from Duluth, to the
crossing of the Mississippi River at Brainerd, and launch his boat on
the Father of Waters, which he may descend with but few interruptions to
below the Falls of St. Anthony, at Minneapolis; or, if he will take his
boat by rail from Duluth, one hundred and fifty-five miles, to St. Paul,
he can launch his canoe, and follow the steamboat to the Gulf of Mexico.
This is the longest, and may be called the canoeist's western route to
the great Southern Sea. In St. Louis County, Minnesota, the water from
"Seven Beaver Lakes" flows south-southwest, and joins the Flood-Wood
River; there taking an easterly course towards Duluth, it empties into
Lake Superior. This is the St. Louis River, the first tributary of the
mighty St. Lawrence system. From the head waters of the St. Louis to the
mouth of the St. Lawrence at Bic Islands, where it enters the great
estuary, the length of this great water system, including the great
Lakes, is about two thousand miles. The area thus drained by the St.
Lawrence River is nearly six millions of square miles. The largest craft
can ascend it to Quebec, and smaller ones to Montreal; above which city,
navigation being impeded by rapids, the seven canals before mentioned
have been constructed that vessels may avoid this danger while voyaging
to Lake Ontario.

The southern and shorter coast route to the gulf leaves the great river
at the Acadian town of Sorel, where the quiet Richelieu flows into the
St. Lawrence River. Of the two long routes offered me I selected the
southern, leaving the other to be traversed at some future time. To
follow the contours of rivers, bays, and sounds, a voyage of at least
twenty-five hundred miles was before me. It was my intention to explore
the connecting watercourses southward, without making a single portage,
as far as Cape Henlopen, a sandy headland at the entrance of Delaware
Bay; there, by making short portages from one watercourse to another, to
navigate along the interior of the Atlantic coast to the St. Mary's
River, which is a dividing line between Georgia and Florida. From the
Atlantic coast of southern Georgia, I proposed to cross the peninsula of
Florida by way of the St. Mary's River, to Okefenokee Swamp; thence, by
portage, to the Suwanee River, and by descending that stream (the
boundary line of a geographical division--eastern and middle Florida),
to reach the coast of the Gulf of Mexico, which was to be the terminal
point of my cano