Passing down the hill and by the farmhouse at the foot, with its great barn and blooming orchard, we strike the road once more, passing for a mile or two between wheat-fields, with the Mary River on the left closed from our sight by the screen of firs that follow it all the way along; then by a bridge and by other farms, and between fir-woods of thickly standing trees, and up and down hill, with here and there a level valley in between, we strike the Mary River again for the last time, and climb the Summit Hill.
We are twenty-two miles from our starting-point, and claim a meal and rest. We are among old friends as we ride up to Crain's to dine, and the noonday sun is hot enough for us to enjoy the cool breeze among the young firs behind the house, as we stand to wash hands and face by the bench on the side of the dairy built over the stream close by. The horses know their way to the barn, to stand with slackened sinches, and nuzzle into the sweet timothy-hay with which the racks are filled.
THE YAQUINA VALLEY.On our way once more, in half an hour we stand on the edge of the water-shed, and look down far into the Yaquina Valley, lying deep between rugged and broken hills below. As we dip below the crest, the character of the vegetation changes at once.
We have left the thick woods behind. The last of the tall green firs clothes the crest we have passed, and the black burned timber is dotted along the hill-sides.
Last year's brake-fern clothes the hills in dull yellow and brown, except where patches of thimble-berry and salmon-berry bushes have usurped its place. The wild-strawberry has been almost entirely left behind, and instead there is the blackberry-vine trailing everywhere along the rough ground, and casting its purple-tinged tracery over the fallen logs. There is plenty of grass among the fern, and the wild-pea grows erect as yet, not having length enough to bend and creep. The river Yaquina comes down from a wild, rough valley to the right, to be crossed by a wooden bridge close to a farmhouse on rising ground. Two of our recently arrived Englishmen have bought this place, and are well satisfied with their position. About eight hundred acres of their own land, of which quite three hundred are cultivable in grain, though not nearly all now in crop, and really unlimited free range on the hills all round for stock; some valley-land which produces everything it is asked; a garden-patch where potatoes grew this year, one of which was six pounds in weight; a comfortable house and substantial barn; a trout-stream by their doors; a railroad in near prospect to bring them within two hours of a market at either end; and, meanwhile, a demand at home for all the oats and hay they can raise for sale—it would be strange, indeed, I think, if they who had supposed they were coming into a wilderness with everything to make, were not well pleased.
The only things they complain of are the scarcity of neighbors and bad roads—both, we hope, in a fair way to be overcome. They look contented enough, as they stand by their house-door to bid us good-day as we ride by. The valley widens out and narrows again in turn. In each open space stands a farmhouse, or else the site demands one.
As we get nearer to the coast, the river forces its way through quite a narrow gorge, following round the point of a projecting fern-covered slope, and under the shadow of the high hill on the northern side. The great blechnum ferns, with fronds three or four feet long, are interspersed with the thimble-berry bushes, and border the road. Syringa and deutzia plants and two varieties of elder, which bear black and red berries, but are now bright with abundant flowers, clothe the steep bank overhanging the river, which here widens out into calm pools, divided by ripples, and runs over rocks. And see, here is a natural bridge; a huge fir has fallen right across, and the farmer has leveled the ground up to the top of the trunk, some six feet high, and has set up a slender rail on each side of his bridge, and over it he drives his sheep into the less matted and tangled ground on the far side.
"CHUCK-HOLES."The road, cut into the steep hill-side, never gets the sunshine; the mud clogs the horse's feet and fills the "chuck-holes"—traps for the unwary driver. Be it known that oftentimes a great log comes shooting down the hill in winter, and brings up in its downward course on the ledge formed by the road. Notice is sent to the road supervisor by the first passer-by, and this functionary, generally one of the better class of farmers, who has charge of the road district, calls out his neighbors to assist in the clearing of the road. He has legal power to enforce his summons, but it is never disregarded, and the "crowd" fall on with saws, axes, and levers. They soon cut a big "chunk" out of the log, some ten feet long, wide enough to clear the center of the road, and roll it unceremoniously away down the hill, or lodge it lengthwise by the roadside. There they leave matters, deeming spade-and-shovel work beneath them. Next winter's rain lodges and stands in the dint made by the trunk when it fell, and in the depression left by the men who rolled the middle of the log away. Never filled up, or any channel cut to run the water off, a "chuck-hole" is formed, which each wagon enlarges as it is driven round the edge to escape the center. Woe betide the stranger who does not altogether avoid, or boldly "straddle," the "chuck-hole" with his wheels! The side of the wagon whose fore and hind wheels have sunk into the hole dips rapidly down, and he is fortunate who escapes without an upset, and with only showers of liquid mud covering horses, driver, and load, as the team struggles to drag the wagon through. But, pressing through the gorge, we emerge into a more open stretch. On the right of us rises a smooth, round hill, fern-covered to the top; and on the opposite side, next the river, planted on a pretty knoll just where the valley turns sharply to the north, thereby getting a double view, is Mr. Trapp's farmhouse, our resting-place for the night. We have made our forty-four miles in spite of the muddy road and steep grades, and there is yet time before supper to borrow our host's rod and slip down to the river for a salmon-trout. Excellent fare and comfortable beds prepare us for the eighteen miles we have yet before us on the morrow, and we get an early start. Two miles below Trapp's is Eddy's grist-mill, with its rough mill-dam, made on the model of a beaver-dam, and of the same sticks and stones, but not so neatly; the ends of the sticks project over the mill-pool below, and prove the death of numberless salmon, which strike madly against them in their upward leaps, and fall back bruised and beaten into the pool again.
An effort was made to pass a law, this last session of the Legislature, compelling the construction of fish-passes through the mill-dams; but it was too useful and simple a measure to provoke a party fight, and therefore was quietly shelved. Better luck next time.
MINNOWS AND CRAWFISH.Presently we leave the Yaquina River, which, for over twenty miles, we have followed down its course; for never a mile without taking in some little brook, where the minnows are playing in busy schools over the clean gravel, and the crawfish are edging along, and staggering back, as if walking were an unknown art practiced for the first time. The river has grown from the burn we first crossed to a tidal watercourse, with a channel fifteen feet in depth, and, having left its youthful vivacity behind, flows gravely on, bearing now a timber-raft, then a wide-floored scow, and here the steam-launch carrying the mail. But we climb the highest hill we have yet passed, where the aneroid shows us eleven hundred feet above the sea-level, and from its narrow crest catch our first sight of the bay, glittering between the fir-woods in the morning sun.