54 THE GEOLOGY OF MINNESOTA. 



[Allen, 1835. 



birch, pine and sugar maple. " Three miles" above the grand portage begins 

 the portage a couteau, or knife portage, on the west side of the river, beginning 

 at a small island of argillyte which rises abruptly to the hight of 100 feet, 

 in the midst of the river at the foot of a strong rapid. This portage is 

 stated to be a mile and a half long. " Nine and a half miles" above the knife 

 portage he mentions continued rapids through argillyte rock for about four 

 miles. The St. Louis river of the map he styles Fond du Lac river in his 

 journal. The country on the portage to the West Savanna river is described 

 as very swampy, but divided by a ridge of higher land timbered with sugar 

 maple, birch and linn, running southeastwardly, about a mile and a half 

 from the West Savanna river. It is less than half a mile wide, and is suc- 

 ceeded by swamps again on its west or Mississippi side, which extend with 

 some alternating ridges of higher land to the West Savanna river. The 

 highest point on the portage is about 150 feet above the Savanna rivers. 

 Sandy lake overflows with the Mississippi, and the great flood covers the 

 country for many miles around. At " Pacagama falls " the descent of the 

 river is between twenty and thirty feet in the distance of a hundred yards, 

 and is nowhere perpendicular, but the channel is much contracted. In one 

 place the whole water runs down the surface of a smooth, plain rock for a 

 distance of forty feet, with a pitch of about twelve degrees. The river is 

 here said to break through a low ridge that traverses its course perpen- 

 dicularly in a northeast and southwest direction, the rock being of granular 

 quartz. At a small stream which joins the Mississippi a short distance above 

 the falls, from the west, commence the great swamps and savannas which 

 border the Mississippi on one or both sides for a great distance above. By 

 way of Lac la Crosse (remarkable for the fine whitefish it afforded) and a small 

 river extending three or four miles to another little lake, he left the Missis- 

 sippi, at last, making a portage of 800 yards to Little Winnipeg lake, through 

 which the Mississippi runs. A few miles further up he reached Big Winnipeg 

 lake, from which he says there is a short portage to a river of Rainy lake, 

 probably the Big Fork river. Red Cedar lake, the former name of Cass lake, 

 derived its name from a little high island called Red Cedar island. 



