From Joliet, who was well entertained at Frontenac, La Salle heard of the discovery of the Mississippi; and at once conceiving vast plans for the colonisation of the south-west, he again hastened to France and obtained a royal commission for the perfecting the discovery of the Mississippi, together with the monopoly of the trade in buffalo hides. The purpose of this visit accomplished, La Salle lost no time in returning to America, provided with men and abundant stores, and accompanied by Chevalier Tonti, an Italian soldier, as his lieutenant. It was autumn when he returned; and before winter, he had built a wooden canoe of ten tons, the first that ever sailed into Niagara River, and thus conveyed part of his company to Tonawanta Creek, not far from the falls at the foot of Lake Erie, a spot which he had selected for the purpose, and here he commenced building a sailing-vessel of sixty tons burden, which he called “The Griffin.” While the ship was building, a trading house was established at Niagara, where La Salle collected furs from the Indian traders; and Tonti and the Franciscan Father Hennepin, who was attached to the enterprise, ventured among the Senecas, with whom they formed amicable relationships. On August 7th, 1679, amid a salvo of cannon, the chanting of the _Te Deum_, and the astonishment of the assembled Indians, “The Griffin” was launched, the first civilised vessel that ever ploughed the waters of Lake Erie. She bore La Salle, Tonti, and Hennepin, besides sailors, boatmen, hunters and soldiers, amounting in all to sixty persons. Leaving Lake Erie, they entered the strait “Detroit,” at the head of the lake, and passing through a little lake which they called St. Clair, entered Lake Huron by a second strait, and navigating that inland sea, reached Lake Michigan by the Straits of Mackinaw, where La Salle planted a colony, and thence, after a voyage of twenty days, to Green Bay, thus being the first to traverse that which is now a great highway of commerce. From this point, after despatching his vessel back to Niagara, with a valuable cargo of furs, ordering her to return immediately to the head of Lake Michigan with provisions and supplies, he and his company repaired in birch-bark canoes to the appointed place of rendezvous, stopping by the way at the mouth of the St. Joseph, then called the Miami, where Allouez had already established a Jesuit mission, and here they built a fort called the Post of the Miamis. Of the Griffin came no tidings; and weary of waiting, La Salle resolved to employ himself in exploring the Illinois. Ten men were left to guard the fort, and La Salle, Hennepin, and the rest, it now being the depth of winter, penetrated to the banks of Lake Peoria, where was an Indian village. Four days’ journey below Lake Peoria, they built a second fort, which, as expressive of their disappointment in receiving no tidings of the Griffin, and the general depression, was called _Crevecœur_.