The redskins loved the peaceful soldier of the cross and welcomed him, “as an angel from Heaven.” Easter time soon came, and a great service was held for the red men and their wives and children. First the priest presented the chiefs with gifts of wampum to attest his love and the importance of his mission, then he explained the doctrine of Christianity and his reason for journeying to this wild and distant land. “I cannot stay longer,” he said, in conclusion, “but the peace of God be with you.” The children of the forest listened to him with great joy and appreciation, and, at the conclusion of his address, begged him to return to them again. They escorted him to his canoe with great pomp and ceremony, many of the warriors accompanying him for thirty miles. Then they waved “good-bye” saying: “Come again to us, good father, for we love you right well. Come again, for you are truly a brother of the Great Spirit.” Alas! the good priest’s strength now began to fail him and he became so ill and weak that he had to be carried by his faithful attendants. The season was stormy, and, as the Frenchmen paddled northward towards Green Bay, they had to wait in the land-locked harbors of the St. Joseph River, the Kalamazoo, the Grand, and the Muskegon. The white-caps raged on Lake Michigan, so that it was not safe for the frail birch-bark canoe to venture upon the tossing waves. Poor Father Marquette! your journeys are almost over! Ill, weak, exhausted, the gentle priest had to be carried upon the shoulders of his faithful _couriers de bois_. “Take me to the shore,” he said, weakly. “Build me a cabin and let me there give up my soul to Christ. I cannot live much longer and it is well. God’s will be done.” Near the present city of Ludington, upon a plot of rising ground, the expiring Marquette selected a place to die. His companions made a rude, log cabin, laid him upon a bed of evergreens, over which were stretched his blankets, and, as the white-breasted woodthrush sang a soft cadence from the branch of the wild apple tree, the gentle soul of the explorer and Jesuit Missionary went to the Great Beyond. His rough boatmen clustered about him with tears in their eyes, and they have said that, as the noble man-of-God awaited Death, his countenance beamed and was aglow with the spark of a curious and brilliant radiance. Spring came. Some Huron Indians, whom Marquette had instructed at his mission at La Pointe, heard of his death and burial as they were returning from a hunt in the vast woods of northern Michigan. They sought the grave of this good man, whom they had so tenderly loved. With reverent hands they removed him from his forest sepulchre, carried him to their canoe, and started back to the little chapel which he had built at St. Ignace.