La Salle and the discovery of the great West - North Central ...

116 PARTY STRIFE. [1678.object of the intrigue was to make the Iroquoisjealous of him, and engage Frontenac in expenseswhich would offend the King. After La Salle andthe governor had lost credit by the rupture, theJesuits would come forward as pacificators, in thefull assurance that they could restore quiet, andappear in the attitude of saviors of the colony.La Salle, pursues his reporter, went on to say thatabout this time a quantity of hemlock and verdigriswas given him in a salad ; and that the guilty personwas a man in his employ named Nicolas Perrot,otherwise called Jolycoeur, who confessed the crime. 1The memoir adds that La Salle, who recovered fromthe effects of the poison, wholly exculpates theJesuits.This attempt, which was not, as we shall see, theonly one of the kind made against La Salle, isalluded to by him in a letter to a friend at Paris,1This puts the character of Perrot in a new light ; for it is notlikely that any other can be meant than the famous voyageur, Ihave found no mention elsewhere of the synonyme of JolycoeurPoisoning was the current crime of the day, and persons of thehighest rank had repeatedly been charged with it. The followingis the passage :—" Quoiqu'il en soit, M r -dela Salle se sentit quelque temps aprfcsempoissonne' d'une salade dans laquelle on avoit mesle' du cigue,qui est poison en ce pays la, et du verd de gris.II en fut malade aTextr^raite', vomissant presque continuellement 40 ou 50 jours apres,et il ne re'chappa que par la force extreme de sa constitution. Celuyqui luy donna le poison fut un nomme' Nicolas Perrot, autrementJolycoeur, Tun de ses domestiques., , II pouvait faire mourir cethomme, qui a confesse' son crime, mais il g'est contente de Ten-*fermer les fers aux pieds."— Histoire de M r -de la Salle,