(1) The term "Forked River" referred to the
Missouri and Mississippi, not the Wisconsin and Mississippi. (2) No
other rivers in that region are to be compared to the Ottawa and St.
Lawrence but the Missouri and Mississippi. (3) The Mascoutins, or
People of the Fire, among whom Radisson found himself when he descended
the Wisconsin from Green Bay, conducted him westward only as far as the
tribes allied to them, the Mascoutins of the Missouri or Nebraska.
Hence, Radisson going west-north-west to the Sioux--as he says he
did--must have skirted much farther west than Wisconsin and Minnesota.
(4) His descriptions of the Indians who knew tribes in trade with the
Spaniards must refer to the Indians south of the Big Bend of the
Missouri. (5) His description of the climate refers to the same
region. (6) The _Jesuit Relations_ confirm beyond all doubt that he
was among the main body of the great Sioux Confederacy. (7) Both his
and the Jesuit reference is to the treeless prairie, which does not
apply to the wooded lake regions of eastern Minnesota or northern
Wisconsin.
To me, it is simply astounding--and that is putting it mildly--that any
one pretending to have read _Radisson's Journal_ can accuse him of
"claiming" to have "descended to the salt sea" (Gulf of Mexico).
Radisson makes no such claim; and to accuse him of such is like
building a straw enemy for the sake of knocking him down, or stirring
up muddy waters to make them look deep.
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