Page:The Early Indian Wars of Oregon.djvu/25

Rh this argument to the Canadians themselves, that many of them in fear of losing their farms signed the petition to have the protection of the United States government ex tended over them.

So much did Jason Lee have at heart the colonial scheme that in the spring of 1838 he returned to the states overland, carrying this memorial; and so did he prevail both with the church and members of the cabinet that in 1840 a third reinforcement and a shipload of goods and farming implements arrived for the mission settlements, which were scattered from The Dalles to the mouth of the Columbia, but which as missions were soon after abandoned, the incumbents frankly owning the hopelessness of the missionary cause with the native population of western Oregon.

In 1840 the missionaries again petitioned congress to establish a territorial government in Oregon. The mission colony received this year a reinforcement of over fifty persons, swelling the whole number to seventy, and was assisted by the government—an open secret then, and admitted freely at a later period. Every one who could be induced to go to Oregon at that time was encouraged, if necessary, by financial aid from the contingent fund; both parties to the boundary controversy feeling that occupation was the argument which must ultimately settle the vexed question.

To offset the mission colony the Hudson's Bay Company introduced in 1841 about an equal number of Red-river people to the Puget Sound region, many of whom subsequently settled south of the Columbia. This year also Oregon was visited by the United States exploring expedition under Commodore Wilkes, who inspected the American settlements, and was consulted by the colonists with regard to organizing a provisional government; a scheme he disapproved as unnecessary. In the autumn there arrived overland a small company of actual settlers—the first low wash of the wave of immigration which touched