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Show The Pioneers. (Address delivered by Judge C. O. Goodwin at Reno, Nev, July 3rd, upon the occasion of the Pioneers' celebration.) It lacks "tut a month of fifty-one years since I first looked out upon this valley. Things have changed somewhat since. There was no Reno then. There was no bridge nor ferry here then. But the Truckee waB low, only about two feet deep, and bo my companion and myself decided to ford it. I was on the hurricane deck of a mule named Hannah. In Plumas county, California, where Hannah resided, she had a large reputation for sagacity. On that day Hannah thought she needed a bath; she knew that I did, and so in the middle of the river she lay down. I had other cold baths in Washoe county. The people here after a while gave me a high and honorable office, for which I was most grateful. grate-ful. I determined to make my permanent home hero. I bought a half interest in a ranch up the valley; I cleared much of the sage brush from it with my own hands. Two or three of us built a ditch seven miles long, from the river, to irrigate it. I raised one crop of wire worms and one crop of locusts from It. The worms destroyed everything every-thing planted; the locusts devoured every green thing except me. I went away, carrying nothing with me that I treasured save some friendships that were very sweet then, and which the on-sweeping years have not caused to grow cold. But I suspect that my personal affairs, then or now, are not of any absorbing Interest to you. It was of the Pioneers that you wished me to speak. When I received your committee's invitation invi-tation to come here today, I was glad, and held the invitation as a great honor. But when I read that I might be called upon to say something of the Pioneers, then I became afraid. For they who might have fitly spoken on that theme are all gone. Under the boatings of the years one voice after another has grown still, and as we call to them no replies come back save the echoes of our unanswered cries. But in thought we can still see them. How splendid was that procession! The wilderness and the desert only were before them, but in their arteries the hot, red blood of youth was throbbing; in their souls Hope was Binglng to them triumphal songs which were paeans of enchantment. en-chantment. What did they care what obstacles might be heaped in their paths? The mirage before their eyes filled the wilderness with light, and turned the mantle of serge, which the desert had drawn over Its naked breast, into a robe of cloth of gold. Thei first pioneers to cross the Rockies were those who set the first stakes of civilization in the northwest. No dream of mines of gold and silver was before their eyes. People had been invading their domain west of the Missouri too fast, they began to have neighbors within two or three miles of their old homes. They began to be crowded and to feel that oppression on their respiratory organs that men feel when lowered Into a shaft where there Is no ventilation. ventila-tion. So they repaired their prairie schooners, hitched their oxen to them, put on board such simple things as they fancied they would need; on them, loaded their wives and children and, heading west, started. Then the air above that long waste became sanctified by the swear words of Missouri. r They knew in advance that there were mountains moun-tains and rivers and deserts to cross, but what of them? They knew that there would be hostile savages in their path, but they were not afraid. They knew that there waB no road, that they must blaze the first trail, but they reasoned that it would have to be done some time, why not then? They had heard of the awful silence of the desert, but they trusted to those same swear words and to the crack of their whips to drive that away. They wanted more land and wer neighbors, plenty of room, and reasoned that the more difficult dif-ficult the journey the less liable would they be to be followed. So they moved out, so they followed their purpose, and never rested until the Columbia rolled before them, and the Willamette valley broke upon their visions like an answer to prayer. They never realized that the feat they had performed was one of the most marvellous in history. We can understand that men could do such a thing, but think of the women in that train; women who love dainty and beautiful things and the joys of home and society. Think of them in that mighty, wilderness, clasping their children to their hearts, in those nights when the prairie wolf and mountain wolf howled around them! What fears they must have fought back, what longings they must have suppressed! sup-pressed! No wonder Portland is called the City of Roses. They have come from the hopes that were buried in the hearts of those Pioneer Oregon Ore-gon v. . en and could never find expression until un-til they sprung up in flowers from those women's wo-men's graves. The next Pioneers went to Utah. They had no dreams of gold or silver mines. Lives of toil and privation with but scant reward re-ward were what they contracted for. But the arm of faith was around them, and so when they camped in the Salt Lake Valley, with the barren mountains behind them; the desert stretching out before them, and the sullen, sul-len, heavy waves of the Great Lake rolling in sight in the distance, they, kneenng on that soil, held a praise service of thankful prayer and triumphal tri-umphal song. They were buoyant with youth and strength. J They took up their work and pursued it and accepted privation and hardships as a matter of course. But slowly the face of the desert began be-gan to change. Flowers came and fruits and golden grain, and as their youth and strength waned, more and more the earth responded, and if you will go there now and look around, it will not be hard for you to Imagine that by some subtle chemistry, the youth and dreams and hopes of those pio- neers have been transmuted into fruits and I flowers, for the frown of the desert has given I away to smileB and the mountains surrounding ! that valley have become the frame of a picture I more beautiful than the old masters 'ever I dreamed of. I The pioneers of California were not like any I others. They came from every state and nation; I they were the pick of the world. 8 They were all young; all alert. From across I the plains, from round the Horn, up from the 8 pestilential Isthmus they came. They had suf- g fered enough in coming to maKe them consid- j erate and generous, but the more self-contained; and so when they looked out upon the empire that was to be redeemed, they never for a moment mo-ment doubted their ability to perform the task. They went to their work joyously and sang as they toiled. They laughed hardships to scorn and made jests of misfortune. What they suffered suf-fered they hid in their breasts, and when disappointments disap-pointments came, like the Spartan boy, they let them gnaw at their own hearts and made no sign. That ro il band! They did not come to patiently pa-tiently plod their way until at last a state should round into form, of which they should be the representatives. Rather they came to carve at once a state out of the wilderness, which should represent them. They possessed within themselves all needed need-ed materials. There were tongues tipped with fire, men who by their eloquence could sway a multitude as the autumn winds sway the great pines on i the Sierra, until the roar rivals that of the deep sea as it hurls its surges against the shore. , The echoes of their voices still sanctify the air of the golden coast. There were writers whose pens were set to music and though the pens have fallen from their hands and the hands themselves have fallen fall-en back to dust, that music comes sounding down the years in melody sweeter than the love songs of mating birds. There were great jurists and learned law-years. law-years. There were profound scholars and statesmen. There were some young soldiers, who held in their souls, as they later proved, all the elements of great commanders. There were men of affairs, financial and industrial in-dustrial kings, who, looking around them at what was to be done, said, low to their own souls: "We; are equal to it all; we will go on from conquest to conquest." It was nothing for them to blaze the trails, to build the roads, the bridges, the cities; to grasp and solve new problems in engineering; f to readjust mouldy laws, to make them fit new conditions, to rear signal stations to civilization from Siskiyou to San Diego, and ranging out over their work were songs of cheer, from new singers, sing-ers, which beat upon that air like the angles' song of hope. They early dedicated the state to freedom, to law, to justice, to industry, to learning; and they kept the faith. They were not all either groat or good but they averaged higher than ever before had the people of a state. There were .not many good women there for a long time and the wild beast develops rapidly in man when the trail of the robes of pure women wo-men does not sanctify the streets and there are no reproaches in good women's eyes to abash man when he becomes reckless But where else were true women ever so much revered as there, where were children ever so much loved? Not all succeeded, but many did; great work was performed, mighty advances made; many built monuments to themselves which will stand forever. The pioneers of Nevada, how shall I speak of them? California drew to her golden shores the pick of the world. Nevada drew to herself the pick of California. Here what I say takes on more and more the tones of a funeral eulogy, for here we realize more acutely than elsewhere, that the foundations founda-tions of states are laid upon the graves of pioneers. pio-neers. The pioneers of Nevada were better seasoned men than those who first went in force to California, Cali-fornia, and so, though only the repellant arms of the desert were opened to receive them, they (Continued on Pago 15.) the pioneers. r (Continued riom Page 7.) I looked forward confident in anticipation, and ex- I ultant in the promise of what was to be. (The thought in every heart was, "What cannot can-not be wrought out here? The first assays from the great Comstock were causing men to cease dreaming of fortunes I in thousands, only millions would do. . Toil brought no fatigue to them; privations were nothing. They were an unselfish company. True they wanted to make fortunes, but they wanted the fortunes for those they loved far more than for themselves. They wanted to make for themselves honored names, but those names they coveted more for those they loved than for themselves. They did not lack in public spirit, they wanted to chase away the frown from the face of the desert; to see it smile with harvests and flowers, and to see holy temples erected to industry, to justice, to learning and to peace. So they went each his way. Their toil was incessant. The blizzard was' faced; the desert explored; every indication which gave promise of treasuer was delved upon; "the ground was their bed, the stars their canopy." They were their own cooks, chambermaids and laundrymen. As a rule they had little, but that little was common property when a brother man was in need. Where all the conditions were against them they taught the world how to open great mines and how to reduce rebellious ores. Their initiative initia-tive never failed them, their resourcefulness was limitless, to adjust means to ends was with them an instinct. Nevada was vexed with new problems at first. |