copy of the treaty made with their tribes in
1728 and expressed a desire to renew it. After the usual negotiations
the treaty was engrossed on parchment and signed by the Indians, each
man appending to his signature his private mark or "totem." Eleven
members of the council also signed the treaty as witnesses.

A few days later the Indians returned with Capt. How to the St. John
river, where the treaty was duly ratified, and thirteen chiefs signed
the following declaration:--

"The Articles of Peace concluded at Chebuckto the Fifteenth of August,
1749, with His Excellency Edward Cornwallis Esq'r, Capt. General
Governor and Commander-in-Chief of His Majesty's Province of Nova
Scotia or Acadie, and signed by our Deputies, having been communicated
to us by Edward How Esq'r, one of His Majesty's Council for said
Province, and faithfully interpreted to us by Madame De Bellisle
Inhabitant of this River nominated by us for that purpose. We the
Chiefs and Captains of the River St. Johns and places adjacent do for
ourselves and our different Tribes confirm and ratify the same to all
intents and purposes.

"Given under our hands at the River St. Johns this fourth day of
September, 1749."

At first glance it would seem that the interpreter, Madame Belleisle,
must have been Anastasie St. Castin, wife of Alexander le Borgne de
Belleisle, but as she was then more than sixty years of age it is
possible the interpreter may have been her daughter, Francoise
Belleisle Robichaux. That the latter had a position of some influence
with the Indians is shown by the fact that when the chiefs of the
River St. John went to Halifax in 1768 (nearly twenty years later)
they complained that the ornaments of their church "were taken by
Francoise Belleisle Robicheau and carried to Canada by her, and that
she refused to give them up." The natural presumption is that the
ornaments were intrusted to her care by the missionary, Germain, when
he left the mission of Ste. Anne, and that she took them with her for
safe keeping.

The English colonial authorities congratulated Cornwallis on the
treaty made with the Indians. "We are glad to find," say they, "that
the Indians of the St. John river have so willingly submitted to His
Majesty's government and renewed their treaty, and as they are the
most powerful tribe in those parts, we hope their example may either
awe or influence other inferior tribes to the like compliance."

Cornwallis in reply said, "