did not succeed in opening relations with Cathay and
Cipango (China and {171} Japan), he did something else that entitles him
to be commemorated among the Pathfinders. He ascended Fox River to its
head-waters, crossed the little divide that separates the waters flowing
into the Lakes from those that empty into the Gulf of Mexico, and
launched his canoe on the Wisconsin, the first white man, so far as we
know, who floated on one of the upper tributaries of the mighty river.
This was just about one hundred years after Soto had crossed it in its
lower course. On his return, he reported that he had followed the river
until he came within three days of the sea. Undoubtedly he misunderstood
his Indian guides. The "Great Water" of which they spoke was almost
certainly the Mississippi, for that is what the name means.

The first undoubted exploration of the mighty river took place
thirty-five years later. It was made by two men who combined the two
aspects of Jesuit activity, the spiritual and the worldly. Louis Joliet
was born in Canada, of French parents. He was educated by the Jesuits,
and was all his life devoted to them. He was an intelligent merchant,
practical and courageous. No better man could have been chosen for the
work assigned him.

{172}

His companion in this undertaking was a Jesuit priest, Jacques Marquette,
who was a fine example of the noblest qualities ever exhibited by his
order. He was settled as a missionary at Michillimackinac, on Mackinaw
Strait, when Joliet came to him from Quebec with orders from Count
Frontenac to go with him to seek and explore the Mississippi.

On May 17, 1673, in very simple fashion, in two birch-bark canoes, with
five white _voyageurs_ and a moderate supply of smoked meat and Indian
corn, the two travelers set out to solve a perplexing problem, by tracing
the course of the great river. Their only guide was a crude map based on
scraps of information which they had gathered. Besides Marquette's
journal, by a happy chance we have that of Jonathan Carver, who traveled
over the same route nearly a hundred years later. From him we get much
useful and interesting information.

At the first, the explorers' course lay westward, along the northern
shore of Lake Michigan and into Green Bay. The Menomonie, or Wild-rice
Indians, one of the western branches of the Algonquin family, wished to
dissuade them from going further. They told of ferocious tribes, {173}
who would p