Page:Joutel's journal of La Salle's last voyage, 1684-7 (IA joutelsjournalof00jout).pdf/64

 Monsieur de la Sale undertook into the Gulf of Mexico, to the Country of Louisiana, to finish what he had projected at his former Voyage, had not the Treachery of his own Men cut him off. This Journal of Monsieur Joutel, whereof Monsieur Tonty makes mention in the Book that has been printed of the last Discoveries in America, Folio 319, has this peculiar, that it exactly contains what hapned to Monsieur de la Sale, Day by Day, in that fatal Voyage, since his Departure from Rochelle to his death, and till the Return of his Brother Monsieur Cavelier the Priest, Monsieur Cavelier his Nephew, the Reverend Father Anastasius, the Recolet, and the said Sieur Joutel, who in Order to return to France, took that long Journey by Land, from the Gulf of Mexico to Canada, being a Tract of above 800 Leagues. Many Adventures of all Sorts, most of which are Tragical, will please the curious Reader; and above all he will admire the Protection of Divine Providence, in Conducting and Preserving that small Company throughout those vast Regions, and among so many barbarous Nations.

We do not here pretend to Criticise upon the Work of Father Hennepin, or that of Monsieur Tonty; but even their own Favourers cannot take it ill, that this Author does not sometimes say as they do; that he plainly delivers what he saw, and that he exposes to publick View all the Truths he was an Eye Witness to, without magnifying or inventing. It is nevertheless true, that they may be all excus'd as to some Particulars; Father Hennepin and Monsieur Tonty may have seen some Things, that did not come to the Knowledge of Monsieur Joutel; but there is a Fact of great Consequence in the History of Monsieur de la Sale, which must not be pass'd over in Silence. It is, that Monsieur Tonty, in his Book affirms, that Monsieur de la Sale at length found the Mouth of the Missisipi, and Monsieur Joutel asserts the contrary, and says, that is so far from being true, that during his last Progress towards the Cenis, when the said Sieur Joutel was with him, and had