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About The west shore. (Portland, Or.) 1875-1891 | View Entire Issue (Sept. 1, 1879)
The West Shoee. VOL. 5 No. 5). j Sail I. imlilkltrr. In Miuitaii HI. Portland, Oregon, September 1H7!. IV. AltmtM. I hlHgl . ...l. . not .i yoi.i Utift. X,,itl l ,1 ml Nhorr.' i n. I i.K our yrnr's ratuplrit i ii in In r, rr u r.n.lj lur .1. in.-. , mm. I w III l. ,., ,,,,,, ,.i,i. ( ,,liy flw m i . . ipi l a. Tin: GREAT ULTIMATUM, 11V I . I'. VKNKN. Tin' first nomtdlc mania in tin- world WM the mania for going west. Even long prior to the dissolution of staid, patriarchal forms of government, a strange infatuation seems to have pos sessed the human mind. Then, as now, that vociferation. "Westward, ho!" was the shibboleth of enterprise among the children of men. As the SUM rose in the east and set in the west, so did the great trend of the world's early population point towards the setting sun. We do not undertake to explain this Irrepressible occidental tendency on the part of the world's humanity, hut that it always has existed and is so now, there is no question. The dim nal ro tation of the earth from west to cast is not a more positive fixture in the economy of the solar system, than is the tendency of human enterprise to gravitate towards the mysterious west When Ood called Abraham and that primitive emigrant Journeyed with his family from the land of his father, la set his la.e towards what was to him the unexplored West. After wander ing forty years in the wilderness of Syria, the children of Isiacl 000001 mated their homestretch by fording, wt tward, the river that separated them from the promised land, the grand fulfillment of nil their hope. Tin- magi of the east journeyed wt i "aid in qtMWt of the bab of It.-thlc hem. Xerxes led the Persian host, weslwanl when be nnaded tiicc. , The Culminating stiokc of Julius C.esai's eventful career N as M carry still westward the germs of Latin civil ization and refinement anil plant them in the soil of ancient Britain. The western empire of Rome was but (be outgrowth of the maturity and gradual decay of Eastern magnificence. Ma homet lb'1 westward to escajso the lynch law of righteous indignation s hi.h bad vn raised against bim in Mecca. Columbus boldly steered his little licet into the heart of the uu known and mysterious western ocean, to seek and open unto mankind a new world. The pilgrims came west in ipiesi of religious and political lilicrty. And so, west, west, west, from the Orient to the Occident, has been the watchword from ancient to medi.rwd times, nnd thence to the present dav. Amid all this curious progression which We have thus traced for cen turies, and whose current we find inlin itcly stronger to-day than e ei bclore, there have been successive stopping pi. iii s relay, as il were, or goals to attain which, it has engrowed and taxed the ambition of the thousands and tens of thousands who haw- hern drawn into the surging tide and become a part and parcel of its accumulated mass. After what has U-rn said, let no one be startled when we say that we verity believe there is a grandct and more glorious future in Wilting lot the Pacific mast than ffaf any other portion of the habitable globt . In point of fact, the lively buidru o that tout-inspiring legend, " Wi'sUsanl the iln of main lLc Il ," is no mole a living pi csen, , tOdt than it was in the earliest ages of civil ization Away up in the mountains then- is tin source of a mighty river. A thou sand little rivulets take then use in the v alb v s o the loot hills, and go darning and sauntering down to the sleeping plains below thence, after meandering through the alluvium of vcidaiil mead ows and grain Ileitis, I bet an- finally lost in the broad rivei that rolls in stately grandeur to the oenn. Each tiny rill brings down its qooti of earthy and organic parti. Ie, which, alter past ipg through an infinitude of tortuous windings, in at last dcpmitiil upon that common lendevoiis, the delta, So have we often conceived it In lie with modern immigration. The Pa cific coast is the ultimate delta of this jjreat river of throbbing humanity, which we have traced through a thou and winding, .no, tl,o rirctirflfer rnao of the jflotie. Here, in the final sunset laud, of forjwucc, tho rende- vous of nations. When we cak of the " Pacific coast," how many of our friends cleaily understand the true lm poit of the term ? Think, one mo ment. of our magnificent pi opinions. Prom the snowy crest of the Sierras on the east to the M Peaceful 00080 " on the west; In, in San DiegO, California, on the south to the Slraits of Puca on the north, there is comprised a VariOt of soil, climate and scenery which is exrclled by no othet (Million of the earth! suifacc of similar extent. The Pacific Stales and Teiritories in already rivaling the Atlantic States in many things, Yen by year, and we had almost said day by day, we are becoming more and more inuViH-udcut in nil things that spH-ilaiu to the necessities and pleasures of life, In like manner, Oregon and Washington Territory are fast becoming the puis of California in agricultural and ntln end wealth, as well as in the moral and inlelli-ctu.il eminence of theii snvctcign ptOple. Hut lime and space loibid furthCI discussion nf this intending topic at present. . . Mill X I ADAMS, III n AM SV W. is I V MAN, Ml. il.ims I fort) miles noilli of tin Columbia livei. i'rom one narrow point on the inn dvv ay hi Ivv . . R the months of the Wluic S.ihno I Hood river, Mis. Adams ind Hoed are both visible. In one scene, the cleat, Icy waters of the two little riveta tumbling thrOOgtl then lo. Rj banks, and I licit snowy wnin es Iv ing up among lb- clouds. Tin i the western limit of the sunny " East oftlie Mountains." Down river, the ghostly i loads pect cautiously over the shoejklefS f Hald mountain, and clumber slowly up the pinnatles nf Shell rOati Hut 1 1- sun with Itoty lontempl of these watery visitors from the sea, melts their linger with a (lance, and thry roll down Into the gorges U fund the cliff and hale them selves in III forest. Up rivet, Ih m.I ami bare hill 'lopes palpitate in In tier hlaao, and l he pmr - II taiw r .o-i ik , ofisuanci in ihs Mut'rrsal kuiy