164 Marcel Moraud
in spite of a most friendly and active cooperation between
American and French students of de La Salle, and of thou-
sands and thousands of hours spent to bring out his last
expedition from the mists of the past, we have not come to
the end of the trail yet, although we have gone a long way.
At least three different places have been indicated as being
without a doubt the spot where de La Salle was murdered.
The very details of his assassination, related many times,
remain uncertain, although reported by a very reliable eye-
witness.
The story as told by Father Douay, who was present when
de La Salle was assassinated, runs as follows: “Our prudent
commander, finding himself in a country full of game . . .
sent Sieur Moranget, his lackey Saget and seven or eight of
his people to a place where our hunter, the Shawne Nika
had left a quantity of buffalo meat.” Owing to a plot, on the
17th of March, Moranget was murdered “by one, whom
charity does not permit to name.”—Here is first, the story
of the death of Moranget, de La Salle’s nephew, as told by
Father Douay: “The Sieur de Moranget lingered for about
two hours, giving every mark of a death precious in the
sight of God, pardoning his murderers and embracing them,
and reciting his ‘acts’ of sorrow and contrition, as they
themselves assured us, after they recovered from their un-
happy blindness. He was a perfectly honest man and a good
Christian, confessing every week or fortnight on our march.
I have every reason to hope that God has shown him
mercy.”
Now we come to the death of de La Salle, who, uneasy,
had gone out to look for his nephew: “We proceeded some
steps along the bank to the fatal spot, where two of these
murderers were hidden in the grass, one on each side, with
guns cocked; one missed Monsieur de La Salle, the other