cation of Disoway's letter called forth a spirited editorial in the issue of March 22, 1833, exhorting the Church to take the matter up at once and respond to a call which appealed so powerfully to the Christian conscience of the world. Additional correspondence appeared in the issue of May 10, 1833, and the whole subject had by this time become familiar to Protestant churches throughout the United States.
There grew out of the event a curious myth, to the effect that on the eve of the departure of the surviving Indians for their home they were given a banquet, and that at this banquet one of the Indians delivered a speech, in which he declared that he and his companions had not found what they came for and must therefore go home disappointed to a disappointed people. The writer has never seen the smallest evidence that this reported speech was genuine, nor any as to who the real author was. (5) The speech itself, by whomsoever prepared, holds a prominent place in the history of the Protestant Missions in the Columbia valley, and is here given in full:
"I come to you over the trail of many moons from the setting sun. You were the friends of my fathers, who have all gone the long way. I came with an eye partly open for my people, who sit in darkness. I go back with both eyes closed. How can I go back blind, to my blind people? I made my way to you with strong arms through many enemies and strange lands that I might carry back much to them. I go back with both arms broken and empty. Two fathers came with us, they were the braves of many winters and wars. We leave them asleep here by your great waters and wigwams. They were tired in many moons and their moccasins wore out.
"My people sent me to get the `White Man's Book of Heaven.' You took me to where you allow your women
(5) It is said, upon the questionable authority of the Rev. H. H. Spalding, who went to Oregon with Marcus Whitman, that a clerk of the American Fur Company in St. Louis overheard the speech and wrote it up and sent it to his friends in Pittsburg.