For the shame of this disgraceful peace La Barre was recalled to France and the Marquis de Denonville, a brave soldier, sent out as governor. Unfortunately Denonville did not understand conditions in the colony. The Jesuit missionaries were commissioned to summon the Iroquois to a conference at Fort Frontenac, but when the deputies arrived they were seized, tortured, and fifty of them shipped to France by the King's order to serve as slaves on the royal galleys. It was an act of treachery heinous beyond measure and exposed the Jesuit missionaries among the Five Nations to terrible vengeance; but the Iroquois code of honor was higher than the white man's. "Go home," they warned the Jesuit missionary. "We have now every right to treat thee as our foe; but we shall not do so! Thy heart has had no share in the wrong done to us. We shall not punish thee for the crimes of another, tho' thou didst act as the unconscious tool. But leave us! When our young {164} men chant the song of war they may take counsel only of their fury and harm thee! Go to thine own people"; and furnishing him with guides, they sent him to Quebec. Though Denonville marched with his soldiers through the Iroquois cantons, he did little harm and less good; for the wily warriors had simply withdrawn their families into the woods, and the Iroquois were only biding their time for fearful vengeance. This lust of vengeance was now terribly whetted. Dongan, the English governor of New York, had been ordered by King James of England to observe the treaty of neutrality between England and France; but this did not hinder him supplying the Iroquois with arms to raid the French and secretly advising them "not to bury the war hatchet,--just to hide it in the grass, and stand on their guard to begin the war anew." [Illustration: FORT FRONTENAC AND THE ADJACENT COUNTRY] Nor did the treaty of neutrality prevent the French from raiding Hudson Bay and ordering shot in cold blood any French bushrover who dared to guide the English traders to the country of the Upper Lakes. In addition to English influence egging on the Iroquois, the treachery of the Huron chief, The Rat, lashed the vengeance {165} of the Five Nations to a fury. He had come down to Fort Frontenac to aid the French. He was told that the French had again arranged peace with the Iroquois, and deputies were even now on their way from the Five Nations. "Peace!" The old Huron chief was dumbfounded. What were these fool French doing, trusting to an Iroquois peace? "Ah," he grunted, "that may be well"; and he withdrew without revealing a sign of his intentions. Then he lay in ambush on the trail of the deputies, fell on the Iroquois peace messengers with fury, slaughtered half the band, then sent the others back with word that he had done this by order of Denonville, the French governor. "There," grunted The Rat grimly, "I 've killed the peace for them! We 'll see how Onontio gets out of this mess."