Page:History of Oregon volume 1.djvu/175

124 On the 18th of June Parker took final leave of Fort Vancouver, and sailed for Honolulu, where he was compelled to wait until the middle of December for a vessel to the United States, reaching his home in Ithaca the 23d of May, 1837, having travelled 28,000 miles.

We have now to deal with the results of the exploration ordered by the American Board. When Mr Parker decided to proceed alone, Dr Whitman turned back with the caravan to St Louis for the next year's supplies, reaching the Missouri frontier late in the autumn of 1835. The business in hand was something requiring all his superabundant energy, for before spring he must bring into the service of the Presbyterian missions in Oregon persons enough to set up at least two stations, one among the Flatheads and one among the Nez Percés.

To enlist the sympathy of Christians, he took with him two Indian lads, as did Columbus, Pizarro, and Wyeth, and as do others, down to the Indian agents and military men of the present day, when wishing to interest the public in alien and savage races. With these he went directly to the missionary board, and reported the field of mission work west of the Rocky