such papers to France. He affirmed, too, that Talon had carried off the agreement, signed by the Iroquois in 1667, to put themselves under the French king’s dominion. All this was embarrassing in his correspond- ence with so wary a diplomatist as Dongan. The best that Denonville could do was what Vaudreuil and Begon did at a later day, —to search the Jesuit Relations for such unofficial records as could be found on going back for forty years. Don- gan had something better vouched in the various recorded trea- ties which the English had made with the Iroquois, by which they succeeded to their rights of dominion. Denonville, aware that he was expected to make the Iroquois feel the French power with little delay, had soon discovered that it took many months to bring the forces scattered through- out New France to bear upon any one point. Durantaye and Duluth, whose assistance was necessary, were too remote to be communicated with for any concerted action during yovember, the next season, and it was in November, 1685, that 17> the governor was thus looking ahead. The long interval, how- ever, could be employed in provisioning the fort at Cataraqui and making needful preparations. In the spring of 1687, events were moving forward. The governor’s messengers had long since departed to his lieutenants in the west ; and by this time Dongan, who learned of the plan, had warned the Iroquois. It was by no means certain, after the dis- appointment which had been felt at La Barre’s recusancy, that the western Indians could be brought again to the task. The French were pretty sure to have to confront, if the confederates combined, about two thousand of the best warriors that the red race could produce. These fighters were not indeed g,oquois all of the old stocks of the confederacy, for debauch- >™¥* ery had checked their natural increase, and the losses of num- 1687. 334 DENONVILLE AND DONGAN. bers in their incessant wars had been largely repaired by the adoption of their prisoners. But the prestige of the Iroquois name was such that the aliens grew to the work imposed upon them. It was supposed that about twelve hundred Mohegans could also be brought against the French. It had been a provision of the treaty of neutrality between Louis XIV. and James JI. that the colonies should remain at peace, however the native tribes should be impelled to war. Notwithstanding this, the French government had been sending over more regular troops, and something like sixteen hundred soldiers were at Denonville’s disposal. He expected to use them largely in garrisoning posts, while the more experienced ee militia were to be used in the campaign. It was June oe 18, 1687, when he left Montreal, at the head of eight hundred troops, and he found he had two thousand with him when he reached Fort Frontenac. Here he gave him- self to a fiendish act, and it has been alleged, not, however, by proof which the Catholic historians accept, that the bishop approved it. A number of unoffending Iroquois who were liv- ing near the fort were seized to prevent their sending tidings Iroquois tor- across the lake, which act was defensible; but they aii were tied to stakes and tortured for the amusement of the neighboring mission Indians, which was certainly indefensi- ble, even if in dying they kissed the cross to save their souls. Lamber. Denonville had not recalled the missionary Lamber- mon ville, who was among the Onondagas, for fear of ex- citing suspicion. This proceeding meant abandoning him to his fate. If Charlevoix is to be trusted, the Iroquois took no advantage of their opportunity, but suffered him to depart. He soon appeared at Cataraqui, to look with horror, let us hope, on the inhumanity of a higher race. It was July 4 when the imposing flotilla of four hundred canoes and bateaux moved away from Fort Frontenac. Three days before, Denonville had heard from Niagara — this form of the name was just now com- ing into vogue, and was to be made popular shortly after in Coro- nelli’s map — that the contingent from the west for which he aren had hoped had reached that point. With this rein- quit all forcement was Tonty, who had come from the Rock jon Denon- with sixteen French and two hundred Indians. He had struck across the country to Detroit, and there 3385 FORT FRONTENAC. eM o seman. 4.9 8 Sake BF a L A K ao aus A PLAN Of the 4: FORT and BaY BS o: Z E ON T ARI OV" x Goeland. : ys 109, 9.4.) - AN09.50 00. . a. fow oh “ ofc eg Middle Te ep fduLarge Gi 3! eZ Seite , eee oes ~ 740 a il ot aig] ” British Milo PF 20 15 2. wt Lraverse. . Powt § (From the London Magazine, 1758.) 336 DENONVILLE AND DONGAN. he had met and joined Duluth, coming with a large body from the upper lakes, and Durantaye, who led a force from Mackinac. On Lake Huron, their lieutenants had met and captured a trad- @ &@& @ & Lroguots- ,, Village des i f &é& © © @ & ~ a® DENONVILLE’S MARCH. [From La Hontan’s Nouveauz Voyages.] ing party of Dutch and English, who were seeking traffic under permits from Dongan. On Lake Erie, a second party fell into their hands. Their prisoners were sixty in all, and the plunder THE SENECAS ATTACKED. 383T of their canoes was valuable. Towards the end of June, they had all assembled at Niagara, when the word was sent on to Cataraqui. They numbered about one hundred and eighty French, and four hundred Indians. By the return of the mes- senger, they were ordered to join Denonville at Irondequoit Bay. On July 10, these two sections of the invading force, coming from opposite directions, met at that rendezvous, being together not far from three thousand men. One day was spent in building afort, in which four hundred men were left to protect 4657, guy, their canoes. On July 12, they began their march in- (hate land, carrying provisions for thirteen days. There “4° were twenty-two miles before them, and on they plodded, Cal- litres leading a vanguard of bushrangers and Indians, Denon- ville following with his regulars and Canadians, while a body of savages and a force of white men almost as savage brought up the rear. The day was one of sweltering heat. Suddenly the van found itself inan ambush of three hundred Senecas. There was some loss on both sides, for the enemy, unaware of the nearness of the main body, were over-bold. The defenders at last yielded. The French were glad of a halt for the night. The next morning, the van advanced with caution, and was unopposed. The Senecas had sent off their women, hid their treasures, and burned their chief town. The invaders came to the blackened ruins, and made everything wherever they went blacker still. They uprooted gardens and cornfields. They leveled everything that stood. There were ten days of havoc, but the marauders were not spared a misery of their own. They ate immoderately of green corn and fresh pork, — for the hogs of the villages were running wild,—and_ sickened. The wild riot maddened their Indian allies, and they scattered in crowds. On the 24th, such of the bewildered force qpeFrench as had kept together returned to their canoes. Re- ™ embarking and coursing alongshore to Niagara, Denonville built there a fort on the site of the one constructed by port putt at La Salle. He left the Chevalier de Troyes with a “s™ hundred men to hold it, and then the flotilla started down the lake, and on August 13 Denonville was at Montreal. The governor had inflicted a chastisement, but only upon the Senecas. The other tribes of the great confederacy were un- hurt. He had done nothing, in fact, from which the Senecas 338 DENONVILLE AND DONGAN. themselves could not readily recover. He had killed but few of them. He had destroyed their villages and ruined their crops, but their habitations were easily replaced, and English corn was to be had for the asking. We have Denonville’s own account of these proceedings. It Denonville’s Was found by Brodhead in the Archives of the Marine narrative at Paris, and Mr. O. H. Marshall published it for the first time. It can be supplemented by a variety of minor IROQUOIS COUNTRY, BY RAFFEIX, 1688. [From a map in the Bibliothéque Nationale at Paris.] sources, so that we are not at any loss in telling the story. Marshall has succeeded best in identifying the sites of the cam- paign, and he places them by his map near the modern town of Victor. It was on his return to the Rock, on October 27, 1687, that 1687, October Lonty met Joutel and heard the false stories about La baetethe Salle. A few weeks later, when Couture came up the Rock, mine river and Tonty learned the truth, he started down Mississippi; to the gulf with five Frenchmen and three Indians, to do what he could to rescue the poor lingerers at the Texan fort. He was not without some hope, too, of banding the river tribes and attacking the Spaniards; for Couture had sug- gested the practicability of doing so, and the plan had a certain THE GENESEE COUNTRY. 839 opportuneness in it, since he had just heard from Denonville of war with Spain being declared. It was early in December Wt AN IP of that part of the GENESEE COUNTRY, Livaded by THE MARQUIS DE NONVILLE. [A section of the map given in O. H. Marshall’s Historical Writings. The dash-and-dot line is Denonville’s route ; the dash lines show Indian paths. A, Indian fishing station. B, C, M, N, the four principal Seneca villages. D, Indian village. 7, the fort.] when Tonty left his fort. Late in March (1689), he was at the Red River. Here he got tidings, as he thought, of Heins, one of La Salle’s conspirators, and resolved to find him if he could. 340 DENONVILLE AND DONGAN. His men revolted, and only two would accompany him further. He lost his powder while crossing a river, and when he reached the village that he sought, he found nothing of the German, but suspected by the bearing of the Indians that they had killed him. Tonty had no courage, perhaps no strength, for further trial. His lifeasa ie turned his canoe upstream, and after many tribu- iia lations reached his Illinois fort. The next year, in consideration of his unselfish services, a royal grant made him master of his stronghold, and he lived on there for a dozen years, trading with the Indians who came to the post. The government regarded him kindly, and when it stopped other unofficial trading, it suffered his to go on; and year by year two of his canoes and twelve men brought his peltry to a market as long as the fortress on the Rock was permitted to exist. In 1702, a royal order caused it to be abandoned, and Tonty sought Iberville at the mouth of the Mississippi. CHAPTER XVI. FRONTENAC RECALLED. 1687-1698. Ir was said at the time that in his devastation of the Seneca country, Denonville had destroyed the wasps’ nest, |... — but the wasps were unharmed. As always results os from such a success, the victorious party was more alarmed than the beaten one. There was trepidation through- out the St. Lawrence settlements. The noise of axe and beetle betrayed the work of palisading on every hand. There was a cessation of the fur trade, for the prowling Senecas were too numerous to be evaded. On the other hand, Dongan was not intimidated, but he was anxious. He had promptly protested against the occupation of Niagara, — Onygaro as he called it, —and was not quite sure but some movement against Albany was hatching in Quebec. There was ground for the suspicion, for Calliéres was anxiety in sent to Paris to present a project of invading New ev Yor. York by way of Lake Champlain and capturing Manhattan, a scheme that always came to the minds of the Canadian leaders when matters grew unbearable. There were French spies in Albany that were not easy to discover; but Dongan expelled the Jesuits from the Iroquois villages, and stopped any revelations through that source. In November, (1687), it seemed as if there was to be an end to the prevari- cations of the English king, when word reached Dongan that he must protect the Iroquois against any repetition of the re- cent raid; but the feeling that some sort of a stand could at last be made did not continue long. James yielding poian re. to the exactions of Louis, Dongan was recalled, and “+ the English colonists were deprived of the ablest leader they had had in their contention with the French. This was some November. 342 FRONTENAC RECALLED. relief to Denonville, but he was not so content with the ru- mors which came from the west. The old antipathy against La Salle was perpetuated in the suspicion entertained of his successors, and Denonville was by no means sure that mischief was not brewing in the Illinois country. He feared that the young men in Tonty’s company valued the profits of trade more than loyalty to France, and that they only awaited an oppor- tunity to carry their interests over to the English. Denon- ville’s recommendation to the home government was to change the governor in that region often enough to prevent the ripen- ing of any mischievous plot. Sir Edmund Andros, with more extensive power, covering Sir Eamuna New England as well as New York, succeeded Don- Andros. gan. He was soon made to understand that the Eng- lish king had constituted the Five Nations as a part of his subjects. It was a renewed instance of playing fast and loose on James’s part. Andros was quite of Dongan’s spirit, and he had forbidden the Iroquois to yield to the temptations which the French were offering, under what they evidently supposed were better chances of success, now that Dongan had gone. To accept some advantage from the Iroquois, the Canadians proved willing to abandon the Illinois once more. They were ready to cause even the destruction of Fort St. Joseph in order to ap- pease the confederates. The sacrifice was premature, for on July 14, 1689, the flight Noone of James II. from England was known in Quebec, The English and there was an end of French influence at the Eng- oe lish court. War between the two countries was cer- tain. Perrot had already been ordered to the western country, and in the autumn of 1688 he had passed with forty ee men, by Green Bay and the Fox River, into the region Perrotatthe bordering upon the upper Mississippi. On the 8th of , May (1689), on the Wisconsin side of Lake Pepin, he emphasized the French claim to the possession of all this region watered by the St. Croix, St. Peter, and the other afflu- Pierrele ents of the great river, and took formal occupation, Sueur: under the observation of a notary. Pierre le Sueur, whose name had been associated since 1683 with the early ex- plorations on the upper Mississippi and in the present Minne- sota, was with him at the time. LACHINE ATTACKED. 843 At this period, when England exerted herself to secure a Protestant succession, and France was under the most imperial of her kings, in the greatest amplitude of his powers, a politi- eal prophet, as Professor Seeley says in his Hxpansion of England, comparing the prospects of these two colonizing powers, might have been led, by observing what an advantage the possession of the St. Lawrence and the Mississippi prench ana valley gave to France, to think that in the future Peis) oa North America would belong rather to her than to Pret England, notwithstanding there were but about twelve thousand Frenchmen on the continent, to something like two hundred thousand English. La Salle had, it is true, failed at the mouth of the great river, but there was no one as yet to dispute the French sway along its banks. There had been danger at the north, but Duluth, Perrot, and Tonty were vigilant. The English, indeed, had threatened to extend their influence from Hudson’s Bay by the attractions of trade rather than by occu- pying the soil. It was a struggle in which English mercantile thrift was set against the flexible adaptability to circumstances which characterized the French intercourse with the natives. The greater superiority of the English as colonists has usually been recognized by the French themselves, unless they limited the sphere of colonization to the pioneer work of the bush- ranger, as Rameau has done in comparing the two. At this very time a memorial was presented to Seignelay, setting forth the instability of trade and fur-hunting in comparison with the tilling of the soil, as conducing to colonial prosperity. But the chief danger to the French lay nearer their main settlements, and did not diminish till the Iroquois, ten or fifteen years later, began to lose their prestige. The revenge for the devastation of the Senecas came suddenly, when a failure in in- vesting Fort Frontenac set fourteen or fifteen hun- jeg ay. dred of the confederates free to fall (August, 4,5, sis ft 1689) upon the settlement at Lachine. Death or cap- “ke ture came to three or four hundred unprepared victims. The suddenness of the attack seemed to paralyze Denonville, since he countermanded orders for pursuit, when Subercase, who had reached the scene from Montreal, was prepared to hunt the assailants down. Dr. Shea does not doubt English complicity in this movement of the Iroquois; and why should he, when 3844 FRONTENAC RECALLED. French and English were as barbarous as their savage depen- dants? There is little doubt that Governor Leisler of New York had prompted them to the futile effort to capture Fort Frontenac. If they failed in this, they succeeded in luring Father Milet out of the stronghold, and ran him off to the < 4. “Wo Lac 3 Sos yons Se Seg bes guru Francois ou - . ea 2 Bi he, pissoutas z ee ZS Oh26 oS xy ‘2 AS Ce FRANQUELIN, 1688. Oneida country. We have his own account of his captivity, and the English at Albany did not profit much in the face of the influence which he acquired in the savage councils. It had earlier become apparent that if there was to be open war along the frontiers, the French needed a better leader than CORONELLI AND TILLEMON. 845 Denonville. Consequently there was general acquiescence in the wisdom of the choice when Frontenac came back hae: to his old post. His remembered career gave ground ier for hope, and the necessity for a man of his indomita- ble courage and unfailing resources had induced the king to 1ZUOISIY mp Wyre pay 527 or7 ne $70U77/ AS .sapr2P7 Q 4 ¢woANH sso ‘NOWATIIL aNv IITANOYOO forget all the charges which had compelled his recall seven years before. Frontenac did not disappoint expectation, though he was now a man of threescore and ten. His instructions, which were dated June 7, 1689, had made it imperative on him to attempt two things, — the expulsion of FRONTENAC RECALLED. 346 POfe-iourpr, a 2 Bites anb tig 2gr bp ze “S891 ‘TAOITANE S.AWOTa my I ning, ft er RN “£yF WOU agrrytg 8 E fi aru & O70 2 ; fara Fiasigo NEE VPC Ea La ye ‘ A 7 sgt a hd Ey HACALATONY 3 {tee} ih WTTHACON ; Mtg, : , : ; ae x Laegopriyy, Os pete ra! Bey ypapy~a - ° AY prasr fy OE phic sanyo 3 s 2uIy £ a Shap £7\] pirate RAFFEIX’S MAP. 347 the English from Hudson’s Bay, and the capture of New York. The last did not contemplate Calliéres’s plan of invasion along Lake Champlain, except as subordinate to a direct naval attack at the mouth of the Hudson. It is curious to see how widely at variance with the geographical conditions of the problem were ‘] wesT se ow 24 90 wornen = wranovern wy, v7 O10HO Fe AIS 2INT8 YNTNHIANS KIWYL OYT SYONITT/ S70 IVT ‘slug Ye owUOUNT oNbeyoNgrE oy uy sy deur syyq Jo Teapsy10 oy] ‘9891 ‘XISMdVa NEE LTS 10 NTE +] ones et Jo fgro7 ur -— —-] waning Jo ‘2191 ur eqyjonbrey_ pue yoror jo [----- NOUNH I¥7 Cezor ur [—- youq pur [-—-—] no oqnod oy saroys 47 OlMVLNO IV? 9 save the current notions which prevailed even in Holland at this time, notwithstanding the close intimacy which the Dutch had had with this region. Official knowledge in France was of course much better, but the Amsterdam edition of Blome’s America, which was just published (1688), makes the portage between the St. Lawrence and the Atlantic at a divide which 348 FRONTENAC RECALLED. separated the headwaters of the Connecticut River and the sources of Lake Champlain. The scheme of invasion of the English colonies, as they understood it in the cabinets of Quebec and Paris, was a far- reaching one. It would isolate New England for the same end which Burgoyne and Clinton sought, when in 1777 they aimed at uniting their forces at Albany. It would deprive the Ivo- quois of their accustomed dependence on the English, and so check their western raiding. It would give to Canadian trade a harbor that was not blocked by ice a large part of the year. It was hoped that the campaign could be consummated by bite he October (1689) ; but that month had already come, attempton when the fleet under Frontenac reached the Gulf of ’ St. Lawrence. To perfect the strategical arrange- ments involved, and organize a land service, the governor, leav- ing the fleet in the gulf, had intended to go on to Quebec, and when all was ready to send back word to his naval asso- ciate in the gulf, who was then to proceed to New York. All this, to be effective, ought to have been done at an earlier season. Therefore it was not long before the French determined that the project must be abandoned for that year at least. The demoralization which Frontenac found on reaching Quebec, as it turned out, gave no time to think of any such eee offensive undertaking. With the opening of the year Troubles at (January, 1690), it was known in Quebec that con- spiracy against the French had ripened among the tribes around Mackinac. They were known to be joining in the councils of the Iroquois. The Foxes were rendering the portage to the Illinois by Green Bay almost useless, because of their hostility, and all communication with the Mississippi valley was forced to find a channel by Lake Superior and the St. Croix, where we find Le Sueur, a little later, endeavoring to protect even this distant portage from hostile raids. Perrot was doing what he could to hold the Ottawas to their allegiance. It was clear that Frontenac had no resources to meet these dangers where they lay. Louis in sending him to Canada had warned him that he must do the royal bidding with no further help than he could find in the country, for France had dangers enough at home to employ all her troops. It was also apparent that to paralyze the English support of the Iroquois, whose THE FOX-WISCONSIN ROUTE. 349 machinations had produced this western difficulty, these rivals must be kept busy at home. While there was a plan under consideration at Versailles to attack Boston, Frontenac thought oS S SK ES aarssiss™ OG SEsy Cc = > a ze a ae § SS ae [-sinmwamAl 22L0]8/ 77 8 SevVayyT, Wo1g) ALAOWU UAATH NISNOOSIM-XOd TAL 09 Peg. we A902 & oS Wea by SA gE é “ Yo, WE iT eS 2 . EY i 8 4 3 by 2 x ae MoE "|S %, 2 S Qe a g se & oy INSP ts oe Rs be = £0 ¥ Q s Is = ¢ 0 2 & & os Ne, S-a Woy = O Ff 225 & &$ De So = ype—_—_—>z oe SON? & 4p & & #7 bah “ N Fe pt ~o fx & & fen get u 3 te FH bz et : B by (Ee B OFS Avgrudsag | that it was left for him to set on foot the expeditions which led to the bloody work at Schenectady, Salmon Falls, and gyooay work Fort Loyal (the modern Portland). In the spring * "°° of 1690, the English at Albany, aware of the natural result of any Iroquois defection, had warned the Boston government of 350 FRONTENAC RECALLED. what they were to expect along the eastern frontiers. The New Englanders on their part, and at the same time, sought to keep the attention of Frontenac on the alert along the St. Lawrence, and so leave the western question to settle itself, confident that the Iroquois intrigues were equal to the task. When both sides showed their hands, there was enough to do in the east. The New Englanders had long been familiar with the Nova Scotia coasts, and it had been a frequent complaint of Meules, the intendant, that the Boston fishermen dared to make the Acadian fisheries their own, while there was hardly a pilot or sailor in all Canada. The time had come for a firmer grasp. 1000. sir Lhe spring of 1690 was a busy one in Massachusetts Phireex. Bay, in fitting out the armament which Sir William ptterat, Phips led against Port Royal (Annapolis), and in to Quebec. May he came back in triumph. He could now enter upon the greater preparation for an attack on Quebec. At the same time a congress at Albany had planned a land attack by Lake Champlain under Fitz-John Winthrop, who was commis- sioned by Leisler, on July 81, 1690. The two expeditions were to act in conjunction, and Phips sailed from Boston with thirty-two vessels in August. Colonel Church was sent to the eastward along the Maine coast, to divert attention, and he accomplished enough for this purpose; but Winthrop’s effort was a failure from the beginning, so that Phips approached Quebec with no prospect of the expected cooperation. His mis- carriage was worse than Winthrop’s, in that he blustered and retreated. Frontenac put on a bolder front than his strength warranted, and Phips was deceived. The New England ships straggled down the river, and did little but burn, on Anticosti Island, the establishment with which the government had re- warded Joliet for his services in discovery. The baffled New Englanders also managed later to intercept some of the supply ships, which Quebee could ill spare, but Iberville, who was returning with some plunder from a renewed attack on the Eng- lish at Hudson’s Bay, eluded the English ships and escaped to France. Phips’s failure was every way dispiriting. The merchants Furtrae Of New England and New York had counted on his northand — suecess to control the Indian trade of the west, for the monopoly of the Hudson Bay Company was diminish- LA HONTAN. 351 ing this western trade too much to make a division of it between the French and the English profitable to both. The Carolinians were already opening the channels of trade in the valley of the Tennessee. In this same spring London merchants, trading in these colonies, had urged a protest in the Lords against the Commons being allowed to give new force to the charter which Charles II. had bestowed upon the Hudson Bay Com- pany. They represented that, under color of pushing the search for a northwest passage, the company was both engrossing the trade of the far west, and driving the French to an interference with the trade of other English farther south, upon whose pros- perity that of England depended. Frontenac had never shown himself more signally equal to a trying emergency than when he hurried to Quebec and defied the English fleet. When he saw it disappear behind the island of Orleans, he experienced a relief which he could hardly have anticipated. His good fortune did not consist in the discomfi- ture of Phips alone. He had succeeded in running down to Montreal the first flotilla of fur-laden canoes which the mer- chants of that town had seen for a long time. There were a hundred and ten of these little cargoes of peltry to reanimate trade. Frontenac, seventy years old as he was, was joyful enough to dance a war-dance with the Indian boatmen. In November, Frontenac wrote out his dispatches upon his success. He somewhat exuberantly told the minis- 4599, yo. ter that if he would take care of the English for the jm... future, he could deal with the Iroquois. He sent his “sPtches. letters by a young Gascon, who had come to Canada six or seven years before, and had made his way into Frontenac’s favor. He was an imaginative, if not audacious, story-teller, La Hontan by name, and what he claimed to have seen in the far west, beyond the Mississippi, along a river by which one could ascend to the mountains, and thence reach by another stream the Pacific, passed into current belief some years later, when he published his book. His story began to be doubted by 1716 ; but it continued to have a fitful existence, accepted wholly by some, in a qualified way by others, and dis- carded entirely by the warier, till its last defenders disappeared in the early part of the present century. The Long or Dead River, as he calls it, — the last name fitting its sluggish current, La Hontan. 852 FRONTENAC RECALLED. 280 228 : 290 206 200 Seplensio ee — a Ss tm ° G “| we, . my, ie 2 Sgr ge , 2 EReg Tate Foredussr se Germain | N — Bau Lore OTL = a, PORTAcKAM + ae RBAMLITEGOVAN gv 6 EASE | 2 eee Sn ‘LIMITES DES "CANAD Ces b imites font yustem'la route gue lew GNThncis, Qurranws ef autre 8 ten par terre, de niéme gue celle que les Yroguois CVruivent poTaller porter lL 3 a Bx \ Jutgiau dela du Misrsripipr am) —— — OQuabach R Andartzguet, eri —— oo fi ho [pa : er B20 lidzy. 30 5 LA HONTAN’S LA HONTAN’S MAP. 853 320 325 gto 32S, 33? pee er er ee he ere , Tome 2 Fag | zz GRAND ESPACE DE TERRE 22 DE LABRADOR OU DES ESKIMAUX : co Sonedes Rowe on bon pork anos Z brie Reinare a lative + 80. 200. 1 Lteit Degre: HP ehale de 100», wetier Far ag ‘a OCEA NE har ars an a BLS Jo 325 CANADA. FRONTENAC RECALLED. 854 — came and went on the maps, and was now identified with this or the other stream of the modern geography till the later dis- coverers found it difficult to place it anywhere. ('s}uMy] Yst[Sag_ oT JO MOTA TPOUALT Of} SoyVOIPUT Sossoro Jo OUI] OL] 6 Sot ‘NVINOH WI os bb itn ol q VAVNV) yy ITY ot v SSS ee SP Yo2pe27 oq FT = i aa f aie = Gliese bog Spe SS Wy : Heionbouy saa mej eee fariagoninyp Dua p 3 aH Pay: aiftroung gemnssig mn a G 4 Ss ra + », neo x d 7 aa H yohs.= SF H Pinte id Fy Yee 3} / 9 ASI es ae go wee < qo J DP VA P Mog fProran IC wt SIMI ESOT fw] iy aioquoag az ZIQITO LiM not po ahosme ¢ s3Gb Sigpun-{T per ee Sop hiagyd i 2 Cg sap! brepy ge . §dp2_ anibap Frontenac lost no time in sending the tidings of his suecesses to the western tribes, hoping to stay their defection, but the defeat of Phips and the discouragement of Winthrop had little THE IROQUOIS. 355 effect on the Iroquois. They still prowled and attacked, and it was thought necessary to palisade the Jesuit mission 7. troquois at Mackinac. still active. The government in London was little inclined to risk an- other armament in the St. Lawrence. In November, 1691, Phips was in London suggesting it, but he did not press the subject. The colonists were soon using their influence to bring the Iroquois and the Shawnees into terms of agreement. The re- sult was to relieve the confederates of an enmity which distracted them, and it left them freer to renew their raids along the St. Lawrence. So it happened that it was not till 1693 that the French succeeded in getting through to Mon- treal another flotilla of canoes, when two hundred of them, under escort of a force which Frontenac put at the disposal of Louvigny, now the commandant at Mackinac, relieved the store- houses at the straits, and brought trade once more to the St. Lawrence. There were rumors of another attack on Quebec from Bos- ton, to be aided this time by a naval contingent from England, and Frontenac set vigorously to work to strengthen the defenses of his capital, and kept the confederates occupied by new irruptions among them. Governor Fletcher, then in authority in New York, had received enlarged powers, particularly in relation to the militia of the neighboring colonies, in order that he might command a dangerous force, if invasion was intended. In 1694, the Iroquois showed signs of fal- tering. They told the English that they must have more active help if they were still to press the French. At the same time they sent a deputation to Quebec. In May, and again in Sep- tember, they urged their diplomacy with Frontenac, but he was firm in his rejection of any offer that did not include the west- ern allies of the French, and which did include the English. The Iroquois were not quite ready to abandon their white neighbors, or forego their hope of eating the Illinois, as they always expressed it. So the negotiations failed. Frontenac’s sense of duty towards these western allies was not acceptable either to the bishop or to the home government. It meant too much interference with plans, to please the Jes- uits, and the king was easily persuaded by that body. When 1693. 1694. 3806 FRONTENAC RECALLED. Louis tried, a little later, to force Frontenac to make terms with Frontenne the Iroquois on conditions that broke faith with the ange western tribes, the courage and obstinacy of the gov- eR ernor were put to the test, but he carried his point. He knew there was one, in his ardent lieutenant on the Llinois, who was ready to make a new effort for the occupation of the Mississippi. ‘Tonty hoped for an attack on Mexico from such a base; he hoped to develop the lead mines and augment the trade in peltries ; and above all, he hoped in this way to prevent the threatening advent of the English. It was to warn the government of this danger that Le Sueur went to Paris the next year (1695). This adventurer was now given a trade monopoly for ten years of the upper Mississippi, to make good the French hold on that part of it; but the English captured him on his way back. With the return flotilla in September, 1694, Frontenac sent La Mothe Cadillac to govern at Mackinac and be- 1694. La pana : Mothe a —-yond. This lieutenant soon informed Frontenac that he found the Ottawas despairing of the French protec- tion, as the governor was too well aware that they must be, con- sidering what kind of lessons the Jesuit spirit was inculcating. That liquor was no longer sold to them was one of the enforced deprivations which the Indians laid to the Jesuits. If this deprivation had in many ways proved salutary, Cadillac saw gheFngtish that it had also a bad effect on French domination, imnortrat Since it induced communication with the English, os where the savages had little difficulty in obtaining what they desired. This longing for liquor was always strong enough to counteract the purposes of the French trader, who aimed to keep the Indian sufficiently in his debt to leave him little occasion to seek the English for trade. Communication with these rivals of the French could only mean a weakening of their allegiance, and there was enough of it to cause no small disquiet to Cadillac. This officer soon found that the most stubborn pagan would receive any amount of baptism for an equal amount of brandy, and would make little distinction between brandy with and without the sacred rites. Cadillac soon informed Frontenac that there could be no peace with the Iroquois till the English were eliminated from the problem, and there was no effectual way of doing it but CADILLAC. 357 to capture and hold the English posts at Albany and New York. entre deux Vatpseauc, Anglais et Francors [From La Hontan’s Vouveaux Voyages.] Cadillac, in his fort at Mackinac, — it had a garrison of two hundred men, — was in every way situated to know the conditions of the problem. His was an active mind, and it mattered little 358 FRONTENAC RECALLED. Bg Gh aah. eee. aa Zunes d' Alemagne> 60 75 «90 Lac des Assentposls acthets, ou Aatuns de Fores Tra trices Outoul: bis Sire Tour Empeches Fiathonba Les. Grcnipods ou fens le A THE LARGER HENNEPIN’S MAP. 859 a0 293] 305} ” fl,: Jee PR chit a Has tac Lhe les Tabutibus sie ands * ae ~ area Le he 2 ae entee be NOUVEAU MEXIQUE etla Fh tor Chacule avec leCours duGrand Fleuve he MOS CHAS IPT Dedieca mm GUILIAUME mI" Rey dela Grand Breteaone Purle RP Lours oxHENNE PIN AMffion Recall Naer bishk Chea G Bxrorn Y srt A, HENNEPIN MAP, 1697 360 FRONTENAC RECALLED. to him whether he had the mischievous Huron or the ungodly bushranger to control. He liked most to thwart the Jesuits, Mackinae 20d his purposes were all that Frontenac could wish poate in this respect. A pistol-shot away from the French post at Mackinac there was a permanent Indian village of six or seven thousand souls; and not a tribe of the northwest but had all the time more or less straggling representatives hanging about the spot. The little place had some attractions for wide-eyed wonder. It was as fine a village as there was in Canada, as Cadillac describes it, with its sixty houses in a straight street, and the land, which the Indians cultivated for supplying the settlement with corn, cleared for three leagues around. Frontenac, in forcing his policy, had other steadfast abettors Perrot and im the west beside Cadillac. Perrot was a man to be Te Sueur. trusted. The Sieur Juchereau was starting the first industry on the Mississippi in a tannery at the mouth of the Ohio. Le Sueur was building forts on the upper Mississippi to hold all hostile tribes in check. It was he who, in 1695, took the first Sioux to Montreal that had been seen on the St. Lawrence, —a chief, who did not survive the winter in his unwonted environment. That same year, as we have seen, this trader went to France to get new privileges. In 1696, Frontenac was ready once more to try, on the Mo- F808. hawk, to settle this vexed question of the west. Early Frontenac in the summer, the Iroquois were again making trouble, Troquois. and the governor determined to deliver a heavy blow. He had recently received three hundred soldiers from France, and he sent a party to put Fort Frontenac in repair. He made the work move briskly for fear his intention would be checked by orders to desist. The confederates took the movement as a menace, and moved as rapidly. Early in July (1696), Fron- tenac was ready, and left Montreal with twenty-two hundred men. He went to Cataraqui, and then, crossing to Oswego, was at Lake Onondaga on the 1st of August. Here he saw the light of the village, which the Onondagas were burning as they retired before the French advance. A detachment was sent to destroy an Oneida town, while the main body did all the mischief they hurriedly could. This end accomplished, they were off for Fort Frontenac before the English at Albany knew PEACE OF RYSWICK. 361 what had happened. The occurrence readily suggested argu- ments to those who were at this time urging, in the Board of Trade at London, that the English power should be centralized in a captain-general ; and it gave force to the demand of Wil- liam Penn that the English colonies could more effectively act if they only had an annual congress. It seemed, for a while, as if the vigor of Frontenac’s cam- paign had unnerved the Iroquois. The English sent corn to their desolated villages, but it did not prevent the qnetroquois confederates sending messengers to Quebec to pro- 82 nut pose a peace. Their incessant wars had told on their *°™™s** strength, notwithstanding their custom of adopting prisoners. Fletcher, the English governor, reckoned that they had been reduced from twenty-five hundred warriors to less than thir- teen hundred, and that they numbered perhaps fifteen thousand souls in all. They had not, however, been reduced enough to abandon their old grudge against the western Indians, and Frontenac was not disposed to listen, unless they would include in their peace the Ottawas and the other distant allies of the French. The Iroquois would not yield, and the negotiations fell through. The French were now seriously considering an attack on Boston, and we have the plans which were made for them (January, 1697) and put in shape by their cartographer, Fran- quelin, to guide them up the harbor of that New England town ; but the Peace of Ryswick, in the autumn (September 4697 peace 30, 1697), prevented action and brought a five years’ °! Ryswick. truce with the English, and stayed the latter’s purpose of seiz- ing the mouths of the Mississippi. The news of the treaty reached New York before it came to Quebec, and Frontenac heard of it from this source in February, 1698; while yo95. Known no confirmation came from his own government till ™ #4. July. This delay illustrated anew the disadvantages of an ice- ' bound river, and brought a fresh reminder of the desirableness of a more salubrious ingress to Canada. The Quebec govern- ment had long been aware of the maritime supremacy which the open seaboard of the English colonies gave to their rivals, and the English government had of late begun the construction of ships of war in Massachusetts Bay, the “ Falkland,” a frig- ate of fifty-four guns, having just been finished at Portsmouth. This act was of itself ominous. FRONTENAC RECALLED. 862 1 O 2, 7TTLLNV C8 QR” | | | ey \ omer” 40 10% ouat 1 “G601-869T Pp 2 SS See h| ‘gqvM JO CLUS MAN jo, = TAT < rece Be Is x qa AVANCE WOUE | PAY ova parte BESS Gyre 3 sien 3 ho Hess a7 4 AP HFA PUP mibvgle abplte \ ? "8 hog, SD — * gs : ‘ i pnoge so £0, muss 7 : R P 70h eOTer ad i aS Lr van ey, | OK ? ode | ~2ys 99 fa) ule ae | z — le <> (oa eee | a as, 15 TA e Pissed AUTAOISIT EINE is ¥ VINW yIsNaa/ 2 10 279° 9) noyod AP \ | ( “gajavy . flO A NESE wae a 5 veer ee a SEP OPeL aN 5 ‘ 6 hic J ae a3 AME S FRONTENAC’S DEATH. 363 Lord Bellomont was now in command in New York. He had arrived April 2, 1698, and his authority covered also Massa- chusetts and New Hampshire. He soon undertook to arrange an exchange of prisoners with Frontenac, and demanded the return of some Iroquois whom the French had taken. To have acceded would have been to recognize the English sovereignty over those confederates, and Frontenac was too wary to be caught. As the summer went on, Bellomont (August august. 22) gave a more forcible expression of the English Belomont position in a warning to Frontenac that if the French *™* attempted another invasion of the Iroquois country he was pre- pared to resist it. Frontenac received the intimation in his usual defiant spirit. A man of seventy-seven, as Frontenac now was, with all his rugged and blunt determination rendered bolder by a sort of barbarous pride, had not lived a life of turmoil without some CHATEAU DE ST. LOUIS, 1698. [From Sulte’s Canadiens-Frangais, vii.] inroads upon a naturally robust constitution. In December, word came to Boston from Champigny, his associate in the gov- ernment, that the old soldier had at last succumbed, on seams the 25th of November (1698). A frozen river had 2%. 'Fron- tenac dies. again brought the necessity of communicating with Francs through a rival province. Champigny’s messenger, Vincelot, sailed for Europe from Boston; but another messen- ger reached Paris a few hours ahead. This was Courtemanche, whom Callieres had secretly dispatched ahead of Vincelot. This other messenger had ascended the Sorel, and reached New York by the Hudson. His earlier appearance in Paris very likely helped assure the appointment of Callitres as the suc- cessor of Frontenac. The death of Frontenac left France with many difficult prob- lems yet unsolved. Notwithstanding the exclusive nae trade which the government preserved to itself at Ta- French i doussac and elsewhere, Canada had not been able to oe 364 FRONTENAC RECALLED. yield a revenue equal to the charges. The English and the Iro- quois were a constant danger to the French occupation of the great valleys. The Iroquois still hovered along the St. Law- rence, and both they and their English allies were feared on the Mississippi. Adventurous traders were already crossing the Alleghanies from the seaboard colonies, and their huts were becoming permanently fixed along the Ohio. The government FRONTENAC. [From Sulte’s Canadiens-Frangais, vol. ii] at Paris, aware of this, and having no occasion of their own as yet to take possession of the region towards which these Eng- lish were heading, felt the necessity of occupying the great valley of the west, merely to keep their rivals out. An expe- 198-1700, dition under Montigny and St. Cosme had started Montigny, along Lake Michigan in the later months of 1698. It St. Cosme, Gute, Was the advance of the church to make good the Ia Sueur yrophecy of Marquette. They passed up the western shores of that lake; they stopped at Melwarik (Milwaukee) ; they crossed the Chicago portage early in November, and on * CALLIERES. 365 December 6 they reached the Mississippi. They had picked up Tonty at his post, and he guided them on as far as the Arkansas, when he was obliged to return. The missionaries, in their narrative, speak of this old companion of La Salle as the man who best knew the country, where he was both loved and feared by all the tribes. The next year (1700), Father Gravier made his descent of the Mississippi for the same purpose, and we have his additional account of experiences along its course. We learn from him how the English forerunners were active along the lines of the Tennessee, where some scattering Mohegans, rem- nants probably of those outcasts from New England whom La Salle had found so serviceable, were trading with adventurers from over the Appalachians. On the lower Mississippi, Gravier reports finding English guns in the hands of the savages. It is evident that Gravier was by no means sure that these English were destined to be seriously opposed. ‘I do not know what our court will decide about the Mississippi,” he says, “if no silver mines are found, for our government does not seek land to cultivate. They care very little for mines of lead, which are very abundant near the Illinois.” The previous year (1699), Le Sueur had passed up the Mississippi from its mouth, in charge of a band of miners. The friendship of the Iroquois was still the key to the situa- tion between the English and the French, not only along the St. Lawrence, but at the remotest western posts. Towards the close of Frontenac’s life, the colonists on the Hudson were renewing their efforts to make it appear by deposition and memorial that they held the confederates as subjects ae of the English crown. Calliéres, while yet in tempo- and the. rary authority by the death of Frontenac, and before ~~ he was confirmed in his power, had assumed the same air of confident indifference toward these savages which Frontenac had borne. He refused to entertain any proposition for the exchange of prisoners which could be thought to constitute the slightest recognition of their dependence on the English. William ITI. had sent orders to Bellomont to unite with the powers in Canada in making the Iroquois keep a peace. Cal- ligres revealed this fact to the confederates, and in J uly, 1700, they thought it prudent to send mesengers to Quebec. Bello- mont, on his part, tried to prevent any pact of the tribes with 366 FRONTENAC RECALLED. the French, and the Iroquois determined to treat with the French first and with the English next. The Onondagas even 1700, Sep. Seemed inclined to break with the English, and on tember tn September 8, 1700, Callieres concluded a treaty with the Iroquois. the Iroquois deputies at Montreal, by which the con- federates, the Hurons, the Ottawas, and the Abenakis were em- braced in the terms of peace. Meanwhile, the French and English were scheming to attain 1699-1700, @ position at Detroit. Robert Livingston had urged Deirolt: Bellomont to take possession of that point, and secure control through it of the Miamis, Illinois, and Shawnees. It was hoped in this way to keep the Iroquois in subjection to the purposes of the authorities at Albany, by making them friends of the more distant tribes, and so to secure their trade. The English plan was delayed, and this hesitation gave Callitres his opportunity. After he had made his treaty at Montreal, he planned to occupy Detroit, and in order not to attract the at- tention of the Iroquois, his purpose was to let Cadillac and Tonty approach it from the side of Lake Huron, and begin a fort there. It was Cadillac’s notion to make it the chief west- ern post for trade, and to discontinue the establishments at Mackinac and other points on the upper lakes. This plan raised great opposition both in Montreal and Mackinac, as tending to destroy or weaken their business prospects. The Jesuits, too, were aroused because Cadillac intimated a preference for Re- collects in the missionary work, and had proposed to instruct the tribes in French, thereby diminishing the influence of the Jesuit interpreters. To push his views, Cadillac went in the autumn of 1700 to France, to urge the scheme upon the Comte de Maurepas. He succeeded in bringing Pontchartrain over to his interests, and the way was opened to other movements, which took the active interest of France from the St. Lawrence and the lakes to the mouths of the Mississippi. This is another theme, beyond the scope of the present book. INDEX. ABENAKI InprAns, 159, 288. Acadia, bounds of, 128, 138. Accault in charge of an expedition, 267, 274, 276, 277. Agnese, Baptista, his maps, 56, 59, 63. Agona, 39. Agramonte, 11. Akamsea, 243. Albanel, 198, 231 Albany, 147, 160. Alexander, Sir William, and Nova Sco- tia, 123; his Encouragement to Colo- nies, 127; his grants, 127; his Knights- Baronets, 127; his map, 128; and the attack on Quebec, 132; authorized to trade on the St. Lawrence, 133; his charter of Canada, 136, 187; vacated, 138. Algonquins, 53, 95, 115; enemies of the Troquois, 85. Allefonsce, Jean, 40, 41; his maps, 42, 43, 56; Cosmographie, 42, 44, 56 ; Les Voyages, 56. Alleghany Mountains, 16. Allouez, Father, goes west, 198; at Green Bay, 200, 236; at the Sault, 205; supposed early visits to the West, 22!); among the Illinois, 250; and La Salle, 266, 290, 323. Amazon River, 16. Amyar de Chastes, 80, 83, 88. ‘Andastes, 115, 117, 121, 255. André, Louis, 202, 205. Andros, Sir Edmund, governor, 342. Angouléme, Lake of, 31. Anian, Straits of, 280. Anticosti Island, 26-28, 51. Appalachee Bay, 312. Appalachian Mountains, 207. Argall, Samuel, 113. Argenson, Vicomte d’, 178. Arkansas Indians, 242, 292, 297. Arkansas River, 151, 242, 291, 522. Asiatic theory of America, 3, 8, 21, TB. Assiniboines, 273. Assumption Island. See Anticosti. Atchafalaya Bay, 312. Athabasca, Lake, 151. Aubert, Thomas, in the St. Lawrence, 10. Auguada, Baye d’, 15. Avalon, 134. Avangour, Dubois d’, 189. Baccalaos, 38. Balboa, 4, 16. Baltimore, Lord, at Avalon, 134. Bandelier on the fate of La Salle’s col- onists, 324. Basques on the Newfoundland coasts, 9, 23, 124. Batts, Captain Thomas, 203. Baugis, Chevalier de, 304, 326. Bay of Chaleur, 26. Bazire River, 242. Beaujeu, commands La Salle’s fleet, 311; his reputation, 311; disagrees with La Salle, 315. Beauport, 149, 155. Beaupré, 39. Beauvais, Sieur de, 306. Belleforest, 328. Belle Isle, Straits of, 26. Bellero’s map, 62. Bellomont, Earl of, 363, 365. Bering’s Straits, 280, 2 283. Bernon, Abbé, 287, Bettencourt, Descob. dos Portuguezes, 12. Beverly, Robert, Virginia, 230. Bimini, 15. Black River, 276. Blaeu, Atlas, 160, 181; his map of North America, 182. Blanc Sablon, 28. Block, Adrian, 112. Blome, America, 347. Bois Brulé River, 274. Bolt, Captain, 203. Boston harbor, 91, 124; French plan to attack, 549, 361; maps, 361. Botero, 66; Relaciones, 88. Boucher, Canada, INT. Boullé, Eustache, 130. Boullé, Nicolas, 100. Bourinot, J.G., on Cartier, 26. Bradford, governor of Plymouth, 174. 368 Bradore Bay, 11. Bréard, Marine Normande, 10, 75. Brébeuf, Jean de, 129, 145, 148, 150, 158; killed, 172; bust, 172. Bressani, 161. Bretons on the Newfoundland banks, 23, v4. Brevoort, J. C., 17. Brulé, Etienne, 100, 116, 117, 119; his adventures, 121. Buade. See Frontenac. Buade, Lake, 276. Buffaloes, 237, 265, 270, 272, 276, 290, 318, 320, 321; Hennepin’ drawing, 259. Burel, Gilbert, 129. Buteux, 147, 148. Butterfield, C. W., 223. Byrd, Colonel, 230. Cabot, John, his landfall, 54; discov- eries. 1,6; mappemonde, 14, 52, 53. Cadillac, 257; at Mackinac, 356. Caen, Emeric de, 134, 138. Caen, Guillaume de, 124. California, considered an island, 127; 186; Gulf of, 136, 151. Calliéres, 337 ; succeeds Frontenac, 365. var (Lord Baltimore) at Ferryland, mer in Canada, 129; excluded, 130. Canada, population, 147, 190, 195, 239, 253, 298, 343; fur trade, 147 ; coloni- zation of, compared with New Eng- land, 147, 148; earliest records of, 148; seigneuries, 149; earliest cen- sus, 187; restored to the crown, 190; soldiers and settlers arrive, 191; in- tendant and governor, 191; peace, 194; Duval’s map, 216; immigra- tion falling off, 254; trade decreas- ing, 298; claims of the Hundred As- sociates, 301; Company of the North, 301. See New France. Canerio Map, 1, 3. Cape Bonavista, 25. Cape Breton, 26, 50, 58, 54. Cape Race, 36. Cape Rouge, 39, 41, 42. Capitanal, 146. Capuchins, 139. Carignan-Saliéres regiments, 191. Carleill, Entended Voyage, 75. Carolina, traders, 242, 351. Carpunt, 39. Carr, Colonel, 196. Cartier, Jacques, finds melons and cu- cumbers, 14; commissioned by Fran- cis L., 18; his purpose, 22 ; his career, 23; sources, 23, 27, 52,57; his first voyage, 24; second voyage, 28, 51, 62 ; INDEX. near Quebec, 29; monument to, 30; portrait, 30, 45; abandons a ship, 36; Bref Récit, 36-38; printed, 52, 57; third voyage, 38 ; connection with Roberval, 40; in St. Malo, 45; his manor house, 46; death, 47; results of his explorations, 48; his maps and their influence, 50, 73; Discours du Voyage, 58; Relation Originale, 58; his lost maps, 58; his heirs, 75; his kidnapping of Indians, 75; his fort found by Champlain, 94; had mass said, 115. Cathay, Sea of, 42. Cavelier. See La Salle. Cavelier, Pére, 310, 320, 321. Cayuga Creek, 258. Cayugas, raiding, 305. See Iroquois. Cazot, 247. Ceriani, Abbé, 18. Chabot, Admiral, 18, 23. Chambly, 85. Champigny, 363. Champlain, Samuel de, his youth, 80; his portrait, 81; was he originally Protestant ? 80; later Catholic, 82; in Spain, 82; in the West Indies, 82; goes to the St. Lawrence, 83; his character, 83; goes up the Sague- nay, 84; hears of western waters, 85, 86, 100, 193; Sauvages, 86, 88 ; his first map, 88; eager for explora- tion of the St. Lawrence valley, 89; on the NovaScotia and New England coast, 89, 90; at Boston harbor, 91, 103; lieutenant-governor of Canada, 93; to find a way to China, 93; founds Quebec, 94; overcomes con- spirators, 94; attacks the Iroquois, 95, 99; Lescarbot’s award, 98; picks outa wife, 100; engages in the fur trade, 100, 101; his maps of the St. Lawrence Gulf and River, and the Great Lakes, 102-107; receives a new commission, 103; on the Ottawa with Vignau, 110; his astrolabe, 111; his descriptions, 113; in France, 114; introduces missions into Canada, 114; sends over Recollects, 114; again at- tacks the Iroquois, 116; wounded, 118; winters with the Hurons, 120; in France, 120; prints a new book (1619), 122; in Quebec (1621), 128; a new company formed, 124; mar- riage, 126; once more in France (1624), 126; in Quebee, 130; surren- ders Quebec, 134; in London, 136; in Paris, 137; his final narrative, 139, 140; his large map, 142-144 ; his map of the St. Lawrence Gulf, 140; re- commissioned and again governor, 144; and Richelieu, 146, 153; his INDEX. idea of French colonization, 148; at Three Rivers, 148; his last council, 149; and Nicolet, 149, 153; his last letter, 153; his death, 153; burial, 155; his remains, 155. Champlain, Lake, 37, 98; its position misconceived, 160; map, 346. Charles I. (England), his marriage, 137 ; demands for a dower, 137. Charles V., 74. Charles IX., 74. Charlesbourg, 39. Charton, E., 75. Charton, Frangois, 129. Chastes. See Amyar. Chaudiére River, 91. Chaulmer, Nouveau Monde, 139. Chautauqua, Lake, 223. Chauvin, 77,78, 80, 98. Chaves, Alonso de, his chart, 48. Chesapeake Bay, 124, 199. el portage, 5, 243, 244, 248, 249, 30. Chickasaw bluff, 291. Chippewas, 198. Choctaws,, 326. Chomedy, Paul de. See Maisonneuve. Chouart. See Grosseilliers. Church, Colonel Benjamin, 350. Clamorgan, Jean de, 51. Clark, General J.S., 117, 224; on La Salle, 317. Clayton, 229. Colbert, 189; portrait, 190; and west- ern exploration, 231; wishes ingress to Canada in a milder climate, 254 ; resigns, 298. Colbert River. See Mississippi. Colden, Cadwalader, Five Nations, 96, 204, 282. Colonists, English, French, 343. Colorado River, 151, 240. Columbia River, 151, 240. Columbus’s second voyage, 3; fourth voyage, 4; doubts the Asiatic theory, 4; belief as to South America, 16. Comanches, 320. Company of the West, 190, 191. Condé, Prince de, 103. Conibas, Lake, 67. Conjugon, Cap de, 75. Connecticut charter, 203. Connecticut River, 346. Copper in Canada, 37; mines, 122, 199, 208, 218. Coppo’s map, 16, 17. Cortereals, 6, ‘7, 10, 280. Cortes, 16, 21. Cosa, La, map, 2, 3. Couillard, Henri, 93. Couillard, Madame, 126. compared with 369 Coulombier, 80. Courcelles, Sieur de, 191; attacks the Mohawks, 194. Coureurs de bois, 199; relations with Frontenac, 253 ; with Denonville, 330. Courtemanche, 363. Couture, 169, 323, 388. Coxe, Daniel, Carolana, 183, 312. Crawford, Earl of, 56. Creuxius, Histoire du Canada, 139, 181; map, 184, 185. Cudragmy, 30. Cumberland River, 291. Cunat on Cartier, 23. Dablon, Relation, 198, 247; his mission, 199; at the Sault, 205,220; returns, 232; on western exploration, 234 ; on Joliet, 246, 247. Dacotahs, 151; their tongue, 186. See Sioux. Daniel, Jesuit, 145, 150. Daumont. See St. Lusson. Dautray, 292. Dauversiére, 165. D’Avezac on Cartier, 23. Davost, Jesuit, 145. Dawson, Sir William, 33. Dead River, 351. Deane, Charles, 69; on the Cabot map, 52. De Bry, 67. De Caze on Cartier, 30. De Costa on Cartier, 23, 26. Dee, Dr. John, his map, 70, 71. Deguerre, 229. Delaware River, 146. Denonville, Governor, 328; his instruc- tions, 329; his forces, 334; tortures the Iroquois, 334; attacks the Sene- eas, 3836; plan of march, 336, 339; accounts of his expedition, 338; re- sults of it, 341; anxious about the west, 342. De Noiie, 139. Denys, Jean, his alleged map, 9, 10. Dermer on the New England coast, 124. Descelier’s map, 14, 54, 55. Desimoni on the Verrazano voyage, 18. De Soto, 295. Des Plaines River, 243. Detroit oceupied by the French, 366. Detroit River, 330. De Vries, 280. Dieppe, 80; writers, 10. Dionne on Cartier, 23, 30. Divine River, 248. D’Olbeau, Jean, 114, 115. Dollier de Casson, 213; on Lake Erie, 219. Dongan, Thomas, governor of New 370 York, 305; relations with the Iro- quois, 327; how looked upon by the French, 328, 3829; his methods, 329 ; his anxiety, 341; recalled, 341. Donnacona, 29,30; seized, 35-37; dies, 39. Douay, 310, 320, 521. Doyle, Puritan Colonies, 173. Drake, Sir Francis, and the Straits of Anian, 280. Druillettes, 183; sent to Boston, 173; to Plymouth, 174; with St. Lusson, 205. Duchesneau arrives, 254; charges against Frontenac, 299; wishes the purchase of Albany and Manhattan, 299; would drive the English from Hudson’s Bay, 301; mentioned, 329. Dudley’s map, 170. Du Gay, 276. Duhaut, 319, 322. Duluth, among the Sioux, 273; takes possession of the country, 273, 293; seeks a waterway, 274; seeks salt water, 274; meets Hennepin, 277; arrested at Quebec, 277; distrusted by La Salle, 289, 290; sent to Lake Nepigon, 305; summoned by La Barre, 328; on the Detroit River, 330; near Lake Superior, 531; joins Denonville, 336; map of his western route, 547. Durantaye, 303, 328, 330, 333, 336. Dutch and the fur trade, 147. Dutch West India Company, 130. Duval, his map, 181, 216. Eden’s edition of Miinster, 69. Effingham, Lord, 327. Eliot, John, 173. Endicott at Salem, 135. England, and the Huguenots, 132; treaty with France, 137; granting charters on the coast, 203. English in the St. Lawrence, 4; under Cabot, 6,52, 53; under Kirke, 138 ; trading, 145. English colonies, population, 343; in- vasion planned, 348; projects of uniting, 360; building war vessels, 361. Erie, Lake, uncertain knowledge of, 151, 160, 207; first tracked by Joliet, 219; Dollier takes possession, 220. In maps: Galinée’s, 221 ; Hennepin’s (1683), 278, 279; Franquelin’s, 344; Coronelli’s, 345; Raffeix’s, 347; La Hontan’s, 353, 354 ; Hennepin’s, 359 ; Wells’s, 362. Eries (Indians), 115. Espiritu Santo, Bay, 293, 317. Esprit, Pierre d’. See Radisson. INDEX. Fagundes, Joam Alvarez, 12-14. Faillon, Abbé, on Canadian history, 33, 80, 83, 96, 164. Ferland, Abbé, 44, 96, 177. Ferryland, 124. Fiefs, 167. Finzus, Orontius, 22. Fleet, Henry, 138. Fletcher, Governor, 355. Florio, John, 57. Florida, 37, 131. Fort Albany, 331. Fort Créveceur, 266; abandoned, 268, 272. Fort Frontenac, 252, 333; plan, 385; invested, 343. Fort Hayes, 331. Fort Loyal (Portland), 349. Fort Miami, 289, 290. Fort Niagara, 257, 337. Fort Prudhomme, 291, 297. Fort Richelieu, 192. Fort Rupert, 331. Fort St. Anne, 191. Fort St. Joseph, 264, 272, 288. Fort St. Louis (Texas), 317; (Quebec), 306; (Starved Rock), 302, 340. Fort Thérése, 19-4. Fox River, 152,199, 237; portage, 248, 249, 344, 345; map, 349. Foxes (Indians), 237, 289, 380, 348. France and Spain, 231. Francis I. of France, 74; and Ameri- can discovery, 18, 21, 27, 31, 35, 37. Franciscans, 158. FE ranciscus Monachus and his globe, 22, 73. Frangois-Roi, 43. Franquelin, 274; maps, 293, 294, 302, 308, 344; his drawing of the fort at Pees 306; maps of Boston harbor, Bes Frascastoro, 61. Freire map, 14, 62. Fremin, 216. French Creek, 223. French, The, in the St. Lawrence, 11; on the Atlantic coast, 17. Freville, on the commerce of Rouen, 18. Frobisher, 68, 280. Frontenac, made governor of Canada, 232; his character, 232; interest in exploration, 233, 246; on Joliet’s dis- coveries, 246; wishes a vessel built on Lake Erie, 247, 252; conference at Cataraqui, 251, 252; Jesuits’ op- position, 251 ; relations with La Salle, 251; builds vessels on Ontario, 252; and the bushrangers, 253; alleged trading interests, 273, 299; losing con- trol of the Iroquois, 298 ; withdrawn to France, 299; recalled to Canada, INDEX. 345; his new instructions, 345; fails in plans of invading New York, 348 ; repels Phips at Quebec, 350; dances a war dance, 351; disagrees with the bishop, 355; attacks the Iroquois, 860; and Bellomont, 363; dies, 363 ; portrait in death, 364. Fundy, Bay of, 62, 63. Furlano, 280. Fur trade, 147; difficulties of regulat- ing, 277; more licenses granted, 277 ; demoralizing effects, 299; English and French rivalry, 330, 356. Gali in the Pacific, 280. Galinée, 214; his journal and map, 215, 220. Gallzus, 66. Galveston Bay, 313, 317. Ganeau, 74. Ganong, on Cartier’s track, 26. Garcitas River, 317. Garnier, 216. Garreau, 183. Gaspé, 26, 80. Gastaldi’s maps, 60, 61. Genesee country, 339. George, Lake, 160. Georgian Bay, 116. Gerritsz, H., Delectio Freti Hudsoni, 107; its map, 108-110. Gifart, Robert, 155. Gilbert, Sir Humphrey, 67, 280. Gillam, Captain Z., 195, 197. Gold, sought by the Spaniards, 5; spu- rious, 40, 44. Golfo Quadrado, 10. Gomara, Historia, 11, 58. Gosselin, E. H., Glanes, 101; Nouvelles Glanes, 101. Gottfried map, 180. Grand River, 219. Gravé. See Pontgravé. Gravier, Pére, 365. roe La Salle, 223; on Joliet’s map, 24 Great Kenawha River, 230. Green Bay, name, 236; misplaced by Champlain, 143, 144, 151. Grelon, 186. Griffin, A. P. C., 318. F “ Griffon,” The, built, 260; is lost, 263; early picture, 275. Grollet, 324. Grosseilliers, Sieur de, in Canada, 182; at Lake Superior, 183, 186; at Three Rivers, 186; goes west, 187; at the north, 195; proposes a voyage to, 195 ; goes to Boston, 195 ; at Hudson’s Bay, 195; in England, 196; again in Canada, 253; in Quebec, 301; at- tacks Port Nelson, 301. oTl Grynzus, Novus Orbis, 22. Guast. See Monts. Gutierrez map, 48. Hakluyt, 19; on Cartier, 41, 44, 52; on a fresh water sea, 66; Westerne Plant- ing, 68, 72; in Paris, 69; on the St. Lawrence valley, 70; Divers Voyages, 72; map (1587), 72; his version of Peter Martyr, 73; relations with Or- telius, 73; his labors, 74; and Les- earbot, 98. Hamy, E. T., 7, 51. Hariot’s Virginia, 113. Harleyan mappemonde, 14, 51. Harrisse, Henry, Discovery of North America, 12, 54; views on American discovery, 21, 52; his Cabots, 23; Champlain’s map, 103; Cartographie de Nouvelle France, 224, 246. Harvard College, 147. Havre de Grace, 90. Hébert, Louis, 121, 154. Heins, 339. Hennepin, uses Marquette’s map, 249; arrives in Canada, 254; ministers to the Iroquois, 255 ; at Fort Frontenac, 257; drawing of a buffalo, 259; view of Niagara, 261; on the Mississippi, 267; meets Duluth, 277; at Fort Frontenac, 278; his Description de la Louisiane, 278, 282; his map (1683), 278, 279, 282; his veracity, 282; Nouvelle Découverte, 282; relations with La Salle, 282; his map (1697), 282, 284, 285; Nouvelle Voyage, 283, 286 ; recent discussions, 28+; his irre- sponsible editors, 285; joins Wil- liam ITI. of England, 286; The New Discovery, 286; his books popular, 307; his larger map, 358. Henri, the Dauphin, 38. Henri IL., 74. Henri IIL., 74. Henri IV., 74, 77, 82, 83; killed, 100. Hérman, map of Maryland, 207. Heylyn’s map, 180, 181. Hochelaga, 30, 31, 39; view of, 82; dis- appeared, 31; plan of Lescarbot, 34. Hochelay, 39. Homem’s map, 62. Hondius, Mercator - Atlas, 107; map (1635), 141, 147; and the Straits of Anian, 280. Honfleur, 74, 88, 94, 98, 121. Hundred Associates, company formed, 130; its territory, 131; its purposes, 151, 167; give up their charter, 190. Hudson, Henry, on the Hudson River, 98; in the north, 106; his charts, 106; account of his voyage, 106. Hudson Bay Company, 197, 301; its 372 effect on western discovery, 302; Du- luth to divert their trade, 305, 331; their posts attacked by De Troyes, 331; rechartered, 351. Hudson River, 85, 346. Hudson’s Bay, prefigured, 106; mapped, 108; James’s map, 145; Sanson’s map, 179; other early maps, 179-181, 196, 216; passages to by land, 915; James’s Bay, 195; Grosseilliers at, 196, 197; English in, 197, 198, 2038, 231; the French take formal posses- sion, 231; Joliet’s notions of its geog- raphy, 245, 246; Franquelin’s map, 294 ; the English traders, 300 ; claims of the French, 300; Port Nelson at- tacked, 301; New Englanders’ illicit trade, 301; French and English at, 381; Jailot’s map, 332. Huguenots in the English colonies, 328. Humber River, 272. Humboldt, Alexander von, Straits of Anian, 280. Huron, Lake, 86, 105, 120; mapped by Champlain, 142 ; united with Lake Michigan, 221, 222. In maps: Fran- quelin’s, 344; Coronelli’s, 345; Raf- feix’s, 347; La Hontan’s, 352, 353 ; Hennepin’s, 359; Wells’s, 362. Hurons, 33, 95, 115; war with the Iro- quois, 116; their villages, 117, 150; map of their country, 120; missions, 158; attacked by the Iroquois, 172; dispersed, 172; at the Island of Or- leans, 176; driven west, 178; found there, 186, 187; at La Pointe, 200; feud with the Sioux, 201, 202; Mar- quette among, 234; on the Detroit River, 270. on the Iberville at Hudson’s Bay, 331, 350. Illinois Indians, 151, 201; seen by Mar- quette, 234; hunted by the Iroquois, 242, 268, 305; at Starved Rock, 302. Illinois River, ascended by Joliet, 243. Incarnation, Mére de 1’, 183. Indians, kidnapped, 26, 28, 35, 37, 39; sales of arms to, 123; treatment of by Europeans, 139; in council, 146; from New England at the west, 288, 290, 295. See names of tribes. Towas, 178, 331. Troquois attacked by Champlain, 95, 99, 116; constant attacks on the French, 96; their isolated position, 115; war on the Hurons, 116; threaten Quebec, 125; make peace, 126; their ubi- quity, 158; at the west, 159; get fire- arms, 160; peace of, 169 ; their num- bers, 169; attack the Hurons, 172; sue for peace, 175; fighting the Eries, 175; and the fur trade, 175; INDEX. and the Jesuits, 176; their command- ing country, 177; their number, 188 ; hunt the Montagnais, 188, 197; league with the English, 193; on the Ohio, 241, 242; drive the Shaw- nees, 241; meet Frontenac at Cata- raqui, 251; instigated by the Dutch, 252; subdue the Andastes, 255 ; raids into the English colonies, 255; in the Illinois country, 264; attack their towns, 268; middlemen for the Eng- lish, 268; La Salle’s league against them, 289; raiding west, 298 ; leagu- ing with the English, 298; courted by French and English, 342; have firearms, 326; alleged treaty with the French, 883; agreements with the English, 333 ; their warriors, 333 ; map of their country, 3838; banding the western tribes, 348, 355 ; demand English assistance, 355; attacked by Frontenac, 360 ; dwindling, 361; their influence, 865; make peace with the French, 366. Irondequoit Bay, 216, 337, 389. Island of Orleans, 29. Isle aux Coudres, 29. Jacker, Father, 187, 250. Jacobsz, maps, 124, 125. Jail-birds in Canada, 28, 38, 44. Jailot, his map, 332. Jalobert, Macé, 28, 39, 40. Jamay, Dennis, 114, 115. James, Strange Voyage, 145; his map, 145. James IT. of England, 329, 332,341, 342. Japan, 282. Jesso, Island of, 281. Jesuits, join the Recollects in Canada, 129; their labors, 129; favored by Richelieu, 188; their Relations, 139, 201, 283 ; their connection with Cham- plain’s final edition, 141; sent west, 148; their influence, 157; their mar- tyrs, 161; among the Iroquois, 176, 217; struggle with the Sulpitians, 179, 217; and Frontenac, 243, 253; as traders, 253; on La Salle, 257; rela- tions with La Salle, 290; their Rela- tions as evidence, 333 ; expelled from the Iroquois country, 341; disagree with Frontenac, 356, 360; and the liquor traffic, 356; dislike Cadillac, 366. Jogues, 159; captured, 160; among the Iroquois, 161, 169; killed, 169. Joliet, seeking copper mines, 203, 218; with St. Lusson, 204; at Green Bay, 205; meets La Salle, 218 ; first tracks Lake Erie, 219; his larger map, 224, 225; his smaller map, 226, 227; se- INDEX. lected for western discovery, 234 ; ig- norant of what La Salle had done, 234; joined by Marquette, 254; his maps, 236; his expedition, 237 ; reaches the Mississippi, 238; visits the Ilinois, 240 ; turns back, 243; up the Ilinois, 243; at the Chicago portage, 244; at Sault Ste. Marie, 244; at Fort Frontenac, 244; loses his papers, 245 ; his earliest map (1673-74), 245, 247; his Carte Générale, 246; his accounts of his explorations, 245, 246; map drawn from recollection, 249 ; denied the right to a trading-post on the Mississippi, 250; sent to Hudson’s Bay, 301; map of his route on the Mississippi, 347; his buildings on An- ticosti burned, 350. Jomard, 56. Joutel, with La Salle, 310; his Journal Historique, 310, 317, 5321; his map, 318, 319; left at Fort St. Louis, 311), 320; on La Salle’s last expedition, 321; separates from La Salle’s mur- derers, 322; reaches Starved Rock, 323; tells a false story, 323. Juchereau, 360. Judaeis’s map, 67. Kankakee River, 244, 265, 272, 290. Kaskaskia (on the Illinois), 243. Kennebec River, 91, 147. Kickapoos, 237, 269. King map, 7. Kingsford, Canada, 81, 211, 260, 317. Kirke, David, in the St. Lawrence, 132; returns to England, 133; captures Quebec, 134. Kirke, Gervase, 132. Kohl, J. G., Discovery of Maine, 25, 26, 55. Kretschmer’s Atlas, 5, 15, 19, 22. Kunstmann’s maps, 3, 6. La Barre, Governor, 300; impedes La Salle’s movements, 303; invades the Seneca country, 326. Labrador as an island, 3, 7, 11; in the early maps, 15; its coasts, 26. La Chesnaye, 300. Lachine attacked, 343; rapids, 85. Laconia, 135, 160. La Forest, 272, 288, 310. Lafreri’s atlas, 61. La Hontan in Canada, 351; his maps, 352, 353, 354. Lake of the Woods, 151. Lakes. See names of lakes. Lalemant, Charles, 129, 180, 155. Lalemant, Gabriel, 172. Lamberville, 327, 334. La Mothe Cadillac. See Cadillac. 373 Lane, Ralph, 72. La Pointe, 185; mission, 198, 199. La Platte River, 240. La Potherie, 204. L’ Archevéque, 321, 324. La Roche. See Roberval. La Salle, his early life, 210; and the Jesuits, 211, 225; settles near Mon- treal, 211; portrait, 212; plans an ex- pedition, 213 ; joined by Galinée, 214; starts, 214; among the Iroquois, 217; meets Joliet, 218; his track uncer- tain, 222; his papers, 242; Histoire de M. La Salle, 222; did he discover the Ohio and Mississippi? 225, 224; his Lachine estate, 228; and the early maps, 230; meets Joliet, 244; at Cataraqui, 244; thinks of a traffic in buffalo skins, 245; relations with Frontenac, 251; commands Fort Fron- tenac, 252; returns to France, 253; obtains a grant, 253 ; agrees to rebuild Fort Frontenac, 254; ennobled, 254; returns to Canada, 254; strengthens Fort Frontenac, 255; keeps vessels on Lake Erie, 255; again in France, 256; receives a patent for the Mis- sissippi country, 256; gains the aid of Tonty, 257; his character, 257; at Fort Frontenac, 257; builds the “Griffon,” 258; his creditors, 260; at St. Ignace, 262; at Green Bay, 262; on Lake Michigan, 263; anx- ious about the “ Griffon,” 264, 266, 270, 271; and Allouez, 266; builds Fort Crévecceur, 266; builds a ves- sel, 266; returns to the settlements, 268, 270; at Fort Frontenac, 271; business embarrassments, 271; cap- tures marauders, 271; again on the Illinois, 272; reaches the Mississippi, 272; returns to the Miami country, 272; papers perhaps used by Henne- pin, 252; his official report, 286; in the Miami country, 288; misrepre- sented by the Jesuits, 288; his Mo- hegan hunter, 288; hears of Tonty, 289; finds him at Mackinac, 289; at Cataraqui making his will, 289 ; hates Allouez, 290; takes possession of the Arkansas country, 292; at the mouth of the Mississippi, 293 ; falls ill, 297; his official report, 297; hints at a voyage to the Mexican gulf, 297; his movements incensed the Iroquois, 298; his enemies in power, 300; his property seized, 300; returns to the Ulinois, 302; fortifies Starved Rock, 302; embarrassed by La Barre, 303; his post seized by De Baugis, 304; hears of Frontenac’s recall, 304, 306; leaves the Rock, 305 ; in France, 307; 374 plans an expedition by sea to the mouths of the Mississippi, 308 ; would reach the heathen, 308; his posts in Canada restored, 310; commissioned to govern Louisiana, 310; his dis- ordered ways, 311; fears of the Jes- uits, 311; sails, 312; at San Domingo, 312; the ships separate in a fog, 312; on the Texan coast, 313; joimed by Beaujeu, 313 ; disembarks, 314; loses the “ Aimable,” 514; his camp, 314; his confusion about the Missis- sippi mouths, 317; builds Fort St. Louis, 317; first attempt to find the Mississippi, 318; loses the “ Belle,’’ 320; seeks a way to the Illinois country, 320; his last expedition, 321 ; killed, 322; fate of his colony, 324; map of his route to the Mississippi, 347.. La Tour, Charles de, 138, 175. Lavaca Bay, 317. Laval arrives, 179; on liquor selling, 189; portrait, 215; returns from France, 254. Le Caron, Joseph, 114, 115, 117. Leclercq, Premier Etablissement de la Foy, 283, 310. Leisler, Governor, 344, 350. Le Jeune, 139, 144, 148, 155, 159; por- trait, 157. Lemercier, 158, 200. Lemoine, Quebec, 327. Le Moyne, Simon, 175. Lesearbot on Hochelaga, 34; on Car- tier, 46; La Nouvelle France, 8,101. Le Sueur, Pierre, 342, 348, 356, @60, 365. Liens, N. des, map, 63. Linschoten, 66. Liotot, 321, 322. Liturgical test in geography, 14. Lok’s map, 20, 21, 72. Long River, 351. Longrais on Cartier, 23. Louis XIV., 529, 541. Louisiana, taken possession of by La Salle, 295; its extent in Franquelin map, 293. Louvigny, 355. Luiz, Lazaro, map, 12. Mackenzie River, 151. Mackinae, map of, 235; strengthened, 503; Jesuit mission, 355; garrison, 357; the settlement, 360. Mackinaw, Straits of, 144; its dominat- ing position, 150. Magdalene Islands, 26. Magellan, 4. Maine, coast of, 90, 112. Maiollo (Maggiolo) map, 14, 18, 19. INDEX. Maisonneuve, founder of Montreal, 165 ; his portrait, 164, Major, R. H.., 55. Mance, Jeanne, her portrait, 165; em- barks at Rochelle, 166. Manhattan, 124, 147. Manitoulin Islands, 202, 204. Marcel, 224. Margry, Collection, etc., 216, 219, 222-224, 297, 246, 247, 256, 282, 287, 289, 291, 292, 295, 311, 317, 323, 325 ; his char- acter, 223, 227; his route for La Salle, 224, 225, Marquette, at Sault Ste. Marie, 199, 202, 206; at La Pointe, 199, 200; founds St. Ignace mission, 202; at Sault Ste. Marie, 220; his statue, 231; joins Joliet, 234; on the Missis- sippi, 242; at Mackinac, 244; his ac- counts of his discoveries, 247; his maps, 248, 249; returns to the Illi- nois, 249; winters near the Chicago portage, 249; at Kaskaskia, 250; his death, 250; his grave, 250. Marshall, O. H., on Champlain’s march, 117; Historical Writings, 216, 258, 338. Martin, Mission du Canada, 246, 247. Martines, 70. Martyr, Peter, doubts the Asiatic the- ory, 3. Maryland founded, 184; mapped, 207. Mascoutins, 152, 237, 264. Massachusetts Bay, 113; population of, 147. Massachusetts charter, 135, 203. Massé, Enemond, 129, 145. Matagorda Bay, 315. Matagorda Island, 313. Maumee River, 256. Maurepas, 366. Mazarin, 189. Medina, Pedro, Arte de Navegar, 59; map, 59. Megapolensis, 176. Melwarik, 364. See Milwaukee. Membré, 261, 267, 270; his journal and Hennepin’s, 283, 286, 289, 297 ; among the Arkansas, 292; nurses La Salle, 297; on La Salle’s Texan expedition, 310 Ménard, René, 187. Mercator, Gerard, maps (1538), 48, 49; his great map, 64; comparative ge- ographer, 65, 70; Atlas, 88; on the Straits of Anian, 280. Mercator-Hondius Atlas, 161. Mercure Francois, 101. Metellus, 67. Meulan de Circe, 229. Meules, 350. Mézy, Sieur de, 189. INDEX. Miamis, 237; attack the Llinois, 268; to be leagued, 289. Michel, French colonists, 132. Michelant, 48. Michigan, Lake, 151; described by Marquette, 249; mapped by Fran- quelin, 344; by Coronelli, 345; by Raffeix, 347; by La Hontan, 352; by Hennepin, 358; Wells’s, 362. Milet, 328, 344. Mille Laes, 273. Milwaukee, 264, 364. Minet, his map, 315, 316. Mississippi River, early found by the Spaniards, 5; developed by the French, 6; early notion of its magnitude, 116; valley, 151; early intimations of, 183, 186, 201, 213; perhaps seen, 186, 187, 230; called Missipi, 199, 238 ; its uncertain direction, 200, 201, 213, 225; did La Salle reach it before Joliet did? 225; reached in 1673, 220, 238; named La Buade, 238; and Conception, 238 ; its native name, 238; extent of its water-shed, 239; Joliet’s farthest point, 243; Joliet’s maps, 245, 246; Marquette’s maps, 248, 249; approach by the Maumee and Wabash, 256 ; La Salle wishes to find its mouth, 256 ; Hennepin’s first map of, 279, 282; second map, 282, 285 ; his diverse statements, 282, 283; ealled Colbert, 290, 296; its great valley, 293, 294; La Salle at its mouth, 295; ‘‘ Acadian coast,” 295 ; Franquelin’s map of its mouths, 296 ; Minet’s maps, 316; Joutel’s map, 318; Franquelin’s (1688), map, 344; Coronelli’s map (1688), 544; Raf- feix’s map, 347; Hennepin’s, 358; Wells’s, 362. Missouri River, 151, 240; called Osage, 291. Mistassini River, 44. Mitchell, John, 230. Mobile Bay, 256, 293. Mohawks make peace, 169; raiding, 176; attacked by Courcelles, 194; and Tracy, 194; sue for peace, 194. Mohegans, 260, 264, 288, 334, 365. Molineaux’s map, 67, 69. Montagnais, pact with, 95; missions, 115, 158; mentioned, 175, 188, 197. Montanus, 207. Montigny, 364. Montmagny, Charles Huault de, 156; his policy as governor, 157. Montmorency, Duke of, 123; sells his viceroyalty, 126. Montmorency Falls, 84. Montreal, visited by Cartier, 33; site of, 85; founded, 161; map of its 375 vicinity, 162, 163, 168; its position, 167; and the fur trade, 211. Mont Royale, 33. Monts, Sieur de, 77; on the Atlantic coast, 90; on the St. Lawrence, 93, 98, 99. Moranget, 321. Moreau, Pierre, 274. Mount Desert, 92. Mount Joliet, 243. Mouy, Charles de, 27. Miinster, Sebastian, 66; his maps, 49, 58. Muskingum River, 223. Muskrat Lake, 112. m9 Myritius, his map, 73. Nahant, Dutch at, 112. Nancy globe, 50. Nantes, Edict of, 74. Natchez Indians, 292. Nepigon, Lake, 195. Neuters, 116. New Amsterdam, 160. New Biscay mines, 312. New England, settled, 135 ; confederacy, 169; map, 346 ; Society for the Prop- agation of the Gospel in, 174; popu- lation, 174, 187. Newfoundland coasts in the early maps, 1-8, 5-8, 10-12, 15-17, 19, 20, 25, 49, 53-55, 59, 60, 62, 71,125; early visitors, 23, 25, 73-75; Champlain’s map, 104, 107, 140; Calvert at Ferry- land, 124; mapped by Hondius, 141; by Duval, 226. New Plymouth Colony, 147. New Scotland, 128. New York and the Iroquois, 193 ; grants to the Duke of York, 203; restored to the English (1674), 253; popnla- tion, 329; invasion threatened, 341; attack proposed bythe French, 347, 357. Niagara, Falls, early heard of, 86; River, 104; Falls in Champlain’s map, 144 ; early notions, 144; mentioned by Vi- mont, 159; River early described, 171; Falls heard by La Salle, 217; Gorge, 244; River, map, 260; Henne- pin’s view of Falls, 261; exaggerated by Hennepin, 307; spelling of the name, 334, 341. Nicolet, Jean, his discoveries 22, 149, 150; at Three Rivers, 153; effect of his story, 156 ; on the Fox River, 237. Nipissing Lake, 116, 204. Néel, Jacques, 39, 40, 72, 75. Nordenskiéld, 21. Normans on the Newfoundland banks, 23. North America, its great waterways, 4; 376 early notions as to its width, 15, 16; as an archipelago, 17; early maps, 1-4, 8, 12, 15-17, 19, 20, 49, 53, 5¥, 64, 67, 72, 110; as a part of Asia, 21, 22 North Sea, 199. Northwest passage, 351. Norumbega, 90. Ogilby, maps, 160, 207, 210. Ohio River, early intimations of, 176, 177, 181, 217; La Salle upon it, 224; called the Wabash, 241; the Iroquois on, 242 ; undeveloped in Joliet’s maps, 245, 246; and in Marquette’s, 246, 249; approach by the Maumee and Wabash, 256 ; unknown to Hennepin, 278, 291; misunderstood by La Salle, 278, 291; drawn incorrectly by Mi- net, 316; mapped by Franquelin, 344; by Raffeix, 347; by Hennepin, 358; English traders, 365. Oil Creek, 17. Ojibways, 150, 159, 183. Olier, 165, 166. Oliva, J., 107. Oneida, Lake, 117. Onondaga, Lake, 360. Onondagas, their fort, 117; its plan, 119. Ontario, Lake, prefigured, 86, 103; mapped by Champlain, 143; its southern water-shed, 161, 175; map (168s), 338, 354; Hennepin’s map, 359; Wells’s, 362. Orinoco River, 16. Ortelius’s maps, 64-66; his interest in American geography, 63, 73; on the Straits of Anian, 250. Osages, river of, 241. See Missouri. Oswego River, first entered, 175. Ottawa River, seen by Cartier, 33; in Mercator’s map, 65, 72; and Cham- plain, 85, 87, 105; Champlain on, 110, 112, 116; mapped by him, 143; the usual route, 151, 171, 181; route and portages, 216, 221, 227; in Joli- et’s maps, 245, 246; in Jailot’s map, 352 Ottawas at Manitoulin Island, 202; on the Mississippi, 214; missions, 222; on the Illinois, 265; as fur-hunters, 330; Perrot among them, 348. ee 264. Oviedo, Sumario, 17, 48, 61. Padron General, 48. Page, Louis de, 194. Pana Indians, 262. Panuco, 293, 309. Pare, Sieur de, 100. Parkman, F., on Cartier’s portrait, 31; INDEX. cited, 74, 118, 150, 224, 230; his maps, 291, 294; on Pefialosa, 309. Parmentier, Jean, 57. Patterson, Dr., 12. Peltrie, Madame de la, 166; portrait, 166. Pefialosa, abetting La Salle, 309. Penn, William, 361. Pennsylvania, charter, 203. Penobscot River, 90. Peoria Lake, 265. Pepin, Lake, 178, 276, 330, 342. Peré, 195, 218. Perrot, Nicolas, with St. Lusson, 202, 204; his memoirs, 204; quarrel with Frontenac, 253, 328; on the Missis- sippi, 330; at the west, 342; among the Ottawas, 348, 360. Philip IL, 74. Philip’s war, 288. Phillipps, Sir Thomas, 55. Phips, Sir William, 350. Pineda in the Gulf of Mexico, 5. Pinet, 229. Plessis, Pacifique du, 114, 121. Plymouth Company, 147. Plymouth Pilgrims, 122, 123, 130. Poncet, Pére, 175. Pontchartrain, 366. Pontgravé, 77, 83, 89, 91, 93-95, 98, 114, 121. Poole, W. F., on Hennepin, 283. Pope, Joseph, on Cartier, 23. Popelliniére, 68. Poreacchi’s maps, 63, 280. Porcupine Indians, 171. Portland, Me., 349. Port Royal (Annapolis), attacked by Phips, 350. Portuguese in the Gulf of St. Lawrence, 6, 7, 11, 55; portolanos, 7, 11, 62; under Fagundes, 12, 13; chart (1520), 15; on the Newfoundland Banks, 24. Pottawattamies, 153, 159, 200, 219, 270. Poutrincourt, 90. Prévert, Sieur, 80, 88. Priest and trader, 177. Prince Edward Island, 26. Prouville, Alexander de. Ptolemy maps, 7, 11, 61. Puants, their bay, misplaced by Cham- plain, 143. Purchas, 124. See Tracy. Quebec, Champlain at, 84; founded, 94; new fortress at, 125; threatened by the Iroquois, 125; famine, 130; surrender demanded, 132; given up, 134; restored, 185; Indian confer- ence at, 146; early records, 148; Chapel of Notre Dame de Recou- vrance, 149; described, 153; popula- INDEX. tion, 156, 190; its site impressed Fron- tenac, 233; great fire in, 299; ruins of intendant’s palace, 327; its con- dition, 328; attacked by Phips, 350; its defenses, 355. Queylus, 214. Quinté mission, 214. Radisson, Sieur, in Canada, 182; cap- tured, 183; at the North, 195; in England, 197; in Quebee, 301. Raffeix, his maps, 338, 347. Ragueneau, 195; his map, 158; Rela- tion, 171, 173. Ramé on Cartier, 23, 27. Ramusio on Cartier, 27, 52; his la- bors, 61; Raccolta, 57; his interest in American geography, 74. Raudin lays out Fort Frontenac, 252; sent to Lake Superior, 255. Raymbault, 159; death of, 160. Razilly, 137. Recollects in Canada, 114; their char- acter, 115; on the St. Charles, 122; their convents attacked, 126; others arrive, 126; befriended by Cham- plain, 129; their missions, 129, 279 ; invite the Jesuits to join them, 129; apply for a bishop, 159; excluded from Canada, 139; treatment of in Champlain’s final narrative, 141; and Frontenac, 233. Red River, 291, 292, 309. Reinel chart, 5-7. Rémy, Daniel de. Ribero map, 48. Ribourde, 269. Richelieu, 180; and the missions, 138 ; delays to send succor to Canada, 146. Richelieu River, 192. Rio Bravo, 309. Rio Grande, 293. Roanoke River, 72. Roberval, 37, 55, 56; his career, 40; death, 47. Rochelle, merchants of, 90. Rocky Mountains, 293. Roman calendar in geography, 14. Roquemont, Claude de, 131; defeated, 133. Rotz’s maps, 50, 51,61; Boke of Idrog- raphy, 51. Rouen and the new world, 18; mer- chants, 101. Roussiliére, 213. Royéze, 44. Ruge, Sophus, 1, 15. Rupert, Prince, 197. Rupert’s River, 197. Ruscelli’s maps, 63, 70. Ruysch’s map, 7, 8. Ryswick, Peace of, 361. See Courcelles. 3TT Sabine River, 313. Sable Island, 61, 76. Sagard, Gabriel, 126, 150, 153; on the Indians, 115. Sagean, 267. Saguenay River, 29, 37, 42-44, 54, 78; explored by Champlain, 84; in- fested by Iroquois, 174, 197; ex- plored, 198, 231, 353. Sainte Croix, Cartier at, 34. Salem, 135. Salmon Falls, 349. Sanson’s map, 179, 180 (1669), 238. Santa Cruz, his map, 51. Sault St. Louis, 85. Sault Ste. Marie, 144, 150; mission, 159, 199, 220; St. Lusson at, 202; its position, 206. Savignon, 99. Schenectady, 194, 349. Schéner, his gores, 21; his view of North America, 21; his theory of North America, 73. Schooleraft, 258. Seeley, Expansion of England, 543. Seignelay in power, 298, 343. Seignelay River, 243. See Red River. Seigneuries, 167. Senecas, villages, 216; object to a fort at Niagara, 257; middlemen for the English, 258; moving West, 305, 326; threaten to destroy the “ Grif- fon,” 260; make a truce with La Barre, 328; attacked by Denonville, 337; map of their country, 339. See Troquois. Shawnees, 218, 241, 268, 290, 326. Shea, J. G., 118; on La Salle, 225, 244, 257, 266, 270, 282 ; his Catholic Church in Colonial Days, 225; on Marquette, 229, 236 ; Discovery of the Mississippi, 247, 249, 207; on Hennepin, 284; on Pefialosa, 309; on the Lachine mas- sacre, 343. Ship (1613), 113; building, 147; cuts of, 357. Simcoe, Lake, 120, 272. Sioux, 152, 159, 178, 186, 199, 201, 202; presents to, 255; visited by Duluth, 273; wandering parties, 276, 277; in Montreal, 360. See Dacotahs. Slafter, E. F., 118. Smith, Captain John, 92, 135. Soissons, Comte de, 103. South America, Columbus’s view of its extent, 16; early maps, 1, 2, 8, 11, 15-17, 19, 20, 22, 49, 64, 65. Spain, suspicious of France, 38. Spaniards and the French, 193. Sparks, Jared, on Marquette, 249; on La Salle, 284. Square Gulf, 10, 11, 23, 67. 378 St. Anthony’s Falls, 276. St. Charles River, 29, 34. St. Clair, Lake, 262. St. Cosme, 364. St. Francis Xavier mission, 200. St. Germain-en-Laye, Treaty of, 137, 301. St. Ignace mission, 202, 250; “ Grif- fon”’ at, 262. St. John, Lake, 231. St. Joseph River, 264. St. Joseph’s (Sillery), 158. St. Lawrence valley, early knowledge of, 4, 23, 68; origin of name, 28, 58; ascended by Cartier, 28, 39; earliest charts, 42; ascended by Roberval, 42; cartography of, 50, 53-55, 58, 62, 64, 65, 67, 69, 71; shown as an archipelago, 63 ; attempts to colonize, 77; Chauvin and Pontgravé, 77, 78; Champlain on. See Champlain; maps of, by Champlain, 102, 104-107, 140, 142, 143; in Gerritsz, 110; Basques in, 124; Dutch map, 125; in Hondius, 141; Dudley’s map, 170; exposed to inroads, 171 ; Sanson’s map, 179 ; Gott- fried’s map, 180; Heylyn’s map, 180; Blaeu’s map, 181; Visscher’s map, 181; Creuxius’s map, 184, 185; Ogil- by’s map, 210; Duval’s map, 226; its extent, 239; Joliet’s maps, 245, 246; Hennepin’s maps, 279, 284, 285 ; map (1683), 291; Minet’s map, 316; Joutel’s map, 318; Jailot’s map, 332. St. Louis, city, site of, 241. St. Louis, Lake, 162. St. Lusson at Sault Ste. Marie, 202; his pageant, 204. St. Malo, 24, 27, 36, 75, 77-79, 91, 112; merchants, 101. Ste. Marie mission (Georgian Bay), 159. St. Mark mission, 200. St. Mary’s current, 31. St. Michel River, 30. St. Pierre Island, 36. St. Pierre, Lake, 85, 192. St. Quentin, 74. Stadacona, 29. Starved Rock, 265, 267, 272, 302; view, 303; abandoned, 340. Stephens, H. B., on Cartier, 23. Stevens, Henry, 21. Strait of the Three Brothers, 58. Suberease, 343. Sulpitians, 179; and La Salle, 211; at Montreal, 211; missions, 214; and Jesuits, 220; and Frontenac, 253. Sulte, Benjamin, 150, 152, 183, 189, 215 ; Canadiens-Francais, 306. Superior, Lake, mapped by Champlain, 143; unseen, 151; pictured rocks, INDEX. 184; named Tracy, 198; mapped by the Jesuits, 206, 208, 209; copper at, 218; its size, 222; mapped by Fran- quelin, 344; by Coronelli, 345; by Raffeix, 347; by La Hontan, 352; Hennepin’s, 358 ; Wells’s, 362. Susquehanna River, 117, 121. Sylvanus’s map (1511), 10, 11. Tadenac, Lake of, 67. ee, settlement at, 7,79, 83; map, 9. Taensas, 292. Tailhan, Father, 204. Talon, Jean Baptiste, intendant, 191; aids western discovery, 193; and western exploration, 218, 231; and northern exploration, 231; disliked Frontenac, 232. Tannery, 360. Taupine, La. See Moreau. Tennessee River, 291, 351, 365. Thevenot, Recueil, 249. Thomassy, Géologie pratique de la Louisiane, 296, 297. Three Brothers, Strait of, 73. Three Rivers, 84, 121; settled, 148. Thwaites, R. G., Historic Waterways, 349. Ticonderoga, Champlain at, 96, 97. Tobacco Nation, 115, 159. Tonty, Henri, joins La Salle, 257; at Niagara, 260; at the Detroit River, 261; on Lake Michigan, 263; occu- pies Starved Rock, 268; wounded, 269; deserts the Illinois, 269; pros- trated, 270 sought by La Salle, 272, 288; disowns the Derniéres Decou- vertes, 289, 325; with La Salle, 290; at St. Ignace, 297; goes down the Mississippi to succor La Salle, 322; his Mémoires, 325; attacked at the Rock, 326; joins Denonville, 334; meets Joutel, 338; descends the Mis- sissippi, 338; given » patent of the Rock region, 340; seeks Iberville, 340; on the Mississippi, 356, 365. Tordesillas, Treaty of, 6. Tournon, Cardinal, 37. Tracy, Marquis de, 191; attacks the Mohawks, 194. Trader and priest, 177. Trent River, 117. Trinity River, 321. Troyes, De, at Hudson’s Bay, 331; at Niagara, 337. Ulpius’s globe, 50. Vallard, Nicolas, map, 55. Van Rensselaers, 130. Ventadour, Duke of, 126, 129. INDEX. Vermilion Sea, 240. Verrazano map, 14, 18; sea of, 17, 18, 20-23. Vespucius’s alleged voyage, 8. Viegas, Gaspar, map, 14, 24, 25. Vignau, Nicolas de, 100; his deceit, 109 Ville, Marie. See Montreal. Vimont, Relation, 152, 167. Vincelot, 363. Virginia, 92, 98, 118; wheat trade, 147; charter, 203; her explorers, 203; traders, 242, Visscher’s maps, 178, 181. Voyageurs, 120. Wabash River, La Salle on, 224, 241, 256, 291. Walloons, 130. Wells, Edward, maps, 362. Western Sea, supposed, 147, 148, 159. Westminster, Treaty of, 253. 379 ' White, of Virginia, 113. White Fish Indians, 171. Whittlesey, Charles, 278. Winnebago Lake, 171, 200, 349. _ Winnebagoes, 151. Winnepesaukee, ‘Lake, 160. Winnipeg, Lake, 151. Winthrop, Governor, invites the French to a commercial treaty, 173. Winthrop, Fitz John, 350. Winthrop, Wait, 107. Wisconsin River, 152, 200; Joliet on, 237; map, 349. Wolf River, 200. Wood, Colonel Abraham, 183, 229. Wood River, 280. Wytfliet, his first American atlas, 67, 101, 280. Young, Captain Thomas, 146. Zalterius, map, 64, 280.