doctrine requires but little elucidation. Happy indeed is the poor, sickly, degraded being here, who can be brought to look forward to riches, health, pleasures, and a glorious existence hereafter. It is the ideality of religion, the poetry of everlasting life.
But though the Mission seemed for a short time to promise some fruit, the expectation was lessened by a return in the first months of 1837 of the former disorders in a more threatening and fatal form. A chief of the Cayuses, having removed in the autumn with his family to the Willamete Valley in order that his children might attend the Mission school, lost two of them in quick succession, and a third became extremely ill. In his alarm he fled to Fort Vancouver with his family, but at the moment the canoe touched the landing the child expired. An incident like this, together with the continued sickness of the inmates of the Mission, produced a dread of the place in the minds of the Indians, and their parents refused the risk of earthly loss even for heavenly gain. At no time were there more than thirty-five or forty pupils in attendance, and of all that were received to the close of 1838, one third died, and the remainder were sickly.[1] When will men learn that in the affairs of the savages the benevolence of civilization curdles into
- ↑ Hines' Or. Hist., 35. These details are gathered from the writings of the missionaries themselves; but I find in a report made to the United States government by its agent, Mr Slacum, a more flattering account. According to this report, made it must be assumed from information furnished by the Lees, there were within fence 150 acres of land in the winter of 1836. The Mission family consisted of 3 adults and 23 Indian and half-breed children, ten of whom were orphans. There were, besides, 22 Indians and 8 half-breeds who attended the day-school. All were taught to speak English, and several could read. The larger boys worked on the farm in fine weather, earning, at the lowest pay of the Hudson's Bay Company, their board clothing, and tuition. The school and family, it was said, could be increased, but the missionaries did not wish to add to their number until they had further assistance; and nothing whatever was stated showing any of the discouragements under which they labored. Mr Slacum's report was much like other similar documents furnished the government, that is, made to suit the occasion. Of the faithfulness and zeal of the Lees and their assistants up to the period of Slacum's visit, no doubt could be entertained. We have McLoughlin's testimony that no men 'could exert themselves more zealously'. Copy of a Document, in Trans. Or. Pioneer, 1880, 50. For Slacum's account, see 25th Cong. 3d Sess., House Rept. 101.
