great stationary tribes of the lakes; and of these none remained but the
Iroquois,--the destroyers of the rest, among whom, indeed, was a field
which might stimulate their zeal by an abundant promise of sufferings and
martyrdoms; but which, from its geographical position, was too much
exposed to Dutch and English influence to promise great and decisive
results. Their best hopes were now in the North and the West; and thither,
in great part, they had turned their energies.

We find them on Lake Huron, Lake Superior, and Lake Michigan, laboring
vigorously as of old, but in a spirit not quite the same. Now, as before,
two objects inspired their zeal, the "greater glory of God," and the
influence and credit of the order of Jesus. If the one motive had somewhat
lost in power, the other had gained. The epoch of the saints and martyrs
was passing away; and henceforth we find the Canadian Jesuit less and less
an apostle, more and more an explorer, a man of science, and a politician.
The yearly reports of the missions are still, for the edification of the
pious reader, stuffed with intolerably tedious stories of baptisms,
conversions, and the exemplary deportment of neophytes; for these have
become a part of the formula; but they are relieved abundantly by more
mundane topics. One finds observations on the winds, currents, and tides
of the Great Lakes; speculations on a subterranean outlet of Lake
Superior; accounts of its copper-mines, and how we, the Jesuit fathers,
are laboring to explore them for the profit of the colony; surmises
touching the North Sea, the South Sea, the Sea of China, which we hope ere
long to discover; and reports of that great mysterious river of which the
Indians tell us,--flowing southward, perhaps to the Gulf of Mexico,
perhaps to the Vermilion Sea,--and the secrets whereof, with the help of
the Virgin, we will soon reveal to the world.

The Jesuit was as often a fanatic for his order as for his faith; and