While these preliminary arrangements are being made, all the rest of the band, men, women, and children, have assembled, and every one awaits to see if any charge will be made. The manner of making an accusation, is for the party making it to step up in front of the girl, seize her by the hand and pull her to her feet. If nothing transpires before the rice is eaten, the giver of the feast is vindicated, her character restored, and her mother satisfied; then the feast is broken up and the actors disperse.

I cannot convey the idea of the making of a charge, and the trial of its truth or falsity, better than to relate what I witnessed on one of these occasions. When the circle was formed, a young buck stepped boldly in front of a very pretty girl of about sixteen or eighteen years, and roughly jerked her to her feet, and charged her with some indiscretion. The spectators watched the countenances of both parties with the closest scrutiny. The face of the accused became a study. She seemed paralyzed with indignation, and looked her accuser boldly in the eye with an expression of injured innocence so intense and agonizing as to prevent utterance. The two stood glaring upon each other in silence for a short time, when the man displayed symptoms of nervousness, which immediately attracted the audience, and they began crying out to the girl, "Swear! Swear!" This seemed to give her courage, and, wrenching herself forcibly from her accuser, she strode with a queenly air to the stone and almost embraced it. This together with an apparent weakening of the man, seemed to convince the people of her innocence, and they began to jeer and howl at him until he commenced to back from his position, when about fifty men and boys closed in on him, and he fled like a scared antelope, with the crowd at his heels, hurling sticks and stones at him until he disappeared from sight. I never was more satisfied with the correctness of a decision in all my experience.

ORIGIN OF THE NAME ITASCA.

In speaking of the origin of names of natural objects in our state, one of the most interesting is "Itasca," which is the name of the lake now known to be the true source of the Mississippi river. Most people think it is an Indian word, but such is not the case. It is a coined word, and was made under the following circumstances.

It has always been an object of interest to know where this great river has its source. More than fifty years ago, when Gen. Lewis Cass was governor of Michigan, his territory included all that is now Minnesota, and he made a voyage of discovery to find the source of the river. He ascended in birch canoes until he reached the large lake now known as Cass lake, and not finding any inlet he decided it to be the source, and did not pursue his investigations further. This lake was from that time called Cass lake, and was supposed to be the head of the river. Some years afterward Mr. Schoolcraft undertook the same exploration, and, finding a considerable inlet to Cass lake, he advanced to its sources, and found a small lake which he was convinced was the true head, which our historical society has since absolutely verified. Schoolcraft was not a man of much education, and knew little Latin and less Greek. He wanted a name for his lake that would be agreeable to the ear and appropriate to the subject. He had with him a gentleman, who recently died in Stillwater, Rev. William T. Boutwell, whom he consulted on the important subject of naming his new-found lake. This person took two Latin words, "veritas," truth, and "caput," the head, which Schoolcraft cut down, to retain only the last two syllables of "veritas," making "Itas," and the first syllable of "caput," making "ca." He then joined them and made the beautiful word "Itasca" or the true head. A more skillful or beautiful feat in a literary point of view was never achieved.

You will find this name accounted for erroneously in some of the editions of Webster's Dictionary. He says it is taken from two Indian words, "Ia" and "totosha," meaning, I have found the breast of the woman, or the source of life. This is entirely unfounded, as the words can not be tortured into making the word Itasca; and we know without a doubt that the explanation I give is absolutely correct. Some one fooled Webster. It is true that the words he quotes are strictly good Chippewa, and mean what he says they do, "Ia," I have found, and "to-to-sha," the female breast; but they are utterly foreign to the name "Itasca."

Another illustration of the descriptive nomenclature of the Sioux is found in the name they give a piano, "chan-da-wa-kiya-pee," which means an instrument made of wood that talks music.

OLD NAMES PASSING AWAY.

It occurs to me that we have an illustration of the fact that original names are fast passing away in our own state and city. We have a county of Wabasha, a city of Wabasha, and in St. Paul a Wabasha street. All these names come from an Indian chief whom I knew very well and highly respected. He was a chief of the "Wak-pay-ku-ties," or leafshooters, and his name was "Wa-pa-sha," not Wabasha. "Wapa" means a leaf, a staff, and a bear's head; "sha" means red. So his name meant either Red Leaf, Red Staff, or Red Bear's Head. We always thought it meant the Red Leaf. This corruption between Wabasha and Wapasha is not of so much importance; but it is well, while we can, to get things right. It amounts to about as much as Thompson with a "p," or Thomson without a "p."

Robert

Another instance exists right in our own midst. street was named after Louis Robert, pronounced "Robear," a prominent Frenchman among the old settlers, and until quite recently was always given the French pronunciation "Robear," but the newcomers all call it Robert street. I was in a streetcar the other day and told the conductor to put me off at "Robear" street. He promptly informed me that I was on the wrong car. It will not be long before the correct name will be forgotten.

INDIAN MEDICINE MEN.

A singular thing among the Sioux Indians was their faith in their medical mysteries. There is a guild among them called medicine men. They work wonders with the sick and afflicted. I have known men sick with rheumatism to be cured by the medicine men rattling gourds full of beans over their prostrate forms, and chanting in a manner calculated to kill the sick and destroy the nerves of the well. I have had them bring to me the evidence of their success in various ways. One man was sick unto death with rheumatism. The medicine men worked over him for several days and finally produced an old-fashioned flint-style gunlock, which they extracted from his afflicted back. They showed me this in triumph. I read on it "Harper's Ferry" in very plain English. I have had them show me live frogs and snakes which they had taken out of their patients.

Now, it is easy to understand how the medicine man can humbug his patients. We see this every day in civilized life. But how the medicine man can be humbugged in the same way it is difficult to understand. But such is undoubtedly the case. When an old friend of mine, named Shakopee, who was a medicine man, became sick at the Redwood Agency, I sent my doctor down to see him. I was then represented by Dr. Daniels, now one of the most prominent physicians in the state, living at St. Peter. He reported that he was sick with typhoid fever, and that all he needed was good nursing, good food, and rest. I had the facilities for all these conditions, and sent an ambulance to bring him to my agency. But he positively refused, and had the medicine men drum and rattle beans over him until he died. Now, this has always been to me a problem; do these savages actually believe in their medicine, and that they get gunlocks, snakes, frogs and such things out of their patients? or would they rather die under the same treatment than confess their frauds by accepting civilized methods? I confess that I have never been able to solve the problem, and when my old friend Shakopee stuck to the barbaric treatment unto death, I rather inclined to the opinion that they were really in earnest. It is an interesting question, and, having given the facts, I turn the psychological part of it over to the thinkers.

Now, ladies and gentlemen, I have given you a general melange of everything, which contains very little of anything; and if I have amused, interested, or instructed you, in any degree, I am well repaid.

HENNEPIN AS DISCOVERER AND AUTHOR.*

BY SAMUEL M. DAVIS.

EARLIER DISCOVERY TO THE TIME OF LA SALLE.

Columbus discovered the fringes and borders of the great western world on his first and second voyages. He left it to be explored and occupied by the rivals of many different nations. The French, the English, and the Spanish, sent out many adventurers and explorers, the prows of whose vessels were turned ever westward. Nicollet, Marquette, and La Salle; the Cabots, Frobisher, and Drake; Ponce de Leon, Balboa, and De Soto, all won laurels and enduring fame for themselves from the discoveries and explorations made on this continent. The French, naturally a race of explorers, in whom discovery speedily develops into a passion, were among the foremost to penetrate far into the interior of the new world. They came either as explorers and discoverers in search of adventure, as leaders of expeditions, and as traders and soldiers, or as missionaries with Bible and Crucifix, carrying the gospel of Cross and Church to the fiercest savage tribes in the remote wilderness. They passed westward by the natural chain of communication, consisting of rivers and the line of great lakes, until they pierced the very center of the continent itself, and established wherever they went trading posts and mission stations. These afterwards developed into the numerous towns and cities which still bear the names of the early French explorers. They pushed their enterprises throughout the entire valley of the Mississippi and traversed the remotest regions of the Northwest. With unwearied feet they stayed not until they had made good their claims of discovery by actual possession, and then rested not from their labors until

*Read at the monthly meeting of the Executive Council, April 11, 1898.