Note II-17 — Chapter II · ITINERARY, CONTINUED: ST. PAUL TO LEECH LAKE, SEPTEMBER 22D, 1805-JANUARY 31ST, 1806.

About 6 m., to a position near the mouth of Little Rock r., above Watab rapids and the town of that name in Benton Co. Pike first passes on his right, about a mile from camp, a small stream whose name has not reached me (it empties in the S. W. ¼ of Sect. 15, T. 36, R. 31, 4th M.). In another mile he passes Little Sauk r., a stream like its namesake, but small. This is called Watab r. by Nicollet, Owen, and Brower, Wadub r. by Schoolcraft, Wattah r. by Allen. This little river was formerly important as the most tangible part of the shadowy Sioux-Chippewa boundary of 1825. Starting from the Chippewa r., the line cut across most rivers, at odd places the savages no doubt understood, but geographers never did. It crossed the St. Croix at "Standing Cedars" below the falls, struck near the head of Coon cr., crossed Rum r. at or near its principal forks, hit a "Point of Woods" somewhere, crossed Leaf (Elk) r. low down, and reached the Mississippi opp. the mouth of the Little Sauk, which it followed up, and then went N. W., passed past Swan and Little Elk rivers to the watershed of the Red River of the North, which it followed approx. N. to the Otter Tail and Leech l. traverse. (See Allen's map.) The "narrow rocky place" passed is Watab rapids, and the town of Watab is just above these, on the creek to the right, 5 m. above Sauk Rapids. Sauk and Watab are respectively the "2nd" and "3rd" rapids of Nicollet's map. The word watab means spruce; or, rather, as follows: "The small roots of the spruce tree afford the wattap, with which the bark [of birchen canoes] is sewed; ... Bark, some spare wattap, and gum, are always carried in each canoe," Alex. Henry, Travels, 1761-66, N. Y., 8vo, 1809, p. 14. In this matter we also have the support of the highest possible authority; for the Century Dictionary, representing the acme of English scholarship, defines watap or watapeh as "the long slender roots of the white spruce, Picea alba, which are used by canoe-makers in northwestern North America for binding together the strips of birch-bark." Cf. Baraga's Otchipwe Dict., 1880, Pt. 2, p. 404, s. v. watab. Pike charts Watab rapids; his map, place marked "Ripple," first above his "Little Sack R." This is where his boat sprung a leak, and he did not get much further.