[JAMKS] THE DOWNFALL OF THE HURON NATION, £25 



the heroic Brebœiif founder of the Huron ]\Ossion, and his frail but 

 resolute companion l.alemanf. They laid their bodies in the little burial 

 plot at St. MàTj on the Wye until their return to Quebec when they 

 carried with them the treasured remains of their martyred brethren. 

 Eagueneau, Bressani, and other French priests and their assistants 

 preparv d for an attack upon the head mission, but it did not come. The 

 Iroquois were retreating homeward laden with spoils, but the Hur,ons who 

 were left were in a panic. Towti after town was abandoned lOr destroyed. 

 Some fled west«^ard to the rocky gorges in the Blue Mountains or to the 

 Tobacco î^Tation ; but most of them were crowding towards the northwest 

 promontary of the Huron country. Beyond this lay the island of 

 Ahoendoe, St. Joseph, and further on Ekaentoton or ]\Ianitoulin. Whither 

 should thoy go ? The Jesuits prepared to renew their mission on Mani- 

 toulin, but the Hurons were bound to settle upon the nearer island. 

 The end of a long conference was that the Jesuits decided to stay with 

 the Hurons. St. Marj^ on the Wye was given to the flames and a new 

 St. Mar}' erected upon St. Joseph, the island now knowTi as Christian 

 Island. 



The late snows of March had been reddened by the blood of Brebeuf 

 and Lalemant; the early ,snows of December the same year were to be 

 reddened by the blood of two others of the Jesuit Fathers. Late in the 

 year the Iroquois returned, this time to wreak havoc among the villages 

 of the Tobacco or Petun Nation. Amiong this people there were two 

 missions served by four priests. St. Mathias, a village on the Pretty 

 Eiver, located near Ekarenniondi or the Standing Rock, and St. John, a 

 few miles southwest of it, were captured. Fatner Gamier was killed on 

 the 7th of December and his remains lie buried in a grave still undis- 

 covered somewhere to the southwest of Oollingwood. On the following 

 day Father Chabanel was killed at the mouth of the i^ottawasaga Eiver. 

 Then began the dispersion of the Petuns, Tionnontates or Tobacco 

 Xation, relatives of and practically forming part of the Huron iSTation. 

 Some may have escaped southward to the Detroit, but most of them 

 followed the Hurons northward towards Manitoulin and the Straits of 

 ^[ackinac. 



Having dispersed the Hurons and their neighbours the Tobacco 

 Nation, the Iroquois next destroyed the Neutrals, and then turning their 

 attention to the Fries on the south side of the lake, blotted out that 

 per>ple and thus made themselves master of the whole country formerly 

 divided among the different members of the great Huron-Iroquois 

 family. When the Huron Mission was started in 1634 there were 

 Hurons, Petuns, Neutrals, Fries, Andastes and Iroquois; in less than a 

 quarter of a century only the Iroquois were loft. In this short time one 



