Copyright, 1903, by The Singer Manufacturing Company, and used through the courtesy of the copyright owners.
LA SALLE AT THE MOUTH OF THE MISSISSIPPI RIVER
These redskins were a frank and open-hearted people of gentle manners, and very hospitable. The Sieur de La Salle was treated with marked deference and respect. He took possession of the country in the name of the King of France, erected a cross, and adorned it with the arms of his native country. This was done with great pomp and ceremony, the savages believing that it was a ritual for their amusement. Two weeks were pleasantly spent among the red men and then the voyagers kept on their way.
The journey to the mouth of the mighty water-course was easy and pleasant. Many Indian tribes were met with, but no battles occurred. Finally, on the 6th. day of April, the river was observed to divide itself into three channels, so the Sieur de La Salle separated his company into three divisions and, putting himself at the head of one of them, he took the western channel, the Chevalier de Tonty the middle, and the Sieur Dautray the eastern. The water soon became brackish, then salt, until, at last, the broad ocean opened up before them. La Salle encamped for the night about twelve miles above the mouth of the western branch, and the next day he and Tonty examined the shores bordering on the sea in order to ascertain the depth of the waters in the two principal channels. The day following was employed in searching for a dry place, removed from the tide and the inundation of the rivers, on which to erect a column and a cross. Next day this ceremony was performed.
All the Frenchmen were drawn up under arms, while a column was erected with this inscription:
“Louis the Great, King of France and Navarre, reigns; the 9th. of April, 1682.”
The Te Deum was now chanted and the soldiers discharged their muskets with shouts of Long Live the King! La Salle then made a formal speech, taking possession of the whole country of Louisiana for the French King, the nations and people contained therein, the seas and harbors adjacent, and all the streams flowing into the Mississippi, which he called the great river St. Louis. A leaden plate was then buried at the foot of a tree, with a Latin inscription, containing the arms of France and the date, and stating that La Salle, Tonty, Lenobe, and twenty Frenchmen were the first to navigate the river from the Illinois to its mouth. The cross was then erected with appropriate ceremonies. At the same time an account of these proceedings was drawn up, in the form of a Proces Verbal, certified by a Notary and signed by thirteen of the principal persons of the expedition.
La Salle felt happy, for he had seen, he had come, he had conquered!
Although the journey up the Mississippi was without danger, La Salle, when he reached the upper courses, was seized with a dangerous illness which made it impossible for him to go forward for forty days. The Chevalier de Tonty was dispatched to Mackinac in order to inform the Count de Frontenac of the particulars of the voyage, and then, by slow stages, La Salle reached the Miami River, where he arrived by the end of September.