oral traditions, handed down from generation to generation. These become more or less changed by lapse of time and are accompanied with superstition and a belief in the miraculous intervention of the Divinity—a doctrine which it enhances while it envelops the pride of a people with a halo of glory.
But we have for the origins of the history of Oregon abundance of written and printed contemporary material; and we know, therefore, we are on the sure and solid ground of historical truth. Here, however, are disadvantages, because there is little room for play of the imagination. The poetry is lost.
One who stands as an actor on the threshold of such a new movement has great advantage in this, that though his labors may be arduous, he has a chance, a certainty almost, of reaching a place in the memory of posterity. And after all, fame is something, and it is something to win even remembrance among men. Though a great poet declares the desire of fame "the last infirmity of the noble mind," yet the desire is one that justifies itself in the lives of men, and even at the bar of human history. For none would live without notice or praise, if he could gain it, nor pass to the infinite unknown leaving no mention or memorials of his name.
I am not now intending to give a sketch of the early history of Oregon, but shall attempt some account or estimate of one of the leading actors in it, incidentally only referring to others. I avoid claims made for one and another, and all controversy as to who "saved Oregon"; for in my conception Oregon was secured to the United States by a train of events in which numerous persons were important actors. Nevertheless, I must give chief credit for our beginning as an American state to the missionary effort, of which Jason Lee was the protagonist.
