I must set down here what I saw them do on the twelfth of February. As I was reciting my hours, toward evening, the sorcerer began to talk about me: _aiamtheou_, "He is making his prayers;" then, pronouncing some words which I did not understand, he added: _Niganipahau_, "I will kill him at once." The thought occurred to me that he was speaking of me, seeing that he hated me for several reasons, as I shall state in the proper place; but especially because I tried to show that all he did was mere nonsense and child's play. Just as I was thinking that he wanted to take my life, my host said to me, "Hast thou not some powder that kills men?" "Why?" I asked. "I want to kill some one," he answered me. I leave you to imagine whether I finished my prayers without any distraction; for I knew very well that they were disinclined to kill any of their own people, and that the sorcerer had threatened me with death [74] some days before,--although only in jest, as he told me afterward; but I did not have much confidence in him. Now seeing these people bustling about, I retired within myself, supplicating our Lord to help me, and to take my life at the moment and in whatever manner would be pleasing to him. Nevertheless, to better prepare myself for this sacrifice, I wished to learn if they had me in mind, and so I asked them where the man was that they wished to kill; they answered me that he was in the neighborhood of Gaspé, more than a hundred leagues away from us. I began to laugh, for in truth I had never dreamed that they would undertake to kill a man a hundred leagues away. I inquired why they wished to take his life. They answered that this man was a Canadian sorcerer, who, having had some trouble with ours, had threatened him with death and had given him the disease from which he had suffered so long, and which was going to consume him in two days, if he did not prevent the stroke by his art. I told them that God had forbidden murder, and that we never killed people; that did not prevent them [75] from pursuing their purpose. My host, foreseeing the great commotion which was about to take place, said to me, "Thou wilt have the headache; go off into one of the other cabins near by." "No," said the sorcerer, "there will be no harm in his seeing what we do." They had all the children and women go out, except one who sat near the sorcerer; I remained as a spectator of their mysteries, with all the Savages of the other cabins, who were summoned. All being seated, a young man comes bearing two pickets, or very sharply-pointed sticks; my host prepares the charm, composed of little pieces of wood shaped at both ends like a serpent's tongue, iron arrow-points, pieces of broken knives, bits of iron bent like a big fishhook, and other similar things;