80 NOTES ON THE NORTHWEST. 



llie name of Assinaboin, and a tributary of the last, called 

 Mouse River, rises within a mile of the Missouri. 



Long says, " although many have supposed that the 

 waters of the Missisippi are separated from those running 

 northwestwardly into the Pacific, and northeastwardly into 

 the Atlantic, by a mountainous range of country ; yet, from 

 the best information that can be had on the subject, the fact 

 is quite otherwise. The old and almost forgotten statement, 

 of savage origin, that four of the largest rivers of the conti- 

 nent have their sources in the same plain, is entitled to far 

 more credit. The rivers alluded to, are the Missisippi, St. 

 Lawrence, Suskatckawan, and Oregon.* Agreeably to the 

 accounts of Col. Dixon, and others, wdio have traversed the 

 country situated between the Missouri and Assiniboin, a 

 branch of the Red River of Hudson's Bay, no elevated 

 ridge is to be met with ; but, on the contrary, tributaries to 

 both these streams take their rise in the same champaign. 

 The w^atcr courses are represented as chains of lakes of 

 various magnitudes, while lakes and stagnant pools are scat- 

 tered in every direction, without ridges or perceptible declivi- 

 ties, to show the direction in which they are drained." — V. 

 ii., p. 380. 



The tract included between the Missisippi, Crow Wing, 

 Red River, and the ridge spreading over the. sources of the 

 Missisippi, forming nearly a parallelogram of 100 by 150 

 miles, lying northeast and southwest, is mostly, at this day, 

 a collection of lakes and water. There is very clear evi- 

 dence, from geological indications, that the whole Upper 

 Missisippi was, at one time, submerged ; and it is highly pro- 

 bable that, in the gradual subsidence of the waters, which 



* Colonel Long is probably mistaken in naming the Oregon as one of 

 the four alluded to. Charlevoix is probably more correct in naming the 

 rivers. 



