When the ice broke, on 17 May 1673, Mar quette and Joilet set forth. Father Pierson took Father Marquette's place at the mission. Father Marquette was something of a surveyor, and his maps are yet in evidence and very valuable. Two birch canoes that could only hug the shore and not dare the open lakes, and seven men,— five voyageurs — made up the expedition. Their stores were barely sufficient, their scien tific instruments were, as one can easily imagine, inadequate. They were hopeful, hardy and they knew every mood of the treacherous lakes and the meanings of all the changes in the weather. Marquette had acquired the quick eye and ear of the Indian, and his mind was supple and well-trained; Joilet was not far be hind him in wood and water craft. Still, they followed dim rumors. The most interesting of Marquette's reports is that of the second halt at the Indian village of Mascouten, on Lake Winnebago. They had reached the °jumping off" place. Their first halt was at De Pere, the Mission Saint Francis Xavier, to which Father Marquette had been recently assigned. They reached Lake Winnebago by way of the Fox River. From Green Bay,— the Mission Saint Francis,— they went to Lake Winnebago, and, from thence, accompanied by the Indian guides, they ascended the upper Fox River and entered the Wisconsin, on 10 June 1673. After seven days of hard paddling, they entered the Missis sippi on 17 June. The report of this expedition on which we must rely for information is Marquette's,— Joliet's having been lost in the upsetting of his canoe at the La Chine Rapids, near Montreal. It is included in the 'Jesuit Relations,' and quoted by Jahn Gilmary Shea, Sparks, Parlanan, Thwaites, Hedges, and all who have written of the early days of the Northwest. Dr. Shea, in his and Exploration of the Mississippi Valley,' esti mates the distance traveled by Marquette and Joliet from Saint Ignace to Green Bay (Mis sion Saint Francis Xavier), at 218 miles. Gen eral Wood, inspector-general United States army, makes the whole distance traveled 2,549 miles, but he omits the distance from Saint Ignace to Green Bay. Marquette and Joliet ex plored the Mississippi for 300 miles in solitude. Marquette describes the river at its junction with the Missouri as turbulent in the extreme. Marquette was pleased by the treatment re ceived at the first village of Illinois Indians. They met Indians who showed some traces of civilization, and at the mouth of the Arkansas, they met with great kindness from the Indians. From the Illinois— believing the
route to be shorter— they went, it is asserted, to a point near Chicago. By portage, at Stur geon Bay, they saved time and strength, and from the Green Bay into the Fox River, they reached the Mission Saint Francis — having spent, from the beginning of their ascent of the newly-discovered river, on 17 July, about two months — four months, in all, of almost inces sant hardship since they began their voyage on 17 May 1673. Further journeying was out of the question. Marquette and Joliet had not much strength left. A journey of nearly 3,000 miles, in birch canoes, had told on them, hardy as they were. Marquette spent 13 months at De Pere, endeavoring to regain his health. He knew well the stupendous importance of what he had done for France and for the world; but his business was with souls. While Joliet went to Montreal to report, Marquette started to found a new mission in Illinois. He left the Mission Saint Francis on 25 Oct. 1674, with 10 canoes; he arrived at the Chicago River, 4 De cember. The description of the carrying of the canoes through the forests gives a glimpse of the difficulties the missionary expected to en counter. The inundations of 30 March 1675 destroyed their hovel. At Kaskasian Mar quette's heart was filled with gratitude by the kindness he received. His desire for explora tion led him, while using his strength in minis tering to the Indians, to explore Lake Michigan farther. He grew weaker, and turned to the north. Through the river—now Pere Mar quette —he made his homeward way. On Sat urday, 18 May 1675, he died. The Ottawa under that name were included the tribes under the Jesuits in the Lake regions — had among them several Hiskakons, to whom Marquette had been much devoted. These, going north ward in the spring, raised his body, reverently prepared it according to the mode of their „tribe, took it to the Mission Saint Ignace, where Fathers Nource and Pierson awaited it. On Tuesday, 9 June 1676, Marquette was buried in the centre of the chapel of Saint Ignace, a building which was destroyed by fire in 1706. In September 1877, Father Edward Jacker, pastor of Saint Ignace, discovered the grave and remains of the great and good explorer, and they rest under a monument erected by the citizens of Saint Ignace in 1882. Consult Harvey, M. A., 'The Mississippi' (1900) ; ley, J., 'French in the Heart of•America) (1915).