The warnings and assurances of the Paracoussi were sufficiently enforced by this instance of the hostility of the red-men. But the necessity of securing all the supplies they might possibly procure from the natives, either through their own artifices or because of the apprehension for their chiefs, caused our Frenchmen to linger at the village of Utina. They were determined to wait the full period of four days which they had assigned themselves. In this period they saw the Paracoussi more than once. At each interview his admonitions were delivered with increased solemnity. They found his chiefs less and less accommodating at every interview. The piles of grain at the council-house increased slowly. Occasionally an Indian might be seen to enter and cast the contents of his little basket among the rest. The Frenchmen endeavored to persuade the chiefs to furnish men to carry the grain to their vessel, but this was flatly denied. Resolved, finally, to depart, each soldier was required to load himself with a sack as well filled as it was consistent with his strength to bear. This was slung across his shoulder, and, in this way, burdened with food for other mouths as well as their own, and carrying their matchlocks besides, the Frenchmen prepared to depart, on the morning of the 27th July, 1565, from the village of Utina to the bark which they had left. It was a memorable day for our adventurers. In groups, scornfully smiling as they beheld the soldiers staggering beneath their burdens, the chiefs assembled to see them depart from the village. Alphonse D'Erlach beheld the malignant triumph which sparkled in their eyes. "We shall not be suffered to reach the bark in quiet;" was his remark to Ottigny. "Let me have the advance, Monsieur, if you please; I have dealt with the dogs before." To this Ottigny consented; and leading one of the divisions of the detachment, as at coming, D'Erlach prepared to take the initiate in a progress, every part of which was destined to be marked with strife. The immediate entrance to the village of the Paracoussi, the only path, indeed, by which our Frenchmen could emerge, lay, for nearly half a mile, through a noble avenue, the sides of which were densely occupied by a most ample and umbrageous forest. The trees were at once great and lofty, and the space beneath was closed up with a luxuriant undergrowth which spread away like a wall of green on either hand. D'Erlach remembered this entrance. "Here," said he to Ottigny, "Here, at the very opening of the path, our trouble is likely to begin. Let your men be prepared with matches lighted, and see that your fire is delivered only in squads, so that, at no time, shall all of your pieces be entirely empty."