Valley, extended from the great westward bend of that river south to Lac La Biche about twenty-five miles. It had the Willamette to the west and Pudding River[1] on the east. Between it and the Willamette was a belt of low wooded land. It was beautified by groves of fir and oak at frequent intervals, and watered by numerous small streams. East of Pudding River rose the foothills of the Cascade Range, and towering beyond and over them the shaggy heights of those grand mountains, overtopped here and there by a snowy peak.
The entrance to this lovely region from the north was, as already intimated, opposite the mouth of the Chehalem, a small stream flowing into the Willamette from the west, and famous for the charming features of its little valley.[2]
The landing at the crossing of the Willamette on the east side was known as Campement du Sable, being a sandy bluff and an encampment at the point of arrival or departure for French Prairie. Two
- ↑ The nomenclature of the various posts whose history is presented in these volumes will be given in their natural order as the work progresses. The name Willamette and its orthography are discussed in the History of the Northwest Coast, to which the reader is referred. Pudding River received its name from the circumstance of a trapping party which had become bewildered and out of food; there they ate a pudding made from the blood of a mule which they killed. White's Ten Years in Or., 70. Lac La Biche, or Deer Lake, took its name from the abundance of game in its vicinity in the period of the early settlement of French Prairie.
- ↑ Chehalem is an Indian name, whose signification is not clear. Parrish, in his Oregon Anecdotes, MS., 15, attempts to show that the prefix che which occurs so frequently in the Indian dialect meant town or 'ville,' and cites Chemeketa, Chenoway, Cheamhill, and other names. He fails to make evident the analogy, as these were not names of villages, but rather of valleys or localities. Cheamhill, now corrupted into Yamhill, signifies a beautiful view of a range of grassy hills near the ford of the Yamhill River. Deady's Hist. Or., MS., 76; Victor's Or., 195.
England with the island king, and as a guard presented arms to George III., and was rather lionized in London. He came at last to be the swineherd of the chiefs at Fort Vancouver, where he lived and died amongst his oaks. Anderson's Hist. Northwest Coast, MS., 89–90. An Englishman named Felix Hathaway, saved from the wreck of the Hudson's Bay Company's vessel William and Ann in 1828, became a resident of Oregon. Another sailor who came to Oregon in 1829 was James M. Bates. He is claimed by some to be the first American settler in Oregon, as he remained in the country and cultivated a piece of land on Scappoose Bay, an estuary of the Columbia, south of and below Sauvé Island. He was still living in Oregon in 1872.
