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

.224 TONTY AND THE IROQUOIS. [1680.friars, Membre' and Ribourde, were not in the village,but at a hut a league distant, whither theyhad gone to make a " retreat " for prayer and meditation.Their missionary labors had not been fruitful;they had made no converts, and were in despairat the intractable character of the objects of theirzeal. As for the other Frenchmen, time, doubtless,hung heavy on their hands ; for nothing can surpassthe vacant monotony of an Indian town when thereis neither hunting, nor war, nor feasts, nor dances,nor gambling, to beguile the lagging hours.Suddenly the village was wakened from its lethargyas by the crash of a thunderbolt. A Shawanoe,lately here on a visit, had left his Illinois friends toreturn home. He now reappeared, crossing theriver in hot haste, with the announcement that hehad met, on his way, an army ofIroquois approachingto attack them. All was panic and confusionThe lodges disgorged their frightened inmates;women and children screamed, startled warriorssnatched their weapons. There were less than fivehundred of them, for the greater part of the youngmen had gone to war. A crowd of excited savagesthronged about Tonty and his Frenchmen, alreadyobjects of their suspicion, charging them, withfurious gesticulation, with having stirred up theirenemies to invade them.Tonty defended himself inbroken Illinois, but the naked mob were but halfconvinced. They seized the forge and tools andflung them into the river, with all the goods that had