France, Great Britain, Belgium,
Italy, Sweden, Germany, and the Netherlands, have their residence in the
city. It is an art-centre, and almost equally with Brooklyn is entitled
to be called a city of churches.
A week is a short time to devote to seeing all that this queen city has
that is interesting, and that included every day we spent there. Neither
in a sketch like the present shall we have space to give more than we
have done--a general idea of the city. One day about noon we steamed out
of the harbor, on a magnificent lake-steamer, bound for Duluth. We were
to have a run of over seven hundred miles with but a single
stopping-place the whole distance. It would be three days before we
should step on land again.
"Farewell, a long farewell, to the city of the Indian sachem," said
Hugh, as the grand emporium and railway-centre grew dim in the distance.
"By the way," continued he, "are you aware that the correct etymology of
the name Chicago is not generally known?"
Vincent and I confessed that we did not even know the supposed etymology
of the name.
"No matter about that," went on the Historian. "The name is undoubtedly
Indian, corrupted from Chercaqua, the name of a long line of chiefs,
meaning strong, also applied to a wild onion. Long before the white men
knew the region the site of Chicago was a favorite rendezvous of several
Indian tribes. The first geographical notice of the place occurs in a
map dated Quebec, Canada, 1683, as 'Fort Chicagon.' Marquette camped on
the site during the winter of 1674-5. A fort was built there by the
French and afterward abandoned. So you see that Chicago has a history
that is long anterior to the existence of the present city. Have a
cigar, Montague?"
Clouds of fragrant tobacco-smoke soon obscured the view of the Queen
City of the Northwest, busy with life above the graves of the Indian
sagamores whose memories she has forgotten.
On the third day we steamed past Mackinaw, and soon made the ship-canal
which was constructed for the passage of large ships, a channel a dozen
miles long and half a mile wide. And now, hurrah! We are on the waters
of Lake Superior, the "Gitche Gumee, the shining Big Sea-Water," of
Longfellow's musical verse. The lake is a great sea. Its greatest length
is three hundred and sixty miles, its greatest breadth one hundred and
forty miles; the whole length of its coast is fifteen hundred miles. It
has an area of thirty-two thousand square miles, a
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