an under or overdose of it, and the effects
manifested themselves only in a long illness. He was too far on his
journey from Fort Heartbreak when stricken down to return to it, and was
mercifully received and nursed back to health by the friendly
Pottawottamies.

While the leader was lying sick in an Indian lodge, the knightly Tontz,
ignorant of the fate of his friend, was having his troubles at the
little fort of Heartbreak. Pere Francois Xavier had remained with him,
and aided him with counsels and personal exertions; he had made himself
so indispensable that he was now lieutenant; if anything should happen
to Tontz, he would be commander. He was secretary of the expedition,
drew careful maps, and made voluminous daily entries in a journal, which
was afterward found to be a marvel of painstaking both in the facts and
fictions which it contained. Scanty mention was there of La Salle and
Tontz Main de Fer, and much of Pere Francois Xavier, but it was clear,
explicit, depicting the advantages of an acquisition of this territory
to the crown of France in glowing terms, and strongly advising that the
man who had most distinguished himself in the difficulties of its
discovery should be appointed as governor, or baron, under the royal
authority.

While Father Xavier was compiling this remarkable piece of authorship,
the Iroquois descended in warlike array upon the somewhat friendly
disposed Illinois Indians, in whose midst Fort Crevecoeur had been
built. The suspicious Indian mind immediately connected the advent of
their enemies with the building of the fort, and regarded the little
garrison with distrust. Tontz, at the instance of Father Xavier,
presented himself to their chief, and offered to do anything in his
power to prove his friendly intentions. The chief accepted his services,
and sent him as ambassador to inquire into the cause of the coming of
the Iroquois. This mission had nearly been his last, for Tontz was
received with stabs, and hardly allowed to give the message of the
chief. His ill treatment at the hands of their enemies did not reassure
the suspicious Illinois, who ordered Tontz to immediately evacuate the
fort and return with his forces to the country whence he had come. In
his wounded condition such a journey was extremely hazardous, and it
must have been with grave doubts as to his surviving it that Father
Xavier took temporary command of the returning expedition.

It was the spring of 1681. Father