to Puget Sound from the Fraser Biver Mines, or by sea, being unmarried. This condition of society resulted in the union of Indian women with white men, and the degradation of the latter. It was suggested to Governor Pickering that it would be a philanthropic action to furnish the white bachelor population of Washington with wives from among the widows and daughters of soldiers killed in the war of the rebellion. The man selected or permitted to take charge of the enterprise was Asa S. Mercer, of Seattle, who, armed with a certificate of character, repaired to Washington, D.C., with the intention of appealing for aid to President Lincoln, but arrived on the day of his assassination, which seemed to put an end to the undertaking.
However, he then formed an immigration scheme of his own and secured contracts with one hundred and fifty young women, and as many families, to take them to Washington and guarantee them employment at good wages, on the payment to him in advance of a certain amount of passage-money. He made terms with a steamship company, and, instead of notifying all those who had contracted with him, set sail for Puget Sound with half the number, leaving the remainder to their vain regrets. For this violation of trust he was sued in the Superior Court of New York, which decided it had no jurisdiction, and his victims were left without redress. As for the seventy-five young women who reached this coast, an Immigrant Aid Society had been organized to provide homes and employment for them, and they disappeared like morning dew before the sun, being too few to create much of a change in Washington society or morals.
In this city, where such a movement was possible twenty-five years ago, there are now forty-three church organizations,—and we all know that churches consist chiefly of women,—with over eight thousand communicants. Sermons are preached in the English, German, Swedish, Norwegian, Danish, and Welsh languages, and sixteen denomi nations are represented. Half a million dollars is to be expended this year in fifteen new church edifices.
Seattle has four daily and several weekly newspapers, of which the Post-Intelligencer and the Seattle Press are the principal ones. The State University is located here, and in the heart of the city. Its endowment being inadequate to its needs, a movement is on foot to sell the ground, and with the proceeds
