Enough of solemn reveries on starlit lakes--enough--too much--of self and self-communings; I turn over a new leaf, and this shall be a chapter of geography, and topography, natural philosophy, and such wise-like things. Draw the curtain first, for if I look out any longer on those surging rapids, I shall certainly turn giddy--forget all the memoranda I have been collecting for you, lose my reckoning, and become unintelligible to you and myself too. This river of St. Mary is, like the Detroit and the St. Clair, already described, properly a strait, the channel of communication between Lake Superior and Lake Huron. About ten miles higher up, the great ocean-lake narrows to a point; then, forcing a channel through the high lands, comes rushing along till it meets with a downward ledge, or cliff, over which it throws itself in foam and fury, tearing a path for its billows through the rocks. The descent is about twenty-seven feet in three quarters of a mile, but the rush begins above, and the tumult continues below the fall, so that, on the whole, the eye embraces an expanse of white foam measuring about a mile each way, the effect being exactly that of the ocean breaking on a rocky shore: not so terrific, nor on so large a scale, as the rapids of Niagara, but quite as beautiful--quite as animated. What the French call a _saut_ (leap), we term a _fall_; the Sault-Sainte-Marie is translated into the falls of St. Mary. By this name the rapids are often mentioned, but the village on their shore still retains its old name, and is called the Sault. I do not know why the beautiful river and its glorious cataracts should have been placed under the peculiar patronage of the blessed Virgin; perhaps from the union of exceeding loveliness with irresistible power; or, more probably, because the first adventurers reached the spot on some day hallowed in the calendar. The French, ever active and enterprising, were the first who penetrated to this wild region. They had an important trading post here early in the last century, and also a small fort. They were ceded, with the rest of the country, to Great Britain, in 1762.[36] I wonder whether, at that time, the young king or any of his ministers had the least conception of the value and immensity of the magnificent country thrown into our possession, or gave a thought to the responsibilities it brought with it!--to be sure they made good haste, both king and ministers, to get rid of most of the responsibility. The American war began, and at its conclusion the south shore of St. Mary's, and the fort, were surrendered to the Americans.