Ohio History Journal

Sieur de la Salle.                     109

marais, a la hauteur de 37 degres, apres avoir ete grossie par une autre

riviere fort large qui vient du nord; et toutes ces eaux se dechargent

selon toutes les apparences dans le Golfe du Mexique.

Surely La Salle was not the writer of this paragraph, as

Parkman and others allege. It was surely the work of a friend

or an amanuensis who did not understand clearly what La Salle

told him. A literal translation of it, as of the preceding excerpt,

is unintelligible. But, with a naturally free rendering, it accords

with the preceding translation, viz:-

In the year 1667, and the years following, he [La Salle] made

several voyages with much expense, in which he was the first to discover

a large extent of country south of the great lakes, and the great river

Ohio. He came to this by way of a river which rises in a large swamp

and is enlarged by other rivers, and with much fall. He followed it

throughout its extent, and along another large river until it was enlarged

by another very large river from the north, to the latitude of thirty-seven

degrees. According to all appearances these waters are discharged into

the Gulf of Mexico.

This rendering also makes good La Salle's claim     of being

the first to discover the Mississippi, it being that "very large river

from the north."

It is also significant that the latitude of 41^°, named in the

first extract, corresponds with that of the large swamp which,

110       Ohio Arch. and His. Society Publications.

even through the first half of the 1₉th century, often partook of

the nature of a lake, as shown on Franquelin's map herewith

sketched. This swamp existed, until the last few years, a few

miles southwest of the City of Fort Wayne, Indiana, it being

the broad channel which first drained the Glacial Lake Maumee,

and which has since been drained by the Aboite and Little River,

the first northern tributary to the Wabash. Also it is significant

Anonymous. Sketch of Central Part. Figures refer to Legends that cannot be

given here.

that none of the maps preceding this date, 1669, indicated the

River Wabash nor the Ohio, though several do show the Mau-

mee. In 1672, however, the Ohio appears on the map of The

Basin of the Great Lakes, and Joliet's Smaller Map. Further,

the stated latitude of thirty-seven degrees in the second extract

accords well with the debouching of the Ohio River into the

Mississippi.

Fortunately we have corroborating evidence of the justness

of the foregoing renderings of the befogged French by the writer.

In Tract Number Twenty-five of the Western Reserve Historical

Society, Mr. C. C. Baldwin then its Secretary, wrote as follows:

Sieur de la Salle.                     111

Mr. Margry, in a letter addressed to Col. Whittlesey, President of

the Historical Society, after expressing in the kindest manner his thanks

for the influence exerted here in behalf of his project [the publication of

his researches], communicates the following extract of an unpublished

letter of La Salle, (no date) which translated reads: The river which

you see marked on my map of the southern coast of this lake [Erie]

and towards the extremity called by the Iroquois Tiotontaenon, is without

doubt the passage into the Ohio, or Olighira Sipon as it is called in

Iroquois, or in Ottawa The Beautiful River. The distance from the

one to the other is considerable, and the communication more difficult;

but within a day's journey from its mouth at Lake Erie (washing as it

flows a beautiful country) and at a musket shot from its banks, there

is a little lake [the marsh southwest of Fort Wayne? See Map No. 1]

from which flows a stream three or four fathoms wide at the outlet from

the lake one fathom in depth. It soon changes, however, into a river by

the junction of a number of other streams, which after a course of a

hundred leagues, without rapids, [without great fall] receives another

112        Ohio Arch. and His. Society Publications.

small river that comes from near the Miamis, and five or six others quite

as large, and flowing with greater rapidity along the declivity of a

mountain [higher ground] and discharging into the Illinois [Ohio] two

leagues below a village and from there thence into the River Colbert. It

is called the Quabachi or Aramoum.

The original of this letter was sent to Mr. Parkman, who kindly

returned it with the following note:

JAMAICA PLAINS, MASS., 9 Sept., 1872.

DEAR SIR: With regard to the extract from La Salle's letter, one or two

points are worth attention. It looks like an account made from hearsay. On the

map described on pp. 406-7 of Discovery of the Great West, [map No. 2 above]

the Maumee River is clearly laid down, with a portage direct to the Ohio, which

is brought close to Lake Erie. This map is clearly anterior to 1680. On the map

of Franquelin, 1864, made after data furnished by La Salle, the Maumee is also

laid down, with a branch [tributary] to the Wabash, designated as R. Agonasake,

closely approaching it. Now I have little doubt that 'la riviere que vous avez

vue marquee dans ma carte,' is the Maumee, the natural route 'pour aller a la

riviere Ohio ou Oleghin (Allegheny) Sipon.' The distance to the portage at Fort

Wayne is certainly far more than 'une journee,' but accuracy is scarcely to be ex-

pected. After crossing the protage, La Salle speaks of a stream 'qui se change

bientot en riviere par la jonction de quantite de semblabies (et) qui apres le cours

de plus de 100 lieues sans rapides recoit une autre petite riviere qui vient de proche

celle des Miamis.' Such a 'petite riviere' is laid down on Franquelin's map. It

flows into the Wabash, and answers to the Tippecanoe. The 'riviere des Miamis,

an Franquelin's and other contemporary maps, is the St. Joseph of Lake Michigan.

La Salle goes on to say that the main river in question, called by him 'Ouabache

or Aramoni,' 'constant le long au penchant d' une montagne, se descharger dans

celle des Illinois deux lieues an dessous du village et de la dans le fleuve Colbert'

[Mississippi]. He begins by professing to indicate the way to the Ohio, but ends

with bringing the traveler not to the Ohio but to the Illinois. I can see no other

explanation of the passage, than that of a slip of the pen on La Salle's part, (or

that of some copyist,) writing Illinois for Ohio. [See map No. 1, above.] I can

think of no other way of making the passage intelligible. This solution derives

some support from the circumstance that on Franquelin's map an Aborigine village

Taarsila, is laid down a little above the mouth of the Wabash (Ouabache). La