duties; say my early morning mass and recite my breviary. They had the very thing for me - a poor cellar (fifteen feet square) built of hewn timbers and covered with earth and long abandoned. It was serving as a junk shed for all the community and was full of rags, pieces of rusted iron, chips, planks, etc. This was all cleared away and the place swept out. My little effects were quickly transported thither, and in less than an hour I took possession, without the least doubt that I would spend several agreeable days there in the instruction of the Indians, and several tranquil nights in reposing after the fatigues and the great heats of the day. I had a long conference with the chiefs and their subjects concerning the motives of my visit; I answered all their questions, and it was prolonged well into the night. At last I said prayer with my new community, we smoked one last calumet together, and then every one, thanking me joyfully for my presence, withdrew to give himself up to repose under his own roof.
Worn out by the heat of the day and the fatigues of the journey, I expected to enjoy a good sleep. I had reckoned without my hosts. I had been perhaps ten minutes in bed and was almost asleep, when I was awakened with a start. The dugout was swarming with famished rats; they came and laughed in my very face. Night is their particular domain and they make the best use they can of it in their own behalf. They carried on at a shocking rate. They were rummaging all my bags of provisions, and were about to begin in earnest the transportation of such of their contents as suited their purposes into their caves, when I stopped
them short. To prevent the depredations of the rats, I hung my sacks to the posts of my mansard out of reach of any attempts on the part of these highwaymen. During this labor I felt myself assailed by another enemy, the flea. If he is not so formidable as the rat, he is more importunate and he attaches himself to his prey in a most tenacious man ģer. Often one is deceived into the consoling belief that he
has put his finger upon him, but "he is not there." To 81