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

218 TONTY AND THE IROQUOIS. [1680.young Sieur de Boisrondet and the servant L'Esp^rancehastened to carry the news to Tonty, who at oncedespatched four ofthose with him, by two differentroutes, to inform La Salle of the disaster. 1 Besidesthe two just named, there now remained with himonly one hired man and the Re'collet friars. Withthis feeble band, he was left among a horde of treacheroussavages, who had been taught to regard himas a secret enemy. Resolved, apparently, to disarmtheir jealousy by a show of confidence, he took uphis abode in the midst of them, making his quartersin the great village, whither, as spring opened, itsinhabitants returned, to the number, according toMembre\ of seven or eight thousand. Hither heconveyed the forge and such tools as he couldrecover, and here he hoped to maintain himself tillLa Salle should reappear. The spring and thesummer were past, and he looked anxiously for hiscoming,unconscious that a storm was gathering inleader of the deserters, and seems to have been one of those capturedby La Salle near Fort Frontenac. Twelve days after, Hillaretwas examined by La Salle's enemy, the intendant ; and this paper isthe formal statement made by him. It gives the names of most ofthe men, and furnishes incidental confirmation of many statementsof Hennepin, Tonty, MembrC, and the Relation des DScouvertes.Hillaret, Leblanc, and Le Meilleur, the blacksmith nicknamed LaForge, went off together, and the rest seem to have followed afterwards.Hillaret does not admit that any goods were wantonlydestroyed.There is before me a schedule of the debts of La Salle, madeafter his death. It includes a claim of this man for wages to theamount of 2,600 livres.1 Two of the messengers, Laurent and Messier, arrived safely.The otherb seem to have deserted.