following, the settlers had little cause for anxiety on account of Indian hostilities.

The counties both north and south of the river were now organized, or in a fair way to have their organizations completed. The courts were open, and the authority of the territorial government everywhere established, so far as the settlers had urgent need for it. Governor Lane now tendered his resignation, to take effect June 18th, at which time he expected to have completed negotiations with certain tribes of Indians in southern Oregon, and subsequently went to California for a time. Major John P. Gaines had been appointed to succeed him and was soon to arrive.

The steamer Massachusetts, besides the two companies. of the first artillery, had brought out a commission composed of Brevet Colonel J. L. Smith, Major Cornelius A. Ogden and Lieutenant Danville Leadbetter, of the army, and Commanders Louis M. Goldsborough, G. J. Brunt and Lieutenant Simon F. Blunt, of the navy, "to examine the coast of the United States lying upon the Pacific Ocean, with reference to points of occupation for the security of trade and commerce, and for military and naval purposes. They entered immediately upon their work, coming to the Sound, where they remained several months, exploring its numerous harbors, bays, inlets, and points where fortifications should some time in the future be established. They then examined the coast from Cape Flattery to the Columbia River. The name of Leadbetter Point, on the south shore of the entrance to Shoalwater Bay, remains a monument of their work.

Samuel R. Thurston was the representative of the new territory in Congress, and was demonstrating to statesmen of the McDuffie and Mitchell school that it was possible

for a representative from a place so far away to get to Washington and return home, and still have some time left to serve his constituents.

General Adair, the new collector of customs, established his authority more at leisure, and yet not without some spectacular effects. He was a Kentuckian by birth and had been a slaveowner. He had emancipated his slaves and moved with them to Indiana, from which State he was appointed collector by President Polk. He came to the coast by way of the isthmus, going to Panama via New Orleans. The overcrowded steamer by which he came from Panama to San Francisco was out of fuel twice, and on fire twice, on the way up. Arriving at San Francisco he was urged to remain there for a time, and report that there was far more need of a custom house at that place than at Astoria, but feeling that it was clearly his duty to proceed to his destination, he took passage with his family by the first vessel offering, which was the brig Valadora, Captain Nathaniel Crosby, and after a voyage of twenty-eight days, during twenty-four of which the passengers worked with the crew at the pumps to keep the vessel from sinking, arrived at Astoria early in April 1849.

During the succeeding ten months the new collector seems to have found little to do. By the organic act the president was authorized to designate two ports of delivery in the district, and this was done by proclamation of January 10th, 1850, designating Portland and Nisqually.

In those days the mail for Oregon came by way of Panama, and under the contract with the carriers, Howland & Aspinwall, was to be carried in steam vessels "via some port in California" though north of it, it might be carried in sailing ships, but mails must be received and delivered as

often as once a month "at or near Kalamath River." This arrangement continued for nearly a year and a half after Collector Adair reached Astoria, when Delegate Thurston, Oregon's first representative in Congress, secured an improvement in the service, by which the mails north of San Francisco were carried in steam vessels. Under this new arrangement the steamer Carolina of the Pacific Mail Steamship Line, arrived at Portland early in June 1850, with mails and passengers, and on June 13th came to the Sound and her officers paid a visit to Dr. Tolmie at Nisqually. She was succeeded at irregular intervals by the California, the Sea Gull, the Panama and the Oregon, until March 1851, when, by the arrival of the Columbia, a regular steam mail service was established between Portland and San Francisco.

As soon therefore as news of the proclamation designating the two ports of delivery could have been received at the custom house at Astoria, the new collector began to exercise his authority with vigor. Since his arrival, as before, the Hudson's Bay Company and the Puget Sound Agricultural Company had carried on their business as they had done for many years, their ships coming and going between Vancouver and Nisqually and Victoria with no customs officers to annoy them. Every year a new stock of goods, suited to the uses of the settlers and the Indians, had been brought from England, and after June 15th, 1846, when the boundary question was settled, all these should have been entered at the custom house, if there had been one where they could enter. No charge was made then, nor has any been made since, that the Company sought to avoid paying duties on these goods. There was no representative of the United States there to receive

them, and therefore they were not entered or the duties paid.

Great was the surprise, therefore, of the good Dr. Tolmie to receive on the evening of April 13th, 1850, news that the Company's ship Cadborough was to be seized for violating the revenue laws. The Cadborough was a small vessel of seventy or eighty tons register, which had for many years been in the Company's service. She had made frequent trips to the Sandwich Islands in earlier times, on which she carried letters for the missionaries and earlier settlers to their friends in the Eastern States. She had also carried the officers and crew of the United States Schooner Shark from Fort Vancouver to San Francisco, after she was wrecked at the mouth of the Columbia in 1846. In later years, she had been in service between Victoria and Nisqually, and frequently made trips to Forts Langley and McLoughlin. She frequently made as many as two and three trips a month, when the weather was favorable, between Victoria and Nisqually, bringing in goods for the Company store from the former, and taking out cattle and sheep and furs from the latter.

She arrived at Fort Nisqually on the evening of April 13th, 1850, and dropped anchor not far from the Company's store on the beach as usual. She had on board a few passengers, among whom was a young man named Edward Huggins, who had just arrived from England, with the intention of remaining one year as a clerk in the Company's service. He was destined to remain through a long and useful life, to be the last chief factor of the Puget Sound Company, to serve Pierce County faithfully in offices of trust and responsibillty, and finally to die respected and regretted by all who knew him.

The people about the fort, Indians and white men, were set to work as usual, to transfer the cargo from the ship to the warehouse, but early next morning their work was interrupted by the appearance of Lieutenant Dement and a file of soldiers from Fort Steilacoom, who took possession. of the ship, lowered her British ensign, and ran up the Stars and Stripes in its stead, and sent Captain Sangster and his crew on shore. When Dr. Tolmie asked for an explanation of this procedure on the part of his tenantsthe soldiers were then occupying grounds and buildings at Fort Steilacoom leased from the Company, as they did for a long time afterwards-he was told that it was done by order of the collector of customs, whose representative would soon arrive and make formal seizure. The doctor protested that the Company had never sought to evade payment of duties, but was ready, and always had been, to pay whenever a custom house was established, or a duly authorized officer sent to receive them, but he protested in vain. Lieutenant Dement could do nothing but obey orders, and obey orders he did, taking the ship down the bay toward Steilacoom in the afternoon, by the aid of some of his soldiers who had once been sailors.

So matters remained until the 19th, nearly a week later, when Inspector Eben May Dorr arrived from the Columbia, and in company with Captain Hill from Fort Steilacoom called at Nisqually early in the afternoon. "After having some wine and cake," says Dr. Tolmie, in the fort journal, as if he felt that his hospitality was but poorly requited, "they proceeded toward the beach store, where in presence of myself, Mr. Dixon,* and Captain Hill, and calling Glasgow the squatter as a witness, he seized on all the imported

* Dixon was mate of the Cadborough.