Oregon: there and back in 1877

Front matter

OREGON. YAQUINA HAY — LOOKING TOWARDS I.ANn. Frontispiece. I OEEGON: THERE AND BACK IN 187 BY WALLIS NASH. "AU places that the eye of heaven visits Are to a wise man ports and happy havens." —Eichard II., i. 3. sjtmtijon : MACMILLAN AND CO. 1878. [The Bight of Translation and Reproduction is Reserved.] TO CHARLES DARWIN, IN TOKEN OF A FRIENDSHIP WHEREIN HIS GENTLE COURTESY HAS ALMOST INDUCED FORGETFULNESS OF HIS GREATNESS, THIS BOOK IS, BY HIS PERMISSION, Jltbitaftfr. b

Preface

. Since returning from the journey here described man}' questions have been put to me as to the climate, soil, productions, institutions, laws, and conditions of social life found on the Pacific slope, and chiefly in Oregon. This proves that while there is a growing necessity for a better knowledge of that State, as her corn, wool, and salmon become more important articles of com merce, and on the other hand her applications for English manufactures are more loudly expressed, and the number of English settlers in Oregon is ever increasing, yet there is not available any simple and popular account of the State. My visit, which resulted from a friendship of several years standing with Colonel T. Egenton Hogg — a Californian who has devoted the best years of his b

PREFACE.

. X life and a vast amount of energy, intelligence, and capital to acquiring extensive tracts of land in Oregon — convinced me that whilst English money is being, and will be, most profitably employed there, a field of emigration is also open which is suited in all respects to a large number of our fellow-countrymen. Situated only twenty days journey from Liverpool, possessing so many attractions in climate, soil, beauty of scenery, ease of access, freedom from drought, tempest, floods, and immunity from insect plagues, the next question which presented itself was whether the institutions of the State, its government, laws, and taxation, were such as to encourage the Enghsh settler. My best answer to this appears in the following pages. It is allowable for an Englishman to express deep regret that Oregon is not a British colony — that ignorance as to its capabilities and lack of faith in its future prevailed when it was ceded to the United States.

But it still can boast liberal laws, and the British settler, should he purchase and hold land and prosper in this State, will not find it necessary to abandon his British citizenship.

PREFACE.

. XI Should the reading of this book suggest to any to try their fortunes there, if they will communicate with me I will gladly put them in the way. A handbook to Oregon, compiled from the best official sources, and verified by actual inquiry and observation, has been prepared by Mr. H. N. Moseley, M.A., F.R.S., the Naturalist to the late Challenger Expedition, who was one of our companions on this journey. Reliable information is thus at the disposal of the intending settler. I cannot end my pleasant labours in this book without gratefully recognising the kind reception we met in Oregon on all hands, from the Hon. S. F. Chadwick, the Governor, to the little farmers in their cabins and the teamsters and herdsmen along the country roads. Wallis Nash. Beckenham, Kent, March, 1878. CONTENTS.

Chapter I

Life on the Germanic — Introduction to New York ways — Bribery and Corruption — Steaming on Dry Land — Relieved of Baggage— House Telegraphs — Automatic Fire-Alarms— Our Fellow-Travellers— Going to Bed on Board the Train— Two Hours of Chicago . . . Page 1

Chapter II

Farming in Iowa — The American " Moses and Sons "— March of the Mormon Soldiers — Turn out at Omaha — Nebraska Puffed — Prairie-travelling in the Olden Days — The Snowshed Man — Mormon Civilisation — Indians for near Neighbours — Travellers' Tale of " Snowing Up." — John Chinaman in California — Bret Harte's Mining District— Over the Sierra Nevada — Nearing San Francisco Page CONTENTS. XIV

Chapter III

A House Taking a Journey— The Golden Gate and the Sea-lions — Fast-trotters — The Lick University — The Court of Justice— The Days of the Vigilance Committee —Chinatown in San Francisco : Shops, Theatre, and Opium-smoking — The Glorious Fourth of July— Coachtravelling to the Yosemite Valley— Mr. Adams and the Padre— The Geysers— Tame Indian— The Spanish Water-finder— The Englishman's Ranch— San Francisco Hospitality ' Page 44

Chapter IV

The Stage to Oregon — Seeing Friends off — Charlie McConnell — Bushranging in California — A Costly Buffet — Government Fish-hatching Establishment — Hotel at Soda Springs — Volcanic Sentinels — Mount Shasta — Mining Yreka — Over the Mountains — First Look at Oregon — Change of Landscape — Gold Mines of the Rogue River — Jacksonville — Scotch Sunday — Our Stage Companions — Again amid the Mountains — The Secluded Valley and its Contented Inhabitants — Descending our Last "Grade" — Our Last Driver — An Oregon Somersetshire — The Little Town of Roseburg Page 86

Chapter V

Information for the Colonist — Position and Acreage of the State — The Three Divisions — Willamette Valley, its Cultivation, Streams, and Mountains — Railway to CONTENTS. XV 108 129 Yaquina Bay— Wheat Export"— Thirty Bushels to the Acre - -Volunteer Crops — Harvesting by Contract — Oats — Open air Threshing— Farmers' Profits — Fruit-growing — Wild Berries— The Operation of Clearing — Absence of Stones — The Mary River — Beaver-dam "Slews" — Change in Vegetation — A Look into the Future — The Rival Bays of Oregon — Mid-Oregon : its Climate — Summer Camping out — Soil — The Herdsman — The Sage Brush of the Al kali Plains — Eastern Oregon — Harney Lake Valley, a perfect Land of Promise — Forests and Woodlands . Page

Chapter VI

Fittiug-out at Corvallis — Our Horseflesh — Our Cook and Iron Stove — Village of Philomath — Houses on Trunks of Trees — The Man who could not Pay — Fly-Fishing — Hemmed in — Night coming on — Kit Abbey — Deer and Elk — King's Valley on the Luckiomute — The Settler's Choice of Site — Fire-Ravaged Land — Portrait-painting — Indians of the Siletz Reservation — Model Farm — The Naturalist's Escape from his Horse — Evening Scene in View of the Pacific — Newport on Yaquina Bay — Indians Fishing in the Bay — Capabilities of the Harbour — Oyster-beds — Kit Abbey's Shot — The Dance — Dancing at the Word of Command — The Lecture — Mr. Towner and his Outcrop of Coal — The Solitsary Tree-feller — Sighting a Bear Page CONTENTS.

Chapter VII

The Indians of To-day and the Indian of the Novelist — Chinook Talk— The Indians at Home — "King George's Man " taking Portraits — Visiting the Siletz Reserve — The Sweat Bath of the Chief— Mr. Bagley, the Indian Agent — Chitco Jennie, the Human Heart-eater— Indian Burying-ground — The one Naturalized Indian — Former Tribes — The Settler's Relations— What the White Man did for the Red — Indian Character Page 166

Chapter VIII

A Presbyterian Minister's Experience as Settler : his Ignorance at Starting, and his Success — A Scotch Miller of Twenty Years Standing — An Italian on Yaquina Bay and his Bees — A Town and Country Lawyer — The Ladies of the Family — A Farmer of Elk City — The Struggles of the First Year, and Present Prosperity — A Reverse of the Picture : the Garden of the Sluggard — The Farmer and his Angora Goats — The Story of his Life in Oregon — His smiling Prosperity — The Feminine Granger Page 185 CH.APTER IX. The " Law " Easily Enforced — And generally Respected — The Election of Judges Discussed — Lawyers' Influences — Popular Prejudices — Religious Divisions — Newspaper CONTENTS. XVII 207 Press— A Travelling Editor— Party Spirit— Doctors and Doctoresses — Roads — Common Halls — Social Gatherings — Self-help — Education — Schools — Colleges — Education Lands — Compulsion — Insane Asylum — State Penitentiary — Prison Management — Convict Labour — Blind Institution —The Capitol, its Buildings and their Contents . Page

Chapter X

The Library — Senate Chamber — Oregon City and Willamette Falls— The Ship Canal— Iron Works— Woollen Mills— Dried-fruit Works — The Donation Law of 1850 — Grants to the Railroad and Waggonroads — The Homestead Law — Special Laws for Mineral Lands — The Pre-emption Law — The Emigrant on " Wild " Land — Advice to a Settler in Oregon — The Rights of Foreigners — Married Women's Property Page 222

Chapter XI

The City of Portland— The Grain Ships— Theatre— Fire in an Adjoining Hotel — One Life Lost — Steamer to San Francisco — The Mouth of the Columbia — Our Ship's Company — The " Cannery " — Chinamen at Work — The Process — The Arrangement with the Fishermen — Astoria — Prophecy Concerning the River — The Facilities of Yaquina Bay as a Harbour — The New Railway from Corvallis — Farewell to Oregon Page CONTENTS.

Chapter XII

The Coast of California— Passing the Golden Gate— An Echo of the Railroad Riots— Menlow Park— The Rich Men of San Francisco— Its Climate, Winter and Summer — Life at High Pressure . Page 248

Chapter XIII

The Top of the Sierra Nevada — Salt Lake— Brigham Young's Death — Mormon Government and Mormon Institutions — Cattle-droves going Eastward — Contrast between Home and American Life — Coasting Lake Michigan — Its gigantic Expanse — The Comfort of the Pullman Car — The " Great Western " of Canada — Compared with our Own — Nearing Niagara — The American Fall — Prospect House —The "Awful Corner"— The Abyss of Waters— The Fate of an Only Son — Fascination for Suicides — The Thunder Storm — Last Look at the Rapids — Custom House Officer in plain clothes — The Racing Trains — Eight-day Passage Home — Epilogue Page LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS. 1. Yaquina Bat, Looking Towards Land . . Frontispiece Rocky Mountains — Summit. Central Pacific 2. Railway Page 25 3. Utah Indians 43 4. Seal Rock near San Francisco 48 5.

Valley of the Willamette. Town of Albany . 115 6. Skinning a 'Coon 141 7. Yaquina Bay 151 8. Chitco Charley 165 9. Yaquina Bay. Indian's full Dress 170 10. Kaseeah 184 11. Elk City 195 12. Falls of the Willamette. Oregon City . . . 225 13. Astoria. Mouth of Columbia River OREGON OREGON

Chapter I

Travellers only can realise the thrill of excitement of climbing from the tender into the great White Star steamer as she lies in the Mersey, steam blowing off. In that one moment the regrets at leaving home, the fear lest human nature at sea should prove too weak, the joy of wandering, are strangely mixed. But the pressing needs of finding one's cabin and getting "fixed " there, of preventing all the state-room luggage from being swept into the hold, of saying good-bye to friends who pity you for going so far away, and whom you pity for staying in the mill-wheel round of home duties, soon recall the first-time voyager to himself. As the ship passes from the dingy tide-water and "goes on ahead," and the ear gets accustomed to the rhythm and beat of the screw, which will B unceasingly play the same tune for the next nine, or ten days, we realise that the journey looked forwards to for years has begun.

The first night on shipboard passed, sea-life has fairly commenced. The passengers begin to make friends ; neighbours at table comment on the meals ; and the pace of the ship answers for that common topic, the weather, in ordinary landsmen's life. The afternoon after leaving Liverpool we reached Queens town, to find the Channel fleet at anchor in the splendid harbour. One or two of the officers were shown over the Germanic, and praised the noble proportions of the ship, and the good order and cleanliness of every part. The eighth day after we left Queenstown we were nearing New York. We had had three days of head-wind and sea, but had hardly known what rolling or pitching was : so that our preference for ships having state-rooms and saloons amidships, instead of aft, was justified. We had seen hundreds of porpoises, playing, rolling over, springing half out of the water, romping along ; two whales had spouted for our amusement, the petrels had borne us company across the ocean, and now the Yankee gulls had come out to welcome us : very like, *■•] AT SEA. 3 only, we thought, a shade more lively even than their Irish cousins who left us five days ago.

Now the excitement was to be certain if we could get to the quarantine ground in New York harbour by eight o'clock, that the health officers might come on board to-night, and so suffer our hundred of American passengers to spend their Sunday at home. Faster and faster the ship went, until we were told, and we believed, that for sixteen hours she had averaged seventeen miles an hour. Long Island was in sight ; the lighthouse was passed; Sandy Hook was on our left hand ; and the ship stopped. The sudden silence caused by the ceasing of that screw-beat, which had registered fifty-two strokes a minute, and had formed the unceasing accompaniment to so many tunes for nine days, was almost oppressive. The tug-boat, with health-officers, and with many friends of the passengers on board, came in sight, striking golden lights from the fast darkening waters of the harbour, and in a minute the friendly groups of the voyage were broken up: the quickly-made acquaintanceships were as quickly ended.

In a few minutes the great ship seemed deserted, while cheer after cheer sounded from the tug, crowded to the B gunwale, bustling along towards the city, the spires and chimneys of which were shining in the sun's last rays. Having no special reason for hurry, the quartet forming our party slept on board that Saturday night, and only left the Germanic about eleven on Sunday morning, after she had found her way, as neatly and gracefully as a yacht, among the crowds of vessels, to her berth alongside the White Star wharf. The night before one of the custom-house officers had remained on board, nominally to see that all was right, practically to give all who were so minded the chance of making to themselves friends of the Mammon of unrighteousness. It was a strange coincidence that the virtuous and strong-minded passenger found it a tedious, complicated matter to get, with his baggage, through the hands of the officers in waiting on the wharf, while the old stagers, who in Rome did as Rome does, and were busy as they left the ship in rolling dollar-notes into the smallest compass, and then held them in the lightest possible fashion in their fingers, passed quickly through, baggage really unopened and unexamined, to their carriages.

Since we landed there have been great '.] NEW YORK. 5 changes in this matter, and there are new men, new manners — and quite time, too. From the wharf a lumbering coach, swaying on its C-springs, took us to the hotel. But what paving ! Holes here, ruts there, tram-roads everywhere ! Our American travelling friend said, "You won't find worse roads in Oregon." We disbelieved him then; but he spoke the truth. How hot it was ! We bathed and dressed, putting on black coats and white ties, after the example of half the passers-by ; but we had to change once more before the day was out : for every scrap of under clothing on us was damp. New York reminded us more of Continental cities than of English ones : so many trees shaded the side walks; so many green jalousies were fixed outside the windows; while the absence of smoke and dirt on the house-fronts struck us all.

We were to travel West by the Monday evening train ; so we ordered tickets from an agent sent by a friend who had passed West a day or two before, and who recommended him as active and prompt. He was. He cheated us in the price of the tickets, in the collection and checking of the baggage, in the [chap. OREGON. 6 charge for sleeping-car berths. We should have saved money and temper had we shaken hands with him all round, given him cigars and drinks, and ourselves gone in a very expensive coach to the depot of the railway to fetch our tickets ourselves. Was it not a really good introduction for simple-minded Englishmen? We congratulated ourselves that our teeth were fast in our heads, or they would have gone too. The American cities swarm with agents like our friend, who live (we cannot say they fatten) on strangers.

At the railway and stage offices themselves, on the other hand, honesty and a certain rough, independent civility was the rule. After some debate we settled to go West by the Pennsylvania railroad, going South from New York to Philadelphia, and thence West by way of Pittsburg and Fort Wayne to Chicago. The train left at eight o'clock in the evening. About six our luggage was ready, and our first experience of the baggage-checking system began. Having each made up a hand-valise or carpet-bag of necessaries for the seven days' trip, everything else was to be "checked." The transfer company's agent came to the hotel with a bundle of brass labels on his arm, each label being attached to a leather strap with a loop, and <■] NEW INVENTIONS. 7 bearing a plainly-impressed number, corresponding with a similar number on a small brass ticket.

By the leather strap a brass label was looped on to each article of baggage, and the corresponding ticket handed to us. A small fee for each package was paid to the transfer agent. No one gave another thought to his baggage till we reached Omaha on the following Friday. The transfer company takes all trouble and risk of loss off the traveller's hands, and no one grudges the large dividends they earn. Another institution we saw in full work. In the office of the hotel a small black case, like a travelling clock case, stands on the counter, by the clerk's side. A visitor wants a parcel carried to the other side of the city : the clerk touches an electric bell once, and in two minutes a bright, cleanly-dressed lad stands at the counter, waiting his instructions. In the same way a hack carriage is called, or a police man summoned.

The company which arranges all this supplies the battery and dial at a small annual charge, and the subscriber uses both as and when he pleases. A still more useful novelty we noticed in full operation at New York, and afterwards at Chicago and San [chap. 8 OREGON. Francisco. This is the self-acting fire-alarm. In the upper corner of every room and corridor of the hotel, in many shops, offices, and warehouses, is fixed a modest looking dial-case, about five inches square. It is hardly noticed as one enters the room. But day and night a watch is kept. Let the temperature in the neighbourhood of the little apparatus rise to 140 degrees, that is, let a fire break out in or near the room, and the electric connection is automatically made, and the alarm flashes to the nearest fire-engine station, indicating the street, house, and room where the enemy is at work.

Here also the company owning the patent receives a small annual sum, and supplies and keeps in order the little machine. About seven o'clock we had the family coach once again, and rumbled and jolted to the Jersey City ferry. In company with several other coaches and waggons, and in a crowd of seventy or eighty people, we got on to the huge ferry-boat really without knowing it. We had parted from the land and were well out in the stream before we saw that we had started. The machinery is hidden from the passengers' view, and makes very little noise: the horses '■] THE TRAVELLERS. 9 were unconcernedly resting and blinking: passengers were chatting, newsboys everywhere with the evening papers, and in a few minutes we landed as easily as we embarked, and took our places in the train. Each place and berth in the long sleeping-car being numbered and specially set apart previously for its occupant, there was no scrambling or confusion; and we were soon curiously scanning the faces of our fellow-passengers, of whom we were to see so much for the next seven days.

But it is time to label separately the members of our party, since the experience of each on the journey differed according to character, temper, and history. It was a number of strange chances which had brought together the naturalist, the captain, the lawyer, and the American Confederate colonel. The first had journeyed round the world and seen many men, many manners; the second had served the Queen long, and passed some years in India; the third came straight from the worry and bustle of London Hfe ; the fourth had travelled more than the traveller, fought more than the soldier, schemed and struggled more than the lawyer. When one man's tongue was tired another took up the talk ; and OREGON. [chap. 10 when the three Englishmen gave in, the colonel was ready, with a fiery tale of the civil war, with incidents of prison life, with experiences in both hemispheres, with sporting life in Australia, India, and his native America, North and South — so that one way or other topics never failed.

The colonel left us by an earlier train to visit his friends in Baltimore and join our train in the night at Harrisburg — so the three Englishmen entered the train at eight alone : tickets they had for train and sleeping-berths ; but their mentor having left them before the tickets were obtained, the firstfruits of the thieving agent's tricks appeared. Showing their tickets, they asked for their places ; the negro porter pointed out one section for the four travellers : the two narrow seats below drawn out and joined made but one average-sized bed : the tray which was lowered overhead showed but one similar sized bed : so where were the four to sleep? The agent had sold "berths" instead of "sections," thus giving but one half of the accommodation they supposed they were to get. Every other sleeping-berth in the Pullman cars was taken, so there was nothing for it but to draw lots '■] NIGHT TRAVELLING. 11 who should pass the night in the day-car: the soldier -lost, and so dozed, and smoked, and grizzled all night long on the seats where one can neither lie along nor rest.

Every one has heard described the cars, twice as long as our English carriages, with passage down the middle open throughout the train, and free to "conductors," as the guards are called, and to passengers of every grade in life. But the scene as night comes on is strange. The passenger calls the negro porter and tells him to get the bed ready. Clearing the double seats of the section of the books, bags, work, newspapers, and any other litter with which they are strewed, the porter drags the two seats together till they meet; from the locker under each seat he draws pillows and blankets; then reaching up, he turns a handle in the sloping panel overhead and draws down a shelf, forming thus the upper berth. There are stored two mattresses and other bed clothes. Curtains are slipped on to the rods running the length of the carriage, and there are at once two rows of berths completely curtained off the one from the other, and the central passage through the car left clear. [chap. 12 OREGON.

Going to bed is a ticklish business. You disappear behind your curtains and roll into your lower berth or clamber into your upper one ; but what then ? Coats and waistcoats are easily doffed ; but there is only just room to sit, with feet stretched out : the position does not adapt itself to the farther opera tions of the toilet; consequently much agitation of the curtains and many grunts and groans disclose the sufferings of your neighbours. If you are in the upper berth, a smart shock from below shows you that the gentleman on the ground floor has not judged distance correctly with his head : if in the lower berth the shelf over your head creaks and groans till you expect a sudden fall in dry goods. Meanwhile the carriage rocks and tumbles along, and the Britisher is saying to himself, " Not much palace about this car — the line's not equal to the North-Western — talk of smooth travelling indeed !

" But the longest night ends at last, and each traveller tries to forestall his neighbour at the washing-basins at the far end of the car. The porter puts away the beds, and the day is begun. The morning after we left New York was lovely, >■] NEW YORK TO CHICAGO. 13 and we looked with curious eyes to mark the differences and resemblances between home and here. The fields were larger, the farming not so neat, more weeds, less grass; the hedges were absent, their places being taken by snake fences made of zigzag interwoven logs, seven logs in height, and each link in the zigzag about eight feet long. Then the wooden houses with shingled roofs gave no idea of solid permanence to an English eye, but suggested rather the here to-day, there to-morrow, of a race always stretching forwards to new and better lands, and building and farming for themselves, and not for their grandchildren.

The nights were lighted with the fire flies dancing round every bush : the sunsets were resplendent with clouds of the deepest red. Travelling on these lines even so far West as to Omaha is further made easy by the hotel cars attached to each train. Very cheap and excellent meals are served, and the hotel car is joined to the rear of the train from six in the morning till eight at night. The travelling kitchens are wonders of compact and clever stowage, and all the dishes of the season are served, with the pleasant accompaniments OREGON. [chap. of clean tablecloths and bright glass and silver, and active, black-faced, white-jacketed waiters. We passed Pittsburg, with its coal mines and furnaces, the whole tract resembling the district between Rotherham and Sheffield. The great round-house at the station with its many engines, each in its stall, waiting its turn for the road, was a striking object; though we little thought how soon it would be in flames, and one hundred and one engines burned into shapeless twisted masses of steel and brass in the labour riots, but a few weeks after our visit.

After passing for many hours through undulating country, with miles and miles of wheat and Indian corn, dotted everywhere with farms, we approached Chicago. The hills and rugged ground were flattened out into wide fertile plains, and we got our first glimpse of Lake Michigan. The line approached the water: other lines met and joined ours, several crossing at right angles on the level: the masts of the shipping and piles of lumber, with huge grain-elevators, showed us what a centre of life and bustle we were entering : then the train ran along the streets, the great bell on I] CHICAGO. 15 the engine continually clanging to warn passers-by off the unfenced railway, and we entered a dingy, smoke-stained terminus. The passengers and luggage going West were transferred in omnibuses and waggons across the city to the terminus of the Chicago and North- Western line, and we found our way to an hotel for a much-needed bath and breakfast.

As we crossed the city we looked in vain for traces of the fire. The new buildings of brick and stone surpassed those of New York in size and costliness ; we passed a gap showing a lower level of three or four feet, and were told that the whole city had been rebuilt on this fresh-brought layer of soil, to raise the streets and houses by so much above the level of the lake. The streets were thronged like those of Liverpool ; at the bridges in several places the vehicles were formed by the police into lines to pre vent blocks ; the foot-passengers jostled each other in crowds. A Chicago man in the train had told us, " I guess Chicago is the most money-making city in the United States ; " certainly it needed some attraction of that nature to overcome the drawbacks of [chap. I. 16 OREGON. position on a perfect flat just on a level with the lake. Two hours there sufficed us ; and we were all glad enough to find our places for the next long stage in our journey — Chicago to Omaha. II.]. IOWA 17

Chapter II

Leaving Chicago about one o'clock by the Chicago and North-Western Line, we very soon lost sight of the lake and passed through an undulating, well wooded and watered country for many miles. Then, crossing the Mississippi, we entered on vast plains of rich, dark soil, dotted everywhere with white farm houses, each surrounded with its plantation of rapidly growing cottonwood-trees. Wide-stretching fields of wheat, Indian-corn, clover, and oats reached as far from the railroad-line as we could see; and so across the State of Iowa. Villages were growing up round every station; in each the church, the school, the liquor store, the black smith's shop, and the store where agricultural machinery of ail kinds was exposed for sale, were conspicuous. Everywhere advertisements of the Buck-eye Reaper and the Champion Plough were displayed, and these c [chap. OREGON. 18 disputed every blank wall and fence with a notice of a knife-polish.