and
Remus; and when we emerge into the light of European record, we find the
Jesuit missionaries preaching the gospel at St. Ignace and the Sault St.
Mary almost as early as the so-called Cavaliers were planting tobacco at
Jamestown, or the Pilgrims smiting the heathen at Plymouth.

The first white persons who penetrated into the Upper Lake region were
two young fur-traders who left Montreal for that purpose in 1654, and
remained two years among the Indian tribes on those shores. We are
not informed of the details of this journey; but it appears that they
returned with information relative to Lake Superior, and perhaps Lake
Michigan and Green Bay; for in 1659 the fur-traders are known to have
extended their traffic to that bay. The first settlement of Wisconsin
may be dated in 1665, when Claude Allouez established a mission at La
Pointe on Lake Superior. This was before Philadelphia was founded by
William Penn.

The first account we have of a voyage on Lake Michigan was by Nicholas
Perrot, who, accompanied by some Pottawattomies, passed from Green Bay
to Chicago, in 1670. Two years afterwards the same voyage was undertaken
by Allouez and Dablon. They stopped at the mouth of the Milwaukie River,
then occupied by Kickapoo Indians. In 1673, Fathers Marquette and Joliet
went from Green Bay to the Neenah or Fox River, and, descending the
Wisconsin, discovered the Mississippi on the 17th of June.

In 1679, La Salle made his voyage up the Lakes in the Griffin, the first
vessel built above the Falls of Niagara. This vessel, the pioneer of the
great fleet which now whitens those waters, was about sixty tons burden,
and carried five guns and thirty-four men. La Salle loaded her at Green
Bay with a cargo of furs and skins, and she sailed on the 18th of
September for Niagara, where she never arrived, nor was any news of her
ever received. The Griffin, with her cargo, was valued at sixty thousand
livres. Thus the want of harbors on Lake Michigan began to be felt
nearly two hundred years ago; and the fate of the Griffin was only a
precursor of many similar calamities since.

About 1760 was the end of what may be called the religious epoch in
the history of the Northwest, when the dominion passed from French to
English hands, and the military period commenced. This lasted about
fifty years, during which time the combatants were French, English,
Indians, and Americans. Much blood was shed in desultory warfare.
Detroit, Mackinac, an