threats. At length, it seemed to have subsided. After a march of about two months, provisions failing, this man with Liotot, the surgeon, Hiens and Duhault, were sent to kill buffaloes and salt and smoke the meat. These persons, displeased with Lasalle and his nephew, who commanded this small detachment, plotted their destruction. In the evening of the seventeenth of March, Liotot despatched Lasalle's nephew, his servant and an Indian, with an axe. His companions standing by, ready to defend him with their arms, had any resistance been made. Lasalle, missing his nephew, left the party with father Athanase, and retrograded. Meeting Lancelot, he inquired whither his nephew was; the wretch pointed to a spot, over which a number of buzzards were hovering; as Lasalle advanced, he met with another of the accomplices, to whom he put the same question; but Duhault, who lay concealed in high grass, fired; the ball lodged in Lasalle's head; he fell and survived an hour only. This was on the nineteenth of March 1687, near the western branch of Trinity River.

The murderers, joined by other malcontents, taking possession of the provisions, ammunition and every thing that belonged to the deceased, compelled the rest of the party to continue with them.` In a quarrel among themselves, two of them were killed, and the rest sought an asylum among the Indians.

Lasalle's brother, father Athanase and five others continued their route towards the Illinois. A few days after, de Monte, one of them, bathing in a river, was drowned. In the latter part of July, this small party reached the country of the Arkansas. They noticed a large cross fixed in the ground, near a house built like those of the French in Canada. Here they found two of their countrymen, Couture

and Delaunay, natives of Rouen, who had come thither from the fort at the Illinois. Here the party learned that the Chevalier de Tonti, on his way to the mouth of the Mississippi, to meet Lasalle, had left six Frenchmen, at the Arkansas; four of whom had returned to the Illinois. After staying some time with Couture and Delaunay, the travellers disposed of their horses and procured canoes, in which they ascended the Mississippi, and the river of the Illinois to Fort St. Louis, which they reached on the fourth of September. The Chevalier de Tonti was absent, and Bellefontaine, his lieutenant, commanded. The travellers thought it prudent to conceal the death of Lasalle; they staid but a few days in the fort, and proceeded, by the way of Michillimackinac to Canada, and landed at Quebec, on the ninth of October, and soon after took shipping for France.

Charlevoix-Tonti.-Hennepin.

LOU. 1.

16

CHAPTER VI.

The English excite the Iroquois against the Indian allies of the French.-Proposals of James II. to Louis XIV. for the neutrality of their American dominions.-Instructions to Denonville.-The English attack Iberville, in Hudson's Bay, and he repels them.-Iroquois Chiefs decoyed, made prisoners and sent to the galleys at Marseilles.-Vaudreuil leads the Canadian forces against the Iroquois.-Correspondence between Denonville and the Governor of New York.-The French are attacked in a defile.-Good conduct of their red allies and the militia.-The Iroquois are routed, one of their villages is burnt, and their plantations laid waste.-Denonville marches back to Niagara and builds a fort.-Epidemic disease.-The Iroquois ravage the plantations near Fort Frontenac.-They sue for and obtain peace.-Population of Canada.-Abdication of James II-William and Mary.-Distress of the Colony on the Gulf of Mexico.-Alonzo de Leon scours the country.— Province of Texas.-Frontenac returns to New France. Commissioners for settling the boundaries of the French and English Colonies in North America.—Frontenac’s instructions.-De Callieres.-La Caffiniere.-Projected attack of New York.-Irruption of the Iroquois -Declaration of War between France and England.— Corlaer, Sermentel and Kaskebé.-Medal.-Famine. Vaudreuil takes possession of Acadie.-Du Palais.The English possess themselves of Hudson's Bay. Iberverville retakes it and winters there.—Scurvy.—Iberville reduces the Fort at Pentagoet.-The English land in Acadie and distress the planters.—Iberville's success in New Foundland.-The Fort in Hudson's Bay taken by the English, and retaken by Iberville.-Peace of Riswick.-De Callieres.

DURING the fall of 1687, a party of the Iroquois fell on some of the Indians in alliance with the French near Michillimackinac. Father Lamberville, the missionary at that post, was informed that this attack had been determined on at a meeting of deputies of several tribes, the chiefs of which had been lately convened at Albany, by the governor of New York, who had assured them the Marquis de Denonville meant to wage war against them: the governor advised them to begin it themselves, by falling on the French or their allies, whenever they met them, as, not suspecting any attack, they would be found an easy prey. He promised that, whatever might be the consequences, he never would forsake his red allies.

While the government of New York was provoking its Indians to hostilities against Canada, James the second was apparently pursuing quite a different line of conduct. The Marquis received a letter from the Minister, informing him that the cabinet of St. James had proposed to the Ambassador of France, a treaty of neutrality, between the subjects of the two crowns in North America; and its offers having been accepted, one had been concluded in the preceding fall. The Marquis was accordingly directed to have the treaty published throughout the colony, and registered in the superior council, and to see it faithfully executed by the king's subjects in Canada.

By the fourteenth and fifteenth articles, it was agreed that the two sovereigns should send orders to their respective governors and other officers, to cause to be arrested and prosecuted, as pirates, the captains and crews of all vessels, sailing without a commission, and any of the subjects of either king, sailing under one from a prince or state at war with him.

It does not appear that the English had any other view, than to lull the French into security; for they fell on Fort St. Anne, in Hudson's Bay; but Iberville, who commanded there, repelled the assailants, took one of their ships, and burnt a house which they had erected on the sea-shore.

Louis the fourteenth, with the view of increasing the crews of his galleys, and avenging the ill treatment of his -subjects who fell into the hands of the Iroquois, had directed the Marquis' predecessor to send over all those Indians taken in war, to be employed on board of the galleys at Marseilles. The Marquis, under this order, had the imprudence of decoying, through various pretences, a number of Iroquois Chiefs, into Fort Frontenac, where he had them put in irons and afterwards sent over. This unfortunate step was disowned at court, but the Indians were not ordered back. The disavowal had the effect of emboldening the Iroquois, who attributed this act of justice and humanity to the king's apprehension of exciting the resentment of their nation. It attached them the more to the English.

In the summer, these Indians becoming more and more troublesome, it was deemed necessary to march against them. The Chevalier de Vaudreuil, who had been sent to command the troops, took the field. He encamped on the island of St. Helen, opposite that of Montreal, with eight hundred regulars and one thousand militia. Champigny de Norroy, the intendant, preceded the army to Fort Frontenac: the Marquis followed it. At the fort, he received a letter from the governor of New York, complaining bitterly of the French making war against the allies of his sovereign. At the same time a piece of information was received, showing that but little reliance was to be placed on the writer's apparently peacea