are familiar. Ever since you baptized this excellent Indian chieftain, he was always steadfast in the faith. He daily made progress in virtue and became more fervent in the
practices of our holy religion. He was a father to his people, firm in repressing their disorders and zealous in exhorting them to be faithful to the lessons of the missionaries. In the severe trials to which divine Providence subjected his virtue in his latter years, when within a short space of time he lost his wife and three of his children, he bore the heavy stroke with the edifying resignation of a Christian. During his last illness, of several weeks' duration, he seemed more anxious to do something still for the promotion of piety among his people, than to have his own great sufferings alleviated. His death, which occurred on the 6th of April, 1854, was lamented by the Indians with such tokens of sincere grief as I have never before witnessed. There was not that false wailing over his tomb which Indian usage is said to prescribe for a departed chieftain; they wept over him with heartfelt and heartrending grief, as if each one had lost the best of fathers, and their grief for the good Loyola has not died away even at this day. Never had I thought our Indians capable of so much affection.
" As Loyola, contrary to Indian customs, had not designated his successor, a new chief was to be chosen after his death. The election, to which all had prepared themselves by prayer, to lead them to a proper choice, ended in an almost unanimous voice for Victor, a brave hunter, whom you as yet must remember as a man remarkable for the generosity of his disposition. His inauguration took place amid great rejoicing. All the warriors, in their finest costumes, marched to his wigwam, and ranging themselves around it, discharged their muskets, after which each one went up to him to pledge his allegiance and testify his affection by a hearty shaking of hands. During the whole day, numerous parties came to the mission-house to tell the Fathers how much satisfaction they felt at having a chief whose goodness had long since won the hearts of all. Victor alone