A spring ride in Oregon--The start--The equipment--Horses and saddlery--Packs--The roadside--Bird fellow-travelers--Snakes--The nearest farm--Bees--The great pasture--The poisonous larkspur-- Market-gardening--The Cardwell Hill--The hill-top--The water-shed --Mary River--Crain's--The Yaquina Valley--Brush, grass, and fern --The young Englishmen's new home--A rustic bridge--"Chuck-holes"-- The road supervisor--Trapp's--The mill-dam--Salmon-pass law--Minnows and crawfish--The Pacific at rest--Yaquina--Newport. 48 CHAPTER V. Hay-harvest--Timothy-grass--Permanent pasture--Hay-making by express--The mower and reaper--Hay-stacks as novelties-- Wheat-harvest--Thrashing--The "thrashing crowd"--"Headers" and "self-binders"--Twine-binders and home-grown flax--Green food for cows--Indian corn, vetches--Wild-oats in wheat--Tar-weed the new enemy--Cost of harvesting--By hired machines--By purchased machines--Cost of wheat-growing in the Willamette Valley. 62 CHAPTER VI. The farmer's sports and pastimes--Deer-hunting tales--A roadside yarn--Still-hunting--Hunting with hounds--An early morning's sport--Elk--The pursuit--The kill--Camp on Beaver Creek-- Flounder-spearing by torchlight--Flounder-fishing by day--In the bay--Rock oysters--The evening view--The general store--Skins-- Sea-otters--Their habits--The sea-otter hunters--Common otter--The mink and his prey. 72 CHAPTER VII. Birds in Oregon--Lark--Quail--Grouse--Ruffed grouse--Wild-geese-- Manoeuvres in the air--Wild-ducks--Mallard--Teal--Pintail-- Wheat-duck--Black-duck--Wood-duck--Snipe--Flight-shooting-- Stewart's Slough--Bitterns--Eagles--Hawks--Horned owls--Woodpeckers --Blue-jays--Canaries--The canary that had seen the world--Blue-birds --Bullfinches--Snow-bunting--Humming-birds at home. 91 CHAPTER VIII. Up to the Cascades--Farming by happy-go-lucky--The foot-hills--Sweet Home Valley--Its name, and how deserved and proved--The road by the Santiam--Eastward and upward--Timber--Lower Soda Springs--Different vegetation--Upper Soda Springs--Mr. Keith--Our reception--His home and surroundings--Emigrants on the road--The emigrant's dog--Off to the Spokane--Whence they came--Where they were bound--Still eastward-- Fish Lake--Clear Lake--Fly-fishing in still water--The down slope east--Lava-beds--Bunch-grass--The valleys in Eastern Oregon--Their products--Wheat-growing there--Cattle-ranchers--Their home--Their life--In the saddle and away--Branding-time--Hay for the winter--The Malheur reservation--The Indians' outbreak--The building of the road--When, how, and by whom built--The opening of the pass--The history of the road--Squatters--The special agent from Washington--A sham survey. 100 CHAPTER IX.