Chap. I.] ILLINOIS. 33 



Of the tribes which, single and detached, or co- 

 hering in loose confederacies, dwelt within the 

 limits of Lower Canada, Acadia, and New England, 

 it is needless to speak ; for they offered no distinc- 

 tive traits demanding notice. Passing the country 

 of the Lenape and the Shawanoes, and descending 

 the Ohio, the traveller would have found its valley 

 chiefly occupied by two nations, the Miamis or 

 Twightwees, on the AVabash and its branches, and 

 the Illinois, who dwelt in the neighborhood of the 

 river to which they have given their name, while 

 portions of them extended beyond the Mississippi. 

 Though never subjugated, as were the Lenape, both 

 the Miamis and the Illinois were reduced to the last' 

 extremity by the repeated attacks of the Five Na- 

 tions ; and the Illinois, in particular, suffered so 

 much by these and other wars, that the population 

 of ten or twelve thousand, ascribed to them by the 

 early French writers, had dwindled, during the first 

 quarter of the eighteenth century, to a few small 

 villages.^ According to Marest, they were a people 

 sunk in sloth and licentiousness ; but that priestly 

 father had sujffered much at their hands, and viewed 

 them with a jaundiced eye. Their agriculture was 

 not contemptible ; they had permanent dwellings 

 as well as portable lodges ; and though wandering 

 through many months of the year among their 

 broad prairies and forests, there were seasons when 

 their whole population was gathered, with feastings 



1 Father Rasles, 1723, says that there were eleven. Marest, in 1712, 

 found only three. 



3 



