Our good ship Columbus got to Green Bay at last, and, stirring up the mud which obstructs the entrance to Fox River, bore us up that fine stream and deposited us in front of a large store, surrounded by fifty houses, there or thereabouts.  This settlement was not in the United States, but on Wisconsin Territory, an embryo State, not populous enough as yet, nor sufficiently organised, to be called a State, nor have a voice in the deliberations of the American Union.  The country on the left bank of the Fox River was not even a Territory; it was a No-Man’s Land, where any man might settle where and how he pleased.  Like all the places I had passed through, Green Bay, the “Baie Verte” of our forefathers (and it still deserves its title) was occupied in the first instance by the French.  After Father Marquette’s exploring journey, twenty soldiers, two sergeants, and four bandsmen, under the command of Lieutenant du Roussel, were sent thither in 1684 by M. de Beauchamptrelle, commanding the king’s troops at Mackinaw.  Now, as I have said, it possessed a hotel and about fifty houses, inhabited for the most part by merchants trading with the Redskins.  Everybody talked French, and everybody hastened forward when the boat arrived to ask for news from the civilised world.

A few Indians, silent and motionless, wrapped in their blankets, looked on indifferently at the bustle.  Squaws shod with moccasins, and the toes of their little feet turned in, passed by without raising their heads, their papooses sitting astride on their backs.  The somewhat numerous Indian tribes inhabiting the country were the Menomenis, the Winnepeg Indians, and the Iroquois, which last had emigrated from Canada to escape the English yoke.  I much regretted not having time to pay a visit to their wigwams.  To the very last they were our most devoted allies in our wars with the English.  I had a talk with one of the chiefs sons, who told me he still had Montcalm’s sword in his possession, and preserved it as a sacred relic.  According to his story, during the battle of Quebec, probably just at the moment when Montcalm was mortally wounded, his sword was hung up in a tree, whence it was taken by one of his faithful Indian followers, and it has always remained with his tribe.  After a great deal of difficulty we succeeded in procuring saddle horses for ourselves, and a farmer’s waggon for our baggage, and we set forth for the Mississippi.  The whole journey was most interesting.  There were no roads—­the merest track through woods interspersed with prairies—­ along which we went to the lake and fort of Winnepeg.  Beyond that lake we knew there would be nothing but prairie, stretching far and wide, over which we must steer as though we were at sea, or else be guided by the mysterious instinct of some trapper.  We met many Redskins in the woods, all busy hunting.  Game was very abundant—­waterfowl on the streams, flights of prairie hens (a sort of grouse), and herds of buck, which constantly crossed our line of march Here and there was a clearing or first attempt at cultivation, round a squatter’s log cabin.