Page:All Over Oregon and Washington.djvu/195

Rh than the prairie, and better adapted to fruit-growing or the pasturage of stock.

Washington County has Columbia County, to the north, between it and the Columbia River; the Coast Mountains, to the west, between it and the sea; and a high ridge dividing it from Multnomah County and the Wallamet River. South of it, and separated from it by the Chehalem Mountains, lies the famous County of Yamhill. There are probably 350,000 acres in Washington County, of which about one-sixteenth is under cultivation, and five-sixteenths timber.

Hillsboro, the county-seat, is a small and quiet town on a branch of the Tualatin River; not notable, nor particularly handsome in its location. Forest Grove, six miles south-west of Hillsboro, is, on the contrary, beautifully located, near the base of a mountain spur, and is a thriving place, with an academic air. Forest Grove is the seat of the Pacific University—a college under the patronage of the Congregational Church. The present buildings, three in number, are of wood, sufficiently commodious to accommodate the present wants of the country. The Professorships are all filled with men of ability, and the University Library is a valuable one. This college first conferred the degree of A.B., in 1862, upon Mr. Harvey Scott, the present chief editor of the Oregonian newspaper, who has kindly furnished us the following notes on the university: "The project of establishing an institution of learning at Forest Grove can scarcely be said to have had its origin as a missionary enterprise, as was notably the case with the educational work at Salem, under direction of the Methodist Episcopal Church, which developed into Wallamet University. Nevertheless, men who came out to