The early Jesuit missions in North America; comp. and tr. from the letters of the French Jesuits, with notes

Part I New York ; Wiley And Putnam, 161 Broadway

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COPY or A MAP,

PUBLISHED BY THE JESUITS,

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Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1848, by

WILLIAM INGRAHAM KIP,

In the Clerk's Office of the District Court of the United States for the Southern District of New York.

O. A. ALVORD, PRINTER, COR. JOHN AND DUTCH 8T3.

T. B. SMITH, STEREOTYPKR, 216 WILLIAM STREET.

TO

THE HON. GEORGE FOLSOM,

IN REMEMBRANCE OF

MANY PLEASANT HOURS PASSED IN HIS COMPANY, THIS VOLUME

IS INSCRIBED AS A SLIGHT TESTIMONY OP REGARD.

Preface

There is no page of our country's history more touching and romantic, than that which records the labors and sufferings of the Jesuit Missionaries- In these western wilds they were the earliest pioneers of civilization and faith. The w41d hunter or the adventurous traveller, who, penetrating the forests, came to new and strange tribes, often found that years before, the disciples of Loyola had preceded him in that wilderness. Traditions of the " Black robes" still lingered among the Indians. On some mossgrown tree they pointed out the traces of their work, and in wonder he deciphered, carved side by side on its trunk, the emblem of our salvation and the lilies of the Bourbons. Amid the snows of Hudson's Bay — among the woody islands and beautiful inlets of the St. Lawrence — by the council fires of the Hurons and the Algonquins — at the sources of the Mississippi, where, first of the white men, their eyes looked upon the Falls of St. Anthony, and then traced down the course of the bounding river, as it rushed onward to earn its title of " Father of Waters " — on the vast prairies of Illinois and Missouri — among the blue hills which hem in the salubrious dwellings of the Cherokees — and in the thick canebrakes of Louisiana — everywhere were found the members of the " Society of Jesus." Marquette, Joliet, Brebeuf, Jogues, Lallemand, Rasles, and Marest, are the names which the West should ever hold in remembrance.

Tiii PREFACE.

But it was only by suffering and trial that these early laborers won their triumphs. Many of them too were men who had stood high in camps and courts, and could contrast their desolate state in the solitary wigwam with the refinement and affluence which had waited on their early years. But now all these were gone. Home — the love of kindred — the golden ties of relationship — all were to be forgotten by these stern and high-wrought men, and they were often to go forth into the wilderness, without an adviser on their way, save their God. Through long and sorrowful years they were obliged to " sow in tears" before they could " reap in joy." Every self-denial gathered around them which could wear upon the spirit and cause the heart to fail. Mighty forests were to be threaded on foot, and the great lakes of the West passed in the feeble bark canoe. Hunger and cold and disease were to be encountered, until nothing but the burning zeal within could keep alive the wasted and sinking frame. But worse than all were those spiritual evils which forced them to weep and pray in darkness. They had to endure the contradic-^ tion of those they came to save, who often after listening for months with apparent interest, so that the Jesuit began to hope they would soon be numbered with his converts, suddenly quitted him with cold and derisive words, and turned again to the superstitions of their tribe.

Most of them too were martyrs to their faith. It will be noticed in reading this volume, how few of their number " died the common death of all men," or slept at last in the grounds which their Church had consecrated. Some, like Jogues and du Poisson and Souel, sunk beneath the blows of the infuriated savages, and their bodies were thrown out to feed the vulture, whose shriek, as he flapped his wings above them, had been their only requiem. Others, like Brebeuf and Lallemand and Senat, died at the stake, and thfeir ashes " flew no marble tells us whither," while the

PREFACE. ix dusky sons of the forest stood around, and mingled their wild yells of triumph with the martyrs' dying prayers. Others again, like the aged Marquette, sinking beneath years of toil, fell asleep in the wilderness, and their sorrowing companions dug their graves in the green turf, where for many years the rude forest ranger stopped to invoke their names, and bow in prayer before the cross which marked the spot.

But did these things stop the progress of the Jesuits ? The sons of Loyola never retreated. The mission they founded in a tribe ended only_with the extinction of the tribe itself. Their lives were made up of fearless devotedness and heroic self-sacrifice. Though sorrowing for the dead, they pressed forward at once to occupy their places, and, if needs be, share their fate. " Nothing " — -wrote Father le Petit after describing the martyrdom of two of his brethren — " nothing has happened to these two excellent missionaries for which they were not prepared when they devoted themselves to the Indian Missions." If the flesh trembled, the spirit seemed never to falter. Each one indeed felt that he was " baptized for the dead," and that his own blood, poured out in the mighty forests of the West, would bring down perhaps greater blessings on those for whom he died, than he could win for them by the labors of a life. He realized that he was " appointed unto death." " Ibo, et non redibo," were the prophetic words of Father Jogues, when, for the last time, he departed to the Mohawks. When Lallemand was bound to the stake, and for seventeen hours his excruciating agonies were prolonged, his words of encouragement to his companion were, " Brother ! we are made a spectacle unto the world, and to angels, and to men." When Marquette was setting out for the sources of the Mississippi, and the ii'iendly Indians who had known him, wished to turn hnn from his purpose by

declaring " Those distant nations never spare the stran-

1#

PREFACE.

gers," the calm reply of the missionary was, " I shall gladly lay down my life for the salvation of souls." And then, the red sons of the wilderness bowed with him in prayer, and before the simple cross of cedar, and among the stately groves of elm and maple which line the St. Lawrence, there rose that old chant which the aged man had been accustomed to hear in the distant Cathedrals of his own land —

But how httle is known of all these men ! The history of their bravery and sufferings, touching as it is, has been comparatively neglected. And it is to supply in some degree this deficiency, and Jo give at least a specimen of what the early Jesuits endured and dared, that this volume has been prepared. It is sent forth merely as a contribution to the historical records of the country. The early Jesuit missions form indeed a page of our history which has never yet been written, and the interest which the writer has taken in them is entirely accidental. During the last year he found in a bookstore in Europe, a set of the " Lettres Edifiantes et Curieuses, Ecrites des Missions Etrangeres," in thirty-four volumes, scattered through which are letters from the Jesuits in our own country. There are but few copies of this work in America, and it is thus rendered inaccessible to most persons, while its size would prevent others from attempting to investigate it. It has therefore remained only as a storehouse from which some of our historians have drawn occasional facts with regard to the early discoveries in our country. Having become interested in reading it, the writer determined to

* The banners of Heaven's king advance, The mystery of the Cross shines forth.

Bancroft's Uniied States, vol. iii. 156

PREFACE. xi attempt a literal translation of the letters from our own part of the continent. The notes he has added throughout the work are designated by brackets^ The map prefixed is a facsimile of one published by the Jesuits in 1664, and is to be found in the " Relation de ce qui s'est passe en la Nouvelle France, en I'annee 1664."

It would have been easy to have woven the history of some of these missionaries into a romantic and touching narrative, but the writer preferred allowing them to speak for themselves, and to tell their own story. It is more interesting to read the very words these earnest laborers wrote more than a century ago, when camping in the wilderness, or sharing the wigwams of the rude savage. They portray their own views and feelings. They lead us, as no one else does, into the inner and private life of our Aborigines.

Some parts of the volume contain in successive letters the entire missionary life of an individual. Such are the the first two, which give the labors of Rasles as related by himself, while the third, by Father de la Chasse, concludes the account by the narrative of his death. So again, the eighth gives the diary of Father du Poisson from the time o{ his arrival in New Orleans, until he reached the distant scene of his labors among the Arkansas — the ninth is his own account of his missionary field — and the tenth, by another Jesuit, tells of his martyrdom two years afterwards in the massacre by the Natchez. The fourth letter in this volume, containing the life of the Mohawk maiden whose reputation still lives in the tradition of the North, as the Geneveva of New France, shows how the faith was presented to these savages, and how they received it. The sixth gives us for the first time an account of the expedition of Montcalm, written at the time by an eye-witness, while the journeys of Father Marest over the wide prairies of xii PREFACE.

Illinois and Michigan, by their I'omantic interest, we think, will arrest the attention of every reader.

It has ever been through life the object of the writer, to reverence goodness wherever seen and by whatever name it may be called, and therefore he is willing to pay his tribute to the fearless devotedness of these men. His heart can respond with joy to the triumphs they won for the Cross, when the wild tribes of the West bowed to the Emblem of our common faith,* even though he differs widely from them in their theology, and feels that often, as in the case of Catherine, the superstitions and errors of their system broke a noble spirit which might otherwise have lived for years, a light in the wilderness. Yet beautiful, notwithstanding all this, was the life of the Mohawk maiden — beautiful for the faith it showed, and the stern devotion beneath which even the body was crushed, — and sweetly solemn in the ears of the Iroquois must have sounded the Dies Irce, as they slowly bore her remains over the plain of the Madeleine to their last resting-place.

But let not any carry this feeling too far, or from admiration of the romance which gathers around the label's of the Jesuits, feel as if the claim of devotedness was to be confined to them alone. Our own Church has equally her Acta Sanctorum, and he who with an unquickened pulse can read the record of her sons who " counted not iheir lives dear unto themselves," must be sadly wanting

* •• The Priest

Believed himself the fables that he taught: Corrupt their forms, and yet those forms at least Preserv'd a salutary faith that wrought, Maugre the alloy, the saving end it sought. Benevolence had gain'd such empire there, That even superstition had been brought An aspect of humanity to wear.

And make the weal of man its first and only care."

Southey^s Tale of Paraguay^ Cant. iv. 10.

PREFACE. xiii in a true appreciation of all that is self-denying and holy. The annals of no Church give a loftier picture of self-sacrifice than that furnished by Henry Martyn, when he abandoned the honors of academic life and exchanged his happy home at Cambridge for the solitary bungalow at Dinapore — the daily disputes with his Moonshee and Pundit — or the bitter opposition of the Mahommedans at Shiraz. And no where do we read of a nobler martyrdom than his, when he lay expiring at Tocat, without a friend to close his eyes or a sympathizing voice to address him. So too it was when Heber left the peaceful retreat of Hodnet, to suffer and die under the burning heats of India, or Selwyn in our day consecrated himself to this cause among the wild savages of New Zealand. But the time would fail us were we to speak of Buchanan, or Thomason, or Middleton, or James, or Corrie, — " these all died in the faith" — or of Wilson, and Spencer, and Broughton, and Carr, who in this generation went out to distant heathen lands, "not knowing the things which should befall them there." Many a humble Missionary indeed, who is now suffering from poverty and an unhealthy climate in our own western wilds, and whose record is written only in Heaven, is " dying daily" and enduring as true a martyrdom for the Gospel's sake, as any Jesuit whose history is given in this volume.

There is one thought however which has constantly occurred to us in the preparation of these letters, and which we cannot but suggest. Look over the world and read the history of the Jesuit missions. After one or two generations they have always come to naught. There is not a recorded instance of their permanency, or their spreading each generation wider and deeper, like our own missions m India. Thus it has been in China, Japan, South America, and our own land. For centuries the .Tesuit foreign missionaries have been like those " beating xiv PREFACE.

the air." And yet, greater devotion to the cause than theirs has never been seen since the Apostles' days. Why then was this result ? If " the blood of the martyrs be the seed of the Church," w^hy is this the only instance in which it has not proved so ? Must there not have been something wrong in the whole system — some grievous errors mingled with their teaching, which thus denied them a measure of success proportioned to their efforts ?

The preparation of this volume has formed the relaxation of the writer, when he wished at times to turn from the severer studies of his profession. Probably he should not have ventured to send it to the press, but for the encouragement of one, whose own publications have rendered his name well known to the students of historical research in our country, and who amidst the engrossing cares of active life, can still cultivate those scholar-like tastes and acquirements, which unfortunately are so rare among us. To him therefore the writer felt he could most appropriately inscribe this volume.

Contents

The Death of Father Rasles. 1724 .

Catherine, the Iroquois Saint. 1656 — 1715

The Iroquois Martyrs. 1688—1693 .

Letter I

FROM FATHER SEBASTIEN RASLES, MISSIONARY OF THE SOCIETY OF JESUS IN NEW FRANCE, TO MONSIEUR, HIS NEPHEW.

At Nanrantsouak^t this 15th of October, 1723.

MONSIEUR, MY DEAR NEPHEW,

The Peace of our Lord be ivith you :

During tlie more than thirty years that I have passed in the depth of the forests with the Savages, I have been so occupied in instructing them, and training them to Christian virtues, that I have scarcely had time to write many letters, even to those who are most dear to me. I cannot, however refuse you the little detail of my occupations for which you ask. I owe it, indeed, to the gratitude I feel for the strong interest which your friendship induces you to take in all that concerns me.

I am in a district of that vast extent of country which is between Acadia and New England. Two other Missionaries, as well as myself, are engaged there among the Abnakis'^ Indians,

[* Charlevoix writes the name Easles. The early New England historians spell it Ralle^ while the . missionary himself in a letter of Nov. 1712, signs it Rale, The latter form has been adopted by Francis in his Life.

[t Now NorridgwocJc in Maine. The little Indian village was near the present site of this town, on a beautiful bend of the river,]

[X The meaning of this Indian word is, '■'- Men of the East," and it was a name formerly given to all the tribes on the Eastern coast of the continent, but afterwards restricted to those inhabiting Nova Scotia, the territory of the present state of Maine, and a part of Canada. Francis^ Life of Eale^

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but we are separated very far from each other. The Ahnakis Indians, "besides the two villages which they have in the midst of the French colony, have also three other considerable settlements on the borders of a river. There are three rivers which empty into the sea, to the south of Canada, between New England and Acadia.

The village in which I live is called Nanromtsouak^ and is situated on the banks of a river which empties into the sea, at the distance of thirty leagues below. I have erected a Church there, which is neat and elegantly ornamented. I have, indeed, thought it my duty to spare nothing either in the decoration of the building itself, or in the beauty of those articles which are used in our holy ceremonies. Vestments, chasubles, copes, and holy vessels, all are highly appropriate, and would be esteemed so even in our Churches in Europe. I have also formed a little choir of about forty young Indians, who assist at Divine Service in cassocks and surplices. They have each their own appropriate functions, as much to serve in the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass as to chant the Divine Offices for the consecration of the Holy Sacrament, and for the processions which they make with great crowds of Indians, who often come from a long distance to engage in these exercises; and you would be edified by the beautiful order they observe and the devotion they show.*

p. 166. In all cases through this volume the orthography of proper names has been strictly preserved, as written by the Jesuits. It is interesting sometimes to see the changes through which, names have since passed.]

[^ The following extract from Whittier's beautiful poem of Mogg Megone jjlaces before us the scene which in those days must have been witnessed on the spot : —

'' On the brow of a hill, which slopes to meet The flowing river, and bathe its feet — The bare-washed rock, and the drooping grass. And the creeping vine as the waters pass — A rude and unshapely chapel stands, Built up in that wild by unskilled hands ;

They have built two Chapels at three hundred paces distance from the village ; the one, which is dedicated to the Holy Virgin, and where can he seen her image in relief, is above on the river ; the other, which is dedicated to the Guardian Angel, is below, on the same river. As they are both on the road which leads either into the woods or into the fields, the Indians can never pass without offering up their prayers. There is a holy emulation among the females of the village, as to who shall most ornament the Chapel of which they have care, when the procession is to take place there : all who have any jewelry, or pieces of silk or calico, or other things of that kind, employ them to adorn it.

The great blaze of light contributes not a little to the beauty of the Church and of the Chapels, it not being necessary for me to be saving of the wax, for the country itself furnishes it abundantly. The islands of the sea are bordered by a kind of wild lau.rel which in autumn produces a berry a little like that borne by the juniper. They fill their kettles with these, and boil them with water. In proportion as the water thickens, the green wax rises to the surface, where it remains. From a measure of about

Yet the traveller knows it a place of prayer^ For the holy sign of the Cross is there ; And should he chance at that place to he.

Of a Sabbath morn, or some hallowed day, When prayers are made and masses are said, Some for the living, and some for the dead, — Well might the traveller start to see The tall dark forms, that take their way From the birch canoe, on the river shore, And the forest paths, to that chapel door ; And marvel to mark the naked knees

And the dusky foreheads bending these, — And, stretching his long thin arms over these

In blessing and in prayer, Like a shrouded spectre, pale and tall, In his coarse white vesture, Father Ralle !'']

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three "busliels of this berry, can be made almost four pounds of wax ; it is very pure and beautiful, but neither sweet nor pliable. After several trials I have found, that by mingling with it an equal quantity of fat, either of beef or mutton, or of the elk, beautiful tapers can be made, firm, and excellent for use. With twenty-four pounds of wax and as much of fat, can be made two hundred tapers of more than a foot in length. A vast quantity of these laurels are found on the islands and on the borders of the sea, so that one person in a day can easily gather four measures, or twelve bushels of the berry. It hangs down like grapes from the branches of the tree. I have sent one branch of it to Quebec, together with a cake of the wax, and it has been found to be very excellent.

None of my neophytes fail to repair twice in each day to the Church, early in the morning to hear Mass, and in the evening to assist at the prayers, which I offer up at sunset. As it is necessary to fix the imagination of these Indians, which is too easily distracted, I have composed some appropriate prayers for them to make, to enable them to enter into the spirit of the august sacrifice of our altars. They chant them, or else recite them in a loud voice during Mass. Besides the Sermons which I deliver before them on Sundays and festival-days, I scarcely pass a week-day without making a short exhortation to inspire them with a horror of those vices to which they are most addicted, or to strengthen them in the practice of some virtue.

After the Mass, I teach the Catechism to the children and young persons, while a large number of aged people, who are present, assist and answer with perfect docility the questions which I put to them. The rest of the morning, even to mid-day, is set apart for seeing those who wish to speak with me. They come to me in crowds, to make me a participator in their pains and inquietudes, or to communicate to me causes of complaint against their countrymen, or to consult me on their marriages and other affairs of importance. It is, therefore, necessary for me to instruct some, to console others, to re-establish peace in families at variance, to calm troubled consciences, to correct others bj reprimands mingled with softness and charity; in fine, as far as it is possible, to render them all contented.

After mid-day, I visit the sick and go round among the cabins of those who require more particular instructions. If they hold a council, which is often the case with these Indians, they depute one of the principal men of the assembly to ask me to assist in their deliberations. I accordingly repair to the place where their council is held ; if I think that they are pursuing a wise course, I approve of it ; if, on the contrary, I have anything to say in opposition to their decision, I declare my sentiments, supporting them by weighty reasons, to which they conform.. My advice always fixes their resolutions. They do not even hold, their feasts without inviting me. Those who have been asked carry each one a dish, of wood or bark to the place of entertainment. I give the benediction on the food, and they place in each dish the portion which has been prepared. After this distribution has been made I say grace, and each one retires ; for such is the order and usage of their feasts.

In the midst of such continual occupations, you cannot imagine with what rapidity the days pass by. There have been seasons, when I scarcely had time to recite my Office, or to take a little repose during the night ; for discretion is not a virtue which particularly belongs_to the Indians. But for some years past I have made it a rule, not to speak with any person from the prayers in the evening until the time of mass on the next morning. I have therefore forbidden them to interrupt me during this period, except for some very important reason, as, for example, to assist a person who is dying, or some other affair of the kind which it is impossible to put off. I set apart this time to spend in prayer, or to repose myself from the fatigues of the day.

JESUITS IN AMERICA.

"When the Indians repair to the sea-shore, where they pass some months in hunting the ducks, bustards, and other birds, which are found there in large numbers, they build on an island a Church, which they cover with bark, and near it they erect a little cabin for my residence. I take care to transport thither a part of our ornaments, and the service is performed with the same decency and the same crowds of people as at the village.

You see then, my dear nephew, what are my occupations. For that which relates to me personally I will say to you, that I neither hear, nor see, nor speak to any but the Indians. My food is very simple and light. I have never been able to conform my taste to the meat or the smoked fish of the savages, and my nourishment is only composed of corn which they pound, and of which I make each day a kind of hominy, which I boil in water. The only luxury in which I indulge is a little sugar, which I mix with it to correct its insipidity. This is never wanting in the forest. In the Spring, the maple trees contain a liquor very similar to that which is found in the sugar canes of the Southern Islands. The women employ themselves in collecting this in vessels of bark, as it is distilled from the trees. They then boil it, and draw off from it a very good sugar. That which is drawn off first is always th6 most beautiful.

The whole nation of the Abnakis is Christian, and very zealous to preserve their religion. This attachment to the Catholic faith, has induced them, even to this time, to prefer our alliance, to advantages which might be derived from an alliance with the English who are their neighbors. These advantages would be too of very great importance to our Indians. The facility of trading with the English, from whom they are distant but one or two days' journey, the ease with which the journey can be made, the admirable market they would find there for the purchase of the merchandise which suits them : these things certainly hold out very great inducements. In place of which, in going to

Quebec, it is necessary to take more tlian a fortnigtit to reach there, they have to furnish themselves with provisions for the journey, they have different rivers to pass, and frequent portages to make.* They are aware of these inconveniences, and are by no means indifferent to their interests, but their faith is infinitely more dear to them, and they believe that if they detach themselves from our alliance, they will shortly find themselves without a missionary, without sacraments, without a sacrifice, with scarcely any exercise of their religion, and in manifest danger of being replvinged into their former heathenism. This is the bond which unites them to the French. Attempts have been vainly made to break it, sometimes by wiles which were held out to their simplicity, and sometimes by acts of violence, which could not fail to irritate a nation exceedingly jealous of its rights and liberties. The commencement of this misunderstanding could not but alarm me, for it made me fear the dispersion of that little community which Providence had for so many years confided to my care, and for the sake of which I would willingly sacrifice what remains to me of life. Let me mention to you then some of the different artifices to which the English had recourse to detach them from our alliance.

The Governor-general of New England, some years ago, sent to the lower part of the river, the most able of the ministers of Boston,! to establish there a school to instruct the children of the Indians, and maintain them at the expence of the govern-

* To make a portage is to transport their canoe and baggage from one river to another, with, which it has no communication. These portages are sometimes of many leagues, and it is the principal reason which induces the Indians to us© canoes of bark, since they are very light and easily trans- X)orted.