Land where my fathers died.--_Smith_.
A Cornishman was once asked why there were no public houses (saloons)
in his town. He replied, "Once a man by the name of John Wesley
preached here, and there have been none since."
Once a man by the name of General O. O. Howard passed through eastern
Oregon and northern Idaho, and the country has not been the same
since. The occasion was the uprising of the Nez Perces Indians in
1877. Ridpath, the historian, tells of the long chase of the red men
and the weary pursuit of "sixteen hundred miles." It was truly a
Fabian retreat on the part of Chief Joseph and his band, but General
Howard was dealing mercifully with them; at a dozen places he could
have given battle, but he spared the useless slaughter, avoiding the
needless scaring of the white settlers and the complement of dire
scenes and death that would necessarily follow.
The story of Chief Joseph is one of the most interesting unwritten
chapters in the history of the great Northwest. The fact of the
capture of this wily Indian leader with most of his band is well
known. They were banished from the Alpine regions of eastern Oregon
and compelled to make their home across the marble cañon of the Snake
in the State of Idaho, far from their loved Wallowa.
The valley of Wallowa (an Indian name) is one of the most beautiful
spots imaginable. At its southern end stand pillared peaks, eternally
snow-crowned, rivaling the finest to be seen in Switzerland. Here lies
the limpid, glassy Lake Wallowa, near the busy town of Joseph, so
named in honor of the great chieftain. This emerald valley nestles in
the lap of the Blue Mountains, and was from time immemorial the
favorite home of the exiled natives. When Bonneville passed through
that remote region in the early thirties they were in the enjoyment of
that valley and the rugged recesses of the Imnaha between Oregon and
Walla Walla. The famous red fish, the yank, and others possibly
peculiar to the place were found in abundance in the lake. It was
their treasure house for finny food, and the hovering hills furnished
flesh of deer and bear.
At a point in the valley twenty miles north of the lake, Old Joseph,
father of the more famous son, lies buried; his bramble-covered grave
is to be seen by the roadside to-day. For this reason something more
than an instinctive affection dominated the heart of the younger man.
Not long before his death, accompanied by guards, Chief Joseph was
taken into the valley on some sort of errand, and was thus permitted
to see again the enchanting beauties of his birthplace and early home.
How hungry were his eyes as he viewed the great opaline pool which
reflected the sinewy cedars and pointed pines; as he looked upon the
surrounding glen, the ancient game-range, the distant dissolving
plain, the hills heightening through their timber-covered sides up to
the very sky! His bursting heart cried out, "I have but one thing to
ask for from the White Father: Give me this lake and the land around
it, and some few acres surrounding the grave of my father."
[Illustration: WALLOWA LAKE]
The white man's ax had cleared the timber about the old man's grave;
the white man's plow might menace the sacred sod above the mute dust
of his honored sire. He wished to protect that place hallowed by
love--his own father's grave. But his plea was denied. He was not
permitted to have what in all reason seemed his very own.
He was now an old man, with eyes that had never shed tears, a soul
that was unacquainted with fear, and a heart that had never weakened
in the presence of danger. But at the thought that he was no more to
see his lovely Wallowa his eyes melted, his soul sank, his heart
broke.
Chief Joseph died near Spokane not many years since, wailing out the
one great desire of his life, a final glimpse of the land of his
birth, the hunting ground of his manhood and the graves of his
sires.