No. 5. A wild, reckless, don’t-care sort of a youth, with a Nez Percé wife, so thoroughly attached to Indian ideas and customs that he has felt it beneath his dignity to turn from the ancient habits of the Indian to a “more recent invention” of religion and civilization. His curiosity was a little excited, which induced him to pay his respects to the missionaries, on account of their wives. He called on them, and spoke of some day finding his way somewhere down about where the missionaries might be located; as he had bought him a Nez Percé wife, she might want to go and see her people, and he might make up his mind to go and settle. This man, from his utter disregard for all moral and civilized social relations, has coiled himself up in the tribe he adopted, and spit out his venomous influence against all moral and civil improvement, training his children so that the better portion of the natives treat them with contempt. For a time he had considerable influence in shaping government policy toward the tribe and securing his own personal Indian position, to the injury of all other interests. I am unable to say how he obtained his title of colonel, unless it was from the influence he once pretended to have with the Indians, and a disposition on the part of those of his countrymen to title those who aspire to such honors.
No. 6. What the miners nowadays would call a “plain, honest farmer,” with a native wife and one child. He called on the party, took a look at their cattle, and some four years afterward, after going into Mexico and Taos, found his way to the Wallamet as a settler, with a few head of cattle, which he managed to get through. This man is a quiet and good citizen, and has a respectable family of half-native children. The accursed influence of slavery in his neighborhood has borne heavily upon his children. Whether they will be able to rise above it and stand as examples of good citizens remains for them to demonstrate.
No. 7. A short, thick-set man, with a Nez Percé wife; a good honest farmer; has done credit to himself and family in giving them every possible advantage for education and society, though the aquafortis mixture has been strong in his neighborhood; his family are respected; his Indian wife he considers as good as some of his neighbors’, that don’t like her or her children. In this opinion all who are not saturated with our cultus mixture agree with him. His title in the mountains was Squire, but I think it has been improved since he came to the settlements by adding the E to it, he having been duly elected to fill the office under the provisional, territorial, and State government. I have learned, with much regret, that the Squire of the Rocky Mountains, who had courage and strength to meet and overcome all the dangers and trials of early times, has not the courage to resist the approaches of false friends and bad whisky, which will ultimately bring himself and his family to that certain destruction that follows the debasing habit of using liquor in any shape.
No. 8. A fair, light-haired, light-complexioned, blue-eyed man, rather above the medium height, with a Nez Percé wife, came about the camp, had little or nothing to say. I am not quite certain that he had his native wife at that time, still he had one when he came into the settlement. He has a good farm, and if he avoids his false friends and the fatal habits of his neighbors, he may have a good name, which will be of more value to his children than his present social and vicious habits.
Doctor Marcus Whitman, they considered, on the whole, was a good sort of a fellow; he was not so hide-bound but what he could talk with a common man and get along easily if his wife did not succeed in “stiffening,” starching him up; he would do first-rate, though there appeared considerable doubt in their minds, whether, from her stern, commanding manner, she would not eventually succeed in stiffening up the Doctor so that he would be less agreeable. Mrs. Whitman, they thought, was a woman of too much education and refinement to be thrown away on the Indians. “She must have had considerable romance in her disposition to have undertaken such an expedition with such a common, kind, good-hearted fellow as the Doctor. As to Spalding, he is so green he will do to spread out on a frog-pond; he may do to preach to Indians, but mountain men would have to be fly-blown before he could come near them. Mrs. Spalding is a first-rate woman; she has not got any starch in her; it is strange she ever picked up such a greenhorn as she has for a husband; she will do first-rate to teach the Indians, or anybody else; she has got good common sense, and doesn’t put on any frills. As to Gray, he is young yet, is not quite so green as Spalding; he seems inclined to learn a little; by the time he goes to the Columbia River and travels about more, he will know a good deal more than he does now. He may do well in his department if he ‘keeps his eye skinned.’”
I suppose by this expression was meant a sharp look out for swindlers, rogues, and thieves, to see that they do not lie, cheat, and steal, every opportunity they may have, or at least that you do not allow them to take your property under false pretenses. Be that as it may, the general conclusion was, that, as this mission party had succeeded in getting thus far on their journey, they might get still further, and perhaps (most were certain) make a failure, either by being sent out of the country by the Hudson’s Bay Company, or destroyed by the Indians. Good wishes and hopes that they might succeed were abundant from all, as was plainly expressed, and a disposition, in case the mission succeeded in establishing themselves, to find their way down into the Columbia River Valley with their native families, and become settlers about the mission stations. Lightly as these frank, open expressions of good wishes and future ideas of the mountain hunter may appear, the missionaries saw at once there was the germ of a future people to be gathered in the Columbia River Valley, probably of a mixed race. These men had all abandoned civilization and home for the wild hunter life in the midst of the mountains. They had enjoyed its wild sports, felt its fearful dangers and sufferings, and become, most of them, connected with native women – a large proportion of them with the Nez Percé and Flathead tribes. Their family, at least, could be benefited by education, and taught the benefits of civilization and Christianity. The men had expressed kind wishes, good feelings, and treated them kindly; why should they not include this class of men and their families in their efforts to benefit the Indians in the valleys of the Columbia River.
As before stated, the mission party had been introduced by Captain Wyeth to Mr. John McLeod, a gentleman holding the rank of chief trader in the Hudson’s Bay Company. He had frequent interviews and conversations with the mission party while at rendezvous, and as often as any of these mountain men met him at the mission camp, he would leave without ceremony. There appeared a mutual dislike, a sort of hatred between them. This chief trader of the Hudson’s Bay Company, in the conversations had with him, informed the mission party that it was not the wish of the company to encourage any of these mountain hunters and trappers to go to the Columbia River to settle, or to have any thing to do with them, assigning as a reason that they would cause trouble and difficulties with the Indians. He also gave them to understand that should they need manual labor, or men to assist them in putting up their houses and making their improvements, the company would prefer to furnish it, to encouraging these men in going into the country. This intimation was distinctly conveyed to the party, with the advice and intimations received from Captain Wyeth, who had seen and understood all the policy of the Hudson’s Bay Company, and had been compelled to sell his improvements at Fort Hall to this same McLeod, and his goods designed for the trade to Dr. McLaughlin, soon after their arrival in the country. These facts and statements, with the decided manner of Mr. McLeod, compelled the mission party to defer any effort for these mountain men, but subsequently they advised the sending of a man to travel with their camps.
CHAPTER XVI
Missionaries travel in company with Hudson’s Bay Company’s party. – The Lawyer’s kindness. – Arrival at Fort Hall. – Description of the country. – The Salmon Indians. – The Hudson’s Bay Company’s tariff.
Letters all written to friends, and everybody supposed to have any particular interest in the person or individual who wrote them; the letters placed in the hands of Captain Wyeth; mission camp overhauled and assorted; all goods supposed unnecessary, or that could be replaced, such as irons for plows, blacksmith’s tools, useless kettles, etc., etc., disposed of. (All articles left, the party were careful to learn, could be had at Vancouver of the Hudson’s Bay Company, or Methodist Mission, at reasonable prices.) Tents struck; good-byes said; over the party goes to Horse Creek, not far from the Nez Percé camp, where we found that of McLeod and McKay. Soon