| and found. His adventures. |
With the spring of 1681 there came a gleam of hope. The western Indians, terror-stricken by the Iroquois—and Indian immigrants from the east, driven out by the English colonists—gathered for protection to the brave, enduring Frenchman, took him for their leader, and hearkened to his word. News came that Tonty was in safety at Green Bay; and at length, about the end of May, La Salle and he joined hands again at Michillimackinac. Tonty had a tale of heroism to tell. Left in charge of the garrison at Fort Crèvecoeur, he had gone, according to his leader's instructions, to prospect a site for a fort a little higher up the river. When his back was turned, his followers destroyed the fort, carried off the stores, and left him with five other Frenchmen, two of whom were Recollet friars, among the Illinois Indians. True to his trust, he stayed among them, when the hordes of the Five Nations broke in, bent on destruction. Between the contending forces he held his life in the balance, vainly striving to stem the tide of massacre; and, having done all that man could do, found his way back to the lakes, saved by his own fearless honesty and by respect for the French name.
| Hennepin's travels on the upper Mississippi. Du Luth. |
Of the expedition which started in the ill-fated Griffin, there was still another prominent member to be accounted for. This was Father Hennepin. Before La Salle turned home from Fort Crèvecoeur in the spring of 1680, he sent two Frenchmen of his company, and with them Father Hennepin, to explore and to trade on the upper Mississippi. Hennepin and his companions went down the Illinois; and, ascending the Mississippi, fell among the Sioux or Dakota Indians. Carried off to the Sioux lodges, in the present State of Minnesota, the Frenchmen sojourned among them for some months, half captives and half guests, until they were found by Du Luth, fur-trader and coureur de bois, who had already explored these regions, and had crossed from Lake Superior to the Mississippi by the line of the St. Croix river. In his company, Hennepin returned up the Wisconsin; and, before the year 1680 ended, was safe at Michillimackinac. In the following year he went back to Montreal; and soon afterwards, returning to Europe, published the book to which reference has already been made. He was the first European to describe the upper Mississippi and its tributaries, and the Falls of St. Anthony preserve the name of his patron saint—St. Anthony of Padua.
| La Salle descends the Mississippi. Fort Prudhomme built on the Mississippi. |
The descent to the sea, which in after years he falsely claimed to have made, was soon afterwards achieved by La Salle. After rejoining Tonty at Michillimackinac, he went back with him to Fort Frontenac and Montreal, and once more procured men and money to renew his enterprise. Again turning west, he reached Fort Miami late in the autumn of 1681, and on the shortest day his expedition left Lake Michigan. Crossing from the St. Joseph to the Chicago creek, and from the latter to the Des Plaines river, the northern tributary of the Illinois, they embarked—fifty-four Frenchmen and Indians, including thirteen women and children—in six canoes, and took their way steadily down stream. They joined the Mississippi, they passed the mouths of the Missouri and Ohio. Halfway between the Ohio and the Arkansas, on the east bank of the Mississippi, they built and manned a small wooden fort, naming it Fort Prudhomme after one of their number who for a while lost himself in the woods. Again holding on their course, under softer skies than those of Canada, they reached the mouth of the Arkansas river, whence Joliet and Marquette had turned back; and there, among friendly and wondering Indians, they proclaimed the French King lord of the land. Below the Arkansas they came to other Indian tribes, such as the Spaniards had known, who, under dome-shaped roofs, worshipped the sun. At length the river parted into three channels, as it neared the sea; and, dividing into three parties, the bold voyagers soon met again on the shore of the Gulf of Mexico.
| La Salle reaches the Gulf of Mexico. Louisiana. |
It was April 9, 1682, when, on the southernmost edge of the new domain, a column was reared inscribed with the arms of France and with the name of Louis le Grand. The secret of the great river was won at last, from its source to its mouth; and, claiming all the lands which it watered for the Crown of France,8 La Salle called them by the name 'Louisiana.'
8 In La Salle's proclamation the basin of the Ohio was excluded from Louisiana, as the words are 'from the mouth of the great river St. Louis, otherwise called the Ohio' (Parkman's La Salle, 12th ed., p. 286).
| He returns up stream. The colony on the Illinois. Fort St. Louis. |