Some Canadian writers have charged the English with instigating the massacre. I find nothing in contemporary documents to support the accusation. Denonville wrote to the minister, after the Rat's treachery came to light, that Andros had forbidden the Iroquois to attack the colony. Immediately after the attack at La Chine, the Iroquois sachems, in a conference with the agents of New England, declared that "we did not make war on the French at the persuasion of our brethren at Albany; for we did not so much as acquaint them of our intention till fourteen days after our army had begun their march." Report of Conference in Colden, 103. Canada lay bewildered and benumbed under the shock of this calamity; but the cup of her misery was not full. There was revolution in England. James II., the friend and ally of France, had been driven from his kingdom, and William of Orange had seized his vacant throne. Soon there came news of war between the two crowns. The Iroquois alone had brought the colony to the brink of ruin; and now they would be supported by the neighboring British colonies, rich, strong, and populous, compared to impoverished and depleted Canada. A letter of recall for Denonville was already on its way. [38] His successor arrived in October, and the marquis sailed for France. He was a good soldier in a regular war, and a subordinate command; and he had some of the qualities of a good governor, while lacking others quite as essential. He had more activity than vigor, more personal bravery than firmness, and more clearness of perception than executive power. He filled his despatches with excellent recommendations, but was not the man to carry them into effect. He was sensitive, fastidious, critical, and conventional, and plumed himself on his honor, which was not always able to bear a strain; though as regards illegal trade, the besetting sin of Canadian governors, his hands were undoubtedly clean. [39] It is said that he had an instinctive antipathy for Indians, such as some persons have for certain animals; and the coureurs de bois, and other lawless classes of the Canadian population, appeared to please him no better. Their license and insubordination distressed him, and he constantly complained of them to the king. For the Church and its hierarchy his devotion was unbounded; and his government was a season of unwonted sunshine for the ecclesiastics, like the balmy days of the Indian summer amid the gusts of November. They exhausted themselves in eulogies of his piety; and, in proof of its depth and solidity, Mother Juchereau tells us that he did not regard station and rank as very useful aids to salvation. While other governors complained of too many priests, Denonville begged for more. All was harmony between him and Bishop Saint-Vallier; and the prelate was constantly his friend, even to the point of justifying his worst act, the treacherous seizure of the Iroquois neutrals. [40] When he left Canada, the only mourner besides