The things we do!

I take space to speak in such detail of this voyage because
it traces another important route into the valley.
About seventy miles up the stream there stands an old cedar-tree bearing,
as it is believed by antiquarians, the blaze marks of the old French
broadaxes and marking the beginning of another of those historic portage
paths over the valley's low rim. I have visited this portage more than
once, and when last there I dug away the sand and soil about the trunk of
the tree till I could trace the scar left by the axe of the French. It is
only about two miles from this tree at the bend of the St. Joseph to where
a mere ditch in the midst of the prairie, a tributary of the Illinois,
soon gathers enough eager water to carry a canoe toward the Gulf of
Mexico.
I have read in the chronicles, with a regret as great as that of the
hungry Hennepin, that the Illinois, from whom La Salle expected
hospitality at their village farther down the Illinois River, which had
been visited by Marquette twice, were off on their hunting expeditions.


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