ST. LOUIS OF THE ILLINOIS.

LOUISIANA.--ILLNESS OF LA SALLE.--HIS COLONY ON THE ILLINOIS.--
TOUT ST. LOUIS.--RECALL OF FRONTENAC.--LE FEVRE DE LA BARRE.
--CRITICAL POSITION OF LA SALLE.--HOSTILITY OF THE NEW GOVERNOR.
--TRIUMPH OF THE ADVERSE FACTION.--LA SALLE SAILS FOR FRANCE.


Louisiana was the name bestowed by La Salle on the new domain of the
French crown. The rule of the Bourbons in the West is a memory of the
past, but the name of the Great King still survives in a narrow corner of
their lost empire. The Louisiana of to-day is but a single State of the
American republic. The Louisiana of La Salle stretched from the
Alleghanies to the Rocky Mountains; from the Rio Grande and the Gulf to
the farthest springs of the Missouri. [Footnote: The boundaries are laid
down on the great map of Franquelin, made in 1684, and preserved in the
Depot des Cartes of the Marine. The line runs along the south shore of
Lake Erie, and thence follows the heads of the streams flowing into Lake
Michigan. It then turns north-west, and is lost in the vast unknown of the
now British Territories. On the south it is drawn by the heads of the
streams flowing into the Gulf, as far west as Mobile, after which it
follows the shore of the Gulf to a little south of the Rio Grande, then
runs west, north-west, and finally north along the range of the Rocky
Mountains.]

La Salle had written his name in history; but his hard-earned success was
but the prelude of a harder task. Herculean labors lay before him, if he
would realize the schemes with which his brain was pregnant. Bent on
accomplishing them, he retraced his course, and urged his canoes upward
against the muddy current. The party were famished. They had little to