were devoted to the Catholic soldiers, (Irish and German). The greater part of them took advantage of the occasion to approach the tribunal of penance and the holy table, on the solemn day of Pentecost.
The Ist and ad of June were passed in interviews with the Indian chiefs and in making my preparations for departure to go in search of and to meet the hostile bands in the interior country. My plan seemed to astonish them and they hardly concealed from me the dangers that were involved in it, even touching the security of my scalp. I answered them simply, " the little children, in all their innocence, are the little pets, the little angels of the Great Spirit on earth. Before the image of the Holy Virgin Mary, the good Mother and the great protectress of all nations, six lamps are burning night and day, through all the duration of my journey. In St. Louis and in other places, more than a thousand little children are imploring every day, before these burning lamps, the favor and protection of heaven upon all the band who accompany me. I intrust myself with all my fears to the hands of the Lord." All of them then, as by one impulse, raised their hands toward heaven crying out " Oh! that is fine! We will go with you! When shall we start? " " To-morrow, at sunrise! " June 3d. I said my mass early to recommend the undertaking to heaven. A short account of my travelling companions will not, I trust, be inappropriate. Mr. Galpin, an old Indian trader, who has spent thirty years in the country, a man of honesty and great experience, generously offered to accompany me in the capacity of interpreter, together with his old wife, a Sioux by birth, a convert to our holy religion and who has great influence among all the tribes of her nation. I will add only the names of the principal chiefs of my escort. Two Bears, head chief of the powerful tribe of the Yanktonnais, who is at the head of 700 lodges or families; a very remarkable man, from his great zeal for peace, his valor and his eloquence. He has solemnly