the narrow
valley of the river of that name, which is cultivated and pretty
with its gardens, cotton-wood groves, and thickets of birch, alder,
sumach, and wild roses in the sharp bends of the stream. Proceeding up the valley you are constantly kept on the alert by
the dodging of the train from one green vista to another, and
from the shelter of bare hills on one side to the shadow of overhanging rocks on the opposite side of some promontory, or
making a straight run for some distance under the perpendicular wall of a basaltic upheaval, to leap suddenly into a cottonwood copse with a little farm home-place close by.
But all this is strictly local, and below the general level. The road from Pendleton to Snake River, running across the Blue Mountains and through the Grand Rond and Powder River Valleys, has more extensive views, and a greater variety of features. Prom Wallula Junction to Pendleton the road lies the greater part of the distance through a canon between hills so high that only their sides are seen, bristling with rock or tufts of dry grass, for miles. But when we have crossed the sand-belt, we observe that for other miles and miles towards Pendleton a green blanket of growing wheat hangs over the rounded tops of these high hills, giving promise of freight for this line after harvest.
Leaving Pendleton for Lewiston, our route takes in a better country than that nearer the Columbia, skirting the Umatilla Indian Reservation, than which there is no finer body of land in East Oregon. The road follows the sinuous course of Wild- Horse Creek to the top of the ridge dividing the waters of the Umatilla from those of the Walla Walla River, and from which there is an extensive view of the surrounding country, which is one vast wheat-field as far as the eye can reach. From this point the Walla Walla Valley appears spread out as on a chart, with the city of Walla Walla set in its midst and embowered in trees.
From this ridge, after making a long circuit to head a small side valley, and to gain distance for the train in descending, steam is withheld from the locomotive, and this becomes a gravity railroad until we again strike a level, where the train shoots ahead through fields of wheat, barley, and corn to Walla
