Page:The Early Indian Wars of Oregon.djvu/45

Rh work, sewing, spinning, and cookery, all of which they learned readily when they chose.

Farnham, who visited Waiilatpu in 1839, was struck with admiration of the superintendent s work, both as teacher and farmer, and greatly impressed by the apparently devotional character of the Cayuses as exhibited in some of the chief families, who were regular in their attendance upon public worship, and morning and evening devotions in their lodges.

At the Spokane mission of Chemekane there was less improvement, and somewhat less anxiety. In 1839 one of the teachers at that station wrote, "The failure of this mission is so strongly impressed upon my mind that I feel it necessary to have cane in hand, and as much as one shoe on, ready for a move. I see nothing but the power of God that can save us." Yet the Spokaues were esteemed more tractable than the Cayuses. When the mission house was burned in the winter of 1839-40, they offered their assistance, and refrained from pillage. But not knowing what their course might be, the Hudson s bay gentlemen at Colville came down with their servants, and camped near, to afford their protection.

As early as 1838 an element of discord of a nature different from those already mentioned, was introduced into the missionary life in Oregon. This was a period in church history, when Catholicism and Protestantism were in a state of active hostility to each other. The mere presence of a Catholic priest in the neighborhood of Waiilatpu was like a pestilence in the air, threatening the welfare of every member of the missions. The same feeling existed in western Oregon, with this difference—that the natives there were so contemptible that their souls were not worth saving, and their bodies too insignificant to be feared.

But in the upper country, inhabited by powerful and numerous tribes, religious antipathy and intolerance were likely to occasion disorders of a dangerous nature, partic-