1685.] TROUBLES OF DENONVILLE. 117 



were overwhelmed with the sick. " Not only our 

 halls, but our church, our granary, our hen-yard, 

 and every corner of the hospital where we could 

 make room, were filled with them." * 



Much was expected of Denonville. He was to 

 repair the mischief wrought by his predecessor, 

 and restore the colony to peace, strength, and 

 security. The king had stigmatized La Barre's 

 treaty with the Iroquois as disgraceful, and ex- 

 pressed indignation at his abandonment of the 

 Illinois allies. All this was now to be changed ; 

 but it was easier to give the order at Versailles 

 than to execute it in Canada. Denonville's diffi- 

 culties were great ; and his means of overcoming 

 them were small. What he most needed was more 

 troops and more money. The Senecas, insolent 

 and defiant, were still attacking the Illinois ; the 

 tribes of the north-west were angry, contemptuous, 

 and disaffected ; the English of New York were urg- 

 ing claims to the whole country south of the Great 

 Lakes, and to a controlling share in all the western 

 fur trade ; while the English of Hudson's Bay were 

 competing for the traffic of the northern tribes, 

 and the English of New England were seizing upon 

 the fisheries of Acadia, and now and then making 

 piratical descents upon its coast. The great ques- 

 tion lay between New York and Canada. Which 

 of these two should gain mastery in the west ? 



Denonville, like Frontenac, was a man of the 

 army and the court. As a soldier, he had the ex- 

 perience of thirty years of service ; and he was in 



1 Juchereau, Hotel-Dieu, 283. 



