Page:History of Iowa From the Earliest Times to the Beginning of the Twentieth Century Volume 1.djvu/110



and Foxes found themselves outnumbered and unable to force a passage through the enemy's country. As night was approaching, their losses being heavy, the command was given to retreat. As the fleet turned back and attempted to ascend the river, the Mascoutines left the shelter of the woods and from the water's edge sent a shower of arrows into the disordered enemy. Pushing their canoes out into the river, the Mascoutines continued the conflict. Beset on all sides by superior numbers, the invaders made a heroic fight for their lives; but one by one they fell before the enraged Mascoutines, who seized their canoes and capsized them, tomahawking the occupants as they struggled in the water. In the darkness that ensued a few of the Sacs and Foxes escaped in their canoes; but three-quarters of the army was sunk beneath the Mississippi.

When La Salle descended the Mississippi Valley in 1680, he found this tribe still in that vicinity. The Mascoutines, displeased with the presence of the white men, sent emissaries to the Illinois to influence them to join in resistance. Ninety-eight years later they are mentioned as attending a council when Colonel George Rogers Clark led a party into that region. Little more is known of the Mascoutines in later times, save that they lived near where Muscatine now stands and that the city derives its name from them.

It is supposed that as they became weakened by frequent wars, the remnants of the once powerful tribe were merged with some other nation, as they had disappeared before the white settlers came to Iowa.

THE IOWAS

We first hear of the Iowa Indians in 1690 when they were found in the vicinity of the great lakes. Their noted chief, Man-haw-gaw, was then at the head of the tribe and under his leadership they migrated westward. They