t the head of a half-naked band in the billowy
plains of Nebraska.

[Footnote 44: This writer is much distinguished for his numerous works,
most of which relate to the early missions of the Roman Catholic church
in America. He is a native of New York.]

* * * * *

From "Introduction to Early Voyages," etc.

=_148._= EXPLORATION OF THE MISSISSIPPI RIVER.

Many a river lives embalmed in history and in historic verse. The
Euphrates, the Nile, the Jordan, the Tiber, and the Rhine typify the
course of empires and dynasties. Countries have been described _per
flumina_, but these streams possess renown rather from some city that
frowned on their currents, or some battle fought and won on their banks.
The great River of our West, from its immense length and the still
increasing importance of its valley, possesses a history of its own. Its
discovery by the Spanish adventurers, a Cabeza de Vaca, a De Soto, a
Tristan, who reached, crossed, or followed it, is its period of early
romance, brilliant, brief, and tragic. Its exploration by Marquette and
La Salle follows,--work of patient endurance and investigation, still
tinged with that light of heroism that hovers around all who struggle
with difficulty and adversity to attain a great and useful end. Then
come the early voyages depicting the successive stages of its banks from
a wilderness to civilization.

The death of La Salle in Texas in his attempt to reach Illinois closes
the chapter of exploration. Iberville opens a new period by his voyage
to the mouth of the Mississippi, which crowning the previous efforts,
gave the valley of the great river to civilization, Christianity, and
progress. The river had become an object of rivalry. English, French,
and Spanish at the same moment sought to secure its mouth, but fortune
favored the bold Canadian, and the white flag reared by La Salle was
planted anew.

... At the moment when these narratives take us to the valley of the
Mississippi, that immense territory presented a strange contrast to its
present condition. From its head waters amid the lakes of Minnesota to
its mouth; from its western springs in the heart of the Rocky mountains
to its eastern cradle in the Alleghenies, all was yet in its primeval
state. The Europeans had but one spot, Tonty's little fort; no white men
roamed it but the trader or the missionary. With a sparse and scattered
Indian population, the country teeming with buffalo