Under this favorable change of affairs, missionary efforts were renewed. Allouez coasted Lake Superior, and two years afterward, in company with Dablon and Marquette, established the mission of St. Mary, the first settlement of white men within the limits of our north western States. Various missions were established and explorations made. Fired by the rumors of a great river in the west, Marquette was presently sent by the intendant Talon to search it out. Accompanied by Joliet, a merchant of Quebec, with five Frenchmen, and two Algonquin guides, they ascended on the 10th of June, 1673. to the head of Fox River, and carrying their canoes across the intervening ground which separates the eastern from the western streams, they launched them again upon the waters of the Wisconsin, where their Indian conductors, fearful of advancing any farther, left them to make their way alone. For seven days they floated down the stream, when at length, to their great joy, they emerged upon the mighty waters of the Mississippi, that "great river"—for so its name imports—rolling through vast verdant prairies dotted with herds of buffalo, and its banks overhung with primitive forests. With the feelings of men who have discovered a new world, they passed the mouths of the Des Moines, the Illinois, the Missouri, and the Ohio, keeping on as far as the Arkansas. They landed to visit the astonished Indians upon the shores, who received them with hospitality, and invited them to form a permanent settlement. As they floated on day after day, they were greeted by richer scenery and by a different climate; they were fanned by the soft breezes and delighted by the luxuriant vegetation of the south; the sombre pines of the Canadian forests were exchanged for the cotton wood and palmetto of the tropics, and they began to suffer from the heat and the mosquitoes. Marquette, satisfied that the river must empty into the Gulf of Mexico, and fearful of falling into the hands of the Spaniards, reluctantly turned his steps back again towards Canada. Leaving Marquette at Green Bay, at his missionary work, Joliet carried the news to Quebec. Marquette's health soon after gave way, and while engaged in missionary efforts among the Illinois, he died, May 18th, 1675, at the early age of thirty-eight.[1]
Robert Cavalier De La Salle, an energetic young French adventurer, who had evinced unusual sagacity and met with great success in his explorations on Lakes Ontario and Erie, was roused by the news of the discovery of the "great river." Leaving his fur trade, his fields, and his many advantages in connection with Fort Frontenac—at the outlet of Ontario—La Salle hurried to France, and received from Colbert a commission to proceed with further discoveries on the Mississippi. Accompanied by the Chevalier Tonti, a veteran Italian, as his lieutenant, he returned to Frontenac, built a small bark, with which he ascended the Niagara River to the foot of
- ↑ See Mr. J.G. Shea's interesting and valuable work, "Discovery and Exploration of the Mississippi Valley," p. lxxi.
