He asked for eight
hundred more regulars. The king sent him three hundred. Affairs grew
worse, and he grew desperate. Rightly judging that the best means of
defence was to take the offensive, he conceived the plan of a double
attack on the Iroquois, one army to assail the Onondagas and Cayugas,
another the Mohawks and Oneidas. [Footnote: _Plan for the Termination
of the Iroquois War_, _N. Y. Col. Docs._, IX. 375.] Since to reach the
Mohawks as he proposed, by the way of Lake Champlain, he must pass
through territory indisputably British, the attempt would be a
flagrant violation of the treaty of neutrality. Nevertheless, he
implored the king to send him four thousand soldiers to accomplish it.
[Footnote: Denonville, _Memoire du_ 8 _Aout_, 1688.] His fast friend,
the bishop, warmly seconded his appeal. "The glory of God is
involved," wrote the head of the church, "for the Iroquois are the
only tribe who oppose the progress of the gospel. The glory of the
king is involved, for they are the only tribe who refuse to recognize
his grandeur and his might. They hold the French in the deepest
contempt; and, unless they are completely humbled within two years,
his Majesty will have no colony left in Canada." [Footnote:
Saint-Vallier, _Memoire sur les Affaires du Canada pour Monseigneur le
Marquis de Seignelay_.
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