Page:Oregon Historical Quarterly vol. 7.pdf/441

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"Morning and evening the hills throw welcome shadows."

Many will recall the delicious humor of "Elizabeth," whose letters from "The Pointed Firs" were published from time to time in the Oregonian. Later, they were collected into book form and brought out under the title, "Letters from an Oregon Ranch," by Katherine. Now "Katherine" is "Elizabeth," and "Elizabeth" is "Katherine," and the book belongs to the very small flock of "Oregon Classics." Would you live again an evening by an Oregon fireside with the rain dripping outside, would you see an Oregon Spring in bridal beauty dressed, would you know the mysteries of Oregon hillside and woodland, of waterfall and brooklet, read Katherine-Elizabeth. This charming book with its laughable associations, its pathos and its native art, its poesy and its prose, is really the high water mark of Oregon literary achievement. No library of the Pacific Northwest can claim to be up to date without this volume, beautiful in tint and print, in holiday dress and filled with the delicate perfume of pear and plum and apple blossoms. In it we hear again the carol of blue jays and wild canaries, in short, it is the Oregon book. If the East knows little of Oregon and cares less, if Oregon herself ignores her artists with pen and brush, where then shall come our place on the literary map of the nation? When something so really precious lies unheralded on the shop shelves, and our Christmas shoppers load up with cheap eastern novels, one might be pardoned for encouraging all authors to move back to "the effete east" where at least literature finds its author recognition. As a matter of loyalty every Oregonian should own a copy of the inimitable Katherine-Elizabeth's "Letters from an Oregon Ranch."

Eva Emery Dye.

McDonald of Oregon. A tale of Two Shores. By Author:Eva Emery Dye. (Chicago. A. C. McClurg & Co. 1906. Pp. 395.)

A tremendous task is essayed in this book, for the sub-title, "A Tale of Two Shores," more truly indicates its scope than does its main title. The four parts to the work are given as "The Fur Traders"