282 PEACE. L1645. 



a forbearance hitherto without example. One of 

 them, who was defiant and abusive, received a 

 blow to silence him ; but no further indignity was 

 offered to either.^ 



As the successful warriors approached the little 

 mission settlement of Sillery, immediately above 

 Quebec, they raised theh song of triumph, and 

 beat time with their paddles on the edges of their 

 canoes ; while, from eleven poles raised aloft, 

 eleven fresh scalps fluttered in the wind. The 

 Father Jesuit and all his flock were gathered on 

 the strand to welcome them. The Indians fired 

 their guns, and screeched in jubilation ; one Jean 

 Baptiste, a Christian chief of Sillery, made a 

 speech from the shore ; Piskaret replied, standing 

 upright in his canoe ; and, to crown the occasion, a 

 squad of soldiers, marching in haste from Quebec, 

 fired a salute of musketry, to the boundless delight 

 of the Indians. Much to the surprise of the two 

 captives, there was no running of the gantlet, no 

 gnawing off of finger-nails or cutting off of fingers ; 

 but the scalps were hung, like little flags, over the 

 entrances of the lodges, and all Sillery betook 

 itself to feasting and rejoicing.^ One old woman, 

 indeed, came to the Jesuit with a pathetic appeal : 

 " Oh, my Father ! let me caress these prisoners a 

 little : they have killed, burned, and eaten my 

 father, my husband, and my children." But the 



1 According to Marie de rincarnation, Lettre, 14 Sept., 1645, Piskaret 

 was for torturing the captives ; but a convert, named Bernard by the 

 French, protested against it. 



2 Vimdnt, Relation, 1645, 19-21. 



