The English Governor was a believer in prompt action, and he hastened to have the Iroquois’ subjection to King Charles confirmed. To that end he despatched a Dutch interpreter, Arnold Viele by name, to Onondaga. But Charles Le Moyne and the crafty Jesuit Jean de Lamberville, who knew the Indian character well, were there before the envoy of the English arrived. Le Moyne had been sent to invite the tribes to a conference with La Barre. The chief of the Onondagas was Otréouati, or Big Mouth, a famous orator and influential warrior, and ranking as one of the ablest Indians of the Confederacy. He was unscrupulous as regards keeping promises, but his valor and astuteness were beyond question. The two Frenchmen had spent some days in trying to induce the Onondagas to get their Seneca confederates to make peace with the French. The Senecas at first would not hear of it; but finally they succumbed to Big Mouth’s eloquence, and gave the Onondagas power to complete a treaty for them. Viele appeared on the scene; but he was no diplomat, and he shocked the pride of the Onondagas when he told them, with more arrogance than policy, that the English were masters of their territory, and that they had no right to hold council with the French without permission. It was natural that Big Mouth should become indignant: he asserted the independence of his tribe, and told his warriors and chiefs not to listen to the proposals of a man who seemed to be drunk, so opposed to all reason was what he uttered. The end of it was that Big Mouth and his sachems consented to accompany Le Moyne to meet La Barre.
The French Governor was ready for the campaign, having seven hundred Canadians, a hundred and thirty regulars, and two hundred mission Indians under his command. He was to be reinforced by a band of Indians on the way, and a company of coureurs de bois led by Du Lhut and La Durantaye. More warriors were to join him at Niagara. He declared that he intended to exterminate the Senecas; but his Intendant, Meules, had no faith in his promises, and kept urging him on, as if he feared that he would make peace without striking a blow,—a fatal course in his eyes. He wrote to the Governor two letters on the subject, concluding the second one thus: “If we do not destroy them, they will destroy us. I think you see but too well that your honor and the safety of the country are involved in the results of this war.” He also sent a despatch to Seignelay, which contained the customary complaints against La Barre, and some vigorous comments on his conduct in trading against the orders of the King, and his warlike pretensions which meant nothing. “I will take the liberty to tell you, Monseigneur,” he wrote, “though I am no prophet, that I discover no disposition on the part of Monsieur the General to make war against the aforesaid savages. In my belief, he will content himself by going in a canoe as far as Fort Frontenac, and then send for the Senecas to treat of peace with them, and deceive the people, the Intendant, and, if I may be allowed with all possible respect to say so, his Majesty himself.” La Barre proceeded on his way with his army, and after encountering a few adventures en route, finally reached Fort Frontenac, where the whole party encamped. A malarial fever broke out among the French, and many died. La Barre himself was greatly reduced and wasted by the disease, and so disheartened that he abandoned his plans, and sought to secure peace on the most favorable terms that he could get. He no longer thought of punishing the Senecas, nor had he the courage to invite them to council. He crossed over to La Famine with a few men, and sent Le Moyne to beg the tribes to meet him on their side of the lake. Here provisions grew scarce, and hunger and discontent prevailed among his followers. Several soldiers languished through disease; others died.
La Barre awaited the return of his envoy with fear and suspense. When at last he came on the third of the month, with Big Mouth and thirteen deputies, the Governor received the party with what grace he could. He had sent his sick men away, and told the Indians that his army was at Fort Frontenac; but the keen-witted savages were not deceived, and one of their number, understanding French, gathered during the evening from the conversation of the soldiers the true condition of affairs. The council was held on the 4th of September; and Baron La Hontan, who was present, gives a long account of what took place. The Governor related the offences of the Iroquois; charged them with maltreating and robbing the French traders in the country of the Illinois, with introducing the “English into the lakes which belong to the King, my master, and among the tribes who are his children, in order to destroy the trade of his subjects,” and with having made “several barbarous inroads into the country of the Illinois and Miamis, seizing, binding, and leading into captivity an infinite number of those savages in time of peace.... They are the children of my king,” he said, “and are not to remain your slaves. They must at once be set free and sent home.” Should such things occur again, he was ordered, he said, to declare war against the offending tribes. He agreed to grant them terms of peace, provided they made atonement for the past, and promised good conduct for the future; otherwise he would burn their villages and destroy them. Big Mouth rose and replied. He very soon convinced La Barre of the hopelessness of his task. “Listen, Onontio,” he said. “I am not asleep, my eyes are open; and by the sun that gives me light I see a great captain at the head of a band of soldiers who talks like a man in a dream. He says that he has come to smoke the pipe of peace with the Onondagas; but I see that he came to knock them in the head if so many of his Frenchmen were not too weak to fight. I see Onontio raving in a camp of sick men, whose lives the Great Spirit has saved by smiting them with disease. Our women had snatched war-clubs, and our children and old men seized bows and arrows, to attack your camp, if our warriors had not restrained them, when your messenger, Akouessan, appeared in our village.” The savage refused reparation; said that his tribe had been born free, and that they depended on neither Onontio nor on Corlaer, the governor of New York. “We have knocked the Illinois in the head,” he continued, “because they cut down the tree of peace and hunted the beaver on our lands. We have done less than the English and the French, who have seized upon the lands of many tribes, driven them away, and built towns, villages, and forts in the country.” La Barre, greatly disgusted, retired to his tent, and the council closed. In the afternoon another session was held, and in the evening a treaty was patched up. Big Mouth agreed to some reparation, which, however, he never made; but he would not consent to make peace with La Barre’s allies, the Illinois, whom he declared he would fight to the death. He also demanded that the council fire should be removed from Fort Frontenac to La Famine,—a concession yielded by La Barre without hesitation, but which Frontenac would never have granted.
The Governor returned home the next day, broken and dispirited; his men followed, wasted by fever and hunger, as best they could. This disgraceful truce was treated with contempt by all, the allies of the French included; and for a while it was thought that the friendly tribes would go over to the enemy in a body, make peace with their old rivals, and divert the channel of trade from Montreal to Albany. Lamberville only indorsed the Governor’s conduct, and styled him the “savior of the country” for having made peace at so critical a time. Meules and the others viewed the matter differently, and the former wrote to the minister that the Governor’s excuses were a mere pretence; that he had lost his wits, had gone off in a fright, and since his return his officers could not abstain from showing him the contempt in which they held him. The King, much annoyed, recalled La Barre, and the Marquis de Denonville, a colonel in the Queen’s regiment of Dragoons, full of piety and a devoted friend of the Jesuits, was sent to succeed him.
Denonville had been thirty years a soldier, and was much esteemed at court for his valor. It was agreed on all hands that the King’s selection of him for governor of the troubled colony was a very good one. But results proved it otherwise; and Denonville’s administration was even more unfortunate than that of La Barre, whose disastrous reign had brought Canada almost to the brink of ruin. When he arrived at Quebec in the autumn of 1685, with his wife and a portion of his family, he found little to cheer him. One hundred and fifty of the five hundred soldiers who had been sent out to Canada by King Louis had perished of scurvy while crossing the sea. The colony was in great disorder; the Iroquois roamed at their pleasure, destroyed when and whom they pleased, and vented their anger with all the cruelty and ferocity of their savage nature on such tribes as favored the French. The Indian allies of the French who had been abandoned by La Barre had little respect left for the nation whose chief representative had so badly served them. But now all this would be changed. Denonville was ordered to ratify the peace with the Iroquois or to declare war, the alternative being left to his own discretion. The King, who felt acutely the disgrace of La Barre’s abandonment of the Illinois, enjoined the new governor to repair that mischief as speedily as possible, to sustain the friendly tribes, and to humble the Iroquois at all hazards. A vigorous policy was determined on, and the King had great faith in the instrument which was to effect it. Denonville was given especial instructions regarding the English of New York, who at this time were constantly intriguing with the enemies of New France. Dongan understood the country well, and was striving with all his energy to secure control of the valuable fur districts south of the Great Lakes. To that end he was always in treaty with the Iroquois, who promised and disregarded their promises as exigency or humor suited them. The King was fully aware of this, and his instructions of March 10, 1685, are especially clear on this point. First, the French ambassador at London, M. Barillon, was desired to demand from the King of England “precise orders obliging that Governor [Dongan] to confine himself within the limits of his government, and to observe a different line of conduct toward Sieur de Denonville, whom his Majesty has chosen to succeed said Sieur de la Barre.” And Denonville was himself told that “everything must be done to maintain good understanding between the French and English; but if the latter, contrary to all appearances, excite and aid the Indians, they must be treated as enemies when found on Indian territory, without, at the same time, attempting anything on territory under the obedience of the King of England.” Meanwhile, the English were seizing posts in Acadia[700] which had always been occupied by the French. Denonville was ordered to send to the governor at Boston to explain the points of boundary, and to request him to confine himself to his own limits in future. Perrot, the former governor of Montreal, was now governor of Acadia, and he was instructed to keep up a correspondence with Denonville, and to take his orders from him.[701]
The struggle for the supremacy was between Denonville and Dongan. The latter dared not act as openly as he wished, for his King, being often at the mercy of Louis, kept saddling him with mandates which he could not disobey, though they sorely touched his pride. He could, however, intrigue; and the convenient Iroquois, who found their gain in the dissensions of the English and French, and who soon learned to encourage the rivalry between the two white powers encroaching on their domain, turned listening ears to his words. Louis favored the schemes of Denonville, which had been formed on a very extensive scale, and involved the mastery of the most fruitful part of the entire continent. New York had at this time about 18,000 inhabitants; Canada’s population was 12,263; but while the latter people were united in furthering French aims, the inhabitants of New York, save the active traders of the colony who were concerned in the purchase of peltries, took very little interest in Dongan’s plans. The English colonies were all deeply interested in checking French advancement, but they declined to help the government of New York, and Dongan was forced to fight his battles single-handed. His king furnished him neither money nor troops; but the assistance rendered, though sometimes in a negative sense, by the Iroquois league, was often formidable enough, and served his purpose on occasion. On the part of Denonville there were, of course, counter-intrigues. Through Lamberville he distributed presents to the Iroquois, and Engelran spent many days at Michillimackinac trying to stay the Hurons, Ottawas, and other lake tribes from allying themselves with the English, as they threatened to do. It was clear that a bold stroke must be made to keep these hitherto friendly tribes on the side of the French, and the only means which seemed to be open was war with the Iroquois. The latter were also intriguing with their old enemies, and trying to make treaties independently of the French. The coureurs de bois, too, were a source of danger and annoyance. La Barre had not kept them in check, and Denonville speedily discovered that they acted as though they regarded the edicts of the King as so much waste paper. It was impossible to prevent their selling brandy to the Indians, and demoralizing and debauching the tribes. Denonville wrote for more troops, and seemed anxious to deal a decisive blow at the Iroquois. Affairs were in a deplorable state, and nothing short of a stalwart exhibition of French power would save the country. “Nothing can save us,” wrote the Governor, “but the sending out of troops and the building of forts and blockhouses. Yet I dare not begin to build them; for if I do, it will bring down all the Iroquois upon us before we are in a condition to fight them.”
A brisk correspondence sprang up between the Governor of New York and Denonville. At first it was polite and complimentary, but ere long it assumed a sterner character, and strong language was employed on both sides. A good deal of fencing was indulged in. There were charges and countercharges. Each blamed the other for keeping bad faith, and each side made every effort to out-manœuvre the other. Denonville saw with military prescience that forts would be of service at several important points. One of these sites was situate on the straits of Detroit, and he hastened to send Du Lhut with fifty men to occupy it. The active woodsman promptly built a stockade at the outlet of Lake Huron, on the western side of the strait, and paused there for a while. News reached Denonville that Dongan contemplated sending, early in the spring of 1687, an armed expedition in the direction of Michillimackinac to forestall the trade there. He complained to the Governor of New York, and advised the King about it. To Du Lhut he issued orders to shoot down the intruders so soon as they presented themselves. Dongan dissembled until he heard from England, when he altered his tone, and wrote a letter much subdued in temper to Denonville. The French Governor replied, and counselled harmony.
Intelligence from the north reached Denonville about this time, which gave him considerable satisfaction. The French had resolved in the spring of 1686 to assert their right to the territory of Hudson’s Bay. An English Company had established a post at the mouth of Nelson River, on the west, and on the southern end there were situate forts Albany, Hayes, and Rupert, each garrisoned by a few men. The rival of this Company was the Company of the North, a Canadian institution, which held a grant from Louis XIV. The French had decided to expel the English from their posts, and Denonville approved the plan, and sent Chevalier de Troyes with a band of eighty men to assist the Company. Forts Hayes and Rupert were assaulted at night. In each instance the attack was a surprise, and the posts readily fell into the hands of the invaders. Several of the English were killed, others were wounded, and the rest were made prisoners. Iberville attacked a vessel anchored near the fort; three of its defenders were killed, and others, including Bridger, the governor for the Company, were captured. At Fort Albany, which was garrisoned by thirty men, a stouter resistance was offered, but at the end of an hour it was silenced, and shared the fate of its fellows.