HISTOKICAL SKETCH. 5 



1678, Du Luth.] 



country south of Minnesota, visiting the Mississippi by way of the 

 Wisconsin in 1673, he seems not to have prosecuted his discoveries within 

 the area of Minnesota. 



SIEUR DU LUTH. 



Under the direction of the Governor of Canada, but probably at the 

 instance of the merchants of Quebec, Daniel Greysolon, the Sieur du Luth, 

 was dispatched with eight men, in 1678, for the purpose of visiting the 

 country to the west of lake Superior, and taking possession of it in the 

 name of the king of France, and securing the trade of the native tribes 

 before the English could reach them. He entered Minnesota in the 

 summer of 1679, having wintered near the falls of the St. Mary's river. 

 In July he caused the arms of the king of France to be set up in the great 

 Sioux village, KatJrio, which he styles the village of the Izatys, which can be 

 no other than the great Nadouessioux settlement at Mille Lacs, to which he 

 gave the name Lac Buade. The next year he reached the Mississippi river 

 by way of the Bois Brule river (in Wisconsin) and the St. Croix, and 

 encountered Hennepin and his companions, as detailed in his report made 

 to the Marquis of Seignelay in 1685, an extract from which is as follows :* 



EXTRACT FROM DU LUTH'S REPORT, MADE IN 1685. 



On July 2d, 1679, 1 had the honor to plant his majesty's arms in the great village of the 

 Nadoecioux, called Izatys, where never had a Frenchman been, no more than at the Songaskitons 

 and Honetlotons, distant six score leagues from the former, where I also planted his majesty's 

 arms in the same year, 1679. 



On the 15th of September, having given the Agrenipoulak, as well as all the other northern 

 nations, a rendezvous at the extremity of lake Superior, to induce them to make peace with the 

 Nadouecioux, their common enemy, they were all there, and I was happy enough to gain their 

 esteem and friendship, to unite them together, and in order that the peace might be lasting among 

 them I thought that I could not cement it better than by inducing the nations to make reciprocal 

 marriages with each other. This I could not effect without great expense. The following winter 

 I made them hold meetings in the woods, which I attended, in order that they might hunt 

 together, give banquets, and by this means contract a closer friendship. 



The presents which it cost me to induce the Indians to go down to Montreal who had been 

 diverted by the Openagaux and Abenakis, at the instigation of the English and Dutch, who 

 made them believe that the plague raged in the French settlements, and that it had spread as far 

 as Nipissingw, where most of the Nipissiriens had died of it have also entailed a greater 

 expense. 



In June, 1680, not being satisfied with having made my discovery by land, I took two canoes 

 with an Indian, who was my interpreter, and four Frenchmen, to seek means to make it by 

 water. With this view I entered a river which empties eight leagues from the extremity of lake 

 Superior, on the south side, when, after having cut some trees, and broken about a hundred 

 beaver dams, I reached the upper waters of the said river ; and then 1 made a portage of half a 



* Shea's Translation of Hennepin's Description of Louisiana. 



