the
Neutrals, the Hurons and the Iroquois together. In a large number of
these villages the Algonkin language was spoken. Farther away, it was
the prevailing tongue. In remote Algonkin tribes, even at that early
day, there were Christians who knelt, crossed their hands, turned their
eyes heavenward, and prayed to God morning and evening, and before and
after their meals; and the best mark of their faith was that they were
no longer wicked nor dishonest as they were before. So it was reported
to Lalemant by trustworthy Hurons who went every year to trade with
Algonkin nations scattered over the whole northern part of the
continent.

Ragueneau in the Relation of 1648 refers to Lake Erie as being almost
200 leagues in circuit, and precipitating itself by "a waterfall of a
terrible height" into Lake Ontario, or Lake Saint Louys.

The Aondironnons a tribe of the Neutrals living nearest to the Hurons
were treacherously attacked in their village by 300 Senecas, who after
killing a number carried as many as possible away with them as
prisoners. The Neutrals showed no open resentment but quietly prepared
to revenge themselves. A Christian Huron, a girl of fifteen, taken
prisoner by the Senecas, escaped from them and made her way to the
Neutral country, where she met four men, two of whom were Neutrals and
the others enemies. The latter wished to take her back to captivity; but
the Neutrals, claiming that within their country she was no longer in
the power of her enemies, rescued her and she returned in safety to Ste.
Marie on the Georgian Bay. These incidents were the prelude to the storm
which shortly afterward burst.

In 1650 the principal part of the Iroquois forces was directed against
the Neutrals. They carried two frontier villages, in one of which were
more than 1600 men, the first at the end of autumn, the second early in
the spring of 1651. The old men and children who might encumber them on
their homeward journey were massacred. The number of captives was
excessive, especially of young women, who were carried off to the
Iroquois towns. The other more distant villages were seized with terror.
The Neutrals abandoned their houses, their property and their country.
Famine pursued them. The survivors became scattered amongst far-off
woods and along unknown lakes and rivers. In wretchedness and want and
in constant apprehension of their relentless enemy, they eked out a
miserable existence.

The Journal (April 22, 1651