PART I. 



PHYSICAL GEOGRAPHY. 



This country (west of Lake Micliigan) was almost un- 

 known to geographers twenty years ago. The report of 

 Rev. J. Morse to the Secretary of War, in 1821, states that 

 in 1819 there were but three famihes settled from the mouth 

 of the Illinois up two hundred and forty miles, and Darby, in 

 his Gazetteer (2d edit., 1827), says, "of this immense re- 

 gion" (included l)ctwecn Lakes Micliigan and Superior, Rivers 

 Missisippi and Red, the Stale of Missouri and the northern 

 boundary of the United States) " mucli remains unknown, 

 and of those parts that have been explored, our information 

 is generally imperfect." [Verb. Michigan.] Galena was 

 settled in 1828; and in 1833, after the Black Hawk war, 

 settlements began on Rock River and the northern parts of 

 Illinois and in Iowa, upon tlic tract purchased of the Sacs 

 and Foxes. In the list of rivers flowing into the Upper Mis- 

 sisippi, in the same work, arc several defects and eiTors. 

 On the right side, Root and Wabsipinicon and Checagua (or 

 Skunk) are omitted ; and that now known to the inhabitants 

 of Iowa as Tete des Moris, is called Galena. On the left, 

 some considerable streams arc not named. The falls of St. 

 Anthony are placed, in the same authority, in latitude 44^, 

 wliich is one degi-ee south of their true situation. 



It is said that the list is given mostly on the autliority of 

 Schoolcraft, and they are also inore minutely detailed front the 



