Page:Oregon Historical Quarterly vol. 7.pdf/247

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Jason Lee.
241

otic than he. If they dismissed him because of any alleged misappropriation of the funds of the society, they did not know the honesty of the man or the difficulties under which he labored. The historian Bancroft, further speaking upon this subject, says:

"That he had the ability to impress upon the Willamette Valley a character for religious and literary aspiration, which remains to this day; that he suggested the manner in which Congress could promote and reward American emigration, at the same time craftily keeping the government in some anxiety concerning the intention of the British Government and Hudson's Bay Company, when he could not have been ignorant of the fact that so far as the country south of the Columbia was concerned, there was nothing to fear; that he so carefully guarded his motives as to leave even the sagacious McLoughlin in doubt concerning them, up to the time he left Oregon—all of these taken together exhibit a combination of qualities which were hardly to be looked for in the frank, easy tempered, but energetic and devoted missionary, who in the autumn of 1834 built his rude house beside the Willamette River, and gathered into it a few sickly Indian children whose souls were to be saved though they had not long to remain in their wretched bodies. How he justified the change in himself no one can tell. He certainly saw how grand a work it was to lay the foundation of a new empire on the shores of the Pacific, and how discouraging the prospect of raising a doomed race to a momentary recognition of its lost condition, which was all that ever could be hoped for the Indians of Western Oregon. There is much credit to be imputed to him as the man who carried to successful completion the dream of Hall J. Kelley and the purpose of Ewing Young. The means by which these ends were attained will appear more fully when I come to deal with