Page:History of Oregon volume 1.djvu/159

108 of mounted men, seemingly natives, riding full tilt in his direction. Fontenelle, at the hurried flight of Parker, hastened to his relief with a squad of armed men; but when the wild cavalcade came near enough for recognition, they proved to be a party of trappers, dressed in Indian finery, coming out to welcome the St Louis partner with the year's supplies. Then all was merriment, questionings, and mutual rejoicings.

On the 1st of August, the wagons being left at Fort Laramie, which Parker called the Fort of the Black Hills, and the goods all packed upon mules, the caravan resumed its journey to the rendezvous on Green River, where it arrived on the 12th, and where Parker remained until the 21st, waiting for an escort to pursue his explorations westward. While at the rendezvous Dr Whitman gave surgical and medical aid to a number of persons, among other operations extracting an iron arrow three inches long from the back of Captain Bridger, who afterward built Fort Bridger on the Black branch of Green River, and an arrow from the shoulder of a hunter who had carried it in his flesh for more than two years. The exhibition of his skill excited the wonder of the Flatheads and Nez Percés there present, and roused their desires to have teachers come among them who could do so much to relieve suffering.

The evident anxiety of the natives to secure the benefits of the white man's superior knowledge, through the instrumentality of "a man near to God," as they called Parker, led to a consultation between the missionaries upon the propriety of bringing out teachers without delay. With his usual impetuosity, Whitman proposed to return with the caravan to St Louis, obtain assistants, and join the same escort to the mountains the next spring. To this Parker readily consented, having confidence that God would go with and protect him as surely without as in the company