18 WHERE ROLLS THE OREGON 



a song. Am I not a child? and do I not owe 

 the child something? Must I put the child in 

 the mill to grind? There are children in our 

 mills, — little children, yes, and big children; 

 young children, and old children, — more old chil- 

 dren than young; grinding, grinding, grinding as 

 our dank, dark rivers go turning on, too hurried 

 now to tell a story, too thick-tongued to sing a 

 song. 



Here were still the story and the song, here on 

 Three-Arch Rocks ; and here they shall ever re- 

 main; a story as naked as birth, a song as stark 

 as death and as savage as the sea, — 



Birth, birth and death! 

 Wing and claw and beak; 

 Death, death and birth! 

 From crowded cave to peak. 



Ill 



These were Isles of Life. Here, in the rocky 

 caverns, was conceived and brought forth a life 

 as crude and raw and elemental as the rock it- 

 self. It covered every crag. I clutched it in 

 my hands; I crushed it under my feet; it was 

 thick in the air about me. My narrow path up 

 the face of the rock was a succession of sea-bird 



