France and England in North America, Part III: La Salle, Discovery of The Great West
she was built at the mouth of a stream (_rivière_) entering the Niagara
two leagues above the Falls. Excepting one or two small brooks, there is
no stream on the west side but Chippewa Creek, which Hennepin had
visited and correctly placed at about a league from the cataract. His
distances on the Niagara are usually correct. On the east side there is
a stream which perfectly answers the conditions. This is Cayuga Creek,
two leagues above the Falls. Immediately in front of it is an island
about a mile long, separated from the shore by a narrow and deep arm of
the Niagara, into which Cayuga Creek discharges itself. The place is so
obviously suited to building and launching a vessel, that, in the early
part of this century, the government of the United States chose it for
the construction of a schooner to carry supplies to the garrisons of the
Upper Lakes. The neighboring village now bears the name of La Salle.
In examining this and other localities on the Niagara, I have been
greatly aided by my friend O. H. Marshall, Esq., of Buffalo, who is
unrivalled in his knowledge of the history and traditions of the Niagara
frontier.
[125] Hennepin (1704), 97. On a paper drawn up at the instance of the
Intendant Duchesneau, the names of the greater number of La Salle's men
are preserved. These agree with those given by Hennepin: thus, the
master-carpenter, whom he calls Maître Moyse, appears as Moïse Hillaret;
and the blacksmith, whom he calls La Forge, is mentioned as--(illegible)
dit la Forge.
[126] "This bad man," says Hennepin, "would infallibly have debauched
our workmen, if I had not reassured them by the exhortations which I
made them on fête-days and Sundays, after divine service." (1704), 98.
[127] _Lettre de La Salle, 22 Août, 1682_ (Margry, ii. 229); _Relation
de Tonty_, 1684 (Ibid., i. 577). He called this new post Fort Conti. It
was burned some months after, by the carelessness of the sergeant in
command, and was the first of a succession of forts on this historic
spot.
[128] Hennepin (1683), 46. In the edition of 1697, he says that it was
of sixty tons. I prefer to follow the earlier and more trustworthy
narrative.
[129] La Salle's embarrassment at this time was so great that he
purposed to send Tonty up the lakes in the "Griffin," while he went back
to the colony to look after his affairs; but suspecting that the pilot,
who had already wrecked one of his vessels, was in the pay of his
enemies, he resolved at last to take charge of the expedition himself,
to prevent a second disaster. (_Lettre de La Salle, 22 Août, 1682_;
Margry, ii. 214.) Among the creditors who bore hard upon him were
Migeon, Charon, Giton, and Peloquin, of Montreal, in whose name his furs
at Fort Frontenac had been seized. The intendant also placed under seal
all his furs at Quebec, among which is set down the not very precious
item of two hundred and eighty-four skins of _enfants du diable_, or
skunks.
CHAPTER XI.
1679.
LA SALLE ON THE UPPER LAKES.
The Voyage of the "Griffin."--Detroit.--A Storm.--St. Ignace of
Michilimackinac.--Rivals and Enemies.--Lake
Michigan.--Hardships.--A Threatened Fight.--Fort Miami.--Tonty's
Misfortunes.--Forebodings.
The "Griffin" had lain moored by the shore, so near that Hennepin could
preach on Sundays from the deck to the men encamped along the bank. She
was now forced up against the current with tow-ropes and sails, till she
reached the calm entrance of Lake Erie. On the seventh of August, La
Salle and his followers embarked, sang _Te Deum_, and fired their
cannon. A fresh breeze sprang up; and with swelling canvas the "Griffin"
ploughed the virgin waves of Lake Erie, where sail was never seen
before. For three days they held their course over these unknown waters,
and on the fourth turned northward into the Strait of Detroit. Here, on
the right hand and on the left, lay verdant prairies, dotted with groves
and bordered with lofty forests. They saw walnut, chestnut, and wild
plum trees, and oaks festooned with grape-vines; herds of deer, and
flocks of swans and wild turkeys. The bulwarks of the "Griffin" were
plentifully hung with game which the men killed on shore, and among the
rest with a number of bears, much commended by Hennepin for their want
of ferocity and the excellence of their flesh. "Those," he says, "who
will one day have the happiness to possess this fertile and pleasant
strait, will be very much obliged to those who have shown them the way."
They crossed Lake St. Clair,[130] and still sailed northward against the
current, till now, sparkling in the sun, Lake Huron spread before them
like a sea.
[Sidenote: ST. IGNACE.]
For a time they bore on prosperously. Then the wind died to a calm, then
freshened to a gale, then rose to a furious tempest; and the vessel
tossed wildly among the short, steep, perilous waves of the raging lake.
Even La Salle called on his followers to commend themselves to Heaven.
All fell to their prayers but the godless pilot, who was loud in
complaint against his commander for having brought him, after the honor
he had won on the ocean, to drown at last ignominiously in fresh water.
The rest clamored to the saints. St. Anthony of Padua was promised a
chapel to be built in his honor, if he would but save them from their
jeopardy; while in the same breath La Salle and the friars declared him
patron of their great enterprise.[131] The saint heard their prayers.
The obedient winds were tamed; and the "Griffin" plunged on her way
through foaming surges that still grew calmer as she advanced. Now the
sun shone forth on woody islands, Bois Blanc and Mackinaw and the
distant Manitoulins,--on the forest wastes of Michigan and the vast blue
bosom of the angry lake; and now her port was won, and she found her
rest behind the point of St. Ignace of Michilimackinac, floating in that
tranquil cove where crystal waters cover but cannot hide the pebbly
depths beneath. Before her rose the house and chapel of the Jesuits,
enclosed with palisades; on the right, the Huron village, with its bark
cabins and its fence of tall pickets; on the left, the square compact
houses of the French traders; and, not far off, the clustered wigwams of
an Ottawa village.[132] Here was a centre of the Jesuit missions, and a
centre of the Indian trade; and here, under the shadow of the cross, was
much sharp practice in the service of Mammon. Keen traders, with or
without a license, and lawless _coureurs de bois_, whom a few years of
forest life had weaned from civilization, made St. Ignace their resort;
and here there were many of them when the "Griffin" came. They and their
employers hated and feared La Salle, who, sustained as he was by the
governor, might set at nought the prohibition of the King, debarring him
from traffic with these tribes. Yet, while plotting against him, they
took pains to allay his distrust by a show of welcome.
The "Griffin" fired her cannon, and the Indians yelped in wonder and
amazement. The adventurers landed in state, and marched under arms to
the bark chapel of the Ottawa village, where they heard mass. La Salle
knelt before the altar, in a mantle of scarlet bordered with gold.
Soldiers, sailors, and artisans knelt around him,--black Jesuits, gray
Récollets, swarthy _voyageurs_, and painted savages; a devout but motley
concourse.
As they left the chapel, the Ottawa chiefs came to bid them welcome, and
the Hurons saluted them with a volley of musketry. They saw the
"Griffin" at her anchorage, surrounded by more than a hundred bark
canoes, like a Triton among minnows. Yet it was with more wonder than
good-will that the Indians of the mission gazed on the "floating fort,"
for so they called the vessel. A deep jealousy of La Salle's designs had
been infused into them. His own followers, too, had been tampered with.
In the autumn before, it may be remembered, he had sent fifteen men up
the lakes to trade for him, with orders to go thence to the Illinois and
make preparation against his coming. Early in the summer, Tonty had been
despatched in a canoe from Niagara to look after them.[133] It was high
time. Most of the men had been seduced from their duty, and had
disobeyed their orders, squandered the goods intrusted to them, or used
them in trading on their own account. La Salle found four of them at
Michilimackinac. These he arrested, and sent Tonty to the Falls of Ste.
Marie, where two others were captured, with their plunder. The rest were
in the woods, and it was useless to pursue them.
[Sidenote: RIVALS AND ENEMIES.]
Anxious and troubled as to the condition of his affairs in Canada. La
Salle had meant, after seeing his party safe at Michilimackinac, to
leave Tonty to conduct it to the Illinois, while he himself returned to
the colony. But Tonty was still at Ste. Marie, and he had none to trust
but himself. Therefore, he resolved at all risks to remain with his men;
"for," he says, "I judged my presence absolutely necessary to retain
such of them as were left me, and prevent them from being enticed away
during the winter." Moreover, he thought that he had detected an
intrigue of his enemies to hound on the Iroquois against the Illinois,
in order to defeat his plan by involving him in the war.
Early in September he set sail again, and passing westward into Lake
Michigan,[134] cast anchor near one of the islands at the entrance of
Green Bay. Here, for once, he found a friend in the person of a
Pottawattamie chief, who had been so wrought upon by the politic
kindness of Frontenac that he declared himself ready to die for the
children of Onontio.[135] Here, too, he found several of his advance
party, who had remained faithful and collected a large store of furs. It
would have been better had they proved false, like the rest. La Salle,
who asked counsel of no man, resolved, in spite of his followers, to
send back the "Griffin" laden with these furs, and others collected on
the way, to satisfy his creditors.[136] It was a rash resolution, for it
involved trusting her to the pilot, who had already proved either
incompetent or treacherous. She fired a parting shot, and on the
eighteenth of September set sail for Niagara, with orders to return to
the head of Lake Michigan as soon as she had discharged her cargo. La
Salle, with the fourteen men who remained, in four canoes deeply laden
with a forge, tools, merchandise, and arms, put out from the island and
resumed his voyage.
[Sidenote: POTTAWATTAMIES.]
The parting was not auspicious. The lake, glassy and calm in the
afternoon, was convulsed at night with a sudden storm, when the canoes
were midway between the island and the main shore. It was with
difficulty that they could keep together, the men shouting to each
other through the darkness. Hennepin, who was in the smallest canoe with
a heavy load, and a carpenter for a companion who was awkward at the
paddle, found himself in jeopardy which demanded all his nerve. The
voyagers thought themselves happy when they gained at last the shelter
of a little sandy cove, where they dragged up their canoes, and made
their cheerless bivouac in the drenched and dripping forest. Here they
spent five days, living on pumpkins and Indian corn, the gift of their
Pottawattamie friends, and on a Canada porcupine brought in by La
Salle's Mohegan hunter. The gale raged meanwhile with relentless fury.
They trembled when they thought of the "Griffin." When at length the
tempest lulled, they re-embarked, and steered southward along the shore
of Wisconsin; but again the storm fell upon them, and drove them for
safety to a bare, rocky islet. Here they made a fire of drift-wood,
crouched around it, drew their blankets over their heads, and in this
miserable plight, pelted with sleet and rain, remained for two days.