Jesuits continued going from
lodge to lodge, and in this way Onondaga gained vague knowledge of the
plots outside the fort. The French could venture out only at the risk
of their lives, and spent the winter as closely confined as prisoners
of war. Of the ten drilled soldiers, nine threatened to desert. One
night an unseen hand plunged through the dark, seized the sentry, and
dragged him from the gate. The sentry drew his sword and shouted, "To
arms!" A band of Frenchmen sallied from the gates with swords and
muskets. In the tussle the sentry was rescued, and gifts were sent out
in the morning to pacify the wounded Mohawks. Fortunately the besieged
had plenty of food inside the stockades; but the Iroquois knew there
could be no escape till the ice broke up in spring, and were quite
willing to exchange ample supplies of corn for tobacco and firearms.
The Huron slaves who carried the corn to the fort acted as spies among
the Mohawks for the French.

In the month of February the vague rumors of conspiracy crystallized
into terrible reality. A dying Mohawk confessed to a Jesuit that the
Iroquois[4] Council had determined to massacre half the company of
French and to hold the other half till their own Mohawk hostages were
released from Quebec. Among the hostiles encamped before the gates was
Radisson's Indian father. This Mohawk was still an influential member
of the Great Council. He, too, reported that the warriors were bent on
destroying Onondaga.[5] What was to be done? No answer had come from
Quebec, and no aid could come till the spring. The rivers were still
blocked with ice; and there were not sufficient boats in the fort to
carry fifty men down to Quebec. "What could we do?" writes Radisson.
"We were in their hands. It was as hard to get away from them as for a
ship in full sea without a pilot."

They at once began constructing two large flat-bottomed boats of light
enough draft to run the rapids in the flood-tide of spring. Carpenters
worked hidden in an attic; but when the timbers were mortised together,
the boats had to be brought downstairs, where one of the Huron slaves
caught a glimpse of them. Boats of such a size he had never before
seen. Each was capable of carrying fifteen passengers with full
complement of baggage. Spring rains were falling in floods. The
convert Huron had heard the Jesuits tell of Noah's ark in the deluge.
Returning to the Mohawks, he spread a terrifying report of a