Page:How Marcus Whitman Saved Oregon.djvu/151

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organization has not been, in a measure, responsible for the neglect of this Hero, who served it and the Christian world with all faithfulness and honesty, until he and his noble wife dropped into their martyr graves? If they say yea, we raise the question whether the time has not been reached to make amends?

Dr. Barrows says, in his "Oregon and the Struggle for Possession," "It should be said in apology for both parties at this late day that, at that time, the Oregon Mission and its managing board were widely asunder geographically, and as widely separated in knowledge of the condition of affairs." Dr. Whitman seems to have assumed that his seven years' residence on the Northwest Coast would gain him a trustful hearing. But his knowledge gave him the disadvantage of a position and plans too advanced—not an uncommon mishap to eminent leaders. As said by Coleridge of Milton, "He strode so far before his contemporaries as to dwarf himself by the distance."

He adds that:

"Years after only, it was discovered by one of the officers of the American Board," that "It was not simply an American question then settled, but at the same time a Protestant question." He also refers to a recent work, "The Ely Volume," in which is discussed the question, "Instances where 136 the direct influence of missionaries