Page:Oregon Historical Quarterly volume 17.djvu/71



CORRESPONDENCE 63

Missionary at the mouth of the Columbia River.

Should you have opportunity to forward any boxes or packages to the Islands and not directly to this place, you can direct to me to the care of E. O. Hall, Financier for the A. B. C. F. Missions at Honolulu, Oahu, and pay the freight and they will probably reach me in safety.

Received Jan. 17, 1848.

Clatsop Plains, Oregon, Oct. 20th, 1847. Rev. and Dear Br. Hill :

The Bark Whiton being about to sail for N. Y. in a day or two, I take this opportunity to address you a line, which I trust will reach you in three months, as Captain Gelston pro- poses crossing the Isthmus and sending his ship around the Cape.

The two boxes of goods which you forwarded me on the Whiton were duly received, and the accompanying letters. I have delivered half the Bibles and Testaments, pamphlets and periodicals, and half of the goods which you forwarded to me, without my order, to Br. Johnson.

The Bibles, Testaments, periodicals and reports were most gladly received and read with eagerness not only by myself and family, but by the surrounding community. They seemed to transport us to the shores of civilization and the regions of Christian enterprise, after years of seclusion. I carry with me a few tracts and religious periodicals each Sabbath, and give away the tracts and request the periodicals to be returned for further circulation. I give away no tract without enjoining upon the receiver the importance of reading it.

Your letter of January 19th and 24th was received last week, but the periodicals are still behind; probably lost. I have just returned from a tour of four weeks in the Willam- ette Valley. I found rather an interesting state of things in Tualatin Plains. A gradual work of grace has been in progress in those plains since last June. Since last January, Brother Vincent Snelling has baptized fifteen into the fellowship of the church in that place, two of whom were the fruits of a series