precise and detailed evidence of the existence of this story before the preparation of Hoyt's book, nearly fifty years ago.

The "legend," of which Dr. Hough gives a translation, is calculated to cause doubt rather than belief. It does not profess to be founded on tradition, but is said to have been taken, some fifteen years before 1853, from an old English book; and Hoyt's book is the only one we know of, from which its leading facts could have been taken. This "legend" describes the St. Louis Indians, living nine miles from the church bells of Montreal, as having never heard the sound of a bell, and getting their first idea of its tones from the account of their priest, and going out in procession to wreathe it with flowers, and overcome with rapture in hearing it for the first time. It seems to be simply a magazine story, in which a few well-known historical facts are decked with the ornaments of fiction.

Strong circumstances of suspicion attach to the story as first published by Hoyt. As published, it purported to come from Rev. Eleazer Williams, who, at the time of the publication, was a clergyman in good standing, whose statements of fact would be likely to be received with implicit belief. There were, without doubt, certain defects and improbabilities in the story as he told it. He spoke of obtaining Rouville's journal, and another of the same kind, "from one of the principal convents, where copies were required to be deposited on the return of the commanders of parties." I am informed by gentlemen accustomed to investigations among Canadian records, that they know of no convent where manuscripts of that description were required to be deposited, or can now be found. He says that De Rouville, in his journal, describes Rev. John Williams as an obstinate heretick." As De Rouville himself is described by Abbé Ferland (following Charlevoix) as a Huguenot, it is not probable that he would have used this particular term of reproach.†

66

The additional fact that Williams fixed upon an impossible locale for the resting-place of the bell, raises a strong suspicion that he invented the whole story.

All that is known of Mr. Williams goes to confirm this suspicion.

One of these gentlemen is Mr. J. M. Le Moine, of Quebec, who has given great attention to the early history of the Dominion, and to whose intelligent kindness I am much indebted.

† Since the above was written, however, I learn that a communication by M. Faucher de St. Maurice has appeared in a Canadian paper, in which it is claimed that the De Rouvilles were, in fact, Catholics.

He could not resist any temptation to mystify the public. At one time he came to a distinguished antiquary, now living in New York, and told him that the priest's house in Caughnawaga had been left for some time untenanted, had been blown down by a tempest, and that he had then discovered, in a recess thus revealed in a chimney, a number of Indian manuscripts, which he had taken away with him to Green Bay in Michigan. Inquiry was immediately instituted, and it was ascertained that the house had neither been left untenanted nor been blown down, and that the whole story was fictitious. In 1853, very general attention was excited by two articles published in "Putnam's Magazine," asserting his claims to be considered the son of Louis XVI. of France. In one of those papers appeared his account of an interview with the Prince de Joinville, in which the prince was represented as making him large pecuniary offers if he would sign an instrument releasing his claim to the throne of France. To this proposition, according to his own statement, he returned an indignant refusal. This statement, being brought to the notice of the prince, was publicly contradicted by him as "a work of the imagination," and "a speculation upon public credulity."

Nothing, then, seems to me more likely than that Williams invented the alleged tradition of the Deerfield or St. Regis bell; but, however originated, it seems quite clear to me that the truth of the story is not sustained by the evidence now known.

41

JUNE MEETING.

A stated monthly meeting was held on Thursday the 9th of June, at 11 o'clock, A.M.; the President, Hon. ROBERT C. WINTHROP, in the chair.

The record of the last meeting was read.

The Librarian read his monthly list of donors to the Library. The Corresponding Secretary read a letter of acceptance from the Hon. William T. Davis, of Plymouth.

He also read a letter from Thomas B. Akins, Esq., of Halifax, Nova Scotia, presenting a number of copies of the Journals of the Legislature of that Province, and offering to supply any deficiency in the Society's set of those volumes.

The Corresponding Secretary also read a letter from Colonel James Warren Sever, of Boston, presenting to the Society a silver canteen and a pewter plate, which once belonged to Governor Edward Winslow, of Plymouth, and which bear his arms and initials, and expressing the wish that a suitable inscription should be engraved upon the canteen, and that it should ever be preserved in the archives of the Society. Whereupon, the following resolution was unanimously adopted:

Resolved, That the thanks of this Society be presented to Colonel James W. Sever, for the very interesting and highly acceptable relics of his ancestor, Governor Winslow, which have just been communicated in his letter of May 19th; and that the request of the donor be complied with.

The President spoke of the death of Winthrop Sargent, Esq., a Corresponding Member, as follows:

We have been called on of late to take notice of the deaths of Honorary or of Resident Members of our Society, who had completed, and more than completed, the common term of human existence, and in regard to whom we could have no regrets that they had left any expectations of future usefulness unfulfilled. It is our sadder duty, to-day, to

make mention of one who has been called away in the prime of life, and who had given large promise of valuable service in the cause of American History in years to come.

Mr. Winthrop Sargent was chosen a Corresponding Member of this Society in 1856. He was born in Philadelphia on the 23d of September, 1825, and had thus reached his forty-fifth year. He was graduated at the University of Pennsylvania, in 1845, and received the degree of Bachelor of Laws, at the Dane Law School of Harvard University, in 1847. He exhibited an early interest in historical pursuits and researches, and few persons of his age have made more creditable contributions to the illustration of our Revolutionary and ante-revolutionary period.

In 1855, he edited for the Pennsylvania Historical Society the Journals of Officers engaged in Braddock's Expedition, from original manuscripts in the British Museum, with an introductory Memoir of the highest interest; a volume which has been everywhere recognized as containing the most accurate and thorough account of an expedition in which Washington played so important a part, and in the preparation for which Franklin, also, was a conspicuous actor.

In 1857, he published a beautifully printed and carefully annotated collection of "The Loyalist Poetry of the Revolution."

In 1858, he edited for the Pennsylvania Historical Society a Journal of the General Meeting of the Cincinnati Society, in 1784, from the original manuscript of his grandfather, Major Winthrop Sargent, a delegate from Massachusetts, who had served with distinction in various capacities through the whole Revolutionary War, and who was afterwards Governor of the Mississippi Territory.

In 1860, he published "The Loyal Verses of Joseph Stansbury and Dr. Jonathan Odell, relating to the American Revolution."

In 1861, he published his most elaborate work,—“The Life and Career of Major John André,”—with a dedication to President Sparks; a volume full of attractive and valuable matter, and displaying the fruit of rich culture and rare accomplishments.

More than one of these productions, and especially the last, received honorable mention at home and abroad, and won the strong commendations of some of our best historical writers.

Mr. Sargent had more recently performed a labor of love for our own Society, in editing "The Letters of John Andrews, of Boston, from 1772 to 1776," which occupy nearly a hundred pages in our printed Proceedings for 1864 and 1865. He had also been a frequent contributor to the "North-American Review," and to others of our lead

ing periodicals. But the events of the late war, and more especially the death of a beloved father, the late George Washington Sargent, a graduate of Harvard University in 1820,- who fell a victim, in 1864, to the unprovoked violence of a lawless soldiery, -interrupted his literary pursuits; and he thenceforth devoted himself to the quiet practice of his profession as a lawyer, in the city of New York. His failing health and spirits compelled him, during the last year, to seek rest and recreation in foreign lands; but he sought them in vain, and died of consumption in Paris on the 18th of May last.

He was a gentleman of the greatest delicacy and refinement, of ready wit and large resources, and whose agreeable companionship had endeared him to many friends. He was married, in his earliest manhood, to a daughter of his relative, Ignatius Sargent, Esq., of this city, but had been a widower for many years past. An only child, a son, survives him.

It has not been our custom to pass formal resolutions on the death of our Corresponding Members; but this brief notice will serve to secure a place in our records for the name and career of one who so well deserves to be remembered among those who have labored successfully in the illustration of our National History, and whose lives have been cut short before they had fulfilled the rich promise of their spring.

At the conclusion of the President's remarks, Dr. HOLMES said that he rose to add a very few words. He held in his hand a letter addressed to him by Mr. Sargent, before leaving this country, accompanying a roll of the 4th Co. 8th Mass. Regiment, dated in the year 1782, which Mr. Sargent sent, thinking it probably contained the name of one of his correspondent's relatives. Dr. Holmes offered this paper to the Society, believing that it might have an intrinsic interest to some of the members. It would be valued, he felt sure, as the last token from a cherished associate, whose character had been most tenderly and truly drawn by the President. Mr. Sargent was a gentleman whom it was impossible to know without esteeming and loving. His scholarship was so genuine, his tastes were so pure, his manners were so engaging, that he made friends wherever he went. As one of those whose personal intercourse with him had been occasional only, but always delightful, he had listened with deep gratifica