Under Wolfe's Flag; or, The Fight for the Canadas

by Rowland Walker

The fierce and implacable Iroquois, who formed that wonderful confederation called the Five Nations, consisting of the Mohawks, Senecas, Onondagas, Oneidas, and the Cayugas, and later the Tuscaroras, were the most powerful of all the Indian tribes. They were the deadly enemies of the Canadas, and during the whole period of the French wars were the irreconcilable foes of the latter, and more or less the faithful allies of the English, though their paleface friends did not always show them that consideration which was their due.

They jealously guarded the passes and rapids that lay between Quebec and Mont Royale (Montreal) and right away to the "Thousand Islands" and the lakes, they took every occasion to harass the French, who had come to steal their lands, to rob them of their hunting-grounds, and drive them towards the setting sun.

They scalped all the outlying bands of soldiers who had the misfortune to fall into their hands; they waylaid the fur-traders and the voyageurs, destroyed the harvests and burned the villages of the settlers beyond the forts.

So tiresome did they become that at length a price was paid for every Iroquois scalp that was brought into Quebec. It was, therefore, considered a matter of no small importance when the renowned "White Eagle," the most powerful chief of the Iroquois, had been captured.

Parties of soldiers from the various forts had been repeatedly dispatched to trap him and to bring him in dead or alive, but this wily foe, retreating before his enemies, generally drew them into the forest and harassed them in the rear and the van, then cut off their supplies, and scalped the stragglers, eluding their vigilance at every turn.

This desperate chief was now chained to one of the guns on board the Sapphire, and for two days he was the object of cruelty and ill-treatment, chiefly from those who had brought him aboard. He was kept without food or water. He was taunted with the fact that a heavy price was set upon his head, and that he would soon be tortured or roasted alive.

Though hungry and parched with thirst, he was too proud to ask his captors for a drink of water. He remained sullen and obdurate, and refused to speak. Once a tormentor offered him a pannikin of salt water to drink, and then, because he refused it, threw it over him. But he remained as immovable as a statue. Once a marlin-spike was hurled at him. A white man would have dodged to avoid such an unwelcome missile, but this mighty chief was too proud. He never winced or moved a muscle, though the spike went perilously near his face.

Jack and Jamie both remonstrated, but were told to mind their own business, and as the Iroquois had been allied with the English, and spoke a smattering of their tongue, they were forbidden to converse with or even to approach him. To speak to him was what they both very much longed to do, for he was the first real Indian they had seen, and very different from the wretched specimens who hung about the settlements of the white men. They admired the haughty pride and fearlessness of this child of the forest.

"He must be parched with thirst," said Jamie, on the afternoon of the second day. "I will give him a drink of water, whatever the Frenchies say."

And he immediately took a pannikin of fresh water and held it to the chief's mouth, for his hands were bound. Before the water could touch his lips the pannikin was dashed to the ground, and the boys were ordered away, but the look of gratitude that came into the chief's eyes showed that he had understood that a kindness was intended.