Henry Rowe Schoolcraft
Summary Narrative of an Exploratory Expedition to the Sources of the Mississippi River, in 1820
Resumed and Completed, by the Discovery of its Origin in Itasca Lake, in 1832
Published by Good Press, 2019
EAN 4057664561145
Table of Contents
6. METEOROLOGY.
7. INDIAN HIEROGLYPHICS, OR PICTURE WRITING, LANGUAGES, AND HISTORY.
CHAPTER I.
Departure—Considerations on visiting the northern summits early in the season—Cross the Highlands of the Hudson—Incidents of the journey from Albany to Buffalo—Visit Niagara Falls—Their grandeur the effect of magnitude—Embark on board the steamer Walk-in-the-Water—Passage up Lake Erie—Reach Detroit.
The determination to penetrate to the source of the Mississippi, during the summer months, made an early departure important. I had, while at Potosi, in Missouri, during the prior month of February, written to Hon. J. B. Thomas, U. S. S., Washington, to endeavor to secure an appointment to explore the mineralogy and natural features of the upper Mississippi River; and as soon as I had published my treatise on the mines and minerals of Missouri, I proceeded to Washington, and submitted to the proper officers of the Government, my account of the mineralogical wealth of the western domains, with a plan for the management of the public mines. Mr. Calhoun decidedly favored these views; but, foreseeing the necessity of congressional action on the subject, and the necessary delays of departmental references, said to me, that he had just received a memoir from Governor Cass, of Michigan, proposing an expedition to the source of the Mississippi, to leave Detroit early in the spring, and offered me the position of mineralogist and geologist on that service. This agreeing, as it did, with my prior views of exploring the public domains, I gladly accepted, and