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About The west shore. (Portland, Or.) 1875-1891 | View Entire Issue (March 1, 1876)
THE WEST SHORE. WHICH? The following tells its own story, and a beautiful one it is, too to be read best, and sounding sweetest when the family circle have gathered around the evening lamp. It cannot but touch a father's or a mother's heart, and make them appreciate the more their household darlings : 'Which shall it be P Which aholl it be?" I looked at John, John looked at me. (Dear patient John, who loves roe yet, As well as though my locks were jet,) And whn I found that I muat speak, My voice seemed strangely low and weak : "Tell me again what Robert said," And then I, litt'ning, bent my head "This is his letter." "1 will give A house and land while yon shall live, It, in re tarn, from out your seven, One child to me for aye is given." I looked at John's old garments worn, I thought of all that John hod borne Of poverty, and work, and care, Which I, though willing, could not share ; I thought of seven mouths to feed, Of seven little children'., need, And then of this. Come, John," said I, "Well choose among them as they lie ' Asleep," so, walking hand in hand, . Dear John and I surveyed our band, First to the cradle lightly stepped, Where Lillian, the baby, slept, A glory 'gainst the pillow white. Softly her father stooped, to lay His rough hand down its loving way, When dream or whisper made her stir, And huskily he said, "Not her not her." We stooped beside the trundle bed, And one long ray of lamplight shed Athwart the boyish faces there, In sleep so pitiful and fair ; I saw on Jamie's rough red cheek A tear undried. Ere John could speak 'He's but a baby, too," said I, And kissed him as we hurried by. Pale, patient Bobbie's angel face Still in his sleep bora suffering's trace. "No, for a thousand crowns, not him." He whispered, while our eyes were dim. Poor Dick I bad Dick I our wayward son, Turbulent, reckless, idle one Could he be spared f "Nay, He who gave Bids us befriend him to the grave ; Only a mother's heart can be Patient enough for such as he. "And so," said John, "I would not dare To send him from hor bedside prayer." Then stole we softly up above, And knelt by Mary, child of love. "Perhaps for her 'twould better be," I said to John. Quite silently He lifted up a ourl that lay Across her cheek in wilful way, Atid shook his head. "Nay, love, not thee," The while my heart beat audibly. Only one more, our eldest lad, Trusty, faithful, good and glad So like his father. "No, John, no I cannot, will not, let him go." And so we wrote in courteous way, We could not give oue child away, And afterward toil lighter seemed, Thinking of that which we dreamed, Happy, in truth, that not one face We missed from its accustomed place : Thankful to work for all the seven, Trusting the rest to One in Heaven. THE LAND OF BUNCH CRASS. From the OregonlRi), A good many years ago we lived in Kastern Oregon, the land of clear skies and bunch gra.su. It is a goodly country to live in, so we thought then, especially in the way of sunshine which is a rare lux ury in the W'ebfoot nation and beef steak, which is a desideratum in all civilized countries. But we shared the then uni versal opinion that for purely agricultural purposes the land of clear skies and bunch grass must prove a failure. True, there were good productive farms along the nar row bottoms, where the mountain streams meander through the hills and high table lands, and it had been sufficiently demon strated that in the same localities excellent fruit could be raised. But these little val leys comprised but a small part of the country, altogether inadequate to the pur poses of extensive agriculture. Hence the idea that that vast region must remain for ever or until the grass was eaten and tramped out merely a pasture for cattle. We have just returned from a visit to the bunch grass country, in the course of which we found that a change had come over the spirit of the dreams of that region, and things were not as they "used to were." There is bunch grass there yet, and cattle in great abundance, and the skies are bright as ever. There are farms and orchards where there were farms and orchards; but they are no longer confined to the narrow valleys. They have crept up the hillsides. They have squared themselves over the "lower benches" instead of following the sinuous courses of the creeks. They have multiplied in number and spread them selves out upon the derated plains. And they have, by this last movement, shown how fallacious the old notion was. The uplands of Eastern Oregon are good grain lands. They arc good agricultural lands generally. They are fit for wheat and oats and barley and vegetables and orchards. Wherever water can be got for ordinal' uses the farmer may safely count on as good returns for his labor as on the lower lands, except in respect of those crops that require irrigation. It is a demonstrated fact that Eastern Oregon is to be a great farming country. It is often said down here that the stock business in Eastern Oregon is overdone the range eaten out. That is a mistake. There are sections where the grass is about gone, but they are comparatively small sec tions. Not the tenth nor the twentieth blade of grass is ever cropped. Of course the most choice stock ranches are occu pied. The pioneers are justly entitled to the first choice and they get it. But there are plenty of places for good stock farms left. Between The Dalles and the Des chutes, over toward the Tygh, or the plains beyond White river, there is room for thou sands of settlers, where they could get belter homes than in the northwestern States of the Mississippi valley. The country is only waiting for people sturdy, industrious people, who are willing to work, who do not expect to reap without sowing. Improvement goes slowly in the farming of Eastern Oregon. The want of conven ient markets for the products of the farm and garden prevents rhe, rapid develop ment of this kind of industry, but there is growth. The farms are not only more numerous, but are better tilled. The local demand for their product increases gradu ally, and the increase is more than met by increased production. In the Tygh valley the farms are looking quite farm-like. They have a good flouring mill situated at the falls of White river a hundred per cent the handsomest waterfall in Oregon by the way where the wheat crop of the region round about is marketed. This is quite an item to that part of the country. But the great staple of Eastern Oregon is stock horned cattle, sheep, horses. They are to the country what the mines used to be, and more. Everybody talks of stock and nearly everybody owns stock. This is, and will be for a long time, the principal source of wealth. Bunch grass is the mine that is worked with least labor and exiense, and with greatest profit. GROWING OLD. How strange our ideas of growing old cliange as we get on in life I To the girl in her 'teens the riper maiden of twenty five seems quite aged, Twenty-two thinks thirty-five an "old thing." Thirty-five dreads forty, but congratulates herself that there may still remain some ground to be possessed in the fifteen years before the half centuryshall be attained. But fifty does not by any means give up the battle of life. It feels middle aged and vigorous, and thinks old age is a long way in the future. Sixty remembers those who have done great things at threescore, and one doubts if Parr, when he was married at one hundred, had at all begun to feel him self an old man. It it the desire of life in us w hich makes us feel young so long. Many a man who would roll up his eyes I in terror at the idea of stealing a nickel will swoop down on a silk umbrella worth I $10, and march off with his lips moving ' peacefully as it in prayer. HOW MESSAGES ARE SENT BY THE OCEAN CABLE. The ocean telegraph operator taps, the "key" as in a land telegraph, only it is a double key. It has two levers and knobs instead of one. The alphabet used is sub stantially the same as the Morse alpliabci that is, the different letters are repre sented by a combination of dashes and dots. For instance, suppose you want to write the word "boy." It would read like B is one dash and three dots; 0, three dashes; and Y, one dash, one dot, and three dashes. Now. in the land telegraph, the dashes and the dots would appear on the strip of paper at the other end of the line, which is unwound from a cylin der, and perforated by a pin at the end of the bar or armature. If the operator could read by sound, we would dispense with the strip of paper, and read the message by the "click" of the armature as it is pulled down and let go by the electric magnet. The cable operator, however, has neither of these advantages. There is no paper to perforate, no click of the armature, and no armature to click. The message is read by means of a moving flash of light upon a polished scale produced by the "deflection of a very small mirror," which is placed within a "mirror galvanometer," which is a small brass cylinder two or three inches in diameter, shaped like a spool or bobbin, composed of several hundred turns of small wire wound with silk to keep the metal from coming in contact. It is wound or coiled exactly like a bundle of new ropc,-a small hole being left in the middle about the size of a common wooden pencil. In the centre of this is suspended a very thin, del icate mirror about as large as a kernel of corn, with a correspondingly small magnet rigidly attached to the back of it. The whole weiglis but a little more than a grain, 'and is suspended by a single fibre of silk, much smaller than a human liair, and al most invisible. A narrow horizontal scale is placed within a darkened box two or three feet in front of the mirror, a narrow slit being cut in the centre of the scale to allow a ray of light to shine upon the mir ror from a lamp placed behind said scale, the little mirror in turn reflecting the light back upon the scale. The spot of light upon the scale is the index by which all messages arc read. The angle through which the ray moves is double that tra versed by the mirror itself, and it is, there fore, really equivalent to an index four or six feet in length, without weight. To the casual observer there is nothing but a thin ray of light, darting to the right and left, with irregular rapidity ; but to the trained eye of the ojierator every (lash is replete with intelligence. Thus the word "boy," already alluded to, would read in this way : One flash to the right and three to the left is B. Three flashes to the right is 0. One to the right, one to the left and two more to the right is Y, and soon. Long and constant practice makes the operators wonderfully expert in their profession, and enables them to read from the mirror as readily and as accurately as from a newspaper. Ot: Wealth. The land in cultivation in Oregon and the products thereof, and the stock raised and gold mined thereon, if divided among the voters of the State would give to each the following: zi acres of land, 193 bushels wheat, 110 bushels barley, 6 tons of hay, 69 pounds of wool, 8 dollars in gold dust, 4 bushels corn, 19 head of sheep, 4 head of hogs, 3 head of horses and mules, 10 head of cattle, 1 pound of tobacco, 19 bushels of potatoes, 43 bushels of applet, 3,617 feet of lum ber, 7 pounds of cheese, 57 poundt of but ter, making $1,479 5 to each voter, inde pendent of coin. We challenge any State in the Union to equal this showing. Why are tom-catt so musical ? Because the' are all fiddle-tiring, inside. 3 ' DAVE CAFFIN'S GROUSE. Dave Calfin, who keeps a boarding house at Emigrant Gap, on the Central Pacific Railroad, is very hard of hearing can hardly hear anything that is not shout ed in his ear. Dave is fond of hunting, and very often takes his gun and scouts about the mountains in search of grouse, quail and other game. A Comstockcr who was snow-bound at Cisco for a day or two last week tells the following story about Caffin : He had been out hunting and was going home with a grouse he had killed. As he came out of the wood and struck the railroad track he was overtaken by a stranger, who asked: "How far is it to Cisco i" "Yes," said Dave, holding up his grouse, "I got one of 'em." "I don't think you understand me," said the stranger : "I asked how far it was to Cisco." "Yes, he's pretty fat,'t said Have, "he'll make a very good stew." "You must be a d d fool I" cried the stranger. "Certainly, certainly I" said Dave; "there's a good many of 'em flyin' alow this year." lirginia Enttrprist, CLOSING CRACKS IN STOVES. It may he convenient to know a ready method of closing up cracks, which are not uncommon, in cast iron stoves; and we are assured that the following recipe a reliable one. Good wood ashes arc to be sifted through a fine sieve, to which fe added the same quantity of clay, finely pulverized, together with a little tail. The mixture is to be moistened with watet enough to make a paste, and the crack of the stove filled with it. This cement don not peel off or break away, and assumes an extreme degree of hardness after beita; heated. The stove must be cool when the application is made. The same substance may be used in setting in the plates of stove, or in fitting stove-pipes, serving to render all the joints perlcctly light. POSTAL CARDS. What rights in courtesy have letter writers who do not consider their corres pondents of inqmrtance enough to give their epistles to them the poor compliment of an enclosure? How is a communi cation to be entertained when the writer confesses by the postal card that it isn't worth a sheet of pacr and a postage stamp ? That the postal card is very useful for circular notes, for announcements, for communicating any simple fact that doc not call for a response, no one can deny. But we submit lliat social custom ought to establish that a missive of this kind calling for a response, excepting on business mat ters concerning the recipient, is an imper tinence: and that a postal card partaking of the nature of correspondence as ordi narily understood, is entitled to no respect, or consideration whatever. TEST FOR PURnVoFWATKH. A glass tube of about a yard in length, closed at the end by a cork, and renting uimn a white dish of rcclain, is recom mended for determining the purity of water, as the slightest tint is seen again the white ground, and the different sMr indicate different ingredients. A green tinge is produced by minute alga: ; a white oiocity often by fungoid growths, iron salts by a peculiar ochry color, The apnratia is termed the chromiomctcr. Exphiikcie. "IJid you ever break a yoke of four-year-old steers?" asked a Rock county, Iowa, farmer of 1 young Janesvillc chap, who wanted to inar7 ha daughter. "No, I never did," was the meek reply, "but I liave rode a mule in a circus." "No other experience," said the Granger, "could qualify you, young man, for trying to handle tliat girl," and the tad youth deiarted. Many 1 woman who knows how to drcti herself, don't know how to dress a chicken.