"Well, we organized the church the next fall, in 1853, with just seven of the sixty persons who had left the East with me the year before. So you see we have grown a good deal in these seven-and-twenty years."
Here the minister got up and left the circle. So we turned to a brown-coated, cheery fellow in the next arm-chair. "You came round the Horn, didn't you, Bush?"
But the cake of tobacco had to be got out of a deep pocket, and a pipeful slowly cut off and the fresh pipe started, before the answer came; and then a great laugh had to expend its force over the merry memories called up by the question.
"We had a pretty rough old time of it, hadn't we, boys?" and a low murmur of assent ran round, and all eyes turned, meditatively, to the stove. Presently the answer to the first question dropped casually out: "Yes, I came round the Horn. I had been whaling in the Pacific, and stopped at 'Frisco; we were all mad for the diggings. One day, as I was strolling round, I saw a great, big placard on the wall, in letters two feet long: 'Ho! for the Umpqua diggings! Lots of gold! Plenty of water! Good grub! Fine country! The well-known schooner Reindeer, Captain Bachelor, will sail for the Umpqua, October the 15th, 1850!' There were four of us in my party, all young and active then, and we made up our minds to go, and weren't long about deciding, either. We were up to roughing it, too; you see, a few years in a whaler will fit you for most anything."
"What was the voyage like?"
"Rough! There were about one hundred and thirty on board the schooner, some for the Umpqua, the rest going on to Portland. After knocking about at sea for a few days, we made the Umpqua and stood in. The old man anchored just under the north beach. As I put my hand on the cable, it was like a bar of iron, and I felt the anchor drag. I told the mate, and he went and called the captain. Up came the old man, and wouldn't believe it at first, but in another minute we should all have been in the breakers, and nothing could have saved us. Just then a little boat came past and they hollered out, 'You'll be on the beach inside of three minutes!' I tell you it was touch and go."
"How did you get off, Bush?"
THE "WHALER" SETTLER."The old man shouted to set all sail, and I ran to the helm. I could see the channel pretty well, and I just steered her by the look of the water. We just shaved a big rock by three feet or so, and ran up the river. Presently we anchored again and landed. Then we got a little Indian canoe and pulled on up the river."
"What was the country like?"
"Pretty rough."