peared to them remarkably beautiful. Here
they encamped for a brief rest. Nika brought in word that he had killed
two buffaloes, and wished to have a couple of horses sent to bring in
the meat. A party of five was sent out, led by M. Moranget, who was a
rash and irritable man. There were three men who had accompanied the
hunter, and who were cutting up and drying the meat, in preparation for
transporting it to the camp. At the same time they were cooking for
themselves some of the choicest pieces.

When Moranget reached the place and found the men feasting, as he
thought, rather than jerking the meat, he reprimanded them, in his
accustomed tones of severity. The men chanced to be the very worst and
most desperate in the camp. Moranget accompanied his denunciations with
still more irritating actions. He took from them the delicious morsels
which they cooked. Four men, for another had joined them, greatly
enraged, sullenly abandoned their work, and retiring a short distance
agreed to avenge themselves by killing Moranget, and also by killing
Nika and another man who was the valet of La Salle. Both of these men
were friends and supporters of Moranget.

They waited till night. All took their supper together. It was the
night of the 17th of March. Though in that genial climate the weather
was serene and mild, a rousing fire was found very grateful in
protecting them from the chill of the night air. With the fading
twilight the stars shone down brightly upon them, and, surrounded by
the silence and solemnity of the prairie and the forest, they were soon
apparently all asleep.

One of the murderers, Liotot, cautiously arose as by agreement, and
with a hatchet in his hand, creeping toward Moranget, with one
desperate blow split open his skull from crown to chin. The deed was
effectually done. And yet with sinewy arm blow followed blow, till the
head was one mass of clotted gore. The other two were despatched in the
same way. The three remaining conspirators stood, with their guns
cocked and primed, to shoot down either of the victims who might
succeed in making any resistance. There is some slight discrepancy in
the detail of these murders. It is said that Moranget, upon receiving
the first blow, made a convulsive movement, as if to rise; but that the
valet and the Indian did not stir.

One crime always leads to another. The conspirators, having perpetrated
these murders, now consulted together as to what was next to be don