3. Suspicion Regarding the Black Robes. Calling Down the Thunderbirds, an Epidemic and the Terrors it Spread. Paradise and Hell. Jesuit Methods of Salvation for the Perishing. Danger to the Jesuits. A Sentence of Death and a Farewell Feast. Missionaries Amid Man-like Beasts. “The Narrow Gate of Paradise.” The Lives of Two Martyrs. Tortures and Deliverance

A life consisting of continuous wars with neighboring tribes and filled with real and imagined dangers had developed among the Native Americans a strict suspicion of anything that went beyond the limits of their everyday understanding. For a time, it could be suppressed by actions in which the Native Americans saw direct benefit to themselves, but then at any other occasion it could manifest itself with even greater force. The Jesuits in any case seemed to them strange men. Where did they come from and what did they want, the Native Americans asked themselves involuntarily. This was a mystery to them. From their actions the Native Americans could only guess that the black robes were great medicine men and could cause people harm or benefit. They were convinced that each people had its own medicine men, and the medicine men of enemy tribes brought all sorts of misfortunes upon them. Could not the black robes also have been sent to cause them harm?—This vague suspicion quickly found support among their own medicine men, who disliked the Jesuits most of all for their exposure of their incantations. Circumstances soon gave them the opportunity to practically prove their suspicion regarding the black robes. On account of a terrible drought, the corn planted by the Native Americans perished entirely. The medicine men constantly climbed onto roofs and wailed their incantations, summoning the “thunderbirds”; but the sky remained cloudless. Seeing all their efforts in vain, the medicine men then accused the Jesuits of this. A red cross stood before their hut, and the medicine men declared that it was this that frightened the “thunderbirds.” The Native Americans became agitated, and decided to cut down the cross. All the Jesuits’ exhortations were in vain, terrified of the desecration threatening the cross; the wild crowd stood firm. Then the Jesuits’ usual cleverness saved them. “You say,” said one of them, “that the red color of the cross frightens the thunderbirds. Then paint it white and see if the thunder will come.” The Native Americans complied and the cross was painted white; but still no thunderbirds appeared. The Jesuits took advantage of this opportunity. “Your spirits cannot help you,” they said; “and your medicine men deceive you with their lies. Now ask help from Him who created the world, and perhaps He will hear you.” To this the Jesuits added that if the Native Americans would abandon their sins and obey the true Great Spirit, they themselves would pray to Him for them. The Native Americans obeyed and did all that the black robes wished. Then the Jesuits organized several processions, celebrated nine masses to their principal patron, Saint Joseph, and, to their great joy, soon a heavy rain fell, which convinced the Native Americans of the power of the “medicine” of the black robes[1]. But fate was already preparing even greater troubles for them in the future.

Epidemics raged among the Native Americans quite frequently. The lack of cleanliness in their lives, irregular eating habits, the alternation of gluttony with terrible starvation—all gave conditions for the development of disease, and these sometimes devastated entire villages and even tribes. One such epidemic broke out among the Native Americans at the end of 1637. Death passed from one village to another and everywhere wrought devastation. The huts of the Native Americans became places of weeping and dying cries. All were seized by horror; only the black robes were not afraid of death.

They fearlessly visited the huts and everywhere comforted and calmed the despairing savages, giving them Christian last rites and baptizing the dying. By the dim fires in the huts sat gloomy figures of Native Americans wrapped in dirty hides. Some wailed over the dead, others gave forth dying cries. The Jesuits had some medicines and, as far as possible, relieved the suffering of the sick, but their chief concern was the salvation of their souls. “This life is short and miserable,” they said to the hopeless sick. “It is of no great importance whether we live or die.” And then they explained the future life, showing pictures of paradise and hell. The Native Americans readily understood the torments of hell, but did not value the bliss of paradise very highly. When the Jesuits asked them where they wished better to go, the Native Americans often answered in ways that confused the missionaries. “I wish to go where all my ancestors and relatives went,” they usually answered. “This paradise is good for the French,” said one; “but I wish to be among the Native Americans, because the French will give me nothing to eat when I come there.” “Which do you wish better to go to—paradise or hell?” asked a Jesuit of a dying Native American woman. “To hell, if, as you say, my children are there,” answered the unhappy mother. “And do they hunt in the sky, go to war and have feasts?” asked a dying warrior. “Oh no!” “Then I do not wish to go there; it is not good to be lazy,” answered the savage[2]. Those who answered satisfactorily to such questions were immediately baptized by the Jesuits, with the touching of a wet cloth or the dropping of a drop of water accompanied by sacred words.

Meanwhile the epidemic continued its devastating work. The Native Americans in despair resorted to all sorts of means to appease the spirit of the plague, offering it sacrifices of tobacco and roasted dogs. One medicine man, after fasting seven days, received a revelation that the plague would be driven away if straw scarecrows were placed on all the huts, and indeed all the huts were soon decorated with effigies. The Native Americans offered the Jesuits to place a scarecrow on their huts, but they declared that their cross protected them better than any scarecrow. The medicine men performed incantations, climbed on the huts, and cried out to the invisible spirit of plague: “If you want meat, go to our enemies; go to the Iroquois!” But all was in vain. Seeing the fruitlessness of all their means against the plague, the Native Americans then turned to the Jesuits. “What should we do so that your God might take pity on us?” they said to them. This occasion was favorable for the missionary work, and one of the missionaries, Fr. Brébeuf, immediately replied: “Believe in Him: keep His commandments; abandon your faith in dreams; take only one wife and be faithful to her; give up your superstitious celebrations; cease your riotous gatherings; do not eat human flesh; never sacrifice to demons, and make a vow that if God delivers you from this plague, you will build a chapel to offer Him thanksgiving and praise”[3]. The savages listened attentively to these conditions, but they seemed burdensome to them. After consultation among themselves, they decided to ask the Jesuits if they could not be satisfied with only building a chapel. But Brébeuf firmly rejected this proposal, and the matter came to nothing. In one village, however, the Native Americans accepted all the conditions. Stricken with horror, they were willing to make any promises if only to be delivered from the plague. Even the chief medicine man inclined toward the Jesuits: going through the streets, he loudly proclaimed that the God of the black robes was their chief and that therefore they should live according to His will[4].

The Jesuits triumphed and rejoiced at the success of the mission, but soon their joy turned to horror. There appeared among the Native Americans a medicine man who enjoyed unlimited influence among the savages and seemed to the Jesuits the very embodiment of Satan, which he himself considered himself to be. After several failed incantations, he began to accuse the black robes of causing the plague, and everything suddenly changed toward them. With the speed of lightning, a fatal idea spread through the Huron villages. The baptism which the Jesuits performed on the dying, which the Native Americans considered a healing medicine, they now began to consider a killing potion. Everything about the Jesuits now became an object of terror to the Native Americans. They had at their hut door a picture of the Last Judgment; to the Native Americans it now seemed like a potion: dragons and serpents appeared to them as demons of the plague, devouring Native Americans. On the top of a neighboring tree the Jesuits had a weathervane to determine the direction of the wind; the Native Americans looked upon it with horror and thought that it spread disease and death in all directions of the world. The very clocks, which had previously been objects of curiosity, became objects of terror, and the Jesuits had to stop them, as the Native Americans suspected that their striking announced death. The usual singing of the Jesuits at the performance of mass was considered hostile incantations spreading the plague[5]. If such suspicions had been directed at the Native American medicine men, the Native Americans would have quickly dealt with them; but the Jesuits seemed to them such sorcerers whom they feared. Therefore, they first began to oppose them passively and held nighttime councils. Boys began to throw sticks and stones at them when they approached the huts. The sick shut themselves in and did not let them in. But nothing could stop the Jesuits from their charity to the sick and instruction of the dying, especially children. Hearing through the cracks a sick child’s crying, they boldly pushed in and entered the hut; they asked to buy something, talked about hunting, war, anything but the plague and the sick child. Then, having quieted the suspicion somewhat, they asked to see the sick child and, feeling his pulse, as if by accident touched him with the corner of a cloth previously moistened with water, whispered the words of baptism—and the child’s salvation was accomplished. The Jesuits performed many such secret baptisms without arousing the suspicion of the adults, who forbade them to perform it. Once a young Huron woman was walking through the village carrying a sick child on her back. Two Jesuits approached her and while one of them occupied the woman with his prayer beads, the other secretly baptized the child[6]. But “the devil came into a rage that we had brought so many of these innocent infants to heaven,” said Lemercier[7]. The Native Americans’ suspicion of the Jesuits kept increasing; they held nighttime councils more frequently and spoke more boldly of the black robes destroying the people. Some said that the Jesuits had hidden a human body in their huts which had infected the land (a result of their perverted understanding of the Body of Christ offered in sacrifice during the performance of mass); others attributed the plague to a serpent; still others to a demon which the Jesuits supposedly carried in a gun they had; some said that the black robes had pierced a child with an awl in the forest to kill Huron children through sorcery; some suspected that the Jesuits had bewitched clothing which was the cause of the people’s misfortunes[8]. In August 1638, a general popular council was convened to discuss the situation. Councils were usually held at night by the light of fires. Native Americans gathered at this council from all the Huron tribes. “I never saw anything darker,” writes Jesuit Lemercier. They looked at each other like corpses, or like men who already felt the horror of death. When they spoke, they spoke only with sighs, recounting the sick and dead in their families. All this was to stir up the poison of rage against us[9]. The Jesuits were invited to the council, and there one after another the Native Americans began to accuse them of the ruin of the people. The Jesuits defended themselves and tried to explain the cause of the plague; but the more they defended themselves, the stronger the rage of the Native Americans burned against them, until finally they ceased to listen to their answers and with cries and threats demanded that they give up the bewitched clothing that was destroying their land. In vain the Jesuit said they had no such clothing. The noise and rage increased. “If you do not believe me,” said one of the most fearless and courageous missionaries, Jesuit Brébeuf, “then come into our house, search everything, and if you do not know which clothing is bewitched, take all our clothes and throw them in the lake.” Such determination by the Black Robe somewhat confused the savages, and this time the Jesuits avoided the threatening danger. The Native Americans ended the council and left the Jesuits in peace, although an old warrior, passing by Brébeuf, remarked to him: “If anyone of our boys were to crack your head open, we would say nothing against it.” And the missionary continued fearlessly to preach to the remaining gathering about the necessity of obeying the Great Spirit and the danger of offending Him[10].

Footnotes

[6] The Jesuits used all possible means to baptize children so that the parents would not notice, as they in no way agreed to voluntarily allow their baptism. Their reports are full of such cases. Two cases described by the Jesuit Le Mercier are of interest: “On the third day of May,” he recounts, Father Pierre Picard baptized a small child of two months in Anonataia, in apparent danger of death, without the notice of the parents, who would not have consented. He used the following method. Sugar does wonders for us. He said he wanted to give the child a little water sweetened with sugar to drink, and at the same time dipped his finger in it. When the child’s father began to suspect something and cried out to him not to baptize, he handed the spoon to the woman standing beside him and said to her: ‘give it to him yourself.’ She went to the child and found it asleep, and at that very moment Father Picard, under the pretext of looking to see if he was really sleeping, touched his face with his moistened finger and baptized him. Forty-eight hours later, the child departed to heaven. A few days before, this missionary used the same method to baptize a boy of six or seven years. His father, who was very ill, refused baptism several times; and when asked if he wished his son to be baptized, answered: no. ‘At least,’ said Father Picard, ‘you will not object to my giving him a little sugar.’ ‘No, but you must not baptize him.’ The missionary gave the child sugar once, then again; and at the third spoonful, before putting the sugar in water, he sprinkled drops on the child, pronouncing at the same time the words of the sacrament. A small girl watching him cried out: ‘Father, he is baptizing him.’ The child’s father was greatly alarmed, but the missionary said to him: ‘did you not see that I was only giving him sugar?’ The boy soon died afterward; but God showed His mercy toward his father, who is now in perfect health.’