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The Jesuits in North America in the Seventeenth Century

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[ 1 The Indian name of St. Jean was Etarita; and that of St. Matthias,
Ekarenniondi. ]

It was two o'clock in the afternoon of the seventh of December.
[ Bressani, Relation Abrégée, 264. ] Chabanel had left the place a day
or two before, in obedience to a message from Ragueneau, and Garnier was
here alone. He was making his rounds among the houses, visiting the sick
and instructing his converts, when the horrible din of the war-whoop rose
from the borders of the clearing, and, on the instant, the town was mad
with terror. Children and girls rushed to and fro, blind with fright;
women snatched their infants, and fled they knew not whither. Garnier
ran to his chapel, where a few of his converts had sought asylum.
He gave them his benediction, exhorted them to hold fast to the Faith,
and bade them fly while there was yet time. For himself, he hastened
back to the houses, running from one to another, and giving absolution or
baptism to all whom he found. An Iroquois met him, shot him with three
balls through the body and thigh, tore off his cassock, and rushed on in
pursuit of the fugitives. Garnier lay for a moment on the ground,
as if stunned; then, recovering his senses, he was seen to rise into a
kneeling posture. At a little distance from him lay a Huron, mortally
wounded, but still showing signs of life. With the Heaven that awaited
him glowing before his fading vision, the priest dragged himself towards
the dying Indian, to give him absolution; but his strength failed,
and he fell again to the earth. He rose once more, and again crept
forward, when a party of Iroquois rushed upon him, split his head with
two blows of a hatchet, stripped him, and left his body on the ground.
[ 1 ] At this time the whole town was on fire. The invaders, fearing
that the absent warriors might return and take their revenge, hastened to
finish their work, scattered firebrands every where, and threw children
alive into the burning houses. They killed many of the fugitives,
captured many more, and then made a hasty retreat through the forest with
their prisoners, butchering such of them as lagged on the way. St. Jean
lay a waste of smoking ruins thickly strewn with blackened corpses of the
slain.

[ The above particulars of Garnier's death rest on the evidence of a
Christian Huron woman, named Marthe, who saw him shot down, and also saw
his attempt to reach the dying Indian. She was herself struck down
immediately after with a war-club, but remained alive, and escaped in the
confusion. She died three months later, at Isle St. Joseph, from the
effects of the injuries she had received, after reaffirming the truth of
her story to Ragueneau, who was with her, and who questioned her on the
subject. (Mémoires touchant la Mort et les Vertus des Pères Garnier,
etc., MS.). Ragueneau also speaks of her in Relation des Hurons, 1650, 9.
--The priests Grelon and Garreau found the body stripped naked, with
three gunshot wounds in the abdomen and thigh, and two deep hatchet
wounds in the head. ]

Towards evening, parties of fugitives reached St. Matthias, with tidings
of the catastrophe. The town was wild with alarm, and all stood on the
watch, in expectation of an attack; but when, in the morning, scouts came
in and reported the retreat of the Iroquois, Garreau and Grelon set out
with a party of converts to visit the scene of havoc. For a long time
they looked in vain for the body of Garnier; but at length they found him
lying where he had fallen,--so scorched and disfigured, that he was
recognized with difficulty. The two priests wrapped his body in a part
of their own clothing; the Indian converts dug a grave on the spot where
his church had stood; and here they buried him. Thus, at the age of
forty-four, died Charles Garnier, the favorite child of wealthy and noble
parents, nursed in Parisian luxury and ease, then living and dying,
a more than willing exile, amid the hardships and horrors of the Huron
wilderness. His life and his death are his best eulogy. Brébeuf was the
lion of the Huron mission, and Garnier was the lamb; but the lamb was as
fearless as the lion.

[ Garnier's devotion to the mission was absolute. He took little or no
interest in the news from France, which, at intervals of from one to
three years, found its way to the Huron towns. His companion Bressani
says, that he would walk thirty or forty miles in the hottest summer day,
to baptize some dying Indian, when the country was infested by the enemy.
On similar errands, he would sometimes pass the night alone in the forest
in the depth of winter. He was anxious to fall into the hands of the
Iroquois, that he might preach the Faith to them even out of the midst of
the fire. In one of his unpublished letters he writes, "Praised be our
Lord, who punishes me for my sins by depriving me of this crown" (the
crown of martyrdom). After the death of Brébeuf and Lalemant, he writes
to his brother--

"Hélas! Mon cher frère, si ma conscience ne me convainquait et ne me
confondait de mon infidélité au service de notre bon maître, je pourrais
espérer quelque faveur approchante de celles qu'il a faites aux bien-heureux
martyrs avec qui j'avais le bien de converser souvent, étant dans les mêmes
occasions et dangers qu'ils étaient, mais sa justice me fait craindre que
je ne demeure toujours indigne d'une telle couronne."

He contented himself with the most wretched fare during the last years of
famine, living in good measure on roots and acorns; "although," says
Ragueneau, "he had been the cherished son of a rich and noble house,
on whom all the affection of his father had centred, and who had been
nourished on food very different from that of swine."--Relation des
Hurons, 1650, 12.

For his character, see Ragueneau, Bressani, Tanner, and Alegambe, who
devotes many pages to the description of his religious traits; but the
complexion of his mind is best reflected in his private letters. ]

When, on the following morning, the warriors of St. Jean returned from
their rash and bootless sally, and saw the ashes of their desolated homes
and the ghastly relics of their murdered families, they seated themselves
amid the ruin, silent and motionless as statues of bronze, with heads
bowed down and eyes fixed on the ground. Thus they remained through half
the day. Tears and wailing were for women; this was the mourning of
warriors.

Garnier's colleague, Chabanel, had been recalled from St. Jean by an
order from the Father Superior, who thought it needless to expose the
life of more than one priest in a position of so much danger. He stopped
on his way at St. Matthias, and on the morning of the seventh of December,
the day of the attack, left that town with seven or eight Christian
Hurons. The journey was rough and difficult. They proceeded through the
forest about eighteen miles, and then encamped in the snow. The Indians
fell asleep; but Chabanel, from an apprehension of danger, or some other
cause, remained awake. About midnight he heard a strange sound in the
distance,--a confusion of fierce voices, mingled with songs and outcries.
It was the Iroquois on their retreat with their prisoners, some of whom
were defiantly singing their war-songs, after the Indian custom.
Chabanel waked his companions, who instantly took flight. He tried to
follow, but could not keep pace with the light-footed savages, who
returned to St. Matthias, and told what had occurred. They said, however,
that Chabanel had left them and taken an opposite direction, in order to
reach Isle St. Joseph. His brother priests were for some time ignorant
of what had befallen him. At length a Huron Indian, who had been
converted, but afterward apostatized, gave out that he had met him in the
forest, and aided him with his canoe to cross a river which lay in his
path. Some supposed that he had lost his way, and died of cold and
hunger; but others were of a different opinion. Their suspicion was
confirmed some time afterwards by the renegade Huron, who confessed that
he had killed Chabanel and thrown his body into the river, after robbing
him of his clothes, his hat, the blanket or mantle which was strapped to
his shoulders, and the bag in which he carried his books and papers.
He declared that his motive was hatred of the Faith, which had caused the
ruin of the Hurons. [ Mémoires touchant la Mort et les Vertus des Pères,
etc., MS. ] The priest had prepared himself for a worse fate. Before
leaving Sainte Marie on the Wye, to go to his post in the Tobacco Nation,
he had written to his brother to regard him as a victim destined to the
fires of the Iroquois. [ Abrégé de la Vie du P. Noël Chabanel, MS. ]
He added, that, though he was naturally timid, he was now wholly
indifferent to danger; and he expressed the belief that only a superhuman
power could have wrought such a change in him.

[ "Ie suis fort apprehensif de mon naturel; toutefois, maintenant que ie
vay au plus grand danger et qu'il me semble que la mort n'est pas
esloignée, ie ne sens plus de crainte. Cette disposition ne vient pas de
moy."--Relation des Hurons, 1650, 18.

The following is the vow made by Chabanel, at a time when his disgust at
the Indian mode of life beset him with temptations to ask to be recalled
from the mission. It is translated from the Latin original:--

"My Lord Jesus Christ, who, in the admirable disposition of thy paternal
providence, hast willed that I, although most unworthy, should be a
co-laborer with the holy Apostles in this vineyard of the Hurons,--I,
Noël Chabanel, impelled by the desire of fulfilling thy holy will in
advancing the conversion of the savages of this land to thy faith, do vow,
in the presence of the most holy sacrament of thy precious body and blood,
which is God's tabernacle among men, to remain perpetually attached to
this mission of the Hurons, understanding all things according to the
interpretation and disposal of the Superiors of the Society of Jesus.
Therefore I entreat thee to receive me as the perpetual servant of this
mission, and to render me worthy of so sublime a ministry. Amen.
This twentieth day of June, 1647." ]

Garreau and Grelon, in their mission of St. Matthias, were exposed to
other dangers than those of the Iroquois. A report was spread, not only
that they were magicians, but that they had a secret understanding with
the enemy. A nocturnal council was called, and their death was decreed.
In the morning, a furious crowd gathered before a lodge which they were
about to enter, screeching and yelling after the manner of Indians when
they compel a prisoner to run the gantlet. The two priests, giving no
sign of fear, passed through the crowd and entered the lodge unharmed.
Hatchets were brandished over them, but no one would be the first to
strike. Their converts were amazed at their escape, and they themselves
ascribed it to the interposition of a protecting Providence. The Huron
missionaries were doubly in danger,--not more from the Iroquois than from
the blind rage of those who should have been their friends.

[ Ragueneau, Relation des Hurons, 1650, 20.

One of these two missionaries, Garreau, was afterwards killed by the
Iroquois, who shot him through the spine, in 1656, near Montreal.--
De Quen, Relation, 1656, 41. ]




CHAPTER XXXI.

1650-1652.

THE HURON MISSION ABANDONED.


FAMINE AND THE TOMAHAWK.--A NEW ASYLUM.--
VOYAGE OF THE REFUGEES TO QUEBEC.--MEETING WITH BRESSANI.--
DESPERATE COURAGE OF THE IROQUOIS.--INROADS AND BATTLES.--
DEATH OF BUTEUX.


As spring approached, the starving multitude on Isle St. Joseph grew
reckless with hunger. Along the main shore, in spots where the sun lay
warm, the spring fisheries had already begun, and the melting snow was
uncovering the acorns in the woods. There was danger everywhere, for
bands of Iroquois were again on the track of their prey. [ 1 ] The
miserable Hurons, gnawed with inexorable famine, stood in the dilemma of
a deadly peril and an assured death. They chose the former; and, early
in March, began to leave their island and cross to the main-land, to
gather what sustenance they could. The ice was still thick, but the
advancing season had softened it; and, as a body of them were crossing,
it broke under their feet. Some were drowned; while others dragged
themselves out, drenched and pierced with cold, to die miserably on the
frozen lake, before they could reach a shelter. Other parties, more
fortunate, gained the shore safely, and began their fishing, divided into
companies of from eight or ten to a hundred persons. But the Iroquois
were in wait for them. A large band of warriors had already made their
way, through ice and snow, from their towns in Central New York. They
surprised the Huron fishermen, surrounded them, and cut them in pieces
without resistance,--tracking out the various parties of their victims,
and hunting down fugitives with such persistency and skill, that, of all
who had gone over to the main, the Jesuits knew of but one who escaped.
[ 2 ]

[ 1 "Mais le Printemps estant venu, les Iroquois nous furent encore plus
cruels; et ce sont eux qui vrayement ont ruiné toutes nos esperances,
et qui ont fait vn lieu d'horreur, vne terre de sang et de carnage,
vn theatre de cruauté et vn sepulchre de carcasses décharnées par les
langueurs d'vne longue famine, d'vn païs de benediction, d'vne terre de
Sainteté et d'vn lieu qui n'auoit plus rien de barbare, depuis que le
sang respandu pour son amour auoit rendu tout son peuple Chrestien."--
Ragueneau, Relation des Hurons, 1650, 23. ]

[ 2 "Le iour de l'Annonciation, vingt-cinquiesme de Mars, vne armée
d'Iroquois ayans marché prez de deux cents lieuës de païs, à trauers les
glaces et les neiges, trauersans les montagnes et les forests pleines
d'horreur, surprirent au commencement de la nuit le camp de nos
Chrestiens, et en firent vne cruelle boucherie. Il sembloit que le Ciel
conduisit toutes leurs demarches et qu'ils eurent vn Ange pour guide: car
ils diuiserent leurs troupes auec tant de bon-heur, qu'ils trouuerent en
moins de deux iours, toutes les bandes de nos Chrestiens qui estoient
dispersées ça et là, esloignées les vnes des autres de six, sept et huit
lieuës, cent personnes en vn lieu, en vn autre cinquante; et mesme il y
auoit quelques familles solitaires, qui s'estoient escartées en des lieux
moins connus et hors de tout chemin. Chose estrange! de tout ce monde
dissipé, vn seul homme s'eschappa, qui vint nous en apporter les
nouuelles."--Ragueneau, Relation des Hurons, 1650, 23, 24. ]

"My pen," writes Ragueneau, "has no ink black enough to describe the fury
of the Iroquois." Still the goadings of famine were relentless and
irresistible. "It is said," adds the Father Superior, "that hunger will
drive wolves from the forest. So, too, our starving Hurons were driven
out of a town which had become an abode of horror. It was the end of
Lent. Alas, if these poor Christians could have had but acorns and water
to keep their fast upon! On Easter Day we caused them to make a general
confession. On the following morning they went away, leaving us all
their little possessions; and most of them declared publicly that they
made us their heirs, knowing well that they were near their end. And,
in fact, only a few days passed before we heard of the disaster which we
had foreseen. These poor people fell into ambuscades of our Iroquois
enemies. Some were killed on the spot; some were dragged into captivity;
women and children were burned. A few made their escape, and spread
dismay and panic everywhere. A week after, another band was overtaken by
the same fate. Go where they would, they met with slaughter on all
sides. Famine pursued them, or they encountered an enemy more cruel than
cruelty itself; and, to crown their misery, they heard that two great
armies of Iroquois were on the way to exterminate them. . . . Despair
was universal." [ Ragueneau, Relation des Hurons, 1650, 24. ]

The Jesuits at St. Joseph knew not what course to take. The doom of
their flock seemed inevitable. When dismay and despondency were at their
height, two of the principal Huron chiefs came to the fort, and asked an
interview with Ragueneau and his companions. They told them that the
Indians had held a council the night before, and resolved to abandon the
island. Some would disperse in the most remote and inaccessible forests;
others would take refuge in a distant spot, apparently the Grand
Manitoulin Island; others would try to reach the Andastes; and others
would seek safety in adoption and incorporation with the Iroquois
themselves.

"Take courage, brother," continued one of the chiefs, addressing
Ragueneau. "You can save us, if you will but resolve on a bold step.
Choose a place where you can gather us together, and prevent this
dispersion of our people. Turn your eyes towards Quebec, and transport
thither what is left of this ruined country. Do not wait till war and
famine have destroyed us to the last man. We are in your hands. Death
has taken from you more than ten thousand of us. If you wait longer,
not one will remain alive; and then you will be sorry that you did not
save those whom you might have snatched from danger, and who showed you
the means of doing so. If you do as we wish, we will form a church under
the protection of the fort at Quebec. Our faith will not be
extinguished. The examples of the French and the Algonquins will
encourage us in our duty, and their charity will relieve some of our
misery. At least, we shall sometimes find a morsel of bread for our
children, who so long have had nothing but bitter roots and acorns to
keep them alive."

[ Ragueneau, Relation des Hurons, 1650, 25. It appears from the
MS. Journal des Supérieurs des Jésuites, that a plan of bringing the
remnant of the Hurons to Quebec was discussed and approved by Lalemant
and his associates, in a council held by them at that place in April. ]

The Jesuits were deeply moved. They consulted together again and again,
and prayed in turn during forty hours without ceasing, that their minds
might be enlightened. At length they resolved to grant the petition of
the two chiefs, and save the poor remnant of the Hurons, by leading them
to an asylum where there was at least a hope of safety. Their resolution
once taken, they pushed their preparations with all speed, lest the
Iroquois might learn their purpose, and lie in wait to cut them off.
Canoes were made ready, and on the tenth of June they began the voyage,
with all their French followers and about three hundred Hurons. The
Huron mission was abandoned.

"It was not without tears," writes the Father Superior, "that we left the
country of our hopes and our hearts, where our brethren had gloriously
shed their blood." [ Compare Bressani, Relation Abrégée, 288. ] The
fleet of canoes held its melancholy way along the shores where two years
before had been the seat of one of the chief savage communities of the
continent, and where now all was a waste of death and desolation.
Then they steered northward, along the eastern coast of the Georgian Bay,
with its countless rocky islets; and everywhere they saw the traces of
the Iroquois. When they reached Lake Nipissing, they found it deserted,--
nothing remaining of the Algonquins who dwelt on its shore, except the
ashes of their burnt wigwams. A little farther on, there was a fort
built of trees, where the Iroquois who made this desolation had spent the
winter; and a league or two below, there was another similar fort.
The River Ottawa was a solitude. The Algonquins of Allumette Island and
the shores adjacent had all been killed or driven away, never again to
return. "When I came up this great river, only thirteen years ago,"
writes Ragueneau, "I found it bordered with Algonquin tribes, who knew no
God, and, in their infidelity, thought themselves gods on earth; for they
had all that they desired, abundance of fish and game, and a prosperous
trade with allied nations: besides, they were the terror of their
enemies. But since they have embraced the Faith and adored the cross of
Christ, He has given them a heavy share in this cross, and made them a
prey to misery, torture, and a cruel death. In a word, they are a people
swept from the face of the earth. Our only consolation is, that, as they
died Christians, they have a part in the inheritance of the true children
of God, who scourgeth every one whom He receiveth." [ Ragueneau,
Relation des Hurons, 1650, 27. These Algonquins of the Ottawa, though
broken and dispersed, were not destroyed, as Ragueneau supposes. ]

As the voyagers descended the river, they had a serious alarm. Their
scouts came in, and reported that they had found fresh footprints of men
in the forest. These proved, however, to be the tracks, not of enemies,
but of friends. In the preceding autumn Bressani had gone down to the
French settlements with about twenty Hurons, and was now returning with
them, and twice their number of armed Frenchmen, for the defence of the
mission. His scouts had also been alarmed by discovering the footprints
of Ragueneau's Indians; and for some time the two parties stood on their
guard, each taking the other for an enemy. When at length they
discovered their mistake, they met with embraces and rejoicing. Bressani
and his Frenchmen had come too late. All was over with the Hurons and
the Huron mission; and, as it was useless to go farther, they joined
Ragueneau's party, and retraced their course for the settlements.

A day or two before, they had had a sharp taste of the mettle of the
enemy. Ten Iroquois warriors had spent the winter in a little fort of
felled trees on the borders of the Ottawa, hunting for subsistence,
and waiting to waylay some passing canoe of Hurons, Algonquins, or
Frenchmen. Bressani's party outnumbered them six to one; but they
resolved that it should not pass without a token of their presence.
Late on a dark night, the French and Hurons lay encamped in the forest,
sleeping about their fires. They had set guards: but these, it seems,
were drowsy or negligent; for the ten Iroquois, watching their time,
approached with the stealth of lynxes, and glided like shadows into the
midst of the camp, where, by the dull glow of the smouldering fires,
they could distinguish the recumbent figures of their victims. Suddenly
they screeched the war-whoop, and struck like lightning with their
hatchets among the sleepers. Seven were killed before the rest could
spring to their weapons. Bressani leaped up, and received on the instant
three arrow-wounds in the head. The Iroquois were surrounded, and a
desperate fight ensued in the dark. Six of them were killed on the spot,
and two made prisoners; while the remaining two, breaking through the
crowd, bounded out of the camp and escaped in the forest.

The united parties soon after reached Montreal; but the Hurons refused to
remain in a spot so exposed to the Iroquois. Accordingly, they all
descended the St. Lawrence, and at length, on the twenty-eighth of July,
reached Quebec. Here the Ursulines, the hospital nuns, and the
inhabitants taxed their resources to the utmost to provide food and
shelter for the exiled Hurons. Their good will exceeded their power; for
food was scarce at Quebec, and the Jesuits themselves had to bear the
chief burden of keeping the sufferers alive. [ Compare Juchereau,
Histoire de l'Hôtel-Dieu, 79, 80. ]

But, if famine was an evil, the Iroquois were a far greater one; for,
while the western nations of their confederacy were engrossed with the
destruction of the Hurons, the Mohawks kept up incessant attacks on the
Algonquins and the French. A party of Christian Indians, chiefly from
Sillery, planned a stroke of retaliation, and set out for the Mohawk
country, marching cautiously and sending forward scouts to scour the
forest. One of these, a Huron, suddenly fell in with a large Iroquois
war party, and, seeing that he could not escape, formed on the instant a
villanous plan to save himself. He ran towards the enemy, crying out,
that he had long been looking for them and was delighted to see them;
that his nation, the Hurons, had come to an end; and that henceforth his
country was the country of the Iroquois, where so many of his kinsmen and
friends had been adopted. He had come, he declared, with no other
thought than that of joining them, and turning Iroquois, as they had
done. The Iroquois demanded if he had come alone. He answered, "No,"
and said, that, in order to accomplish his purpose, he had joined an
Algonquin war-party who were in the woods not far off. The Iroquois,
in great delight, demanded to be shown where they were. This Judas,
as the Jesuits call him, at once complied; and the Algonquins were
surprised by a sudden onset, and routed with severe loss. The
treacherous Huron was well treated by the Iroquois, who adopted him into
their nation. Not long after, he came to Canada, and, with a view,
as it was thought, to some further treachery, rejoined the French.
A sharp cross-questioning put him to confusion, and he presently
confessed his guilt. He was sentenced to death; and the sentence was
executed by one of his own countrymen, who split his head with a hatchet.
[ Ragueneau, Relation, 1650, 30. ]

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