SWANTON] INDIAN TRIBES OF THE LOWER MISSISSIPPI VALLEY 313 



reckoned very rich. He has Ions left olT the Ureses of a savat;e. and he takes a 

 pride in appearing always well dressed, according to our fashion. 



The other cabins of the village are partly square, as that of the chief, and 

 partly round, lilce those of the Natchez. The open space round which they all 

 stand is about 100 paces in diameter, and notwithstanding the heat of the 

 weather was that day suffocating, the young people were diverting themselves 

 at a kind of truck, much like ours. 



There are two other villages of this nation at a little distance from this and 

 that is all that remains of a people formerly very numerous. I said befoi'e that 

 they had a missionary whom they greatly loved ; I have learned that they drove 

 him away not long since, because he had burned their temple, which neverthe- 

 less they have not rebuilt, nor lighted their fire again; a certain proof of their 

 little attachment to their false religion. They even soon recalled the mission- 

 ary, but they heard all he had to tell them with an indifference which he could 

 never conquer, and he has forsaken them in turn." 



An opinion regarding the effect Davion's preaching was producing 

 strikingly different from that of La Ilarpe is expressed here, and 

 that it is trner is vouched for by the action of Davion himself in 

 abandoning the mission. Since La Harpe found him there in Janu- 

 ary, 1719, and he had left before Charlevoix's visit in December, 

 1721, while his name occurs in the church register of Mobile in the 

 year 1720, which it is fair to assume was after his withdrawal from 

 the mission field,^ we must date his retirement as having taken 

 place in 1719 or early in 1720. Poisson, missionary to the Arkansas, 

 states that Davion returned to France shortly after the arrival of 

 the Capuchin fathers in Louisiana.'^ That brotherhood was placed 

 in charge of the Louisiana missions in 1725, but the first Capuchin 

 appeared in Mobile in January, 1721,'^' and this is the date the above 

 writer probably had in mind. Very likely Davion set sail the same 

 year. He did not long survive his return, for Poisson, writing in 

 1727, states that he was then dead.*^ 



In 1723 the Tunica accompanied Bienville on his second expedition 

 against the Natchez, and the great chief was severely wounded in 

 an exchange of shots with one of the Suns, whom he killed.' 



In 1727 the missionary Poisson, just referred to, passed the Tunica 

 on his way from New Orleans, and gives us the information regarding 

 Father Davion just recorded. He says that the great chief of the 

 Tunica on hearing of Davion's death expressed regret " and seemed 

 to wish for a missionary." He says of him, further, " He bears no 

 mark of being a Christian but the name, a medal, and a rosary." ^ 



^^Hien the French first came to Louisiana the Mississippi bent far 

 around to the westward opposite the place where these Tunica villages 

 were then located, but where were then the Houma, leaving a nar- 



o Charlevoix's Journal in French, Hist. Coll. La., 173-174, 1851. See pp. 309-311. 

 *< Hamilton, Colonial Mobile (1st ed.), 126, 1897. 

 ■^ Jes. Rel., Lxvii, 309. 

 <* Ibid., and note. 

 « See p. 214. 



