294 REVEREND EZRA FISHER
in the place, if the proprietors would give the site and pledge their attendance on the services of the Roman Church. 110 A somewhat similar proffer has been made to some of the settlers of the Clatsop Plains south of the mouth of the Columbia, if my informant, a resident of said plains, is to be relied upon, and I think him a man of veracity.
I have taught one quarter and probably I shall teach another, commencing about the first of October, if my lungs will allow me to teach and preach; if not, I must abandon teaching and find some other employment sufficient to sustain my family till relief comes from your Board, should it decide that a mission must be sustained here. Our Pedo-baptist friends have very freely expressed to me the opinion that I ought to have gone to Oregon City. But as the circumstances are and Br. Johnson seems desirous of remaining, I have for months been decidedly of the opinion that I should hold myself in readiness to make my home at or near the mouth of the Columbia, as soon as our brethren in this region will give their consent and Provi- dence opens the door. I rejoice to be able to say that quite unexpectedly to me our brethren are now adopting my views, and the probability is that by next summer settlements will become sufficiently extended on the coast to justify my re- moval to that point . . . We need men in Oregon who desire to magnify the office of the ministry and love it more than all other pursuits. We need more ministers, but we shall doubtless be better able to say what the character and qualifications should be after the arrival of the forth-coming emigration; volunteer ministers will probably come then and we shall then probably have an opportunity of writing you by way of the Sandwich Islands. We shall probably need one more at least in the Willamette Valley, one at Vancouver and one in the neighborhood of Pugets Sound before you
1 10 There seems to be no other record of this offer. If it was ever made it was not accepted. The first Catholic chapel was not erected in Portland until 1851, and not until 1859 was the first Catholic school opened in Portland. Hist, of Portland, Ore., ed. by H. W. Scott, pp. 348, 394.
