ir
steps. Arriving with them at the Miami fort, he reinforced his little
troop by twenty-three Frenchmen and eighteen Indians, and reached Fort
Crevecoeur. On February 6th, 1682, he reached the mouth of the Illinois,
and then descended the Mississippi. Towards the end of this same month
the bold explorers stopped at the juncture of the Ohio with the Father
of Rivers, and erected there Fort Prudhomme. On what is Fame dependent?
A poor and unknown man, a modest collaborator with La Salle, had the
honour of giving his name to this little fort because he had been lost
in the neighbourhood and had reached camp nine days later.

Providence was finally about to reward so much bravery and perseverance.
The sailor who from the yards of Christopher Columbus's caravel, uttered
the triumphant cry of "Land! land!" did not cause more joy to the
illustrious Genoese navigator than La Salle received from the sight of
the sea so ardently sought. On April 9th La Salle and his comrades could
at length admire the immense blue sheet of the Gulf of Mexico. Like
Christopher Columbus, who made it his first duty on touching the soil of
the New World to fall upon his knees to return thanks to Heaven, La
Salle's first business was to raise a cross upon the shore. Father
Membre intoned the Te Deum. They then raised the arms of the King of
France, in whose name La Salle took possession of the Mississippi, and
of all the territories watered by the tributaries of the great river.

Their trials were not over: the risks to be run in traversing so many
regions inhabited by barbarians were as great and as numerous after
success as before. La Salle was, moreover, delayed for forty days by a
serious illness, but God in His goodness did not wish to deprive the
valiant discoverers of the fruits of their efforts, and all arrived safe
and sound at the place whence they had started. After having passed a
year in establishing trading-posts among the Illinois, La Salle
appointed M. de Tonti his representative for the time being, and betook
himself to France with the intention of giving an account of his journey
to the most Christian monarch. His enemies had already forestalled him
at the court; we have to seek the real cause of this hatred in the
jealousy of traders who feared to find in the future colonists of the
western and southern country competitors in their traffic. But far from
listening to them, the son of Colbert, Seignelay, then minister of
commerce, h