Page:How Marcus Whitman Saved Oregon.djvu/234

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in 1844, and thenceforth became a political clique, whose chief aim was to acquire other men's property."

Please note the charges. Here are Christian men and women who have for years deprived themselves of all the benefits of civilization, and endured the hardships and dangers of frontier life, professedly that they might preach the gospel to savage people, but says Mr. Bancroft:

"Missionary work did not pay." In the sense of money making, when did Missionary work ever pay? This history of the Pacific States is a history for the generations to come. It is to go into Christian homes and upon the shelves of Christian libraries. If it is true, Christianity stands disgraced and Christian Missionaries stand dishonored.

Mr. Bancroft says: "They broke up their establishments in 1844 and became a political clique, whose chief aim was to acquire other men's property." As usual, another one of the historian's valuable aides comes upon the stage in the succeeding volume, and gives a horrifying account of "The great massacre at Dr. Whitman's Mission, on Nov. 29th, 1847." He tells us "There were at the time seventy souls at the Mission" and "Fourteen persons were killed and forty-seven taken captives." Does this prove the historian's truthfulness who 213 had before told his readers that "They broke up their establishments