December, 1883
2g8
THE WEST SHORE.
OUR ILLUSTRATIONS.
In his, "The Birth of the Flowers," Moir
gives ui the beautiful thought that as flowers, the
emblem of purity and happiness, bloom at all
seasons, even mid the bleakness of winter, so ev
ery lile, from childhood to the grave, be it appar
ently never so cheerless and harsh, has woven
into it some blossoms of purity and sweetness.
The lines read
" Never quite shall disappear
The Klnrv circling year-
Fade Mull It never quite, 1 1 flowers
An emblem 01 existence hi-;
The golden rod nhall flourish free,
And lauresllnl shall weave bowers
For Winter; while the Christinas roue
Shall blossom, though it be 'mid mows."
Our artist has happily caught the inspiration of
the last two lines and presented in the face of one
of our fairest flowers, to show that even 'mid the
wintry snows of adversity or declining years,
these sweet little blossoms come to cheer and
gladden us.
Our Christmas tree is laden with substantial
presents for all our many friends. Were it within
the power of The West Shore, the actual, tan
gible substance would be given as freely as in our
engraving we bestow the unsubstantial shadow.
As it is, we can only offer our best wishes to all,
with the hope that Father Time will attend to
this matter with the greatest possible dispatc.li,
and to aid him in bis task we promise the hearty
co-operation of The West Shore.
Who can look upon our engravings of " Winter
Sports in Oregon" without being lorcibly struck
wilh the great contrast they present with the out
door amusements of the people in the same lati
tude on the Atlantic side of our continent? In
stead of the sleigh-iide in the frosty air, with its
chinkling bells, muffling robes and wide land
scape of snow, we skim over the smooth water
in the white-winged boat. There the broad sheet
of ice is the racing ground for thousands of swift
skaters, while here, stripped for the contest, the
nimble runners contend on the track for the prite
ol Redness, the rowers test their speed, or oppos
ing nines display their skill at the national game.
Instead of the games played by the warm fire
side, the fisherman angles for the sporting trout
in some sheltered nook, and the hunter seeks the
haunt of the water-fowl, or; rifle in hand, pur
sues the nobler game of the mountains. Even
the artist, with his portable stool and little sketch
ing block, wanders away to some solitude of na
ture and returns with a miniature reflection of
lomr of the many inspiring scenes his eye rests
upon. Such is the contrast but are we happier
by reason of our exemption from snow, ice and
wintry blasts ? As happiness is a condition of
mind, having frequently but little relation to the
condition of the body, we leave the query unan
swered, except to say that we are decidedly more
comfortable, and to the degree that comfort alone
is conducive of happiness we must be certainly
happier. " But it rains all the time," some one
suggests. Ah, yes, so it does, but it has been so
pleasant and sunny tut the past two weeks that
we had quite forgotten.
We can well Imagine that no one will appre
ciate our " Christmas on the Overland Route " to
much as the old pioneers who recently enjoyed
the railroad excursion to the East Though few
emigrants were on the rood in the old days at
Christmas time, yet such scenes as depicted by
our artist were frequent enough to satisfy the most
exacting. Many an emigrant has known what it
is to cook and eat in the open air with snowflakes
flying thickly about him. These, as they dined
luxuriantly in the elegant hotel-car, speeding over
the rails farther in an hour than the ox-team was
wont to go in a day, must have been carried back
in memory from the savory food and elegant table-ware
to the bacon, coffee, water-biscuits and
fingers of camp life. In truth, it is a wonderful
change 5 so wonderful that we of the new gener
ation utterly fail to realize its magnitude.
Like sunbeams fading in the West,
The year is closing fust;
Yet like those beams, may Christmas blest
Still cheer nil at the last
To one who has lived well this life, however
humble his station, the dying year carries away
with it into the unknown no sighs of regret. To
him indeed it " smiles as it draws near its death."
As the cumbrous record of the year U securely
clasped and laid away in the vaults of time, he finds
it unnecessary in the new volume spread out before
him to inscribe upon its pure pages resolutions of
reform. On the contrary, the new record, like
the new ledger opened by the accountant, is but
a continuation of the old volume. But to him
who has failed in his duty the dying year is stern
and reproachful. No smile playes around its lips
nor ray of kindness beams from its fast-closing
eye. Like the bankrupt merchant he lays aside
the old volume in which is entered so sad an array
of debits, and opens a new account with himself
for the succeeding year, in which no balance is
carried from the old tomb which he hopes will
never again have its heavy clasp unfastened. . To
him the new year smiles and beckons with the
finger of hope, while the old one grimly folds its
mantle about its withered form and lies silently
down to its death. To all its readers The West
Shore wishes that the coming year may draw
near to its death with a smile.
Cascades and falls are to be found along the
course of every mountain brook and stream in the
west, and so varied are they in form, and all of
them so beautiful in their graceful outlines or im
posing in their grandeur that it is difficult to
award among them the first prise of merit. One
or more of these has been presented in nearly
every number of The West Shore, and this
month is given an engraving of the Siuslaw, a
stream, flowing through Lane county, Oregon,
from the summit ridges ol the Coast Range into
the Pacific.
The practice of hanging mistletoe on the wall
at Christmas time and the privilege it bestows of
kissing anyone who may be inveigled into pausing
beneath it, is one of the most tenacious of the
holiday customs of our ancestors. The maid
sauntering through the grove with her lover, is
slyly conducted beneath the bunch derjendincr
from the branching limb of a tree, and is then
compelled to yield the reward of his craftiness,
though she generally accepts the situation with at
"sweet resignation," nor can it be said that she
always "goes blindly to her death." When this
device fails the lover is by no means at the end
of his resources. Mistletoe bows are suspended in
every unlooked-for place, and he frequently
wanders about with a small spray concealed in
his hand, which he surreptitiously holds over his
victim's head and claims the forfeit. In our m.
graving we see how the little girl hai In th!
manner captured a kiss from her gray-haired
grandfather. It is a time-honored custom from
which youth nor age, master nor servant, is ex
empt.
THE OREGON QUESTION.
Messrs. Houghton,, Mifflin & Co., the well
known publishing house of Boston, have recently
issued another volume of the series of "American
Commonwealths," edited by Horace F. Scuddtr,
It is entitled " Oregon, The Struggle for Posses
sion," and is from the pleasing pen of William
Barrows, who brings to bear upon his work high
literary culture and careful consideration of an-
thorities. He has availed himself of many sources
of information which have been overlooked by
other writers upon the subject, and has held him
self nloof from those bitter local controversies
which have formed so prominent a portion of
previous publications and detracted largely from
their historical value. One of these questions,
however, he puts at rest, we hope, and that is the
oft-repeated assertion that Dr. Whitman pre
vented the trading off of Oregon for a codfishery.
While he gives the heroic missionary full credit
for what he accomplished, he shows conclusively
that such a barter was never under consideration
by the government, nor at the time Dr. Whitman
made his memorable winter journey was there any
treaty pending on the Oregon boundary question,
though he gives the doctor credit for thinking so
and making that his ruling object in undertaking
his hazardous journey across the continent Ai
a history of the Oregon question it is complete,
and is rendered especally valuable by its inter
taining and graphic style of composition. The
volume is neatly printed and bound in cloth. It
contains 363 pages, is carefully indexed sod b
accompanied by necessary maps. For sale by J'
K. Gill & Co., Portland, Oregon, at Jl.aS-
COSSACK HORSEMANSHIP.
Duke Nicholas and
many foreign officers and guests the regiment of
Prakrit Hilars, rrrmtlv went thrOUoh SB tlUS-
ordinary series of exercises, which throw the mo
daring feats of the circus into the snaae.
full eallop in a
order, with many of the men standing upright ot
the saddle, others on their heads witn legs -air,
many leaping on to the ground and then into
the saddle again at fuU speed, some
over their horses' heads and picking P "
from the ground and then regaining then
While performing these feats all were brwdi
ing their sabers and firing pistolsv lhrowWVa
carbines in the air and catching them agaui,
yelling like maniacs. Some men T Pr
pairs, standing with one leg on eacbj thf
One fellow carried off another dressed a. awn
The effect of the scene wit aiejlZi
ing, and it seemed a. if the whote refill
gone mad. Upon a signal given "'v
divided into two parts. One rode &
halted and made their horses lie down w
ground while they lay beside them, vriittnfi
war, the approach of an toeroj- 1 J j
tion of the regiment then charged dowo.
an instant every horse was on its le
rider in his saddle, and wilh wild yells
at their supposed enemy. When os
were overUiVregiment rode past
commonly well together, mibt7 eba!n'