CHAPTER IV

THE PAGEANT OF SAINT LUSSON

With the destruction of the Huron missions western exploration ceased for a few years. In 1660 Father Ménard passed through the Sault Ste. Marie and spent a winter ministering to the Indians on the southern shore of Lake Superior. In the following summer he set out on an inland journey from the lake and was never heard from again. In the same year, however, two fur-traders, Radisson and Groseilliers, coasted along the shore of Lake Superior and Lake Michigan and were followed by many Jesuit missionaries whose names have become famous. Two principal mission stations were established, one at Sault Ste. Marie, the other at La Pointe at the western end of Lake Superior. At these places missionaries and traders heard many tales of a great river to the south and of rich copper deposits in the lake region, which in turn led to more exploring expeditions.

At Sault Ste. Marie, in 1671, there was a picturesque ceremony when Daumont de Saint Lusson, agent of Louis XIV, took possession of the interior of North America in the name of his king. For months the French and the Indians had been preparing for this pageant. Messages had been sent to all the Indian tribes living within one hundred leagues of Ste. Marie, urging them to attend, and Nicholas Perrot, a Canadian voyager and interpreter, had visited many of the tribes in person to make sure of their coming. With a large Indian following, he paddled up the Strait of Mackinac from Lake Michigan and landed at the foot of the rapids. Saint Lusson was already there with fifteen men. The French leaders were housed at the mission station, while the savages made themselves comfortable in temporary lodges erected along the stretch of shore and in the fields. Gradually tribe after tribe from the north and the west arrived, and on the 14th of June, when fourteen tribes or their representatives had come, Saint Lusson announced that the ceremony would take place.

The Frenchmen, led by Saint Lusson, assembled in the village, and crowds of curious Indians gathered about the small group of white men. The French soldiers had brought out their gayest uniforms and had polished their swords and muskets till they shone in the sunlight. Coureurs de bois--runners of the woods--and other Indian traders stood about in their rough picturesque costumes. At the head of the line walked four Jesuits arrayed in the impressive vestments of the priesthood. The names of these four men stand to-day as they signed them at the foot of the instrument which records this act of taking possession. They were a group of priests noteworthy in the history of the lakes. At one end stood Father Claude Dablon, the Superior of the Missions of the Lakes; next him came Gabriel Druilletes, a veteran missionary, whose experience with the Indians exceeded probably that of any Frenchman in Canada, and who had been sent by the government years before on a mission to the English colonists on the Atlantic to invite their coöperation against the Iroquois. Father Claude Allouez had followed Father Ménard in the Lake Superior country and founded the La Pointe Mission, and Father Louis André was establishing a station among the Ottawas at Manitoulin Island. Father Allouez had been obliged to leave the young Jesuit missionary Marquette in charge at La Pointe. Had he been with his brother priests, the circle of famous names would have been complete.

Led by these four men, the line of Frenchmen--a motley company of soldiers, priests, explorers, and traders--marched up the hill to a height which had been selected because it overlooked the surrounding country. On either side of the column and behind it hovered the vast throng of dusky Indians. As the Frenchmen halted and grouped themselves about a huge cross of wood that lay on the ground, the Indians fell into position behind them and stood silent, waiting to see what the “white faces” would do. When all was quiet, Father Dablon, as Superior of the Lake Missions, stepped forward and blessed the cross with all the ceremonies of the Church. At a sign from Saint Lusson the holy wood was lifted, and as the foot of the standard fell into the opening prepared for it, the Frenchmen sang with all their hearts the ancient hymn of their church:--

“The royal banners forward go, The Cross shines forth in mystic glow: * * * * Fulfilled is all that David told, In true prophetic song of old; How God the heathen’s King should be, For God is reigning from the tree.”

As they looked from the mighty cross to the horde of assembled savages the Frenchmen felt that to-day as never before these words were fulfilled. The uncomprehending Indians, who gazed at the pageant with wondering delight in its pomp, little knew how the minds of these white men were filled with the vision of a time, of which this was the forerunner, when these red-skinned savages should be followers of the heavenly King of the French and the obedient retainers of their earthly monarch.

Beside the cross was erected a cedar pole to which was nailed a metal plate engraved with the royal arms of France. As this was being raised the Frenchmen chanted the twentieth Psalm, “In the name of our God we will set up our banners,” and one of the Jesuits, even “in that far-away corner of the earth,” as the record says, offered a prayer for the French king in whose name all this was being done. Thus side by side the standards of the two monarchs were raised in the wilderness, and Saint Lusson, stepping forward amid an expectant hush, with a sword in one hand and a sod of earth in the other, took formal possession of the soil with these words:--

“In the name of the most high and redoubtable sovereign, Louis the Fourteenth, Christian King of France and Navarre, I now take possession of all these lakes, straits, rivers, islands, and regions lying adjacent thereto, whether as yet visited by my subjects or unvisited, in all their length and breadth, stretching to the sea at the north and at the west, or on the opposite side extending to the South Sea. And I declare to all the people inhabiting this wide country that they now become vassals of His Majesty, and bound to obey his laws and follow his customs. He will protect them against all enemies. In his name I declare to all other princes and sovereigns and potentates of whatever rank,--and I warn their subjects,--that they are denied forever seizing upon or settling within the limits set by these seas; except it be the pleasure of His Most Christian Majesty, and of him who shall govern in his behalf; and this on pain of incurring his resentment and the efforts of his arms. Long live the King!”

As the last words fell from his lips the Frenchmen responded with a loud shout, “Vive le Roi! Long live the King!”; guns were fired, and the Indians shouted and yelped with delight. “The astonishment and delight of those people,” says the chronicler, knew no bounds, “for they had never seen anything of the kind.” If words and the planting of symbols could do it, the king of France had taken possession of the continent of North America, extending his dominion to the shores of seas of which he had no knowledge. But the dream of the French was not fulfilled. To-day a rival people, which then occupied only a small strip of the Atlantic seaboard, has swept away almost every trace of the empire thus proclaimed.

In order to impress upon the Indians more clearly the meaning of this august ceremony, Father Claude Allouez had been appointed to set forth the glory of the monarch to whom they were that day submitting themselves. He had spent many hours listening to flowery Indian harangues, and was familiar with the style of speech which suited their comprehension and met with their approval. What the Indians gathered from his curious address we do not know. After reading the part of it which has been preserved we cannot wonder that, as the record tells, “they had no words with which to express their thoughts.”

As soon as the wild uproar of shouts and musketry was hushed Father Allouez stepped forward on a slight eminence and began his speech. With a few words he dismissed the usual subject of his priestly discourses, the cross and its significance, and turned to the other post on which, as he explained to them, were fastened the armorial bearings of the great “Captain of France.” To him all the captains whom they had seen were mere children, or little herbs which one tramples underfoot as compared to a great tree. Even Onontio,--the governor of New France,--whose name was a daily terror to that mighty nation, the Iroquois, was but one of ten thousand captains who lived beyond the seas. When this great captain said, “I am going to war,” all obeyed him. Those ten thousand captains raised companies of a hundred warriors each, disposing them according to his orders, on sea or land. Those who were needed at sea embarked on great ships which held four or five hundred or even a thousand men, while their Indian canoes held only four or five, or at best ten or twelve. Thus did this king with his vast numbers of followers prepare for war, and when he came to attacking the enemy he was more terrible than thunder, and the earth trembled beneath him, while air and sea were set on fire by the discharge of his cannon. He had been seen in the midst of his warriors covered with the blood of his enemies whom he killed in such numbers that he set flowing rivers of blood. But all this was now long past. No one dared to make war on him; all nations had submitted to him and begged humbly for peace.

In this warlike guise Father Allouez presented Louis XIV till the Indian admiration was fully aroused and all were “astonished to hear that there was any man on earth so great and rich and powerful.”

The day closed with a “fine bonfire,” lighted toward evening, around which the Frenchmen sang the “Te Deum,” thanking God on behalf of “those poor peoples,” who did not know enough to do it for themselves,--that they were the subjects of so great and powerful a monarch. The Indians departed to their homes, traders and coureurs de bois disappeared into the forests, the Jesuits returned to their self-sacrificing life of ministry, and adventurous French pioneers set out across lake and wood to explore and claim the vast wilderness thus appropriated by France. The pageant of Saint Lusson was over, and Sault Ste. Marie relapsed into its usual life; but thus early in the history of the Great Lakes this place had been singled out as a strategic spot.