220- ISAAC JOGUES. [1642. 



where at length the summer night was hideous 

 with carnage, and an honored name was stained 

 with a memory of blood. ^ 



The Iroquois landed at or near the future site of 

 Fort William Henry, left their canoes, and, with 

 theh prisoners, began their march for the nearest 

 Mohawk town. Each bore his share of the plun- 

 der. Even Jogues, though his lacerated hands 

 were in a frightful condition and his body covered 

 with bruises, w^as forced to stagger on "with the rest 

 under a heavy load. He with his fellow-prisoners, 

 and indeed the whole party, were half starved, sub- 

 sisting chiefly on wild berries. They crossed the 

 upper Hudson, and, in thirteen days after leaving 

 the St. Lawrence, neared the wretched goal of 

 their pilgrimage, a palisaded town, standing on a 

 hill by the banks of the River Mohawk. 



The whoops of the victors announced their ap- 

 proach, and the savage hive sent forth its sw^arms. 

 They thronged the side of the hill, the old and the 

 young, each with a stick, or a slender iron rod, 

 bought from the Dutchmen on the Hudson. They 

 ranged themselves in a double line, reaching upward 

 to the entrance of the town ; and through this 

 " narrow road of Paradise," as Jogues calls it, the 

 captives were led in single file, Couture in front, 

 after him a half-score of Hurons, then Goupil, then 



1 The allusion is, of course, to the siege of Fort William Henry in 

 1757, and the ensuing massacre by Montcalm's Indians. Charlevoix, 

 with his usual carelessness, says that Jogues's captors took a circuitous 

 route to avoid enemies. In truth, however, they were not in the slight- 

 est danger of meeting any ; and they followed the route which, before the 

 present century, was the great highway between Canada and New Hol- 

 land, or New York. 



