The next day we descended the river seventy miles. There is a perceptible current below Puckaway Lake. The river increases in width and depth, and offers no impediment whatever to its navigation. Fox River runs, indeed, from the portage to Winnebago Lake on a summit, over which it winds among sylvan hills, covered with grass and prairie-flowers, interspersed with groves of oak, elm, ash, and hickory, and dotted at intervals with lakes of refreshing transparent water. The height of this summit, above the Mississippi and the lakes, must be several hundred feet (stated at 234), which permits the stream to flow with liveliness, insuring, when it comes to be settled,[121] the erection of hydraulic works; and it would be difficult to point to a region possessing in its soil, climate, and natural resources, a more favorable character for an agricultural population. It has a diversified surface, without mountains; a fine dry atmosphere; an admirable drainage east, west, north, and south, and a ready access to the great oceanic marts through the Great Lake and the Mississippi. [121] WISCONSIN. This region was separated from Michigan, and formed into a separate territory in 1836; and admitted as a State in 1848. By the census of 1850, it has a population of 305,391, divided into 33,517 families, occupying 32,962 dwellings, and cultivating 1,045,499 acres of land. There are 43 organized counties, and 334 churches of all denominations, giving one church to every 1,250 inhabitants. It has three representatives in the popular branch of Congress. It was 16 years after my visit, before it had a distinct legal existence--it increased to become a State in twelve years; and, according to our ordinary rate of increase, will contain one million of inhabitants in 1890.