basalt here presenting a columnar formation. We come now to the last, and by far the most singular, portion of the gorge of the Columbia. The river here flows for eight miles through a narrow channel, cut in solid trap-rock, and more or less tortuous. It is, of course, not navigable, and travellers by the river make a portage by rail to Celilo, at the upper end of the gorge. The word dalles comes from the French word dale, a trough or conduit, and was first applied by the French voyageurs, being corrupted into its present form of spelling by Americans.
What a strange scene it is! Sand, rock, and water,—not uncommon elements in a pleasing picture; but here it is not pleasing—it is uncanny to a degree. I find myself wondering how deep here must be a stream only forty yards wide, which in other places is two thousand yards wide, and deep enough to float any kind of a ship; for I cannot help fancying that what the river here lacks in breadth it makes up in depth. I am not aware that soundings have ever been taken in this part of the river.
Boats have gone through this passage. In low water the barges of the Hudson's Bay Company used to run the dalles. One or two steamers have been brought through at a low stage of water; but it is a very perilous undertaking,—much more perilous than going over the Cascades at high water. I take observations, and decide that I should not willingly embark on this particular portion of the Columbia.
How it swirls, how it twirls, how it eddies and boils!
How it races and chases, how it leaps, how it toils!
How one mile it rushes, and another it flows
As soft as a love-song sung "under the rose
How in one place it seethes, in another is still
And as smooth as the flume of some sleepy old mill.
A rock-entroughed torrent like none else, I pledge;
And, in truth, is a river set up on its edge.
Dalles City—or "The Dalles," as it is officially named, is a town of about twelve hundred inhabitants, situated on the Oregon side of the Columbia, at the lower end of the dalles of the river. In the early history of the country it was fixed upon by the Methodists as a mission station; but failing in their efforts to instruct the Indians, or intimidated by their warlike
