1646.] DRUILLETES ON THE KENNEBEC. 321 



To return to Druilletes. The smoke of the wig- 

 wam bhnded him ; and it is no matter of surprise 

 to hear that he was cured by a miracle. He re- 

 turned from his winter roving to Quebec in high 

 health, and soon set forth on a new mission. On 

 the River Kennebec, in the present State of Maine, 

 dwelt the Abenaquis, an Algonquin people, destined 

 hereafter to become a thorn in the sides of the New- 

 England colonists. Some of them had visited their 

 friends, the Christian Indians of Sillery. Here they 

 became converted, went home, and preached the 

 Faith to their countrymen, and this to such pur- 

 pose that the x\.benaquis sent to Quebec to ask for 

 a missionary. Apart from the saving of souls, 

 there were sohd reasons for acceding to their re- 

 quest. The Abenaquis were near the colonies 

 of New England, — indeed, the Plymouth colony, 

 under its charter, claimed jurisdiction over them ; 

 and in case of rupture, they would prove service- 

 able friends or dangerous enemies to New France.^ 

 Their messengers were favorably received ; and 

 Druilletes was ordered to proceed upon the new 

 mission. 



He left Sillery, with a party of Indians, on the 

 twenty-ninth of August, 1646,^ and following, as 

 it seems, the route by which, a hundred and twenty- 

 nine years later, the soldiers of Arnold made their 

 way to Quebec, he reached the waters of the 

 Kennebec and descended to the Abenaqui villages. 

 Here he nursed the sick, baptized the dying, and 



1 Charlevoix, I. 280, gives this as a motive of the mission. 



2 Lalemant, Relation, 1647, 51. 



