NARRATIVE OF THE EXPEDITION. 131 



we had of tlie upper Eed Cedar Lake. The Mississippi River 

 here deploys itself in one of those large sheets of pellucid water 

 which are so characteristic of its sources. On reaching the estuary 

 at its entrance, a short halt was made. A large body of the most 

 transparent water spread out before us. Its outlines, towards the 

 south, were only bounded by the line of the horizon. In the 

 distance appeared the traces of wooded islands. If Sandy Lake 

 had, on emerging from the wilderness, impressed us with its rural 

 beauty, this far transcended it in the variety and extent of out- 

 lines, and that oceanic amplitude of freshness, which so often 

 inspires admiration in beholding the interior American lakes. It 

 was determined to cross a part of the lake towards the north- 

 east, in order to strike the site of an ancient Indian village at the 

 mouth of Turtle River ; and under the influences of a serene day, 

 and one of their liveliest chants, the men pushed for that point, 

 which was reached at three o'clock in the afternoon of the 21st 

 July. The spot at which we landed was the verge of a green 

 lawn, rising in a short distance to a handsome eminence, crowned 

 with oaks and maples. One or two small log tenements stood on 

 this slope occupied by two Canadians in the service of the Ame- 

 rican Fur Company. Several wigwams of bark and poles lifted 

 their fragile conical forms on either side. 



In one of these tenements, consisting of a small cabin of poles, 

 sheathed with bark, we found an object of human misery which 

 excited our sympathies. It was in the person of one of the Ca- 

 nadians, to whom reference has been made, of the name of Mon- 

 truille. He had, in the often severe peregrinations of the fur 

 trade in this quarter, been caught in a snow-storm during the last 

 winter, and frozen both his feet in so severe a manner that they 

 eventually sloughed off, and he could no longer stand upright or 

 walk. He lay on the ground in a most pitiable state of dejection, 

 with the stumps of his legs bound up with deer skins, with a gray, 

 long-neglected beard, and an aspect of extreme despair. English he 

 could not speak; and the French he uttered was but an abuse of the 

 noble gift of language to call down denunciations on those who had 

 deserted him, or left him thus to his fate. A rush mat lay under 

 him. He had no covering. He was emaciated to the last degree, 

 every bone in his body seemed visible through the skin. His 

 cheeks were fallen in, and his eyes sunk in their sockets, but 



