Thus wore away the terrible winter of 1852-53. I say terrible, and the
word but poorly expresses our situation during that memorable winter. To
fully understand our situation one has but to imagine oneself in a
strange land, far from human aid, save from those environed as
ourselves. We were three thousand miles from "home," surrounded by a
primeval wilderness, in which ever lurked the treacherous savage.
Happily for us and for all, no annoyance or real danger threatened us
from that quarter. A few years before, a salutary lesson had been taught
the savages. The deadly rifles of the pioneers had instilled into their
bosoms a wholesome fear. Information had reached the settlers that the
Indians contemplated a massacre--that they were going to break out. The
information reached them through the medium of a friendly Indian. The
result was that the settlers "broke out" first. A company was formed,
consisting of about all of the able-bodied men within reach. The savages
were encountered on the Molalley and after a sharp fight were dispersed
or killed. Several were left dead on the ground. The whites had one man
wounded. Thus the war power of the Molalleys was destroyed forever.

In this connection I wish to make a digression, which I trust my readers
will pardon. It has often been urged that the white man has shown little
gratitude and no pity for the aborigines of this country. This I wish to
refute. The Indian that brought the word of warning to the white
settlers was ever after the object of tender solicitude on the part of
those whom he had befriended. I have seen that Indian, then old and
possibly worse off for his association with civilization, sitting down
and bossing a gang of Chinamen cutting and splitting wood for Dan'l
Waldo. The Indian, "Quinaby," always contracted the sawing of the wood
at $2.00 per cord and hired the Chinamen to do the work for 50 cents per
cord. He had a monopoly on the wood-sawing business for Mr. Waldo,
Wesley Shannon, and other old pioneers. It mattered not to "Quinaby"
that prices went down, his contract price remained the same, and the old
pioneers heartily enjoyed the joke, and delighted in telling it on
themselves.

But enough of this. Spring came at last and a new world burst upon the
vision of the heretofore almost beleaguered pioneers. We had wintered on
a "claim" belonging to a young man named John McKinney, two miles from
the present town of Jefferson. He had offered his cabin as