west to join some company of fur-traders for the Flathead country the following spring.
Frequent and fervid meetings were thus held in every quarter, and on the 20th of November there was a farewell gathering at the Forsyth-street church, New York, Bishop Hedding presiding. Though Methodist in attendance and tone, it is well to note here, as showing the general feeling, that the meeting was addressed by Doctor McAuley of the Presbyterian church, and by others of different denominations.
At this juncture, and before the missionaries had left New York, tidings were received of the arrival at Boston of Nathaniel J. Wyeth from his first attempt to establish a trading post on the lower Columbia.[1] With him were two Indian boys from beyond the mountains, to whom now attached more than ordinary interest by reason of the leaven working in the community. By orders of the board Jason Lee at once visited Wyeth and obtained information concerning western parts, particularly in regard to fields for missionary enterprise. Lee's attention was thus directed to the natives of the Lower Columbia, as well as to those of the upper country; and since the Columbia River Company, as Wyeth and his associates styled themselves, was about sending a vessel round Cape Horn, Wyeth himself proceeding across the mountains in the spring to meet it, opportunity was thus offered the missionary men, not only to forward their supplies by water, but to secure the necessary escort for their proposed overland journey.
The two laymen finally chosen to accompany the Lees were Cyrus Shepard of Lynn, Massachusetts, thirty-five years of age, and Philip L. Edwards, a Kentuckian by birth, lately of Richmond, Missouri. Courtney M. Walker, also of the place last mentioned, was engaged for a year, for pecuniary consideration, to
- ↑ For full accounts of Wyeth's first and second expeditions and efforts, see Hist. Northwest Coast, this series.
