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As his influence was great among his people, Frontenac hoped that he might use him with success to bring about an accommodation. He placed three of the captives at the disposal of the Cayuga, who forthwith sent them to Onondaga with a message which the governor had dictated, and which was to the following effect: "The great Onontio, whom you all know, has come back again.
Onontio hath forgotten the fight in the night of storms, on the banks of the Yellow Wabash, when the sister of Ohquamehud was slain and his brother pierced by the knife of the accursed pale face, with the curling-hair." "Indian! I sought to save the maiden's life. I can show the scar I received in her defence. As for thy brother, I know naught of him.
Huttamoiden described to her with that particularity which marks the description of natural objects by an Indian, whose habits of life in the forest compel him to a close observation, the situation of the log-hut from which the child was taken, the hut itself before which leaped a mountain stream, the appearance of the unfortunate woman who was murdered, and the desperate resistance of the master of the cabin, who, at the time, was supposed to have perished in the flames, but was afterwards known by the name of Onontio as the scourge and terror of the tribe which had destroyed his family.
The great King has sent me to protect and defend you; but above all he has charged me to make you happy and unconquerable, by establishing among you the union which ought to prevail among brothers, children of one father, the great Onontio." Then he held out a prodigious wampum belt of six thousand beads: "Take this sacred pledge of his word.
The Indians near Pittsburgh, I have said, prayed the messenger of Onontio that they might keep their English smith and the prayer seems to have been abundantly answered, for Pittsburgh appears at first to be one vast smithy, so enveloped is it in the smoke of its own toil, so reddened are its great sky walls by its flaming forges, so filled is the air with the dust from the bellows, and so clangorous is the sound of its hammers.
The Onondagas, led by Garacontié, a friend of the Jesuits, made overtures of peace, which were favourably heard by "Onontio," as the governor of Canada had been called ever since the days of Montmagny, whose name, "Great Mountain," the Iroquois so translated.
"My brothers, the white men, have asked to speak with the chiefs of the Cayugas," said the spokesman, a wrinkled old warrior, whom Menard recognized as one of the speakers at the Long House. "The Big Buffalo is on his way to the stone house of Onontio. He is far from the trail. His muskets and his knives and hatchets were taken from him by the Onondagas and were not returned to him.
"The son of Onontio wanders far," he said. "It is a march of many days from here to Quebec." "It is, Tayoga," replied St. Luc gravely, "but the dominions of the King of France, whom Onontio serves, also extend far." It was a significant speech, and Robert glanced at Tayoga, but the eyes of the young chief were veiled.
It was of the last necessity to revive the dashed spirits of the Canadians and the troops; and action, prompt and bold, was the only means of doing so. He resolved, therefore, to take the offensive, not against the Iroquois, who seemed invulnerable as ghosts, but against the English; and by striking a few sharp and rapid blows to teach both friends and foes that Onontio was still alive.
By these tokens, the nine tribes declared that they came to learn wisdom of the Iroquois and the English; to wash off the war-paint, throw down the tomahawk, smoke the pipe of peace, and unite with them as one body. "Onontio is drunk," such was the interpretation of the fourth wampum belt; "but we, the tribes of Michillimackinac, wash our hands of all his actions.
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