Page:Portland, Oregon, its History and Builders volume 1.djvu/223

Rh Mr. Lee engaged P. L. Edwards as a teacher and Courtney M. Walker as an assistant.

The young evangehst found himself in strange company. There were nearly two hundred of Wyeth's men, and they were a tough lot of mountaineers and trappers, accustomed to hard life and scant ceremony—winters spent in St. Louis and the river towns in wild orgies, then back to the fur country. This company was expecting to compete with the Hudson's Bay establishment for the fur trade of the northwest, and it is not likely that Captain Wyeth engaged any class-leaders for the enterprise. The Lees were sick of their strange surroundings at first, but soon found themselves none the worse. They bore their proper share of the toils and dangers of the journey through the Indian country and won the friendship and good will of the party. Jason Lee kept a journal, and extracts from it on the early days of the Wyeth expedition show a pathetic homesickness and longing for the gentle life he had been wont to lead, but also full of determination to stay with the train and his task. It was better very soon. He entered into the freer life of the open, new world around him and found hope and gladness. A line from his diary. Out beyond Laramie, in as hopeless looking country as he had ever seen, he says: "Awoke just at daylight after a night of sweet repose and found all safe. Roasted buffalo meat and pure water was our rich repast. Am persuaded that none even in New England ate a more palatable meal. We do not feel the want of bread, and I am m better health than for years."

On June 15, the Wyeth company met the great body of trappers and mountaineers of the inter-mountain region at the "summer rendezvous," a summer gathering of these semi-wild men, at a time when they were footloose. This time the rendezvous was on Ham's Fork, a stream which enters Green river, a branch of the Colorado, at a point near the site of Fort Bridger, two days' journey by the old emigrant road west from Green river. Some of the trappers in the motley crowd promised to make trouble for the missionary party, but as soon as Jason Lee was informed of their threats he sought the men out and had a frank talk with them, which quite removed their hostile ideas and gave them a wholesome respect for the young preacher.

Mr. J. K. Townsend, ornithologist, who was making the journey to the Pacific with Captain Wyeth's party, says: "Mr. Lee is a favorite with the men, deservedly so, and there are few to whose preaching they would have listened with such complaisance. I have been amused and pleased by Mr. Lee's manner of reproving them for their coarseness and profanity. The reproof, though decided, clear and strong, is always characterized by the mildness and affectionate manner peculiar to the man, and it is always treated with respect."

At the rendezvous Lee encountered certain Indians of the Nez Perces tribe who had heard of Christianity, like their neighbors, the Flatheads, and the young chief who was at the head of this party of Nez Perces invited him to come to the country of his people and establish his mission among them. This chief was the celebrated leader of his tribe, subsequently known as "Lawyer," and is remembered by many of our pioneers.

On July 10th, the expedition passed over the divide, from which the waters flow west into the Shoshone, and three days later they reached that river at the mouth of the Port Neuf. Here Wyeth's party remained some time, procuring provisions from the Indians and establishing the trading post station known as Fort Hall. Here Lee preached the first sermon ever uttered in the Oregon country, July 27, 1834.

His audience consisted of Indians, half-breeds, Canadian trappers, etc. Among the listeners was the famous Captain Tom McKay, who acted as guide for Wyeth's party from this point west, and two years later he performed the