“Annual Narrative of the Mission of the Sault from its Foundation until the Year 1685” by Claude Chauchetière, S.J., written in the beginning of 1686

1667

The time of the wars that were between the French and the Iroquois being pass, we saw the prophecy of Isaiah literally fulfilled, “The bears and the lions shall dwell with the lambs.” We saw the Iroquois come to seek the friendship of the French, we saw the French go on missions to the country of the Iroquois. That was the time when every one thought of living on the lands of New France. Montreal, which was the great theatre of the war, became a fertile field. We even crossed the Saint Lawrence River and established opposite of Montreal, the lands of La Prairie, a place well chosen by God for to have done one of the most beautiful missions that has been seen in Canada. The French prepared the place were transported to build a village, which began in the year 1667.

While the Reverend Father Rafeix was occupied in having the lands cleared at La Prairie and was inviting new settlers to follow him. God was inviting the Natives to come to this place. This invitation took place when he wanted that Tonsahoten, with some others offered to come down from Oneida to conduct over the ice to Montreal with one of the missionaries who was to come back. Seven persons from Oneida laid the foundations of the whole Mission of Saint Francis Xavier. This Tonsahoten was constrained to come down to get some remedies, which he did not find in his own country. He was a Christian and was named Pierre. On going to war, he told his wife that she should take care of Father Bruyas, who had just arrived and that she should learn his prayer. Father Boquet sent by Father Fremin to give notice to Quebec of the (the rest of the note is illegible in the original manuscript). The illustrious Ganneaktena, wife of the one whom I have called Tonsahoten, was from the Cat Nation destroyed by the Iroquois. She was a slave, but she had a very good disposition and one well proper for Christianity. She served as guide to the six persons who came from Montreal. She said her prayers although she was not yet baptized. She had from that time done such great things for God that a recital of her great actions in particular is in the Relations, which was written elsewhere. This little band arrived at Montreal over the ice, where Father Rafeix met them some time after their arrival and invited them to go upon his lands. These poor barbarians, did not know not who were the priests of the Church and ceremonies, having entered the Church at Montreal were so greatly delighted and especially Ganneaktena that they no longer thought of the Iroquois where they came, Ganneaktena at once resolved to have her husband to remain and she attached herself to the French for all the rest of her days. These Holy thoughts increased during all the rest of the winter and while waiting a thorough instruction in the mysteries of our Holy Faith, and the grace of baptism, she spent the winter with the five others at La Prairie, living under the same roof as the French. This was but a simple shed of boards, upright and leaning one against the other in a ridge. As they knew that it was a time of peace, several came to the hunt in the region of Montreal, and halted at various places on the island, without any object. They did so every year during four years. They were thus dispersed in the woods while the land was preparing to receive them at La Prairie, where the spirit of God was guiding them all where they were assembled. We saw anew what had happened at Jerusalem when the Church was formed out of all the assembled nations. We saw in this little number of Natives, the men of different languages, one was of the Cat nation, the other was a Huron, some were freed Iroquois others Gandastogues (Hurons) and now the Mission is of more than ten or twelve different nations, which they speak all Iroquois.

1668

We will admire during the years to come the different of vocation, which God has used in order to gather up the nations who compose this Mission, and because the external vocation rather than the light of the Faith and the affections that God diffuses in the hearts of men, is what most strikes the senses and makes God known to the people, it will be well to speak elsewhere of some particular vocations.

It was in the year 1668 that all these Natives descended at Quebec, after news had been given to Monsignor the Bishop (Bishop Montmorency de Laval). While they were bringing this news, in the early spring, at the melting of the snows, other Oneida relatives of the six who had first come had come to the surrounding country where they hunted during the winter at La Prairie. The number rose to ten or twelve, who all together came down to Quebec about the end of the summer. The Reverend Father Rafeix introduced them to Father Chomonot, who hastened instructing them for they had already begun the practice of prayer at La Prairie. Thus the band was soon capable to receive baptism. Monsignor was the one who conferred this sacrament upon them and who thus laid the first stone of that spiritual building whose structure is admirable. The chief of the pious band was called Francis Xavier from the name of the whole Mission and his wife was named Catherine, a name that has become remarkable in her and is venerable in another Catherine who died in the Mission recently, in odour of sanctity. The ceremony being finished, they wished to detain Francis Xavier in the Mission of the Hurons, but God who has His own designs, took away from that man the intention of dwelling there. His wife would have voluntarily accepted the offer, if God had not chosen her to come to find the Holy Family at La Prairie. Our newly baptized returned in autumn and landed at La Prairie, where in the course of time they and several others have built a beautiful village. They spent the rest of the year in the same cabin that the French had built for them. They set out to go hunting at he beginning of winter that. They did not go far without finding any animals. While for the short time that they spent in the woods, for they went to the village on all the great feast days and especially at Christmas. They carried with them a little calendar in which feasts and Sundays were marked by the hand of the Father Rafeix who instructed them. Thus they were all filled with the grace of baptism, which they preserved even in the woods, being punctual in saying prayers, both morning and evening. The wintering became the rule of all the others who have followed, and who have since sanctified many Natives in the woods, where some have died there as predestined, where others have lived there like angels for a period of six months, where others have exposed themselves there for the Faith and have acted as apostles, preaching all winter to those who were not yet Christians.

1669

While our Natives were thus hunting, Father Rafeix had prepared the land and his good Christians having returned, he marked out their field for them after seeding was done. Francis Xavier built a cabin, which in future was to be the model for all the others, a cabin so blessed that it is the mother, as it were, of sixty others in the midst of which it stands and that the one who built it has become the Father, as it were, of the believers of whom there are now a very great number. There were as yet only two families, at most in this cabin, there was not one who was not recently baptized. Although the good sense of these new Christians so filled the woods round about here that several people came to visit them. Their reputation went even to the country of the Iroquois and was the source there of a thousand blessings, which God poured upon the infidels, at the same time they heard of the new Mission. There were many Natives who lived on the banks of the Saint Lawrence up the river in the direction of the Outaouaks. Curiosity drew these to La Prairie. Some came to it as agents of the demon to corrupt the others and yet they all found themselves caught by the nets of the Gospel, little by little, cabin-by-cabin and man-by-man. Thus it is that the beginnings of the Mission have been like the grain of mustard seed. These visitors, seeing the corn very fine, had the thought to remain there and build their cabins. The first cabin did not stay long alone, in less than a year there were four. Among others, we saw there that of an Oneida who was baptized in France, to whom the King gave his name, with a beautiful silver medal that he has always worn suspended to his neck.