lakes more than a thousand years ago, as proven by the fact that two forests of timber have grown over the tumuli, near the Mississippi river, each forest requiring five hundred years to complete its growth and decay. In these groups of mounds we find virgin copper, that must have come from mines in the region of lake Superior, which establishes the fact of that early traffic across our state. It is now fully substantiated, that they penetrated as far north as Itasca lake, and were on every branch of the Mississippi in its upper basin, and had even pushed their way across the continental divide into Canadian territory. It is also in evidence that the very portages used by our historic Indians were used by the Mound Builders, and that these shortest and most eligible routes between our water ways were discovered and occupied for centuries, and long prior to their occupation by our present Indian tribes.

Who these people were, we know not; but that they were here is incontestable, and that they had modes of transportation is beyond doubt. Our aboriginal historic Indians, of whom we have some knowledge for about four hundred years, have even no legendary information concerning the people who built the mounds, nor have they themselves ever been mound buildOur first transportation was conducted, therefore, by that prehistoric people.

But if we desire to be really curious and learnedly inquisitive, we can go back of all these. There are on deposit, in the vaults of this society, prehistoric clipped flints found at Little Falls, Minnesota, which date back probably five thousand years, according to the opinion of Prof. F. W. Putnam, the curator of the Peabody Museum. These implements, found by Miss Frances E. Babbitt, were under sand and gravel, which formed the flood plain of the Mississippi river in the closing stage of the Glacial period. They bring us face to face with Glacial man, existing upon the southern boundary of the great ice sheet which once enveloped the Northwest. Did these people possess the means of transportation of their persons and property? and if so, what? Without pursuing this inquiry, we know enough to be fully assured that a thousand years before the keel of Columbus plowed the waters of the Atlantic in quest of a new world, transportation was in active operation

on the lakes and rivers of Minnesota, by the strange and nameless people who left us the tumuli scattered over our state as the indubitable evidence of their occupancy and activity.

PERIOD OF FRENCH EXPLORATION.

Following the North American Indians, if we look for the first white men who navigated our waters, we find them in Peter Esprit Radisson and his brother-in-law, Sieur des Groseilliers. In their "fourth voyage" these intrepid Frenchmen visited the southwest portion of lake Superior, fourteen years before Joliet and Marquette explored the lower part of the Mississippi river. Radisson and his companion discovered the upper Mississippi in 1659. They coasted along the south shore of lake Superior, probably to the bay, Chequamegon, meaning a "long point of land," near Ashland, in Wisconsin. The Indian name of the bay was Sha-ga-wa-ma-kon. They probably passed to a point between Kettle and Snake rivers, not far from Hinckley, Minnesota, thence to Mille Lacs and thence to discovery and crossing of the Mississippi river, at an unknown and unascertainable point, probably between the mouth of Sauk river and the mouth of Rum river. They were the first white men who visited the country now embraced in our state and paddled the first canoe through our waters. They came, as they themselves state, "in search of fur-bearing countries." It was commerce and trade, therefore, which opened this region to the knowledge of the world.

I am well aware that I stood in this very place January 24, 1879, Henry Hastings Sibley being in the chair, and delivered the annual address, then as now, of this society. My topic being "Lake Superior," I then said: "Religion was the grand inspiring motive which first gave lake Superior to the knowledge of our era." The publication of Radisson's "Voyages," by the Prince Society in 1885, constrains me to note, in contrast with the missionary labors of Marquette and others, that the earliest Frenchmen to explore the west part of lake Superior, to enter the area of Minnesota, and to see the Mississippi river, were led here for traffic and commercial gain.

There is no sufficient reason, in my judgment, even to attempt the impeachment of Radisson's quaintly told story. It

sheds light upon the first navigation of our waters in the very twilight of our history. It comes to us like a voice from the dead past, out of the Bodleian Library and British Museum. I am the more confirmed in my views as to the integrity of the Radisson annals by reason of the fact that the late Alfred J. Hill, long an honored member of this society, and Hon. J. V. Brower, the most careful and laborious archeological scholars this state has yet produced, both fully agree, after a careful consideration of all the facts for a period of four years, that Radisson's story is true, and, in their judgment, ought not to be further questioned.

Next in the order of time came the Jesuit Fathers. In 1665, on the shore of Chequamegon bay, Allouez established the Mission of the Holy Spirit, and four years later was succeeded in the same mission by Marquette. The Jesuits found upon the shores of this inland sea, many warlike tribes, but chief among these were the Chippewas, who filled almost the entire basin of Superior. The French early formed an alliance with these Indians, and the attachment has continued to this day. Their nomenclature was given to many places by the Jesuit Fathers; and it is a debatable question whether Minnesota did not receive its name from Chippewa, rather than Sioux

sources.

A most noteworthy French adventurer came into this country as early as 1683, named Le Sueur, who, twelve years afterward built a fort, or trading post, on the Mississippi a few miles below the mouth of the St. Croix. He came from Montreal, through the northern lakes, following the line of trade then establishing itself within the area that is now Minnesota. Le Sueur returned to France, and received from the Grand Monarch a license to open certain mines on the St. Peter river. The whole story of this mineral search is shrouded in romance and mystery. Instead of entering the country by the old route, he went to the mouth of the Mississippi river, and then, organizing his expedition, which consisted of twenty-five men, mostly miners, he equipped a felucca, and in April, 1700, started upon a journey as visionary as Jason's in search of the Golden Fleece. After some time he increased his means of transportation by the addition of two canoes, and with these

little boats he bravely stemmed the current of the great river a distance of more than 2,300 miles. His felucca was the first boat with sails which ever ascended the Mississippi. Near the confluence of the Blue Earth river with the Minnesota, he seems to have found the object of his search. Here they spent the winter of 1700. When the last detachment of Le Sueur's party left the next year, they cached their tools in that vicinity, and I have often endeavored to find the spot, but without success. Le Sueur failed in the object of his expedition, to discover and open valuable mines, as did De Soto in his pursuit of gold, and Ponce de Leon in quest of the fountain of eternal youth; but he opened up our rivers to transportation, and carried back to France 4,000 pounds of supposed copper ore, being the first boat load of freight, a native product, carried by a white man on the Minnesota river.

LATER TRAFFIC OF THE MINNESOTA VALLEY.

While speaking of the Minnesota river, it is as well to complete such reference to its early navigation as is deemed important. After Le Sueur, it was sixty-six years before we hear of another white man ascending the old St. Peter's river. Ten years before the Declaration of Independence, a medical student from Connecticut, who had become a captain in the colonial French war, Jonathan Carver, turned his canoe into the waters of the St. Peter's river, to the vicinity of the site of New Ulm, where he spent the next winter with friendly Dakotas. Carver was confident that, if he could have continued his travels, he would find some river flowing westerly and leading to the Pacific ocean.

In the year 1800, we find trading posts established in the St. Peter's valley by the Northwest Company of Montreal. The first one was located at Lac Travers, the next at Lac qui Parle, and the third at Traverse des Sioux. These forts were erected by that wonderful race of men called coureurs des bois, who came in by way of the Red river. This was the establishment of an early and fixed trade on that river. After these came Lieut. Zebulon M. Pike, in 1805. He was an officer of the United States army, and came to require obedience to United States laws by certain British traders who still hoisted the

British flag over their trading posts in violation of the treaty of 1783. He found these trading posts, up the St. Peter's river, and others on the upper waters of the Mississippi, in full operation. In 1823, Major Stephen H. Long, of the United States topographical engineers, ascended the St. Peter's river. A little later, our army officers found some remarkable men in charge of the growing trade of the St. Peter's valley. At Lac Travers was Joseph R. Brown; at Lac qui Parle, Joseph Renville; at Traverse des Sioux, Louis Provencalle; and at Little Rapids, Jean B. Faribault. These men were identified with every movement of trade in that era. The trade was carried on by pack

ers, dog trains, and canoes. The earliest of these trading posts was transferred from the Northwest Company to John Jacob Astor, in 1811; Astor transferred them, in 1834, to the American Fur Company, of which Ramsay Crooks was president; and they were finally transferred, in 1842, to Pierre Chouteau, Jr., and Company, of St. Louis. H. H. Sibley became, in 1834, a partner of the American Fur Company, and the same year he established his headquarters at the mouth of the St. Peter's river.

Thus were trade and commerce firmly established in the valley of the St. Peter's river. This was the first era of trade of white men in that region. The next era was the advent of steamboats on that river in 1850, to be followed by the railways in 1867.

LAKE SUPERIOR AND THE FUR TRADE.

We must always remember that Minnesota was discovered by the way of lake Superior; that our earliest traders, voyageurs and missionaries, all came to us by way of the great lakes. Commerce and transportation began from that direction; and our Indian coadjutors there were Chippewas, not Sioux. We recount with pride our early settlements and trade at Fort Snelling, Mendota, and St. Paul; but long before these there were bold and daring men on our northeastern frontier, leading a strange life, and abounding in commercial activity.

It is two hundred and twenty-eight years since Charles II ceased toying with his mistresses long enough to sign a royal license to a company of traders, known as the "Honourable Company of Merchants-Adventurers trading into Hudson's