Page:Oregon Historical Quarterly volume 15.djvu/183

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DIARY 171

would do next day. I sent the letter to him by S. L. Harris, a clerk in the Department. This took me till night. In the evening I was engaged till eleven in directing Pres. messages to my constituents, writing to some of them &c.

December 29, 1849 This morning I went to see the Sec. of the Interior. He informed me that he had removed R. Newell and appointed J. L. Parrish. I next called on the 1st Comptroller of the Treasury and he informed me he had sent the order to General Adair to pay off the Legislature. I next went and drew my travel and took up Stephen Coffin's draft on me, of Oregon, for eighteen hundred dollars. I also bought 100 of Pres. message with accompanying documents for my constituents, and directed 100 papers to same. I also wrote my wife, telling her to call on said Coffin and tell him to pay her one thousand dollars in Am. gold, and deliver up to her my note due to G. Abernethy for seven hundred dollars, and that he and I would be square, as I borrowed one hundred dollars of him at San Francisco. Also wrote to Parrish in- forming him of his apt. ; answered several letters relative to Oregon, drew up a resolution relative to extinguishing Ind. title to land in Oregon, and went to bed at 11.

December 30, 1849 This day was Sunday, and by reason of having to go to the Intelligencer office to examine the proof sheet of an article I had prepared to [answer] the slanderous letter from Vancouver, I got belated so that I did not go to meeting at all. So I wrote two or three letters home to people in Oregon, drew up a resolution to offer in the House on Monday, and did some other work and went to bed at 10 o'clock in the evening.

December 31, 1849 On this day, in the forenoon, I drew up two resolutions, one to call the attention of the Committee on Indian affairs to the extinguishment of the Indian title to land in Oregon, and one to call the Comt. on Territories and on the Judiciary to Puget Sound Ag. Com. lands & possessory rights of H. B. Company and British subjects to land in Oregon.

After attending the session, I wrote a letter and carried it to the President requesting him to declare Portland and Nes-