While we wandered through the orchard, the beauty and practical utility of which astonished me, the doctor, gave us a lecture on colonization, agriculture, gardening, horticulture, etc., which he flavored here and there with pious reflections.  He pointed out with pride that all this was his own work, and described how he had transformed the wilderness into a garden.  In the year 1856 he came with forty followers to Oregon, as a delegate from the parent association of Bethel in Missouri, in order to found in the far West, then so little known, a branch colony.  At present the doctor is president both of Aurora and of the original settlement at Bethel:  the latter consists of about four hundred members, the former of four hundred and ten.

When he first came into this region he found the whole district now owned by his flourishing colony covered with marsh and forest.  Instead, however, of establishing himself on the prairies lying farther south, in the midst of foreign settlers, he preferred a home shared only with his German brethren in the primitive woods; and here, having at that time very small means, he obtained from the government, gratis, land enough to provide homes for his colonists, and found in the timber a source of capital, which he at once made productive.  He next proceeded to build a block-house as a defence against the Indians, who at that time were hostile in Oregon:  then he erected a saw-mill and cleared off the timber, part of which he used to build houses for his colonists, and with part opened an advantageous trade with his American neighbors, who, living on the prairie, were soon entirely dependent on him for all their timber.  The land, once cleared, was soon cultivated and planted, with orchards:  the finer varieties of fruit he shipped for sale to Portland and San Francisco, and from the sour apples he either made vinegar or sold them to the older settlers, who very soon made themselves sick on them.  He then attended them in the character of physician, and cured them of their ailments at a good round charge.  This joke the good doctor related with especial satisfaction.

By degrees, the doctor continued to say, the number of colonists increased; and his means and strength being thus enlarged, he established a tannery, a factory, looms, flouring-mills, built more houses for his colonists, cleared more land and drained the marshes, increased his orchards, laid out new farms, gave some attention to adornment, erected a church and school-houses, and purchased from the American settlers in the neighborhood their best lands for a song.  He did everything systematically.  He always assigned his colonists the sort of labor that they appeared to him best fitted for, and each one found the place best suited to his capabilities.  If any one objected to doing his will and obeying his orders, he was driven out of the colony, for he would endure no opposition.  He made the best leather, the best hams and gathered the best crops in all Oregon.  The possessions of the colony, which he added to as he was able, extended already over twenty sections (a section contains six hundred and forty acres, or an English square mile), and the most perfect order and industry existed everywhere.