weather continued warm throughout the winter; but on the 12th of December 1842 the Columbia was frozen over, and the ice remained in the river at the Dalles till the middle of March, and the mercury was 6° below zero in that month, while in the Willamette Valley the cold was severe. On the other hand, in the winter of 1843 there was a heavy rainfall, and a disastrous freshet in the Willamette in February. The two succeeding winters were mild and rainy,[1] fruit forming on the trees in April; and again in the latter part of the winter of 1846–7 the Columbia was frozen over at Vancouver so that the officers of the Modeste played a curling match on the ice. The winter of 1848–9 was also cold, with ice in the Columbia. The prevailing temperature was mild, however, when taken year by year, and the soil being generally warm, the vegetables and fruits raised by the first settlers surprised them by their size and quality.[2] If any fault was to be found with the climate it was on the score of too many rainy or cloudy days; but when by comparison with the drier climate of California it was found to insure greater regularity of crops the farming community at least were satisfied.[3] The cattle-raisers had most reason to dread the peculiarities of the Oregon climate, which by its general mildness flattered them into neglecting to provide winter food for their stock, and when an occasional season of snow and ice came upon them they died by hundreds; but this was partly the fault of the improvident owner.
The face of nature here was beautiful; pure air from the ocean and the mountains; loveliness in the
- ↑ Clyman's Note Book, MS., 82–98; Palmer's Journal, 119.
- ↑ A potato is spoken of which weighed 3¼ Ibs., and another 3½ lbs.; while turnips sometimes weighed from 10 to 30 lbs. Blanchet raised one of 17¾ lbs.
- ↑ The term 'web-foot' had not yet been applied to the Oregonians. It became current in mining times, and is said to have originated in a sarcastic remark of a commercial traveller, who had spent the night in a farm-house on the marshy banks of the Long Tom, in what is now Lane County, that children should be provided with webbed feet in that country. 'We have thought of that,' returned the mistress of the house, at the same time displaying to the astonished visitor her baby's feet with webs between the toes. The story lost nothing in the telling, and Web-foot became the pseudonyme for Oregonian.
