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

'406 ST. LOUIS OF TEXAS. [1688.mass and prayers in the chapel, they issued from thegate, each bearing his pack and his weapons, somewith kettles slung at their backs, some with axes,some with gifts for Indians. In this guise, theyheld their way in silence across the prairie ; whileanxious eyes followed them from the palisades ofLouis, whose inmates, not excepting Joutel himself,seem to have been ignorant of the extent and difficultyof the undertaking. 1"On May Day," he writes, "at about two in theafternoon, asSt.I was walking near the house, I hearda voice from the river below, crying out severaltimes, Qui vive? Knowing that the Sieur Barbierhad gone that way with two canoes to hunt buffalo,I thought that it might be one of these canoes comingback with meat, and did not think much of thematter till I heard the same voice again.I answered,Versailles, which was the password I had given theSieur Barbier, in case he should come back in thenight. But, as I was going towards the bank, Iheard other voices which I had not heard fpr a longtime. I recognized among the rest that of M.Chefdeville, which made me fearhad happened.that some disasterI ran down to the bank, and my firstgreeting was to ask what had become of the 4Belle.1 Joutel, Journal Historigue, 140 ; Anastase Douay in Le Clerc, ii.303; Cavelier, Relation. The date is from Douay. It does notappear, from nig narrative, that they meant to go farther than theIllinois.Cavelier says that after resting here they were to go toCanada. Joutel supposed that they would go only to the IllinoisLa Salle seems to have been even more reticent than usual.