, 1866-02-09

JeNeTsOl counted
upon as great public ACQUISITION TO become a
connecting link between the ladies, the United
States and Europe. The expedition under Hunt
was nearly two years in reaching the coast, ar
riVing in small parties during the months Of
January and February, mere skeletons, mostly
naked and oareioot having traversed half the
continent from the head waters of SOAK kvvr
10 the Columbia On foot. Several we're left in
the sand deserts of the Snake country and never
saw Astoria seferal perished outright from
startato1, hardships and SHOWS, in that s,great
and terri ie Wilderness The expedition by sea
was not less desiructivq Of human life aud more
stuPendous In the sinking Of human wealth and
human hopes, and the world sees tO-dat in con-
temriatb. the tOtai failare of sbis Almost yupe-.
human enterprise Of this great man with his iron
will and his immense wealth TO light In the
blaze of new American Republic on the North
West coast. Capt. Bonneville, Kelly, Young,
Wych and others, between the years 1890 and
"a, followed in the same great enterprise and
failed, as all former ones had, for the reasons
probably that they had counted the overrulng
hand Of God out Of their arrangements and
were compelled, from the terrific nature of the
country, to leave out one ingredient absolutely
indispensable to the permaneucy of a new set
tlement in foreign wilderness, viz: tyipss and
mothers. To supply this deficiency with Indian
women has proved to civilization, in the hands
Of Americans, what it would be for father to
give a stone to his son for bread when hungry
The great and noble pioneer Lee having
reached the head waters of the Colorado under
the convoy of Capt. Wyett's caravan ir 1884.
made up his mind, every Rocky Mountain
traveller had done before him, and as every pru-
dent humane man, except perhaps one man, who
is to have an important place in this narrative
would have DONE that it was not his duty to at
tempt to bring a white woman over the Rocky
mountains. He had undertaken his mission in
answer to that wonderful call for "the book of
the white mans God" from the Flat Head and
Nez Perce Indians, and these Indians had met
him on Greene River and given him 0 horses to
induce him TO stop with them. They saw him
"looking toward the setting SUM- but the hazJ
ards and hardShips Of the overland route pre-
cluded the idea of his lady missionaries crossing
the Rocky mountains, and he very naturally did
just what the writer would have done, turned
his eye towards the Pacific shores, where he
would be in reach of Shipping, as the field of
his future missionary labOrs. And after trayers-
ing the rest of the great wilderness and reaching
the valley of the Multnoma, his convictions were
only confirmed and after selecting this beauti.
full valley as the theater Ofhis missionary labors,
he made out his Report to his mission Board ac-
cOrdingly and sent for his lady missionary help,
families and supplies to come around Cape
Horn, and they arrived in the Columbia River
in May 1891, nine months after Mrs. Spalding
and Mrs Whitman arrived in the country BY the
overland route.
SO far as the Mission cause is concerned, the
Cape Horn route would have been all sufficient
But God had determined as before observed,
that the y extensive goli miucs. so long unde-
veloped, shOhld be opened. and by American
hands; and FIR rh,s c.ui !lo bad determined that
these then unknown, distant wild regions
should be tr1yrrsel and >"1ird bv Americans
and American families; and for this end, as the
pioneer emigrant who usually takes the lead in
settling new countries, corld not reach this
coast with his long OK teams csd Cape Horn, an
overland emigrdnt ruuts must be had over the
mountains to the coast.
And our Gracious God, when the auspicious
moment came to develop his plans, took His own
way, chose His own instruments, to open this
overland route and secure a basis for the settling
of the country 20 accomplish which so many
lives, so much treasure and so much wisdom
had been expended and failed. lie knew the
men and women, the latter Indispensable, which
He would select to begin the work, and He knew
He had the only motive power that would move
them. And we are struck with the simplicity of
the instruments and reminded of David and his
smooth stOue He did not select John Jacob
Astor, az the right hand of the American Gov
ernment, but He chose four Indians from the
Rocky mountains two white women and one
white man. without wealth to aid them or
military power to protect them.
Thus far the motive power used to induce
hardy trappers and hunters to adventure the
Rocky mountains, and the vast sand deserts OF
DEATH and the sleepless treachery of the savage
tribes where human life has been found to aver
age little short of four years, had been only
wealth from the fur trade and the acquisition to
commerce from American settlements on the Pa
ciic. But these motives had had no pain on
wives and mothers Not one of these had been
found of sufficient nerve TO encounter those haz-
ards and the opinion had become fixed among
mountain travellers, except the one person above
named, who mad experience in ''that great and
terrible wilderness, which had proved emphat-
ically "a wilderness of death" that no white wo-
men could outlive an overland journey to the Pa
ciic shores. But this very thing, such a jour-
ney by white woman must become a fact be-
fore an Emigrant Road is established from the
Missouri to the Columbia so that the Western
Emigrant so Indispensable to the settling of the
vast unknown Paciic West, can see his way
clear for his family and wagons.