France and England in North America Part 13

"I trust that, as it lies with you alone to prevent or to permit the return of the men whom I have sent down, you will not so act as to thwart my plans. A part of the goods which I have sent by them belong not to me, but to the Sieur de Tonty, and are a part of his pay. Others are to buy munitions indispensable for our defence. Do not let my creditors seize them. It is for their advantage that my fort, full as it is of goods, should be held against the enemy. I have only twenty men, with scarcely a hundred pounds of powder; and I cannot long hold the country without more.

The Illinois are very capricious and uncertain.... If I had men enough to send out to reconnoitre the enemy, I would have done so before this; but I have not enough. I trust you will put it in my power to obtain more, that this important colony may be saved." [Footnote: _Lettre de la Salle, a La Barre, Portage de Chicagou_, 4 _Juin_, 1683, MS. Portions of the above extracts are condensed in the rendering. A long pa.s.sage is omitted, in which La Salle expresses his belief that his vessel, the "Griffin," had been destroyed, not by Indians, but by the pilot, who, as he thinks, had been induced to sink her, and then, with some of the crew, attempted to join Du Lhut with their plunder, but were captured by Indians on the Mississippi.]

While La Salle was thus writing to La Barre, La Barre was writing to Seignelay, the Marine and Colonial Minister, decrying his correspondent's discoveries, and pretending to doubt their reality. "The Iroquois," he adds, "have sworn his [La Salle's] death. The imprudence of this man is about to involve the colony in war." [Footnote: _Lettre de La Barre au Ministre_, 14 _Nov_. 1682, MS.] And again he writes in the following spring, to say that La Salle was with a score of vagabonds at Green Bay, where he set himself up as a king, pillaged his countrymen, and put them to ransom; exposed the tribes of the West to the incursions of the Iroquois,--and all under pretence of a patent from his Majesty, the provisions of which he grossly abused; but as his privileges would expire on the twelfth of May ensuing, he would then be forced to come to Quebec, where his creditors, to whom he owed more than thirty thousand crowns, were anxiously awaiting him. [Footnote: _Lettre de La Barre au Ministre_, 30 _Avril_, 1683. La Salle had spent the winter, not at Green Bay, as this slanderous letter declares, but in the Illinois country.]

Finally, when La Barre received the two letters from La Salle, of which the substance is given above, he sent copies of them to the Minister Seignelay, with the following comment: "By the copies of the Sieur de la Salle's letters, you will perceive that his head is turned, and that he has been bold enough to give you intelligence of a false discovery. He is trying to build up an imaginary kingdom for himself by debauching all the bankrupts and idlers of this country." [Footnote: _N.Y. Col Docs_., ix.

204. The letter is dated 4 Nov. 1683.] Such calumnies had their effect.

The enemies of La Salle had already gained the ear of the king; and he had written in August from Fontainebleau to his new Governor of Canada: "I am convinced, like you, that the discovery of the Sieur de la Salle is very useless, and that such enterprises ought to be prevented in future, as they tend only to debauch the inhabitants by the hope of gain, and to dimmish the revenue from beaver-skins." [Footnote: _Lettre du Roy a La Barre_, 5 _Aoust_, 1683, MS.]

In order to understand the posture of affairs at this time, it must be remembered that Dongan, the English Governor of New York, was urging on the Iroquois to attack the Western tribes, with the object of gaining, through their conquest, the control of the fur-trade of the interior, and diverting it from Montreal to Albany. The scheme was full of danger to Canada, which the loss of the trade would have ruined. La Barre and his a.s.sociates were greatly alarmed at it. Its complete success would have been fatal to their hopes of profit; but they nevertheless wished it such a measure of success as would ruin their rival. La Salle. Hence, no little satisfaction mingled with their anxiety, when they heard that the Iroquois were again threatening to invade the Miamis and the Illinois; and thus La Barre, whose duty it was strenuously to oppose the intrigue of the English, and use every effort to quiet the ferocious bands whom they were hounding against the Indian allies of the French, was, in fact, but half- hearted in the work. He cut off La Salle from all supplies; detained the men whom he sent for succor; and, at a conference with the Iroquois, told them that they were welcome to plunder and kill him. [Footnote: _Memoire pour rendre compte a Monseigneur le Marquis de Seignelay de l'Etat ou le Sieur de Lasalle a laisse le Fort Frontenac pendant le temps de sa decouverte,_ MS. The Marquis de Denonville, La Barre's successor in the government, says, in his memoir of Aug. 10, 1688, that La Barre had told the Iroquois to plunder La Salle's canoes.

La Barre's course at this time was extremely indirect and equivocal. The memoir to Seignelay, cited above, declares--and other doc.u.ments sustain it--that he was playing into the hands of the English, by sending furs, on his own account and that of his a.s.sociates, to Albany, where he could sell them at a high rate, and at the same time avoid the payment of duties to the French farmers of the revenue.

The merchants, La Chesnaye, Le Ber, and Le Moyne, were at the head of the faction with which La Barre had identified himself; and their hatred of La Salle knew no bounds. If we are to believe La Potherie, he himself had formerly, in defence of his monopolies, told the Iroquois that they might plunder the canoes of traders who had not a pa.s.s from him. The adverse faction now retorted by adding the permission of murder to the permission of pillage. Margry thinks that La Chesnaye was the prompter of this villany.]

The old Governor, and the unscrupulous ring with which he was a.s.sociated, now took a step, to which he was doubtless emboldened by the tone of the king's letter, in condemnation of La Salle's enterprise. He resolved to seize Fort Frontenac, the property of La Salle, under the pretext that the latter had not fulfilled the conditions of the grant, and had not maintained a sufficient garrison. [Footnote: La Salle, when at Mackinaw, on his way to Quebec, in 1682, had been recalled to the Illinois, as we have seen, by a threatened Iroquois invasion. There is before me a copy of a letter which he then wrote to Count Frontenac, begging him to send up more soldiers to the fort at his (La Salle's) expense. Frontenac, being about to sail for France, gave this letter to his newly arrived successor, La Barre, who, far from complying with the request, withdrew La Salle's soldiers already at the fort, and then made its defenceless state a pretext for seizing it. This statement is made in the memoir addressed to Seignelay, before cited.] Two of his a.s.sociates, La Chesnaye and Le Ber, armed with an order from him, went up and took possession, despite the remonstrances of La Salle's creditors and mortgagees; lived on La Salle's stores, sold for their own profit, and (it is said) that of La Barre, the provisions sent by the king, and turned in the cattle to pasture on the growing crops. La Forest, La Salle's lieutenant, was told that he might retain the command of the fort, if he would join the a.s.sociates; but he refused, and sailed in the autumn for France. [Footnote: These are the statements of the memorial, addressed in La Salle's behalf, to the minister Seignelay.]

Meanwhile, La Salle remained at the Illinois in extreme embarra.s.sment, cut off from supplies, robbed of his men who had gone to seek them, and disabled from fulfilling the pledges he had given to the surrounding Indians. Such was his position, when reports came to Fort St. Louis that the Iroquois were at hand. The Indian hamlets were wild with terror, beseeching him for succor which he had no power to give. Happily, the report proved false. No Iroquois appeared; the threatened attack was postponed, and the summer pa.s.sed away in peace. But La Salle's position, with the Governor his declared enemy, was intolerable and untenable; and there was no resource but in the protection of the court. Early in the autumn, he left Tonty in command of the Rock, bade farewell to his savage retainers, and descended to Quebec, intending to sail for France.

On his way, he met the Chevalier de Baugis, an officer of the king's dragoons, commissioned by La Barre to take possession of Fort St. Louis, and bearing letters from the Governor, ordering La Salle to come to Quebec; a superfluous command, as he was then on his way thither. He smothered his wrath, and wrote to Tonty to receive De Baugis well. The Chevalier and his party proceeded to the Illinois, and took possession of the fort; De Baugis commanding for the Governor, while Tonty remained as representative of La Salle. The two officers spent the winter harmoniously; and, with the return of spring, each found himself in sore need of aid from the other. Towards the end of March, the Iroquois attacked their citadel, and besieged it for six days, but at length withdrew, discomfited, carrying with them a number of Indian prisoners, most of whom escaped from their clutches. [Footnote: Tonty, Menoire, MS.; Lettre de La Barre, au Ministre, 5 Juin, 1684; Ibid., 9 Juillet, 1684, MSS.]

Meanwhile, La Salle had sailed for France, and thither we will follow him.

CHAPTER XXIII.

1684.

A NEW ENTERPRISE.

LA SALLE AT COURT.--HIS PROPOSALS.--OCCUPATION OF LOUISIANA.--INVASION OF MEXICO--ROYAL FAVOR.--PREPARATION.--THE NAVAL COMMANDER.--HIS JEALOUSY OF LA SALLE.--DISSENSIONS.

From the wilds of the Illinois,--crag, forest, and prairie, squalid wigwams, and naked savages,--La Salle crossed the sea; and before him rose the sculptured wonders of Versailles, that world of gorgeous illusion and hollow splendor, where Louis the Magnificent held his court. Amid its pomp of weary ceremonial, its glittering masquerade of vice and folly, its carnival of vanity and pride, stood the man whose home for sixteen years had been the wilderness, his bed the earth, his roof the sky, and his companions a rude nature and ruder men. In all that throng of hereditary n.o.bles, there was none of a prouder spirit than the son of the burgher of Rouen.

He announced what he had achieved in words of energetic simplicity, more impressive than all the tinsel of rhetoric. [Footnote: Witness the following. He speaks of himself in the third person. "To acquit himself of the commission with which he was charged, he has neglected all his private affairs, because they were alien to his enterprise; he has omitted nothing that was needful to its success, notwithstanding dangerous illness, heavy losses, and all the other evils he has suffered, which would have overcome the courage of any one who had not the same zeal and devotion for the accomplishment of this purpose. During five years he has made five journeys, of more, in all, than five thousand leagues, for the most part on foot, with extreme fatigue, through snow and through water, without escort, without provisions, without bread, without wine, without recreation, and without repose. He has traversed more than six hundred leagues of country hitherto unknown, among savage and cannibal nations, against whom he must daily make fight, though accompanied only by thirty- six men, and consoled only by the hope of succeeding in an enterprise which he thought would be agreeable to his Majesty."

See the original, as printed by Margry, _Journal General de I'Instruction Publique,_ x.x.xi. 699.] He had friends near the court,--Count Frontenac was one of them,--and he gained the ear of the colonial minister. There was a wonderful change in the views of the court towards him. The great Colbert had lately died, bequeathing to his son Seignelay, his successor in the control of the Marine and Colonies, some of his talents, and all of his harshness and violence. Seignelay entered with vigor into the schemes of La Salle, and commended them to the king, his master. The memorial, in which these schemes are set forth, is still preserved, as well as another memorial designed to prepare the way for it; and the following is the substance of them. The preliminary doc.u.ment states that the late Monseigneur Colbert was of opinion that it was important for the service of his Majesty to discover a port in the Gulf of Mexico; that to this end the memorialist, La Salle, made five journeys of upwards of five thousand leagues, in great part on foot; and traversed more than six hundred leagues of unknown country, among savages and cannibals, at the cost of a hundred and fifty thousand crowns. He now proposes to return by way of the Gulf of Mexico to the countries he has discovered, whence great benefits may be expected; first, the cause of G.o.d may be advanced by the preaching of the gospel to many Indian tribes; and, secondly, great conquests may be effected for the glory of the king, by the seizure of provinces rich in silver mines, and defended only by a few indolent and effeminate Spaniards. The Sieur de la Salle, pursues the memorial, binds himself to accomplish this enterprise within one year after his arrival on the spot; and he asks for this purpose only one vessel and two hundred men, with their arms, munitions, pay, and maintenance. When Monseigneur shall direct him, he will give the details of what he proposes. The memorial then describes the boundless extent, the fertility and resources of the country watered by the River Colbert, or Mississippi; the necessity of guarding it against foreigners, who will be eager to seize it now that La Salle's discovery has made it known; and the ease with which it may be defended by one or two forts at a proper distance above its mouth, which would form the key to an interior region eight hundred leagues in extent. "Should foreigners antic.i.p.ate us," he adds, "they will complete the ruin of New France, which they already hem in by their establishments of Virginia, Pennsylvania, New England, and Hudson's Bay." [Footnote: _Memoire du Sr.

de la Salle, pour rendre compte a Monseigneur de Seignelay de la decouverte qu'il a faite par l'ordre de sa Majeste_, MS.]

The second memorial is more explicit. The place, it says, which the Sieur de la Salle proposes to fortify, is on the River Colbert, or Mississippi, sixty leagues above its mouth, where the land is very fertile, the climate very mild, and whence we, the French, may control the continent; since, the river being narrow, we could defend ourselves by means of fire-ships against a hostile fleet, while the position is excellent both for attacking an enemy or retreating in case of need. The neighboring Indians detest the Spaniards, but love the French, having been won over by the kindness of the Sieur de la Salle. We could form of them an army of more than fifteen thousand savages, who, supported by the French and Abenakis, followers of the Sieur de la Salle, could easily subdue the province of New Biscay (the most northern province of Mexico), where there are but four hundred Spaniards, more fit to work the mines than to fight. On the north of New Biscay lie vast forests, extending to the River Seignelay [Footnote: This name, also given to the Illinois, is used to designate Red River on the map of Franquelin, where the forests above mentioned are represented.] (Red River), which is but forty or fifty leagues from the Spanish province. This river affords the means of attacking it to great advantage.

In view of these facts, pursues the memorial, the Sieur de la Salle offers, if the war with Spain continues, to undertake this conquest with two hundred men from France. He will take on his way fifty buccaneers at St. Domingo, and direct the four thousand Indian warriors at Fort St.

Louis of the Illinois to descend the river and join him. He will separate his force into three divisions, and attack on the same day the centre and the two extremities of the province. To accomplish this great design, he asks only for a vessel of thirty guns, a few cannon for the forts, and power to raise in France two hundred such men as he shall think fit, to he armed, paid, and maintained at the king's charge, for a term not exceeding a year, after which they will form a self-sustaining colony. And if a treaty of peace should prevent us from carrying our conquest into present execution, we shall place ourselves in a favorable position for effecting it on the outbreak of the next war with Spain. [Footnote: _Memoire du Sr.

de la Salle sur I'Entreprise qu'il a propose a Monseigneur le Marquis de Seignelay sur une des provinces de Mexique_, MS.]

Such, in brief, was the substance of this singular proposition. And, first, it is to be observed that it is based on a geographical blunder, the nature of which is explained by the map of La Salle's discoveries made in this very year. Here, the River Seignelay, or Red River, is represented as running parallel to the northern border of Mexico, and at no great distance from it; the region now called Texas being almost entirely suppressed. According to the map, New Biscay might be reached from this river in a few days; and, after crossing the intervening forests, the coveted mines of Ste. Barbe, or Santa Barbara, would be within striking distance. [Footnote: Both the memorial and the map represent the banks of Red River, as inhabited by Indians, called Terliquiquimechi, and known to the Spaniards as _Indios bravos_, or _Indios de guerra_. The Spaniards, it is added, were in great fear of them, as they made frequent inroads into Mexico. La Salle's Mexican geography was in all respects confused and erroneous; nor was Seignelay better informed. Indeed, Spanish jealousy placed correct information beyond their reach.] That La Salle believed in the possibility of invading the Spanish province of New Biscay from the Red River, there can he no doubt; neither can it reasonably be doubted that he hoped at some future day to make the attempt; and yet it is incredible that he proposed his plan of conquest with the serious intention of attempting to execute it at the time and in the manner which he indicates. He was a bold schemer, but neither a madman nor a fool. The project, as set forth in his memorial, bears all the indications of being drawn up with the view of producing a certain effect on the minds of the king and the minister. Ignorant as they were of the nature of the country and the character of its inhabitants, they could see nothing impracticable in the plan of mustering and keeping together an army of fifteen thousand Indians. [Footnote: While the plan, as proposed in the memorial, was clearly impracticable, the subsequent experience of the French in Texas tended to prove that the tribes of that region could be used with advantage in attacking the Spaniards of Mexico, and that an inroad, on a comparatively small scale, might have been successfully made with their help. In 1689, Tonty actually made the attempt, as we shall see, but failed from the desertion of his men. In 1697, the Sieur de Louvigny wrote to the Minister of the Marine, asking to complete La Salle's discoveries, and invade Mexico from Texas.--_Lettre de M. de Louvigny_, 14 _Oct._ 1697, MS. In an unpublished memoir of the year 1700, the seizure of the Mexican mines is given as one of the motives of the colonization of Louisiana.]

La Salle's immediate necessity was to obtain from the court the means for establishing a fort and a colony within the mouth of the Mississippi. This was essential to his own commercial plans; nor did he in the least exaggerate the value of such an establishment to the French nation, and the importance of antic.i.p.ating other powers in the possession of it. But he needed a more glittering lure to attract the eyes of Louis and Seignelay; and thus, it would appear, he held before them, in a definite and tangible form, the project of Spanish conquest which had haunted his imagination from youth, trusting that the speedy conclusion of peace, which actually took place, would absolve him from the immediate execution of the scheme, and give him time, with the means placed at his disposal, to mature his plans and prepare for eventual action. Such a procedure may be charged with indirectness; but it was in accordance with the wily and politic element from which the iron nature of La Salle was not free, but which was often defeated in its aims by other elements of his character.

Even with this madcap enterprise lopped off, La Salle's scheme of Mississippi trade and colonization, perfectly sound in itself, was too vast for an individual; above all, for one crippled and crushed with debt.

While he grasped one link of the great chain, another, no less essential, escaped from his hand; while he built up a colony on the Mississippi, it was reasonably certain that evil would befall his distant colony of the Illinois. The glittering project which he now unfolded found favor in the eyes of the king and the minister; for both were in the flush of an unparalleled success, and looked in the future, as in the past, for nothing but triumphs. They granted more than the pet.i.tioner asked, as indeed they well might, if they expected the accomplishment of all that he proposed to attempt. La Forest, La Salle's lieutenant, ejected from Fort Frontenac by La Barre, was now at Paris; and he was despatched to Canada, empowered to reoccupy, in La Salle's name, both Fort Frontenac and Fort St. Louis of the Illinois. The king himself wrote to La Barre in a strain that must have sent a cold thrill through the veins of that official. "I hear," he says, "that you have taken possession of Fort Frontenac, the property of the Sieur de la Salle, driven away his men, suffered his land to run to waste, and even told the Iroquois that they might seize him as an enemy of the colony." He adds, that, if this is true, he must make reparation for the wrong, and place all La Salle's property, as well as his men, in the hands of the Sieur de la Forest, "as I am satisfied that Fort Frontenac was not abandoned, as you wrote to me that it had been."

[Footnote:_Lettre du Roy a la Barre, Versailles, 10 Avril, 1684,_ MS.]

Four days later, he wrote to the Intendant of Canada, De Meules, to the effect that the bearer, La Forest, is to suffer no impediment, and that La Barre is to surrender to him, without reserve, all that belongs to La Salle. [Footnote:_Lettre du Roy a De Mettles, Versailles, 14 Avril, 1684._ Selgnelay wrote to De Meules to the same effect.] Armed with this letter, La Forest sailed for Canada. [Footnote: On La Forest's mission,--_Memoire pour representer a Monseigneur le Marquis de Seignelay la necessite d'envoyer le Sr. de la Forest en diligence a la Nouvelle France,_ MS.; _Lettre du Roy a la Barre, 14 Avril, 1684,_ MS.; _Ibid., 31 Oct. 1684,_ MS.

There is before me a promissory note of La Salle to La Forest, of 5,200 livres, dated at Roch.e.l.le, 17 July, 1684. This seems to be pay due to La Forest, who had served as La Salle's officer for nine years. A memorandum, is attached, signed by La Salle, to the effect, that it is his wish that La Forest reimburse himself, "_par preference_," out of any property of his, La Salle's, in France or Canada.]

La Salle had asked for two vessels, [Footnote: _Le Sieur de la Salle demande_, MS. This is the caption of the memorial, in which he states what is required; viz., a war vessel of thirty guns, pay and maintenance of two hundred men for a year at farthest, tools, munitions, cannon for the forts, a small vessel in pieces, the furniture of two chapels, a forge, with a supply of iron, weapons for his followers and allies, medicines, &c.] and four were given to him. Agents were sent to Roch.e.l.le and Rochefort to gather recruits. A hundred soldiers were enrolled, besides mechanics and laborers; and thirty volunteers, including gentlemen and burghers of condition, joined the expedition. And, as the plan was one no less of colonization than of war, several families embarked for the new land of promise, as well as a number of girls, lured by the prospect of almost certain matrimony. Nor were missionaries wanting. Among them was La Salle's brother, Cavelier, and two other priests of St. Sulpice. Three Recollets were added: Zen.o.be Membre, who was then in France; Anastase Douay, and Maxime Le Clercq. Including soldiers, sailors, and colonists of all cla.s.ses, the number embarked was about two hundred and eighty. The princ.i.p.al vessel was the "Joly," belonging to the royal navy, and carrying thirty-six guns. Another armed vessel of six guns was added, together with a store-ship and a ketch. In an evil hour, the naval command of the expedition was given to Beaujeu, a captain of the royal navy, who was subordinated to La Salle in every thing but the management of the vessels at sea. [Footnote: _Letter de Cachet a Mr. de la Salle, Versailles, 12 Avril, 1684, signe, Louis_, MS.] He had his full share of the arrogant and scornful spirit which marked the naval service of Louis XIV., joined to the contempt for commerce which belonged to the _n.o.blesse_ of France, but which did not always prevent them from dabbling in it when they could do so with secrecy and profit. He was unspeakably galled that a civilian should be placed over him, and he, too, a burgher recently enn.o.bled. La Salle was far from being the man to soothe his ruffled spirit. Bent on his own designs, asking no counsel, and accepting none; detesting a divided authority, impatient of question, cold, reserved, and impenetrable,--he soon wrought his colleague to the highest pitch of exasperation. While the vessels still lay at Roch.e.l.le; while all was bustle and preparation; while stores, arms, and munitions were embarking; while faithless agents were gathering beggars and vagabonds from the streets to serve as soldiers and artisans,--Beaujeu was giving vent to his disgust in long letters to the minister.

He complains that the vessels are provisioned only for six months, and that the voyage to the liver which La Salle claims to have discovered, and again back to France, cannot be made in that time. If La Salle had told him at the first what was to be done, he could have provided accordingly; but now it is too late. "He says," pursues the indignant commander, "that there are fourteen pa.s.sengers, besides the Sieur Minet, [Footnote: One of the engineers of the expedition.] to sit at my table. I hope that a fund will be provided for them, and that I shall not be required to support them."

"You have ordered me, Monseigneur," he continues, "to give all possible aid to this undertaking, and I shall do so to the best of my power; but permit me to take great credit to myself, for I find it very hard to submit to the orders of the Sieur de la Salle, whom I believe to be a man of merit, but who has no experience of war, except with savages, and who has no rank, while I have been captain of a ship thirteen years, and have served thirty, by sea and land. Besides, Monseigneur, he has told me that, in case of his death, you have directed that the Sieur de Tonty shall succeed him. This, indeed, is very hard; for, though I am not acquainted with that country, I should be very dull, if, being on the spot, I did not know, at the end of a month, as much of it as they do. I beg, Monseigneur, that I may at least share the command with them; and that, as regards war, nothing may be done without my knowledge and concurrence; for, as to their commerce, I neither intend nor desire to know any thing about it."

[Footnote:_Lettre de Beaujau au Ministre, Roch.e.l.le_, 30 _Mai_, 1684, MS.]

In another letter, he says: "He [La Salle] is so suspicious, and so fearful that somebody will penetrate his secrets, that I dare not ask him any thing." And, again, he complains of being placed in subordination to a man "who never commanded anybody but school-boys." [Footnote: "Qui n'a jamais commande qu'a des ecoliers."--_Lettre de Beaujeu au Ministre_, 21 _Juin_, 1684, MS. It appears from Hennepin that La Salle was very sensitive to any allusion to a "_pedant_," or pedagogue.] "I pray," he continues, "that my orders may be distinct and explicit, that I may not be held answerable for what may happen in consequence of the Sieur de la Salle's exercising command."

He soon fell into a dispute with him with respect to the division of command on board the "Joly," Beaujeu demanding, and it may be thought with good reason, that, when at sea, his authority should include all on board; while La Salle insisted that only the sailors, and not the soldiers, should be under his orders. "Though this is a very important matter,"

writes Beaujeu, "we have not quarrelled, but have referred it to the Intendant." [Footnote: _Lettre de Beaujeu au Ministre_, 25 _Juin_, 1684, MS. Arnoult, the Intendant at Roch.e.l.le, had received the king's orders to aid the enterprise. In a letter to La Salle, dated 14 April, and enclosing his commission, the king tells him that Beaujeu is to command the working of the ship, _la manoeuvre_, subject to his direction. Louis XIV. seems to have taken no little interest in the enterprise. He tells La Barre in one of his letters that La Salle is a man whom he has taken under his special protection.]

While these ill-omened bickerings went on, the various members of the expedition were mustering at Roch.e.l.le. Joutel, a fellow-townsman of La Salle, returning to his native Rouen, after sixteen years of service in the army, found all astir with the new project. His father had been gardener to La Salle's uncle, Henri Cavelier; [Footnote: At the modest wages of fifty francs a year and his maintenance.--Family papers found by Margry.] and, being of an adventurous spirit, he was induced to volunteer for the enterprise, of which he was to become the historian. With La Salle's brother, the priest, and two of his nephews, of whom one was a boy of fourteen, besides several others of his acquaintance, Joutel set out for Roch.e.l.le, where all were to embark together for their promised land.

[Footnote: Joutel, _Journal Historique_, 12.]

CHAPTER XXIV.

1684-1685.

LA SALLE IN TEXAS.

DEPARTURE.--QUARRELS WITH BEAUJEU.--ST. DOMINGO.--LA SALLE ATTACKED WITH FEVER.--HIS DESPERATE CONDITION.--THE GULF OF MEXICO.--A FATAL ERROR.--LANDING.--WRECK OF THE "AIMABLE."--INDIAN ATTACK.--TREACHERY OF BEAUJEU.--OMENS OF DISASTER.

The four ships sailed on the twenty-fourth of July; but the "Joly" soon broke her bowsprit, and they were forced to put back. [Footnote: La Salle believed that this mishap, which took place in good weather, was intentional.--_Memoire autographe de l'Abbe Jean Cavelier sur la Voyage de_ 1684, MS. Compare Joutel, 15.] On the first of August, they again set sail. La Salle, with the princ.i.p.al persons of the expedition, and a crowd of soldiers, artisans, and women, the destined mothers of Louisiana, were all on board the "Joly." Beaujeu wished to touch at Madeira: La Salle, for excellent reasons, refused; and hence there was great indignation among pa.s.sengers and crew. The surgeon of the ship spoke with insolence to La Salle, who rebuked him, whereupon Beaujeu took up the word in behalf of the offender, saying that the surgeon was, like himself, an officer of the king. [Footnote: "Le capitaine du batiment, qui avait en deux autres occasions a.s.sez fait connoitre qu'il etoit mecontent de ce que son autorite etoit partagee, prit la parole, disant au dit Sr. de la Salle que le chirurgien etoit officier du roi comme lui."--_Memoire autographe de l'Abbe Jean Cavelier,_ MS.] When they crossed the tropic, the sailors made ready a tub on deck to baptize the pa.s.sengers, after the villanous practice of the time; but La Salle refused to permit it, to the disappointment and wrath of all the crew, who had expected to extort a bountiful ransom, in money and liquor, from their victims. There was an incessant chafing between the two commanders; and when at length, after a long and wretched voyage, they reached St. Domingo, Beaujeu showed clearly that he was, to say the least, utterly indifferent to the interests of the expedition. La Salle wished to stop at Port de Paix, where he was to meet the Marquis de St. Laurent, Lieutenant-General of the Islands; Begon, the Intendant; and De Cussy, Governor of the Island of La Tortue,--who had orders from the king to supply him with provisions, and give him all possible a.s.sistance. Beaujeu had consented to stop here; [Footnote: "C'est la (au Port de Paix) ou Mr. de Beaujeu etait convenu de s'arreter."-- _Memoire autographe de l'Abbe Jean Cavelier,_ Joutel says that this was resolved on at a council held on board the "Joly," and that a Proces Verbal to that effect was drawn up.--_Journal Historique,_ 22.] but he nevertheless ran by the place in the night, and, to the extreme vexation of La Salle, cast anchor on the twenty-seventh of September, at Pet.i.t Goave, on the other side of the island.

The "Joly" was alone; the other vessels had lagged behind. She had more than fifty sick men on board, and La Salle was of the number. He despatched a messenger to St. Laurent, Begon, and Cussy, begging them to join him, commissioned Joutel to get the sick ash.o.r.e, suffocating as they were in the hot and crowded ship, and caused the soldiers to be landed on a small island in the harbor. Scarcely had the voyagers sung _Te Deum_ for their safe arrival, when two of the lagging vessels appeared, bringing the disastrous tidings that the third, the ketch "St. Francois," had been taken by the Spaniards. She was laden with munitions, tools, and other necessaries for the colony; and the loss was irreparable. Beaujeu was answerable for it; for, had he followed his instructions, and anch.o.r.ed at Port de Paix, it would not have occurred. The Lieutenant-General, with Begon and Cussy, who had arrived, on La Salle's request, plainly spoke their minds to him. [Footnote: Joutel, _Journal Historique_, 28.]

Meanwhile, La Salle's illness rose to a violent fever. He lay delirious in a wretched garret in the town, attended by his brother, and one or two others who stood faithful to him. A goldsmith of the neighborhood, moved at his deplorable condition, offered the use of his house; and the Abbe Cavelier had him removed thither. But there was a tavern hard by, and the patient was tormented with daily and nightly riot. At the height of the fever, a party of Beaujeu's sailors spent a night in singing and dancing before the house; and, says Cavelier, "The more we begged them to be quiet, the more noise they made." La Salle lost reason and well-nigh life; but at length his mind resumed its balance, and the violence of the disease abated. A friendly Capucin friar offered him the shelter of his roof; and two of his men supported him thither on foot, giddy with exhaustion and hot with fever. Here he found repose, and was slowly recovering, when some of his attendants rashly told him of the loss of the ketch "St. Francois;" and the consequence was a critical return of the disease. [Footnote: The above particulars are from the unpublished memoir of La Salle's brother, the Abbe Cavelier, already cited.]

There was no one to fill his place; Beaujeu would not; Cavelier could not.

Joutel, the gardener's son, was apparently the most trusty man of the company; but the expedition was virtually without a head. The men roamed on sh.o.r.e, and plunged into every excess of debauchery, contracting diseases which eventually killed them.

Beaujeu, in the extremity of ill humor, resumed his correspondence with Seignelay. "But for the illness of the Sieur de la Salle," he writes, "I could not venture to report to you the progress of our voyage, as I am charged only with the navigation, and he with the secrets; but as his malady has deprived him of the use of his faculties, both of body and mind, I have thought myself obliged to acquaint you with what is pa.s.sing, and of the condition in which we are."

He then declares that the ships freighted by La Salle were so slow, that the "Joly" had continually been forced to wait for them, thus doubling the length of the voyage; that he had not had water enough for the pa.s.sengers, as La Salle had not told him that there were to be any such till the day they came on h.o.a.rd; that great numbers were sick, and that he had told La Salle there would be trouble, if he filled all the s.p.a.ce between decks with his goods, and forced the soldiers and sailors to sleep on deck; that he had told him he would get no provisions at St. Domingo, but that he insisted on stopping; that it had always been so; that, whatever he proposed, La Salle would refuse, alleging orders from the king; "and now,"

pursues the ruffled commander, "everybody is ill; and he himself has a violent fever, as dangerous, the surgeon tells me, to the mind as to the body."

The rest of the letter is in the same strain. He says that a day or two after La Salle's illness began, his brother Cavelier came to ask him to take charge of his affairs; but that he did not wish to meddle with them, especially as n.o.body knows any thing about them, and as La Salle has sold some of the ammunition and provisions; that Cavelier tells him that he thinks his brother keeps no accounts, wishing to hide his affairs from everybody; that he learns from buccaneers that the entrance of the Mississippi is very shallow and difficult, and that this is the worst season for navigating the Gulf; that the Spaniards have in these seas six vessels of from thirty to sixty guns each, besides row-galleys; but that he is not afraid, and will perish, or bring back an account of the Mississippi. "Nevertheless," he adds, "if the Sieur de la Salle dies, I shall pursue a course different from that which he has marked out; for his plans are not good."

"If," he continues, "you permit me to speak my mind, M. de la Salle ought to have been satisfied with discovering his river, without undertaking to conduct three vessels with troops two thousand leagues through so many different climates, and across seas entirely unknown to him. I grant that he is a man of knowledge; that he has reading, and even some tincture of navigation; but there is so much difference between theory and practice, that a man who has only the former will always be at fault. There is also a great difference between conducting canoes on lakes and along a river, and navigating ships with troops on distant oceans." [Footnote: "Si vous me permettez de dire mon sentiment, M. de la Salle devait se contenter d'avoir decouvert sa riviere, sans se charger de conduire trois vaisseaux et des troupes a deux mille lieues au travers de tant de climats differents et par des mers qui lui etaient tout a fait inconnues. Je demeure d'accord qu'il est savant, qu'il a de la lecture, et meme quelque teinture de la navigation. Mais il y a tant de difference entre la theorie et la pratique, qu'un homme qui n'aura que celle-la s'y trompera toujours.