Original - North Central Michigan College Library

jintroductionTo your tales of shocking escapades by trail andlake and riverI'm afraid you were a liar, but you knew how todeliverYour auditors of Gotham from the shackles ofennui!vIn support of this charge of willful mendacityagainst Henry, the writer calls attention tocertain erroneous statements of detail, a formof criticism to which Henry's narrative isclearly vulnerable; but so carelessly have theaccusations been drawn that it would be easyto retort upon the critic the very charge hebrings against Henry. 3 Not to go fartherafield, the sole factual basis for the verse picturingthe "garrulous old trader" engaged inspinning his yarns for the entertainment ofan audience of "pop-eyed New York burghers"is the single circumstance .that his book waspublished by a New York printer. There isno hint in it or elsewhere to the presentwriter's knowledge that Henry ever lived inNew York, or indeed that he ever saw thatcity.3Thus, Henry's account (in Part One, chap. VII)of his trip from Mackinac to the Sopis described as"ludicrously inaccurate; and from Point Detour, findingthe lake open, our hero pushes on and sends backaid but fails to say how he crossed the open straits."But on turning to Henry's account we find that afterthe party reached Point Detour a delay of more than aweek ensued, as to part of which it is expressly statedthat the weather was "exceedingly cold." Only a hypercriticcould require further explanation than this as tohow Henry crossed the "open straits."xx