St. Louis University, Feb. 27, 1852.
Mr. GEORGE THOMPSON, Chapel Hill, Perry Co., Ohio:
Dear Sir.- I acknowledge the receipt of your letter of the I 5th instant, in which you ask me some information concerning Oregon. As it is asked by way of advice which may decide you and eight or ten more families, as you say, to emigrate to that country, I am indeed at a loss what to say, and I must acknowledge that till now I have never taken it upon me to encourage any one to undertake the journey. Oregon, no doubt, has great advantages, several of its valleys are beautiful and rich; the grazing, even in winter, is fine and abundant; and the great discoveries in Cali fornia have opened up a large market for its products. In no country are cattle easier raised, and its wheat is most beautiful. The climate may be put down as fair, if you except the rainy season, which lasts between three and four months. I must say, at the same time, that it can bear no comparison with most of our Western States, all things well considered. The richness of the lands in general, with all the other advantages connected with it, are much greater here than there.
I left Oregon in the fall of 1846, and since that time extensive emigrations to that country have taken place; so that I think by this time the best and most suitable spots must have been taken up.
Besides, the great difficulty is to get there, for the road is long and dangerous. Last summer I paid a visit to the different Indian nations as far as the Rocky Mountains. and returned to the States by the Oregon route, which I struck in the neighborhood of Independence Rock, about 200 miles above Fort Laramie. The scene we witnessed on this road presented indeed a melancholy proof of the uncertainty which attends our highest prospects in life. The bleached bones of animals everywhere strewed along the track, the hastily erected mound, beneath which lie the remains of some departed friend or relative, with an occa