, and the next ship from France brought a letter
from the colonial minister declaring that the Outagamies must be
effectually put down, and that "his Majesty will reward the officer who
will reduce, or rather destroy, them."[339]

The authorities of Canada were less truculent than their masters at the
court, or were better able to count the costs of another war. Longueuil,
the provisional governor, persisted in measures of peace, and the Sieur
de Lignery called a council of the Outagamies and their neighbors, the
Sacs and Winnebagoes, at Green Bay. He told them that the Great Onontio,
the King, ordered them, at their peril, to make no more attacks on the
Illinois; and they dutifully promised to obey, while their great chief,
Oushala, begged that a French officer might be sent to his village to
help him keep his young warriors from the war-path.[340] The pacific
policy of Longueuil was not approved by Desliettes, then commanding in
the Illinois country; and he proposed to settle accounts with the
Outagamies by exterminating them. "This is very well," observes a
writer of the time; "but to try to exterminate them and fail would be
disastrous."[341]

The Marquis de Beauharnois, who came out as governor of Canada in 1726,
was averse to violent measures, since if an attempt to exterminate the
offending tribe should be made without success, the life of every
Frenchman in the West would be in jeopardy.[342] Lignery thought that if
the Outagamies broke the promises they had made him at Green Bay, the
forces of Canada and Louisiana should unite to crush them. The
missionary, Chardon, advised that they should be cut off from all
supplies of arms, ammunition, and merchandise of any kind, and that all
the well-disposed western tribes should then be set upon them,--which,
he thought, would infallibly bring them to reason.[343]

The new governor, perplexed by the multitude of counsellors, presently
received a missive from the King, directing him not to fight the
Outagamies if he could help it, "since the consequences of failure would
be frightful."[344] On the other hand, Beauharnois was told that the
English had sent messages to the Lake tribes urging them to kill the
French in their country, and that the Outagamies had promised to do so.
"This," writes the governor, "compels us to make war in earnest. It will
cost sixty thousand livres."[345]

Dupuy, the intendant, had joined with Beauharnois in this letter to the
minister; but