ambassadors of peace. The destruction of the Mohawk towns had produced a deep effect, not on that nation alone, but also on the other four members of the league. They were disposed to confirm the promises of peace which they had already made; and Tracy had spurred their good intentions by sending them a message that, unless they quickly presented themselves at Quebec, he would hang all the chiefs whom he had kept prisoners after discovering their treachery in the preceding summer. The threat had its effect: deputies of the Oneidas, Onondagas, Cayugas, and Senecas presently arrived in a temper of befitting humility. The Mohawks were at first afraid to come: but in April they sent the Flemish Bastard with overtures of peace; and in July, a large deputation of their chiefs appeared at Quebec. They and the rest left some of their families as hostages, and promised that, if any of their people should kill a Frenchman, they would give them up to be hanged. * They begged, too, for blacksmiths, surgeons, and Jesuits to live among them. The presence of the Jesuits in their towns was in many ways an advantage to them; while to the colony it was of the greatest importance. Not only was conversion to the church justly regarded as the best means of attaching the Indians to the French, and alienating them from the English; but the Jesuits living in the midst of them could influence even those whom they could not convert, soothe rising jealousies, * Lettre du Père Jean Pierron, de la Compagnie de Jésus, escripte de la Motte (Fort Ste. Anne) sur le lac Champlain, le 12me d’aoust. 1667 counteract English intrigues, and keep the rulers of the colony informed of all that was passing in the Iroquois towns. Thus, half Christian missionaries, half political agents, the Jesuits prepared to resume the hazardous mission of the Iroquois. Frémin and Pierron were ordered to the Mohawks, Bruyas to the Oneidas, and three others were named for the remaining three nations of the league. The troops had made the peace; the Jesuits were the rivets to hold it fast; and peace endured without absolute rupture for nearly twenty years. Of all the French expeditions against the Iroquois, that of Tracy was the most productive of good. CHAPTER XII. 1665-1672. PATERNAL GOVERNMENT. _Talon.--Restriction and Monopoly.--Views of Colbert.--Political Galvanism.--A Father of the People._