Page:History of the Ojibway Nation.djvu/151

Rh Ojibways who had resided on this island, and who occupied the surrounding shores of the lake, now traded at this establishment, and they learned to pitch their lodges once more on the spot which they had on a previous occasion so suddenly evacuated.

Many, it is true, had been drawn back to Sault Ste. Marie, Mackinaw, and even further east, to visit the spots which the feet of their ancestors had once trodden, and on which they had left their bones to moulder and decay. Yet those that remained still formed a formidable body numbering many hundreds of warriors and hunters, and their trade for many years made the post located on the island of their ancient town, a most important and lucrative one.

At this time it is said that the French worked the copper mines on Lake Superior extensively, and doubtless many, if not all of the signs which are at the present day being discovered by the American miners, are the remains of the former works of these old French pioneers. When the British subsequently conquered this section of country in 1763, the Indians state that the French miners carefully covered the mines which they had been working, so that their conquerors might not have the advantage of their discoveries.

The first old French "Fort" at La Pointe was not maintained many years before a bloody murder was enacted within its walls, which resulted in its final dismantling and evacuation. The clerk or trader in charge was named Joseph. He passed his last winter there with his wife, two children, and with but one Canadian "Coureur du Bois." This man, it appears from his after confession, had conceived an unlawful passion for his master's wife, and he took occasion one morning when the unsuspecting Joseph had gone to shoot ducks in an adjacent pond, to press his suit to the wife, who, however, threatened to in-