Page:Oregon Historical Quarterly volume 17.djvu/320



312 REVEREND EZRA FISHER

shall soon need a few Latin and Greek grammars, readers, and lexicons. Now it seems almost indispensable to our suc- cess that we have the most approved works always at hand. Can you not find some friends who will send out by our teacher on commission a small book store of school books and religious and literary works and afford them here for forty or fifty per cent profits? They will meet with a ready sale and we can find some friend here who will sell them for a small per cent for the benefit of the school and Oregon generally, without taxing the teacher with this matter farther than receiving the funds and forwarding them and conducting the correspond- ence. More than a thousand dollars' worth of school books were brought to this place about two months since 2 4 and they are almost entirely sold, so that the country will be out of school books in a few weeks. In addition to this we want a small, well selected library, comprising histories, voyages, travels, literary and scientific works, especially works on the natural sciences, mental and moral philosophy, political econ- omy, lives, theological standard works, etc. ; also a set of globes, a small portable telescope and a case of instruments to facilitate the study of natural philosophy, surveying, trig- onometry, etc. We have already asked you for a bell. We repeat that request; if you can find some benevolent friends who can send us one of from 200 to 600 pounds weight. The Romans regulate the time of our city by their bells. Not a Protestant bell in the place. We need: nails, hinges, door latches and glass sufficient for building a house of the size before named and furnishing two school rooms thirty feet square. Sash also can be bought and shipped much cheaper than they can be bought here. We think you could render us essential service, if your Board would take this matter into advisement and, when you find the man, commission him to travel a few months through some of the most important cities and large towns in the free states and solicit funds for the

304 These were brought out by G. H. Atkinson. George H. Himes.