Houston County, Minnesota - Chapter 4: Fibst White Men at Falls of Saint Anthony of Padua, 1882

Chapter 4: Fibst White Men at Falls of Saint Anthony of Padua

Falls of St. Anthony Viiit«d by White Meu.-La Salle OWes the First Description of Upper Xi»i»ippi Vlley.-Accault, the Leader, Accompanied by AufeUe and Hennepin, at Falls of Saint Anthony.-Hennepin Declared Unreliable by La Salle -Hi. Early Life - Hi. Fir* Book Criticised by Abbe Bernou and Tronson.- Deceptive Map. -Fir* Meeting with Sioux.;- Astonishment at Reading Hi. Breriary.-Sioux Name for Guns.-Accault and Hennepin at Lake Fepin-Leave the River Below Saint Paul.-At MiUe Leca.-A Sweatiu, Cabin. -Sioux Wonder at Mariner'. Compaes.-Fears of an Iron Fot-Makinf a Dictlonary.-Inf.nt Baptised.-Bouto to the Pacific-Hennepin Descend. Rum RiTer.-First Visit to Fall, of Saint Anthony.-On a Buffalo Hunt-Meet. Du Luth.-Return. to Mill. Lac-With Du Luth at Fall, of St^Anthony.- Return. to France.-Subaeo.uent Life.-His Book, Kxamined.-I)en^ m Firrt Book Hi. Deacent to the Gulf of Mexico.-Di»puto*with Du Luth at Falls of St, Anthony.-Patronage of Du Luth.-Tribute to Du Luth.-HenneptoV. liiswer to Cntici«xu.-Denounced by D'lbervill: and Father Grarier.-Reaideuce in

In the summer of 1680, Michael Accault (Ako), Hennepin, the Franciscan missionary, Augelle, Du Luth, and Faffart ail visited the Falls of Saint Anthony.

The first description of the valley of the upper Mississippi was written by La Salle, at Fort Frontenac, on Lake Ontario, on the 22d of August, 1682, a month before Hennepin, in Paris, obtained a license to print, and some time before the Franciscan's first work, was issued from the press.

La Salle's knowledge must have been received from Michael Accault, the leader of the expedition, Augelle, his comrade, or the clerical attache, the Franciscan, Hennepin.

It differs from Hennepin's narrative in its freedom from bombast, and if its statements are to be credited, the Franciscan must be looked on as one given to exaggeration. The careful student, however, soon learns to be cautious in receiving the statement of any of the early explorers and ecclesiastics of the Northwest. The Franciscan depreciated the Jesuit missionary, and La Salle did not hesitate to misrepresent Du Luth and others for his own exaltation. La Salle makes statements which we deem to be wide of the truth when his prejudices are* aroused.

While official documents prove that Du Luth was in Minnesota a year before Accault and associates, yet La Salle writes: " Moreover, the Nadonesioux is not a region which he has discovered. It is known that it was discovered a long time before, and that the Rev. Father Hennepin and Michael Accault were there before him."

La Salle in this communication describes Accault as one well acquainted with the language and names of the Indians of the Illinois region, and also u cool, braye, and prudent," and the head of the party of exploration.

We now proceed with the first description of the country above the Wisconsin, to which is given, for the first and only time, by any writer, the Sioux name, Meschetz Odeba, perhaps intended for Meshdeke Wakpa, River of the Foxes.

He describes the Upper Mississippi in these words : " Following the windings of the Mississippi, they found the river Ouisconsing, Wisconsing, or Meschetz Odeba, which flows between Bay of Puans and the Grand river. * * * About twenty-three or twenty-four leagues to the north or northwest of the mouth of the Ouisconsing, * * * they found the Black river, called by the Nadouesioux, Chabadeba [Chapa Wakpa, Beaver river] not very large, the mouth of which is bordered on the two shores by alders.

" Ascending about thirty leagues, almost at the same point of the compass, is the Buffalo river [Chippewa], as large at its mouth as that of the Illinois. They follow it ten or twelve leagues, where it is deep, small and without rapids, bordered by hills which widen out from time to time to form prairies."

About three o'clock in the afternoon of the 11th of April, 1680, the travelers were met by a war party of one hundred Sioux in thirty-three birch bark canoes, u Michael Accault, who was the leader," says La Salle, "presented the Calumet." The Indians were presented by Accault with twenty knives and a fathom and a half of tobacco and some goods. Proceeding with the Indians ten days, on the 22d of April the isles in the Mississippi were reached, where the Sioux had killed some Maskoutens, and they halted to weep over the death of two of their own number ; and to assuage their grief, Accault gave them in trade a box of goods and twenty-four hatchets.

When they were eight leagues below the Falls of Saint Anthony, they resolved to go by land to their village, sixty leagues distant. They were well received ; the only strife among the villages was that which resulted from the desire to have a Frenchman in their midst. La Salle also states that it was not correct to give the impression that Du Luth had rescued his men from captivity, for they could not be properly called prisoners.

He continues: " In going up the Mississippi again, twenty leagues above that river [Saint Croix] is found the falls, which those I sent, and who passing there first, named Saint Anthony. It is thirty or forty feet high, and the river is narrower here than elsewhere. There is a small island in the midst of the chute, and the two banks of the river are not bordered by high hills, which gradually diminish at this point, but the country on each side is covered with thin woods, such as oaks and other hard woods, scattered wide apart.

"The canoes were carried three or four hundred steps, and eight leagues above was found the west [east?] bank of the river of the Nadouesioux, ending in a lake named Issati, which expands into a great marsh, where the wild rice grows toward the mouth."

" I believed that it was appropriate to make for you the narrative of the adventures of this canoe, because I doubt not that they will speak of it, and if you wish to confer with the Father Louis Hennepin, Recollect, who has returned to France, you must know him a little, because he will not fail to exaggerate all things; it is his character, and to me he has written as if he were about to be burned when he was not even in danger, but he believes that it is honorable to act in this manner,

Hennepin was born in Ath, an inland town of the Netherlands. From boyhood he longed to visit foreign lands, and it is not to be wondered at that he assumed the priest's garb, for next to the soldier's life, it suited one of wandering propensities.

At one time he is on a begging expedition to some of the towns on the sea coast. In a few months he occupies the post of chaplain at an hospital, where he shrives the dying and administers extreme unction. From the quiet of the hospital he proceeds to the camp, and is present at the battle of Seneffe, which occurred in theyear 1674.

His whole miritt, from the time that he became a priest, appears to have been on " things seen and temporal," rather than on those that are " unseen and eternal." While on duty at some of the ports of the Straits of Dover, he exhibited the characteristic of an ancient Athenian more than that of a professed successor of the Apostles. He sought out the society of strangers "who spent their time in nothing else but either to tell or to hear some new thing." With perfect nonchalance he confesses that notwithstanding the nauseating fumes of tobacco, he used to slip behind the doors of sailors' taverns, and spend days, without regard to the loss of his meals, listening to the adventures and hair-breadth escapes of the mariners in lands beyond the sea.

In the year 1676, he received a welcome order from his Superior, requiring him to embark for Canada. Unaccustomed to the world, and arbitrary in his disposition, he rendered the cabin of the ship in which he sailed any thing but heavenly. As in modern days, the passengers in a vessel to the new world were composed of heterogeneous materials. There were young women going out in search for brothers or husbands, ecclesiastics, and those engaged in the then new, but profitable, commerce in furs. One of his fellow passengers was the talented and enterpriprising, though unfortunate, La Salle, with whom he was afterwards associated. If he is to be credited, his intercourse with La Salle was not very pleasant on ship-board. The young women, tired of being cooped up in the narrow accommodations of the ship, when the evening was fair sought the deck, and engaged in the rude dances of the French peasantry of that age. Hennepin, feeling that it was improper, began to assume the air of the priest, and forbade the sport. La Salle, feeling that his interference was uncalled for, called him a pedant, and took the side of the girls, and during the voyage there were stormy discussions.

Good humor appears to have been restored when they left the ship, for Hennepin would otherwise have not been the companion of La Salle in his great western journey.

Sojourning for a short period at Quebec, the adventure-loving Franciscan is permitted to go to a mission station on or near tbe site of the present town of Kingston, Canada West.

Here there was much to gratify his love of novelty, and he passed considerable time in rambling among the Iroquois of New York. In 1678 he returned to Quebec, and was ordered to join the expedition of Robert La Salle.

On the 6th of December Father Hennepin and a portion of the exploring party had entered the Niagara river. In the vicinity of the Falls, the winter was passed, and while the artisans were preparing a ship above the Falls, to navigate the great lakes, the Recollect whiled away the hours, in studying the manners and customs of the Seneca Indians, and in admiring the sublimest handiwork of God on the globe.

On the 7th of August, 1679, the ship being completely rigged, unfurled its sails to the breezes of Lake Erie. The vessel was named the " Griffin," in honor of the arms of Frontenac, Governor of Canada, the first ship of European construction that had ever ploughed the waters of the great inland seas of North America.

After encountering a violent and dangerous storm on one of the lakes, during which they had given up all hope of escaping shipwreck, on the 27th of the month, they were safely moored in the harbor of " Missilimackinack. " From thence the party proceeded to Green Bay, where they left the ship, procured canoes, and continued along the coast of Lake Michigan. By the middle of January, 1680, La Salle had conducted his expedition to the Illinois River, and, on an eminence near Lake Peoria, he commenced, with much heaviness of heart, the erection of a fort,

The first work bearing the name of the Reverend Father Louis Hennepin, Franciscan Missionary of the Recollect order, was entitled, " Description de la Louisiane," and in 1683 published in Paris.

As soon as the book appeared it was criticised. Abbe Bernou, on the 29th of February, 1684, writes from Rome about the 44 paltry book" (meshcant livre) of Father Hennepin. About a year before the pious Tronson, under date of March 13, 1683, wrote to a friend: " I have interviewed the P. Recollect, who pretends to have descended the Mississippi river to the Gulf of Mexico. I do not know that one will believe what he speaks any more than that which is in the printed relation of P. Louis, which I send you that you may make your own reflections."

On the map accompanying his first book, he boldly marks a Recollect Mission many miles north of the point he had visited. In the Utrecht edition of 1697 this deliberate fraud is erased.

Throughout the work he assumes, that he was the leader of the expedition, and magnifies trifles into tragedies. For instance, Mr. La Salle writes that Michael Accault, also written Ako, who was the leader, presented the Sioux with the calumet but Hennepin makes the occurrence more formidable.

He writes : " Our prayers were heard, when on the 11th of April, 1680, about two o'clock in th^ afternoon, we suddenly perceived thirty -three bark canoes manned by a hundred and twenty Indians coming down with very great speed, on » war party, against the Miamis, Illinois and Maro>- as. These Indians surrounded us, and while at a distance, discharged some arrows at us, but as they approached our canoe, the old men seeing us with the calumet of peace in our hands, prevented the young men from killing us. These savages leaping from their canoes, some on land, others into the water, with frightful cries and yells approached us, and as we made no resistance, being only three against so great a number, one of them wrenched our calumet from oux hands, while our canoe and theirs were tied to the shore. We first presented to them a piece of

Henxepi2Ps Difficulty With Pbayfr-Book

" As we did not understand their language, we took a little stick, and by signs which we made on the sand, showed them that their enemies, the Miamis, whom they sought, had fled across the river Colbert [Mississippi] to join the Islinois; when they saw themselves discovered and unable to surprise their enemies, three or four old men laying their hands on my head, wept in a mournful tone.

44 With a spare handkerchief I had left I wiped away their tears, but they would not smoke our Calumet. They made us cross the river with great cries, while all shouted with tears in their eyes; they made us row before them, and we heard yells capable of striking the most resolute with terror. After landing our canoe and goods, part of which had already been taken, we made a fire to boil our kettle, and we gave them two large wild turkeys which we had killed. These Indians having called an assembly to deliberate what they were to do with us, the two head chiefs of the party approaching, showed us by signs that the warriors wished to tomahawk us. This compelled me to go to the war chiefs with one young man, leaving the other by our property, and throw into their midst six axes, fifteen knives and six fathom of our black tobacco ; and then bringing down my head, I showed them with an axe that they might kill me, if they thought proper. This present appeased many individual members, who gave us some beaver to eat, putting the three first morsels into our mouths, according to the custom of the country, and blowing on the meat, which was too hot, before putting the bark dish before us to let us eat as we liked. We spent the night in anxiety, because, before retiring at night, they had returned us our peace calumet.

" Our two boatmen were resolved to sell their lives dearly, and to resist if attacked ; their arms and swords were ready. As for my own part, I determined to allow myself to be killed without any resistance ; as I was going to announce to them a God who had been foully accused, unjustly condemned, and cruelly crucified, without showing the least aversion to those who put him to death. We watched in turn, in our anxiety, so as not to be surprised asleep. The next morning, a chief named Narrhetoba asked for the peace calumet, filled it with willow bark, and all smoked. It was then signified that the white men were to return with them to their villages."

In his narrative the Franciscan remarks, "I found it difficult to say my office before these Indians. Many seeing me move my lips, said in a fierce tone, ' Ouakanche.' Michael, all out of countenance, told me, that if I continued to say my breviary, we should all three be killed, and the Picard begged me at least to pray apart, so as not to provoke them. I followed the latter's advice, but the more I concealed myself the more I had the Indians at my heels ; for when I entered the wood, they thought I was going to hide some goods under ground, so that I knew not on what side to turn to pray, for they never let me out of sight. This obliged me to beg pardon of my canoe -men, assuring them I could not dispense with saying my office. By the word, c Ouakanche,' the Indians meant that the book I was reading was a spirit, but by their gesture they nevertheless showed a kind of aversion, so that to accustom them to it, I chanted the litany of the Blessed Virgin in the canoe, with my book opened. They thought that the breviary was a spirit which taught me to sing for their diversion ; for these people are naturally fond of singing."

This is the first mention of a Dahkotah word in a European book. The savages were annoyed rather than enraged, at seeing the white man reading a book, and exclaimed, "Wakan-del" this is wonderful or supernatural. The war party was composed of several bands of the M'dewahkantonwan Dahkotahs, and there was a diversity of opinion in relation to the disposition that should be made of the white men. The relatives of those who had been killed by the Miamis, were in favor of taking their scalps, but others were anxious to retain the favor of the French, and open a trading intercourse.

Perceiving one of the canoe-men shoot a wild turkey, they called the gun, " Manza Ouackange," iron that has understanding; more correctly, " Maza Wakande," this is the supernatural metal.

Aquipaguetin, one of the head men, resorted to the following device to obtain merchandise. Says the Father, "This wily savage had the bones of some distinguished relative, which he preserved with great care in some skins dressed and adorned with several rows of black and red porcupine quills. From time to time he assembled his men to give it a smoke, and made us come several days to cover the bones with goods, and by a present wipe away the tears he had shed for him, and for his own son killed by the Miamis. To appease this captious man, we threw on the bones several fathoms of tobacco, axes, knives, beads, and some black and white wampum bracelets. * * * We slept at the point of the Lake of Tears [Lake Pepin], which we so called from the tears which this chief shed all night long, or by one of his sons whom he caused to weep when he grew tired."

The next day, after four or five leagues' sail, a chief came, and telling them to leave their canoes, he pulled up three piles of grass for seats. Then taking a piece of cedar full of little holes, he placed a stick into one, which he revolved between the palms of his hands, until he kindled a fire, and informed the Frenchmen that they would be at Mille Lac in six days. On the nineteenth day after their captivity, they arrived in the vicinity of Saint Paul, not far, it is probable, from the marshy ground on which the Kaposia band once lived, and now called Pig's Eye.

The journal remarks, " Having arrived on the nineteenth day of our navigation, five leagues below St. Anthony's Falls, these Indians landed us in a bay, broke our canoe to pieces, and secreted their own in the reeds."

They then followed the trail to Mille Lac, sixty leagues distant. As they approached their villages, the various bands began to show their spoils. The tobacco was highly prized, and led to some contention. The chalice of the Father, which glistened in the sun, they were afraid to touch, supposing it was uwakan." After five days' walk they reached the Issati [Dahkotah] settlements in the valley of the Rum or Knife river. The different bands each conducted a Frenchman to their village, the chief Aquipaguetin taking charge of Hennepin. After marching through the marshes towards the sources of Rum river, five wives of the chief, in three bark canoes, met them and took them a short league to an island where their cabins were.

The son of the chief took great pleasure in carrying upon his bare back the priest's robe with dead men's bones enveloped. It was called Pere Louis Chinnen. In the Dahkotah language Shinna or Shinnan signifies a buffalo robe.

" The day after our arrival, Aquipaguetin, who was the head of a large family, covered me with a robe made of ten large dressed beaver skins, trimmed with porcupine quills. This Indian showed me five or six of his wives, telling them, as I afterwards learned, that they should in future regard me as one of their children.

" He set before me a bark dish full of fish, and seeing that I could not rise from the ground, he had a small sweating-cabin made, in which he made me enter with four Indians. This cabin he covered with buffalo skins, and inside he put stones red-hot. He made me a sign to do as the others before beginning to sweat, but I merely concealed my nakedness with a handkerchief. As soon as these Indians had several times breathed out quite violently, he began to sing vociferously, the others putting their hands on me and rubbing me while they wept bitterly. I began to faint, but I came out and could scarcely take my habit to put on. When he made me sweat thus three times a week, I felt as strong as ever."

The mariner's compass was a constant source of wonder and amazement. Aquipaguetin having assembled the braves, would ask Hennepin to show his compass. Perceiving that the needle turned, the chief harangued his men, and told them that the Europeans were spirits, capable of doing any thing.

In the Franciscan's possession was an iron pot with feet like lions', which the Indians would not touch unless their hands were wrapped in buffalo skins. The women looked upon it as " wakan," and would not enter the cabin where it was.

" The chiefs of these savages, seeing that I was desirous to learn, frequently made me write, naming all the parts of the human body ; and as I would not put on paper certain indelicate words, at which they do not blush, they were heartily amused."

Hennepin'S Visit To Falls Of Saint Anthony

They often asked the Franciscan questions, to answer which it was necessary to refer to his lexicon. This appeared very strange, and, as they had no word for paper, they said, "That white thing must be a spirit which tells Fere Louis all we say."

Hennepin remarks: "These Indians often asked me how many wives and children I had, and how old I was, that is, how many winters ; for so these natives always count. Never illumined by the light of faith, they were surprised at my answer. Pointing to our two Frenchmen, whom I was then visiting, at a point three leagues from our village, I told them that a man among us could only have one wife ; that as for me, I had promised the Master of life to live as they saw me, and to come and live with them to teach them to be like the French.

" But that gross people, till then lawless and faithless, turned all I said into ridicule. * How,' said they, 'would you have these two men with thee have wives? Ours would not live with them, for they have hair all over their face, and we have none there or elsewhere.' In fact, they were never better pleased with me than when I was shaved, and from a complaisance, certainly not criminal, I shaved every week.

" As often as I went to visit the cabins, I found a sick child, whose father's name was Mamenisi. Michael Ako would not accompany me; the Picard du Gay alone followed me to act as sponsor, or, rather, to witness the baptism.

44 1 christened the child Antoinette, in honor of St. Anthony of Padua, as well as for the Picard's name, which was Anthony Auguelle. He was a native of Amiens, and nephew of the Procurator- General of the Premonstratensians both now at Paris. Having poured natural water on the head and uttered these words : 4 Creature of God, I baptize thee in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost,' I took half an altar cloth which I had wrested from the hands of an Indian who had stolen it from me, and put it on the body of the baptized child ; for as I could not say mass for want of wine and vestments, this piece of linen could not be put to better use than to enshroud the first Christian child among these tribes. I do not know whether the softness of the linen had refreshed her, but she was the next day smiling in her mother's arms,

"During my stay among them, there arrived four savages, who said they were come alone five hundred leagues from the west, and had been four months upon the way. They assured us there was no such place as the Straits of Anian, and that they had traveled without resting, except to sleep, and had not seen or passed over any great lake, by which phrase they always mean the sea.

44 They further informed us that the nation of the Assenipoulacs [Assiniboines] who lie northeast of Issati, was not above six or seven days' journey ; that none of the nations, within their knowledge, who lie to the east or northwest, had any great lake about their countries, which were very large, but only rivers, which came from the north. They further assured us that there were very few forests in the countries through which they passed, insomuch that now and then they were forced to make fires of buffaloes' dung to boil their food. All these circumstances make it appear that there is no such place as the Straits of Anian, as we usually see them set down on the maps. And whatever efforts have been made for many years past by the English and Dutch, to find out a passage to the Frozen Sea, they have not yet been able to effect it. But by the help of my discovery aud the assistance of God, I doubt not but a passage may still be found, and that an easy one too.

44 For example, we may be transported into the Pacific Sea by rivers which are large and capable of carrying great vessels, and from thence it is very easy to go to China and Japan, without crossing the equinoctial line ; and, in all probability, Japan is on the same continent as America."

Hennepin in his first book, thus describes his first visit to the Falls of St. Anthony : 41 In the beginning of July, 1680, we descended the [Rum] River in a canoe southward, with the great chief Ouasicoude [Wauzeekootay] that is to say Pierced Pine, with about eighty cabins composed of more than a hundred and thirty families and about two hundred and fifty warriors. Scarcely would the Indians give me a place in their little flotilla, for they had only old canoes. They went four leagues lower down, to get birch bark to make some more. Having made a hole in the ground, to hide our silver chalice and our papers, till our return from the hunt, and keeping only our breviary, so as not to be loaded, I stood on the bank of the lake formed by the river we had called St. Francis [now Rum] and stretched out my hand to the canoes as they rapidly passed in succession.

"Our Frenchmen also had one for themselves, which the Indians had given them. They would not take me in, Michael Ako saying that he had taken me long enough to satisfy him. I was hurt at this answer, seeing myself thus abandoned by Christians, to whom I had always done good, as they both often acknowledged; but God never having abandoned me on that painful voyage, inspired two Indians to take me in their little canoe, where I had no other employment than to bale out with a little bark tray, the water which entered by little holes. This I did not do without getting all wet. This boat might, indeed, be called a death box, for its lightness and fragility. These canoes do not generally weigh over fifty pounds, the least motion of the body upsets them, unless you are long accustomed to that kind of navigation.

41 On disembarking in the evening, the Heard, as an excuse, told me that their canoe was halfrotten, and that had we been three in it, we should have run a great risk of remaining on the way. * * * Four days after our departure for the buffalo hunt, we halted eight leagues above St. Anthony of Padua's Falls, on an eminence opposite the mouth of the River St. Francis [Rum] * * * The Picard and myself went to look for haws, gooseberries, and little wild fruit, which often did us more harm than good. This obliged us to go alone, as Michael Ako refused, in a wretched canoe, to Ouisconsin river, which was more than a hundred leagues off, to see whether the Sieur de la Salle had sent to that place a reinforcement of men, with powder, lead, and other munitions, as he had promised us.

"The Indians would not have suffered this voyage had not one of the three remained with them. They wished me to stay, but Michael Ako absolutely refused. As we were making the portage of our canoe at St. Anthony of Padua's Falls, we perceived five or six of our Indians who had taken the start ; one of them was up in an oak opposite the great fall,- weeping bitterly, with a rich dressed beaver robe, whitened inside, and trimmed with porcupine quills, which he was offering as a sacrifice to the falls; which is, in itself, admirable and frightful. I heard him while shedding copious tears, say as he spoke to the great cataract, 4 Thou who art a spirit, grant that our nation may pass here quietly, without accident; may kill buffalo in abundance ; conquer our enemies, and bring in slaves, some of whom we will put to death before thee. The Messenecqz (so they call the tribe named by the French Outagamis) have killed our kindred; grant that we may avenge them.' This robe offered in sacrifice, served one of our Frenchmen, who took it as we returned."

It is certainly wonderful, that Hennepin, who knew nothing of the Sioux language a few weeks before, should understand the prayer offered at the Falls without the aid of an interpreter.

The narrator continues : 44 A league beyond St. Anthony of Padua's Falls, the Picard was obliged to land and get his powder horn, which he had left at the Falls. * * * As we descended the river Colbert [Mississippi] we found some of our Indians on the islands loaded with buffalo meat, some of which they gave us. Two hours after landing, fifteen or sixteen warriors whom we had left above St. Anthony of Padua's Falls, entered, tomakawk in hand, upset the cabin of those who had invited us, took all the meat and bear oil they found, and greased themselves from head to foot,"

This was done because the others had violated the rules for the buffalo hunt. With the Indians Hennepin went down the river sixty leagues, and then went up the river again, and met buffalo. He continues :

"While seeking the Ouisconsin River, that savage father, Aquipaguetin, whom I had left, and who I believed more than two hundred leagues off, on the 11th of July, 1680, appeared with the warriors." After this, Hennepin and Heard continued to go up the river almost eighty leagues.

There is great confusion here, as the reader will see. When at the mouth of the Rum River, he speaks of the Wisconsin as more than a hundred leagues off. He floats down the river sixty leagues ; then he ascended, but does not state the distance; then he ascends eighty leagues.

with the flotilla of canoes loaded with meat, came down. * * * All the Indian women had their stock of meat at the mouth of Buffalo River and on the islands, and again we went down the Colhert [Mississippi] ahout eighty leagues. * * * We had another alarm in our camp : the old men on duty on the top of the mountains announced that they saw two warriors in the distance ; all the bowmen hastened there with speed, each trying to outstrip the others ; but they brought back only two of their enemies, who came to tell them that a party of their people were hunting at the extremity of Lake Conde [Superior] and had found four Spirits (so they call the French) who, by means of a slave, had expressed a wish to come on, knowing us to be among them. * * * On the 25th of July, 1680, as we were ascending the river Colbert, after the buffalo hunt, to the Indian villages, we met Sieur du Luth, who came to the Nadouessious with five French soldiers. They joined us about two hundred and twenty leagues distant from the country of the Indians who had taken us. As we had some knowledge of the language, they begged us to accompany them to the villages of these tribes, to which I readily agreed, knowing that these two Frenchmen had not approached the sacrament for two years."

Here again the number of leagues is confusing, and it is impossible to believe that Du Luth and his interpreter Faffart, who had been trading with the Sioux for more than a year, needed the help of Hennepin, who had been about three months with these people.

We are not told by what route Hennepin and Du Luth reached Lake Issati or Mille Lacs, but Hennepin says they arrived there on the 11th of August, 1680, and he adds, " Toward the end of September, having no implements to begin an establishment, we resolved to tell these people, that for their benefit, we would have to return to the French settlements. The grand Chief of the Issati or Nadouessiouz consented, and traced in pencil on paper I gave him, the route I should take for four hundred leagues. With this chart, we set out, eight Frenchmen, in two canoes, and descended the river St. Francis and Colbert [Rum and Mississippi]. Two of our men took two beaver robes at St. Anthony of Padua's Falls, which the Indians had hung in sacrifice on the trees.79

The second work of Hennepin, an enlargement of the first, appeared at Utrecht in the year 1697, ten years after La Salle's death. During the interval between the publication of the first and second book, he had passed three years as Superintendent of the Recollects at Reny in the province of Artois, when Father Hyacinth Lef evre, a friend of La Salle, and Commissary Provincial of Recollects at Paris, wished him to return to Canada. He refused, and was ordered to go to Rome, and upon his coming back was sent to a convent at St. Omer, and there received a dispatch from the Minister of State in France to return to the countries of the King of Spain, of which he was a subject. This order, he asserts, he afterwards learned was forged.

"The pretended reason of that violent order was because I refused to return into America, where I had been already eleven years ; though the particular laws of our Order oblige none of us to go beyond sea against his will. I would have, however, returned very willingly had I not known the malice of M. La Salle, who would have exposed me to perish, as he did one of the men who accompanied me in my discovery. God knows that I am sorry for his unfortunate death ; but the judgments of the Almighty are always just, for the gentleman was killed by one of his own men, who were at last sensible that he exposed them to visible dangers without any necessity and for his private designs."

After this he was for about five years at Gosselies, in Brabant, as Confessor in a convent, and from thence removed to his native place, Ath, in Belgium, where, according to his narrative in the preface to the "Nouveau Decouverte," he was again persecuted. Then Father Payez, Grand Commissary of Recollects at Lou vain, being informed that the King of Spain and the Elector of Bavaria recommended the step, consented that he should enter the service of William the Third of Great Britain, who had been very kind to the Roman* Catholics of Netherlands. By order of Payez he was sent to Antwerp to take the lay habit in the convent there, and subsequently went to Utrecht, where he finished his second book known as the New Discovery.

His first volume, printed in 1683, contains 312 pages, with an appendix of 107 pages, on the Customs of the Savages, while the Utrecht hook of 1697 contains 509 pages without an appendix.

On page 249 of the New Discovery, he begins an account of a voyage alleged to have been made to the mouth of the Mississippi, and occupies over sixty pages in the narrative. The opening sentences give as a reason for concealing to this time his discovery, that La Salle would have reported him to his Superiors for presuming to go down instead of ascending the stream toward the north, as had been agreed ; and that the two with him threatened that if he did not consent to descend the river, they would leave him on shore during the night, and pursue their own course.

He asserts that he left the Gulf of Mexico, to return, on the 1st of April, and on the 24th left the Arkansas ; but a week after this, he declares he landed with the Sioux at the marsh about two miles below the city of Saint Paul.

The account has been and is still a puzzle to the historical student. In our review of his first book we have noticed that as early as 1683, he claimed to have descended the Mississippi. In the Utrecht publication he declares that while at Quebec, upon his return to France, he gave to Father Valentine Roux, Commissary of Recollects, his journal, upon the promise that it would be kept secret^ and that this Father made a copy of his whole voyage, including the visit to the Gulf of Mexico ; but in his Description of Louisiana, Hennepin wrote, 44 We had some design of going to the mouth of the river Colbert, which more probably empties into the Gulf of Mexico than into the Red Sea, but the tribes that seized us gave us no time to sail up and down the river."

The additions in his Utrecht book to magnify his importance and detract from others, are many. As Sparks and Parkman have pointed out the plagiarisms of this edition, a reference here is unnecessary.

Du Luth, who left Quebec in 1678, and had been in northern Minnesota, with an interpreter, for a year, after he met Ako and Hennepin, becomes of secondary importance, in the eyes of the Franciscan.

few words : " Two of our men seized two beaver robes at the Falls of St. Anthony of Padua, which the Indians had in sacrifice, fastened to trees." But in the Utrecht edition, commencing on page 416, there is much added concerning Du Lnth. After using the language of the edition of 1683, already quoted it adds: "Hereupon there arose a dispute between Sieur du Luth and myself. I commended what they had done, saying, 4 The savages might judge by it that they disliked the superstition of these people.' The Sieur du Luth, on the contrary, said that they ought to have left the robes where the savages placed them, for they would not fail to avenge the insult we had put upon them by this action, and that it was feared that they would attack us on this journey. I confessed he had some foundation for what he said, and that he spoke according to the rules of prudence. But one of the two men flatly replied, the two robes suited them, and they cared nothing for the savages and their superstitions. The Sieur du Luth at these words was so greatly enraged that he nearly struck the one who uttered them, but I intervened and settled the dispute. The Picard and Michael Ako ranged themselves on the side of those who had taken the robes in question, which might have resulted badly.

44 1 argued with Sieur du Luth that the savages would not attack us, because I was persuaded that their great chief Ouasicoude would have our interests at heart, and he had great credit with his nation. The matter terminated pleasantly.

44 When we arrived near the river Ouisconsin, we halted to smoke the meat of the buffalo we had killed on the journey. During our stay, three savages of the nation we had left, came by the side of our canoe to tell us that their great chief Ouasicoude, having learned that another chief of these people wished to pursue and kill us, and that he entered the cabin where he was consulting, and had struck him on the head with such violence as to scatter his brains upon his associates ; thus preventing the executing of this injurious project.

44 We regaled the three savages, having a great abundance of food at that time. The Sieur du Luth, after the savages had left, was as enraged as before, and feared that they would pursue and attack us on our voyage. He would have pushed the matter further, but seeing that one man would resist, and was not in the humor to be imposed upon, he moderated, and I appeased them in the end with the assurance that God would not abandon us in distress, and, provided we confided in Him, he would deliver us from our foes, because He is the protector of men and angels."

After describing a conference with the Sioux, he adds, " Thus the savages were very kind, without mentioning the beaver robes. The chief Ouasicoude told me to offer a fathom of Martinico tobacco to the chief Aquipaguetin, who had adopted me as a son. This had an admirable effect upon the barbarians, who went off shouting several times the word 4 Louis,' [Ouis or We] which, as he said, means the sun. Without vanity, I must say that my name will be for a long time among these people.

"The savages having left us, to go to war against the Messorites, the Maroha, the Illinois, and other nations which live toward the lower part of the Mississippi, and are irreconcilable foes of the people of the North, the Sieur du Luth, who upon many occasions gave me marks of his friendship, could not forbear to tell our men that I had all the reason in the world to believe that the Viceroy of Canada would give me a favorable reception, should we arrive before winter, and that he wished with all his heart that he had been among as many natives as myself."

The style of Louis Hennepin is unmistakable in this extract, and it is amusing to read! his patronage of one of the fearless explorers of the Northwest, a cousin of Tonty, favored by Frontenac, and who was in Minnesota a year before his arrival.

In 1691, six years before the Utrecht edition of Hennepin, another Recollect Franciscan had published a book at Paris, called " The First Establishment of the Faith in New France," in which is the following tribute to Du Luth, whom Hennepin strives to make a subordinate : " In the last years of M. de Frontenac's ad^ninistration, Sieur Du Luth, a man of talent and experience, opened a way to the missionary and the Gospel in many different nations, turning toward the north of that lake [Superior] where he even built a fort, tie advanced as far as the Lake of the Issati, called Lake Buade, from the family name of M.

In the second volume of his last book, which is called " A Continuance of the New Discovery of a vast Country in America," etc., Hennepin noticed some criticisms.

To the objection that his work was dedicated to William the Third of Great Britain, he replies : " My King, his most Catholic Majesty, his Electoral Highness of Bavaria, the consent in writing of the Superior of my order, the integrity of my faith, and the regular observance of my vows, which his Britannic Majesty allows me, are the best warrants of the uprightness of my intentions."

To the query, how he could travel so far upon the Mississippi in so little time, he answers with a bold face, " That we may, with a canoe and a pair of oars, go twenty, twenty-five, or thirty leagues every day, and more too, if there be occasion. And though we had gone but ten leagues a day, yet in thirty days we might easily have gone three hundred leagues. If during the time we spent from the river of the Illinois to the mouth of the Meschasipi, in the Gulf of Mexico, we had used a little more haste, we might have gone the same twice over."

To the objection, that he said, he nad passed eleven years in America, when he had been there but about four, he evasively replies, that " reckoning from the year 1674, when I first set out, to the year 1688, when I printed the second edition of my 4 Louisiana,' it appears that I have spent fifteen years either in travels or printing my Discoveries."

To those who objected to the statement in his first book, in the dedication to Louis the Fourteenth, that the Sioux always call the sun Louis, he writes : " I repeat what I have said before, that being among the Issati and Nadouessans, by whom I was made a slave in America, I never heard them call the sun any other than Louis. It is true these savages call also the moon Louis, but with this distinction, that they give the moon the name of Louis Bastache, which in their language signifies, the sun that shines in the night."

The Utrecht edition called forth much censure, and no one in France doubted that Hennepin was the author. D'Iberville, Governor of Louisiana, while in Paris, wrote on July 3d 1699, to the Minister of Marine and Colonies of France, in these words : " Very much vexed at the Recollect, whose false narratives had deceived every one, and caused our suffering and total failure of our enterprise, by the time consumed in the search of things which alone existed in his imagination."

The Rev. Father James Gravier, in a letter from a fort on the Gulf of Mexico, near the Mississippi, dated February 16th, 1701, expressed the sentiment of his times when he speaks of Hennepin " who presented to King William, the Relation of the Mississippi, where he never was, and after a thousand falsehoods and ridiculous boasts,

* * * he makes Mr. de la Salle appear in his Relation, wounded with two balls in the head, turn toward the Recollect Father Anastase, to ask him for absolution, having been killed instantly, without uttering a word - and other like false stories."

Hennepin gradually faded out of sight. Brunet mentions a letter written by J. B. Dubos, from Rome, dated March 1st, 1701, which mentions that Hennepin was living on the Capitoline Hill, in the celebrated convent of Ara Coeli, and was a favorite of Cardinal Spada. The time and place of his death has not been ascertained.

Nicholas Pebbot, Foundeb Of Fibst Post On Lake Pepin Nicholas Perrot, Founder Of First Post On Lake Pepin

Bsriy Lift. - Searches for Copper. - Interpreter at 8a alt St Marie, Employed by La Salle. - Bailds Stockade at Lake Pepin. - Hostile Indians Rebuked. - A SflTer Ostensarinm Qiren to a Jesuit Chapel. - Perrot in the Battle against Benecas, in New York. - Second Visit to Sioux Country. - Taking Possession by "Proees YerbaL" - Discorery of Lead Mines. - Attends Council at Montreal. - Establishes a Post near Detroit, in Michigan. - Perrot's Death, and his Wife.

Nicholas Perrot, sometimes written Pere, was one of the most energetic of the class in Canada known as " coureurs des bois," or forest rangers. Born in 1644, at an early age he was identified with the fur trade of the great inland lakes. As early as 1665, he was among the Outagamies [Foxes], and in 1667 was at Green Bay. In 1669, he was appointed by Talon to go to the lake region in search of copper mines. At the formal taking possession of that country in the name of the King of France, at Sault St. Marie, on the 14th of May, lt»71, he acted as interpreter. In 1677, he seems to have been employed at Fort Frontenac. La Salle was made very sick the next year, from eating a salad, and one Nicholas Perrot, called Joly Cceur (Jolly Soul) was suspected of having mingled poison with the food. After this he was associated with Du Luth in the execution of two Indians, as we have seen. In 1684, he was appointed by De la Barre, the Governor of Canada, as Commandant for the West, and left Montreal with twenty men. Arriving at Green Bay in Wisconsin, some Indians told him that they had visited countries toward the setting sun, where they obtained the blue and green stones suspended from their ears and noses, and that they saw horses and men like Frenchmen, probably the Spaniards of New Mexico ; and others said that they had obtained hatchets from persons who lived in a house that walked on the water, near the mouth of the river of the Assiniboines, alluding to the English established at Hudson's Bay. Proceeding to the portage between the Fox and Wisconsin, thirteen Hurons were met, who were bitterly opposed to the establishment of a post near the Sioux. After the

Mississippi was reached, a party of Winnebagoes was employed to notify the tribes of Northern Iowa that the French had ascended the river, and wished to meet them. It was further agreed that prairie fires would be kindled from time to time, so that the Indians could follow the French.

After entering Lake Pepin, near its mouth, on the east side, Perrot found a place suitable for a post, where there was wood. The stockade was built at the foot of a bluff beyond which was a large prairie. La Potherie makes this statement, which is repeated by Penicaut, who writes of Lake Pepin : "To the right and left of its shores there are also prairies. In that on the right on the bank of the lake, there is a fort, which was built by Nicholas Perrot, whose name it yet [1700] bears."

Soon after he was established, it was announced that a band of Aiouez [Ioways] was encamped above, and on the way to visit the post. The French ascended in canoes to meet them, but as they drew nigh, the Indian women ran up the bluffs, and hid in the woods ; but twenty of the braves mustered courage to advance and greet Perrot, and bore him to the chief's lodge. The chief, bending over Perrot, began to weep, and allowed the moisture to fall upon his visitor. After he had exhausted himself, the principal men of the party repeated the slabbering process. Then buffalo tongues were boiled in an earthen pot, and after being cut into small pieces, the chief took a piece, and, as a mark of respect, placed it in Perrot's mouth.

At the end of the beaver hunt, the Ayoes [Ioways] came to the post, but Perrot was absent visiting the Nadouaissioux. and they sent a chief to notify him of their arrival. Four Illinois met liim on the way, and were anxious for the return of four children held by the French. When the

Sioux, who were at war with the Illinois, perceived them, they wished to seize their canoes, but the French voyageurs who were guarding them, pushed into the middle of the river, and the French at the post coming to their assistance, a reconciliation was effected, and four of the Sioux took the Illinois upon their shoulders, and bore them to the shore.

An order having been received from Denonville, Governor of Canada, to bring the Miamis, and other tribes, to the rendezvous at Niagara, to go on an expedition against the Senecas, Perrot entrusting the post at Lake Pepin to a few Frenchmen, visited the Miamis, who were dwelling below on the Mississippi, and with no guide but Indian camp fires, went sixty miles into the country beyond the river.

Upon his return, he perceived a great smoke, and at first thought that it was a war party proceeding to the Sioux country. Fortunately he met a Maskouten chief, who had been at the post to see him, and he gave the intelligence, that the Outagamies [Foxes], Kikapous [Kickapoos], and Mascoutechs [Maskoutens], and others, from the region of Green Bay, had determined to pillage the post, kill the French, and then go to war against the Sioux. Hurrying on, he reached the fort, and learned that on that very day three spies had been there and seen that there were only six Frenchmen in charge.

The next day two more spies appeared, but Perrot had taken the precaution to put loaded guns at the door of each hut, and caused his men frequently to change their clothes. To the query, " How many French were there?" the reply was given, 41 Forty, and that more were daily expected, who had been on a buffalo hunt, and that the guns were well loaded and knives well sharpened. " They were then told to go back to their camp aud bring a chief of each nation represented, and that if Indians, in large numbers, came near, they would be fired at. In accordance with this message six chiefs presented themselves, After their bows and arrows were taken away they were invited to Perrot's cabin, who gave something to eat and tobacco to smoke. Looking at Perrot 's loaded guns they asked, *- If he was afraid of his children?" He replied, he was not. They continued, " You are displeased." He answered, " I have good reason to be. The Spirit has warned me of your designs; you will take my things away and put me in the kettle, and proceed against the Nadouaissioux, The Spirit told me to be on my guard, and he would help me." At this they were astonished, and confessed that an attack was meditated. That night the chiefs slept in the stockade, and early the next morning a part of the hostile force was encamped in the vicinity, and wished to trade. Perrot had now only a force of fifteen men, and seizing the chiefs, he told them he would break their heads if they did not disperse the Indians. One of the chiefs then stood up on the gate of the fort and said to the warriors, " Do not advance, young men, or you are dead. The Spirit has warned Metaminens [Perrot] of your designs. " They followed the advice, and afterwards Perrot presented them with two guns, two fettles, and some tobacco, to close the door of war against the Nadouaissioux, and the chiefs were all permitted to make a brief visit to the post.

Returning to Green Bay in 1686, he passed much time in collecting allies for the expedition against the Iroquois in New York. During this year he gave to the Jesuit chapel at Depere, five miles above Green Bay, a church utensil of silver, fifteen inches high, still in existence. The standard, nine inches in height, supports a radiated circlet closed with glass on both sides and surmounted with a cross. This vessel, weighing about twenty ounces, was intended to show the consecrated wafer of the mass, and is called a soleil, monstrance, or ostensorium.

A Cup Of Brandy And Water Detects A Thief

During the spring of 1687 Perrot, with De Luth and Tonty, was with the Indian allies and the French in the expedition against the Senecas of the Genessee Valley in New York.

The next year Denonville, Governor of Canada, again sent Perrot with forty Frenchmen to the Sioux who, says Potherie, " were very distant, and who would not trade with us as easily as the other tribes, the Outagamis [Foxes] having boasted of having cut off the passage thereto."

When Perrot arrived at Mackinaw, the tribes of that region were much excited at the hostility of the Outagamis [Foxes] toward the Sauteurs [Chippeways]. As soon as Perrot and his party reached Green Bay a deputation of the Foxes sought an interview. He told them that he had nothing to do with this quarrel with the Chippeways. In justification, they said that a party of their young men, in going to war against the Nadouaissioux, had found a young man and three Chippeway girls.

Perrot was silent, and continued his journey towards the Nadouaissioux. Soon he was met by five chiefs of the Foxes in a canoe, who begged him to go to their village. Perrot consented, and when he went into a chief's lodge they placed before him broiled venison, and raw meat for the rest of the French. He refused to eat because, said he, " that meat did not give him any spirit, but he would take some when the Outagamis [Foxes] were more reasonable." He then chided them for not having gone, as requested by the Governor of Canada, to the Detroit of Lake Erie, and during the absence of the French fighting with the Chippeways. Having ordered them to go on their beaver hunt and only fight against the Iroquois, he left a few Frenchmen to trade and proceeded on his journey to the Sioux country. Arriving at the portage between the Fox and Wisconsin Rivers they were impeded by ice, but with the aid of some Pottawattomies they transported their goods to the Wisconsin, which they found no longer frozen. The Chippeways were informed that their daughters had been taken from the Foxes, and a deputation came to take them back, but being attacked by the Foxes, who did not know their errand, they fled without securing the three girls. Perrot then ascended the

As soon as the rivers were navigable, the Nadouaissioux came down and escorted Perrot to one of their villages, where he was welcomed with much enthusiasm. He was carried upon a beaver robe, followed by a long line of warriors, each bearing a pipe, and singing. After taking him around the village, he was borne to the chief's lodge, when several came in to weep over his head, with the same tenderness that the Ayoes (Ioways) did, when Perrot several years before arrived at Lake Pepin. "These weepings," says an old chronicler " do not weaken their souls. They are very good warriors, and reported the bravest in that region. They are at war with all the tribes at present except the Saulteurs [Chippeways] and Ayoes [Ioways], and even with these they have quarrels. At the break of day the Nadouaissioux bathe, even to the youngest. They have very fine forms, but the women are not comely, and they look upon them as slaves. They are jealous and suspicious about them, and they are the cause of quarrels and blood-shedding.

" The Sioux are very dextrous with their canoes, and they fight unto death if surrounded, Their country is full of swamps, which shelter them in summer from being molested . One must be a Nadouaissioux, to find the way to their vil-

While Perrot was absent in New York, fighting the Senecas, a Sioux chief knowing that few Frenchmen were left at Lake Pepin, came with one hundred warriors, and endeavored to pillage it. Of this complaint was made, and the guilty leader was near being put to death by his associates. Amicable relations having been formed, preparations were made by Perrot to return to his post. As they were going away, one of the Frenchmen complained that a box of his goods had been stolen. Perrot ordered a voyageur to bring a cup of water, and into it he poured some brandy. He then addressed the Indians and told them he would dry up their marshes if the goods were not restored ; and then he set on fire the brandy in the cup, The savages were astonished and terrified, and supposed that he possessed supernatural powers ; and in a little vbile the goods

Expl0Beb8 And Pioneebs Of Minnesota

The Foxes, while Perrot was in the Sioux country, changed their village, and settled on the Mississippi. Coming up to visit Perrot, they asked him to establish friendly relations between them and the Sioux. At the time some Sioux were at the post trading furs, and at first they supposed the French were plotting with the Foxes. Perrot, however, eased them by presenting the calumet and saying that the French considered the Outagamis [Foxes] as brothers, and then adding: "Smoke in my pipe; this is the manner with which Onontio [Governor of Canada] feeds his children." The Sioux replied that they wished the Foxes to smoke first. This was reluctantly done, and the Sioux smoked, but would not conclude a definite peace until they consulted their chiefs. This was not concluded, because Perrot, before the chiefs came down, received orders to return to Canada.

About this time, in the presence of Father Joseph James Marest, a Jesuit missionary, Boisguillot, a trader on the Wisconsin and Mississippi, Le Sueur, who afterward built a post below the Saint Croix Kiver, about nine miles from Hastings, the following document was prepared:

" Nicholas Perrot, commanding for the King at the post of the Nadouessioux, commissioned by the Marquis Denonville, Governor and Lieutenant Governor of all New France, to manage the interests of commerce among all the Indian tribes and people of the Bay des Puants [Green Bay], Nadouessioux, Mascoutens, and other western nations of the Upper Mississippi, and to take possession in the King's name of all the places where he has heretofore been and whither he will go:

44 We this day, the eighth of May, one thousand six hundred and eighty-nine, do, in the presence of the Keverend Father Marest, of the Society of Jesus, Missionary among the Nadouessioux, of Monsieur de Boisguillot, commanding the French in the neighborhood of the Ouiskonche, on the Mississippi, Augustin Legardeur, Esquire, Sieur de Caumont, and of Messieurs Le Sueur, Hebert, Lemire and Blein.

" Declare to all whom it may concern, that, being come from the Bay des Puants, and to the Lake of the Ouiskonches, we did transport ourselves to the country of the Nadouessioux, on the border of the river St. Croix, and at the mouth of the river St. Pierre, on the bank of which were the Mantantans, and further up to the interior, as far as the Menchokatonx [Med-ay-wah-kawntwawn], with whom dwell the majority of the Songeskitons [Se-see-twawns] and other Nadouessioux who are to the northwest of the Mississippi, to take possession, for and in the name of the King, of the countries and rivers inhabited by the said tribes, and of which they are proprietors. The present act done in our presence, signed with our hand, and subscribed."

The three Chippeway girls of whom mention has been made were still with the Foxes, and Perrot took them with him to Mackinaw, upon his return to Canada.

While there, the Ottawas held some prisoners upon an island not far from the mainland. The Jesuit Fathers went over and tried to save the captives from harsh treatment, but were unsuccessful. The canoes appeared at length near each other, one man paddling in each, while the warriors were answering the shouts of the prisoners, who each held a white stick in his hand. As they neared the shore the chief of the party made a speech to the Indians who lived on the shore, and giving a history of the campaign, told them that they were masters of the prisoners. The warriors then came on land, and, according to custom, abandoned the spoils. An old man then ordered nine men to conduct the prisoners to a separate place. The women and the young men formed a line with big sticks. The young prisoners soon found their feet, but the old men were so badly used they spat blood, and they were condemned to be burned at the Mamilion.

The Jesuit Fathers and the French officers were much embarrassed, and feared that the Iroquois would complain of the little care which had been used to prevent cruelty.

Perrot, in this emergency, walked to the place where the prisoners were singing the death dirge, in expectation of being burned, and told them to sit down and be silent. A few Ottauwaws rudely told them to sing on, but Perrot forbade. He then went back to the Council, where the old men had rendered judgment, and ordered one prisoner to be burned at Mackinaw, one at Sault St. Marie and another at Green Bay. Undaunted he spoke as follows : 44 1 come to cut the strings of the dogs. I will not suffer them to be eaten . I have pity on them, since my Father, Onontio, has commanded me. You Outaouaks [Ottawaws] are like tame bears, who will not recognize them who has brought them up. You have forgotten Onontio's protection. When he asks your obedience, you want to rule over him, and eat the flesh of those children he does not wish to give to you. Take care, that, if oyu swallow them, Onontio will tear them with violence from between your teeth. I speak as a brother, and I think I am showing pity to your children, by cutting the bonds of your prisoners."

His boldness had the desired effect. The prisoners were released, and two of them were sent with him to Montreal, to be returned to the Iroquois.

On the 22nd of May, 1690, with one hundred and forty-three voyage urs and six Indians, Perrot left Montreal as an escort of Sieur de Louvigny La Porte, a half-pay captain, appointed to succeed Durantaye at Mackinaw, by Frontenac, the new Governor of Canada, who in October of the previous year had arrived, to take the place of Denonville.

Perrot, as he approached Mackinaw, went in advance to notify the French of the coming of the commander of the post. As he came in sight of the settlement, he hoisted the white flag with the fleur de lis and the voyageurs shouted, " Long live the king! " Louvigny soon appeared and was received by one hundred "coureur des bois" under arms.

From Mackinaw, Perrot proceeded to Green Bay, and a party of Miamis there begged him to make a trading establishment on the Mississippi towards the Ouiskonsing ( Wisconsin.) The chief made him a present of a piece of lead from a mine which he had found in a small stream which flows into the Mississippi. Perrot promised to visit him within twenty days, and the chief then returned to his village below the d'Ouiskonche (iWsconsin) Kiver.

They arrested the messengers and came to the post for the purpose of plunder. Perrot asked them why they acted in this manner, and said that the Foxes, Miamis, Kickapoos, Illinois, and Maskoutens had united in a war party against them, but that he had persuaded them to give it up, and now he wished them to return to their families and to their beaver. The Sioux declared that they had started on the war-path, and that they were ready to die. After they had traded their furs, they sent for Perrot to come to their camp, and begged that he would not hinder them from searching for their foes. Perrot tried to dissuade them, but they insisted that the Spirit had given them men to eat, at three days' journey from the post Then more powerful influences were used. After giving them two kettles and some merchandise, Poerrt spoke thus: " I love your life, and I am sure you will be defeated. Your Evil Spirit has deceived you. If you kill the Outagamis, or their allies, you must strike me first; if you kill them, you kill me just the same, for I hold them under one wing and you under the other." After this he extended the calumet, which they at first refused; but at length a chief said he was right, and, making invocations to the sun, wished Perrot to take him back to his arms. This was granted, on condition that he would give up his weapons of war. The chief then tied them to a pole in the centre of the fort, turning them toward the sun. He then persuaded the other chiefs to give up the expedition, and, sending for Perrot, he placed the calumet before him, one end in the earth aud the other on a small forked twig to hold it firm. Then he took from his own sack a pair of his cleanest moccasins, and taking off Perrot's shoes, put on these. After he had made him eat, presenting the calumet, he said: " We listen to you now. Do for us as you do for our enemies, and prevent them from killing us, and we will separate for the beaver hunt. The sun is the witness of our obedience."

After this, Perrot descended the Mississippi and revealed to the Maskoutens, who had come to meet him, how he had pacified the Sionx. He, about this period, in accordance with his promise, visited the lead mines. He found the ore abundant " but the lead hard to work because it lay between rocks which required blowing up. It had very little dross and was easily melted."

Penicaut, who ascended the Mississippi in 1700, wrote that twenty leagues below the Wisconsin, on both sides of the Mississippi, were mines of lead called u Nicolas Perrot's." Early French maps indicate as the locality of lead mines the site of modern towns, Galena, in Illinois, and Dubuque, in Iowa.

In August, 1693, about two hundred Frenchmen from Mackinaw, with delegates from the tribes of the West, arrived at Montreal to attend a grand council called by Governor Frontenac, and among these was Perrot.

gave the Indians a great feast, after which they and the traders began to return to the wilderness. Perrot was ordered by Frontenac to establish a new post for the Miamis in Michigan, in the neighborhood of the Kalamazoo River.

Two years later he is present again, in August, at a council in Montreal, then returned to the West, and in 1699 is recalled from Green Bay. In 1701 he was at Montreal acting as interpreter, and appears to have died before 1718: his wife was Madeline Raclos, and his residence was in the Seigneury of Becancourt, not far from Three Rivers, on the St. Lawrence.