Page:Oregon Historical Quarterly volume 15.djvu/140



130 C. O. ERMATINGER

"The fourth is a Scotchman who acted in the store with M. and must have known his misconduct and said nothing of it and such a coward that, though he admits the deceased was most kind to him, still, though he saw the murderer level his gun sometime before to murder the deceased, he never in- formed him !

"As to his drinking, Mr. Finlayson, his assistant, says he never saw him take more than a glass of wine or a glass of spirits, or water, in the course of the day, though M. had the villainy to swear to Sir George that he and my son used to drink grog continually, and as he, M., could not join them in drinking grog, they allowed him wine which is false. The deceased's private store or allowance of liquors is almost in the same state as when he, Finlayson, left the deceased. The Indian woman he kept, a woman of the place, similar to our Chinooks, declares she never saw him drink and I believe what she says, as these Indians do not consider drunkenness a'ny way improper. Mr. Work and Dr. Kennedy, who had charge of posts on each side of him and several times saw Indians from the deceased, never heard a whisper of the deceased drinking, from the Indians (and they soon find out), though Mr. Work writes he heard from Indians of the attempt to shoot him. The men admit he was most vigilant and watchful, up night a'nd day visiting the watchmen often several times in the night. His journal is posted up to the day of his death, his accounts and documents in order and cer- tainly these are not the marks of a drunkard. And if you add to this his letters to Mr. Work are full of the miscon- duct of his assistants, M. and S. the Scotchman, a laborer, whom Sir George left when he took Finlayson away- -and in fact Sir George Simpson was the cause, though uninten- tionally, of the murder of my son, by taking Finlayson and leaving this man S. in his place. And Work is greatly to blame, who did not send me those letters my son wrote him, wherem he complains so much of the misconduct of S. and M. especially as he saw these fellows had so imposed on Sir George as to make him believe they were such valuable men