RALE, or RASLE, r;11. StrtAsnEN (1657 1i24). A .Jesuit missionary in North America. He was born in Franche-ComtC1, became a Jesuit novice at Dole in 1675. was an instructor fro::: 1677 to 1684 at Carpentras and Nimes, and in 1639 went to Canada as a missionary. He was stationed for two years at the Abenaki mission of Saint Francis. near the mouth of the Chaudire, afterwards spent two years among the Illinois Indians, and from 1694 until his death was sta tioned among the Norridgewocks, near the pres ent Norridgewock, :Maine. Ile learned the Abe naki language, acquired great influence over the Indians, and was believed by the English, appar ently with good reason, to have been the instiga tor of the Indian attacks upon the English in this region, which resulted in the so-called Dummer's War (q.v.). In 1705 a party of English settlers attacked and burned the church which had been built by Rale; in 1722 another party pillaged Rate's cabin and burned the chureh, which had been rebuilt: and in August, 1724, a third party surprised the town, killed several Indians, and shot Bale. Among Bale's papers which were car
ried off by the English was his dictionary of the Abenaki language, upon which he had been en gaged for thirty years. This is preserved in the library of Harvard University, and was pub lished by .John Pickering in the American Acad emy of Arts and Sciences Memoirs, New Series, vol. i. (Cambridge, 1833). A number of Mlle's letters are given in Thwaites (ed.), Jesuit Re lations (Cleveland. 19(13). Consult: Francis, "Life of Rale." in Sparks's American Biography, New Series, vol. vii.: Parkman, A Half ('eatery of Conflict (Boston, 1892) ; Baxter, The Pioneers of J CIC France in Nen- England (1894) ; and, for a defense of Rale, Shea, The Catholic Church in Colonial Days (1886) ; and an article in the United States Catholic Intelligences., vol. viii. (1831).