The Missouri River and Its Utmost Source: Curtailed Narration of Geologic Primitive and Geographic Distinctions Descriptive of the Evolution and Discovery of the River and Its Head-waters; Containing an Archaelogical [!] Addendum ... With an Appendix ... |
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Common terms and phrases
Alaska Basin America Bannock Beaver Head Big Hole branch camp Centennial Valley channel chart crater creek crest Cretaceous Culver's Cañon Dakota deposits depth discovery east elevation Elliott existence explorations feet Flat Mouth flowage fort la Reine French Gens geographical Geological Survey glacial Gulf of Mexico Hanson Mountain Henry Henry's lake hundred Idaho implements Indians Itasca lake James Blair Jefferson Kansas land leagues Lewis and Clark Lima locality Madison Madison river miles Minn Minnesota Mississippi Missouri Basin Missouri river Monida Mont Montana moun Mound-Builders mounds numerous obsidian Peak photograph plains prehistoric probably quartz Quivira range Raynolds Pass Red Rock lake Red Rock Pass Red Rock river region Rocky Mountains Sioux snow stone stream summit surface tain temperature thence Three Forks timber tion tribe Upham uplift Upper Red Rock utmost source Verendrye village volcanic Western Yellowstone Yellowstone National Park
Popular passages
Page 46 - Ouabache, with all the countries, territories, lakes within land, and the rivers which fall directly or indirectly into that part of the river St. Louis.
Page 42 - I have seen nothing more frightful; a mass of large trees, entire, with branches, real floating islands, came rushing from the mouth of the river Pekitanoui [Missouri], so impetuously, that we could not, without great danger, expose ourselves to pass across. The agitation was so great that the water was all muddy and could not get clear.
Page 76 - ... of the Missouri. They had now reached the hidden sources of that river, which had never yet been seen by civilized man; and, as they quenched their thirst at the chaste and icy fountain, as they sat down by the brink of that little rivulet, which yielded its distant and modest tribute to the parent ocean, they felt themselves rewarded for all their labors and all their difficulties.
Page 45 - It is full as large as the river Colbert into which it empties troubling it so, that from the mouth of the Ozage the water is hardly drinkable. The Indians assure us that this river is formed by many others, and that they ascend it for ten or twelve days to a mountain where it rises; that beyond this mountain is the sea where they see...
Page 46 - We, by these presents, signed by our hand, have appointed, and do appoint, the said Sieur Crozat, solely to carry on a trade in all the lands possessed by us, and bounded by New Mexico, and by the lands of the English of Carolina, all the establishments, ports, havens, rivers, and principally the port and haven of the Isle Dauphine, heretofore called Massacre; the river of St.
Page 194 - I deem it necessary to follow the historic data, however interesting, which has brought to our notice and knowledge the existence of the main river extending from the Gulf to the Itasca basin, where it takes its rise, for there can be no well-founded disagreement as to that fact, because the discovery of the Mississippi, by piecemeal, is co-extensive with the discovery of the coast line of North America, and the facts are indisputable, in consequence of which I must base my reply to your executive...
Page 194 - The sources of a river which are in a right line with its mouth, particularly when they issue from a cardinal point and flow to the one directly opposite.
Page 76 - McNeal had exultingly stood with a foot on each side of this little rivulet and thanked his god that he had lived to bestride the mighty & heretofore deemed endless Missouri...
Page 194 - ... variance of authorities, good, bad and indifferent, gave me but little comfort in an interesting geographic and historic research, the source of no two principal rivers of the world being alike, and I arbitrarily adopted a reliable rule of no uncertainty, a rule of nature, in ascertaining where the waters were gathered which form the ultimate source of the Mississippi, and for that purpose the length of the main river in statute miles up through the valley of the basin, was ascertained from the...
Page 198 - ... banks incline toward the stream; a variety of fish, large and small, were found in its waters; the mink, otter, and muskrat abounded, and wild ducks of many Northern varieties were from time to time noticed in its channel. Trees have been felled in several places across its banks to permit of passage on foot. Upon the removal of these trees, canoes might be propelled nearly two miles up this principal channel from Itasca lake. These are a portion of the characteristics of the stream, indicating...