MUSTERING RECRUITS. C75

might be trouble at home. Under all the circum- stances Douglas did what was undoubtedly the wisest thing ; he accepted the security of the governor and two of the commissioners, Applegate and L.ove- ioy and advanced the means to equip and put in the field the first company of Oregon riflemen, at a cost of about a thousand dollars.

On obtaining these supplies, the volunteers pro- ceeded without unnecessary delay to the Dalles, where they were to remain in charge of the mission property until reenforced.

But one company of less than fifty men could not make war upon several powerful tribes, likely to com- bine at the first intimation of hostilities on the part of the Americans. The business of the loan commis- sioners was, therefore, only begun. On the 13th ot December they addressed a letter to the merchants and citizens of Oregon, in very much the same lan- guage in which they had addressed the Hudson s .Bay

Company. 7 '

The success attending the labors of the commis- sioners was entirely inadequate to the demand lor means to put in the field five hundred men m the winter season, the amount secured being only $<3,b0U,

• It differed only in the concluding paragraph: ^^^J^^^t

Columbia have committed a great outrage upon °« f f^^ m ^T ? through their country and residing among them, and their punishment; lor these murder, may and ought to InTa prime object with every citizen of Ore ton vX as thaT duty more particularly devolves upon the government of the $? \lfkZlTxn I admits of delay, we do not make this the strongest ground nnon wWcfto found ""r ea nSppeal to you for pecuniary assistance It is Xc\ well known to every person acquainted with the Indian character that bvoLrin-Sw over their repeated thefts, robberies, and murders of our dlow cozens they have been emboldened to the commission of the appadmg tnZcre at Waiilatpu They call us women, destitute of the hearts and c?ura£ o mn andtf we allow this wholesale murder to pass by as former anions who^n tell how long either life «JWg*gg ^s'cUe nnv ™rt of the country, or what moment the Willamette will be the scene oH>loo 1 and carnage' The officers of our provisional government have nobly IrformeTttierdX. None can doubt the readiness of the patriotic sons of the weTt to offer their personal services in defence of a cause so righteous. So

• noTrerts ^LyOn, P |entleinen, to say whether our rights and onr firesides

ahaSLlefendodo^not? Or. Archives, 323-5; V ^^^^^t

» Of this $1,000 was obtained from citizens $1,000 was a loan rromiv Roberts superintendent of the Oregon Methodist Mission, and $1,000 from