ranging from $10 to $500, all but $350 being subscribed by the missionaries. On the 26th of October it is resolved at a meeting of the Methodist society of Oregon, to make the pledge required by the constitution of the proposed institution of learning, and assume proprietorship of the property in the hands of the board, which is done. A building is commenced soon after, under the superintendence of W. H. Gray, formerly of the Presbyterian mission; and in the course of the year following $3,000 has been expended in its construction.
There was one more scheme in which the superintendent of the Oregon missions was deeply interested, but to which he did not care publicly and personally to commit himself. This was no less than the acquisition for the Methodist colony of the water-power at the falls of the Willamette. To this place, as we have seen, John McLoughlin held the prior claim, and the unsettled condition of the Oregon boundary allowed him to maintain it; but from this the Methodists were plotting to drive him, standing ready to take his place when he should have been forced to abandon it.
It was a plan worthy of persons who, professing piety, had turned the sanctified gold of their supporters into personal profit.
Their intention was made known by report to McLoughlin soon after the arrival of the great reënforcement. He at once notified Lee of facts with which every one was already well aware, namely, that possession had been taken of the place by him in 1829, at which time, and since, improvements had been made, consisting of several houses and a mill-
by those who subscribe $50 or upwards, until such time as some society shall so pledge itself. The by-laws provide that no subscription is binding until some society has come forward and assumed the responsibility of maintaining the Oregon Institute, and as nothing can be done without funds, and as there is no other Protestant religious society in the Willamette Valley able to take charge of the proposed school, it falls, as it was intended to do, to the Methodist Episcopal church.
