and it would be true, but the facts are that England, through her Hudson Bay Company, had virtually owned and controlled Oregon for nearly half a century, from 1818 up to the day Whitman started upon his great ride, altogether with the official sanction of the American people. There can scarcely be a doubt in regard to it, for reasons before stated, that England expected to continue to hold it all, or at least a large portion of it. Those who shout no danger are blind to historic facts.
Had England at the date mentioned owned Oregon, or any part of it, it is reasonably certain she would have thrown her great influence with the South in that terrible struggle in 1861-1865, when "cotton was king," and when it required all the eloquence of America's greatest orators, backed up by many of England's wisest statesmen, to prevent England at the most critical period of the struggle, "acknowledging the belligerent rights of the South."
Old Glory floats to-day from ocean to ocean, and from lakes to the Gulf the men once at war are at peace: "the gray" and "the blue" have since marched and fought under the same flag, and have rejoiced together alike in its achievements.
The brave pioneers of Oregon, without waiting
