The new Northwest. [volume] (Portland, Or.) 1871-1887, 1876-06-16
EDITORIAL CoRREsPoNDENOE.

WAa8 SnaL commence ID manifest QeS-
siey which astonishes Us every time we
think Of it, behold your correspondent
again upon the wing, or, rather, s0ave,
for the upper Columbia is boiling like
the ocean, and even the hotels we sleep
in at night rock in the water like the
agitated "Ajax" when it enters the
river at its mouth. AS we sit scribbling,
we pause toscratch our pate for an idea,
and the only one that assumes very i'm
portant shape is the astonishing one al
luded to, but not expressed in the be-
ginning of this paragraph, namely: We
are off to the Centennial, Vid Boise City
and KeltOn, our object to respond to
national invitation from the suffragists
in Philadelphia assembled, to address
them on the women's independence
day, our manner of accomplishing the
journey reminding us of something
Scriptural.
"Silver and gold have 1 none, but
such as L have give thee" saith the
Bible.
''Silver and gold have none, but I
can make the journey on JaW bone"
saith your correspondent, and loI and
behold as she travels, many difficulties
vanish, and the way opens as by magic.
But let us not brag too soon. We
haven't begun the staging yet, and the
cruel mercies of the great o. S. n. Com
pany are always tender, which means
that we mean to bestow the very graph
ic-est compliment possible upon one of
the best corporations that ever graced
water-course. And such water-course!
Water to the right and water to the left
of us, water all around us, and water
everywhere.
The town of The Dalles, which is usu-
ally so dry as to almost choke you with
sympathy as you gaze upon its lichen-
covered Businesses of sand, and its gray,
columnar rocks of basalt, has sue
cumbed to decidedly aOet condition of
things, and sits, with it's nose under
water, and the bodies of its streets, ho-
tells, and stores ditto. The mighty
Columbia has encroached upon its bor-
ders, and its never broad boundaries
are by no means enlarged by the collis-
ion.
The Umatilla House, famous for good
dinners and dry surroundings, looks
like a swamped steamboat with the
smokestack and wheels gone, as it
crouches in a great, muddy eddy and
stares at you with its windowy, watery
eyes, and gasps continually with
wheezy waves of watery respiration.
The old omnibus met about forty of
US ~ We emerged from the steamer
''Daisy Ainsworth" and stood expect
autly upon the verge of The Dalles of
the Columbia, which are no longer "set
up on their edges" and as we gazed, dis
cOnsolate, we wondered what the
deIuge was coming next. Dear reader,
don't accuse US of profanity. We're 60
ing to the Centennial, but we never
swear. "Deluge" is proper word.
The passengers piled into and onto
that omnibus like frightened wharf
rats, and the driver took us about fif-
teen feet away and dumped us into the
second story of the old Empire Hotel,
where Messrs. HandIey & Sinnott, the
drowned-out proprietors of the Umatilla
House, have temporarily taken refuge;
and here we have temporarily taken
refuge; and here We are supplied with
good beds, and, by walking temporary
planking for a block or two, through
streets filled with boats and boatmen,
we get very good-gra.b. What the
mischief makes anybody say grub for
food, we wonder? A lady sits near US,
in good clothes, whose acquaintance we
were anxious to make till we heard her
say, when speaking of a certain San
Francisco hotel just now, 'The travel
ing public don't go cent on style
They're principally concerned about
good grub" Is the word good one ?
And if so, when, where, and how did it
originate? We never think of it but
we think involuntarily of great,
brown, lazy tobacco worm.
Supper being over, we wended our
way back over the narrow, rickety
bridgeway to the hotel, where, as usual,
we met many friends, in spite of the OBJ
trusive Columbia, and with difficulty
excused ourself from attending lecture
before the Teachers Institute, because
too tired to think.
The mad river, all swollen with its
angry flood, lashed the sides of the ho-
tel with a warning vehemence, but only
rocked us to sleep with its billows, and
kept us for ten consecutive hours a.
roaming in the wilds of dream-land.
The water had risen several inches dur
i ing the night, and the rickety bridge
way leading to breakfast was necessa-
rily much elongated to accommodate
hungry pedestrians, while the small
boat business had assumed greater pro-
portions than on the previous evening.
Boatmen padded their own canoes
right into the emptied store-houses, rats
swan for dear life to get in somewhere,
out of the wet, and cats scrambled fol
dear existence almost right beside
them, while bent upon the same mis-
sion. If you want the cat and the rat