394 THE SANCTUARY. [1649. 



Nation ; a few joined the Neutrals on the north of 

 Lake Erie. The Hurons, as a nation, ceased to 

 exist.^ 



Hitherto Sainte Marie had been covered by- 

 large fortified towns which lay between it and the 

 Iroquois ; but these were all destroyed, some by 

 the enemy and some- by their own people, and the 

 Jesuits were left alone to bear the brunt of the 

 next attack. There was, moreover, no reason for 

 their remaining. Sainte Marie had been built as 

 a basis for the missions ; but its occupation was 

 gone : the flock had fltd from the shepherds, and 

 its existence had no longer an object. If the 

 priests stayed to be butchered, they would perish, 

 not as martyrs, but as fools. The necessity was as 

 clear as it was bitter. All their toil must come to 

 nought. Sainte Marie must be abandoned. They 

 confess the pang which the resolution cost them ; 

 but, pursues the Father Superior, " since the birth 

 of Christianity, the Faith has nowhere been plant- 

 ed except in the midst of suff'erings and crosses. 

 Thus this desolation consoles us ; and in the midst 

 of persecution, in the extremity of the evils which 

 assail us and the greater evils which threaten us, 

 we are all filled with joy : for our hearts tell us 

 that God has never had a more tender love for us 

 than now." ^ 



1 Chaumonot, who was at Ossossane at the time of the Iroquois 

 invasion, gives a vivid picture of the panic . and lamentation which 

 foUowed the news of the destruction of the Huron warriors at St. Louis, 

 and of the flight of the inhabitants to the country of the Tobacco 

 Nation.— Fie, 62. 



^ Ragueneau, Relation des Hic'^ns, 1649, 26. 



