Page:Eleven years in the Rocky Mountains and a life on the frontier.djvu/331

Rh to be benefited as had been hoped, as the whites were turning their attention to benefiting themselves.

As early as 1839, Mr. Smith, an associate of Mr. Spalding in the country of the Nez Perces, was forbidden by the high chief of the Nez Perces to cultivate the ground. He had been permitted to build, but was assured that if he broke the soil for the purpose of farming it, the ground so broken should serve to bury him in. Still Smith went on in the spring to prepare for ploughing, and the chief seeing him ready to begin, inquired if he recollected that he had been forbidden. Yet persisting in his undertaking, several of the Indians came to him and taking him by the shoulder asked him again "if he did not know that the hole he should make in the earth would be made to serve for his grave." Upon which third warning Smith left off, and quitted the country. Other missionaries also left for the Wallamet Valley.

In 1842 there were three mission stations in the upper country; that of Dr. Whitman at Waiilatpu on the Walla-Walla River, that of Mr. Spalding on the Clearwater River, called Lapwai, and another on the Spokane River, called Cimakain. These missions were from one hundred and twenty to three hundred miles distant from each other, and numbered altogether only about one dozen whites of both sexes. At each of these stations there was a small body of land under cultivation, a few cattle and hogs, a flouring and saw mill, and blacksmith shop, and such improvements as the needs of the mission demanded. The Indians also cultivated, under the direction of their teachers, some little patches of ground, generally but a small garden spot, and the fact that they did even so much was very creditable to those who labored to instruct them. There was no want of ardor or industry in the Presbyterian