1681-1682.
SUCCESS OF LA SALLE.
HIS FOLLOWERS.--THE CHICAGO PORTAGE.--DESCENT OP THE MISSISSIPPI.
--THE LOST HUNTER.--THE ARKANSAS.--THE TAENSAS.--THE NATCHEZ.
--HOSTILITY.--THE MOUTH OF THE MISSISSIPPI.--LOUIS XIV. PROCLAIMED
SOVEREIGN OF THE GREAT WEST.
The season was far advanced. On the bare limbs of the forest hung a few
withered remnants of its gay autumnal livery; and the smoke crept upward
through the sullen November air from the squalid wigwams of La Salle's
Abenaki and Mohegan allies. These, his new friends, were savages, whose
midnight yells had startled the border hamlets of New England; who had
danced around Puritan scalps, and whom Puritan imaginations painted as
incarnate fiends. La Salle chose eighteen of them, "all well inured to
war," as his companion Membré writes, and added them to the twenty-three
Frenchmen who composed his party. They insisted on taking their women with
them, to cook for them, and do other camp work. These were ten in number,
besides three children; and thus the expedition included fifty-four
persons, of whom some were useless, and others a burden.
On the twenty-first of December, Tonty and Membré set out from Fort Miami
with some of the party in six canoes, and crossed to the little river
Chicago. [Footnote: La Salle, _Relation de la Découverte_, 1682, in
Thomassy, _Géologie Pratique de la Louisiane_, 9; _Lettre du Père Zenoble_
(Zenobe Membré), 14 Aoust, 1682, MS.; Membré, in Le Clercq, ii. 214;
Tonty, _Mémoire_, MS.; _Procès Verbal de la Prise de Possession de la
Louisiane_.
The narrative ascribed to Membré, and published by Le Clercq, is based on
the document preserved in the Archives Scientifiques de In Marine,
entitled _Relation de la Découverte de l'Embouchure de la Rivière
Mississippi faite par le Sieur de la Salle, l'année passée_, 1682. The
writer of the narrative has used it very freely, copying the greater part
verbatim, with occasional additions of a kind which seem to indicate that
he had taken part in the expedition. The _Relation de la Découverte_,
though written in the third person, is the official report of the
discovery made by La Salle; or perhaps for him, by Membré. Membré's letter
of August, 1682, is a brief and succinct statement made immediately after
his return.] La Salle, with the rest of the men, joined them a few days
later. It was the dead of winter, and the streams were frozen. They made
sledges, placed on them the canoes, the baggage, and a disabled Frenchman;
crossed from the Chicago to the northern branch of the Illinois, and filed
in a long procession down its frozen course. They reached the site of the
great Illinois village, found it tenantless, and continued their journey,
still dragging their canoes, till at length they reached open water below
Lake Peoria.
La Salle had abandoned, for a time, his original plan of building a vessel
for the navigation of the Mississippi. Bitter experience had taught him
the difficulty of the attempt, and he resolved to trust to his canoes
alone. They embarked again, floating prosperously down between the
leafless forests that flanked the tranquil river; till, on the sixth of
February, they issued forth on the majestic bosom of the Mississippi.
Here, for the time, their progress was stopped; for the river was full of
floating ice. La Salle's Indians, too, had lagged behind; but, within a
week, all had arrived, the navigation was once more free, and they resumed
their course. Towards evening, they saw on their right the mouth of a
great river; and the clear current was invaded by the headlong torrent of
the Missouri, opaque with mud. They built their camp fires in the
neighboring forest; and, at daylight, embarking anew on the dark and
mighty stream, drifted swiftly down towards unknown destinies. They passed
a deserted town of the Tamaroas; saw, three days after, the mouth of the
Ohio; [Footnote: Called by Membré the Ouabache (Wabash).] and, gliding by
the wastes of bordering swamp, landed, on the twenty-fourth of February,
near the Third Chickasaw Bluffs. [Footnote: La Salle, _Relation de la
Découverte de I'Embouchure, etc._; Thomassy, 10 Membré gives the same
date; but the _Procès Verbal_ makes it the twenty-sixth.] They encamped,
and the hunters went out for game. All returned, excepting Pierre
Prudhomme; and, as the others had seen fresh tracks of Indians, La Salle
feared that he was killed. While some of his followers built a small
stockade fort on a high bluff [Footnote: Gravier, in his letter of 16 Feb.
1701, says that he encamped near a "great bluff of stone, called Fort
Prudhomme, because M. de la Salle, going on his discovery, entrenched
himself here with his party, fearing that Prudhomme, who had lost himself
in the woods, had been killed by the Indians, and that he himself would be
attacked."] by the river, others ranged the woods in pursuit of the
missing hunter. After six days of ceaseless and fruitless search, they met
two Chickasaw Indians in the forest; and, through them, La Salle sent
presents and peace-messages to that warlike people, whose villages were a
few days' journey distant. Several days later, Prudhomme was found, and
brought in to the camp, half dead. He had lost his way while hunting; and,
to console him for his woes. La Salle christened the newly built fort with
his name, and left him, with a few others, in charge of it.
Again they embarked; and, with every stage of their adventurous progress,
the mystery of this vast New World was more and more unveiled. More and
more they entered the realms of spring. The hazy sunlight, the warm and
drowsy air, the tender foliage, the opening flowers, betokened the
reviving life of Nature. For several days more they followed the writhings
of the great river, on its tortuous course through wastes of swamp and
cane-brake, till on the thirteenth of March [Footnote: La Salle,
_Relation_; Thomassy, 11.] they found themselves wrapped in a thick fog.
Neither shore was visible; but they heard on the right the booming of an
Indian drum, and the shrill outcries of the war-dance. La Salle at once
crossed to the opposite side, where, in less than an hour, his men threw
up a rude fort of felled trees. Meanwhile, the fog cleared; and, from the
farther bank, the astonished Indians saw the strange visitors at their
work. Some of the French advanced to the edge of the water, and beckoned
them to come over. Several of them approached, in a wooden canoe, to
within the distance of a gun-shot. La Salle displayed the calumet, and
sent a Frenchman to meet them. He was well received; and the friendly mood
of the Indians being now apparent, the whole party crossed the river.
On landing, they found themselves at a town of the Kappa band of the
Arkansas, a people dwelling near the mouth of the river which bears their
name. The inhabitants flocked about them with eager signs of welcome;
built huts for them, brought them firewood, gave them corn, beans, and
dried fruits, and feasted them without respite for three days. "They are a
lively, civil, generous people," says Membré, "very different from the
cold and taciturn Indians of the North." They showed, indeed, some slight
traces of a tendency towards civilization; for domestic fowls and tame
geese were wandering among their rude cabins of bark. [Footnote: Membré,
in Le Clercq, ii. 224; Tonty, _Mémoire_, MS.]
La Salle and Tonty at the head of their followers marched to the open area
in the midst of the village. Here, to the admiration of the gazing crowd
of warriors, women, and children, a cross was raised bearing the arms of
France. Membré, in canonicals, sang a hymn; the men shouted _Vice le Roi_;
and La Salle, in the king's name, took formal possession of the country.
[Footnote: _Procès Verbal de la Prise de Possession du Pays des Arkansas,
14 Mars_, 1682, MS.] The friar, not, he flatters himself, without success,
labored to expound by signs the mysteries of the faith; while La Salle, by
methods equally satisfactory, drew from the chief an acknowledgment of
fealty to Louis XIV. [Footnote: The nation of the Akanseas, Alkansas, or
Arkansas, dwelt on the west bank of the Mississippi, near the mouth of the
Arkansas. They were divided into four tribes, living for the most part in
separate villages. Those first visited by La Salle were the Kappas or
Quapaws, a remnant of whom still subsists. The others were the Topingas,
or Tongengas; the Torimans; and the Osotouoy, or Sauthouis. According to
Charlevoix, who saw them in 1721, they were regarded as the tallest and
best formed Indians in America, and were known as _les Beaux Hommes_.
Gravier says that they once lived on the Ohio.]
After touching at several other towns of this people, the voyagers resumed
their course, guided by two of the Arkansas; passed the sites, since
become historic, of Vicksburg and Grand Gulf; and, about three hundred
miles below the Arkansas, stopped by the edge of a swamp on the western
side of the river. [Footnote: In Tensas County, Louisiana. Tonty's
estimates of distance are here much too low. They seem to be founded on
observations of latitude, without reckoning the windings of the river. It
may interest sportsmen to know that the party killed several large
alligators on their way. Membré is much astonished that such monsters
should be born of eggs, like chickens.] Here, as their two guides told
them, was the path to the great town of the Taensas. Tonty and Membré were
sent to visit it. They and their men shouldered their birch canoe through
the swamp, and launched it on a lake which had once formed a portion of
the channel of the river. In two hours they reached the town, and Tonty
gazed at it with astonishment. He had seen nothing like it in America;
large square dwellings, built of sun-baked mud mixed with straw, arched
over with a dome-shaped roof of canes, and placed in regular order around
an open area. Two of them were larger and better than the rest. One was
the lodge of the chief; the other was the temple, or house of the Sun.
They entered the former, and found a single room, forty feet square,
where, in the dim light, for there was no opening but the door, the chief
sat awaiting them on a sort of bedstead, three of his wives at his side,
while sixty old men, wrapped in white cloaks woven of mulberrybark, formed
his divan. When he spoke, his wives howled to do him honor; and the
assembled councillors listened with the reverence due to a potentate for
whom, at his death, a hundred victims were to be sacrificed. He received
the visitors graciously, and joyfully accepted the gifts which Tonty laid
before him. [Footnote: Tonty, _Mémoire_, MS. In the spurious narrative
published in Tonty's name, the account is embellished and exaggerated.
Compare Membré, in Le Clercq, ii. 227. La Salle's statements in the
Relation of 1682 (Thomassy, 12) sustain those of Tonty.] This interview
over, the Frenchmen repaired to the temple, wherein were kept the bones of
the departed chiefs. In construction it was much like the royal dwelling.
Over it were rude wooden figures, representing three eagles turned towards
the east. A strong mud wall surrounded it, planted with stakes, on which
were stuck the skulls of enemies sacrificed to the Sun; while before the
door was a block of wood, on which lay a large shell surrounded with the
braided hair of the victims. The interior was rude as a barn, dimly
lighted from the doorway, and full of smoke. There was a structure in the
middle which Membré thinks was a kind of altar; and before it burned a
perpetual fire, fed with three logs laid end to end, and watched by two
old men devoted to this sacred office. There was a mysterious recess, too,
which the strangers were forbidden to explore, but which, as Tonty was
told, contained the riches of the nation, consisting of pearls from the
Gulf, and trinkets obtained, probably through other tribes, from the
Spaniards and other Europeans.
The chief condescended to visit La Salle at his camp; a favor which he
would by no means have granted, had the visitors been Indians. A master of
ceremonies, and six attendants, preceded him, to clear the path and
prepare the place of meeting. When all was ready, he was seen advancing,
clothed in a white robe, and preceded by two men bearing white fans; while
a third displayed a disk of burnished copper, doubtless to represent the
Sun, his ancestor; or, as others will have it, his elder brother. His
aspect was marvellously grave, and he and La Salle met with gestures of
ceremonious courtesy. The interview was very friendly; and the chief
returned well pleased with the gifts which his entertainer bestowed on
him, and which, indeed, had been the principal motive of his visit.
On the next morning, as they descended the river, they saw a wooden canoe
full of Indians; and Tonty gave chase. He had nearly overtaken it, when
more than a hundred men appeared suddenly on the shore, with bows bent to
defend their countrymen. La Salle called out to Tonty to withdraw. He
obeyed; and the whole party encamped on the opposite bank. Tonty offered
to cross the river with a peace-pipe, and set out accordingly with a small
party of men. When he landed, the Indians made signs of friendship by
joining their hands,--a proceeding by which Tonty, having but one hand,
was somewhat embarrassed; but he directed his men to respond in his stead.
La Salle and Membré now joined him, and went with the Indians to their
village, three leagues distant. Here they spent the night. "The Sieur de
la Salle," writes Membré, "whose very air, engaging manners, tact, and
address attract love and respect alike, produced such an effect on the
hearts of these people, that they did not know how to treat us well
enough." [Footnote: Membré, in Le Clercq, ii. 232.]
The Indians of this village were the Natchez; and their chief was brother
of the great chief, or Sun, of the whole nation. His town was several
leagues distant, near the site of the city of Natchez; and thither the
French repaired to visit him. They saw what they had already seen among
the Taensas,--a religious and political despotism, a privileged caste
descended from the Sun, a temple, and a sacred fire. [Footnote: The
Natchez and the Taensas, whose habits and customs were similar, did not,
in their social organization, differ radically from other Indians. The
same principle of clanship, or _totemship_, so widely spread, existed in
full force among them, combined with their religious ideas, and developed
into forms of which no other example, equally distinct, is to be found.
(For Indian clanship, see "Jesuits in North America," _Introduction_.)
Among the Natchez and Taensas, the principal clan formed a ruling caste;
and its chiefs had the attributes of demi-gods. As descent was through the
female, the chief's son never succeeded him, but the son of one of his
sisters; and as she, by the usual totemic law, was forced to marry in
another clan,--that is, to marry a common mortal,--her husband, though the
destined father of a demi-god, was treated by her as little better than a
slave. She might kill him, if he proved unfaithful; but he was forced to
submit to her infidelities in silence.
The customs of the Natchez have been described by Du Pratz, Le Petit, and
others. Charlevoix visited their temple in 1721, and found it in a
somewhat shabby condition. At this time, the Taensas were extinct. In
1729, the Natchez, enraged by the arbitrary conduct of a French
commandant, massacred the neighboring settlers, and were in consequence
expelled from their country and nearly destroyed. A few still survive,
incorporated with the Creeks; but they have lost their peculiar customs.]
La Salle planted a large cross, with the arms of France attached, in the
midst of the town; while the inhabitants looked on with a satisfaction
which they would hardly have displayed, had they understood the meaning of
the act.
The French next visited the Coroas, at their village, two leagues below;
and here they found a reception no less auspicious. On the thirty-first of
March, as they approached Red River, they passed in the fog a town of the
Oumas; and, three days later, discovered a party of fishermen, in wooden
canoes, among the canes along the margin of the water. They fled at sight
of the Frenchmen. La Salle sent men to reconnoitre, who, as they struggled
through the marsh, were greeted with a shower of arrows; while, from the
neighboring village of the Quinipissas, [Footnote: In St. Charles County,
on the left bank, not far above New Orleans.] invisible behind the cane-
brake, they heard the sound of an Indian drum, and the whoops of the
mustering warriors. La Salle, anxious to keep the peace with all the
tribes along the river, recalled his men, and pursued his voyage. A few
leagues below, they saw a cluster of Indian lodges on the left bank,
apparently void of inhabitants. They landed, and found three of them
filled with corpses. It was a village of the Tangibao, sacked by their
enemies only a few days before. [Footnote: Hennepin uses this incident, as
well as most of those which have preceded it, in making up the story of
his pretended voyage to the Gulf.]
And now they neared their journey's end. On the sixth of April, the river
divided itself into three broad channels. La Salle followed that of the
west, and D'Autray that of the east; while Tonty took the middle passage.
As he drifted down the turbid current, between the low and marshy shores,
the brackish water changed to brine, and the breeze grew fresh with the
salt breath of the sea. Then the broad bosom of the great Gulf opened on
his sight, tossing its restless billows, limitless, voiceless, lonely, as
when born of chaos, without a sail, without a sign of life.
La Salle, in a canoe, coasted the marshy borders of the sea; and then the
reunited parties assembled on a spot of dry ground, a short distance above
the mouth of the river. Here a column was made ready, bearing the arms of
France, and inscribed with the words,--
LOUIS LE GRAND, ROY DE FRANCE ET DE NAVARRE, RÈGNE; LE NEUVIÈME AVRIL,
1682.
The Frenchmen were mustered under arms; and, while the New-England Indians
and their squaws stood gazing in wondering silence, they chanted the _Te
Deum_, the _Exaudiat_, and the _Domine salvum fac Regem_. Then, amid
volleys of musketry and shouts of _Vive le Roi_, La Salle planted the
column in its place, and, standing near it, proclaimed in a loud voice,--
"In the name of the most high, mighty, invincible, and victorious Prince,
Louis the Great, by the grace of God King of France and of Navarre,
Fourteenth of that name, I, this ninth day of April, one thousand six
hundred and eighty-two, in virtue of the commission of his Majesty, which
I hold in my hand, and which may be seen by all whom it may concern, have
taken, and do now take, in the name of his Majesty and of his successors
to the crown, possession of this country of Louisiana, the seas, harbors,
ports, bays, adjacent straits, and all the nations, peoples, provinces,
cities, towns, villages, mines, minerals, fisheries, streams, and rivers,
within the extent of the said Louisiana, from the mouth of the great river
St. Louis, otherwise called the Ohio, ... as also along the River Colbert,
or Mississippi, and the rivers which discharge themselves therein, from
its source beyond the country of the Nadouessious ... as far as its mouth
at the sea, or Gulf of Mexico, and also to the mouth of the River of
Palms, upon the assurance we have had from the natives of these countries,
that we are the first Europeans who have descended or ascended the said
River Colbert; hereby protesting against all who may hereafter undertake
to invade any or all of these aforesaid countries, peoples, or lands, to
the prejudice of the rights of his Majesty, acquired by the consent of the
nations dwelling herein. Of which, and of all else that is needful, I
hereby take to witness those who hear me, and demand an act of the notary
here present." [Footnote: In the passages omitted above, for the sake of
brevity, the Ohio is mentioned as being called also the _Olighin_
(Alleghany), _Sipou_ and _Chukagoua_; and La Salle declares that he takes
possession of the country with the consent of the nations dwelling in it,
of whom he names the Chaouanons (Shawanoes), Kious, or Nadouessious
(Sioux), Chikachas (Chickasaws), Motantees (?), Illinois, Mitchigamias,
Arkansas, Natches, and Koroas. This alleged consent is, of course, mere
farce. If there could be any doubt as to the meaning of the words of La
Salle, as recorded in the _Procès Verbal de la Prise de Possession de la
Louisiana_, it would be set at rest by Le Clercq, who says, "Le Sieur de
la Salle prit au nom de sa Majesté possession de ce fleuve, _de toutes les
rivières qui y entrent, et de tous les pays qu'elles arrosent._" These
words are borrowed from the report of La Salle; see Thomassy, 14. A copy
of the original of the _Procès Verbal_ is before me. It bears the name of
Jacques de la Métairie, Notary of Fort Frontenac, who was one of the
party.]
Shouts of _Vive le Roi_ and volleys of musketry responded to his words.
Then a cross was planted beside the column, and a leaden plate buried near
it, bearing the arms of France, with a Latin inscription, _Ludovicus
Magnus regnat_. The weather-beaten voyagers joined their voices in the
grand hymn of the _Vexilla Regis_:--
"The banners of Heaven's King advance,
The mystery of the Cross shines forth;"
and renewed shouts of _Vive le Roi_ closed the ceremony.
On that day, the realm of France received on parchment a stupendous
accession. The fertile plains of Texas; the vast basin of the Mississippi,
from its frozen northern springs to the sultry borders of the Gulf; from
the woody ridges of the Alleghanies to the bare peaks of the Rocky
Mountains,--a region of savannahs and forests, sun-cracked deserts, and
grassy prairies, watered by a thousand rivers, ranged by a thousand
warlike tribes, passed beneath the sceptre of the Sultan of Versailles;
and all by virtue of a feeble human voice, inaudible at half a mile.