322 DESCRIPTION OF THE COUNTRY 
the waters of Big Fork and Lake Winibigoshish. The river, which is exceedingly 
crooked, continues to become wider, until, eleven miles further up, it expands into 
a lake, called by the Indians Cut Tooth Lake, which is about three quarters of a 
mile long, and a quarter of a mile wide. This lake connects with Kashebushkag 
Lake by a narrow stream a little over two miles long. These lakes, together with 
the expansions of the river below, have large fields of rice in them. They are bor- 
dered in every direction by tamerack swamps, extending as far as vision can reach, 
with occasional knolls, a few acres in area, rising out of them, and covered with 
small pine, spruce, aspen, poplar, and birch. In general appearance the country 
resembles that described as constituting the highlands between Fond du Lac and 
Lake Pokegoma, and along the upper part of East Savannah River. There are no 
high hills, nor are there any exposures of rock south of the one last named, in this 
section of country, the whole region being covered with drift deposits. 
A small stream connects Kashebushkag with Round Lake, which is the last of 
the lakes on this route, north of the water-shed, connecting with Big Fork River. 
From this lake a portage, one thousand four hundred paces in length, leads to a 
tributary of Lake Winibigoshish. The gentle swell of land which divides these 
waters, rises, at the highest point seen, only twenty-five feet above the level of 
Round Lake. It is the lowest “dividing ridge” we met with in the territory, and 
there is every probability that the information alluded to in a previous chapter, of 
the interlockage of the northern and southern streams in this vicinity, is correct. 
The small stream down which we descended to Lake Winibigoshish is called by 
the Indians Ondodawanonan River. It is very narrow and exceedingly crooked, 
and in these respects resembles very much the upper part of Bois Brulé River, and 
also West Savannah River. Like this last stream, it winds through wet meadows. 
It was with great difficulty we got our long canoes around the bends. We found 
in the bed of this stream numerous fragments of limestone, some of them quite large 
and thin, and of the same character as the limestone fragments met with on St. 
Louis and Embarras Rivers, and all along our route from Rainy Lake River to this 
place. The organic remains contained in them, show them to belong to the Silu- 
rian period. 
We reached the trading-post on Lake Winibigoshish on the evening of the 19th 
of September. 
8. The Northern Mississippi, including a Reconnoissance between Red Lake and 
Cass Lake.—As the country lying between Lake Winibigoshish and the sources of 
the Mississippi, has been well and accurately described by Mr. Schoolcraft and Mr. 
Nicollet, and the country north of their explorations, as far as Red Lake, does not 
differ materially from that described by them, I shall confine my remarks to a few 
points deemed of geological and economical importance. 
We left the house of the Fur Company, at Lake Winibigoshish, on the 21st of 
September, and crossing the lake, proceeded up the Mississippi to Cass Lake. Our 
route from this place led through Turtle River, and the chain of lakes described by 
Mr. J. C. Beltrami, in 1823, as the “Julian Sources of the Mississippi.” 1 may re- 
mark here, that notwithstanding the almost numberless errors and absurdities con- 
