When morning came, behold an empty fort! The
French renegades had fled with their Indian allies.
[Illustration: Chateau St. Louis, Quebec, 1669, from one of the oldest
prints in existence.]
Glad to be rid of the first hindrance, the explorers once more sped
north. In the afternoon, Radisson's scouts ran full tilt into a band
of Iroquois laden with beaver pelts. The Iroquois were smarting from
their defeat of the previous night; and what was Radisson's amusement
to see his own scouts and the Iroquois running from each other in equal
fright, while the ground between lay strewn with booty! Radisson
rushed his Indians for the waterside to intercept the Iroquois' flight.
The Iroquois left their boats and swam for the opposite shore, where
they threw up the usual barricade and entrenched themselves to shoot on
Radisson's passing canoes. Using the captured beaver pelts as shields,
the Upper Indians ran the gantlet of the Iroquois fire with the loss of
only one man.
The slightest defeat may turn well-ordered retreat into panic. If the
explorers went on, the Iroquois would hang to the rear of the
travelling Indians and pick off warriors till the Upper Country people
became so weakened they would fall an easy prey. Not flight, but
fight, was Radisson's motto. He ordered his men ashore to break up the
barricade. Darkness fell over the forest. The Iroquois could not see
to fire. "They spared not their powder," relates Radisson, "but they
made more noise than hurt.
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