THE LOWER MISSISSIPPI

For several days the canoes of La Salle’s party passed wet banks and thick canebrakes. No longer were to be seen the otter and the flattailed beaver, for they had been driven out or devoured by the alligators that now infested the river. As the canoes slid past these huge monsters, sometimes nearly twenty feet in length, the Frenchmen sat snugly in the center of their barks for fear of following the way of the beaver.

At length the Arkansas guides indicated a small cove into which a little brook flowed. It was the beginning of the inland trail to the Taensas; and so the whole party landed and pitched camp on the shore of the bay. La Salle asked Tonty to take with him the two guides, a Frenchman, and one of the New England Indians and proceed up the brook toward the villages.

The men paddled their canoe as far as the water would permit, then packed it upon their shoulders, and under the guidance of the Arkansas Indians picked their way across the swampy country. Finally they reached a lake lying in the form of a crescent, and crossing it in their canoe they came upon an Indian town. The men in the canoe drew in their paddles and stepped out on the shore of the lake. Tonty looked in amazement at the Indian village before him, for in all of his wanderings over the continent he had never seen houses like these. Instead of lodges made of bark or mats or skins fastened to a framework of poles, here were great houses built with thick walls of sun-dried mud and dome-shaped roofs of canes.

To the Arkansas guides, however, the village presented no strange scene. They were in familiar country; and when they reached the shore they began a weird Indian song. Back in the village the Taensas who heard them knew they were friends, and came out to welcome them. They led the visitors first to the lodge of the chief, which was a building forty feet in length with walls two feet thick and ten or twelve feet high, surmounted by a domed roof that reached to a height of about fifteen feet.

They passed through the doorway and stood in the semi-darkness of a large room. In the center of the room a torch, made of dried canes, was burning. Its light gleamed upon shields of burnished copper that hung on every wall and lit up dimly hides painted with all manner of pictures. In the flickering light of the torch white-robed figures stood out from the dusk of the room. They were old men of the tribe, sixty of them, and they stood facing an alcove where, on a couch, with his three wives beside him, sat the chief. He was dressed like the old men, in a white robe made from the bark of the mulberry tree; and pearls as big as peas hung from his ears.

There were girls and women in the room, and here and there a child with its mother; but over all the group was a respectful quiet, a dignified reverence for the chief who sat upon the couch gazing curiously at Tonty and his companions. The old men, standing with their hands upon their heads, burst out in unison with a cry, “Ho-ho-ho-ho,” and then seated themselves upon mats laid on the floor. The visitors also were given mats to sit upon.

One of the Arkansas guides rose and began to address the chief. He told him that the white men had come to make an alliance with him, but just now they were sorely in need of food. Then he swung from his own body a buffalo skin and presented it to the chief. Tonty, too, delighted him with the gift of a knife—for the knives and hatchets of the Taensas were rude instruments made of flint.

The chief ordered food to be sent to the men who were waiting over on the Mississippi and a banquet to be prepared for their guests. It was a dignified feast, at which slaves waited upon the chief. They brought him dishes and cups, made of pottery with the fine art in which his people excelled. No one else used his dishes or drank out of his cup.

A little tottering child started to cross the floor between the chief and the flaming torch. With a quick reproof his mother seized him and made him walk around the torch. Such was the respect which they paid to the living chief; and when a chief died it was their custom to sacrifice perhaps a score of men and women, that they might accompany him to the country beyond the grave and serve him there.

When the feast was over and the visitors came out from the lodge of the chief, they saw across the way a building somewhat similar in shape and size. It was the sacred temple of the tribe. Into the mud walls that inclosed it were stuck spikes on which were hung the skulls of enemies. On the roof, facing the rising sun which the Taensas worshiped, were the carved figures of three eagles. Inside the temple were preserved the bones of departed chiefs. An altar stood in the middle of the room, and here the sacred fire was kept burning. Two old medicine men sat beside it, unwinking and grave, guarding it by day and by night.

The chief was highly pleased with his visitors. If the man who had sent Tonty to his village had been an Indian, it would have been beneath the chief’s dignity to call upon him. But he sent word to La Salle by Tonty that he would pay him a visit, and on the next day he set out. He sent before him a master of ceremonies with six men to prepare the way. They took with them a beautifully woven mat for him to rest upon, and with their hands they swept the ground over which he would pass. As he came down the little creek in his dugout canoe his followers beat upon drums and his wives and the other women in the party sang songs of praise. He landed and approached La Salle’s camp, dressed in his white robe and preceded by two men carrying white plume fans and a third bearing two shields of shining brass. The two chiefs met and exchanged presents; and after a quiet call the dignified Taensas chief returned to his village on the lake.

When La Salle’s men pushed their canoes out from the shore of the cove, well laden with provisions from the Taensas, they left behind their Arkansas guides and four of the New England Indians who were fearful of the dangers below. But there were now two new members of the party, for the Taensas had given to Tonty and his Mohegan companion two slave boys, captured from the Coroas farther south.

They had not gone far when they observed upon the river a single canoe, to which a number of the party gave chase. The canoe of Tonty, outstripping the others, had nearly reached the strange bark when they saw a band of perhaps a hundred Indians, armed with bows and arrows, on the shore ready to defend their comrade in the canoe. Tonty, after consulting with La Salle, offered to take a pipe of peace to the band of savages. He crossed to the shore, presented the calumet for the Indians to smoke, and made a gift of a knife to one of the old men who seemed to be a chief. The Indians were of the nation of Natchez, and they showed their desire for peace by joining hands. This presented some difficulty to Tonty, but he bade his men join hands in his place, and the treaty of peace was concluded. Soon the rest of the party came ashore, and La Salle, taking with him a few of his men, made a visit to the village which lay three leagues from the river.

The Natchez were a powerful people related to the Taensas, and, like them, they worshiped the sun and maintained a sacred temple. La Salle spent the night in their village; and while he slept a swift runner hurried through the darkness to the village of the Coroas to ask the chief to come and visit their guest. The chief of the Coroas set out at once and traveled all night to reach the Natchez village and pay his respects to La Salle. For several days the white leader visited with the Natchez, and when he rejoined Tonty on the shore of the river the Coroa chief came with him. He accompanied the white men down the river to his own village, six leagues below, where his tribe gave the strangers a friendly reception. Here Tonty’s little Coroa slave seized the opportunity to escape to his people. But the boy who had been given to the Mohegan was not so fortunate and remained with the party of explorers.

Thus far peace had attended the journey of La Salle; but it was not to be so always. Without stopping they passed the village of the Humas and the high bank where a red pole, or baton rouge marked the boundary between the territory of the Humas and the tribes to the south. As they approached the village of the Quinipissas, they heard the sound of drums and war cries, and a party sent out by La Salle to reconnoiter was received with a volley of arrows. La Salle decided not to stop; and picking up his men, passed on down the river.

At length, early in April of the year 1682, the party reached the long-dreamed-of mouth of the river; and La Salle, on the 9th of the month, full of joy, took possession, in the name of the King of France, of all the lands watered by the rivers that flowed into the basin of the Mississippi. No white man before them had traveled from Canada to the Gulf. As they saw the cross rise in the swampy land near the sea and the arms of their king held up to the southern sky, the hearts of La Salle and Tonty, of Father MembrÉ and every Frenchman there beat high with pride.

And the dusky New England Indians—devoted to their leader and far-wandered in a valley which meant nothing to them—rejoiced also, as every Indian rejoices and feels pride in the end of a long journey, be it for vengeance, for game, or for adventure. As for the young Coroa lad, who stood in their midst, the only representative of the people of the Mississippi, he was too young and his people and his race were too young to understand what had happened in their valley.

The voyagers now turned the prows of their canoes to the north and began the slow ascent of the river. They were so nearly out of provisions that La Salle determined to stop at the Quinipissa village for food, in spite of their former hostility. Coming upon four women of the tribe, he sent one of them home to her people with presents and a message of peace. Keeping the other three as hostages, he waited across the stream from the village. Soon there came Quinipissas who invited him to cross over to their side. La Salle did so and pitched camp a short distance from the village. The Indians brought him food and he released the three women, but still kept a careful guard.

That night watches were posted with unusual care. Crevel, one of the Frenchmen, was the last to keep guard. It was now within a half-hour of dawn. Already faint lights were beginning to shine, when he heard a noise in the canes. He spoke to a comrade who said it was only some dogs. But Tonty had heard their words and called to them to be on guard, and La Salle, in whose eyes was little sleep, leaped up with the cry, “To arms.” In a moment the camp was ready for an attack.

At the same instant came the war cries of the Quinipissas on all sides of them. Guns flashed and arrows flew in the spreading light. When the sun came up and the Quinipissas looked upon their slain warriors they turned and fled, with the whites after them until recalled by La Salle. The New England Indians came excitedly back to camp waving scalps which they had taken from the enemy.

Later in the morning La Salle with half of his men went to the edge of the village and broke up the Indians’ pirogues under their very eyes. Then with no one hurt, the party of explorers put off upstream in their canoes. Coming again to the country of the Coroas they were welcomed to the village, but there was a strange new feeling in the air. The French saw Quinipissas among them, and learned that they were allies. The young Coroa captive soon had told the story of the battle to his people. When the voyagers sat down to eat they found themselves surrounded by more than a thousand warriors. They ate with their arms within quick reach, for no one knew when massacre might be attempted. Taking counsel, however, the Indians finally allowed their visitors to proceed up the Mississippi in peace.

When they reached the village of the Taensas, the chief in his white cloak was as dignified and kind as ever, and rejoiced greatly at the scalps which the Mohegans showed him. Again they passed the villages of the Arkansas. And now La Salle fell sick—so seriously that, in alarm lest he should not reach Canada, he sent Tonty ahead to carry the good news of the trip to the French settlements. Tonty with four men hurried northward. He had passed the Ohio and was drawing near the Illinois Valley when one day thirty Illinois warriors burst out of the woods with drawn bows, taking the party for Iroquois. But just in time one warrior recognized Tonty and cried out, “It is my comrade! They are Frenchmen!” After a short stop at the Tamaroa village, Tonty pushed on to the white settlements.

By the time La Salle, slowly recovering from his illness, joined Tonty at Mackinac, word had come to the white men about the Lakes that the cross and the arms of France had been raised at the mouth of the Mississippi. And the Illinois tribes in the upper valley, still afraid to return to their deserted homes, took heart when they heard of the safe return of La Salle and the Man with the Iron Hand from their long trip to the sea. For they had not forgotten La Salle’s promise to build a fort to protect them from the Iroquois, and make it safe for them to return to the valley they had lost.