Pathfinders of the West Part 6

[Ill.u.s.tration: Chateau St. Louis, Quebec, 1669, from one of the oldest prints in existence.]

Glad to be rid of the first hindrance, the explorers once more sped north. In the afternoon, Radisson's scouts ran full tilt into a band of Iroquois laden with beaver pelts. The Iroquois were smarting from their defeat of the previous night; and what was Radisson's amus.e.m.e.nt to see his own scouts and the Iroquois running from each other in equal fright, while the ground between lay strewn with booty! Radisson rushed his Indians for the waterside to intercept the Iroquois' flight.

The Iroquois left their boats and swam for the opposite sh.o.r.e, where they threw up the usual barricade and entrenched themselves to shoot on Radisson's pa.s.sing canoes. Using the captured beaver pelts as s.h.i.+elds, the Upper Indians ran the gantlet of the Iroquois fire with the loss of only one man.

The slightest defeat may turn well-ordered retreat into panic. If the explorers went on, the Iroquois would hang to the rear of the travelling Indians and pick off warriors till the Upper Country people became so weakened they would fall an easy prey. Not flight, but fight, was Radisson's motto. He ordered his men ash.o.r.e to break up the barricade. Darkness fell over the forest. The Iroquois could not see to fire. "They spared not their powder," relates Radisson, "but they made more noise than hurt." Attaching a fuse to a barrel of powder, Radisson threw this over into the Iroquois fort. The crash of the explosion was followed by a blaze of the Iroquois musketry that killed three of Radisson's men. Radisson then tore the bark off a birch tree, filled the bole with powder, and in the darkness crept close to the Iroquois barricade and set fire to the logs. Red tongues of fire leaped up, there was a roar as of wind, and the Iroquois fort was on fire. Radisson's men dashed through the fire, hatchet in hand. The Iroquois answered with their death chant. Friend and foe merged in the smoke and darkness. "We could not know one another in that skirmish of blows," says Radisson. "There was noise to terrify the stoutest man."

In the midst of the melee a frightful storm of thunder and sheeted rain rolled over the forest. "To my mind," writes the disgusted Radisson, "that was something extraordinary. I think the Devil himself sent that storm to let those wretches escape, so that they might destroy more innocents." The rain put out the fire. As soon as the storm had pa.s.sed, Radisson kindled torches to search for the missing. Three of his men were slain, seven wounded. Of the enemy, eleven lay dead, five were prisoners. The rest of the Iroquois had fled to the forest. The Upper Indians burned their prisoners according to their custom, and the night was pa.s.sed in mad orgies to celebrate the victory. "The sleep we took did not make our heads giddy," writes Radisson.

The next day they encountered more Iroquois. Both sides at once began building forts; but when he could, Radisson always avoided war. Having gained victory enough to hold the Iroquois in check, he wanted no ma.s.sacre. That night he embarked his men noiselessly; and never once stopping to kindle camp-fire, they paddled from Friday night to Tuesday morning. The _portages _over rocks in the dark cut the _voyageurs'_ moccasins to shreds. Every landing was marked with the blood of bruised feet. Sometimes they avoided leaving any trace of themselves by walking in the stream, dragging their boats along the edge of the rapids. By Tuesday the Indians were so f.a.gged that they could go no farther without rest. Canoes were moored in the hiding of the rushes till the _voyageurs_ slept. They had been twenty-two days going from Three Rivers to Lake Nip.i.s.sing, and had not slept one hour on land.

It was October when they came to Lake Superior. The forests were painted in all the glory of autumn, and game abounded. White fish appeared under the clear, still waters of the lake like shoals of floating metal; bears were seen hulking away from the watering places of sandy sh.o.r.es; and wild geese whistled overhead. After the terrible dangers of the voyage, with scant sleep and scanter fare, the country seemed, as Radisson says, a terrestrial paradise. The Indians gave solemn thanks to their G.o.ds of earth and forest, "and we," writes Radisson, "to the G.o.d of G.o.ds." Indian summer lay on the land.

November found the explorers coasting the south sh.o.r.e of Lake Superior.

They pa.s.sed the Island of Michilimackinac with its stone arches.

Radisson heard from the Indians of the copper mines. He saw the pictured rocks that were to become famous for beauty. "I gave it the name of St. Peter because that was my name and I was the first Christian to see it," he writes of the stone arch. "There were in these places very deep caves, caused by the violence of the waves."

Jesuits had been on the part of Lake Superior near the Sault, and poor Menard perished in the forests of Lake Michigan; but Radisson and Groseillers were the first white men to cruise from south to west and west to north, where a chain of lakes and waterways leads from the Minnesota lake country to the prairies now known as Manitoba. Before the end of November the explorers rounded the western end of Lake Superior and proceeded northwest. Radisson records that they came to great winter encampments of the Crees; and the Crees did not venture east for fear of Sautaux and Iroquois. He mentions a river of Sturgeons, where was a great store of fish.

The Crees wished to conduct the two white men to the wooded lake region, northwest towards the land of the a.s.siniboines, where Indian families took refuge on islands from those tigers of the plains--the Sioux--who were invincible on horseback but less skilful in canoes.

The rivers were beginning to freeze. Boats were abandoned; but there was no snow for snow-shoe travelling, and the explorers were unable to transport the goods brought for trade. Bidding the Crees go to their families and bring back slaves to carry the baggage, Radisson and Groseillers built themselves the first fort and the first fur post between the Missouri and the North Pole. It was evidently somewhere west of Duluth in either what is now Minnesota or northwestern Ontario.

This fur post was the first habitation of civilization in all the Great Northwest. Not the railway, not the cattle trail, not the path of forward-marching empire purposely hewing a way through the wilderness, opened the West. It was the fur trade that found the West. It was the fur trade that explored the West. It was the fur trade that wrested the West from savagery. The beginning was in the little fort built by Radisson and Groseillers. No great factor in human progress ever had a more insignificant beginning.

The fort was rushed up by two men almost starving for food. It was on the side of a river, built in the shape of a triangle, with the base at the water side. The walls were of unbarked logs, the roof of thatched branches interlaced, with the door at the river side. In the middle of the earth floor, so that the smoke would curl up where the branches formed a funnel or chimney, was the fire. On the right of the fire, two hewn logs overlaid with pine boughs made a bed. On the left, another hewn log acted as a table. Jumbled everywhere, hanging from branches and k.n.o.bs of branches, were the firearms, clothing, and merchandise of the two fur traders. Naturally, a fort two thousand miles from help needed sentries. Radisson had not forgotten his boyhood days of Onondaga. He strung carefully concealed cords through the gra.s.s and branches around the fort. To these bells were fastened, and the bells were the sentries. The two white men could now sleep soundly without fear of approach. This fort, from which sprang the buoyant, aggressive, prosperous, free life of the Great Northwest, was founded and built and completed in two days.

The West had begun.[4]

It was a beginning which every Western pioneer was to repeat for the next two hundred years: first, the log cabins; then, the fight with the wilderness for food.

Radisson, being the younger, went into the woods to hunt, while Groseillers kept house. Wild geese and ducks were whistling south, but "the whistling that I made," writes Radisson, "was another music than theirs; for I killed three and scared the rest." Strange Indians came through the forest, but were not admitted to the tiny fort, lest knowledge of the traders' weakness should tempt theft. Many a night the explorers were roused by a sudden ringing of the bells or cras.h.i.+ng through the underbrush, to find that wild animals had been attracted by the smell of meat, and wolverine or wildcat was attempting to tear through the matted branches of the thatched roof. The desire for firearms has tempted Indians to murder many a trader; so Radisson and Groseillers _cached_ all the supplies that they did not need in a hole across the river. News of the two white men alone in the northern forest spread like wild-fire to the different Sautaux and Ojibway encampments; and Radisson invented another protection in addition to the bells. He rolled gunpowder in twisted tubes of birch bark, and ran a circle of this round the fort. Putting a torch to the birch, he surprised the Indians by displaying to them a circle of fire running along the ground in a series of jumps. To the Indians it was magic.

The two white men were engirt with a mystery that defended them from all harm. Thus white men pa.s.sed their first winter in the Great Northwest.

Toward winter four hundred Crees came to escort the explorers to the wooded lake region yet farther west towards the land of the a.s.siniboines, the modern Manitoba. "We were Caesars," writes Radisson.

"There was no one to contradict us. We went away free from any burden, while those poor miserables thought themselves happy to carry our equipage in the hope of getting a bra.s.s ring, or an awl, or a needle... . They admired our actions more than the fools of Paris their king... .[5] They made a great noise, calling us G.o.ds and devils. We marched four days through the woods. The country was beautiful with clear parks. At last we came within a league of the Cree cabins, where we spent the night that we might enter the encampment with pomp the next day. The swiftest Indians ran ahead to warn the people of our coming." Embarking in boats, where the water was open, the two explorers came to the Cree lodges. They were welcomed with shouts. Messengers marched in front, scattering presents from the white men,--kettles to call all to a feast of friends.h.i.+p; knives to encourage the warriors to be brave; swords to signify that the white men would fight all enemies of the Cree; and abundance of trinkets--needles and awls and combs and tin mirrors--for the women.

The Indians prostrated themselves as slaves; and the explorers were conducted to a grand council of welcome. A feast was held, followed by a symbolic dance in celebration of the white men's presence.

Their entry to the Great Northwest had been a triumph: but they could not escape the privations of the explorer's life. Winter set in with a severity to make up for the long, late autumn. Snow fell continuously till day and night were as one, the sombre forests m.u.f.fled to silence with the wild creatures driven for shelter to secret haunts. Four hundred men had brought the explorers north. Allowing an average of four to each family, there must have been sixteen hundred people in the encampment of Crees. To prevent famine, the Crees scattered to the winter hunting-grounds, arranging to come together again in two months at a northern rendezvous. When Radisson and Groseillers came to the rendezvous, they learned that the gathering hunters had had poor luck.

Food was short. To make matters worse, heavy rains were followed by sharp frost. The snow became iced over, destroying rabbit and grouse, which feed the large game. Radisson noticed that the Indians often s.n.a.t.c.hed food from the hands of hungry children. More starving Crees continued to come into camp. Soon the husbands were taking the wives'

share of food, and the women were subsisting on dried pelts. The Crees became too weak to carry their snow-shoes, or to gather wood for fire.

The cries of the dying broke the deathly stillness of the winter forest; and the strong began to dog the footsteps of the weak. "Good G.o.d, have mercy on these innocent people," writes Radisson; "have mercy on us who acknowledge Thee!" Digging through the snow with their rackets, some of the Crees got roots to eat. Others tore the bark from trees and made a kind of soup that kept them alive. Two weeks after the famine set in, the Indians were boiling the pulverized bones of the waste heap. After that the only food was the buckskin that had been tanned for clothing. "We ate it so eagerly," writes Radisson, "that our gums did bleed... . We became the image of death." Before the spring five hundred Crees had died of famine. Radisson and Groseillers scarcely had strength to drag the dead from the tepees. The Indians thought that Groseillers had been fed by some fiend, for his heavy, black beard covered his thin face. Radisson they loved, because his beardless face looked as gaunt as theirs.[6]

Relief came with the breaking of the weather. The rain washed the iced snows away; deer began to roam; and with the opening of the rivers came two messengers from the Sioux to invite Radisson and Groseillers to visit their nation. The two Sioux had a dog, which they refused to sell for all Radisson's gifts. The Crees dared not offend the Sioux amba.s.sadors by stealing the worthless cur on which such hungry eyes were cast, but at night Radisson slipped up to the Sioux tepee. The dog came prowling out. Radisson stabbed it so suddenly that it dropped without a sound. Hurrying back, he boiled and fed the meat to the famis.h.i.+ng Crees. When the Sioux returned to their own country, they sent a score of slaves with food for the starving encampment. No doubt Radisson had plied the first messengers with gifts; for the slaves brought word that thirty picked runners from the Sioux were coming to escort the white men to the prairie. To receive their benefactors, and also, perhaps, to show that they were not defenceless, the Crees at once constructed a fort; for Cree and Sioux had been enemies from time immemorial. In two days came the runners, clad only in short garments, and carrying bow and quiver. The Crees led the young braves to the fort. Kettles were set out. f.a.gged from the long run, the Sioux ate without a word. At the end of the meal one rose. Shooting an arrow into the air as a sign that he called Deity to witness the truth of his words, he proclaimed in a loud voice that the elders of the Sioux nation would arrive next day at the fort to make a treaty with the French.

The news was no proof of generosity. The Sioux were the great warriors of the West. They knew very well that whoever formed an alliance with the French would obtain firearms; and firearms meant victory against all other tribes. The news set the Crees by the ears. Warriors hastened from the forests to defend the fort. The next day came the elders of the Sioux in pomp. They were preceded by the young braves bearing bows and arrows and buffalo-skin s.h.i.+elds on which were drawn figures portraying victories. Their hair was turned up in a stiff crest surmounted by eagle feathers, and their bodies were painted bright vermilion. Behind came the elders, with medicine-bags of rattlesnake skin streaming from their shoulders and long strings of bears' claws hanging from neck and wrist. They were dressed in buckskin, garnished with porcupine quills, and wore moccasins of buffalo hide, with the hair dangling from the heel. In the belt of each was a skull-cracker--a sort of sling stone with a long handle--and a war-hatchet. Each elder carried a peace pipe set with precious stones, and stuck in the stem were the quills of the war eagle to represent enemies slain. Women slaves followed, loaded with skins for the elders' tents.

[Ill.u.s.tration: A parley on the Plains.]

A great fire had been kindled inside the court of the Cree stockades.

Round the pavilion the Sioux elders seated themselves. First, they solemnly smoked the calumet of peace. Then the chief of the Sioux rose and chanted a song, giving thanks for their safe journey. Setting aside gifts of rare beaver pelts, he declared that the Sioux had come to make friends with the French, who were masters of peace and war; that the elders would conduct the white men back to the Sioux country; that the mountains were levelled and the valleys cast up, and the way made smooth, and branches strewn on the ground for the white men's feet, and streams bridged, and the doors of the tepees open. Let the French come to the Sioux! The Indians would die for the French. A gift was presented to invoke the friends.h.i.+p of the Crees. Another rich gift of furs let out the secret of the Sioux' anxiety: it was that the French might give the Sioux "thunder weapons," meaning guns.

The speech being finished, the Crees set a feast before their guests.

To this feast Radisson and Groseillers came in a style that eclipsed the Sioux. Cree warriors marched in front, carrying guns. Radisson and Groseillers were dressed in armor.[7] At their belts they wore pistol, sword, and dagger. On their heads were crowns of colored porcupine quills. Two pages carried the dishes and spoons to be used at the feast; and four Cree magicians followed with smoking calumets in their hands. Four Indian maids carried bearskins to place on the ground when the two explorers deigned to sit down. Inside the fort more than six hundred councillors had a.s.sembled. Outside were gathered a thousand spectators. As Radisson and Groseillers entered, an old Cree flung a peace pipe at the explorers' feet and sang a song of thanksgiving to the sun that he had lived to see "those terrible men whose words (guns) made the earth quake." Stripping himself of his costly furs, he placed them on the white men's shoulders, shouting: "Ye are masters over us; dead or alive, dispose of us as you will."

Then Radisson rose and chanted a song, in which he declared that the French took the Crees for brethren and would defend them. To prove his words, he threw powder in the fire and had twelve guns shot off, which frightened the Sioux almost out of their senses. A slave girl placed a coal in the calumet. Radisson then presented gifts; the first to testify that the French adopted the Sioux for friends; the second as a token that the French also took the Crees for friends; the third as a sign that the French "would reduce to powder with heavenly fire" any one who disturbed the peace between these tribes. The fourth gift was in grateful recognition of the Sioux' courtesy in granting free pa.s.sage through their country. The gifts consisted of kettles and hatchets and awls and needles and looking-gla.s.ses and bells and combs and paint, but _not_ guns. Radisson's speech was received with "Ho, ho's" of applause. Sports began. Radisson offered prizes for racing, jumping, shooting with the bow, and climbing a greased post. All the while, musicians were singing and beating the tom-tom, a drum made of buffalo hide stretched on hoops and filled with water.

Fourteen days later Radisson and Groseillers set out for the Sioux country, or what are now known as the Northwestern states.[8] On the third voyage Radisson came to the Sioux from the south. On this voyage, he came to them from the northeast. He found that the tribe numbered seven thousand men of fighting age. He remarked that the Sioux used a kind of c.o.ke or peat for fire instead of wood. While he heard of the tribes that used coal for fire, he does not relate that he went to them on this trip. Again he heard of the mountains far inland, where the Indians found copper and lead and a kind of stone that was transparent.[9] He remained six weeks with the Sioux, hunting buffalo and deer. Between the Missouri and the Saskatchewan ran a well-beaten trail northeastward, which was used by the Crees and the Sioux in their wars. It is probable that the Sioux escorted Radisson back to the Crees by this trail, till he was across what is now the boundary between Minnesota and Canada, and could strike directly eastward for the Lake of the Woods region, or the hinterland between James Bay and Lake Superior.

In spring the Crees went to the Bay of the North, which Radisson was seeking; and after leaving the Sioux, the two explorers struck for the little fort north of Lake Superior, where they had _cached_ their goods. Spring in the North was later than spring in the South; but the sh.o.r.e ice of the Northern lakes had already become soft. To save time they cut across the lakes of Minnesota, dragging their sleighs on the ice. Groseillers' sleigh was loaded with pelts obtained from the Sioux, and the elder man began to f.a.g. Radisson took the heavy sleigh, giving Groseillers the lighter one. About twelve miles out from the sh.o.r.e, on one of these lakes, the ice suddenly gave, and Radisson plunged through to his waist. It was as dangerous to turn back as to go on. If they deserted their merchandise, they would have nothing to trade with the Indians; but when Radisson succeeded in extricating himself, he was so badly strained that he could not go forward another step. There was no sense in risking both their lives on the rotten ice. He urged Groseillers to go on. Groseillers dared not hesitate.

Laying two sleds as a wind-break on each side of Radisson, he covered the injured man with robes, consigned him to the keeping of G.o.d, and hurried over the ice to obtain help from the Crees.

The Crees got Radisson ash.o.r.e, and there he lay in agony for eight days. The Indians were preparing to set out for the North. They invited Radisson to go with them. His sprain had not healed; but he could not miss the opportunity of approaching the Bay of the North.

For two days he marched with the hunters, enduring torture at every step. The third day he could go no farther and they deserted him.

Groseillers had gone hunting with another band of Crees. Radisson had neither gun nor hatchet, and the Indians left him only ten pounds of pemmican. After a short rest he journeyed painfully on, following the trail of the marching Crees. On the fifth day he found the frame of a deserted wigwam. Covering it with branches of trees and kindling a fire to drive off beasts of prey, he crept in and lay down to sleep.

He was awakened by a crackling of flame. The fire had caught the pine boughs and the tepee was in a blaze. Radisson flung his snow-shoes and clothing as far as he could, and broke from the fire-trap.

Half-dressed and lame, shuddering with cold and hunger, he felt through the dark over the snow for his clothing. A far cry rang through the forest like the bay of the wolf pack. Radisson kept solitary watch till morning, when he found that the cry came from Indians sent out to find him by Groseillers. He was taken to an encampment, where the Crees were building canoes to go to the Bay of the North.

The entire band, with the two explorers, then launched on the rivers flowing north. "We were in danger to perish a thousand times from the ice jam," writes Radisson. "... At last we came full sail from a deep bay ... we came to the seaside, where we found an old house all demolished and battered with bullets... . They (the Crees) told us about Europeans... . We went from isle to isle all that summer... . This region had a great store of cows (caribou)... .

We went farther to see the place that the Indians were to pa.s.s the summer... . The river (where they went) came from the lake that empties itself in ... the Saguenay ... a hundred leagues from the great river of Canada (the St. Lawrence) ... to where we were in the Bay of the North... . We pa.s.sed the summer quietly coasting the seaside... . The people here burn not their prisoners, but knock them on the head... . They have a store of turquoise... . They find green stones, very fine, at the same Bay of the Sea (labradorite)... . We went up another river to the Upper Lake (Winnipeg)." [10]

For years the dispute has been waged with zeal worthy of a better cause whether Radisson referred to Hudson Bay in this pa.s.sage. The French claim that he did; the English that he did not. "The house demolished with bullets" was probably an old trading post, contend the English; but there was no trading post except Radisson's west of Lake Superior at that time, retort the French. By "cows" Radisson meant buffalo, and no buffalo were found as far east as Hudson Bay, say the English; by "cows" Radisson meant caribou and deer, and herds of these frequented the sh.o.r.es of Hudson Bay, answer the French. No river comes from the Saguenay to Hudson Bay, declare the English; yes, but a river comes from the direction of the Saguenay, and was followed by subsequent explorers, a.s.sert the French.[11] The stones of turquoise and green were agates from Lake Superior, explain the English; the stones were labradorites from the east coast of the Bay, maintain the French. So the childish quarrel has gone on for two centuries. England and France alike conspired to crush the man while he lived; and when he died they quarrelled over the glory of his discoveries. The point is not whether Radisson actually wet his oars in the different indentations of Hudson and James bays. The point is that he found where it lay from the Great Lakes, and discovered the watershed sloping north from the Great Lakes to Hudson Bay. This was new ground, and ent.i.tled Radisson to the fame of a discoverer.

From the Indians of the bay, Radisson heard of another lake leagues to the north, whose upper end was always frozen. This was probably some vague story of the lakes in the region that was to become known two centuries later as Mackenzie River. The spring of 1663 found the explorers back in the Lake of the Woods region accompanied by seven hundred Indians of the Upper Country. The company filled three hundred and sixty canoes. Indian girls dived into the lake to push the canoes off, and stood chanting a song of good-speed till the boats had glided out of sight through the long, narrow, rocky gaps of the Lake of the Woods. At Lake Superior the company paused to lay up a supply of smoked sturgeon. At the Sault four hundred Crees turned back. The rest of the Indians hoisted blankets on fis.h.i.+ng-poles, and, with a west wind, scudded across Lake Huron to Lake Nip.i.s.sing. From Lake Nip.i.s.sing they rode safely down the Ottawa to Montreal. Cannon were fired to welcome the discoverers, for New France was again on the verge of bankruptcy from a beaver famine.

A different welcome awaited them at Quebec. D'Argenson, the governor, was about to leave for France, and nothing had come of the Jesuit expedition up the Saguenay. He had already sent Couture, for a second time, overland to find a way to Hudson Bay; but no word had come from Couture, and the governor's time was up. The explorers had disobeyed him in leaving without his permission. Their return with a fortune of pelts was the salvation of the impecunious governor. From 1627 to 1663 five distinct fur companies, organized under the patronage of royalty, had gone bankrupt in New France.[12] Therefore, it became a loyal governor to protect his Majesty's interests. Besides, the revenue collectors could claim one-fourth of all returns in beaver except from posts farmed expressly for the king. No sooner had Radisson and Groseillers come home than D'Argenson ordered Groseillers imprisoned.

He then fined the explorers $20,000, to build a fort at Three Rivers, giving them leave to put their coats-of-arms on the gate; a $30,000 fine was to go to the public treasury of New France; $70,000 worth of beaver was seized as the tax due the revenue. Of a cargo worth $300,000 in modern money, Radisson and Groseillers had less than $20,000 left.[13]

Had D'Argenson and his successors encouraged instead of persecuted the discoverers, France could have claimed all North America but the narrow strip of New England on the east and the Spanish settlements on the south. Having repudiated Radisson and Groseillers, France could not claim the fruits of deeds which she punished.[14]

[1] The childish dispute whether Bourdon sailed into the bay and up to its head, or only to 50 degrees N. lat.i.tude, does not concern Radisson's life, and, therefore, is ignored. One thing I can state with absolute certainty from having been up the coast of Labrador in a most inclement season, that Bourdon could not possibly have gone to and back from the inner waters of Hudson Bay between May 2 and August 11.

J. Edmond Roy and Mr. Sulte both p.r.o.nounce Bourdon a myth, and his trip a fabrication.

[2] "Shame put upon them," says Radisson. Menard did _not_ go out with Radisson and Groseillers, as is erroneously recorded.

[3] I have purposely avoided stating whether Radisson went by way of Lake Ontario or the Ottawa. Dr. Dionne thinks that he went by Ontario and Niagara because Radisson refers to vast waterfalls under which a man could walk. Radisson gives the height of these falls as forty feet. Niagara are nearer three hundred; and the Chaudiere of the Ottawa would answer Radisson's description better, were it not that he says a man could go under the falls for a quarter of a mile. "The Lake of the Castors" plainly points to Lake Nip.i.s.sing.

[4] The two main reasons why I think that Radisson and Groseillers were now moving up that chain of lakes and rivers between Minnesota and Canada, connecting Lake of the Woods with Lake Winnipeg, are: (1) Oldmixon says it was the report of the a.s.siniboine Indians from Lake a.s.siniboine (Lake Winnipeg) that led Radisson to seek for the Bay of the North overland. These a.s.siniboines did not go to the bay by way of Lake Superior, but by way of Lake Winnipeg. (2) A memoire written by De la Chesnaye in 1696--see _Doc.u.ments Nouvelle France_, 1492-1712--distinctly refers to a _coureur's_ trail from Lake Superior to Lake a.s.siniboine or Lake Winnipeg. There is no record of any Frenchmen but Radisson and Groseillers having followed such a trail to the land of the a.s.siniboines--the Manitoba of to-day--before 1676.

[5] One can guess that a man who wrote in that spirit two centuries before the French Revolution would not be a sycophant in courts,--which, perhaps, helps to explain the conspiracy of silence that obscured Radisson's fame.

[6] My reason for thinking that this region was farther north than Minnesota is the size of the Cree winter camp; but I have refrained from trying to localize this part of the trip, except to say it was west and north of Duluth. Some writers recognize in the description parts of Minnesota, others the hinterland between Lake Superior and James Bay. In the light of the _memoire_ of 1696 sent to the French government, I am unable to regard this itinerary as any other than the famous fur traders' trail between Lake Superior and Lake Winnipeg by way of Sturgeon River and the Lake of the Woods.

[7] _Radisson Relations_, p. 207.

[8] We are now on safe ground. There was a well-known trail from what is now known as the Rat Portage region to the great Sioux camps west of the Mississippi and Red River valleys. But again I refuse to lay myself open to controversy by trying definitely to give either the dates or exact places of this trip.

[9] If any proof is wanted that Radisson's journeyings took him far west of the Mississippi, these details afford it.

[10] _Radisson's Journal_, pp. 224, 225, 226.

[11] Mr. A. P. Low, who has made the most thorough exploration of Labrador and Hudson Bay of any man living, says, "Rupert River forms the discharge of the Mista.s.sini lakes ... and empties into Rupert Bay close to the mouth of the Nottoway River, and rises in a number of lakes close to the height of land dividing it from the St. Maurice River, which joins the St. Lawrence at Three Rivers."