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finished.
But, before the assembly dispersed, the
Jesuits, by their presents and their festivals, had won new affection, and an invitation was given to visit the nation of Chippewas at
Sault Ste. Marie.
For the leader of this first invasion of the soil of our republic in the west,
Charles Raymbault was selected; and, as Hurons were his attendants,
Isaac Jogues was given him as a companion.
It was on the seventeenth day of September, 1641,
that the birch-bark canoe, freighted with the first envoys from Christendom, left the
Bay of Penetangushene for the
Falls of St. Mary.
Passing to the north, they floated over a wonted track till beyond the
French River; then they passed onward over the beautifully clear waters and between the thickly clustering archipelagoes of
Lake Huron, beyond the Manitoulins and other isles along the shore, to the straits that form the outlet of
Lake Superior.
There, at the falls, after a navigation of seventeen days, they found an assembly
of two thousand souls.
They made inquiries respecting many nations, who had never known Europeans, and had never heard of the one God.
Among other nations, they heard of the Nadowessies, the famed
Sioux, who dwelt eighteen days journey farther to the west, beyond the
Great Lake, then still without a name—warlike tribes, with fixed abodes, cultivators of maize and tobacco, of an unknown race and language.
Thus did the religious zeal of the
French bear the cross to the banks of the
St. Mary and the confines of
Lake Superior, and look wistfully towards the homes of the
Sioux in the
valley of the Mississippi, five years before the
New England Eliot had addressed the tribe of Indians that dwelt within six miles of
Boston harbor.
