Page:Oregon Historical Quarterly vol. 26.djvu/225

Rh gives eight thousand francs of this sum to the missionaries of the Columbia river. It will be learned, not without interest, that considerable sums are sent from France each year for the missions of British America, and particularly for our former provinces of Acadia and New France. The funds collected during these last years for the British Possessions in America alone have reached nearly two hundred thousand francs a year.

Messrs. Blanchet and Demers, leaving Montreal in May, 1838, arrived at Fort Van Couver at the end of November of the same year. They were actively engaged in founding missions among the natives, and in re-establishing order among the French Canadians who had been left to themselves. These two ecclesiastics now had five missions: one at Puget Sound, near Fort Nesqually, the mission of Saint Francis Xavier on the Kaoulis River; Saint Mary for the Chinook Indians of Fort Van Couver; Saint Louis, King of France, at Willamette falls; and Saint Paul, on the left bank of this river, in the midst of the farms of the French Canadians. On the excursions that I made with the worthy Abbe Blanchet to the falls of the Willamette, he asked me to whom he should dedicate this mission. I did not think I could suggest a name more glorious for France than that of our sainted King Louis.

At the three missions of Nesqually, Saint Francis Xavier, and Saint Paul, lands have been reserved especially for extension of the missions. At the first two they have kept three hundred hectares, and at Saint Paul have chosen a magnificent valley, fifteen hectares long by seventy deep, divided between woods and prairies, and having several water courses where they can set up