Perhaps the most perfect and beautiful of all Indian fire myths of the Columbia, is that connected with the famous “tomanowas bridge” at the Cascades. This myth not only treats of fire, but it also endeavours to account for the peculiar formation of the river and for the great snow peaks in the near vicinity. This myth has various forms, and in order that it may be the better understood, we shall say a word with respect to the peculiar physical features in that part of the Columbia. The River, after having traversed over a thousand miles from its source in the heart of the great Rocky Mountains of Canada, has cleft the Cascade Range asunder with a cañon three thousand feet in depth. While generally swift, that portion between The Dalles and the Cascades is deep and sluggish. There are, moreover, sunken forests on both sides visible at low water, which seem plainly to indicate that at that point the river was dammed up by some great rock slide or volcanic convulsion. Some of the Indians affirm that their grandfathers have told them that there was a time when the river at that pointpassed under an immense natural bridge, and that there were no obstructions to the passage of boats under the bridge. At the present time there is a cascade of forty feet at that point. This is now overcome by government locks. Among other evidences of some such actual occurrence as the Indians relate, is the fact that the banks at that point are gradually sliding into the river. The prodigious volume of the Columbia, which here rises from fifty to seventy-five feet during the summer flood, is continually eating into the banks. The railroad has slid several inches a year at this point toward the river and requires frequent readjustment. It is obvious at a slight inspection that this weird and sublime point has been the scene of terrific volcanic and probably seismic action. One Indian legend, probably the best known of their stories, is to the effect that the downfall of the bridge and consequent damming of the river was due to a battle between Mt. Hood and Mt. Adams,—or, some say, Mt. St. Helens—in which Mt. Hood hurled a great rock at his antagonist; but, falling short of the mark, the rock demolished the bridge instead. This event has been made use of by Frederick Balch in his story,The Bridge of the Gods.
But the finer, though less known legend, which unites both the physical conformation of the Cascades and the three great snow mountains of Hood, Adams, and St. Helens, with the origin of fire, is to this effect. According to the Klickitats, there was once a father and two sons who came from the east down the Columbia to the region in which Dalles City is now located, and there the two sons quarrelled as to who should possess the land. The father, to settle the dispute,shot two arrows, one to the north and one to the west. He told one son to find the arrow to the north and the other the one to the west, and there to settle and bring up their families. The first son, going northward, over what was then a beautiful plain, became the progenitor of the Klickitat tribe, while the other son was the founder of the great Multnomah nation of the Willamette Valley. To separate the two tribes more effectively, Sahale, the Great Spirit, reared the chain of the Cascades, though without any great peaks, and for a long time all things went in harmony. But for convenience’ sake, Sahale had created the great tomanowas bridge under which the waters of the Columbia flowed, and on this bridge he had stationed a witch woman called Loowit, who was to take charge of the fire. This was the only fire in the world. As time passed on Loowit observed the deplorable condition of the Indians, destitute of fire and the conveniences which it might bring. She therefore besought Sahale to allow her to bestow fire upon the Indians. Sahale, greatly pleased by the faithfulness and benevolence of Loowit, finally granted her request. The lot of the Indians was wonderfully improved by the acquisition of fire. They began to make better lodges and clothes and had a variety of food and implements, and, in short, were marvellously benefited by the bounteous gift.
But Sahale, in order to show his appreciation of the care with which Loowit had guarded the sacred fire, now determined to offer her any gift she might desire as a reward. Accordingly, in response to his offer, Loowit asked that she be transformed into a young and beautiful girl. This was accordinglyaffected, and now, as might have been expected, all the Indian chiefs fell deeply in love with the guardian of the tomanowas bridge. Loowit paid little heed to any of them, until finally there came two chiefs, one from the north called Klickitat and one from the south called Wiyeast. Loowit was uncertain which of these two she most desired, and as a result a bitter strife arose between the two. This waxed hotter and hotter, until, with their respective warriors, they entered upon a desperate war. The land was ravaged, all their new comforts were marred, and misery and wretchedness ensued. Sahale repented that he had allowed Loowit to bestow fire upon the Indians, and determined to undo all his work in so far as he could. Accordingly he broke down the tomanowas bridge, which dammed up the river with an impassable reef, and put to death Loowit, Klickitat, and Wiyeast. But, inasmuch as they had been noble and beautiful in life, he determined to give them a fitting commemoration after death. Therefore he reared over them as monuments, the great snow peaks; over Loowit, what we now call Mt. St. Helens; over Wiyeast, the modern Mt. Hood; and, above Klickitat, the great dome which we now call Mt. Adams.
Of the miscellaneous myths which pertain to the forces of nature, one of the best is that accounting for the Chinook wind. All people who have lived long in Oregon or Washington have a conception of that marvellous warm wind which in January and February suddenly sends them almost summer heat amid snow banks and ice-locked streams, and causes all nature to rejoice as with a resurrection of spring time. Scarcely anything can be imagined in nature more picturesqueand dramatic than this Chinook wind. The thermometer may be down nearly to zero, a foot of snow may rest like a pall on the earth, or a deadly fog may wrap the earth, when suddenly, as if by the breath of inspiration, the fog parts, the peaks of the mountains may be seen half stripped of snow, and then, roaring and whistling, the warm south wind comes like an army. The snow begins to drip like a pressed sponge, the thermometer goes with a jump to sixty, and within two hours we find ourselves in the climate of Southern California. No wonder the Indians personified this wind. We personify it ourselves.
The Yakima account of the Chinook wind was to the effect that it was caused by five brothers who lived on the Columbia River, not far from the present town of Columbus. Now there is at rare intervals in this country a cold north-east wind, which the Indians on the lower Columbia call the Walla Walla wind because it comes from the north-east. The cold wind was caused by another set of brothers. Both these sets of brothers had grandparents who lived near what is now Umatilla. The two groups of brothers were continually fighting each other, sweeping one way or the other over the country, alternately freezing or thawing it, blowing down trees and causing the dust to fly in clouds, and rendering the country generally very uncomfortable. Finally, the Walla Walla brothers sent a challenge to the Chinook brothers to undertake a wrestling match, the condition being that those who were defeated should forfeit their lives. It was agreed that Speelyei should act as umpire and should inflict the penalty by decapitating the losers. Speelyei secretly advised the grandparents ofthe Chinook brothers to throw oil on the wrestling ground so that their sons might not fall. In like manner he secretly advised the grandparents of the Walla Walla brothers to throw ice on the ground. Between the ice and the oil it was so slippery that it would be hard for any one to keep upright, but inasmuch as the Walla Walla grandfather got ice on the ground last, the Chinook brothers were all thrown and killed.
The eldest Chinook had an infant baby at home, whose mother brought him up with one sole purpose in view, and that was that he must avenge the death of his father and uncles. By continual practice in pulling up trees he became prodigiously strong, insomuch that he could pull up the largest fir trees and throw them about like weeds. The young man finally reached such a degree of strength that he felt that the time had come for him to perform his great mission. Therefore he went up the Columbia, pulling up trees and tossing them around in different places, and finally passed over into the valley of the Yakima, where he lay down to rest by the creek called the Setas. There he rested for a day and a night, and the marks of his couch are still plainly visible on the mountain side.
Now, turning back again to the Columbia, he sought the hut of his grandparents, and when he had found it, he found also that they were in a most deplorable condition. The Walla Walla brothers had been having it all their own way during these years and had imposed most shamefully upon the old people. When he learned this, the young Chinook told his grandfather to go out into the Columbia to fish for sturgeon, while he in the meantime would lie down in the bottom of the boat and watch for the Walla Walla wind. It wasthe habit of these tormenting Walla Walla wind brothers to wait until the old man had got his boat filled with fish, and then they, issuing swiftly and silently from the shore, would beset and rob him. This time they started out from the shore as usual, but to their great astonishment, just as they were about to catch him, the boat would shoot on at miraculous speed and leave them far behind. So the old man landed safely and brought his fish to the hut. The young Chinook then took his grandparents to a stream and washed from them the filth which had gathered upon them during all those years of suffering. Strange to say, the filth became transformed into trout, and this is the origin of all the trout along the Columbia.
As soon as the news became known abroad that there was another Chinook champion in the field, the Walla Walla brothers began to demand a new wrestling match. Young Chinook very gladly accepted the challenge, though he had to meet all five. But now Speelyei secretly suggested to the Chinook grandfather that he should wait about throwing the oil on the ground until the ice had all been used up. By means of this change of practice, the Walla Walla brothers fell speedily before the young Chinook. One after another was thrown and beheaded until only the youngest was left. His courage failing, he surrendered without a struggle. Speelyei then pronounced sentence upon him, telling him that he must live, but could henceforth only blow lightly, and never have power to freeze people to death. Speelyei also decreed that in order to keep Chinook within bounds he should blow his hardest at night time, and should blow upon the mountain ridges first in order to prepare people forhis coming. Thus there came to be moderation in the winds, but Chinook was always the victor in the end. And thus at the present time, in the perpetual flux and reflux of the oceans of the air, when the north wind sweeps down from the chilly zones of Canada upon the Columbia Basin, his triumph is but transient. For within a few hours, or days at most, while the cattle are threatened with destruction and while ranchers are gazing anxiously about, they will discern a blue-black line upon the southern horizon. In a short time the mountain ridges can be seen bare of snow, and deliverance is at hand. For the next morning, rushing and roaring from the South, comes the blessed Chinook, and the icy grip of the North melts as before a blast from a furnace. The struggle is short and Chinook’s victory is sure.
Nearly all our native races had a more or less coherent idea of a future state of rewards and punishments. “The happy hunting ground” of the Indians is often referred to in connection with the Indians of the older part of the United States. Our Indians have ideas in general quite similar. Some believe that there is a hell and a heaven. The Siskiyou Indians in Southern Oregon have a curious idea similar to that of the ancient Egyptians as well as of the Mohammedans. This is to the effect that the regions of the blessed are on the other side of an enormously deep chasm. To pass over this, one must cross on a very narrow and slippery pole. The good can pass, but the bad fall off into empty space, whence they reappear again upon the earth as beasts or birds.
The Klickitat Indians, living along The Dalles of the Columbia have a fine legend of the land of spirits.There lived a young chief and a girl who were devoted to each other and seemed to be the happiest people in the tribe, but suddenly he sickened and died. The girl mourned for him almost to the point of death, and he, having reached the land of the spirits, could find no happiness there for thinking of her. And so it came to pass that a vision began to appear to the girl at night, telling her that she must herself go into the land of the spirits in order to console her lover. Now there is, near that place, one of the most weird and funereal of all the various “memaloose” islands, or death islands, of the Columbia. The writer himself has been upon this island and its spectral and volcanic desolation makes it a fitting location for ghostly tales. It lies just below the “great chute,” and even yet has many skeletons upon it. In accordance with the directions of the vision, the girl’s father made ready a canoe, placed her in it, and passed out into the Great River by night, to the memaloose island. As the father and his child rowed across the dark and forbidding waters, they began to hear the sounds of singing and dancing and great joy. Upon the shore of the island they were met by four spirit people, who took the girl, but bade the father return, as it was not for him to see into the spirit country. Accordingly the girl was conducted to the great dance-house of the spirits, and there she met her lover, far stronger and more beautiful than when upon earth. That night they spent in unspeakable bliss, but when the light began to break in the east and the song of the robins was heard from the willows on the shore, the singers and the dancers fell asleep.
The girl, too, had gone to sleep, but not soundlylike the spirits. When the sun had reached the meridian, she woke, and now, to her horror, she saw that instead of being in the midst of beautiful spirits, she was surrounded by hideous skeletons and loathsome, decaying bodies. Around her waist were the bony arms and skeleton fingers of her lover, and his grinning teeth and gaping eye-sockets seemed to be turned in mockery upon her. Screaming with horror, she leaped up and ran to the edge of the island, where, after hunting a long time, she found a boat, in which she paddled across to the Indian village. Having presented herself to her astonished parents, they became fearful that some great calamity would visit the tribe on account of her return, and accordingly her father took her the next night back to the memaloose island as before. There she met again the happy spirits of the blessed, and there again her lover and she spent another night in ecstatic bliss. In the course of time a child was born to the girl, beautiful beyond description, being half spirit and half human. The spirit bridegroom, being anxious that his mother should see the child, sent a spirit messenger to the village, desiring his mother to come by night to the memaloose island to visit them. She was told, however, that she must not look at the child until ten days had passed. But after the old woman had reached the island, her desire to see the wonderful child was so intense that she took advantage of a moment’s inattention on the part of the guard, and, lifting the cloth from the baby board, she stole a look at the sleeping infant. And then, dreadful to relate, the baby died in consequence of this premature human look. Grieved and displeased by this foolish act, the spirit people decreed that thedead should never again return nor hold any communication with the living.
In concluding this chapter we cannot forbear to call the attention of our readers to the rare beauty of many of the native Indian names of localities. These names always have some significance, and ordinarily there is some such poetic or figurative conception involved in the name as plainly reveals the fact that these rude and unfortunate natives have the souls of poets beneath their savage exterior. It is truly lamentable that some of the sonorous and poetic native names have been thrust aside for the commonplace and oft-repeated names of Eastern or European localities or the still less attractive names of discoverers or their unimportant friends.
Think of using the names Salem and Portland for Chemeketa and Multnomah, the native names. Chemeketa means “Here we Rest,” or, some say, the “Place of Peace,” for it was the council ground of the Willamette Valley Indians. But the Methodist missionaries thought that it would have a more Biblical sound and conduce to the spiritual welfare of the natives to translate the word into its equivalent, Salem. So they spoiled the wild native beauty of the name for all time. Multnomah means “Down the Waters.” But two Yankee sea captains, with a sad deficiency of poetry in them, tossed up a coin to decide whether to employ the name of Boston or Portland, the native town of each, and the latter won the toss.
Oregon has been more fortunate than Washington in its State name, for it has the unique name, stately and sonorous, which old Jonathan Carver first used for the River and which is one of the most distinctiveof all the names of States. But whether Oregon is Indian, Spanish, French, or a corruption of something else, or a pure invention of Carver’s is one of the mooted points in our history. Idaho, too, has one of the most mellifluous of names, meaning the “Gem of the Mountains.”
All three States have many beautiful and appropriate names of rivers, lakes, mountains, and cities. Such are Chelan, “Beautiful Water”; Umatilla, “The Wind-blown Sand”; Walla Walla, “Where the Waters Meet”; Shuksan, “The Place of the Storm Winds”; Spokane, “The People of the Sun”; Kulshan, “The Great White Watcher”; Snoqualmie, “The Falls of the Moon God.” Seattle derives its name from the old chief Seattle, or Sealth.
The most bitterly disputed name of all is Tacomavs.Rainier, as the name of the greatest of our mountains. The name of Rainier was derived by Vancouver from that of an officer of the British navy, a man who never knew anything of Oregon and had no part or lot in its discovery or development. Tacoma, or more accurately,Takhoma(a peculiar guttural which we cannot fully indicate), was the native Indian name, meaning, according to some, “The Great White Mountain,” and according to others meaning “The Fountain-breast of Milk-white Waters.”
With these glances at the character of the land, and its native inhabitants, we are now ready to see how they became known to the world.
Tales of the First White Men along the Coast
Nekahni Mountain and Tallapus—Quootshoi and Toulux—Original Beauty of Clatsop Plains—The Story Told by Celiast and Cultee—Casting of the “Thing” upon the Beach—The Pop-corn—Burning of the Ship—Konapee, the Iron-worker—Franchère’s Account of Soto—The Treasure Ship on the Beach at Nekahni Mountain—The Black Spook and Mysterious Chest—The Inscription Still Found on the Rock—The Beeswax Ship—Quiaculliby.
Nekahni Mountain and Tallapus—Quootshoi and Toulux—Original Beauty of Clatsop Plains—The Story Told by Celiast and Cultee—Casting of the “Thing” upon the Beach—The Pop-corn—Burning of the Ship—Konapee, the Iron-worker—Franchère’s Account of Soto—The Treasure Ship on the Beach at Nekahni Mountain—The Black Spook and Mysterious Chest—The Inscription Still Found on the Rock—The Beeswax Ship—Quiaculliby.
Wehave told something of the mountains, rivers, and lakes which make up the framework of our Pacific North-west. We have also tried to see the land through the eyes of the native red men, and have called back a few of the grotesque, fantastic, sometimes heroic, sometimes pathetic legends which they associated with every phase of their country.
Now the very centre of Indian lore, the Parnassus, the Delphi, the Dodona, of the lower Columbia River Indians, is the stretch of mingled bluff, plain, lake, sand-dune, and mountain, marvellously diversified, from the south shore of the Columbia’s mouth to the sacred Nekahni Mountain. It is a wonderously picturesque region. From it came Tallapus, the Hermes Trismegistus of the Oregon Indians. Its forests were haunted by the Skookums and Cheatcos. From the volcanic pinnacles of Swallallochast, now known asSaddle Mountain, the thunder bird went forth on its daily quest of a whale, while at the mountain’s foot Quootshoi and Toulux produced the first men from the monstrous eggs of that same great bird. In short, that region was rich in legend, as it was, and still is, in scenic beauty.
It is said by the Indians that a hundred years or more ago it was much finer than now, for the entire breadth of Clatsop Plains was sodded with deep green grass and bright with flowers almost the whole year through. This bright-hued plain lay open to the sea, and across its southern end flowed three tide streams, having the aboriginal names of Nekanikum, Ohanna, and Neahcoxie.
It was a veritable paradise for the Indians. The forests were filled with elk (moosmoos) and deer (mowitch), while fish of almost every variety thronged the waters, from that king of all fish now known as the royal chinook of the Columbia down to such smaller fry as the smelt and the herring, which even now sometimes so throng the lesser streams that the receding tide leaves them by the thousands on the muddy flats. On the beach were infinite numbers of clams; and as an evidence of their abundance we can now see shell mounds by the acre, in such quantity, indeed, that some of the modern roads have been paved with shells.
This favoured region was the home of the Clatsops. There, too, according to the legends, the first white men landed. The story of the first appearance of the white men has reached our own times in various forms, but the most coherent account is through the word of Celiast, an Indian woman who died many years ago, but who became the wife of one of theearliest white settlers and the mother of Silas Smith, now dead, but known in his time as one of the best authorities on Indian history. Celiast was the daughter of Kobaiway, a chieftain whose sway extended over the land of the Clatsops in the time of the Astor Company a century ago. Celiast was in fact the best authority for many of the Indian legends. But she is not alone in the knowledge of this appearance of the white men, for a number of other Indians tell the substance of the same tale. Among others an old Indian of Bay Centre, Washington, by the name of Charlie Cultee, related the story to Dr. Franz Boas, whose work in the Smithsonian Institute is known as among the best on the native races. This is the story, a composite of that of Celiast and that of Cultee.
It appears that an old woman living near the ancient Indian village of Ne-Ahkstow, about two miles south of the mouth of the Great River (the Columbia) had lost her son. “She wailed for a whole year, and then she stopped.” One day, after her usual custom, she went to the seaside, and walked along the shore towards Clatsop. While on the way she saw something very strange. At first it seemed like a whale, but, when the old woman came close, she saw that it had two trees standing upright in it. She said, “This is no whale; it is a monster.” The outside was all covered over with something bright, which they afterwards found was copper. Ropes were tied all over the two trees, and the inside of the Thing was full of iron.
While the old woman gazed in silent wonder, a being that looked like a bear, but had a human face, though with long hair all over it, came out of theThing that lay there. Then the old woman hastened home in great fear. She thought this bearlike creature must be the spirit of her son, and that the Thing was that about which they had heard in the Ekanum tales.
The people, when they had heard the strange story, hastened with bows and arrows to the spot. There, sure enough, lay the Thing upon the shore, just as the old woman had said. Only instead of one bear there were two standing on the Thing. These two creatures,—whether bears or people the Indians were not sure,—were just at the point of going down the Thing (which they now began to understand was an immense canoe with two trees driven into it) to the beach, with kettles in their hands.
As the bewildered people watched them they started a fire and put corn into the kettles. Very soon it began to pop and fly with great rapidity up and down in the kettles. The pop-corn (the nature of which the Clatsops did not then understand) struck them with more surprise than anything else,—and this is the one part of the story preserved in every version.
Then the corn-popping strangers made signs that they wanted water. The chief sent men to supply them with all their needs, and in the meantime he made a careful examination of the strangers. Finding that their hands were the same as his own, he became satisfied that they were indeed men. One of the Indians ran and climbed up and entered the Thing. Looking into the interior, he found it full of boxes. There were also many strings of buttons half a fathom long. He went out to call in his relatives, but, before he could return, the ship had been set on fire.Or, in the language of Charlie Cultee, “It burnt just like fat.” As a result of the burning of the ship, the Clatsops got possession of the iron, copper, and brass.
Now the news of this strange event became noised abroad, and the Indians from all the region thronged to Clatsop to see and feel of these strange men with hands and feet just like ordinary men, yet with long beards and with such peculiar garb as to seem in no sense men. There arose great strife as to who should receive and care for the strange men. Each tribe or village was very anxious to have them, or at least one of them. The Quienaults, the Chehales, and the Willapas, from the beach on the north side, came to press their claims. From up the river came the Cowlitz, the Cascades, and even the Far-off Klickitat. The different tribes almost had a battle for possession, but, according to one account, it was finally settled that one of the strange visitors should stay with the Clatsop chief, and that one should go with the Willapas on the north side of the Great River. According to another, they both stayed at Clatsop.
From this first arrival of white men, the Indians called them all “Tlehonnipts,” that is, “Of those who drift ashore.” One of the men possessed the magical art of taking pieces of iron and making knives and hatchets. It was indeed to the poor Indians a marvellous gift of Tallapus, their god, that they should have a man among them that could perform that priceless labour, for the possession of iron knives and hatchets meant the indefinite multiplying of canoes, huts, bows and arrows, weapons, and implements of every sort. The iron-maker’s name was Konapee. The Indians kept close watch of him for many daysand made him work incessantly. But, as the tokens of his skill became numerous, his captors held him in great favour and allowed him more liberty. Being permitted to select a site for a house, he chose a spot on the Columbia which became known to the Indians, even down to the white occupancy of the region, as “Konapee.”
Among other possessions, Konapee had a large number of pieces of money, which, from the description, must have been Chinese “cash.” From this some have inferred that Konapee must have been a Chinaman, and the wrecked ship a Chinese or Japanese junk. This does not, however, follow. For the Spaniards had become entirely familiar with China, and any Spanish vessel returning from the Philippine Islands or from China would have been likely to have a supply of Chinese money on board.
There is an interesting bit of testimony which seems to belong to this same story of Konapee. It is found in the book by Gabriel Franchère in regard to the founding of Astoria, the book which was the chief authority of Irving in his fascinating narrative entitledAstoria. Franchère describes meeting an old man, eighty years old, in 1811, at the Cascades, whose name was Soto, and who said that his father was one of four Spaniards wrecked on Clatsop beach many years before. His father had tried to reach the land of the sunrise by going eastward, but having reached the Cascades was prevented from going farther and had there married an Indian woman, Soto’s mother. It is thought likely that the father of Soto was Konapee. The two stories seem to fit quite well. If this be true, it is likely that Konapee’s landing was asearly as 1725. If all the details of Konapee’s life could be known, what a romance might be made of it! There is no reason to suppose that he ever saw other white men or ever got away from the region where the fortune of shipwreck had cast him. Yet he was in possession of one of the greatest geographical secrets of that country, for the hope of the discovery of some great “River of the West,” the elusive stream which many believed to be a pure fabrication of Aguilar and other old navigators, had enticed many a “marinere” from many a far “countree.”
In any event it is probable that the Columbia River Indians had got a general knowledge of the whites and their arts from Konapee long before the authentic discovery of the river was made. Especially it seems that from him they got a knowledge of iron and implements fashioned from it. Captain Cook mentions that when he visited the coast in 1780 the Indians manifested no surprise at the weapons or implements of iron. In fact even all whites who supposed themselves to be the first to visit this coast found the Indians ready to trade and especially eager to get iron. A new era of trade and business seems to have been inaugurated among these Clatsops and Chinooks dating from about the supposed time of Konapee. But he was by no means the only one of his race to be cast upon the Oregon shore. There is a story of a treasure ship cast upon the beach near Nekahni Mountain. This mountain, the original home of Tallapus, while on its summit the great chief god Nekahni himself dwelt, is one of the noblest pieces of Nature’s art all along the shore. Fronting the ocean with a precipitous rampart of rock five hundred feethigh and thence rising in a wide sweeping park clad in thick turf, and dotted here and there with beautiful spruce and fir trees, to an elevation of twenty-five hundred feet, the sacred Nekahni presents as fine a combination of the beautiful and sublime as can be seen upon a whole thousand miles of coast. It was a favourite spot with the natives. For lying upon its open and turfy slopes they could gaze upon many miles of sea, and could no doubt light up their signal fires which might be seen over a wide expanse of beach. Very likely there, too, they celebrated the mysterious rites of Nekahni and Tallapus.
One pleasant afternoon in early summer, a large group of natives assembled upon the lower part of Nekahni, almost upon the edge of the precipitous cliff with which it fronts the sea. Gazing into the offing they saw a great object like a huge bird drawing near from the outer sea. It approached the shore, and then from it a small boat with a number of men and a large black box put out to land. Coming to the beach the men took out the box and also a black man whom the Indians supposed to be a spook or evil demon. Going a little way up the beach the men dug a hole into which they lowered the box, and then having struck down the black man they threw him on top of the box and, covering it up, they returned to the ship, which soon disappeared from sight. On account of the black man buried with the box, the superstitious Indians dared not undertake to exhume the contents of the grave. But the story was handed from one generation to another, and it came to constitute the story of the “treasure ship.”
In recent times the idea that here some chest, withgold and jewels in the most approved style of buried fortunes, might be found has caused much searching. The ground has been dug over for the sight of the regulation rusty handle which is to lead to the great iron-bound chest with its doubloons of gold and crucifixes of pearls. Parties have come from the Eastern States to join the search. One party even secured the guidance of spirits who professed to locate the treasure. But though the spirit-led enthusiasts turned over every stone and dug up the sand for many feet along the beach, they found never an iron-bound chest, and never a sign of the treasure. There is, however, in plain sight now, on a rock at the foot of Nekahni Mountain, a character cut in the rock bearing a rude resemblance to a cross. Some think it looks more like the letters, I.H.S., the sacred emblem of the Catholic Church. There is also what seems to be quite a distinct arrow pointing in a certain direction. But the treasure remains unfound.
The next legend of the prehistoric white man is that of the “Beeswax Ship.” This, too, has a real confirmation in the presence of large quantities of beeswax at a point also near Nekahni Mountain, just north of the mouth of the Nehalem River. Some naturalists claimed at one time that this substance was simply the natural paraffine produced from the products of coal or petroleum. But more recently cakes of the substance stamped with the sacred letters, “I.H.S.,” together with tapers, and even one piece with a bee plainly visible within, may be considered incontestable proof that this is indeed beeswax, while the letters, “I.H.S.” denote plainly enough the origin of the substance in some Spanish colony. An interestingpoint in connection with this is the historical fact that on June 16, 1769, the shipSan Joséleft La Paz, Lower California, for San Diego, and was never heard from again. Some have conjectured that theSan Joséwas the “Beeswax Ship,” driven far north by some storm or mutiny. As to the peculiar fact that a ship should have been entirely loaded with beeswax it has been conjectured that some of the good padres of the Spanish Missions meant to provide a new station with a large amount of wax for the sake of providing tapers for their service, the lighted candles proving then, as they do now, a matter of marvel and wonder to the natives, and, with other features of ceremonial worship, having a great effect to bring them into subjection to the Church.
The Indian legend runs on to the effect that several white men were saved from the wreck of the “Beeswax Ship,” and that they lived with them. But having infringed upon the family rights of the natives, they became obnoxious, and were all cut off by an attack from them. One story, however, asserts that there was one man left, a blue-eyed, golden-haired man, that he took a Nehalem woman, and that from him was descended a fair-complexioned progeny, of which a certain chieftain who lived at a beautiful little lake on Clatsop plains, now known as Culliby Lake, was our Quiaculliby.
Such in brief survey, are some of the stories which preserve the record of the space betwixt the Indian age of myth and the period of authentic discovery.
How all Nations Sought the River from the Sea and how they Found it
Search for Gold—Economic Effects—Early Extension of Exploration Westward—Cortez—Magellan—Aguilar—Fables of the Sea—Shakspere and Swift—Maps—Great Wars of the Seventeenth Century and Downfall of Spain—Long Delay—Resumption of Exploration—Spanish Settlement of California—Russia and Behring—Perez—Heceta—Cook—Fur-trade—Gathering of Nations—The Yankees—Gray and Kendrick—Meares and Vancouver—The Complete Discovery—Strife between England and the United States.
Search for Gold—Economic Effects—Early Extension of Exploration Westward—Cortez—Magellan—Aguilar—Fables of the Sea—Shakspere and Swift—Maps—Great Wars of the Seventeenth Century and Downfall of Spain—Long Delay—Resumption of Exploration—Spanish Settlement of California—Russia and Behring—Perez—Heceta—Cook—Fur-trade—Gathering of Nations—The Yankees—Gray and Kendrick—Meares and Vancouver—The Complete Discovery—Strife between England and the United States.
Theperiod of the Renaissance is one, which by reason of splendid achievements in literature, in art, in science, and in discovery, can hardly be duplicated. We are here especially concerned with the discoverers. A mingling of motives impelled those dauntless spirits onward, and among the most potent was the greed for gold. Much American history is bound up with the mad rush for the precious metals, and the spread of exploration from the West Indies and Mexico, the first centres of Spanish power, was one of its results. Only eight years after the landing of Columbus on San Salvador, the Portuguese Gaspar Cortereal had conceived the idea of a north-west passage, which in some unexplained manner became known as the Strait of Anian. In 1543, the Spaniards Cabrillo and Ferrelo coasted along the shores of California,and the latter was doubtless the first white man to look upon the coast of Oregon. In 1577, England appeared in the person of that boldest and most picturesque of the half-discoverers, half-pirates, of that time, Francis Drake. In that year he set forth on the wonderful voyage in which he plundered the treasures of the Spanish Main, cut the golden girdle of Manila, queen of the Spanish Orient, skirted along the coast of California and Oregon, and at last circumnavigated the globe. Brilliant as were Drake’s exploits, they did not result in the discovery of our Great River. In 1592, just a century after Columbus, Juan de Fuca, whose name is now preserved in the strait leading to Puget Sound, is said to have made that voyage which is regarded by most historians as a myth, but which affords so fascinating a bit of narration that it ought to be true. Two hundred years later John Meares, the English navigator, attached the name of the stout old Greek pilot to that inlet now familiar to ships of all nations. With the passage of a few years more, explorations upon the western shore of America began to assume a more definite form. In 1602 the best equipped squadron thus far sent out left Acapulco under command of Vizcaino, with the aim of carrying out Monterey’s great purpose for the northward extension of Spanish power. The fleet being scattered by storm, thefragatain command of Martin Aguilar ran up the coast as far as latitude 43 degrees. There they found a cape to which they attached the name still held, Cape Blanco. From that point, following the north-westerly trending of the coast, they soon came abreast of a “rapid and abundant river, with ash trees, willows, and brambles, andother trees of Castile upon its banks.” This they endeavoured to enter, but from the strength of the current could not. “And seeing that they had already reached a higher latitude than had been ordered by the viceroy and that the number of the sick was great, they decided to return to Acapulco.” Torquemada, the historian, from whom the account is taken, goes on to say:
It is supposed that this river is one leading to a great city, which was discovered by the Dutch when they were driven thither by storms, and that it is the Strait of Anian, through which the vessels passed in sailing from the North Sea to the South Sea; and that the city called Quivera is in those parts; and that this is the region referred to in the account which His Majesty read, and which induced him to order this expedition.
It is supposed that this river is one leading to a great city, which was discovered by the Dutch when they were driven thither by storms, and that it is the Strait of Anian, through which the vessels passed in sailing from the North Sea to the South Sea; and that the city called Quivera is in those parts; and that this is the region referred to in the account which His Majesty read, and which induced him to order this expedition.
The interesting question arises, Was the river the Columbia? It is the only large river on the Oregon coast, though the Umpqua, if at flood stage, might have given the impression of size. The latitude is not right, either, though the Spanish narrator does not say how far north of Cape Blanco they went. But whether or not Aguilar really went so far north as the Columbia, his voyage was one of much interest. It gave Spain a warrant to claim the western coast of America; it still further strengthened the idea of the Strait of Anian; it seemed to confirm the romantic conception of a great city or group of cities with civilised inhabitants along that passage way, and it gave the first name to the river, the Rio de Aguilar.
Thenceforth the navigators of all nations accepted as the primary object of their search some great river of the West. Hidden in the fogs of fancy, as it layshrouded in truth in the mists of the ocean, the supposed Rio de Aguilar yet held the spell of enchantment over many an “ancient mariner” of many a land. Whatsoever nation could actually find the river and establish a definite claim to first discovery, would have, by the generally accepted usage of nations, the right of occupation and ownership.
That was a fruitful time for fables of the sea, and around the Great River many of them gathered. The original of Baron Munchausen seems to have existed in the persons of Captain Lorenzo Ferrer de Maldonado and Admiral Pedro Bartolomé de Fonte. The first of these worthies, whose voyage was said to have been made in 1588, describes in a very circumstantial manner his passage through the Strait of Anian and his exit upon the Asiatic side of the continent. This he averred was marked with a very remarkable rocky eminence which rendered it wonderfully adapted to fortification and defence, the mountain being so steep, in fact, that a missile dropped from the summit would fall directly upon a ship in mid-channel. It is thought by some students that some unchronicled Spanish navigator may have actually made the inland passage up the Alaskan coast and that some report of it may have become transformed into Maldonado’s story. Fonte’s story seems to have first appeared in a London publication in 1708, though his voyage was alleged to have been made in 1640. He told a marvellous tale of a great river which led to a magnificent lake on whose banks stood a great city. The river he located in latitude 53 degrees, and he named it the Rio de los Reyes, or River of Kings. This is far north of the Columbia, but the account persisted inpopular idea for a long time. The name became associated with those of the Rio de Aguilar and the River of the West.
These and other similar tales, the flotsam and jetsam of ocean myths, gave something of inspiration and suggestion to literature. For even long before the alleged exploits of Fonte, the fertile mind of Shakspere had conceived of Caliban and Ariel and other fancies of the age of Western adventure. And in the next century the prince of political satirists, Jonathan Swift, had located almost exactly at the mouth of the Rio de Aguilar, the land of the Brobdingnagians, while the countries into which the veracious Gulliver was thrown at a later time, Luggnagg and Blubdubrib, were in the Pacific at a somewhat indefinite distance from the land of the Giants.
The land of the Oregon was in short, the land of the great unexplored and of boundless fancy. Some of the old maps illustrating that period are of much interest. Zaltieri’s map of 1566 shows a generally accurate conception of the eastern part of America and of the western coast of Mexico and California, but the entire continent above about latitude 60 degrees is occupied with amare septentrionale incognito. Luck’s map of 1582 presents a fairly good conception of Florida and Mexico, but is entirely astray on the western coast. The Wytfliet-Ptolemy map of 1597 has a singularly indented coast running nearly east and west in the location of Oregon, while Cape Blanco and a river, the Rio de los Estrachos, in about latitude 51 degrees, seem to be an attempt to denote Aguilar’s cape of 1543, and to locate the river by still another name, though in a higherlatitude. Maldonado’s map of the Strait of Anian of 1609 is manifestly manufactured to suit the occasion, and is interesting only as showing how far mendacity and gullibility could travel hand in hand.
But now the first age of discovery on the coast of Oregon drew to a close. It cannot be said that much of tangible knowledge had been attained. Puzzling questions had been raised. Labyrinths of conjecture, with no definite clues for exit, had been entered. Fascinating romances had been so interwoven with probable fact that no one could untangle them. A general conception of a great river and a great north-west passage had been held up with some distinctness as the goal of navigators. Finally, most important of all, what had been seen was of so enticingly interesting a nature and seemed to promise results so important, that they furnished a motive for continued exploration. It certainly looked as though the nations would continue the search for the Great River of the West. Spain had the inside track of all, though Drake and Cavendish and Hawkins had run down many a richly laden treasure galleon and had laid the booty at the feet of the Virgin Queen, and many an embittered buccaneer of French or English race had hounded the flag of Spain across the breadth of half the seas.
But a great change was impending. There was a new shuffle of the cards in the hands of the Fates and the Furies as the seventeenth century moved on apace. Spain’s time had come. Her cup of iniquity was now full. Her whole measure of national policy had been the sword for the pagan and the inquisition for the heretic. The banished Moors of Granada andthe murdered “Beggars” of Holland and the wasted Incas and Montezumas of America united to call down the vengeance of Nemesis upon the destroyer of a fair world’s peace.
The stupendous struggles engendered by the Reformation, culminating in the Thirty Years’ War, went on almost without pause for over a century. That strife, ending at Westphalia in 1648, saw Spain prostrate and the principle of religious toleration triumphant. But almost immediately another struggle arose, the natural successor of the first, the struggle against the absolute monarchy of the Bourbons. As may well be seen, the nations of Europe were so enchained in the strife against Pope and King that they had little thought for new discoveries. Over a hundred and sixty years passed after the voyage of Aguilar before there was another serious movement of discovery on the coast of Oregon.
This new movement of Pacific exploration, destined to continue with no cessation to our own day, was ushered in by Spain. There was even yet much vitality in the fallen mistress of the world. Impelled by both religious zeal and hope of material gain, the immigration of 1769 went forth from La Paz to San Diego and Monterey. That inaugurated the singular and poetic, in some aspects even beautiful, history of Spanish California, an era which has provided so much of romance and poetry for literature in the California of our own times. The march of events had made it plain to the Spanish Government that, if it was to retain a hold on the Pacific Coast, it must bestir itself. Russia, England, and France, released in a measure from the pressure of European struggles,were fitting out expeditions to resume the arrested efforts of the sixteenth century. It seemed plain also that colonial America was going to be an active rival on the seas. And well may it have so seemed, for, in the sign of the Yankee sailor, the conquest was to be made.
But just at that important juncture a most favouring condition arose for Spain. The government of England precipitated the struggle of the American Revolution. France soon joined to strike her island rival a deadly blow by assisting in the liberation of the colonies. For the time, Spain had nearly a clear field for Pacific discovery, so far as England and France were concerned. As for Russia, the danger was more imminent. Russia had, indeed, begun to look in the direction of Pacific expansion a long time prior to the Spanish immigration to California. That vast monarchy, transformed by the genius of Peter the Great, had stretched its arms from the Baltic to the Aleutian Archipelago, and had looked from the frozen seas of Siberia to the open Pacific as a fairer field for expansion. Many years elapsed, however, before Peter’s great designs could be fulfilled. Not till 1741 did Vitus Behring thread the thousand islands of Sitka and gaze upon the glaciated crest of Mt. St. Elias. And it was not till thirty years later that it became understood that the Bay of Avatcha was connected by the open sea with China. In 1771 the first cargo of furs was shipped directly from Avatcha to Canton. Then first the vastness of the Pacific Ocean was comprehended. Then first it was understood that the same waters which lashed the frozen ramparts of Kamchatka encircled the coral islands of the SouthSea and roared against the stormy barriers of Cape Horn.
The Russians had not found the Great River, though it appears that Behring in 1771 had gone as far south as latitude 46 degrees, just the parallel of the mouth of the Columbia. But he was so far off the coast as not to see it.
Three Spanish voyages followed in rapid succession: that of Perez in 1774, of Heceta in 1775, and of Bodega in 1779. The only notable things in connection with the voyage of Perez were his discovery of Queen Charlotte’s Island, with the sea-otter furs traded by the natives, the first sight of that superb group of mountains which we now call the Olympic, but which the Spaniards named the Sierra de Santa Rosalia, and finally the fine harbour of Nootka on Vancouver Island, named by Perez Port San Lorenzo, for years the centre of the fur-trade and the general rendezvous of ships of all nations. But no river was found.
With another year a still completer expedition was fitted out, Bruno Heceta being commander and Francisco de la Bodega y Quadra, second in command. This voyage was the most important and interesting thus far in the history of the Columbia River exploration. For Heceta actually found the Great River, so long sought and so constantly eluding discovery. On June 10, 1775, Heceta passed Cape Mendocino, and entered a small bay just northward. There he entered into friendly relations with the natives and took solemn possession of the country in the name of His Catholic Majesty of Spain. Sailing thence northward, he again touched land just south of the Straitsof Fuca, but there he met disaster at the ill-omened point subsequently named Destruction Island. For there his boat landing for exploration was set upon by the savage inhabitants, and the entire boat-load murdered. Moving southward again, on August 15th, in latitude 46 degrees 10 minutes, Heceta found himself abreast of some great river. Deciding that this must be indeed the mysterious Strait of Fuca, or the long concealed river of the other ancient navigators, he made two efforts to enter, but the powerful current and uncertain depths deterred him, and he at last gave up the effort and bore away for Monterey. Three additional names were bestowed upon the River at this time. Thinking the entrance a bay, Heceta named it, in honour of the day, Ensenada de Asuncion. Later it was more commonly known as Ensenada de Heceta, while the Spanish charts designated the river as Rio de San Roque. The name of Cabo de Frondoso (Leafy Cape) was bestowed upon the low promontory on the south, now known as Point Adams, while upon the picturesque headland on the north which we now designate as Cape Hancock, the devout Spaniards conferred the name of Cabo de San Roque, August 16th being the day sacred to that saint.
The original account given by Heceta is so interesting that we insert it here: