saw anything mentionable; but going to the other side of the building, we heard noise enough in an upper room, to lead my comrade to suppose they were engaged in disputation. We entered and went up stairs, when a person met us and requested us to walk in, which we did. We found there, eight or ten young fellows, sitting around, smoking tobacco, with the smoke of which the room was so full, that you could hardly see: and the whole house smelt so strong of it, that when I was going up stairs, I said, this is certainly a tavern. We excused ourselves, that we could speak English only a little, but understood Dutch or French, which they did not. However, we spoke as well as we could. We inquired how many professors there were, and they replied not one, that there was no money to support one. We asked how many students there were. They said at first, thirty, then came down to twenty; I afterwards understood there are probably not ten. They could hardly speak a word of Latin, so that my comrade could not converse with them. They took us to the library where there was nothing particular. We looked over it a little. They presented us with a glass of wine. This is all we ascertained there. The minister of the place goes there morning and evening to make prayer, and has charge over them. The students have tutors or masters.

Josiah Quincy in his "History of Harvard University transcribes from the records of the Corporation the following account of the reception of the newly elected Governor Shirley of the Colony of Massachusetts Bay. "The intimate union which subsisted between Harvard College and the civil and ecclesiastical powers of the Province," says Quincy, "unavoidably connected the interests of the seminary with political events."

The Governor came up to Cambridge with an escort of forty men, including officers, accompanied by the Council, a great many other gentlemen, and a considerable number who came over the ferry, by way of Charlestown. He was met a mile off, by the gentlemen of Cambridge, the Tutors, the Professors,

Masters, and two of the Bachelors.1 Both the Meetinghouse bell and the College bell were rung. He was received at the door of the College, exactly at eleven o'clock, by the President and Corporation, and escorted to the Library, where, having waited twenty minutes, the bell was tolled, and all moved down to the Hall: the Corporation first, the Governor and LieutenantGovernor next, and then the other gentlemen. When all were seated, the President ordered the orator (Mr. Winslow, a junior Bachelor) to begin: and, when he had finished, the Governor rose (all rising with him) and made a very fine Latin speech, promising the College all his care for the promoting of learning and religion. All proceeded afterwards to the Library again, where the President asked the Governor if he would like to see a philosophical experiment in the Professor's chamber; on which all moved there directly, and saw three or four experiments, which took up almost all the time till dinner; the Governor going to Mr. Flynt's chamber again until it was ready. The tables were laid two at each end of the hall, and one across by the chimneys. The Governor, Council, and Corporation sat at the cross table; the Governor facing the door, the rest in their order. ... The whole number present amounted to one hundred and twenty! The Governor sat about an hour, and then, after the 101st Psalm was sung, he, with the rest of the gentlemen, went off, about five o'clock with his guard.

1 Lest this should give the impression of a large college faculty it might be well to quote the remark of the celebrated evangelist George Whitefield, who visited Harvard in 1740: "The chief College in New England has one President, four Tutors, and about a hundred students. It is scarce as big as one of our least Colleges in Oxford and ... not far superior to our Universities in piety and true godliness. Tutors neglect to pray with and examine the hearts of their pupils. Discipline is at too low an ebb. Bad books are become fashionable amongst them." - Whitefield, Seventh Journal, p. 28.

CHAPTER III

THE STRUGGLE WITH FRANCE FOR NORTH AMERICA

THE RISE OF NEW FRANCE

Salle's voy

April, 1682

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In the stirring annals of French exploration in the new 25. La world, René Robert Cavelier de la Salle's journey of a age down thousand miles from Lake Michigan to the Gulf of Mexico, the Mississippi, Janopening the main current of the great river system that uary to drains our midland states, holds the first place. Among La Salle's companions was the Recollect (Franciscan) Friar, Father Zenobius Membré, who reported the success of La Salle's expedition in a letter directed to his cousin and superior, Father Chrétien Le Clercq of Gaspé, and dated "From the Mississippi, June 3, 1682." Nine years later Le Clercq published at Paris an ambitious work entitled "The First Establishment of the Faith in New France," in which he included Father Zenobius' report of La Salle's voyage.

Monsieur de la Salle, having arrived safely at the Miamis on the 3d of November [1681], bent himself, with his ordinary activity and great breadth of mind, to prepare all things necessary for his departure. He selected twenty-three Frenchmen and eighteen Indians inured to war, some Mahingans [Mohicans] or Loups, some Abenaquis. They desired to take along ten of their women to cook for them, as their custom is, while they were fishing or hunting. These women took with them three children, so that the whole party consisted of but fifty-four persons, including the Sieur de Tonty and the Sieur Dautray, son of the late Sieur Bourdon, procurator-general of Quebec. On the 21st of December I embarked with the Sieur de Tonty

and part of our people on Lake Dauphin [Michigan] to go toward the divine river called by the Indians Checagon, in order to make the necessary arrangements for our voyage. The Sieur de la Salle joined us there with the rest of his troop, on the 4th of January, 1682, and found that the Sieur de Tonty had made sleds to put all the party on and carry them over the Checagon, which was frozen; for though the winter in these parts lasts only two months, it is notwithstanding very severe.

There is a portage to be made to enter the river of the Illinois, which we found also frozen: we made it on the 27th of the same month, dragging our canoes, our baggage and provisions about eighty leagues' distance on the river Seignelay [Illinois], which runs down into the river Colbert1; we traversed the great village of the Illinois without finding anyone there, the Indians having gone to winter thirty leagues lower down on Lake Pimiteoui [Peoria], where Fort Crèvecœur stands. We found it in good condition. The Sieur de la Salle left his orders here, and as from this spot navigation is open at all seasons and free from ice, we embarked in our canoes, and on the 6th of February reached the mouth of the river Seignelay, situated at latitude 38°. The ice which was floating down on the river Colbert at this place kept us there till the thirteenth of the same month, when we set out and six leagues lower down we found the river of the Ozages [the Emissitoura or Missouri] coming from the west. It is full as large as the river Colbert, into which it empties, and which is so disturbed by it that from the mouth of this river the water is hardly drinkable. The Indians assured us that this river is formed by many others, and that they ascend it for ten or twelve days to a mountain where they have their source; and that beyond this mountain is the sea, where great ships are seen. . . .

1 The Mississippi was named the Colbert by La Salle, says Tonty, on the occasion of his passage from the Illinois (Seignelay) into the main stream.

2 It was built by La Salle in 1680, and left as an outpost when he was obliged to return to Fort Frontenac on account of the failure of supplies, "all Canada," as his companion Father Membré says, "seeming in league against his undertaking."

At last. . . we arrived, on the 6th of April, at a point where the river divides into three channels. The Sieur de la Salle divided his party the next day into three bands to go and explore them. He took the western, the Sieur Dautray the southern, the Sieur Tonty, whom I accompanied, the middle one. These three channels are beautiful and deep. The water is brackish; after two leagues it became perfectly salt, and advancing on, we discovered the open sea, so that on the 9th of April, with all possible solemnity, we performed the ceremony of planting the cross and raising the arms of France. After we had chanted the hymn of the church, Vexilla Regis,1 and the Te Deum, the Sieur de la Salle, in the name of his majesty, took possession of that river, of all rivers that enter it, and of all countries watered by them. An authentic act was drawn up, signed by all of us there, and, to the sound of a volley from all our muskets, a leaden plate, on which were engraved the arms of France and the names of those who had just made the discovery, was deposited in the earth. The Sieur de la Salle, who always carried an astrolabe, took the latitude of this mouth. . . . This river is estimated at 800 leagues long: we travelled at least 350 from the mouth of the river Seignelay.

and Denon

To the energetic Irishman, Thomas Dongan, Governor of 26. Dongan the Province of New York under the later Stuarts, belongs ville, 1685the credit of first perceiving clearly and resisting firmly the 1687 dangerous French encroachments to the south of the great lakes.

Dongan protests first to Governor La Barre of

1 The famous Latin hymn Vexilla regis prodeunt ("The banners of the King advance"), composed by Venantius Fortunatus in the sixth century. 2 The ancient hymn Te Deum laudamus ("We praise thee, O God!"), composed by an unknown writer in the fourth century.

3" Dongan entered the lists against the French. If his policy should prevail, New France would dwindle to a feeble province on the St. Lawrence: if the French policy should prevail, the English colonies would remain a narrow strip along the sea. Dongan's cause was that of all the colonies; but they all stood aloof and left him to wage the strife alone. Canada was matched against New York, or rather against the Governor of New York.". Parkman, Count Frontenac and New France under Louis XIV, Vol. I, p. 124.

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