There are yet other theatres of action for this sublime mass of inland waters, where the lake has manifested, perhaps, still more strongly, its abrasive powers. The whole force of its waters, under the impulse of a northwest tempest, is directed against prominent portions of the shore, which consist of black and hard volcanic rocks. Solid as these are, the waves have found an entrance in veins of spar, or minerals of softer texture, and have thus been led on their devastating course inland, tearing up large fields of amygdaloid, or other rock; or, left portions of them standing in rugged knobs, or promontories. Such are the east and west coasts of the great peninsula of Keweena, which have recently become the theatre of mining operations.
When the visitor to these remote and boundless waters comes to see this wide and varied scene of complicated geological disturbances and scenic magnificence, he is absorbed in wonder and astonishment. The eye, once introduced to this panorama of waters, is never done looking and admiring. Scene after scene, cliff after cliff, island after island, and vista after vista are presented. One day's scenes of the traveller are but the prelude to another; and when weeks, and even months, have been spent in picturesque rambles along its shores, he has only to ascend some of its streams, and go inland a few miles, to find falls, and cascades, and cataracts of the most beautiful or magnificent character. Go where he will, there is something to attract him. Beneath his feet are pebbles of agates; the water is of the most crystalline purity. The sky is filled, at sunset with the most gorgeous piles of clouds. The air itself is of the purest and most inspiring kind. To visit such a scene is to draw health from its purest sources, and while the eye revels in intellectual delights, the soul is filled with the liveliest symbols of God, and the most striking evidences of his creative power.
(b) Letters of Mr. M. Woolsey. Southern Literary Messenger, 1836. Oneöta, p. 322.
These spirited and graphic letters are unavoidably excluded. The evidence they bear to the purity of principle, justness of taste, and excellence of character of a young man, now no more, ought to preserve his name from oblivion. He accompanied me in 1831, as a volunteer, in a leisure moment, an admirer of nature, seeking health.
INDEX
A
- A bear trapped, [98]
- A box of minerals stolen, [40]
- A granitical formation on Lake Superior, [88]
- A long fast, [126]
- A new philological principle in languages, [455]
- A phenomenon, [103]
- A precinct of Indian orgies, [115]
- A sub-expedition to Sandy Lake, [112]
- A war-party surprised, [552]
- Account of sub-explorations of Green Bay, [210]
- Acipenser oxyrinchus, [95]
- Acipenser spatularia, [163]
- Advance of Lake Superior to the Rocky Mountains, [109]
- African and Indian marriages, [108]
- Agaric mineral, [60]
- Agate, [87]
- Agglutinative properties of the Indian pronoun, [502]
- Aggregate fall of the Mississippi below Sandy Lake, [150];
- commencement of the calcareous rocks, [150]
- Algoma, [107]
- Algonquin language justly applauded, [122]
- Algonac, [50]
- Allenoga River, [250]
- Allen's Lake, [263]
- Aluminous minerals, [354]
- American Indian policy, [546]
- American antiquities, [166]
- Amygdaloid, [90]
- An Indian breakfast, [253]
- An Indian grave with hieroglyphics, [88]
- An Indian nonplused in the woods, [97]
- An Indian salute, [120]
- Analysis of Lake Superior copper at Utrecht, [364]
- Anodonta corpulenta, [516]
- Announcement of return of expedition, of 1820, [279]
- Antique markings on the pinus resinosa, [552]
- Antique notices of the lake mineralogy, [295]
- Antiquities, [157];
- first notice of in 1766, [165]
- Apparent tide in the Baltic, [191]
- Appearance of dune sand at Point aux Barques, [54]
- Appendix No. 2, [449]
- Apricots in bloom on the 22d of April, [41]
- Arched rock, [61]
- Argillaceous stratum of Detroit, [307]
- Argillite, [111]
- Artesian borings for water, [51]
- Art of the wounded duck, [249]
- Arts and manufactures of the Chippewas and Ottowas, [70]
- Ascent of the Assowa River, [235]
- Asphaltum and naphtha, [196]
- Assassination of Owen Keveny, [69]
- Assowa Lake, [239]
- Atmospheric heat 28th June, [96]
- Aux Sables Indians, [55]
B
- Bark letter in pictographic characters, [433]
- Barometrical height of Cass Lake, [139]
- Barytic minerals, [357]
- Basin of Lake Michigan, [335]
- Basin of Lake Superior, [318]
- Bat in wood, [396]
- Beltrami, [227]
- Birch Lake, [263]
- Birds inhabiting the region of Pakagama Falls, [130]
- Birds of Lake Superior, [104]
- Birds of the Wisconsin Valley, [181]
- Bituminous minerals, [358]
- Bivalve shells, [415]
- Black River, [103]
- Boatswain to Com. Perry in 1813, [194]
- Botany, [408]
- Boulders on the shores of Lake St. Clair, [49]
- Boundary between Michigan and Wisconsin, [103]
- Breadth of the Mississippi at Sandy Lake, [124]
- Brigham's residence at Blue Mound, [568]
- Brulé summit, [273]
- Buckshot gravel, [62]
- Buffalo hunt, [146]