“As I was leaving Lake Alemepigon [Nepigon], I made in June all the presents necessary to prevent the savages carrying their beavers to the English. I have met the Sieur de la Croix, with his two comrades, who gave me your despatches, in which you demand that I omit no step for the delivery of your letters to the Sieur Chouart at the River Nelson. To carry out your instructions Monsieur Péré will have to go himself,[509] the savages having all at that time gone into the wilderness to gather their blueberries. The Sieur Péré will have left in August, and during that month will have delivered your letters to the said Sieur Chouart.[510] “It remains for me to assure you that all the savages of the north have great confidence in me, and this makes me promise you that before two years have passed not a single savage will visit the English at Hudson’s Bay. This they have all promised, and have bound themselves thereto by the presents which I have given or caused to be given. “The Klistinos, Assenepoualacs, Sapiniere, Opemens Dacheliny, Outouloubys, and Tabitibis, who comprise the nations who are west of the Sea of the North, having promised next spring to be at the fort which I have constructed near the River à la Maune, at the end of Lake Alemepigon,[511] and next summer I shall construct one in the country of the Klistinos, which will be an effectual barrier.... It is necessary, to carry out my promises, that my brother[512] should, in the early spring [of 1685], go up again, with two canoes loaded with powder, lead, fusils, hatchets, tobacco, and necessary presents.” Durantaye, Du Lhut, and Nicholas Perrot left Mackinaw with one hundred and fifty Frenchmen and about five hundred Indians[513] to join De la Barre’s army; and they had not been six hours at Niagara, on the 6th of September, before orders were received that their services were not needed, as the French troops were suffering from sickness, and a truce had been made with the Iroquois.[514] Du Lhut and the other Frenchmen slowly returned to their posts, and when the new governor (Denonville) arrived, he wrote to De la Durantaye at Mackinaw, and sent orders to Du Lhut, who was at a great distance beyond, to inform him of the number of allies he could furnish in case of a war against the Iroquois.