Page:Oregon Historical Quarterly vol. 19.djvu/148

 could have his services but one Saturday and Sabbath each month.

The people generally are as much a church going people as is common for new countries. The influence in the churches is generally good in the country and the members have a fair proportion of talents and wealth. But they need (like all churches in new countries) habitual training in practical Christian duties. A minister, with a small family, adapted to fill that place, should be appointed with a salary of $700 from the Home Mission Society and he might expect the first year to receive $200 from the churches and people in Salem and vicinity, if he is a man with fair preaching talents in the old States and could command respect from the leading men in the territory and the government officers who will be located at Salem. As I expect soon to present you with some views on the importance of Oregon as a missionary field, I will only add that I conceive it of vast importance to the cause of Christ under God that your Board, as soon as practica- ble, sustain in the Willamette Valley at least three missionaries one at Salem, one at Oregon City and one at Portland. If all the churches besides receive little missionary aid, except as they receive it through the influence and labors of these men, we probably can find men on claims who can attend to the wants of the country churches for the present better than that these places go entirely neglected from year to year.

Yours respectfully,

EZRA FISHER.

Received March 19, 1853.

Oregon City, O. T., Jan. 10th, 1853.

Rev. Benjamin M. Hill,

Cor. Sec. A. B. H. M. Soc., New York.

Dear Brother:

I wrote Br. James S. Read about eight weeks since suggesting to him the propriety of his representing to you the importance of his field of labor and making timely application for reappointment, at the same time assuring him that I