Note I-50 — Chapter I · ITINERARY: ST. LOUIS TO ST. PAUL, AUGUST 9TH-SEPTEMBER 21ST, 1805.

La Feuille is a name which Pike rarely, and only by accident, spells correctly. But in writings of the period it was extremely variable, being found even as Lefei, Lefoi, Lefoy, La Fye, etc. This French term commonly appears in English as The Leaf, sometimes Falling Leaf, and is conjecturally a translation of the native name of the hereditary chiefs of the Kioxa (Kiyuksa) band of Sioux. This has usually been rendered Wabasha or Wapasha, and explained as derived from wapa, leaf, and sha, red. In one place Long has Wauppaushaw. In Riggs and Pond's Dakota dictionary the name is given as Wapahasha, and etymologized as from wapaha, a standard, and sha, red. In Minn. Hist. Coll., I. 2d ed. 1872, p. 370, J. Fletcher Williams surmises the origination of the name in the chieftainship of the Warpekutes, otherwise Leaf Shooters—though why the tribe was so called, and whether the English term is a proper version of the aboriginal name, seem never to have been satisfactorily shown. Such forms of the chief's name as Wabashaw and Wapashaw, etc., are common, besides which there are some odd and rare ones; e. g., Beltrami, II. p. 180, has: "The Great Wabiscihouwa, who is regarded as the Ulysses of the whole nation." Three chiefs named Wabasha are known to us in history. Wabasha I. was famous during the Revolutionary war. Wabasha II. was his son, and the latter is the one of whom Pike, Long, Beltrami, and many others speak. He was already a great chief in Pike's time, who grew in credit and renown with years. He was seen in 1820 by General Henry Whiting, who describes him as a small man with a patch over one eye, who nevertheless impressed everyone with respect, and whose profile was said to resemble that of the illustrious Condé. "While with us at Prairie du Chien," says Whiting, "he never moved, or was seen, without his pipe-bearer. His people treated him with reverence. Unlike all other speakers in council, he spoke sitting, considering, it was said, that he was called upon to stand only in the presence of his great father at Washington, or his representatives at St. Louis." He was not a warrior, believing that Indians could prosper only at peace with one another and with the whites, and declared that he had never been at war with the latter, though many of his young men, against his advice, had been led astray in the war of 1812. His son, Wabasha III., resided at the village below Lake Pepin until 1853, and in 1872 was living on the Niobrara Reservation.