Page:Centennial History of Oregon 1811-1912, Volume 1.djvu/130

 om the move-

ment until Commodore Sloat had landed his marines and raised the American flag. Then Fremont became the leader of the Ide rebels and rendered some as- sistance in making California an American state.

To the men and women of this age the account of the Hunt party and others will not appear as fairy stories, but rather as a hideous phrensy of a diseased or intoxicated imagination. But few people can comprehend it, and not a few may disbelieve it altogether. But only by such dangers, trials and privations of those fearless, self-sacrificing heroes was Oregon saved to the United States. There is now no more West ; there is no more wilderness ; there is no more privation, danger or heroism. The palace car glides swiftly from the Missouri to the great Pacific ocean ; the traveler reclines on luxurious couches ; a colored porter attends to every whim of a satiated appetite ; instead of deserts, mountains, savages and grizzlies, he sees but a procession of peaceful homes and bustling cities. There is no other West, or desert, or mountains, savage beast or Indian foe to conquer and reclaim — and no more heroes.

We have given this much of the first expeditions to Oregon, and the fortunes of the first commercial venture to open commerce with this country and the strug- gles of the brave and invincible men who did this pioneering, so that those now here in great prosperity from that feeble beginning of trade, and those who go down to the sea in ships may see how the great work was started, and all the more appreciate and honor the sturdy men who started it. Persons who would like to read the whole story of Astor's venture to the Columbia and the betrayal and loss of his property at Astoria, will find it most interesting reading and fully and graphically portrayed in Franchere's narrative, and in Washington Irving 's As- toria. Mr. Elwood Evans, in his history of the northwest, fairly and .justly sums up the character of Astor 's enterprise as follows :

"The scheme was grand in its aim. magnificent in its breadth of purpose and area of operation. Its results were naturally feasible and not ovei'-anticipated. Astor made no miscalculation, no omission ; neither did he permit a sanguine hope to lead him into any wild or imaginary venture. He was practical, gener- ous, broad. He executed what Sir Alexander Mackenzie urged as the policy of British capital and enterprise. That one American citizen should have individu- ally undertaken what two mammoth British companies had not the courage to try, was but an additional cause which had intensified national prejudice into embittered jealousy on the part of bis British rivals. ' '