Page:McLoughlin and Old Oregon.djvu/15



IXTY years ago, on a green terrace sloping up from the north bank of the Columbia, not far from the mouth of the Willamette, lay old Fort Vancouver. It might be likened to the Dutch stockade at New Amsterdam, or to a rude stronghold of central Europe in the middle ages, with a little village clustered under its guns.

Fort Vancouver was fortified in primitive fashion. There was a stout palisade of fir posts, twenty feet high, sharpened at both ends and driven into the ground. There were thick double-ribbed and riveted gates in front and rear, ornamented with brass padlocks and ponderous keys. A grim old three-storied log tower formed a bastion at the northwest corner, bristling with portholes and cannon. Some rough-hewn stores, magazines, and workshops were ranged inside the enclosure, with an open court in the middle where the Indians brought their game and peltries. Directly opposite the main entrance stood the governor's residence, a somewhat pretentious two-story structure of heavy timber, mortised Canadian fashion, and painted white. Here Dr. John McLoughlin, governor of the Hudson's Bay Company west of the Rocky Mountains,