custom of the race. The keen eye of a savage, who, by looking at a track in the sand, could tell how many days old it was, needed not a blazed tree or sign-stone to tell him the direction of a broken path. If there is any evidence that Indians ever made efforts to outwardly mark the course of any of their thoroughfares, it is not to be found in the most trustworthy records of the first white men who entered the Indians' land. Indian hieroglyphics announcing their triumphs in war may yet be seen at low tide on rocks in certain of our rivers, and rough blazes made centuries ago by Frenchmen who first crossed the portages of the West have been brought to light by removing earth from the trunks of old trees along the trail,[1] but the Indian land-thoroughfares were not marked.
Wrote an early student, "Indeed all the Indians have this Knowledge to a very great Degree of practical Purpose. They are very attentive to the Positions of the Sun and Stars, and on the Lakes can steer
- ↑ See Jesuit Relations and Allied Documents; vol. xxxvii., p. 33; also Baker's St. Joseph-Kankakee Portage.
