154 REVEREND EZRA FISHER
considerable number of the natives, who have suffered long from the venereal. Our soil is generally productive and yields a generous return to the labors of the husbandman. Yet it is not to be forgotten that we are far removed from the civilized world and consequently the few merchants in Oregon sell their goods of a very ordinary quality at very exorbitant prices, often one, two and three hundred per cent and, in some instances, more than a thousand per cent in advance of the first cost, among which I will name castings, edged tools, nails and all iron wares, coffee, cotton, cloth, leather boots and shoes, hats, cotton and woolen cloth. As yet there is no competition in trade. Much has been said and written of the changes of the mouth of the Columbia. I will venture to remark, upon the best authority, that the harbor within the mouth of the Columbia is one of the easiest of access and the safest in all North America. The last fifty times the bar has been crossed with no other accident than the loss of the anchor of the brig Henry. For further proof on this subject, I would refer you to Mr. Blain's 145 " 8 letter to Honorable Thomas Benton, published in his three days' speech in the U. S. Senate on the subject, "The United States' Title to Oregon in 1846." The publishing of that let- ter in the commercial periodicals in our Atlantic cities would contribute something to the encouraging of commerce in Oregon.
We hope to organize an association in June next in the Willamette Valley. 340 We are beginning to need one or two more efficient missionaries in the Willamette Valley. I have chosen my position as advantageously as I could near the mouth of the Columbia and promise seems to indicate that it is too important to be abandoned. The population is gradu- ally, but constantly, increasing. We have no doubt but the government will make the first national improvements at the mouth of the Columbia, and we think it rather probable that
i45-a Rev. Wilson Hlain, editor of the Oregon Spectator, Oregon City.
146 For the organization of the association, see the letter of Sept. 20, 1848, and Mattoon, Bap. An. of Ore. I:i8.
