Page:History of Oregon Literature.djvu/366

 it aside to respond to the inspiration that was heavy upon him to write what was to turn out to be one of the famous and enduring books of American fiction.

In August, 1887, he took a vacation trip to British Columbia and while there he wrote the opening chapters of The Bridge of the Gods. He finished the book at Hood River, working on it for two years before he thought it was good enough to submit to a publisher. During that time he was full of it. He talked about it to several friends and read it to some for their opinion. In the later editions the dedication is left out. In the first edition it was dedicated to Mrs. Almeda Hodge Barrett. She was a woman of education, the wife of a pioneer physician, living near Hood River. She spent a great deal of time with him in correcting and revising the manuscript. Finally it was as good as both of them could make it. It was copied and sent off. He waited in suspense; it came back; he sent it off again. It was a routine to which he was to become calloused before it ended. It made many trips to many publishers and was always rejected. He began to despair of ever seeing it in print, when at last and considerably to his surprise, so accustomed had he become to getting it back, it was accepted by A. C. McClurg & Company of Chicago. But they wanted another title. While traveling about as a manuscript among the publishers it had borne the title Cecil Gray, the Missionary. It was Mrs. Barrett who suggested the name The Bridge of the Gods.

It was published in September, 1890, in a first edition of 1500 copies—a brown book with an Indian picture stamped on the front cover. It immediately