Spring, Marquette proceeded on his way to his Indian friends, where he established a mission and started back, hoping to reach St. Ignace before he died. He failed to realize his desire, dying on the return trip near the present site of Ludington, Michigan.

Marquette and Joliet were followed in 1679 by the Chevalier, Robert de La Salle, with his faithful associate, Tonti, and the ever-present representative of the church, in this case Father Hennepin. It was the dream of La Salle to establish a chain of forts from Quebec on the St. Lawrence River around the Great Lakes and down the Mississippi valley to New Orleans on the Mississippi, by which the French would control the great commerce which he foresaw must be developed along those mighty water routes. In pursuance of his great scheme, he built a fort at the mouth of the St. Joseph River on the east shore of Lake Michigan which he called Fort Miami, from the name of the Indians in that vicinity. He then proceeded up the St. Joseph River to its headwaters, across a portage to the Kankakee, and down the Kankakee into the Illinois River, reaching Peoria Lake about the first of the year. Here, near the present site of Peoria, he built his second fort, which he named Creve Coeur (broken heart), in token of the misfortunes and disasters which had recently overtaken but had not overwhelmed him. Returning to Mon

treal to mend his broken fortunes, he prepared himself for his attempt to navigate the Mississippi River to its mouth, in which he finally succeeded, planting the banner of France at the mouth of the Father of Waters on April 9, 1682, on which day, by right of exploration, he claimed all of the territory drained by the great river in the name of his king, Louis XIV, after whom he called it the Territory of Louisiana. This established and constituted the basis of the French claim to practically all the territory in the United States between the Appalachian and the Rocky Mountains.

On his return to the Illinois country he was stricken en route with illness, which made it necessary for him to disembark at a point which is the present site of Natchez, Mississippi, where a rudely constructed fort, called Prud Homme, was erected for his protection. His arrival in Illinois was thus delayed until December, 1682. During his absence from Illinois the savage and hostile Iroquois Indians had dispersed the friendly and peaceful Illinois tribes along the river of that name and had destroyed the fort on Peoria Lake. This led La Salle to execute the plan he had contemplated for years, namely, the erection of a fort on the summit of Starved Rock, which rises to a height of 125 feet on the bank of the Illinois River near Utica. This fortification was the greatest structure erected by La Salle

in Illinois, and within a short time there was located within the sound of its guns 20,000 Illinois Indians, who came there for protection from the savage Iroquois.

Soon after the erection of the fort on Starved Rock, Fort St. Louis, so named in honor of his king, La Salle went to France to report his achievements to his monarch, who received him with great cordiality and arranged for him an expedition which was to sail from France to the mouth of the Mississippi in order to establish a colony there. Pursued by persistent misfortune, the expedition missed the mouth of the Mississippi and landed somewhere on the coast of Texas, where, after a few years of hardship and privation, his followers mutinied and he was foully assassinated by one of his own party early in 1687.

Soon after the death of La Salle the settlers of the upper Illinois were transplanted to the Mississippi River, the principal settlement being made on the Illinois shore just above the present site of Chester, which was named Kaskaskia, apparently to perpetuate the memory of Father Marquette's mission on the upper Illinois. It has been suggested that the settlement was made by men of La Salle's party on their return from the discovery of the mouth of the Mississippi in 1682, but there is nothing to substantiate this theory. It is more likely that the removal came about as

the culmination of the many disasters which attended the attempts of the French to make settlements on the upper Illinois, for about the time of the settlement of Kaskaskia on the upper Mississippi, Tonti, the associate of La Salle, is found in the extreme southern colonies along the Gulf of Mexico, showing that even that hardy adventurer had given up the idea of subduing or pacifying the implacable Iroquois Indians. Within a year after the settlement of Kaskaskia another settlement was made on the Illinois shore about four miles south of the present site of East St. Louis, which was called Cahokia, after a tribe of Indians in that vicinity. At about the same time a combined trading post and mission was established on the Ohio River in Illinois a short distance from the mouth of the Ohio, near the present location of Metropolis, which was called Fort Assumption, but later changed to Fort Massac, for which Massac County was named, the derivation of which is not just clear.

The dawn of the eighteenth century found these thriving French colonies located along the important waterways, and they were considered of enough importance in connection with the French occupation of the territory that a detachment of the colony at New Orleans was sent north in 1718 under Boisbriant to build an imposing fortress for their protection. This fort, named Chartres, was located on the Mississippi River

midway between Kaskaskia and Cahokia. At the time it was built it was the most imposing military structure on the continent, costing approximately one million dollars. Within its walls the flower of French society in New France was wont to gather, and the fame of its social functions spread even to Europe. In sharp contrast to the gay life at the fort was the humble life of the peasantry which it was supposed to protect. The male section of this population was made up largely of trappers who roamed the woods and navigated the streams in search of furs and peltries. There not being many French women for them to associate with, it was only natural that there should be considerable miscegenation with the natives, which was given the tacit approval of the church.

Although the rich, alluvial bottom lands of the valley they occupied constituted the most fertile portion of the earth's surface, the French were supremely indifferent to agriculture or anything connected with it. On the other hand, the English-speaking peoples east of the Alleghanies were attached to the quiet pursuit of farming, and, consequently, looked with longing eyes at the great Mississippi valley which was dominated by the French. This clash of opposing interests heralded the approach of the irrepressible conflict which finally resulted in the French and Indian War against England and the colonies which