As to the benefits from the missionaries to the Indians themselves
eternity alone will reveal how little or how much good was conferred.
The
Cayuse was a trading tribe of Indians, and were almost as
unscrupulous in their dealings as Wall Street is to-day. Dr. Whitman
had hard uphill work in changing their customs. Yet many of the
Cayuse became Christians. Old Istikus was a prince among Christian
men, savage as he was. For sixteen years after the death of his loved
friends, he regularly went to the door of his wigwam, rang the old
mission bell, and invited all to come in to prayers. General Joel
Barlow, who was one of the commissioners after the treaty of peace in
1855, to settle the Indians upon their reservations, says:
"I found forty-five Cayuse and one thousand Nez Perces who have
kept up regular family worship, singing from the old hymn books,
translated into their language by Mrs. Spalding. Many of them
showed surprising evidences of piety."
The most successful of the missions, as far as good to the Indians
was concerned, was doubtless that of Mr. and Mrs. Spalding among the
Nez Perces. They were the friends and companions of Dr. and Mrs.
Whitman on that long wedding journey over plains and mountains. They
were pushed far out in the wilderness by the Hudson Bay Company in
what is now eastern Washington, and the Spokane country near where
the city of that name is located. They were gentle, kind, and
self-sacrificing, and perhaps were fortunate in being so isolated.
The Indians received them and their message kindly, and soon there
were many sincere and earnest Christians among them. A small
printing-press was sent them from Honolulu that had become
insufficient for their work there. Mrs. Spalding translated the Book
of Matthew, some psalms, hymns, and a few school books, into the Nez
Perces language, and they printed them with their little hand-press.
It is said that, now after sixty years have passed, they still have
some of them that are carefully treasured relics. They have never
engaged in wars, remain in the lands of their fathers, are farmers
and stock raisers, have churches and schools, and are respected by
their white neighbors. One little touch of nature lingers with them
still, one will often see an Indian teepee or wigwam in the yard or
some place near a comfortable house. Doubtless the father often goes
there to smoke his pipe in peace and comfort. Mr. Spalding lived to
be an old man, and told and wrote much of the early life of the
missions.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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