1637.] THE JESUITS IMPEACHED. 119 



each other like so many corpses, or Hke men who 

 akeady feel the terror of death. When they spoke, 

 it was only with sighs, each reckoning up the sick 

 and dead of his own family. All this was to excite 

 each other to vomit poison agamst us." 



A grisly old chief, named Ontitarac. withered 

 with age and stone-blind, but renow^ned in past 

 years for eloquence and counsel, opened the debate 

 in a loud, though tremulous voice. First he saluted 

 each of the three nations present, then each of the 

 chiefs in turn, — congratulated them that all were 

 there assembled to deliberate on a subject of the 

 last importance to the public welfare, and exhorted 

 them to give it a mature and calm consideration. 

 Next rose the chief whose office it was to preside 

 over the Feast of the Dead. He painted in dis- 

 mal colors the woful condition of the country, and 

 ended with charging it all upon the sorceries of 

 the Jesuits. Another old chief followed him. 

 '•My brothers," he said, "you know well that I 

 am a war-chief, and very rarely speak except in 

 councils of war ; but I am compelled to speak 

 now, since nearly all the other chiefs are dead, and 

 I must utter what is in my heart before I follow 

 them to the grave. Only two of my family are 

 left ahve, and perhaps even these will not long 

 escape the fury of the pest. I have seen other 

 diseases ravaging the country, but nothing that 

 coidd compare with this. In two or three moons 

 we saw their end : but now w^e have suffered for a 

 year and more, and yet the evil does not abate. 

 And what is w^orst of all, we have not yet discov- 



