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

1687.] THE MISSISSIPPI. 457ney, under the sweltering sun of August, — now onthe water, now knee-deep in mud, dragging theircanoe through the unwholesome jungle. On thenineteenth, they passed the mouth of the Oliio ; andtheir Indian guides made it an offering of buffalomeat. On the first of September, they passed theMissouri, and soon after saw Marquette's picturedrock, and the line of craggy heights on the eastshore, marked on old French maps as "the RuinedCastles." Then, with a sense of relief, they turnedfrom the great river into the peaceful current of theIllinois. They were eleven days in ascending it, intheir large and heavy wooden canoe ; when at length,on the afternoon of the fourteenth of September,they saw, towering above the forest and the river,the cliff crowned with the palisades of Fort St. Louisof the Illinois. As they drew near, a troop ofIndians, headed by a Frenchman, descended fromthe rock, and fired their guns to salute them. Theylanded, and followed the forest path that led towardsthe fort, when they were met by Boisrondet, Tonty'scomrade in the Iroquois war, and two other Frenchmen,who no sooner saw them than they calledout,demanding where was La Salle. Cavelier, fearinglest he and his party would lose the advantage theymight derive from his character of representative ofhis brother, was determined to conceal his death;and Joutel, as he himself confesses, took part in thedeceit. Substituting equivocation for falsehood,they replied that La Salle had been with them nearly