But really not much was known of the Sioux until the summer of 1680, when Hennepin and Du Luth met in a camp of Dakotas, as they hunted buffalo in what is now north-western Wisconsin. Hennepin had been captured by a war-party, which descended the Father of Waters in their canoes, seeking for scalps among their enemies, the Miamis and Illinois. They took him and his companions of the voyage up to their villages on the head-waters of Rum River, and around the shores of Mille Lac and Knife Lake. From the former of these the eastern band of the Sioux nation named themselves Mdaywakantonwan, _Spirit Lake Villagers_; and from the latter they inherited the name of Santees (Isanyati), _Dwellers on Knife_. These two representative Frenchmen, thus brought together, at so early a day, in the wilds of the West, visited the home of the Sioux, as above indicated, and to them we are indebted for much of what we know of the Dakotas two centuries ago. The Ojibwas and Hurons were then occupying the southern shores of Lake Superior, and, coming first into communication with the white race, they were first supplied with fire-arms, which gave them such an advantage over the more warlike Sioux that, in the next hundred years, we find the Ojibwas in possession of all the country on the head-waters of the Mississippi, while the Dakotas had migrated southward and westward. The general enlistment of the Sioux, and indeed of all these tribes of the North-west, on the side of the British in the war of 1812, showed the necessity of a strong military garrison in the heart of the Indian country. Hence the building of Fort Snelling nearly sixty years ago. At the confluence of the Minnesota with the Mississippi, and on the high point between the two it has an admirable outlook. So it seemed to us as we approached it on that first day of June, 1837. On our landing we became the guests of Lieutenant Ogden and his excellent wife, who was the daughter of Major Loomis. To Mary and me, every thing was new and strange. We knew nothing of military life. But our sojourn of a few days was made pleasant and profitable by the Christian sympathy which met us there--the evidence of the Spirit's presence, which, two years before, had culminated in the organization of a Christian church in the garrison, on the arrival of the first missionaries to the Dakotas.