97 complete Oregon Mission story, but only so much of it as will make clear the heroic and patriotic services of Dr. and Mrs. Whitman. The reader will find a most careful study of the whole broad field of pioneer mission work upon the Pacific Coast in the Rev. Myron Eells' two books, the "History of Indian Missions," and the "Biography of Rev. Cushing Eells."
How much or how little the work of the Oregon Missionaries benefited the Indians eternity alone will reveal. They simply obeyed the call "to preach the gospel to every creature."
A train of circumstances, a series of evolutions in national history which they neither originated nor could stop, were portending. But that the Missionaries first of all saw the drift of coming events, and wisely guided them to the peace and lasting good of the nation is as plain as any page of written history.
With the light of that time, with the terrible massacre at Waiilatpui in sight, it is not strange that good people felt that there had been great sacrifice with small good results. All the years since have been correcting such false estimates. The American Board and the Christian people of the land have made their greatest mistake in not rallying to the defense of their martyr heroes.
No "forty thousand dollars" ever spent by that organization before or since has been so prolific in 98
