FOOTNOTES:
[52] In common use, this word was restricted so as to indicate only the boatmen, the carriers of that time; but I am writing of a period anterior, by many years, to the existence of the Trade which made their occupation.
[53] Joutel, who was one of La Salle's party, and afterward wrote an account of the enterprise, entitled Journal Historique, published in Paris, 1713. Its fidelity is as evident upon its face, as is the simplicity of the historian.
[54] This was in the winter of 1679-'80; and the Five Nations, included in the general term Iroquois, had not then made the conquest upon which the English afterward founded their claim to the country. They were, however, generally regarded as enemies by all the Illinois tribes.
[55] A collective name, including a number, variously stated, of different tribes confederated.
[56] Annals of the West, by J. H. Perkins and J. M. Peck, p. 679. St. Louis. 1850.
[57] The substance of the Journal may be found, republished by Dr. Sparks, in the second edition of Butler's Kentucky, p. 493, et seq., and in vol. x. of his American Biography.
[58] Miscellanies, “Review of Ranke's History of the Popes.”
[59] In a book which he published at Utrecht, in 1697, entitled A New Discovery of a Vast Country, he claims to have gone down the Mississippi to its mouth before La Salle. The whole book is a mere plagiarism. See Sparks's Life of La Salle, where the vain father is summarily and justly disposed of.
[60] Most of these dates may be found in Bancroft's United States, vol iii.
[61] The legend of the Piasau is well known. Within the recollection of men now living, rude paintings of the monster were visible on the cliffs above Alton, Illinois. To these images, when passing in their canoes, the Indians were accustomed to make offerings of maize, tobacco, and gunpowder. They are now quite obliterated.
[62] June 10, 1673.
[63] I mean, of course, the upper Mississippi; for De Soto had reached it lower down one hundred and thirty-two years before.
[64] It was announced, some months since, that our minister at Rome, Mr. Cass, had made discoveries in that city which threw more light upon this expedition. But how this can be, consistently with the fact stated in the text (about which there is no doubt), I am at a loss to divine.
[65] The place of Marquette's landing—which should be classic ground—from his description of the country, and the distance he specifies, could not have been far from the spot where the city of Keokuk now stands, a short distance above the mouth of the Des Moines. The locality should, if possible, be determined.
[66] It was by virtue of a treaty of purchase—signed at Fort Stanwix on the 5th of November, 1768—with the Six Nations, who claimed the country as their conquest, that the British asserted a title to the country west of the Alleghenies, Western Virginia, Kentucky, etc.
[67] The geographical mistakes of the early French explorers have led to some singular discussions about Western history—have even been used by diplomatists to support or weaken territorial claims. Such, for example, is the question concerning the antiquity of Vincennes, a controversy founded on the mistake noticed in the text. Vide Western Annals. 2d Ed. Revised by J. M. Peck.
[68] In 1541, De Soto crossed the Mississippi about the thirty-fifth parallel of latitude, or near the northern boundary of the state of that name. It is not certain how far below this Marquette went, though we are safe in saying that he did not turn back north of that limit.
[69] Bancroft's History of the United States, vol. iii., p. 161, et seq., where the reader may look for most of these dates.