Chapter I (5)

[I-64] Pike calls him Murdock Cameron on Apr. 12th: see that date; text of 1807 has Mordock Cameron, p. 59 and p. 64: see also L. and C., ed. 1893, pp. 239, 1222. This is the same Cameron of whom Featherstonhaugh, Canoe Voyage, etc., I. 1847, p. 314, speaks at length, and whose death in 1811 is given as follows: "Passed a place on the right bank [of St. Pierre's r., above the Waraju] where Milor [F.'s voyageur] buried his bourgeois, a Mr. Cameron, in 1811. He was an enterprising, sagacious Scotchman who had amassed a good deal of property by trafficking with the Indians;... and whilst upon one of his expeditions he was taken ill in his canoe, was landed, and died in the woods." Fgh. does not hint at foul play here; for the suspicions in the case, see Long, as cited in my L. and C. Cameron was buried on a bluff near Lac qui Parle, the lake where his trading-post was, and "Cameron's grave" has continued to be an identified spot from that day to this. Cameron's name appears as that of one of the four witnesses to Pike's Sioux treaty of Sept. 23d on one of the manuscript copies of that document before me. The "Milor" mentioned here was a Canadian French half-breed who became very well known as a resident of Mendota, Minn., where he died about 1860, "after a long life full of adventure and daring exploits," as J. F. Williams says, Minn. Hist. Coll., I. 2d. ed. 1872, p. 375.

[I-65] Those of a sentimental turn who may like to have the full-rounded legend of the maiden Winona will find the romance related in a scholarly yet sympathetic vein by Prof. Keating, in Long of 1823, pub. 1824, I. pp. 280-85. Beltrami, II. p. 183, calls the girl Oholoaïtha, her lover Anikigi, comparing the pair to the muse of Mitylene and Phaon. Whether the tragic event is fact or fancy is another question I see no use of raising. There is no inherent improbability in the case; any girl could have thrown herself over the rock with more ease than she had climbed it for that purpose, and suicide is not less frequent among squaws than various other peoples of both sexes. In the case of Indian women the most usual causes are said to be grief, anger, and revenge, though in some cases the suicidal resolve is more deliberate, and rather a matter of social etiquette or of a religious code than of emotional insanity. I understand that hanging is the customary method of taking one's self off; and that the smallest tree which will answer the purpose is preferred, because it is an article of belief that the ghost thus discarnated must drag the instrument of death about for a period, and a woman naturally prefers to lighten the load as much as possible. Supposing Winona to have taken the fatal leap, it is reasonable to infer from the faith in such affairs that she is there yet, chained to the rock like another Andromeda; for the bluff is too big for her to budge an inch, even with the assistance of a possible Perseus. There is unimpeachable precedent for her performance in the classics, not entirely dissociated from the name and fame of the gifted poetical archetæra Sappho; and rocks reputed to be the scenes of lovers' leaps abound in history and geography.

[I-66] That much-named river, whereto hangs a tale of great length. Pike here has the right name of it, though it is now usually called Cannon r., by perversion of the French Rivière aux Canots: Cano, Canot, Canon, Canow r. of various writers; Riviere au Canon, Canoe r., Cannon r., Pike, _passim_; Canon r., Long's map; Eamozindata or High Rock r., Long's text, 1824, I. p. 263; Inyan Bosndata r., Natural Obelisk r., Standing Rock r., Lahontan r., Cannon r., Nicollet, text and map. It is commonly supposed that the stream marked R. aux Raisins on Franquelin's map of 1688 is this river, and I see no objection to this identification; for though the name is suspiciously like a mistake for R. aux Racines, the river is laid down as above the Chippewa, and can hardly have been intended for Root r. The main question is whether R. Morte and R. Longue (Long r.), Lahontan, 1686-87, are names to be added to the synonyms of this stream. The Baron Lahontan, "Lord Lieutenant of the French colony at Placentia in Newfoundland," gives an account of himself on the Miss. r. in Letter XVI. of his book, pp. 104-141 of the English ed., Lond., 1735. This letter is "Dated at Missilimakinac, May 28th, 1689, containing an Account of the Author's Departure from, and Return to Missilimackinac. A Description of the Bay of Puante, and its Villages. An Ample Description of the Beavers; followed by the journal of a remarkable Voyage upon the Long River, and a Map of the adjacent Country." According to this relation Lahontan came by the Fox-Wisconsin route to Prairie du Chien Oct. 23d, 1686, thus hard upon the heels of Accault's party, who had Hennepin along: "On the 3d [of Nov.] we entered the Mouth of the Long River, which looks like a lake full of Bull-rushes; we found in the middle of it a narrow Channel," etc. He continued his journey, on paper if not on the river, and returned to the Mississippi Mar. 2d, 1687; dropped down to the Missouri Mar. 17th; went up the Missouri to the Osage r.; down the Missouri to the Mississippi again Mar. 25th; down the Mississippi to the Wabash, and back up to the Illinois Apr. 7th; up the Illinois to Fort Crêvecœur Apr. 16th; arrived at "Chekakou" Apr. 24th; and made Michilimackinac soon afterward. The whole _crux_ of Lahontan's relation is in his Long r., which he professes to have ascended a great distance to the countries of the Eororos, Esanapes, and Gnacsitares, where he also got wind of equally peculiar people called Mozeemlek and Tahuglauk. The main feature of his map is the "Morte or River Longue," represented as larger than that portion of the Mississippi which he traces, and as heading in a great lake which connects across high mountains by numerous large streams with another great river which runs off his map due W. _De te fabula narratur._ But there is nothing to forbid us to suppose that Lahontan went up to or toward, or even ascended, some such stream as Cannon r., and then simply tacked this on to St. Peter's r. by hearsay. We must in justice observe that all he professes to know about Long r. above the point he says he ascended it he acknowledges he got from the natives; and he is careful to separate his map into two parts by a heavy line lettered "The Division of the Two Maps," _i. e._, his own and one "drawn upon Stag-skins by y^e Gnacsitares." Such a piece of patch-work would easily make his Long r. out of Cannon or some similar stream, run on to the whole course of St. Peter's above the Mankato or Blue Earth r. Fortunately we have little to do with the Baron's crazy-quilt, but I must here quote Nicollet, because he sees reason to believe that Lahontan really did ascend Cannon r., and has signalized his conclusion by naming it Lahontan r. on his map. Though the gentle Nicollet's quality of mercy was never strained, yet his judgments, even his special pleadings, deserve always the most respectful consideration. Nicollet says, in substance, Rep. pp. 20, 21, that he was forced to this conclusion after surveying the Undine region; that the principal statements of the Baron "coincided remarkably well with what I have laid down as belonging to Cannon river.... His account, too, of the mouth of the river is particularly accurate"; the objection that the Baron says that he navigated Long r. in November and December, when it is usually frozen, is in part overcome by the fact that it is one of the last to freeze, and the last resort of the wild fowl; and while he must convict the Baron of "gross exaggeration of the length of the river," of its numerous population, and other pretended information, he would conclude "that if La Hontan's claims to discoveries are mere fables, he has had the good fortune or the sagacity to come near the truth." As this musty old straw has never been threshed over to find any more grains of wheat in it than Nicollet believed he had garnered, no one else is likely in the future to make more of it than this; and our alternative seems to be to accept Nicollet's results, or _noll. pros._ the whole case. I incline to the former, partly from my habitual inclination to account for as many historical names as possible, partly because I have so much confidence in Nicollet. It does not seem to have occurred to him that his view of the case would be strengthened by the original though probably not new suggestion I have made, to the effect that fables of the St. Peter, tacked on to some facts of Cannon r., would explain Lahontan's Long r.

[I-67] The present town of Redwing or Red Wing, Goodhue Co., Minn., commemorates this chieftain, and preserves the site of his village with entire exactitude. Pike's tabular statement, bound in this work, calls him Talangamane, L'Aile Rouge, and Red Wing; his tribe, Minowa Kantong, Gens du Lac, and People of the Lakes. Beltrami, II. p. 186, makes one Tantangamani "the unnatural father of the unhappy Oholoaïtha." "Major Long arrived on the evening of the 30th [of June, 1823] at an Indian village, which is under the direction of Shakea, (the man that paints himself red;) the village has retained the appellation of Redwing, (aile rouge,) by which this chief was formerly distinguished," Keating's Long, I. p. 251, where the name which Pike renders "Talangamane" is given as that of Red Wing's son, Tatunkamene, and translated Walking Buffalo. "The Redwing chief is, at present [1823], very much superannuated, but he is still much respected on account of his former distinguished achievements," _ibid._, p. 260. More about him to come in Pike, beyond.

[I-68] Frontenac to Red Wing, some 13 miles by present channel, whence it is a couple of miles further to the head of the island opp. Cannon r. camp. Pike coasts the Minnesota shore till he finishes with the lake at the mouth of Bullard's or Ida cr., a streamlet that makes in at a town called after the chief Wakouta, Wacouta, Wakuta, etc. Here he enters one of the channels by which the Mississippi finds its way into the lake, no doubt the middle one, then as now the main one, which, however, soon joins the south one; the north channel is narrower, crookeder, shoaler, and connected with some expansions known as Upper and Lower lakes and Goose bay. The town of Red Wing is situated on the S. side of a sharp bend the river makes in coming from the Cannon, on a plain under bluffs that nearly encompass the town; one of these is specially notable as the isolated elevation forming a conspicuous landmark on the very brink of the river. This is Barn bluff, or Barn mountain, so named by tr. of F. La Grange; it is ¾ of a mile long and 345 feet above low water mark; "upon the highest point of the Grange. Major Long, who ascended it in 1817, observed an artificial mound, whose elevation above its base was about five feet," Keating, I. p. 296. Nicollet made the altitude 322 feet, with commendable caution; Owen gave 350 feet, almost correctly. This word _Grange_ is often found as Gange: thus Beltrami has in text, p. 189, mountain of the Gange, and Gange r.; latter also on map, and I suppose Ganges r. could be found, even at this distance from India. About the mouth of Cannon r., opp. Pike's camp, there was a place called Remnichah; both Nicollet and Owen chart Remnicha r. or cr. as a stream falling in close to the mouth. While Remnicha or Hhemnicha was a name of Red Wing's village, it also covered the whole tract from Barn bluff to Cannon r. Mr. A. J. Hill informs me of "a small ravine or coulée which ran through Red Wing's village, and in 1854, when I lived there, was called the Jordan. It only headed a few blocks back, and is now doubtless a sewer or filled up." So Nicollet's Remnicha r. is that now known as Hay cr., above which a certain Spring cr. makes in on the same side. Present town of Trenton, Pierce Co., Wis., is about a mile above camp.

[I-69] Discovery of the St. Croix r. is commonly attributed to Accault's party, already mentioned as consisting of himself, Auguelle, and Hennepin, prisoners in the hands of the Sioux at the time. The date is 1680; day in question. According to La Salle's letter of Aug. 22d, 1682, written at Fort Frontenac, in Margry's Relations, II. p. 245 _seq._, it was very shortly after the 22d of April, 1680, when the Indians who were carrying them off had come up the Mississippi to 8 leagues below the falls of St. Anthony, and then determined to finish their journey by land to their village at Mille Lacs. As the St. Croix is more than 24 m. below Minneapolis, this party must have passed its mouth about the date said. The Memoir of Le Sieur Daniel Greysolon Du Luth to the Marquis of Seignelay, 1685 (Archives of the Ministry of the Marine), states that in June, 1680, he entered a river 8 leagues from the end of Lake Superior, ascended it, made a half league portage, and fell into "a very fine river," which took him to the Mississippi r. This was the St. Croix, which Du Luth thus certainly descended to its mouth at that time. He heard of the captivity of his countrymen with indignation and surprise, hired a Sioux to show him where they were, and rescued them; he says that he put them in his canoes and carried them to Michelimakinak, whence, after wintering there, they set out for the settlements Mar. 29th, 1681. It is quite possible that before the great triangular duel which La Salle, Du Luth, and Hennepin managed to arrange among themselves over the operations of 1680, the St. Croix was seen by the missionary Menard, who in 1661 may have reached the Mississippi by way of the St. Croix or some other way, and was soon after lost. Marquette is not in question here, as he came by the Wisconsin to the Mississippi and went down the latter. So with any other person who reached the Mississippi prior to 1680. Excepting the Menard matter, which is uncertain, the case narrows to Accault's party and Du Luth, within some weeks of each other, late spring and early summer of 1680; the facts appear to be that the former first passed the mouth of the St. Croix, and the latter first descended this river. Hennepin first named the river R. de Tombeau, Descr. Louis., 1683, map; this is translated Tomb r., as, _e. g._, Shea's Hennepin, 1880, p. 199, where we read: "Forty leagues above [Chippewa r.] is a river full of rapids, by which, striking northwest [read N. E.], you can proceed to Lake Condé [L. Superior], as far as Nimissakouat [in Margry Nemitsakouat, in the Nouv. Déc. Nissipikouet, being the Bois Brûlé] river, which empties into that lake. This first river is called Tomb river because the Issati [Sioux] left there the body of one of their warriors, killed by a rattlesnake, on whom, according to their custom, I put a blanket." Some translate Grave r. On Franquelin's map, 1688, the St. Croix is lettered R. de la Magdelaine, though a certain Fort St. Croix appears about its head; by whom it was first called Magdalene r. I am not informed. Lahontan's map shows nothing here; he was too full of his fabulous Long r. to concern himself much with real rivers. Next come Lesueur and his people, 1695; he had first reached the Mississippi in 1683, and on this his second appearance (his third being in 1700) they built the trading-house called Fort Lesueur on Pelée isl., just below the mouth of the St. Croix, as already noted. His editor, so far as this trip is concerned, is the clever carpenter Penicaut, a sensible, fair-and-square man. Just here comes in the question of the first application of the _name_ St. Croix. The river was already so called and the name in use before 1700; thus, Nicolas Perrot's prise de possession, a document dated at Fort St. Antoine, May 8, 1689, mentions the Rivière-Sainte-Croix. The Carte du Canada ou de la Nouvelle France, par Guillame de L'Isle, Paris, 1703, traces the river and letters it "L. & R. Ste. Croix," _i. e._, as some have translated it, Lake and River Holy Cross; said lake being, of course, the dilation of the same bottle-nosed river, which issues from a contracted orifice, but is a mile or two wide higher up. But whatever the theological proclivity to suppose this name to have been given for the usual instrument of the execution of Roman malefactors, later put by the Emperor Constantine on his banner, and afterward used for other purposes, it is certain that the Christian crucifix is not directly implied in the name. It is a personal designation, connoting one Sainte Croix or Saint Croix, a trader named in La Harpe's MSS. of Lesueur's third voyage as a Frenchman who had been wrecked there; for we read: "September 16 he [Lesueur] passed on the east a large river called Sainte-Croix, because a Frenchman of that name was shipwrecked at its mouth." Hennepin names Sainte Croix as one of six men who deserted La Salle. A letter written in June, 1684, by Du Luth to Governor De la Barre (who succeeded Frontenac in 1682), states that the writer had met one Sieur de la Croix and his two companions. This case resembles those of La Crosse r. already noted, and St. Pierre r., noted beyond. It may be summed in the statement that St. Croix r., St. Pierre r., and Lake Pepin, were all three so named for persons, by Lesueur or his companions, not earlier than 1683 and not later than 1695; best assignable date, 1689. The river has also been called Hohang or Fish r. (_cf._ Sioux Hogan-wanke-kin). The character of St. Croix's r. as a waterway to the Great Lakes is elsewhere discussed. This stream now forms the boundary between Wisconsin and Minnesota from its mouth to beyond 46° N., where it splits up into small streams in Burnett Co., Wis. Its general course is not far from S.--it is due S. for many miles before it falls into the Mississippi; which latter, for a great distance above their confluence, has a general bearing S. E. Immediately at the mouth of the St. Croix, on the E., is Prescott, Pierce Co., Wis., the site of which was once recommended by Long for a military post; on the W. is Point Douglas, Washington Co., Minn.; and across the Mississippi, a very little higher up, is Hastings, seat of Dakota Co., Minn., at the mouth of Vermilion r. The above-mentioned dilation of the river into Lake St. Croix extends some 30 m. up from its mouth; and as far above this lake as an Indian ordinarily paddled his canoe in a day was the long-noted Sioux-Chippewa boundary, at a place which became known as Standing Cedars. Thus the river did duty in Indian politics before it set bounds to our Minnesota and Wisconsin. This lake was often called Lower St. Croix l., in distinction from the sizable body of water at the head of the river known as Upper St. Croix l. For the route thence by Burnt r. to Lake Superior, see a note beyond.

[I-70] Especially as it leaves us in the lurch for mileage of the 19th. But we can easily overhaul him before he gets to St. Paul, which is only 30 river-miles from Prescott (mouth of St. Croix r.). He did not go far above this river; for he makes it 26½ + 8 = 34½ m. to the Sioux village, which latter was close to the present city limits of St. Paul. If we must set a camp for him, it may be assigned to Hastings, Dakota Co., Minn., 2½ m. above Prescott, Pierce Co., Wis., and 18½ m. below Newport, Washington Co., Minn., in the vicinity of which he will camp to-morrow. "Tattoo," at which the blunderbuss was fired, is not a place, as the context and capitalization might suggest, but a certain military call which is habitually sounded in garrisons and camps in the evening before taps. It marks the hour when the soldiers are supposed to retire to their quarters for their devotions before the lights are put out at taps, and when the officers settle down in earnest for the night's poker. In approaching the St. Croix from his camp opposite Cannon r., Pike has bluffs off his right nearly all the way, and the town of Diamond Bluff, Pierce Co., Wis., is at the point where they first reach to the river, a mile and a half above the mouth of Trimbelle r., right, and 11 m. below Prescott. On the left the bluffs are off the river all the way, and for most of this distance Vermilion slough, running under the bluffs, cuts off an island 11 m. long and at its widest near 3 m. broad. The lower outlet of the slough is below Trimbelle r.; the middle opening is only 3 m. below Prescott; the upper one is at Hastings. The bottom-land of the principal island has several bodies of water, one of them called Sturgeon l., discharging separately from the main slough; and is traversed lengthwise by a sand-bank 6 m. long, which may be called Lesueur's Terrace. For this Prairie or Bald isl. is no doubt that formerly known as Isle Pelée, on which was built Fort Lesueur, 1695. The middle opening of Vermilion slough is in common with a lower outlet of Vermilion r. This is Rapid r. of Long, and Rivière Jaune of the French; "R. Jaune" appears on Franquelin's map, 1688. The upper discharge of this river is at Hastings, and thus above the mouth of the St. Croix; Lake Isabel is a small sheet between the river and the town. The Minnesota county line between Goodhue and Dakota strikes the Mississippi just 1¼ m. below the lower mouth of Vermilion r. At the mouth of the St. Croix the Mississippi ceases or rather begins to separate Wisconsin from Minnesota; so that henceforth Pike proceeds in the latter State.

[I-71] Hastings to Newport, 18½ m. by the channel; camp a mile and a half beyond this, vicinity of present Red Rock, Washington Co., at the point on the small strip of prairie where the Sioux had their celebrated red medicine-stone; this was the "large painted stone" Pike observed. It gave name to Red Rock, having meanwhile become a historical object. We read in Long, I. p. 287: "a stone which is held in high veneration by the Indians on account of the red pigment with which it is bedawbed, it is generally called the painted stone.... It is a fragment of syenite, which is about four and a half feet in diameter.... The Indians frequently offer presents to the Great Spirit near this stone," etc. The party found near the stone an eagle's feather, roots of _Psoralea esculenta_, and willow sticks painted red; they secured a fragment of the idol for their mineralogical collection. At the time of this visit (1823) there was an Indian burying-ground a short distance above--in sight from the spot--if that place can be called a burying-ground where the bodies are not buried in the ground but scaffolded in the air; a mode of disposition of the dead which might be called hypsitaphy, in distinction from bathytaphy or ordinary underground interment. See Pike's remarks on Sioux burial on the 21st. To reach the sacred spot, hallowed by association with the deepest religious emotions of the untutored aboriginal mind, Pike left Hastings, where the river was bridged by the C., M. and St. P. R. R. in 1871 (Act of Minn. Legisl., Feb. 7th, 1867), and soon passed the site of Nininger, Dakota Co., a small town built at the lower point of a steep bluff which fronts the river's edge on the S., at the mouth of the rivulet which serves as the upper discharge of Lake Rebecca or King l.--in fact the whole bottom on his left is an island 2¾ m. long, extending from Hastings to Nininger, being cut off by the slough of which King l. is a dilation. On the right, in Washington Co., bluffs front the river for a mile or more, to the lower opening of Boulanger slough, which cuts off an island 2½ m. long. The immediate frontage of the Nininger bluffs on the river is less than a mile, for they recede at the lower opening of Nininger slough. The river thus winds from side to side of its bed, with alternation of bluffs and bottom on each side. Above Nininger slough the river makes a great loop to the left; the whole irregular curve is subtended on the right by Grey Cloud slough, about 4 m. long direct, and longer by its meanders, thus cutting off Grey Cloud isl., of the same length, and over 2 m. wide in some places; town site Grey Cloud, Washington Co., on the river bank on this island, which also presents at its northern end a limestone rock, 50 to 75 feet above low-water mark, and a mile or more long; this is probably the Medicine Wood of Forsyth, 1819. Near the middle of the loop, on the other side, is the _nominis umbra_ site of Pine Bend, Dakota Co., where the river runs under the hills. This loop was formerly called Détour de Pin or des Pins, whence its modern names Pine bend and Pine turn. The hills border the river pretty closely for 5 m. further, to Merrimac, opposite which is an island of the same name; within 1½ m. of this on the right hand, opposite an island of its own name, is Newport, Washington Co.

[I-72] Newport to St. Paul--to a steamboat ldg. about the foot of Wabasha or Robert st.--is 8½ m. by the channel, and considerably more than halfway up to Pike's camp on the island at the mouth of St. Peter's or the Minnesota r. Thus, though Pike calls to-day's voyage "24 miles," it is nearer 14. One who then swept around the bold bend of the river at St. Paul saw a germ of that great metropolis in the humble Sioux village, though only prescience could have divined what time would make of the site above it. A later account than Pike's is given in Keating's Long's Exp. of 1823, pub. 1824, I. p. 289: "Passed an Indian village consisting of ten or twelve huts, situated at a handsome turn on the river, about 10 miles below the mouth of the St. Peter; the village is generally known by the name of the Petit Corbeau, or Little Raven, which was the appellation of the father and grandfather of the present chief. He is called Chetanwakoamene (the good sparrow-hunter). The Indians designate this band by the name of Kapoja, which implies that they are deemed lighter and more active than the rest of the nation." This was a band of Mdewakantonwan Sioux (the Minowa Kantong of Pike), for which, as well as for the celebrated chief himself, see notes beyond. The term which Keating renders Kapoja is now Kaposia, as a designation of the locality of South Park, a place on the west bank of the river; but the old Sioux village was on the east bank, below Frenchman's bar, in the low ground formerly called by the French Grand Marais, rendered by Beltrami Great March (for Great Marsh, II. p. 197), and now rejoicing in the epithet of Pig's Eye marsh or lake. Pig's Eye was the soubriquet of one Peter Parrant, a whisky-seller who squatted on the bottom in 1838, below Carver's Cave in the Dayton bluff. The whole region about the mouth of St. Peter's r. had been a Sioux focus and stamping-ground for generations before any of the localities thereabouts received names from us. The curious origin of the name St. Paul for the present capital was in this wise: The limits of the military reservation about Fort Snelling were authoritatively fixed in 1839. The whisky-traders, loafers, and squatters about the place became so troublesome that the U. S. Marshal of Wisconsin was directed to remove all such intruders, who were given till next spring to decamp; and on May 6th, 1840, the troops were called out to complete the eviction by the destruction of cabins. In the words of E. D. Neill, Minn. Hist. Soc., II. Part 2, 1864, 2d ed. 1881, p. 142: "The squatters then retreated to the nearest point below the military reserve, and there they became the inglorious founders of a hamlet, which was shortly graced with the small Roman Catholic chapel of St. Paul, the name of which is retained by the thrifty capital of Minnesota, which has emerged from the groggeries of 'certain lewd fellows of the baser sort.'" The chapel above mentioned was built by Rev. Lucian Galtier, on what is now Catholic block; it fronted on Bench street. It was dedicated Nov. 1st, 1841. The first marriage bans were those of one Vital Guerin, described as "a resident of St. Paul;" and thus the priest named the place as well as the house, although it was also called for a time St. Paul Landing, because some stores had been put up close by, which caused steamboats to stop there. In 1848, when Minnesota acquired Territorial organization, and the capital was fixed at St. Paul, no such place could be found on ordinary maps; it was some obscure settlement, supposed to be somewhere about the mouth of St. Peter's r., or in the vicinity of St. Anthony's falls, perhaps at a place known as White Rock, or Iminijaska, where some bluffs were more easily discernible than any village. Even down to 40 years ago, or a little before 1858, when Minnesota acquired statehood, St. Paul had only replaced tepees with a sprinkling of log cabins; and people scrambled up the bluff by digging their toes into the ground. The site of the city is one which would hardly have been anticipated as such; nor would the original features of the locality be easily recognized now after all the grading and terracing that has been done to convert the stubborn hills and intractable hollows into a beautiful city of over 190,000 inhabitants. But all this was to be, and is well worth all that it cost. Among the natural features which should be noted in this connection, especially as they have given rise to conflicting historical statements, are Carver's Great Cave in Dayton's bluff, and Nicollet's New (Fountain) Cave, halfway thence to Fort Snelling; but for these, as well as for a third cave close to Carver's, see a note beyond, at date of Apr. 12th, 1806, when Pike's text brings the matter up.

[I-73] Jean Baptiste Faribault, b. Berthier, Lower Canada, 1774, d. Faribault, Minn., Aug. 20th, 1860, being at the time the oldest white resident of the present State. Jean Baptiste was the youngest one of 10 children of Bartholomew (who was b. in Paris and came to Canada in 1754); he was in business in Quebec 1790-97, at the latter date entered the employ of J. J. Astor as an agent of the N. W. Co., and was engaged in the Indian trade at various points in the Mississippi region for about 50 years, for the most part on his own account. One of the posts he established was at the mouth of the Minnesota r., where Pike found him. In 1814 he married a half-breed daughter of Major Hause (then Superintendent of Indian Affairs), by whom he had eight children. His Indian name was Chahpahsintay, meaning Beaver Tail. His eldest son, Alexander, founded the present town of Faribault, Minn. Mr. J. B. Faribault "espoused the cause of the U. S. during the war of 1812, and lost many thousand dollars thereby, as well as narrowly escaping with his life on several occasions. He labored all his life to benefit the red man, teach him agriculture and the arts of industry, and protect his interests. He had an unbounded influence over them; his advice was never disregarded. He was prominent at all treaties, and rendered the U. S. many valuable services," says J. F. Williams, Minn. Hist. Coll., I. 2d ed. 1872, p. 377: see also _ibid._, p. 468. An extended memoir of Faribault, by General H. H. Sibley, occupies pp. 168-79 of III. of the Minn. Hist. Coll., 1874.

[I-74] The history of the discovery of St. Peter's r., off the mouth of which Pike is now camped, is involved in some obscurity, which modern research has not wholly cleared up, though the main facts have probably been certified. (1) It has been conceded since Carver's time that Hennepin missed the river. Discovery has not been traced back of Lesueur's time. Lesueur was first on the Mississippi hereabouts in 1683; next in 1695, when he built on Pelée isl., just below the St. Croix; and again in 1700; both these rivers are noted in the treatise of Nicolas Perrot, and before 1700 the river of St. Pierre had been so named. (2) Charlevoix's account, Hist. N. Fr., Paris, 1744, IV. pp. 165, 166, is in substance: In 1700 Lesueur, sent by D'Iberville to establish himself in the Sioux country and take possession of a copper-mine _que le Sueur y avait découverte_, had already discovered there, some time before; ascended St. Peter 40 leagues to Rivière Verte (now Blue Earth r.) which comes in on the left hand as you go up; ascended this Green r. 1 league; built a fort and wintered there, 1700-1; in April, "1702," for which read 1701, went up Green r. ¾ league to his mine and in 22 days got out over 30,000 lbs. of ore, of which 4,000 selected lbs. were sent to France; there was a mountain of this mineral 10 leagues long, etc. (3) The Amer. Philos. Society's copy of the MS. of Bénard de la Harpe is carefully digested by Keating in Long's Exp., I. pp. 317-322. This MS. is entitled: "Journal historique concernant l'établissement des Français à la Louisianne, tiré des mémoires de Messrs. d'Iberville et de Bienville, etc., par M. Bénard de la Harpe." The original of this copy was in the hands of Dr. Sibley, who certifies to the correctness of the copy in a note annexed, dated Natchitoches, Oct. 29th, 1805. Some of the contents of this MS. are: (_a_) Lesueur and d'Iberville, with 30 hands, reached the mouth of the Mississippi Dec., 1699. Lesueur was sent there by M. l'Huillier, fermier général, under orders to establish himself at a place near the sources of the Mississippi, where he had _previously_ discovered a green ore, _i. e._, in 1695. The substance of the 1695 discovery is: Lesueur built a fort on an island (Isle Pelée, now Prairie isl.) in the Mississippi over 200 m. above the Illinois, by order of Count Frontenac; and the same year he went to Montreal with the Chippewa chief Chingouabé and the Sioux chief Tioscaté, the latter the first of his nation that ever was in Canada, and received very kindly by the authorities in view of what they hoped to make out of his country. With this Sioux chief Lesueur had intended to reascend the Mississippi in 1696; but the former died at Montreal after 33 days' illness. Lesueur, thus released from an obligation to go back with the chief to the country where he had discovered the ore, determined to go to France to ask leave to open mines; this voyage he made, and had his permit in 1697. June, 1697, he embarked at La Rochelle for Canada; was captured by the British on the Newfoundland banks and carried to Portsmouth; after peace, returned to Paris for a new commission, which was issued to him in 1698; went to Canada with this; various obstacles threw him back to Europe; and meanwhile part of the men whom he had left in charge in 1695 abandoned their posts and proceeded to Montreal. Thus operations on the mines were suspended from 1695 to 1700, for Lesueur and d'Iberville, with their 30 workmen, as we have seen, only reached the mouth of the Mississippi in Dec., 1699. (_b_) The MS. we are following states, under date of Feb. 10th, 1702, that Lesueur was that day come to the mouth of the Mississippi with 2000 quintaux of blue and green earth. This he certainly had got on his tour of Dec., 1699-Feb., 1702, from and back to the mouth of the Mississippi, and he had got it from the mine he opened and worked on Rivière Verte or Blue Earth r., the principal branch of St. Peter's. The MS. contains a narrative of this tour from July 12th to Dec. 13th, 1700. It appears that Lesueur moved as follows: July 13th, mouth of the Missouri; Sept. 1st, mouth of the Wisconsin; Sept. 14th, mouth of the Chippewa (on one of whose branches he had found a 60-lb. mass of copper during his previous journey); same day, Lake Pepin, so designated in the MS.; 16th, passed La Croix r., so called from a Frenchman wrecked there; 19th, entered St. Peter's r.; Oct. 1st had ascended this for 44¼ leagues, and then entered Blue r., so called for the color of the earth on its banks; started an establishment at or more probably near the mouth of Blue r., at what the MS. gives as lat. 44° 13' N.; Oct. 14th, finished the works, which were named Fort L'Huillier; Oct. 26th, went to the mine with three canoes, which he loaded with colored earth taken from mountains near which were mines of copper, samples of which L'Huillier had assayed at Paris in 1696. Lesueur wintered there, 1700-1, and, as we have seen, was back to the mouth of the Mississippi Feb. 10th, 1702. (_c_) From these historical data Keating in Long, 1823, I. p. 320, infers that St. Peter's and the Blue (Blue Earth) rivers were those streams which Lesueur had ascended in 1695, which date is consequently assigned to the discovery, without reference back to 1683. This inference is made "from the circumstance that they are mentioned as well known, and not as recently discovered; and more especially from the observation of la Harpe, that the eastern Sioux having complained of the situation of the fort [L'Huillier], which they would have wished to see at the confluence of the St. Peter and Mississippi, M. le Sueur endeavoured to reconcile them to it. 'He had foreseen,' says la Harpe, 'that an establishment on the Blue river would not be agreeable to the eastern Sioux, who are the rulers of all the other Sioux, because they were the first with whom the French traded, and whom they provided with guns; nevertheless, as this undertaking had not been commenced with the sole view of trading for beavers, but in order to become thoroughly acquainted with the quality of the various mines _which he had previously discovered there_ [italics Keating's], he replied to the natives that he was sorry he had not been made sooner acquainted with their wishes, &c., but that the advanced state of the season prevented his returning to the mouth of the river.' No mention is made in this narrative of the stream being obstructed with ice, a circumstance which, had it really occurred, would, we think, have been recorded by de la Harpe, who appears to have been a careful and a curious observer, and who undoubtedly saw le Sueur's original narrative." (4) On the foregoing data Nicollet, Rep. 1843, p. 18, has some judicious remarks in fixing Lesueur's locality with precision: "On the left bank of the Mankato [Green, Blue, or Blue Earth r.], six miles from its mouth, in a rocky bluff composed of sandstone and limestone, are found cavities in which the famed blue or green earth, used by the Sioux as their principal pigment, is obtained. This material is nearly exhausted, and it is not likely that this is the spot where a Mr. Lesueur (who is mentioned in the Narrative of Major Long's Second Expedition, as also by Mr. Featherstonhaugh) could, in his third voyage, during the year 1700, have collected his 4000 pounds of copper earth sent by him to France. I have reason to believe that Lesueur's location is on the river to which I have affixed his name, and which empties into the Mankato three-quarters of a league above Fort L'Huillier, built by him and where he spent a winter. This location corresponds precisely with that given by Charlevoix, whilst it is totally inapplicable to the former. Here the blue earth is abundant in the steep and elevated hills at the mouth of this river, which hills form a broken country on the right side of the Mankato. Mr. [J. C.] Fremont and myself have verified this fact: he, during his visit to Lesueur river; and I, upon the locality designated by Mr. Featherstonhaugh, where the Ndakotahs formerly assembled in great numbers to collect it, but to which they now seldom resort, as it is comparatively scarce--at least so I was informed by Sleepy-eye, the chief of the Sissitons, who accompanied me during this excursion." (5) Featherstonhaugh's remarks, Canoe Voyage, etc., I. p. 280 and p. 304, seem to me less judicious than likely to make the judicious grieve; in fine, they are singularly obtuse to have come from so British a man and so clever a story-teller. He heads a page in caps, "THE COPPER-MINE, A FABLE;" he has in text, "finding the copper-mine to be a fable"; again: "that either M. le Sueur's green cupreous earth had not corresponded to the expectations he had raised, or that the whole account of it was to be classed with Baron Lahontan's" fables, etc. This sort of talk would befog the whole subject, were it not obvious that it has no bearing whatever upon the historico-geographical case we are discussing. The question is _where_ Lesueur went, and _when_ he got there--not at all what he found there. It is obtuse, I say, because unintentionally misleading, for F'gh to say that, when he reached the bluff whence the pigment had been taken, "Le Sueur's story lost all credit with me, for I instantly saw that it was nothing but a continuation of the seam which divided the sandstone from the limestone ... containing a silicate of iron of a blueish-green color." In the first place, F'gh was not at exactly the right spot, which Nicollet has pointed out. Secondly, though Lesueur should have been mistaken or mendacious about any copper-mine being in that region--though he should not have collected 30,000 lbs. of ore in 22 days, or even a gunny-sack full of anything in a year--though the mountains should shrink to bluffs, and the whole commercial features of the case turn into the physiognomy of the wild-cat--that would not affect the historical and geographical facts, viz.: Lesueur ascended the St. Peter's to the Mankato, and this as far at least as its first branch, thus exploring both these rivers in 1700. Item, he had been to if not also up the river of St. Pierre in 1695; and it had been known since his first voyage in 1683. (6) As to the name Rivière St. Pierre, or de St. Pierre, which we have translated St. Peter, or St. Peter's r., the former obscurity of its origin has, I think, been almost entirely cleared up. Keating's Long, 1824, I. p. 322, has: "We have sought in vain for the origin of the name; we can find no notice of it; it appears to us at present not unlikely that the name may have been given by le Sueur in 1795 [slip for 1695], in honor of M. de St. Pierre Repantigni, to whom La Hontan incidentally alludes (I. p. 136) as being in Canada in 1789 [_i. e._, 1689]. This person may have accompanied le Sueur on his expedition." Keating does not cite in this connection the remark of Carver, ed. 1796, p. 35: "Here [at Lake Pepin] I discovered the ruins of a French factory, where it is said Captain St. Pierre resided, and carried on a very great trade with the Naudowessies [Sioux], before the reduction of Canada." This person was Jacques Le Gardeur St. Pierre, who in 1737 commanded the fort on Lake Pepin (Fort Beauharnois). One Fort St. Pierre was built at Rainy l. late in 1731; J. Le G. St. Pierre was there in 1751: for extended notice of him, see Neill, Macalester Coll. Cont., No. 4, 1890, pp. 136-40. His father was Captain Paul St. Pierre, who was sent to the French post (Maison Françoise) at La Pointe (Chaquamegon bay) in 1718. Nicollet, Rep. 1843, p. 68, cites Carver, and states: "I have no hesitation in assigning its [the name's] origin to a Canadian by the name of De St. Pierre, who resided for a long time thereabouts." The name appears for the first time in Perrot's report, of the date 1689, which is also the most probable date of naming the St. Croix r. and Lake Pepin. The only question left is, whether the river was not named to compliment _Pierre_ Lesueur himself. Whoever the St. Pierre whose name the river bears may prove to be, the name is a personal one, which we should not have translated into English St. Peter; for it certainly has nothing to do with the legendary saint so styled, whose career is connected with the crowing of cocks three times more than with the course of any river. Had the stream been named by some priest for such a sadly overworked patron as the apocryphal first Bishop of Rome, we should have heard all about it in the Jesuit Relations or elsewhere. (7) The suggestion that the name St. Pierre is a perversion of _sans pierres_ ("without stones"), may be dismissed as too good to be true; for it is a settled principle of sound philology that the easiest etymologies are the most likely to have been invented to fit the case, _ex post-facto_. (8) As to native names, Nicollet says, _l. c._: "The name which the Sioux give to the St. Peter's river is _Mini-sotah_; and to St. Peter's, as a station [Mendota], _Mdote-mini-sotah_. The adjective _sotah_ is of different translation. The Canadians translate it by a pretty equivalent French word, _brouillé_--perhaps most properly rendered into English by _blear_; as, for instance, _mini sotah_, blear water, or the entrance of blear water. I have entered into this explanation, because the word _sotah_ really means neither clear nor turbid, as some authors have asserted; its true meaning being readily found in the Sioux expression _ishta-sotah_, blear-eyed.... The Chippeways are more accurate; by them, the St. Peter's river [is called] _Ashkibogi-sibi_, the Green Leaf river." It occurs to me that the distinction Nicollet draws would correspond to _translucent_, as distinguished on the one hand from colorless or transparent water, and on the other from opaque or turbid water. I may also refer to the old medical term, _gutta serena_, for forming cataract of the eye, when clear vision is obscured by a degree of opacity that does not entirely exclude light. As applied to water, Sioux _sotah_ may be about equivalent to Greek γλαυκός, Latin _glaucus_, variously rendered "gray," "bluish-green," etc., and Nicollet's "blear-eyed" be equivalent to what was called _glaucoma_ (γλαύκωμα). Notice what Pike says above of the color of the water; but it must be added that, when he speaks of the Mississippi as "remarkably red," we must understand only a reddish-yellow hue of its shoal portions, imparted by its sands; and by "black as ink," only the darker color of deeper places where the sands do not show through. The name Mini-sota has a number of variants: for example, Carver, who wintered on it Nov., 1766-Apr., 1767, has "the River St. Pierre, called by the natives the Waddapawmenesotor"; with which compare Watapan Menesota of Long, Watpàmenisothé of Beltrami, and the title of Featherstonhaugh's diverting book, "A Canoe Voyage up the Minnay Sotor," etc. It has become fixed of late years, since an Act of Congress, approved June 19th, 1852 (Stat. at Large, X. p. 147), decreed that the noble river should bear the name of the State through which it flows. (9) The Minnesota r. appears on various old maps of Louisiana (not on Hennepin's, 1683). Franquelin's, 1688, traces it without any name, but letters it with the name of the Indians, "Les Mascoutens Nadouescioux," _i. e._, Sioux of the Prairie, Gens du Large of the French, collectively, as distinguished from Gens du Lac. De L'Isle's map, 1703, has "R. St. Pierre."