Mouth of the Saint Louis, August, 1846.
By looking on the map you will observe that this river enters Lake
Superior on the extreme west. I had not the means of ascertaining its
precise length, but was told that above the Savannah, where I struck it,
it is an inconsiderable stream. From that point to the lake it is quite
a majestic river, and I should suppose the distance to be nearly one
hundred and fifty miles. It has more the appearance of a wild New
England river than any other that I have seen in the western country. It
is exceedingly rocky, and so full of sunken boulders and dangerous
rapids, that it never could be made navigable further up than Fon du
Lac, which is twenty miles from Lake Superior. The water is perfectly
clear, but of a rich snuff color, owing probably to the swamps out of
which it runs. It is said to rise and fall very suddenly. Its entire
shores are without a solitary habitation (excepting at the trading post
already mentioned), and the scenery is picturesque, wild and romantic.
But I hear the roar of its glorious cataracts, and must attempt a
description of them.
There is a place on this river called the Knife Portage, from the fact
that the rocks here are exceedingly sharp and pointed, where the stream
forms a large bend, and where the voyager has to make a portage of
twelve miles. The length of this bend may be sixteen miles, and in that
distance the water has a fall of about three hundred and twenty feet.
The width of the river may be from three to four hundred yards. At this
point (just above Fon du Lac) are three nameless waterfalls, whose
dimensions are indeed stupendous: they are said to be the largest in the
northwest. The water of the first tumbles over a pile of pointed rocks,
and after twisting itself into every possible variety of schutes and
foaming streams, finally murmurs itself to sleep in a pool eighty feet
below the summit whence it takes its first leap.
The second fall, or rather cataract, is about one hundred and forty feet
high, nearly perpendicular, and the water rushes over almost in a solid
and unbroken body.
The walls of slate on either side are lofty, and “crowned with a
peculiar diadem of trees;” and as the roaring of the fall is perfectly
deafening, its effect upon me was allied to that of Niagara. The pools
at the bottom appeared to be black and fathomless, but the spray was
whiter than snow, and the rainbows beautiful beyond comparison. When I
gazed upon the features of this superb water-wonder, united as they were
in one complete picture; when I listened to the scream of an hundred
eagles mingling with its roar, and thought of the uninhabited wilderness
in every direction around me, I was most deeply impressed with the power
of the Omnipotent.
I visited this cataract accompanied by a party of Indians, and owing to
the length of time it took us to reach it, we were compelled to spend
the night in its immediate vicinity. And then it was that the effect of
this cataract upon my mind was so impressive as actually, at times, to
be exceedingly painful. We built our watch-fire on the southern shore,
in a sheltering bay, about one hundred yards from the fall, and on a
spot where we could command a complete view of the superb picture.
Our supper on that occasion was composed exclusively of venison, as one
of the party had succeeded in killing a deer in one of his morning
excursions; and though I had not eaten for nine or ten hours, I seemed
to have lost my appetite, and took my food merely as a matter of
necessity;—the fact was, I thought myself the inhabitant of a “fantastic
realm,” and could hardly feel that I was a mere mortal, the creature of
an hour. After our repast was ended, two of the Indians lighted their
birchen torches and jumped into a canoe for the purpose of spearing
fish. I watched them with peculiar interest, and saw them perform one
feat which was truly wonderful. They had wounded an immense pike on a
shoal, very near a column of the falling element, when the stricken
creature floundered away into the foaming water, and the canoe darted on
in quick pursuit, as if its inmates were determined to capture or die.
One moment it seemed as if the torrent of water must be pouring into the
canoe, and the torches be extinguished, and then again, I could only see
a halo of light, looking like the sun rising at midnight, as the
fishermen glided behind a sheet of water or a cloud of spray. They were
successful in their sport, and finally returned and presented their
prize at my feet. The party then enjoyed a pipe for about twenty
minutes, when the younger Indians commenced playing their favorite
moccason game, and I spent the remainder of the evening conversing with
the chief and patriarch of the band, from whom I gathered the following
tradition respecting the cataract.
“More moons ago than I can count,” said the old man, “the country lying
between the big lake (Superior) and the place where the sun goes down,
was owned by the Sioux nation, which was then immensely powerful. They
were very cruel in their warfare, and did every thing in their power to
annihilate the Chippeway nation. The Great Spirit was not their friend,
but ours, and once, when a multitude of their warriors were pursuing
some of our hunters down the river, the Great Spirit suddenly _kicked
out the bottom_ in this place, and the principal enemies of our nation
were all destroyed. Since that time we have been the possessors of this
vast country, and the children of our ancient enemies catch the buffalo
in a far distant prairie land.”
With this legend deeply impressed on my brain (the telling of which
occupied my companion for nearly two hours) I ordered more wood to be
placed on the fire, and leaving the others to take care of themselves,
rolled myself up in my blanket, and was soon asleep. I was awakened only
once during the night, and that was by the distant howl of a wolf,
mingling with the solemn anthem of the cataract. I sat up for a moment
to look upon the scene, but the sky was covered with clouds, and it was
exceedingly dark. Even the embers of our watch-fire had ceased blazing.
Around me lay my companions in a deep sleep. Once more did I listen to
that dreadful howl, and that Godlike voice of many waters, until, like a
frightened child, I hastily covered my head, and wept myself to sleep.
On the following morning we resumed our journey in the midst of a rain
storm, the memory of that night and that cataract, however, haunting me
like a dream.
The next perpendicular fall within the bend I have mentioned, is some
two miles down the stream, and is only about fifty feet in height, but
its grandeur is somewhat enhanced by the rapids which succeed it, and
have a fall of some forty or fifty feet more. An old trader tells me
that I am the first traveller from the states who has ever taken the
trouble actually to visit these cataracts. If this is a fact, and as the
Indians, so far as I can learn, have never christened them, I claim the
privilege of giving them a name. Let them, then, be known hereafter as
the Chippeway Falls. It is a singular circumstance that a pine tree
might be cut in this interior wilderness, and if launched in one of the
tributaries of the Mississippi, or in the Saint Louis River, and
propelled by favorable winds alone, could, in process of time, be
planted in the hull of a ship at any sea-port on the globe.
The navigable portion of the Saint Louis, as before remarked, extends
only about twenty miles from the Lake, at which point is the place
legitimately called Fon du Lac. It is an ancient trading post, and
contains about half a dozen white inhabitants, viz., a worthy missionary
and his interesting family. The agent of the Fur Company and his
assistants are half-breeds, and a most godless set of people they are.
It is a general rendezvous for several Indian tribes, and when I was
there was quite crowded with the barbarians.
Fon du Lac, so far as the scenery is concerned, is one of the most truly
delightful places that I ever met with in my life. The first white man
who traded here was my friend Morrison, after whom the highest hill in
the vicinity was named. Upon this eminence I spent a pleasant afternoon
revelling over a landscape of surpassing loveliness. Far below me lay an
extensive natural meadow, on the left of which was a pretty lake, and on
the right a little hamlet composed of log cabins and bark wigwams. The
broad valley of the Saint Louis faded away to the east, studded with
islands, and protected on either side by a range of high wood-crowned
hills, beyond which reposed in its conscious pride the mighty
lake-wonder of the world. The atmosphere which rested upon the whole
scene seemed to halo every feature, and with the occasional tinkling of
a solitary cow-bell, combined to fill my heart with an indescribable
joy.
Most of my rambles about this place were performed in company with the
missionary already mentioned. He informed me that the surrounding
country abounded in rich copper ore, in agates and cornelians of the
first water, and that all the smaller streams of the country afforded
rare trout fishing. If this end of Lake Superior should become, as I
doubt not it will, famous for its mines, Fon du Lac would be a most
agreeable place to reside in, as it is easily reached by vessels. I was
hospitably entertained by this gentleman, and could not but contrast the
appearance of his dwelling with that of his neighbor the French trader.
In the one you might see a small library, a large family Bible, the
floor covered with matting, &c., a neat, tidy, and intelligent wife and
children; in the other, a pack of cards, a barrel of whisky, a stack of
guns, and a family whose filthiness was only equalled by the total
ignorance of its various members. And this contrast only inadequately
portrays the difference between Christianity and heathenism.
I left Fon du Lac about day-break, and with a retinue of some twenty
canoes, which were freighted with Indians bound to a payment at La
Pointe. It was one of those misty summer mornings when every object in
nature wears a bewitching aspect, and her still small voice seems to
whisper to the heart that it is not the “whole of life to live, nor the
whole of death to die,” and when we feel that God is omnipotent and the
mind immortal. But the scenery of this portion of the river is
beautiful—beautiful beyond any thing I had imagined to exist in any
country on the globe. The entire distance from Fon du Lac to this place,
as before mentioned, is not far from twenty miles. The river is very
broad and deep and completely filled with wooded islands, while on
either side extends a range of mountains which are as wild and solitary,
as when brought into existence.
Every member of the voyaging party seemed to be perfectly happy, and we
travelled at our ease, for the purpose of prolonging the enjoyment of
the voyage. At one time we landed at the base of a cliff, and while I
made a drawing or ransacked the shore for agates and cornelians, and the
young Indians clambered up a hillside for roots or berries, the more
venerable personages of the party would sit in their canoes, quietly
puffing away at their pipes as they watched the movements of their
younger companions. Ever and anon might be heard the report of a gun, or
the whiz of an arrow, as we happened to pass the feeding place of a
flock of ducks, the nest of an eagle or raven, or the marshy haunt of a
muskrat or otter. Now we surprised a couple of deer swimming across the
river, one of which the Indians succeeded in capturing; and now we
hauled up our canoes on a sandy island, to have a talk with some lonely
Indian family, the smoke of whose wigwam had attracted our attention,
rising from between the trees. Our sail down the river occupied us until
about ten o’clock, when we reached the mouth of the river, and
disembarked for the purpose of preparing and eating our breakfast. We
landed on the river side of a long sandy point, and while the Indians
were cooking a venison steak and a large trout, I rambled over the sand
hills, and as the sun came out of a cloud and dissipated every vestige
of the morning mist, obtained my first view of Lake Superior, where,
above the apparently boundless plain I could only discover an occasional
gull wheeling to and fro as if sporting with the sunbeams.