Page:Oregon Historical Quarterly vol. 7.pdf/387

Rh travel to mark out. No road building, however, was undertaken by the territorial government during this period. It was only in the expense incurred in special road legislation that there was any public burden involved.

Western Oregon is a well-watered country with numerous considerable streams. The Provisional Government period was before the day of bridges, so the licensing of ferries and fixing of tolls was an important line of legislation. Ferry licenses were among the most certain sources of territorial revenues.

As those who exercised authority under the Provisional Government were always conscious that it was simply tiding over a temporary need, they desisted from activity in providing public buildings except where exigencies seemed to compel action. They built a jail out of moneys that escheated to the Government. This building was burned within about a year from the time of its completion and from that time on (August 18, 1846) they made shift to get along without any public building whatever.

Although the Governor regularly called the attention of the Legislatures to the advisability of provision for education, no Legislature saw its way clear to do more than to charter private schools. There was a single appropriation for the care of the insane. The records seem to indicate that it was applied for the care of a single person.

The administration of a postal department was tried for a year, but the rates of postage on letters was fixed so high that they were sent by private conveyance and the "postmaster general" at the end of the third quarter of the first year stopped sending the mail. An appropriation was made to take care of the deficiency and the department was abolished.

A matter of vital importance to the community was the