1684.] SPEECH OE BIG MOUTH. 109 



of his tribe had no fear of the French. He also 

 avowed boldly that the Iroquois had conducted 

 English traders to the lakes. " We are born free," 

 he exclaimed, " we depend neither on Onontio nor 

 on Corlaer. We have the right to go whitherso- 

 ever we please, to take with us whomever we please, 

 and buy and sell of whomever we please. If your 

 allies are your slaves or your children, treat them 

 like slaves or children, and forbid them to deal with 

 anybody but your Frenchmen. 



" We have knocked the Illinois in the head, be- 

 cause they cut down the tree of peace and hunted 

 the beaver on our lands. We have clone less than 

 the English and the French, who have seized upon 

 the lands of many tribes, driven them away? and 

 built towns, villages, and forts in their country. 



" Listen, Onontio. My voice is the voice of the 

 Five Tribes of the Iroquois. When they buried 

 the hatchet at Cataraqui (Fort Frontenac) in pres- 

 ence of your predecessor, they planted the tree 

 of peace in the middle of the fort, that it might be 

 a post of traders and not of soldiers. Take care 

 that all the soldiers you have brought with you, 

 shut up in so small a fort, do not choke this tree 

 of peace. I assure you in the name of the Five 

 Tribes that our w T arriors will dance the dance of the 

 calumet under its branches ; and that they will sit 

 quiet on their mats and never dig up the hatchet, 

 till their brothers, Onontio and Corlaer, separately 

 or together, make ready to attack the country that 

 the Great Spirit has given to our ancestors." 



The session presently closed \ and La Barre with- 



