The principal village of the Sacs and Foxes, for a long period of time,
was on the north side of Rock river, near its junction with the
Mississippi. It contained at one time upwards of sixty lodges, and was
among the largest and most populous Indian villages on the continent.
The country around it is fertile and picturesque, finely watered, and
studded with groves and prairies. It is described in the following
graphic manner, by a gentleman[3] who travelled over it in 1829.

"The Mississippi, which below its junction with the Missouri, is a
troubled stream, meandering through low grounds, and margined by muddy
banks, is here a clear and rapid river, flowing over beds of rock and
gravel, and bordered by the most lovely shores. Nothing of the kind can
be more attractive, than the scenery at the upper rapids. On the western
shore, a series of slopes are seen, commencing at the gravelly margin of
the water, and rising one above another, with a barely perceptible
acclivity, for a considerable distance, until the back ground is
terminated by a chain of beautifully rounded hills, over which trees are
thinly scattered, as if planted to embellish the scene. This is the
singular charm of prairie scenery. Although it is a wilderness, just as
nature made it, the verdant carpet, the gracefully waving outline of the
surface, the clumps and groves and scattered trees, give it the
appearance of a noble park, boundless in extent, and adorned with
exquisite taste. It is a wild but not a savage wild, that awes by its
gloom. It is a gay and cheerful wilderness, winning by its social aspect
as well as its variety and intrinsic gracefulness. The eastern shore is
not less beautiful: a broad flat plain of rich alluvion, extending from
the water's edge, is terminated by a range of wooded hills. A small
collection of the lodges of the Saukies and Foxes stood on this plain
when the writer last saw it, but their chief village was about three
miles distant. In the front of the landscape, and presenting its most