THE OUTAGAMIE WAR.
The Western Posts.—Detroit.—The Illinois.—Perils of the West.—The Outagamies.—Their Turbulence2.—English Instigation.—Louvigny's Expedition.—Defeat of Outagamies.—Hostilities renewed.—Lignery's Expedition.—Outagamies attacked by Villiers; by Hurons and Iroquois.—La Butte des Morts.—The Sacs and Foxes.
[Pg 326]The rulers of Canada labored3 without ceasing in their perplexing task of engrossing4 the fur-trade of the West and controlling the western tribes to the exclusion5 of the English. Every day made it clearer that to these ends the western wilderness6 must be held by forts and trading-posts; and this policy of extension prevailed more and more, in spite of the league of merchants, who wished to draw the fur-trade to Montreal,—in spite of the Jesuits, who felt that their influence over the remoter tribes would be compromised by the presence among them of officers, soldiers, and traders; and in spite of the King himself, who feared that the diffusion7 of the colony would breed disorder8 and insubordination.
Detroit, the most important of the western posts, struggled through a critical infancy9 in the charge of[Pg 327] its founder10, La Mothe-Cadillac, till, by a choice not very judicious11, he was made governor of Louisiana. During his rule the population had slowly increased to about two hundred souls; but after he left the place it diminished to a point that seemed to threaten the feeble post with extinction12. About 1722 it revived again; voyageurs and discharged soldiers settled about the fort, and the parish register shows six or eight births in the course of the year.[320]
Meanwhile, on the banks of the Mississippi another settlement was growing up which did not owe its birth to official patronage14, and yet was destined15 to become the most noteworthy offspring of Canada in the West. It was known to the French as "the Illinois," from the name of the group of tribes belonging to that region. La Salle had occupied the banks of the river Illinois in 1682; but the curious Indian colony which he gathered about his fort on the rock of St. Louis[321] dispersed16 after his death, till few or none were left except the Kaskaskias, a sub-tribe of the Illinois. These still lived in the meadow below Fort St. Louis, where the Jesuits Marquette, Allouez, Rale, Gravier, and Marest labored in turn for their conversion17, till, in 1700, they or some of them followed Marest to the Mississippi and set up their wigwams where the town of Kaskaskia now stands, near the mouth of the little river which bears the same name. Charlevoix, who was here in 1721, calls this[Pg 328] the oldest settlement of the Illinois,[322]—though there is some reason to believe that the village of Cahokia, established as a mission by the Jesuit Pinet, sixty miles or more above Kaskaskia, and nearly opposite the present city of St. Louis, is, by a few weeks, the elder of the two. The voyageurs, coureurs de bois, and other roving Canadians made these young settlements their resort, took to wife converted squaws,[323] and ended with making the Illinois their home. The missions turned to parishes, the missionaries18 to curés, and the wigwams to those compact little Canadian houses that cause one to marvel19 at the ingenuity20 which can store so multitudinous a progeny21 within such narrow limits.
White women from Canada or Louisiana began to find their way to these wilderness settlements, which with every generation grew more French and less Indian. The river Mississippi was at once their friend and their enemy. It carried their produce to New Orleans, but undermined their rich alluvial22 shores, cut away fields and meadows, and swept them in its turbid23 eddies24 thirteen hundred miles southward, as a contribution to the mud-banks of the delta25.
When the Mississippi Company came into power, the Illinois, hitherto a dependency of Canada, was[Pg 329] annexed26 to Louisiana. Pierre Dugué de Boisbriant was sent to take command of it, and under his direction a fort was built on the bank of the Mississippi sixteen miles above Kaskaskia. It was named Fort Chartres, in honor of the Duc de Chartres, son of the Regent, who had himself once borne the same title. This work, built at first of wood and earth, was afterwards rebuilt of stone, and became one of the chief links in the chain of military communication between Canada and Louisiana.
Here, with the commandant at its head, sat the council of three which ruled over the little settlement.[324] Here too was a garrison27 to enforce the decrees of the council, keep order among the settlers, and give them a protection which they greatly needed, since they were within striking distance of the formidable Chickasaws, the effects of whose hostility28 appear year after year on the parish register of deaths at Kaskaskia. Worse things were in store; for the gallant29 young Pierre d'Artaguette, who was appointed to the command in 1734, and who marched against the Chickasaws with a band of Frenchmen and Indians, was defeated, captured, and burned alive, astonishing his torturers by the fortitude30 with which he met his fate. The settlement had other foes32 not less dangerous. These were the Outagamies,[Pg 330] or Foxes, between whom and the tribes of the Illinois there was a deadly feud33. We have seen how, in 1712, a band of Outagamies, with their allies, the Mascoutins, appeared at Detroit and excited an alarm, which, after a savage34 conflict, was ended with their ruin. In 1714 the Outagamies made a furious attack upon the Illinois, and killed or carried off seventy-seven of them.[325] A few years later they made another murderous onslaught in the same quarter. They were the scourge35 of the West, and no white man could travel between Canada and Louisiana except at the risk of his life.
In vain the French parleyed with them; threats and blandishments were useless alike. Their chiefs would promise, sometimes in good faith, to keep the peace and no more offend their father Onontio; but nearly all the tribes of the Lake country were their hereditary37 enemies, and some bloody38 revenge for ancient wrongs would excite their young warriors39 to a fury which the elders could not restrain. Thus, in 1722 the Saginaws, a fierce Algonquin band on the eastern borders of Michigan, killed twenty-three Outagamies; the tribesmen of the slain41 returned the blow, other tribes joined the fray42, and the wilderness was again on fire.[326]
The Canadian authorities were sorely perplexed43, for this fierce inter-tribal war threatened their whole system of western trade. Meanwhile the English[Pg 331] and Dutch of New York were sending wampum belts to the Indians of the upper lakes, inviting44 them to bring their furs to Albany; and Ramesay, governor of Montreal, complains that they were all disposed to do so. "Twelve of the upper tribes," says Lord Cornbury, "have come down this year to trade at Albany;" but he adds that as the Indians have had no presents for above six years, he is afraid "we shall lose them before next summer."[327] The governor of Canada himself is said to have been in collusion with the English traders for his own profit.[328] The Jesuits denied the charge, and Father Marest wrote to the governor, after the disaster to Walker's fleet on its way to attack Quebec, "The protection you have given to the missions has drawn45 on you and the colony the miraculous46 protection of God."[329]
Whether his accusers did him wrong or not, Vaudreuil felt the necessity of keeping the peace among the western Indians and suppressing the Outagamie incendiaries. In fact, nothing would satisfy him but their destruction. "They are the common enemies of all the western tribes," he writes. "They have lately murdered three Frenchmen and five Hurons at Detroit. The Hurons ask for our help against them, and we must give it, or all the tribes will despise us."[330]
[Pg 332]He put his chief trust in Louvigny, formerly47 commandant at Michilimackinac. That officer proposed to muster48 the friendly tribes and march on the Outagamies just as their corn was ripening49, fight them if they stood their ground, or if not, destroy their crops, burn their wigwams, and encamp on the spot till winter; then send out parties to harass50 them as they roamed the woods seeking a meagre subsistence by hunting. In this way he hoped to cripple, if not destroy them.[331]
The Outagamies lived at this time on the Fox River of Green Bay,—a stream which owes its name to them.[332] Their chief village seems to have been between thirty and forty miles from the mouth of the river, where it creeps through broad tracts52 of rushes, willows53, and wild rice. In spite of their losses at Detroit in 1712, their strength was far from being broken.
During two successive summers preparations were made to attack them; but the march was delayed, once by the tardiness54 of the Indian allies, and again by the illness of Louvigny. At length, on the first of May, 1716, he left Montreal with two hundred and twenty-five Frenchmen, while two hundred more waited to join him at Detroit and Michilimackinac, where the Indian allies were also to meet him. To[Pg 333] save expense in pay and outfit55, the Canadians recruited for the war were allowed to take with them goods for trading with the Indians. Hence great disorder and insubordination, especially as more than forty barrels of brandy were carried in the canoes, as a part of these commercial ventures, in consequence of which we hear that when French and Indians were encamped together, "hell was thrown open."[333]
The Outagamies stood their ground. Louvigny says, with probable exaggeration, that when he made his attack their village held five hundred warriors, and no less than three thousand women,—a disparity of sexes no doubt due to the inveterate56 fighting habits of the tribe. The wigwams were enclosed by a strong fence, consisting of three rows of heavy oaken palisades. This method of fortification was used also by tribes farther southward. When Bienville attacked the Chickasaws, he was foiled by the solid wooden wall that resisted his cannon57, being formed of trunks of trees as large as a man's body, set upright, close together, and made shot-proof by smaller trunks, planted within so as to close the interstices of the outer row.[334]
The fortified58 village of the Outagamies was of a somewhat different construction. The defences consisted of three rows of palisades, those of the middle row being probably planted upright, and the other[Pg 334] two set aslant59 against them. Below, along the inside of the triple row, ran a sort of shallow trench60 or rifle-pit, where the defenders61 lay ensconced, firing through interstices left for the purpose between the palisades.[335]
Louvigny had brought with him two cannon and a mortar62; but being light, they had little effect on the wooden wall, and as he was provided with mining tools, he resolved to attack the Outagamie stronghold by regular approaches, as if he were besieging63 a fortress64 of Vauban. Covered by the fire of three pieces of artillery65 and eight hundred French and Indian small-arms, he opened trenches66 during the night within seventy yards of the palisades, pushed a sap sixty feet nearer before morning, and on the third night burrowed67 to within about twenty-three yards of the wall. His plan was to undermine and blow up the palisades.
The Outagamies had made a furious resistance, in which their women took part with desperation; but dreading68 the threatened explosion, and unable to resist the underground approaches of their enemy, they asked for a parley36, and owned themselves beaten. Louvigny demanded that they should make peace with all tribes friendly to the French, give up all[Pg 335] prisoners, and make war on distant tribes, such as the Pawnees, in order to take captives who should supply the place of those they had killed among the allies of the French; that they should pay, in furs, the costs of the war, and give six chiefs, or sons of chiefs, as hostages for the fulfilment of these conditions.[336]
On the twelfth of October Louvigny reached Quebec in triumph, bringing with him the six hostages.
The Outagamie question was settled for a time. The tribe remained quiet for some years, and in 1718 sent a deputation to Montreal and renewed their submission69, which the governor accepted, though they had evaded70 the complete fulfilment of the conditions imposed on them. Yet peace was not secure for a moment. The Kickapoos and Mascoutins would not leave their neighbors, the Illinois, at rest; the Saginaws made raids on the Miamis; and a general war seemed imminent71. "The difficulty is inconceivable of keeping these western tribes quiet," writes the governor, almost in despair.[337]
At length the crisis came. The Illinois captured the nephew of Oushala, the principal Outagamie war-chief, and burned him alive; on which the Outagamies attacked them, drove them for refuge to the top of the rock on which La Salle's fort of St. Louis had been built, and held them there at mercy. They would have starved to death, had not the victors,[Pg 336] dreading the anger of the French, suffered them to escape.[338] For this they took to themselves great credit, not without reason, in view of the provocation72. At Versailles, however, their attack on the Illinois seemed an unpardonable offence, and the next ship from France brought a letter from the colonial minister declaring that the Outagamies must be effectually put down, and that "his Majesty73 will reward the officer who will reduce, or rather destroy, them."[339]
The authorities of Canada were less truculent74 than their masters at the court, or were better able to count the costs of another war. Longueuil, the provisional governor, persisted in measures of peace, and the Sieur de Lignery called a council of the Outagamies and their neighbors, the Sacs and Winnebagoes, at Green Bay. He told them that the Great Onontio, the King, ordered them, at their peril1, to make no more attacks on the Illinois; and they dutifully promised to obey, while their great chief, Oushala, begged that a French officer might be sent to his village to help him keep his young warriors from the war-path.[340] The pacific policy of Longueuil was not approved by Desliettes, then commanding in the Illinois country; and he proposed to settle accounts with the Outagamies by exterminating75 them.[Pg 337] "This is very well," observes a writer of the time; "but to try to exterminate76 them and fail would be disastrous77."[341]
The Marquis de Beauharnois, who came out as governor of Canada in 1726, was averse78 to violent measures, since if an attempt to exterminate the offending tribe should be made without success, the life of every Frenchman in the West would be in jeopardy79.[342] Lignery thought that if the Outagamies broke the promises they had made him at Green Bay, the forces of Canada and Louisiana should unite to crush them. The missionary80, Chardon, advised that they should be cut off from all supplies of arms, ammunition81, and merchandise of any kind, and that all the well-disposed western tribes should then be set upon them,—which, he thought, would infallibly bring them to reason.[343]
The new governor, perplexed by the multitude of counsellors, presently received a missive from the King, directing him not to fight the Outagamies if he could help it, "since the consequences of failure would be frightful82."[344] On the other hand, Beauharnois was told that the English had sent messages to the Lake tribes urging them to kill the French in their country, and that the Outagamies had promised to do[Pg 338] so. "This," writes the governor, "compels us to make war in earnest. It will cost sixty thousand livres."[345]
Dupuy, the intendant, had joined with Beauharnois in this letter to the minister; but being at the time in a hot quarrel with the governor, he soon after sent a communication of his own to Versailles, in which he declares that the war against the Outagamies was only a pretext83 of Beauharnois for spending the King's money, and enriching himself by buying up all the furs of the countries traversed by the army.[346]
Whatever the motives84 of the expedition, it left Montreal in June, under the Sieur de Lignery, followed the rugged85 old route of the Ottawa, and did not reach Michilimackinac till after midsummer. Thence, in a flotilla of birch canoes carrying about a thousand Indians and five hundred French, the party set out for the fort at the head of Green Bay.[347] Here they caught one Outagamie warrior40 and three Winnebagoes, whom the Indian allies tortured to death. Then they paddled their canoes up Fox River, reached a Winnebago village on the twenty-fourth of August, followed the channel of the stream, a ribbon of lazy water twisting in a vague, perplexing way through the broad marsh86 of wild rice and flags, till they saw the chief village of the Outagamies[Pg 339] on a tract51 of rising ground a little above the level of the bog87.[348] It consisted of bark wigwams, without palisades or defences of any kind. Its only inmates88 were three squaws and one old man. These were all seized, and, to the horror of Père Crespel, the chaplain, were given to the Indian allies, who kept the women as slaves, and burned the old man at a slow fire.[349] Then, after burning the village and destroying the crop of maize89, peas, beans, and squashes that surrounded it, the whole party returned to Michilimackinac.[350]
The expedition was not a success. Lignery had hoped to surprise the enemy; but the alert and nimble savages90 had escaped him. Beauharnois makes the best of the miscarriage91, and writes that "the army did good work;" but says a few weeks later that something must be done to cure the contempt which the western allies of the French have conceived for them "since the last affair."[351]
Two years after Lignery's expedition, there was another attempt to humble92 the Outagamies. Late in the autumn of 1730 young Coulon de Villiers, who twenty-four years later defeated Washington at Fort Necessity, appeared at Quebec with news that the Sieur de Villiers, his father, who commanded the[Pg 340] post on the St. Joseph, had struck the Outagamies a deadly blow and killed two hundred of their warriors, besides six hundred of their women and children. The force under Villiers consisted of a body of Frenchmen gathered from various western posts, another body from the Illinois, led by the Sieurs de Saint-Ange, father and son, and twelve or thirteen hundred Indian allies from many friendly tribes.[352]
The accounts of this affair are obscure and not very trustworthy. It seems that the Outagamies began the fray by an attack on the Illinois at La Salle's old station of Le Rocher, on the river Illinois. On hearing of this, the French commanders mustered93 their Indian allies, hastened to the spot, and found the Outagamies intrenched in a grove94 which they had surrounded with a stockade95. They defended themselves with their usual courage, but, being hard pressed by hunger and thirst, as well as by the greatly superior numbers of their assailants, they tried to escape during a dark night, as their tribesmen had done at Detroit in 1712. The French and[Pg 341] their allies pursued, and there was a great slaughter96, in which many warriors and many more women and children were the victims.[353]
The offending tribe must now, one would think, have ceased to be dangerous; but nothing less than its destruction would content the French officials. To this end, their best resource was in their Indian allies, among whom the Outagamies had no more deadly enemy than the Hurons of Detroit, who, far from relenting in view of their disasters, were more eager than ever to wreak97 their ire on their unfortunate foe31. Accordingly, they sent messengers to the converted Iroquois at the Mission of Two Mountains, and invited them to join in making an end of the Outagamies. The invitation was accepted, and in the autumn of 1731 forty-seven warriors from the Two Mountains appeared at Detroit. The party was soon made up. It consisted of seventy-four Hurons, forty-six Iroquois, and four Ottawas. They took the trail to the mouth of the river St. Joseph, thence around the head of Lake Michigan to the Chicago portage, and thence westward98 to Rock River. Here were the villages of the Kickapoos and Mascoutins, who had been allies of the Outagamies, but having lately quarrelled with them, received the strangers as friends and gave them guides. The party now filed northward99, by forests and prairies, towards the[Pg 342] Wisconsin, to the banks of which stream the Outagamies had lately removed their villages. The warriors were all on snow-shoes, for the weather was cold and the snow deep. Some of the elders, overcome by the hardships of the way, called a council and proposed to turn back; but the juniors were for pushing on at all risks, and a young warrior declared that he would rather die than go home without killing100 somebody. The result was a division of the party; the elders returned to Chicago, and the younger men, forty Hurons and thirty Iroquois, kept on their way.
At last, as they neared the Wisconsin, they saw on an open prairie three Outagamies, who ran for their lives. The Hurons and Iroquois gave chase, till from the ridge101 of a hill they discovered the principal Outagamie village, consisting, if we may believe their own story, of forty-six wigwams, near the bank of the river. The Outagamie warriors came out to meet them, in number, as they pretended, much greater than theirs; but the Huron and Iroquois chiefs reminded their followers102 that they had to do with dogs who did not believe in God, on which they fired two volleys against the enemy, then dropped their guns and charged with the knife in one hand and the war-club in the other. According to their own story, which shows every sign of mendacity, they drove back the Outagamies into their village, killed seventy warriors, and captured fourteen more, without counting eighty women and children killed, and a hundred and forty taken prisoners. In short,[Pg 343] they would have us believe that they destroyed the whole village, except ten men, who escaped entirely103 naked, and soon froze to death. They declared further that they sent one of their prisoners to the remaining Outagamie villages, ordering him to tell the inhabitants that they had just devoured104 the better part of the tribe, and meant to stay on the spot two days; that the tribesmen of the slain were free to attack them if they chose, but in that case, they would split the heads of all the women and children prisoners in their hands, make a breastwork of the dead bodies, and then finish it by piling upon it those of the assailants.[354]
Nothing is more misleading than Indian tradition, which is of the least possible value as evidence. It may be well, however, to mention another story, often repeated, touching105 these dark days of the Outagamies. It is to the effect that a French trader named Marin, whom they had incensed106 by levying107 blackmail108 from him, raised a party of Indians, with whose aid he surprised and defeated the unhappy tribe at the Little Butte des Morts, that they retired109 to the Great Butte des Morts, higher up Fox River, and that Marin here attacked them again, killing or capturing the whole. Extravagant110 as the story seems, it may have some foundation, though various dates, from 1725 to 1746, are assigned to the alleged111 exploit, and contemporary documents are silent concerning[Pg 344] it. It is certain that the Outagamies were not destroyed, as the tribe exists to this day.[355]
In 1736 it was reported that sixty or eighty Outagamie warriors were still alive.[356] Their women, who when hard pushed would fight like furies, were relatively112 numerous and tolerably prolific113, and their villages were full of sturdy boys, likely to be dangerous in a few years. Feeling their losses and their weakness, the survivors114 of the tribe incorporated themselves with their kindred and neighbors, the Sacs, Sakis, or Saukies, the two forming henceforth one tribe, afterwards known to the Americans as the Sacs and Foxes. Early in the nineteenth century they were settled on both banks of the upper Mississippi. Brave and restless like their forefathers115, they were a continual menace to the American frontiersmen, and in 1832 they rose in open war, under their famous chief, Blackhawk, displaying their hereditary prowess both on foot and on horseback, and more than once defeating superior numbers of American mounted militia116. In the next year that excellent artist,[Pg 345] Charles Bodmer, painted a group of them from life,—grim-visaged savages, armed with war-club, spear, or rifle, and wrapped in red, green, or brown blankets, their heads close shaven except the erect118 and bristling119 scalp-lock, adorned120 with long eagle-plumes, while both heads and faces are painted with fantastic figures in blue, white, yellow, black, and vermilion.[357]
Three or four years after, a party of their chiefs and warriors was conducted through the country by order of the Washington government, in order to impress them with the number and power of the whites. At Boston they danced a war-dance on the Common in full costume, to the delight of the boy spectators, of whom I was one.
FOOTNOTES:
[320] Rameau, Notes historiques sur la Colonie Canadienne du Detroit.
[321] See "La Salle and the Discovery of the Great West," 315.
[322] "Ce poste, le premier121 de tous par13 droit d'antiquité."—Journal historique, 403 (ed. 1744).
[323] The old parish registers of Kaskaskia are full of records of these mixed marriages. See Edward G. Mason, Illinois in the Eighteenth Century.
[324] The two other members were La Loire des Ursins, director of the Mississippi Company, and Michel Chassin, its commissary,—he who wrote the curious letter to Ponchartrain, asking for a wife, quoted in the last chapter, pp. 317-318.
[325] Vaudreuil au Ministre, 16 Septembre, 1714.
[326] Idem, 2 Octobre, 1723.
[327] N. Y. Col. Docs., v. 65.
[328] Mémoire présenté au Comte de Ponchartrain par M. d'Auteuil, procureur-général du Roy, 1708.
[329] Marest à Vaudreuil, 21 Janvier, 1712.
[330] Vaudreuil et Bégon au Ministre, 15 Novembre, 1713.
[331] Vaudreuil au Ministre, 16 Septembre, 1714.
[332] "Les Renards [Outagamies] sont placez sur une rivière qui tombe dans la Baye des Puants [Green Bay]."—Registre du Conseil de la Marine122, 28 Mars, 1716.
[333] "Où il y a des Fran?ois et des sauvages, c'est un enfer ouvert."—Registre du Conseil de Marine, 28 Mars, 1716.
[334] Le Page du Pratz.
[335] Louvigny au Ministre, 14 Octobre, 1716. Louvigny's account of the Outagamie defences is short, and not very clear. La Mothe-Cadillac, describing similar works at Michilimackinac, says that the palisades of the innermost row alone were set close together, those of the two other rows being separated by spaces of six inches or more, through which the defenders fired from their loopholes. The plan seems borrowed from the Iroquois.
[336] Dépêche de Vaudreuil, 14 Octobre, 1716.
[337] Vaudreuil au Conseil de Marine, 28 Octobre, 1719.
[338] Paroles des Renards [Outagamies] dans un Conseil tenu le 6 Septembre, 1722.
[339] Réponse du Ministre à la lettre du Marquis de Vaudreuil du 11 Octobre, 1723.
[340] Mémoire sur les Renards, 27 Avril, 1727.
[341] Mémoire concernant la Paix que M. de Lignery a faite avec les Chefs des Renards, Sakis [Sacs], et Puants [Winnebagoes], 7 Juin, 1726.
[342] Mémoire sur les Renards, 27 Avril, 1727.
[343] Ibid.
[344] Mémoire du Roy, 29 Avril, 1727.
[345] Beauharnois et Dupuy au Ministre, 25 Octobre, 1727.
[346] Mémoire de Dupuy, 1728.
[347] Desliettes came to meet them, by way of Chicago, with five hundred Illinois warriors and twenty Frenchmen. La Perrière et La Fresnière à Beauharnois, 10 Septembre, 1728.
[348] Guignas à Beauharnois, 29 Mai, 1728.
[349] Dépêche de Beauharnois, 1 Septembre, 1728.
[350] The best account of this expedition is that of Père Emanuel Crespel. Lignery made a report which seems to be lost, as it does not appear in the Archives.
[351] Beauharnois au Ministre, 15 Mai, 1729; Ibid., 21 Juillet, 1729.
[352] Beauharnois et Hocquart au Ministre, 2 Novembre, 1730. An Indian tradition says that about this time there was a great battle between the Outagamies and the French, aided by their Indian allies, at the place called Little Butte des Morts, on the Fox River. According to the story, the Outagamies were nearly destroyed. Perhaps this is a perverted123 version of the Villiers affair. (See Wisconsin Historical Collections, viii, 207.) Beauharnois also reports, under date of 6 May, 1730, that a party of Outagamies, returning from a buffalo124 hunt, were surprised by two hundred Ottawas, Ojibwas, Menominies, and Winnebagoes, who killed eighty warriors and three hundred women and children.
[353] Some particulars of this affair are given by Ferland, Cours d'Histoire du Canada, ii. 437; but he does not give his authority. I have found no report of it by those engaged.
[354] Relation de la Défaite des Renards par les Sauvages Hurons et Iroquois, le 28 Février, 1732. (Archives de la Marine.)
[355] The story is told in Snelling, Tales of the Northwest (1830), under the title of La Butte des Morts, and afterwards, with variations, by the aged117 Augustus Grignon, in his Recollections, printed in the Collections of the Wisconsin Historical Society, iii.; also by Judge M. L. Martin and others. Grignon, like all the rest, was not born till after the time of the alleged event. The nearest approach to substantial evidence touching it is in a letter of Beauharnois, who writes in 1730 that the Sieur Dubuisson was to attack the Outagamies with fifty Frenchmen and five hundred and fifty Indians, and that Marin, commander at Green Bay, was to join him. Beauharnois au Ministre, 25 Juin, 1730.
[356] Mémoire sur le Canada, 1736.
[357] Charles Bodmer was the artist who accompanied Prince Maximilian of Wied in his travels in the interior of North America.
The name Outagamie is Algonquin for a fox. Hence the French called the tribe Renards, and the Americans, Foxes. They called themselves Musquawkies, which is said to mean "red earth," and to be derived125 from the color of the soil near one of their villages.
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peril
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| n.(严重的)危险；危险的事物 | |
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turbulence
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labored
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engrossing
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exclusion
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infancy
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Founder
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| n.创始者，缔造者 | |
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11
judicious
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| adj.明智的，明断的，能作出明智决定的 | |
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extinction
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| n.熄灭，消亡，消灭，灭绝，绝种 | |
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par
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| n.标准，票面价值，平均数量；adj.票面的，平常的，标准的 | |
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patronage
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| n.赞助，支援，援助；光顾，捧场 | |
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destined
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| adj.命中注定的；(for)以…为目的地的 | |
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16
dispersed
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| adj. 被驱散的, 被分散的, 散布的 | |
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17
conversion
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| n.转化，转换，转变 | |
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18
missionaries
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| n.传教士( missionary的名词复数 ) | |
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19
marvel
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| vi.(at)惊叹vt.感到惊异；n.令人惊异的事 | |
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20
ingenuity
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| n.别出心裁；善于发明创造 | |
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21
progeny
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| n.后代，子孙；结果 | |
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22
alluvial
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| adj.冲积的；淤积的 | |
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23
turbid
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| adj.混浊的，泥水的，浓的 | |
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24
eddies
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| （水、烟等的）漩涡，涡流( eddy的名词复数 ) | |
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25
delta
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| n.（流的）角洲 | |
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26
annexed
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| [法] 附加的，附属的 | |
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27
garrison
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| n.卫戍部队；驻地，卫戍区；vt.派(兵)驻防 | |
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28
hostility
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| n.敌对，敌意；抵制［pl.］交战，战争 | |
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29
gallant
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| adj.英勇的，豪侠的；(向女人)献殷勤的 | |
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30
fortitude
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| n.坚忍不拔；刚毅 | |
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31
foe
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| n.敌人，仇敌 | |
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32
foes
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| 敌人，仇敌( foe的名词复数 ) | |
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33
feud
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| n.长期不和；世仇；v.长期争斗；世代结仇 | |
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34
savage
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| adj.野蛮的；凶恶的，残暴的；n.未开化的人 | |
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35
scourge
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| n.灾难，祸害；v.蹂躏 | |
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36
parley
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| n.谈判 | |
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37
hereditary
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| adj.遗传的，遗传性的，可继承的，世袭的 | |
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38
bloody
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| adj.非常的的；流血的；残忍的；adv.很；vt.血染 | |
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39
warriors
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| 武士，勇士，战士( warrior的名词复数 ) | |
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40
warrior
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| n.勇士，武士，斗士 | |
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41
slain
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| 杀死，宰杀，杀戮( slay的过去分词 )； (slay的过去分词) | |
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42
fray
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| v.争吵；打斗；磨损，磨破；n.吵架；打斗 | |
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43
perplexed
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| adj.不知所措的 | |
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44
inviting
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| adj.诱人的，引人注目的 | |
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45
drawn
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| v.拖，拉，拔出；adj.憔悴的，紧张的 | |
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46
miraculous
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| adj.像奇迹一样的，不可思议的 | |
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47
formerly
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| adv.从前，以前 | |
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48
muster
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| v.集合，收集，鼓起，激起；n.集合，检阅，集合人员，点名册 | |
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49
ripening
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| v.成熟，使熟( ripen的现在分词 )；熟化；熟成 | |
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50
harass
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| vt.使烦恼，折磨，骚扰 | |
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51
tract
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| n.传单，小册子，大片(土地或森林) | |
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52
tracts
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| 大片土地( tract的名词复数 )； 地带； （体内的）道； （尤指宣扬宗教、伦理或政治的）短文 | |
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53
willows
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| n.柳树( willow的名词复数 )；柳木 | |
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54
tardiness
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| n.缓慢；迟延；拖拉 | |
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55
outfit
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| n.（为特殊用途的）全套装备，全套服装 | |
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56
inveterate
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| adj.积习已深的，根深蒂固的 | |
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57
cannon
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| n.大炮，火炮；飞机上的机关炮 | |
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58
fortified
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| adj. 加强的 | |
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59
aslant
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| adv.倾斜地；adj.斜的 | |
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60
trench
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| n./v.(挖)沟，(挖)战壕 | |
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61
defenders
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| n.防御者( defender的名词复数 )；守卫者；保护者；辩护者 | |
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62
mortar
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| n.灰浆，灰泥；迫击炮；v.把…用灰浆涂接合 | |
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63
besieging
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| 包围，围困，围攻( besiege的现在分词 ) | |
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64
fortress
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| n.堡垒，防御工事 | |
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65
artillery
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| n.(军)火炮，大炮；炮兵(部队) | |
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66
trenches
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| 深沟，地沟( trench的名词复数 )； 战壕 | |
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67
burrowed
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| v.挖掘（洞穴），挖洞( burrow的过去式和过去分词 )；翻寻 | |
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68
dreading
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| v.害怕，恐惧，担心( dread的现在分词 ) | |
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69
submission
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| n.服从，投降；温顺，谦虚；提出 | |
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70
evaded
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| 逃避( evade的过去式和过去分词 )； 避开； 回避； 想不出 | |
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71
imminent
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| adj.即将发生的，临近的，逼近的 | |
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72
provocation
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| n.激怒，刺激，挑拨，挑衅的事物，激怒的原因 | |
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73
majesty
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| n.雄伟，壮丽，庄严，威严；最高权威，王权 | |
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74
truculent
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| adj.野蛮的，粗野的 | |
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75
exterminating
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| v.消灭，根绝( exterminate的现在分词 ) | |
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76
exterminate
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| v.扑灭，消灭，根绝 | |
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77
disastrous
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| adj.灾难性的，造成灾害的；极坏的，很糟的 | |
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78
averse
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| adj.厌恶的；反对的，不乐意的 | |
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79
jeopardy
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| n.危险；危难 | |
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80
missionary
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| adj.教会的，传教(士)的；n.传教士 | |
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81
ammunition
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| n.军火，弹药 | |
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82
frightful
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| adj.可怕的；讨厌的 | |
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83
pretext
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| n.借口，托词 | |
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84
motives
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| n.动机，目的( motive的名词复数 ) | |
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85
rugged
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| adj.高低不平的，粗糙的，粗壮的，强健的 | |
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86
marsh
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| n.沼泽，湿地 | |
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87
bog
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| n.沼泽；室...陷入泥淖 | |
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88
inmates
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| n.囚犯( inmate的名词复数 ) | |
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89
maize
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| n.玉米 | |
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90
savages
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| 未开化的人，野蛮人( savage的名词复数 ) | |
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91
miscarriage
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| n.失败，未达到预期的结果；流产 | |
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92
humble
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| adj.谦卑的，恭顺的；地位低下的；v.降低，贬低 | |
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93
mustered
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| v.集合，召集，集结（尤指部队）( muster的过去式和过去分词 )；（自他人处）搜集某事物；聚集；激发 | |
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94
grove
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| n.林子，小树林，园林 | |
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95
stockade
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| n.栅栏，围栏；v.用栅栏防护 | |
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96
slaughter
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| n.屠杀，屠宰；vt.屠杀，宰杀 | |
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97
wreak
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| v.发泄；报复 | |
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98
westward
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| n.西方，西部；adj.西方的，向西的；adv.向西 | |
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99
northward
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| adv.向北；n.北方的地区 | |
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100
killing
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| n.巨额利润；突然赚大钱，发大财 | |
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101
ridge
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| n.山脊；鼻梁；分水岭 | |
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102
followers
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| 追随者( follower的名词复数 )； 用户； 契据的附面； 从动件 | |
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103
entirely
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| ad.全部地，完整地；完全地，彻底地 | |
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104
devoured
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| 吞没( devour的过去式和过去分词 )； 耗尽； 津津有味地看； 狼吞虎咽地吃光 | |
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105
touching
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| adj.动人的，使人感伤的 | |
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106
incensed
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| 盛怒的 | |
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107
levying
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| 征（兵）( levy的现在分词 )； 索取； 发动（战争）； 征税 | |
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108
blackmail
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| n.讹诈，敲诈，勒索，胁迫，恫吓 | |
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109
retired
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| adj.隐退的，退休的，退役的 | |
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110
extravagant
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| adj.奢侈的；过分的；(言行等)放肆的 | |
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111
alleged
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| a.被指控的，嫌疑的 | |
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112
relatively
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| adv.比较...地，相对地 | |
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113
prolific
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| adj.丰富的，大量的；多产的，富有创造力的 | |
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114
survivors
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| 幸存者，残存者，生还者( survivor的名词复数 ) | |
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115
forefathers
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| n.祖先，先人；祖先，祖宗( forefather的名词复数 )；列祖列宗；前人 | |
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116
militia
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| n.民兵，民兵组织 | |
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117
aged
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| adj.年老的，陈年的 | |
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118
erect
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| n./v.树立，建立，使竖立；adj.直立的，垂直的 | |
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119
bristling
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| a.竖立的 | |
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120
adorned
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| [计]被修饰的 | |
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121
premier
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| adj.首要的；n.总理，首相 | |
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122
marine
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| adj.海的；海生的；航海的；海事的；n.水兵 | |
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123
perverted
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| adj.不正当的v.滥用( pervert的过去式和过去分词 )；腐蚀；败坏；使堕落 | |
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124
buffalo
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| n.(北美)野牛；(亚洲)水牛 | |
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125
derived
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| vi.起源；由来；衍生；导出v.得到( derive的过去式和过去分词 )；（从…中）得到获得；源于；（从…中）提取 | |
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