The embarcation being completed, the feast was concluded at a fixed time the and sleep having soon overwhelmed them, we withdrew from our house by a back door and embarked with very little noise, without bidding adieu to the Savages, who were acting cunning parts and were thinking to amuse us to the hour of our massacre with fair appearances and evidences of good will. Our little Lake on which we silently sailed in the darkness of the night, froze according as we all our equipage.

;

guests retired,

advanced and caused us to fear being stopt by the ice after having evaded the fires of the IroquoisGod, however, delivered us, and after having advanced all night and all the following day through frightful precipices and waterfalls, we arrived finally in the evening at the great Lake Ontario, twenty

leagues from the place of our departure.

This first day was the most dangerous, for had the Iroquois

observed our departure they would have intercepted us, and had they been ten or twelve it would

have been easy for them to have thrown us into disorder, the river being very narrow, and terminating after travelling ten leagues in a frightful precipice where we were obliged to land

and carry our

baggage and canoes during four hours, through unknown roads covered with a thick forest which

FIRST SETTLEMENT AT ONONDAGA,

could have served the enemy for a Fort, whence at each step he could have struck and fired on us

without being perceived. God's protection visibly accompanied us during the remainder of the road, in which we walked through perils which made us shudder after we escaped them, having at night