While this correspondence was going on, both governors were doing their best to win over the Indians of the lake region. If these could be drawn into an alliance with the Iroquois, so that their trade should pass through the Iroquois country to the English, not only would the French lose the most profitable part of their traffic, but their political position would be seriously endangered, in fact would become untenable. There was much in the arrangement from a business point of view to recommend it to the savage mind. The English paid better prices for goods, and gave their merchandise at lower prices; and, if their traders once had free access to the lake region, the effects of their more liberal dealing would be felt in every wigwam. Against this highly practical consideration was to be set a certain hereditary distrust of the Iroquois on the part of the Huron and Ottawa tribes, to which might be added the personal influence of the French missionaries and a few noted French leaders. The situation was for some time a most doubtful one; but in the end it was not the economic argument that triumphed. In the winter of 1685-6, a Dutchman, named Johannes Rooseboom, had set out from Albany, by Dongan's directions, with a party of armed traders in eleven canoes, filled with English goods, to trade in the Upper Lakes. There was no resistance to their progress; and after trading most successfully, and to the great satisfaction of the Indians, they returned in safety. This was encouragement for a larger expedition the following year; so, in the fall of 1686, the same adventurer set out with a similar party in twenty canoes. On this occasion they were to winter with the Senecas and resume their journey in the spring, accompanied by fifty men, who were to come from Albany under the charge of a Scots officer named M'Gregory, and a band of Iroquois; the whole party to be under M'Gregory's command. The intention was to form a general treaty of trade and alliance with the tribes that hitherto had been under the domination of the French.