So we marched, mingled, and, as some might have said,
motley in our personnel—sons of some of
the best families in the South, men from the Carolinas
and Virginia, Georgia and Louisiana, men from Pennsylvania
and Ohio; Roundhead and Cavalier, Easterner and Westerner,
Germans, Yankees, Scotch-Irish—all Americans.
We marched, I say, under a form of government; yet
each took his original marching orders from his own
soul. We marched across an America not yet won.
Below us lay the Spanish civilization—Mexico,
possibly soon to be led by Britain, as some thought.
North of us was Canada, now fully alarmed and surely
led by Britain. West of us, all around us, lay
the Indian tribes. Behind, never again to be
seen by most of us who marched, lay the homes of an
earlier generation. But we marched, each obeying
the orders of his own soul. Some day the song
of this may be sung; some day, perhaps, its canvas
may be painted.
OREGON
The spell and the light of each
path we pursue—
If woman be there, there is happiness too.
—Moore.
Twenty miles a day, week in and week out, we edged
westward up the Platte, in heat and dust part of the
time, often plagued at night by clouds of mosquitoes.
Our men endured the penalties of the journey without
comment. I do not recall that I ever heard even
the weakest woman complain. Thus at last we reached
the South Pass of the Rockies, not yet half done our
journey, and entered upon that portion of the trail
west of the Rockies, which had still two mountain ranges
to cross, and which was even more apt to be infested
by the hostile Indians. Even when we reached
the ragged trading post, Fort Hall, we had still more
than six hundred miles to go.
By this time our forces had wasted as though under
assault of arms. Far back on the trail, many
had been forced to leave prized belongings, relies,
heirlooms, implements, machinery, all conveniences.
The finest of mahogany blistered in the sun, abandoned
and unheeded. Our trail might have been followed
by discarded implements of agriculture, and by whitened
bones as well. Our footsore teams, gaunt and weakened,
began to faint and fall. Horses and oxen died
in the harness or under the yoke, and were perforce
abandoned where they fell. Each pound of superfluous
weight was cast away as our motive power thus lessened.
Wagons were abandoned, goods were packed on horses,
oxen and cows. We put cows into the yoke now,
and used women instead of men on the drivers’
seats, and boys who started riding finished afoot.
Our herds were sadly lessened by theft of the Indians,
by death, by strayings which our guards had not time
to follow up. If a wagon lagged it was sawed shorter
to lessen its weight Sometimes the hind wheels were
abandoned, and the reduced personal belongings were
packed on the cart thus made, which nevertheless traveled
on, painfully, slowly, yet always going ahead.
In the deserts beyond Fort Hall, wagons disintegrated
by the heat. Wheels would fall apart, couplings
break under the straining teams. Still more here
was the trail lined with boxes, vehicles, furniture,
all the flotsam and jetsam of the long, long Oregon
Trail.
