About four thousand miles were traversed. Of this distance the topography was accurately traced by Captain Douglass and his assistant, Mr. Trowbridge. This officer also took observations for the latitude at every practical point, and collected with much labor the materials for a new and enlarged map. Its geology and mineralogy were the subjects of a detailed report made by me to the War Department in 1822. Of the copper deposits on Lake Superior, a detailed report was made to the same department in November 1820. The Indian tribes were the subject of observation made by General Cass. Its botany, its fresh water conchology, and its zoology and ichthyology, received the attention that a rapid transit permitted. Its soil, productions, and climate were the topics of daily observation. In short, no exploration had before been made which so completely revealed the features and physical geography of so large a portion of the public domain. And the literary and scientific public waited with an intense desire for the result of these observations in every department.
The first letter I received on my return route from that eventful tour, was at the post of Green Bay, where a letter from J.T. Johnston, Esq., of New York, awaited me: "Since you departed," he observes, "nothing of importance has occurred, either in the moral or political world. The disturbances which disgrace the kingdom of Great Britain are, and still continue to be, favored by a few factionists. Thistlewood, and the members of the Cato Street conspiracy, have been tried for high treason, and condemned, and I presume the next arrivals must bring us an account of their execution. The Cortes has been established in Spain, and there floats a rumor that the Saint, the adored Ferdinand, has fled to France. The public debates in France seem to me to thunder forth, as the precursor of some event which will yet violently agitate the country. (Napoleon was now in St. Helena.) The stormy wave of discord has not subsided. The temple of ambition is not overthrown, and party spirit will rush to inhabit it. The convulsive struggle for independence in the South (America) still continues, but civil war appears about to interrupt its progress. At home all is quiet. A virtuous chief magistrate and a wise administration must benefit a people so PRONE TO DOMESTIC FACTION."
This gave me the first glimpse of home and its actualities, and the letter was refreshing for the sympathies it expresses, after long months of tugging over portages, and looking about to arrange in the mind stratifications, to gather specimens of minerals, and fresh water shells, and watch the strange antics which have been cut over the whole face of the north-west by the Boulder Group of Rocks.
Sept. 6. Mr. C.C. Trowbridge writes from Michilimackinack: "I forward the specimens collected by Mr. Doty and myself, on the tour (from Green Bay, on the north shore, to Michilimackinack). The most interesting will probably be the organic remains. They were collected in Little Noquet Bay, on the N.E. side, where ridges of limestone show themselves frequently. Near the top of the package you find a piece of limestone weighing about two pounds, of which the upper stratum was composed; there are two pieces of the lower stratum, resembling blue pipestone. The middle stratum was composed of these remains. About ten miles N.E. of Great Bay de Noquet, we found flint, or hornstone, in small quantities in the limestone rocks. There is also a specimen of the marble, which we saw little of; but since our arrival I am informed that a large bluff, composed of the same, is seen 30 to 40 miles from this. The gypsum I picked up on St. Martin's Islands."
On reaching Detroit, Gov. Cass invited Capt. Douglass and myself to recruit ourselves a few days at his "old mansion of the ancient era." I examined and put in order my collection of specimens, selecting such as were designed for various institutions. A local association of persons inclined to foster literary efforts, under the name of "Detroit Lyceum," elected me a member. The intrepid and energetic officer who had planned and executed this scheme of western exploration gave me a copy of his official letter to the Secretary of War, warmly approbating the conduct of Capt. Douglass and myself, as members of the expedition. All its results were attended with circumstances of high personal gratification.
I left Detroit on the 13th of October at 4 o'clock P.M., in the steamer "Walk-in-the-Water," the first boat built on the Lake waters, and reached Black Rock at 7 o'clock in the morning of the 17th, being a stormy passage, in a weak but elegant boat, of eighty-seven hours. Glad to set my foot on dry land once more, I hurried on by stage and canal, and reached Oneida Creek Depot on the 21st at 4 o'clock in the morning, stopped for breakfast there, and then proceeded on foot, through the forest, by a very muddy path, to Oneida Castle, a distance of three miles--my trunk being carried by a man on horseback. Thence I took a conveyance for Mr. W.H. Shearman's, at Vernon, where I arrived at ten o'clock A.M.
Capt. Douglass, who had preceded me, wrote from West Point Military Academy, on the 27th, that in the sudden change of habits he had been affected with a dreadful influenza. My own health continued to be unimpaired, and my spirits were buoyant. After a few days' rest, I wrote a report (Nov. 6th) to the Secretary of War on the metalliferous character of the Lake Superior country, particularly in relation to its reported wealth in copper. I proceeded to Albany on the 7th of December, and arrived the day following, and was cordially greeted by all my friends and acquaintances. It was my intention to have gone immediately to New York, but the urgent entreaties of Mr. Carter and others induced me to defer it. Very little had been said by the members of the party about a publication. We looked to Capt. Douglass, who was the topographer and a professor at West Point, to take the lead in the matter. The death of Mr. Ellicott, Professor of Mathematics at that institution, who was his father-in-law, and his appointment to the vacant chair, from that of engineering, placed him in a very delicate and arduous situation. He has never received credit for the noble manner in which he met this crisis. He was not only almost immediately required to teach his class the differential calculus, but the French copy--a language with which he was not familiar--was the only one employed. He was therefore not only obliged to study a comparatively new science, but to do it in a new language; and when the course began, he had to instruct his class daily in tasks which he committed nightly. Most men would have sunk under the task, but he went triumphantly through it, and I have never heard that the students or others ever had cause to suspect his information or question his abilities. He wrote to me, and perhaps to me only, on this subject.
There was something like a public clamor for the results of the expedition, and the narrative was hurried into press. A new zeal was awakened upon the subject of mineralogy and geology. A friend wrote to me on the mineral affluence of upper Georgia. Several letters from the western district of the State, transmitting specimens, were received. "The unexampled success of your expedition," observes one of these correspondents, "in all respects is a subject of high congratulation, not only for those of whom it was composed, but also to a great portion of the people of the United States, and to this State in particular, as we are the grand link that unites that vast region to our Atlantic border." [9] These feelings appear in letters from near and far. Captain Douglass was aware of this interest, and anxious, amidst his arduous duties, to get the necessary time to arrange his notes and materials. He wrote to me (December 25) to furnish Professor Silliman some sketches for the American Journal of Science. On the topic of topography he says:--
[9] W.S.D.Z., 9th Dec. 1820.
"With regard to our daily occurrences, ought not something to be done? I intended to have had a conversation with Governor Cass and yourself on the subject before I parted from you, but it escaped me, and I have since written about it.
"I should be glad to receive your delineation of the Mississippi below Prairie du Chien, and your levels through the Fox and Wisconsin (I believe in these we agree pretty nearly) would enable me to consolidate mine.
"While I think of it, let me tell you I have made some calculations about the height of the Porcupine Mountains. My data are the distance at which they were seen from Kewewena portage, under the influence of great refraction, and the distance on the following day without unusual refraction, and I am convinced they cannot be less than 2000 feet high; if, however, this staggers you, say 1800, and I am confident you are within the real elevation.
"Estimates of heights, breadths of rivers, &c., and, in looking