He must see the neighboring tribes. So he ascended the Fox river of Green bay, to Winnebago lake--passing through which, he again entered that stream, paddling his canoe up its current, until he reached the homes of the Mascoutins,[69] the first tribe to be met with after leaving the Winnebagoes; for the Sacs[70] and Foxes[71] were not residents of what is now Wisconsin at that period,--their migration thither, from the east, having been at a subsequent date. Nicolet had navigated the Fox river, a six-days' journey, since leaving the Winnebagoes.[72] The Mascoutins, as we have seen, were heard of by Champlain as early as 1615, as being engaged in a war with the Neuter nation and the Ottawas. But, up to the time of Nicolet's visit, and for a number of years subsequent (as he gave no clue himself to their locality), they were only known as living two hundred leagues or more beyond the last mentioned tribe--that is, that distance beyond the south end of the Georgian bay of Lake Huron.[73] Their villages were in the valley of the Fox river, probably in what is now Green Lake county, Wisconsin.[74] They had, doubtless, for their neighbors, the Miamis[75] and Kickapoos.[76] They were a vigorous and warlike nation, of Algonquin stock, as were also the two tribes last mentioned. Nicolet, while among the Mascoutins, heard of the Wisconsin river, which was distant only three days' journey up the tortuous channel of the Fox. But the accounts given him of that tributary of the Mississippi were evidently very confused. A reference to the parent stream (confounded with the Wisconsin) as "the great water,"[77] by the savages, caused him to believe that he was, in reality, but three days' journey from the sea; and so he reported after his return to the St. Lawrence.[78] Strange to say, Nicolet resolved not to visit this ocean, although, as he believed, so near its shores. He traveled no further upon the Fox river,[79] but turned his course to the southward. And the Jesuits consoled themselves, when they heard of his shortcoming, with the hope that one day the western sea would be reached by one of their order.[80] "In passing, I will say," wrote one of their missionaries, in 1640, "that we have strong indications that one can descend through the second lake of the Hurons ... into this sea."[81]