Notwithstanding Champlain had previously ascended the Ottawa and stood upon the shores of the Georgian bay of Lake Huron, and although he had received from western Indians numerous reports of distant regions, his knowledge of the great lakes was, in 1634, exceedingly limited. He had heard of Niagara, but was of the opinion that it was only a rapid, such as the St. Louis, in the river St. Lawrence. He was wholly uninformed concerning Lake Erie, Lake St. Clair, and Lake Michigan; while, of Lake Huron, he knew little, and of Lake Superior still less. He was assured that there was a connection between the last-named lake and the St. Lawrence; but his supposition was, that a river flowed from Lake Huron directly into Lake Ontario. Such, certainly was the extent of his information in 1632, as proven by his map of that date;[12] and that, for the next two years, he could have received much additional information concerning the great lakes is not probable. He had early been told that near the borders of one of these "fresh-water seas," were copper mines; for, in June, 1610, while moving up the St. Lawrence to join a war-party of Algonquins, Hurons, and Montagnais, he met, after ascending the river about twenty-five miles above Quebec, a canoe containing two Indians--an Algonquin and a Montagnais--who had been dispatched to urge him to hasten forward with all possible speed. He entertained them on his bark, and conferred with them about many matters concerning their wars. Thereupon, the Algonquin savage drew from a sack a piece of copper, a foot long, which he gave Champlain. It was very handsome and quite pure. He said there were large quantities of the metal where he obtained the piece, and that it was found on the bank of a river near a great lake. He also declared that the Indians gathered it in lumps, and, having melted it, spread it in sheets, smoothing it with stones.[13]