250 ' THE ILLINOIS. [1764. 



way to the Mississippi, in the year 1680, La Salle 

 built a fort in the country of the Illinois ; and, on 

 his return from the mouth of the great river, some 

 of his followers remained, and established them- 

 selves near the spot. Heroes of another stamp 

 took up the work which the daring Norman had 

 begun. Jesuit missionaries, among the best and 

 purest of their order, burning with zeal for the 

 salvation of souls, and the gaining of an immortal 

 crown, here toiled and suffered, with a self-sacrific- 

 insf devotion which extorts a tribute of admiration 

 even from sectarian bigotry. While the colder 

 apostles of Protestantism labored upon the out- 

 skirts of heathendom, these champions of the 

 cross, the forlorn hope of the army of Rome, 

 pierced to the heart of its dark and dreary do- 

 main, confronting death at every step, and well 

 repaid for all, could they but sprinkle a few drops 

 of water on the forehead of a dying child, or hang 

 a gilded crucifix round the neck of some warrior, 

 pleased with the glittering trinket. With the 

 beginning of the eighteenth century, the black 

 robe of the Jesuit was known in every village of 

 the Illinois. Defying the wiles of Satan and the 

 malice of his emissaries, the Indian sorcerers ; 

 exposed to the rage of the elements, and every 

 casualty of forest life, they followed their wander- 

 ing proselytes to war and to the chase ; now wad- 

 ing' through morasses, now dragging canoes over 

 rapids and sand-bars ; now scorched with heat on 

 the sweltering prairie, and now shivering house- 

 less in the blasts of January. At Kaskaskia and 



