82 Karhj M(ni in Northeastern Minnesota — Stuntz. 



'Vermilllon^ Lake. — This extensive interior lake is thirty miles 

 long, is divided into bays by long capes and is studded with nu- 

 merous islands, varying in size from a few rods to several miles in 

 length and as diversified in beauty as they are in size. They pre- 

 sent every tint of green, and with the surrounding hills they pre- 

 sent a landscape seldom surpassed in beauty. On the shores of 

 such a lake, with its abundant supply of fish for food, we are natu- 

 rally led to look for traces of settlements of this ancient people, 

 and they are there. The whole region north of the Mesabi moun- 

 tains is covered with bowlders so thickly scattered over the surface, 

 that it is hardly possible to drive a team without first clearing the 

 track. It is Micollefs "land of rocks and water." The first evi- 

 dence we get of improved land is on a cape about half a mile east of 

 the mouth of Pike river. Although the area is small it is very 

 evident it has been cleared of stones and cultivated. Here grow 

 the oak, the linden and the plum, or they were growing there 

 eighteen years ago, before extensive forest fires destroyed the tim- 

 ber around the shores of the lake. Farther east in Section 25, 

 Town 62, Range 16, is an island of not more than two acres in ex- 

 tent with similar indications; at the mouth of Two rivers lies a 

 spot now occupied by the Minnesota Iron Company and cultivated 

 as a farm and garden. Eighteen years ago it was covered Avith a 

 dense forest; successive fires destroyed the timber and the company 

 plowed a large area without teing troubled by stones. I claim that 

 there is no locality on this lake where that can be done unless the 

 bowlders are first removed, and if they have been removed it was 

 done by human labor, and it was not done by the Indians at pres- 

 ent inhabiting the region. Until quite recently these Indians 

 knew nothing about farming and lived entirely by hunting and 

 fishing and by gathering the berries and wild rice of the region. 

 At Sucker bay, on a cape in sections 23 and 24, Town 62, Range 16, 

 the present Indian farm is quite an extensive tract, now cultivated 

 by the Indians, under the direction of a government farmer. Ad- 

 vantage was taken of this favorable locality, because the stones had 

 been cleared off. Here we find additional evidence of the presence 

 of the mound builder, in fragments of pottery which have the 

 marks and the general appearance of similar fragments found in 

 the mounds at Yellow lake in Wisconsin, and at White Oak Point 

 on the upper Mississippi, in Itasca county. There are several other 



