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Until October they seem to have laboured in different settlements, Viel at Toanche, a short distance from Penetanguishene Bay, Sagard at Ossossane, near Dault's Bay, an indentation of Nottawasaga Bay, and Le Caron at Carhagouha. It does not appear that they were able to make much of an impression on the savages, though they had the satisfaction of some baptisms. The Recollets were discouraged.
Some years later, the tribe de l'Ours occupied fourteen villages, with thirteen missions under the charge of the Jesuits. The whole mission, called Immaculate Conception, had its principal seat at Ossossané, which had replaced Carhagouha, mentioned by Champlain. The French called it La Rochelle. Ossossané was the nearest village of the Iroquois territory.
Champlain observed, in 1615, that there were eighteen bourgades or villages, of which he mentions five, namely: Carhagouha, Toanché, Carmeron, Tequenonquiayé and Cahiagué. Cahiagué was the most important, and had two hundred huts; it was also the chief bourgade of the tribe called de la Roche. Four tribes of a common origin and a common language were living on the Huron peninsula.
The Petun sorcerers or medicine-men dreaded the influence of the grey-robed friar, regarded him as a rival, and caused his teachings to be derided. After an uncomfortable month Champlain and Le Caron returned to Carhagouha, where they remained until the 20th of May, and then set out for Quebec. When Le Caron reached Quebec on the 11th of July he found that his comrades had not been idle.
In the latter encampment Father Le Caron resided. On July 12th Father Le Caron celebrated mass and sang the Te Deum, after which the Indians planted a cross near the small chapel which had been erected under Champlain's direction. The reverend father occupied a hut within the palisade which formed the rampart of the village, and he spent the fall and winter with the Hurons of Carhagouha.
Champlain, his expedition ended, returned to Huronia and remained there until the middle of January, when he and Le Caron set out on a visit to the Petun or Tobacco Nation, then dwelling on the southern shore of Nottawasaga Bay, a two-days' journey south-west of Carhagouha. There had been as yet no direct communication between the French and the Petuns, and the visitors were not kindly received.
It was situated near the lake Ouentaron, now lake Simcoe, at the northern extremity, near the small town of Orillia. The Jesuits established a mission here, and their principal residence was on the right shore of a small river called the Wye, near Penetanguishene. The remains of a fort built there in 1639 could be seen a few years ago. Cahiagué was distant from Carhagouha fourteen leagues.
Early in 1624 he had written to Father Piat hoping that he might live and die in his Huron mission at Carhagouha. There is no record of his sojourn in Huronia during the winter 1624-25.
Next, he went to Carmaron, a league distant, and then to Tonagnainchain and Tequenonquihayc; till at length he reached Carhagouha, with its triple palisade thirty-five feet high. Here he found Le Caron. The Indians, eager to do him honor, were building for him a bark lodge in the neighboring forest, fashioned like their own, but much smaller.
At another village, called Carhagouha, some distance farther west, the explorer found the Recollet friar Le Caron, who had accompanied him from France only a few months before as above mentioned. And here, on the 12th of August, 1615, Le Caron celebrated, in Champlain's presence, the first mass ever heard in the wilderness of western Canada.
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