or incapable, neither very good nor very bad, very wise nor very foolish. Little that occurred to distinguish one commandant or one administration from another has found its way to record. In 1736, D'Artiguette, young, handsome, brave, and greatly beloved of his people, in an ill-considered attack upon the Chickasaws in their own country, after being wounded and his force exterminated, was captured by his savage enemies and perished at the stake. Macarty, the Frenchman with an Irish name (or the Irishman with a French commission, as the case may be) distinguished his administration of ten years by the reconstruction of Fort Chartres at a cost to his government of something like $1,000,000. Finding it in logs he left it in limestone, the most notable fortification on the continent. His successor, DeVilliers, while yet a major subordinate to Macarty, led from Fort Chartres an expedition to the headwaters of the Ohio, in 1754, and on the 4th day of July compelled the capitulation of Fort Necessity and its garrison commanded by Colonel George Washington of Virginia.

It would be interesting to review the character of these early colonists, the manner of their lives, their communistic cultivation of fields and pasturage of flocks, their general immunity from all thirst for wealth or appetite for power or ambition for distinction above their fellows, taking thought, perhaps, of "what they should eat, what they should drink and wherewithal they should be clothed," but surely of little else. It would be interesting to notice the many striking contrasts between this little community midway between the oceans and those colonies of the Atlantic coast with whose history (the more shame to us) we are more familiar. No sketch of this era can be complete, or even approach completeness, and leave unnoticed that heroic band of devoted priests, who, consecrating themselves to a hopeless task, reaped little where they sowed much; took up nothing where they laid down all, and yet who seldom stopped in their work to murmur of the folly of casting pearls before swine. All these things might be made interesting; but, in order to keep this paper within reasonable limits, I lightly pass over or wholly ignore many events belonging to this period.

The end soon came and with little warning to these dwellers in a land where even ill-news traveled slowly. That fateful September morning of 1759 on the far away Heights of Abraham had sealed their doom. Negotiations carried on still further away in point of distance and further yet removed from every thought of their placid minds, ended in the treaty of Paris, Feb 10, 1763, by which the land of the Illinois was made a part of the British empire and its people subjects of the British king. The formal transfer of the post was delayed by the difficulties thrown in the way by Pontiac, chief of the Ottawas and greatest of Indian generals, who thrice drove back the detachments of red coats sent to take possession of the settlements. October 10, 1765, nearly three years after the treaty stipulating their surrender, the British took possession of Fort Chartres and the Kaskaskia settlements (the last spots upon the continent to fly the white flag of the Bourbons) and finally turned down the last page of the history of "Illinois under the French." The king of France and of

Navarre could transfer their territory but not so lightly their allegiance. Repugnance to English rule, inherited from their fathers and fostered by generations of conflict, could not be dispelled by the bargains of diplomats and the proclamations of kings. Still ignorant of the terms of the treaty and the broad sweep of its provisions, many betook themselves to New Orleans, supposing lower Louisiana still within the French domain, while others passed across the Mississippi to St. Genevieve and St. Louis, only to learn that what had been withheld from the hand of the English king had been laid at the feet of another hereditary enemy, his Catholic majesty, the king of Spain. Still others, fortunate enough to possess the requisite means, found their way back to the mother country. A mere handful remained-few of them attempting more-and continued to remain, on and on, until submerged by the overwhelming tide of Anglo-Saxon immigration and until the site on which they had built crumbled away beneath them, a prey to successive floods of the insidious stream which had brought them hither. The name of Kaskaskia and the memories that cluster around it are all that are left us.

Kaskaskia and its environs seem a fitter field for the poet than for the historian. When some skilled hand worthy of the task shall weave into the sober warp of fact the softer threads and brighter colorings of romance, and do for Old Kaskaskia what has been done for Acadia, we shall gladly excuse the historian from his labors. We do not care to know the formal history of Acadia. We do not concern ourselves about the number or the names of its governors, civil or military, if such there were, nor seek to know the precise date of the founding of the "beautiful village of Grand Pré," the exact number of its inhabitants, the extent of its cultivated acres, the quantity of its agricultural products or the value of its fisheries. If these facts were ever ours they have long since escaped us and we make no effort to reclaim the fugitives; for we know the story of Evangeline and of Gabriel, of saintly Father Felician and sturdy Basil the Blacksmith, and what more do we care to know?

Comparing old Kaskaskia with Acadia as a field for poetic endeavor the setting seems as picturesque, the life as idylic, the souls as devout, the spirits as brave, the hearts as true, the end as tragic, the effacement as complete. They are all gone

"Scattered like dust and leaves when the mighty blasts of October

Seize them, and whirl them aloft and sprinkle them far o'er the ocean"

the soldier and his fortress; the priest and his people; the master and his slaves; the gold digger and his dreams; the hunter and his quarry; the trader and his traffic; the voyageur and his canoe; the cottager and his village; leaving no more impress upon the country or upon its institutions than was left by their fragile barks upon the broad bosom of the Mississippi. The work of Joliet and LaSalle alone endures-a priceless heritage, a legacy in perpetuity to all the ages.

Yes, it is a theme for the poet and not for the historian. Until another Longfellow shall arise to take in hand such naked facts as I have set before you, touch them with the magic wand of his sympathetic genius and clothe them in the graceful drapery of poetic thought and form, there will be no satisfactory rendering of the story of "Illinois Under the French."

CHICAGO-ORIGIN OF THE NAME OF THE CITY AND THE OLD PORTAGES.

(John F. Steward.)

The origin of the name of our city will probably never be settled to the satisfaction of all, notwithstanding the many proofs left us. We agree, however, that the natives gave descriptive names to all geographical localities, and that the region of our present city was given a significant name by them.

Few who speak any of the dialects of the Algonquin language remain, and not many more who knew the meanings of its limited Vocabulary. Fortunate it is that intelligent explorers left records that avail us much. It is my pleasure to number among my friends William Jones, a graduate of Harvard University, and having in his veins a deep strain of blood of the Fox branch of the Algonquins; from him I gather much information.

When came the first explorers the Miami branch occupied this region, and their names of our lakes and rivers were imitated by the French as best their tongues, untrained to the sounds so new to them, could do.

The name of our odorous river, and also of that into which we strive to turn its repulsive waters, the French spelt in ways as representative as to each making the attempt, seemed possible. The result, to us, is that we find the name was spelt a score of ways; the ending is most varient. This was in consequence of the fact that in French there were no symbols for the exact vowel and diphthong uttered by the native tongue. Mr. Jones, in speaking of the origin of our city's name, judging as best he can, the dialect he speaks and that of the Miamis whom the French writers tried to imitate, differing much, gives the reason ascribed by the Foxes for referring to our region as that of the skunk, says:

"A Fox, now dead, once had this story to tell: 'Some Foxes were on a hunt and came to the shore of a big lake. Looking out over the water, and toward the northwest, they beheld an object with only the head above the surface. It was approaching and soon came near enough for them to see that it was a skunk, a monster of a skunk, the like of which had never been seen before or since. The hunters lay