Page:History of Oregon volume 1.djvu/119

68 to another futile attempt by sea in 1832, was the father of several expeditions, notably that of Wyeth, and was the immediate cause of the settlement of many prominent pioneers; it was he, this fanatic, who stimulated senators to speak for Oregon on the floor of congress, and even shaped the presidential policy. I am not prepared to give Mr Kelley all he claims, but I am prepared to give him his due. With regard to the missionary brothers Lee, who arrived in the country before him, he maintains that they too received their first knowledge of Oregon through him, and that he was the first person to advocate the christianizing of the natives. That he did impress upon the new commonwealth some portion of his ideas, that he did influence its destinies, there is no question, though we have onno [sic] means of weighing that influence with any degree of exactness. Regarding settlement his writings contain some practical suggestions; indeed, without clear discrimination between design and necessity, and read by the light of subsequent events, some of them might be pronounced prophetic. For a sketch