Page:Oregon Historical Quarterly vol. 7.pdf/109

Rh settlers with articles of merchandise, and to trade with foreign ports.

Having obtained a skiff at the Fort, belonging to Oregon City, we went down the River six miles, to the upper mouth of the Willammette. The lower mouth comes into the Columbia twenty miles below, making Sophia's Island. The hills are very high on the West side of the River; but rise gradually, and are covered with dense forests of Pine. We had but little difficulty in ascending the Willammette, there being not much current until we came within one and a half miles of the Falls, where we found a strong Rapid, at the junction of the Clackamas; a small, but rapid River, coming in from the East. Here we were obliged to get out into the water, and draw our boat with a cord, several hundred yards.

Having passed these rapids, we arrived, in a few minutes, at Oregon City, situated at the Falls of the Willammette, the place of our destination. This was the 13th of November, 1843, and it was five months and nineteen days after we left Independence, in Missouri. Here we were able to procure such things as were really necessary to make us comfortable; and, what was most especially pleasing to us, an abundance of substantial food. We enjoyed that plenty which, until now, we had long been strangers to; and were happy, after a long and tedious tour, over mountains and deserts, through a wild and savage wilderness, to witness, upon these distant shores, the home of Civilization. To see houses, farms, mills, storehouses, shops; to hear the busy hum of industry; the noise of the workman's hammer; the sound of the woodman's axe; the crash of the falling pines; and to enjoy the warm welcome of countrymen and friends. How grateful these circumstances were to us, he who had never passed the bounds of Civilization, or forsaken the parental roof, can never know. We had been here but a short time, before the last