CHAPTER VI.
The farmer's sports and pastimes—Deer-hunting tales—A roadside yarn— Still-hunting—Hunting with hounds—An early morning's sport—Elk—The pursuit—The kill—Camp on Beaver Creek—Flounder-spearing by torchlight —Flounder-fishing by day—In the bay—Rock oysters—The evening view —The general store—Skins—Sea-otters—Their habits—The sea-otter hunters—Common otter—The mink and his prey.
The Oregon farmer has one great advantage over his Eastern or European brother. Starting from the first of January, he has until July comes a good many days wherein he can amuse himself without the detestable feeling that he is wasting his time and robbing his family. The ground may be either too hard or too soft for plowing; or he may have sown a large proportion in the autumn and early winter, and so have little ground to prepare and sow in spring; and he has little, if any, stock-feeding to do as yet.
A good supply of hay is the only addition to the pasture-feed that he need provide; so long, that is, as he is content to work his farm in Oregon fashion.
Many a one is within reach of the hills where range the deer, and shares in the feeling strongly expressed to me the other day, "I would rather work all day for one shot at a deer, than shoot fifty wild-ducks in the swamps."
As I was riding out to the hills not long since, I met an old friend of mine returning from a week's hunt in the regions at the back of Mary's Peak.
A ROADSIDE YARN.His long-bodied farm-wagon held some cooking-utensils, the remains of his store of flour and bacon and coffee, his blankets, his rifle, and the carcasses of his deer. With him were two noble hounds, Nero and Queen—powerful, upstanding dogs; stag-hounds with a dash of bloodhound in them; black and tan, with a fleck of white here and there. "Had a good time, John?" we asked, as we stopped at the top of a long hill for a chat. "Well, pretty good—ran four deer and killed three; got my boots full of snow, and bring home a bad cold," he answered. "Where did you camp?" "Away up above Stillson's, there"—pointing to the mountain-side just where the heavy fir-timber grew scattering and thin, and the clean sweep of the sloping crest came down to meet the wood. "We was there inside of a week, hunting all the time." "See any bear?" "Just lots of sign, but I guess my dogs haven't lost any bear; the old dog got too close to one a bit ago, and came home with a bloody head and a cut on his shoulder a foot long." "Find many deer?" "Had two on foot at once one day: killed one, and hit the other, but he jumped a log just as I shot, and I guess I only barked him; I ran after him to try for another shot before he got clear off down the cañon, but I tumbled over a log myself in the snow, and just got wet through, and my boots all filled with it." "Pretty rough up there, isn't it?" "Well, it wouldn't be so bad if it wasn't for the fallen timber; but you can't get through them woods fast when you have to run round the end of one big log one minute and then duck under another, and then scramble on to the next for dear life, and half the time get only just in time to see the last of the deer as he gets into the thick brush." "Better come out with us after the ducks, John." "Blamed if I do!" came out with an unction and energy that startled us. "Can't understand what you fellers can see in that duck-hunting." And, with a cheery good-by, the old boy spoke to his horses, and off they went down the hill, the brake hard held, and the wagon pushing the team before it on the rough corduroy road.
Still-hunting is the more sportsmanlike way; but the deadlier fashion is this hunting with two or three hounds: the slower they run, the more chance for the guns.
One day last summer, returning from the bay, we stopped for the night at a farm by the roadside, among the burned timber. The fern had not grown up yet, but the hillsides were green and thick with salmon-berry and thimble-berry growth.
Two or three hounds—not of the very purest breed, but still hounds—were lounging about the door, and greeted us with a noisy welcome as we dismounted.
The sons of the house were telling, round the fire before we went to bed, of the hundred and thirty deer they had already killed this season. They urged us to have a hunt in the morning, promising to get all done, so that we might be on the journey again by nine instead of seven.
Breakfast was over by a quarter to six, and we started. Four in the party—two farmers' sons and two travelers—and three hounds. The huntsman carried a Henry rifle of the old model; his younger brother a rifle of the old school—long, brown, heavy-barreled, throwing a small, round bullet. Round the huntsman's neck hung an uncouth cow's horn, to recall the hounds if they strayed too far away.
HUNTING WITH HOUNDS.The sun was just driving off the early mist as we tramped along the road by the side of the river, toward the spot where they intended throwing off. But before we reached the place a quick little hound threw up her head, and, with a short, sharp cry, dashed into the brush between us and the river; the other hounds followed, and we heard the plunge and splash as the deer, so suddenly roused from his lair, took to his heels.
The hounds took up in full cry along the opposite cañon, which led high up the hill-side, and the huntsman followed, his jacket changing color at once as he pushed through the dew-laden brush.
Under the guidance of the younger brother, we crossed the river also, and, following the farther bank, soon came to an open, grassy spot, from the upper side of which a view was got of the course of the river as it wound round the lower side in a graceful sweep. The trees, willow and alder, were thick on the bank, but here and there we caught more than a glimpse of the brown water as it hurried along.
One of us being posted here, our guide took the other still higher up the stream.
Sitting down under the lee of a big old log, its blackness hidden under the trailing brambles and bright ferns, we waited and watched.
The cry of the hounds came faint on the air from the hill-side above us, hounds and quarry alike invisible, and, as the sides of the cañon caught the sounds, echo returned them to us from all points in turn—fainter and still fainter, until we thought the chase had gone clear over the mountain into the distant valley beyond; and we sat watching the two little chipmunks, grown hardy by our stillness, which were chasing each other in and out among the brambles, then stopping to watch us with their bright-black, beady eyes.
No sounds at all, and then a far-off music, just audible and no more. But it comes nearer, and we see our guide creeping toward us, rifle in hand, his face white with excitement and suspense. He can not resist the temptation of passing us to get command of the lower reach of the stream, and we have sympathy with his nineteen years, and take no notice. Presently a distant splash in the river, and then a scrambling and splashing along the water's edge, and we catch a glimpse of a bright-yellow body flitting rapidly between the trees. The young hunter's rifle cracks, but the deer only gains in speed and dashes by. There is a clear space of ten or fifteen yards between the tree-trunks on our right, and, as the deer rushes past, we get a quick sight, almost like a rabbit crossing a ride in cover at home, and the Winchester rings out. Whether by luck or wit we will not say, but the splash ceases suddenly, and, running to the bank, there lies the deer, shot through the neck close to the head, drawing his last long breath. He was soon dragged out on to the grassy bank, and a feeling of pity was uppermost as we admired his graceful limbs, neat hoofs, and shapely head. In about ten minutes' time came the hounds, their eager cry ceasing as they caught sight of their quarry, lying motionless before them. The last hunters' rites were speedily paid, and we went a mile higher up the stream, to where a brook joined it, flowing quickly down from the southern hill.
The hounds were again thrown into the brush, and before long were once more in full cry. This time the shot fell to the young huntsman's share, and we saw nothing of the chase till, hearing his rifle, and noticing the ceasing of the voices of the hounds, we pushed our way to the spot, to find the obsequies of a second deer already in progress.
Leaving one deer on a log by the roadside, with a note attached to it, asking the stage-driver to pick it up and bring it for us into Corvallis, when he passed, in a couple of hours' time, we retraced our steps, mounted our horses, and were on our road, according to promise, by very soon after nine o'clock.
STILL-HUNTING.Still-hunting is a more arduous business. The hunter has the work to do of finding the deer; his rifle must slay it; if he wounds it, he must follow it on foot; the only help he can get is that of one steady old dog, which must never stray from his side.
Starting from his camp in the early dawn, he mounts the hill-side, carefully examining each likely spot of brush as he passes it, taking special note of each sheltered patch of fern. Very carefully he climbs the logs, avoiding every dead branch that may crackle under his weight, and parting the brush before he pushes through. When he reaches the crest, he follows it along, scrutinizing every cañon closely, for his prey lies very wisely hidden. At last, he sees a gentle movement in the brush, and the deer rises from his lair, stretches his neck, arches his back, and snuffs round at each point of the compass to try if there be danger in the air. The hunter sees his chance, judges his distance as cleverly as he can, remembering that in this clear mountain air he is almost sure to underestimate the range; the shot rings out, and the deer springs high into the air, to fall crashing down the steep cañon-side.
The common deer of Western Oregon is the black-tailedCervus Columbianus. In the early spring many of them leave the mountains and traverse the valley-land to the closely timbered sloughs and brush bordering the Willamette River. But, as the valley has been more closely cultivated and the farms spread in a nearly unbroken line, the deer have but a poor chance. Some settler is almost sure to get a glimpse of the visitor as he tops the snake-fence into the oat-field for his morning feed, and the rifle, or worse, the long muzzle-loading shot-gun which carries five buckshot at a charge, hangs by or over the wide fireplace. If not killed outright, the poor beast carries with him a lingering and dangerous wound. But, away in the hills, I do not hear that the number is appreciably diminished; many of the hunters get a deer almost every time they go out. So wasteful are they that they carry off only the hind quarters, which they call the hams, and the hide, leaving the fore quarters and head to taint the air.
The white-tailed deer (Cervus leucurus) is now very rare. He frequents the more open spots; he chooses the bare slopes at the top of Mary's Peak and the Bald Mountain; he is not so shy as his black-tailed brother, and so falls an easier victim to the rifle. He abounds in the Cascade Range on the eastern side of the Willamette Valley, where he is found in the same haunts as the larger mule-deer. The noblest deer we have in Oregon is the wapiti (Cervus Canadensis), invariably known in this country as elk.
A day or two ago I saw a pair of fresh horns standing in front of one of the stores in the town, which were quite four feet six inches long, spread three feet six inches at the tips, and weighed forty pounds by scale.
ELK.As we handled them, a dry-looking, bearded, long-booted fellow joined the group. "Those horns are nothing much," said he; "I killed an elk some time back in the Alseya country, back of Table Mountain, that when we set the horns on the ground, tips downward, a feller could walk upright through them." "Oh, yes," said we; "did you walk through them, stranger?" "Wal, no, I guess not," said he, "but a feller might, you know."
The elk go in bands of from seven to twenty in number, and their tracks through the woods are trampled as though a drove of cows had passed along. To kill an elk you can not go out before breakfast and return to dine. You must secure a good guide, who knows the mountains well; you must take a pack-horse, with food and blankets, as far into the wilds as the last settlement reaches, and there leave him. Then slinging your blankets round your shoulders, and packing some flour, bacon, and coffee, a small frying-pan and coffee-pot, and tin cup, into the smallest possible compass, and taking your rifle in your hand, not forgetting the tobacco, you must strike into the woods.
When night comes on, build your fire, fry your bacon, make some damper in the ashes, smoke the pipe of peace, and lie down under the most sheltering bush. No snakes will harm you, nor will wolf or cougar molest you, and the softness of your bed will not tempt you to delay long between the blankets after the first streak of dawn.
Rise and breakfast, and then on again. All that day, perhaps, you will have to tramp on and on, seeking one mountain-slope after another; here skirting brush too thick to penetrate, there walking easily through the low fern among the massive red and furrowed trunks of the gigantic firs.
Your guide finds "sign," and reports that it is not fresh enough to follow; so pursues his course till, looking back on the devious miles of weary wandering, you can hardly credit it that you have been but eight-and-forty hours on the trail. But your camp is pitched once more, and dawn has again roused you from your ferny bed. Listen! the branches are crackling and rustling close by. You and your guide race for the spot, rifle in hand, too eager almost to duly remember woodland rules of caution. Crouching and crawling as you get closer to the sounds, peering through the fern, you see—what? Six, eight, ten, twelve, seventeen great beasts; one with enormous head, two others with smaller but still imposing antlers; the rest the mothers of the herd. Unconscious of danger, they browse round; both rifles speak together, and the monarch and one of the smaller stags lie prostrate. You stay hidden; the deer group together in a confused crowd, too foolish and excited to think of flight. Again your comrade fires, and another falls, and yet another, till, in disgust at the needless slaughter, you step from your shelter, and the survivors rush madly away, crashing through the wood as if a herd of cattle were in flight.
I have known men, not usually cruel or excitable, get so maddened in a scene like this, that seven great elk lay dead together before they thought of stopping firing; and yet they knew that from the wilderness they stood in it was impossible to carry off the meat of even one!
Many hunters prefer elk-meat to any deer; others think the fawn of the white-tailed deer the best eating in the world.
CAMP ON BEAVER CREEK.One night last summer we camped out on Beaver Creek, nine miles south of the Yaquina, along the beach. We had been trout-fishing all day from a canoe, and were glad to stretch out before the fire limbs that had been somewhat cramped from the need of balancing the rocking craft with every cast of the fly. Before the fire stood roasting a row of trout, held in place over the hot embers by a split willow wand. We heard voices approaching through the wood, and presently a half-breed hunter and two friends of ours came in sight. They had been out two days after elk, but failed to find. On the way back they came across a doe and well-grown fawn; the latter they had killed, and brought it in. It was speedily skinned and cut up, and a loin, shoulder, and leg were skewered on sticks and roasting in the blaze. No bad addition to our fish supper, deer-meat and trout; the coffee was the only contribution of civilization to the meal, and a merry evening, extended far into the night, followed, as the logs were piled on, and the ruddy glow and showers of sparks lighted up the wild but comfortable scene, dancing in the lights and shadows of the overhanging trees.
Did you ever hear of flounder-spearing by torch-light? I have tried it, and do not propose to try it again. Yaquina Bay abounds in flounders—a flat fish resembling the turbot more than the flounder; red-spotted like the plaice, and weighing from one pound up to five or six. After nightfall, when the evening tide has just turned to come in, and the sandy channels and banks are all but bare, away from the main deep-water, channels of the bay, you may see tiny specks of distant lights moving on the black water. These are the Indian canoes. Take a skiff from the beach by the hotel at Newport, and row out to sea. Here are two or three lights near together, under Heddon's Point, on the south shore. Row on till the lights in the hotel are blended into one, and the dark outlines against the sky of the overhanging cliffs are lost to sight. No sound reaches you in the darkness, but the recurring rattle of the sculls in the rowlocks, and the soft lapping of the tide. The lights you are seeking grow brighter, and you distinguish the glare of the fire and the moving, dim form of the fisherman. The canoe, some sixteen feet long, is boarded roughly across amidships, and on a thin layer of sand and wood-ashes burns a pine-knot fire. The Indian stands in the bows, his back to the fire; as you look, he poles himself along by driving the handle of his long spear into the sand underlying the shallow channel. His fire burns dim for a moment, and he turns and with the same spear-handle he trims it; then, stooping, throws on it a fresh lump of the resinous pine. The fire dulls for an instant, then flares with a bright light, and a thick puff of smoke rises into the air, on which the glare falls strongly. The short, athletic form of the Indian, and his swarthy, flattened features, glittering eyes, and bushy hair, stand out for a moment in strong relief. He turns, and again looks keenly into the black water. A moment, and he strikes, the spear making the water flash as it dips swiftly in. Yes, he has it, and the frail boat quivers as he balances it ere he lifts out his struggling prey, and, with a deft, quick motion, throws the fish off, flapping and bouncing on a heap of victims in the stern of the canoe. Without a smile or word, or an instant's respite, he turns again and resumes his keen watch, moving to the shallower waters as the tide makes.
FLOUNDER-SPEARING BY TORCHLIGHT.I had a friend who was an enthusiast in the sport, and he beguiled me to join him. About eight we started, and about two in the morning we returned. Warm as the weather was, I was chilled to the bone; and the worst of it was, I had not succeeded in striking one single fish. My friend armed me with a long spear and a lantern, and deposited me in the stern of the boat; similarly provided, he knelt in the bow and pushed the skiff along from bank to bank of sand and mud. My light did not burn brightly enough to show more than the dimmest outlines of the fish, just off the sandy bottom of the bay. Here scuttled an old crab, scared by the novel light, and hurrying for shelter, crab-fashion, to the nearest bunch of weeds. There was a school of tiny fish, their silver sides glancing as the ray reached them; and there, again, a quick, white flash betrayed the sea-perch, not waiting to be spoken to. Every now and then my friend darted his long spear at what he said were the flounders, but I could see nothing with my untrained eyes but a gray cloud and a gentle stirring of the sand. He did get one fish at last; and I, being too proud to say how bored and tired I was, waited sleepily for the rising tide to drive us home. How glad was I when he announced that the water was now too deep to see distinctly, and how thankfully I stumbled up the slimy steps by the little wharf and in to bed!
FLOUNDER-FISHING BY DAY.Flounder-fishing in the daytime is good sport. Find out the nearest camp of Indians there on the beach, crowded under a shelter of sea-worn planks, a few fir-boughs, and a tattered blanket; the smell of tainted fish pollutes the air, and a heap of flounders, each with the triangular spear-mark, attests the skill of last night's fishermen. "Any fish, muck-a-muck?" say you, blandly. Without turning her head, or raising herself from her crouching posture by the old black kettle, stewing on a tiny fire of sticks in the center of the hut, the old crone grunts out, "Halo" (none). "Want two bit?" you say, nowise discouraged. Money has magic power nowadays, and she rises slowly and shuffles past you to where a rag or two are drying in the sun on a stranded log. From under the clothes she brings out a dirty basket of home make, and in it is a heap of greenish, struggling prawns. She turns out two or three handfuls into the meat-tin you have providently brought, holds out her skinny hand for the little silver pieces, and buries herself in her shanty without another word.
Fit out your fishing-lines and come aboard; the tide has turned, and the wind blows freshly across the bay. The surf keeps up its continuous roar on the rocky reefs outside. On the sand-bank in front of you sits a row of white and gray gulls preening themselves in the morning sun; a couple of ospreys are sailing overhead in long, graceful, hardly-moving sweeps, and away out by the north head hangs an eagle in the air, watching the ospreys, that he may cheat them of the fish he looks to see them catch.
Set the sail and let her go free, and away rushes the little boat, tired of bobbing at her moorings by the pier—away across the bay, to where the south beach sinks in gentle, sandy slope. Take care of that waving weed, or we shall be on the edge of the bank! Here we are, and down goes the kedge in six feet of water, close to but just clear of that same edge.
Now for the bait; tie it on tightly with that white cotton, or the flounders will suck it off so fast that you will have nothing else to do but keep replacing it. Keep your sinkers just off the bottom, and a light hand on the line. A gentle wriggle, a twitch, and you have him; haul him in steadily. Up he comes, a four-pounder, tossing and flopping in the bottom of the boat. Here comes a great crab, holding on to the bait grimly, and suffering you to catch him by one of his lower legs and toss him in. Now for a sea-perch; what a splendid color!—bands of bright scarlet scales, interlaced with silver. But what is this? A stream of water flows from the fish's mouth, and in it come out five or six little ones, the image of their parent. I wonder if it is true (and I think it is) that the little ones take refuge inside their parent in any time of need? The fishermen on this coast call this the "squaw-fish," from this sheltering, maternal instinct.
But we have been here long enough; the water is too deep, the fish have gone off the feed, and we shall have to beat back, lucky if we do in two hours the distance we ran in half an hour on our way.
The tide has run nearly out this evening: a good chance for some rock-oysters. Get your axe and come along. Where? Along the coast toward Foulweather; we shall find those long reefs almost bare. We climb over the big reef on the north head of the harbor, under the lighthouse hill, and wind in and out on the hard sand among the rough rocks, all crusted over their sides with tiny barnacles. There is little kelp or seaweed here. The surf beats too powerfully in this recess, away from the shelter of the great outer reef.
See that group of Indian women and children away out there, barelegged, digging with their axes in the rock. They are after the rock-oysters too.
Now is our chance. Jump on to that rock before the next wave comes in, and climb on to the reef beyond it and get out to low-water mark. Here we are. Do you see that crevice? Chip in and wrench the piece off; the rock is soft enough sandstone to cut with that blunt old axe. Here is the spoil—soft mollusks, are they not, and not pretty to look at? But wait for the soup at dinner to-morrow before you pronounce on them. And we dig, and then venture farther out and farther, till the turn of the water warns us to get back.
The evening is closing in; the sun has set, leaving a hot, red glow, where his copper disk has just sunk beyond the Pacific horizon; and the eye wanders out from the infant waves, at foot just tinged with red, and reflecting the light as they move up in turn to catch it, to the blue and still darker blue water beyond, out to the sharp indigo line where sky and water meet.
No land between us and the Eastern world; the mind can hardly grasp the idea of the vast stretch of sea across which this new world reaches forth to join hands with old China and Japan.
SEA-OTTERS.Before we go to bed, step for a moment into the quaint general store all but adjoining the hotel. What a medley! Flour and axes; bacon and needles and thread; fishing-lines and bullock-hides; writing-paper and beaver-traps; milk-pails and castor-oil; tobacco in plenty, and skins; and a smell compounded of all these and more, but chiefly the product of that batch of skins hanging from that big nail in front of you, and lying piled on the bench by your side. Take them down, and turn them over; Bush won't mind. And we shake hands with the proprietor, coming from the darkness at the back. He has borne an honorable limp ever since the war, and has never yet quite recovered from illness and wounds. He swears by Newport as the best, and healthiest, and most promising place in the world. "Say," he whispers in our ear, "got a sea-otter skin to-day!" "Where did you get it, Bush, and who from, and how much did you have to pay for it?" "Got it from the Indians," he says; "they shot it away up by Salmon River, beyond Foulweather, and had to give more dollars for it than I care to say." "Where did they get it?" "Where they always do, away out in the kelp among the surf." "Don't they ever come to land?" "No," he answers, "they live, and sleep, and breed out in the kelp. But if you want to know all about them, why don't you ask Charlie here? He has been trading this summer, and last winter and spring, up by Gray's Inlet in Washington Territory, where they are plenty." So saying, he calls up the captain of the steam-schooner lying at her moorings by the quay.
From this man, and from hunters and Indians all along the coast, I have gathered many a tale of the habits of the sea-otter, and of the fate of those that have been killed; for the rarity of the beast, and the beauty and value of its skin, interest these men, both from their hunters' instinct and from the mere money business of it. I know also that scientific naturalists desire all the facts they can get, that such facts may be placed on record before this connecting link between the seals and the otters perishes from the earth. I believe that the sea-otter (Enhydra marina) is only met with on this north Pacific coast, along which it is gradually being driven northward by constant hunting. Thirty years ago they were common along the Oregon sea-line; now the killing of a single specimen is noted in the newspapers; and hardly more than one a year is generally met along the coast. They inhabit the belt of tangle and kelp, which is found a few hundred yards from the beach, beyond the shore-line of sand or rock. They are never seen ashore, or even on isolated rocks; when the sea is warm and still, they live much on the surface, playing in the weed; sometimes, supporting their fore-feet on the thickest part of the wavy mass, they raise their head and shoulders above the weed, and gaze around. Parents and children live together in the weed; I have not heard of more than two young ones being seen in the family group. The skeleton is about four feet long: the fore-paws are short, strong, and webbed; almost in the same proportions as a mole's; the hinder extremities are flappers, like the seal's. The hide is twice the size of the common otter's; the fur the most beautiful, soft, thick, and glossy in the world—dark-brown outside, and almost yellow beneath, like the seal's. They are sometimes shot from a steam-schooner, like my friend's, lying-to at a safe distance, but much more commonly from the shore. Along the coast of Gray's Inlet several hunters make a regular business of it. Quite high watch-towers of timber are built just above high-water mark, and on these the hunter climbs with his long-range rifle, and watches. He provides a man on horseback to follow any otter he may be fortunate enough to kill, up or down the coast, and take possession of it when thrown up on the beach by the tide. These men seem to prefer the Sharp rifle for accuracy of long-range fire. That they are no mean proficients may be judged when I mention that one hunter killed upward of sixty last year; the skins, or most of them, my friend the captain bought, at prices, varying with size and condition, of from fifty to one hundred dollars each. I am told that about August the young ones are seen in company with their parents; but that the otters may be met with at almost any time in the year when the sea is calm enough for them to be marked among the tangle.
COMMON OTTER. MINK.The common otter (Lutra Californica) abounds in the tidal portions of the rivers along this coast. Two Indians, whom I know, shot six in an hour or two among the rocks bordering a little cove some eight miles north of the Yaquina, into which a little river empties itself. The skins are not quite so large as those of the English otter, but the fur is valuable. The mink (Putorius vison) resembles the polecat, but is nearly twice as large, with nearly black fur; it frequents the borders of the streams, and takes to the water with the greatest readiness. We have rabbits in Oregon (Lepus Washingtonii) not much more than half the size of the common rabbit of Europe, but similar in habits and place of residence. It is on these that the mink chiefly preys. I was walking my horse along a quiet stretch of sandy road, between thick bushes, returning from the Yaquina one day in summer, when a rabbit darted out before my horse and down the road for a hundred yards as hard as he could go; then into the bushes, then back into the road, and up the other side, close to me, evidently in the greatest fear. I stopped to see. Presently, a mink came out where poor Bunny first appeared—nose to the ground, and hunting like a ferret. He followed the rabbit's track step by step down the road, into the bushes, back again close to me, then into the brush; and then out came poor rabbit again, the heart gone out of him. Stopping an instant, then going on a few steps, stopping again, and at last, trembling, he bunched himself into his smallest compass in the middle of the road, and there awaited his fate. Not losing one twist or turn, patient, fierce, inexorable, the enemy followed, not raising his nose from the trail till he was almost on his prey. Then a quick bound; the rabbit was seized by the head, almost without a struggle, and dragged nearly unresisting into the bushes down toward the river's edge, while I passed on, musing on the points of resemblance between cousins on opposite sides of the world. Fortunately, these rabbits are very scarce. They are hardly seen in the valley; they live solely in the woods, never in or about the cultivated ground.
CHAPTER VII.
Birds in Oregon—Lark—Quail—Grouse—Ruffed grouse—Wild-geese— Manœuvres in the air—Wild-ducks—Mallard—Teal—Pintail—Wheat-duck —Black duck—Wood-duck—Snipe—Flight-shooting—Stewart's Slough— Bitterns—Eagles—Hawks—Horned owls—Woodpeckers—Blue-jays—Canaries —The canary that had seen the world—Blue-birds—Bullfinches— Snow-bunting—Humming-birds at home.
I have read comments on the scarcity of birds in America. This may be true in some parts; here, in Oregon, we have abundance, except of singing-birds. Of these last the meadow-lark is almost the sole example; and his song, in its fragmentary notes and minor key, does not even remind one distantly of his English cousin, who always seems to express by his gush of complete and perfect melody the joy that fills his being:
"... In a half sleep we dream,And dreaming hear thee still, O singing lark!That singest like an angel in the clouds."
"... In a half sleep we dream,And dreaming hear thee still, O singing lark!That singest like an angel in the clouds."
"... In a half sleep we dream,
And dreaming hear thee still, O singing lark!
That singest like an angel in the clouds."
The quail (Oreortyx pictus) has one long, sweet whistle, with the peculiarity that it is almost impossible to follow up and find the bird by his note; it sounds so close that you expect the bird is standing on the nearest log, but you look in vain; then it calls you from a hundred yards off, among the brush; again from the other side, and you try to drive him out of the left-hand thicket; but all the while your dog is working in the wood twenty yards ahead. You turn your head just in time to see a dark-brown bird flit like a flash across the road and disappear.
In the shooting-season the quail is one of the hardest birds to kill. They run in front of the dog in the brushwood with the greatest speed, then rise and fly for fifty or a hundred yards like lightning, and then take to their heels again.
In harvest-time the grouse (Tetrao obscurus), here called the partridge, come down from the fir-woods to the grain-fields and give good sport. They frequent the corners of the fields, nearest to the brush, and as the brood rise, ten or a dozen in number, and wing quickly across to shelter in the wood, it reminds one of old times and of partridge-shooting in Norfolk or Suffolk ten years ago.
When the grain is cleared off, the grouse keep to the slips and corners of brush nearest to the field for some weeks. As the season advances, they take to the fir-woods again, and lose their interest to the sportsmen by becoming in the first place almost impossible to find, and next worthless for the table from their turpentine taste. After the grouse have left the harvest-fields and got back into the woods, the shot-gun sportsman must be quick indeed to shoot as the bird rises and makes for the nearest tall fir. There he perches and defies you. The rifle-shot waits till the bird has taken up its place on the bough and peers over to look after the dog; then he shoots and often kills, though the head and neck of a grouse thirty or forty yards off is not a very big mark.
The ruffed grouse (Bonassa Sabinensis), here called the pheasant, is a fourth larger than the common grouse, with beautiful bright-brown plumage, dashed with yellow, and a spreading tail. He frequents the oak-grubs and scattering brush of the foot-hills, and is found all through the less dense portions of the woods of the Coast Range. He gives good sport, rising to the dog and giving a longer flight, and offering the sportsman a fairer chance.
WILD GEESE.As soon as the first half of October has passed by, the cry of the wild-geese is heard far away in the sky, and their V-shaped companies are seen winging their southward course. These first advance-guards do not stay, and scarcely ever descend low enough to tempt even the most sanguine shot. But in a week or so the main army arrives. Following up the general course of the Willamette River, they betake themselves to the sand- and gravel-bars of the river to spend the night, leaving in the early morning for the bare harvest-fields, where, after a vast amount of debate and consideration, and many long, circling flights, they descend to feed. Now every kind of firearms sees the light, and the gun-maker of the town begins to reap his harvest.
As you ride along the country roads in the valley, you see a lurking form behind almost every fence. It is a kind of sport exactly suiting the average Oregonian, who likes his game to come to him, and is great at watching for it.
Following with your eye the line of timber that betokens the river's course, you see six or seven great flocks of geese (Bernicla Canadensis) on the wing at once; some in the far distance, mere specks in the air, others near enough for you to overhear their conversation, which goes on continually. However confused the crowd that rises from the river, it is but a few seconds until order is taken. One flies to the head to guide the band, others take places on either side behind him; regular distances are kept, leaving just enough room for free motion, but no more. Inside the head of the V, and generally on its left side, fly two or three geese in a little independent group. I think it is from these that the officer appears in turn to lead the van.
How many times have I watched their evolutions with delight!—all the keener that the band was coming my way; that the quick, regular beats of the wings had nearly stopped, and the spread pinions showed they were about alighting in the very field under the snake-fence of which I crouched, double-barrel in hand.
The voices grow louder; the conversation and debate is perfectly confusing; they are near enough for you to note the outstretched necks and quick eyes glancing from side to side; the blue-gray colors on the wings, with the black bars, are plain. Waiting till they have passed over, some thirty yards to the right—for it is of no avail to shoot at them coming to you (the thick feathers turn the shot)—here go two barrels at the nearest birds. What a commotion! There is a perfect uproar of voices all declaiming at once, and away they scatter as hard as they can, resuming regular order in a hundred yards, but leaving one poor bird flapping on the ground. My dog runs to pick him up, but can't make out the big bird, and comes inquiringly back to know what on earth I mean by shooting at birds he surely has seen—"Yes, about the home-pond, master—whatareyou about?"
The geese are sorely destructive to the autumn-sown wheat; the farmer welcomes the sportsman from selfish motives, as well as from his usual hospitality, when he sees him, gun in hand.
The wild-geese are nearly all of one variety (Bernicla Canadensis); a few white ones (Anser hyperboreus) appear now and then, prominent among their gray brethren by their snowy plumage. Wild-ducks come next, and by the end of the first week of November the sportsman's carnival is in full swing. First come the mallard and his mate (Anas boschus), in small bands; next follow the whistling and the common teal (Querquedula cyanopteraandNettion Carolinensis); then the pintail (Dafila acuta) in great bands; following these, the wheat-duck, or gadwall (Chaulelasmus streperus), in multitudes; then, at a short interval, the redhead (Fuligula Athya Americana) and the black duck (Fulix affinis). These stay with us all the winter, as do also the wood-duck (Dix sponsor), and until the crocuses cover the wild ground once again. We have the snipe (Gallinago Wilsonii) in our marsh-lands, but not in large numbers, and one specimen of the great solitary snipe has been killed.
The snipe have a curious instinct for knowing exactly how many one piece of marsh will support. Near this house is a wet corner, fed by springs and also by ditches. The extent is about an acre; it is covered with rose-bushes and alder-shoots, and with rushes. In this are usually three snipe, never more. Several times each winter we have cleared the three out, but in a week or so successors fill their places.
FLIGHT-SHOOTING.Our favorite sport in winter is "flight-shooting"—killing the geese and ducks as they fly round the swamps at evening, preparing to settle for their night's feed. This comes in after the day's work is pretty nearly done. Mounting our ponies about four o'clock, we canter off to a big swamp about three miles off. Through this flows a little stream, whose water swells with the winter rains into two little lakes. Long grass and sedges cover the ground, and a good many patches of reeds give shelter.
Arriving just as the sun is setting behind the mountain south of Mary's Peak, his departing rays strike in brilliant red and yellow light along the surface of the pools, filling the valley with quivering, purple haze. We post ourselves at long intervals along the marsh, crouching while the light lasts, among the reeds. Just as the red light fades away, a group of black specks is seen against the sky, rising from the fir-timber that bounds the distant river. They grow quickly larger, and presently the rapid beat of wings is heard, as they whistle through the air overhead. The first flight round is high up in the sky, as they take a general view. Circling at the far end of the swamp, back they come, this time nearer to the ground. Just as you are debating if you dare risk the shot, whish! whish! comes the big band of teal close behind you, dashing by with a swoop worthy of the swiftest swallow, and defying all but a chance shot into the thick of them. By this time the big ducks are past, your chance at them is gone, and you hear in a second or two the bang! bang! from lower down the swamp, telling of one of your comrades' luck. Here come some more—right, left, overhead, behind—till an unlucky cartridge sticks in your gun, and the scene falls on an unhappy wretch cursing his luck, and devoting himself, his gun, his powder, the ducks, the swamp, and all Oregon to the infernal deities!
Night has fallen; the pale gold-and-green light has faded from the sky; the dark purple line of mountains has turned into a solid mass of the darkest neutral tint; one star after another has shown out overhead, to be reflected in the still, shallow water in which you stand.
A low voice calls out of the darkness, "Time to go home, I suppose." And a quick canter along the muddy road, possible only because the horses know every step of the way, soon brings us home to a late meal, where all our battles are fought over again, and the spoils, in their various beauty, are proudly shown. Among the game-birds may be included the blue crane, which flies in bands of from ten to twenty, high in the air. But it does not remain here, and is only killed by chance.
The other day a bittern (Ardeidæ minor) was shot—a bird somewhat larger than the European bittern, but exactly resembling it in all essentials.
EAGLES, HAWKS, HORNED OWLS.Eagles and hawks we have in abundance, and of all sizes. The former are destructive to the young lambs even in the valley. How bold they are, too! One flew into a bush the other day as I rode across a wide pasture, and watched me as I came close by him, never taking to flight, though I passed within twenty yards of him—near enough to note the defiant, proud expression of his great black eye. Last summer we lost chicken after chicken. I could not make out the robber, having taken precautions against rats,et id genus omne. One night, about ten o'clock, our English servant burst into the sitting-room with—"Sir, sir, bring your gun; here's a heagle come down on to the roof of the barn!" One of us ran out with a gun, and made out a big bird against the starlit sky. A shot, and down it came on the roof of the stable, making the horses jump and rattle their halter-blocks. It turned out to be a splendid specimen of the great horned owl. After his death the depredations among the chickens ceased for the time. Very often a pair of owls, just like the English barn-owl, are seen beating the swampy ground, I suppose after rats; quartering the ground, and examining every sedgy patch like a setter-dog.
Two kinds of woodpeckers are common; the smaller sort abounds in the burned timber, and again and again in the course of the day's ride you hear the tap, tap, and see the little fellow propping himself against the black trunk with his strong tail. The larger woodpecker is a beautiful bird, with a bright brown-and-gray speckled and barred chest, and a scarlet head and top-knot. These birds are eagerly sought by the Indians, who adorn themselves with the red feathers, and use them also as currency among themselves in various small transactions.
The blue-jays are as noisy in our woods as in other parts of the world, and as inquisitive and impertinent.
In summer we have flights of little yellow-birds just like canaries. One of my boys brought his pet canary from England in a little cage. He cared for and tended it all the long journey, and until we were on board the steamer coming up the Willamette. In the course of the morning he thought he would clean out his bird's cage. The open door was too strong a temptation. Out slipped the captive, and, after a short flight or two in the cabin, away he went into the outer air and perched on the upper rail of the pilot-house. After a moment he caught sight of a flock of little yellow-birds flitting round a big tree by a farmhouse on the bank. Off flew the little traveler to join them, and the last we saw of him was that he was joyfully joining the new company, while his master stood disconsolately watching the escape of his favorite.
Flocks of little bluebirds (Sialia Mexicana) frequent the town, the whole of their plumage a bright metallic blue. Among them is sometimes seen the golden oriole (Icterus Bullockii), making, with his orange jacket and black cap, a brilliant contrast with his blue companions.
Along the fences, and in the clumps of bushes filling their angles, is the favorite haunt of a pretty bird (Pipilo Oregonus), in plumage almost exactly resembling the European bullfinch; like him too in habit, as he accompanies you along the road in little, jerky flights.
HUMMING-BIRDS AT HOME.When the winter day has closed in, and the lamps are lighted, several times the little snow-bunting (Iunco Oregonus) has come tapping at the window, attracted by the light, and seeking refuge in the warmth within from the rough wind and driving rain without. In the honeysuckle, which covers the veranda and climbs over the face of the house, two sets of humming-birds (Selasphorus rufus) made their home. It was pretty to watch them as they poised themselves to suck the honey, and then darted off to one flower after another among the beds, returning every instant to their nests, close to our heads, as we sat out in the cool evening air. We were taken in several times by the humming-bird moths, which imitated exactly the motions of the birds.
CHAPTER VIII.
Up to the Cascades—Farming by happy-go-lucky—The foot-hills—Sweet Home Valley—Its name, and how deserved and proved—The road by the Santiam—Eastward and upward—Timber—Lower Soda Springs—Different vegetation—Upper Soda Springs—Mr. Keith—Our reception—His home and surroundings—Emigrants on the road—The emigrant's dog—Off to the Spokane—Whence they came—Where they were bound—Still eastward—Fish Lake—Clear Lake—Fly-fishing in still water—The down slope east— Lava-beds—Bunch-grass—The valleys in Eastern Oregon—Their products —Wheat-growing there—Cattle-ranchers—Their home—Their life—In the saddle and away—Branding-time—Hay for the winter—The Malheur reservation—The Indians' outbreak—The building of the road—When, how, and by whom built—The opening of the pass—The history of the road—Squatters—The special agent from Washington—A sham survey.
After recovering from a sharp attack of illness last fall, I was sent away for change of air. I fancied the mountain air would revive me speedily; so we resolved to travel up to the Upper Soda Springs, in the Cascades. It was two days' journey from the valley. The first twenty miles led us across the rich valley portion of Linn County. We had to pass through the little town of Lebanon.
Near here we saw an illustration of farming carelessness that I must mention. The harvest of 1879 was marked by the first recorded instance of rust attacking the spring-sown wheat. The spring was unusually late, and when the rains ceased, about the 25th of May, the summer sun broke forth at once with unclouded warmth and splendor. The lately sown grain sprang up in marvelous vigor, and the crop promised abundantly for the farmer, when, just before the wheat hardened in the ear, the rust seized it, the leaf took a yellow tinge, and the grain shriveled up. The valley portions of Linn, Lane, Marion, and Benton Counties suffered, the first-named the most severely.
In our ride across the valley we passed several fields which were standing abandoned and unreaped; the preparations for next year's crop were in active progress; in one great wheat-field we saw the farmer, with his broad-cast grain-distributor fixed in his wagon, sowing his seed among the untouched, shriveled crop! And the wonder is that the crop of this year, all through this stricken district, was unusually fine for both quality and quantity of wheat.
I do not know that a stronger fact could be adduced in proof of the still wonderful fertility of this Willamette Valley than that it should be possible this year to reap a good crop, grown on ground that was neither reaped, plowed, nor rolled—nothing done but to cast abroad the seed and harrow it lightly in.
Soon after passing Lebanon, eighteen miles from here, we reached the foot-hills of the Cascades; round, swelling, sandy buttes; sometimes covered with short pasture-grass; generally bearing a growth of oak-brush, sprinkled with firs of a moderate size.
SWEET HOME VALLEY.We slept at the first toll-gate, at the other side of Sweet Home Valley. This pretty vale deserved its name. Some five or six miles long by about two in width, there was a good expanse of fertile bottom-land, plowed and cultivated; all round the hills rose, lightly timbered in part, affording pasture for the cattle. We were told that the first five settlers were bachelors, and called the Valley "Sweet Home" to induce their lady-loves to follow them so far into what was then a wilderness. That their invitation succeeded, I judge from the fact that the valley has now three hundred inhabitants; that the settlement was a permanent one, I judge from the fact that a neat schoolhouse, well filled with scholars, is now the chief ornament of the valley.
The road followed on along the course of the Santiam River, now becoming a rapid mountain-stream, with many a rock and ripple. By the side of every farmhouse stood one or two "fish-poles," betokening that the river was of use as well as ornament to the dwellers by its banks.
The road now led us straight eastward to the mountains, whose fir-crowned summits frowned on us from every side. Here and there a little valley nestling among the hills had been reclaimed to the use of man; and many a neat little farm and well-grown orchard, with fenced grain-fields and hay-fields, witnessing to the successful labor of the owner, smiled on us as we passed.
On nearly all appeared the magic words: "Hay and oats sold here. Good accommodation for campers"; betokening that we were on the main road of travel, and that the farmers found a ready market for their produce at their very door.
At one farm stood a set of Fairbanks's scales, for weighing and apportioning the wagon-loads before undertaking the passage of the mountains. The ascent was soon commenced; indeed, we had mounted several hundred feet before we were well aware of it, so good was the engineering of the road.
LOWER SODA SPRINGS.The timber grew larger on either side and ahead; no burned timber here, but massive, heavy growths, extending mile after mile, of spruce, hemlock, and pine, interspersed with many a cedar, tall, straight, and strong. Very little undergrowth of brush; a good deal of brake-fern and of grass; and by the sides and along the edges of the little gullies and cañons that we crossed, the large maidenhair-fern grew in beautiful profusion. We were never far from the Santiam, and now and again the roar and rush of water told us of little falls and rapids in the stream. Always ascending, here with a long, straight stretch of grading cut into the hill-side, there with a winding course to cheat the hill that rose to bar our road; down a short distance, then along the little valley with its farm, then up again, till we gained the brow overlooking the settlement at the Lower Soda Springs. The little wooden houses, with galleries overhanging the rocky stream; the heavy fir-woods clothing the hill-sides; the abundant ferns and creeping plants growing down to the water's edge; the abrupt outlines of the rocks in places too steep for vegetation—all reminded us of Norway, and of happy tours in bygone years. And the welcome we received from the hospitable innkeepers served to strengthen the remembrance.
We went down to drink at the soda-springs. Long, inclined ledges of white and gray rocks lead down to the river's edge; there, within a few feet of the sweet, running water, so near that the rise of one foot in actual level of the stream would overrun the spring, we found the alkaline spring, welling out from a hole six inches across in one of the wide ledges of gray rock. I never yet tasted a mineral water that was nice, and it seems as if the medical value of a spring varied exactly with its nastiness; so judged, I should say that the Lower Soda Springs were very valuable. A few hours more, over broken country, which grew wilder as we advanced, brought us in twelve miles' travel to our destination. The last few miles entered a burned timber-patch, where the black trunks either towered high into the air or lay supine, rotting by degrees into yellow mold. The vegetation had a different aspect from the Coast Range; a great feature in the brush was the abundance of elder-bushes, then covered with blue-gray berries, and the flourishing dogwood-trees, whose branches bore a quantity of large, white flowers and also of scarlet fruit. We had crossed the Santiam several times, here by timber bridges, there by fords.
The excellence of the road, its freedom from rocks and "chuck-holes," alike surprised and pleased us, and my poor bones would have told a sad tale if all the stories of "mere wagon-track" had been founded in even the semblance of fact.
MR. KEITH.We mounted the little rise which brought us in sight of Upper Soda Springs. On the left of the road stood a barn; on the right, three little detached wooden huts, from one of which the thin, blue smoke was rising and betokened the habitation of the owner. A thin, bent, elderly man issued from the barn with a big bundle of hay in his arms, as we drove up, and came across to meet us. "Mr. Keith?" I asked. "I have a letter of introduction from a friend of yours, and we wish to stay with you for a week or ten days." "You read it to me," was the answer; "I haven't got my spectacles." So I read it. "Well, sir, can we stay?" "I don't mind men, but I can't abear women," was the somewhat forbidding response, as my wife smiled across from the back of the carriage. "I don't think you need mind my wife, Mr. Keith; she won't give you any extra trouble." "I don't mind cooking for men—they don't know any better; but, as for the women, they are always thinking how much better they could do it." However, we settled it amicably, and took possession of the third little hut, where the bundle of hay was soon shaken out on to the two standing bed-places on either side. We made great friends with the old gentleman, whose roughness was all on the outside, and who slew his chickens, and cooked his cabbages, and stewed his dried plums and apples for us without stint, and in a manner that no woman could object to.
The situation was most romantic—just under the shadow of a huge body of rugged rocks on one side, while on the other Mr. Keith's little fields, from which all the dogwood and elderberry bushes had not been grubbed out, led to the edge of the bank overhanging the Santiam. The river here is a beautiful stream, rocky and broken, deep and shallow, by turns, with a trout under every stone.
Mr. Keith's garden was a few steps from the house, in a little bottom; although so high up above sea-level (about twenty-five hundred feet, I believe), the vegetables were as fine as I ever saw, and the grape-vines, trained over a trellis in front of the house, were loaded with fruit.
Here, among the hills, trout-rod for me and sketch-book and water-colors for my wife, we spent ten happy days. There was no lack of company, for, besides our old host, all the passers-by stopped at the house. Hardly a day went, even at that late period of the season, without from six to ten wagons passing, on their way from Western and Southern Oregon to the wide plains and fertile valleys of Eastern Oregon and Washington Territory.
The self-reliance, the absolute trusting to the future, of all these good people was impressive. The whole family were together: beds, chairs, stove, blankets, clock, saucepans, and household stores were all packed or piled into the wagon; underneath hung a box or basket with a couple of little pigs or a dozen cocks and hens. A couple of cows were driven along or took their parts as a yoke of oxen in draught; a colt or two and a few young cattle ran by the side, and the family dog, presiding over the cavalcade, seemed to have more of a burden on his mind than the human heads of the expedition. Many stopped to camp for the night, almost all for at least one meal, and all without exception to get a drink from the effervescing soda-spring.
OFF TO THE SPOKANE.One wagon was driven by a pleasant-spoken man; with him were his wife and a sick baby of a year old. They had nothing for the baby but potatoes and flour. Their stores were but scanty. "Where are you going?" said I. "To the Spokane, I guess," was the reply. "Where do you come from?" "Well, I had a valley-farm, and we were doing pretty well, but I hadn't my health good, and I thought we'd try the Spokane." "Do you know where it is you are going?" "No, but they told us to take this road and we'd find our way." "Have you any idea how far it is?" "Not much; a hundred miles or two, isn't it?" "Put five hundred or so on, and you'll get there." "You don't say so! Well, I dare say we shall get through all right." "What do you mean to do?" "Well, I haven't money enough to buy a farm, so I shall just take up a place." "You mean to homestead, then?" "I guess so." "How many miles can you make in a day?" "Not more than ten or fifteen with this old scrub team." "Have you thought that this is the first week in October, and that you can't expect to get there much before January?" "I guess not; but I dare say we shall get on very well." "You told me just now you had not much money; have you thought how long it will last you, spending two dollars a day on the road?" "No, I haven't rightly figured it. I knew we shouldn't have much left when we got there." "What makes you want to go to the Spokane?" "Well, I've heard it's good land up there." "Isn't Oregon good enough for you?" "I don't know but what it is. I didn't know the place was so far off." I fetched him a large scale map, and left him to think it over after supper. They were off in the morning before we were out, and I have no idea whether they reached the Spokane; my only consolation was, that the baby was the better for the care and food it got that night, and for the additional stores they carried away for it.
This conversation was, perhaps, an extreme one; but it is absolutely true to facts. All that we talked to were equally hopeful, and few much better instructed as to their course. Certainly no people in the world could be better qualified to make a little go far, to take cheerily all the inevitable discomforts of both the long journey and the new home, and to make the best use of every advantage they found or made. Only a few were going to this Spokane country, away north in Washington Territory; the rest were bound for Eastern Oregon, which is being settled up marvelously fast, when the difficulties of getting there, and of getting their produce out from there, are taken into account.
The stretch of burned timber country ended about the Upper Soda. All round it, and on from there eastward, grew miles upon miles of magnificent fir, hemlock, spruce, and cedar-trees, averaging three feet through, and, I judged, a hundred and fifty feet in height. I measured several of the dead trees on the ground, which ran from two hundred and twenty to two hundred and fifty feet in length, and the tops of all of them were gone.
A few miles farther on eastward are Fish Lake and Clear Lake. The former merits its name from the abundance of trout from one to three and four pounds in weight. In summer the water shrinks away to little more than a stream in the middle of the depression which forms the lake, and a growth of rich, succulent grass follows the subsidence of the waters. Clear Lake, some four miles off, is vastly different. It evidently occupies the place of a great and sudden depression of timber-covered country, for, looking down into the deep, clear water, the great firs are seen still standing erect on the bottom, far, far below. Fly-fishing on this lake is wonderfully good. Throw the flies on to the still water, oh! so quietly, and there let them lie motionless; in a moment or two a dim form shines deep down, rising with a quick, vibrating motion, and up comes your friend: with a greedy snatch he takes the fly, and bolts downward with it, to be speedily checked and brought to book.
Soon begins the descent, much more gradual than the ascent, and not so prolonged, since all Eastern Oregon is a kind of plateau, elevated from one to two thousand feet above sea-level.
VALLEYS IN EASTERN OREGON.A stretch of lava-bed is soon reached, the acme of desolation, where the road has been painfully worked by crushing down the rugged blocks, or laboriously moving them with levers from the path. Two or three miles carry us across, and then the bunch-grass country begins. Great tussocks of succulent feed for spring and early summer, dried by the hot sun into natural hay for autumn and winter use, afford pasture for countless herds of cattle. Even here there are watercourses and springs a few miles apart. The valleys—namely, Des Chutes, Crooked River Valley, Ochoco, Beaver Creek, Grindstone Creek, Silver Creek, Harney Lake, and Malheur—stretch in a practically unbroken line across the whole of the remainder of Oregon to the eastern boundary of Snake River.
Take Crooked River Valley as a specimen. It varies from one to three miles in width, but is bounded, not by the steep and rugged hills we are used to in the Coast Range, but by gently swelling bluffs, covered with bunch-grass to and over their tops. The valley-land is rich and fertile, and wherever cultivated yields abundantly in potatoes, cereals, vegetables, and small fruits of all kinds. Sixty and eighty bushels of oats to the acre is not an unusual crop. And tame grasses take firm hold of the country wherever opportunity is given them. The bunch-grass slopes, with occasional sagebrush scattered among the grass, are not to be always set apart for such common use as at present.
Precisely the same character of land has been plowed up and put into wheat during the last few years round Walla Walla, just north of the northeast corner of Oregon, and produces forty bushels of wheat to the acre. Indeed, it is from country like this that the great crops of Northeastern Oregon and Washington Territory are produced; crops yielding a magnificent return, if not to the farmer whose enterprise and industry have served to raise them, yet to the recently formed transportation company called the Oregon Railway and Navigation Company, by whose boats plying on the Columbia the wheat is carried to Portland to be shipped.
At present these vast stretches of rolling hill and dale are the home of the cattle-rancher—a strange and wild life. A suitable site is fixed on, commanding ample water privilege, with some valley-land near by to grow sufficient hay, and to raise the desired quantity of oats and vegetables; here the house is built, the lumber being hauled by wagons perhaps fifty or a hundred miles from the mill. The rancher's family consists of his wife and children, and possibly five or six herdsmen. While looking after cattle, these men almost live in the saddle. Horses abound, and form as good a source of revenue as cattle, in proportion to the capital engaged. The Eastern Oregon horse is taller and bigger-boned than the valley horse, but naturally his education is not so well attended to, and he is apt to be "mean" and to buck. Little recks his rider, and after a bout of bucking, in which the horse has not dislodged the man, but has shaken up every bone in his body till he is sore all over with the constant jar, as the horse comes to the ground all four feet at once after a mighty jump, then it is the man's turn. Driving in the heavy Mexican spurs, with their rowels two or three inches across, the rider starts wildly out, and mile after mile the open country is crossed at a hard-gallop. The herd is soon seen and ridden round, and a close lookout is kept to see if any stragglers have joined the band, and if the calves and yearlings are all right. Branding-time comes twice a year, in spring and autumn, when the cattle of a whole "stretch" of country are driven together, separated according to the various ownerships determined by marks and brands.
In spring come in the Eastern buyers, who travel through the country, collecting a huge drove of perhaps from ten to twenty thousand head. The three-year-old steers fetch about fifteen or seventeen dollars a head; no wonder the ranchers prosper, considering that the cost from calfhood was only that of herding.
Some of the provident ones collect one or two hundred tons of natural hay against the severities of winter. It may be that for two or three years the hay will stand unused; then comes the stress. Deep snow will cover the face of the country and lie for weeks, too deep for the cattle to live, as in ordinary winters, on the dry bunch-grass protruding from the snow, or easily reached by scratching a slight covering away. Even an abundant store will not save all, for many of the herd will have taken refuge in distant valleys, or perhaps have retreated far off the whole range in the face of the driving storm. And even those that are found will move very unwillingly from any poor shelter they may have secured toward the life-saving food.
THE MALHEUR RESERVATION.There is a large Indian reservation called the Malheur Reserve; the road crosses its southwest corner. These Indians are quiet enough now, but only three years ago there was an outbreak among them. One rancher had built a fine stone house, just outside the reservation bounds, and there lived in comfort, surrounded by all the necessaries and many of the luxuries of life. He had six or eight thousand head of cattle and some three hundred horses in his band. One morning a friendly Indian rode up in haste, telling him to get away, as the hostiles were coming to kill them all. Mounting their horses, the rancher and his wife took to flight; they looked back from the hill-top to see the flames and smoke rising from their comfortable home, telling how narrow had been their escape. A hurried ride of fifty miles took them to safe refuge; and the speedy repulse of the Indians, and their being driven once again within their own boundaries, enabled the rancher to rebuild his house, and restore once more his household goods.
This road was built by men who were sent out from Albany, and spent years in the work, rifles by their side; for the country fourteen years ago was not the safe domain it has now become. The first idea was to use the pass through the Cascades (which is the lowest and safest in Oregon, so far as I can learn), to build a road to open the plains of Eastern Oregon to the Willamette Valley. After a good deal of the work had been accomplished, a suggestion was made to the owners of the road that if they would undertake to extend it clear across the State to the Idaho boundary, a distance from Albany of some four hundred and fifty miles by the necessary deviations from a straight line, a land grant might probably be procured from Congress to aid the work. Whatever may be said of the general policy of granting the national lands to corporations to aid wagon-road and railroad enterprises, there may surely be cases where the effect is not only to secure the execution of the work, but also to encourage the settling up of a district, and the consequent increase of the population and wealth of a State.
Here was the state of affairs in Eastern Oregon prior to 1866: A vast country, adapted for the gradual settlement and ultimate habitation of a prosperous race, was lying at the mercy of a few roving bands of Indians, who made the lives and property of even casual travelers their speculation and sport. What was the value then of all that country? Could any purchaser for it have been then found, at even a few cents an acre?
BUILDING OF THE ROAD.The projectors of the road took their lives in their hands when they ventured forth to work. They risked themselves, their horses and equipments. Every pound of food consumed had to be brought in wagons from their starting-point. As they progressed, their danger and difficulty increased with every mile they traversed; and the last section of the road was built by men who had suffered themselves to be snowed in and shut off from families and friends, and to give up every chance of succor in distress, that the work might not stand still. And it was no light work, even judged by us who travel the road at ease, and have hardly a passing glance for the rocky grade, the deep cutting, the ponderous lava-block, the huge black trunk. How appalling must the undertaking have appeared to those who had first to face the dangers and difficulties of a mountain-chain, to plan for and survey out the most favorable route among heavy timber and rocky precipice, beside rushing waters and through deep gorges; and then across those wide and then silent plains, where the timid antelope ranged by day, and the skulking wolf by night made solitude hideous with his melancholy howl! No roadside farms to welcome them, no little towns to mark, as now, the stages of their journey, but farther and farther into the wilderness, till four hundred miles lay between the workers and the valley-homes they had left months before.
And this was no wealthy corporation, which has but to announce its readiness to receive, and dollars are poured into its lap by a public hungry for dividends, until it has to cry, "Hold, enough!" Here were no regiments of yellow workmen, trained to labor in many a ditch and grade; but citizens of Oregon, who desired to build up their State; who believed the records of their fellows as to the miles of country that could be forced to contribute their quota of productions if but the way were opened in and out; who, having themselves prospered in the sound and moderate way in which Oregon encourages her children, were ready to risk what they had gained in a cause they knew was good—these men combined their energies to the common end. It was an enterprise which roused and maintained the kindly interest of all. The working parties in the Cascade Range were followed up by the teams of those who desired the first choice of settlement in the promised land beyond.
By the time the last great log that barred the pass was reached, a long string of wagons stood waiting its removal. While the long saws were plied, and then the levers brought, all stood in expectation; willing hands lent their eager aid: the great wooden mass rolled sullenly away, and the tide of settlement poured through the gap. Between that day in 1867 and 1880 upward of five thousand wagons have made the journey, and, to the honor of the original locators be it said, all without accident arising from the road.
The first few years all went merry as a marriage-bell. The road naturally followed the fertile valleys; and small blame to the road-makers if, having the whole country before them, they chose the smoothest and cheapest route. No man will climb a hill and cut his way along its side if he can find good level ground at the bottom.
The road-makers were entitled under their congressional grant to alternate mile-square sections in a wide belt on either side of their road; the intervening sections were, of course, opened to settlement by the construction of the road. The open-valley sections were soon seized on, and a band of settlements justified, even so soon, the principle of the road-grant.
SQUATTERS.But to many men in this world, and Oregon has her share, the descriptive motto is not, "Labor is sweet, and we have toiled," but the antithesis, "Other men have labored: let us enter into the fruits of their labor." So squatters entered with the legitimate settler, or close on his heels, and took possession of many a section of the road company's land, "taking the chances," as they would express it, of something happening to help them to hold. To aid matters, these men fenced across the road near their houses, and carried the road round on the hill-sides above their farms. The settlers were not slow to follow so promising an example, and, to have the benefit of the bottom-land through which the road ran, they also pushed the road away up the hills.
On more than one occasion the road company sent and had these fences removed and opened the original road afresh. But travelers did not aid them; for here came in a trait of American character I have often noticed, namely, unwillingness to insist on strict right against their neighbors, and a readiness to make any shift, or agree to and use anydétour, when to keep the old, straight road would involve a question. So the valley road got disused in places, and travel went round by the hills.
Next, the squatters bethought them that they might in time upset the road grant, and get good title to their neighbors' vineyard. So they sent on a petition to Washington, alleging that the road had never been made; that there was no road at all; that there had been a colossal fraud. But the matter was investigated, and discovery made that the United States authorities had ceased to have any jurisdiction so long ago as 1866. Still, those who were agitating thought something might be made of it. So, somehow or other, the Secretary of the Interior, Mr. Carl Schurz, was induced to interfere, not deterred by the knowledge that the land department had declined to act twelve months before; and so, a year after the squatters' complaint had been refused, an agent was sent out to report; he was well armed with the assailants' stories in advance, and he need be a man of superexcellent straightforwardness and hardihood unless he too could "see something in it."