outlet in 1830. This dam raised the water level about 700 feet, and so covered the intervening areas of low ground between the several smaller lakes. The greater portion of Manitou Lake is therefore covered with shallow water, much of which is not over five feet in depth. The deepest water occurs south of Long Island, where it is forty-nine feet. The main inlet, Mill Creek, is a small sluggish stream, which enters the lake near its extreme southern end. Whites Creek, still smaller, enters the east side opposite Long Island. The outlet flows about four miles northwestward and empties into the Tippecanoe River.

The word "Manitou" among certain of the American Indians signified spirit or other object of religious awe or reverence. Two Manitous or spirits are spoken of in Indian traditions—one the spirit of good, the other the spirit of evil. The latter must have been the one from which Lake Manitou was named, as Dr. Gould states that "It was also known as 'Devils Lake' to the Indians and to all the early settlers. Most of the latter believed 'Manitou' meant 'devil.' The devil was even reputed to have been seen by some of these early settlers, especially when they had snakes in their boots."

The shores of the lake have lost much of their primitive beauty on account of the destruction of timber formerly covering the bordering territory. They are much diverse in character, being, for the most part, low and marshy. In places, however, they rise fifteen to forty feet above the water level and are prettily wooded with oak and other timber. This is especially true of a stretch on the east shore above and below the East Side Hotel. Here the bank rises abruptly and the wooded grove on its breast offers fine sites for cottages a number of which have been erected. The bottom of the lake bordering this stretch is of gravel and affords fine facilities for bathing, the water increasing gradually to ten feet in depth fifty feet from shore.

Three wooded islands, Coney, Long and Round, rise ten to fifteen feet above the water level. Coney Island has one or two buildings upon it and is quite a resort for a certain element of Roch

ester's population. The other two are often occupied as fishing

camps.

The fish of the lake attract hundreds of anglers each season.

'NORTH AND SOUTH MUD LAKES.

These two lakes lie in Liberty Township, eight miles south of Rochester and three miles west of the Lake Erie & Western Railway. By the encroachment of decaying vegetation and by draining, the water area has been reduced more than one-half within the past twenty years.

North Mud Lake has at present a water area of only sixty acres, is about 160 rods long by forty to sixty rods wide and is divided into two lobes, which are connected by a channel seventy-five feet wide by 300 feet in length. The upper and larger lobe has low marshy shores on its east and north sides. About the inlet which enters near the middle of the east shore, the marsh extends back for a long distance, forming an area of sixty or more acres. This was formerly covered with water and comprised a portion of the lake shown on the older maps. The banks of the west shore rise twenty to thirty feet, back ten or more rods from the water's edge, a marsh intervening, except on the south half where the bluff rises close to the water. The margins of the water contain many rushes, spatterdock and other aquatic plants. The south lobe comprises about twenty-five acres of water with high cultivated banks on the north and west and low marshy ones on the south and east. The marsh on the east is, however, not more than twenty rods wide and then rises into sloping wooded hillsides. The maximum depth of water in the lake is fifty feet and the shallow water area is everywhere

very narrow.

The north line of the water area of South Mud Lake is within a quarter of a mile of the southern end of North Mud Lake, a low divide intervening which formerly could be crossed with a boat during high water. The lake now contains about fifty acres of vater, with a marsh of equal or greater area bordering the north

east shore. The present water area is elliptical in shape, its shores are everywhere low and bordered with marsh. A small island covered with underbrush is located near the center of the northern half and just north of this the maximum depth of water, twentysix feet, occurs. The water is much more turbid than in North Lake, containing myriads of the lower forms of vegetable life.

BRUCES LAKE.

This lake, formerly noted for its beauty and its fine fishing facilities, is now a desolate stretch of water bordered by bare, gravelly shores, and in many places choked by aquatic vegetation. These changes have mainly been brought about in the past few years by a dredged ditch on the west side of the lake which has drained off this water into the Tippecanoe River.

The immediate shores of the lake, for the most part, are low, and the shallow water area is now wide. Only on the north half of the east side do the gravelly banks rise any distance above the water level. Here they are thirty feet high with a gravelly plain ten to fifteen rods wide intervening between them and the lake. On the northeast shore the gravel banks slope gradually up fifteen to twenty feet above the water and a small timbered area, the only one about the lake, lies back of them.

Bruces Lake has long been noted as an excellent fishing resort. Black bass, blue-gills, catfish, warmouth, goggle-eye, sunfish, perch and occasionally a pickerel, were caught before the lake was lowered. Since then all kinds of fish have been growing gradually fewer in number and many of the fishermen who formerly sought its bounds with an assurance of a good catch now cast their lines in more distant lakes. Waterfowl, too, were then abundant. Being distant from any other lake, most of the migratory ducks, geese, snipe and rail, passing anywhere near its surface, stopped to feed or to float on its quiet waters, and many hunters were attracted thither in autumn and spring. At the present annual rate of decrease of its water area, but a few years can elapse before this

"Mecca" of fishermen and hunters will be wholly a marsh of cattails and rushes. A score of years will see it changed into a vast acreage of corn-producing land—which changes are doubtless what the gold-seeking landowners, who have begun the drainage of its waters, most fervently desire.

LAPORTE COUNTY.

Laporte County is in the third tier of counties from the western line of Indiana, and lies adjacent to the south border of the State of Michigan. Its northwestern corner is bordered by the shore of Lake Michigan for a distance of seven miles.

Transportation facilities are most excellent, six railways crossing the county from east to west, two from north to south and one from southeast to northwest, thus furnishing an outlet in every direction. The area of the county is 562 square miles. Of this the northern third is somewhat broken and hilly and was formerly covered with timber. The central and southern portions contain about 200 square miles of fine prairie and a large area of Kankakee marsh land, much of which has been drained and now forms excellent grazing and farming lands.

The lakes of Laporte County are few in number and are, for the most part, situated near the crest of the divide.

HUDSON OR DU CHEMIN LAKE.

This lake lies about eleven miles northeast of Laporte and is just west of Hudson Station, on the Lake Shore & Michigan Southern Railroad. The total length of the lake from east to west is nearly two miles and the average width about one-half mile. The area is 750 or more acres.

CLEAR LAKE.

This lake lies north of and adjoining the city of Laporte. In 1875, Dr. G. N. Levette wrote of it as follows: "Clear Lake has uniformly low and sandy shores, and sustains a scanty growth of vegetation in the shallow portions. The water owes its turbid,