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and whence another voyage had to be undertaken in such poor craft as could be constructed or hired, taking weeks to complete this portion of the long journey from the states, in the late and rainy months of the year ; the oxen and herds being driven down to Vancouver on the north side of the river, or being left in the upper country to be herded by the Indians. The rear of the immigration of 1844 remained at Whitman s mission over winter, and several families at The Dalles. The larger body of 1845 divided, some coming down the river, and others crossing the Cascade mountains by two routes, but each enduring the extreme of misery. John Minto, then a young man, says of 1844: "I found men in the prime of life lying among the rocks (at the Cascades), seeming ready to die. I found there mothers with their families, whose hus bands were snowbound in the Cascade mountains, with out provisions, and obliged to kill and eat their game dogs. * * There was scarcely a dry day, and the

snow line was nearly down to the river." These scenes were repeated in 1845 with a greater number of sufferers, one wing of the long column taking a cut-off by follow ing which they became lost, and had all but perished in a desert country. "Despair settled upon the people; old men and children wept together, and the strongest could not speak hopefully." "Only the women," says one nar rator, " continued to show firmness and courage."

The perils and pains of the Plymouth Rock pilgrims were not greater than those of the pioneers of Oregon, and there are few incidents in history more profoundly sad than the narratives of hardships undergone in the settle ment of this country. The names of the men who pioneered the wagon rpad around the base of Mount Hood are worthy of all remembrance. They were Joel Palmer, Henry M. Knighton, W. H. Rector, and Samuel K. Barlow in partic ular; but there were many others, even women, who crossed the mountains late in the year of 1845 on pack horses, barely escaping starvation through the exertions