This is a most surprising conclusion; at war with his own account of the several sections which he visited, and denied by every intelligent man living in the territory. What! Oregon, in this respect, equal to California, or the Valley of the Mississippi! This can never be, until Oregon be blessed with a vast increase of productive soil, and California {276} and our own unequalled Valley be greatly changed.
Extracts from the Report of Lieutenant Wilkes to the Secretary of the Navy, of the examination, by the Exploring Expedition, of the Oregon Territory.[88]
The Territory embraced under the name of Oregon,
extends from latitude 42° north to that of 53° 40['] north,
and west of the Rocky Mountains. Its natural boundaries,
were they attended to, would confine it within the above
geographical boundaries.
On the east it has the range of Rocky Mountains along its whole extent; on the south those of the Klamet range, running on the parallel of 42° and dividing it from California; on the west the Pacific Ocean; and on the north the western trend of the Rocky Mountains, and the chain of lakes near and along the parallels of 54° and 55°
