Iron County register. [volume] (Ironton, Iron County, Mo.) 1867-1965, 1905-01-12
| ELIAS LUCK
How the Columbia River Made q Match
BY MAX MCNEIL.
BY MAX MCNEIL.

l rises above it's banks in the VALLEY
below the mouth Of the Willamette
and changes the property rights of 6
tribe Of scow-dwellers who skirt It'll
shores. These arbitrary transpositions
by the resistless stream of the river
lead to many complications; some
times to bloodshed. In one case to a
solution of a problem that had vexed
the tender hearts Of two young PEG.
pie.
On Wild Mans island, which lies be-
low Kalama, and is tucked under the
high shores OF the Washington side,
there lived in comparative state a
rancher named Walker, with his dog
and his son He was a proud man
and his house, originally a scow, was
surrounded by a fence painted yellow.
He also possessed a chicken yard and
raised potatoes in a patch of ground
elevated slightly above the water
mark. The dog drowsed most of the
time in the muddy foreyard, and the
son ished on the swelling river and
Sob Lol lllS OutdLlGIS. To-
Six miles above, a gayly-painted
%houseboat had come ashore during an
unusually high flood and the master of
it, a lonely Missourian, had slid
skids under it, put out a gang-plank
and accepted the adjoining land as a
perquisite Of discovery. His daughter
had grown up till she was an efficient
aid to her father in handling his net
n the two of them called the Shiny
strip of bar home. Their one grievance
was that the water was not low enough
to justify a fence. They were simply
squatters; no more.
1t was the difference in the social
standing Of these two men, Walker and
StoWler, that caused much anguish to
the children, Hennery and Eliza.
Hennery tried to blind himself to the
fact that his father was a proper
.'ancher, while Eliza was simply the
daughter of a scow-dweller. But Eliza
knew very we'll that old nan Walker
would never forget. And as she was
proud, she assumed disdain of Hen
nery's clumsy efforts to obliterate the
dividing line between responsibility
and shiftless poverty.
Walker, like most men signally IA
vored of Fortune, attributed his W
position OF a%ffiuence to personal en-
ergy, and as authority must have a
subject, he was fond of slyly meeting
StoWler to nag him into the rage of an
inferior, and these encounters he re-
tailed with gusto to Hennery and the
dog, knowing that the boy resented
keenly every sighting reference to
the father of the girl he loved. Hen
merry many times attempted to re-
tallate, but somehow it never entered
his head that his fathers place in So
clety was due solely to a lucky eddy
IN a swift current some ten years be-
fore. So his words fell emptily and
fruitlessly, except in so far as they
gave the old man opportunity for
shrewd sarcasm.
In the spring of a new year, when
the alder on the bank were thicken-
ing with foliage and the clouds on the
hills we're worn thin and rifted with
summer, Hennery met Eliza by the
ELK Rock, and told her many things
that had little reference to ANYBODY
but themselves. Eliza responded slow
ly and with tears. Womanlike. she
was unable to see how she was to be
made happier by Hennery's love unless
the entire world acquiesced. But she
kissed him passionately, and saw the
covering peaks of the Cascade range
in a dream.
Driven beyond himself by Eliza's
kisses, Hennery went, late in the
and told his father that he was
going to marry the scow-dweller's
laughter. Walker stroked his scrawny
beard, and called the dog for an execu-
i've session. When he had introduced
lis measure and carried it by two to
me, he turned his back on Hennery.
rev his flat-buttoned skiff into the
water, and went up stream, rowing
With regularity and slow strength.
He found Stowler sitting bootless
IN the back platform Of his little scow.
Trying his feet in the weak sunshine.
listless pose of the man filed F,
with rage, and he was Of two (,
minds about speaking. But he had :
oiled six miles, and he saw no use In
citing anger defeat his purpose. :
How do, Stowler?" he said gruff- J
Y, as he tied the painter to a stake in !
he mud. 4
Purity we'll" was the answer. .
How's the fish by you?" Is