PORTLAND AND MT. HOOD
From photo by The Weister Co., Portland, Oregon
We left Portland with no little reluctance. We were conscious that we had not seen the City of Roses at its best, coming as we did at the end of summer, when roses, even in Portland, are not very common—though we saw them and were told that they bloom every month in the year. We are already planning a return visit which we hope to make at a more favorable time and under more favorable conditions.
VII
THE VALE OF THE WILLAMETTE
The old Oregon Territory, comprising the present states of Oregon and Washington, has the unique distinction of being the only part of the United States that was actually acquired by exploration and settlement, and this was not accomplished without lively competition from the British. The New England States were wrested from the unwilling hands of Great Britain and we paid the first Napoleon his price for Louisiana. Spain sold us Florida very reasonably when she saw we were going to take it in spite of her. California, Texas, New Mexico, and Arizona were taken at the mouth of the cannon from Old Mexico—pity we didn’t complete the annexation of the rest of that troublesome country at the same time. We paid Russia seven millions for Alaska and thought it a gold brick for a time—Seward’s Folly, they called it—and a little pressure was exercised on Spain to relinquish the Philippines and Porto Rico into our keeping. Oregon alone became ours by right of “discovery,” and this no doubt seemed a curious kind of right in the eyes of the red men who possessed this goodly land.
ALONG THE COLUMBIA HIGHWAY
From photo by The Weister Co., Portland, Oregon