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STORIES FROM 
 
 > 
 
 LOUISIANA HISTORY 
 
 BY 
 
 GRACE KING, 
 
 Author of 
 'New Orleans, the Place and the People^ 
 "De Soto in the Land of Florida" etc. 
 
 JOHN R. FICKLEN, B. Let. 
 
 Professor of History in Tiilane Uniz'ersity of Louisiana. 
 
 Ant ho I of 
 ''History and Civil Government of Louisiana," etc. 
 
 NEW ORLEANS: 
 THE L. GRAHAM CO., LTD. 
 
 1U05 
 

 LIBRARY Of OONGRESS 
 
 StP. 2 1905 
 y ;? (p c?t^ 
 
 8^. 
 
 L 
 
 OgpY 
 
 Entered according to Act of Congress in the year 1905, 
 
 By grace king and JOHN R. FICKLEN, 
 
 In the Office of the Librarian of Congress at Washington, D. O. 
 
Preface 
 
 This book of ^'Stories from Louisiana History" is 
 intended to lead up to the authors' History of 
 Louisiana, which has been used for more than a 
 decade in the i)ublic scliools of the State. It relates 
 in greater detail and in simpler form the romantic 
 incidents in the early history of the Mississippi 
 Valley. 
 
 Though the "Stories" have been prepared for 
 very young readers, the authors have been able, in 
 a large part of the book, to give them word for 
 word from the original sources. The narratives left 
 us by the first explorers and settlers tell in the 
 simplest and most stirring language of the dan- 
 gers and hardships they themselves endured. 
 Thus, at the beginning of their studies, the young 
 people may taste one of the highest joys of the his- 
 torian ; they may feel themselves in direct, intimate 
 touch with the men who made our history. 
 
 The "Stories," it will be found, are true in every 
 particular. Not a single detail has been introduced 
 from the realm of fiction. 
 
 It should be added that the first portion of the 
 book, down to the Revolution of 1768, was written 
 by Miss King and the remainder by Mr. Ficklen. 
 The latter wishes to express his obligations to his 
 wife for her aid in preparing the story of the 
 "Great Purchase," and both authors desire to 
 thank her for designing the cover. 
 
 If the present volume meets with favor, the 
 authors purpose to issue another covering the 
 period from 1815 to the present time. 
 
Contents. 
 
 PAGE. 
 
 The Finding of Louisiana i 
 
 The Adventures of Narvaez and Cabeza de Vaca 6 
 
 Narvaez and His Three Hundred Horsemen. The Story 
 of Cabeza de Vaca. 
 
 DeSoto's Search After Gold 24 
 
 He Lands' in Florida. The Plot of Vitachuco. The Lady 
 of Cofachiqui. DeSoto at Mauvilla. He Finds the 
 Great River. Death of DeSoto. The Escape of 
 DeSoto's Followers. 
 
 French Explorers 60 
 
 The Pioneers. Marquette and Joliet. 
 
 LaSalle 75 
 
 LaSalle's Vast Plan. In the Great Lakes. The Illinois' 
 River and the Illinois Indians. The Loss of the 
 "Griffin." Bad News From Tonty. The Naming of 
 Louisiana. 
 
 LaSalle's Last Voyage 114 
 
 Fort St. Louis in Texas. Murder of LaSalle. 
 
 Iberville 138 
 
 His Exploration of the Mississippi. The First Capital. 
 Bienville Visits the Indians. Bienville's Journal. 
 Chang-e of Capital. 
 
 Bienville 182 
 
 First War of the Natchez. 
 
 The Company of the West 199 
 
 The Founding- of New Orleans. The Second Natchez 
 War. Recall of Bienville. 
 
 The Natchez Massacre 212 
 
 Last Campaigns of Bienville 219 
 
 Defeat of the French. 
 The Revolution of 1768 229 
 
 The Treaties. The Coming of Ulloa. Departure of 
 Ulloa. The Death of the Patriots. 
 The Great Purchase 243 
 
 Jefferson and Napoleon. The Bath-tub Scene. 
 
 The Change of Flags in New Orleans 264 
 
 New Orleans in 1804 268 
 
 The First Steamboat on the Mississippi' 272 
 
 The Lafittes 278 
 
 The Battle of New Orleans 288 
 
 The Strug-gle of January 8th. 
 
 Timrod's Ode 303 
 
 Maps, etc. 
 
 Map of Mississippi Valley 66 
 
 Plan of New Orleans, 1728 206 
 
 Map of United States, 1803 256 
 
 Sketch of New Orleans, 1803 265 
 
 The Battle Field 293 
 
THE FINDING OF LOUISIANA. 
 
 When Columbus, in 1492, sailed from Spain upon 
 his great vo^^age of discovery, very few people be- 
 lieved in him and man^^ looked upon him as a kind 
 of madman. But when he came back bringing the 
 account of the new and beautiful land he had found 
 ^n the other side of the Atlantic Ocean, and show- 
 ng the gold and pearls he had found there, the 
 battering i3arrots and queer animals, and strang- 
 est sight of all, the six tall, handsome Indians in 
 their war paint and feathers ; then all the greatest 
 men in Spain were proud to honor him; the King 
 and Queen gave him a royal reception, and the 
 people crowded the streets to see him pass, pointing 
 him out to the children so that they could say in 
 their old age they had seen the great Columbus. 
 
 It was so hard for Columbus to get money to 
 hire ships and men and buy provisions for his first 
 voyage, that often he was on the ii#int of giving 
 up his glorious enterprise. But, when he was get- 
 ting read}^ for his second voyage, more money than 
 he needed was given him ; ship captains were eager 
 
2 STORIES FROM LOUISIANA HISTORY. 
 
 to sail with liim and from all over Spain came 
 young men begging to go with him. 
 
 The first land that Columbus discovered was 
 one of tlie West India islands, and the first settle- 
 ments he made in the New World were upon the 
 islands of Cuba and Hispaniola. .At these two 
 islands the ships from Spain landed all the men 
 and the provisions and arms and ammunition that 
 came over to the New World, and from these two 
 islands set out all the "adventurers," as they were 
 called; the men who, after Columbus had shown 
 them the wa^^, wished also to discover new lands 
 and find gold and pearls and strange men, birds, 
 and animals; and to go back to Spain and be re- 
 ceived by the King and Queen, and be followed on 
 the streets by crowds of men, women, and children. 
 And so, by these, in the course of a few years. South 
 America, Central America, and all the islands of 
 the Caribbean Sea, and Mexico, and Florida were 
 discovered and made known. 
 
 What drew the Spanish adventurers to South and 
 Central America and Mexico, was the stories told 
 of the gold to be found there. But the story that 
 the Indians told the Spaniards about Florida was a 
 different and far prettier one. They said that in 
 the land of "Bimini," (this was the Indian name 
 for Florida), there was a most wonderful fountain. 
 
THE FINDING OF LOUISIANA. 3 
 
 whose waters when one drank of it gave eternal 
 youth. There were no old Indians over there, only- 
 young and beautiful ones. 
 
 This story came to the ears of an old Spanish 
 
 PONCE DE LEON. 
 
4 STOKIES FROM LOUISIANA HISTORY. 
 
 knight, in Cuba, Juan Ponce de Leon, and he be- 
 lieved it to be true. No gold nor lands in the 
 world seemed to him to be worth having, when he 
 thought of the Fountain of Eternal Youth. He 
 longed to drink the magical waters and become 
 what he was twenty years before, when he followed 
 Columbus to America. He went to Spain and ob- 
 tained permission of the King to conquer the land 
 that held the Fountain of Eternal Youth, and so 
 make it his own. 
 
 'He came in sight of the land of Bimini on 
 Easter Sunday, 1513, and called it the land of 
 Florida, because in Spanish, Easter is called Pascua 
 Florida, the flowery feast. But the Indians fought 
 him so fiercely that he could not land, and he had 
 to sail away again. He tried once more with an- 
 other expedition, several years later, when he was 
 in still greater need of the waters of the Fountain 
 of Youth. This time he was not only driven away 
 by the Indians, but was shot by an arrow and he 
 died of the wound. 
 
 Again and again, after him, did the Spaniards 
 try to land in Florida and make the country their 
 own. They did not believe, as he did, in the Foun- 
 tain of Youth, but they believed other tales just 
 as untrue, which were told them by the Indians of 
 Cuba, about great villages filled with gold and 
 
THE FINDING OF LOUISIANA. 5 
 
 precious stones, and wealth enough to make each 
 man of the army rich for life. 
 
 They fared, however, no better than poor, old 
 Ponce de Leon. As soon as their boats would ap- 
 pear on the coast, the Indians would SAvarm out of 
 the woods in wild fury and attack and drive them 
 away. Pineda, the commander of one expedition, 
 did not attempt to land where the others had failed, 
 but sailed along the coast, looking for a more favor- 
 able spot. Thus he sailed all the way to Mexico and 
 back again, coming upon a great river with three 
 mouths that poured a vast volume of muddy water 
 into the Gulf. He named the river the ^^Espiritu 
 Santo,'' the river of the Holy Spirit, because he 
 came to it on Trinity Sunday. He sailed up the 
 river and stayed fort}^ days with the Indians living 
 on its banks. As the Espiritu Santo was the Mis- 
 sissippi, Pineda may be called the first explorer of 
 Louisiana. 
 
THE ADVENTURES OF NARVAEZ AND 
 CABEZA DE VACA. 
 
 Narvaez and His Three Hundred Horsemen. 
 
 Pampliilo de Narvaez was the next one to 
 attempt tlie conquest of Florida. His fleet of five 
 ships carried not only the men and arms to conquer 
 the country, but the mechanics and laborers and 
 implements to cultivate it. He did not intend to land 
 in the same place as those who had gone before, but 
 as near as possible to Mexico. A storm, however, 
 caught his fleet and drove it into Apalache Bay. His 
 pilot made him believe that he was not far from 
 where he intended to land, that is, from the bound- 
 ary of Mexico. And so he landed his men and or- 
 dered his ships to follow along the coast whi'le he 
 marched inland with three hundred horsemen to ex- 
 plore the country. They came to an Indian village 
 which was deserted and took possession of it. But 
 the next day the Indians returned to it and, by 
 angry words and gestures, seemed to order the 
 Spaniards out of their country. Well would it have 
 
THE ADVENTURES OF NARVAEZ. T 
 
 been for Narvaoz had lie heeded the warning. In- 
 stead he pushed forward into the land looking for 
 gold. What met his eye was not gold, but a bare 
 country with empty villages, thick forests, deep 
 rivers, and great swamps. The army marched fif- 
 teen days without seeing a native, living on the 
 corn they carried and on the palm roots they gath- 
 ered, and so were nigh on to starvation when they 
 met a large body of Indians, who instead of fight- 
 ing them, received them kindly and led them to 
 their village, where they could rest and get food. 
 When they set out again they found the same for- 
 ests, swamps, and rivers before them, the same want 
 of food. The Indians that they met were some- 
 times friendly, sometimes cruel. The largest and 
 most comfortable village they came to was the 
 Apalache village. It contained forty cabins and 
 was situated in a beautiful forest, well stocked with 
 game, deer, rabbits, raccoons, opossums, wild ducks, 
 and birds. The warriors had fled from the village, 
 but the squaws with their children were there. 
 The next day, however, the warriors returned, took 
 the women and children away, and that night at- 
 tacked the village, and set it on fire. The Spaniards 
 escaped to the swamps. And then the Indians gave 
 them little peace. They shot at them from behind 
 the trees, and always made their escape before the 
 
8 «T()UIKS FliOM LOUISIANA IIISTOIiY. 
 
 heavy-footed Spaniards could catch up with them. 
 The Apalaches proved themselves then, as after- 
 wards, the fiercest and bravest of the Florida In- 
 dians. The}^ were splendid looking men, large and 
 well formed, and their bows were as thick as a 
 man's arm and from ten to twelve feet long. They 
 could send an arrow two hundred feet, and never 
 missed their aim. 
 
 Xarvaez at last decided to turn back and march 
 towards the sea to meet his ships. But this march 
 was the worst of all, for he had to make his way 
 through swamp after swamp, and in every swamp 
 to fight the Indians, sometimes standing waist deep 
 in the water, and his men were always starving 
 for food; for now the Indians not only deserted 
 the villages at their approach ; they burned them 
 and the food in them. 
 
 When the Spaniards arrived at the sea, they were 
 all sick and weak and longed for nothing so much 
 as to leave the dreadful country they had come to 
 conquer. And never had their eyes looked so keenly 
 for gold, as they now looked over the blue gulf in 
 search of their ships. Not one was in sight. What 
 had become of them? Narvaez never knew. What 
 were the army to do? They could not live where they 
 were. To march again inland meant sure death at 
 the hands of the Indians. Thev saw but one chance 
 
THE ADVEXTUUES OF NAliVAEZ. 9 
 
 before them; to build boats and to sail along the 
 gulf until they came to Mexico, for they still 
 thought they were near the boundary of Mexico. 
 But what had they to build boats with? Their tools, 
 their iron, their nails, their hemp, their tar, their 
 carpenters, all had been left in the missing ships; 
 and they had no food, sorest need of all. 
 
 But brave men find strength in the things that 
 drive cowards to despair. The Spaniards set to 
 work to do what they could with what they had, 
 trusting in God for the rest. They melted down 
 their spurs and what other iron they had, and made 
 axes, saws, and nails of them. They gave their 
 shirts for sails, they made ropes of their bridles 
 and of the manes and tails of their horses and of 
 palmetto fibre. They cut down trees, and though 
 tiiey had not a ship builder among them, they 
 planned and built five boats. They calked them 
 with palmetto fibre and tarred them with pine gum. 
 Every three days they killed a horse for food, and 
 skinning the legs entire, they used the skins for 
 water flasks. 
 
 They began their task on the first of August. 
 They finished it on the '20th of September, and two 
 days later embarked, forty-eight or forty-nine men 
 crowding into each boat. 
 
 For thirty days they sailed along the gulf coast. 
 
10 STORIES FROM LOI'ISIANA HISTORY. 
 
 landing where the Indians permitted, for food and 
 water. The horses' skins not being properly cured, 
 the water in them became putrid and unfit for 
 drink. Their food was corn, which they parched 
 when they could, but most of the time ate raw. 
 
 The Story of Cabeza de Vaca. 
 
 At the end of October, they came to a broad 
 river,* pouring into the gulf such a volume of 
 fresh water, that they were able to drink it; but 
 the current was too strong for their frail, over- 
 loaded boats. Narvaez's boat was lost, but the rest 
 went on for many days. Cabeza de Vaca, the treas- 
 urer of the expedition, who was in command of a 
 boat, relates what then happened : "All in my boat 
 were lying one on top of the other, and so near 
 death that few of them knew that they were alive. 
 Only the cockswain and I were left to manage the 
 boat. He called to me to do what I could by my- 
 self, for he felt that he was dying. A little before 
 day, I thought I heard water breaking upon the 
 shore, and I took up an oar and began to roAv in tlie 
 direction of the sound. AVhen we were near, a great 
 swell came and threw the boat high up on tlu 
 beach. t The shock was so sudden and so great that 
 all the dvinu: men came to themselves, and crawled 
 
 *This was the Mississippi. 
 t This was the present State o 
 
 i Texas, 
 
THE STORY OF CABEZA DE VACA. 11 
 
 from the boat on their hands and knees. We made 
 a fire to warm ourselves, roasted some corn to eat, 
 and found some fresh Avater to drink, and so little 
 by little gained our strength. Later on about one 
 hundred Indians came towards us, armed with bows 
 and arroAVS. In our terror at sight of them the}^ 
 seemed to us as big as giants. We did what we 
 could to make friends of them. When they left us 
 they promised to come next day and bring us some- 
 thing to eat. By daylight they came bringing us 
 fish and some roots, such as they ate. The next 
 day, also, they brought us food. And now, rested 
 and haying a supply of food, we decided that we 
 would start again in our own boats. But we were 
 hardly away from the land, when a great wave 
 rolled over us, drenching us from head to foot. As 
 we were naked and the Aveather freezing cold, the 
 oars dropped from our numbed hands. Another 
 waA^e rolled over us and capsized the boat, and Ave 
 Avere throAAm back upon the beach again. We found 
 some coals in the ashes Ave had left, and so kindled a 
 fire, around which Ave la}^ to Avarm ourselves. 
 
 ^'That cA^ening the Indians came again bringing 
 us food. When they saw the miserable state Ave were 
 in, they took us Avitli them to their village, and gaA^e 
 us a cabin with a great fire inside. It Avas noAV 
 NoA^ember and there Avas but one thing for us to do : 
 
13 STORIES FROM LOUISIANA HISTORY. 
 
 to pass the winter where we were. But the weather 
 grew so terribly cold and so wet and stormy, that 
 the Indians could no longer gather roots or catch 
 fish to eat. And the cabins were so poorly built that 
 they were hardly a shelter. And so from hunger 
 and cold, our men perished until there were only 
 fifteen left. And now the Indians Avere attacked 
 with a sickness that killed half of them. At first 
 they thought that we were the cause of their dying, 
 and they made up their minds to kill us, and came 
 to us for the purpose. But just then one of them 
 pointed out how we, too, were dying, and told them 
 if we had any power over life and death, we would 
 surely save ourselves. And then we were spared. 
 But the Indians insisted that we must be doctors, 
 and so they would bring their sick and tell us to 
 cure them. When we told them that we could not 
 cure them, because we did not know how, they 
 stopped bringing us food and starved us till we gave 
 in. And to satisfy them, we Avould nmke the sign of 
 the cross over them, and breathe upon the ailing 
 spot, and then we would pray to God to cure the 
 sick one, and turn the hearts of the Indians towards 
 treating us well. 
 
 ^'And God heard our prayers. As soon as the sick 
 ones were cured, the Indians would do without food 
 themselves in order to give it to us ; and they gave 
 
THE STORY OF CABEZA DE VACA. 13 
 
 US skins and little trinkets and ornaments. But the 
 famine grew so great that I was once three days 
 without eating; and it seemed to me that I could 
 not bear life any longer. But I had to bear even 
 more than this in the course of time. I was forced 
 to stay with the Indians a year, when on account of 
 their ill treatment of me, I ran away. I made my- 
 self a trader among the new Indians, carrying my 
 pack inland and along the coast, going once over 
 a hundred miles. My wares were sea snails, and 
 shells which the Indians use to cut with, and the 
 little shells they use for money, and other trifles 
 that I gathered. I brought back in exchange 
 skins and a kind of red earth that the Indians pow- 
 der their faces with, flints for arrow points, and 
 reeds to make arrows. This sort of life suited me 
 well. I could go and come as I pleased. I was not 
 forced to work, and wherever I went I was well re- 
 ceived by the Indians, who always set up great re- 
 joicings Avhen they saw me coming. But what I suf- 
 fered on these trips, it would take me too long to 
 tell ; the dangers and hunger, the storms, the cold, 
 when I was all alone in the wilderness. I lived 
 nearly six years with the same Indians. I could have 
 left them, but I wanted to take with me a Spaniard, 
 Lope de Oviedo, who was still on the island where 
 we first landed. His companions had all died as 
 
14 STOKIES FROM LOUISIANA HISTORY. 
 
 mine had. Every year I crossed over to the island 
 and begged him to come with me to find our way, as 
 best we could, back to the land of Christians, but he 
 would always jjut me off until the next year. At 
 last he consented to come with me and we started 
 with a party of Indians. We met another party, 
 who told us there were three other men, Spaniards 
 like us, in a tribe further on. All the rest of their 
 companions had died of hunger or been killed. 
 They, with a party of Indians, were coming our 
 way, and if we waited two or three days we could 
 see them. When these Indians left us, our Indian 
 masters began to ill treat us, beating us with their 
 fists and sticks, threatening to kill us. Oviedo be- 
 came frightened, and giving up, went back to the 
 island. I went on alone. Two days later we met 
 the Indians with the two Spaniards, Alonzo del 
 Castillo and Andreas Dorante, and a negro named 
 Estevano, who also was wrecked with us. When 
 they saw me they could not believe their eyes, for 
 they thought I was dead. I told them I was going 
 to try to escape and make my way into the land of 
 Christians. They agreed to come with me. We 
 passed six months Avaiting for a chance to escape. 
 But before the chance came, our Indian masters got 
 into a quarrel, which ended in a fight ; and they 
 broke up their camp and separated, going off in 
 
THE STOIIY OF CAKEZA 1)E VACA. 15 
 
 different directions from one another, taking their 
 slaves with them. It was one year before we three 
 Spaniards got together again in the same spot as 
 before. We then planned our flight for the full 
 moon; when, as I told my companions, if they did 
 not come, I would go alone. The month was Septem- 
 ber. When the moon was full we met as agreed and 
 set forth. We had nothing to eat but the fruit of 
 tlie prickly pear, and no water to drink but the juice 
 of that plant. On the first day's march we were in 
 constant terror of being caught and taken again 
 by the Indians we had left. About sunset we came 
 to an Indian village. The Indians were pleased to 
 see us. They knew who we were, for they had heard 
 how we could cure the sick. That very evening 
 some of them came to us, complaining that they had 
 a pain in the head, and begging us to cure them. 
 We blessed them and prayed over them, and they 
 said the pain left them at once; and going to their 
 cabins they came back bringing great quantities 
 of roots with them and dried meats, which they gave 
 us. And that night a number of other Indians came 
 to us, saying that they were sick and asking us to 
 cure them ; each bringing a piece of meat. We did 
 not know where to put all the food they brought us. 
 As soon as the Indians were blessed and cured, they 
 set to dancing and singing and playing games, keep- 
 
IG STORIES FROM LOUISIANA HISTORY. 
 
 ing up their frolic all night. At the end of three 
 days we began to ask about the country ahead of us, 
 so as to go on with our journey. We were told that 
 we would find plenty of prickly pears to eat, but 
 few people, for they had all gone away to their 
 winter homes; that the winter was cold in that 
 country and Ave would find but few skins to cover 
 ourselves with. When we had thought over all 
 this, we decided to pass the winter with the Indians 
 we were with. 
 
 "And so we passed eight months. We calculated 
 time by the moon, and during all this time we were 
 besought on all sides to heal the sick. The Indians 
 believed that we were really children of the sun and, 
 therefore, gods. But all the time there was so little 
 food that we starved. At last we got away from 
 them, and advanced farther on in the country. We 
 came to another tribe, where there was a great nuni-^ 
 ber of sick, and where we suffered again from 
 hunger and became so famished that we traded 
 some nets we had and a skin, with the Indians, for 
 two dogs, which we ate. After this food we thought 
 we were strong enough to go on our way. And so 
 we set out, praying God to guide us. It rained hard 
 one day, and we lost our way in the forest, but when 
 we came out on the other side of the forest, we saw 
 some Indian huts. Onlv women and childrcD were 
 
THE STORY OF CABEZA DE VACA. 17 
 
 in them, and they fell into a great fright when they 
 saw us. They called to their men, who were afraid 
 too; they came and hid themselves to watch us. 
 They told us that they were dying of hunger, but 
 that there was a larger village farther on. They 
 guided us to it. The Indians here Avere also afraid 
 of us at first; but after a Avhile they came up to us 
 close enough to touch us with their hands. When- 
 ever the}^ touched us, they touched themselves after- 
 wards. They brought their sick to us, and begged 
 us to make the sign of the cross over them, and then 
 gave us what food they had, that is, the beans and 
 fruits of the cactus. When they heard we wanted 
 to go on further, they were grieved and when we 
 left them, they cried. The next Indians we joined 
 treated us very well.'- 
 
 Travelling on thus from tribe to tribe, Cabeza de 
 Vaca and his companions went so far north that on 
 the other side of the mountains they saw the sea. 
 But now, wherever they went they were followed 
 by Indians, whose numbers grew larger and larger. 
 They treated the white men as gods, but they ham- 
 pered their escape and in fact tried in every way to 
 prevent it. At last, after many adventures, the 
 party came upon two women carrying loads of corn- 
 meal. These told the Spaniards that the country 
 where the corn grew was towards where the sun 
 
18 STORIES FROM LOUISIANA HISTORY. 
 
 set. ''And now," says Cabeza de Vaca, "we told the 
 Indians that we wanted to go where the sun set. 
 They said that the people in that direction were too 
 far away. We told them to guide us towards the 
 North. They said, as before, that the people in that 
 direction were too far off, and that we would find 
 no food, and have no water to drink. At this we be- 
 came angry and went to sleep in the woods apart 
 from them. This terrified them ; they begged us no 
 longer to be angry with them, that they would lead 
 us anywhere that we wislied to go, even if they died 
 on the Avay. 
 
 ''After three days' journey we stopped; and the 
 next day one of our Spaniards and the negro set out 
 with two Indian women as guides. They returned 
 after three days, saying that they had found a vil- 
 lage of houses, where the peoi^le had beans and 
 pumpkins, and that they had seen corn among them. 
 This news made us glad, and giving thanks to the 
 good Lord, we set out and travelled towards those 
 Indians. At niglitfall we came to their houses, 
 where great rejoicings were made over us. We 
 stayed here one day and the Indians guided us to 
 their next village, where there were houses and food 
 like their own. We stayed two days with them. 
 They gave us beans and pumpkins to eat. Their 
 way of cooking their food is this: They fill half 
 
THE STOUY OF CABEZA DE VACA. 19 
 
 of a large gourd with water and throw into a fire 
 a number of stones. When the stones are heated 
 they take them up between sticks and drop them 
 into the gourd until the water boils from heat. Then 
 they put in the food to be boiled. Tliey keep the 
 water boiling by taking out the cold stones and put- 
 ting in hot ones. 
 
 ^^These were the finest of all the Indians we had 
 seen; the strongest and most active, Avho under- 
 stood our questions the quickest and answered them 
 the best. We called them the ^cow nation,' because 
 great numbers of wild cattle are killed along the 
 banks of the river on which they live. 
 
 "For seventeen days we travelled up this river. 
 Then we crossed it and travelled onwards seventeen 
 days more. Upon some plains that lie between 
 chains of very high mountains we found a tribe who, 
 for the third part of a year, eat nothing but the 
 powder of stems ; and as we were there in that sea- 
 son, we also had to eat it, until we came to a village 
 again where there was an abundance of corn stored 
 up. 
 
 "Some of the houses here were made of earth and 
 some were woven of cane. From this point on, we 
 w^ent through hundreds of miles of country, with 
 fixed dwellings and plenty of corn and beans. The 
 people gave us coverings of deer skins and cotton, 
 
20 STORIES FROM LOUISIANA HISTORY. 
 
 and beads and corals and turquoises. They gave 
 US emeralds made into arrow heads, which seemed 
 to be very precious. I asked them where they got 
 them, and they said from lofty mountains towards 
 the North, where there were great towns and very 
 large houses, and that they bought them with the 
 feathers'of parrots. They gave us also six hundred 
 dried hearts of the deer for food. The women are 
 treated better here than among the Indians we had 
 seen. They wear a skirt of cotton that falls to the 
 knees, and over it dressed deer skin ; all wear shoes. 
 
 "Throughout all this country the Indians who 
 were at Avar made friends with one another, that 
 they might come to meet us and bring us presents. 
 In this way we left the land in peace behind us. We 
 taught the people by signs that in Heaven dwelt 
 God, who had created heaven and earth, whom we 
 worshipped and obeyed, and from whom came all 
 good. So quick were they to understand us, that if 
 we had known more of their language, we should 
 have left them all Christians. 
 
 "A day's journey farther on we came to a town at 
 which we were detained fifteen days by rain. The 
 river became so high we could not cross it. Here 
 we saw the buckle of a sword belt on the neck of an 
 Indian, and fastened to it the nail of a horse shoe. 
 We asked the Indian what they were. He said they 
 
THE STORY OF CAREZA DE VACA. 21 
 
 came from heaven. We asked who had brought 
 them from heaven, and all the Indians answered 
 that men who wore beards like us had come from 
 heaven and to that very river, bringing horses, 
 lances, and swords; and that they had killed two 
 Indians with their lances. With all the calmness 
 we could put on, we asked what had become of the 
 men. The answer was that they had been seen going 
 towards the sunset, on their way to the sea. We 
 gave mau}^ thanks for this to God, for we had given 
 up hope of ever hearing again of Christians, and 
 we made greater haste than ever on our journey. 
 And as we went along we heard more and more of 
 these Spaniards. We told the Indians that we were 
 going in searcli of the Christians, to order them not 
 to kill any more Indians or to make slaves of them, 
 or take their lands from them, or to do them any 
 more harm. The Indians were glad to hear this. 
 
 ''We now passed through great spaces empty of 
 inhabitants. The people had fled to the mountains, 
 not daring to live in their houses or till their ground 
 for fear of the Spaniards. It was a painful sight 
 to us, for the land was fertile and beautiful, with 
 plenty of springs and streams ; but the villages were 
 deserted or burned, and the people thin and weak, 
 hiding or flying from the Spaniards. As they did 
 not plant, all they had to eat was roots and the 
 
22 STOUIKS FROM LOUISIANA HISTORY. 
 
 bark of trees. They told us liow the Spaniards had 
 come through their land, destroying and burning 
 their villages, carrying away half the men and all 
 the women and boys, while those that escaped were 
 wandering about as fugitives, not daring to stay 
 in any one place. They said they would rather die 
 than live in dread of such cruel treatment as they 
 had received. 
 
 "They took us to a town on the edge of a range of 
 mountains, the way to which is over high, steep 
 crags. We found many Indians hiding here in fear 
 of the Spaniards. But they received us well and 
 gave us of what they had with them. They gave us 
 more than two thousand loads of corn, which we 
 gave to the poor hungering beings that had guided 
 us here. We set out the next day with all the 
 Indians. The tracks of the Spaniards and marks 
 of where they had slept were seen all along where 
 we passed. On the morrow, in the afternoon, we 
 came to a place where we saw the stakes to which 
 they had tied their horses. When we saw such sure 
 signs of Christians and heard how near we were to 
 them, we gave thanks to God our Lord for having 
 chosen to bring us out of a captivity so sad and 
 cruel. 
 
 "The next morning I took the negro with eleven 
 Indians, and following the Spaniards by their trail, 
 
THE STORY OF CABEZA DE VACA. 23 
 
 travelled thirty miles, passing three villages at 
 which they had slept. The following day I overtook 
 four of them on horseback. At sight of us, so 
 strangely dressed, they stood staring, neither hail- 
 ing us nor coming near me. I bade them take me 
 to their chief, w^hich they did. I told him of Castillo 
 and Dorante, who were behind me, and of the mul- 
 titude of Indians who were following them. He 
 sent three horsemen and fifty of the Indians who 
 were with him, to meet them. I asked the Spaniards 
 to give me a certificate of the year, month, and 
 day, and the manner of my coming to them, which 
 they did.'' 
 
 It was nine years since Narvaez and Cabeza de 
 Yaca, and the five boat loads of men, had set out 
 from Florida. Of the three hundred who went 
 upon the expedition, only these three were saved. 
 They had walked across the great extent of the 
 present State of Texas and reached Mexico. 
 
DE SOTO'S SEARCH AFTER GOLD. 
 
 He Lands in Florida. 
 
 When Cabeza cle Vaca came back to Spain, he 
 wrote an account of what he had seen and done 
 in the New World. The King and his courtiers 
 read it and wondered at it just as we wonder today. 
 Thev tallvcd about it to one another, and whenever 
 tliey had a chance they would question Cabeza de 
 Vaca over and over again about the strange country 
 he had been in, and ask for more and more stories 
 about it. Cabeza de Vaca was as willing to tell 
 about it as they to listen, and his stories, as the 
 stories of travellers are apt to do, grew more won- 
 derful the oftener he told them. But, instead of 
 dwelling on the miseries he had suffered there, he 
 pretended that even the most wonderful things he 
 could tell about the beauty and richness of the 
 country, and the gold and silver and precious stones 
 in it, fell far short of the truth, for, as he said, he 
 kept a great deal to himself, because he intended to 
 go back and conquer it. Just at this time, there 
 came to the court Hernando de Soto, one of the most 
 
DE SOTO'^S SEARCH AFTER GOLD. 
 
 25 
 
 noted cavaliers of Spain. He had gone to the New 
 World when he was only a lad of sixteen, and had 
 
 HERNANDO DE SOTO. 
 
 just come back from the conquest of Peru with the 
 fortune he had gained there. Now, Peru was one of 
 
26 STORIES FROM LOUISIANA HISTORY. 
 
 the richest countries that the Spaniards had con- 
 quered/but when De Soto heard the stories told by 
 Cabeza de Yaca, he came to think that the wealth 
 of Peru was nothing in comparison to that of 
 Florida. 
 
 He hastened to the King and offered to make the 
 conquest of- Florida at his own expense, if the King 
 would only give him the permission to do so. The 
 King consented, and De Soto and his friends at once 
 threw all the money they had brought from Peru 
 into enlisting men and buying ships and food and 
 ammunition for the conquest of Florida. They 
 engaged twelve priests to go with them to convert 
 the natives, and took the supplies with them for the 
 churches they intended to build and the settlements 
 they intended to make. There was nothing talked 
 about all over Spain but De Soto's expedition to 
 the land of Florida, the land that was richer than 
 Peru or Mexico; and from all over Spain came 
 young and daring men to join it. The ships sailed 
 in the spring of 1538, and landing in Cuba, De Soto 
 spent the next winter there, buying horses and live 
 stock, and more ships, to carry them. He set sail 
 from Havana, and on a bright June day landed on 
 the same part of the coast of Florida where Ponce 
 de Leon had tried to land Avheu he came in search 
 of the Fountain of Eternal Youth. Three hundred 
 
DE SOTO S SEARCH AFTER GOLD. Zi 
 
 soldiers were sent ashore to raise the royal flag of 
 Spain on the beacli and to proclaim that they took 
 possession of the land in the name of the King of 
 Spain. But they soon found that the conquest of 
 Florida depended, not upon the consent of the King 
 of Spain, but upon the consent of the Indians of 
 Florida. 
 
 That night, as they lay asleep in their camp, they 
 were roused by a fearful clamor of shrieks and yells 
 and blowing of horns; and before they could arm 
 themselves, hundreds of naked Indians were leap- 
 ing through the darkness upon them, and sending 
 showers of arrows hissing into them. All that 
 they could do was to run out into the water as far 
 as they could, and sound their trumpets to the ship 
 for help, which came just in time to save them from 
 massacre. The whole army was then landed, and 
 De Soto, finding a deserted village about ten miles 
 away, marched to it, and camped there Avhile the 
 ships were unloaded. When he was ready for the 
 march inland, he learned from some prisoners that 
 a man like himself, a Spaniard, Avas living in 
 captivity in a village somewhere round about. He 
 resolved that he would not move from where he was 
 until he had found that nmn and delivered him. 
 He sent two companies of horsemen in dilferent 
 directions to search for the village where the Span- 
 
28 STOIilKS FROM LOI^ISIAXA HISTORY. 
 
 iard was held a slave. One of the companies came 
 back with nothing' to report, but six wounded men. 
 The other company came walloping into camp, late 
 in the night, bringing with them a naked, thin, 
 scarred man ; a poor wretch who looked like a 
 savage and seemed no better than one. He had been 
 found with a party of Indians, who ran to the woods 
 when they saw the Spaniards coming. The horse- 
 men overtook only two of them ; one they killed, the 
 other one turned and nuiking a great sign of the 
 cross in the air, called out "'Sevilla! Se- 
 villa!'^ ''Are you a Spaniard?'' called out the horse- 
 man, who was about to kill him. ''Yes! Yes!'' he 
 answered. The horseman, who was one of the 
 strongest men in the Spanish army, stooped down, 
 picked up the man with one hand, threw him over 
 his saddle, and galloped off with him to his captain, 
 who then brought him at full speed to the camp. 
 
 He told his story to De Soto. He said that his 
 name was Juan Ortiz, and that he had come to 
 that coast nine years before in a ship sent out from 
 Cuba to search for some tidings of Narvaez and his 
 expedition, wlio had not been seen or heard of b^^ 
 the ships which came back, according to their agree- 
 ment to bring sui)])lies. Now, Narvaez had shown 
 himself most cruel to the Indians of that coast. He 
 had seized the chi(^f, Hirrihigua, cut off his nose, 
 
DE SOTO^S SEARCH AFTER GOLD. 29 
 
 and, most horrible of all, had thrown the chief's old 
 mother to the blood hounds, and she was devoured 
 before the eyes of her son. When the savages, 
 therefore, saw another Spanish ship coming 
 towards their land, they determined to revenge 
 themselves. They sent messengers to it, pretending 
 that they had papers left by Narvaez, which they 
 said they would give to the Spaniards, if they came 
 for them. Four warriors were sent to stay on the 
 ship, while four Spaniards went for the papers. But 
 the boat that carried the Spaniards had hardly 
 touched the beach, when the four warriors sprang 
 with a great leap from the ship into the water and 
 swam aAvay like fish. The four Spaniards were 
 seized and dragged off in great glee into the woods. 
 Juan Ortiz was one of them. They were dragged to 
 that very village in which DeSoto was then camped, 
 and were taken before its chief, Hirrihigua. He 
 kept them under careful guard until the great feast 
 time of all the tribes. Then they were stripped, and 
 one by one, driven into the open space in the middle 
 of the village, around which stood Indian warriors, 
 with their bows and arrows. One by one three of the 
 captives were chased like wild beasts and shot to 
 death. When Juan's turn came, and he was driven 
 into the space, he looked so young, almost a child, 
 that he moved the heart of the chief's wife, and she 
 
30 «T()IUi:S FllOM LOl'ISIANA HISTORY. 
 
 begged so tenderly for mercy, that she moved the 
 heart of the pitiless warrior, and he gave her Juan 
 to be a slave. 
 
 But after sparing him, Hirrihigua, whenever he 
 remembered the fate of his mother, would turn upon 
 Juan with fury, and his life became so hard that he 
 often thought it would have been better for him to 
 have been killed at once with his companions. Every 
 feast day he would have to play wild beast for the 
 amusement of Hirrihigua, and be chased and pelted 
 with blunt arrows from sunrise to sunset. One day 
 he was seized and tied upon a frame and laid upon 
 a great bed of live coals, and was half roasted before 
 the good squaw, the wife of the chief, heard of it 
 and rushed to the spot, and with her own hands 
 loosed him from the frame and dressed his wounds, 
 bitterly reproaching her husband and the warriors 
 for their hard-heartedness. Finally, his misery be- 
 came so great that the good woman helped him to 
 escape to a neighboring chief, who pitied him and 
 treated him kindly, and there he had been ever 
 since. When the Spaniards heard Juan's story, and 
 saws the scars of ill treatment on his naked body, 
 they wept tears of pity for him and gratitude to 
 God for returning him to his people. The next day 
 handsome clothing was given him, but he had gone 
 naked for so long that he could not at first bear 
 
DE SOTO'S SEARCH AFTER (JOLD. 31 
 
 anything on his slvin. He became one of the most 
 useful men in the army to De Soto ; for as he knew 
 the Indian and Spanish languages, he could be in- 
 terpreter for both Spaniards and Indians ; and was 
 also a good guide into the country. 
 
 Three days after this, the army was drawn out in 
 regular order, and started upon the march inland; 
 and a beautiful sight it was. The men were all 
 3'oung ; their bright new arms glittered in the sun ; 
 their faces shone with the confidence that fame and 
 fortune lay before them. Between the vanguard 
 and the rearguard came the well-packed baggage 
 train and the priests ; and the i^ack of blood hounds, 
 which always went along with the Spanish army in 
 the conquest of the New World ; and there was also 
 a goodly herd of swine to supply fresh meat. Pleas- 
 ant enough was the march at first. The more the 
 Spaniards saw of the countr^^, the better they liked 
 it; and, indeed, how could they have asked for a 
 better? The soil was rich ; with fine forests of oak, 
 pine, mulberry, and many other handsome trees 
 that they did not know ; and the trees Avere twined 
 with vines bearing heavy bunches of grapes. The 
 villages were large and well built, and although 
 they were deserted, the Spaniards found them filled 
 with food. 
 
 When he came to one of the great swamps that 
 
32 STORIES FKOM LOUISIANA HISTORY. 
 
 line the coast of Florida, De Soto would halt until 
 he could find an Indian to guide him through it. If 
 the guide did not lead faithfully, he was thrown to 
 the dogs, and another guide found, who, dreading 
 punishment, led the army safely. The Indians of 
 Florida, howeyer, proyed by far the fiercest fighters 
 that he had eyer met, and he found them Ayhereyer 
 he marched. If his road lay through the forest, the 
 Indians sw^armed from behind the trees, shot their 
 volleys into the midst of his men, and then made 
 their escape, laughing and jeering at the slow-footed 
 Spaniards. When a stream was to be crossed, their 
 canoes would dart from behind bushes along the 
 banks, and before the Spaniards had time to draw 
 their swords or aim their guns, their men Ayere fall- 
 ing about them. In the swamps the Indians 
 ambushed them ; and then the two sides would fight, 
 standing waist deep in Ayater. De Soto would 
 question eyery prisoner, himself; asking if gold was 
 to be found in the country and where he should go 
 to find it. The Indians would always answer that 
 there was no gold there, but that farther north 
 there was plenty of it. And so eyer farther on- 
 ward, eyer farther away from the coast, De Soto 
 marched his army ; but he did not find what he was 
 seeking for ; he did not find gold. He crossed yast 
 forests, went around impassable marshes, built 
 
THE PLOT OF VITACHUCO. 33 
 
 bridges over river after river, on the march. Every- 
 where he found only rich lauds and prosperous In- 
 dians, who were peaceful when the Spaniards were 
 peaceful, fierce and cruel when the Spaniards of- 
 fended them. 
 
 The Plot of Vitachuco. 
 
 Finally the army entered the territory of 
 Vitachuco, a famous chief and warrior. De Soto, 
 as was his custom, sent Indian messengers ahead of 
 the army, bidding the chief to receive the Spaniards 
 as friends and to furnish them with food during the 
 march through the country. Yitachuco's reply was, 
 ''Tell the Spaniards not to enter my territory, for I 
 promise them, however brave they may be, if they 
 put their foot within it, they shall never get out 
 alive; I will make an end of them all in it." But the 
 Spaniards were not men to be frightened with such 
 threats, and they marched on towards the land of 
 Vitachuco, just the same as if he had promised 
 friendship instead of enmity. Vitachuco then 
 changed his tactics. He invited the Spaniards to 
 his village, and began to make ready for a grand 
 reception of them and a grand massacre of them 
 afterwards. He came forward to meet the army 
 with an escort of five hundred warriors in war paint 
 and feathers, Vitachuco himself was about the 
 
34 STORIES FROM LOUISIANA HISTORY. 
 
 same age as De Soto, fine looking and noble in his 
 bearing. His village was a large and well built one. 
 The Spanish army entered it in full military style, 
 banners flying and band playing ; and for three days 
 enjoyed the feasting and frolicking prepared for 
 them. Then Vitachuco got ready to execute his 
 l^lot. He ordered the neighboring tribes to send 
 him their best warriors, and told them to hide their 
 weapons in the grass of a great plain outside 
 the village, while tliej came into it loaded 
 with food and wood as if for the Spanish. 
 When ten thousand braves had been thus collected, 
 Vitachuco intended to invite De Soto and his offi- 
 cers to go out into the plain and see a grand review 
 of all his warriors. Vitachuco was to go with his 
 bodyguard of twelve strong, daring warriors, who, 
 at a certain signal, Avere to seize De Soto and his of- 
 ficers. Then the assembled Indians were to grasp 
 their weapons from the grass, rush into the village, 
 and aid Vitachuco's men in killing the Spaniards. 
 But Juan Ortiz found out the plot and told it to De 
 Soto, who decided to meet trickery with trickery, 
 and to take Vitachuco in the very trap he had pre- 
 pared for the Spaniards. Orders were given to the 
 soldiers to be on their guard, and twelve of the 
 strongest men in the Spanish army were chosen to 
 act as an escort to the General. When the day 
 
THE PLOT OF VITACHUCO. 35 
 
 agreed upon came, a bright clieery morning, Vita- 
 cliuco asked the Spanish General to go to the field 
 Avith him, and see what a fine band of warriors he 
 had. De Soto accepted with pleasure; but said he 
 would hold a review of his arni}^ at the same time, 
 to show the Indians what a fine band of soldiers he 
 had. The Indian chief was much taken aback at 
 this, but, confident in the greater number of his 
 Indians, determined to carry out his plans. So he, 
 with his bodyguard, and De Soto Avith his, rode to- 
 gether to the field, where the Spanish army and a 
 great body of Indians faced one another. De Soto 
 and Vitachuco Avalked forward side by side to the 
 spot Avhere each one was to giA^e the signal to his 
 men to seize the other. De Soto gave his signal first. 
 His twelve men thrcAv themseh^es upon Vitachuco 
 and held him. The Spanish trumpets sounded the 
 charge. De Soto, jumping upon his horse, held in 
 readiness for him, spurred upon the surprised 
 Indians with his battle cry; and he and his men 
 charged over them as over a cornfield, trampling 
 and crushing them to the earth, slaying them with 
 their swords, right and left. The Spaniards Avere 
 protected by their shirts of mail ; the Indians were 
 in their naked skins. The Spaniards had swords 
 and lances, the Indians only their boAA^s and arrows 
 and rude stone tomahaAvks. Brave as the Indians 
 
36 STORIES FROM LOUISIANA HISTORY. 
 
 were, the moment came when they could stand the 
 slaughter no longer. They broke and ran towards 
 the forests, and those who could outrun the horses 
 escaped; the others were killed. Some ran toward 
 a lake at one end of the field, and tliose that the 
 horsemen did not catch and kill jumped into it. The 
 Spaniards spurred their horses up to their necks 
 into the water, but the Indians swam out of their 
 reach. The Spaniards then surrounded the lake, 
 and tried to make the Indians surrender, for there 
 was no chance for them to escape. But all day long, 
 the warriors withstood their foe, swimming round 
 and round the lake, shouting out their defiances of 
 the Spaniards, and shooting at them till all their ar- 
 rows gave out. One warrior would mount on 
 the back of five or six of his companions, and send 
 off arrow after arrow until he had emptied his 
 quiver. Then he would drop into the water, and 
 another would take his place. The water was too 
 deep for standing, the Indians had to keep swim- 
 ming or drown. When night came on, the Spaniards 
 lighted fires and kept up the watch around the lake. 
 Sometimes a warrior swimming stealthily under the 
 cover of a big leaf, held in his mouth to hide his 
 head, would get safely to the edge of the land, but 
 the Spaniards would thrust their lances at him 
 and drive him back into deep water. The Spaniards 
 
THE PLOT OF VITACHUCO. 37 
 
 thought that, by keeping the Indians swimming all 
 night, they would tire them to surrender. But by 
 daylight only a few had surrendered. During the 
 following day, however, all came out of the lake ex- 
 cept seven, who still swam about in the water, 
 shouting their defiance of the Spaniards. When 
 their voices grew faint and at last ceased, De Soto 
 commanded twelve soldiers to go into the lake and 
 fetch them out. This they did, dragging the Indians 
 out and throwing them on the earth, where they 
 lay as if dead. They had been thirty hours in the 
 water without rest or food. 
 
 In the meantime Vitachuco, raging with fury, 
 was kept a close prisoner in one of the vil- 
 lage cabins. Far from giving up his bloody 
 designs, he set his mind upon executing them in 
 some other way. It was true that his warriors were 
 now captives and slaves of the Spaniards, their 
 weapons had been taken away from them, and they 
 were forced to cook for them, and serve them, 
 but he counted that each Indian Avas good 
 to kill one Spaniard, as he himself was to kill 
 De Soto. He found a way to send word secretly 
 to his men that on the third day from the fol- 
 lowing, at noon, each one was to be ready to 
 kill his master; the signal would be a war 
 whoop, which he himself would give. And so, just 
 
38 STORIES FROM LOUISIANA HISTORY. 
 
 one week from the last attempt, when the mid-day 
 meal was being eaten in the Spanish camp, Vita- 
 chuco, who eat at the officers' table, suddenly 
 sprang up, and gave a war whoop. Then, seizing 
 De Soto with his left hand he gave him such a blow 
 with his right that the Spanish General hung like 
 dead in his grasp, with his face crushed in and his 
 teeth dashed out, as if a sledge hammer had struck 
 him. But before Vitachuco could give another blow, 
 which would have finished De Soto, the Spanish 
 officers drew their swords and killed him. As the 
 loud, clear, war whoop of their chief rang over the 
 camp every Indian rushed upon his master with 
 whatever he happened to have in his hand or could 
 seize. Pots were jerked from their hooks over the 
 fire, and the boiling food dashed over the heads of 
 the Spaniards; tongs, pokers, fire irons, red hot, 
 were used ; plates, dishes, chairs, tables. The Span- 
 iards fell, stunned, burned, scalded. Many, like 
 De Soto, had their faces crushed and teeth dashed 
 out. But in a moment they were themselves again, 
 calling to one another, seizing their weapons, jump- 
 ing upon their horses, and now no mercy did they 
 show to the Indians. Every man of them was killed. 
 Four days later, the army, with bodies sore and 
 stiff, and heads in bandages, drew out from the 
 bloody village. But though they left the village ho- 
 
THE PLOT OF VITACHUCO. 39 
 
 hind, they found the same people before them, the 
 same fierce savages, for seventy-five miles along 
 their march, fighting them by day, harassing them 
 at night. Coming at last to the great village 
 of the Apalaches, they took possession of it, 
 and stayed in it all winter. As soon as 
 spring came they set forth again npou their 
 march. An Indian lad, captured during the 
 winter, now acted as guide; for he said he had 
 been reared by Indian traders, who used to 
 take him great distances into the country, and that 
 in a land called Cof achiqui, twelve or thirteen days' 
 journey away, was to be found plenty of gold and 
 silver. It lay, he said, to the North and towards the 
 sunrise, as he called the East. In this direction, 
 therefore, De Soto led his men, and entered new 
 provinces, where he found a different kind of In- 
 dians, kindly, peace-loving, domestic tribes,. living 
 in comfortable villages, surrounded b^^ rich corn- 
 fields. At every village, the Spaniards were 
 received with presents of game and fruit ; and when 
 they set forth again were given food to carry along 
 with them. And the villages were better built than 
 any yet seen in Florida. The cabins were thatched 
 with cane, and the walls plastered with clay. In 
 every cabin was a fireplace, and before the doors 
 were porticos with benches or seats of cane. The 
 
40 STORIES FROM LOUISIANA HISTORY. 
 
 men and women wore mantles of skin, or of stuff 
 woven from grass, or the bark of trees, or fibre of 
 nettles. The skins were so beaiitifuUj dressed that 
 they looked like the finest cloth. 
 
 The Lady of Cofachiqui. 
 
 After about three weeks the boundary of the land 
 of Cofachiqui was reached; a broad river, on the 
 other bank of which lay a large village. The river 
 is known today as the Savannah. The Spaniards 
 calling loudly, some Indians came out of the village 
 to the river bank ; but when they saw such strange 
 men and strange beasts, they ran back into the vil- 
 lage as fast as they could in great fear. Soon, how- 
 ever, six warriors, splendid looking savages, came to 
 the bank, and crossed the river in a canoe. Then, all 
 coming forward together and making a low bow to 
 De Soto : "Sir,'' they asked, "do you wish peace or 
 war?'' "Peace," said the Spaniard, "not war" ; 
 and, he added, "food for my men on their march." 
 The warriors then told him that the village on the 
 other side of the river was Cofachiqui, and that 
 their chief was a young girl, to whom they would 
 take the answer of the Spaniards. They then re- 
 turned to their canoes and crossed the river. A little 
 later, the Spaniards saw cushions being brought to 
 two large canoes and a canopy raised over one of 
 
THE LADl* OF COFACHIQUI. 41 
 
 them. After which the young princess was carried 
 to the bank, seated on a litter that was borne upon 
 the shoulders of four warriors. She placed herself 
 in the canoe under the canopy, and was paddled 
 over the river by eight Indian Avomen. When she 
 landed, she came forward towards the Spaniards 
 without fear, and seating herself at the side of 
 De Soto began to speak to him with all the ease and 
 graciousness of a perfect lady. The Spanish caval- 
 iers were charmed, not only with her manners, but 
 with her beauty, and they called her the "Lady of 
 Cofachiqui." 
 
 When she had finished talking, she took a string 
 of pearls that she wore around her neck, and gave 
 it to the Spanish general, and he took a gold ring 
 set with a handsome ruby from his finger and pre- 
 sented it to her. The next day the army crossed the 
 river and took up their quarters in the village of 
 the princess. 
 
 When the princess was asked for the gold that the 
 Indian lad had seen, she had brought forward great 
 quantities of shining copper, which looked enough 
 like gold to have deceived the boy. Her silver was 
 only great slabs of shining mica. As for precious 
 stones, she had none, she said, but pearls. If the 
 Spaniards wished some of these, they might take as 
 much as they would, from a temple that 
 
42 STORIES FROM LOUISIANA HISTORY. 
 
 she showed them, the burial place of her tribe. In 
 this temple and in one of a neighboring- village, the 
 Spaniards did, indeed, find pearls enough to enrich 
 each man in the army for life, and thousands of the 
 finest skins dressed with the fur on, which in 
 Europe would have been almost as valuable as 
 pearls. But as the Indians told De Soto that there 
 was still a richer country further North, he, un- 
 mindful that "a bird in the hand is worth two in the 
 bush," made up his mind to march there instead of 
 taking what he found where he was. When the 
 army left Cofachiqui, De Soto, forgetting the kind- 
 ness with which the young princess, had received 
 him, took her along as a prisoner, hoping to use her 
 as a guide and to force her to make friends for him 
 among the Indians on the line of march. But when 
 he reached the limit of her territory, tlie princess, 
 happily, made her escape. And now tlie Spaniards 
 went forward nearly a month tlirough the land of a 
 young cliief called Coosa, whose village was l)uilt on 
 the bank of the Coosa river. The chief, like the 
 •princess of Cofachiqui, lived in a rich, happy coun- 
 try; but lie had no gold mines, to the great disap- 
 pointment of the Spaniards. 
 * 
 
 De Soto at Mauvilla. 
 
 The second winter of the Spaniards in Florida 
 was now coming on, and with it the time set for De 
 
DE SOTO AT MAUVILLA. 43 
 
 SoWs ships to meet him on the coast with more 
 men, and arms and food. So he turned his army 
 towards the Gulf, marching through Georgia, and 
 entered into the territory of the Alabama tribes. 
 Here he met his fiercest foe, the great Chief Tusca- 
 loosa, and suffered from him a most crushing 
 defeat. The army came in sight of him early 
 one morning in a beautiful plain, where he was 
 waiting in state to receive them. He was 
 seated on his royal chair, a seat hollowed 
 out of the solid wood. At his feet were spread 
 beautiful mats, above his head was held a 
 great banner of buckskin striped with blue. Over 
 a hundred tall warriors in war plumes and hand- 
 some mantles stood about him. Tuscaloosa was a 
 giant in size, he was taller than the tallest Spaniard 
 by a foot and a half, and was stout in proportion. 
 His eyes were as large as those of an ox ; his shins 
 as long as most men^s legs. As cunning as he was 
 brave, he saw that it was folly to oppose the Span- 
 iards in open battle, where they would have the ad- 
 vantage over the naked Indians, armed only with 
 bows and arrows. He determined to surprise and 
 massacre them when they were off their guard. 
 Therefore he came out as a friend, and invited them 
 to his village of Mauvilla, and he went along 
 with them to show the way. The Spaniards 
 
44 STORIES FROM LOUISIANA HISTORY. 
 
 mounted him on the largest horse in the army, but 
 when seated in the saddle he nearly touched the 
 ground with his feet. At the close of a beautiful 
 June day, they came to within five miles of 
 Mauvilla and camped there. The next morning De 
 Soto with a hundred cavaliers, followed by the pack 
 bearers of the army with the luggage, set out with 
 Tuscaloosa for the village. The rest of the army 
 was ordered to follow as soon as they could break 
 camp and pack their tents. Unfortunately they 
 took their time about this. 
 
 The village was surrounded by a great wall 
 fifteen feet high, made of Avell grown trees driven 
 into the ground close together, tied with vines, and 
 plastered with mortar. A])out the heiglit of a man, 
 loop holes for arrows had been cut, and about every 
 fifty paces, towers had been built, which could hold 
 from six to eight men. 
 
 As Tuscaloosa and De Soto approached, the gates 
 of the village were thrown open, and bands 
 of warriors and beautiful Indian maids came 
 out dancing and singing to meet them. The 
 Spaniards rode into the street that ran from one 
 end of the village to the other, and looked around 
 them with astonishment. Instead of the small 
 houses of the usual Indian village, they be- 
 held great buildings like barracks, the smallest 
 
DE SOTO AT MAU VILLA. 45 
 
 of which could hold five hundred and the larger 
 a thousand or fifteen hundred men. Mauvilla was 
 indeed the largest and strongest village in that 
 country, and although the Spaniards saw few men 
 and women walking about, Tuscaloosa had secretly 
 summoned all his tribes there, and the buildings 
 were packed with thousands of the fiercest Indians, 
 watching eagerly the arrival of their enemies and 
 the signal for the massacre. The Spaniards noticed 
 also that there were no children in the streets. They 
 learned afterwards that the children and old women 
 had all been sent away. 
 
 Tuscaloosa came to a stop in the open 
 place or public square in the center of the 
 village. Here, after pointing out a cabin where 
 the Spaniards could go, he left them, and went into 
 his own cabin, the largest one around the square. 
 The Spaniards dismounted and sent their horses to 
 graze in the open land outside the wall; while 
 they waited for the rest of the army to arrive. 
 
 After a short consultation with his braves, Tusca- 
 loosa decided to kill first the Spaniards in the 
 square, and then the others as they came into the 
 village. A warrior stepped to the door, and, throw- 
 ing it open, shot an arrow into the group of Span- 
 iards in the square. A Spaniard, who happened 
 to be standing near the door, drew his sword in a 
 
46 STORIES FROM LOUISIANA HISTORY. 
 
 flash and cut the Indian open from shoulder to 
 waist. A war cry then arose from all over the vil- 
 lage, and from every cabin Indians rushed out 
 upon the Spaniards. So great was their num- 
 ber, and so wild and furious their rush, 
 that the Spaniards were driven before it like leaves 
 before a hurricane, and were cast out of the gate 
 into the open field. And while one body of Indi-ans 
 were pursuing them, another drove the Indian 
 slaves and the pack-bearers of the Spaniards 
 with all the luggage of the army into the village. 
 The Spaniards leaped upon their horses, turned and 
 charged into the Indians, and drove them back into 
 their walls, where the gates were pushed to and 
 barred. The Spaniards beat against the gates, but 
 such a storm of arrows and stones fell upon them 
 from the wall, that they were forced to retreat 
 again, and again the Indians made a furious charge 
 upon them. Dashing out of the gates and leaping 
 the walk, they drove the Spaniards back and closed 
 the gates against them. The Spaniards, holding 
 their axes in one hand and their shields over their 
 h^ads with the other, now rushed upon the gates, 
 and with quick strokes cut them open, and charged 
 into the broad open street of the village, driving the 
 Indians before them. And now, before the Indians 
 could turn again upon him, De Soto gave the com- 
 
DB SOTO AT MAU VILLA. 47 
 
 inand to fire the cabins. In a moment flames and 
 smoke burst out of the dry thatched roofSj 
 and soon the village became a sheet of flame. 
 The Indians then called out their women, who, 
 grasping the weapons of their fallen warriors, 
 stepped into their places and fought side by side 
 with the men, and with as fine a courage as they. 
 
 In the meantime the rest of the army, careless and 
 lazy, advanced at their ease and leisure, the men 
 scattered over the field, picking fruit, laughing, and 
 talking like a picnic party. What was their horror 
 when they came in sight of Mauvilla to see smoke 
 and flames rising from it, and to hear within the 
 walls the din and cries of battle. With a shout they 
 rushed forward, and well it was for the Spaniards 
 within the walls that they did so ; for De Soto and 
 his men were fighting for their lives and with no 
 hope save that their comrades would come in time. 
 The Indians tried to head them off, and for a while 
 the fight was as fierce outside the walls as in. But 
 the number and fresh strength of the Spaniards 
 soon told, and they made their way to the center of 
 the village, where stood a great hollow square of 
 warriors and women fighting like wild beasts. But 
 their weapons were almost harmless against the 
 Spaniards in armor and mounted on horseback, 
 while the keen swords and lances of the Spaniards 
 
48 ST01UE8 FROM LOUISIANA HISTORY. 
 
 were deadly against their nalved skins. They 
 fell like sugar cane under the stroke of the cutter. 
 The horsemen leaped upon them from all sides, 
 trampling them down and charging over them 
 until the horses' hoofs trampled only the dead ; for 
 not one would surrender; all died fighting, falling 
 in heaps and rows where they stood. It was sunset, 
 and both sides had been fighting for nine hours, be- 
 fore the Spaniards at last won the day. The victory 
 proved a bloody one to them. Eighty two of their 
 men and forty-five horses were killed, and there was 
 hardly a man in the army that had less than five or 
 six arrow wounds ; many of them had ten or twelve. 
 And this was not the worst. As all the army bag- 
 gage had been captured and carried into the village, 
 it was burned and the Spaniards had no medicines, 
 no oil, bandages, or lint to dress the wounds; and 
 no linen shirts or sheets even to tear up for 
 bandages ; for all their clothing had been burned as 
 well as all their food. They were so exhausted they 
 could hardly stand on their feet ; but they went to 
 work as best they could, each man helping the man 
 who was worse off than himself. They made sheds 
 of twigs and branches, as a shelter for the wounded. 
 They stripped their dead companions of their shirts 
 for bandages; they butchered the dead horses for 
 meat to make broth to nourish them, and in addi- 
 
HE FINDS THE GREAT RIVER. 49 
 
 tion stood sentinel duty; for they knew that a very 
 small force of Indians could then have done what 
 Tuscaloosa with all his braves had failed to do. It 
 was eight days before the army could leave the spot, 
 and three weeks before they could continue their 
 march. 
 
 Some Indians, captured after the battle, told De 
 Soto that Spanish ships had been seen sailing in the 
 Gulf, which lay not more than a six days' march 
 from Mauvilla. 
 
 He Finds the Great River. 
 
 De Soto, as we know, had planned to go to the 
 sea shore and meet these ships. When, however, his 
 soldiers heard of them, they began to talk about 
 leaving the country. They said they should never 
 be able to conquer it; that they should all 
 be killed, or should have to kill all the Indians 
 in it before they could bring them under the 
 yoke of Spain. They had found no gold in it, and 
 there w^as no use staying there, wasting their time 
 and strength, when they could go to Peru or Mexi- 
 co, where the Indians did not fight so fiercely, and 
 where gold and silver were plentiful. Therefore, 
 they plotted that when they reached the coast, they 
 would rise in mutiny, seize the ships and sail away 
 from the land and their leader. When De Soto 
 
50 STORIES FROM LOUISIANA HISTORY. 
 
 heard of this, he resolved to lead the army, without 
 their knowing it, away from the sea coast, and so 
 when he broke up his camp, he started, instead of 
 South, due North again. 
 
 Leaving the land of Tuscaloosa, he entered into 
 the country of the Chickasaws, now the State of 
 Mississippi. The Chickasaws were also warlike and 
 independent, and the march through their land 
 was not an easy one. They had no gold in their 
 land, but they told of gold on the other side of a 
 great river that flowed through it. And so the Span- 
 iards marched to find this river and came to the 
 Mississippi. It was the greatest river they had ever 
 seen. It was so wide, they said, that if a man stood 
 on the other bank it could not be told whether he 
 were a man or not. It was of mighty depth and cur- 
 rent and brought along down stream continually 
 great trees and timbers. But even the ^lississippi 
 could not stop the Spaniards in their search for 
 gold. De Soto built rafts and crossed the army to the 
 other side of the mighty stream, and took up his 
 march again. But west of the INIississippi, as east of 
 it, they found the same beautiful country, the same 
 Indians, hospitable and generous in some places, 
 fierce and cruel in others. The Spaniards marched 
 I^orth into the rocky country where buffaloes 
 roamed, then turned to the South again; then 
 
DEATH OF DE SOTO. 51 
 
 turned again to the West, and still found neither 
 the gold nor the precious stones, nor the great tem- 
 ples, nor the populous cities, told of by Cabeza de 
 Vaea. 
 
 Another winter passed. The army had now 
 shrunk to one-half, the horses to a small number; 
 provisions and clothing were exhausted. The men 
 were dressed in skins, and were living on the corn 
 and fresh meat they took from the Indians. But 
 still De Soto would not give up his expedition. 
 He determined, on the contrary, to return to the 
 Mississippi, and build boats to send to Mexico or 
 Havana for more men, horses, and provisions, so 
 that he could remain still longer in the land of his 
 hopes. 
 
 Death of De Soto. 
 
 He readied the Mississippi at a point not far 
 from where Red River joins it. Finding an 
 Indian village there, he took possession of it, and 
 set his men to cutting timber for the building of 
 his boats, collecting vines for cordage, and pine 
 gum and the gum of other trees to make pitch. He 
 set up forges and began the work of making nails 
 and fastenings out of what metal they had. The 
 Indians round about were treacherous and threat- 
 ening, and so besides building his boats, he had to 
 keep constantly on the watch against an attack, 
 
52 STORIES FROM LOULSIAXA HISTORY. 
 
 which, in the weakened state of his army, it would 
 have been hard to repel. 
 
 In the midst of his cares and anxieties he was 
 taken ill with a fever, which never left him, but 
 rose steadily until it reached such a height that 
 he knew he should die of it. He prepared for death 
 like a Christian and a soldier. He drew up his will 
 and he confessed his sins. Then he called for his 
 officers, cavaliers, and principal men of his army. 
 When they had come and placed themselves around 
 his bed, he told them that he was going to give an 
 account, in the presence of God, for all his past life. 
 He said he was much beholden to them for their 
 love and loyalty to him, begged them to pray to 
 God in his mercy to forgive him his sins,and he told 
 them to choose some one among the ofifiters to take 
 his place after his death. The officers and cavaliers 
 begged him to name the man he thought fit, and 
 they would obey him. He named Luis de Moscoso. 
 Then he took leave of them all. He died in May, 
 1542. 
 
 The Indians believed De Soto to be a god. 
 Should they find out that he was dead, Moscoso and 
 his officers feared that they would set upon the 
 Spaniards and overpower them. So they kept the 
 death of the counnander a secret, and bade the 
 soldiers go around with careless, gay faces, and tell 
 
THE ESCAPE OF I)E SOTO'S FOLLOWERS. 53 
 
 the Indians that he was getting better. And they 
 resolved to bury him in such a way that the 
 Indians would never find his body. They cut down 
 an oak tree, took the trunk of it, and hollowed it 
 out like a coffin, and nailed tlie body of De Soto 
 in it. And at midnight they carried him out 
 to the deepest part of the Mississippi, and, in 
 the darkness and silence of nature, they buried 
 him beneath the waters. 
 
 The Escape of De Soto's Followers. 
 
 After the death of their leader, the Spaniards 
 had but one idea, to get back to their own country, 
 their homes, and their families. Leaving their un- 
 finished boats, they started out to march across the 
 land in a straight line to Mexico. They tramped 
 from early morning to late at night, halting only for 
 a few minutes at a time to eat and a few hours to 
 sleep. They urged one another to go faster; it 
 seemed to them they could not be speedy enough. 
 They passed through the northern part of Louis- 
 iana, fighting their way, for the Louisiana Indians 
 opposed them just as the Florida and Alabama 
 Indians had. They came to the province and 
 tribe of the Natchitoches, and halted at their 
 village, situated in the same spot as the 
 City of Natchitoches today. From here they 
 
54 ST0RIE8 FROM LOUISIANA HISTORY. 
 
 marched onward still towards the West, until 
 they passed out of the limits of the present 
 State of Louisiana, and entered the vast regions of 
 Texas. Through Texas they pushed on until they 
 got beyond the tribes with fixed villages and corn 
 fields, and entered the bare and sterile plains where 
 Cabeza had suffered so greatly from the famine, the 
 land of the Yacqueros, or Cowherds. Here Mos- 
 coso suffered as keenly for want of food as Cabeza 
 de Vaca and his companions had done. Still they 
 pushed on, hoping to reach Mexico. At last, worn 
 out with hunger and toil, they halted and sent men 
 out to see what was the land ahead of them. These 
 men returned with the report that the farther they 
 went into the country, the poorer they found it. 
 There were no villages, no corn fields in it ; the In- 
 dians were a roving people, who Avent about in 
 bands living upon wild fruits and herbs; and that 
 the army would die of starvation in it long ere the}^ 
 reached Mexico. Moscoso then saw that there was 
 but one hope for them, and that was to get back 
 to the Mississippi, and carry out De Soto's plan 
 of building boats and going down the river to the 
 Gulf and along the sea coast until they reached 
 ^lexico. 
 
 He counted that they were about five hundred 
 miles froni the river, And now the army, putting 
 
THE ESCAPE OF UE SOTO S FOLLOWERS. 55 
 
 what streugtli was left in their bodies into their 
 feet, strained day b}^ day to put those five hundred 
 miles behind them. They started back at the 
 beginning of October; the end of November over> 
 took them still on the road. But through the keen 
 winds, heavy rains, biting cold, they trudged along 
 doggedly. Sometimes the heavy rains and great 
 snow storms of the upper country swelled the 
 streams so tliat the land overfloAved, and often they 
 were forced to stand all night long in water up to 
 their knees. With no food, no rest, no sleep, and 
 spent with marching, it is no wonder that they 
 sickened and died; more than one hundred good 
 men and eighty horses. But no one stopped for 
 sid^ness. They would hardly take time to bury the 
 dead. At last they came again in sight of the 
 Great River. The Spaniards, when they saw it, 
 wept like children. Moscoso took possession of a 
 deserted village on the bank, and as soon as his 
 men were rested enough for work, he began the 
 building of boats. Through February, March and 
 April, they kept at their task, each man doing with 
 might^and main what he was most fitted for. While 
 some sawed the logs into planks, others hammered 
 at the forge, turning chains and stirrups and any 
 bits of iron that could be found into nails. In 
 March the water rose and overflowed all the 
 
56 STORIES FROM LOUISIANA HISTORY. 
 
 land, and nothing was to be seen but the 
 tops of the cabins and trees. But the Spaniards 
 made rafts for their horses, raised the floors of their 
 work sheds, slept under the roofs of their cabins, 
 and went on with their work. The timber for oars 
 was cut from the branches of trees that were 
 standing in the water. At the end of April the 
 w^ater began to go down. The six boats Avere 
 floated upon it into the river. They were open 
 barges with seren oars to the side and sails of skin. 
 As there vrere no decks, loose planks were laid down 
 for the men to run upon to trim the sails. The drove 
 of hogs that had folloT^'^ed them in all their wander- 
 ings were butchered, and their meat salted for food, 
 and the lard, mixed with resin, was used for tar for 
 the outside of the boats. Some of the horses were 
 killed and their meat parboiled, salted, and dried 
 for food. • 
 
 By the second of July, 1543, four years and two 
 weeks since the}' set foot in the country, the Span- 
 iards had completed their preparations for leaving 
 it. There were about three hundred and fifty of 
 them left. Waiting until after sunset to deceive the 
 Indians, they quietly stepped into their boats, 
 pushed off from the shore, and steered into the cur- 
 rent. They rowed two nights and one day without 
 stopping, passing over the spot where De Soto lay 
 
THE ESCAPE OF DE SOTO's FOLLOWERS. 57 
 
 buried. The Indians pursued them furiously in 
 canoes and harassed them from the banks. For 
 seventeen days the rowing and fighting were kept up 
 without ceasing, hardly a Spaniard in any of the 
 boats escaping without a wound. One boat was cut 
 off by the Indians, and its load of forty-eight brave 
 Spaniards perished. 
 
 At the end of the nineteenth day of their voyage, 
 they came in sight of the Gulf. They rested upon 
 one of the islands at the mouth of the river; and 
 even here they were attacked by the Indians, and 
 forced to fight for their lives. But it was their last 
 fight with the ferocious natives. They got into their 
 boats and passing the night at anchor in the mouth 
 of the river, put out at daylight into the Gulf. 
 
 And now came the last stage of their unfortu- 
 nate expedition; sailing in their open boats along 
 the coast of Louisiana, Texas, and Mexico, in search 
 of the Iviver of Palms, the nearest Spanish settle- 
 ment on the Mexican coast. Squall after squall 
 struck them. At one time, the wind for five days 
 kept them out of sight of land. For fifty-two 
 days they made their slow way along. How many 
 miles it was, they never knew ; for they could only 
 keep count of the days; always creeping along by 
 sail or oar, and coming into the land for 
 water and rest when the wind permitted. If the 
 
58 STORIES FKOM LOUISIANA HISTORY. 
 
 place were good, the}^ stopped to fish; some drag- 
 ging the net and casting the line, some wading 
 along the shore for shell fish ; for they had nothing 
 to eat but dry corn. As they were more often in 
 the water than out of it, they wore no clothes but 
 short skin breeches. 
 
 With each dawn rose the hope of coming in sight 
 of the River of Palms, but with each sunset the hope 
 went down. At last, they began to fear that they 
 had sailed past it in the night or been driven past 
 it in a squall. On the fifty-third day, a furious 
 storm came on that rose to frightful violence during 
 the night. Two of the boats Avere driven out to sea, 
 and the main mast of another went down in the 
 blast. With daylight the storm grew even wilder. 
 The Spaniards fought with it all day, as they had 
 all night. Many a time the boats went under the 
 waves, as the Spaniards thought, for good and all. 
 Sunset came, and there was still no promise of bet- 
 ter weather. The men had been for twenty-six 
 hours without a Avink of sleep, a moment's rest, or 
 a mouthful of food; standing half way up their 
 legs in water, now pulling at the sails, now bailing- 
 out the water which the waves poured over them. 
 The sun was sinking and another night was low- 
 ering over them, when suddenly, like a dim 
 line of light on the right hand, a coast. 
 
THE ESCAPE OF DE SOTO's FOLLOWERS. 59 
 
 appeared. The waves were running so high 
 that most of the time one boat could not see the 
 other, but whenever they rose in sight on the crest 
 of a w^ave, shouts were sent across from the cap- 
 tain's boat to steer for the white line and beach 
 the boats. This was their only chance for life, so 
 daring the tempest, still at its height, they headed 
 their boats for the coast, and just as the sun went 
 down, they drove hard upon it. At daylight they 
 sent out two parties to explore the coast. One 
 party returned with the good news that the land 
 they were in was Mexico, a Spanish country. The 
 men danced and laughed like mad men, and hugged 
 and kissed one another in their joy. 
 
 They made their way to the nearest town, and 
 after resting there ten or twelve days, set out for 
 the City of Mexico. They reached it in: the Autumn 
 of 1543. Barefooted, half naked in their ragged 
 garments, parched black by the wind and the sun, 
 thin and weak, they looked more like beasts than 
 men. This was the end of the great expedition that 
 set sail with so much pomp from Spain for the con- 
 quest of Florida. Less than one-third of the men 
 lived to return. 
 
FEENCH EXPLOREES, 
 
 The Pioneers. 
 
 And now for a liimdred years, tlie Indians of 
 Louisiana, Alabama, and Mississippi lived in their 
 lands, free from the fear of the white man. For 
 a hundred years, the Mississippi rolled its mighty 
 currents through a wild and savage country, car- 
 rying down its huge forest drift and casting it up 
 like a wall or palissade, around its mouth in the 
 gulf, so that in time the river became known as 
 the Palissado Iviver. 
 
 But during these same hundred years, the Eng- 
 lish had settled the Atlantic coast from Florida 
 to Maine, and the French had taken possession of 
 Canada, and settled it from the mouth of the St. 
 Lawrence lUver up to the great Lakes Ontario, 
 Erie, Huron, Michigan, and Superior. And every 
 year the French and English pioneers pushed far- 
 ther and farther into new regions, raising their 
 flags and taking possession of the land in the name 
 of the king. 
 
 Robert Cavelier de la Salle was the greatest of 
 
THE PIONEERS. 61 
 
 French pioneers in America. He was the son of 
 a rich merchant of Eouen, but at tAventy-three his 
 bold and daring character led him across the ocean 
 to seek his fortunes in the hardy life of the New 
 World. A few miles above Montreal there can still 
 be seen on the land that belonged to the young 
 La Salle, the stone house in Avhich he lived. 
 As the Indians had to pass by his settlement on 
 their way to Montreal to trade, they got into the 
 habit of stopping there, and from them La Salle 
 first heard of a river called the Ohio, which was 
 so long that it took eight or nine months to pad- 
 dle in a canoe to its mouth in the sea. 
 
 Now La Salle, and indeed all the men of his time, 
 believed that China lay just beyond the western 
 coast of America. When he heard of this wonder- 
 ful river, he thought that it must run across 
 America, and if so, it would be a short and quick 
 way to China ; and if France owned this river, her 
 ships could sail through it to China and make the 
 trade of the vast continent of Asia her own. After 
 he once began to think of it, he could think of noth- 
 ing but the glory of discovering this river and tak- 
 ing possession of it for his king. 
 
 He sold his land and house, and having bought 
 canoes and food and hired men and Indian guides, 
 he started in search of the Ohio. He travelled 
 
()2 STORIES FROM LOUISIANA HLSTOllY. 
 
 down tlie St. Lawrence tlirougli Lake Ontario and 
 into Ironde(iuoit Ba^^, wliere lie found some Seneca 
 Indians, who knew the yvaj to the Ohio Kiver. His 
 comi^anions, fearing the long route, and the hard- 
 ships before them, deserted him here, but he Avent 
 on alone, and for two years nothing was known 
 of him in Canada, but a stray story told here and 
 there by Indians, or fur traders, who had met him, 
 or heard that he was pushing along through 
 friendly and unfriendly Indians in search of the 
 Ohio liiver. 
 
 Marquette and Joliet. 
 
 La Salle, however, was not the only Frenchman 
 who had heard from Indians of the great river, nor 
 the only one whose heart burned to go in searcJi 
 of it. 
 
 Far away, on the western end of Lake Superior, 
 in a solitary little mission, lived in 1670 the young 
 priest, Jacques Marquette, engaged in teaching the 
 savages who gathered about him. He, also, had 
 heard from a band of Illinois Indians about a great 
 river they had crossed to come to the mission ; they 
 said that it flowed hundreds of miles through the 
 country and emptied no one knew Avhere, and th^i: 
 upon its rich banks lived great tribes of Indians. 
 
 Marquette could not, like La Salle, buy boats and 
 
FATHER MARQUETTE. 
 
 From the Statue in the Capitol at Washington, D. C. 
 
64 STORIES FRo:\r lotttstana history. 
 
 hire men and start at once in search of the river. 
 He could only write what he heard to the Superior 
 of his order and pray that before he died, God would 
 grant him the favor of going there and bringing 
 all its vast country into the fold of His church. 
 But even while ^Marquette was thus praying, the 
 savages about him broke into war, and, with his 
 little flock of Christians, he had to flee away from 
 Lake Superior and take refuge in a mission on the 
 straits of Mackinaw. 
 
 Fatlu^r Allouez, at tlie same time, was in 
 charge of another mission at the head of 
 Green Bay, in Lake Michigan, a favorite hunt- 
 ing and fishing place of the Indians, who came 
 there every year in great numbers; and he, also, 
 heard of the Mississippi, as Father Marquette did ; 
 and like Father Marquette, he also wrote of it to 
 his Superior, and he, also, hoi3ed one day to preach 
 his faith to the savage tribes living along its won- 
 derful course. 
 
 As La Salle had not come back from his search 
 for the Ohio, and, indeed, as we have said, had 
 hardly been heard from, the Governor of Canada 
 decided to send out another explorer to search for 
 the great river and to take possession of it for 
 France. For he feared that the English, also, 
 might hear of it and take possession of it for their 
 king. 
 
MARQUETTE AND JOLIET. 65 
 
 He chose Louis Joliet, a daring young fur trader, 
 to carry out his plans, and Marquette to go with 
 him. Joliet found Marquette in his mission at 
 Mackinaw, and gave him the good news that his 
 prayer was answered. 
 
 They soon set out in two canoes with five men 
 and a good supply of smoked beef and corn. They 
 paddled through the straits of Mackinaw and into 
 Lake Michigan, and were on their way to the Green 
 Bay Mission, when they came to a Mttle river called 
 the Menomonie, or Wild Rice River, where lived 
 the Menomonie Indians. These told Marquette and 
 Joliet that upon the banks of the Mississippi lived 
 ferocious Indians, who put every stranger to death 
 that came among them ; and that there was a demon 
 on the river, whose roar could be heard for miles, 
 who would suck them down into the whirlpool 
 where he lived; that the waters of the river were 
 full of monsters who would devour them; and be- 
 sides all this, that the heat there was so great that it 
 would surely kill them. Marquette and Joliet lis- 
 tened to these tales, but they were not to be fright- 
 ened. They paddled their canoes on through Green 
 Bay until they came to the Mission, and from the 
 Mission they followed a little river called Fox 
 River, which brought them to Lake Winnebago. 
 Crossing the Lake, they paddled into a river on 
 
66 
 
 STORIES FROM LOUISIANA HISTORY, 
 
 the other side, which brought them to a beautiful 
 prairie, where they saw droves of elk and deer, 
 and found a village of the Mascoutin and Miamie 
 
 MAP OF MISSISSIPPI VALLEY, 
 
MARQUETTE AND JOLIET. 67 
 
 Indians, who gave them guides to the Wisconsin 
 River. Like the Menomonies, these Indians tried 
 to frighten them from their voyage, and when the 
 Frenchmen paddled their canoes away just the 
 same, all the Indians of the village stood upon the 
 banks, gazing at them in wonderment, at men so 
 brave as to go thus into such unknown and terrible 
 regions. 
 
 Marquette and Joliet followed the guides to the 
 end of the little river they were in, and then car- 
 ried their canoes a mile and a half over dry land, 
 a "portage," as it was called, and got into the Wis- 
 consin River, a clear, calm stream, which bore 
 them through a beautiful country of forests ancT 
 prairies. Day by day, they glided on through a 
 peaceful solitude. At night, they would draw their 
 canoes on to the bank, build a fire, cook their sup- 
 per, smoke their pipes, and then go to sleep, with- 
 out fear, under the sky gleaming with stars. 
 
 About the middle of June, a month after they 
 had started, they came to a river dashing with a 
 mighty current across the Wisconsin. It was the 
 great river they were in search of. They turned 
 their canoes into it and were borne along, through 
 the savage grandeur of its banks, into a region 
 where they were the first white men to penetrate. 
 They paddled along, looked with awe about them, 
 
68 STORIES FROM LOUISIANA HISTORY. 
 
 expecting to meet the wonders that the Indians 
 had foretold. A catfish bumped against their 
 paddle one day; and another day they caught 
 a curious and ugly spade fish in their net; 
 but they saw no other monsters. And the 
 only demon they met was a hideous figure painted 
 on a rock in red, black and green, with red eyes, 
 horns like a deer, whiskered mouth like a tiger's, a 
 body covered with scales, and a great tail that 
 twisted around it. 
 
 They saw no Indians along the banks, only great 
 herds of buffaloes. But now they did not sleep on 
 shore. After they had cooked their supper, they 
 would carefully put out the fire and sleep in their 
 canoes, anchored out in the river, and would keep 
 a man on watch all night. 
 
 About the end of June, their keen eyes made out 
 some foot-prints in the mud of the bank on their 
 right. Marquette and Joliet followed the tracks, 
 which led into a forest and across a prairie, 
 where they could see an Indian village on the bank 
 of a river and two or three other villages beyond. 
 They crept, unseen, near enough to the first village 
 to hear the Indians talking in their wigwams. Then 
 they stood out in full view and shouted. In a flash 
 the village was like an ant hill that had been trod- 
 den upon, The Indians swarmed out and ran 
 
mahquette and jolie^. 6d 
 
 about wildly. After a little four warriors were 
 seen to be coming forward holding out a calumet 
 or peace-pipe. Marquette and Joliet were thank- 
 ful in their hearts to see that the Indians wore 
 shirts of French cloth, which showed that they had 
 traded with the French. Marquette asked them 
 who they were. They answered, ''Illinois.'^ After 
 smoking the pipe together, as was the Indian cus- 
 tom, the warriors led the Frenchmen first to their 
 own village, and then to one of the villages in the 
 distance, which was the village of the great chief 
 of all the Illinois. Here they were received with 
 all the honors and ceremony that the Indians knew 
 how to show. After smoking the peace-pipe with 
 them the chief made a long speech of welcome, to 
 which Marquette answered, telling the Indians that 
 he was sent by God, whom they should knovv^ 
 and obey, and that his chief was the great 
 and powerful French King. A great feast 
 followed. A wooden bowl of hominy boiled 
 with grease was set before them, out of whicli 
 a warrior fed Marquette and Joliet with a 
 wooden spoon. Then came a great wooden platter 
 of fish, which the same warrior fed to them with 
 his fingers, after carefully taking out the bones and 
 blowing on. the morsels to cool them. A large dog 
 had been killed and roasted in their honor; but as 
 
70 STORIES FROM LOUISIANA HISTORY. 
 
 the Frenchmen did not seem to relish this dish, it 
 was taken away and a dish of buffalo meat was 
 brought on in its place. At night buffalo skins 
 were spread on the ground for the guests to lie 
 upon. 
 
 When Marquette and Joliet left the village the 
 next morning, the chief with six hundred of his 
 people went out with them to the river and bade 
 them good-bye. 
 
 The canoes now passed the mouth of the Illinois 
 River, and after that the Missouri, which poured 
 into the beautiful clear water of the Mississippi 
 a torrent of yellow mud and great logs and branches 
 and uprooted trees. The light canoes pitched and 
 rocked, and were almost wrecked in the furious cur- 
 rent. They passed the site upon which has been 
 built the great and stately city of St. Louis, and 
 a few days later came to the Ohio or the ^'Beauti- 
 ful Eiver," as the Indians well called it. 
 
 Now the banks began to change; they became 
 lower and flatter, and were covered in the low 
 places with cane-brakes. Mosquitoes buzzed and 
 bit, and the sun grew so hot that the white men 
 had to shield themselves with awnings stretched 
 over the canoes. 
 
 One day, as they were paddling along without a 
 thought of Indians, they suddenly came upon a 
 
MARQUETTE AND JOLIET. 71 
 
 party of them on the bank of the river; and the 
 Indians seemed much startled to see white men. 
 Marquette at once held up the calumet given him 
 by the Illinois. At sight of it, the Indians became 
 friendly and made the Frenchmen land and eat of 
 their food with them. 
 
 After this, they went about three hundred miles, 
 seeing no human beings but themselves, hearing 
 nothing but the sound of their own voices and pad- 
 dles. Then a turn in the river brought them before^ 
 they knew it in front of a little village on the left 
 bank. As soon as the Indians saw them, they broke 
 into war whoops and seized their weapons. Some, 
 jumping into canoes, paddled out into the river 
 above and below the strangers; some rushed 
 into the water with great clubs to attack them, 
 and others stood on the bank and aimed their bows 
 and arrows at them. Marquette all the time was 
 standing up and holding out the calumet towards 
 the Indians; but they took no notice of it. 
 The Frenchmen gave themselves up for lost, 
 when some old men of the village, hurrying 
 after the young ones, came to the bank. 
 They saw the calumet, and pointing it out 
 to the hot-headed young warriors, quieted them. 
 Then they called to the strangers to land. Mar- 
 quette and Joliet with their men did so; but they 
 
72 STORIES FROM LOUISIANA HISTORY. 
 
 could not but fear what would follow after so war- 
 like a reception. The Indians, however, did them 
 no harm ; on the contrary, after a friendly talk with 
 them, they got ready a feast for them, and that 
 night gave them a wigwam to sleep in. They be- 
 longed to the Arkansas tribe. Their greatest village, 
 they said, was tw^enty-five miles below, opposite 
 the mouth of the Arkansas River. 
 
 The next day, on their way to this village, Mar- 
 quette and Joliet met a warrior from it, standing 
 in his canoe in the river and holding out a calumet 
 to them. The Indians from the village above had 
 sent word ahead of the coming of the strangers. 
 
 The warrior guided them to his village, and led 
 them to a sort of cypress shed before the cabin of 
 the chief. The ground was covered with cane mats. 
 On these the Frenchmen sat, -while around them 
 sat the warriors, and behind the warriors stood 
 all the rest of the people of the village, gazing 
 eagerly at the strangers. Long speeches were made 
 by the Indians and by the white men, and during 
 the speeches food was brought : great dishes of hom- 
 iny, boiled corn, and roasted dog. When Marquette 
 asked the Indians about the river below their vil- 
 lage, he was told that the Indians down there were 
 armed with guns, which they had got from white 
 men, and that they were so fierce that the Arkansas 
 
MARQUETTE AND JOLIET. 73 
 
 Indians did not dare to fish or hunt about there. 
 
 Marquette and Joliet had now gone far enough 
 to know that the Mississippi flowed south and into 
 the Gulf of Mexico. They feared that if they tried to 
 get to its mouth, they might be killed on the way by 
 the Indians, or perhaps captured after they got 
 there by the Spaniards, and thus lose the good of 
 their expedition. And, as it was the middle of July, 
 and they had already been two months on the voy- 
 age, they decided to return to Canada and report 
 what they had done. They therefore turned their 
 canoes homeward, but found it a long and toilsome 
 task, paddling their boats now up stream against 
 the Mississippi current, under the heat of a mid- 
 summer sun. Marquette fell ill and almost died. 
 When the party reached the Illinois, they turned 
 into it, and went through a country that gladdened 
 their eyes with its fine forests and broad plains. 
 They came to the great village of the Illinois, named 
 Kaskaskia, where Marquette, later, was to meet 
 with the fulfilment of his prayers. The chief and 
 some warriors guided them to Lake Michigan. 
 
 When they reached Green Bay, Marquette was 
 too weak to go further, so Joliet went on alone to 
 make report to the Governor of Canada of the 
 great exploration they had made. Marquette, still 
 ill and weak, spent that winter and the next sum- 
 
74 STORIES FROM LOUISIANA HISTORY. 
 
 mer at Green Bay. In the autumn, he thought he 
 was strong enough to carry out th-e wish 
 of his heart, which was to found a mission 
 at Kaskaskia among the Illinois. He set 
 out in a canoe with two men. But his 
 disease returned, and he was forced to spend 
 the winter in the forests of Michigan. When 
 March came, he made another start, and reached 
 Kaskaskia, where the Indians received him as if he 
 were, indeed, a messenger from Heaven. He went 
 from wigwam to wigwam, bearing his holy message 
 and baptizing the children. The Indians begged 
 him always to stay with them and teach them, but 
 he felt that his life was nearing its end, and he 
 had to hasten away. . He left the village a few 
 days after Easter, the Indians following him in a 
 large crowd, as far as Lake Michigan. He lay pale 
 and weak in the canoe, which his faithful men pad- 
 dled along as fast as they-^could, hoping to get to 
 the mission in Mackinaw in time to save his life. 
 But on the nineteenth of May, 1675, telling them 
 that his hour was come, he begged them to land 
 that he might die. According to his request, he was- 
 buried on the shore of the lake. 
 
LA SALLE. 
 
 His Vast Plan. 
 
 La Salle came back from his exploration of the 
 Ohio, filled with a vast plan. He had not been able 
 to reach the Mississippi, but, like Marquette, he 
 had found that it flowed not west into the Pacific 
 Ocean, as he once thought, but south into the Gulf 
 of Mexico. And he had learned, by having crossed 
 them himself, the different rivers that flowed into 
 the Mississippi. 
 
 The English, as we have said, were settled along 
 the eastern coast of tlie continent, in the strip of 
 land that lies between the Atlantic coast and the 
 Alleghany Mountains. The Spaniards held Mexico 
 and what is now California. The great rich Mis- 
 sissippi valley, all the middle land of the continent, 
 lying between the Alleghany and the Rocky Moun- 
 tains, was yet unsettled by the white man, and lay 
 open to the first power that should take posses- 
 sion of it and hold it. La Salle determined that 
 this power should be France. 
 
 His plan was to build forts along the Great 
 
76 
 
 STORIES FROM LOUISIANA fitSTORt. 
 
 Lakes, which feed the streams that flow into 
 the Mississippi, to build forts where these 
 streams join the Mississippi, and lastly to build a 
 
 LA SALLE. 
 
 great fort at the mouth of the Mississippi, upon 
 the Gulf of Mexico. In each fort a garrison of 
 French soldiers was to be kept, and around it the 
 Indians were to be settled; and so there would be 
 all along the Mississippi from Canada to Mexico 
 a line of French and Indian towns. 
 
HIS VAST PLAN. 77 
 
 It was a vast project and required a vast mind 
 to carry it out, but La Salle had such a mind. He 
 was, as we have said, the greatest pioneer France 
 ever had in this country. For ten years he worked 
 at it, with all his strength of head and heart. He 
 went to France, and there gained the authority 
 and consent of the king for the undertaking, and 
 borrowed what money he wanted, promising to pay 
 it back from the profits he counted upon making 
 out of the furs traded from the Indians. But the 
 greatest gain he made in France was Henri de 
 Tonty, a young Italian officer, who made in America 
 a reputation for courage, loyalty and unselfishness, 
 that still endears him to the hearts of readers and 
 lovers of history. He had lost a hand in the wars 
 and had replaced it by an iron hand, which he al- 
 ways covered with a glove. In America, in disputes 
 with the Indians, Tonty would use this hand to 
 knock them over, and so became known by 
 them as the "Iron Hand." He returned to Can- 
 ada with La Salle, who brought over, also, 
 a number of other men for the expedition. 
 But there never has been a great man with 
 a great plan who has not had to fight his 
 way against ill-will and jealousy. There were mer- 
 chants in Montreal who feared that La Salle was 
 going to take away from them their fur trade, and 
 
78 STORIES FROM LOUISIANA HISTORY. 
 
 the furtraders feared that he would get their trade 
 from the Indians, and, therefore, they did what they 
 could to excite enmity against the new expedition, 
 and to turn his own men against La Salle, and even 
 to rouse the Indians against him. But despite his 
 enemies and all the trouble and vexation they 
 caused him. La Salle, by 1678, had raised his first 
 fort. Fort Frontenac, on the Niagara River, and 
 had built a large boat, the "Griffin," to carry his 
 men, provisions, arms, and implements across the 
 Great Lakes, and bring back the furs which he 
 expected to get from the Indians. 
 
 La Salle in the Great Lakes. 
 
 In the month of August, 1679, he set sail in the 
 "Griffin," and passing safely through Lake Erie and 
 Lake Huron, he landed at the French mission in 
 the Straits of Mackinaw, where he expected to meet 
 some of his men with furs, for he had sent men 
 ahead to buy furs and have them ready waiting for 
 him at different points. But he found that some had 
 deserted, stealing his furs ; others had sold them and 
 spent the money in Mackinaw. He arrested those 
 he could find in Mackinaw and sent Tonty after 
 the deserters. He then sailed on his way to Lake 
 Michigan, and cast anchor at one of the islands in 
 the mouth of Green Bay, which belonged to the 
 
LA SALLE IN THE GREAT LAKES. 79 
 
 tribe of Pottawatamies. Here he found the friendly 
 chief of the tribe and some of his men, with so 
 rich a lot of furs that he decided to send the Grifl&n 
 at once back with them to his creditors in Canada. 
 Hie charged the captain to make all speed and 
 return as quickly as he could to the head of Lake 
 Michigan, Avhere he would find the expedition wait- 
 ing for him. La Salle then set out in canoes to go 
 around the shores of Lake Michigan to its head. The 
 canoes were so heavily laden that they could get 
 along only very slowly. And hardly had they left 
 the island of the Pottawatamies, Avhen a great 
 storm arose that came near sending them all to the 
 bottom of the lake. But they managed to reach 
 land, where they had to wait six days before the 
 lake was smooth enough for them to put out again. 
 And they had barely gone a day's journey when 
 again the wind arose and drove them ashore; and 
 this time a snow storm stopped them two days. 
 Then storm after storm belated them, until their 
 food gave out. One day they paddled thirty miles 
 without eating, when a gale came on, and as they 
 were off a high rocky shore, the only way they 
 could save their canoes was to jump into the water, 
 and lifting them up, load and all, to carry them 
 through the waves that broke over their heads, and 
 -to climb the heights with them — the heights which 
 now bear the beautiful city of Milwaukee, 
 
80 STORIES FROM LOUISIANA HISTORY. 
 
 October came on and the autumnal winds 
 kept the lake so rough that every night the 
 Frenchmen had to climb the rocky coast with their 
 canoes on their shoulders, and carry them down 
 the next morning, and launch them again. But 
 they soon began to find game in plenty and wild 
 grapes loading the tops of the forest trees. La 
 Salle was getting some of these one day, when he 
 saw some fresh footprints in the ground. He re- 
 turned at once to his camp, and charged his men to 
 be on their guard against Indians. They obeyed him 
 for a while, but catching sight of a bear, they could 
 not keep from firing at it, and so made their camp 
 known to a roving party of Indians, who were 
 near by. 
 
 La Salle blamed his men for their carelessness, 
 and placed a guard over the canoes that night. But 
 as it was raining heavily, the guard grew careless, 
 and the wily Indians, creeping flat on the ground 
 under cover of the rain to the farthest canoe, stole 
 almost everything in it; the Indian nearest the 
 canoe handing what he took to the one behind him, 
 who passed it on to the next, and so on till the 
 plunder reached the last Indian. 
 
 La Salle, who had waked, saw something moving. 
 He roused his men and kept them on guard until 
 daylight. Then, finding out that he had been 
 
ILLINOIS RIVER AND INDIANS. 81 
 
 plundered, he went after the Indians and fright- 
 ened them into returning what they had stolen; 
 after which they had a great feast, all together. 
 From them La Salle heard what to him was a very 
 bad piece of news ; that war had broken out between 
 the Iroquois and the Illinois, through whose coun- 
 try he had to pass. 
 
 The Iroquois, the fiercest and strongest tribe of 
 the Northern Indians, had been, in the past, the 
 most cruel foes of the French in Canada, and had 
 reddened the soil of the French settlements with 
 the blood of men, women, and children. But at 
 last they had buried the hatchet, that is, made 
 peace with the French. What La Salle feared was 
 that the Illinois would make war against his party 
 as friends of the Iroquois. 
 
 The Illinois River and the Illinois Indians. 
 
 When he reached the end of Lake Michigan, at the 
 mouth of the little river St. Joseph, where he ex- 
 pected to meet Tonty and the "Griffin,'' neither the 
 boat nor Tonty was there, nor any sign of them. 
 While he waited for them, he put his men to work 
 to cut timber and build a fort. They had it nearly 
 finished before Tonty came. As for the "Grififiji," 
 Tonty reported that she had not put into Macki- 
 naw, nor could any news be heard of her by the men 
 
82 STORIES FROM LOUISIANA HISTORY. 
 
 he had sent out in her search. La Salle was 
 sorely troubled at this, but anxious as he was for 
 news of his missing boat, he dared not wait any- 
 longer where he was ; for the winter was coming on 
 fast and he feared the streams would freeze over 
 and so block his way. He started, therefore, with 
 what he had: thirty men and eight canoes; and 
 followed the little river St. Joseph to its end. Then, 
 carrying their canoes over land five miles, they 
 floated them on the Kankakee, one of the heads of 
 the Illinois River. It was but a small rill hardly 
 large enough for a canoe to pass in it. But it grew 
 broader and deeper as it carried them along. Great 
 swamps and trembling prairies lay on each side as 
 far as the eye could reach. They could see bones 
 of the buffalo in all directions, but ithe Indians had 
 already hunted over the plains and burnt the grass. 
 For when they see a heard of buffalo, they fire the 
 grass in a great circle all around, leaving only one 
 passage. Here they post themselves with their 
 bows and arrows, and as the flames drive the buf- 
 falo through the passage, they shoot as many as 
 they want. The only buffalo the Frenchmen got 
 was one they found stuck fast in the mire, and the 
 only other game, one deer and some wild geese. 
 
 By the end of December, the party reached a 
 large Illinois village on the right hand of the river. 
 
ILLINOIS RIVER AND INDIANS. 83 
 
 it held four hundred and sixty cabins; long and 
 rounded on the top and covered with double layers 
 of rush mats, so closely woven that they kept out 
 wind, rain, and snow perfectly. They looked, the 
 Frenchmen said, like great cradles stuck in the 
 ground. Each cabin was large enough to hold five 
 or more families around its own fire place. The 
 village, however, was deserted, all the Indians 
 being away on their winter hunt. 
 
 This troubled La Salle, for he was out of food, 
 and although he had found where the Indians had 
 hidden their corn underground, he was afraid to 
 take any, as he knew there was no surer way than 
 this of offending them. But he could not go on any 
 further without food, for the firing of the prairies 
 had driven away the game. So he did take some 
 of the corn, hoping that when he met the Indians, 
 he could make the act good to them. A few days 
 later, towards evening, he saw smoke rising in the 
 air from an Indian camp, down the river. And the 
 next morning he came in view of a great number 
 of pirogues in the river ahead of him ; and on both 
 banks, a village filled with Indians. As he had 
 been warned against the Illinois, he prepared him- 
 self to meet them. _He ranged his eight canoes side 
 by side, and as they came down the current in a 
 line across the river, each man held his gun to his 
 
84 STORIES FROM LOUISIANA HISTORY. 
 
 shoulder. The old men, women, and children in 
 the village took to the nearest woods as fast as 
 they could go. The warriors ran for their 
 weapons; but before they could do anything, La 
 Salle's canoes were at their landing, and La Salle 
 had jumped ashore. He could easily have gotten 
 the better of the Indians in the panic they were in ; 
 but instead, he halted his men and waited for the 
 Indians to quiet down. The warriors on the other 
 side of the river, seeing this, came forward at 
 once with the calumet, and they all smoked the 
 pipe of peace together. The savages, as joyful now 
 as they were terrified before, passed the rest of 
 day in eating, dancing, and frolicking with their 
 new friends. La Salle then called the head war- 
 riors of the tribe around him, and after making 
 them a present of some tobacco and hatchets, told 
 them how he had been forced to take corn from 
 their village above. He said he would pay them 
 for it in things that they needed ; but if they wished 
 to take the corn back, they could do so; and then 
 he would go to their neighbors, the Osages, w^ho 
 would gladly trade him corn for presents. He told 
 them, besides, that he meant to make a settlement 
 in their country, and build a great boat there and 
 go down in it to the end of the great river. As for 
 the Iroquois, he said, they were now sons of the 
 
ILLINOIS UIVBR AND INDIANS, 85 
 
 King of France and brothers of the Frenchmen. 
 He therefore advised the Illinois to make peace 
 with them and offered to help them to do it. But, 
 he added, that if the Illinois allowed him to build a 
 fort in their land, he would help them against the 
 Iroquois, should these bring war into their country. 
 The Illinois gladly took the presents as pay for the 
 corn, and agreed to all that La Salle said. In their 
 speeches they told him about the wonderful length 
 and beauty of the Mississippi, and how boats could 
 easily go down all the way to the mouth. 
 
 But the next day an Indian came secretly to the 
 village and told the Illinois that La Salle had come 
 there to arm their enemies against them, and that 
 he was a friend of the Iroquois; that he already 
 had a fort in their country, and that he gave them 
 arms and powder. The following day, therefore, 
 when the Frenchmen and Indians were eating to- 
 gether, one of the Illinois chiefs arose and told 
 La Salle that he wished to cure him of the sickness 
 he had of wishing to go down the great river ; that 
 no one had ever gone down there and come back 
 alive; that the banks were filled with a multitude 
 of savages, barbarous people who could crush the 
 Frenchmen no matter how well armed they were; 
 that the waters of the river were filled with mon- 
 sters and serpents; and even if in their big boats 
 
86 STORIES FllOM LOUISIANA HISTORY, 
 
 the Frenchmen could pass through all these dan- 
 gers, the river, at its lower end, went over great 
 falls and precipices, and ended by plunging into a 
 bottomless gulf in the earth. The chief's manner 
 was so serious, and he showed so much interest in 
 the French, that La Salle's men hearing him, and 
 not knowing of the secret visit of the strange 
 Indian, believed him and became very much fright- 
 ened. La Salle, who had heard of the visit, knew 
 that the warrior was sent by enemies, and that 
 he had brought presents to the Illinois to turn them 
 against him. But he could not make his men be- 
 lieve this, and that" night six of them deserted, 
 choosing rather to risk the danger from Indians 
 and famine on the way back to Canada, than the 
 dreadful things that the warrior said lay before 
 them on the river. 
 
 La Salle did what he could to prevent the others 
 from following so bad an example. He promised 
 that if any among them wanted to return to Can- 
 ada, he would give them a boat to do so in the 
 spring. He asked them only to stay through the win- 
 ter, and repeated over and over again to them that 
 he wanted no man to go with him against his will. 
 But he made up his mind to withdraw his men 
 from the Indian village, where it was so easy for 
 them to be turned against the expedition. He 
 
THE LOSS OF THE "GIUFFIN/^ 87 
 
 went down the river some miles below the village, 
 where he built a fort that he called '^Creve-Coeur/^ 
 or ^'Break Heart." But he should have called it 
 ^^Great Heart" instead, for although, as we shall see, 
 he suffered trials enough to break the heart of al- 
 most any man, he never gave up courage, but on the 
 contrary, pushed on more bravely after each disap- 
 pointment. Within the new fort the Frenchmen 
 were safe from the Indians; but they suffered for 
 food and for news of the ^^Grifl&n." The men whom 
 La Salle had sent back to search for the vessel, had 
 never returned. The timber Avas cut and sawed 
 for the new boat, but there was no chance of finish- 
 ing it without the fastenings, the cordage, sails, 
 and anchors that were in the ''Griffin." In fact, 
 there was no hope of going any further in the ex- 
 pedition, unless with the other supplies in the 
 "Griffin" came food, arms, and ammunition. 
 
 The Loss of The ^^Griffin.^^ 
 
 Fearing that while he was waiting for the vessel, 
 the time would slip by and he would be kept an- 
 other winter where he was. La Salle made up his 
 mind to go himself to Canada, and find out the 
 truth about the ''Griffin," and if she were lost to 
 raise money and get the other supplies and men and 
 bring them back with him to Fort Creve-Coeur, It 
 
8S STORIES FROM LUL ISIANA HISTORY. 
 
 seemed a desperate undertaking and one above the 
 courage and strength of any man, for it was a 
 journey of more than a thousand miles over a 
 strange country, filled with hostile Indians. He 
 set out with four Frenchmen and a faithful Mohe- 
 gan Indian, who never left him. Each man carried 
 his gun, powder, balls, a hatchet, an iron pot, a 
 blanket, a change of clothing, and dressed leather 
 to make new moccasins. For, like the Indians, the 
 Frenchmen wore moccasins, not shoes, and used 
 up a pair in a hard day's tramp. It was the first of 
 March, and the ice was just beginning to melt. For 
 a few miles they could paddle their canoes up the 
 center of the river, where the current kept a pas- 
 sage free from ice. But when the river spread out 
 into Lake Peoria, they found it frozen hard and 
 covered with snow. They made sleds, put their 
 canoes on them, and dragged them over to the other 
 end of the lake. But the river there was 
 covered with ice, too thin to walk on, and too thick 
 to paddle through, so they had to carry their canoes 
 along the bank through the woods, walking in snow 
 that came half way up their waists. That night 
 a heavy rain fell, which melted the ice, and 
 the next morning they found they could travel by 
 the river ; but seven or eight times during the day, 
 they had to cut a passage through the ice with 
 
89 
 
 their hatchets. Before evening the ice was so thick 
 that they were forced to carry or drag their canoes 
 over the frozen ground or marsh until they came 
 to running water again. 
 
 At the end of the ninth day, they found the snow 
 so firm that they made snow shoes, and gliding 
 swiftly over the surface, pulling their boats be- 
 hind them, they made from twenty to thirty miles a 
 day. This brought them to the great Illinois vil- 
 lage, where they were kept two days by a heavy fall 
 of rain. The village was still deserted and empty. 
 La Salle had hoped to find corn here to send back 
 to his hungry men at Fort Creve-Coeur; but there 
 was none. As far as he could see, the country 
 around was white, frozen, desolate. The rain had 
 loosened the ice in the river above ; and in the still, 
 clear air the sound of its bursting and cracking 
 echoed like cannon shots, followed by grinding and 
 crunching, as the huge blocks piled up one upon 
 the other along the bank or against the islands in 
 the river. La Salle knew that the Indians would 
 not return to their village in such a season as this, 
 but he made a fire of some dried rushes and grass, 
 in hopes that the smoke might catch the eye of some 
 roaming hunter. A buffalo was caught struggling 
 in the snow. The Frenchmen killed it. While they 
 were smoking its meat. La Salle, walking arounci 
 
90 STORIES FUOM LOUISIANA HISTORY. 
 
 outside the village, came upon three warriors. One 
 of them was Chassagoac, a noted Illinois chief, 
 who was also a great friend of the French. La 
 Salle brought him into the village and gave him a 
 present of some hatchets, knives, a red blanket, and 
 an iron pot. He then told him of the great need of 
 food at Fort Creve-Coeur, and asked him to send 
 some thither. Chassagoac promised to do this, and 
 also to be the friend of the Frenchmen left at the 
 fort. 
 
 Eased in his mind, La Salle and his men left the 
 village and worked their waj^ along as before, pad- 
 dling when they could, cutting their way through 
 the ice, carrying their boats around bad places. 
 They came at last to a point where the river was 
 completely closed by the ice; so hiding their canoes 
 on an island and taking their packs on their backs, 
 they set out on foot to cross the country that lay 
 between them and the southern end of Lake Mich- 
 igan. For two days they walked across the prairie 
 through the ice and snow, and came to swamps and 
 lowlands, where they waded in water up to their 
 knees, until they were stopped by a swift river, 
 which they crossed on a raft. The next day, after 
 crossing three more streams in the same way, they 
 came in the evening to Lake Michigan, and the 
 morning after they were at their fort on the little 
 
THE LOSS OP THE "GUIFFIN/'' 91 
 
 river St. Joseph. La Salle found here the two men 
 sent in search of the "Griffin." They had no good 
 tidings of the missing vessel for him. They had 
 gone all around the lake, but had found no sign of 
 her or of her cargo. La Salle ordered the men to go 
 on to Fort Creve-Coeur and join Tonty, while he 
 and his party pursued their way across the country 
 to Lake Erie. 
 
 For two days they pushed their way through a 
 forest so thick with thorns and brambles that their 
 clothes were torn in tatters, and their faces became 
 so scratched and bloody that they hardly knew one 
 another. But after this they came into the open 
 woods, where they found plenty of game, and so 
 had not to suffer for food as before, when often 
 they would walk from dawn to night without eat- 
 ing. Their gun shots, how^ever, were heard by 
 Indians, who started out at once in pursuit of them. 
 One party surrounded them, and would surely have 
 put an end to them, had not the white men quickly 
 jumped behind trees, and pointed their guns. The 
 Indians, not seeing their faces, took them for 
 Iroquois, of w^hom they were afraid, and so made 
 off again, giving the alarm on^ all sides that the 
 Iroquois were in the country. Thus, for days, the 
 Frenchmen were let alone. To hide their tracks 
 from the Indians, they burnt the grass behind them 
 
92 STORIES FROM LOUISIANA HISTORY. 
 
 as they went over the prairie. But they came to a 
 swamp which they had to cross in mud and water 
 up to their waists; and their footprints here were 
 found by a band of Indians, who followed them for 
 three days. They did not dare make a fire at night, 
 and so they could dry their wet clothes only by 
 spreading them out while they slept, wrapped in 
 their blankets. One morning they found their 
 clothes frozen so stiff that they could not put them 
 on, and had to make a fire to thaw them. The 
 Indians, who were camping not far away, seeing the 
 smoke, ran up at once with loud cries; but fortu- 
 nately a deep little river was running between them 
 and the Frenchmen, and this and the sight of the 
 Frenchmen's guns stopped them. In the first week 
 of April, two of the men fell sick and were not able 
 to walk any longer. La Salle was forced to make a 
 canoe and carry them on by a little stream he found 
 that flowed into Lake Erie. As there were no birch 
 trees there, he had an elm cut down and the bark 
 taken off whole by pouring boiling water upon it. 
 With this bark they made a canoe, and all getting 
 into it paddled along as far as they could, which 
 was not very far; for great trees, brought down by 
 the high water or fallen in from the banks, blocked 
 their passage and they were continually forced to 
 get out and carry their canoe around ; and besides 
 the river was so crooked that in five days they had 
 
BAD NEWS PROM TOXTY. 93 
 
 hot gone as far as one day's walking in a straight 
 line would have taken them. So, as the sick men 
 were now better, they gave up their canoe, and a 
 few days afterwards reached the Straits of Detroit, 
 through which the waters of Lake Huron pass into 
 Lake Erie. La Salle sent two of his men from 
 here to Mackinaw to find out if there had not yet 
 come some news of the ^'Griffin,'' while he and the 
 two other Frenchmen and the Indian crossed the 
 strait on a raft and pushed on afoot around Lake 
 Erie. They found the woods overflowed with the 
 melting of the snow and ice, and after a few days 
 of wading through this, one of the Frenchmen and 
 the Indian fell very ill, and La Salle and his one 
 well man made a canoe and carried them in it the 
 rest of the journey. They reached Niagara the 
 last week of April. La Salle found some of his 
 men here, and from them heard that not only the 
 ^'Griffin" and all of her cargo were lost, but that a 
 vessel sent to him from France, loaded with goods, 
 had been wrecked at the mouth of the St. Lawrence. 
 As far as loss of money could make him so, he was 
 a ruined man. 
 
 Bad News From Tonty. 
 
 It was not loss of money, however, that could ruin 
 La Salle. This misfortune only acted like fuel to 
 brighten the flame of his courage. He hurried at 
 
94 STOKIES FROM LOUISIANA HISTORY. 
 
 ouce on to Fort Frontenac and from there to Mon- 
 treal. As his men were broken down, he hired 
 three fresh ones to go on with him. In one week 
 he finished his business in Montreal and came back 
 to Fort Frontenac, ready to start on the return to 
 Fort Creve-Coeur, when there came to him mes- 
 sengers from Tonty with the worst news received 
 yet; which was that nearly all his men had deserted 
 from Fort Creve-Coeur, after plundering his store- 
 house and destroying and throwing into the river 
 all the goods, arms, ammunition, and stores they 
 could not carry off. Tonty and the few who had 
 remained faithful to him had taken refuge in the 
 Illinois village. Tonty's messengers were followed 
 by two men, who told La Salle that the deserters 
 had also destroyed the fort at St. Joseph, had stolen 
 the furs belonging to La Salle at Mackinaw, and 
 had plundered his store-house at Niagara. Some 
 of them had gone to New York, but the rest, in three 
 canoes, were then on their way to Fort Frontenac, 
 to kill La Salle himself, so that he could not punish 
 them. 
 
 La Salle at once took his measures to arrest the 
 villains and to recover what he could of his stolen 
 property. Leaving a boat and five men at Fort 
 Frontenac, he set out in a canoe with five other 
 men, and paddling all night came, at daylight, to 
 
BAD NEWS FROM TONTY. 95 
 
 a point that the deserters had to pass. Their first 
 and second canoes were surprised, captured, and 
 sent on to Fort Frontenac, where the men were cast 
 into prison. The third canoe was not seen until 
 the next day. As it would not stop when hailed. 
 La Salle's men fired into it, and killed two men. 
 The rest gave themselves up and were sent to join 
 their comrades in prison. 
 
 And now, after engaging new men, soldiers, 
 masons, ship carpenters, blacksmiths, and laborers, 
 and buying a fresh supply of food and goods as well 
 as what Avas needed to finish and rig the vessel be- 
 gun at Fort Creve-Coeur, La Salle made all haste 
 to get back to Tonty in the Illinois country 
 
 He set , out in August ; but when he reached 
 Mackinaw, where he expected to buy corn and meet 
 some of his men, he found the Indians there in an 
 ugly temper and slow about selling food to him, 
 and the men he had engaged did not come on time. 
 He left a lieutenant to bring them and the food on, 
 while he and twelve men hastened on to Fort St. 
 Joseph. He found it in ruins. Leaving there his 
 heavy luggage and five men to wait until the rest of 
 the party came, he with six men and the Mohegan 
 set out to get as quickly as they could to Tonty in 
 the great Illinois village. 
 
 As before, they followed the St. Joseph River 
 
96 STORIES FROM LOUISIANA HISTORY. 
 
 and carrying their boats over to the Kankakee, 
 paddled down this river to the Illinois. The prairies 
 had not been burned, and they killed plenty of 
 buffalo, deer and other game, and loaded a canoe 
 with the best portions to take to Tonty. But when 
 they came in sight of the village, they saw only the 
 charred poles of the cabins standing; all else was 
 cinders and ashes. The Iroquois had passed over it, 
 and well did the Frenchmen know their bloody 
 work. On the upright poles of the cabins were 
 stuck the heads of the unfortunate Illinois. Heaps 
 of ashes showed where a number had been burned 
 at the stake. Wolves and buzzards were feasting 
 on the bodies of the dead. The corn fields had been 
 destroyed; the storehouses broken open, and the 
 food carried off. Even the graveyard of the Illinois 
 had suffered the savage vengeance of the Iroquois. 
 The graves had been broken open, and the bones of 
 the dead Illinois thrown out; the greatest insult 
 the Indians could inflict upon one another. 
 
 La Salle and his men, with hearts heavy with 
 grief and fear, looked at each head to see if it 
 might be that of a Frenchman ; but all had the hair 
 of Indians. They looked at the bodies; all were 
 Indians. They searched, but found no marks of gun 
 shots or any sign that the Frenchmen had been 
 made prisoners. 
 
HAD NEWS FROM TONTY. 97 
 
 But in a garden of the Illinois, about a mile and 
 a half below, on the bank of the river, they 
 found set in the ground six stakes painted red, and 
 upon each stake, drawn in black, the figure of a man 
 with blindfolded eyes. As it is the custom of the 
 Indians to paint such stakes when they have killed 
 their enemies, or made them prisoners. La Salle 
 thought that this meant that the Iroquois had 
 found the six Frenchmen and had killed them or 
 made them prisoners. There was no sleep for him 
 that night, but in its stead, grief, pain, and cruel 
 anxiety, and trying to decide what was best for 
 him to do. 
 
 By morning he had made up his mind to push 
 down the river after the fleeing Illinois, in hopes of 
 finding that they had carried Tonty and his men 
 with them as prisoners. He took four men Avith 
 hihi and left tAvo.men hidden in an island near the 
 village, on watch for the rest of the party, who 
 might come in his absence. He ordered them to 
 cover their fire at night, make no smoke by day, 
 and not to fire their guns. He and his men each 
 carried two guns, a pistol, a sword, powder and 
 lead, and some hatchets and knives for gifts to the 
 Indians. About fifteen miles below the village they 
 came to an island where the fleeing Illinois had 
 camped with their wives and children. Just op- 
 
98 STOIUES FKO.Al LOUISIANA HISTORY. 
 
 posite, on the river bank, was the camp of the pur- 
 suing Iroquois; but in neither could be found any 
 trace of the Frenchmen. As he went down the river 
 La Salle passed seven camps of the Illinois and 
 on the other side of the river as many of thfe 
 Iroquois, but in none of them was there any sign of 
 the Frenchmen. 
 
 He came to the ruined and deserted Fort Creve- 
 Coeur, and passed on, following the route of the 
 fleeing Illinois and the pursuing Iroquois, stopping 
 only to examine their camps alwa^'S just opposite 
 one another on the river bank. At last, by the fresh 
 state of the ash heaps. La Salle saw that the In- 
 dians could not be much ahead of him, and he 
 paddled all night to gain on them the more quickly. 
 The next day he saw in a meadow on the right bank 
 of the river some straight, still, human figures. He 
 and his men landed, but when they came near they 
 saw that the figures were the half burned bodies of 
 Indian women, tied to stakes, and all around the 
 bloodj^ signs of savage victory. But still no trace of 
 the Frenchmen! La Salle still paddled on down 
 the river and came to where it poured into the 
 Mississippi. How he had schemed and planned 
 to reach the Mississippi! How he had looked for- 
 ward to leading the expedition into it! And here 
 he was, in a single canoe and but four men with 
 
BAD NKws fro:,! toxty. 99 
 
 him, in sight of it, and on the thrcshohl of the great 
 country that it was to be his glory to affix to the 
 crown of France. His men begged him to go on. 
 They offered their lives, if necessary, to finish the 
 discovery. But until he knew what Tonty's fate was, 
 there could be no further discovery for La Salle. 
 He turned his canoe up the river, and the men used 
 their paddles with such a will that in four days they 
 did two hundred and fifty miles, and reached 
 the Illinois village. The two men left here were 
 taken up, and the party pushed on, now with their 
 boats in sleds, now breaking a way through the ice 
 with their paddles, as far as the canoe could go, and 
 then on foot through soft snow,fWaist deep. La Salle 
 was always in the lead; and he, who never seemed 
 to mind cold and fatigue, who had made such a bit- 
 ter journey the year before, even he said that he 
 had never yet felt such cold or suffered such hard- 
 ships. The only consolation in it was finding, in 
 a camp cabin, a bit of sawed wood, and some other 
 traces of Frenchmen, which made him hope that 
 Tonty and his party might have passed along that 
 way. 
 
 At the end of January, La Salle reached the Fort 
 of St. Joseph, where he found his men waiting for 
 him. He spent the rest of the winter there, and 
 turned his time to good account by making friends 
 
100 STORIES FROM LOUISIANA HISTOUY. 
 
 of the Indian tribes around liini, and winning peace 
 from them for his friends, the Illinois. 
 
 In the month of May, he set out for Canada. At 
 Mackinaw, he found, to his great joy, Tonty, who, 
 with his men, had had the good fortune to get out 
 of the village of the Illinois before the Iroquois 
 fell upon it; and so, while La Salle was looking 
 for him, he was on his way to Mackinaw. 
 
 The Naming of Louisiana. 
 
 For the third time La Salle fitted out his expedi- 
 tion, but he had learned from two failures the les- 
 son of success. This time he led his men himself, 
 all in one body; and instead of taking along the 
 heavy loads of materials, and the carpenters and 
 blacksmiths for boat building, he took only the 
 necessar}^ food, arms, ammunition, and the goods 
 to trade with the Indians. His canoes made the 
 long voyage from Fort Frontenac through the lakes 
 safely, and arrived at Fort St. Joseph at the end 
 of the Autumn of 1681. By the last week of Decem- 
 ber, all was in readiness for the start for the Mis- 
 sissippi. 
 
 There were fift^^-four in the party; twenty-three 
 white men, eighteen Indians ; ten squaws and three 
 children; for some of the warriors would not go 
 without their squaws, and children. The gallant 
 
THE NAMING OF LOUISIANA. 101 
 
 and lojal Tonty and Father Zenobe Membre, the 
 priest who had gone on the other expedition, were 
 the most noted among the white men. Among the 
 Indians was the faithful Mohegan, who had fol- 
 lowed La Salle in all his wanderings. 
 
 The country lay in all the beauty of a Northern 
 Christmas tide. The prairies were a dazzling white 
 expanse of frozen snow. The leafless trees of the 
 forest shone like silver under the calm blue sky. 
 The streams were still and silent, frozen from bank 
 to bank. 
 
 Over prairies, through forests, and down the solid 
 roadway of the Illinois river, they went, dragging 
 their canoes on sledges behind them. They passed 
 by the Illinois villages, now Illinois graveyards. 
 The}^ glided over Lake Peoria and into the river 
 again, and went onward until the ice grew thin, and 
 they were able to launch their canoes and use their 
 paddles. The river led them past the Illinois and 
 Iroquois camps of the year before, into the Missis- 
 sippi, and La Salle reached the point on the bank 
 of the river where, with so heavy a heart, he had 
 turned back from his desperate search for Tonty. 
 Smoothly and pleasantly the voyagers went on into 
 the new and strange country before them. The 
 Indians hunted along the bank and kept them sup- 
 plied with game. Fish could be had at any time by 
 
102 STORIES FROM LOUISIANA HISTORY. 
 
 Tasting a line into the river ; and one time a catfish 
 was caught so large that it fed all the white men 
 for supper. 
 
 Early in the afternoons, the canoes were paddled 
 to the bank at some convenient place for the camp ; 
 when all quickly got ashore and went briskly to 
 work; the men gathering wood; the squaws lighting 
 the fires and putting the kettles to boil, while the 
 children played around. Soon the good smell of 
 supper rose in the air. Then came the hearty, 
 cheery meal, and then all lay down under the starrs 
 or in the moonlight to sleep. 
 
 A few miles below the mouth of the Missouri, 
 the expedition passed a large Tamaroas village of 
 one hundred and eighty cabins. Three days later, 
 they paddled by the beautiful Ohio, flowing in from 
 the left. 
 
 As they advanced, the aspect of the country be- 
 gan to change. The wild and rugged north- 
 ern scenery seemed to soften and grow gen- 
 tle. The high rocks and wooded cliffs be- 
 came more and more level. Then came stretches of 
 swamp, and again the bank would rise into bluffs. 
 At what we know as the Chickasaw Bluffs they had 
 an adventure. AYliile camping here, some of the men 
 went off to hunt. Pierre Prudhomme, who had 
 never gone on a hunt before, went with them. La 
 
THE NAMING OF LOUISIANA. 103 
 
 Salle charged him not to get lost; but told him if he 
 should, to guide himself by the compass and keep 
 to the North, and he would be sure to get back to 
 the camp. 
 
 That evening, when the hunters returned, Prud- 
 honime was not with them. As a great many Indian 
 tracks had been seen. La Salle was afraid that he 
 had been captured or killed, and the whole camp 
 was excited and troubled over it. The next day the 
 hunters went out to search for him, but only found 
 a cabin in the woods, which the Indians had just 
 left. La Salle sent out a party of his men, red 
 and white, to track these Indians, and capture 
 some of them, in hopes that they could tell him 
 something about Prudhomme; and in the mean- 
 time, he raised a stockade around his camp, in case 
 of trouble with the Indians. Two warriors were 
 caught, and brought to La Salle. They said they 
 were Chickasaws, and that their village was a few 
 days' journey away. La Salle sent men to the vil- 
 lage to see if Prudhomme was there, and to get him 
 back. But Prudhomme was not there. After eight 
 days spent in hunting for him. La Salle sadly de- 
 cided to go on without him, giving his little fort 
 the name of Prudhomme, in memory of him. When 
 the canoes, however, had paddled about fifteen 
 miles, a fire was seen on the bank, and all stopped. 
 
104 STORIES FROM .LOUISIANA HISTORY. 
 
 From wliat tliey saw, Priidliomme had evidently 
 just left the fire, and the search for him began anew. 
 Some of the Indians and white men at last found 
 the poor man. He was on a raft, Avhich he had made 
 to float down the river, hoping to come up with the 
 canoes. He had been lost ten days, during which, 
 he said, he had eaten nothing. Great was the joy 
 of the camp to see him again alive ; and the men put 
 out in their canoes from the bank with renewed 
 spirits. 
 
 And ever as they went along, the great river 
 unfolded still newer scenes for their ejes. 
 Now, they came to cane-brakes so dense that the 
 hunters could not make a Avay through them; and 
 now the current divided to flow around islands 
 that rose fresh and green from the yellow water. 
 Winter dropped ever further behind them ; and with 
 each day they seemed to come closer and closer 
 upon spring. The long, thin twigs of the willows 
 along the banks turned a faint green and then 
 blossomed ; the vines that had twisted like dry ropes 
 around the forest trees turned into living garlands, 
 which soon were hung Avith clusters of flowers and 
 fruit. The wild peach and plum scented the air 
 with their fragrance. 
 
 One morning, when a fog hid both banks from 
 the canoes in the river, a Avar cry and the beating of 
 
THE NAMIXG OF LOUISIANA. 105 
 
 drums were heard on the right. La Salle ordered 
 the canoes to the left bank, and set the men to 
 making a barricade behind which they might be safe 
 in case the warlike sounds meant an attack. When 
 the fog cleared, an Indian village was seen on the 
 other bank, whose people, taking the French for 
 enemies, Avere hastily getting ready for them. As 
 the French did not move from their side, the 
 Indians sent a canoe across the river to spy out 
 who and what they were. The canoe stopped in 
 mid stream, and a warrior shot an arrow towards 
 the camp; the custom of the Indians to find 
 out whether war or peace be meant. As the answer 
 of the French was not an arrow, but a calumet, held 
 out by La Salle, the Indians paddled their canoes 
 back to the village, and soon another canoe was seen 
 coming, filled with Avarriors, bearing a calumet. 
 They landed and presented it to La Salle and to all 
 the Frenchmen, who smoked it, each in turn. Then 
 the warriors asked the strangers to come to their 
 village. They did so; the whole party getting at 
 once into their canoes and crossing the river. When 
 they reached the landing place, they found all the 
 men of the village waiting to receive them. The 
 women and children had fled to the woods on the 
 first alarm, and were still hiding. 
 
 The village belonged to the Kappas^ a tribe of the 
 
lOG STORIES FKOM LOUISIANA HISTORY. 
 
 Arkansas Indians. The French thought them the 
 handsomest savages they had ever seen, and the 
 pleasantest and most polite. They were dressed in 
 skins. Their cabins were well built, and roofed 
 with the bark of cypress trees. Their canoes were 
 also made of cypress, dug out of the solid log, not 
 of bark like those of the Canadians. There were 
 peach and other fruit trees in the village ; and what 
 the French had never seen among other savages, 
 plenty of chickens. When the Kappas saw that the 
 French would rather stay to themselves, they were 
 not offended, but like good hosts, helped to make 
 shelters for them out of the green boughs outside 
 the village; sweeping a clean place for the camp, 
 and bringing them all the firewood they needed. 
 When the women came back from the woods, La 
 Salle made them presents of beads and lit- 
 tle trifles, which delighted them so much, 
 that they brought him a fine supply of corn 
 and beans, dried plums, persimmons, and 
 grapes. On the next day a great feast was given 
 by the village, when the Peace or Calumet Dance 
 was danced. Around the open playground, in the 
 center of the village, forked poles were stuck, upon 
 which were hung the presents to be given the 
 French. In the center of the space was a bare, 
 straight pole. The dance began by one of the chiefs 
 
THE NAMING OF LOUISIANA. 107 
 
 of the tribe entering the ring, bearing two calumets 
 of red clay, filled with tobacco and gaily decked 
 with feathers. For music there was a great rattling 
 of empty gourds filled with pebbles, and much beat- 
 ing of great earthen pots, covered with dressed 
 skins. After this, warrior after warrior, in full 
 war paint and feathers, stepped into the ring and 
 chanted the great deeds he had done on the war 
 path, dancing in a stately step all the Avliile around 
 the center pole, and casting his tomahawk into it 
 for every enemy he had killed. 
 
 At the end of the dance, sixty buffalo skins were 
 given to La Salle. The next day La Salle, in his 
 turn, gave the village an entertainment, and it must 
 have seemed as curious to the Indians as the cal- 
 umet dance to the Frenchmen. He took possession 
 of the land in the name of the King of France. It 
 was done in this manner : A great tree was felled 
 and its trunk squared into a pillar, upon which was 
 painted the figure of the cross, and under this, the 
 arms of the King of France, with the inscription, 
 '^Louis the Great, King of France and Navarre, 
 13th March, 1682." 
 
 This was brought in solemn procession from the 
 camp to the village, the priest marching in front, 
 and all the Frenchmen following, singing a Latin 
 hymn. Three times around the open space they 
 
108 STORIES FROM LOUISIANA HISTORY. 
 
 walked, singing; then the pillar Avas fixed upright in 
 the ground. La Salle, taking his place by it, read 
 in a loud voice from a pape;;* in his hand, that in the 
 name of the most high and noble and victorious 
 Prince, Louis the Great, by the grace of God, King 
 of France and Kavarre, the 14th of his name, on 
 the 13th of March, 1682, and with the consent of the 
 nation of the Arkansas, assembled in the village of 
 Kapaha, and present at the time, he, in virtue jof 
 the commission which he held in his hand, took pos- 
 session of the country of Louisiana and of all its 
 provinces, peoples, mines, ports, in short of all 
 the land Avatered by the Mississippi and its 
 branches, from its source in the North, to its mouth 
 in the Gulf. 
 
 A translation in the Arkansas language was then 
 made to the Indians, Avho stood around gazing 
 curiously. "Vive le IJoi!" was shouted by the 
 Frenchmen, the guns Avere fired in salute, and 
 France thus gained her title to the great country, 
 to which La Salle gaA^e the beautiful name of 
 ''Louisiana,'' after Louis XIV. 
 
 The other villages of this tribe were one about 
 twenty miles beloAv on the river, and the one visited 
 by Marquette and Joliet, at the mouth of the Ar- 
 kansas river. The Indians of both received the 
 Frenchmen well, and begged them to stav and 
 
THE NAMING OF LOUISIANA. 1(39 
 
 dance the calumet with them ; but La Salle, in haste 
 to get on with his journe}', would not stop. Losing, 
 once, a day, by a strong Avind, his men paddled all 
 niglit by moonlight to make up, resting at day-- 
 light for a few hours on a small flat island^ 
 covered with willows. The next night they camped 
 on a large, beautiful island, covered with laurel, 
 mulberry and other fine forest trees. The following 
 day, while they were paddling along, they 
 killed two deer, and a, day later they killed 
 their first crocodile, and ate the meat for 
 supper, making a great frolic over it, and finding 
 that it tasted very good. That night they stopped 
 at a little stream which led into Lake Tensas. 
 Again they camped on an island in the river, and as 
 they had done on all the other islands, they made 
 a barricade of timber and brush around the camp 
 for fear of an Indian surprise. The next day, they 
 saw ahead of them a canoe of Indians crossing the 
 river, from the right to the left. The Frenchmen 
 paddled at full speed through the water to catch 
 up with them, but stopped short when they came in 
 sight of a fishing camp of about two hundred In- 
 dians, who, giving their shrill war cries, at once 
 caught up their tomahawks, bows and arrows. La 
 Salle turned his canoes to the other side of the river 
 and waited there while Tonty and five men carried 
 
110 STORIES FROM LOl'ISIAXA HISTORY. 
 
 the calumet to the savages. After smoking it to- 
 gether, Tontv came back with a friendly message 
 from the Indians, and La Salle crossed over to the 
 fishing place and camped there, and afterwards went 
 to the villages of the Indians, some miles back from 
 the river bank. This was the celebrated village of 
 the Natchez, who, as we shall see, played a great 
 part in the early history of Louisiana. While La 
 Salle was there, the chief of the Coroas, the next 
 tribe on the river, came to see him, and La Salle 
 visited his village also. 
 
 The following day, which was Easter, the expedi- 
 tion came to the Houma village, opposite the mouth 
 of Red River; but did not stop at it. Three days 
 later, the canoes saw some Indians fishing on the 
 right bank, and called to them; but the Indians 
 fled, and soon the beating of the drum and war cries 
 came from behind a cane-brake. La Salle landed 
 and sent a party of his men towards it 
 with the calumet ; but they were received with a 
 volley of arrows. The Indian guide said they were 
 (Juinipissas. The Frenchmen went on their way 
 down the river, until now they saw on the left bank 
 another village, over which hovered flocks of buz- 
 zards. They landed here and found a ghastly sight ; 
 five large cabins filled with corpses, and the ground 
 running blood. The rest of the village had been 
 
THE NAMING OF LOUISIANA. Ill 
 
 burned. La Salle found out afterwards that this 
 was the village of the Tangipahoas, and that the 
 enemies who had destroyed them were the Chou- 
 ehoumas. 
 
 The banks now grew so flat and low, that at night 
 the men had to pile up rushes or brush to get a dry 
 sleeping place. It was the time of the spring rise 
 in the Mississippi, and as they went on further, they 
 found even the forests overflowed. Then after some 
 days, the forests ceased, and on each side of the 
 river were seen only vast open prairies stretching 
 out for miles; trembling prairies, covered with tall 
 rushes, with no solid land, save here and there, 
 a spot like an island, upon which grew clusters of 
 trees. Whenever these could be found on the bank, 
 the camp was made. And here, one afternoon, one 
 of the Frenchmen, climbing to the top of a tree, 
 saw, beyond the flat, green prairie, a great expanse 
 of water shining in the sun. 
 
 La Salle knew then that the great river was com- 
 ing to the end of its long course, and on the morrow 
 the canoes had not made ten miles before they came 
 to the three mouths or passes, by which it pours 
 its floods into the Gulf of Mexico. The canoes pad- 
 dled into the right hand pass and into the middle 
 channel, but turned back, as they saw no chance of 
 finding a camping place. Over the low banks, the 
 
112 STORIES FROM LOUISIANA HISTORY. 
 
 tide was then rising. They at last found a 
 dry spot on the bank of the right hand 
 pass, opposite an island, where they killed 
 a quantity of red and white herons and 
 other marine birds. In the morning, La Salle went 
 through the right pass, while Tonty went through 
 the middle one, and another canoe took the left one. 
 All three came out at the open water of the Gulf 
 and saw the muddy current of the river running 
 far out before it mingled with the clear, blue 
 depths. 
 
 The dream of La Salle had come to pass. He had 
 explored the great river whose course and end, as 
 the Indians had told him, were unknown to man. In 
 the satisfaction of that moment all the past ten 
 years of disappointment and trouble must have 
 passed from his memory. Now nothing was 
 needed to complete his triumph, but to make public 
 proclamation, that he, the discoverer of the region, 
 took possession of it for his sovereign, the King of 
 France. The ceremony at the Kappas' village was 
 repeated, but with greater solemnity. There was no 
 one to witness it but the Avhite men, Indians, 
 squaws, and pappooses who had made the long jour- 
 ney down there together. A tree was sought, cut, 
 squared, and planted in the ground, to bear 
 the arms of the King of France. A great 
 
THE NAMING OF LOUISIANA. 113 
 
 cross was raised beside it, and in the earth 
 at its feet was buried a leaden plate, on 
 which were written the words: ''In the name of 
 Louis XIV, King of France and Navarre, 9 April, 
 1682." The priest, followed by La Salle and his 
 little band, sang the Latin hymn, ''Vexilla Regis." 
 La Salle read aloud the act by which he took pos- 
 session of the river and all the land that it and its 
 branches flowed through; the land of Louisiana. 
 The Te Deum was sung, a salute of musketry fired, 
 and "Vive le Roi!" was shouted in the solemn 
 stillness of nature. 
 
 The canoes were then turned up stream, and the 
 long voyage back to Lake Michigan was begun. Day 
 after day the men plied their paddles, night after 
 night the camp w^as made, as in the journey down. 
 Indian villages were stopped at; the calumet was 
 smoked with the tribes. But La Salle was seized 
 with a desperate illness and was forced to stop at 
 Fort Prudhomme, while the rest went on without 
 him. For forty days he lay in danger of his life, 
 but as soon as he had strength enough he set out 
 again for Mackinaw, where Tonty awaited him. 
 He and Tonty then went back with a band of men 
 to the Illinois river, and on a great rock that rose 
 one hundred and twenty-five feet above the river, 
 near the site of the destroyed Illinois village, they 
 
114: STOUIES FKOM LOUISIANA HISTORY. 
 
 built a fort, which La Salle named St. Louis. The 
 two passed the winter here, making friends of the 
 Indians, who came from all the country round 
 about to settle at the fort. Greatly pleased with 
 his success, thus far. La Salle, in the fall of 1683, 
 turned the fort over to the command of Tonty, and 
 went to Canada, and from there to France, to carry 
 out the next steps in his scheme. 
 
 LA SALLE'S LAST VOYAaE. 
 
 In France, La Salle appeared before King Louis 
 XIV himself, and told him of the great river, the 
 Mississippi, that he had explored, and of the vast 
 and rich country he had taken possession of for 
 France. He unfolded his plan of holding this coun- 
 try by building forts along the course of the river, 
 and he proposed now to build a fort and make a set- 
 tlement at the mouth of the Mississippi, which 
 would not only prevent the ships of any other 
 power from entering the river, but would also 
 give France a port and a stronghold that could 
 protect her ships upon the Gulf of Mexico. For, 
 over the Gulf, as has been said, the Spaniards 
 
LA SALLE'S LAST VOYAGE. 115 
 
 ruled as lords and masters. Instead, however, 
 of making again the long and toilsome journey 
 from Canada, La Salle wished now to sail 
 from Prance direct to the mouth of the Missis 
 sippi, taking with him the colonists and the mate- 
 rials and provisions for the settlement. The king 
 gave him not only the two ships he asked for, but a 
 third vessel, a royal man-of-war, to escort the ex- 
 pedition, and to protect it, in the Gulf of Mexico, 
 from the Spaniards. 
 
 One hundred soldiers were enlisted and eighty 
 colonists to go out to the new country ; mechanics of 
 all kinds, farmers, laborers, with some gentlemen of 
 good family, and well-to-do tradesmen. Some of the 
 men took their families with them. Some young 
 girls w^ent along hoping to get homes and husbands 
 in the new, sweetly named country of Louisiana. 
 
 As Providence before had sent to La Salle the true 
 and loyal Tonty, so now again was sent to him a 
 faithful companion and good friend, Henri Joutel. 
 Joutel was a Eouen boy, the nephew of a gardener 
 of the La Salle family. Hie was a soldier and had 
 been away from home sixteen years. When he came 
 back to Kouen, he found the people there all talking 
 about the new enterprise of La Salle. La Salle's 
 brother, the Abb^ Cavelier, and his two nephews, 
 Cavelier and Moranget, had joined it. Joutel him- 
 self was too fond of adventure not to join it, also, 
 
116 STORIES FROM LOUISIANA HISTORY. 
 
 In July, 1684, La Salle's four ships set sail from 
 La Eoclielle; the royal man-of-war, ^^Joly"; a large 
 ship, the "Amiable"; the bark, "La Belle"; and a 
 small vessel called a "ketch." The last three were 
 heavily loaded, and sailed so slowly, that it was 
 September before the expedition reached San Do- 
 mingo, where a stop was to be made for fresh sup- 
 plies of food and water. The man-of-war came first 
 into port, and after a few days the lagging "Amia- 
 ble" and "La Belle"; but the "ketch," which was 
 thought to be following, never came. She was cap- 
 tured off the coast of Cuba by Spanish buccaneers. 
 The ships were but a short time at San Domingo 
 before fever broke out among the crew and pas- 
 sengers, who had to be put ashore for fresh air and 
 treatment. La Salle, himself, became very ill of it 
 and when the loss of the "ketch" with all her cargv) 
 of stores was told to him, he fell into a violent 
 delirium and came near dying. It was the end of 
 November before all were well enough to sail away. 
 
 When La Salle was at the mouth of the Missis- 
 sippi, the year before, he took the latitude of it, but 
 failed to get the longitude, which would have given 
 him the sure course to find it. He had hoped to get 
 some advice about it in San Domingo, but the gulf 
 coast was unknown to the people there. No one 
 could be found who had ever explored it, or knew 
 
LA SALLE^S LAST VOYAGE. 117 
 
 of any one who had done so. All that La 
 Salle could learn was, that in the gulf there 
 was a very strong current towards the East, 
 which bore ships out of their course, un- 
 less the pilot made allowance for it by steering 
 to the West. Unfortunately, La Salle heeded this 
 as a true warning. When he sailed into the gulf, 
 instead of steering a straight course, which would 
 have brought him to the coast of Florida, he steered 
 to the West, and so, as there was no strong easterly 
 current to bear his ships back, they sailed past the 
 mouth of the Mississippi. When land was sighted, 
 La Salle thought it was Florida, but it was Texas. 
 He sailed slowly along the shore line, looking for 
 the mouth of the river, and anchoring at 
 night and in fogs so as not to pass it 
 unknowingly. Whenever a curve in the shore 
 showed anything like a bay or the mouth of 
 a river La Salle would send a boat ashore 
 with an exploring party. Once, one of these parties 
 came back with some Indians, and La Salle tried to 
 ask them about the river, but he could not under- 
 stand them nor they him, and so nothing was 
 learned from them. Thus, he sailed onward ever 
 further and further away from the mouth of the 
 Mississippi. At last he reached tlhe large bay 
 which we know as Matagorda Bay. 
 
118 STOIilKS FROM LOUISIANA lIISTOlli'. 
 
 Fort St. Louis in Texas. 
 
 The low flat shore, covered with rushes, the sand 
 islands and reefs, and the muddy water, were not 
 different from Avhat he had seen about the mouth of 
 the Mississippi. When the exploring party returned 
 and reported that they had found a river emptying 
 into it at the further end, he thought this might be 
 an arm of the Mississippi. He was in doubt about 
 it, and had the season not been so late, in order to 
 be sure, he would have turned his ships and sailed 
 back again along the shore, when, as we know, he 
 could not have failed to find the river. But the 
 colonists were suffering from their long confine- 
 ment on shipboard, and Beaujeu, the commander of 
 the "Joly," was impatient to get on his way back 
 to France. La Salle, therefore, despite his doubt, 
 decided to land his colony here. He was sure, at 
 least, of one thing, that he was somewhere in the 
 neighborhood of tlie river. He was, in truth, four 
 hundred miles away from it. With his usual 
 energy, as soon as he got his colony ashore, he put 
 the men to work, clearing a space for a camp, col- 
 lecting timber to build houses and barns to store the 
 provisions in, and to make canoes for use in the 
 river. He sounded the bay and the channel care- 
 fully, and had them marked so that the "Amiable" 
 could come tli rough in safety to land her cargo. 
 
Port st. Louis in texas. 119 
 
 On a bright morning, the ship with spread sails 
 was just coming in, and La Salle was watching her 
 from the shore, when the cry came to him, that a 
 band of Indians had fallen upon one of the working 
 parties, and had carried two men off. There was 
 nothing for him to do but to start at once after the 
 Indians and to rescue his men. But as he turned 
 away and left the coast, he exclaimed anxiously to 
 Joutel, who was with him : ^^If she does not 
 change her course, she will surely go aground.'' 
 The Indians carried their prisoners to their camp, 
 about five miles away. By the time La Salle 
 reached the camp, a cannon shot from the ^^Amia- 
 ble" boomed upon the air. The Indians, frightened 
 to death at the strange thunder, fell upon the 
 ground. La Salle knew what it meant; it was a 
 signal of distress from the "Amiable.'' As soon as 
 he could get his men from the Indians, he hastened 
 back to the beach to look for the "xlmiable." What 
 he feared, had happened ; the great ship lay helpless 
 on her side on a reef. She was lost. But the cargo 
 might be saved. La Salle worked with all his might 
 and urged his men to work. With what boats and 
 canoes they could gather, they hurried to the 
 stranded ship. The gunpowder was first taken out 
 and brought ashore, and then the fiour. But the 
 wind rose and great waves, rolling in from the gulf. 
 
120 STORIES FROM LOUISIANA HISTORY. 
 
 broke over the reef and the helpless ship, pounding 
 upon it, shivering and shaking it, and rocking it to 
 and fro. The men jumped upon the deck, and at the 
 risk of their lives, cut away the masts. But the 
 wind growing stronger and the waves greater, it 
 became harder and harder to board the wreck, and 
 many of the boats lost their loads in getting aw^ay 
 from her. At last the danger was so great that 
 the men had to give up. The ship went to pieces 
 that night; and in the morning, the beach 
 all around the bay was strewn with bar- 
 rels of wine, boxes of goods, fragments of timber, 
 papers, books, bales, and bundles — all that w^as 
 light enough to float; but the guns, balls, nails, 
 hatchets, axes, saw^s, the furnaces, grindstones, and 
 the iron and steel cooking pots, the anvils, the casks 
 of salt, and all the heavier articles— they strewed 
 tlie bottom of the bay. 
 
 Two of his vessels and their cargoes lost I 
 Surely La Salle's heart must have sunk within 
 him. But he gave^ no sign of it. He sent 
 men up and down the beach to gather and save what 
 they could of the drift, which he piled in one place, 
 and kept under guard, not alone for fear of Indians, 
 but also of the dishonest among his own colonists. 
 For most of these had been picked up in France, as 
 colonists were picked up in those days, among the 
 
FORT ST. LOUIS IN TEXAS. 1^1 
 
 good and bad, the poor and the needy, the beggars, 
 the vagrants, and even the criminal classes. Often 
 they were captured by force and made drunk, and 
 put upon a ship, and came to themselves only when 
 upon the high sea in a vessel bound for they knew 
 not where. In spite of the sentinels, the Indians 
 managed to steal a good deal, as some Frenchmen 
 found upon a visit to their camp. La Salle sent a 
 party, under his nephew, Moranget, to claim these 
 articles. Moranget was high tempered and domi- 
 neering, and did not know how to deal with the 
 Indians; and so the only result of his expedition 
 was, two men killed and two others, besides himself, 
 wounded. The sight of the killed and wounded 
 threw the newly landed colonists into a panic ; and 
 a dread of the Indians was added to their other 
 miseries. 
 
 They were encamped on the beach, exposed 
 to the hot sun by day and the dampness by 
 night. Most of them were still weak from the fever 
 caught at San Domingo. Their biscuits had been 
 lost in the wreck ; they had no ovens to bake more. 
 As provisions were measured out to them in scanty 
 rations, and they had only sea water to cook with, 
 it is not surprising that they ate the shell fish they 
 found, and berries and fruit, without knowing 
 whether they were wholesome or not. And they 
 
122 STORIES FROM LOUISIANA HISTORY. 
 
 would drink at once all their portion of fresh water, 
 and afterwards, when thirsty, drink salt or brackish 
 water. Such numbers of them fell ill that the camp 
 was soon a hospital. Every day some one died, and 
 around the graves of the two young men killed by 
 the Indians, so many other graves were dug that it 
 seenned as if the only settlement to be made in the 
 new laud was that of the dead. 
 
 As soon as possible after seeing the colonists 
 landed, Beaujeu sailed away in the "Joly." He had, 
 from the first, disliked the duty of escorting La 
 Salle, and showed this so plainly that La Salle soon 
 grew to dislike Beaujeu bitterly, and showed it 
 plainly, and became as eager to get rid of his royal 
 escort, as Beaujeu was to get rid of him. Unfortu- 
 nately this ill-will between the two men had ham- 
 pered the expedition all along. It had stood in the 
 way of a more thorough search for the mouth of the 
 Mississippi, and now, although Beaujeu was sure 
 that La Salle had made a mistake, it kept him from 
 helping him in a friendly way, as it kept La Salle 
 from asking Beaujeu's advice and help. La Salle, 
 however, soon proved to his colonists what kind of a 
 man he was, into whose keeping they had given their 
 lives and their fortunes. He' gave himself to them, 
 mi ad and body; ever planning and thinking for 
 them, iind ever foremost in the work, or in the dan- 
 
FORT ST. LOUIS IN TEXAS. 123 
 
 ger, of carrying out his plans, and ever the last in 
 rest or recreation. His patience was as endless as his 
 energy. He was strict, stern, and haughty ; it is 
 true, but not unjust. He bore his own great losses 
 and misfortunes, as we have seen, without murmur- 
 ing; and he only demanded that those under him 
 should bear their smaller ones in like spirit. Un- 
 fortunately, the trials that call forth great qualities 
 in heroic hearts, call forth base ones in hearts of 
 weaker strength. What we admire in La Salle 
 now-a-days, is what gained him the hatred and 
 enmity of many of his colonists. 
 
 When he had made the camp safe from the In- 
 dians by raising around it a fortification and had 
 built some cabins and storehouses, he set out with 
 fifty men to explore the shores of the bay and to 
 find a better place for the settlement; one where 
 there was fresh water and pasturage for the live 
 stock, and better soil for a garden. He found such 
 a spot on the rising bank of the little river La Vaca, 
 which flows into the head of Matagorda Bay. 
 In April he removed the colony to it. As sickness 
 still held on to the emigrants, many of them were 
 taken in a dying condition to the new home, and 
 only reached it to be buried there. 
 
 It was hard work, indeed, building the great fort 
 which La Salle had planned, in the heat of summer, 
 
124 STORIES FROM LOUISIANA HISTORY. 
 
 with such poor working force as the colonists 
 proved themselves to be ; some of them never having 
 done a day's honest labor in their lives. The woods 
 where the timber was cut, was at some distance 
 from the settlement, and as there were no horses or 
 oxen, the men themselves had to drag the heavy 
 logs over rough ground, until, at last, they found 
 they could make use of a gun carriage; but even 
 then, the strain was so great that the strongest 
 broke down under it. The garden was made and the 
 seeds, brought from France, sowed in it; but there 
 was a drought during tlie summer, and the plants 
 were parched in the ground. Nevertheless, by 
 October, in spite of the sickness, the shirking from 
 work, the constant fear of the Indians, and the gen- 
 eral discouragement, a large fort was put up, and a 
 stout wall built around it. La Sf lie then felt he 
 could leave the settlement, and carry out his inten- 
 tion of going in search of the mouth of the Missis- 
 sippi, for he was determined to find the place he had 
 taken possession of, and to settle the colony there, 
 as he had told the king he would do. 
 
 To be sure of not missing it, this time, he resolved 
 to go along the shore in a canoe, and to make explor- 
 ations inland as he went along, while ''La Belle'' 
 followed, anchoring every night opposite the place 
 where he camped. He was so sure, indeed, of find- 
 
FORT ST. LOUIS IN TEXAS. 125 
 
 ing the mouth of the Mississippi, that "La Belle" 
 was loaded with most of the provisions in the 
 settlement; and with a quantity of merchandise 
 and arms, tools, cannon, powder, lead, a forge, and 
 with the personal property of himself, the priests, 
 and officers of the expedition; their boxes of cloth- 
 ing, linen, papers, silver and crockery, and two 
 thousand livres in gold. She carried, in fact, the 
 best part of the supplies still left in the colony. 
 
 Twenty-seven men went in "La Belle"; fifty in 
 canoes accompanied La Salle. They started the 
 last of October; La Salle putting Joutel in com- 
 mand of the fort. 
 
 There were but thirty-four persons in all, left in 
 it ; three priests, the girls and married women, sol- 
 diers and workmen. Joutel proved himself a good 
 commander. Strict guard was kept up ; the sentinels 
 were changed every two hours, and if a.nj of them 
 was caught sleeping at his post, he was punished. 
 Details of men went outside the wall every day to 
 bring in the wood and water needed. One of the 
 regular emplo^, ments was to kill buffalo and dry the 
 meat. From the top of a house one could get a gooa 
 view of the prairies round about; and whenever 
 buffaloes were seen, the men started out at once 
 with their guns. At first the Frenchmen did not 
 know how to kill the buffalo, and lost a great many, 
 
126 STOKIIuS FROM LU I LSI AN A HISTORY. 
 
 and had all kinds of mishaps with them ; but they 
 were soon taught by experience. Where the animal 
 fell, he was killed and butchered. The priests went 
 out with the hunters, and even the women and girls 
 Avent along and helped to carry away the meat ; for, 
 as Joutel said, if they ate they must also work. In 
 the fort the meat was cut in small strips, dried 
 in the sun, and smoked. Once one of the priests was 
 lost for a night and a day, and great fear was felt 
 that he had been killed by the Indians; and 
 when he came back safe and sound, there was great 
 rejoicing. Another time, one of the 3^oung girls lost 
 her way, and when she did not return, guns were 
 fired and even the cannon shot off; and parties 
 were sent in all directions to search for her. She, 
 too, was given up as killed by the Indians. But 
 after two nights and two days, she made her way 
 back, being guided to the fort by the river, as the 
 priest had been. Every day, morning and evening, 
 prayers were said by all in common; on Sundays 
 and feast days, mass was celebrated. Two or three 
 men died — to the grief of the little band; but there 
 were no crimes nor bad conduct. 
 
 As for La Salle, at the very beginning of his ex- 
 pedition, he lost four or five men from eating 
 poisonous berries; and ^^La Belle" lost six men, 
 who, against La Salle's orders, carelessly slept 
 
FORT ST. LOUIS IN TEXAS. 127 
 
 ashore one night around a camp fire, and thus were 
 surprised and killed by the Indians. La Salle, 
 coming back to the coast after a journey inland, 
 found their dead bodies and buried them. Keturn- 
 iug to his inland exploration, he Avent through a 
 vast extent of country. He saw beautiful prairies 
 and great forests, and he killed much game; he met 
 many different tribes of Indians, and came to a 
 Avider river ; but he found not the Mississippi. The 
 time he had allowed for his absence ran out, so he 
 turned back to the fort. He reached it in March^ 
 sending some of his men to the bay to bring him 
 news of ''La Belle," which he had left anchored 
 there. 
 
 These men came to the fort one day after him ; 
 they had not seen ''La Belle," nor any sign of her or 
 her crew anywhere along the coast. This threw La 
 Salle into great uneasiness. What had become of 
 the boat and all the valuable property she carried? 
 Could she have been wrecked? Was she aground 
 somewhere? Or could her^crew have run away with 
 her to the islands? If this last were the case, he had 
 a hope that the governor of San Domingo would 
 seize her and send her back. He saw now what a 
 great mistake he had made in not foreseeing some 
 accident and keeping at least half of her cargo at 
 the fort. But when he started he had been confident 
 
128 STORIES FROM LOUISIANA HISTORY. 
 
 of finding the mouth of the Mississippi. This loss 
 was the worst blow of all, worse, indeed, than the 
 loss of the "Griffin," the "ketch,'' and the 
 "Amiable," all combined. Indeed, with "La Belle" 
 went all hope for the colony. How, now, if he 
 found the Mississippi, could he transport the colony 
 to it? And if he did not find the Mississippi, he 
 could, with the vessel, at least have taken the poor 
 unfortunates who had followed him back to San 
 Domingo. With the vessel, he could always send to 
 the island for provisions or for help. Without 
 her, he was no better than a cast-away on an 
 unknown coast, without the means of getting away 
 from it, or getting help to it. There was but one 
 course open to him now; to make his way to 
 Canada, and to get word to France of the desperate 
 straits of the colony. In April, as soon as he rested 
 from his last journey, he set out again, taking 
 twenty men with him, and leaving the fort again 
 under command of Joutel. 
 
 As before, Joutel kept up good guard against' the 
 Indians, and sent out hunting parties to kill buffalo, 
 and as this weakened the number of men at the fort, 
 he made the women and girls take their turn at 
 sentinel duty with the men. About the first of May, 
 some of the men who had sailed in "La Belle," 
 arrived at the fort, bringing an account of the wreck 
 
FORT ST. LOUIS IN TEXAS. 129 
 
 of the vessel. Only six men of the crew and some of 
 La Salle's clothing and papers were saved. The cer- 
 tainty that ^^La Belle" was lost threw the colonists 
 into great discouragement. They could see,' as well 
 as La Salle, how desperate their situation was with- 
 out a vessel. Joutel worked harder than ever to keep 
 them busy' and amused. He would gather them all 
 together of an evening, when they would dance and 
 sing songs; and although he had been ordered to 
 measure out the rations very sparingly, he did so 
 only when food was scarce. When the hunters killed 
 plenty of buffalo, he would give the colonists as 
 much meat as they could eat. There was love-making 
 among the young people, and even a marriage. The 
 men, women, and girls all iDracticed shooting at a 
 target, and Joutel gave little prizes for the best 
 shot ; and so the time passed pleasantly, even gaily. 
 As before, prayers were said together, morning 
 and evening. Mass was celebrated on feast days 
 and holidays. The chapel was only a rude log cabin 
 thatched with grass and reeds; but the altar was 
 prettily decorated by the good priests with images 
 and pictures. Whenever there were any murmurs 
 about La Salle being away so long, Joutel would 
 preach patience, and tell how long it would take to 
 go up the Mississippi to the Illinois country and re- 
 turn. When the summer came on, a space in the 
 
130 STORlKtS FROM LOUISIANA HISTORY. 
 
 open was cleared for a plaj-ground, and here 
 of evenings Jontel would get them all to play- 
 ing games; each one contributing his or her 
 share to the general fun. They were amus- 
 ing themselves, thus, one evening, when La Salle 
 returned. He brought back only eight men 
 of the twenty who had set out in April. Four had 
 deserted, one had been eaten by an alligator, one 
 had been lost, and the rest had given out on the 
 march, and never been heard of afterwards. The 
 evening was passed by the anxious colonists in 
 listening to the tale of all that had happened in the 
 long and dismal journey which their leader and 
 his little band had made. They had gone to the 
 North until they saw, as far as the eye could reach, 
 vast prairies alive with buffalo. They had crossed 
 the Colorado river, and turning their steps towards 
 the East, had come to a region thick with Indian 
 villages. In crossing a river on a raft. La Salle 
 was caught in the current and swept out of sight, 
 and his men had to wait so long for him that they 
 thought they would never see him again. They 
 reached the villages of the Cenis Indians, in the 
 country watered by Trinity river. Here the Indians 
 received them well, and sold them five horses, which 
 La Salle brought back to the fort. After leaving 
 these Indians he and his nephew were taken Avith 
 a fever, whicli kept them in one camp for more thau 
 
:muki)eu of la salli:. 131 
 
 two months. Wlieu they were well euough to travel 
 again, their ammunition was nearly out, so they 
 saw that they must return to the fort. 
 
 Even before La Salle began to talk, the colonists 
 knew that he had not found what he went for — the 
 Mississippi river, and that all the time he had been 
 away was time lost. Their hearts sank with disap- 
 pointment. Of the hundred and eighty who had set 
 out from France, only forty-five remained. What 
 was to be their fate? Hope and trust in La Salle, 
 alone, saved them from despair. He walked among 
 them with so calm and serene a face, spoke so cheer- 
 fully and bravely to them, kept them so busy in and 
 about the fort, that he inspired them all with some 
 of his own great nature. Christmas came, and the 
 great festival was celebrated with a fervor and de- 
 votion that none of them had ever felt before. There 
 was a midnight mass, at which all made vows to 
 God, and prayed Him to guide and protect them in 
 their forlorn condition. Twelfth Night was passed 
 in a gay frolic, and the old game, ^the king 
 drinks," was played with water instead of wine, but 
 the fun and laughter were only the greater. 
 
 Murder of La Salle. 
 
 A few days later La Salle, for the third time, led 
 a party from the fort, in his last and only hope to 
 reach Canada and in some way get a ship to come 
 
132 STORIES FROM LOUISIANA HISTORY. 
 
 to the colony. Seventeen men went with him, 
 among whom were his brother, Cavelier, his two 
 nephews, Moranget and young Cavelier, Father An- 
 astase, and the sturdy and trusty Joutel. 
 
 La Salle made an address to the twenty who were 
 to stay at the fort. His words were so tender and 
 so kind, his manner so full of feeling, his sentiment 
 so noble, that the little coiony was melted to tears; 
 and the good byes were said as if, indeed, each one 
 knew the parting might be forever. 
 
 La Salle led his men along, in easy stages, 
 through the country he had been over, in the direc- 
 tion of the Cenis villages. When he met Indians, 
 La Salle was most careful to treat them well, so that 
 they should have no cause to make war on the feeble 
 band left in the" fort. Sometimes the band came to 
 thickets and cane-brakes so dense that they could 
 not have made their way through, had they not fol- 
 lowed the buffalo paths. But when it rained, these 
 paths were running streams, and when it was dry, 
 they were so hard and rugged, that the men suffered 
 cruelly, for they were shod in moccasins, made of 
 raw buffalo hide, which, unless it was kept wet, 
 grew as tight and hard as iron around their feet. 
 Fortunately for them, after a while they were able 
 to get some dressed skins from the Indians. They 
 had a great many rivers to cross, and each time hacj 
 
MUIiDEli OF LA SALLE. 133 
 
 to unload tlieir horses and carry the loads over, 
 while the horses swam to the other side, and were 
 then loaded again. Sometimes the rains kept them 
 three and four days at a time in the camp, and then 
 they would find all the streams so swollen that they 
 were afraid to cross. They made a boat by sewing- 
 four buffalo skins together and stretching them 
 over a frame, and putting grease on the seams to 
 prevent them from leaking. This was a great help, 
 for after using the boat, they could take the skin off 
 the frame and carry it along on one of the horses. 
 Where there were no buffalo tracks to guide them, 
 they had to look out a passage for themselves in 
 the cane-brakes and thickets. January and Feb- 
 ruary passed, and March came on. They had pushed 
 along towards the Xortheast, across the Brazos 
 river, and had reached the Trinity river, which ran 
 through the country of the Cenis Indians. 
 
 All along there was much ill humor and quarrel- 
 ing among the little band. La Salle, busy with his 
 own thoughts and feelings, held himself apart from 
 the men ; his nephew, Moranget, was hated by all of 
 them. La Salle, himself, was hated by some of 
 them, who even in the fort had conspired against 
 him. Therefore the long and toilsome journey was 
 made doubly hard and toilsome by the want of the 
 hearty good will and good fellowship, which, as we 
 
134 , STORIES FROM LOUISIANA HISTORY. 
 
 have seen, Joutel kept up so well in the little Fort 
 St. Louis. 
 
 It so happened that on the 15th of March, they 
 camped eight or ten miles from a place where 
 La Salle, the year before, coming back from the 
 Cenis village, had buried some corn and beans in the 
 ground, for the Indians had given him more than 
 he could carry, and he prudently hid some, in case 
 he should return that way and be in need of food. 
 As his supply of food was now getting low, he de- 
 cided to send a party of men to the hiding place 
 for the corn and beans. The men found the place, 
 but the grains were rotting and spoiled, so they 
 were returning empty-handed, when they came 
 across two buffaloes. They stopped and killed them 
 and sent a messenger to La Salle, asking for horses 
 to carry the beef to the camp. La Salle sent his 
 nephew, Moranget, and two other Frenchmen 
 with the horses, and ordered them to load one 
 horse with a part of the meat, and send it at once 
 to the camp; while they stayed with the 
 other and dried the rest of the meat. When IMoran- 
 get reached the men, he found them busy cutting up 
 the meat and drying it. The marrow bones and 
 those parts of the meat which would not do to dry, 
 they laid aside to cook for their supper. Moranget, 
 in his high-handed way, at once took possession of 
 
MURDER OF LA SALLE. 135 
 
 the meat, telling the men that in future he should 
 have charge of it, and that they need not expect to 
 have so much of it as in the past. He even, in the 
 rudest manner, took away from tliem what they had 
 laid aside for themselves, and tliat niglit, at supper, 
 he served himself with the best and the most of the 
 beef, measuring out small pieces of it to the others. 
 There was not a man in the group who had not 
 cause to hate him for trying to pla^^ the tyrant w^ith 
 them man^^ times before. Each one had some insult 
 to remember, to revenge. This last act l)rought all 
 they had suffered in the past from Moranget back to 
 them, and in their temper, they resolved that they 
 would suffer no more from him, but be revenged 
 upon him at once. So that night while Moranget, 
 his man, and the guide slept, they were knocked on 
 the head with a hatchet and killed. When the deed 
 was done, the assassins saw that, for their own 
 tuifety, they must also kill La Salle, his brother, 
 Cavelier, his other nephew, and Joutel. They would 
 at once have gone to camp and carried out their 
 bloody design, but that a little river which lay in 
 their way was so swollen by the rain, that they had 
 to stop and make a raft to cross it. 
 
 When the evening came, but not the ex- 
 pected horse with the meat, and when the next day 
 passed and still there came no horse and no mes- 
 
136 STORIES FllOM LOUISIANA HISTORY. 
 
 senger, La Salle grew anxious, and did not know 
 what to think of it. He made up his mind to go, 
 himself, and see what had happened. Leaving his 
 brother, his nephew, Cavelier, and Joutel at the 
 camp, he set forth with Father Anastase, the priest, 
 and an Indian guide. As he walked nearer and 
 nearer the spot where he expected to find the men, 
 and saw no sign of them. La Salle became more and 
 more troubled. Looking up and seeing eagles cir- 
 cling in the air, he judged that they could not be far 
 off. He fired off his gun, so that if they heard it, 
 they could answer. But the signal brought no re- 
 ply ; it only warned the assassins to make ready for 
 him ; for they did not doubt but that he was coming 
 in search of Moranget. Two of the men crossed the 
 river; one of them hid in the bushes on the bank. 
 La Salle, seeing the other one, asked where Moran- 
 get was. He was answered: "Somewhere round 
 about." At that instant came the crack of the gun 
 from the man in the bushes, and La Salle fell, shot 
 in the head. 
 
 Satisfied with the blood they had shed, the 
 assassins did not attempt the life of Joutel, nor of 
 the Abb^ Cavelier, nor of the young nephew. But 
 they carried them along with them to the Cenis vil- 
 lage, and kept them there for two months. One day 
 the assassins fell to quarreling, and two were shot 
 
MURDER OF LA SALLE. ISt 
 
 and killed. Joutel and the Caveliers, with Pere 
 Anastase and three others of their party, then man- 
 aged to escape. They made their way across the 
 country to the East, and after two months of hard 
 marching, reached the Arkansas, not far from 
 where it joins the Mississippi. Here they found two 
 of Tonty's men. Tonty had heard that La Salle had 
 landed at the mouth of the Mississippi, and collect- 
 ing a party of Canadians and Indians, he had gone 
 there in canoes to meet him. But finding no trace of 
 him, he had gone back to Fort St. Louis on the Illin- 
 ois, leaving these men at the Arkansas village to 
 wait and watch for news of La Salle. Joutel and his 
 party arrived at Fort St. Louis in September, but 
 could not get on to Canada till the following spring. 
 They sailed for France in August, and reached 
 Rochelle in October, 1688, four years and three 
 months after they had set sail from it. 
 
 And what became of the little band of twenty- 
 six who were left in Fort St. Louis of Texas? 
 When the brave a.nd generous Tonty heard from 
 Joutel and the Caveliers of their sad condition, he 
 set out in a canoe with five Frenchmen and three 
 Indians to go to their relief. But when he reached 
 the village of the Caddo Indians, on Red river, all 
 but one of his Frenchmen deserted him. He would 
 still, however, have pushed on, had he not learned 
 
138 STORIES FliOM LOUISIANA HISTORY. 
 
 that all in Fort St. Louis had been put to death. 
 This was true. All were killed by the Indians, ex- 
 cept two children and two men, who were saved by 
 the Indian women and carried away captives. 
 
 IBERVILLE, 
 
 Nine years went by after the sorrowful ending of 
 La Salle and of his colony in Texas, without any 
 further attempt by the French to settle the mouth 
 of the Mississippi. It almost seemed as if La Salle 
 and his Mississippi and his great scheme of French 
 domination in America, Avere forgotten both in Can- 
 ada and in France. But the king of France had 
 not forgotten. While La Salle and his colony were 
 'struggling for life in Texas, King Louis was en- 
 gaged in a great war in Europe. So soon as the 
 peace of Kyswick was signed, which ended this war 
 in 1697, he gave orders that an expedition should, 
 be sent, at once, to the mouth of the Mississippi to 
 carry out what La Salle had planned. Pierre Le 
 Moyne Iberville was selected to lead this expedi- 
 tion. 
 
 No one in tlie king's service at tliat time sur- 
 
IBERVILLE. 139 
 
 passed this young Canadian as a good seaman and a 
 good fighter. He was born in Montreal in 16G1, and 
 was the third son of Charles Le Moyne, and the 
 most famous of nine brothers, who all gained fame 
 in the service of France. 
 
 Charles Le ^loyne, the father, was himself a noted 
 man of that day. He was the son of a tavern- 
 keeper of Dieppe, the great shipping town of Nor- 
 mandy, in France. At the age of fifteen he sailed 
 for Canada, and there by his quickness in learning 
 the waj^s and the language of the different tribes of 
 Indians, and his skill in trading, he made a large 
 fortune, and became the owner of many valuable 
 grants of land. One of these, an island opposite the 
 city of Montreal, he named Longueuil, after the dis- 
 trict in Normandy in which stood Dieppe, and when 
 the king, to reward him for his good and successful 
 service in Canada, raised him to the rank of a Can- 
 adian noble, Charles Le Moyne took the title of the 
 Sieur de Longueuil. As his sons grew to be men, 
 he gave them lands, named for the places in Nor- 
 mandy, and they, too, added them as titles to their 
 names. Thus, Pierre Le Moyne was called d'lber- 
 ville (of Iberville) ; and Jean Baptiste Le Moyne 
 was de Bienville. In the course of time, they were 
 known only as Iberville and Bienville. 
 
 Before Iberville was fourteen, he had sailed so 
 
140 
 
 STORIES FROM LOUISIANA HISTORY. 
 
 often in a vessel of his father's, upon the St. 
 Lawrence, from Quebec to Montreal, that he knew 
 the river bv heart. At fourteen he was a midship- 
 
 l^ 
 
 ^fek"" 
 
 ;>^-3^^^H 
 
 ^p '^^S^^^B ■■■: 
 
 
 ^^^^^^^^E •' "^'Sj , .^■*' - < "^^^B^HB^^^B 
 
 "^■^^^H 
 
 ^^^^^^^kj<»?. - ^^''^H^^^^^H .J4 
 
 t^l^^H 
 
 * 
 
 IBERVILLE. 
 
 man, sailing between France and Canada, and he 
 learned to handle a frigate and navigate the ocean' 
 as perfectly as he knew how to handle river craft 
 
IBEKVILLI-:. 141 
 
 and navigate the river. At twenty-five lie was a 
 lieutenant, and Canada was ringing w^itli a daring 
 exploit of his against the English in Hudson's Bay. 
 
 Setting out with his men from Montreal, in the 
 depth of winter, he marched over the frozen country 
 to Hudson's Bay, in snowshoes, stopping to make 
 canoes as they were needed to cross lakes and shoot 
 rapids. Iberville's canoe upset in one of the most 
 dangerous of these rapids, and two of his men were 
 drowned, but his coolness and presence of mind 
 saved his own life and the life of the other men 
 with him. Reaching the English, his men stormed 
 and captured a fort, Avhile he, with nine men in 
 two canoes, surprised an English vessel lying at 
 anchor, jumped on deck, killed the sentinel, fas- 
 tened down the hatches, and made prisoners of all 
 on board. 
 
 He was now raised to the rank of captain 
 and in his frigate swept the New England 
 coast, capturing vessels and raiding settlements. 
 Later he went, once more, against the English in 
 Hudson's Bay, this time with a squadron of four 
 ships. But Hudson's Bay was so blocked by ice- 
 bergs, that the squadron was hemmed in for weeks. 
 Iberville's ship made her way out first, and sailed 
 alone towards the English, and meeting three of 
 their ships, he sank one, captured another, and 
 
142 STORIES FROM LOUISIANA HISTORY. 
 
 chased the third out of sight, before the rest of his 
 squadron joined him. 
 
 When, after this, he went to France, the Minister 
 of Marine, Pontchartrain, sent for him and gave 
 him the commission to lead an expedition to the 
 mouth of the Mississippi river, and to take posses- 
 sion of it ; to build a fort and make a settlement 
 there. He was given four vessels ; two frigates, the 
 ''Badine'^ and the "Marin,'' and two transports of 
 provisions. His young brother Bienville, who had 
 been with him in Hudson's Bay, was enlisted for the 
 new enterprise, as midshipman. 
 
 While Iberville was in France, fitting out his ex- 
 pedition, he heard that the English were also fitting 
 out one for the mouth of the Mississippi. He hur- 
 ried his preparations, determined to get to the goal 
 first, or if he found the English there already, to 
 drive them away. So, besides the crews of his ves- 
 sels, he engaged a band of Canadians to go with 
 him ; men as hardy as himself upon land and water, 
 and as well trained as he in the fighting of English- 
 men. 
 
 On the 24th of October, 1698, he sailed from 
 Brest, and brought his vessels safe to port in San 
 Domingo. Here he was joined by the royal 
 man-of-war, "Francois," whose captain, the Mar- 
 quis de Chateaumorant, had been ordered to escort 
 and protect him in the Gulf. 
 
IBERVILLE. 143 
 
 Iberville heard, in San Domingo, that four 
 English vessels had been sighted; sailing no one 
 knew where. Guessing that they were his rivals on 
 their way to the mouth of the Mississippi, he laid 
 in, with all haste, the fresh supplies he needed, and 
 sailed away. He had the good fortune to find on 
 the island a noted filibuster captain, named Laurent 
 de Graff, who knew the Gulf of Mexico and its 
 coast well. He engaged him as a pilot, and he also 
 engaged a band of filibusters to go with him. These 
 filibusters were ''free hooters," as they were called ; 
 seamen who went about in their own boats, preying 
 upon the commerce of the gulf, fighting for or 
 against anyone for the profit of the spoils. Some- 
 times, when they had made their fortune they re- 
 tired to peaceful homes and became good citizens, 
 but sometimes, again, they became pirates or out- 
 laws, and were run down and killed by all nations. 
 
 On the evening of the twenty-third day after 
 leaving San Domingo, Iberville's fleet came in sight 
 of land, which throughout the night was lighted up 
 by the red glare of burning prairies. The next morn- 
 ing, a low line of white sand, with woods behind, 
 was clearly seen. A barge was sent to row along 
 the coast, while the ships followed in deep water. 
 Just before nightfall of the second day's search, the 
 barge signalled that it saw the mouth of a river, 
 
144 STORIES FROM LOUISLVNA HISTORY. 
 
 with ships in it. Iberville feared it was the Missis- 
 sippi, and that the vessels were English. He stopped 
 his fleet. Then a fog fell and nothing more could be 
 known. When it lifted, Iberville sent a party 
 ashore. They found out that the bay was Santa 
 Maria de Pensacola, and that the Spaniards were in 
 possession of it. Iberville was relieved about the 
 English, but he was greatly disgusted that he had 
 not come a few months earlier, for the harbor of 
 Pensacola was a fine one, and he could easily have 
 taken possession of it for France. 
 
 He sailed along until he came to Mobile Bay. 
 Here again he hoped to find the Mississippi, but was 
 again disappointed. A terrible storm, which lasted 
 three days, broke upon him here. WhcM fair 
 weather came, he set sail again and followed the 
 curving line of the Gulf shore. Before him, tiny 
 islands, like dots of white sand and green trees, 
 came into view in the Northwest. As another storm 
 was rising, he sent Bienville with a barge to look 
 for shelter among them for the ships. But Bienville 
 found none. More islands were seen in the North- 
 west, and, nearer in the South, two flat, sandy ones. 
 Iberville ran into these, and found shelter. It was 
 Candlemas day, and the islands were called 
 "Chandeleur," or Candlemas Islands. While the 
 ships stayed here a day, Bienville was again sent 
 
IBERVILLli. 145 
 
 out to look for a harbor among the little islands 
 at the North, and a passage between them. At 
 nightfall, he came back with the good news that this 
 time he had been successful. At daylight, Iberville 
 steered his ships through the pass, and cast anchor 
 in the harbor of Ship Island, an easy shelter, he 
 joyfully said, from every wind that blew. The live 
 stock was landed ; the swine were put on the island 
 near by, which the sailors called "Cat Island," 
 taking the raccoons upon it for cats. 
 
 On the shore, about twenty miles away, Iberville 
 could see, with his spy glass, the figures of Indians 
 moving about. He lost no time in sailing over there 
 with Bienville and a crew of Canadians. Landing 
 they followed the trail of the Indians, and came 
 to where they could see canoes full of them, cross- 
 ing betw^een a little island and the mainland — Deer 
 Island and Biloxi, as we know them now. 
 
 At sight of the white men the Indians, in terror, 
 leaped from their canoes to the land, and ran into 
 the woods. The Canadians tried to head them 
 off, or stop them by friendly cries ; but the only one 
 they caught was an old man, who had a dreadful 
 sore on his leg and could not run. He was shiver- 
 ing with cold and fear. The Canadians wrapped 
 him in a blanket, kindled a fire to warm him, and 
 gave him food and tobacco. In the meantime, Bien- 
 
146 STORIES FKOM LOUISIANA HISTORY. 
 
 ville and two Canadians, who had gone into the 
 woods in chase of the Indians, came back with an 
 old woman, whoi/i they had fonnd hiding. She, too, 
 was frightened to death, thinking that her last hour 
 had come. But she, too, was won by friendly signs 
 and a present of enough tobacco for herself and 
 her own family. She was taken to the old man, and 
 the two were left together. 
 
 As Iberville expected, that night the old woman 
 slipped away, carrying her presents and her tale 
 about the strangers to her people. As for the poor 
 old man, during the night the grass around him 
 caught fire, and he Avas badly burned. The Can- 
 adians did what they could to ease his pain, but 
 he died a short while afterwards. The effect of the 
 old woman's talk and tobacco was soon seen, or 
 rather heard, for the sound of Indians singing ap- 
 proached nearer and nearer through the woods, and 
 they came forward in a procession, bringing their 
 calumet. Iberville received them with their own 
 greeting; a gentle rubbing of the stomach; and 
 taking them to their canoes, which tliey had jumped 
 out of in such a hurry the day before, he showed 
 them that the corn in them had not been touched. 
 He feasted them on ^'sagamity," that is, pounded 
 corn boiled with grease and bits of meat. And, 
 other Indians coming out of the woods, all were 
 
IBERVILLE. 147 
 
 soon smoking together like the best of friends. The 
 next morning, however, when the Canadians looked 
 for their good friends of the night before, they had 
 nearly all slipped away, taking their canoes and 
 corn with them. Only a few warriors were left. 
 Iberville coaxed three of these to go with him on a 
 visit to his ships. 
 
 As the boats approached the ships, the chiefs 
 stood up and chanted the peace song. Their recep- 
 tion flattered them greatly. The cannon were fired 
 off, and the ships put through their manoeuvers 
 for them; and spy glasses were held to their eyes. 
 This was the strangest wonder of all to them, that 
 they could see so far off with one eye, and so near 
 with the other, at the same time. They looked with 
 curiosity at everything on the ^'floating houses,'' as 
 they called the ships. They belonged, they said, 
 to the Annochy and Biloxi tribes, who lived on the 
 Pascagoula river, about three days' journey from 
 the ships. Iberville asked them about the Missis- 
 sippi, but they knew nothing about the river. When 
 he took them back to the mainland, he found Bien- 
 ville, who had been left on shore, making friends 
 with a new set of Indians. These were, indeed, 
 worth knowing. They were a chief and Avarriors 
 of the Mongoulachas and Bayougoulas tribes, who 
 lived on the banks of the Mississippi Itself. They 
 
148 STORIES FROM LOUISIAx\A HISTORY. 
 
 were out on a hunt, but hearing the sound of the 
 cannon, had hurried to the shore to find out what 
 it was. Iberville gave them a lot of presents, one of 
 which was a calumet or peace pipe, such as they 
 had never seen before. It was made of iron, in the 
 shape of a ship fl^'ing the lily banner of France. 
 The evening was passed in great jollity; Canadians 
 and Indians singing, dancing, and feasting around 
 the campfire. 
 
 In the morning the warriors left to go on with 
 their hunt, but they promised to come back to the 
 same spot in three days, to meet the French and 
 guide them to a little stream that would take them 
 into the Mississippi. They were to light a fire on 
 shore as a signal, and Iberville was to answer by a 
 cannon shot. Two da^'S later, the fire was seen on the 
 shore, and Iberville fired his cannon, and with all 
 haste sailed over to the spot. But not an Indian 
 was to be seen. He returned disappointed to his 
 ships, and the next day set about the discovery of 
 the river by himself. He took with him a crew of 
 Canadians, soldiers, and filibusters, in two barges, 
 which were loaded with food for twenty-five days, 
 and each armed with a small cannon, and carrying 
 a canoe in tow. Iberville took command of 
 one barge; Sauvole, his lieutenant, of the other. 
 They sailed from the ships on Friday, the 
 
IBERVILLE. 149 
 
 27th of Febriiarj, and steered South, Avhere 
 groups of sandy islands could be seen. The weather 
 was bad ; for the wind was blowing from the South- 
 east, with rain. Running the length of the first 
 island, that they came to, the boats entered the 
 strange scene of the Mississippi Delta. Far as the 
 men could see, islands small and great rose before 
 them — some standing high and dr}^, some rippled 
 over the slightest waves, and beyond, far out in the 
 open, they could see the Chandeleur Islands, and 
 they could hear, further away still, the roar of the 
 breakers over other islands. No growth was 
 seen except grasses and willows. The men worked 
 with sail and oar to find a Ava^^ through the maze; 
 but would get around one island only to find 
 another in their wa^^ Well tired out at night, they 
 camped on the nearest dry land they could find. 
 They gathered oysters and ate them. . The only game 
 they saw was wild cats — great red, furred animals. 
 On Sunday such a furious storm broke over them 
 that they could not leave their camp. The thunder 
 roared as they had never heard it before ; the light- 
 ning flashed fearfully; the rain came down in tor- 
 rents; the wind changed to a freezing keenness. 
 The water rose until it stood two inches over the 
 highest part of their island, and the waves swept it 
 from end to end. All day the men were cutting 
 
150 STOKIKS FROM LOUISIANA illSTORY. 
 
 riislieo and piilng Ihciii up to sLiuJ cu, or bending, 
 sliiveriug-, cycr tlic lire to keep Hie rain Trom putting 
 it out. On Monday tliey were alle to make a start. 
 They steered to keep tlie shore line in sight, so as 
 not to pass any river that might be there. The wind 
 rose to a gale, and the raging seas broke over and 
 ovw their open boats. The canoes were taken up 
 and shipped inside, and the men held their tar- 
 paulin over the decks by main strength to keep 
 the water from pouring in and swamping them. 
 At one time they were running with the wind 
 into the land, .fearing in the storm to pass the 
 Mississippi by; at another they were fighting with 
 the wind to keep off the land against which the sea 
 was driving them. For three hours they battled 
 to get around a rocky point, that rose as grim as 
 death before them. Night was coming on. The fury 
 of the gale showed no sign of lessening. Iberville 
 saw that he must either perish at sea during the 
 night, or be wrecked ashore. Seizing the one chance 
 of daylight for himself and his men, he grasped the 
 tiller, put the barge about, and with the wind full 
 astern drove her on the rocks. But to his wonder,, 
 as he neared them, the rocks opened out before him ; 
 and through the opening he saw whitish muddy 
 water gushing. He steered into it, tasted it, found 
 it was fresh. The Mississippi was discovered! Th«i 
 
EXPLOICATION OF THE MISSISSITPI. 151 
 
 grim-looking rocks were only driftwood, piled up 
 in huge, fantastic shapes, and covered with mud, 
 hardened by sun and wind. They looked, indeed, 
 like the palissades that made the Spaniards call the 
 river the Palissado. 
 
 The boats entered the channel and went on until 
 they came to a good camping place. Then landing 
 and lighting their fires, they cooked their supper, 
 and after eating it, threw themselves upon the 
 rushes and enjoyed the rest they had earned. 
 
 Iberville's Exploration of the Mississippi. 
 
 The next morning, which was Mardi-Gras, the 
 priests celebrated mass, and all chanted the Te 
 Deum, and raised a cross to mark the spot. 
 Then the boat pushed off from shore, and steered 
 up the river. It still spread out ever wider and 
 Avider before them until it looked like a great lake; 
 and the explorers saw the other two passes branch- 
 ing out towards the Gulf. Then it grew narrower 
 again. After going about thirty miles, Iberville 
 stopped for the night at a little bayou, which he 
 named '^Mardi Gras." 
 
 Henceforth, the low banks gradually began to 
 rise, and instead of willows and grasses they bore 
 oaks and magnolias and fine forests of splendid 
 trees, and down the current came great masses of 
 
152 STORIES FliOM LOUISIANA HISTORY. 
 
 drift; upturned trees, with their branches still 
 green, dead and bare trunks, and leaves and trash, 
 the washings out of low swamps. Bienville, pad- 
 dling ahead in his canoe, would startle up flocks of 
 ducks and sarcelles. Sometimes the tracks of deer 
 on the banks would tempt the Canadians into a 
 hunt; and great was the joy when they brought in 
 game to add to the supper. Several alligators were 
 killed and eaten, but not enjoyed. 
 
 Every evening, when the camp was pitched, the 
 cannon were fired off to attract the Indians there- 
 about, and Iberville w^ould climb to the top of a tall 
 tree, to spy out the new country about him. But no 
 Indians were seen until the fifth day, when turning 
 a bend, they came upon two in a pirogue. In a 
 flash, they jumped into the woods and ran away. 
 Further on, five more pirogues of Indians were 
 seen ; and they took to the woods, also, in a panic. 
 But, this time, Iberville was as quick as they, and 
 chasing them through the woods, he caught up with 
 one warrior, and got him to call his companions 
 back, which he did by chanting a peace song. They 
 belonged to the Annochy tribe, which, as we have 
 seen, lived on the lake shore. They gladly traded 
 their store of dried meat to the Frenchmen. One old 
 Indian, spreading out his stock, and sitting behind 
 it in market style, sold the whole of it — a hundred 
 
EXPLORATION OF THE MISSISSIPPI. 153 
 
 pounds — for two knives. These Indians knew the 
 Bayougoulas, and sent a guide with Iberville to 
 their village. As the Indians had not heard the 
 cannon shot, Iberville had one fired off for their 
 amusement. They threw themselves to the earth 
 in a fit of fear and wonder, at the terrible thing. 
 
 That night, Iberville camped close to the spot 
 selected by Bienville, twenty years later, for the 
 site of New Orleans. Nearby was a small deserted 
 Indian village of about ten cabins, with straw roofs ; 
 and on a point of the river bank was a fortified 
 cabin, surrounded by a palissade, the height of a 
 man. A few miles higher up, the guide took Iber- 
 ville to the portage used by the Indians to cross be- 
 tween the river and the lakes. Taking their 
 pirogues out of the river, they had only to drag them 
 over a short road to launch them in a bayou that 
 flowed into the lake. The Indian, himself, went to 
 the lake and came back to show how short a trip it 
 was. This spot Iberville and Bienville never forgot. 
 Iberville praised it in his report; and when Bien- 
 ville came to found the City of New Orleans, he 
 founded it here. 
 
 The weather changed from great heat to great 
 cold, but the only change in the river was, that it 
 grew still more crooked, and its current still 
 stronger. The rowers grumbled that they had to 
 
154 STORIES FROM LOUISIANA HISTORY. 
 
 travel five miles to get ahead one ; and had to cross 
 the river four times to get around a bend. When, one 
 day, the rain kept them idle, some of the men went 
 out hunting, and two of them Avere lost. The can- 
 non was fired to guide them to the camp, and for 
 two days Iberville kept the men in the woods hunt- 
 ing for them, while the boats went up and down 
 the river searching the banks. But it was all in 
 vain. No trace of the lost men could be found, and 
 the expedition had to go on without them. The 
 next afternoon they passed a little river on the west 
 bank. The guide called it the river of the Ouacha 
 Indians. It is now supposed to be Bayou Lafoureiie. 
 Some. miles beyond this, they met two large piro- 
 gues filled with Ouacha and Bayougoula Indians. 
 As soon as the Bayougoulas heard that the French 
 were going to their village, they turned back to tell 
 the news, so that a reception could be prepared. 
 
 The next day when Iberville came in sight of the 
 landing, a pirogue of Bayougoulas and Mon- 
 goulachas came out to meet him, chanting their 
 peace song and holding out a great calumet three 
 feet long, decked with gay and bright feathers. As 
 Iberville, Bienville and Sauvole stepped from the 
 boat, they were gently taken under the arms by two 
 warriors, and led to a cleared space, spread with 
 mats and skins, where the chief sat in state, sur- 
 
EXPLORATION OF THE MISSISSIPPI. 155 
 
 rounded by his warriors. In the center of the meet- 
 ing place, resting on two forked sticks, Iberville 
 saw the pretty calumet he had given the Indians 
 on the lake shore; the little ship flying the white 
 banner of France, dotted with golden fleur-de-lis. 
 It was guarded by a warrior, who never left it or 
 took his eyes off it. 
 
 The chief was a man of great dignity, who seemed 
 to think it beneath his pride to notice the French- 
 men. He sat staring fixedly before him all the time, 
 and never laughed or smiled. But the most curious 
 thing about him was a blue serge coat that he wore, 
 a Frenchman's coat. Iberville eagerly asked him 
 where he got it. He said it had been given him by 
 the ^^Iron Hand," who had passed by the village 
 going to the mouth of the river and coming back. 
 The afternoon was spent in feasting, singing, and 
 dancing, and at nightfall the Indians went, through 
 the woods, to their village, about a mile distant, 
 lighting their way by holding burning fagots of canes 
 in their hands. The long line looked like a torch- 
 light procession through the woods. The French 
 visited the Bayougoula village the next morning. It 
 was on the bank of a little bayou, surrounded by a 
 palissade of cane ten feet high. Warriors met them 
 at the gateway, and led them to the open space 
 before the cabin of the chief. Here Iberville spread 
 
156 STORIES FROM LOUISIANA HISTORY 
 
 out the presents he had brought; a sight that daz- 
 zled the eyes of the savages — a scarlet coat em- 
 broidered in gold, scarlet hose, shirts, blankets, mir- 
 rors, beads, hatchets, knives ! The Indians, in their 
 turn, spread out their presents, the richest they 
 could give — twelve large, dressed deer skins, and 
 quantities of sagamity and cornbread. 
 
 While the Indians were dividing their presents, 
 Iberville walked through the village. In the center 
 of it was a round temple, made of i^osts set upright 
 in the ground, and plastered half their height with 
 mud. The roof was like a pointed cap, made of 
 split cane, neatly joined together; and it was 
 painted Avith figures of birds and animals in red. 
 Over the doorway was a portico eight feet deep. On 
 one side were painted the same animals as on the 
 roof ; but on the other side, all alone, was the picture 
 of an opossum, the ugliest beast the Frenchmen 
 had ever seen, and which they described as having 
 a pig's head, a rat's tail, a badger's skin, and 
 an open bag in its stomach. In the center 
 of the temple, two great dried logs lay, slowdy 
 burning wdth a fire, which, the Indians said, 
 never died out. At the end, on a table, lay bundles 
 of buffalo, deer, and bear skins, which had been 
 offered to the '^opossum,'' the guardian spirit of 
 the tribe. Iberville saw also on the table, a glass 
 bottle that had been left in the village by Tonty, 
 
EXPLORATION OP THE MISSISSIPPI. 157 
 
 The cabins were built like the temple, but 
 without the portico; there was no floor in them 
 but the earth, and no chimney but a hole in the 
 pointed roof. The beds were made of branches, 
 laid on frames raised two feet from the ground and 
 covered with cane mats and skins. The men went 
 naked, except on grand occasions, when they tied 
 around their waists a kind of sash made of feathers 
 strung together, weighted at the ends with bits of 
 stone or metal, which jingled and tinkled gaily 
 when they danced. The women wore red or white 
 girdles of cloth, woven from the fibre of trees, edged 
 with a fringe of cord that fell to the knee. They 
 tattooed their faces, blackened their teeth, wore a 
 great many bracelets, and twisted their hair up 
 on the top of their heads. The dead, wrapped in 
 cane mats, were laid on scaffolds, covered with lit- 
 tle pointed roofs, which stood all around the village. 
 
 When the Frenchmen went back to the landing 
 place, the chief proudly escorted them, wearing the 
 scarlet coat embroidered in gold. The Bayougqula 
 chief went up the river with Iberville, eight of his 
 tribe following in pirogues. As they rowed along, 
 he pointed out to Iberville a little stream on the 
 right hand side of the river, and said it was called 
 the Ascantia, and that it flowed into the lake where 
 the ships were. Some miles further on they came to 
 
158 STOUIKS FROM LOUISIANA HISTORY. 
 
 the dividing line between the hunting grounds of 
 the Houmas and the Bayougoulas, a little river 
 which was noted among the Indians for its fish. 
 Here Iberville saw a tall, straight post, painted red 
 and hung, by the Indian hunters, with offerings of 
 fish and game. The French called it the "Baton 
 Rouge," and thus the spot that has become the 
 capital of Louisiana, received its name . 
 
 The boats then went past the first island met in 
 the river. About five or six miles above the island, 
 the bank on the right rose in a bluff fifty feet high ; 
 the other bank being as flat as ever. A few miles fur- 
 ther on the Bayougoula chief pointed out to Iber- 
 ville a little bayou, not six feet wide, and said if the 
 barges could only get through it, a whole day's jour- 
 ney would be cut off. Iberville stopped at once, and 
 put the Canadians to work. A huge pile of drift 
 was cut away, and the bayou was cleared of logs 
 and deepened in shallow places. Then the boats 
 were unloaded, and were slowly pulled through the 
 bayou by pulleys rigged to the trees, while the lug- 
 gage was carried along on the bank. It was rain- 
 ing, and the trampled ground soon became a mire in 
 which the men could hardly keep their feet; but 
 they were so eager to knock off a day from their 
 rowing, that th^y never stopped until 9 o'clock that 
 night, when, by the blazing light of cane torches, the 
 
EXPLORATION OF THE MISSISSIPPI. 159 
 
 barges came through the little bayou into the great 
 river again, just eighteen miles from where they 
 had left it. Thus was made Pointe Couple, and 
 this "cut off" of Iberville's was in course of 
 time taken by the river itself, which left its old 
 channel for it. 
 
 The next day the explorers came to the Houma 
 village. As the cannon had been fired off to let the 
 Indians know they were coming, they found the 
 Houmas at the landing place waiting to receive 
 them, with a calumet and singing the peace song. 
 After the smoking and the speech-making were over, 
 the Houmas asked the strangers to go to their vil- 
 lage. Like the Bayougoulas-, it was not on the river 
 bank, but back in the woods. Iberville, Sauvole, and 
 Bienville, with some of the Canadians, set out at 
 once for it, following the Indians, who, chanting 
 their peace songs all the way, led them through 
 swamps and cane-brakes, and up and down hills, at 
 such a pace, that the heavily clad white men found 
 it hard to keep up. At some distance from the vil- 
 lage, another party of Indians was waiting to re- 
 ceive them with a calumet, which had to be 
 smoked. Iberville complained a great deal of all 
 the smoking he had to do; for as he had not the 
 habit of it, it made him sick. And again the visitors 
 were halted on a little hill, just outside the village, 
 
160 STORIES FROM LOUISIANA HISTORY. 
 
 until the chief was told that they were there. Then 
 they were allowed to enter the village, the warriors 
 in front still singing, those behind carrying the 
 calumets, and the Frenchmen following. The chief 
 received them kindly, and Iberville gave him his 
 presents. After each gift, all of the warriors would 
 rise and, stretching their arms out, w^ould give a 
 long cry of "Hou ! Hou ! " a kind of howl of thanks. 
 All the afternoon the eating and the smoking 
 were not allowed to stop a moment. And besides, 
 there was given what the Frenchmen called a regu- 
 lar ball. Singers, placing themselves one one side of 
 the open space, raised their voices in music, beating 
 time with gourd rattles. Thirty-five young girls 
 and young men then bounded from behind the trees 
 into the circle, with their fringe girdles and feather 
 sashes tinkling and flying in the air. Their faces 
 shone with fresh paint, and the young girls had 
 bouquets of birds' feathers in their braided hair, 
 and in their hands held long branches of different 
 colored feathers, which they used as fans to beat 
 time with. For three hours, they kept up the danc- 
 ing. When night came, all went to the cabin of the 
 chief, where after supper, by the light of a cane 
 torch fifteen feet long and two feet thick, the young 
 warriors danced a war dance, with their bows and 
 arrows, knives and tomahawks. At midnight the 
 
EXPLORATION OF THE MISSISSIPPI. 161 
 
 Frenchmen retired to their couches, but not to 
 sleep, for the two chiefs, the Houma and the 
 Bayougoula, began to make speeches to one another, 
 and kept this up till daylight. 
 
 The Houma village was about the same size as 
 the Bayougoula. Its cabins were built in a double 
 row around the top of a hill, with an open space in 
 the center. Their cornfields lay in the surrounding 
 valleys, the soil of which was black, strong, and 
 rich. 
 
 The Houmas told Iberville that Tonty had passed 
 five days in their village, when he went down to the 
 mouth of the river in search of La Salle ; and they 
 said, also, what the Bayougoulas had not told him, 
 that Tonty had left a written paper with the Bayou- 
 goula Indians to give to a man ^^who was to come 
 up the river from the sea.'' This paper was, of 
 course, meant for La Salle. 
 
 Iberville left the Houma village, with the inten- 
 tion of going still further up the Mississippi, but 
 when he stopped at mid-day for dinner, he came to 
 the conclusion, that as his men were tired with 
 rowing, and his food had given out, a further jour- 
 ney was unwise and useless. So he gave orders, 
 and the boats were turned around. Rowing now 
 down stream and towards their ships and good fare, 
 and away from Indian food and cornmeal, the men 
 
162 STORIES FROM LOUISIANA HISTORY. 
 
 easily put mile after mile behind them, and brought 
 the barges quickly to the Ascantia. Iberville de- 
 cided to go through it to the Gulf. Leaving the ex- 
 pedition in command of Sauvole, and charging 
 Bienville to get the letter written by Tonty from the 
 Bayougoula village, he, with an Indian guide and 
 four Canadians pushed his way through the tangled 
 opening of the little bayou, which was henceforth 
 called Bayou Iberville. It was only about ten feet 
 wide and three or four deep, and so choked up 
 that it was hard to get even a pirogue through it. 
 The first day, they went twenty-one miles, and car- 
 ried the canoes fifty-times over or around fallen 
 trees. On the second day, the Indian guide de- 
 serted ; but Iberville went on without him. Then one 
 of the Canadians fell* ill, and Iberville had to take 
 his place in paddling the pirogue and in carrying it. 
 He noted with delight the beautiful country through 
 which the little bayou fiowed ; it was the finest, he 
 wrote to France, he had ever seen ; the soil was rich ; 
 the forests fine; there were no cane-brakes. The 
 bayou was filled with fish, but there were so many 
 alligators in it, that he seemed at times to be pad- 
 dling through a mass of them. He heard numbers 
 of wild turkeys, but he did not see any. After leav- 
 ing the bayou, they came to a beautiful little lake, 
 which Iberville named "Maurepas," after the son of 
 the Duke of Pontchartrain. 
 
EXPLORATION OF THE MISSISSII'PI. 163 
 
 The second and larger lake he named Pontchar- 
 train, after the duke himself. Camping at night 
 on the low grassy points or islands around 
 the lakes, he made the acquaintance of the 
 mosquitoes; ''terrible little animals to men in 
 need of rest," he calls them. As he paddled from 
 twenty to thirty miles a day, he soon came to the 
 shore opposite Ship Island. He crossed to it, and 
 mounted the deck of the "Badine," just one month 
 after he had started on his expedition. 
 
 Eight hours later, Sauvole and Bienville were 
 seen speeding their way over the Gulf to the ships. 
 Bienville brought to Iberville the letter written by 
 Tonty; he had bought it for a hatchet. It was 
 addressed to ''M. de La Salle, Governor General 
 of Louisiana." In it, Tonty wrote how he had gone 
 down the river to help La Salle; but had not found 
 him, although he had explored for twenty miles 
 around the mouth of the river. Bienville brought, 
 also, a little Indian boy, whom he had bought 
 for a gun ; but, best of all, he brought back the two 
 men who were lost going up the river. They had 
 been found by Indians, and taken to the Bayou- 
 goulas' village ; the Indians promising them that if 
 the French did not pass back that way, they would 
 take them to the ships in the lake. 
 
16tt stories from louisiana history. 
 
 The First Capital. 
 
 Iberville had intended making his settlement at 
 the mouth of the river, as La Salle had planned. 
 But now with time and provisions running short, 
 he saw he must choose a spot nearer to Ship Island 
 and to his vessels. He decided upon the snug little 
 harbor of Biloxi Bay, with Deer Island lying in 
 front of it, like a cloak against the storm winds of 
 the Gulf. On its eastern shore was a high bank, 
 which seemed made by nature for a fort, for guns 
 upon it would sweep the horizon east, west, and 
 south. 
 
 Work was begun there at once. Trees were cut, 
 a space cleared, and the fort laid out. The site of 
 it may be seen today.* The trees were of such great 
 size and of such hard woods, mostly oak and nut, 
 that the men sometimes took a day to cut one down, 
 and a forge had to be set up to mend the axes that 
 were constantly broken upon them. The barges 
 and small boats were kept busy, plying between 
 the ships and the shore, fetching over the supplies, 
 tools, implements, provisions, arms, ammunition, 
 and the bands of workmen drawn from the crews 
 of the ships. 
 
 In six weeks enough of the fort was finished for 
 Iberville to leave. He sailed back to France, put- 
 
 * It is the site of the present town of Ocean Spi'ings, in Mississippi, 
 
THE FIRST CAPITAL. 165 
 
 ting Sauvole in command and Bienville second in 
 command under him. Sauvole vigorously carried 
 on the work left him to do. He finished the fort, 
 kept up discipline among his men, and made friends 
 with Indian neighbors. Almost every week brought 
 a visit from some of them curious to see the fort. 
 The first to arrive was our old acquaintance, the 
 Bayougoula chief, with a party of his warriors. 
 They were received with a salute of guns, which ter- 
 rified them greatl}^; but the presents comforted 
 them ; particularly the shirts, which, to their huge 
 delight, were fitted on them. They looked with great 
 surprise at the fort, wondering how the French 
 could get together and pile up such a number of 
 great logs in so short a space of time. All went well 
 until at night, when the sentinels came to get the 
 watch-word from the sergeant. The whispering 
 threw the Indians into a fear of treachery, out of 
 which Sauvole had to soothe and coax them. At day- 
 light the warriors said that their wives were on the 
 other side of the bay, and that they, also, would 
 like to see the fort. The savage dames were at once 
 sent for. When they landed, the chief, anxious that 
 the show should be equal to what they expected, 
 made signs to Sauvole to put his men under arms, 
 and went himself to hunt up the drummer. When 
 'the visit ended, Sauvole sent two French boys along 
 
166 ' STORIES FROM LOUISIANA HISTORY. 
 
 with the Indians to learn their language, while he 
 kept an Indian boy with him to learn French. 
 
 About the first of July, two pirogues paddled 
 across the bay to the fort, filled, not with Indians 
 as Sauvole, expected, but with white men. They 
 were some Canadians and two priests, who had 
 come all the way down from their missions among 
 the Tensas and Tunicas Indians, to see the settle- 
 ment of the French at the mouth of the river, which 
 the Indians had told them about. They were w^orn 
 out with toil and thirst; for their drinking water 
 had given out, and during the ten days it had taken 
 them to make their way from the mouth of the river 
 to Biloxi, they would have died of thirst, they said, 
 if they had not had a rain. 
 
 Bienville Visits The Indians. 
 
 In the meantime Bienville was learning some- 
 thing of the country and of the Indians living in 
 it. He visited the Quinipissas, who lived on the 
 shore of Lake Maurepas, and went to the villages 
 of the Moctobys, Biloxis, and Pascagoulas along the 
 Pascagoula river. In the three villages there were 
 not more than a hundred warriors with their 
 families. A part of them came afterwards to the 
 fort, bringing their calumet and a present of deer 
 skins. Sauvole said that they were the most polite 
 savages he had seen. 
 
BIENVILLE VISITS THE INDIANS. 167 
 
 From Pascagoula river, Bienville went to Mobile 
 Bay, which he again explored and sounded, and 
 he marched by land to Pensacola and made an 
 inspection of that place. When he came back, after 
 a short stay at Biloxi, he set out again, with two 
 pirogues of Canadians and Indians, to go over the 
 route followed by Iberville from the river, and to 
 explore Bayou Ouacha. In three days he reached 
 the Iberville bayou, and in a week was at the Bayou- 
 goula village, where he got a guide, and paddled to 
 the Ouacha village, which lay a mile or so in the 
 woods. But he met here Indians of a different tem- 
 per from any he had come across before. So fierce 
 and war-like were they, that he was very glad to get 
 safely away from them, and back to his pirogues, 
 and into the Mississippi again. He was paddling 
 his way rapidly along, when turning a bend about 
 seventy-five miles above the mouth, he was stopped 
 by a sight that startled him. A sloop of war lay 
 anchored in mid-stream before him. He sent his 
 companion pirogue forward to speak the vessel. It 
 proved to be English. Bienville then paddled for- 
 word in his pirogue and went aboard. The captain 
 was named Banks, and he turned out to be one of 
 Iberville's old Hudson Bay prisoners, and so an 
 acquaintance of Bienville. He said he was in 
 search of the Mississippi and his vessel was one of 
 
J()S STORIES FROM LOUISIANA HISTORY. 
 
 three that had sailed from London, loaded with 
 emigrants, to make a settlement upon the banks of 
 the Mississij^pi. 
 
 This was the expedition Iberville had heard 
 about, and for which he had been on the lookout. It 
 had sailed from England in October, almost at the 
 same date that Iberville had sailed from France; 
 but had passed the winter in Carolina, where most 
 of the colonists, pleased with the climate, had 
 chosen to remain. One ship had gone back to Eng- 
 land, leaving the other two to find the river. Cap- 
 tain Banks had cruised for a hundred miles round 
 about, and finding this large stream, he had sailed 
 into it. As it was the only large river on the coast, 
 he said he was sure it was the Mississippi. Bien- 
 ville, however, proved to the Englishman that the 
 river, and all the country round about, now be- 
 longed to the King of France, who had force enough 
 at hand to protect his rights ; and he had the satis- 
 faction of seeing the captain raise his anchor, and 
 head his sloop down stream. The bend in the river, 
 where this took place, is still called English Turn, 
 in memory of the event. 
 
 The Summer of 1700 came to an end, and winter 
 drew on. At Biloxi, Christmas and New Year's 
 day passed ; and the impatience of the colonists for 
 Iberville's ships to return grew with the hours. At 
 
BlENVlLLE VISITS THE INDIAN^. 169 
 
 last, on the eve of Twelfth Night, the boom of a 
 cannon at Ship Island told the good news to the 
 waiting ears. Sauvole hastened over to the island, 
 and brought Iberville back to the fort, where he 
 was received with salutes from the guns and joyful 
 cries from his men. He came, indeed, like a 
 belated Santa Claus to the little settlement. For 
 Sauvole and Bienville he brought royal commis- 
 sions; for the colony, money, provisions, and more 
 men ; sixty Canadians among them, who had served 
 with him in Hudson's Bay. His seventeen-year 
 old brother, Chateauguay, the youngest of the Le 
 Moyne brothers, came with him; and the famous 
 Juchereau de St. Denis, who later founded the town 
 of Natchitoches. 
 
 Iberville stayed only long enough at Biloxi to 
 get an expedition ready to build a fort on the Mis- 
 sissippi, which the visit of the English captain 
 showed him was needed there. The place he selected 
 was on the left bank* of the river, about fifty-four 
 miles from the mouth. Here he built a strong log 
 house, which he called Fort Maurepas. 
 
 About the middle of February, while the clear- 
 ing, cutting, and building were busily going on, a 
 pirogue of Canadians came down the river, and 
 stopped at the landin g. Iberville greeted the leader 
 
 * The left bank always means the bank on the left of a person de- 
 scending the river. 
 
170 STORIES FROM LOUISIANA HISTORY. 
 
 heartily; for he was Henri de Tontv, the true and 
 loyal friend of La Salle. 
 
 He had heard of the settlement, and had come to 
 offer his services. Iberville gladly accepted them 
 for an expedition he wished to make into the Red 
 River country. They got ready and set out at once. 
 At the Bayougoula village, they met some Tensas 
 Indians. As they were the Indians who, the year 
 before, had told Iberville about Red River and 
 the tribes living there, Iberville tried to get a guide 
 from them, but they said Red River was filled with 
 logs, and the only way they could guide him, was by 
 land through the big Tensas village, above Natchez. 
 So the pirogues were all set in motion up the ^lissis- 
 sippi towards the Natchez and the Tensas. At the 
 Natchez landing, a messenger was sent to tell the 
 chief they were there. The chief responded by 
 sending his brother, escorted by twenty-five men, 
 with a calumet of peace and an invitation to visit 
 the village. 
 
 Climbing to the top of the steep Natchez bluff, 
 covered with magnificent forest trees, Iberville 
 looked with joy upon a beautiful landscape of 
 meadows and hills, dotted with groves of trees, 
 and crossed with roads leading from village to 
 village and from cabin to cabin. Half way to the 
 village, the chief was met, ceremoniously advancing 
 
BIENVILLE VISITS THE INDIANS. 171 
 
 with his body guard, twenty large, handsome men. 
 He himself was rather a small and slight man, 
 about five feet three or four inches high, but with a 
 very intelligent face. 
 
 The village was handsomer and better than any 
 yet seen among the Indians. The cabin of the chief 
 stood on a mound ten feet high. Facing it was the 
 temple ; around stood the cabins, enclosing a hand- 
 some open space. A small running stream nearby 
 furnished water to the village. The Natchez were 
 the most civilized of all the southern Indians. They 
 worshipped the sun, and their chief was called the 
 Great Sun. He never worked. His servants were 
 taken from the most noted families in the tribe; 
 and when he died, they were strangled so as to fol- 
 low him into the next world. When an infant chief 
 was born, each family that had a newborn infant 
 brought it to the chief; and a certain number were 
 chosen as servants for him, and if the baby chief 
 died, all of these were strangled. 
 
 The Natchez spoke a different language from any 
 of the other Indians, but Bienville picked up enough 
 words of it to talk with them, as he talked with the 
 Bayougoulas, Houmas, and Choctaws. After leav- 
 ing the Natchez, Iberville with his party travelled 
 up to the Tensas landing, and went on foot through 
 the woods to Lake Tensas, where they found piro- 
 
17 tl STORIES FROM LOUISIANA HISTORY. 
 
 gues for the rest of the way. The Tensas village 
 stood on the shore of the lake; it had once been the 
 home of a numerous and powerful tribe, but now it 
 was thinned out by sickness. The French were 
 well received, but during the night they saw such 
 an act of barbarity as turned their hearts from the 
 tribe. 
 
 A terrific storm broke out, and lightning striking 
 the temple, set it on fire, and in a few minutes it 
 was burned. The Indian priest thought the disaster 
 was caused by the wrath of their god. Standing by 
 the flames, he called out in loud commands: 
 ^'Women, bring your children and offer them a sac- 
 rifice to the Great Spirit to pacify Him.'' Five 
 women came forward and five infants were thrown 
 into the heart of the flames. The priest then led the 
 unnatural motliers in triumph to the cabin of the 
 chief, where all the village came to praise and 
 caress and do them honor. 
 
 A painful trouble in his knee, which prevented 
 Iberville from walking, put an end to his going on 
 with the Red Kiver exploration. He turned over 
 the command of it to Bienville, and after seeing 
 him start off, journeyed back to Fort Maurepas. 
 There he fell very ill of a fever. 
 
 It was early in March, when Bienville with his 
 party set off, an<l the rising streams were begin- 
 
BIENVILLE'S JOURNAL. 173 
 
 ning to overflow the country. As they had no pi- 
 rogues, they crossed the streams on foot logs; but 
 most of the time they swam or waded across, push- 
 ing their clothes before them on rafts; always fir- 
 ing off their guns first, to scare away the alligators. 
 But Bienville kept a journal, and we can read about 
 it all in his own words. 
 
 BiENViLLE^s Journal. 
 
 "On the 22d of March, I left the village at nine 
 o'clock in the morning, with twenty-two Canadians, 
 six Tensas, and one Ouachita. I marched all day 
 in an overflowed country, the water half way up the 
 leg. In the evening I arrived at the bank of a little 
 river, about seventy paces wide and very deep. I 
 found there some Ouachitas, with sveral pirogues 
 loaded with salt. They were abandoning their vil- 
 lage to go and live with the Tensas. 
 
 "24:th. We set out at sunrise, the weather 
 
 pretty cold Came to two little rivers, which 
 
 we crossed on trees that we threw over from one 
 side to the other. . . .We came to a beautiful dry 
 prairie. . . .at the end of which was a river about 
 forty paces wide, with a strong current and full of 
 crocodiles. We crossed it with rafts. 
 
 "25th. Walked all day through woods and prair- 
 ies, in water to the knees, waist, and sometimes to 
 
174 STORIES FROM LOUISIANA HISTORY. 
 
 the ueck. A man of middle height is at great dis- 
 advantage in such countries. I see some of my 
 men with the water only up to their waists, while I 
 and others are swimming, pushing our bundles 
 before us on rafts, to keep them from getting wet. 
 
 ^'28th, Sunday. Swam across a swamp five hun- 
 dred paces broad, and Avalked over several prairies 
 separated by strips of forest, and came to the vil- 
 lage of the Ouachitas. This village is on the banks 
 
 of Bed River, or rather on a branch of it The 
 
 river in this place may be one hundred and eighty 
 paces wide, and with as much current as the Mis- 
 sissippi It rained all day. 
 
 ^'29th. Rained until mid-day, when I set out with 
 a Natchitoches to guide me to his village. We 
 crossed a river very broad and rather deep. From 
 there we fell into a wet country. We came to two 
 little rivers, very rapid, which we had to swim 
 across; the water in them was very cold. From 
 there we went into a swamp, at the end of which 
 we met six Natchitoches, who were going to the 
 Coroas to sell salt. 
 
 "April 1st. Rained in torrents all night, and 
 this morning until 10 o'clock. . . .We crossed eight 
 little rivers from ten to twelve paces wide, and 
 very deep; we cut down trees for bridges; after 
 which we came to several swamps and sloughs, in 
 
BIENVILLE'S JOURNAL. 175 
 
 which the water came up to the waist and arm-pits. 
 We walked until night without being able to find, 
 in all that time, a camping ground. 
 
 "2d. Rained all night and until two o'clock in 
 the day. We were only able to make four miles 
 to-day, because of the bad roads through the swamp ; 
 the water was as high as the waist, at least. We 
 came to six little rivers, which we had to cross on 
 trees, at least two feet under the water. The cane 
 grows so thick in this country that we had to force 
 our way through. 
 
 "5th. A half league from our camp we came to a 
 swamp, a quarter of a league wide, where there was 
 no bottom at six feet, and which was filled with 
 wood, out of which we made rafts to carry our 
 clothes. We were all day in crossing it. The water 
 was very cold, and several of my men were so 
 chilled that they had to climb trees and stay there 
 to recover. Four passed nearly the whole day up in 
 them, until rafts were sent to fetch them away. My 
 men and I were never so tired in our lives. But 
 we never stopped singing and laughing to show 
 our guides that fatigue does not trouble us, and that 
 w^e are different men from the Spaniards. 
 
 "14th. Came to a swamp, very deep; but our 
 guides said that, a few miles to the south, there 
 were three cabins on the bank of a river, where we 
 
176 STORIES FROM LOUISIANA HISTORY. 
 
 should find pirogues. I put my men immediately to 
 hollowing out a pirogue with our tomahawks. It 
 was finished in five hours, large enough to hold six 
 men, whom I sent to hunt for the Indian cabins 
 and the pirogues. My other men went hunting and 
 killed six deer. 
 
 ''15th. My men returned, bringing me three 
 pirogues, in which we embarked. 
 
 "16th. Left our pirogues and marched the length 
 of the lake on a ridge of fine countr^^ and forest, 
 where, walking along, we killed five deer. We fired 
 several shots to notify the Indians on the other 
 side of a lake a league away, in the west-south- 
 west. Five men came in a pirogue to see who we 
 were. Our guide called them and made them come 
 to us. I went to their village, which was over- 
 flowed. 
 
 ''17th. I set out in two pirogues to go to the 
 Yataches, cutting across the woods the shortest 
 way, the river having overflowed the country all 
 around. Night overtook us opposite a little village 
 of the Nakasas, on the left bank of Red river, where 
 we slept. 
 
 "20th. We followed the river, which makes sev- 
 eral bends arrived at the village of the 
 
 Yataches The Indians, having heard from an 
 
 Indian who arrived a little before us, that we 
 
CHANGE OP CAPITAL. 177 
 
 wished provisions and pirogues, had hidden their 
 corn and pirogues. I threatened them if they did 
 not provide us with them, that I should remain 
 there. From here to the Caddodaquious, they cal- 
 culate it as only a two days' journey in summer. 
 
 "22nd. Embarked for the Caddodaquious, who 
 are northwest from here. Although the Indians tell 
 me it will take ten days and ten nights to get there 
 by the river, I cannot believe it, as it is only two 
 days' journey by land, on which I cannot travel, on 
 account of the high water ; but being once started, 
 the guides, seeing me determined to go there, will, 
 as they have done in several places, tell me the 
 truth about the distance." 
 
 Bienville found, however, that the guides were 
 telling the truth, and that to get to the land of the 
 Caddodaquious would take more time than Iber- 
 ville had allowed him. So he turned back, and 
 reached the ships in the Gulf the middle of May. 
 Ten days later Iberville sailed for France, leaving 
 his young brother in command of the new fort on 
 the Mississippi. 
 
 Change op Capital. 
 
 Fort Maurepas, with its fields of corn and vege- 
 tables, soon formed a bright spot on the wild and 
 savage banks of the great river. Canadian hunters 
 
178 STORIES FROM LOUISIANA HISTORY. 
 
 found out the way there from the far distant North 
 and West. Every now and then, bands of them 
 would come paddling up to the landing in pirogues, 
 almost sinking under their loads of game, skins, 
 dried meat, and bears' grease; and the quiet little 
 landing would break into noisy laughter, singing, 
 dancing, and frolicking. Sometimes, a solitary 
 canoe would glide down the river to the landing, 
 bringing a black-gowned priest — a missionary from 
 some little post among the Indians far up the river, 
 who came to greet his countrymen and get news 
 from France. It is true the place overflowed in 
 high water, and the black snakes — <so it was be- 
 lieved — ate up all the vegetables at the root, and 
 food was scarce ; and there were such quantities of 
 mosquitoes, that at times the air was dark with 
 them, and they bit furiously; but the young Can- 
 adian, Bienville, had been brought up in a school 
 that taught him, as we have seen in his Ked River 
 trip, to make light of hardships. 
 
 The young French lieutenant, Sauvole, at Biloxi, 
 was not so well fitted for the trials of his command. 
 He found the Canadians under him unruly. They 
 liked no work but hunting and fighting; and they 
 were given to drinking, saving up their daily 
 rations of spirits until they got enough to make 
 them drunk. Then there were so many Indians 
 
CHANGE OF CAPITAL. 179 
 
 coming to the settlement all the time, that Sauvole 
 was hard pressed to give them food and the presents 
 they expected, and without which they would get 
 offended and turn into enemies. And in addition 
 to them great pirogues of Canadians, who went 
 down to Fort Maurepas, would also come to Biloxi, 
 and they would stay there frolicking and eating 
 until Sauvole had to ask them to leave. The sun 
 was so hot that the men could work only two hours 
 in a day. There was a drought that killed all the 
 vegetables and dried up all the springs, and even 
 the swamps. The only drinking water for the fort 
 cam-e from a spring several miles away. After this 
 came a season of great rain. Food grew so scarce 
 that there would have been a famine, if Iberville 
 had not sent a transport of provisions from San 
 Domingo. Alligators crawled around the fort, and 
 rattlesnakes abounded. Fever broke out, and the 
 soldiers and Canadians died fast of it. Sauvole 
 struggled along bravely, doing what he could to 
 keep up order, and supply the needs that pressed 
 upon him on all sides. But he, too, was stricken 
 with the fever, and died of it in August, 1701. At 
 the news of his death, Bienville hastened over from 
 Fort Maurepas, and took command in Biloxi. 
 
 Iberville, who was due in March, with the ships 
 of supplies, did not get to the colony until Decem- 
 
180 STORIES FROM LOUISIANA HISTORY. 
 
 ber; and then lie came no further than Pensacola; 
 for he was suffering greatly from an abscess in the 
 side, and was unable to rise from his bed. This 
 time he brought another brother to Louisiana — 
 Joseph Le Movne, the Sieur de Serignj^, who, also, 
 was a seaman of great reputation. 
 
 When Iberville made his report to his govern- 
 ment in France, he showed what an advantage it 
 would be to France to have Pensacola, a harbor 
 directly on the Gulf, and much easier than Biloxi 
 for the ships to get into ; and an effort was made to 
 get Spain to cede Pensacola to France^ but Spain 
 refused. Iberville, therefore, in order to have a 
 harbor on the Gulf, made up his mind to take pos- 
 session of Mobile Bay, and build a fort and make 
 a settlement there. From Pensacola he sent orders 
 to Bienville to move the colony at once to Mobile 
 Bay, and to build a fort on the right bank of the 
 river, about fifty miles above its mouth. 
 
 The work of moving was begun at once and 
 pushed forward with all the strength of the 
 men. De Serigny brought over from Pensacola 
 his ship laden wtih supplies for the colony, and 
 with all the small boats and men that could be 
 spared from Iberville's ship. Tents were put up on 
 Dauphine Island to store the freight in until flat- 
 boats could 1)0 built to take it across the bay and 
 
CHANGE OF CAPITAL. 181 
 
 up the river, where the fort was being put up. As 
 soon as Iberville was well enough to come from 
 Pensacola he took charge of the work, and sent 
 Bienville into the country to make friends with 
 the Indian tribes about there. Bienville found, on 
 the river above the fort, the Mobile Indians, the 
 descendants of the fierce warriors who had given 
 De Soto so bloody a reception at INIauvilla. Above 
 the Mobiles lived the Tohomes, a small, but indus- 
 trious tribe, whose corn crops fed the French gar- 
 rison at Fort Louis through many a season of 
 hunger. On the Alabama river were the Ala- 
 bammas,* a warlike tribe, always fighting against 
 their neighbors. Between the Tombigbee and the 
 Mississippi lay the land of the Choctaws, the most 
 pow^erful tribe of that region. North of the Choc- 
 taws lay the Chickasaws, the worst foes that the 
 French met among the Indians. Tonty went to 
 these great tribes and came back, bringing with 
 him their chiefs, who were received by Iberville in 
 such a grand way, and were given so man^^ presents, 
 that they smoked all the calumets and made all the 
 treaties that he wished. So when Iberville sailed 
 to France, in March, he had the satisfaction not 
 only of leaving behind him a fine, large, well-built 
 fort, but of knowing it was in a country of friendly 
 Indians. 
 
 *The old spelling of this tribal name. 
 
182 STOKIKS FROM LUUISIAXA HISTORY. 
 
 Louisiana never saw the gallant Iberville aaain. 
 He died four years later of yellow fever in Havana, 
 where he stopped to enlist men to go on an expedi- 
 tion with him against the English possessions on 
 the Atlantic coast and in the Gulf. For as he had 
 fought the English in Hudson's Bay, so now he had 
 determined to fiiiht them in these southern waters. 
 
 BIENVILLE. 
 
 Jean Baptiste Le ^loyne, the Sieur de Bienville, 
 was the eighth son of Charles Le Moyne. He was 
 born in Montreal on the 23d of February, 1680. His 
 father died when he was five years old, and his 
 mother, when he was ten; so that he was taken in 
 charge by his eldest brother, Charles, the Baron de 
 Longueuil, who lived in the Chateau de Longueuil. 
 This chateau was the wonder and admiration of all 
 the country around. It was built after the manner 
 of the chateaux in France; and with its thick walls 
 of brick and masonry, its towers, guard-rooms, and 
 barracks, its church, its farms, stables, sheepfolds 
 and dovecotes, it was the handsomest and stateliest 
 residence in Canada. 
 
niENVILLB. 183 
 
 The Baron de Longueuil had been sent to France 
 in his youth and had served as page to a marshal 
 of France; and had gone to court and married the 
 daughter of a nobleman there; and he not only lived 
 as a nobleman of France, but he had the manners, 
 language, and appearance of one. At the same time 
 he had the character and qualities of his worthy 
 father, the pioneer ; and for them was held in honor 
 and esteem by his fellow Canadians. 
 
 The young Bienville, therefore, learned in these 
 surroundings, not only the graces, but the solid 
 virtues of life. Following the example of his elder 
 brothers, Iberville and Serigny, he chose the sea as 
 a career, and like them, by the time he was ready to 
 embark upon it, he had learned all that was to be 
 learned on land, in the forest, and on the St. 
 Lawrence. He was a perfect canoeist and woods- 
 man, and although only a boy at the time, he went 
 to Hudson's Bay with Iberville, and took part in 
 all the dangers from ice, water, and gunshots, that 
 we have told about. At the end of this expedition, 
 he went with Iberville to France, and sailed with 
 him on the Badine for the discovery of the mouth 
 of the Mississippi. As we have seen, he was fore- 
 most in every exploration sent out by Iberville — in 
 Pensacola, in Mobile, in looking for a harbor among 
 the islands^ and finally in the finding of the mouth 
 
184 STOEIES FROM LOUISIANA HISTORY. 
 
 BIENVILLE. 
 
 of the Mississippi. On the first exploration of the 
 river, he always paddled ahead of the boats in his 
 pirogue ; and, indeed, he was the scout and the meg- 
 
BIENVILLE, 185 
 
 senger, always ready for and always capable of any 
 undertaking. 
 
 He was gentle and reserved in disposition, but he 
 had a firm will and a courage that could not be 
 quelled, even in early youth. He knew how to gain 
 a strong influence over his friends and the men 
 under his command. The Canadians were ever 
 devoted to him, and would follow him through any 
 danger. The Indians of Louisiana learned to love 
 and respect him. They called him ^'father." In his 
 dealings with them, he was ever fair and just. He 
 never broke his word to them, nor forgot a promise. 
 When with them, he alwa^^s followed their customs 
 and manners, and could talk to each tribe in its 
 own language. As, in Canada, he had learned the 
 language of the Indians there, so, in Louisiana, he 
 learned the language of every tribe that he had 
 dealings with. He was but twenty-two, when Iber- 
 ville put him in command of the colony, and 
 charged him to hold the mouth of the Mississippi 
 for France, to keep the Spaniards of Pensacola in 
 check, and to be on his guard against the English, 
 and to keep the Indians in peace and friendship 
 w^ith one another and with himself. 
 
 It was not a small task, but the young Canadian 
 did not fail in it. The war that had broken out in 
 Europe, between England and France, made itself 
 
186 STORIKS FROM L(3UISIANA HISTORY. 
 
 felt in America. Bienville was hardly at home in 
 Fort Louis de la Mobile, when Indian war parties, 
 armed and sent out by the English in Carolina, be- 
 gan to raid the cornfields and burn the villages of 
 the Indians, w^ho were friends and allies of the 
 French; and an English fleet, sailing about in the 
 Gulf, kept Mobile in constant fear of an attack. 
 English traders turned the Indians upon the Mis- 
 sissippi against the French ; and the humble pious 
 missionaries and their little flocks were always the 
 first victims; and pirogues would come speeding 
 over the bay to Fort Louis de la Mobile, bearing 
 the news of assassination and murder, and bringing 
 a load of wounded praying for help and medicine. 
 So Father Davion came, fleeing from the Tunicas, 
 and he told of the murder of an old priest, by the 
 Coroas, as he and his attendants were peacefully 
 coming down the river to visit Mobile. And so 
 came Father Gravier, from the Illinois, with his 
 arm wounded by five arrow shots. And closer to 
 the fort the Alabamma Indians killed five French- 
 men, who had gone to their village to buy corn. 
 Bienville armed the Arkansas Indians against 
 the Coroas to punish them for killing the priest; 
 and he himself made an expedition against the 
 Alabammas. Then war broke out between the 
 Chickasaws and Choctaws ; and Bienville's hope of 
 
BIENVILLE. 187 
 
 keeping these two powerful tribes as friends died 
 away, He held the Choctaws true to the French; 
 but the Chickasaws went over to the English. 
 
 For two summers ships came from France, bring- 
 ing all the supplies that a growing colony needed ; 
 emigrants, money, cattle, provisions, missionaries, 
 and young girls to be married to good and thrift}^ 
 young men ; and all seemed to bid fair for the hap- 
 piness and prosperity of Fort Louis. But one of 
 the ships, touching at Havana for live stock, 
 brought the yellow fever into the colony and for a 
 time it raged pitilessly. Priests, sailors, soldiers, 
 and the new emigrants sickened and died, and the 
 place was almost depopulated. But the greatest 
 loss and the most sorrowful death of all was that 
 of the brave and loyal Tonty. 
 
 After this, for three years, no ships came from 
 France, and the colony would, indeed, have been in 
 a sore strait, had it not been for Chateaugu^y, who, 
 with his small vessel, sailed to Cuba, San Domingo, 
 and Vera Cruz, bringing provisions and carrying 
 the mails not only for the French, but for the 
 Spaniards as well. For Pensacola had caught fire 
 and burned to the ground, and had lost its only 
 ship; and the Spaniards, in their misery, appealed 
 to the French for aid. At last after three years of 
 waiting, a ship with supplies came to Mobile; but 
 again another three years passed without a ship. 
 
188 STOKIES FROM LOUISIANA HISTORY. 
 
 As the soldiers were not paid, many of them de- 
 serted; those that remained were out of clothes; 
 and would have gone naked, as Bienville wrote to 
 his government, had he not given them deer skins 
 to dress in. The one vessel the colony had sank; 
 and if the officers of the garrison had not with 
 their own mone}^ bought another from a captain, 
 who came by chance to Dauphine Island, there 
 would have been no means of communicating with 
 San Domingo and Cuba. 
 
 Provisions gave out, and, what was worse, the 
 gunpowder threatened to give out. The able-bodied 
 men had to serve as soldiers, and could not culti- 
 vate the land; and, besides, there were no oxen 
 to plow with. The fort, therefore, had to depend 
 upon the Indians for corn. During the summer 
 months, to save the food in the fort, Bienville was 
 glad enough to allow his men to go and live among 
 the neighboring Indians; but they enjoyed this so 
 much, that it was not easy to get them to come back 
 to duty, when summoned. 
 
 At last, in 1711, when one overflow after the 
 other had ruined the corn crops of the Indians, and 
 there seemed no chance for any other food for the 
 garrison than acorns, and when Fort Louis itself 
 stood under water, Bienville decided to build an- 
 other fort nearer the mouth of the river and closer 
 
UlENVILLIi. 189 
 
 to Dauphine Island, so that one place could help 
 the other more quickly in case of an attack by In- 
 dians or English. All during these hard times he 
 had been writing letter after letter to the royal 
 minister, Pontchartrain, telling him of the great 
 dearth the colony was in, and begging him to send 
 the needed supplies of men, money and provisions ; 
 telling him, also, how, with a handful of poorly 
 clad, poorly fed, and poorly paid men, he had held 
 the great country of Louisiana for France, and kept 
 off the English ; had lived on good terms with the 
 Spaniards, and had made the Indians respect his 
 authority. But Ponchartrain did not send relief to 
 the colony. He could not, in truth ; for France, at 
 that time, needed all tlie money she had for uses 
 nearer home. The man^^ wars and the luxury and 
 extravagance of Louis XIV. had brought the coun- 
 try almost to bankruptcy. Public expenses had to 
 be cut down, and France's great glory and pride, 
 her colonies, had to be sacrificed. As for Louisiana 
 and the mouth of the Mississippi, Ponchartrain 
 saw that he must abandon them, unless he could 
 find some private person who would be willing to 
 take them off his hands, for what money he could 
 make out of them. He found what he wanted in the 
 Sieur Antoine.de Crozat, a great banker, who un- 
 dertook to keep up the colony for fifteen years for 
 
IDO STORIES FROM LOUISIANA HISTORY. 
 
 tlie profit he could get out of the monopoly of its 
 trade. 
 
 It was a blow to Bienville and his officers and his 
 hardy indej^ndent Canadians to find, after their 
 long years of struggle and their sore trials, that 
 their king had made them over by charter to a 
 banker, whose only feeling for the colony was to 
 make money out of it. And, as if this were not dis- 
 grace enough, a new governor, Lamothe Cadillac, 
 was sent to take the place of Bienville. Bien- 
 ville begged that he might retire and go back into 
 the navy. But Louisiana without Bienville to man- 
 age the Indians would have been a poor bargain for 
 Crozat. Pontchartrain ordered him to remain in 
 the colony, and to take up his station among the 
 Natchez, where a fort was to be built. 
 
 First War of the Natchez. 
 
 But in January, 1716, before it was built and 
 Bienville had taken up his post there, news came 
 to Mobile that the Natchez, offended by some 
 neglect or insult of Cadillac, had broken out into 
 war with the French. They pillaged Crozat's store 
 house there, killed the men in charge of it, and 
 began putting to death every Frenchman they could 
 catch traveling up and down the river. 
 
 Bienville knew that the Natchez must be pun- 
 
FIRST WAR OF THE NATCHEZ. l9l 
 
 ished severely, and at once, or they would despise 
 the French as cowards, and other Indians would 
 follow their example. But Cadillac would give him 
 only forty-nine men, half the number he had asked 
 for his campaign. With these, however, he started, 
 and by April he reached the village of the Tunicas, 
 about fifty miles below the Natchez, where he 
 stopped. Here he learned that the Natchez had just 
 killed another Frenchman on the river and were 
 lying in wait for fifteen more, who were on their 
 way down. He was warned, also, to be on his 
 guard against the Tunicas, who had received pres- 
 ents from the Natchez to kill him. As he had not 
 men enough to punish the Natchez by force, he laid 
 his plans to gain his point by cunning. Keeping 
 all that he had learned to himself, he called 
 together the Tunica warriors, and told them that 
 he was on his way to the Natchez to make a trading 
 post there, where they and other tribes could trade 
 skins for merchandise; but as his men were very 
 tired with the trip up the river, he was going to 
 camp on the island a few miles below, to rest awhile. 
 He also told the Tunicas they would do him a 
 favor by sending some of their tribe to tell the 
 Natchez that he was coming. This the Tunicas did ; 
 and Bienville, after smoking their calumet, and 
 making them smoke his, went to the island, where 
 
192 STORIES FROM LOUISIANA HISTORY. 
 
 he put his men at once to work making a fortifica- 
 tion, and building some cabins. A few days later, 
 three Natchez arrived, sent by their chief to present 
 the calumet to Bienville. He waved it aside, saying 
 that they could get some of his soldiers to smoke 
 it, but that for himself, being a great chief of the 
 French, he would only smoke the calumet of a sun 
 chief. This troubled the warriors. However, Bien- 
 ville gave them something to eat, and talked gaily 
 with them; asking news of their chiefs; saying he 
 had a great desire to see them, that he was aston- 
 ished that they had not already come, that the 
 Natchez, perhaps, did not cai*e about the French 
 making a trading post with them, and that, if this 
 were so, he would make it among the Tunicas. The 
 warriors replied that their nation desired nothing 
 better than to have a French post on their territory, 
 and that they were sure that in five or six days, 
 without fail, the chiefs of the nation would come 
 themselves to show their joy at it. The next day, 
 the three warriors went away. Bienville sent with 
 them a young Frenchman, who spoke their language 
 perfectly, to whom he explained everything to say 
 to the chiefs to induce them to come to the island. 
 The same day he sent one of his bravest Canadians, 
 in a pirogue, to slip by the Natchez at night, and 
 hasten up the river to warn the fifteen men coming 
 
FIKST WAR OF THE NATCHEZ. 193 
 
 down from the Illinois. He gave him, also, to place 
 at the different points on the river, a dozen large 
 sheets of parchment, on which was written in large 
 characters: "The Natchez have declared war 
 against the French, and M. de Bienville is camped 
 at the village of the Tnnicas." 
 
 In about a week, six Canadian trappers arrived 
 at the island camp in three pirogues, loaded with 
 skins, smoked beef, and bears' oil. They said that, 
 not knowing of the war of the Natchez, they had 
 landed there ; but hardly had their feet touched the 
 earth, when some warriors jumped upon them and 
 carried off everything they had in their pirogues, 
 and took them to the village of the chief named 
 "Bearded One." A short while afterwards, some of 
 the great chiefs of the Natchez came in a great tem- 
 per, and took the "Bearded One" to task for his 
 treatment of the Canadians. Their arms were 
 given back to them, and food was brought them; 
 but, for three days, they were shut up in a cabin, 
 while the chiefs and warriors talked over what 
 should be done with them. Then they were taken 
 to their pirogues, in which they found almost every- 
 thing that had been taken from them. The 
 chiefs told them that Bienville was at the village 
 of the Tunicas, resting, and that shortly he ex- 
 pected to come to the Natchez to make a trading 
 post there. 
 
194 STORIES FKOM LOT'ISIAXA HISTORY. 
 
 A few days later, iu the iiiornino-, there were seen 
 nearing the ishind four pirogues, iu each of which 
 were four men standing, chanting the calumet, and 
 three sitting under i^arasols, with twelve men 
 swimming alongside. They were the Xatchez chiefs 
 coming to fall into the trap prepared for them. 
 
 Bienville ordered one-half of his men not to show 
 themselves, but to remain under arms near at hand. 
 The other half were to stand unarmed around his 
 tent, and when the boats were landed, were to take 
 the arms one b}^ one of the savages as they stepped 
 ashore; and he charged them only to let the eight 
 chiefs he named enter his tent ; the rest were to be 
 seated at the door. All of this was done, as he said. 
 The eight chiefs came in singing, holding their calu- 
 met, which tliey passed several times over Bienville, 
 from his head to his feet, in sign of union; passing, 
 also, their hands over his stomach, then over theirs; 
 after which they presented him their calumet to 
 smoke. He pushed it aside with contempt, and 
 said he Avished to hear their speeches and know 
 their thoughts before he smoked with them. The 
 chiefs then went out of the tent, and presented their 
 calumets to the sun. One of them fixing his looks 
 on the sun, and raising his arms over his head, 
 prayed to it. Then they came back into the tent, 
 ^nd again presented their calumets. Bienville told 
 
FIRST WAR OF THE NATCHEZ. 195 
 
 them they had to tell him what Ksatisfaction they 
 were going to give him for the five Frenchmen they 
 had killed. They hung their heads without ansAver- 
 ing. xVt this Bienville made a sign, and they were 
 led to a prison and put in irons. In the evening- 
 bread and meat were given to them. They refused 
 to eat. All sang their death song. At nightfall, 
 Bienville had the great chief of the nation, called 
 "Great Sun," with his brother, '^Stung Serpent,'' 
 and a second brother, named the ''Little Sun," 
 brought to his tent. He told them he knew it Avas 
 not by their orders that the five Frenchmen had 
 been killed ; but he demanded not only the heads of 
 the murderers to be brought to him, but the heads 
 of the chiefs who had given the orders. He said 
 that the scalps would not content him ; he wished 
 their heads also, so as to recognize them. He added 
 that it would be easy to declare war against the 
 Natchez and to destroy their villages, without risk- 
 ing the life of a single Frenchman; that they must 
 remember how, in 1704, when the Chichimaches 
 killed a missionary and three Frenchmen, and re- 
 fused to give up the murderers, all of his Indian 
 allies had been set upon them, and they were 
 punished. He reminded them how he had con- 
 demned a Frenchman to death for killing two Pas- 
 cagoula Indians; and how the Coroas had put to 
 
190 STORIES FROM LOUISIANA HISTORY. 
 
 death five of their warriors who had killed a mis- 
 sionary and two other Frenchmen ; and that in the 
 same year he had forced the chief of the Touachas 
 to put to death two of his tribe who had assassi- 
 nated a ChickasaAv; and later the Choctaws had 
 given him the same satisfaction ; and after that, the 
 Mobilians had brought him the head of one of their 
 tribe who had killed an Indian ally ; and that, only 
 a year or so before, when the Pascagoulas had killed 
 a Mobilian, he had forced them to make amends for 
 it. This speech, the truth of which they could not 
 deny, made a great impression on the Natchej* 
 chiefs. They listened with grave attention, but 
 made no attempt to answer. Bienville gave them 
 that night to decide what they would do. The next 
 morning at daylight, the three brother chiefs asked 
 to speak to Bienville. They told him there was 
 no one in the village high enough in authority to 
 put to death the men whose heads he demanded; 
 that if he would permit it, the "Serpent," as the 
 head of the nation, would go and do so. This Bien- 
 ville refused, putting in the place of the "Serpent'' 
 his younger brother, the "Little Sun," who went at 
 once. Five days later, the "Little Sun" returned, 
 fetching with him three heads; but only two be- 
 longed to the murderers. Bienville sent for the 
 chiefs, and the rejected bead was thrown at their 
 
FIRST WAR OF THE NATCHFZ. 19? 
 
 feet, and they were told they had sacrificed an in- 
 nocent man. The chiefs confessed that the head 
 was that of a warrior who had talvcn no part in the 
 killing of the Frenchmen, but that being the brother 
 of one of the murderers, who had escaped, they had 
 put him to death in his place. Bienville, showing 
 his displeasure at this, told them they would have 
 to send, on the morrow, another chief to their vil- 
 lage to get the head he demanded. The next day, 
 two warriors and the great priest of the temple 
 went to the Natchez village. They were confident 
 of bringing back the head of the chief "AYhite 
 Earth," the leader of the movement against the 
 French. 
 
 The river now rose until the highest part of the 
 island was overflowed a foot deep, and the tents and 
 powder magazine had to be raised on scaffolds. The 
 vs'eather grew very hot, and many of the men fell ill. 
 Chief "Serpent" himself took a fever. Bienville had 
 his irons removed, and brought him and his broth- 
 ers into his own tent. During the days they passed 
 together, he found out the truth about the outbreak 
 of their tribe; and the names of the guilty warriors 
 and chiefs who had killed the Frenchmen ; and he 
 agreed to let his prisoners go to their village, on 
 their promise to put to death the murderer, who 
 had run away, as soon as they could catch him. 
 
198 STORIES FRO:^I LOnSIAXA HISTORY. 
 
 The chiefs consented to this, and that Bienville 
 should put to death two warriors taken in the Sun's 
 party, who had been proved to have had a hand in 
 the killing* of the Frenchmen. They pledged them- 
 selves, also, to furnish timber and help in building 
 a French fort at their landing, and to live in future 
 peace with the French. 
 
 As the Mississippi did not fall, and the island 
 was still under water, Bienville sent his sick sol- 
 diers to the high lands of the Tunicas, where the 
 Indians cared for them and kept them supplied 
 with fresh beef and venison. As he heard that the 
 Spaniards from Mexico Avere coming towards Red 
 river to take possession there, he hurried off to the 
 head of the river, so as to make a settlement there 
 before them. On his return, he went with his men to 
 Xatchez, and stayed at the new fort until it was fin- 
 ished. The Indians, true to their word, furnished 
 all the timber and cypress bark the builders needed. 
 The fort was named ''Rosalie," after the wife of the 
 Duke of Pontchartrain. 
 
 At the end of August, Bienville handed over the 
 command of the fort to his lieutenant, and he went 
 down the river to make his report to his superior 
 officer, the Governor Cadillac. But when he ar- 
 rived in Mobile, in October, he found great news 
 awaitinc: him. Cadillac had been recalled, and 
 
I'HE COMPANY OF THE WEST. 199 
 
 Bienville was ordered to take his place until the 
 new governor, de FEpinay, arrived. He came in 
 March, in a ship that brought fifty emigrants and 
 three companies of soldiers. To Bienville was sent, 
 as a reward for his services, the Cross of St. Louis. 
 This was a medal in the shape of a cross, which the 
 king conferred on men who had served France with 
 distinction. Many of them can still be seen in 
 Louisiana, in the possession of the descendants of 
 those who received them. 
 
 THE COMPANY OF THE WEST. 
 
 The Founding of New Orleans. 
 
 But De TEpinay had a sliort rule as governor. 
 Crozat, who had lost monej^ in Louisiana, instead of 
 making it, prayed the king that he might give up his 
 charter. His prayer was granted; but Louisiana 
 did not go back under the royal government. By 
 another charter, she was made over for twenty-five 
 years to a company called the Company of the West, 
 
200 STORIES FliOM LOUISIANA IIISTOKY. 
 
 or the Company of the ^Mississippi ; for such is the 
 name it is known by. 
 
 This company undertook what Crozat had just 
 failed in, to pay the expenses of tlie colony for what 
 profit could be made out of it. But the company 
 went about in a different way to make the profit. 
 Throu*>hout all France it advertised the soil and 
 the future wealth of Louisiana. By every means it 
 urged people to go there and settle. It sold great 
 tracts of lands to French buyers, who, in their turn, 
 sold it in smaller pieces to people with less money. 
 Lords and ladies bought estates in Louisiana, and 
 sent out settlers to it from their estates in the old 
 country. And the company itself sent out emi- 
 grants by the ship loads. 
 
 The Company recalled De FEpinay, and made 
 Bienville governor, as the one man who was able to 
 bring about the great future planned for Louisiana. 
 But under him was a council composed of directors 
 of the company, sent from France, who voted on all 
 measures and in fact acted with the governor very 
 much as our city council acts with the mayor. 
 Ships soon began to arrive at Dauphine Island, 
 loaded with money, provisions, merchandise, and 
 emigrants. A corps of able engineers under the 
 command of the Chevalier Leblond de la Tour came 
 to superintend the construction of such public 
 
THE COMPANY OF THE WEST. 201 
 
 buildings as were needed. At last Bienville bad 
 tbe men and money be wanted to carry out bis ideas 
 about tbe colony. He at once sent men to take pos- 
 session of tbe site of La Salle's old fort on tbe coast 
 of Texas, and to build a new fort tbere, so as to 
 make sure against tbe Spaniards in tbat quarter. 
 He sent fifty emigrants up Red river to settle in tbe 
 country of tbe Caddodaquious, or Caddos, as we call 
 them today. He ordered tbe engineers to sound and 
 examine tbe mouth of tbe ^lississippi, and to find a 
 channel for ships through it. He, himself, Avith a 
 party of workmen, set out for a purpose that bad 
 been in bis heart for eighteen years, ever since the 
 time when be had commanded at Fort ^laurepas. 
 This was to found a city on tbe banks of tbe Mis- 
 sissippi ; for he was sure tbat a city there would 
 one day be one of tbe great centers of trade on this 
 continent. He had chosen tbe spot, as we have 
 seen, years before, and bad even settled some Can- 
 adians upon it. He named the place Orleans, after 
 the Duke of Orleans, tbe regent of France, but be 
 called it ^'New Orleans," as there was another city 
 named Orleans in France. In tbe meantime, ship 
 after ship arrived at Daupbine Island with emi- 
 grants for the concessions (as tbe grants of land 
 were called), that had been sold in France. These 
 concessions were all along tbe Mississippi and on 
 
202 STORII]S FROM LOUISIANA HISTORY. 
 
 the Gulf coast, at Natchitoches, on the Yazoo river, 
 at Bay KSt. Louis, at Natchez, and so on. But the 
 emigrants had to wait on Dauphine Island until 
 boats and carts could be made to send them on to 
 the homes which they had come to settle. Thus the 
 island became packed with people, and a more help- 
 less lot never landed in a new country; ignorant 
 peasants, tired from a long sea voyage and weak 
 from sickness, without shelter, with scant rations 
 of food, with no work, blinded by the dazzling white 
 sand, under the burning rays of a tropical sun, 
 and catching the fever which the ships brought 
 from Cuba and San Domingo. Always waiting, and 
 hoping and being disappointed, many, indeed most, 
 of the unfortunate creatures, died of misery on the 
 on the spot. The directors of the company saw that 
 a move must be made to a better place for the re- 
 ceiving and handling of such great numbers of im- 
 migrants. Bienville spoke and urged in favor of 
 New Orleans, where he said the immigrants could 
 be landed straight from the ships, and be easily 
 sent to their different concessions, or could sup- 
 port themselves at once by cultivating the soil. 
 
 But the directors, who were strangers in Louis- 
 iana, voted not with Bienville, but against him, 
 for Biloxi. A move to the old fort that Iberville 
 had built was made in all haste, and Fort Louis and 
 Dauphine Island were left almost deserted. 
 
THE COMPANY OF Tlllil WEST. 203 
 
 But what Bienville foretold came to pass. Things 
 were not made better by the move to Biloxi. The 
 immigrants unloaded there, found the same bare, 
 white sands, the same burning sun, the same want 
 of food. The famine became so great that more 
 than five hundred died of hunger. Fish and oysters 
 were all the food that the starving creatures could 
 find, and to get them they had to wade in water up 
 to their waists, and their dead bodies would often 
 be found around piles of oyster shells. And crime 
 and lawlessness added to the suffering ; for, in their 
 eagerness to build up the new country, the com- 
 pany shipped as emigrants to Louisiana any men 
 that their agents could get, even from prisons, re- 
 formatories, asylums, hospitals. People were kid- 
 napped even in the streets of Paris and other large 
 cities of France, and sold to the agents at so much 
 a head. To finish the misery of it all, yellow fever 
 broke out. 
 
 It seemed almost a special blessing when a 
 drunken, sleeping sergeant let his lighted pipe fall 
 from his hand, in his tent, and started a fire that 
 burned Biloxi to the ground. The council of 
 directors were glad to change to some other place, 
 and again Bienville tried to get them to move the 
 colony to New Orleans ; but he was again outvoted. 
 The directors said there was not enough water at 
 
204 STORIES FROM LOl'ISIANA HISTORY. 
 
 the moutli of the Mississippi for loaded vessels to 
 get through. So New Biloxi — the present town of 
 Biloxi — was chosen. Bienville, to show that a loaded 
 vessel could get through the mouth of the river, 
 took one through it himself. lie ordered, besides, 
 one of De la Tour's assistants, Pauger, to go to the 
 passes, and sound and make maps of them, and to 
 write a report to send to France, proving the truth 
 of what he had said to the council — -that the Mis- 
 sissippi was deep enough for large vessels, and 
 that New Orleans should be the capital of the 
 colonv. He also sent Pauger with a force of men 
 to lay out his city. 
 
 Just at this time, the news came that the Com- 
 pam^ of the ^lississippi had failed. But too much 
 money had been spent on Louisiana ; too many 
 emigrants — over seven- thousand — had been sent 
 there, for the colony to be given up. The affairs of 
 the compan}^ were put into the hands of a board 
 of liquidation, as is done now-a-days with the affairs 
 of a railroad or any other great public enterprise. 
 Bienville's letters, with the engineer's maps and 
 reports, coming at this time, convinced the new 
 board that he was right; and he received the long- 
 wished-for orders to remove the colony to New 
 Orleans, and to make it the capital of Louisiana. 
 
 The work of this was beirun at once. In June, 
 
- THE CO:MrANY OF THE WEST. 205 
 
 1722, De la Tour and Pauger led the way by sailing 
 up the river in a loaded vessel ; and other boats fol- 
 lowed with men, building materials, ammunition, 
 and provisions. Under De la Tour's direction the 
 new city took shape. A church and houses were 
 built; a levee was thrown up in front; ditches 
 made; a canal dug in the rear for drainage. A cem- 
 etery was laid out and a landing place made. Bien- 
 ville himself came and took up his residence there 
 in August. 
 
 But New Orleans had no easier a beginning than 
 Mobile or Biloxi. In the midst of the building and 
 moving, the September storm came on with a vio- 
 lence never known before. For five da^^s, a furious 
 hurricane raged over land and sea. The church and 
 most of the new buildings were blown down, and 
 three vessels were wrecked in the river. And after 
 this the fever broke out and most of the new popula- 
 tion were taken ill, and many died. Bienville him- 
 self, the untiring Bienville, fell so ill of fever that 
 hope for his life was given up. But the city grew 
 despite it all. And the little square map of houses 
 that De la Tour made began to fill up with inhab- 
 itants. Ships still brought in merchandise and 
 emigrants; many of these stayed in the city, and 
 many that had gone into the country left their 
 land there, preferring to settle around the city. A 
 
206 
 
 STORIES FROM LOUISIANA HISTORY. 
 
 party of these, Germans, were given land on both 
 sides of the river, about twenty miles above the 
 city, which is still called from them '^Cote des Alle- 
 
 
 □BQDQaDD 
 
 □ 
 
 mands." They cultivated gardens, and in time sup- 
 plied New Orleans with vegetables. Every Satur- 
 day evening, their little boats could be seen coming 
 down the river, with their fresh green loads. 
 
 Second Natchez War. 
 
 The year after he had moved to New Orleans, 
 Bienville had again to go against the Natchez, who, 
 forgetting the punishment they had received, 
 began anew their attacks upon the property and 
 lives of the French. After trying in vain, by peace^ 
 fill means, to bring them back to their duty, Bien- 
 
SECOND NATCHEZ WAR. 207 
 
 ville came against them suddenly with an army of 
 seven hundred men. His old friend, ''Stung Ser- 
 pent/' hurried to him at Fort Rosalie. He came, he 
 said, to beg pardon for his nation. He confessed 
 that the people of the White Apple, Jenzenaque, 
 and Gray villages were in a state of rebellion 
 against the French, but he prayed that vengeance 
 should strike only them. This Bienville promised. 
 His army, taking all care for the surprise of the 
 Indians, slipped through the narrow paths of the 
 forest surrounding the White Apple village. But 
 when thej reached the village, it was found 
 to hold nothing but empty cabins. The people had 
 received warning, and, in their turn, had slipped 
 away; and it was the French who were sur- 
 prised. They had only the satisfaction of a 
 cruel foe — that of burning the village. A few 
 days later, Bienville led his army against the Gray 
 village, but it, too, was empty; its people had 
 escaped. It also was burned. From a captured 
 squaw Bienville learned that the Indians were 
 awaiting the French at the Jenzenaque village, a 
 half league away. The army wheeled about, and a 
 Tunica chief taking {lie lead, it marched upon that 
 village. Here was a strong cabin, built on a height ; 
 and the French believed that this time they would 
 catch the Indians in it. The drums beat, the fifes 
 
208 JSTOKIKS FROM L0U1«1AXA HISTORY. 
 
 struck up, and the army advanced. But this cabin, 
 like the others, was empt}^; the people of the village 
 had escaped. The Tunica chief, taking a turn 
 around the height, saw below him one of the 
 Natchez chiefs, or rather they both at the same 
 time saw each other, and fired. The Tunica chief 
 killed his enemy on the spot, but fell himself at the 
 same time, dangerously wounded. 
 
 The baffled army marched back to Fort Rosalie, 
 and Bienville did all that was left for him to do. He 
 summoned '^Stung Serpent" to him, and through 
 him made a peace Avith the Natchez, on condition 
 that the chief of the White Apple village should 
 pay, with his life, for the lives of t'^ Fr":::ximen he 
 had taken. The ''Serpent" asked to be given three 
 days. AYlien they were over, he came, bring- 
 ing the bloody head of the guilty chief. Bienville 
 returned to New Orleans; but before long there 
 came to him a sad surprise — a letter from the king 
 ordering him to turn the colony over to another, 
 and to return at once to France. 
 
 Kecall of Bienville. 
 
 This meant that he was to answer charges made 
 against him and, perhaps, suffer a penalty. From 
 the very beginning of the colony, from the days of 
 Iberville, there had been ill feeling between the 
 
RECALL OF BIENVILLE. 209 
 
 Canadians and the French. The French resented 
 the influence of the Canadians, whom they looked 
 upon as rough, uneducated pioneers. The Can- 
 adians, great, strong, hearty, and mighty in their 
 way with the savages, despised the Frenchmen for 
 their polisli and civility. The Canadians felt that 
 it was they who had made Louisiana, not the 
 French, who came there only as soldiers or to fill 
 offices and to keep accounts. The French, who did 
 fill the government offices, and keep the accounts, 
 and wrote home long official reports, seldom failed 
 in these reports to call the attention of the govern- 
 ment to the failings of the Canadians. They 
 accused them of smuggling and of illegal trading 
 with the Indians, and of banding themselves 
 together against the French, whenever any diffi- 
 culty arose in the Colony. Bienville, the idol of the 
 Canadians, was accused not only of upholding them 
 in this conduct, but also of making a profit out of 
 his position, that is, of trading the government 
 stores to the Indians for skins, and putting the 
 money in his pocket. When he was placed in com- 
 mand of Mobile, this malicious accusation was 
 started against Bienville, and it had been kept 
 going ever since by one French official after an- 
 other. It was true, and no one could deny it, that 
 under Bienville the savage countries settled by 
 
210 STORIES FliOM LOI'ISIAXA HISTORY. 
 
 Iberville had become a great French colony, with a 
 city that bade fair, even then, to be a great center 
 of commerce. It Avas true, as all knew, that Bien- 
 ville himself, in his long service, had never made 
 money ; that, on the contrary, he was a poor man ; 
 that his life had never been other than that of a 
 frugal, simple Canadian pioneer. The charges, 
 nevertheless, were believed in France, and he was 
 recalled. 
 
 He turned over the government of Louisiana to 
 another, as ordered, and made his preparations to 
 sail at once. He took leave of his friends, and went 
 to Dauphine Island to wait for his ship. A very 
 strange thing now happened. The ship came into 
 the roadstead in front of the harbor, but an acci- 
 dent, the upsetting of her barge, on the way to land, 
 prevented Bienville's going aboard. As it was 
 Saturday of Holy Week, his departure was put off 
 until Easter Monday. At dawn of that day, he was 
 to sail, and boats were sent ashore for him and his 
 luggage. Hardly had the boats reached land, when 
 the ship fired two cannon shots, signals for help. 
 The weather was delightful, there was not a wave 
 nor a breath of wind. Before the eyes of all, how- 
 ever, she sank under the water, the crew and pas- 
 sengers jumping overboard. She had sprung a 
 leak. Bienville returned to New Orleans, and 
 waited for another ship. 
 
RECALL OF BlENVlLLl^. 211 
 
 When he reached France, he presented, as his 
 justification to the minister, the memoir of the 
 services that had filled his life, since, as a mere boy, 
 he had come with his brother Iberville to explore 
 the country, for whose misgovernment he was now, 
 a middle-aged man, called to account. The paper 
 begins proudly: "For thirty-four years the Sieur 
 de Bienville has had the honor of serving the king ; 
 twenty-seven of them as lieutenant of the King and 
 commandant of the colony." After giving an 
 account of his government, he modestly tells 
 about himself: "It was not without trouble 
 that I became absolute master of so many 
 nations with such barbarous tempers and 
 different characters. One can imagine how 
 many difficulties I encountered and what risks 
 I ran to found the colony and maintain it to the 
 present time. Necessity, it is said, renders one 
 industrious; I experienced that it also renders one 
 intrepid in danger, and makes one perform, so to 
 speak, the impossible in the different conjunctures 
 one has to meet in an unknown world with so small 
 a force. I first strove to qualify myself to govern 
 without the aid of an interpreter. I applied myself 
 to learn the language which appeared to me to be 
 the dominant one among the savages, the knowledge 
 of which would help me in learning the others. I 
 
212 STORIES FROM LOUISIANA HISTORY. 
 
 was fortunate enough from the first to gain the 
 confidence and friendship of the savages. I studied 
 their customs in order to retain them in peace, one 
 with the other; so that for the twenty-seven years 
 during which I had the honor of commanding in 
 the province, I was the arbiter of their differences." 
 But notwithstanding, and just as if the charges 
 against him had been proved, Bienville was 
 deprived of his rank and his offices, and in his ruin 
 his whole family and all his relatives in Louisiana 
 suffered. They, also, were dismissed from the 
 service and ordered to France. Even tlie oflflcial 
 members of his government were disgraced, and, 
 within a year, not one of the old .Canadian set held 
 office in the colony. The new governor who took 
 Bienville's place was named Perier. 
 
 THE NATCHEZ MASSACRE. 
 
 All went well in Louisiana for two years after 
 the arrival of the new governor. In the country 
 the plantations made good crops, and the city in- 
 creased in size, in population, and in trade. The 
 
THE NATCHEZ MASSACRE. 213 
 
 Indians were quiet and peaceful. Therefore, like 
 a thunderclap in a cloudless sky, came the news, in 
 1727, that the Natchez had risen and murdered all 
 the white people at Fort Rosalie and in the neigh- 
 boring settlements. 
 
 Ever since Bienville's last treaty with them, 
 the Natchez had been good friends of the French, 
 and they would have continued so, but for the ty- 
 ranny and injustice of Chepart, the officer in com- 
 mand of Fort Rosalie. He drove them to the re- 
 venge which caused the ruin of the fort and finally 
 of the Natchez nation itself. 
 
 Looking for land for a plantation, Chepart cast 
 his eyes upon the charming White Apple village, 
 and he determined to make it his own. He sent for 
 the Sun of the village, and ordered him and his 
 tribe to leave it. The Sun replied that the ances- 
 tors of his tribe had lived in the village as many 
 years as there were hairs in his warlock, and it 
 was only right that he and his children should still 
 live in it. But the French officer would not listen to 
 him, and fixed the day for the Indians to leave the 
 village. The Sun, calling together the men of his 
 village, made a speech, telling them of the outrage 
 that was to be done to them, and urging them to 
 make a stand against the tyranny of the French. 
 A'illage by village was aroused^ and their Suns 
 
214 ►STUUIES FiiOM LOUISIANA IILSTOKY. 
 
 swore to strike one bloody blow, and free them- 
 selves forever from the yoke that was upon them. 
 To all the villages were sent packages of an equal 
 number of sticks tied together, and the command 
 was given to take out a stick every day after the 
 new moon, and to fall upon the French and kill 
 them on the day on which the last stick was taken 
 out. 
 
 The fatal day arrived. By daylight the Natchez, 
 in small groups, strolled into Fort liosalie and the 
 neighboring white settlements, until they out- 
 numbered the whites. Pretending they were going 
 on a hunt, they borrowed guns and bought powder 
 and shot. At nine o'clock the signal was given. 
 Each Indian fell on a man. By noon two hundred 
 Frenchmen were killed, and ninety-two women 
 and fifty-five children and all the negroes were 
 made prisoners. Chepart was among the first 
 slain. During the massacre, the Great Sun was 
 coolly and carelessly smoking his pipe in a govern- 
 ment warehouse. His men brought to him the 
 heads of the French officers, placing that of Che- 
 part in the center and the others around. When 
 the Sun was informed that not a white man was 
 left alive, except a carpenter and a tailor specially 
 saved from the massacre, he gave the command to 
 pillage. Every building was sacked and the spoils 
 
THE NATCHEZ MASSACRE. 215 
 
 divided. Two soldiers, who were accidentally in 
 the woods, escaped and carried the news to New 
 Orleans. 
 
 The colony trembled from one end to the other. 
 New Orleans went into a panic. Ships were sent 
 to France for troops. Couriers were hurried to the 
 Illinois, the Red Eiver, and to the Mobile settle- 
 ments, warning the white men there. 
 
 Their Choctaw allies were the first in the field 
 for the French. Seven hundred of them falling upon 
 the Natchez, while they were still in the midst of 
 their feasting and rejoicing, killed sixty of their 
 warriors, and rescued fifty-nine women and chil- 
 dren, and one hundred shrv^es, who had been taken 
 prisoners. By the time the troops from New Or- 
 leans arrived, the Natchez had fortified themselves 
 in two strong houses in the White x\pple village. 
 Fort Yalor (as the French well named it) and 
 Fort Flour. Their defense was so good that the 
 French, with all their cannon, could not force them 
 to surrender. In fact they held their own so bravely 
 that the French had to make terms with them. 
 They agreed to deliver up the rest of the French 
 women, children, and negro prisoners, if the French 
 would retire from the village, with their guns, to 
 the banks of the river. This agreement was carried 
 out. But two nights afterwards^ the Natchez 
 
21G STORIES FROM LOT ISIAXA HISTORY. 
 
 made their escape from their forts so secreth^ that 
 the French could not pursue them. Some of them 
 sought refuge with the Chickasaws; others, cross- 
 ing tlie Mississippi, made their way westward, 
 through forest and swamp, to a mound in the pres- 
 ent i3arish of Catahoula. Here they remained until 
 tidings reached them that Perier was leading a 
 great army of white men and Indians against them. 
 They then withdrcAv to a high bluff, known now as 
 Sicily Island, at the end of Lake Lovelace, where 
 they fortified themselves. 
 
 In the middle of the summer, the reinforcements 
 from France arrived, eight hundred French and 
 Swiss soldiers. These, with Avhat he could raise 
 among the colonists and his Indian allies, gave 
 Perier over a thousand men to lead against his 
 enemies. He went up the Mississippi to the mouth 
 of the Red Piver, and went through Ped Piver to 
 Black Piver, and up the Ouachita, until he reached 
 the bluff, upon Avhich the Natchez stood like beasts 
 at bay. But as before, the Natchez would not give 
 up, and held their own, until the French were glad 
 to talk about a treaty. Perier, however, refused to 
 treat with any but chiefs. Two Suns and the war- 
 rior who had defended Fort Flour so gallantly, 
 came forward, but Perier dishonorably seized them 
 as prisoners, and then demanded the surrender of 
 
THE NATCHEZ MASSACRE. 217 
 
 all the French prisoners. To this the chiefs had to 
 agree. During the night, the warrior from Fort 
 Flour made his escape ; but the Two Suns were not 
 so fortunate — they were discovered in the attempt 
 and held. Perier then offered to spare the lives of 
 all the Natchez men, women, and children who de- 
 livered themselves up to him. The next day four 
 hundred women and children and forty-five men 
 left the Natchez fortifications, and ranged them- 
 selves inside those of the French ; but they came in 
 such small groups that the whole day was passed in 
 the surrender. Seventy still remained in the fort, 
 asking to stay there until the morrow. It was rain- 
 ing in torrents. Between the water under foot and 
 the water overhead, Perier, not being able to take 
 them, was forced to consent. At nine o^clock at 
 night, the weather cleared and the* French were 
 able to take possession of the Natchez forts. They 
 closed in around them, and found them — deserted! 
 Again the warriors of the Natchez, under the lead- 
 ership of the warrior of Fort Flour, had given the 
 slip to their captors. The forts were destroyed, and 
 the only two prisoners taken there were, as if in 
 spite, scalped and burned. Perier returned to New 
 Orleans with his women and children prisoners, 
 and the two Suns, and the forty warriors, all of 
 whom Avere sold into slavery in San Domingo. 
 
218 STOKIEIS FROM LOUISIANA HISTORY. 
 
 The number of Natchez Indians who had escaped 
 was three hundred. They spread themselves over 
 the Eed River country, and took possession of a 
 deserted Natchitoches village, from which they were 
 driven out only after an obstinate fight. They then 
 took refuge with the Chickasaws, Avho, as we re- 
 member, were enemies of the French, and who from 
 the first had offered their villages and strongholds 
 to them. 
 
 With the peace, prosperity, and life of the colony 
 threatened by an Indian war, the directors in 
 France could not hope to make any profit out of 
 Louisiana trade. They therefore gave the colony 
 back to the king. 
 
 In New Orleans confidence in Perier was lost, 
 and those of the old colonists who had served under 
 Bienville's long and wise administration, wrote to 
 the French government, telling of Bienville's 
 wisdom in dealing with the Indians, and declaring 
 that he was the best governor that had ever been 
 in the colony. This had a good etfect. Perier was 
 recalled, and Bienville was given his old place. 
 
LAST CAMPAIGNS OF BIENVILLE, 
 
 On liis way to Louisiana Bienville stopped at 
 San Domingo, and be saw there his old friends, the 
 Natchez Suns, who had been sold into slavery. He 
 was very much touched with their changed fate and 
 wretched appearance. Very different was their 
 condition, indeed, from what it was when they 
 came in such state in their pirogues to meet him on 
 the island in the Mississippi. They told Bienville 
 hoAV they had been driven to revolt by the hard 
 treatment they had received from the French offir 
 cers, and they said they bitterly regretted the sad 
 ending of their long friendship with the French. 
 
 Bienville's first and foremost duty, after his ar- 
 rival, was to bring the Natchez tribe to account 
 for the massacre at Fort Rosalie, and to punish the 
 Chickasaws for receiving and protecting them. 
 
 The country of the Chickasaws laj, as has been 
 said, in the northern part of the present states of 
 Alabama and Mississippi. Bienville's plan of cam- 
 paign was one that he thought could not fail of suc- 
 cess, It was to go up the Tombigbee River into the 
 
220 STORIES FROM LOUISIANA HISTORY. 
 
 Chickasaw country, where D'Artaguette, the com- 
 maiidaut of the Illinois country, was to join him in 
 October with three hundred men. But as his boats 
 could not be gotten ready in time, Bienville had to 
 send a messenger to D'Artaguette, putting off the 
 meeting until the middle of April. 
 
 On the first of April all was ready, and a grand 
 start was made from Mobile. A fine shoAv the army 
 made, rowing up the river in the early morning 
 sunlight; thirty pirogues folloAved by thirty flat- 
 boats, loaded with five hundred soldiers, without 
 counting the brilliant staff of officers, and the com- 
 pany of forty-five blacks, commanded by free 
 negroes. 
 
 It took twenty-three days to get to the place of 
 meeting on the Tombigbee. No trace of D'Arta- 
 guette and the Illinois men was to be seen. But the 
 Choctaw chiefs, with their warriors, arrived 
 promptly, on time at the place of landing, shortly 
 after the French. After throwing up a fortification, 
 and leaving a small force behind them, to protect 
 their boats and proAdsions, the army set out on the 
 march to the Chickasaw villages. At first it was a 
 hard march through deep ravines filled with water 
 waist high, and across thick-grown cane-brakes. But 
 after this came a beautiful country easy to travel. 
 Camp was pitched about six miles from the Chicka- 
 
THE LAST CA:MPAIGNS OP BIENVILLE. ^2l 
 
 saw villages.. Tlie chief of the Choctaws asked 
 Bienville which village he intended to attack first. 
 Bienville told him the Natchez village, as they 
 svere the authors of the war. The cliief then ex- 
 plained that the first village was the nearest Chick- 
 asaw village to the Choctaws, and did them most 
 harm, and that he would like to attack that first, 
 especially as.it was filled with provisions which the 
 Choctaws needed. Knowing that the Choctaws, 
 after taking this first village, would go back home, 
 with the provisions, Bienville pursuaded them to 
 attack the Natchez village first, promising to return 
 and take the other one afterwards. The Choctaws 
 seeined satisfied, and their guides, leading the army 
 as if to conduct it to the point agreed upon, came 
 to a small prairie, wliere were three little villages, 
 placed like a triangle on the crest of a ridge, at 
 the foot of which flowed a brook almost dry. This 
 prairie was separated only by a small forest from 
 the large prairie where lay most of the Chickasaw 
 villages. Bienville marched his army along the 
 edge of the woods surrounding the smaller prairie, 
 and stopped on a little hill, where a halt was made 
 for dinner. It was just past mid-day. 
 
 The tricky Choctaws had gained their point; 
 they had led the army before the village that they 
 wanted to attack, and now with war cries and yells. 
 
222 STORIES FROM LOUISIA^'A HISTORY. 
 
 they began skirmishing around it, and drew its 
 fire upon the French. From the little hill where 
 the French were, they could clearly see four or five 
 Englishmen bustling around among the excited 
 Chickasaws, and over one village floated the En- 
 glish flag. The French ofiicers then angrily joined 
 their demands to those of the Choctaws that this 
 village should be taken at once. Pressed thus on 
 all sides, Bienville ordered the attack. A company 
 of grenadiers, drawn from the French and Swiss 
 trooi)s, and forty-five volunteers under Bienville's 
 nephew, De No^^an, were commanded to lead it. 
 They moved out of the woods, crossed the brook, 
 and began to ascend the ridge, when a murderous 
 fire poured upon them from the three villages. The 
 column of grenadiers which first reached the 
 summit of the ridge, and the entrance to the vil- 
 lage, met the full fire of the three batteries of the 
 three strong-holds. 
 
 Bienville thus describes the Chickasaw strong- 
 holds : "After having surrounded their cabins with 
 several rows of great stockades filled with earth, 
 they hollow out the inside, until they can let them- 
 selves down into it shoulder deep, and shoot 
 through loopholes almost level with the ground; 
 but they obtain still more advantage from the situ- 
 ation of their cabins, which are placed so that their 
 
DEFEAT OF THE FRENCH. 223 
 
 fires cross. The coverings of the cabins are a 
 thatching of wood and mud, proof against fire, ar- 
 rows, and grenades ; nothing but bombs could dam- 
 age them.'' 
 
 Defeat of the French. 
 
 Two or three cabins were taken and burned; but 
 when it came to crossing, under fire, the open space 
 between these and the next, De Noyan, looking 
 about him, saw only a few officers, a remnant of 
 grenadiers, and about a dozen volunteers. The 
 other soldiers were seeking shelter from the Indian 
 loop-holes, behind the captured cabins, and refused 
 to come out. Almost all the officers were killed or 
 wounded. De Noyan and four officers fell wounded 
 at the same moment. In vain he sent his aide to 
 rally the soldiers; the aide was killed, and this 
 added to their panic. He finally got a message to 
 Bienville that, unless help were sent or a retreat 
 sounded, not an officer would be left alive. Bien- 
 ville ordered the retreat, sending a company to pro- 
 tect it. The officers were found crowded together, 
 still fighting. The Choctaws were hiding under a 
 hill. 
 
 The night was passed in cutting down trees and 
 making hasty defences against surprise, but the 
 Chickasaws held themselves quiet in their strong- 
 
224 STORIES FUOM LOUISIANA HISTORY. 
 
 holds. The next morning Bienville dared not re- 
 new the attack. Litters were made for the 
 Avounded, and the beaten French troops led the 
 way back to the landing^ and embarked in their 
 boats. The Tombigbee was slowly reached, and 
 finally the Mobile. Here Bienville heard the first 
 news of the full extent of his disaster. The young 
 commandant of the Illinois, D'Artaguette, had not 
 received the message changing the date of meeting, 
 and so had set out at the date first named, with one 
 hundred and forty white men, and two hundred and 
 sixty Iroquois, Arkansas, Miamis, and Illinois. 
 Arrived at the place of meeting, his scouts could 
 discover no signs or traces of Bienville's army. He 
 called his officers and Indian chiefs together in a 
 council of war. They advised not to wait, but to 
 strike a blow at once. Pushing forward, they ar- 
 rived within a mile of the great Chickasaw prairie. 
 Leaving their baggage under a guard of thirty men, 
 the army confidently took the road to the village. 
 It was the road to death for all but two of them. 
 Hardly had the attack on the village begun, when 
 a troop of from four to five hundred savages darted 
 from behind the neighboring hill, and bore down 
 upon D'Artaguette's men with such speed and 
 force, that his Indians, the greater part of his army, 
 took to flight. He turned to gain the road to his 
 
DEFEAT OF THE FRENCH. 225 
 
 luggage, in order to save or, at least, blow up his 
 powder. Fighting desperately, step by step, he, 
 his officers, men, and the Iroquois and Arkansas, 
 who stood by him, held out for a short space. Then 
 the savages overwhelmed them. Nineteen only were 
 taken alive, among them D'Artaguette, wounded 
 in three places, and a Jesuit priest. 
 
 Two of the prisoners were put aside to exchange 
 for a Chickasaw warrior in the hands of the 
 French. The remaining were divided into two lots, 
 and burned in two huge fires, prepared by the 
 Chickasaw women. All died heroically, one French- 
 man singing his death song to the last, like an 
 Indian brave. 
 
 By the papers found on D'Artaguette, which 
 were read to them by their English friends, the 
 Chickasaws learned the plan of Bienville's cam- 
 paign. And they took their measures of defense, 
 and, as we have seen, took them well. The English 
 supplied them with ammunition, and showed them 
 how to fortify their cabins. They had only to 
 wait for Bienville to come, certain of defeating him. 
 
 Bienville never recovered from the pain and 
 shame of this double defeat. He returned to 
 New Orleans, more determined now than ever 
 to go against the Natchez and Chickasaws 
 in such force as would crush them, and wipe 
 
22G STORIES FROM LOUISIANA HISTORY. 
 
 out the disgrace of the French defeat by a brilliant 
 triumph. He wrote to France for artillery and 
 bombs and soldiers ; and to the governor of Canada 
 for a reinforcement of Canadian volunteers. He 
 sent engineers to explore the best routes to the 
 Chickasaws, and he kept his Canadians busy, win- 
 ning over the Indians to join him. On the report of 
 the engineers, he selected the route by the Missis- 
 sippi and Yazoo rivers, and two years were spent in 
 building a fort, called Fort Assumption, and a 
 depot for provisions, at the mouth of Wolf river. 
 This fort was to be the meeting place of the whole 
 army. Two hundred horses were sent from New 
 Orleans for the transportation of provisions, which 
 were to be drawn from the rich fields of the West. 
 Beeves and oxen were ordered from the Natchi- 
 toches country. 
 
 In the summer of 1739, the help asked for came 
 from France : arms, ammunition, provisions. There 
 were also, seven hundred sol^liers, bombar- 
 diers, cannoneers, and miners; but, on their arrival, 
 these were suffering so much from scurvy that less 
 than one-half were able to go on duty. Then they 
 took the fever, and great numbers of them died. 
 They were hurried out of the city, but on their way 
 up the river, many more of them died. 
 
 When Bienville himself landed at Fort Assump- 
 
DEFEAT OF THE FRENCH. 227 
 
 tion, he found the men from Canada and the Illi- 
 nois waiting. They raised his army to twelve hun- 
 dred white men and two thousand four hundred 
 savages. But it was one thing to get an army to the 
 fort, and another to get it into the Chickasaw 
 country. The continual rains and overflows made 
 the roads impassable for heavy wagons and artil- 
 lery, while the bottom lands could be crossed only 
 by boats or on bridges. More than one-half of the 
 live stock died in the woods before reaching the 
 river. Three months passed, and the situation did 
 not improve. Without a road and the means of get- 
 ting to the Chickasaws, the French army saw itself 
 in danger of a more inglorious fate even than befell 
 it on the Tombigbee; and the safety of the 
 Chickasaws was proved more clearly than ever. A 
 council of war was held to decide how to end the 
 campaign in the manner least shameful to the 
 French. 
 
 The Chickasaws, on their side, saw with uneasi- 
 ness, the great preparations made against them, 
 and in spite of the arms and ammunition given by 
 the English and the strength of their forts, they 
 began to drop, all around the French camp, calu- 
 mets and other symbols of peace. These, at first, 
 the French refused to consider; but finally they 
 decided to seek an agreement with the Indians. The 
 
228 STORIES FROM LOUISIANA HISTORY. 
 
 chiefs were persuaded, by the Indian allies of the 
 French, to come to the French camp and ask for 
 peace; but they were told they could not get it 
 unless they gave up the Natchez. The cunning 
 savages were prepared for this condition. They 
 declared they had bound and imprisoned their 
 Natchez guests in order to surrender them to the 
 French, but that unfortunately some of their young 
 men had released them, and all except three had 
 gone to the Cherokees. Again the Natchez had 
 escaped ! 
 
 Bienville returned with his army to New Orleans. 
 There, feeling bitterly that, after this last defeat, 
 his old reputation could no longer be the same in 
 the colony, he wrote to his government, asking to 
 be relieved of his office. This was granted, and the 
 Marquis de Yaudreuil was named to succeed him. 
 While awaiting the arrival of his successor, Bien- 
 ville endeavored to arrange affairs with the 
 Indians, so that the colony would not suffer by his 
 absence. Calling the prominent chiefs of the Ala- 
 bamma tribes to meet him at Mobile, he made them 
 presents, and had them sign treaties, which wouM 
 help them to get along with his successor. He left 
 Louisiana forever on the 10th of May, 1743. He 
 came to the colony a youth, full of hope and cour- 
 age ; he left it looking like an aged man, worn witli 
 
REVOLUTION OF 17G8. 229 
 
 care, anxiety, and disappointment. He had given 
 fortv-five years of toil to the task left him by Iber- 
 ville. We shall meet him once again, twenty-two 
 years later, in our stories. He died in Paris in 
 1768, a white-haired patriarch of eighty-eight years. 
 
 THE REVOLUTION OF 1768. 
 
 The Treaties. 
 
 In the year 1762 peace was made between the 
 great nations of Western Europe, Great Britain, 
 France, and Spain. War had been going on for 
 nearly seven years, especially between Great Brit- 
 ain and France; and this latter country had lost 
 so many battles that she was glad to sign a treaty 
 of peace. But by this treaty (the first form of 
 which was drawn up November 3d, 1762), France 
 had to agree to give up to Great Britain all that 
 part of Louisiana lying east of the Mississippi 
 river, except the Isle of Orleans. As the American 
 colonies had not yet won their independence. Great 
 Britain now owned all of North x^merica from the 
 
230 STORIES FROM LOUISIANA HtSTOIlY. 
 
 Atlantic to the Mississippi. Just across the Missis- 
 sippi was the great province of Louisiana with the 
 city of New Orleans at its lower end, all of which 
 still belonged to France. But France was afraid 
 that this portion, also, might fall into the hands 
 of Great Britain; and so the French king (Louis 
 XV.) now decided secretly to give it away to his 
 cousin, Charles III. of Spain, who had given him 
 help in the recent Avars. Spain already had Mexico 
 and South America and might be strong enough 
 to keep Great Britain from crossing the Mississippi 
 and taking the rest of Louisiana. 
 
 When the King of Spain was told of this splendid 
 present, he agreed to accept it, but neither he nor 
 the King of France let the secret be known to the 
 world for nearly two years. It is hard to keep 
 such a secret, however, and soon after the treaty 
 was made, it was whispered about in New Orleans 
 that Louisiana no longer belonged to France; that 
 the French king, Louis the Well-Beloved, had given 
 away one of his fairest provinces. Still the French 
 Creoles did not receive any message from their king, 
 and so they hoped and prayed that it was all a 
 mistake, and that they should continue to live 
 under the flag of France. Great was their grief, 
 therefore, when in October, 1764, the French gov- 
 ernor in Louisiana received a letter from the King 
 
REVOLUTION OP 1768. 231 
 
 of France, telling him that, two years before, the 
 province of Louisiana had been given to the King 
 of Spain and that as soon as the Spanish governor 
 arrived, he should be allowed to take possession of 
 it in the name of his Catholic Majesty, as the King 
 of Spain liked to be called. All the Creoles were 
 filled with grief at this dreadful news. There could 
 now be no doubt about the truth of it. Without 
 asking them whether the^^ wished to change kings 
 or not, their own beloved Louis had given away 
 their country to the King of Spain. Of course, if 
 they wished to leave Louisiana and go to France, 
 they could do so, but if they remained, as they all 
 wished to do, they must swear to obey the King of 
 Spain and cease to be called Frenchmen. Besides 
 the laws would be changed, and the rule of Spain, 
 they knew, would be much harder to bear than 
 that of France. Perhaps, however, they might per- 
 suade their king to take back a gift for which he 
 had received nothing in return. So a great meeting 
 was held in New Orleans, and every parish was 
 asked to send its best men. After listening to a 
 noble speech from one of the members, this assem- 
 bly chose John Milhet, a rich merchant of New 
 Orleans, and sent him to France to tell the king 
 how grieved the Creoles were to hear that Louisiana 
 had been given to Spain, and to beg him to take 
 back the province and be its king once more. 
 
232 STORlEi^ FROM LOUISIANA HISTORY. 
 
 Milliet sailed away to France, and as he knew no- 
 body at court, he went to see Bienville, the founder 
 of New Orleans, who was still alive at the great 
 age of eighty-six. Bienville said he understood the 
 feelings of the Creoles, and would do everything in 
 his power to help them to remain under the rule of 
 France. So he went with Milhet to call on the 
 Duke of Choiseul, who was secretary of state to the 
 king and who could introduce visitors at court. 
 But they soon found out that Choiseul, who had 
 made the treaty with Spain, did not wish the king 
 to take back Louisiana, and was unwilling to let 
 them even speak with his majesty. So Milhet had 
 to write home that he could do nothing in Paris 
 for those who had sent him, but that he would re- 
 main a while with the hope that Choiseul might 
 change his mind. 
 
 The Coming of Ulloa. 
 
 The Spaniards have always been famous for 
 '^putting off until tomorrow what might be done 
 today," and so it was in this case. For six months 
 after Milhet sailed for France, nothing was heard 
 from the Spaniards, and the Creoles began to hope 
 that they were never coming to take Louisiana. 
 Finally, however, a letter came from the new Span- 
 ish governor, Don Antonio de Ulloa, Avhicli said that 
 
THE COMING OF ULLOA. 233 
 
 he would soon arrive in New Orleans to take pos- 
 session of Louisiana in the name of the Si)anish 
 king. On the 5tli of March, 1765, his vessel an- 
 chored at the levee in New Orleans, and the Creoles 
 thought it a bad sign that when he landed a great 
 thunder storm burst over the city, and flooded the 
 streets with water. The inhabitants were not glad 
 to see him, but they received him with proper 
 respect, and waited with interest to see what he was 
 going to do. And certainly his behavior was ve^y 
 queer. He did not show any orders from the king, 
 his master, nor take possession of the province in a 
 public manner. The French governor, M. Aubry, 
 was always very polite and ready to serve him; so 
 he gave orders to the police through xA.ubry and 
 even made rules for the trade of the province 
 through the same person. The reason he behaved 
 in this manner seems to have been that he had 
 brought with him only ninety soldiers, and he did 
 not think these were enough to rule the province 
 with. There were a number of French troops in 
 Louisiana and he invited these to serve under him, 
 but they declared that they had already served their 
 terms and that they did not wish to serve under 
 any king but the King of France. x\s Ulloa could 
 not force them to serve the King of Spain, he de- 
 cided to w^ait for troops from Spain, and then take 
 public possession of Louisiana. 
 
234 STORIES FROM LOUISIANA HISTORY. 
 
 After he had been in New Orleans some months, 
 he left the city and went down to a lonely fort 
 called Balize, near the mouth of the Mississippi. 
 Here, surrounded by marshes and bitten by 
 mosquitoes, he remained for seven months. Part 
 of the time he spent in building a strong Spanish 
 fort, upon which he spent over |100,000. Besides 
 this, two curious things happened at the Balize. 
 The first was that Aubry came down from New 
 Orleans to see Ulloa, and while he was there, UUoa 
 asked him to sign a paper transferring Louisiana 
 to the Spanish King. Aubry agreed to do this, 
 and Ulloa promised to raise the Spanish flag at the 
 Balize the next morning. When the next morning 
 came, Ulloa had changed his mind and had decided 
 to wait for the Spanish troops before raising the 
 flag. When Aubry returned to New Orleans, he 
 did not tell the Creoles what he had done, but wrote 
 an account of it to the King of France, just as Ulloa 
 had done to his king. All this secrecy was to do a 
 great deal of harm a little later on. Soon after the 
 return of Aubry, the news of a second strange 
 happening came up to New Orleans. A marriage 
 had taken place at the Balize and Ulloa was the 
 bridegroom. There was great surprise at this; for 
 Ulloa was fifty-one years old, and no one thought 
 that he had gone to the Balize to meet a bride. The 
 
THE DEPARTURE OP ULLOA. 235 
 
 lady whom he had married was the beautiful 
 Marchioness of Abrado, a rich Peruvian, whom he 
 had courted in her owm country, and who had come 
 all the way to Louisiana to marry him. After the 
 marriage, Ulloa brought his wife up to New Orleans 
 to spend the honeymoon, but the Creoles, who had 
 learned to dislike him for the manner in which he 
 treated them, did not welcome his wife, and Ulloa 
 was much displeased. If he had been a wise gover- 
 nor, he would have seen that the way to win the 
 favor of the Creoles was to be frank and open with 
 them. Instead of doing this, he raised the Spanish 
 flag at some of the posts in Louisiana and sent his 
 ninety soldiers to them, while at New Orleans he 
 left the French flag flying. Even Aubry, who was 
 trying in every way to win his favor, wrote to 
 France : "I command for the King of France, and, 
 at the same time, I govern the colony as if it 
 belonged to the King of Spain. It is not a pleasant 
 task to govern a province which for three years has 
 not known whether it is French or Spanish, and 
 which, until the Spaniards take possession, has 
 really no master." 
 
 The Departure of Ulloa. 
 
 The proud Creoles became very indignant when 
 they saw that Spain did not send over any troops, 
 as if Louisiana were not worth the trouble; and 
 
236 STORIES FROM LOUISIANA HISTORY. 
 
 some of the chief men among them began a plot to 
 get rid of the Spaniards altogether. One of these 
 men was Jean Milhet, who had now returned from 
 France, where he had never been able to see the 
 king. The others were Lafreniere, the eloquent 
 attorney-general ; DeMasan, an ex-captain of infan- 
 try; De Noyan, and his brother Bienville, both 
 nephews of the founder of New Orleans; Marquis, 
 formerly an officer in a Swiss regiment; De. Bois- 
 blanc, a councillor; Doucet, a lawyer; Joseph Mil- 
 het, a merchant ; Caresse, a merchant ; Joseph Vil- 
 lere, an officer from the "German Coast" above 
 New Orleans; Petit and Poupet, merchants; and 
 Foucault, the intendant of the colony. 
 
 These men used to meet at the house of a Madame 
 Pradel, just outside of the old cit}-, where they 
 thought themselves safe from discovery.* Bienville 
 and Masan were sent over to Pensacola, which then 
 belonged to England, to ask aid of the English gov- 
 ernor. But this governor thought that if the 
 Louisiana colony were helped to revolt against 
 Spain, the American colonies might be encouraged 
 to rise up against England (as they did a few years 
 later) , and so he refused to help the Louisianians to 
 free themselves from Spain. As they could get no 
 help from England, the Louisianians now decided 
 
 * The Pradel house stood where the Cotton Exchange now Is. 
 
THE DEPARTURE OF ULLOA. 237 
 
 to help themselves. Six hundred of the chief men of 
 the colony signed a petition to the Superior Council 
 in New Orleans, asking that Ulloa be forced to 
 leave Louisiana in three days. After listening to 
 two eloquent speeches from Lafreniere, the council 
 decided that as Ulloa had shown no orders from his 
 king, he had no right to be governor in Louisiana, 
 and that he must depart in three days. A thousand 
 people had gathered in Jackson Square (then the 
 Place d'Armes) to hear what the council would do. 
 As soon as the news was given out, a white flag was 
 run up in the square, and every one cried: "Long 
 live the King of France! Long live Louis, the 
 Well-Beloved !'' 
 
 Ulloa and his wife saw that they should have to 
 go, and so they went on board a ship at the levee 
 and made ready to sail the next day. But that 
 night there was a- wedding in New Orleans. Some 
 young men, returning from the wedding feast, saw 
 Ulloa's ship, and in a spirit of mischief, they cut 
 the ropes and it floated down the river. It was 
 finally stopped by those on board; but the follow- 
 ing day Ulloa took the hint and sailed away to 
 Havana. When he reached that city, he found a 
 body of troops and a large sum of money, which 
 the King of Spain was at last sending over to 
 Louisiana. But it was too late. Ulloa feared to 
 
238 STORIES FROM LOUISIANA HISTORY. 
 
 return to New Orleans; and after resting a while 
 at Havana^ he sailed away to Spain, where he told 
 the king of the wicked revolt of the Louisiana col- 
 ony. Thus the colony was rid for a while of the 
 Spanish government, but the King of Spain was 
 very angry, and was resolved to make the Louis- 
 ianians suffer for their conduct. 
 
 In the meantime the colonists were wondering 
 what was best for them to do. They finally decided 
 to send two more messengers to France to beg at 
 the foot of the throne that Louis XV. would take 
 back the province and keep out the Spaniards. So 
 Charles Le Sassier and St. Lette sailed away to 
 France to carry the petition of the colonists. But 
 now the aged Bienville was dead, and the Due de 
 Choiseul was as decided as ever not to let them get 
 the ear of the king. St. Lette stayed in France, but 
 Le Sassier came back, as Milhet had done, and 
 brought the sad news that the French King would 
 give no aid. Deserted on all sides, the colonists 
 thought of declaring their independence, as the 
 American colonies did some seven years later, and 
 of forming a republic on the banks of the Missis- 
 sippi. But Louisiana at this time contained only 
 about 6,000 white inhabitants, and so small a repub- 
 lie could not resist for a day the powerful army of 
 Spain. There w^as nothing to do except to wait and 
 see what the Spanish King would do. 
 
THE DEATH OF THE PATRIOTS. 239 
 
 The Death op the Patriots. 
 
 One morning in July, six months after Ulloa had 
 sailed away, the news reached New Orleans that a 
 new Spanish governor, Don xllexandro O'Reilly, 
 with a force of several thousand men, had arrived 
 at the Balize and was coming up the river to take 
 possession of Louisiana. 
 
 Some of the Creoles prepared to resist the Span- 
 iards, but the wiser heads thought it would be use- 
 less, and so Lafreniere, Jean Milhet, and Marquis 
 went down the river to meet O'Reilly and to ex- 
 plain to him why Ulloa had been driven out of the 
 colony. The new governor invited them to dinner 
 on board his ship, and listened politely to their 
 speeches. 
 
 On the 18th of August, 1769, O'Reilly reached the 
 city. All the French troops and the militia were 
 drawn up in the Place d'Armes, and, placing him- 
 self at their head, Aubry marched out to the levee 
 to meet the new governor. Bridges were thrown 
 from the Spanish ships to the levee, and 3,000 Span- 
 ish troops in full uniform landed and formed in 
 regular columns along the sides of the square. 
 When the two governors met, O'Reilly announced 
 his name and rank. He then asked Aubry to read 
 to the people the orders of the Spanish King. This 
 was done, and Aubry spoke to the people, saying: 
 
240 STOKIES FiiOM LOUISIANA HISTORY. 
 
 ^'Louisiana is now ceded to the Spanish crown. 
 Prom this moment you are subjects of his Most 
 Catholic Majesty, and I release you from the oath 
 which bound you to the King of France." 
 
 The Creoles kept silence, but the Spanish soldiers 
 fired their muskets and shouted, "Long live the 
 King of Spain ! " while the heavy guns of the ships 
 fired salutes. After the keys of the city had been 
 handed over to O'Reilly the two governors and their 
 staffs entered the cathedral and listened to a 
 solemn "Te Deum," sung in honor of these import- 
 ant events. 
 
 The Creoles now thought the governor had for- 
 given all that had been done in the past; especially 
 as, on the following da^^, he gave a great dinner and 
 invited some of the chiefs of the revolution to dine 
 with him. But in this they were to be sadly dis- 
 appointed. On the very day of the dinner party, 
 he asked Aubrj- to give him the names of those who 
 had led the people in driving out Ulloa, and to tell 
 him all the details of the affair. Aubry, who wished 
 to win favor with O'Reilly, now acted in the mean- 
 est manner. He did not try to excuse his country- 
 men, as we should expect, but described them as the 
 most wicked of men. He even gave the names of 
 those who had led the revolt. On the day after, 
 O'Reilly invited the greater number of these to the 
 
THE DEATH OF THE PATRIOTS. 241 
 
 fine house which he had taken as his residence. At 
 the same time, he gave orders that some of his sol- 
 diers should surround the building. When his vis- 
 itors arrived, he asked them to step into his sitting- 
 room. As soon as they had done so, he said to 
 them: "The Spanish nation is respected through- 
 out the world. Louisiana is the only country which 
 is lacking in proper sentiments towards that na- 
 tion. The King of Spain is displeased at the writ- 
 ings which have come from the colony and at the 
 insult offered to Ulloa. I have been commanded 
 by his Catholic Majesty to arrest and judge, ac- 
 cording to the laws, the authors of this rebellion. 
 You must surrender your swords and consider 
 yourselves my prisoners. All your goods must be 
 given up to the king, but help will be given to your 
 wives and children." 
 
 Those who were arrested were Lafreniere, 
 N,oyan, De Masan, Marquis, DeBoisblanc, Doucet, 
 Joseph and John Milhet, Caresse, Petit, Poupet, 
 and Foucault. Another name sent to O'Reilly by 
 Aubry was that of Villere, but he was absent on his 
 plantation. When O'Eeilly came to New Orleans, 
 Villere thought of taking refuge among the En- 
 glish, but he was persuaded, it is said, by a letter 
 from Aubry to come down to New Orleans. Here 
 he was immediately arrested and placed on board 
 
242 STORIES FROM LOUISIANA HISTORY. 
 
 ship. There are different accounts of his death. 
 The truth seems to be that he made up his mind to 
 escape, and crying out ^^Villere was not born to die 
 on a scaffold," he tried to break through his guards. 
 One of them, however, ran a bayonet through the 
 prisoner's thigli, and Villere fell upon the deck, 
 wounded and furious wth rage. A few days later 
 he died. Another rather doubtful story is that 
 while he was a prisoner, his wife came out in a 
 small boat to visit him, but instead of allowing 
 her to see him, the Spanish guards threw down to 
 her the bloody shirt of her husband.* 
 
 It was hinted to Noyan, who was the nephew of 
 the great Bienville, that if he wished to escape, the 
 Spanish governor would permit it, but he had the 
 noble spirit of his uncle, and refused to desert his 
 companions. 
 
 The day for the trial of the prisoners was soon 
 fixed. They were tried by judges, as was the cus- 
 tom in such cases, without jury and without any 
 lawyers to defend them. Eleven were found guilty. 
 Six of them were sent to Havana and shut up in 
 Moro Castle, while Lafreniere, Noyan, Caresse, 
 Marquis, and Joseph Milhet, as chiefs of the rebel- 
 lion, were to be led to the gallows, with ropes 
 around their necks and mounted on asses, and there 
 to be hanged. 
 
 *The son of Villere was afterwai-d governor of Louisiana. 
 
THE GREAT PURCHASE. 243 
 
 All the Creoles wept over the sad fate of these 
 patriots, and prayed O'Keilly to spare their lives. 
 But nothing could move him. He declared that 
 they must die; but as the hangman of the colony 
 was a negro and no white man could be found to do 
 the work, he agreed that they should be shot in- 
 stead of hanged. Accordingly they Avere taken to a 
 little square near the old Ursuline Convent on 
 Chartres street. Here the sentence of death was 
 read to them. Then, refusing to have their eyes 
 bandaged, they faced the guns of the soldiers. The 
 nuns praying with the families of the condemned in 
 the convent near by heard the reports of the 
 muskets. All was over. 
 
 THE GREAT PURCHASE. 
 
 Jefferson and Napoleon. 
 
 Up to the time when the first Spanish explorers 
 wandered into the country of the Mississippi, it had 
 always been the home of the red man, but after the 
 arrival of the white man there came many changes. 
 The far-stretching valley of the great river was 
 
244 STORIES FROM LOUISIANA HISTORY. 
 
 claimed and claimed again by different countries in 
 Europe, given away, and traded off and sold by 
 them before it all passed at last into the hands of 
 its next-door neighbor and natural owner, the 
 United States. Only the United States was strong 
 enough and near enough to hold on to Louisiana, 
 to search out all the secrets of its woods and 
 streams and plains, and to people it with men and 
 women who would make it prosper like the other 
 parts of the United States. 
 
 ^^Ve have seen that the Spanish explorers made 
 no .settlements, and it was the French, who 
 many years afterwards discovered Louisiana anew 
 and named and claimed it for the King of France, 
 that were the first to build houses and towns, and 
 make Louisiana the home of white men. Louisiana 
 is French by birth, and though she is now a good 
 and true American, many of her people will always 
 be French by nature and French at heart. But only 
 for eighty years, we must remember, was Louis- 
 iana under the French flag, and even then France 
 knew little of the great land she claimed, beyond 
 the small settlements that were scattered along the 
 coasts and rivers. 
 
 The old Louisiana first named and claimed by 
 France was all the vast country which is watered 
 by the Mississippi and its branches. You see on 
 
THE GREAT PURCHASE. 245 
 
 the map how this takes in the greater part of the 
 United States, reaching from Canada to the Gulf 
 of Mexico and from the Alleghanies to the Eocky 
 Mountains. It is about fourteen hundred miles 
 from north to south, and the same from east to 
 west, and more than twenty of our states and ter- 
 ritories were cut from it, either partly or wholly. 
 All this country and more besides France lost in 
 the year 1762. In the great war between France and 
 England, which lasted seven years, you remember 
 France was beaten, and had to give up to England 
 all that part of Louisiana lying east of the Missis- 
 sippi, and then, for fear England would help herself 
 to the rest, which France was now too weak to de- 
 fend, the French King made haste to give this, also, 
 to his cousin, the King of Spain. So Louisiana not 
 only changed owners, but was cut in two, and the 
 part that was given to Spain alone kept the name of 
 Louisiana. But this was much the greater part. 
 It took in all the country west of the Mississippi 
 River, across to the Rocky Mountains, up to Can- 
 ada, and down to the Gulf ; and also that land east 
 of the river called the Isle of Orleans. This Isle of 
 Orleans has always been a most important part of 
 Louisiana^' It was then bounded on the west by the 
 Mississippi, on the north and east by the Iberville 
 River — (which has since been closed) — by Lake 
 
246 STORIES FROM LOUISIANA HISTORY. 
 
 Maurepas, and Lake Pontcliartrain ; and on the 
 south by Lake Borgne, and the Gulf of Mexico. On 
 it was New Orleans, Avhere there lived then most of 
 the white people in that part of the world; and as 
 it reached down to the Gulf it gave to Spain the 
 vrhole mouth of the old Father of Waters. 
 
 We find it hard to remember, at present, all that 
 our big river meant to the Indians and the early 
 settlers. N^w we have roads and railroads through 
 all the country, but then through the West there 
 were no roads except the rivers; and, as all the 
 great rivers between the Alleghanies and the 
 Rocky Mountains flow into the Mississippi, all this 
 wide country had no way to the sea except through 
 the mouth of the Mississippi. 
 
 Into the mouth of the Mississippi and up to New 
 Orleans came Spanish ships, bringing from Europe 
 oil and wine, and cottons, and woolens, and silks, 
 and tools, and all the other things that the colonists 
 needed, but were not yet able to make or raise for 
 themselves. On the Mississippi, and on the long 
 branch rivers to the east and west, there were 
 every year more people and new settlements; and 
 every year more and more boats came floating down 
 the river loaded with lumber, and furs, and corn, 
 and tobacco, which the colonists brought down to 
 exchange for the things that came to New Orleans 
 
THE GREAT PURCHASE. 247 
 
 in the ships. Of course, the boatmen must have 
 some place where they could land and store their 
 goods, and trade with the merchants from the ships 
 — what is called a "place of deposit." 
 
 New Orleans was the place of deposit for all the 
 river trade. She was close enough to the sea and 
 had deep enough water to let the ocean ships come 
 up and land, as thej^ do now at her wharves. This 
 made New Orleans, from the first, a busy town, and 
 each year the trade between the boats and the ships 
 grew larger and brisker. 
 
 For some years all went pretty well for the 
 American colonists who lived on the east of the 
 Mississippi. Spain hated England, and during the 
 Revolutionary War she did everything to help the 
 Americans. But Spain also disliked republics, and 
 after the United States w^on their freedom, in 1783, 
 she made more and more trouble for the American 
 boatmen who came trading down to New Orleans. 
 These Westerners, who lived along the Mississippi 
 and its branches, were, as you know, a brave and 
 adventurous race of men. They were determined 
 that New Orleans should belong to the United 
 States, and, as Spain was unwilling to sell it, they 
 were ready at a word to swarm down and drive out 
 the Spaniards and seize the city. Still the Ameri- 
 can government believed that its river trade was 
 
248 STORIES FliOM LOUISIANA HISTORY. 
 
 in no real danger. Spain was a weak country, and 
 the United States* could always force her to keep 
 the river open. 
 
 But in. the year 1801, came news from Europe 
 that piade the American President decide that New 
 Orleans must be owned by the United States. It 
 was whispered that Louisiana had again changed 
 hands, Spain had given it back to France. 
 
 France was no longer the crippled country that 
 had been forced to give up Louisiana. There had 
 come from an island to the south of France a little 
 cadet named N'apoleon Bonaparte, who in a few 
 years had 'climbed to the head of the French army, 
 and had grown to be one of the greatest generals 
 the world has ever known. With Napoleon to lead 
 her army, France was winning every battle she 
 chose to tight, and now the French felt strong 
 enough to conquer the world. Napoleon wished to 
 make France the mightiest of all the nations, and 
 he determined to get back for her all the colonies 
 that she had lost in the past. As the greatest of 
 these was Louisiana, he sent his brother, Lucien, 
 down to Spain to persuade the Spanish King to 
 give Louisiana back to France. Napoleon had so 
 much power that he found it easy to '^persuade" 
 the weaker countries of Europe. Through Lucien 
 he promised to give Spain some help that she 
 
THE GREAT PURCHASE. 249 
 
 needed, and he also promised that he would not 
 let any other nation get possession of Louisiana; 
 
 THOMAS JEFFERSON IN 1803. 
 
 and on these easy terms, Spain gave the whole 
 immense colony back to Prance. 
 
 Again the people of Louisiana had changed 
 
250 STORIES FROM LOUISIANA HISTORY. 
 
 masters without having a word to say for them- 
 selves; but this time they were glad of the change 
 that would bring them again under the flag of their 
 beloved France. 
 
 But the United States did not feel this jo}^ 
 Thomas Jefferson, the President, wrote to Robert R. 
 Livingston, the American Minister in France, that 
 there was, on the globe, one single spot, the owner 
 of which was the natural enemy of the United 
 States. This was New Orleans, through which the 
 produce of nearly half of the United States must 
 pass to market. 
 
 The President knew that France was strong 
 enough to make a most uncomfortable neighbor for 
 the Western States. She could charge the Ameri- 
 can boatmen any price she chose for landing in 
 New Orleans, and she might at any moment stop 
 the American boats from coming into the lower 
 Mississippi. President Jefferson wisely decided 
 tliat he would not wait for the trouble to begin, but 
 would at once send a special agent oA-er to France, 
 and try in ever}^ way to buy New Orleans. He sent 
 James ^Mouroe to join Livingston in Paris, and he 
 gave these two power to make a bargain with 
 Napolex)n. They were to offer two million dollars 
 at first, and were allowed to bid as high as ten 
 millions for New Orleans and a part of West 
 Florida. 
 
THE GREAT PURCHASE. 251 
 
 NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 
 
 (After painting by Delaroclie.) 
 
252 STORIES FROM LOUISIANA HISTORY, 
 
 Napoleon was now the ruler, not only of the 
 French Army, but of all Prance. His word was 
 the law of the land, and if the Americans could per- 
 suade him to sell New Orleans, no one in France 
 had power to stop him. There was a kind of legis- 
 lature called ^^The Chambers," but it could do 
 nothing against Napoleon. 
 
 This was in the year 1803. Napoleon had won 
 great battles in Austria and Italy and Egypt; but 
 England, the strong old enemy of France, was still 
 to fight. Napoleon hated and dreaded England 
 more than all the rest of Europe, and he was gath- 
 ering all his strength, and all the strength of 
 France, for the great battle with England that he 
 knew must soon take place. So Jefferson's offer to 
 buy New^ Orleans came at a lucky time. In the 
 first place. Napoleon needed more money than 
 France could afford for his coming fight with Eng- 
 land. In the second place, though France fought 
 well on land, England was the Queen of the Sea, 
 and Napoleon felt sure that as soon as war was 
 declared, the English ships would sail over and 
 seize Louisiana. Here was a good chance to get 
 money for the war, to have the Americans defend 
 Louisiana against England, and at the same time 
 to make friends with the United States, Avhich was 
 growing to be a stronger nation every year. 
 
THE GREAT PURCHASE. 
 
 253 
 
 One day, in the springtime of 1803, Mr. Living- 
 ston was making his offers to buy New Orleans to 
 Talleyrand, Napoleon's minister, when, to his sur- 
 prise, Talleyrand, who up to this time had done his 
 
 l« 
 
 ''^E^ 
 
 V 
 
 
 ^ 
 
 
 B 
 
 * 
 
 ROBERT R. LWINGSTON. 
 
 best to stop the sale, asked suddenly, "How would 
 the United States like to have the whole of 
 Louisiana?" 
 
 This was more than Mr. Livingston was ready 
 to bargain for, but Talleyrand said, "Tf France 
 gives up New Orleans, the rest of Louisiana will 
 be of little value. What will you give for the whole 
 of it? " 
 
254 
 
 STORIES FROM LOUISIANA HISTORY. 
 
 Livingston and Monroe had not been given the 
 right to make such a big purchase, but they saw 
 that this was a rare chance for the United States, 
 and they were wise enough and bold enough to act 
 
 JAMES MONROE. 
 
 without waiting to hear from home. Nowadays an 
 American can cable home from France and get an 
 answer the same day, but then it took at least two 
 months to hear from America. There was no way 
 of sending a word across the ocean, except by sail- 
 boats. So Livingston and Monroe, hoping^ that the 
 President and the Senate would approve of their 
 
THE GREAT PURCHASE. 255 
 
 bargain, agreed to take the whole of Louisiana, and 
 to pay for it, in all, fifteen million dollars. 
 
 When their treaty, dated April 30, 1803, reached 
 home, one month later, there was at first a good deal 
 of trouble. Jefferson himself was shocked, as he 
 had never dreamed of buying such a whole new 
 world. , Some people thought fifteen millions were 
 too much to pay for Louisiana ; some thought that 
 Louisiana was too big a country for the United 
 States to manage ; some feared that the French and 
 Spanish Catholics would never make good Ameri- 
 can citizens, and some declared that Spain would 
 go to war with the United States, and even that 
 France would take our money, and then help Spain 
 to get back Louisiana. But Jefferson collected and 
 sent to Congress many papers, telling of the won- 
 ders and riches of Louisiana. Some of these told 
 strange stories — of a mountain of solid salt one 
 hundred and eighty miles long, of prairie land 
 which was too rich to grow trees, and on which 
 wandered giant Indians and animals much larger 
 than elephants. Finally the people grew accus- 
 tomed to the idea of owning Louisiana, the treaty 
 was accepted, and the price was paid. 
 
 Just a few months after the people of Louisiana 
 heard that Spain had given them to France, they 
 learned that France had sold them to the United 
 
256 
 
 STORIES FROM LOl'ISIAXA HISTORY. 
 
 States. They were grieved and indignant, as they 
 perhaps had a right to be, for they did not then see 
 that they were to be much better off now than they 
 ever had been before. 
 
 As for tlie United States, it has never been sorry 
 for its bargain. We bouglit for our fifteen million 
 dollars the larger part of the greatest and richest 
 valley of the world. We bought a country as big as 
 France and Spain and Portugal and Italy and 
 Germany and Great Britain all together — more 
 than a million square miles, nearly six hundred 
 million acres, for about two and a half cents an 
 acre. Thougli the exploring parties that were sent 
 to find out about the new land did not find the 
 mountain of salt and the great animals, they found 
 untold wonders and riches. 
 
THE BATH-TUB SCENE. 2o ( 
 
 The sale of Louisiana was an unpleasant surprise 
 to Spain. The King of Spain was very angry to 
 find that Napoleon had broken his promise, and 
 he warned the United States not to touch Louisi- 
 ana. But what could he do, after all? Napoleon 
 was too strong for Spain to fight. After thinking 
 awhile, therefore, the Spanish King said he would 
 make no more trouble, "because of his love for the 
 United States." 
 
 And as for Napoleon, he was proud of his sale 
 and boasted that he had strengthened forever the 
 power of the United States. "I have given Eng- 
 land," he said, '^a rival on the seas who will sooner 
 or later humble her pride." These words of Napo- 
 leon seem to have come true some ten years later; 
 for in the war of 1812-15, the Americans fought 
 fifteen ship-duels with the English, and won all but 
 three of them. 
 
 The Rath-Tub Scene. 
 
 It is said that the French never forgave Napoleon 
 for selling Louisiana. His own brothers were very 
 much shocked when they first heard of his 
 plan, and did all they could to stop the sale. His 
 younger brother, Lucien Bonaparte, who had just 
 helped to get Louisiana back from Spain, has 
 described the scene. He tells how, one evening in 
 
258 STORIES FROM LOUISIANA HISTORY. 
 
 the month of April, he and his brother Jose^^h met 
 to go to the theatre. 
 
 " ^Here you are at last ! ' exclaimed my brother, 
 ^I was afraid you were not coming. It is a fine time 
 to go to the theatre. I come to tell you a piece of 
 news which will not make you feel like amusing 
 yourself. . . You will not believe it, and yet it is 
 true. I give you a thousand guesses ; the General* 
 (we still called Napoleon in that way), the General 
 wishes to sell Louisiana.' 
 
 " 'Bah! who will buy it from him?^ 
 
 " 'The Americans.' 
 
 ''I was thunderstruck for a moment. 'The idea! 
 If he could wish it, the Chambersf would not con- 
 sent to it.' 
 
 " 'And, therefore, he expects to do without their 
 consent. That is what he replied to me when I 
 said to him, as you do now, that the Chambers 
 would not consent to it.' 
 
 " 'What, he really said that to you? That is a lit- 
 tle too much ! But no ; it is imj^ossible. It is a bit 
 of brag at your expense . . . . ' 
 
 " 'No, no,' insisted Joseph, 'he spoke very seri- 
 ously, and, what is more, he added to me that this 
 sale would furnish him the first funds for war.' " 
 
 * Napoleon was now First Consul of France, and had as much power 
 as if he were kins. 
 
 tThe legislature of France, 
 
THE BATH-TUB SCENE. 259 
 
 Lucien and Joseph talked earnestly over the mat- 
 ter, and decided that on the next morning they 
 would go to see their brother and beg him to give 
 up what seemed to them his wild and foolish plan- 
 
 Lucien writes, ^^The eighteen* millions seemed to 
 me besides, as I still think them today, a miserable 
 and pitiable price." 
 
 "The next morning . . . . " he goes on, "I betook 
 myself to the *Tuileries, where I was immediately 
 shown up to my brother, who had just got into his 
 bath. I found him in excellent humor. He began 
 by speaking of the theatre. . .It was almost time 
 to leave the bath and .... we had not discussed 
 Louisiana any more than we had the year forty. I 
 was vexed at it, but the nearer the last moment of 
 speaking of it approached, the more I put off doing 
 so. The body-servant was already holding the sheet 
 prepared to wrap his master in: I was about to 
 leave the place when Rustan scratched at the door 
 like a cat .... The person for whom Rustan had 
 broken his nails. . . .was Joseph. 
 
 " ^Let him come in,' said the First Consul, 'I will 
 stay in the water a quarter of an hour longer.' 
 
 "It was known that he liked very much to stay 
 there a long time, when there was no pressing busi- 
 ness. I had time to make a sign to the new-comer 
 
 •It was fifteen millions. 
 -^ I The royal palace where Napoleon lived. 
 
260 STORIES FROM LOUISIANA HISTORY. 
 
 that I had not yet spoken of anything, and I saw 
 that he was himself embarrassed as to when and 
 how. he was to open the subject. . . . 
 
 "All at once the Consul said to Joseph : ^Well, 
 brother, so you have not spoken to Lucien?' 
 
 " ^About what?' said Joseph. 
 
 " ^About our plan in regard to Louisiana, you 
 know.' 
 
 " ^About yours, my dear brother, you mean? You 
 cannot have forgotten that, far from being mine — ' 
 
 " *Come, come, preacher — but I have no need of 
 talking about that with you : you are so hard- 
 headed. With Lucien I speak more willingly of 
 serious matters ; for he knows how to give in to my 
 opinion, Lucien does. . . .' 
 
 "Joseph then said to the Consul, rather roughly : 
 'Well, you still say nothing of your great plan?' 
 
 " ^Oh ! yes,' said the Consul, ^but it is late, and if 
 Lucien will wait for me in my study with you, Mis- 
 ter Grumbler, I will join you soon : do me the favor 
 to recall my body-servant, for I must leave the bath. 
 Know merely, Lucien, that I have decided to sell 
 Louisiana to the Americans ' 
 
 "I contented myself with saying, ^Ah! ah!' in a 
 tone which was meant to show only a wish to know 
 more 
 
 "This seeming indifference made Napoleon say, 
 
THE BATH-TUB SCENE. 261 
 
 *Well, Joseph, you see! Lucien does not make an 
 outcry about that as you do, yet he would almost 
 have a right to do so for his part.' 
 
 " ^As for me, I assure you,' replied Joseph, 'that if 
 Lucien says nothing, he thinks none the less.' 
 
 a ^Truly? And why should he play the actor with 
 mer " 
 
 Lucien answered that it was true that on this 
 subject he thought like Joseph. 
 
 "I flatter m3^self,'' he added in a tone which he 
 tried to make as little angry as possible, ^'I flatter 
 myself that the Chambers will not give their con- 
 sent to it." 
 
 Then Lucien's story goes on : 
 
 " *You flatter yourself?' Napoleon said 'That 
 
 is fine in truth'. . . .and at the same time Joseph 
 exclaimed, with an air of triumph : 'And I, too, 
 flatter myself so, and that is what I told the First 
 Consul.' 
 
 " 'And what did I answer you?' said my brother 
 pretty sharply, looking at us one after the other, 
 as if that the expression of our faces might not 
 escape him, 
 
 " 'You answered that you would do without the 
 consent of the Chambers : is not that it?' 
 
 " 'Precisely : that is what I have taken the great 
 liberty of saying to Mr. Joseph, and what I repeat 
 here to Citizen Lucien.' 
 
262 STORIES FROM LOUISIANA HISTORY. 
 
 "The discussion, perhaps, would have stopped 
 there to our great regret, and we were about to 
 start for the door to leave the Consul free to come 
 out of his bath ; he had already made a movement 
 to do so and his body-servant was still holding his 
 sheet spread out, ready to receive his master and to 
 dry him by wrapping him in it, when this master, 
 changing his mind all at once, said to us loud 
 enough to make us turn round : 
 
 " ^And then, gentlemen, think what you please 
 about it, but give this affair up as lost to both of 
 you; you, Lucien, on account of the sale in itself; 
 you, Joseph, because I shall get along without the 
 consent of anyone whomsoever, do you under- 
 stand?' " 
 
 Lucien felt hurt, he says, at these words of 
 Napoleon, and there escaped from him "a smile of 
 astonishment,'' which seemed to displease the great 
 man in the bath-tub. Joseph, who was Napoleon's 
 older brother, was now very angry, and declared 
 that he would himself head the party that he knew 
 would rise up to stop the sale of Louisiana. 
 
 To this Napoleon only replied by laughing aloud. 
 Joseph became redder and redder from anger, and, 
 almost stuttering, said : 
 
 "Laugh, laugh, laugh then ! None the less I will 
 do what I say, and althougli I do not like to speak 
 in public, this time I shall do so." 
 
tHE BATH-TUB SCENE. 263 
 
 At these words, Napoleon, lifting himself half- 
 way out of the bath tub, said that there would never 
 be a chance for Joseph to rise up and speak against 
 him ; that there would be no discussion, as the sale, 
 which was his own idea, was entirely his own affair, 
 and would be put through b}^ himself alone: ^'By 
 me," he said, "who snap my fingers at your opposi- 
 tion.'^ 
 
 Lucien says: "After these words the Consul 
 sank down tranquilly in the waves whitened with 
 cologne water of his bath tub." 
 
 But Joseph, in the tone of the greatest anger, 
 with which his handsome face was aflame, replied 
 that in that case Napoleon and all his family had 
 better get ready to go into exile, where they would 
 surely be sent. 
 
 At this, Napoleon, flying into a fnry, which made 
 his face as white as Joseph's anger had made his 
 red, cried out: "You are an insolent fellow!" and 
 rose suddenly from the water, and as suddenly 
 threw himself back with a splash that deluged 
 Joseph from head to foot. 
 
 The scene changed and became comic. The sud- 
 den bath to his face and his clothes had cooled 
 Joseph's anger. He allowed himself to be sponged 
 and dried off by the body-servant, who, to Lucien's 
 regret, had been a witness of the whole scene, and 
 
2G4: STUKIES FliOM LOUISIANA HISTORY. 
 
 who in the end actually fainted away — so overcome 
 was lie at seeing tlie anger of such great men. 
 
 Soon after this bath-tub scene, Napoleon sold 
 Louisiana to the United States, and the French 
 Chambers did not venture to make any objections. 
 
 THE CHANGE OP FLAGS IN NEW 
 ORLEANS. 
 
 Before the sale of Louisiana took place, the First 
 Consul (Bonaparte) had sent over to New Orleans 
 an agent, Mr. Laussat, who a few months later was 
 the Commissioner of France to receive the province 
 of Louisiana from Spain and to hand it over to the 
 United States. So slow was the coming of news in 
 those days, when there were no steamboats or tele- 
 graph, that Laussat did not hear until near the end 
 of July that the rumors were true and that, on the 
 30th of April, Louisiana had actually been sold to 
 the United States. Laussat was very much aston- 
 ished ; he had been sure that Napoleon would keep 
 Louisiana and make it a French colony. 
 
 On the 30th of November, a 2:reat crowd assem- 
 
266 STORIES FROM LOUISIANA HISTORY. 
 
 bled at Jackson Square, then known as the Place 
 cV Amies. In the Cabildo, (now the Supreme Court 
 building), just opposite, Laussat, as French Com- 
 missioner, met the Spanish Commissioners, Casa 
 Calvo and Salcedo. The latter i3laced in Laussat's 
 hands the keys of the city, declaring that Louisiana 
 now belonged to France, and that all the inhabi- 
 tants who wished to be subjects of the French gov- 
 ernment were released from their allegiance to the 
 King of Spain. The Commissioners then walked 
 out onto the gallery to see the change of flags. Amid 
 the firing of cannon the Spanish flag came down 
 from the tall staff in the square and the French 
 "tricolor'' soon waved over the crowd. This would 
 have been a very interesting event for the Creoles, 
 if they had not known that they would remain 
 under the flag of their beloved France only a few 
 weeks and then be subject to the government of 
 the United States. 
 
 Twenty days later the people assembled in the 
 Place d'Armes once more. This time Laussat met in 
 the Cabildo the Commissioners of the American 
 government, Messrs. Claiborne and Wilkinson. The 
 treaty was read, the keys of the city handed to Mr. 
 Claiborne, and Laussat declared that Louisiana 
 now belonged to the United States. Claiborne made 
 an address, in which he told the people that they 
 
THE CHANGE OF FLAGS IN NEW ORLEANS. 267 
 
 would soon be made full citizens of the United 
 States, and in the meantime would be protected in 
 their liberty, and property, and religion. Again 
 the cannon boomed, and again the flags were 
 
 changed. 
 
 Now 
 
 the French flag came fluttering 
 
 THE CABILDO. 
 
 down and the Stars and Stripes waved in the breeze. 
 The Creoles did not cheer the new flag. They had 
 not been asked whether they wished to have their 
 country sold to the United States, and they did 
 not love the flag that had just been placed over 
 them. They did not foresee that twelve years later 
 
268 STORIES FROM LOUISIANA HISTORY. 
 
 they would be fighting with great bravery and en- 
 thusiasm under this very flag. Now they looked 
 with a kind of dull curiosity at the soldiers drawn 
 up in the Square and at the fall of the flag that was 
 dear to them because it seemed to take them back 
 to their beloved France.* 
 
 NEW ORLEANS IN 1804. 
 
 A traveller,* who visited New Orleans in 1804, 
 has left us some interesting notes on the manners 
 and customs of the Crescent City as he saw it at that 
 time. ^^Tlie French, Spanish and Americans," he 
 tells us, "keep themselves separate in society. The 
 Americans assemble much together and the French, 
 except in business, keep aloof, though when one vis- 
 its them, they are very friendly and agreeable. 
 The people are simple in their habits — they indulge 
 in no extravagance or expense. They are fond of 
 gaiety and dancing, but all is cheaply done. The 
 
 *In December, 1903, the scenes we have described were repeated In 
 the Oabildo by the descendants of those who took part in them one 
 hundred years before. 
 
 t John F. Watson in "American Pioneer " for May. 1843. The order 
 of these notes and the language have been somewhat changed. ' 
 
NEW ORLEANS IN 1804. 269 
 
 admittance to a ball is half a dollar, and the ladies 
 go gratis. The ladies' dresses are mostly of white 
 muslin, and sometimes silk of gay colors, but never 
 costly, and always neatly and modestly made. 
 
 "Being at the theatre one night when it came on 
 to a rain, the wife of the sheriff of New Orleans 
 and the daughter of a Spanish captain both pulled 
 off their silk stockings and gave them to me to 
 carry, and casting the skirts of their gowns over 
 their heads, set off home on foot, making merry all 
 the way ! The ladies at no time wear caps, turbans, 
 or bonnets. No bonnets are ever seen on the 
 streets. They cover their hair with a graceful veil. 
 They are beautiful in person, in gestures, and in 
 action. Nearly all are brunettes. Though none 
 have color in their cheeks, none look unhealthy. 
 Young ladies do not dare to ride out or to appear 
 abroad with young gentlemen ; but ladies frequently 
 ride abroad in a chair carriage { volant e ) ,majisigmg 
 the horse themselves. They usually drive in a 
 gallop ; no trotting is seen. Their volante carriages 
 are very ugly. Often mules are driven, and some- 
 times horses and mules are driven three or four 
 abreast. 
 
 "The boys here never romp or riot in the streets 
 at rude play. They all affect long coats and boots, 
 even from their earliest boyhood. 
 
270 STORIES FROM LOUISIANA HISTORY. 
 
 ^^I often see negroes pnt np for sale, and I see ves- 
 sels loaded with them for sale also. In the latter 
 they are made to dance and seem lively and healthy 
 to increase their value. They assemble in great 
 numbers on the levee on Sunday and make them- 
 selves glad with song, dance, and merriment. ^Light- 
 hearted wretches' ; in them the wind indeed seems 
 ^tempered to the shorn lamb.' They do enjoy them- 
 selves. 
 
 "Generally people live upstairs in the large houses 
 and rent out the lower part for stores. Many 
 houses have no glass lights. None of the streets 
 have pavements, and after a rain the black, loamy, 
 greasy state of the earth would make sleighing 
 easy. On such occasions we all walk on a long line 
 of single logs, set at the edge of the footway as the 
 water sewer. There is some fun in contending for 
 this single walk on wet days. 
 
 "I have never seen or eaten any butter here; few 
 persons milk cows, though cattle are plenty and 
 cheap. There is no copper coin in circulation ; one 
 can't buy anything for less than a six cent piece, 
 called a picayune.* Shrimps are much eaten, also 
 a dish called gumbo. This last is made of every 
 eatable substance, and especially of the shrimps, 
 which can be caught at any time at the river side, 
 with a small net. 
 
 *This was a Spanish coin worth (Mi cents, 
 
NEW ORLEANS IN 1804. 271 
 
 "New Orleans has four forts at the four corners 
 of the town, and a levee entirely surrounds the 
 whole place. The forts in the rear are going to ruin, 
 but those in the front (on the river) are guarded by 
 soldiers. The first part of January, 1805, three or 
 four flatboats arrived from Charleston (West Vir- 
 ginia) ; they were twelve weeks in coming. They 
 had taken out half their cargoes to get over the 
 falls of the Ohio. By their early arrival they sold 
 their flour at |12.50 a barrel." 
 
 Our traveller also describes the charivari, a 
 curious form of amusement, borrowed from France, 
 which he witnessed in New Orleans: "Masquer- 
 ades," he says, "have ceased in New Orleans for 
 eight or nine years, but sherri-varries (charivaries) 
 are still practiced. They consist in mobbing the 
 house of a widow* when she remarries, and de- 
 manding a gift for the public. When Madame 
 Don Andres Almonester was married, the affair 
 lasted three whole days, and brought in crowds 
 from the country. The house was mobbed by thous- 
 ands of persons, shouting at the tops of their 
 voices. Many were in disguise dresses and masks; 
 hundreds were on horseback ; and all had some kind 
 of noisy musical instrument, as old kettles, shovels 
 and tongs, and clanging metals. Some of the 
 crowd drew along in a cart effigies of the widow's 
 
 * Men were also charivaried. 
 
2<2 STORIES FROM LOUISIANA HISTORY. 
 
 former husband and of her present husband. The 
 former husband's effigy was lying in a coffin, while 
 the widow, represented by a living person, sat near 
 it. As Madame did not receive this rude mob 
 very courteously, she became unpopular and was 
 forced to make a public gift of three thousand dol- 
 lars in solid coin for an out-door mass." 
 
 THE FIEST STEAMBOAT ON THE 
 MISSISSIPPI. 
 
 At the beginning of the year 1812, no steamboat 
 had ever appeared at New Orleans, but on the 12th 
 of January, in that year, there was great excite- 
 ment in the Crescent City. A vessel run by steam 
 had come down the river from Pittsburg, Pennsyl- 
 vania, and was to be seen at the levee. A curious, 
 wondering crowd assembled to view the strange ob- 
 ject. Before this time all the products of the West 
 had been brought down to the city in flatboats, keel 
 boats, and barges. The flatboats were so large and 
 so hard to steer that when they reached New 
 Orleans they were broken up as soon as they were 
 
FIRST STEAMBOAT ON MISSISSIPPI. 273 
 
 unloaded, and sold for old lumber. The keel boats 
 were long, with sharp ends, and when they were 
 covered over with a rough shed roof, were called 
 "barges." "Keels" and "barges" could be taken 
 back up the river with long poles and heavy oars, 
 but it was slow, hard work. 
 
 Eobert Fulton, who some years before, ha.d built 
 a steamboat to run on the Hudson in New York, de- 
 cided to make a model for a steamboat which should 
 trade between Natchez and New Orleans. The task 
 of building the boat and the engine was to be super- 
 intended by Mr. Nicholas J. Roosevelt, a well 
 known navigator of that day.* First of all Mr. 
 Roosevelt and his wife floated down the Ohio and 
 the Mississippi from Pittsburg to New Orleans on 
 a flatboat. On this trip he examined these rivers, 
 their currents and their channels, and even pur- 
 chased a lot of coal, which he had piled up on the 
 banks at certain stations for the steamboat which 
 he had not yet built, but which he felt sure he 
 would build. The old boatmen on the Mississippi 
 told him that a steamboat would be lost in the 
 whirling eddies and currents of a great river like 
 the Mississippi; but Mr. Roosevelt thought he 
 knew better. At any rate, he was determined to 
 make the trial. 
 
 *He was the grandfather of President Theodore Roosevelt. 
 
274 STORIES FROM LOUISIANA HISTORY. 
 
 In 1811, at Pittsburg, he began to build the new 
 boat. It was 116 feet long and 20 feet wide. It* cost 
 about 138,000. ]Men were sent out into the forest to 
 cut the timber and to float it down to the shipyard. 
 As soon as the vessel was completed, it was 
 christened ''The New Orleans," and in September, 
 1811, it was ready to start on its trip to the city 
 after which it had been named. The only pas- 
 sengers were to be Mr. and Mrs. Roosevelt. As the 
 voyage was looked upon as dangerous, especially 
 the ''shooting" of the falls of the Ohio, the friends 
 of Mrs. Roosevelt tried to dissuade her from going ; 
 but she was glad to share the dangers of her hus- 
 band. Besides the passengers, there were the cap- 
 tain, the engineer, a pilot, six sailors, several ser- 
 vants, and a big New Foundland dog. 
 
 When all was ready, the steamer started on its 
 long voyage amid the shouts of a great crowd of 
 spectators, who cried Godspeed to the passengers. 
 On the second day they reached Cincinnati, and 
 were greeted by nearly all the inhabitants of the 
 place. "You are as good as your word," some one 
 cried out to Mr. Roosevelt ; "you have visited us in a 
 steamboat ; but we see you for the last time. Your 
 boat may go down the river, but as for coming up, 
 the very idea is absurd." 
 
 At midnight, October 1st, the boat reached 
 Louisville, and the roar of the steam escaping 
 
FIRST STEAMBOAT ON MISSISSIPPI. 275 
 
 aroused the town. Some said that the comet which 
 had been seen in the heavens for some months had 
 suddenly fallen into the river opposite the town. 
 When it was known that the long-expected steam- 
 boat had arrived, Mr. and Mrs. Roosevelt had a 
 great dinner given in their honor. Unfortunately it 
 was found that the water in the Ohio was so low 
 that it would not float ^^The New Orleans" over the 
 falls. So a stop of two months had to be made, 
 while waiting for rain. Finally the up-country 
 rains swelled the waters of the river until it was 
 found that at the falls the channel was five inches 
 deeper than was necessary to allow the boat to pass. 
 The channel, however, was very narrow, and the 
 boat could not be steered straight unless it was 
 driven faster than the current. So under a full 
 head of steam, while all on board held their breath, 
 the little steamer was run at headlong speed 
 through the foaming waters. Luckily no accident 
 happened, and the vessel glided safely into the still 
 waters below the falls. Just here, while it was 
 resting at anchor, there came the shock of an earth- 
 quake. The water was so much shaken that some 
 persons on board were made seasick. But the 
 anchor was drawm up and the voyage was contin- 
 ued. 
 
 One day the Chickasaw Indians, who were 
 still living in Tennessee, seeing the vessel passing, 
 
276 STORIES FROM LOUISIANA HISTORY. 
 
 sent out a large canoe full of warriors to pursue it. 
 There was much excitement on board ; for the canoe 
 at first equalled ''The New Orleans" in speed. But 
 muscle could not endure like steam ; gradually the 
 Indians were left behind in the race — much to the 
 joy of the passengers. But more trouble was in 
 store for the vessel and her crew. It had been hoped 
 that the shock felt at the falls of the Ohio was the 
 last. But this was the year in which there was a 
 series of earthquakes, the most terrible ever remem- 
 bered in the Mississippi Valley. Chimneys and even 
 log cabins were shaken down. Many people in Mis- 
 souri were so much frightened that they ran away 
 from their homes, leaving behind them their cattle, 
 their horses, and all other belongings. Some rushed 
 to the bank as "The New Orleans" passed, and 
 begged to be taken on board, but Mr. Roosevelt had 
 so little food that he was obliged to refuse. Some- 
 times there came a great rumbling noise like thun- 
 der and this would be followed by frightful shocks. 
 Great cracks appeared in the earth, some of which 
 were four miles long and four feet deep. The chan- 
 nel of the river was so much changed in places by 
 the movement of the earth that the pilot often be- 
 came confused and could not steer the boat prop- 
 erly. Where he expected to find deep water, he 
 found great roots and stumps rising out of the 
 water too shallow to float the vessel. As immense 
 
FIRST STEAMBOAT ON MISSISSIPPI. 277 
 
 trees were often thrown into the water by the 
 shocks, it became dangerous to tie up to the bank. 
 One evening the boat was anchored at the foot of a 
 little island ; in the morning the captain was aston- 
 ished to find that though the anchor had held, the 
 island had disappeared, and the water was pouring 
 over the spot. 
 
 All these incidents made the voyage one of '^terror 
 and anxiety." And very happy were Mr. and Mrs. 
 Boosevelt when they reached Natchez, in Missis- 
 sippi, where they found rest and comforts. 
 
 As the boat approached the bank, the current 
 swept it by, and it was found necessary to put on 
 more steam to breast the current and make the 
 landing. When ^'The New Orleans" began slowly to 
 ascend the river, an old negro on the bank cried 
 out : ''By golly, ole Mississippi got her massa dis 
 time." 
 
 After stopping a while at Natchez the vessel 
 steamed down without accident to the Crescent 
 City, having made the trip from Pittsburg, not 
 counting the time lost at Louisville, in 259 hours. 
 As ''The New Orleans" had thus opened the way, 
 other steamboats were put on the Mississippi and 
 they took the place of the slow, tedious old flat- 
 boats.* 
 
 ♦Condensed from the interesting nari'atlve in Claiborne's " Missis- 
 sippi," pp.537-45. 
 
THE LAFITTES. 
 
 On the coast of Louisiana, almost due south of 
 New Orleans, we find the large bay of Barataria, 
 and just in front of it, on the Gulf, is the little 
 island of Grande Terre. On the innerside of this 
 island the old maps of Louisiana show a place 
 called "Spiugglers' Anchorage." One hundred 
 years ago this used to be the meeting place of a 
 band of reckless men, who were said by some to be 
 mere smugglers and by others to be pirates. They 
 had a number of swift vessels, which sailed about in 
 the Gulf and captured Spanish ships. The goods 
 from these ships, often of great value, were brought 
 to Grande Terre, where they were sold at a low 
 price to the traders that came in large numbers 
 from Donaldsonville, from New Orleans, and other 
 parts of the state. The Baratarians, as they were 
 called, began to grow rich from this trade. They 
 did not find much difficulty in capturing merchant 
 vessels, with their armed cruisers, and they never 
 paid any duties to the United States government 
 on the goods that they sold. On one occasion, when 
 the inspector of revenue was sent down to Grande 
 
THE LAFITTES. 279 
 
 Terre to look into the matter and stop any illegal 
 trade, two of his men were wounded by the Bara- 
 tarians and he himself was killed. Moreover, the 
 Congress of the United States in 1808 had passed 
 a law that no more negro slaves should be brought 
 into this country. Yet whenever the Baratarians 
 captured a ship containing slaves, they sold them 
 at Grande Terre like any other goods. 
 , The captain of the band of smugglers was Jean 
 Lafitte, who was assisted in his unlawful business 
 by his brother Pierre. They were Frenchmen by 
 birth, and it is said that when they came to New 
 Orleans from France they first took up the trade of 
 blacksmithing, and soon getting tired of this slow 
 road to wealth, they moved down to Barataria Bay. 
 Other writers say that they were never blacksmiths 
 themselves, but that they had a friend who was a 
 blacksmith and who acted as their agent in New 
 Orleans. 
 
 Jean Lafitte, himself, was a dark, handsome man, 
 brave and even reckless in all his acts. He was 
 much liked by his men and his orders were obeyed 
 as if he had been a king. He claimed that he had 
 a right to attack Spanish ships because the state of 
 Carthagena, in South America, whicli had revolted 
 from Spain, had given him a commission to use a 
 flag and to fit out privateers against that country, 
 
280 STORIES FROM LOUISIANA HISTORY. 
 
 JKAN I.AFITTE. 
 
THE LAFITTES. 281 
 
 His enemies said that he captured the ships not 
 only of Spain, but also of other nations, and that 
 he was, therefore, a pirate. Lafitte denied this, but 
 there seems to have been much truth in the accusa- 
 tion. What Lafitte could not deny, however, was 
 that he was bringing his prizes into a port of the 
 United States and was selling goods without paying 
 the duties. All this was contrary to the laws of the 
 United States. It was the duty of the Federal gov- 
 ernment to put a stop to these unlawful acts, but 
 the government acted slowly, especially after 1812, 
 when the war with Great Britain began. The gov- 
 ernor of Louisiana, W. C. C. Claiborne, tried to 
 get the State Legislature to authorize him to raise 
 a company to assist the revenue officers in putting 
 down the Lafittes, but the Legislature decided to 
 leave the matter to the Federal government. The 
 governor became so indignant at the acts of the Bar- 
 atarians that he offered |500 reward for the cap- 
 ture of Jean Lafitte on the ground that he had re- 
 captured some goods seized by the revenue officers. 
 No one seems to have tried to win the reward, and 
 Lafitte was impudent enough to announce that he 
 would give |15,000 to any one who would bring the 
 governor to him as a prisoner. He and his captains 
 boldly walked the streets of New Orleans, and for 
 a while no one seems to have been rash enough to 
 
282 STORIES FROM LOUISIANA HISTORY. 
 
 lay hands on them. But they were carrying things 
 too far. Pierre Lafitte was finally captured and 
 thrown into the calaboose in New Orleans, while 
 preparations were made by the Federal government 
 to send troops to Grande Terre and break up the 
 nest of smugglers. 
 
 And now a remarkable thing was to happen. The 
 war with Great Britain was then being carried on 
 actively, and in September, 1814, the British fleet 
 approached the coast of Louisiana with the inten- 
 tion of landing a force to capture New Orleans 
 and to seize the lower Mississippi Valley. One day 
 the Baratarians were surprised to see a British 
 brig standing off the coast near Grande Terre. 
 When Jean Lafitte started out in a boat to see what 
 she wanted, she sent to the shore a pinnace with 
 British colors and a flag of truce. In the pinnace 
 were some English officers, who brought a letter 
 addressed to ''Mr. Lafitte, Commandant at Bara- 
 taria," and some orders issued by the senior officer 
 of the British fleet. The orders declared that some 
 British merchant vessels had been taken and sold by 
 the inhabitants of Barataria, and that unless they 
 vrere paid for, the whole settlement at Grande 
 Terre should be destroyed. "In case, however, the 
 Baratarians were willing to assist Great Britain in 
 her just war against the United States and would 
 
THE LAFITTES. 283 
 
 employ their armed vessels in such service, they 
 would be forgiven what they had done, and would 
 be well rewarded." The letter to Lafitte himself 
 was very polite. It told him that if he and ^^his 
 brave followers" would enter the service of Great 
 Britain, lands would be given to them after the war 
 was over, and that he himself should have the rank 
 of captain and a present of |30,000. One of the 
 officers, moreover, tried to persuade him to accept 
 these tempting offers by reminding him that Lafitte 
 himself had been declared an outlaw by the Amer- 
 ican government and that his brother was at that 
 moment lying, loaded with chains, in the jail at 
 New Orleans. 
 
 Some men, under the circumstances, would 
 have gladly gone over to the enemy, but it 
 was not so with Lafitte. He asked for time to pre- 
 pare an answer, and sent his visitors on board their 
 brig. After waiting in vain for some days they be- 
 gan to fear that Lafitte was laying a trap for them, 
 and they sailed away. In the meantime Lafitte had 
 hurried off a letter to New Orleans, addressed to a 
 member of the Legislature, in which he said that, 
 though he had been outlawed by his adopted coun- 
 try, that country was still very dear to him, and 
 that he wished to serve it. He enclosed the letter 
 he had received from the British, and a few days 
 later he wrote again telling how the British in- 
 
284 STOlilES FKOM LOUISIANA HISTORY. 
 
 tended to attack Louisiana. At the same time ne 
 wrote to the governor asking to be taken back as a 
 citizen, and offering to fight against the British if 
 Claiborne would forget what he had done in the 
 past. ^'I am a stray sheep w-ishing to return to the 
 sheepfold." He added that he had been a smuggler, 
 but never a pirate. Governor Claiborne, not wish- 
 ing to answer his letter without asking advice, 
 called together the oflScers of the militia and some 
 officers of the navy, who were in New Orleans. The 
 governor was so much pleased with the letter which 
 the outlaw had written to him that he voted to 
 accept the services of Lafitte and his men in the 
 defense of Louisiana. But the majority of the 
 officers voted to have no friendly dealings with the 
 Baratarians and to try to capture the whole band. 
 So Commodore Patterson, of the navy, who was 
 present at the meeting, collected a strong force of 
 soldiers and swooped down on the camp of the 
 smugglers. The Baratarians, hearing that he was 
 coming, and fearing to meet his soldiers, had al- 
 ready disappeared in the winding bayous, but the 
 Commodore brought back to the city a quantity of 
 rich plunder, which he had found at Grande Terre. 
 Six weeks later there arrived in New Orleans a 
 famous soldier. He was feeble in health, and 
 scarcely able to eat anything, except a little ricc^ 
 but full of energy and patriotism. Jt w^ General 
 
THE LAFITTES. 285 
 
 Andrew Jackson, who had come to defend New Or- 
 leans against the British. Now was Lafitte^s 
 chance. While the Creoles were flocking to the 
 assistance of Jackson, Jean Lafitte suddenly ap- 
 peared at Jackson's headquarters one day, and of- 
 fered the services of himself and his followers. 
 Jackson had heard of the Baratarians, and had once 
 called them robbers and pirates. But now that he 
 found himself face to face with the daring "robber 
 and pirate," he seems to have been pleased with the 
 manly air of Lafitte. He learned, moreover, that 
 the Baratarians had arms and flints, which he was 
 very much in need of, and which they were willing 
 to hand over to him. So he agreed to accept the 
 offer of Lafitte and promised him that if the Bara- 
 tarians behaved well in the war, he would ask the 
 President of the United States to pardon them. Ac- 
 cordingly Lafitte gave the General, among other 
 things, 7,500 pistol flints, which were put into the 
 guns of the militia. "Without this providential 
 supply obtained from the Baratarians,'' wrote Jack^ 
 son, "our country would probably have been lost.'' 
 The General sent Lafitte down to Barataria Bay 
 to defend it against the British, while others of the 
 smugglers were sent to Bayou St. John and Ft. 
 Pike. When the great battle of January 8th was 
 fought on the field of Chalmette, two of Lafitte's 
 followers, Dominique You and Beluche, had charge 
 
286 STOiiii':s from Louisiana- iiistoiiy. 
 
 of Battery No. 8 and behaved with great braverv: 
 The other Baratarians, wherever they were placed, 
 acted with the same bravery, and Jackson was 
 greatly pleased. Mr. Gayarre (the historian of 
 Louisiana) tells iis that whenever Jackson, in re- 
 viewing his troops, came up to any of the men from 
 Barataria, he would stop and chat a while with 
 them. Once during the great battle, he found him- 
 self near Battery No. 3, where that skillful old 
 gunner, Dominique You, w^as in command. But 
 Dominique's guns were silent. ^'What, by the Eter- 
 nal,'' cried Jackson, "you have ceased firing?" 
 
 "Of course. General, of course," replied You ; the 
 powder is good for nothing, fit only to shoot black- 
 birds and not red coats."* 
 
 "Tell the ordnance officer," said Jackson to his 
 aide, as he galloped off, "that I will have him shot 
 in five minutes as a traitor, if Dominique complains 
 any more of his powder." 
 
 When the General returned, Dominique's battery 
 was blazing away. 
 
 "Ha! friend Dominique, I see you are hard at 
 work." 
 
 "Pretty good work, too," replied Dominique 
 with a chuckle ; "I guess the British have found out 
 by this time that there has been a change of powder 
 in my battery." 
 
 *;rne British were called red coats on account of their uniform. 
 
THE LAFITTES. 287 
 
 After the battle was over, Jackson, in his general 
 orders, spoke of the Baratarians as ^'gentlemen" 
 who had defended their coimtr^^ with great bravery, 
 and added that the President of the United States 
 should be informed of their good conduct. Jackson 
 kept his promise, and President Madison gave a full 
 pardon to all the outlaws for their unlawful acts at 
 (irande Terre. 
 
 Pierre Lafitte and Dominique You lived, 
 in New Orleans for many years after this 
 time, and there was no more smuggling at Bara- 
 taria. You is buried in the old St. Louis Ceme- 
 tery, where his tomb may still be seen. The epi- 
 taph is in French;, of which the following is a trans- 
 lation : 
 
 "This warrior bold on land and rolling sea 
 In hundred battles proved his bravery; 
 Nor had this pure and fearless Bayard* known 
 One tremor, though the Avorld were overthrown." 
 
 Jean Lafitte, soon tiring of the quiet life of the 
 city, went over to Texas. Here he led a wild and 
 reckless life of adventure, being known as "the 
 Lord of Galveston." He was finally compelled to 
 leave Galveston, and died a few years later (1826) 
 in Yucatan.t 
 
 * Bayard was a famous French knight, of whom it was said that he 
 was " without feai- and without reproacli." 
 
 tThe deeds of Lafitte inspired Lord Byron to write his famous poem 
 called the " Corsair.'" 
 
BATTLE OP NEW ORLEANS, 
 
 In the year 1814, Louisiana was drawn into the 
 war which the United States had declared against 
 Great Britain, and which had been carried on 
 already for eighteen months in the north. The two 
 countries had quarrelled over sailors' rights and 
 commerce. Great Britain had seized several thous- 
 and sailors on American vessels, saying that they 
 were Englishmen and not Americans. The United 
 States government declared that these sailors had 
 become American citizens by naturalization, but 
 Great Britain answered: ^'Once an Englishman, 
 always an Englishman.'' Nor was this all. Our 
 trade with foreign countries was interrupted by 
 Great Britain, until for a time we gave up trade 
 with countries across the Atlantic, and kept our 
 ships at home. But this act hurt us more than it 
 did England, and we ended by declaring war. On 
 sea and land we had had some success — especially 
 on the sea — when in 1814 the British sent a fleet 
 to the coast of Louisiana to capture New Orleans. 
 We have already seen that Lafitte gave notice to the 
 city of the approach of the British. 
 
BATTLE OF NEW ORLEANS. 
 
 289 
 
 Jackson had arrived in full time to meet the 
 enemy, and he was determined to keep them out of 
 New Orleans. His feelings towards them were 
 very bitter; for at the age of fourteen, while the 
 Revolutionary War was in progress, he had been 
 
 JACKSON'S STATUK IN NEW ORLEANS. 
 
 taken prisoner and treated with great cruelty. One 
 day he was ordered to clean the boots of a British 
 officer, and when he refused, saying that he was a 
 prisoner of war and could not be forced to play the 
 servant, the oflflcer drew his sword and cut the boy 
 so severely on his head and one of his hands, that 
 Jackson bore the scars to his grave. 
 
 In New Orleans Jackson encouraged the Creoles 
 to drill, and to polish up their guns for the battle. 
 Troops also came to his aid from Mississippi and 
 
290 STORIES FROM LOUISIANA HISTORY. 
 
 Tennessee, and finally from Kentucky. The "Mar- 
 seilles Hymn" and "Yankee Doodle" (the first 
 French and the other American) were sung in the 
 streets of the city, Avhile "the women at the windows 
 and on the balconies encouraged their husbands, 
 sons, fathers, or brothers to defend them from the 
 insults of the enemy." The Creoles were eager to 
 fight the enemies of their adopted country, who 
 were also the enemies of France. 
 
 The British ships first appeared on Lake Borgne, 
 and, here, meeting a small naval force, placed there 
 to stop them, they succeeded in defeating the 
 Americans. Then finding that Bayou Bienvenu, 
 leading from Lake Borgne to the plantation below 
 the city, was not guarded, they loaded their boats 
 with men and began to creep up this bayou towards 
 the field of Chalmette. Jackson heard of their 
 landing and rushed two thousand men down the 
 river bank to meet them. In the meantime the 
 British had made a camp, and had collected from 
 the plantation houses a lot of fowls, hams, and 
 wines for their supper. It was the evening of 
 December 23d. Suddenly in the twilight they saw 
 a large vessel sailing down the river. It was the 
 "Carolina," sent by Jackson, but the British at 
 first thought it was one of their cruisers which had 
 come up the river. Some one cried out: "Ship 
 
BATTLE OF XKW OK LEANS. 291 
 
 ahoy I what have you got to sell?" To their aston- 
 ishment the ship opened fire on their camp with 
 grape shot and canister, while a rough voice was 
 heard to say : '^Now, my lads, load again, and give 
 those tarnal Britishers another round of grape." 
 As the British soldiers were rushing to the levee 
 for protection, they heard their pickets firing at 
 Jackson's men, who were attacking on the land 
 side. Now that they had an enemy to fight against 
 (for they had no cannon as yet to answer the fire 
 of the "Carolina"), they bravely formed themselves 
 in order of battle and went forward to meet the 
 Americans. It was a sharp fight. From 7 to 9 "by 
 the moonbeams' misty light," Americans and Brit- 
 ish threw themselves upon each other in small par- 
 ties. "After the fight was over," says a British 
 officer, "I went over the field and in some places 
 found two soldiers lying dead, each pierced by the 
 other's bayonet." JajcJvSon lost 213 and the British 
 400 men. One of Jackson's general's (General Car- 
 roll) says: "On the night of December 23d, I came 
 too late for the battle, about midnight, and found 
 the two armies camped within 600 yards of each 
 other." The British were afraid to relight their 
 fires, for the "Carolina" was still on the river, and 
 they passed the night shivering in the cold. 
 Jackson's bold attack saved Kew Orleans. The 
 
292 STORIES FROM LOUISIANA HISTORY. 
 
 British, instead of marcliiiig up to New Orleans, 
 waited to bring up heavy guns from tlieir ships, 
 while Jackson thus gained time to build his famous 
 fortifications across the field of Chalmette. His 
 breastworks were about a mile long. The British, 
 having brought up some heavy guns from their 
 ships, built batteries opposite to the American line, 
 and strengthened them with hogsheads of sugar, 
 which they found in the store-houses of the neigh- 
 borhood. Not to be outdone, Jackson lined the 
 o^enings^f his batteries with cotton bales. First 
 of all the British, who were now commanded by- 
 General Pakenham, got rid of the dangerous ^'Caro- 
 lina" by throwing red-hot shot into her, and setting 
 her on fire. Then, on the 28th of December, and 
 on January 1st, they threw a great number of shells 
 at Jackson's cotton bales, and the guns behind them. 
 But cotton won the battle on both days. The 
 xVmericans were such fine gunners — especially old 
 Dominique You — that even the British praised 
 their skill. The hogsheads of sugar were knocked to 
 pieces, and the British, who hoped to advance 
 against Jackson's line under the protection of their 
 guns, were unable even to hold their position. 
 
 Many pictures of the battle of New Orleans show 
 a long line of cotton bales with the Americans 
 fighting behind them. As we have seen, it is true 
 
294 STORIES FROM LOUISIANA HISTORY. 
 
 that Jackson used cotton bales to line the embra- 
 sures or openings of his batteries. A Mr. Nolte, a 
 German merchant, who was in New Orleans at this 
 time, says this cotton was taken from him. As he 
 was a foreigner and did not wish to aid the Ameri- 
 cans, he asked Livingston, one of Jackson's lieuten- 
 ants, to give back the cotton. But Livingston only 
 said : "If it is your cotton, Mr. Nolte, take a rifle 
 and defend it.'' This Mr. Nolte refused to do, but 
 he w^as paid for his cotton when the war was over. 
 Where it was used in the batteries, however, it was 
 sometimes set on fire by the balls of the enemy, and 
 the flying particles threatened to set the powder 
 magazines on fire. So most of the cotton was 
 removed, and the Louisiana mud took its place. 
 Thus in the great battle of January 8th, which 
 w^e are about to describe, there were very few cot- 
 t-on bales left. "Our line," says General Carroll, 
 "from river to swamp was less than a mile long: 
 it was made of clay (alluvial) four to four and a 
 half feet high and six or seven feet thick. It is a 
 common idea that we fought behind cotton bales; 
 this is an error. Cotton was used only for the em- 
 brasures (of the batteries)."* 
 
 After the artillery battles, both sides began to 
 prepare for the great struggle. Jackson had been 
 
 *Froin Oarroirs letters in library of S. J. Swartz. 
 
THE STRUGGLE OF JANT AKY 8. 295 
 
 now joined by about 2000 men from Kentucky, and 
 some from the Acadian coast, until his army was 
 about 5500 strong. The English had brought up 
 troops until their force was about 8900; most of 
 whom had fought many battles in Europe, while 
 many of Jackson's men were not used to fire, and 
 his whole army was little more than half that of 
 the British. 
 
 The Struggle of January 8th. 
 
 Having learned that the British had chosen Janu- 
 ary the 8th for the attack, and that they were going 
 to advance up the right bank as well as the left, 
 Jackson sent some of his men across the river under 
 General Morgan to meet them there. Early on the 
 morning of the 8th, while a thick fog rested on the 
 field, the British sent up two rockets as a signal 
 to their men to advance. A young Kentuckian, six- 
 teen years of age, who ran away from home and 
 came down the Mississippi on a flatboat, to join 
 Jackson's army at New Orleans, has left us an 
 an interesting account of what he saw of the bat- 
 tle. *^The hour for battle had come," he says, "the 
 long roll of the British was being beaten. We Ken- 
 tuckians were marched to the breastworks (about 
 four and a half feet high), and we formed right 
 behind the Tennesseeans, who stood two deep. I 
 
296 STORIES FiiOM LOUISIANA HISTORY. 
 
 was in the front line of the Kentuckians and, con- 
 sequently, third from the breastworks. Our men 
 stood but four deep at this part of the breastworks. 
 We were on the right of the line, about one-half 
 mile from the I'iver and near the edge of the swamp. 
 We had hardly formed in line, when our front guard 
 came running in, trying out. 'success I' — our watch- 
 word. There was a deep ditch all along in front 
 of our breastworks, and near where I stood there 
 was a bridge across this ditch. Our pickets rushed 
 in over this crossing, yelling that the British were 
 coming. I freely admit that right then and there 
 I was scared. The hair on my head seemed to have 
 a peculiar feeling — as if it were standing erect, a 
 sort of pulling sensation. One of the Tennesseeans, 
 just in front of me, said to one of the pickets: 'I 
 don't see them (the British).' ^Look low down, 
 under the fog,' was the answer. I showed my head 
 to a level with the breastworks and peered under- 
 neath the fog, which was rising in the sunlight. 
 Just as I had made them out with their white panta- 
 loons, red coats, and black gaiters, the British, like 
 a cloud of grasshoppers arising, blew the charge. 
 They had a speaking trumpet, which looked like tin, 
 wound around like a ram's horn and probably ten 
 feet long when straightened. They blew it just as I 
 caught sight of them, and it seemed to me that no 
 
THE STRUGGLE OF JANUARY 8. 297 
 
 man could say more plainly, 'Charge, charge, 
 charge!' Then the sound was drowned by the most 
 terrifying yells that I ever heard or want to hear. 
 Imagine ten thousand men [there were only 5300 in 
 the attack] coming on, all shouting at the top of 
 their voices, while everything on our line was still, 
 not even a whisper, except the short command, j^ass- 
 ing from the right to the left: 'Don't shoot, pass 
 it on.' " 
 
 Jackson's men, as we know from others who were 
 present, hardly showed their heads over the breast- 
 works, and waited in dead silence until the enemy 
 had advanced within forty yards of them. Then 
 General Coffee cried out: ''Aim for the center of 
 their crossbelts." * In a moment Jackson's line 
 fired as if it had been one man, and then stepped 
 back to reload and to give place to the men behind 
 them. When the smoke cleared away, it was seen 
 that the field in front was covered with w^ounded 
 or dying soldiers. The brave Britishers closed 
 their ranks and made another dash for the deadly 
 breastworks. But it was no use. -The big-mouthed 
 cannon were throwing shells, and the sharp-slioot- 
 ers in five volle^^s killed or wounded 2117 British 
 soldiers. General Pakenham, riding forward on 
 horseback and cheering his men, was struck three 
 
 * These belts crossed on the shoulders and met on the breast. 
 
298 STORIES FROM LOUISIANA HISTORY. 
 
 times, and died under an oak tree, to Avhich his men 
 carried him. At 9 o'clock, when the battle was 
 really over, one could have walked across the field 
 for a quarter of a mile on the bodies of the British. 
 General Jackson had lost only eight killed and four- 
 teen wounded! 
 
 On the other side of the river General Morgan 
 had not been so lucky. When the British landed 
 on that side, he sent forward some militia to stop 
 them, but these became frightened and fled back to 
 Morgan's line and beyond, taking most of Morgan's 
 troops with them. Some of them, it is said, ran 
 twelve miles, so great was their panic. The British, 
 finding that Pakenham had been beaten on the 
 other side of the river, did not pursue the Ameri- 
 cans very far. They thought it best to cross the 
 river again and join their general. But their gen- 
 eral was killed, and they came too late to be of any 
 help. The bodies of Pakenham and other chief of- 
 ficers were sunk in barrels of rum, to be taken back 
 to England, but the common soldiers were buried 
 in long shallow trenches on the battlefield. 
 
 The British soldiers who were left gave up all 
 hope of taking New Orleans, and refused to march 
 up to Jackson's breastworks again. When they first 
 landed in Louisiana, they had been told by their 
 officers that they would eat their Christmas din- 
 
THE STRUGGLE OF JANUAUY .^. 299 
 
 ner in New Orleans; bnt ten days after the great 
 battle these same soldiers were glad to make their 
 way through* the marsh back to their ships on Lake 
 Borgne.t 
 
 An English officer, who joined in this retreat, 
 has left us an account of the sufferings of the Brit- 
 ish soldiers after the great battle. He tells us that 
 General Jackson did not come from behind his 
 breastworks to attack the British, but his batteries 
 continued to throw shells into their camp even in 
 the night time. Four nights after the battle a shell 
 burst over a hut in which two officers of an English 
 regiment were sleeping, and the pieces cut off both 
 the feet of one of the officers — one just below the 
 knee and the other at the ankle-joint. He crawled 
 out of the hut in this horrible condition. One of his 
 feet was driven so far into the soft mud that it had 
 to be dug out the following day. 
 
 ''Food," he says, ''became so scarce in our camp, 
 that some days we did not have anything at all to 
 eat. Once when we had a kettle of soup on the tire 
 and were getting ready for our dinner, a round shell 
 from Jackson's line struck the kettle and spilt all 
 
 *Some of Jackson's Tennessee riflemen, who shot so well In the 
 battle, were dark, sunburned fellows, dressed in coonskiia caps and 
 coarse homespun clothes. A fine British officer, who was wounded, 
 was trying to escape from the battle fleld, when one of these Ten- 
 nesseeans stopped him and said, " surrender." The officer had to give 
 himself up, but he remarked that it was "a disgrace for an English 
 officer to have to surrender to a chimney sweep."— (See Alexander 
 Walker: "Jackson at New Orleans.") 
 
300 STORIES FROM LOUISIANA HISTORY. 
 
 the soup, without touching the men who were stand- 
 ing around." 
 
 On January the 18th, at 9 o'clock in the even- 
 ing, the British silenth^ entered the marsh to make 
 their way to Lake Borgne. As there were not 
 enougii boats to carry the men down the bayou, 
 most of them had to walk. It was 10 o'clock of the 
 next morning before they reached the lake, and 
 escaped to their boats. The path through the marsh 
 was the Ayorst the soldiers had ever seen. Sometimes 
 they sank up to their knees in mud ; at other times 
 up to their hips, and any one stepping off the path 
 was almost certain of going down oyer head and 
 ears. One officer went down until only his head 
 was to be seen, and in a few seconds, if he had not 
 been helped, he would haye disappeared. During 
 the night the soldiers struggled along as best they 
 could, and when morning came, it is said that the 
 whole army was covered with mud from head to 
 foot. All were happy to see the waters of the lake 
 and the British ships. 
 
 The defeat at New Orleans was the worst that an 
 English army had ever suffered, and when the ncAVS 
 reached England, no one at first would believe it. 
 The Duke of Wellington, who afterwards defeated 
 Xapoleon at Waterloo, said it Avas "a Yankee lie.'' 
 Of course. Napoleon, who was then an exile at 
 
THE STRUGGLE OF JAXUAltY 8. 301 
 
 Elba, was glad to hear that his enemies, the En- 
 glish, had been defeated. He wanted to know all 
 about the sharp-shooters and their rifles. So one of 
 his friends, an American, sent over to him four 
 rifles used at New Orleans, They were about four 
 feet long, and weighed between nine and ten 
 pounds. It is said that with their rifles the Tennes- j 
 seeans could knock a squirrel out of the highest/ 
 trees. Napoleon was amazed when he was told of 
 the skill of these American sharp-shooters, and it 
 is said that if he had won at Waterloo, he would 
 have trained some riflemen for his army. 
 
 After this great victory Jackson praised the 
 bravery of all the troops who had fought under him, 
 not forgetting the Laflttes and the other Bara- 
 tarians. When he returned to New Orleans, the 
 people prepared a hearty welcome for him. The 
 streets were crowded with men, women, and chil- 
 dren to do honor to ^'Old Hickory," as he was 
 called. Some persons even climbed on the top of 
 the houses. In what is now Jackson Square (then 
 called Place d'Armes), there was a gaeat arch for 
 the hero to walk under. Here stood two handsome 
 little boys holding crowns of laurel in their hands. 
 These they were allowed to place on General Jack- 
 son's head as he passed them. Beyond them at a 
 little distance from one another were a number of 
 
302 STORIES FROM LOUISIANA HISTORY. 
 
 young ladies, dressed in white and covered with 
 white veils, who represented the States and Terri- 
 tories of the Union. Each had a silver star on her 
 forehead, and held in one hand a flag and in the 
 other a basket of flowers. Behind them stood long 
 lines of soldiers with glittering bayonets. With 
 music playing and cannon booming, the General 
 marched through the arch to the Cathedral, Avhile 
 the young ladies waved their flags and covered his 
 path with flowers. At the Cathedral door he was 
 met by Abbe Dubourg, who thanked God for the 
 great victory won by Jackson, and presented the 
 General with a wreath of laurel. When Jackson 
 had replied to this welcome, praising the courage 
 of his soldiers and wishing happiness to New Or- 
 leans, the crowd entered the church and a solemn 
 service of thanksgiving was held.* 
 
 *An equestrian statue of General Jackson now stands In the center 
 of the square in front of the Cathedral; and on the field of Chalmette 
 there Is an unfinished monument in honor of the famous victory. 
 
THE STRUGGLE OF JANUARY 8. 303 
 
 ODE. 
 
 Composed for the anniversary of the Battle of 
 New Orleans; celebrated by the Charleston Rifle- 
 men, January 8, 1856. 
 
 By Henry Timrod. 
 
 The land hath many a battle-ground 
 
 As rich and red with crimson stains; 
 But Orleans is the very sound 
 
 To stir the blood in warrior veins : 
 There the young giant of the world 
 
 Struck a last blow at England's side; 
 And the free Flag of Stars was furled 
 
 Above the grave of England's pride. 
 
 Than his who led, no sterner will 
 
 E'er crouched within a human breast; 
 And his was human, and could thrill 
 
 To all that's softest, purest, best. 
 The hand from which the Briton fled, 
 
 And the bold savage learned to fear, 
 Could stroke a tender infant's head. 
 
 And tremble at a woman's tear. 
 
 The Roman of his country's fame, 
 
 The mighty Consul of the West, 
 No stronger arm, or haughtier name. 
 
 E'er gained a crown, or graced a crest : 
 Yet the white honor of his life 
 
 Nor blood could stain, nor power eclipse ; 
 And having faced all shapes of strife, 
 
 He died with blessings on his lips. 
 
304 
 
 8T0KIKS FllO.M LOUISIANA HISTORY. 
 
 So long as these bright arms we bear, 
 
 May rest all spotless and unproved : 
 So long, we trust, our hearts shall share 
 
 The homelier virtues which he loved. 
 But wlien the war-blast shall be heard, 
 
 And other battles must l)e won, — 
 Be Jackson's name our battle- word; 
 
 And his great Shade shall lead us on, 
 
SEP 8 1905 
 

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