Chapter XXX: , pp. 241-247 (2)

"The sun was nearing the western horizon. I glanced at it and hurried on. The first part of my way lay through heavy woods; then came an opening, in the midst of which rose Peek's Hill. The brow of the hill was perhaps forty rods from the edge of the woods, the steep incline down which we coasted being on the opposite side. There was no road, only a path worn through the snow by our neighborly feet.

"I had passed about half-way through the woods, when suddenly a great shaggy wolf bounded out into the path in front of me. The wolf stopped and glared hungrily at me for a moment, then dashed away into the brush. A moment after, I heard him howling a few rods in the rear. To my inexpressible horror, the howl was quickly answered by another, and then another, and still another, until to my terrified ears the woods seemed full of the ferocious beasts.

"There was no need of telling me what this meant. I was old enough and familiar enough with wolf-nature to know that the first wolf was calling to his mates to come and help him run down and kill his quarry.

"For a moment I stood still in my tracks, listening in trembling horror to the hideous howlings; then I gathered myself together and ran. Fear lent me wings. My feet seemed hardly to touch the snow. And yet it was but a minute before I heard the rapid pit-pat of the feet of the wolves on the hard crust of the snow behind me, and knew that they were drawing near. I reached the edge of the woods; and, as I dashed into the opening, I cast a hurried glance to the rear. Several great, gaunt wolves, running neck and neck, were not five rods behind me. They ran with their heads outstretched, making great bounds over the hard snow.

"At that time I was tall for my age, and could run like a deer. The sight of the wolves, so close behind me, caused me to redouble my efforts; but, in spite of my speed, as I reached the brow of the hill, I could hear their panting breaths, so near had they come. With a quick movement of my hands I threw off my heavy cloth cape and woolen hood. At the same instant my eyes caught sight of the sled, which I had left at the top of the hill. Fortunately it was standing facing the steep incline. If I could reach it before the wolves caught me, possibly I might yet escape! My hood and cape delayed the animals for an instant; but they were again upon me just as I, without slacking my speed in the least, caught the sled up into my hands and threw myself upon it.

"I think the sudden change in my position, just as they were about to spring on me, must have disconcerted the wolves for an instant; and before they recovered I was sliding down the hill. The wolves came tumbling and leaping after me, howling and snarling. At the start, the hill was very steep, and the frozen snow was as smooth and as slippery as ice. The sled kept going faster and faster, and soon I had the inexpressible delight of seeing that I was beginning to leave the wolves behind. Far below I saw the gleaming ice on the pond. About half-way down the hill the incline was considerably less steep, becoming nearly level just before reaching the pond. When I came to this part of the hill I again glanced behind, and, to my horror, saw that the wolves had begun to gain on me, and were now not more than two rods away. Evidently the sled was slowing up. There was nothing I could do to quicken its motion. My fate seemed certain. At last the sled reached the pond, and, while still but a few feet from the bank, I suddenly felt the ice bend and crack beneath me; but either my speed was too rapid or my weight too light, or both, for I did not break through, but sped swiftly on to stronger ice and to safety. For a moment the slippery ice delayed the wolves, then they came on swifter than ever, their sharp claws scratching the ice like knives. Finally I heard a crash, and glancing back, I saw a struggling jumble of heads and paws, and I knew in a moment that the combined weight of the wolves had broken through the ice at the weak place that had cracked as I passed over it.

"I left the sled at the margin of the pond, and hurried home, where, girl-like, I fell fainting into my mother's arms.

"There, children; that is how your mother escaped from the wolves by coasting down Peek's Hill; and that great wolfskin robe in the corner is one of the very hides that father took from the six bodies after he had dragged them out of the pond the next morning"; and mother, with a flush on her dear face, would point to the familiar wolfskin robe.

Then we children would bring the great robe from its place, spread it out on the floor before the fire, and, seating ourselves upon it, talk in low voices of the terrible ride our dear mother took down Peek's Hill when she was a girl and was chased by the wolves.

THE UNIVERSITY GROUP

The selections here placed together under the head, "The
University Group," are taken from the works of authors who
have taught or who are now teaching in the University of
Wisconsin, and who may, therefore, be said both to have
influenced it in its ideals and to have been influenced by
it. The work of the editors in this section of the volume has
been at once peculiarly pleasant and difficult. It has been
pleasant because, under the shadow of Wisconsin's greatest
institution of learning, there has come into birth a large
body of interesting, instructive, and thoroughly worth-while
literary material. The task has been difficult because the
line between technical and special material treated in a
literary way, and what may be styled pure literature, is very
hard to draw. The editors realize thoroughly their
fallibility in the making of these selections. So many books
have been written, and so many contributions to both popular
and technical magazines have been made by teachers in the
University, that it is a physical impossibility even to scan
them with any sure result of fairness or equity in the
selection of real literature from the great mass that has
been produced. The most that is claimed for the present
selections is that at least they are thoroughly worth-while.
No doubt a search covering sufficient time and dealing with a
sufficiently large portion of the output of the University
would reveal other works and other men worthy of
representation in this volume.

There is another consideration that should be mentioned as
rendering the task of the present editors peculiarly
difficult: All but one of the men whose works are mentioned
here are now living. Aside from the impossibility of wholly
pleasing any man by a selection from or a criticism of his
work, there is the inevitable fact that since most of these
men are young, their actual relative standing as producers of
literature is constantly and rapidly changing. As one reads
the selections in the following pages, he is impressed most
of all by the spirit of buoyancy and youth that pervades
them. Scarcely a single selection here, even those by the
older men, bears the imprint of satiety or completion. All
are pulsing with life, hopefulness, buoyancy, and promise.

Again, in a book of this nature, selections must necessarily
be brief. It is not possible to give really adequate
representation to any one of these men, since the laws of
space are inexorable.

Perhaps the one thing common to all sections in this
group--the thing which will most readily and profoundly
impress even the youngest reader--is a feeling of breadth of
experience, wide observation, earnest, keen, and insatiable
desire for truth,--in fact, all the opposites of narrowness,
prejudice, provincialism. One feels at once that the writers
here have read widely and well, that they have a fund of
facts gained both from books and at first hand through travel
and observation, and that their emotions and their judgments
spring from this well of truth as they see it.

PRESIDENT VAN HISE

Charles Richard Van Hise needs no introduction to Wisconsin
readers, nor indeed to readers in any part of America. He is
a man whom our state may proudly call her own. He was born in
Fulton in 1857, took his bachelor's degree in mechanical
engineering at his own State University in 1879 and his Ph.
D. there in 1892, and throughout his whole life, since
receiving his first degree, he has been in the faculty of his
own Alma Mater. In 1903 he was made its president, which
position he now holds.

He is recognized by all as the peer of any man in our country
as an authority on geology. His face, through photographs
appearing from time to time in public prints, is familiar to
us all: while in Madison, and indeed in most cities of the
state, his slightly bent figure, with the face peering
forward as though seeking some new truth, would be readily
recognized by any schoolboy.

When at Madison one of his favorite diversions is riding
horseback, and no doubt in many of his geological trips
horses have been his most dependable friends.

Needless to say, his interests are wide and varied. Nothing
that affects the welfare of his country and its people is
outside the field of his attention. Through his membership in
many learned societies and his connection with various
educational bodies and institutions he wields an influence
for the spirit of truth and enlightenment second to almost
none in the United States.

We quote here a brief passage from his writings to indicate
something of the range of interests the mind and heart of
Wisconsin's most active citizen find time in which to
interest themselves. While President Van Hise's interests are
not primarily literary, any man of fine sensibilities and
intelligence, placed as he is, at the center of momentous
events, is bound to have a message of vital import; and any
such message, clearly and suitably delivered, is literature.

THE FUTURE OF MAN IN AMERICA

By Charles R. Van Hise, published in the World's Work, Vol.
XVIII, p. 11718.

... It is clear that the problem of the conservation of our natural resources is an interlocking one. If the forests are conserved in the rough lands and mountains, the streams will have an even flow, their navigability will be easily maintained, they will give a uniform water-power; the erosion of the soil will be lessened; the bottom lands along the stream will not be flooded. If the water-powers are developed, the consumption of coal will be lessened. If the elements which are changed from ore to metals are carefully saved--not being allowed to rust or to be lost--and thus utilized again and again, it will not be necessary to take from the mines so large an amount of ore, and thus less coal and power will be required for their extraction. The conservation of one resource assists in the conservation of all others. We should work with the agents of the earth rather than reverse their work, as we have been doing since American settlement began.

Intimately connected with the conservation of the natural resources is the conservation of humanity itself. Just as we have been reckless in the use of our natural resources, so as a nation have we been reckless of human life. We now know enough in reference to the prevention and cure of communicable diseases, we know enough in reference to improving the conditions under which the industries are carried on, so that, according to Professor Irving Fisher, the average human life might be lengthened by a third.

So far as we permit human beings to be created, it is plainly our duty to conserve them and, so far as possible, produce a happy environment for them. This great problem of the conservation of humanity is mentioned merely to put it in relation with the problems of the conservation of our natural resources, rather than to discuss it.

How long shall this nation endure? Or, more exactly, how long shall human beings occupy this land? It is only within the past two centuries that the lands of the country have been subject to agriculture upon an extensive scale, and the main drafts upon the soil of this country have been within the last century. We should think, not of a hundred years, or of a thousand years, but of hundreds of thousands, or of millions of years of development of the human race. There is no reason, from a geological point of view, why human beings may not live upon this earth for millions of years to come, perhaps many millions of years, and, so far as we are concerned, such periods are practically infinite.

These considerations impose upon us as our most fundamental duty the transmission of the heritage of our natural resources to our descendants as nearly intact as possible. This is an individual responsibility, as well as a state and a national responsibility. There's a strongly developed opinion at the present time that the owners of great wealth, and especially those who control great natural resources, should act as trustees for the nation. This is easy to see; but every man who owns a farm is equally a trustee to the nation for his small property. If at the end of his life the farm goes to his son depleted in richness, he is as truly faithless to his trust as are the great interests, some of which think only of present gain, and wastefully exploit the natural resources of the country. Each in proportion to his own responsibility is a traitor to the nation. At the present time, fortunately, this sense of stewardship is gaining possession of those who control some of the great resources of the nation. As yet, there is scarcely a glimmering of responsibility in the case of the smaller holder of natural resources. But the future of the nation is safe only when small and large holder alike, from the man who owns forty acres of land to the groups of men who control the anthracite of the nation, shall administer their trust primarily for the benefit of the people now living and for succeeding generations rather than for themselves.

I do not hesitate to assert that, from the point of view of our descendants, this question of conservation of our natural resources is more important than any political or social question, indeed, more important than all political or social questions upon the solution of which we are now engaged. Not only is it more important, but it is more pressing, for already our unnecessary losses are irremediable, and the situation is growing steadily worse.

It is necessary that a great campaign of education be inaugurated at once with reference to the conservation of the soil, just as there has been a campaign of education with reference to the conservation of the forests. The task is an enormous one, indeed vastly greater than that carried on with reference to our other resources, because of the fact that the land holdings are so subdivided; but the campaign of education must be carried on, and, as a part of it, the laws must be developed, until we reach the situation where no man dares so to handle his land as to decrease its fertility. If present methods are allowed to continue, it is certain that in the not distant future this country will be able to support only a relatively sparse population. Only by the conservation of our soil, undiminished in its fertility, can we hope to be able to provide for the hundreds of millions of people who, in the near future in the United States, will be demanding food and clothing. The conservation of the soil is the conservation of the basal asset of the nation.

Similarly, the campaign of education in reference to the forests must be continued, and that with reference to the coal and mineral resources inaugurated; for only second in importance to the conservation of the soil is the economic mining and use of coal, the conservation of the forests, and the use of metals with the minimum waste.

DEAN BIRGE

Edward Asahel Birge was born in Troy, New York, in 1851. He
received his collegiate training at Williams and Harvard and
was made instructor in natural history at the University of
Wisconsin in 1875, professor in 1879, and Dean of the College
of Letters and Science in 1891, which position he has held
down to the present time, except for three years when he
served as Acting President.

No one among all the professors is better known to the
students of the University of Wisconsin than Dean Birge. His
active figure, his firm step, his (now) white hair, which,
when the writer went to school, was but iron-gray, his keen
eye, have all come to be institutional and fundamental at the
University of Wisconsin. No undergraduate who has gone
tremblingly before Dean Birge to get his excuse for being
late to his first class after the Christmas holidays will
need a description of Dean Birge's eye. No one ever thinks of
trying to deceive the Dean.

But withal, nothing could be more unfair than to give the
notion that keenness is the only quality in that eye.
Kindness is there, too, and above all, justice. We who were
undergraduates at Madison, always think of Dean Birge as a
scholar in his chosen line and as a school administrator. It
will be a surprise to many to know of his keen interest in
literature. The writer ventures to say that one will look
some time before he finds, from the pen of the best-trained
specialist in English, a fairer estimate of Milton than the
one here given by this biologist.

MILTON

Introductory remarks at the celebration of the tercentenary
anniversary of Milton's birth, held at the University of
Wisconsin, December 9, 1908.

Perhaps I am wrong in permitting myself to say anything beyond the formal words which belong to my office tonight. I am sure that I have no right to join in the tribute which today the world offers to Milton, beyond that which belongs to every one who did not need to knock the dust from his copy of the poems when this tercentenary anniversary approached. Yet if I had the power to praise, I should attempt the task.

"If my inferior hand or voice could hint
Inimitable things"

I would add my words to those of more discriminating praise. But if I speak at all, it must be as one of Milton's readers, not as his critic, still less as his judge; not even as his eulogist. Perhaps I may speak also as a descendant of the men and women who made up that Puritan commonwealth from which he was born and to which at bottom he belonged; as a descendant of men and women, stern, god-fearing, theology-loving, yet very human; mostly commonplace people; not sensitive to art or caring much about it, yet capable of being profoundly moved by the greatest poetry. I may speak in the name of those who for generations kept Milton second only to the Bible in their knowledge and as belonging to a generation which today finds Milton next beyond the Bible in its ignorance. I may represent in some sort that public which long cherished him but which today leaves him to the few lovers of poetry on the one side, and on the other, must have converted him to a post-mortem belief in purgatory by condemning him to a place among the authors assigned for "intensive study" in secondary schools.

I cannot find it in my heart to blame my fellows severely for their present neglect of Milton. When we read the introductory lines of the Aeneid--for our small Latin extends so far as this--and the triumphant final words: "_atque altae moenia Romae_" "burst out into sudden blaze," then in that quick vision of the walls of lofty Rome we catch some hint of that spirit which made the poem the bible of the Roman state. And when we find the introduction to Paradise Lost closing with the promise that the author will "justify the ways of God to man," we feel that temper in the poem which made it at once the holier bible of the Puritan and prevented it from becoming the bible of the English speaking race for all time.

But we of the stock from which Milton came have not all deserted the poet. Some of us still read his verse, though not for the poem so much as for the poetry, which in his hands became the

"golden key
That opes the palace of eternity."

We do not find our Milton in his earlier poems; for, charming as they are, they lack that note of strong personality and endless power which our ear first catches in Lycidas:

"Ay me! Whilst thee the shores and sounding seas
Wash far away, where'er thy bones are hurled,
Whether beyond the stormy Hebrides,
Where thou, perhaps, under the whelming tide
Visit'st the bottom of the monstrous world;
Or whether thou to our moist vows denied,
Sleep'st by the fable of Bellerus old,
Where the great vision of the guarded Mount
Looks toward Namancos and Bayona's hold--"

Here is the true music of Milton's verse; a deep, long-drawn note, a solemn cadence; far from the "wanton heed and giddy cunning" of the music which untwists the chains of harmony, and equally distant from heaven's calm serenity of choral symphonies and "undisturbed song of pure content." This music sounds in the Paradise Lost, less emotional perhaps, but purer and higher; appealing to ear and soul in complex and interwoven harmonies of thought and verse. We hear it still in the Samson; austere, intellectualized; the scheme of music rather than music itself; still resonant though not resounding. We have no skill to compare this music with that of other poets; but this we know, that while its harmonies linger in our ears all other verse rings poor and thin. We hear no voice but Milton's which can bear the praise of his own words: "_praesentem sonat vox ipsa Deum_"--its very note proclaims the present God.

Nor is this all. Milton's verse moves us as does that of no other poet. I do not mean that it moves us to laughter or even to tears. I mean rather that it moves our souls bodily, if such a thing may be. As we read it, we find ourselves committed to a power not so much buoyant as illimitable. The verse bears us aloft and carries us forward; not swiftly, slowly rather; advancing, to our increased happiness, not directly, but with many a pause and turn; yet steadily and powerfully pressing on toward a goal certain and far-seen. We know not whether Milton's poetry accomplished

"Things unattempted yet in prose or rhyme";

but at least we must confess for ourselves that it illumines our darkness and raises and supports us as does no other verse.

And so we, who in some far off sense belong to Milton's people, join tonight with you who have the right to praise his name. Yet it may be that in so doing we are thinking rather of ourselves than of any tribute that you or we can bring to him. We know that your commemorative words will renew our knowledge and quicken our hearts. We hope that, hearing them, we may feel the presence of those

"immortal shades
Of bright aerial spirits"

who ever attend Milton's verse; perhaps we even hope that our clearer vision may catch some new glimpse of Milton himself--our poet--wearing "the crown that Vertue gives" and sitting

"Amongst the enthroned gods on sainted seats."

RASMUS BJÖRNE ANDERSON

"Rasmus B. Anderson" is a name that has been familiar to all
University of Wisconsin students and to all people of
Scandinavian parentage throughout the Northwest for at least
two score years. This fine old man is a true son of
Wisconsin. He was born in Albion, Wisconsin, of Norwegian
parents, in 1846. He received an honorary A. B. from the
University of Wisconsin in 1885, and the title of L. L. D.
from the same institution in 1888. He was professor of
Scandinavian languages and literature here from 1875 to 1883,
when he resigned to serve as minister to Denmark. He has
translated scores of selections from Scandinavian languages
into English, and is the editor of almost countless articles
of an historical, linguistic, literary, and philosophical
nature. Now, at the age of seventy, his friends know him as a
kindly, busy man with an active and keen interest in all
about him. He is at present serving in an editorial capacity
on the boards of different journals and encyclopedias.

The selection here given was one of the earliest that he
published. It breathes the spirit of enthusiasm and love for
the land of his fathers, but at the same time shows his
careful citation of evidence to support his every assertion.

BJARNE HERJULFSON, 986

From "AMERICA, NOT DISCOVERED BY COLUMBUS." Chapter X. By
Rasmus B. Anderson. Copyright, 1883, by S. C. Griggs & Co.

In the year 986, the same year that he returned from Greenland, the above-named Erik the Red moved from Iceland to Greenland, and among his numerous friends, who accompanied him, was an Icelander by name Herjulf.

Herjulf had a son by name Bjarne, who was a man of enterprise and fond of going abroad, and who possessed a merchant-ship, with which he gathered wealth and reputation. He used to be by turns a year abroad and a year at home with his father. He chanced to be away in Norway when his father moved over to Greenland, and on returning to Iceland he was so much disappointed on hearing of his father's departure with Erik, that he would not unload his ship, but resolved to follow his old custom and take up his abode with his father. "Who will go with me to Greenland?" he said to his men. "We will all go with you," replied the men. "But we have none of us ever been on the Greenland Sea before," said Bjarne. "We mind not that," said the men,--so away they sailed for three days and lost sight of Iceland. Then the wind failed. After that a north wind and fog set in, and they knew not where they were sailing to. This lasted many days, until the sun at length appeared again, so that they could determine the quarters of the sky, and lo! in the horizon they saw, like a blue cloud, the outlines of an unknown land. They approached it. They saw that it was without mountains, was covered with wood, and that there were small hills inland. Bjarne saw that this did not answer to the description of Greenland; he knew he was too far south; so he left the land on the larboard side and sailed northward two days, when they got sight of land again. The men asked Bjarne if this was Greenland; but he said it was not, "For in Greenland," he said, "there are great, snowy mountains; but this land is flat and covered with trees." They did not go ashore, but turning the bow from the land, they kept the sea with a fine breeze from the southwest for three days, when a third land was seen. Still Bjarne would not go ashore, for it was not like what had been reported of Greenland. So they sailed on, driven by a violent southwest wind, and after four days they reached a land which suited the description of Greenland. Bjarne was not deceived, for it was Greenland, and he happened to land close to the place where his father had settled.

It cannot be determined with certainty what parts of the American coast Bjarne saw; but from the circumstances of the voyage, the course of the winds, the direction of the currents, and the presumed distance between each sight of land, there is reason to believe that the first land that Bjarne saw in the year 986 was the present Nantucket, one degree south of Boston; the second Nova Scotia, and the third Newfoundland. Thus Bjarne Herjulfson was the first European whose eyes beheld any part of the present New England.

REUBEN GOLD THWAITES

Reuben Gold Thwaites was born in Massachusetts in 1853. When
twenty-three years of age he came to Madison, Wisconsin, to
act as editor of the Wisconsin State Journal. Just ten years
later he was made secretary and superintendent of the State
Historical Society of Wisconsin, in which capacity he served
until his death in 1913.

All students of history in the University of Wisconsin knew
Mr. Thwaites, for no doubt partly through his influence,
instructors in history impressed upon the young men and women
in their classes the conception of history as being always in
the making. To many a student who had always thought of
history as being something written in books this new
conception came as a great awakening. He urged upon all with
whom he came in contact the importance of recording local
events, and he had an extraordinarily keen sense of
tendencies and activities in his state that were really vital
and significant.

The State Historical Library at Madison contains thousands
of newspaper clippings, little pamphlets, letters by obscure
people, apparently unimportant legal or official documents
that were gathered by Reuben Gold Thwaites, and that now form
the priceless sources of the history of the state. The
services of such a man to his community cannot be reckoned
commercially. The state knows itself better, understands its
ideals more thoroughly, and furnishes to its students a fund
of incontrovertible facts on which to base their study,
because it possessed a citizen like Reuben Gold Thwaites.

THE DISCOVERY OF WISCONSIN

From "STORIES OF THE BADGER STATE," pp. 27-32. By Reuben Gold
Thwaites. Copyright, 1900, by the author.

Among the many queer stories brought [to Quebec] by these fierce, painted barbarians [the Indians] was one which told of a certain "Tribe of the Sea" dwelling far away on the western banks of the "upper waters," a people who had come out of the West, no man knew whence. In those early days, Europeans still clung to the notion which Columbus had always held, that America was but an eastern projection of Asia. This is the reason that our savages were called Indians, for the discoverers of America thought they had merely reached an outlying portion of India; they had no idea that this was a great and new continent. Governor Champlain, and after him Governor Frontenac, and the great explorer La Salle, all supposed that they could reach India and China, already known to travelers to the east, by persistently going westward. When, therefore, Champlain heard of these strange Men of the Sea, he at once declared they must be the long-sought Chinese. He engaged Nicolet, in whom he had great confidence, to go out and find them, wherever they were, making a treaty of peace with them, and secure their trade.

Upon the first day of July, 1634, Nicolet left Quebec, a passenger in the second of two fleets of canoes containing Indians from the Ottawa valley, who had come down to the white settlements to trade. Among his fellow passengers were three adventurous Jesuit missionaries, who were on their way to the country of the Huron tribe, east of Lake Huron. Leaving the priests at Allumettes Island, he continued up the Ottawa, then crossed over to Lake Nipissing, visited old friends among the Indians there, and descended French Creek, which flows from Lake Nipissing into Georgian Bay, a northeastern arm of Lake Huron. On the shores of the great lake, he engaged seven Hurons to paddle his long birch-bark canoe and guide him to the mysterious "Tribe of the Sea."

Slowly they felt their way along the northern shores of Lake Huron, where the pine forests sweep majestically down to the water's edge, or crown the bold cliffs, while southward the green waters of the inland sea stretch away to the horizon. Storms too severe for their frail craft frequently detained them on the shore, and daily they sought food in the forest. The savage crew, tiring of exercise, and overcome by superstitious fears, would fain have abandoned the voyage; but the strong, energetic master bore down all opposition. At last they reached the outlet of Lake Superior, the forest-girt Strait of St. Mary, and paddled up as far as the falls, the Sault Ste. Marie, as it came to be called by the Jesuit missionaries. Here there was a large village of Algonkins, where the explorer tarried, refreshing his crew and gathering information concerning the "Tribe of the Sea." The explorers do not appear to have visited Lake Superior; but, bolder than before, they set forth to the southwest, and passing gayly through the island-dotted Straits of Mackinac, now one of the world's greatest highways, were soon upon the broad waters of Lake Michigan, of which Nicolet was probably the first white discoverer.

Clinging still to the northern shore, camping in the dense woods at night or when threatened by storm, Nicolet rounded far-fetching Point Detour and landed upon the shores of Bay de Noquet, a northern arm of Green Bay. Another Algonkin tribe dwelt here, with whom the persistent explorer smoked the pipe of peace, and they gave him further news of the people he sought. Next he stopped at the mouth of the Menominee River, now the northeast boundary between Wisconsin and Michigan, where the Menominee tribe lived. Another council was held, more tobacco was smoked, and one of Nicolet's Huron companions was sent forward to notify the Winnebagoes at the mouth of the Fox River that the great white chief was approaching; for the uncouth Winnebagoes were the far-famed "Tribe of the Sea" whom Nicolet had traveled so far to find....

By this time, Nicolet had his doubts about meeting Chinese at Green Bay. As, however, he had brought with him "a grand robe of China damask, all strewn with flowers, and birds of many colors," such as Chinese mandarins are supposed to wear, he put it on; and when he landed on the shore of Fox River, where is now the city of Green Bay, strode forward into the group of waiting, skin-clad savages, discharging the pistols which he held in either hand. Women and children fled in terror to the wigwams; and the warriors fell down and worshipped this Manitou (or spirit) who carried with him thunder and lightning.

"The news of his coming," says the old Jesuit chronicler, "quickly spread to the places round about, and there assembled four or five thousand men. Each of the Chief men made a feast for him, and at one of these banquets they served at least six-score Beavers."...

For various reasons, it was nearly thirty years before another visit was made by white men to Wisconsin. Nicolet himself soon settled down at the new town of Three Rivers, on the shores of the St. Lawrence, between Quebec and Montreal, as the agent and interpreter there of the great fur trade company. He was a very useful man both to the company and to the missionaries; for he had great influence over the Indians, who loved him sincerely, and he always exercised this influence for the good of the colony and of religion. He was drowned in the month of October, 1642, while on his way to release a poor savage prisoner who was being maltreated by Indians in the neighborhood.

FREDERICK JACKSON TURNER

Born in Portage, Wisconsin, in 1861, Frederick J. Turner was
graduated from the State University in 1884, and six years
later he received his Ph. D. from Johns Hopkins. Meantime he
had spent some of the years in teaching in his Alma Mater. He
was made full professor of history in 1892, which position he
held until 1910, when Harvard University called him.

Few men on "The Hill" were more beloved by the students than
"Freddie" Turner. His courses were crowded, and his lectures
were exceedingly popular. Perhaps if his students had known
that from 1885 to 1888 he served as tutor in rhetoric and
oratory at Wisconsin, they would not have wondered so much at
the eloquence of his lectures.

But eloquence was not the main feature of his lectures, nor
yet the quality he most desired in the recitations of his
students. Woe betide the young man who had spent too little
time upon the "constitutional period," and who tried to give
this argus-eyed instructor the impression of deep and careful
study. The bubble was sure to be pricked, and the
discomfiture of the ambitious one was, while frequently
laughable, always unmistakable. One never knew when he was
going to be "quizzed" in "Freddie's" class. But one thing was
certain: that was that he would be asked a question, and when
that question came it was best, from every point of view, to
be able to do good, clear, straight thinking, based on a fund
of religiously acquired information. One quality that
Professor Turner exacted of himself and others was that
assertions must be backed up by evidence. Perhaps that is not
the least important reason why the article from which a
selection is here made created as profound a change in the
general attitude toward American history as any single word
on that subject that has ever been spoken.

THE SIGNIFICANCE OF THE FRONTIER IN AMERICAN HISTORY

From "THE ANNUAL REPORT OF THE AMERICAN HISTORICAL
ASSOCIATION" for 1893, pp. 199-227. By Professor Frederick J.
Turner, then of the University of Wisconsin.

In a recent bulletin of the Superintendent of the Census for 1890 appear these significant words: "Up to and including 1880, the country had a frontier of settlement, but at present the unsettled area has been so broken into by isolated bodies of settlement that there can hardly be said to be a frontier line. In the discussion of its extent, its westward movement, etc., it cannot, therefore, any longer have a place in the census reports." This brief official statement marks the closing of a great historic movement. Up to our own day American history has been in a large degree the history of the colonization of the Great West. The existence of an area of free land, its continuous recession, and the advance of American settlement westward, explain American development.

Behind institutions, behind constitutional forms and modifications, lie the vital forces that call these organs into life and shape them to meet changing conditions. The peculiarity of American institutions is the fact that they have been compelled to adapt themselves to the changes of an expanding people--to the changes involved in crossing a continent, in winning a wilderness, and in developing at each area of this progress out of the primitive economical and political conditions of the frontier into the complexity of city life. Said Calhoun in 1817, "We are great, and rapidly--I was about to say fearfully--growing!" So saying, he touched the distinguishing feature of American life. All peoples show development; the germ theory of politics has been sufficiently emphasized. In the case of most nations, however, the development has occurred in a limited area; and if the nation has expanded, it has met other growing peoples whom it has conquered. But in the case of the United States we have a different phenomenon. Limiting our attention to the Atlantic Coast, we have the familiar phenomenon of the evolution of institutions in a limited area, such as the rise of representative government; the differentiation of simple colonial governments into complex organs; the progress from primitive industrial society, without division of labor, up to manufacturing civilization. But we have in addition to this a recurrence of the process of evolution in each western area reached in the process of expansion. Thus American development has exhibited not merely advance along a single line, but a return to primitive conditions on a continually advancing frontier line, and a new development for that area. American social development has been continually beginning over again on the frontier. This perennial rebirth, this fluidity of American life, this expansion westward with its new opportunities, its continuous touch with the simplicity of primitive society, has furnished the forces dominating American character. The true point of view in the history of this nation is not the Atlantic Coast, it is the Great West. Even the slavery struggle, which is made so exclusive an object of attention by writers like Professor von Holst, occupies its important place in American history because of its relation to westward expansion.

In this advance, the frontier is the outer edge of the wave--the meeting point between savagery and civilization. Much has been written about the frontier from the point of view of border warfare and the chase, but as a field for the serious study of the economist and the historian it has been neglected.

The American frontier is sharply distinguished from the European frontier--a fortified boundary line running through dense populations. The most significant thing about the American frontier is, that it lies at the hither edge of free land. In the census reports it is treated as the margin of that settlement which has a density of two or more to the square mile. The term is an elastic one, and for our purposes does not need sharp definition. We shall consider the whole frontier belt, including the Indian country and outer margin of the "settled area," of the census reports. This paper will make no attempt to treat the subject exhaustively; its aim is simply to call attention to the frontier as a fertile field for investigation, and to suggest some of the problems which arise in connection with it....

The stubborn American environment is there with its imperious summons to accept its conditions; the inherited ways of doing things are also there; and yet, in spite of environment, and in spite of custom, each frontier did indeed furnish a new field of opportunity, a gate of escape from the bondage of the past; and freshness, and confidence, and scorn of older society, impatience of its restraints and its ideas, and indifference to its lessons, have accompanied the frontier. What the Mediterranean Sea was to the Greeks, breaking the bond of custom, offering new experiences, calling out new institutions and activities, that, and more, the ever retreating frontier has been to the United States directly, and to the nations of Europe more remotely. And now, four centuries from the discovery of America, at the end of a hundred years of life under the Constitution, the frontier has gone, and with its going has closed the first period of American history.

PAUL SAMUEL REINSCH

Professor Reinsch was born in Milwaukee in 1869. He received
his A. B. from the University of Wisconsin in 1892 and his
doctorate in 1898. He had the advantage of studying at the
University of Berlin and at Rome and Paris. He was assistant
professor of political science at his Alma Mater from 1899 to
1901, and full professor from 1901 to 1913, except for two
years, 1911 and 1912, when he held the Roosevelt
professorship at the Universities of Berlin and Leipzig.
Since 1913, he has been Envoy Extraordinary and Minister
Plenipotentiary to China. His present address is the American
Legation, Peking, China.

Few men have had the advantages both in study and experience
that have come to Dr. Reinsch, and few have met these
advantages with keener love for truth and desire for
knowledge. He is a member of several learned societies of law
and political science, and is the author of many books on
these and related subjects. Some of these books have been
translated into Japanese, Chinese, Spanish, and German. The
selection given here is taken from "Intellectual Currents in
the Far East," and well illustrates the fact that deep
learning and perfect clearness of expression may well go
together in a literary production.

THE NEW EDUCATION OF CHINA

From "INTELLECTUAL AND POLITICAL CURRENTS IN THE FAR EAST."