Page:History of Oregon Literature.djvu/200

 madly along, as if impatient to meet the embrace of the ocean. Above our heads, the peak of the mountain towered sublimely; its snow glittering in the departing rays of the sunlight.

The day died slowly away, and our camp-fire was soon in a cheerful blaze, for the icy breath of the mountain came down upon us with such a chilling effect, as to huddle us together within its comfortable vicinage. We could not but be impressed with the novelty of our situation. Here we were beside an object that had been visible to us at least a hundred miles distant; an object of interest, for we knew that beyond it was our new home—the country of our adoption, and that when we reached it, our long and wearisome journey would be, comparatively speaking, at an end. We were but seven souls, deep in the heart of the great wilderness, far from kindred and friends, and the enjoyments of civilized life, yet we had an unshaken confidence in that protecting Power in the hollow of whose hand we stood.

Our forms were soon stretched at length, and our heads pillowed upon the bosom of that mountain that had been with us for so long a period an object of desired attainment, for the "day had touched the hem of night's argment and tired and fatigued sunk into her concealing lap"; and there she was, enthroned upon Mount Hood, in her ebon mantle, 'in her starry crown, with eternal quiet upon her countenance."

From the great length of the journey from the United States to the Willamette valley, the many rivers to cross and mountains to climb, it is but reasonable to suppose that emigrants would meet with many accidents, and suffer many losses in its accomplishment. To lessen these casualties to