to Minneapolis, that we might enjoy the beautiful river thence to Lake Pepin, yet reach our homes within the appointed time.  Half a day was enjoyed at Brainerd, the junction of the Northern Pacific main line with the St. Paul branch, and the most important town between Lake Superior and the Missouri.  It is beautifully built and picturesquely scattered among the pines upon the Mississippi’s eastern bank, not far above Crow Wing River.  Thence we were carried over the splendid railway, passing the now abandoned Fort Ripley, winding along or near to the river and across the wheat-fields, through the busy and beautiful city of mills, below St. Anthony’s roar and down the dancing rapids to a pleasant island-camp between the green-and-gray bluffs that bind Minneapolis to Minnehaha—­the first really fine scenery this side of Itasca’s solitude.  A delightful paddle under a bright morning sun and over swift, clear water carried us to the little brook whose laughter, three-quarters of a mile up a deep ravine, has been sent by Longfellow rippling outward to all the world.  We rounded the great white-faced sand-rock that marks the outlet, paddled as far as we might up the quiet stream, beached the canoes under the shade of the willows, walked a little way up the brook, past a deserted mill, under cool shadows of rock and wood, and enjoyed for half an hour the simple, seductive charms of the “Laughing Water.”  Then we tramped back to our boats, floated down under the old walls of Fort Snelling and between the chalk-white cliffs which line the broadening river, until we came in sight of St. Paul’s roofs and spires, and soon were enjoying the thoughtful care and generous hospitality of the Minnesota Boat Club.  Another day’s close brought us to Red Wing, backgrounded by the green bluffs and reddened cliffs of its bold hills.  One more pull down the now broad and islanded stream carried us to Lake Pepin, one of the loveliest mirrors that reflects the sun, and to Frontenac’s white beach.  The keels of the Fritz, the Betsy and the Hattie crunched the sands at the end of their long journey, the boats were shunted back upon the railway, and their weary owners were soon dozing in restful forgetfulness upon the couches of the unsurpassed Chicago, Milwaukee and St. Paul line.

[Illustration:  END OF VOYAGE (FRONTENAC, LAKE PEPIN).]

Beyond reasonable doubt, our party is the only one that ever pushed its way by boat up the entire course of the farther-most Mississippi.  Beyond any question, our canoes were the first wooden boats that ever traversed those waters.  Schoolcraft, in 1832, came all the way down the upper river without portages, but he had very high water and many helpers, in spite of which one of his birch canoes was wrecked.  The correspondent of a New York newspaper claimed the complete trip in his canoe some five years ago, but his own guide and others told us that his Dolly Varden never was above Brainerd, and that his portages above were frequent.  So we may well feel an honest pride in our Rushton-built Rob Roys and our hard knocks, and may remember with pardonable gratification that upon our own feet and keels we have penetrated the solitudes lying around the source of the world’s most remarkable river, where no men live and where, probably, not more than two-score white men have ever been.—­A.H.  SIEGFRIED.