Page:Oregon Historical Quarterly vol. 9.djvu/32



Thirty miles south of the mouth of the Columbia River the Oregon coast line, which for a greater part of the distance has been composed of picturesquely rugged headlands and most charming stretches of ocean beach, swings around the sacred mountain Nekahnie, of the Indians, and spreads out within a distance of two or three miles into a flat, sandy spit which serves to separate Nehalem Bay from the Pacific. Here is a spot not only beautiful in its surroundings, but rich in mysterious legends of shipwreck and buried treasure, as well as vague traditions regarding the first comings of white men to the great Northwest. There are now, to be sure, no certain relics of the shipwrecks, and about all that remains to recall the traditions are occasional pieces of wax, rescued from the sands of the spit, perchance, by a passer-by. It is of this wax particularly that the present article will deal, for it has long been a subject of interest, speculation, and even of warm controversy. In this substance many have tried to fathom an ancient mystery of the sea; others have hoped to find it a guiding index to a vault in Nature's treasure house. It has been at once an enigma to the theorizing antiquarian, the despair of the sordid promoter, and the solace of the newspaper space writer. Yet when all of the evidence bearing upon the matter is summarized the enigmatical aspects of the question are seen to disappear almost entirely.

For our first historical mention of this wax deposit we are indebted to that admirable representative of the Northwest Company, Alexander Henry, who, in company with David Thompson, official geographer of the same company, made an expedition down the Columbia to the present site