il next day on the beach, and thus
come to some definite conclusion. Next morning they all assembled,
and we talked in the Chinook language all day long, until at last
they gave in, consenting, probably, as much because they could not
help themselves, as for any other reason. It was agreed that on the
following day at 12 o'clock, when the tide was going out, I should
take my men and place the canoes in the bay, and let them float out
on the tide across the ocean to the happy hunting-grounds:

At that day there existed in Oregon in vast numbers a species of
wood-rat, and our inspection of the graveyard showed that the canoes
were thickly infested with them. They were a light gray animal,
larger than the common gray squirrel, with beautiful bushy tails,
which made them strikingly resemble the squirrel, but in cunning and
deviltry they were much ahead of that quick-witted rodent. I have
known them to empty in one night a keg of spikes in the storehouse in
Yamhill, distributing them along the stringers of the building, with
apparently no other purpose than amusement. We anticipated great fun
watching the efforts of these rats to escape the next day when the
canoes should be launched on the ocean, and I therefore forbade any
of the command to visit the graveyard in the interim, lest the rats
should be alarmed. I well knew that they would not be disturbed by
the Indians, who held the sacred spot in awe. When the work of
taking down the canoes and carrying them to the water began,
expectation was on tiptoe, but, strange as it may seem, not a rat was
to be seen. This unexpected development was mystifying. They had
all disappeared; there was not one in any of the canoes, as
investigation proved, for disappointment instigated a most thorough
search. The Indians said the rats understood Chinook, and that as
they had no wish to accompany the dead across the ocean to the happy
hunting-grounds, they took to the woods for safety. However that may
be, I have no doubt that the preceding visits to the burial-ground,
and our long talk of the day before, with the unusual stir and
bustle, had so alarmed the rats that, impelled, by their suspicious
instincts, they fled a danger, the nature of which they could not
anticipate, but which they felt to be none the less real and
impending.

CHAPTER VII.

LEARNING THE CHINOOK LANGUAGE--STRANGE INDIAN
CUSTOMS--THEIR DOCTORS--SAM PATCH--THE MURDER OF A
WOMAN--IN A TIGHT PLACE--S