The sun is now getting low in the west, and at length the painstaking pilot is standing ready to conduct the train in the circle which he has previously measured and marked out, which is to form the invariable fortification for the night. The leading wagons follow him so nearly around the circle that but a wagon length separates them. Each wagon follows in its track, the rear closing on the front, until its tongue and ox chains will perfectly reach from one to the other; and so accurate [is] the measure and perfect the practice, that the hindmost wagon of the train always precisely closes the gateway. As each wagon is brought into position it is dropped from its team (the teams being inside the circle), the team is unyoked, and the yoke and chains are used to connect the wagon strongly with that in its front. Within ten minutes from the time the leading wagon halted, the barricade is formed, the teams unyoked and driven out to pasture. Everyone is busy preparing fires ... to cook the evening meal, pitching tents and otherwise preparing for the night. . . . [The watches] begin at eight o'clock p. m. and end at four o'clock a. m.
2
Thomas Nelson Strong of Cathlamet and Portland
Cathlamet on the Columbia, a small book of 119 pages by Thomas Nelson Strong, was first published, in an edition of about 200 copies, by The Holly Press of Portland, Oregon, in 1906. It had as a sub-title: "Recollections of the Indian People and Short Stories of Early Pioneer Days in the Valley of the Lower Columbia." The Metropolitan Press printed a new hand-set edition of 800 copies in 1930. It has 170 pages, with a preface by Dr. A. L. Kroeber, professor of anthropology in the University of California, in which he says:
Modestly does the author of these tales refer to them as perhaps of little worth; but he has made a work, which, though small in compass, shines with a quality that endures. It is an unusual book. It possesses savor and sincerity, exactness and charm. Pioneer incidents
