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

220 TONTY AND THE IROQUOIS. [1680.reduce all these regions to subjection, and drawthence an exhaustless supply of furs, to be barteredfor English goods with the traders of Albany. Theyturned their eyes first towards the Illinois, the mostimportant, as well as one of the most accessible, ofthe western Algonquin tribes;and among La Salle'senemies were some in whom jealousy of a hatedrival could so far override all the best interests of thecolony that they did not scruple to urge on the Iroquoisto an invasion which they hoped would provehis ruin. The chiefs convened, war was decreed, thewar-dance was danced, the war-song sung, and fivehundred warriors began their march. In their pathlay the town of the Miamis, neighbors and kindredof the Illinois. It was always their policy to divideand conquer; and these forest Machiavels hadintrigued so well among the Miamis, working craftilyon theirjealousy, that they induced them to join inthe invasion, though there is every reason to believethat they had marked theseinfatuated allies as theirnext victims. 1J Go to the banks of the Illinois where it flows bythe village of Utica, and stand on the meadow thatborders it on the north.In front glides the river, amusket-shot in width; and from the farther bankrises, with gradual slope, a range of wooded hills1There had long been a rankling jealousy between the Miamisand the Illinois. According to Membre*, La Salle's enemies hadintrigued successfully among the former, as well as among theIroquois, to induce them to take arms against the Illinois.