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were just leaving their winter post at Clatsop, but Von Resanoff knew nothing of that. The whole coast might have been ours, but he could not get across the bar. Beastly river, the Columbia. Tried it three days and gave it up and went on down to California. There he found supplies, and fell in love with the Spanish commandant's charming daughter, Dona Conception.
"The matter was brought before the commandant would he give to the baron the hand of his daughter as a seal to the compact for future supplies to Sitka?
"Don Arguello, the commandante, considered and consented, but a dreadful lion lay in the way! Von Resanoff was a Greek Catholic, the donna a Roman Catholic. Von Resanoff laughed at the lion: Til go to St. Petersburg. I'll beg the consent of the czar himself; then to Madrid, and doubt not, I'll conciliate the King of Spain. " They parted with tears. Far out from shore his handkerchief fluttered farewell. But alas! in his haste to cross Siberia, Von Resanoff fell from his horse and broke his neck. The girl is down there yet, somewhere. But England forestalled Russia on the Columbia."
After breakfast the gentlemen went away to attend to their commission. Lady Etholine and the Princess Racheff led Eloise out on the promenade around the castle. Below them lay the low, square, rough-hewn huts of the half-breed Sitkans. Yonder were the officers' homes, three-storied, lemon-yellow houses with iron-red roofs and stained-glass windows. The green roof of the bishop's house shone in the sun, and the green dome of the Greek church, surmounted by its oriental spire. Behind the castle, the princess pointed to the living green flanks of Vestova, where the Muscovites held their summer picnics.
