Page:Oregon Historical Quarterly volume 12.djvu/378

 370 ARCHIBALD McKiNLAY 690-91 of Vol. 2 of History of Northwest Coast from MSS. dictated to Mr. Bancroft himself at Victoria in 1878, illustrates the Bancroft method of popularizing his text ; for this volume of the series of Bancroft histories was written by Mr. Bancroft himself (see p. 52, Vol. 4, of this Quarterly). Mr. Elwood Evans, Tacoma, Wash. Dear Sir: I will now send you the gunpowder story in detail : At Walla Walla it was the duty of the officer in charge to furnish horses, pack saddles and other equipment to all and every party requiring the same. All over the country from Utah to British Columbia: I had a man especially employed to make pack saddles. The only hard wood we could find for the purpose was Birch; this we got from the Blue Mountains at least fifty miles away. My saddles for the season were fin- ished ; however there was a quantity of saddle wood in the saddle maker's house. I happened to go in one day and found the saddle wood diminished in bulk. I remarked the same to the saddle maker; his reply was that both Indians and whites helped themselves to the wood & that he thought the wood was not required. I told him that if the wood was not required then it would be re- quired in another year, to allow no person to take a stick of it. A few days after while busily employed writing the saddle maker opened my door and told me an Indian was taking a piece of the wood, that he had remonstrated with him & that he would not give it up. I asked my clerk Mr. Wm. Todd to go and see about it. In a few minutes after I heard some noise which induced me to go to the window ; I saw an Indian rush out of the saddle maker's house, pick up a stone & before you could say Jack Robertson Todd was out grappling with him and happening to have two other Indians standing by they also got hold of Todd. I drove the two off, to give Todd fair play. The consequence was that altho. Todd's opponent was a stronger man than himself, he had thrown him down and