spirit, the fever of exploration was still strong upon him; and he valued the position he had attained only as a stepping-stone to the realization of his life-long dream.
La Salle's second return visit to France. So, in the autumn of 1677, leaving his fort and seigniory in charge of a trusted lieutenant, La Forest, who was also one of his partners in the proposed fur-trade, La Salle sailed again for France. There, lodged modestly in a rather obscure quarter of Paris, he renewed the friendships and associations which he had formed during his previous visit; and added to them by making new and valuable friends. Among these were the Marquis de Seigneley, the Prince de Conti, La Motte de Sussière, and last but not least, Henri de Tonti, thenceforth his foremost companion in his Western labors.[1] La Salle also received from the King a royal patent authorizing him to explore and occupy the Mississippi country, "through which, to all appearances, a way may be found to Mexico." This patent, confirmatory of that granted him in 1675, imposed upon him the erection and maintenance of such forts as he might deem necessary, and gave him a monopoly for five years of the trade in buffalo hides. The whole expense was to be borne (as was the custom of the monarchs of that day, in granting lands which they did not own, and the privileges which such grants carried with them) by the grantee. The fur-trade of the Montreal colony was not to be interfered with; nor did the patent include any provision or encouragement of the industrial or colonization scheme which had fully taken
- ↑ Capt. Tonti (or Tonty, as he signed his name in its Gallicized form) was an Italian (the son of the financier who instituted that form of life-insurance known as the Tontine), an ex-officer in the Sicilian wars, where, by the explosion of a grenade, he lost one of his hands. This loss was supplied, in some measure, by an artificial hand of iron, or some other metal, over which he always wore a glove, and the weight of which was, in one or two instances at least, felt by the savages who tried to intimidate him. Tonti's name will survive in history as that of La Salle's most faithful and courageous friend and lieutenant, and one who, by reason of his noble qualities is entitled to our admiration and respect. See also Parkman's La Salle (Champlain edit., i, 129).
