Poems (Markham)/Road to Oregon

by Elizabeth Markham

Road to Oregon

We left our friends in foreign lands—
 Our native country dear;
In sorrow, took the parting hand
 And shed the falling tear.

For Oregon, three cheers they gave,
 From us to disengage—
Fearing that we might find our graves
 Amidst the sand and sage;

Or met by cruel savage bands,
 And slaughtered on the way—
Their spectred visions, hand in hand,
 Would round our pathway play.

To the Pacific's temperate clime
 Our journey soon began—
Traversing through the desert sands
 Towards the setting sun.

On Platte the rocks like battlements,
 Were towering tall and high;
The frightened elk and antelope
 Before our trains would fly.

And herds of buffalo appear—
 On either side they stand;
Far as our telescope could reach,
 One thick and clustering band.

O'er sinking sands and barren plains,
 Our frantic teams would bound—
While some were wounded, others slain,
 Mid wild terrific sound.

And in these lone and silent dells
 The winds were whispering low;
And moaning to the Pilgrims, tell
 Their by-gone tales of woe.

Deserted on those mountains wild,
 No ear to hear his cry—
Near by a spring, on a rude bluff,
 They laid poor Scott to die.

Unaided grief and blighted hope,
 Midst savage beasts of prey—
The fate of poor deserted Scott
 Is wrapped in mystery!

Our toils are done, our perils o'er—
 The weary pilgrims' band
Have reached Columbia's fertile shore—
 That far-famed happy land.

O'er mountains high and burning plains,
 Three thousand miles or more—
We are here; but who can e'er explain
 Or count the trials o'er?

Such clouds of mist hang round the scene,
 O'er which we have no control;
It's like a half-remembered dream,
 Or tale that's long been told.
E. M.
Oregon City, December, 1850.
Oregon Spectator, January 9, 1851.