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ATLANTIS ARISEN;

l)K,

TALKS OF A TOURIST

.ABOUT

OREGON AND WASHINGTON.

BV

B.

MRS. FRANCES^ (FULLER)^ VICTOR.

ILLUSTRATED.

PHILADELPHIA:
J. B. LIPPINCOTT COMPANY.
189 I.

Copyright, 1891, by Frances Fuller Victor.

Printed by J. B. Lippincott Company, Philadelphia.

PREFACE.

Whoever reads my book will di.scover that the author i« no
hasty observer. In fact, I have been up and down the coast
a good deal, and have studied it from many points of view,
frora Mexico to British Columbia. I have, during different
periods of residence in the Bast, had occasion to notice and
to regizet the want of Ijnowledge of this northwest corner of
the United States, and some years ago published " All over
Oregon and "Washington,'' which is now not only out of print,
but out of date, owing to the immense strides in improveraent
made by these two commonwealths since the era of railroads.
It Avas frequently suggested to me to' reA'ise and republish
that book, but upon devoting a summer of travel to the acquisi
tion of new facts, I found that practically a new book Avould
have to be written. This is here presented. If readers of
the former detect some familiar passages, they are those 1
found necessary to preserA^e, because I did not see how they
could be omitted Avithout injustice to my subject. To the
majority I have lit.tle doubt that the whole will be what I have
meant it to be, — instructive.

CONTENTS.

CHAPTER L
PAGE
A Talk about Discovery  11
CHAPTER II.
A Sa'nopsis of Early History   17
CHAPTER III.
About the Mouth of the Columbia  30
CHAPTER IV.
A Talk about Astoria and Vicinita.'  35
CHAPTER V.
Notes on the Columbia River  47
CHAPTER VI.
SoAiE General Talk about Climate ....  72
CHAPTER VIL
A Talk about the Wallamet and its Chief Town 83
CHAPTER VIII.
Other Towns of the Wallamet Valley  102
CHAPTER IX.
Further Remarks on West Oregon  112
CHAPTER X.
What I saw in Southern Oregon  124
6

6 CONTENTS.
CHAPTER XI.
P.\OE
About Oregon's Inland Empire   146
CHAPTER XIL
A Chat about Oregon Mountains  165
CHAPTER xm.
Geological Formation of Oregon and Washington . . 184
CHAPTER XIV.
AVhat I learned about the Mineralogy op Oregon . . 193
CHAPTER XV.
A Glimpse op the Mines op East Oregon ... . 203
CHAPTER XVL
A Talk about the Forests op the Northwest . . . . 211
CHAPTER XVII.
About the Botany op the Northwest  221
CHAPTER XVIII.
Something about Game and Wild Sports . . 228
CHAPTER XIX.
From Portland to Olympia  236
CHAPTER XX.
From Olympia to Gray's Harbor  .247
CHAPTER XXI.
Olympic Gossip  .  262
CHAPTEli XXII.
Shoalwater Bay or Willapa Harbor  273
CHAPTER XXIII.
The City of Destixy  278

CONTENTS. 7
CHAPTER XXIV. PAGE
The Queen City and its Dependencies  303
CHAPTER XXV.
About the Key City and Vicinity . . ... 323
CHAPTER XXVL
The San Juan Archipelago and City op the Sea . . 329
CHAPTER XXVIL
Fairhaven and Bellingham Bay  339
CHAPTER XXVIII.
Glimpses of the Inland Empire  346
CHAPTER XXIX.
What about Spokane?  363
CHAPTER XXX.
About Geology and Mineralogy in Washington .... 384
CHAPTER XXXL
Last Words   410

LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS.

Castle Kock . . Fnmfispiirr.
A'lBW OF ASTOKIA, L00KI.N"G Seaavard , 35
Eailroad Incline at the Cascades . ... 58
Portland ....  86
t'ORXELL Eoad . . 101
Polk County Hills . . . 117
Oregon City 123
roseburg . . . 130
Ashland 139
"Where Eailroads Go . . . . 163
Snake Eiver . 164
On the Summit oe St. Helen 166
Cloud-Cap Inn ... .174
Gray's Harbor, from Hoquiam 250
^Mxi' or Tacoma . . 281
AVhere Ships are Loaded . .... 283
Northern Pacific Eailroad Yards, Tacoma . . 286
Opera-House Corner, C Street, Tacoma .... . 292
Old Tacoma's Bell-Tower . . . . 298
Seattle "Water-Front . . 303
Map of Seattle and Harbor . . 805
In the Straits . . • • 323
Among the Islands .... . ¦ ¦ 329
A Suburb of Spokane ... . 363
Middle Channel, Post Palls  367
Lake Pend d'Oreille ... . 371
Port Sherman . . • . , . 375
Clarke's Pork of the Columbia . ... . . 382
One Day's Hunt  • • 406

ATLANTIS ARISEN;

OR,

TALKS OF A TOURIST ABOUT OREGON
AND WASHINGTON.

CHAPTEE I.
A TALK ABOUT DISCOVERY.
From the year 1513, when Balboa discovered the Pacific
Oeean at Panama, the navigators of Spain, and of every rival
naval power which arose for the following two hundred and
seventy-nine years, were searching for some strait, or river,
which would furnish Avater communication between the two
great oceans that border the American continent. The Strait
of Magellan, discovered soon after the Pacific, afforded a Avay
by which vessels eould enter this ocean from the westem side
of the Atlantic ; but it was far to the south, crooked and dan
gerous. After the discovery by the English buccaneer, Drake,
of the passage around Cape Horn, the search was continued
with redoubled interest. Not only the Spanish and Portuguese
entered into it, but the English, who had found the great in
land sea of Hudson's Bay penetrating the continent towards the
west, endeavored, by offering prizes, to stimulate the zeal of
naA'igators in looking for the Northwest Passage.
A rumor continued to circulate through the world, vague,
mystical, and romantic, of half discoveries by one and another
power ; and tales, wilder than anything but pure fiction, were
soberly listened to by crowned heads, — all of which went to
confirm the belief in the hoped-for straits, which one pretender
to discovery even went so far as to name, and give latitude and
longitude. Tho Straits of Anian he called them; and so, all
the world was looking for Fretum, Anian. 11

12 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
All this agitation could not go for nothing. By dint of sail
ing up and down the west coast of the continent some actual
discoveries of importance were made, and other hints of things
not yet discovered were received. There even appeared upon
the Spanish charts the name of a river somewhere between
the fortieth and fiftieth parallels, — the San Eoque, — supposed
to be a large stream, possibly the long-sought channel of com
munication with the Atlantic ; but no account of having entered
it was ever given. Then vague mention began to be made of
the " Eiver of the West," whose latitude and longitude nobody
knew. Just before the War of the Eevolution, a colonial captain,
one Jonathan Carver, being inspired with a desire to know more
of the interior of the continent, travelled as far west as the
head-waters of the Mississippi. While on this tour, he heard,
from the Indians with whom he conversed, some mention of
other Indians to the west, who told tales of a range of moun
tains called Stony Mountains, and of a great river rising in them,
and flowing westward to the sea, which they callled Oregon-, or
Origan. After the War of the Eevolution, Great Britain resumed her
voyages of discover}'. A fleet was fitted out to survey the
northwest coast of America, which it was thought might be
claimed by her on account of the voyage to it by Captain Cook,
some years previous. The surveys conducted by Captain Van
couver were elaborate and scientific. He, too, like those who
had gone before him, was looking for the " Eiver of the West,"
or the Northwest Passage.
But that obtuseness of perception which sometimes over
takes the most sharp-sighted overtook Captain Vancouver
when his vessel passed the legendary river; for it was broad
daylight and clear weather, so that he saw the headlands, and
still he declared that thero was no river there, — only a sort of
bay. Fortunately, a sharper eye than his had scanned the same
opening not long before : the eye of one of that proverbially
sharp nation, the Yankee. Captain Eobert Gray, sailing a
vessel in the employ of a firm of Boston traders, in taking a
look at the inlet, and noticing the color of the water, did think

A TALK ABOUT DISCOVERY. 13
there was a river there, and so told the English captain when
his vessel was spoken. Finding that his impressions were
treated with superior scepticism, the Yankee captain turned
back to take another look. This second observation was con
clusive. He sailed in on the llth of May, 1792.
From the log-book of the " Columbia," Captain Gray's ship, we
take the following extracts : At four o'clock, on the morning of
the llth, •' beheld our desired port, bearing east-southeast, dis
tant six leagues. At eight a.m., being a little to the windward
of the entrance of the harbor, bore away, and ran in east-north
east, between the breakers, having from five to seven fathoms
of water. When we were over the bar, we found this to be a
large river of fresh water, up vvhich we steered. Many canoes
came alongside. At one p.m. came to, with the small bower, in
ten fathoms; black and white sand. The entrance between the
bars bore west-southwest, distant ten miles ; the north side of
the river, distant a half mile from the ship ; the south side of
the same, two and a half miles distant ; a village on the north
side of the river, west by north, distant three-quarters of a
mile. Vast numbers ofthe natives came alongside: people em
ployed pumping the salt water out of our water-casks, in order
to fill with fresh, while the ship floated in. So ends.''
No, not so ends, O modest Captain Gray, of the ship " Columbia I"
The end is not yet, nor will be until all the vast territory, rich
with every production of the earth, which is drained by the
waters of the new-found river sball have yielded up its illimit
able wealth to distant generations.
The " Columbia's" log-book certainly does not betray any great
elation of mind in her oflScers on reaching the "desired port."
Everything is recorded calmly and simply, — quite in the way
of business. Only from chance expressions, and the determina
tion to make tho " desired port," does it appear that Gray's
heart was set ou discovering the San Eoque of the Spanish
navigators, — the " Eiver of the West" of the rest of mankind.
No explorer he, talking grandly of '• minute inspections" and of
" unalterable opinions I" Only an adventurous and, withal, a
prudent trader, looking out for the main chance, and, perhaps,
emulous of a little glory.
No doubt his stout heart quaked a little with excitement as

14 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
he ran in for the " opening." We could pardon him if it shrank
somewhat at sight of the hungry breakers; but it must have
been a poor and pulseless affair of a heart that did not give a
throb of exultation as his good ship, dashing the foam from her
prow, sailed between the white lines of surf safely — through
the proper channel, thank God ! — out upon the broad bosom of
the most magniflcent of rivers.
We trust the morning was fine, and that Captain Gray had a
perfect view of the noble scenery surrounding him : of a golden
sunrise from a horizon fretted by the peaks of lofty hills, bear
ing thick unbroken forests of giant trees; of low shores em
bowered in flowering shrubbery; of numerous mountain spurs
putting out into the wide bay, extending miles east and west,
and north and south, forming numerous other bays and coves,
where boats might lie in safety from any storm outside ; of olher
streams dividing the mountains into ridges, and pouring their
tributary waters into the great river, through narrow gaps that
half revealed and half concealed the fertile valleys nestled away
from inquisitive eyes; and that, as he tried iu vain to look be
yond the dark ridge of Tongue Point, around whose foot flowed
the broad, deep current whose origin was still a mystery, he
realized by a prophetic sense the importance of that morning's
transaction. No other reward had he in his lifetime, and we
trust he had that.
From the ship's log-book, we learn that he did not leave the
river for ten days, during which time the men were employed
calking the pinnace, paying the ship's side with tar, painting
the same, and doing such carpenter- work as was needed to put
the vessel in repair after her long voyage out from Boston. All
this time "vast numbers" of natives were alongside continually,
and the eaptain must have driven a thriving trade in furs,
salmon, and the like. On the 14th he sailed up the river about
fifteen miles, getting aground just above Tongue Point, where
he mistook the channel among the many islands ; but the ship
" coming off without any assistance," he dropped down to a
better anchoring-place.
On the 15th, in the afternoon. Captain Gray and Mr. Hos-
kins, the first officer, " went on shore in the jolly-boat, to take
a short view of the country." On the 16th the ship returned

A TALK ABOOT DISCOVERY. 15
to her first position off the Chinook village, and was again sur
rounded by the canoes of that people. The Chinook village
remains to-day, but its people are no longer numerous.
Captain Gray was thinking of getting to sea again by the
18th ; but on standing down the river towards the bar, the wind
came light and fluttering, and again the anchor was dropped.
He must now decide upon a name for this great stream, which
from its volume he knew must come from the heart of the con
tinent. The log of the 19th says, " Fresh and clear weather.
Early a number of canoes came alongside : seamen and trades
men employed in their various departments. Captain Gray
gave the river the name of Columbia's Eiver; and the north
side ofthe entrance. Cape Hancock; tbat on the south side.
Point Adams."
On the 20th of May the ship lifted anchor, made sail, and
stood down the river, coming, as the following extract will show,
near being wrecked : " At two the wind left us, we being on the
bar with a very strong tide, which set on the breakers. It was
now not possible to get out without a breeze to shoot her across
the tide ; so we were obliged to bring up in three and a half
fathoms, the tide running five knots. At three-quarters past
two a fresh wind came in from seaward; we immediately came
to sail and beat over the bar, having from five to seven fathoms
water in the channel. At five p.m. we were out, clear of all
the bars, and in twenty fathoms water."
Captain Gray proceeded from Columbia's Eiver to Nootka
Sound, a favorite harbor for trading vessels, but in dispute at
that time between Spain and Great Britain. Here he reported
his discovery to the Spanish comandante, Quadra, and gave him
a copy of his charts. In the controversy whieh afterwards
happened between Great Britain and the United States con
cerning the title to the Oregon territory, the value of this
precaution became apparent: for in that controversy the
comandante's evidence destroyed the pretensions of Vancou
ver's lieutenant, Broughton, who, on having heard of Gray's
discovery, returned to the Columbia Eiver, and made a survey
of it up as far as the mouth of the Wallamet, founding upon
this survey the claim of Great Britain to a discovery-title. The
subterfuge was resorted to of denying that the Columbia was

16 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
a river below Tongue Point : it was claimed that it was an
inlet or sound. Were it not a fact patent to every one that a
river must extend as far as the force of its current is felt, the
pretence would still be perfectly transparent, since Gray must
have passed Tongue Point, and been in what Broughton claimed
to be the actual river before he grounded. Years afterwards,
the log-book of the obscure Yankee trader, and the evidence pf
Comandante Quadra, overbore all strained pretences, and mani
fest destiny made Oregon and its great river a portion of the
American republic.
Captain Eobert Gray was the first man to carry the flag of
the United States around the world, having, in the spring of
1792, just returned from a voyage from Nootka to Canton, and
from Canton to Boston, by way of the Cape of Good Hope.
Ho continued to command a trading vessel up to the time of
his death, in 1809. Gray's Harbor, on the coast of Washington
Territory, was discovered and named by him, the name remain
ing as a memorial. Ought he not to have some other?
In October, 1792, Vancouver having finished the survey of
Puget Sound, in which the Sj)anish fleet was also engaged,
Broughton was despatched to the Columbia Eiver with the
" Chatham,'' which grounded just inside Cape Hancock ; was got
off and anchored in a small bay on the north side of the river,
known as Baker's Bay. In this cove he found, to his surprise,
another vessel, the brig "Jenny," from Bristol, England, com
manded by Captain Baker, from whom he had parted in Nootka
Sound. The cove was thence named Baker's Bay. From this
time tho Columbia continued to be visited by trading vessels
up to tho war of 1812, which interrupted this sort of traffic for
tho time.

A SYNOPSIS OF EARLY HISTORY. 17

CHAPTEE II.
A SYNOPSIS OP EARLY HISTORY.
In the commencement of the present century, when we paid
for our teas and silks with sealskins, cocoanut oil, and sandal
wood, not to mention turtle and abalone shells, the United
States were bounded by the British provinces on the north, by
the Spanish possessions, called Florida, on the south, and by
the French possessions, called Louisiana, on the west. Our sea-
coast extended only from the northern boundary of Maine to
the southern- boundary of Georgia; and the Mississippi Eiver
represented our western water-front, although tho settlements
in that part of our territory were chiefly French. Beyond the
Mississippi was an expanse of country whose extent was un
dreamed of, as its geographical configuration was unknown.
The explorations of the British fur companies in the north
had revealed the existence of high mountains and great rivers
in that direction ; while the little knowledge obtained of the
sources of the Missouri, the Columbia, and the Colorado, together
with the immense volumes of these rivers, at so great an appar
ent distance from their springs, was sufficient to stimulate public
inquiry and scientific research. How long such inquiry would
have been deferred, but for a fortunate turn in the public affairs
of the United States, can only be conjectured.
Our young republic had barely established her independence,
and shaken ofi' the lingering grasp of Great Britain from the
forts and towns bordering on the Great Lakes, — had only just
begun to feel the young giant's blood in her veins, and to trust
her own strength when measured with that of an older and
adroit foe, — "when the nineteenth century dawned, in which so
much has already been accomplished, though its ninth decade
is but just completed.
The first event of importance marking this period, and bear
ing upon the history of Oregon, was the purchase from France
of the Louisiana territory. This was a vast area of country,

18 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
drained by the waters of the Mississippi, and originally settled
by the French from Canada, especially in its more northern
parts. Notwithstanding the Spaniards had discovered the
Lower Mississippi, and claimed a great extent of country under
the general name of Florida, King Louis XIV. of France, in
consideration of the fact that tho region of the Mississippi re
mained unoccupied by Spain, while it was gradually being settled
by his own people, thought proper to grant to Antoine Crozat,
in 1712, the exclusive trade ofthe whole of Southern Louisiana,
the country included in this grant extending "from the sea
shore to the Illinois, together with the Elvers St. Philip (the
Missouri) and the St. Jerome (the Ohio), with all the countries,
territories, lakes in the land, and rivers emptying directly or
indirectly into that part of tho Eiver St. Louis" (the Missis
sippi). Spain not being able to offer any successful opposition
to this .extensive land-grant of territories to which she laid
claim by the right of discovery, Crozat remained in possession
of Louisiana, under the general government of New France,
until 1717, when, not finding the principality sueh a mine of
wealth as he expected it to be, and having suffered a great pri
vate grief which took away the love of power, he relinquished
his title, and Louisiana reverted to the crown. The Illinois
country was afterward added to the original Louisiana territory,
and the whole once more granted to Law's Mississippi Company,
whicli company held it until 1732, when, the bubble of specula
tion being hopelessly flattened, Louisiana once more reverted to
the French crown, and remained a French province until 1769.
In the mean time, however, certain negotiations were being
carried forward which were to decide the future boundaries of
the United States. In 1762, on the 3d of November, a con
vention was held at Paris, to settle the preliminaries of peace
between France and Spain on the one part, and England and
Portugal on the other, in which convention it was agreed that
Prance should cede to Spain "all the eountry known under the
name of Louisiana, as also New Orleans and the island on which
that city is situated." On the 23d of the same month this
cession was formally concluded, giving to Spain, with the con
sent of Great Britain and Portugal, all the country drained by
the Mississippi and its tributaries, except a small portion north

A SYNOPSIS OF EARLY HISTORY. 19
of the Illinois country, which was never mentioned in the
boundaries of Louisiana.
In less than three months after the cession of Louisiana lo
Spain a treaty was concluded in Paris between the same high
contracting parties, by which Great Britain obtained from
France Canada, and from Spain Florida, and that portion of
Louisiana east of a line drawn along the middle of the Missis
sippi, " from its source to the Eiver Iberville, and thenco along
the middle of the Iberville, and the Lakes Maurepas and Pont-
chartrain, to the sea."
This treaty defined the limits of the territories belonging to
Great Britain, and set aside, any former grants of English
kings, made when the extent of thc continent was not even
surmised. Thus, at the close of the Eevolutionary War, when
the United States became heirs of all the British possessions
south of Canada, their western boundary, as before mentioned,
was the Mississippi, as far south as the Eiver Iberville and
Lake Pontehartrain, — New Orleans and the mouths of the
Mississippi belonging to Spain.
Florida, during the time it was in the hands of Great Britain,
had been divided into two provinces, separated by the Appa-
lachicola Eiver, and settled chiefly by emigrants from the south
of Europe, to whose numbers, also, a few Carolinians were
added. This colony of foreigners was used, in connection with
the savage natives of Florida, with great effect against the
southern colonies during the War of Independence. However,
while they were directing their energies against Georgia, the
Spaniards of Louisiana seized the opportunity for making in
cursions into these nondescript British provinces, and captured
their chief towns, thereby rendering them worthless to Great
Britain ; and in 1783 Florida was retroceded to Spain, in whose
hands it was in the beginning of th'e 'nineteenth eentury, then
forming the southern boundary of the United States.
In all these transactions the limits of neither Florida nor
Louisiana had ever been distinctly defined; the southern bound
aries of the latter infringing upon the western boundaries of
the former territory. In 1800, when Spain retroceded Louisiana
to France, it was described in the treaty as being the " same in
extent that it now is in the hands of Spain, and that it had heen

20 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
when France possessed it," — that is, embracing the whole terri
tory drained by the Mississippi and its tributaries, " directlj' or
indirectly." In 1803, April 30, this vast extent of country was ceded to
the United States by France, "with all its rights and appur
tenances, as fully, and in the same raanner, as they had been
acquired by the French republic," by the retrocession of Spain.
By this transfer on the part of France tho Spanish government
seemed at first disposed to be offended, and to offer obstacles to
the settlement of tbe Americans in their newly-acquired terri
tory. Doubtless, this feeling arose from the unsettled condition
of the boundary questions, and a fear that the United States
would, as they did, demand the surrender of the whole of the
original territory of Louisiana, called for by the treaty. Spain
then undertook to prove that the pretensions of France to any
territories west of the Mississippi could not bo supported, and
that the French settlements were only tolerated by Spain for
the sake of peace. Such a discrepancy between the views of
the two nations forbade negotiation at that time, and the matter
rested, not to be revived until 1817. In the mean time, however,
the United States, in 1811, feeling the necessity of holding the
principal posts in the disputed territory against all other powers,
took possession ofthe country west ofthe Perdido Eiver, which
was understood to be the western limit of Florida. But a British
expedition having fitted out from Pensacola during the second
war with Great Britain, the United States sent General Jackson
to capture it, which he did in 1814, and again in 1818, as also
the Fort of St. Mark. These repeated demonstrations of the
spirit of the United States led to further and more successful
negotiations with Spain, which power finally ceded to the
American government the whole of the territory claimed to
belong to Florida, February 22, 1819, the boundaries being
settled as follows :
"Article 3. The boundary-line between the two countries
west of the Mississippi shall begin on the Gulf of Mexico, at
the mouth of the Eiver Sabine, in the sea, continuing north,
along the western bank of that river, to the 23d degree of lati
tude; thence, by a line due north, to the degree of latitude
where it strikes the Eio Eoxo of Natchitoches, or Eed Eiver ;

A SYNOPSIS OF EARLY HISTORY. 21
then, following the course of the Eio Eoxo westward, to the
degree of longitude 100 west from London and 23 from Wash
ington ; then, crossing said Eed Eiver, and running thence, by a
line due north, to the Eiver Arkansas; thence, following the
course of the southern bank of the Arkansas, to its source in
latitude 42 north ; and thence, by that parallel of latitude, to
the South Sea."
Other particulars are added in the article quoted, the meaning
of which is the same as tho foregoing: intended to fix the
western boundary of the United States, as regarded the Spanish
possessions, and the eastern and northern boundaries of the
Spanish possessions, as regarded the United States.
Spain had never withdrawn her pretensions to the northwest
coast ; but, being unable to colonize this distant territory, and
still less able to hold it by garrisons in forts, she tacitly relin
quished her claim to the United States, by making tho forty-
second parallel the northern limit of her possessions on the
Pacific. The United States were then at liberty to take posses
sion of that which Spain relinquished in their favor; in fact,
had the same right to this remote territory that they had to the
Florida and Louisiana territories, which were obtained by treaty
from nations claiming them by the right of discovery.
But the claims of the United States to the so-called Oregon
territory had even better foundajtions than this, if it be con
sidered that Spain had actually abandoned her possessions in
the northwest ; for, in that case, the Oregon territoiy was theirs
by the right of discovery and actual occupation, as well as by
contiguity, by treaty, etc. At the time that Gray discovered
and named Columbia's Eiver, important as the discovery was,
it awakened but little thought in the American mind ; because,
as j-et, we had not acquired Louisiana, stretching to the Eocky
Mountains, nor even secured the eoast of the Gulf of Mexico,
which was much more of an object, at that time, than the coast
of the Pacific. However, when Louisiana became ours, the
national mind awoke to the splendid possibilities of the nation's
future. It was not for naught that a company of Boston
merchants had opened a trade between China and the north
west coast; albeit, their captains gathered up trinkets of all
sorts to add to their stock in trade, should furs fall short of the

22 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
market. Not in vain had the prying Boston traders peered into
all inlets, bays, and rivers on the northwest coast. Wben it
eame to discovery-rights, they had more claims than any
people, the original discoverers excepted; and when Captain
Vancouver's journal was published, it only convinced them that
they should Ibe fools not to profit by what it was so evidently-
fair they should profit by, though they did not quite see the
way clear to the occupancy of the country which Columbia's
Eiver was believed to drain, nor of the islands and bays which
their trading ships had explored. If Spain chose to hold posses
sion of these coasts, they would not interfere; but if Great
Britain attempted to override both Spain and America, in laying
claim to the Pacific side of the continent, something might be
done by way of preventing this attempt.
Such must have been the thought, half indulged, half repressed,
in the American mind previous to tho acquisition of the great
Louisiana territory. After that acquisition it became more de
cided. The fact that Gray had discovered the great river of
the west, which for a century had been sought after, the in
creasing evidences of the incapacity of Spain to hold this fur-
off coast against intruders, the feeling that Great Britain had
no right to the countries she had so pompously taken posses
sion of in tbe face of their actual discoverers, — all these reasons,
joined to the probable fact that the Louisiana territory bordered
upon that drained by the great western river, vrhich an Ameri
can was first to enter and explore, at length shaped the policy
of a few leading minds among American statesmen.
It was even contended by some that, as the western boundary
of Louisiana had never been fixed, and, indeed, was entirely
unknown, — since the Missouri and its tributaries had never
been explored,-- the limits of the newly-acquired territory might
be considere 1 as extending to the Pacific ; and if one were to
consult the old French maps for confirraation of such an opinion,
he would find New France, to which Louisiana belonged, ex
tending from ocean to ocean. Yet, a perfectly candid mind
would ignore the authority of maps drawn from rumor and
imagination, and wish to found an opinion upon facts. It was
to secure such facts and to carry out, as far as possible, the
lately-formed policy of leading statesmen, that President Jeffer-

A SYNOPSIS OF EARLY HISTORY. 23
son, even before the transfer of Louisiana was completed, ad
dressed a confidential message to Congress, urging that means
should be immediately taken to explore the sources of the
Missouri and the Platte, and to ascertain whether the Columbia,
the Oregon, the Colorado, or any other river, offered a direct
and practicable water-communication across the continent, for
purposes of commerce. The suggestions of the President being
approved, commissions were issued to Captains Merriwether
Lewis and William Clarke to perform this service. Captain
Lewis made immediate preparations, and, by the time that the
news of the ratification of the treaty had been received, was
ready to commence his journey to the unknown West.
It was already summer when this news was received, and,
although the party were ready to advance into the Indian
country, it was too late to accomplish much of their journey
before winter; besides which, some delay occurring in the sur
render of the country west of the Mississippi, the party were
not able to cross that river until December, in consequence of
which detention, the ascont of the .Missouri could not be under
taken before the raiddle of May of the following year. The
exploring party consisted of but forty-four men, — an insignifi
cant force to send into an Indian countrj', — yet, perhaps, all the
safer for its insignificance. They had to make the ascent
against the current of the Mad Eiver in boats, three of which
sufficed to accommodate this adventurous expedition. By the
end of October tliey had arrived in the Mandan country, near
the forty-eighth degree of latitude, or sixteen hundred miles
from the Mississijipi. where they made their winter camp. As
every school-library is furnished with the printed journal of
Lewis and Clarke, it is unnecessary to dwell upon the incidents
of their memorable journey across the continent. It is only
with its results that we have to deal in this sketch.
One of its results was developed at this early period, or
during their stay at the Mandan village : which was, to alarm
the Northwest Fur Company, and, through them, the English
government, as to the designs of the Americans concerning the
northern coast of the Pacific. It has been before stated that
the Northwest Company had been compelled reluctantly to
resign the posts along the Great Lakes, belonging to the United

24 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
States, after the Eevolutionary War. They still continued to
hunt and trap, and had established their trading-posts in all
that country lying about the head-waters of the Mississippi ;
and their employees were scattered throughout thc region east
of the Missouri, and west of the Lakes, even having penetrated,
on one occasion, to the foot of the Eocky Mountains.
It happened that, while Lewis and Clarke were at the Man
dan villages, the fact of their visit, and the object of it, which
had been explained to the Indians, were communicated to some
members of the Northwest Company, who had a post about
three days' journey from there. So much alarmed was Mr.
Chaboillez, who resided at this post, tbat he wrote immediately
to another partner, Mr. D. W. Harmon, a native of New Bng
land, and, upon receiving a visit frora him, urged Mr. Harmon
to set out in the following spring upon the same route pursued
by Lewis and Clarke, accompanied by Indian guides, doubtless
with the intention of arriving at the head-waters of the Mis
souri, in advance of the American expedition ; but in this
praiseworthy strife for precedence they were in this instance
defeated, — Mr. Harmon proceeding no further than the Mandan
villages, while Lewis and Clarke prosecuted their undertaking
with diligence, leaving the Mandan eountry on the 7th of April,
1805, and arriving at the Great Falls of the Missouri on the
13th of June. The reader need not be reminded of the difficul
ties attending such a journey as the one undertaken by our
exploring party, when, the course of navigation being inter
rupted, boats had to be abandoned, toilsome portages made, new
boats constructed, and all the novel hardships of the wilderness
endured. Such tests of courage have been encountered by
thousands since that time, in the settleraent of the Pacific
Coast ; but that fact does not lessen the glory which attaches
to the fame of the great pioneers commissioned to discover the
hidden sources of America's greatest rivers. Those faithful
services secured to us inestimable blessings, in extended terri
tories, salubrious climates, and exhaustless wealth of natural
resources. Lewis and Clarke, having re-embarked in canoes hollowed
out of logs, arrived at the Gate of the Mountains on the 19th of
July, in the very neighborhood where thousands of men are to-

A SYNOPSIS OF EARLY HISTORY. 25
day probing the earth for her concealed treasures of gold and
silver. Proceeding on to the several forks of the Missouri — the
Jefferson, the Madison, and the Gallatin— and finding them
selves in the midst of the mountains, the two captains left a
portion of their men to explore the largest of these, while they,
with the remainder of the party, pushed on through the moun
tains until they came to streams flowing towards the west. At
this intimation that their labors were about to be crowned with
success, they rejoined their party at the head of the Jefferson
Fork, and prepared for the rugged work of crossing that
majestic range, now become so familiar. Concealing their goods
and canoes in caches, after the fashion of all knowing mountain
eers, and being furnished with horses and guides by the Sho-
shones, or Snake Indians, whose later hostility to the whites
makes us wonder at their early friendship for Lewis and Clarke,
the party commenced the passage of the Eocky Mountains on
the 30th of August. Severe was their toil, and great were the
sufferings they endured from hunger and cold; but, at length,
their trials passed, they arrived at a stream on whieh their
Indian guides allowed them to embark. This was the Clear
water Eiver, the banks of which have since become historic
ground. The party were glad again to be able to resume water naviga
tion, and hastened to build their canoes, and place their horses
in charge of the Chopunish, or Nez Perce tribe of Indians,
whoso extraordinary fidelity to the treaty formed at that time
with Lewis and Clarke is one of the wonders of history. On
the 7th of October they began to descend the Clearwater, and
three days later entered upon that great branch of the Colum
bia whose springs they had, indeed, tasted in the mountains,
but upon whose bosom no party of civilized men had ever
before embarked.
Men are apt to dwell with enthusiasm upon the pride of a
conqueror ; but, certainly, there must be that in the exultation
of a discoverer, whieh is far more pure, elevated, and happifying.
To have succeeded, by patient research and energetic toil, in
securing that which others seeure by blood and devastation
only, is justly a subject of self-congratulation, as it is also de
serving of praise. The choicest wine, from the costliest chalice.

26 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
could hardly have been so sweet to the taste of our hardy
exploring party as the ice-cold draught of living water dipped
from the mountain reservoirs whose streams "flowed towards
the west." With equal pride must they have launched their
frail canoes on that river which now bears the name of the
chief of the expedition. As they descended to the junction
with the northern branch, and found themselves at last fairly
embarked on the main Columbia, when they beheld the beauty
and magnitude of this King of Elvers, and remembered that
their errand, so successfully carried out, was to find a " highway
for commerce," their toils and privations must have appeared to
them rather in the light of pleasures than of griefs. As the
first party of white men to pass through the magnificent moun
tain-gap where the great river breaks through the Cascade
Eange, and to meet the tides of the Pacific just on the west
ward side, the party of Lewis and Clarke have won, and ever
raust retain, an honorable renown.
The voyage from this point to the mouth of the Columbia
was soon accomplished. On the 15th of November the ex
pedition landed at Cape Hancock, comraonly called " Disap
pointment," on the north side of the river, having travelled a
distance of more than four thousand miles from the Mississippi
Eiver. The rainy season, which usually sets in about the 18th
of Noveraber, had already coramenced, so that our explorers
had some difficulty in finding a suitable winter camping-ground.
At first they tried the peninsula north of Cape Hancock, but
were driven from their ground by the fioods. Then they
resorted to the south side of the river, somewhat farther back
from the ocean, building a log fort on a small stream which is
still called "Lewis ahd Clarke Eiver." There they contrived
to pass the winter without actual starvation, though they were
often threatened with it, from the difficulty of obtaining food at
this season of the year. Game was scarce, except in the coast
mountains, which are very rugged and thickly wooded ; while
fishing could not be carried on successfully except with other
boats than their slight canoes, which were entirely unfit for the
winter winds and waves of the lower Columbia. The Indians
among whom they wintered called themselves " Clatsops," and
were suffieiently friendlj-, but had no food to spare, save at the

A SYNOPSIS OP EARLY HISTORY. 27
very highest prices. The Chinooks, on the north side of the
Columbia, the same people Captain Gray had traded with thir
teen years before, were equally exorbitant in their prices, and
exercised a monopoly of the necessaries of life quito equal to
that of the most practised extortionists.
Nothing could be effected in the way of explorations of the
country during the winter of 1805-6, on account of the rains,
which were constant and excessive; and the party, however
unwillingly, remained at Fort Clatsop until the middle of March,
going no farther away than to Cape Lookout, about fifty miles
down tho eoast. As soon as the rainy season had closed, Lewis
and Clarke re-embarked their men, and returned up the river,
surveying the shores on their voyage. On this passage they
discovered the Covclitz Eiver, the principal tributary emjDtying
into the Columbia frora the north side anywhere west of tho
Cascades. The Wallaraet Eiver was also discovered, but re
mained unexplored, from the anxiety of the expedition to return
to the United States.
By the middle of April the party had abandoned their canoes
at the gap in the Cascade Mountains, where the river forms
dangerous rapids ; and, purchasing Indian horses, continued tho
journey on horseback to the Nez Porces country, where these
faithful allies met them on their return, not with friendship
only, but with the animals confided to their care the preceding
autumn, — an example of Indian integrity worthy of mention,
and, as it proved, indicative of a character shown in the events
of succeeding years.
After crossing the Eocky Mountains to Clarke's Eiver, the
two leaders of tbe expedition separated, — Captain Lewis going
northward, down the Clarke Eiver, and Captain Clarko pro
ceeding towards its source. On the 12th of August the two
captains raet at the mouth of the Yellowstone, having explored
that river, as well as the Clarke, and traversed a great extent
of country then unknown to white men, but where white men
to-day are suffering the flushes and the rigors of that most in
fectious and fatal complaint — the gold-fever — in the territory
of Montana.
At about the mouth of the Maria Eiver, Captain Lewis had
an encounter with the Blackfeet, the most savage and dreaded

28 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
of the mountain tribes. In this conflict one of the Indians was
killed, which caused the others to desist at that time ; yet, no
doubt, many a white man's scalp has been taken in revenge,
according to savage custom, and the wonder still remains that
the party escaped alive out of the eountry.
After re-uniting their forces — their raission being accomplished
— the expedition once more embarked on the Missouri Eiver, and
arrived at St. Louis September 23d, having travelled in less
than three years, by canoe and saddle, carrying their own sup
plies, more than nine thousand miles.
Of the results of the expedition of Lewis and Clarke, it may
be said that it was the first great act, wisely conceived and
well executed, which secured the Oregon territory to the United
States. It was the beginning, too, of a struggle for possession
between this country and Great Britain, dating from the meet
ing of the Northwest Company's men with the men of the
American expedition at the Mandan villages. Happily all these
struggles for precedence are matters of past history now ; and
to-day both English and American citizens seek and find homes
on Oregon soil, where, according to a' wise act of Congress, one
maj' be had for the taking.
The first attempt that was made to form a settlement on the
Columbia Eiver was by the Winship brothers, in 1810. On the
7th of July, 1809, there sailed from Boston two ships, — the
" O'Cain," Captain Jonathan Winship, and the "Albatross," Cap
tain Nathan Winship. The " O'Cain" proceeded direct to Cali
fornia, to trade out a cargo of goods wilh the padres of the
Missions and their converts; and the "Albatross" sailed for
the Sandwich Islands, with twenty-five persons on board. At
the Islands she provisioned, and took on board twenty-five
more men, leaving port for the Columbia March 25, 1810.
Arriving in the river early in the spring. Captain Winship
cruised along up, for ten days, finally selecting a site on the
south side, about forty miles frora its mouth and opposite the
place now known as " Oak Point," though its name is borrowed
from Captain Winship's place. Here he commenced founding
an establishment, and for a time everything progressed satis
factorily. A tract of ground, being cleared, was planted with
vegetables ; a building was erected ; and, while the river banks

A SYNOPSIS OF EARLY HISTORY. 29
were gay with the blossoming shrubbery of early sumraer, our
cajitain and his fifty workmen rejoiced in the promise of a
speedy consummation of their plans of colonization. Their
hopes, however, were soon overthrown by an unlooked-for occur
rence ; and the daring pioneers, who feared the face of neither
man nor beast in all that wilderness, found themselves con
fronted with an adversary against whieh it was useless to con
tend. The snows had melted in the mountains a thousand
miles eastward, and the summer flood came down upon their
new plantation, washing the seeds out of the earth and covering
the floors of their houses two feet deep with water, demon
strating conclusively the unfitness of the site selected for their
settlement. Without doubt, this company of adventurers were by turns
wroth and sorrowful. Their seeds were lost ; their residences
made uninhabitable, even had they desired to remain, which
they did not. Captain Winship at once re-embarked his men,
and sailed for California to consult with his brother. Here he
was met by the intelligence of the formation of the Pacific Fur
Company, with John Jacob Astor at ils head, and the intention
of this company to occupy the Columbia Eiver. Competition
with so powerful an association was not to be thought of, and
the brothers Winship abandoned their enterprise. As men of
large ideas and fearless action, they should be reraerabered in
connection with the history of the Columbia Eiver.
In March of the following year, that portion of Mr. Astor's
expedition which was to come by sea did arrive on the Columbia
— not, however, wilhout the loss of eight men on the bar,
through the impatience and overbearing temper of the com
raander of the " Tonquin," Captain Thorne. Subsequently, the
Indians of the Straits of Fuca destroyed the "Tonquin," massa
cring all her officers and erew, twenty-three in number. The
land expedition suffered incredible hardships: supply vessels
failed to arrive ; war with Great Britain broke out, preventing
Mr. Astor from carrying out his plans ; the Canadian partners
took advantage of the situation to betray Mr. Astor's interests ;
and after two years of hope deferred, the establishment at
Astoria was sold out to a British company, and the enterprise
abandoned, the place having been "captured" by the British.

30 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
After the close of the war of 1812, Astoria was restored to
the United States, and Mr. Astor would have renewed his enter
prise, notwithstanding his heavy losses, had Congress guaran
teed hira protection and lent its aid; but the governraent
pursued a cautious policy at this time, and the Oregon territory
remained in the hands of the British fur-traders exclusively for
the twenty years following, notwithstanding a treaty of joint
occupation. To follow the chain of events, and record the incidents of a
long -struggle between Great Britain and the United States to
substantiate a claim to Oregon, is the work of the historian.
Enough for us that we know which claim prevailed ; and let us
proceed to the more congenial contemplation of the physical
features which the country presents, touching lightly now and
then upon its history, as tourists may.

CHAPTEE IIL
ABOUT THE MOUTH OF THE COLUMBIA.
Where the Columbia meets the sea, in an almost continuous
line of surf, is some distance outside the capes ; but frora the
one to the other of these — that is, from Cape Hancock to Point
Adams — is seven miles. Should the sea bo calm on making the
entrance, nothing more than a long, white line will indicate the
bar. If the wind be fresh, the surf will dash up handsomely ;
and if it bo stormy, great walls of foam will rear themselves
threateningly on either side, and your breath will be abated
while the quivering ship, with a most " uneasy raotion," plunges
into the thick of it, dashes through the white-crested turault,
and emerges triumphantly upon the smooth bosom of the river;
The north channel, which is now little used, comes in pretty
close under a handsome promontory. This promontory is tho
Cape Hancock of Captain Gray and the United States govern
ment, and the Cape Disappointment of the English navigators
and of common usage, since the long residence in the country
of the Hudson's Bay Company.

ABOUT THE MOUTH OF THE COLUMBIA. 31
Inside the base of the cape, we find ourselves in a pretty
little harbor, called Baker's Bay from its discoverer, with an
islaud or two in it, and surrounded by sloping shores, originally
densely covered with a growth of spruce, fir, and hemlock, with
many varieties of lesser trees and shrubs. Along the strip of
low land, crescent-shaped and edged with a sandj^ beach, are tho
recentlj- abandoned quarters of the garrison of Fort Canby. for
the capo was fortified during the civil war — when our govern
ment had some distrust of the friendliness of the English and
French powers, and some fears of Confederate cruisers — with
several powerful batteries.
There is also a lighthouse at the point of the cape, in which
a first-class Fresnel light is kept, tended by the resident of
a modest mansion under the shelter of tho hill, and we are
tempted to take the path winding around and about uj) to the
top of the promontory. What fine trees ! What a luxuriant
undergrowth !
Sauntering, pulling ferns and wild vines, exclaiming at the
shadows, the coolness, the magnificence of tbe forests, we come
at last to the summit, and emerge into open ground. Here all
is military precision and neatness : gravelled walks, grassy slopes
and terraces, whitened walls. When we have done with the
contemplation of guns and earthworks, we turn eagerly to gaze
at the sea ; to watch the restless surf dashing itself against the
bar; to catch that wonderful monotone — "ever, forever."
The fascination of looldng and listening would keep me long
spellbound ; but our escort, who understands the symptoms,
politely compels us "to move on," and directly — very oppor
tunely — we are confronted with the light-house keeper, who
offers to show us his tower and light. Clambering up and up,
at last we stand within the great lantern, with its intense refiec
tions, and hear all about the life of its keeper, — how he scours
and polishes by daj-, and tends the burning oil by night. When
wo ask him if the storm-winds do not threaten his tower, he
shakes his head and smiles, and says it is an eerie place up
there when the sou'westers are blowing. But, somehow, he
likes it ; he would not like to leave his place for another.
Then we climb a little higher, going out upon the iron bal
cony, where the keeper stands to do his outside polishing of the

32 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
glass. The view is grand ; but what charms us most is a minia
ture landscape reflected in one of the facets of thc lantern. It
is a complete copy of the northwestern shore of tho cape, a
hundred times more perfect and beautiful than a painter could
make it, with the features of a score of rods concentrated into
a picture of a dozen inches in diameter, with the real life, and
motion, and atmosphere of nature in it. While you gaze en
chanted, the surf creeps up the sandy beach, the sea-birds circle
about the rocks, the giant firs move gently in the breeze,
shadows flit over the sea, a cloud moves in the sky; in short, it
is the loveliest picture your eyes ever rested ou.
When we ask the light-keeper, " What do you do when the
thick fogs bang over the coast?" he shows us a great bell,
which, when the machinery is wound up, tolls, tolls, tolls, sol
emnly in the darkness, to warn vessels off the eoast. " But,"
he says, "it is not large enough, and cannot be heard any great
distance. .Vessels usually keep out to sea in a fog, and ring
their own bells to warn off other vessels."
Then he shows us, at our request. Peacock Spit, where the
United States vessel of that name was wrecked, in 1841 ; and
the South Spit, nearly two miles outside the cape, where the
" Shark," another United States vessel, was lost in 1846. The
bones of many a gallant sailor and many a noble ship are laid
on the sands, not half a dozen miles from the spot where we
now stand and look at a tranquil ocean. Nor was it in storras
that these shipping disasters happened. It was the treacherous
calm that met them on the bar, when the current or the tide
earried them upon the sands, where they lay helpless until the
flood-tide met the current, and the ship was broken up in the
breakers. Pilotage and steara have done away with shipwrecks
on the bar.
We are glad to think that it is so. Having exhausted local
topics for conversation, we descend the winding stairs, which
remind us of those in the " Spider and the Fly," so hard are
they to " come down again." How still and warm it is down
under the shelter of the earth-works! Descending by the
military road, we come out near the life-boat house, — for there
is a life-saving station here, — and, being invited, go in to look
at it. We find it well furnished for its duties, which evidently

ABOUT THE MOUTH OF THE COLUMBIA. 33
have been well performed, for here are the names of half a
dozen vessels of different sorts which havo been rendered
service in their hour of peril.
There is annually great loss of life among the fishermen at
the mouth of the Columbia, and it is here principally that the
life-saving station is most useful. The number of men rescued
during some seasons has reached half a hundred. The fisher
men have recognized this service by presenting the captain of
tbe erew with a powerful glass, and the men wear medals of
which they are very proud. Having inspected the well-kept
boats, ropes, and buoys, we take a look at the fishing-tackle, with
which the light-house keeper goes out to troll for salmon. Glorious
sport I The great, delicious fellows, to be caught by a fly ! But
we, humans, need not sermonize about being taken by small bait.
Baker's Bay is not without its little history ; albeit, it is
nothing romantic. In 1850 a company conceived the plan of
building up a eity, under shelter of the cape, and expended a
hundred thousand dollars, more or less, before they became
aware of the fruitlessness of thoir undertaking. By mistake,
portions of thoir improvements were placed on the Government
Eeserve, to which, of course, they could have no title. Yet
this error, although a hinderance, was not the real cause of the
company's failure, which was founded in tho ineligibility of the
situation for a town of iraportance. The buildings went to
decay, and the site was finally overgrown with a young forest
of alders, spruce, and hemlock. But after many yeai-s the title
to the land was confirmed to tho early speculator, and the town
of Tlwaco, a summer resort, has grown up on the site of obsolete
"'Pacific City."
There is a fine beach-drive of twenty miles from the cape up
to the entrance of Shoalwater Bay, and several seaside resorts
are scattered along it. From Ilwaco to Sea-Land is sixteen miles,
this distance being traversed by the Ilwaco and Shoalwater
Bay Eailroad, which has several stations, namely. Stout's, Cen-
treville. Tinker's, Loomis, Ocean Park, and Sea-Land, the pres
ent terminus. The cottages of suramer residents are scattered
along for two miles from Ilwaco, after which tbe road runs past
waving fields of grass and grain, and thrifty vegetable gardens,
JFor a part of the distance the oeean is in full view, its long

34 ATL-ANTIS ARISEN.
rollers seeming to attack the beach with a purpose to deraolish
it, receding and renewing the onslaught perpetually. The
scene is rendered moro wild by the dense growth of dwarf
timber covering the low land stretching back to an arm of
Shoalwater Bay lying to the east. Many fresh-water lakes or
lagoons dot this long peninsula, which, with its black, rich soil,
would make profitable cranberry fields.
At Ocean Park there is a grove of gnarled spruce-trees
through which streets have been cleared from the railroad to
the beach, making beautiful vistas through which one raay
catch glimpses of the sparkling sea. The trees which brave
the heavy northwest wind of suramer, and the terrible strength
of the winter's southwest storms, lean inland, and have a stunted
appearance very different from the straight, tall timber of the
river bottoms and raountains.
Sea-Land is situated in a spruce forest, on the inner shore of
the peninsula, fronting Shoalwater Bay, the elearilig being of
very recent date. It has a wharf and warehouse extending
half a mile into the bay. Several small steamers ply on these
waters, carrying passengers to and from towns on the mainland
side, whence railroads in the near future will convey them to
Gray's Harbor, or into the interior of Washington.
To a sportsman with sufficient hardihood to invade the
rugged and heavily-timbered mountains on the east side of
Shoalwater Bay, bear, elk, and deer offer temptations. Bear
are numerous, and keep fat on the wild fruit of this region,
—whortleberries, sallal, and salmonberries. They also invade
the apple-orchards of the settlers, and have to be trapped for
their presumption.
Eeturning as we came, we take the "General Canby" at
Ilwaco to cross the Columbia. Such is its expanse that,
although its eourse brings us off Chinook Point, we have but
an indistinct view of it. Not as it was eighty years ago, as
Franehere and Irving and Cox wrote about it, — a populous In
dian viUage, — the dwellings of the white invader overshadow
the ancient wigwams. Even its burial-ground, memelose illihee,
which freely translated means "spirit eountry," is profaned.
Alas ! nothing of one race is sacred to another ; least of all is
there anything in common between the white and the red man.

¦^t^^^^^cf^,- ^_, .tAmtm ¦

lAg---'

'^

(.

VIEW OF ASTORIA, LOOKING SEAWARD.

Page 35.

A TALK ABOUT ASTORIA AND VICINITY. 35

CHAPTEE IV.
A TALK ABOUT ASTORIA AND VICINITY.
The situation of Astoria, in point of beauty, is certainly a
very fine one. The neck of land occupied by the town is made
a peninsula by Young's Bay on one side and the Columbia
Eiver on the other, and points to the northwest. A small cove
makes in at the east side of tho neck, just back of which the
ground rises much moro gently and smoothly than it does a
little farther towards the sea. Tho whole point was originally
covered v\-ith heavy timber, which came quite down to high-
water mark ; and whatever there is unlovely in the present
aspect of Astoria arises from the roughness always attendant
upon the clearing up of timbered lands.
Standing facing the sea or the river, the view is one of un
surpassed beauty. Towards the sea, the low, green point on
which Fort Stevens stands — the Cape Frondosa (leafy cape) of
the Spanish navigators — and the high one of Cape Hancock,
topped by the light-house tower, mark the entrance to the river.
Above them is a blue sky; between them a blue river celebrat
ing eternally its union with the sea by the roar of its breakers,
whose white crests are often distinctly visible. There is a sail
or two in the offing, and a pilot-boat going out to bring them
over the bar ; perhaps the vessel is from " far Cathay," with the
silks and spices of the Ind. While we gaze, there is seen
against the horizon the black smoke of a steamer. On she
eoraes over the bar, breathing asthmatically and beating the
waters with her great wheels in a steady rhythm, until at last
the boom of her gun gives notice to the custom-house officials
of her arrival, and all the town hastens to the wharf to learn
of her cargo and her passengers, and to question what sort of
a voyage she has had.
Towards night, when the sun is setting behind the light-house
cape, and gilding sky and sea beyond the bar, there suddenly
appear upon the river hundreds of fishing-boats, whose white

36 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
sails dot its blue surface as summer clouds a June sky. They
are going out to their night's fishing with drag-nets.
Opposite us, and distant four miles, is the northern shore, — a
line of rounded highlands, covered with trees, with a narrow,
low, and level strip of land between them and the beach. The
village of Chinook is a little to the northwest ; another village,
Knappton, a little to the northeast. Following the opposite
shore-line with the eye, as far to the east as the view extends, a
considerable indentation in the shore raarks Graj-'s Bay, where
tbe discoverer of the river went ashorewith his mate, to " view
the countrj'."
On the Astoria side the shore curves beautifully in a north
east direction, quite to Tongue Point, four miles up the river.
This point is one ofthe handsomest projections on the Columbia.
Connected with the main-land by a low, narrow isthmus, it rises
gradually to the height of fifty or sixty feet, and is crowned
with a splendid growth of trees. Between Tongue Point and
Astoria was erected the first custora-house in Oregon ; the build
ing and wharf have gone to decay, and "Upper Astoria" has
become united to the main town by a line of fish-canning estab
lishments. Following down the curving shore, I inquire for the site of the
Astor establishment of 1811 and the cove where the "Dolly"
was launched. A few years ago, I am told, the foundations of
Fort George, as the place was named by the English successors
to Astor, could have been traced, but they are now built over,
and the cove in front is also concealed from view by a wilder
ness of wharves.
In 1849, a company or two of United States soldiers being
temporarily quartered in the old " Shark" house, a squared-log
m£|,nsion built to shelter the crew of the United States schooner
wrecked on the bar in 1846, the canoes of eight hundred native
warriors of the Chinooks covered the water in Astor Bay,
curious, as savages always are, to watch the acts and note the
customs of civilized men. Not a canoe is now in sight. The
white race are to the red as sun to snow : as silently and surely
the red men disappear, dissipated by the beams of civilization.
Among those who eame to gaze at the overpowering white race
on that occasion was au old Chinook chief, named Waluska, the

A TALK ABOUT ASTORIA AND VICINITY. 37
number of whose years was one hundred. His picture, which
some one gave me, shows a shrewd character. So, no doubt,
looked Com-com-ly, the chief whom Washinglon Irving describes
in his "Astoria," and whose contemporary this venerable savage
must have been. His then sightless eyes, in his early manhood
beheld the entrance into the river of that vessel whose name it
beai's. Between that time and the day of his death he saw the
Columbia Eiver tribes, which once nurabered thirty thousand
souls, decimated again and again, until they scarcely counted up
one-tenth of that number. Only a few j-ears ago, I am told,
there might have been found, on a pretty, level piece of land
around Smith's Point west of Astoria, away from the shingly
beach, and where on the edge ofthe forest thickets of wild roses,
white spirsea, woodbine, and mock-orange made a charming
solitude, an Indian lodge, the residence of the native Clatsop.
Exteriorly, the Clatsop residence could not be praised for its
beauty, being made of cedar planks, sot upright and fastened to
a square or oblong frame of poles, and roofed with cedar bark.
Outside were numberless dogs, and some pretty girls of ten and
twelve years of age, with glorious great, black, smihng eyes.
Inside might be seen three squaws of various ages, braiding
baskets and tending a baby of tender age, with two " warriors"
sitting on their haunches and doing nothing; and salmon every
where, — on the fire, on tbe walls, overhead, dripping grease, and
smelling villanously, salmon, — nothing but salmon. A conversa
tion with the mother of the little stranger, in jargon, related to
the fair complexion of the tillicum. Ono of the warriors, pre
sumed to be its papa, laughed and declared it all was as it should
be. Such are the benefits of civilization to the savage I
I went in search of this aboriginal family and fell in with a
different sort of savage, — an Irishman, on a little patch of ground
which he cultivates after a fashion of his own, at tho sarae time
doing his housekeeping in preference to being "bothered with
a woman." He is cooking his afternoon meal, which consists of
soup made from boiling a ham-bone, with thistles for greens, and
a cup of spruce tea. Think of this, unlucky men, bothered
with women, who, but for them, might yourselves bo subsisting
on thistles and spruce tea I
Young's Bay, which forms the southwest boundary of Smith's

38 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
Point, is a deep inlet of the Columbia, and receives the waters
of Young's Eiver, Lewis and Clarke's Eiver, and the Skipanon,
all which flow trom tho south ; Young's Eiver, however, having
two considerable branches coming in from the east. The penin
sula formed by Young's Bay and the ocean is a sandy plain,
roughened with raany hummocks, cut up by tide-sloughs, lakes,
and marshy hollows, and timbered near the sea with scrubby
pines. It has two rivers rising in the Coast Eange, — one, Lewis
and Clarke's, emptying into Young' Bay, and one, the Neah-
canacum, flowing into the ocean. I stood upon the spot beside
the former where the brave explorers Lewis and Clarke wintered
in 1805-6, subsisting themselves and their company on elk-meat
obtained on this peninsula. There they listened to Indian tales
of the Yankee traders who had been in the river in past times,
and even learned their names and the naraes of their vessels,
so well had they been remembered by the natives. The Neah-
canacum is a beautiful mountain stream, overhung with trees,
rapid and cold enough for trout-fishing, and deep enough for
boating. Very singularly, it runs parallel to the ocean and very
near it, and is one of the most charraing features of tbe sura
raer resort known as Clatsop Beach. There is good hunting in
the coast mountains bordering on Clatsop Plains to the south,
and this sea-bathing place has for many years been the recrea
tion-ground of Portlanders in the dry months of July, August,
aud September, a distinction now shared by similar resorts on
the beach north ofthe Columbia. Steamers leave Portland late
in the evening, arriving at Astoria in the morning, throughout
the week ; and on Saturdays leave the city early enough to
reach their destination the same evening and give business men
a Sunday with their families at the sea-side, to which they are
conveyed by boat and train from Astoria.
From Young's Bay there is a view of Saddle Mountain, the
highest of its twin peaks, Neah-car-ny, being the subject of a
tradition preserved among the Indians of a vessel once cast
ashore near the mouth of their river, the crew of which were
saved, together with their private property, and a box which
they carried ashore and buried on Mount Neah-car-ny, with
mueh care, leaving two swords placed on it in the form of a
cross.

A TALK ABOUT ASTORIA AND VICINITY. 39
Another version is that one of their own number was slain,
and his bones laid on top of the box when it was buried. This,
were it true, would more effectually keep away the Indians than
all the swords in Spain.
The story sounds very well, and is firmly believed by the
Indians, who cannot be induced to go near tho spot, because
thoir ancestors were told by those whe buried tbe box, that,
should they ever go near it, they would provoke the wrath of
the Great Spirit. The tale corresponds with that told by the
Indians of the upper Columbia, who say that some shipwrecked
men, one of whom was called Soto, lived two or three years
with their tribe, and then left them to try to reach the Spanish
countries overland. It is probable enough that a Spanish
galleon may have gone ashore near the mouth of tho Columbia,
and it agrees with the character of the early explorers of that
nation that they should undertake to roach Mexico by land.
That they never did, we feel sure, and give a sigh to their
memory. If the tourist is so fortunate as to seeure an old Astorian for a
guide, he may, if he chooses, call up manifold " spirits from the
vasty deep." One of the stories of wreck a century or so ago
relates to our almond-eyed neighbors at the antipodes. The
story-teller will most likely take from his pocket, whore he must
have placed it for this purpose, a thin cake of beeswax, well
sanded over, which he avers was a portion of the cargo of a
Japanese junk, cast ashore near tho Columbia in some time out
of mind. When we have wondered over this, to us, singular
evidence of wrecking, he produces another, in tho form of a
waxen tube. At this we are more stultified than before, and
thon are told that this was a large wax candle, such as tho
Japanese priest, as well as the Eoman, uses to burn before
altars. The wick is entirely rotted out, leaving the candle a
hollow cj-linder of was.
By this self-evident exjjlanation we are convinced. Certain
it is that for years, whenever there has been an unu.sually
violent storm, portions of this waxen cargo are washed ashore,
ground full of sand. As beeswax is a common commodity in
Japan, we see no reason to doubt tbat this, which the sea gives
up from time to tirae, originally eame from there. The suppo-

40 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
sition is the moro natural, as the raouth of the Columbia is
exactly opposite the northern extremity of that Island Empire,
and a junk, once disabled, would naturally drift this way. Tbe
thing has been known to occur in later years ; and that other
wrecks, probably Spanish, have happened on this coast, is
evidenced by the light-haired and freckle-faced natives of
some portions of it farther north, discovered by the earliest
traders. Fort Stevens, on the north shore of the Clatsop Peninsula, is
a military post occupying a low, sandy plain, just inside the
projection of Point Adaras. It is one of the strongest and best-
armed on the Pacific coast. Its shape is a nonagon, surrounded
by a ditch, thirty feet wide. This ditch is again surrounded by
earthworks, intended to protect the wall of the fort, from
which rise the earthworks supporting the ordnance. Viewed
frora the outside, nothing is seen but the gently-inclined banks
of earth, smoothly sodded. The officers' quarters, outside the
fort, aro very pleasant ; and, although there is nothing attrac
tive in the location of the fort, or in its surroundings, it is an
interesting place in which to spend an hour. The view frora
the embankment is extensive, commanding the entrance to the
river, the fortifications of Capo Hancock, opposite, and the
handsome highlands of the north side, as well as of a portion
of Young's Bay. Tho troops quartered here have been tem
porarily withdrawn to accommodate the officers and men con
nected with the engineer department of the United States
Army, who are at work upon a jetty built by the government
to iraprove the south channel of the Columbia, which extends
from Fort Stevens four miles out towards deep water, and will
•'probably be still further extended, the improvement in the
channel being manifest. This work was commenced in 1885,
before which the channels over the bar were capricious in loca
tion and variable in depth, the water on the bar being from
nineteen to twenty-one feet, and the channels from one to three
in nuraber. The offect of the jetty has been to build up Clatsop
spit, and concentrate the waters on the raiddle sands, whieh
have been removed, leaving from eighteen to twenty-five feet of
water in their place. Between three and four square miles of
ground in front of Fort Stevens have been built up, where

A TALK ABOUT ASTORIA AND VICINITY. 41
formerly it was being eaten away by the impingement of the
current upon the shore-line.
Tansy Point, on the northeast corner of the Clatsop Penin
sula, and adjoining the military reservation, has recently been
laid off in town lots, and named New Astoria. This brings to
mind the project of some adventurers of 1839, one of whom
was J. T. Farnham, author of the " History of Oregon Terri
tory," and another, Medorum Crawford, of Salera, in this State,
to build a city to be a second New York, on this identical point.
We build cities with wonderful rapidity in these days, ^vith
everj' force made available. But what courage and what iraag
ination must these young fellows have had, who crossed tbe
continent " by hook and by crook" to found a New York at the
mouth of the Columbia ! Few of them ever saw their destina
tion. Another recent town enterprise is East Astoria, laid out above
Tongue Point, at the mouth of John Day Eiver, an affluent of
the Columbia. As a suburb of Astoria it will in time be settled
up, but as an independent site it has no apparent advantages.
A local railwaj' line has been projected which is to connect New
Astoria with old Astoria by following around the shore of
Young's Bay to Smith's Point, which is also now laid off in city
lots. A similar connection will probably be made with the
eastern addition. Astoria, although the oldest Araerican settle
ment on the Pacific coast, has been very slow of development.
The situation for a commercial entrepot, although in some re
spects a fine one, had its drawbacks, being cut off fi-om the
interior by tho densely-timbered mountains of the Coast Eange,
and having apparently few resources outside of salmon canning,
which business is of comparatively recent date. If you had
asked an Astorian in 1870 what constituted the importance of
his town, present or futuro, he would have told you that it had
a commodious harbor, with depth of water enough to accom
modate vessels of the deepest draft, with gpod anchorage, and
shelter from southwest (winter) storms. He would have
pointed to the forts at the raouth of the river, which made
business ; to tho custora-house, whieh brought business ; to the
pilotage of all incoming and outgoing vessels; to a certain
amount of lumber manufactured here, and cement manufactured

42 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
at Knappton, by workmen who spent their wages in Astoria,
and so on.
If you had inquired what back eountry it had to support it,
he would have pointed to Clatsop, and the valley of the Ne-
halem, south of it ; and have told you that it is but seventy
miles into the great valley of Western Oregon, and that a rail
road is to be built into it from Astoria, through the coast moun
tains. He would mention, besides, that there are numerous
small valleys of streams running into the Columbia within
tv^enty miles, which are of the best of rich bottom-lands, and
only need opening up. This was the Astorian's vievp of his
town, and nothing to the contrary could be seen. That there
were in the neighborhood of Astoria many elements of wealth,
both raineral and agricultural, which only required time and
capital to develop, eould not, be doubted, even then. The same
conditions remain, but the resources then raodestly clairaed have
been considerably developed.
To fishing, more than to any other, or all other, business,
Astoria owes its prosperity frora 1870 to the present time. The
first fishery established on the Lower Columbia since 1834, when
Wyeth failed, was in 1862, by Captain John West, of Westport,
some distance above Astoria ; the first cannery in 1867, by Hap-
good and Hume, on the north side of the river, also above
Astoria, A fishery proper is understood to moan a barrelling
establishment, while a cannery is one where fish are jDreserved
in cans, either fresh or spiced, and pickled. Often they are
combined. The fishing season begins in May, and ends in August. The
manner of taking salmon in the Columbia is usually by drift-
nets, frora twenty to a hundred fathoms long. The boats used
by the fishermen are similar to the Whitehall boat. According
to laws of their own, the men engaged in taking the fish, where
the drift is large, allow each boat a stated time to go back and
forth along the dri/t to hook up the salmon. The meshes of
the nets are just of a size to cateh the fish by the gills, when
attempting to pass through ; and their misfortune is betrayed to
the watchful eye of the fisherman by the bobbing of the corks
on the surface of the river.
When brought to the fishery, they are piled up on long tables

A TALK ABOUT ASTORIA AND VICINITY. 43
which project out over tho water. Here stand Chinamen, two
at each table, arraed with long, sharp knives, who, with great
celerity and skill, disembowel and behead the fresh arrivals,
pushing the offal over the brink into the river at tho same time.
After cleaning, the fish are thrown into brine vats, whore they
remain from one to two days to undergo the necessary shrink
age, whicb is nearly one-half They are then taken out, washed
thoroughly, and packed down in barrels, with the proper
quantity of salt. That they may keep perfectly well, it is
necessary to heap them up in the barrels, and force them down
with a screw-press.
The canning process, which was kept secret for one or two
seasons, is a much more elaborate one, requiring a large outlay,
many hands, and much skill and precision, for its success.
Such was the profit derived from this business that canneries
multiplied rapidly until 1880, when it reached its height, since
whieh time there has been a decrease in the output, owing to
over-fishing. The legislature has corao to the protection of
salmon with a law confining fishing to a period from the first of
April to the first of August. A hatchery is also in operation on
the Clackamas Eiver, a branch of tho Wallamet, where spawn
is cared for and developed, the young fish being placed in the
river at a proper stage of gi-owth. With these precautions, it
is hoped to save this industry from further loss, and even to
excel its forraer yield.
There are nineteen canneries at Astoria, in which are invested
two million dollars, and almost as many more which aro tribu
tary to it, the capital operating them being furnished by Astoria.
Shipments are made direct to foreign countries, as well as to
doraestic ports. In 1889 one cargo of salraon whieh was cleared
for Liverpool was valued at three hundred and fourteen thou
sand three hundred and three dollars, the largest cargo, with
one exeeption, ever cleared direct, by sail, for a foreign port
frora the Pacific coast. Astoria is the greatest salmon-fishing
station iu the world, the canneries using between four hun
dred thousand and five hundred thousand salmon annually, and
Astoria sends out larger cargoes by sailing-vessels than San
Francisco of fish and wheat.
There is no part of the Pacific eoast so woll adapted to fish-

44 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
curing as Oregon and Washington. The climate, either north
or south of their latitude, is either too moist or too dry. Wood
for barrels is close at hand ; and, not yet utilized, close at hand,
too, is the best salt in the world for curing meats of any kind.
Seeing to what an immense business salmon-fishing is growing,
one cannot help wishing tbat Nathaniel Wyeth, who tried so
hard, in 1832, to establish a fishery on the Columbia, and failed
through a combination of causes, could see his dream fulfilled,
of making the Columbia famous for its fisheries and its lumber
trade. But he, like most enthusiasts, was born too soon to
behold the realization of the truths he felt convinced of
There are several species of salmon and salmon-trout which are
found in the Columbia. Of these, three species of the silvery
spring salmon, known to naturalists as Salmo quinnat, S, gairdneri,
and >Si. paucidens, are those used for commercial purposes, and
known as the " square-tailed" and " white salraon," — the third
species being considered as smaller individuals of the sarae
kinds, though really distinct in kind.
When they enter the river, near its mouth, they may be
caught by hook and bait. The Indians use small herring for
bait, sinking it with a stone, and trolling, by paddling silently
and occasionally jerking the line. Near the mouth of the
Columbia they ean be taken with the fiy ; but, as salmon do
not feed, on their annual journey up the river to spawn, it is
useless to offer them bait. They ean only be caught at a dis
tanee from the oeean by nets and seines, or by spearing. The
natives usually take them by using scoop-nets, whieh they dip
into the water, at random, near the falls and rapids, where largo
numbers of salmon collect to jump the falls. As these falls are
all at a considerable distance from the sea, bj' the time they
arrive at them the fish are more or less emaciated, frora fasting
and the exertion of stemming currents and climbing rapids,
and, consequently, not in so good a condition as when caught
near the sea. Hence the superior quality of Chinook salmon.
The numbers of all kinds of salmon which ascend the
Columbia annually is something wonderful. They seem to be
seeking quiet and safe places in whieh to deposit their spawn,
and thousands of thera never stop until they reach the great
falls of the Snake Eiver, more than six hundred miles from the

A TALK ABOUT ASTORIA AND VICINITY. 45
sea, or those of Clarke's Fork, a still greater distance. All the
small tributaries of the Snake, Boise, Powder, Burnt, and
Payette Elvers swarra with them in the months of September
and October.
Great numbers of salmon die on having discharged their in-
¦stiuctive duty ; some of them, evidently, because exhausted by
their long journey, and others, apparently, because their term
of life ends with arrival and spawning. Their six hundred
miles of travel against the current, and exertion in overcoming
rapids, or jumping falls, often deprives them of sight, and wears
off their noses. Of course, all these mutilated individuals
perish, besides very many others ; so that tho shores of the
small lakes and tributaries of both branches of the Columbia
are lined, in autumn, with dead and dying fish. But they leave
their roe in the beds of these interior rivers, to replace them in
their return to the sea by still greater numbers.
Tho fishery business has developed vastly improved methods
of taking the salmon, including "salmon wheels," which, placed
in the narrower portions of the Columbia, as at the Cascades,
scoop them up by the hundreds every minute. Tbe fishermen
who supply the Astoria canneries, however, do so by means of
boats and nets, whieh are thrown out at night, and drawn in at
an early hour in the morning. It is a perilous occupation about
the mouth of the Columbia, whei-e currents, tides, and winds
must be encountered. Formerly tho mon were employed and
furnished with boats and nets, an outfit costing several hundred
dollars. But in 1880 the fishermen, chiefiy Scandinavians, com
bined to sell their fish by the piece, at fifty cents each ; and this
year they have asked a dollar, and a dollar and a quarter. At
the same time, owing to the great amount of fish' unconsumed
in the market, from last year's catch, a low price for canned
salmon is prevailing, and this year's business will not prove as
remunerative as in former seasons. About four thousand men
are employed every season in the salmon fishing and canning.
Besides the salmon of comraerce, the Columbia furnishes a
great many other species of edible fish, including salmon-trout,
sturgeon, tom-cod, flounder, and smelt, — all of whieh are ex
eellent table-fish, in their proper seasons.
There are three large lumber-mills located at Astoria, manu-

46 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
facturing daily one hundred and fifty thousand feet of rough
and dressed lumber ; a planing-raill, and a box-factory turning
out annually one raillion boxes ; besides half a dozen other mills
in the vicinity. The timber to feed these mills is in the imme
diate neighborhood, and consists of fir, spruce, hemlock, and
cedar. Spruce is used for boxes, owing to its being odorless
and free from warping. Ship and bridge tiraber is also obtained
frora the adjacent forests. The material for manufacturing fur
niture is abundant, — namely, oak, maple, ash, cedar, larch, and
alder, whieh is still unappropriated.
Astoria has a large iron and brass foundry, three machine-,
two boiler-, and several blacksmith-shops ; but the iron, coal,
and limestone in its vicinity are unworked ; a tannery utilizes
the helmlock bark found conveniently near ; these few manu
facturing enterprises being all that are represented in this eity
by the sea. It has a national and a private bank ; good schools
and handsome sehool buildings ; eight ehurch edifices, and all
the usual orders and societies ; two morning newspapers and
one evening journal ; a chamber of coramerce ; water-works,
street-ear lines, and most of the other accessories of modern
urban comfort.
The imports of Astoria for eleven months in 1889 amounted
to one hundred and twenty-one thousand seven hundred and
forty-nine dollars, on which the duties were fortj'-two thousand
one hundred and thirty-seven dollars and forty-five cents,
the heaviest bill being for tin plates used in manufacturing fish-
cans. The value of cargoes of wheat, lumber, fish, flour, and
miscellaneous exports shipped direct from Astoria was nine
hundred and thirty-three thousand six hundred and ninety-eight
dollars. The arrivals of vessels from January 1 to December 1
numbered ninety, with a total tonnage of ninety-three thou
sand seven hundred and fifty-eight. Tho steamers, sloops,
schooners, barks, and ships owned in this city number seventy-
five. Within half a dozen years about one thousand acres of tide-
land have been reclaimed by diking at Tansy Point on the
Clatsop peninsula, the land proving immoinsoly productive, and
demonstrating that farming is not a lost art on the sea-coast.
Other similar iraproveraents will undoubtedly follow, giving, in

NOTES ON THE COLUMBIA RIVER. 47
time, the Astoria of Oregon as beautiful environments as sur
round the Astoria of New York.
Only last year the first railroad from Astoria into the Wal
lamet Valley was commenced. This is the Astoria and South
Coast Eailwaj', whieh begins at the west end of the town,
crosses Young's Bay by a bridge a mile and a half in length,
and, running west to Skipanon, turns south along the coast to
the seaside resort at Clatsop Beach, a distance of eighteen miles,
whence it takes a eourse southeast and east to a junction with tho
Southern Pacific's west-side line at Hillsborough, in Washington
County, which gives it connection with trains for Portland or
for the southern counties and San Francisco ; or by the Oregon
Pacific for Eastern Oregon. This line will be completed in
1891, being already opened to Clatsop Beach. Another road
under survey is the Albany and Astoria Eailroad, which is to
run. south along the eoast to Tillamook, and thence southeast
through the west-side grain-fields to Albany. Another pro
jected line is the Salem, Astoria and Eastern, whose pet name
will be the " Salera to the Sea road ;" while the Union Pacific
has indicated its intention of building from Portland to Astoria
along the Columbia. These are enterprises pointing to the ac
cession of great shipping advantages by tho city at the mouth
of this great river which must affect it very advantageously.

CHAPTEE V.
NOTES ON THE COLUMBIA RIVER.
The river is the soul of the land to which it belongs. Fringing
its banks, floating upon its waters, are the interests, the history,
and the roraance of the people. Our ideas of every nation are
intimately associated with our ideas of its rivers. To mention
the name of one is to suggest the characteristics of the other.
How the word Euphrates recalls the earliest ages of man's
history on this globe! The Nile reminds us of a civilization
on which the whole of Europe depended for whatever was

48 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
enlightened or refined anterior to the Christian era. The
Tiber is rich in historic associations of the proudest empire the
world ever knew. What romances of Moorish power and
splendor are conjured up by the mention of the Guadalquivir !
The Ehine is so enwreathed with flowers of song, that the
actual history of its battlemented towers is lost from view ; and
yet tho mention of its narae gives us a satisfying conception of
the ideal Gerraany, past and present.
So the Thames, the Ehone, the Danube, are so many words
for the English, the French, and the Austrian peoples. In our
own country, what different ideas attach to Connecticut, Hudson,
Savannah, and Mississippi! How quickly the pictures are
shifted in the stereoscope of imagination by changing Orinoco
for San Joaquin, Amazon for Sacramento, or Eio de la Plata for
Columbia, upon our tongues. It is not that one is longer or
shorter, or wider or deeper, than another : it is that each con
veys a thought of the country, the people, the history, and the
commerce of its own peculiar region.
In comparison with other rivers of equal size and geographi
cal importance, the Columbia is little known. That generation
has not yet passed away whieh was taught that the whole of
the Northwest Territory was Oregon, that it had one river, the
Columbia, and one town, Portland, situated- on the Columbia.
Above Astoria, for some distanee; there are no important
settlements on the river. But the grandeur of the wooded high
lands, the frequently projecting cliffs covered with forest to
their very edges, and embroidered and festooned with mosses,
ferns, and vines, together with the far-stretching views of the
broad Columbia, suffice to engage the admiring attention of the
tourist. In consequence of fires, which every year spread
through and destroy large tracts of tiraber, the raountains in
many places present a desolated appearance, the naked trunks
alone of the towering firs being left standing to decay. This
remark applies to the north bank, on the lower portion of the
river, for an archipelago of islands on the south rises not far
above the surface of the river, covered with a luxuriant growth
of trees, and in high water the river covers many miles of low
land. Opposite Puget Island, the largest of the group, is Cathlamet,

NOTES ON THE COLUMBIA RIVER. 49
in Washington, the seat of government of Wahkiakum County,
and the seat also of a fish-canning establishment. It is perched
on a high bluff, and has a small population.
Tho mountains approach the river again on both sides at the
Narrows, and opposite to the Oak Point of Captain Winship is
the modern Oak Point, which seems to have borrowed the name,
and shifted it to the Washington side. The name is pretty and
distinctive, and ought never to be changed, as it marks the
western boundary of tbe oak-tree in Oregon and Washington.
Between this and the sea not an oak-tree grows. The only
business at or about Oak Point is that of the fisheries already
mentioned, and a lumbering establishment erected in 1848-49.
It is run by water-j)ower, and capable of manufacturing four
million feet annually.
About ten miles above Oak Point we come to the mouth of
the Cowlitz Eiver. Just below it is a high, conical hill, known
as Mount Coffin. This eminence, together with Coffin Eock,
seven miles above, on the Oregon side, formed the burial-places
of the Indians of this vicinity before the settlement of the
country by whites. Here the dead wore deposited in canoes,
well wrapped up in mata or blankets, with their most valuable
property beside them, and their domestic utensils hung upon
the posts which supported their unique coffins. Wilkes relates
in his journal how his men accidentally set fire to the under
brush on Mount Coffin, causing a number of the canoos to be
consumed, to the grief and horror of the Indians, who would
have avenged the insult had they not been convinced of its
accidental occurrence.
The Cowlitz is a sraall river, though navigable for twenty
miles when the water is high enough, and about half that dis
tance at all times. It rises in Mount St. Helen, and runs west-
wardly for some distance, when it turns abruptly to the south.
The valley of the Cowlitz is small, being not more than twenty
miles long and four or five wide. It is heavily timbered, except
for a few miles above its mouth, where the rich alluvial bottom
lands are cleared and cultivated. No finer soil could possibly
exist than this in the Cowlitz Valley. In 1868 the town of
Monticello, four miles from the Columbia, was all swept away
in a flood. It has been replaced by a fresher edition of its
4

50 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
former self, however, and looks as cheerful and ambitious as if
it knew thero eould be no second deluge.
This portion of tho Cowlitz Valley does not depend alone
upon its fertility for its future importance. There are extensive
deposits of coal in the mountains whieh border the river, besides
other mineral deposits whieh an increase of population will
eventually bring into notice. There is, too, an almost inex
haustible supply of the finest fir and cedar upon the mountains
which hera it in. The river, as might be conjectured, is a rapid
stream, and cold from the snows of St. Helen. Its waters in
summer, when the snows are melting rapidly, are white, from
being mixed with volcanic ashes, or some disintegrated infusorial
marl or chalk.
So disguised in a luxuriance of trees and shrubbery is the
mouth of the Cowlitz that, when we are in the open Columbia,
wo can scarcely detect the place of our exit from it. Crossing
over to the Oregon side, we find ourselves at Eainier, where
lumber is manufactured, chiefly for export. The location of
Eainier is, in many respects, fine ; but, at present, there seems
to be little besides the lumber trade to give it business, though
there are a fow exeellent farms in the vicinity. Along here, on
the Oregon side, is a tract of level land, extending back from
the Columbia for some distance. It answers to the depression
of the Cowlitz Valley ; and it is remarkable tbat, wherever a
stream comes into the Columbia large enough to bo said to have
a valley, there is on the opposite side a break in, or a curvature
of, the highlands, making more or less level country facing the
valley perpendicular to it, so that the valleys of the streams
may be said to cross the Columbia, and, oven, to be widest on
the opposite side. Somewhere in here on the Oregon side is the
Klaskanie, a stream with a fertile and cultivated valley on its
head-waters, the mouth of the streara being far down the river,
opposite Cathlemet.
Advancing several miles, we find ourselves abreast of Kalama,
on the Washington side, the initial point of the Portland branch
of the Northern Pacific Eailroad. Here it was that first the
silent grandeur ofthe Columbia was made vocal with the shriek
of "resonant steam eagles" that speed from ocean to oeean,
bearing the good-will of the nations of the world in bales of

NOTES ON THE COLUMBIA RIVER. 51
merchandise. It is the dream of Jefferson and Benton realized
—only could tho latter have had his wish fulfilled to live until
this day !
"In conclusion I have to assure you, that the same spirit
whieh has made me the friend of Oregon for thirty years—
which led me to denounce the Joint Occupation Treaty the day
it was made, and to oppose its renewal in 1828, and to labor for
its abrogation until it was terminated ; the same spirit which
led me to reveal the grand destiny of Oregon in articles written
in 1818, and to support every measure for her benefit since —
this same spirit still animates mo, and will continue to do so
while I live — which I hope will be long enough to see an
EMPORIUM OF Asiatic commerce at the mouth of tour river,
AND A STREAM OP ASIATIC TRADE POURING INTO THE VaLLET OP
THE Mississippi through the channel op Oregon." — Letter of
Benton to the People of Oregon, in 1847.
But, Benton did not understand the geography of the coast ;
neither did he know mueh of the practical working of railroads
in recognizing or ignoring any- points but their own. Ho did
not foresee the Central Pacific going to San Francisco, and the
Northern Pacific to Puget Sound, and an emporium of Asiatic
commerce at either of those termini, while a third great city
distributed commerce along the Columbia and its tributaries,
from its mouth to its sources.
Twelve miles above Kalama the Cathlapootle or Lewis Eiver
enters the Columbia. Like the Cowlitz, it rises in Mount St.
Helen, and is a cold and rapid stream. Opening within a few
hundred feet from the mouth of Lewis is Lake Eiver, not born
of mountain glaciers, but coming from a lake in the vicinity of
Vancouver. It is fed also by a creek from a high source which
runs parallel with the South Fork of Lewis Eiver. Between
the latter and the Columbia, to which it runs nearly parallel for
a few miles, is a stretch of bottom-land, and, according to the
rule I have laid down, the highlands recede on the Oregon side,
giving room for two towns, Columbia City and St. Helen, both
occupying excellent sites, but never having made the progress
which might justly be expected of them. At this latter point,
it is said, Wyeth had his fort and trading house in 1834, from
whieh it was called " Wyeth's Eock" until it was settled upon, a

52 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
dozen years later, by H. M. Knighton, to whora it was patented
by the United States. In the early years of the Pacific Mail
Steamship Company, this great corporation owned a wharf at
St. Helen, and stopped its steamers there ; but the exigencies of
commerce at that period compelled them to go to Portland.
Just above this place lies Sauve Island, about eighteen miles
long by six broad in the widest i^art ; having on one side of it
the Columbia, and on the other one lower Wallamet Eiver, which
is known as the " Columbia Slough." At the junction of these
two rivers is an inlet called Scappoose Bay, extending back
towards the high hills a distance of seven miles, and navigable
by small boats for that distance, but for sailing vessels only two
or three miles. In 1851-52 a town named Milton was laid out
on the low land adjacent to Scappoose Bay by a company of
sea-captains. The first summer flood in the Columbia showed
them their mistake, driving the inhabitants to the high bluff
behind Wyeth's Eock. Not a vestige of Milton remains at this
day, and most of its projectors are gone the way of all the
earth. It should have been mentioned that the Columbia, at about
the mouth of the Cowlitz, sixty miles from the sea, makes a
decided bend, running from tho upper end of Sauve Island to
this point in a northerly course. The Wallamet has its upper
mouth at the head of this island, entering the Columbia, where
it makes another bend, the eourse of the river being in a gen
eral east and west direction for one hundred and eighty miles
above this point.
Passing the entrance to the Wallamet, we observe that the
before-mentioned rule holds good here, and that the wide and
fertile valley of this river seems to cross over to the Washington
side, the flat country on both sides of the Columbia continuing
from the lower mouth of the Wallamet to the foot-hills of the
Cascades which border the great valley on the east. Though
this level country is now covered with timber, it must, from its
alluvial nature, when cleared, prove very excellent farming
land. That portion of it nearest the river is subject to the
annual overflow ; but there is no difficulty in determining the
limits of submersion, for, wherever fir-trees are found, there tho
high-water never comes.

NOTES ON THE COLUMBIA RIVER. 53
At a distance of about six miles above the Wallamet we
eome to the town of Vancouver, on the Washington side. This
plaee is beautifully situated on a sloping plain, with a strip of
velvety-looking meadow land on its river-front. It is the old
head-quarters of the Hudson's Bay Company in Oregon, where
resided, for more than twenty -five years, the governor and
chief factors of that company, nominally holding "joint posses
sion," with the United States, of the whole Oregon Territory,
out really, for the greater portion of that time, holding it alone.
Here lived in bachelorhood, or with wives of Indian descent,
a little colony of educated and refined men, who, by the condi
tions of their servitude to the London Company, were forced
to lead a life of almost monastic seclusion. True, it happened
sometimes that naturalists, adventurous travellers, and others
drifted to this comfortable haven in the wilderness, and by their
talk made a little variety for the recluses; and very hospitable
they found them— ready to provide every civilized luxury their
fort contained, without money and without price, so long as it
pleased their guests to abide with them.
There are few traces remaining of the old, stockaded fort.
When the British company abandoned it the United States gov
ernment took possession of Vancouver for a railitary post ; and
now the tourist beholds, scattered over the plain, a thriving
town of two thousand inhabitants, and bordering on it the well-
kept garrison grounds of the troops, with neat officers' quarters
encircling the parade. Vancouver is the seat of government of
Clarke County, and possesses many advantages, which are to be
brought more prominently to light by railroad communication
with the Puget Sound region and Eastern Washington in the
near future. The Union Pacific Company will soon unite
Washington and Oregon, at this point, bjj^ a steel bridge whose
estimated cost reaches into the millions.
Above Vancouver, for a distance of twenty miles, there are
many beautiful situations all along on the Washington side,
though the country is timbered heavily. The southern shore is
lower : the Sandy — a stream coming down from Mount Hood
— having its entrance into the Columbia above and opposite
Vancouver, through alluvial, sandy bottoms. Beyond this the
whole surface of the country becomes elevated, and we are

54 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
among tho foot-hills of the Cascade Mountains. Not a mile
of the passage has appeared monotonous from Astoria to this
point. We have enjoyed river, forest, mountains, and snow-
peaks, with little intervals of human interest, all along ; and
enjoyed these in absolute comfort, for the steamboat service on
the Columbia is excellent, Ihanks to the original Oregon Steam
Navigation Company, and its successors.
We arrive now at what the tourist must ever regard as the
most interesting portion of tho river — the gorge of tho Colum
bia. Here wonder, curiosity, aud adrairation corabine to arouse
sentiments of awe and delight in the beholder. Entering by
the lower end of the gorge, we commence the passage, of fifty
miles or more, directly through the solid mountain range of the
Cascades. The snow-peaks, which looked so lofty at the dis
tance of eighty miles, as we approach them gradually sink into
the mountain mass, until we lose sight of them entirely. The
river narrows, and the scenery grows more and more wild and
magnificent. Fantastic forms of rock — some with naraes by which they
can be recognized — begin to attract our attention. Crow's
Eoost is a single, detached rock on the right, which time and
weather are slowly wearing down to the " needle" shape, so
common among the trappean formations. It stands with its
feet in the river, at the extremity of a heavily-wooded point ;
and in the crevices about its base, and half-way up, good-sized
firs are growing. Above the Crow's Eoost the mountains tower
higher and higher. Frequently from lofty ledges and terraces
of rock silvery water-falls are seen descending, hundreds of feet,
to some basin hidden by intervening curtains of wooded ridges.
Frora the stearaer's deck they look like mere ribbons ; sorae of
thera, indeed, are dashed into invisible spray before they reach
the bottora.
One of the handsomest of these is Multnomah Fall, whieh
has a straight descent of several hundred feet to a pool sur
rounded by mosses, ferns, and drooping foliage, after which the
stream hastens impetuously to a second plunge over a ledge of
rock, and speeds on to the Columbia. A rustic bridge spans the
torrent just above the lower fall. Somebody more given to
ponies than to poetry, has naraed one of the highest of these

NOTES ON THE COLUMBIA RIVER. 55
Cascade falls Horse-tail ; and another has the rather hackneyed
name of Bridal Veil, which, of course, it does not in the least
resemble. Above Multnomah Fall, on the Washington side, is a high,
precipitous wall of needle-pointed, reddish rock, coming quite
down to the river, and curving in a rounded, face, so as to form
a little bay above. This is the Cape Horn of the lower Colum
bia—a point where the Wind Spirit lies in wait for canoes and
other small craft, keeping tbem weather-bound for days to
gether. Fine as it is stearaing up the Columbia in July weather,
there are times when storms of wind and sand make the voyage
impossible to any but a steam-propelled vessel. It is at our
peril that we invade the grand sanctuaries of Nature in her
winter moods. The narrow channel of the river among the
mountains, the height ofthe overhanging cliffs, — whieh confine
the wind as in a funnel, — and the changes of temperature to
which, even in summer, raountain localities are subject, make
this a stormy passage at some periods of the year.
Sitting out upon the steamer's deck, of a summer morning,
we are not much troubled with visions of storms : the seene is
as peaceful as it is magnificent. Steaming ahead, straight inlo
the heart of the mountains, where they rise to a height of four
thousand feet, each moment affords a fresh delight to the won
dering senses. The panorama of grandeur and beauty seems
endless. As we approach the lower end of the rapids, we find
that at the left the heights recede and enclose a strip of level,
sandy land, in the midst of which stands a solitary shaft of
basalt called Castle Eock, about six hundred feet in altitude.
How it came there, is the question which tho beholder first
asks himself, but which, so far, has never been satisfactorily
answered. A mile or two beyond Castle Eock, situated on this bit of
warm, sandy bottom-land, on the Washington side, is the little
mountain hamlet known as the Lower Cascades. Why it is
that one name is made to serve for so many objects, in the same
locality, must ever puzzle the tourist in Oregon. At the Cas
cades the tautology threatens to overwhelra us in perplexity.
Not only is it the Cascade Eange, whieh the cascades of the
river cut in twain, but there are no less than three points on

56 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
the norlh side, within a distance of six miles, known as the
Lower, Middle, and Upper Cascades. Pretty as the name is,
we weary of it when it is continually in our mouths.
It is a pretty spot, too, this Lower Cascades, surrounded by
majestie mountains, and bordered by a foaming river ; charm
ingly nestled in thickets of blossoming shrubbery, and ean
regale its guests on strawberries and mountain-trout. Here the
Oregon Eailway and Navigation Company has a wharf and
warehouse, and here we take our seats in the ears which trans
fer us to the Upper Cascades, and another steamer. We find
tho change agreeable, as a change, and enjoy intensely the
glimpses of the rapids we are passing, and the wonderful luxu
riance of vegetation on every side, coupled with the grandeur
of the towering raountains.
At the Upper Cascades is a block-house, reminding us of the
Indian war of 1855-56, and another one about the middle rapids.
The scene looks peaceful enough now to make the history of
these forts seem very legendary.
Aside frora scenic features, there is a great deal to interest
one at this plaee. One object of curiosity and surprise is the
immense wheels for taking salmon, A wheel is generally forty
feet in diameter, and eight feet from disk to disk. In place of
paddles, there are throe buckets or pouches of strong wire
screening. The wheel, attached to a shaft, may be raised or
lowered at the will of the operator; and the buckets are so con
structed that whatever enters them is thrown to the centre of
the wheel, where an opening above water-line delivers them
into a large tank. Each bucket, when fish are running well,
will turn into the tank seventy-five fish per minute, or two hun
dred and twenty-five for one wheel every sixty seconds. As a
wheel is kept going quite constantly througli the season, and as
there are about two dozen of them in motion on the river, we
have an opportunity to exercise our arithmetical skill in esti
mating the quantity of salmon taken by this method every
season. The rapids at the Cascades are five miles in length, and the
fall of the river is about sixty feet, the bed of the stream being
formerly choked up with rock in such a raanner as to suggest
recent volcanic agency. The government has expended some

NOTES ON THE COLUMBIA RIVER. 57
money in removing the obstructions below the Middle Cascades,
and a very large amount is being annually laid out in construct
ing a ship canal three thousand feet long around the upper
rapids. This artificial channel, which is " making haste slowly,"
is a fine specimen of engineering skill, and a solid piece of work.
When completed it will remove the now existing monopoly of
this mountain pass, allowing boats to ascend and descend with
out reshipment of cargoes.
One of the natural wonders of the gorge of the Columbia on the
Oregon side is a moving mountain, 'this is a mass of basalt, with
three peaks, extending six or morc miles along the river, and
rising two thousand feet above it. Its raotion is not perceptible
but it is certain. It slides both forward into the river, and
downward towards the sea. In its forward raovement it has
earried below the surface of the Columbia a tract of timbered
shore, the trees on which long ago were killed by submergence,
and stand dark and naked under the water, or when the river
is low, projecting above it. Tbe Oregon Eailway and Naviga
tion Eailroad, whieh is carried along the side of this mountain,
is unable to keep its track in situ owing to this movement, the
road-bed and rails having in some places been pushed, in a few
years, eight or ten feet out of line. The explanation of this
jihenomenon is supposed to be that the great bulk of basalt
which constitutes the mountain was poured out upon a sub
stratum of conglomerate, or softer subrock, which is being
slowly disintegrated by the action of the current of the Colum
bia, or is yielding to the mighty pressure upon it from above, or
possibly both. The lateral movement is explained in a similar
manner, by tho concave shape of the rock foundation of the
eountry to the west, and the yielding of the overlying softer
strata. From the deck of the steamer waiting for us at the end of
the railroad portage, a beautiful picture is spread out on every
side. The river seems a lake dotted with islands, with low
shores, surrounded by mountain walls. Almost the first thing
which strikes the eye is an immensely high and bold, perpen
dicular cliff of red rock, pointed at top with the regularity of
a pyramid, and looking as if freshly- split off from some other
half whieh has totally disappeared. The freshly-broken ap-

58 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
pearance of this cliff, so different frota the worn and mossy
faces of most of the roeks that border the river, suggested to
the savage one of his legends concerning the formation of the
Cascades : which is, that Mount Hood and Mount Adams had
a quarrel, and took to throwing fire-stones at each olher ; and;
with their rage and struggling, so shook the earth for raany
miles around that a bridge of rock whieh spanned the river at
this plaee was torn frora its mountain abutments, and east in
fragments into the river. So closely does legend sometimes
border on scientific fact !
While I am making this grave reflection upon the scientific
truth of legends, some one presents me with a story, in rhyrae,
which he assures me is the true, original Indian legend of the
formation of those other notable points on the river, ^the Dalles,
Horse-tail Falls, Crow's Eoost, as also the Falls of the Wallamet
and Mount Hood. Making all due allowance for poetic license
in some of the details, the story and the manner of its telling
are worthy of notice; and I give it as a pleasing chapter of the
early, romantic history of this romantic countrj' I
THE SONG OF KAMIAKIN.
Should you ask me where I caught it —
Caught this flame and inspiration —
Should you ask me where I got it —
Got this old and true tradition —
I would answer, I would tell you :
Where the virgins of the forest
Sit with quills thrust through their noses,
Eating calmly cricket hashes ;
Where the tar-head maid reposes ;
Where the proud Columbia dashes,
Hearing nothing but his dashing.
Hias skookum* Kamiakin,
Of the vale of Klikatata —
Which I know each nook and track in
As well as Johnny knew his daddy —
Was the chief of all the Siwash,
And the great high-cockalorem —
As his fathers were before him —
* Grreat, strong.

NOTES ON THE COLUMBIA RIVER. 59
Of the winding Wallametta,
Which 1 sing — and say it surely
As the jingling Juniata
Sounds as well ; but 'tis unpretty,
Poets of the sunset sea-rim
Flying otf to Acropolis —
Very absurd it is, and silly —
While the glassy Umatilla,
And the classic Longus Thomas,
And the grassy Tuda-Willa,
All do fl.ish and flow before us.

Well, my hero Kamiakin
Was in love ; you know such folly
Must go in, or something's lacking
In all great, good rhymes emetic.
Now, she dwelt in Walla Walla ;
But her ma was awful stuck up ;
And her pious dad, ascetic,
'Gainst our hero got his back up ;
And he swore on stacks of Bibles,
Higher than the hay you stack up.
He would sue for breaches, libels ;
He would sue him, shoot him, boot him-
That, in fact, he didn't suit him —
Didn't vote the proper ticket.
Now, it cost him like the nation
Going from the land of cider
(You know how these Navigation
Fellows charge a horse and rider) ;
And, though he was law-abiding,
To be treated thus about her
He declared was rather binding,
And that he wouldn't go without her.
So he strode a cayuse charger
With white eyes, also white as
Foam of creamy, dreamy lager
From her nostrils to her caudle ;
With a woolly sheepskin folding
Back behind his jockey saddle,
Where the girl could ride by holding.

60 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
" Come back, come back, O Pickaninny-
Back across the stormy water,"
Cried the old man, like a ninny.
One hand skewed her water-fall up.
While the other held her garter,
As they set off at a gallop.
Oh ! she looked majestic, very.
As she answered, " Nary, nary I"
And the river so is flowing.
Though wider washed a foot or so.
For this was in the gleaming, glowing.
Gilded, golden long-ago.

Then they fled far down the river.
But the old man came upon them.
And she cried, " 0 Lord, deliver I"
And she blew a silver trumpet,
And she cried, " 0 hiac— jump it,"
Till the cayuse jumped the river —
Jumped the awful yawning chasms —
With the lovers both astride her.
Ah, enough to throw in spasms
Belles of this sweet land of cider !
But the daddy, hot and snarling
At the chief and chieftain's darling,
Hip and thigh smote with his sabre,
While the cuitan was crossing.
And her silver tail was tossing ;
And her long tail, white and shaggy,
Cleft where Tam O'Shanter's carlin
Caught the tail of faithful Maggie.
And that horse-tail still is flowing
From the dark rim of the river,
Drifting, shifting, flowing, going.
Like a veil or vision flurried.
But is never combed or curried,
As a body can diskiver.
Then while dad on the piazza
Eead the latest act of Andy,
And the maid on her piano
Trilled a ditty for sorae dandy,

NOTES ON THE COLUMBIA RIVER. 61
" Chaco, chaco, cumtux mika?"*
From afar in tones coyote.
" Ah, you bet you, cumtux nika,"t
Sang the maiden sotto voce.
With this sign the chieftain sought her,
For the old man's bull-dog Towzer
Would have made it rather hot for
Kamiakin, Thane of Chowder.
Night and day they flew like arrows,
Till they passed by sweet Celilo :
"Bully," cried the chief; "tomollo's
Sun will see us hias lolo."t
But the old man missed his daughter ;
Vowing he would catch and score them.
Took the steamer, and by water
Reached the Dalles the day before them.
" Stop, you bummer," yelled the daddy
While the chief fled to the river;
And the dad pursued, and had a
Henry-rifle, bow and quiver.
Then the chief wished him a beaver —
Big or little, didn't mind him —
But the gal, would you believe her,
Stuck like wax, tiglit on hehind him.
Then she waved a wand of willow.
And behold the mighty river
(For the maiden was a fairy)
All did surge and shake and shiver.
Till the banks did kiss, or nearly,
And confine the foaming billow ;
So they crossed without a ferry.
"Verbum sat.," now yelled the daughter,
As she with her lover vamosed ;
And the dad sat in the water
'Till he chilled and died, and so was
Turned to stone forever after.
Now this dad a noble Crow was.
And a chief of fame and power,
* Come, come, do you understand me ?
¦f I understand you. J Far away.

62 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
And is known unto this hour
As the " Crow-Rock" or the " Crow-Roost."
Well, they travelled in a canter
'Till they reached the sweet Wallamet,
And cried, " Boatman, do not tarry ;
We will give three pound of salmon
If you'll row us o'er the ferry."
But he answered, "Nary, nary."
Then the maiden cried out, " Dam it,"
And the stream was dariimed instanter.
So the chieftain reached his nation,
And his mother gave a party —
Gave a July celebration —
And they dinnered very hearty,
All on kouse and salmon smoky,
And then danced the hoky-poky.
But her troubles grew the thicker.
As in truth so did the maiden.
For the chief began to lick her.
And distract her with upbraiding ;
But she had to grin and bear it, ¦
For the gods had got so mad, they
Said she never should repass the
Place she left her dear old daddy.
So she went up in the hill-tops
At the head of the Molalla,
For to look at Walla Walla ;
And by magic spells and hoo-doo —
For, you know, she was a fairy —
She did manage soon to rear a
Mountain like the pile of Cheops.
And Siwash, who saw her mammuk,*
Called the peak " Old Mountain Hoo-doo.''
But there came a Jewish peddler.
Packing head-gear, hoods, and small t'ings
(Says the Almanac McCormick),
And who didn't care three fardings
For this dear and true tradition —
As the learned like me and you do —
And made the gross abbreviation
Of Mount Hood from Mountain Hoo-doo.
* Working, or conjuring.

NOTES ON THE COLUMBIA EIVER. 63
Turning from this bit of pleasantry with a smile, I am again
absorbed in the beauty and majesty of the Columbia. The
Hudson, which has so long been the pride of America, is but
the younger brother of the Columbia. Plaee a hundred JDun-
derhergs side by side, and you have some idea of these stupen
dous bluffs; double tho height of the Palisades, and you ean
form an idea of these precipitous cliffs. Elevate the dwarfed
evergreens of the Hudson highlands into firs and pines like
these, and then j^ou may compare. There is no other river
in United States territory whieh gives such impressions of
grandeur. Down this noble stream, eighty-five years ago, floated those
adventurous explorers Lewis and Clarke. Seven years lator tho
overland party of the Astor expedition struggled along -these
wild mountain shores, among inhospitable tribes, trying to reach
the sea party at the mouth of the river. A few years later still
the annual " brigades" of the Hudson's Bay Corapany descended
the river with their fleet of mackinaw barges to the rhythm of
their Canadian boating-songs, as they approached Fort Van
couver with the year's peltry, these noble cliffs echoing their
noisy gayety. Fifty -six years ago missionaries and men of
science, filtering tliroua;h the crust of somi-civilization in the
West, found their way down the Columbia ; and a dozen years
later immigration set in. A hard time these " men of destiny''
had of it, too, drowning at The Dalles, starving at the Cascades,
entering upon their Canaan destitute of everything but indom
itable American pluck.
The farther we depart from the heart of the mountains tho
more marked is the change in the character and quantity of
the timber. Firs have entirely disappeared, while spruce and
pine have taken their places. The form, too, of the highlands
is changed, being arranged in long ridges, either parallel with
the river or at right angles to it, but all very extensive, and
forming benches, dotted only with trees, instead of being heavily
wooded, as on the western side ofthe range. Tho climate, also,
is changed, and a dryness and warrath quite different from tho
Western climate are observable.
On nearing The Dalles the country opens out more and more,
the terraced appearance continuing quite to that eity, and the

64 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
basalt here presenting a columnar formation. We come now to
the last, and by far the most singular, portion of the gorge of
the Columbia. The river here flows for eight miles through a
narrow channel, cut in solid trap-rock, and more or less tortuous.
It is, of course, not navigable, and travellers by the river raake
a portage by rail to Celilo, at the upper end of the gorge. The
word dalles comes frora the French word dale, a trough or con
duit, and was first appilied by the French voyageurs, being cor
rupted into its present form of spelling by Americans.
What a strange seene it is ! Sand, rock, and water, — not un
common elements in a pleasing picture ; but here it is not pleasing
— it is uncanny to a degree. I find myself wondering how deep
here must be a streara only forty yards wide, which in other
places is two thousand yards wide, and deep enough to float any
kind of a ship ; for I cannot help fancying that what the river
hore lacks in breadth it raakes up in depth. I am not aware
that soundings have ever been taken in this part of the river.
Boats have gone through this passage. In low water the
barges of the Hudson's Bay Company used to run the dalles.
One or two steamers have been brought through at a low stage
of water; but it is a very perilous undertaking, — much more
perilous than going over the Cascades at high water. I take
observations, and decide that I should not willingly embark on
this particular portion of the Columbia.
How it swirls, how it twirls, liow it eddies and boils I
How it races and chases, how it leaps, how it toils !
How one mile it rushes, and another it flows
As soft as a love-song sung •' under the rose ;"
How in one place it seethes, in another is still
And as smooth as the flume of some sleepy old mill.
A rock-entroughed torrent like none else, I pledge ;
And, in truth, is a river set up on its edge.
Dalles City — or " The Dalles," as it is officially named, is a
town of about twelve hundred inhabitants, situated on the
Oregon side of tho Columbia, at the lower end of the dalles of
the river. In the early history of the country it was fixed upon
by the Methodists as a mission station ; but failing in their
efforts to instruct the Indians, or intimidated by their warlike

NOTES ON THE COLUMBIA RIVER. • 65
character, or both, thoy relinquished the station to the Presby
terians, who held it at the breaking out of the Cayuse War iu
1847. On this occurrence the whole country east of tbe Cas
cades was abandoned by all missionaries of Protestant denomi
nations, and Dulles was converted into a military station, the
mission buildings having been burnt down.
When the Donation Act was passed, giving missions the
ground previously occupied by them, the Methodists laid claim
to a portion of The Dalles. The government, however, had
appropriated a portion of the claim for a military post, paying
for the part thus taken. The Presbyterians then disputed the
claim, on the ground that they were in posseasion at the break
ing out of tho war, which compelled them to quit the place, and
had never abandoned it, but had a right to return at the cessa
tion of hostilities. The question of ownership has, however,
been satisfactorily settled by the claim of tho town being recog
nized by the government as superior to any of these.
The raining rush to Idaho in 1862-63 gave The Dalles its first
start. It has now a good trade, and ought witb its fine situa
tion to becorae a place of importance. There are many attrac
tive homes here, but not the appearance of thrift which might
be expected. The Dalles is hoping to have a boat railwaj' from the
foot to the head ofthe Dalles Eapids, the government engineers
having made a favorable report upon the project, which is to be
accomplished by means of hj-draulic lifts at each terminus, the
lower to raise the boats sixty-eight feet, and the upper one forty
feet, at low water. Tho lifted boat will be lowered upon a car,
and transported by rail to Celilo, the track being of very heavy
iron, but of ordinary gauge and double track. Thirty-four
wheeled trucks, placed in two lines of seventeen each, are ex
pected to have si\ffieient flexibility to pass over the curves in
the road ; and nine hundred tons is the maximum weight to be
earried, including the car. Two fifty-ton locomotives will do
the hauling. The estimated cost of tho whole system, with
equipment of two cars and four engines, capable of passing
eight loads of six hundred tons both ways in twelve hours, and
including the necessary buildings, wilh ten per cent, for contin
gencies, is two million six hundred and ninety thousand three
hundred and fifty-six dollars. It is also in contemplation to

66 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
improve some rapids above The Dalles, all of which, when
corapleted, will add a notable feature to Columbia Eiver travel.
There is comparatively little river travel on the Columbia
above the Wallamet, all through passengers being earried on
the Oregon Eailway and Navigation Company's line to its con
nection wilh the Oregon Short Line through Idaho, or to a
junction with the Northern Pacific on the north side of the
Columbia. But sight-seeing is moro satisfactory from the deck
of a steamboat than from the window of a rapidly-moving and
crowded car, and the tourist will do well to bear this in mind.
Aside from the river there is little to interest one about The
Dalles. Just above the old garrison grounds is a fine view of
Mount Adams and another of Mount Hood. Is seeras to the
uneducated vision as if an hour's ride would take one up among
the highest firs on Hood, quite to the glistening snow-fields ; but
it is agood forty miles, over a rough road, to the foot of the
mountain where the climbing begins.
Opposite The Dalles is the imfinished village of Eockland, in
the county of Klickitat, Washinglon. Tbe name of Wasco, the
county in which Tho Dalles is situated, was given to this locality
— so runs the legend — in tbe following manner: The Indians
being collected at the fishery Winquat, a favorite spot for taking
salmon, about three miles from The Dalles, one of them was so
unlucky as to lose his squaw, the mother of his children, oue of
whom was yet only a babe. This babe would not be comforted,
and the other children, being young, were clamorous for their
raother. In this trying jDosition, with these wailing little ones
on his awkward maseulino hands, the father was compelled to
give up fishing and betake himself to arausing his babies. Many
expedients having failed, he at length found that they wero
diverted by seeing hira pick cavities in the rocks in the form of
basins, which they eould fill wilh water or pebbles, and accord
ingly, as many a patient mother does every day, adapted him
self to the taste and capacities of his children, and made any
number of basins they required. Wasco being the name of a
kind of horn basin which is in use among the Des Chutes, his
associates gave the name to this devoted father in ridicule of
his domestic qualities ; and afterward, when he had resolved to
found a village at Winquat, and drew many of his people after

NOTES ON THE COLUMBIA RIVER. 67
him, they continued to call them all Wascos, or basins. To-day
the tribe is little known, but the county of which Dalles is tho
metropolis bears the name once given in derision to a poor,
perplexed father for descending to the office of basin-maker for
his children.
The original Indian name of the plaee where Dalles stands
was Winq^iat, signifying " surrounded by rocky cliffs." There
are many Indian names attached to points in this neighborhood
of poetical signification. " Alone in its beauty" is the transla
tion of Gai-galt-whe-la-Jeth, the name ofa flne spring near town.
"The mountain denoting the sun's travel" is the meaning of
Shim-na-klath, a high hill south of town, etc.
About three miles above Dalles is a noted fishery of the
Indians, as mentioned above, and opposite to it is the site of the
Indian village of Wishram, spoken of by the earliest writers on
Oregon. No village exists there now — at least not anything
which could well be recognized as such.
From The Dalles to Celilo there are rocks all about in every
direction, a little grass, a great deal of sand, and some very
brilliant flowers growing out of it. There are also a few Indian
lodges, with salmon drying inside, whose rich orange color
shows thi'ough the open door-way like a flame ; and a few In
dians fishing with a net, their long black hair falling over their
shoulders, and blowing into their eyes in a most inconvenient
fashion. But everything about an Indian's dress is inconve
nient, except the ease with which it is put on ! Some of these
younger savages have ignored dressing altogether as a fatigue
not to be undertaken, until with increasing years an increase of
strength shall be arrived at.
The railroad takes us along under overhanging cliffs of plu
tonic rock, one of which is called Cape Horn, like its brother of
the lower Columbia. As we near Celilo we discover that we
have by no means left behind high banks and noble outlines.
Just here, where we re-embark for the continuance of the up-
river voyage, is a wide expanse of turabling rapids, between
lofty bluffs, rising precipitously from a narrow, sandy beach.
Of Celilo there is not mueh more than the immense ware
house of the Oregon Steam Navigation Company — nine hun
dred feet in length — built in the flush times of gold-raining

68 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
in the upper eountry, and the other buildings required by the
business of the present owners. This company, forraerlj' the
most important factor in the developraent of the interior, bas
been succeeded by tbe Oregon Eailway and Navigation Com
pany, whose property is leased to the Union Pacific.
Lying along the shores, in little coves, are numerous sailing
craft of small size, which carry freight from point to point on
the river above. The sun of an unclouded morning gilds their
white sails, and sparkles in the dancing rajMds. Tho meadow-
lark's voice — loud, clear, and sweet — reaches us from the over
hanging banks. It is at onee a wild and a peaceful seene.
A short distance above Celilo, Des Chutes Eiver empties into
the Columbia, through a deep canyon. A remarkable feature
of the rivers of East Oregon is the depth of their bods below
the surface of the eountry whieh borders them. Des Chutes
flows through a canyon in places more than a thousand foet
deep. Where it enters the Columbia its banks aro not so high,
because the great river itself has its course through the lowest
portions of the elevated plains; and its bed is nowhere at any
very great elevation above the sea-level. At The Dalles, two
hundred miles from tho sea, the level of the river is one hun
dred and nineteen feet above it; and the Walla Walla Valley, at
a distanee of three hundred and fifty miles, has an elevation of
a few feet over four hundred. Away from the Columbia, the
elevation of the plains varies from five hundred to twenty-five
hundred feet. Hence the great depth of the canyons of strearas
flowing on the sarae level with the great river. .
Along this portion of the Columbia the traveller has plenty
of time to conjecture the future of so remarkable a eountry —
not being startled by constantly-recurring wonders, as he raight
have been on the lower portion of the river. There certainly is
great raajesty and grace expressed in the lofty forms and noble
outlines of the overhanging bluffs which border the river for
great distances ; and that is all. There is neither the smooth
ness of art, nor the wildness which roeks and trees impart to
natural scenes; and the simple beauty of long, curving lines
becomes monotonous. If it be summer, there are patches of
color on the sere-looking, grassy, heights; rosy clarkia, blue
lupine, and golden sunflower. We hear the voices of multitudes

NOTES ON THE COLUMBIA RIVER. 69
of meadow-larks ; and see a few prairie-hens stooping their long
necks shylj- among the bunch grass ; or see a herd of cattle
fattening on the dry but nutritious bunch-grass.
Thirty-one miles above The Dalles we pass tho mouth of John
Day Eiver, named after luckless John Day of the Astor expe
dition, — a stream in all respects similar to Des Chutes, with the
same narrow valley, and the samo depth below the general level
of the country. On the head-waters of John Day Eiver placer-
mining was successfull}' carried on from 1862 for several years,
and has since been followed by quartz-mining.
The high bluffs intervening between the Columbia and the
interior country quite conceal any appearances of settlement,
and leave upon the mind tho impression of an altogether unin
habited country, — an inipre.ssion quite erroneous in fact, though
there aro thousands of square miles still vacant.
Willow Creek is a small stream, coming into the Columbia
thirty-three miles above John Day Eiver, with a small, fertile
valley well settled up. After an interval of another thirty-three
miles, we find ourselves at Umatilla, a small town sot in the
sands at the mouth of the river of that namo. It served
formerly as a port to the raines of Powder Eiver and the Boise
eountry. Hore the steamers of the Oregon Steam Navigation
Company disembarked passengers and freight ; and stages,
" prairie schooners," and pack-trains took up their burdens.
The Umatilla Eiver, on account of its valley, is one of the
most important strearas of East Oregon. The Umatilla Valley,
together with the bottom-land^ of several tributary creeks,
furnishes a fine tract of rich, alluvial land, having a high rep
utation for its agricultural capacity^ About seven thousand
acres, nearly all bottom-land, are under cultivation in Umatilla
County, the whole area of which is over forty-seven thousand
square miles.
All the waj^ from the Cascade Mountains to Umatilla— a hun
dred railes, more or less— we have found the rivers all coming
into the Columbia from the south side. Eising in the Blue
Mountains, which traverse the eastern half of Oregon from
northeast to southwest, they fiow in nearly direct courses to the
Columbia, showing thereby the greater elevation of the central
portion of East Oregon over the valley of the Columbia. Not

70 ATLANTIS. ARISEN.
far above the junction of the Uraatilla and Columbia the great
river makes a long bend, receiving, after it takes the north and
south direction, tbe rivers fiowing east frora the Cascade Eange
in East Washington, as well as the tumultuous Lewis or Snake
Eiver, which divides Oregon from Idaho.
It is nearly sunset when the steamer quits Umatilla to finish
the voyage we have entered upon, at Wallula, — a distance of
twenty-five railes farther up stream, in a direction a little east
of norlh. We steam along in the rosy sunset and purple twilight,
by which the hills aro clothed in royal dyes. About eight in
the evening we arrive at Wallula, too late lo be aware of the
waste of sand and gravel in whieh it is situated. Wallula has
been the port for the Walla Walla Valley ever since the occupa
tion of the country by white people, It was formerly a post
of the Hudson's Bay^ Company, some of tho old adobe buildings
being still standing. s
Tho bluffs bordering tho Columbia at this place repeat those
harmonies of grandeur with grace, which won remark from us
on other portions of the river. The Walla Walla Eiver, which
comos in just hero, is a very pretty stream, with, however, very
little bottom-land near the Columbia.
The sand of Wallula is something to bo dreaded. It insinu
ates itself everywhere. You find it scattered over the plate on
which you are to dine ; piled up in littie hillocks in the corner
of your wash-stand ; dredged over the pillows on whieh you
thoughtlessly sink your weary head, without stopping to shako
them ; setting your teeth on edge witb grit, everywhere. And
this ocean of sand extends several miles back from the river.
In sight of the' Columbia and Snake Elvers, it seems to cry out,
like the Ancient Mariner, —
" Water, water everywhere,
And never a drop to drink."
Bathed in a rosy sunset, with a royal purple twilight stealing
over the hills, it has a simple and chaste grandeur about it that
appertains to desert scenes, making one think of the Nile; the
more so, as tho rising moon touches with a sott gilding the sum
mit of a great rock that might be the pyramid of Cheojis. And
so good-night to it.

NOTES ON THE COLUMBIA RIVER. 71
When I wake in the morning I think to inquire into the navi
gability in general of this upper part of the Columbia and its
southern branch, and am handed the report of Captain T. W.
Symons, recently made to tho department at "Washington. Of
this he says that tho Upper Columbia and Snake form a con
tinuous lino of navigable rivers from Celilo at the bead of Tho
Dalles to Lewiston in Idaho, but broken by many rapids, ren
dering navigation difflcult and dangerous, the rapids in nearly
every instance being caused by rocky bars and occasional
boulders, while tho channels were crooked and narrow, and tho
water, before improvement, ruling from two to three feet on the
bars, which were practically impassable at low water.
This statement, from including tbo Colurabia Eiver, is rais-
leading. Tho Colurabia below the Snake junction, although
having some rapids, especially near Celilo, has boon constantly
navigated by steamboats of considerable size ever since 1859,
when the " Colonel Wright," — named in honor of Colonel, after
wards General, Wright, — a small steamer, was put on the river
experimentallj'. Tbo frequent rocky bars are encountered in
the Snake Eiver between its mouth and Eiparia, although the
Columbia Eiver steamers used to run, during high water, to
Lewiston. After July 1, they were usually drawn off. Some
plans for improving the rivers were adopted in 1877.
According to the report cited, tbe Snake River has a general
breadth of one thousand feet, a slope of 2.48. feet per milo, and a
discharge of twenty thousand cubic feet per second. All th
bars have been improved to an extent which removes all danger
to competent navigators acquainted with them, with the single
exeeption of Long Crossing Bar, all tbe others having three feet
of water on them at low water. Navigation below Eiparia has
been suspended, but quite as much, I imagine, on account of
railroad corapetition as by reason of bars. Above there, where
a rich, agricultural region still depends on navigation, boats are
running. Even far up the Snake a steamer runs between tho
crossing of the 0. E. and N. Eailway, and Seven Devils in
Idaho, a distanee of sixty-five miles north. Still farther up, a
steamer plies between the same crossing and a point beyond,
but the Union Paciflc bridges interfere with navigation, not
being provided with draws.

0

72 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
In this merely superficial sketch of the raost magnificent of
American rivers its scenic features chiefly have been spoken of.
But no thoughtful traveller can make this voyage without pic
turing to his imagination the splendid possibilities here afforded
for a display of the wealth and taste of the nation. Tho de
lightful variety of arrangement in a panorama of two hundred
miles of grandeur, the cunning wiih which nature has inter
spersed imposing ruggedness with enticing beauty, is a strong
feature of Columbia scenery, and suggests the still more charm
ing effect of tbe whole when is added the attraction of refined
human habitations perched every here and there, especially
along the highlands from Astoria to The Dalles, and from Cape
Disappointment to Wallula. With railways on both sides of the
Colurabia, and with the opening of the river to continuous
travel by the improvements in progress and projected, the vol
ume of commerce destined to roll between these noble shores is
simply^ incalculable. Very little effort has been raade toward
settleraent along the great streara, the pioneers of the eountry
first taking up the open lands in the intei-ior; but there is a
large amount of excellent grass, vegetable, and fruit land near
the river, and a little distance away from it land which, when
cleared, will make the best of farms.

CHAPTEE VL
SOME general talk ABOUT CLIMATE.
Having introduced my reader to the two great States of
Oregon and Washington by the magnificent river which divides
and unites them, let me first describe, as best I can, the one
whieh by age has the right of precedence, — Oregon.
In those early times, between 1820 and 1840, when Congress
was discussing the title of the United States to this region,
and doubting often whether the game of contending for our
right was worth the candle, the whole of this country on
both sides of the Colurabia was referred to as " the Oregon,"

SOME GENERAL TALK ABOUT CLIMATE. 73
and "tbe Oregon Eiver" was more frequently on their lips than
tbe Columbia. It is interesting to know that the word was
invented by one New Englander aud immortalized by another.
When Jonathan Carver, doughty eaptain that he was in the
French and Indian wars ofthe last eentury, turned explorer, he
led an expedition to the head-waters of the Mississippi, that
region thon being the "Far West" of the continent, and, finding
little that ho really understood, made some audacious guesses,
as was the custom of explorers before him, and drew a map on
which he had the Mississippi, Missouri, and " Origan" Elvers
to rise from the sarae or neighboring sources.* Th© narae, he
said, was given hira by the Indians, but a thorough search for
any such word in Indian languages leads to the conviction that,
like the raap, the narae was purely imaginary.
The word, however, was ono suited to the poet's numbers, and
after the discovery of the Columbia, when Bryant wrote his
immortal " Thanatopsis," he incorporated the word in his poem,
with a slightly different spelling and a nobler sound. The fame
of Bryant established the uso of the word among educated
people, and henceforth the " territory of the Oregon" was in the
mouths of our national legislators until it became fixed. It is
possible that but for the controversy with Great Britain, whieh
kept alive the name under which the great river in dispute was
known to her statesmen, ours might have ignored it altogether.
Let us be thankful we have both names preserved.
Tbo physical geograph}- of Oregon is unique, and gives a
great variety of climates. Approaching from the Pacific, we
find, first, a narrow skirting of coast, frora one to six miles in
width. Back of this rises tho Coast Eange of mountains, from
three to five thousand foot high. Beyond this range are fine,
level prairies, extending from forty to sixty miles eastward.
Beyond those prairies rises again tho Cascade Eange, from five
to eight thousand feet in height, and having to the east of them

* Carver knew that navigators familiar -with the west coast of the conti
nent expected to find a river from the centre of the continent falling into the
Pacific somewhere in this latitude, and had vaguely named it, hefore seeing
it, the " Biver of the West." He therefore pretended to give the location
of its sources, missing it hy only ahout ten hundred and fifty miles.

74 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
high, rolling prairies, extending to the base of the Blue Moun
tains, which trend soutbwostwardly, leaving plains and small
valleys, to the east, between themselves and tho Snake Eiver,
which forias tbe eastern boundary of Oregon and a portion of
Washington. These differences in altitude would of themselves produce
differences in temperature. But the great reason why the
change is so great from the coast to the Snake Eiver lies in the
arrangement of the raountain ranges, and in the faet that the
northwest shore of the American continent is washed by a
warm current from the Japan Sea. The effect of this current
is such that places in the same > latitude on the Atlantic and
Pacific coasts are several degrees — soraetiraes twenty degrees —
warraer on tbe latter coast than on the forraer. This gives a
temperature at which great evaporation is earried on. The
moisture thus charged upon the atmosphere by day is precipi
tated during the cooler hours of night in fog, raist, or rain.
In summer, the prevailing wind of the coast is from the
northwest, thus following the general direction of the shore-
hne. It naturally carries the sea-vapor inland; but the first
obstacle encountered by these masses of vapor is a range of
mountains high enough to eause, by their altitude and conse
quent lower temperature, the precipitation of a large amount
of moisture upon this seaward slope. Still, a considerable por
tion of moisture is carried over this first range and through
the gaps in the mountains, and falls in rain or mist upon the
level prairie country bej'ond. Not so, however, with the
second, or Cascade Eange. Those mountains, by their height,
intercept the sea-fog completely; and while great raasses of
vapor overhang their western slopes, on their eastern foot-hills
and the rolling prairies beyond not a drop of dew has fallen.
This is the explanation of the difference in climate, as regards
dryness and moisture, between Bast and West Oregon. All
other differences depend on altitude and local circumstances.
Notwithstanding the great amount of moisture precipitated
upon the eountry west of the Cascades, the general cliraate may
be said to be drier than- on the Atlantic ooast. The atmosphere
does not seem to hold moisture, and even in rainy weather its
drying qualities are remarkable. Taken altogether, the stormy

SOME GENERAL TALK ABOUT CLIMATE. 75
days in this part of Oregon are not more numerous than in the
Atlantic States ; but tho rainy daj-s are, because all the storms
here are rain, with rare exceptions. The autumn rains com
mence, usually, in November, — sometimes not till December,—
and the wet season eontinues until April, or possibly till May ;
not without interruptions, however, oftentimes of a month, in
midwinter, of bright weather. About the middle of June the
Columbia Eiver is high, and during the flood there are generally
frequent flying showers. After the flood is abated, there is
seldom any rain until September, when showers commence
again, and jjrove very welcorae, after 'the long, warm, but wholly
delightful summer. The annual rain-fall of the Wallamet Valley
ranges from thirty-five to fifty inches. In the Umpqua and
Eogue Eiver Vallej's it is less ; and at the mouth of the Co
lumbia, and along the coast, both north and south, it is moro.
The mean annual teraperature of Western Oregon is 52.4°,
although in certain localities the average is higher by one or
two degrees.
East of the Cascades the arrangement of the seasons is
somewhat different. There is rauch less rain, whieh comes
in showers rather than in a steady fall, and is confined to the
months between September and Juno. Occasionally snow falls
to the depth of a few inches, and in some winters to a considera
ble depth, and has remained on the ground a number of weeks.
The heat of summer and the cold of winter are each more ex
treme, but not at their highest or lowest degrees so trying as
the same amount of heat or cold would be in a moister atraos
phere. Tho autumn months in this portion of the country are
raost delightful, with the thermometer ranging from fifty-five
degrees to seventy*. Tho pihononienon of the plains is the peri
odical warm wind which comes over the Cascades frora the
Japan current, known as the " Chinook wind," and so named
by the Indians because it carae frora the direction of the
Chinook tribe, with whom they exchanged articles of barter in
a sort of annual fair held at the raountain-j)ass, beyond which
they never intruded on each other's territory. This warra air-
.eurrent has a surprising evaporating quality, licking up several
inehes of snow in a single night, leaving tbe ground bare and
the teraperature mild. It is welcomed by the white stock-raiser.

76 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
as it formerly was by the aboriginal horse-owner of these plains,
and is one of the features of the country.
The opposite of the Chinook is the Walla Walla, or east wind,
whieh is fiercely eold and searching. The Indians had a tra
dition concerning these winds, that they in the persons of two
brothers on each side met and fought a duel to determine which
should prevail, one of their ancient gods to be umpire. In the
battle the Chinook brothers were worsted and beheaded. But
an infant son of tho eldest being told of his father's fate, grew
up with the desire for vengeance, and cultivated his strength
by such exorcise as pulling up trees bythe roots, beginning with
saplings and increasing the size until he could tear up the largest
trees of the forest. Then he sent a challenge to the brothers
of the cold wind, whora he overcame, and who wore in turn
beheaded. But the god who sanctioned these contests declared
that it was not good there should be no wind, and decreed that
thereafter the cold wind sbould not blow with so much violence
nor be so freezing ; neither should the Chinook break down
trees or destroj^ houses. The Chinook raight blow strongest
at night, and the Walla Walla wind by day, whioh they still
continue to do.
The mean temperature of East Oregon is about one degree
higher than the western division ; but the short winters aro
colder and the long summers hotter than West Oregon. A
peculiarity of the climate of every part of Oregon and Wash
ington is the comparative coolness of the nights. No matter
how warm the daj-s may have been, the nights always bring
refreshing sleep, usually under a pair of blankets, even in sum
mer. Nor does the heat, however great, have that fatal effect
which it does in the Atlantic States. Not only men, but cattle
and horses, can endure to labor without exhaustion in the
hottest days of sumraer, and sun-strokes are of very rare
occurrence. There are two charges brought against the Oregon country
on account of climate, — namely, that it does not rain enough in
Eastern Oregon, and that it rains too much in West Oregon.
Humanity does sometimes tire of an overplus of rain from the'
monotony of it rather than because it is disagreeable. But the
earth enjoys it. If you do not believe it, eome with me to tho

SOME GENERAL TALK ABOUT CLIMATE. 77
woods, and I will prove it to you,— aye, in March. The turf in
the flat or hollow places is soaked with water, like a sponge,
and if you do not slop carefully you will press it out over your
shoe-tops ; but, by dint of quick eyes and agile movement, you
will escape any serious mishaps. Climbing over logs, jumping
weather ditches, and crossing creeks furnishes tho necessary
excitement and exercise by which you keep off a chill; for if
you were to sit down to summer reveries at this time of year,
the doctor would be in requisition directly.
Here we are at last, at the very foot of the mountain ; and
what does this forest recess furnish us ? What magnificent
great trees! Fir, cedar, and here and there along this little
creek a yew, a maple, or an alder. Hardly a ray of sunshine
ever penetrates this green and purple gloora. Spring and fall,
winter and sumraer, are mueh tho same hero, — a difference only
of water. In summer the creek is within bounds, and you
ean lie on the mosses, if you feel disposed. " What! lie on the
mosses, every one of whieh seems sueh a raarvel of beauty ?
What a wonderful, what a charming spot! I never, in all my
life  !"
No, of course you never saw anything like it. This is the
only eountry out of the tropics where vegetation has sueh a
remarkable growth. Here are a dozen kinds of elegant green
mosses in a group, to saj- nothing of the tiny gray and brown
and yellow varieties with which we have always been familiar,
besides lichens innumerable. Observe those fallen trees. Their
immense trunks are swathed in elegant blankets of emerald
brightness. See here, I can tear thera off by the j'ard, — enough
on one tree to carpet a roora! Look at the pendent raoss, — two
feet long at least, —and what a vivid yellow green !
Just step up a little higher : I will show you a wonder. Did
you ever dream of anything so marvellous as that bank of moss ?
Six inches high, branching like a fern, yet fine and delicate as
that on the calyx of a moss-rose. Here is enough, if preserved,
to furnish all the French flo wer- makers ; and glad would they
be to get it. And ferns, — yes, indeed ! Just look at this
raaidenhair. It is of every size, from the delicate plant three
inehes high to the mature one of fifteen or eighteen inches.
And here are some that have stood all winter in their autumn

78 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
dress. See how exquisitely they are tinted, — raw-sienna for the
body color, and sueh delicate marking in vandyke-brown on
every leaf, or gold color, raarked with burnt-sienna, and all
relieved so beautifully by the polished black of their slender
steras. But we must not stop long in this dense and damp shade ;
there raight be intermittent lurking in it for unaccustomed
town-folk. But just noto, as we retrace our steps, the great
variety of plants, some of them very beautiful, that grow all
winter long in these solitary places. This h-andsome variegated
leaf comos from a bulbous root, and bears a lily-shaped flower,
I am told ; but being new to me, I cannot yet classify it. We are
still too far from open sunlight to be much among flowering
plants. But directly we corae to occasional openings, or to higher
benches of ground that get the light and drainage, we shall
soe adder-tongue, Solomon's-seal, anemone, wild violet, and
spring-beauty, putting up their leaves, waiting for sunny days
enougb to dare to bring out their blossoms. Here, to6, aro two
species of creeping vines, very delicate and graceful, trailing
along the ground, with little fresh leaflets already growing. In
April the twin-flower (^Linncea borealis') will blossom witb dainty,
pinkish-white, trumpet-shaped flowers, very lovely to behold.
Yerba buona {Micromeria Douglasii?), vulgarly called Oregon tea,
from the spicy flavor of its leaves, which make an agreeable
infusion, is also a beautiful trailing plant of this season.
Now we get down to the woods along the river-bank. Ah,
hore is really a blossoming shrub, the flowering currant. In
haste to brighten the dull March weather with a touch of color
over the groen and brown and jiurple tints that are so melan
choly under a cloudy sky, the currant does not wait t.o put forth
its foliage fir.st, but crimsons all over with thickest flowers, in
racemes of nearly a finger's length. There are two varieties of
the red and one of the yellow, all beautiful and ornamental
shrubs. In company with this still leafless shrub is the glossy
arbutus (misnamed laurel), with its fresh suit of brilliant green
reflecting every ray of light from its polished surface. The
arbutus grows all winter, putting forth its delicate shoots from
December to March, and flowering later in spring. Its cheerful

SOME GENERAL TALK ABOUT CLIMATE. 79
light green makes it a perfect complement to the red of thc
currant when flowering ; and by not looking at all like an ever
green, whieh it really is, bewilders tho beholder, who sees it
growing luxuriantly all along the river-banks, as to the time of
year. Here is another elegant shrub that does its growing in the
winter, and takes the long dry summer to ripen its fruit and be
beautiful in, — the Berberis aquifolium, or holly-leaved barberry,
commonly known as the Oregon grape. It is looking as fresh
and piquant in March as though it had all of April and May
behind it. All around us, on every hand, are plants and shrubs
or trees growing. Behold these graceful little yew-trees, two
feet high. They look as though they had come up in a day, so
delicate and new thoy seem. Examine the ends of the fir-
boughs, and question the crab-apple, the sallal, and the wild-
cherry. Do you see that line of silver down under the river-
bank ? That is the glisten of the catkins on the willows {Salix
scouleriana) that were out in Februaiy. It makes a pretty con
trast to the red stems of a smaller species of willow which grows
along the verj- margin of the river, with its roots in the water.
I am not certain of tho variety.
There certainly is no lack of interesting things in tho woods
of early spring in Oregon. To my eye, with such a variety of
green and really growing trees and shrubs, it is a relief to take
into the view a group of naked stems, like the straight and light
boles of the aspen (JP^pulus tremuloides), the gray trunks of the
dogwood {Comus nuttalis), or the rugged, scraggy forms of the
water-loving ash {Fraxinus Oregona). Uniform as the climate
is, and little as the dropping of the leaves of deciduous trees
affects the general aspect of the landscape, there is yet to the
critical observer a sufficiently marked difference in seasons to
make the studj- of spring and summer, and autumn and winter,
as shown bj- the vegetation of fields and forests, profltable and
compensatory. It is true that one cannot come back from a walk at this time
of year laden with armfuls of flowering shrubbery, as we maj^
in six weeks from now. You cannot, with safety, stretch your
self on the earth and indulge in building Spanish castles, as in
July weather it is pleasant to do, while birds sing among the

80 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
branches overhead, the nervous little squirrel scolds at j-ou frora
a safe distance, or the only half-confiding quail maintains vigi
lant picket duty in your vieinitj-, — all, as j-ou think, for j-our
gratification, though in truth j-ou are regarded by these little
residents as an alien and an intruder. The beauties that should
invite you now pass away or lose their freshness wilh the ap
proach of dry weather. The mosses and lichens will have dried
up by midsummer ; the ferns can then only be found in the
coolest recesses of the woods. The excess of foliage then will
close manj- beautiful vistas ; there will be no raore signs of
daily growth, no tender tints on the leaflets. The j-car will be
at middle ago, round and perfect, but with the touching bloom
of its youth forever past.
There will be a corresponding difference in the color of the
skies, the shape of tho clouds, the hues of the water; in every
part of nature. Let the student of nature learn all her jiassing
moods. There is a wealth of enjoyment in having well-trained
eyes and a receptive observation, that no amount of gold can
purchase. It depends on the individual. Certain of us never
corae into our kingdom, whieh is the kingdom wherewith the
Creator endowed us " in the beginning," because we are too
sordid, too indolent, or too effeminate. Ceriain others of us are
rejoiced to think that we have not wholly missed of it through
either of these faults, and that enjoyment grows with posses
sion. But to return to the subject of climate per se. No country
which has not water enough can bo productive, — water in some
form. West Oregon gets enough, and with great regularity.
East Oregon, with equal regularitj^, gets too little, except in the
bottom-lands, where irrigation is natural, or artificial irrigation
easy. The soil is good alraost anywhere. What then ? There
must and will be developed a sj'stem by which water can be
brought upon the arid lands of East Oregon and Washington.
When that is done the productiveness of the elevated plains will
equal that of the western valleys, and he more certain.
Civilization began in either hemisphere in the rainless coun
tries of Egypt, Peru, and Mexico. The reason is evident.
Civilization depends on the ease and security with which man
harvests the fruits of his fields. The crop in the Nile Valley

SOME GENERAL TALK ABOUT CLIMATE. 81
was unfailing, from the certainty and uniform duration of the
Nile overflow. In Peru, from the constant presence of moisture
eliminated from the atmosphere in the form of heavy dews, the
cultivation of tho earth repaid man's labor surelj-. On the
high table-lands of Mexico irrigation was necessary, but once
accomplished, there, too, agriculture flourished unfailingly ; and
men, instead of roaming from place to plaee, settled and re
mained, until civilization arose and declined, by the natural pro
cesses of the growth and decay of nations.
In these countries, superior inteUigence also resulted from the
drj-ness of the climate ; as it is well known that a pure, dry air
is stimulating to the mental faculties, while a moist, dull, or
cloudy atmosphere is depressing. It is evident tbat men in a
savage state, having the obstacles of want and ignorance to
overcome, have been aided by these circurastances. Nor are
they to be overlooked in considering the future of countries in
the infancj'- of their development. The Columbia Eiver Plains,
owing to their elevation above the level of the draining streams,
will probably require a systera of irrigation by artesian wells,
except those parts bordering on mountains, whence water ean
be conducted with comparative ease. With this addition to tho
amount of moisture furnished by the light rains and occasional
snows of winter, this great extent of country, now given up
to pasturage, might bo made to support a dense jDopulation,
producing for them every grain and fruit of the temperate
zone in the highest perfection.
We aro told that when the missionaries went, in 1836, to look
for a suitable jjlace for a mission farra and station in the Walla
Walla Valley, they estimated that there were about te7i acres of
cultivable ground within thirty miles of the Columbia Eiver ;
and that was a piece of creek-bottom at the junction of a small
stream with the Walla Walla Eiver. These same explorers
decided that there were small patches of six or ten acres, in
places, at the foot of the Blue Mountains which might be
farmed. As for the remainder of the country, it was a desert
waste, whose alkaline properties made it unfit for any use. A
few years' experience changed the estimate put upon the soil
of the Walla Walla Valley ; and now it is known to be one of
the most fruitful portions of the Pacific Coast, and the quality

82 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
of the soil really inexhaustible, — its alkaline properties supply
ing the i^laee of many expensive manures. And j-et the
capacity of the plains for cultivation has only just begun to be
comprehended. East Washington has a greater area of lands
which can be rendered productive by irrigation than East
Oregon, but the area is large in both of the States.
The hill-tops in transmontane Oregon may^ be sown to grain
and safely left to the encouragement of the soil and the elements,
the former having raore clay in it than the lower bench lands,
and the atmosphere, perhaps, at night a little more moisture.
At all events, good crops are harvested on this higher ground
without irrigation. Although in iraagination we beh-old this
country, as it will appear in the happy future, in the very
present hour the tourist is bound to prefer the western division,
whieh is already brought to perfection in so many particulars
by tho deft hand of nature.
All that has been said of Oregon climate, soil, and seasons
applies equally to Washington, except where some local cause
exists for a difference. For instance, there is a greater rain-fall
at the mouth of the Columbia than at Gray's Harbor, or other
points along the coast, until j-ou eome to Neah Bay, at the
entrance to the Strait of Juan de Fuca, the cause of the excess
of moisture being the same in both instances, — namely, a wide
opening in the coast-line, through whieh the storm-winds are
drawn as through a funnel. There is much less rain araong the
islands in the archipelago at the foot of Puget Sound and along
the northern eoast of the mainland of Washington than in the
southern counties, which are affected bj' the climate of the Lower
Columbia. The mean annual precipitation at Olympia is 56.27
inches, and at Portland 50.89 inches. The temperature of the
Puget Sound country is very slightly affected by latitude. The
mean teraperature of Portland in Oregon for the month of De
cember varies from 48° to 43°, although, in an exceptional year,
it has been as low as 31°, and in January, 1888, the mercury
fell to 2° below zero. Thero is a difference of about two
degrees, mean temperature, lower, between Portland and Olym
pia, at the head of Puget Sound, and two or three degrees more
at Tacoma and points farther north.
The lowest temperature for the last five years at Portland

THE WALLAMET AND ITS CHIEF TOWN. 83
was 9° above zero ; at Tacoma, 5° above. Tho highest temper
ature in the sarae time was 97° at Portland and 80° at Tacoma.
The mean temperature of the two places is, Portland 52° to 55°,
and Tacoma 55° to 58°, the difference , being slightly in favor
of the latter plaee, taking the year together, owing to the
influenco of the Sound upon the climate, and to its sheltered
position, away from tho air-currents before spoken of. It is
common to find roses and pansies in blossom until December in
either place, although the stranger may find a chill in the moist
atmosphere which he declares to be " cold," even though the
mercury does not recognize it. A season usuallj'' braces him up
to endure this, and he soon has only eulogies for an even
climate, whose onlj^ fault is that it is not eold enough to be dry
in the winter months.

CHAPTEE VIL
A TALK ABOUT THE WALLAMET AND ITS CHIEP TOWN.
The Wallamet — it is spelled Willamette on the maps, though
the common usage is still to pronounce the word as it was origi
nally spelled— is the river of West Oregon.
Before proceeding to my observations upon this portion of
the country, I am impelled to enter my protest against the
violation of truth and good taste in giving to so sonorous and
musical a word as Wallamet tho French termination of ette,
and, furthermore, substituting an i for the nobler-sounding a.
The word is Indian in origin, and although the early writers
differed somewhat in their spelling, they gave it the native pro
nunciation of Wal-la-met, the a in both syllables being very
broad. Spoken properly it is a beautiful name, but as corrupted
it is a senseless jingle.
Th^ river has two raouths, one coming into the Columbia
where Scappoose Bay sets in, just above St. Helen, the other
about twenty miles above. That portion of the river below the
upper raouth is separated from the Colurabia by an island from
one mile to several miles in breadth, being a fertile and beauti-

84 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
ful outlying district of the great valley to which it belongs.
The original name of this island was Wappatoo, from the
abundance of a tuberous root of that narae {Sagittaria sagitti-
folia) which was used by the natives for food. The first settler
here was one Sauve, a French-Canadian, after whora the island
was thenceforth called, but with the difference in spelling
which makes it Sauvie's Island.
To this lovely insular tract the Columbia maintains a claim,
and asserts its right annually during its rise to submerge a
goodly portion of it, driving the inhabitants to vacate their
houses for a period of two or three weeks. But the farmers
are willing to be thus inconvenienced for the sake of the crops
obtained from the quiek soil after the flood has subsided. On
the mainland opposite the island a high range of heavily-
wooded hills from the Columbia highlands follows along the
Wallamet to and beyond Portland, but receding to a sufficient
distance to leave large tracts of rich land, some of which is
subject to overflow, but mueh of which is valuable for farming.
Tho upper mouth of the Wallamet comes out between the
head of the Sauve Island and a low point opposite a part of
the peninsula whieh is forraed by the junction of the two
rivers. Lying between the peninsula and the Colurabia is a
group of sraall islands, all densely wooded with cotton-wood
and willow, extending also along the Oregon shore of the Colura
bia for several railes, being separated by baj-ous only less luxu
riantly fringed with trees than those of Florida or Louisiana,
and without the alligators and moccasin snakes. These places,
like those water-waj-s about Astoria and Scappoose Bay, furnish
extensive hunting-grounds in the duck-shooting season.
Just at the junction of the Wallamet and Columbia Eivors I
found one of the raost charming views to be had in Oregon.
From the deck of a stearaer passing in between these islands
one sees the vast streteh of the great river behind us, and the
reach of the one before us, with their verdant and wooded shores,
the Cascade Eange drawn in blue on the eastern horizon, with
the white peaks of St. Helen, Hood, Adams, and Jefferson
rising sharply above it, and over the whole the rosy glow of
sunset tingeing the mountains, raaking the blue violet, the white
pink, the seene being reflected from the river's surface as from

THE WALLAMET AND ITS CHIEP TOWN. 85
a mirror, snow-peaks, islands, and all ! Ono might travel far to
see anything finer.
The Wallamet, unlike tbe more majestic polumbia, divides
nearly in half a level valley, but the prairies do not come to
the river-banks for a considerable distance. This valley is
enclosed on the east side by the Cascade Eange, on the west
side by the Coast Eange, and on the south by a cross-range of
spurs from either side, being left open onlj- on tbe north, where
it is cut off by the Columbia Eiver, but from which it is hidden
by a forest extending for nearly twenty miles from the river
southward. This forest covers not only the highlands as far as
the Falls of tho Wallamet, but also the low sandy plains which
form the lower section of the valley. Frora this description of
the north end of the Wallaraet Valloj^ coupled with tho account
already given of the Columbia, it is easy to appreciate the cor
rectness of the poet's — " Continuous woods.
Where rolls the Oregon,"
as well as some of the difficulties which beset tho Oregon
pioneers ; and to understand why the early settlers travelled
in canoes from the mouth of the Columbia, or from The Dalles,
to the heart of tho valley before oven betaking themselves to
a horse, — a wagon being unthought of for travel.
When we have passed the head of Sauve Island we find these
river-banks more populous than those of the Columbia. On the
right hand, going up, is the town of Linnton, located forty-seven
years ago by Hon. Peter H. Burnett, author of "Eecolleotions
of a Pioneer," and first governor of California, a pleasant
writer and an irreproachable raan. Nearly opposite Linnton,
whieh, by the by, was named in honor of that Missouri senator
who fought so long and persistently for the Oregon donation
law, is the town of St. John, occupying probably about the site
selected for a city by that eccentric, if not demented. Hall J.
Kellej-, who organized in New Bngland an immigration society
to bring settlers to Oregon in 1832. Think of that, you whose
knowledge of this region leads you to fancy it a terra incognita!
Poor Kelley had a lugubrious experience, being taken for a
horse-thief by the Hudson's Bay Companj- and harshly treated.
Yet he was very near the truth in his views and prognostica-

86 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
tions concerning this country. It was uot the company's horses
he was after, but the earth under the feet of that powerful
corporation, vrhosg officers had reason to wish him away.
At Linnton there is a smelter for reducing ores frora the
mines of Eastern Oregon and other districts. The Northern
Pacific Eailroad (Portland branch) runs along the river here,
and passes through Linnton, on its way north to the crossing
of the Colurabia at Kalama, on the Washinglon side. I took
a ride over it early in May, when the tall cherry orchards of
the farms and the dogwoods of the forest vied in the snowy
whiteness of their abundant flowering, and the -rounder-topped
plum-trees filled in the spaces, while golden dandelions spangled
the road-side, and away across tbe reaches of river and wood
symmetrical St. Helen rose grandly from the horizon, half
veiled in the mists of early morning.
Along the margin of the Wallamet are groups of handsome
oak-trees, whieh grow and thrive bn the bottom-lands where
a fir-tree cannot live. In fact, a fir is built to shed eveu the
rains from about its roots, while its foliage is so full of pitch
that water cannot penetrate it. Thus cunningly has nature
provided for the safety of its creations.
It is about six miles frora St. John to Portland, but does not
seera so far, the shores being inhabited, and the evidences of
business increasing with every revolution of the steamer's stern-
wheel. Portland.
The chief city of Oregon is set in an amphitheatre of hills,
which rise abruptly at a distance of little more than a mile frora
the river at its widest part. But for the low nature of the
ground it might be extended down as far as Linnton and its
manufactories ; probably will be when the necessity for more
room forces business down river. The town will also grow up
river, where there are choice sites for residences, and back over
the heights, whieh are already being quite thickly built up.
But the overflow of population will go to the east side of the
river, where East Portland and Albina, with their numerous
additions, are even now spreading over a wide area, the land
ou this side being level across to the Columbia, a distance of
six railes.

THE WALLAMET AND ITS CHIEF TOWN. 87
The mistake of the builders of Portland was in not reserving
the river front for a levee. Tho approach to tho city is rendered
unsightly bj' the ugly rears of stores and warehouses, and by
the peculiar appearance of the two-storied wharves, constructed
for convenience of landing during extreme high and low water.
Without these unpleasant features, Portland would present
from the river a very attractive picture.
The site of Portland was first taken up in 1843 by- a man
named Overton, — a Tonnesseean, — who sold his claim the fol
lowing year to Messrs. Lovejoy and Pottj-grovo, who erected a
log-house at the foot of what is now Washington Street, and
began to clear tho land, whieh w-as survoj-ed into lots and blocks
in 1845. A second building for a store was erected that winter,
near the first ono. It was not, like the dwelling, of logs, but a
frame covered with shingles, and wont by the name of tho
" Shingle Store" long after more ambitious competitors had
arisen. The growth of tho embiyo town was by no means rapid, as
the j-ear of its " taking upi" witnessed the first considei-able
immigration to Oregon. Of theso one thousand immigrants, a
few stopped in Oregon City, the recognized capital of the Ter
ritory, and the remainder scattered over the fertile plains, in
quest of the mile square of land for whieh tbej- had come to
this far-off country. The same continued to be true of the
steadily-increasing immigration of the following years ; so that
it was not until 1848 that Portland attained to the dignity of a
name. Of the two owners, one, Mr. Pettj-grove, was from Maine,
and desired the bantling lo be called after the chief town of his
native State. With the samo laudable State love, Mr. Lovejoj-,
who was from Massachusetts, insisted on calling tho town Bos
ton. To end the dispute a penny was tossed up, and, Mr. Pettj'-
grove winning, the future eity was christened Portland. When
it is taken into consideration that Portland, Maine, is nearlj-
two degrees farther south than Portland, Oregon, and that roses
are blossoming in the gardens of the latter, while snow lies
white and winter winds whistle over the leafless gardens of the
former, the older city has no occasion to feel concerned for the
comfort of its godchild.

»a ATLANTIS ARISEN.
After being naraed, Portland changed owners again. Mr.
Pettygrovo bought out his partner, and afterwards sold the
whole property to Mr. Daniel H. Lownsdale, receiving for it
five thousand dollars in leather, tanned by Mr. Lownsdale in a
tannery adjoining the town site. In 1848, or before the gold
discoveries, money was almost unknown in Oregon ; orders on
the Hudson's Bay Companj^, tho Methodist Mission, and wheat,
being the currencj- of tho country. Mr. Lownsdale, it seems,
had the honor of introducing a new circulating medium, which
was Oregon-tanned leather.
Still another change in the proprietorship occurred in 1849,
Lownsdale selling an interest in the town to W. W. Chapraan
and Stephen Coffin. During this j-ear — there being now about
one hundred inhabitants — the Portlanders organized an associa
tion and elected trustees for the purpose of erecting a building
to be used as a raeeting-house for religious services, and for a
school-house. It was used also as a court-room, and continued
to serve the public in its triple capacity for several years.
The gold excitement of 1848-49 for a tirae had a tendency to
check iraproveraents in Oregon ; but finally the wandering gold-
seekers began to return and cultivate their neglected farms.
California deraanded grain and lumber ; and these things Oregon
could furnish in abundance. Vessels now came frequently to
Portland frora San Francisco and the Sandwich Islands; and in
1850 Couch & Co., of Portland, despatched a vessel — the brig
"Emma Preston " — to China, thus fulfilling in jiart the dreara
of Jefferson and Benton. Couch's Addition was also laid out this
J-ear, and the pioneer stearaboat of Oregon, the Lot Whitcomh
was launched on Christmas day, at Milwaukee, to run between
Portland and Oregon Citj-. The Weekly Oregonian was started
at Portland the same year by Thoraas J. Drj-or.
In Januarj-, 1851, the city was incorporated, with 1000 inhab
itants, Hugh D. O'Bryant being chosen raaj-or. In March
began the regular raonthlj- mail service between Portland and
San Francisco, per the steamship Columbia, Captain Dall. Two
j'ears later the taxable property of the town was valued at
11,195,034, or about half the value of its real and personal
property. From this tirae the growth of Portland was healthy
and uniform. During tho mining excitement of 1864, '5, '6,

THE WALLAMET AND ITS CHIEF TOWN. 89
there was a more hurried growth and more inflated condition
of trade, whieh, however, subsided with the cause. In 1870 the
population of Portland was under ten thousand, but the pro
portion of wealth to population was greater than any town
in the United States, paying taxes on six million dollars of
property assessed at one- third of its value. From that time
forward the growth of the city has been steady rather than
forced. According to the census of 1890 tbe population of
Portland proper is 47,294, and its suburbs on tbe east side of the
river contain — East Portland, 10,481 ; Albina, 5,104.
A noticeable feature of Portland is the snug and homelike
appearance of the city. The streets are narrow — too narrow,
indeed, for the display of the fine structures already erected and
in progress ; the squares are sraall, affording frequent streets
and corner lots — so small that many of Portland's capitalists
have appropriated a whole one to themselves, giving a perspec
tive to their tasteful mansions whieh their business houses lack.
The absence of long blocks of uniform structures must ever
deprive the eity of a certain metropolitan solidity of appear
ance, but the airiness and individuality of short blocks constitute
one of its chief attractions.
Portland follows the rule of the Pacific Northwest, and builds
its residences of wood, which is cheaper, more rapidly built,
and more conformable to the climate than brick and stone.
The sun is a necessity everywhere along the coast, and a wooden
house is quickly warmed through by it, while brick houses
exclude the heat, and the winters are seldom cold enough to
make thick walls desirable for protection from frost. There is
not in Portland yet any great loaning toward the half medieval
style adoijtod in some of the trans-montane cities, which indeed
is out of place in wooden structures and not consonant either
with the material of the houses, the climate, or the spirit ofthe
age, which eschews " Mariannes in a moated grange," Juliets in
hooded balconies, and every appearance of constraint. Even
the colonial stjde, which is mueh affected, seems out of place in
close neighborhood with Portland's elegant High School build
ing. Medical College, or the Citj^ Hall now building. The most
that ean be claimed is that it gives variety and individuality to
indulge in these architectural vagaries.

90 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
In the matter of churches, schools, public business buildings,
both wealth and good taste are manifest. Ara6ng the former,
whieh are numerous, the First Presbyterian, Grace Methodist,
Trinity (Episcopal), and the Jewish Synagogue, Beth Israel, are
handsorae as thej- are diverse. Of private schools, St. Mary s
Academy (Catholic), for girls ; St. Michael's College, for boys ;
Bishop Scott Military Academy, for boys, and St. Helen's Hall,
for girls, both Episcopal, are the chief ' Besides these, there are
two business colleges, two medical colleges, and the law depart
ment of the Slate University. The publie schools of Portland,
of which there are thirteen, are large and pleasantly located,
and the work done in them leaves little to be desired in the way
of public instruction. The High-School work, particularly the
drawing, which I chanced to see at a Teachers' National Asso
ciation a few years ago, was equal to the best exhibited by any
of the States.
The Portland Chamber of Commerce, now in course of erec
tion, is a handsome six-story edifice, surmounted by a square
tower over the entrance. The new Baily Oregonian building is
seven stories high, with a tall, square clock-tower and flag-staff,
which will be visible above its less pretentious neighbors from
the outlying parts of tho city. I niight go on, citing evidences
of the taste and the means to gratify it which one meets at
every hand in this verj- charming city, but resist the inclination
upon the reflection that I may lay myself open to the suspicion
of being claquer for Portland, whereas I ara aware that other
cities in this Pacific Northwest share in tho desire aud the
raeans to be beautiful.
I cannot refrain, however, from mentioning tbat pride of
Portlanders, the Hotel Portland, which completely fills one of
the city squares, and then has not roora enough. It faces the
Custom-House and Post-Office, and has on one side of it that
tine teraple to Thespis known as the Marquara Grand, having
been built by one of Portland's pioneers of that name. There
is something of a history to the Hotel Portland, which was
projected by Henry Villard just before the crash in his affairs
whieh followed the opening of the Northern Pacific to Portland
via the Columbia Eiver. At that time the Central School occu
pied this block, and when Villard purchased it the building

THE WALLAMET AND ITS CHIEF TOWN. 91
was removed across the street to the present site of the theatre.
Work was then begun upon the foundations of the hotel, but was
soon suspended, and the premises remained an unsightly spec
tacle in tho heart of the town for several years, during which
the Oregonian labored faithfullj- to spur on its completion by
the citizens, but stock in the enterprise was slowly taken until
the magnates of tho Southern Pacific, on the completion of the
Oregon and California road, bluntly declared that neither they
nor anj- other persons of distinction would ever eare to visit
Portland unless modern hotels were erected and maintained
according to modern tasto in sueh matters. And what was the
result ? Whereas, before, eveiy man of means was a householder,
as he should be, straightway the Hotel Portland was completed
it became the fashion to lire at this hostelry instead of one's
own house, until tourists wore in danger of being crowded out
bj- the home patronage, aud the manager, one of the world-
renowned Lelands, was forced to discourage permanent board
ing. A secondary result was the erection of more hotels and
improved hotel service generally.
Another object of which the city is justly proud is its Indus
trial Fair building, where is held an annual exhibit of the nat
ural and cultivated productions of the State, ils manufactures,
and works of art. It is the largest on the eoast, and the exhi
bition is surprisingly interesting as well as remarkable for bulk.
Many of the exhibits are permanently preserved at the Board
of Immigration, whieh at present occupies rented rooms, but is
to be provided with more convenient quarters in the near future.
This Board of Immigration is doing a good work, if only lo
remind the present inhabitants of the State of their possible
achievements. For strangers it furnishes raany attractions and
answers many questions. For instance, in the centre of the
floor is a " kiosk" constructed of the best specimens of native
grains in the stalk, — quite an elegant work of art. In the
centre is placed a table laden with specimens of the choicest
varieties of fruit and vegetables contributed by the orchardists
and gardeners of all parts of Oregon. There are several tables
arranged across the room for more general displays of fruit, and
shelving around the walls containing glass jars filled with seed-
grains and early fiuits, each labelled with the name and locality

92 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
where raised, beautifully polished slabs of cabinet woods, and
wood in the rough, and collections of minerals and metals, from
building-stone and coal to silver and gold. Thus the visitor is
able to seeure in a few hours' tirae a knowledge of the resources
of the country which it would require months of travel and
even toil to obtain.
In studying the development of a eountry its social traits and
institutions offer the raost interesting points of observation as
indications of the original character of tho founders ; and not
only the city under consideration, but all Oregon gives evidence
of its raissionary breeding. Portland, west and east, has sixtj"--
three churches, twelve of which are Methodist Episcopal, eight
Presbyterian, seven Baptist, six Eoman Catholic, six Protestant
Episcopal, five Congregational, five Lutheran, three Evangelical,
two Unitarian, two Hebrew, two Adventist, the reraainder being
divided araong the Christian, Non-Sectarian, Dutch Eeforraed,
United Brethren, and United Presbyterian. Portland is the
see of a Eoman Catholic bishopric embracing the State of Ore
gon. The eity has the usual number of secret orders to be
found in any city, half a hundred miscellaneous societies and
clubs, and numerous places of amusement.
I have found in this far northwestern city the most discrimi
nating charities. It has two excellent hospitals, one Catholic
and one Protestant, well equipped for relieving suffering. Its
Children's Home, under the patronage of the Ladies' Eelief
Society, is indfeed a home, where no hint of pauperism is per
mitted to intrude ; where unsightly uniforms are not required
or allowed ; where infants are furnished with toj^s, play-rooms,
and kindergarten teaching, and older children with books and
instruction at the public schools. This is said to be one of the
best-managed institutions in tho United States.
Portland ladies have also established a Women's Union, or
boarding-house for underpaid or unemployed women, where
board, lodging, and laundrj-ing costs from throe to seven dollars
per week, and where the needy are entertained while looking
for employment. The table is good, the rooras corafortable,
some even large and well furnished ; there is a piano in the
parlor, and lectures or other social entertainments are furnished
frequentlj''. As the patrons of these benefactions take a pride

THE WALLAMET .AND ITS CHIEF TOWN. 93
in their work, it is likelj- to continue and serve as an example
to younger communities.
It is greatljr to tbe credit of a city hewn out of a wilderness,
as Portland was, that it early established a publie library whieh
has grown until it contains sixteen thousand volumes, besides
regularly receiving two hundred periodicals. For many j-ears
one of the city's pioneers has given the rent of a comfortable
suite of rooms over his bank for use bj- the Library Association,
and the United States district judge a large measure of his time
to the selection of books ; and recently a Portland lady, dj'ing,
loft a bequest to be applied to the erection ofa suitable building
for library purposes, which is now in eourse of construction.
Banks are surprisinglj- frequent on the streets of this city.
There are already sixteen, many of them in handsome struc
tures, and the seventeenth is being erected. This brings us to
the consideration of capital and trade, and of Portland as a com
mercial emporium. According to tbe published statements of
the boards of trade and immigration, the capital at disposal in
the banking-houses is 120,478,750, while tbe capital employed
in the wholesale and jobbing trade is about $65,000,000, divided
among a large number of houses, one hundred of whieh employ
from §200,000 to 11,000,000 or more. The trade of Portland
has increased from $50,000,000 in 1886 to $115,000,000 in 1889.
These figures are remarkable as compared with the era of
recent growth. But it must be taken into account that a long
period of incubation of this wealth was enjoyed while the
resources of the large area of which Portland was the trade-
centre wero being gradually developed. Thus trade was con
servative and safe, and failures in wholesale houses or banks were
unknown. Tho leading grocery house in this city, which does
business to the extent of many millions annually, never emploj-s
travelling salesmen, although competition by Eastern houses
has recently compelled other merchants to do so.
For conservatism, which is annoying to the newer raen, who
gird against it, the non-conservatives have a new word, — namely,
" mossbackism." But tho " mossbacks" have the best of it,
undoubtedly, in their day and generation. What the ultimate
outcome of their policy may be remains to the historian to
relate. Whether or not Portland is to be forever the metropolis

94 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
of Oregon, or of the Northwest, will be determined in the next
ten years, Alreadj' it has dangerously active rivals on the
north, which will struggle for the supremacy ; but even if that
were lost, this citj^ must be to the Wallaraet Valley what
St. Louis is to the Mississippi or Cincinnati to the Ohio valleys.
The future raagnitude of Portland depends upon ils trans
portation facilities, whieh at present are good, and seeraingly
destined to be greatly increased. But within the memorj' of
this generation it depended entirely upon boats of all sizes,
frora the canoe to the sailing ship and ocean steamer.
The history of transportation in Oregon is interesting. The
Wallamet Valley being the first and for many years the only
part settled, and being, as previouslj- described, surrounded by
mountains except at its north end, where it opened on the
Columbia, and not accessible there except by boats, travel to
the settlements was attended with much toil and difficulty.
Neither the Columbia nor the Wallamet was open to continuous
navigation, the latter being obstructed by falls twenty feet in
height. At tho falls, it is true, there grew up a little town ; but
as all the open or agricultural land was some distanee above
this plaee, a portage had to be made hore of a mile or two, and
alwaj^s at a risk of accident. As early as 1846-47 there were
two or three freight-boats rigged with oars and sails on the
Wallamet above the falls. In 1850 the first steamboat was
launched and run below the falls, which was very soon followed
by others, making trips to Astoria and Vancouver, and during
the autumn immigration to the Cascades to assist the new-
eoraors in reaching tho vallej-. Then the Indian troubles made
necessary transjiortation above the Cascades, and above The
Dalles, inducing first the building of sail and next of small
steamboats on those sections of the river. Finally a number
ofthe individual owners corabined, and an organization resulted
in the incorporation in 1862 of tho Oregon Steara Navigation
Company, Captain J. C. Ainsworth, president. To this eonipany
belonged in its early years most of the now solid men of Port
land. It was well officered, conservative, but not unenterpris
ing, and for many years held Oregon in the palm of its hand.
It had a monopoly of the Columbia, having j'ielded the Walla
met to the People's Transportation Company, and, in order to

THE AVALLAMET AND ITS CHIEF TOWN. 95
make business for itself, used a goodly- share of its earnings in
developing raining and wheat-growing oast of the Cascade
Mountains. By the Oregon Steara Navigation Company were built the
first railroads in the country, — namely, the portages of five
miles at the Cascades and fifteen miles at The Dalles. It also
put some money into the Oregon Central on tho west side of
the Wallamet, which was turned over to Holladaj^, of the
Oregon and California, on the east side, aud both are now a
part of the Southern Pacific sj-stem.
The stock of the Oregon Steara Navigation Company was
principallj- in the hands of three raen, J. C. Ainsworth, E. E,
Thompson, and S. G. Eeed, when the Northern Pacific Eailroad
Company made overtures for its purchase and did purchase,
the former owners retaining a fourth of tho stock, Captain
Ainsworth being made manager and a director in the Northern
Pacific Eailroad Company, very fortunately, as it happened, for
when the failure of Jaj- Cooke & Co. suspended construction
and endangered the land grant, the old officers of the Oregon
Steam Navigation Company came to the rescue and completed
the road from the Columbia to Puget Sound in time to save
the grant. The failure of the Northern Pacific Eailroad having
thrown on the Eastern market, where its value was not known,
three-fourths of the Oregon Steara Navigation stock, the gen
tlemen above naraed emploj-ed agents to buy it up, and once
more obtained control. They thon built new and handsorae
boats for tho Columbia trade, and also obtained the trade of
the Wallamet Eiver by purchasing the property- of the Willa
mette Transportation Company, successors to the People's Com
pany, and becarae very pow-erful.
In 1879 Henry Villard, who had secured control of the Oregon
and California, and who had conceived the plan of a road along
the Columbia and across Idaho, finding tbe Oregon Steam Nav
igation Company in his way, made a proposition to purchase
their steamers and portages, and with these, his steamships and
railways, to form a company to be called the Oregon Eailway
and Navigation Company. This he was able to do, and the
road he projected is now leased to the Union Pacific, and is
part of the Oregon Short Line through Idaho, connecting with

96 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
the Union Pacific's main line. Meanwhile the Oregon Steam
Navigation Company has retired to enjoy the results of good
management in other lines of investraent.
The railroads that centre at Portland are those of the
Southern Pacific system, forraerly known as the Oregon aud
California and the Oregon Central, which form a junction one
hundred and ten miles south. The Southern Pacific gives con
nection with all the California lines and trans-continental roads.
The Union Pacific, as above stated, has direct through connec
tion with the East. The Northern Pacific's Columbia Eiver
branch starts at Portland and follows the river to a point oppo
site the Cowlitz Valley, where it crosses by moans of a ferry
and runs north to Tacoma, whence its raain lino crosses the
Cascade Eange, and raakes a long detour southeast via Pasco
and northeast via the Panhandle of Idaho before reaching Mon
tana, where it makes another long angle southeast and north
west before it reaches the parallel on whieh it stretches out for
St. Paul. These routes involve sight-seeing over a vast scope
of country, embracing all the great mountain ranges on the
Pacific Slope, and their commercial advantages maj^ easily be
apprehended. The Canadian Pacific also furnishes eastern connection with
Portland by the outside steamer route lo Victoria, or by the
Northern Pacific and Puget Sound steamers to the western
terminus of the road in British Columbia. The Great Northern
also reaches Portland by using the Union Pacific's lines in East
Washington, thus giving the tourist his choice of five trans
continental routes. Besides these great lines there are two
narrow-gauge roads whieh run through the farming districts in
the Wallamet Valley and contribute to the business of the me
tropolis, — the Portland and Willamette Valley Eailroad, on the
east side of the river, ahd the Oregonian Eailway, on the west
side. These roads have recently been added to the Southern
Pacific system and are being made standard gauge. The Oregon
Pacific is an uncompleted road extending at present from Ya-
quina Bay, on the eoast of Oregon, across the middle of the
Wallamet Valley to the Cascade Mountains. Its route is sur
veyed across East Oregon to a connection with the Union
Pacific at Ontario, near the Idaho line.

THE WALLAMET AND ITS CHIEF TOWN. 97
A narrow-gauge passenger line connects Portland with Van
couver by a ferrj- across the Columbia, and a steam-motor line
runs from East Portland to St. Johns down the Wallamet,
Cable and electric lines make urban and suburban transit easj-
and rapid. And all this development bas taken place within a
period which reminds one of Jack and his bean-stalk.
East Portland and Albina are praciicallj- one town, although
forming two distinct rauiiieipalities, which are soon to be merged
in West Portland corporation for greater eonvcnieneo and mutual
benefit. They are connected with the west side by ferries and
by two bridges spanning tho Wallamet. The wheat warehouses
and elevator of the railroad corapanies are on the east side, there
being insufficient room on the west for the accommodation of
their freight business. The greater extent of level ground on
the peninsula is sure in time to bring a large portion of the
population to this side, as the rapid growth of these suburbs
as well as the city proper plainly indicates.
As a seaport Portland has advantages and disadvantages. It
is one hundred and ten miles from the ocean, but there is a good
depth of water on the bar of the Columbia, and, by using a
dredger at certain points on this river and on the Wallamet in
low water, navigation is kept unobstructeil. The expense of
pilotage to and from Portland is high. Vessels not exceeding
eight hundred tons register are charged four hundred and fifty
dollars from Astoria to this city; over eight hundred tons, five
hundred dollars ; over twelve hundred tons, five hundred and
fifty dollars ; over sixteen hundred tons, six hundred dollars ;
and over two thousand one hundred tons, special rates. Light
erage upon grain and flour is fiftj* cents per ton to Astoria ;
upon other freight one dollar. The pilotage from Astoria to sea
is a special charge.
The wheat market of Portland, except in seasons of low
w-ater, when lighterage is required, is the same in point of no
reshipment as that of Chicago, tho grain placed on board here
reraaining unhandled until it reaches Liverpool, four raonths
after clearing here, and at a cost less than export rates from
the Great Lakes. The bulk of the grain grown in Oregon and
Washington is shipped directly from Portland and Astoria, or
Puget Sound ports, to England, Japan, and China. The clear-
7

98 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
ances of the year ending July 15, 1890, amounted to eighty -nine
million dollars for Portland.
The foreign trade of .Portland is carried on in sailing vessels
and by irregular steamship service. The trade with Europe
employs betvveen one and two hundred vessels annuallj^, each
vessel under a special charter.
Trade with Australia, South America, and the islands of the
Pacific is carried on in a similar manner. Only two regular lines
exist, one to Now York and one to China. Of steamship lines
there is one to San Francisco, one to Alaska, ono to Puget
Sound and British Columbia ports, one to the coast ports of
Washington, and one projected and soon to be put in operation
to Japan.
Portland is not eminent as a manufacturing eity, although
its domestic business is divided between eighty-eight kinds of
manufactures and one hundred and fifty other lines of trade,
which together employ between seven and eight thousand per
sons, the annual product of whose labor is estimated at twenty
million one hundred and eighty-three thousand and forty-four
dollars. Forraerly onlj^ lumber and flour were produced for
export. Mills were followed by foundries and machine-shops,
whose output in 1889 was two million and fifty thousand dollars.
Sash- and door-factories abound, and carriage-making is earried
on to considerable extent. A cordage-manufactory had an out
put for 1889 valued at eight hundred thousand dollars, and a
bag-, tent-, and sail-factory turned out about the same amount
of goods during the year.
Many of the heavy expenditures of Portland capital have
boon made outside of Portland proper, as, for instance, in the
construction of the smelter at Linnton and the Oregon Iron-
and Steel-Works at Oswego.
Iron-beds were early known to e.xist near the Wallamet and
Columbia Elvers, but the only developraent has been at Oswego,
six miles from Portland, where there is an extensive deposit.
The ore is a brown hematite, in a vein from six to fifteen feet
in thickness. It is mined at slight expense, being near the
surface. In 1862 six tons were taken out and tested in San
Francisco, the test showing from fifty-six to sixty-five per
cent, of metal of a superior quality. Thereupon, in 1865, the

THE WALLAMET AND ITS CHIEF TOWN. 99
Oregon Iron Company was formed, with a capital stock of
five hundred thousand dollars, two-thirds of which was owned
in Portland, and the companj- erected the pioneer iron-smelting
furnace of the Pacific Coast, with a capacity of ten tons per day.
The production of iron has been less than hoped for from an
analj-sis of the oi'o, which gave sesquioxide of iron 77.16 per
cent., or 54,37 per cent, of metallic iron, the other parts being
water, 11.16; silica, 11.08; sulphur and phosphorus together,
one-tenth of one per cent. Tbe ore proved not to maintain
throughout the richness of the sample analyzed, and the cost
of production was great, on account of having to import lime
and to manufacture charcoal. In 1874-75 a ton of iron cost to
produce thirty-three dollars and twentj--five cents, and sold
in San Francisco in limited lots for forty-six dollars per ton,
being used where special strength was required. It was found
to answer well for the manufacture of car-wheels, but its cost
was prohibitorv, Scotch and English iron being much cheaper.
The amount produced from the date of its flrst manufacture
to 1869 was two thousand three hundred aud ninety-five tons,
when work was suspended until 1874, when the company was
reorganized, and in little more than two years manufactured five
thousand and seventy-five tons. The property was then sold
for the benefit of its creditors. In 1878 the purchasers started
up the furnace, making eleven hundred and seventy tons, when
it was stopped to rebuild and enlarge its capacity. Again the
manufacture of iron went on for more than two years, when
in the autumn of 1881 other changes were introduced, and the
furnace remained idle for several years. Tn 1888 the company
entered into a contract to furnish iron pipe for the Portland
water-works, and resumed operations, which continue to the
present time.
The present name of the corporation is the Oregon Iron and
Steel Works Company. It supplies mueh of the raw material
for the foundry work of Portland, the value of its product
being about fifty thousand dollars annually.
There are other iron-deposits in several of the counties. The
most available one is in Columbia County, near the Eiver Colum
bia, convenient to deep water and timber. The iron and steel
trade of Portland is nearly two raillion dollars yearly. The cost

100 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
of the production of iron is soraewhat lowered since 1869. If it
eould be still further lowered, there seems no reason why rails
to equip the numerous railways being constructed in the North
west should not be made in Oregon or Wiasbington.
Portland supports nineteen newspapers and other periodicals.
Four of the newspapers are dailies, among whieh the Oregonian,
the pioneer journal, is still chief. It is the best-conducted
journal on the coast, and costs its subscribers about flve cents a
copj-. The West Shore, in another line, has done a great deal'to
deserve the patronage which it gets at home and abroad.
Portland is a more American eity than San Francisco, although
its population is becoraing more mixed every year. There are
many Scotchmen here in business, and a considerable amount
of Scotch capital. Young Englishmen frora Victoria are fre
quently met in society, and, like their countrymen at home, do
not hesitate to criticise our social habits, and particularly the
lack of chaperonage of our j'oung ladies. I was much amused
by an encounter whieh I witnessed between a j'oung English
man and a Portland j-oung ladj' who had favored him with her
society at the tennis court, unattended, and been rewarded for
her trust in his courtesy by very uncourteous reraarks upon
such social freedora. Miss America defended our ideas of pro
priety, and Mr. Briton remained unconvinced, although he very
often sought the society of the j-oung ladj-.
One evening, in the course of conversation the gentleraan
chanced to mention the marriage of a Sir Soraebodj', of British
Columbia, to an Oregonian lady. " Why," said Miss America,
putting on a puzzled look, " I am surprised at that — unless he
was in need of money." It was a telling shot, but both parties
affected unconsciousness.
Portland has but one popular drive. That is from First Street
for five miles up the river bank to the ferry opposite Milwaukee.
It affords a truly delightful view of the Wallaraet, the beautiful
Eiverside Ceraetery, and the city water-works. There is a park,
which is too small, and only partially improved, at the west
side of the town, in the shadow of the hills. There are, how
ever, some wonderfully, interesting drives about Portland, which
will be popular when somewhat more improved, and which rival
the famous eighteen-mile drive at Monterey.

THE WALLAMET AND ITS CHIEP TOWN. 101
In California one hears constant allusion to climate. Now,
while climate is valuable, and worth all that is paid for it, in com
fort and pleasure, and while Oregon has as good a climate as
need be desired, taking it " by and large," I think the "card"
on which West Oregon should draw tourists would be scenery.
Like tbe climate of California, it is everywhere. If you enter
the State bj^ tbe Southern Pacific j-ou have one whole day, at
least, of mountain views greatlj- excelling in variety and interest
the crossing of the Sierra Nevadas, and a lovely ride through
the Wallamet Valloj- after it. If you eome by- the Union
Pacific, you havo the Columbia Eiver views, whose grandeur
I have but faintly indicated. Bj- the Northern Pacific you
are brought in view of an extraordinary and wonderfullj- ex
tended panorama, including lakes, plains, the crossing of the
Cascade Eange, Puget Sound, and West Washington. Or, if the
appi'oach is made via the Canadian Pacific, you enjoy other
similar scenes of subliraity impossible to forget.
But here, right about Portland, are views not to be surpassed
in the United States, and the Cornell Eoad and Portland
Boulevard furnish them to j-ou, one winding among tho heights
north from the eity, and tbe other taking a southerly direction.
From the ridge west of Portland you maj' see five snow-peaks,
two great rivers, tho triune cities of West Portland, East Port
land, and Albina, tho town of Vancouver in Washinglon, and
half a dozen other outlying towns within a radius of twenty-
five miles. You may drive for eighteen miles in one direction,
looking over tvVo counties as j-ou go, and for twelve miles in
another, of scarcely less wonderful picturesqueness, but of softer
features. Neither the camera nor the pon is equal to the task
of delineating scenes on a scale of such magnificence as are
grouped about Portland-on- Wallamet.

102 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
CHAPTEE VIII.
other towns of the wallamet valley.
Proceeding up the Wallamet, we corae in about six miles to
Oswego, the seat of the Oregon Iron- and Steel- Works, a busy little
place on the west bank. Nearly opposite is Milwaukee, faraous
for having been the place where the first nursery of the Pacific
coast was planted, on the grounds of Meek and Lluelling. The
young trees were brought across the continent in a wagon-box
filled with earth. The earliest export of this fruit was raade in
1853 to San Francisco, where two hundred pounds brought five
hundred dollars. The same firm sold the following year forty
bushels of apples for sixty-two dollars and fifty cents per bushel.
"The land of red apples" and "the land of cider" are still
synonymes for the Wallamet Valley among Californians. Mil
waukee was also noted for the flour produced there, but as a
town it has no development.
About three miles above Milwaukee, on the east side, there
comes in the Clackamas river, tho lowest tributary of tho Walla
met, and nearly opposite the Tualatin. There is a fish hatchery
on tho Clackamas where between five and six raillion eggs were
taken in 1890, raost of which will be fish. Above here another
three railes are the Falls of the Wallamet, and Oregon City, built
upon a bed of solid basalt, a ledge of which extends quite across
the river, cropping out on tho other side. This ledge is about
twenty feet higher than the surface of the river below the fall,
and is broken into a ragged crescent with rather a sharp angle
in the middle, where the water deflects towards the western
shore. In low or ordinary stage of water the stream divides into
several parts, seeking the deepest channels in the roeks, and
forming a number of different cataracts; yet the central one, at
tho angle spoken of, is alwaj-s the principal one. Above the
falls the river parts, flowing around an island of rock, on which
onee stood a mill belonging to the Methodist Mission, but which
was carried away in the great flood of 1862, along with numer
ous other buildings from the mainland.

OTHER TOWNS OF THE WALLAMET VALLEY. 103
The current, always strong just above the falls, is terrific
when the heavy rains of winter havo swollen all the tributaries
of the river, and filled its banks with a rushing torrent fifteen
to twenty feet in depth. At such times the rocks are mostly
hidden, and the falls extend from shore to shore, or about a
quarter of a milo.
The Palls of the Wallamet constitute tho great water-power
of the State. The favorite terra for Oregon City- is, "The
Lowell of the Pacific Coast ;" and there is indeed everj- natural
agency hero for tho making of a second Lowell. One of the
largest woollen-mills of tho State is located here. It is built
substantially of stone and brick, four stories high, and ono hun
dred and ninety by- sixty feet in ground area, and contains
twelve sets of the most improved machinery. Its manufactures
are blankets, flannels, and cassiineres and light cloths. Tbe
" Imperial" flouring-raill, and another custom mill, a saw-mill, a
box-factory, paper-mill, and the Portland Electric-Light Power-
House are located here. An important work has been per
formed here, namelj-, the construction of locks on the west side
of the falls, by which boats maj- pass up and down without
transshipment, which for raany years was necessary. However,
as the government fails to keep a boat on the upper river with
apparatus for removing sand-bars and snags, the benefit to the
Stale of these locks for half the year, at least, is lost.
If one is informed of the history of this region, he may step
aside from the main street of Oregon City, and in the enclosure
about the Catholic church road on a raodest head-stone : " Dr.
John McLoughlin, died Sept. 3d, 1857, aged 73 years. Tho
Pioneer and Friend of Oregon. Also tho Founder of this Citj'."
From Oregon City, for a distance of more than fifty miles bj'
the river, there are no towns of any importance, though there are
numerous " landings,'' where freight is put on or off for various
places in the interior, indicating that there is a considerable
population scattered through the vallej-. About eleven miles
above Oregon City the Molalla enters the Wallamet, near the
inouth of which was Champoeg, the oldest settlement in tbe
valley. The river here makes a bend to tho west and receives
the Yamhill Eiver, South of this bend was wbere the French
Canadians had their farms as early as 1829. -As might be ex-

104 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
pected, it is in a fertile and desirable location, yet has never
become a business centre. Here it was that the " Organic
Laws" wore adopted bj' a majority of the Oregon settlers, in
Maj-, 1843, and a provisional government erected, to last until
such tirae as the United States government should see fit to
acknowledge Oregon as one of her Territories. There is also a
memorable spot twelve railes below Salera, on the east bank,
where the Methodist Mission raade its first location in 1834, this
being the very first American settleraent in the Wallaraet Valley.
Here, too, in 1843, after the acceptance of the Organic Laws,
was held the first Legislative Assembly of nine persons, their
Council Chamber being a publie room in a building belonging
to the mission, known as "The Granarj-." Subsequently the
Legislature removed its sessions to Oregon City. The high-
water of 1862 carried awaj- a portion of the old raission ground,
which was on the bank of the river, w-here the open prairie
approaches quite to it.
While we are overcoraing the last twelve miles of quiet voy
aging between the " Old Mission" and Salem, we maj' as well
consider their relation.ship. In the autumn of 1840 the Meth
odist Mission built a mill on a stream twelve miles south of their
first establishment, at a place called by the Indians Chemeketa,
and, finding the situation everj' way a better one than that, re
moved tho raission to it in the following year. The first dwell
ing was erected at some distance baek from the river, on the
bank of a stream known as Mill Creek, in a very- pleasant and
convenient location, with an extensive plain on ono hand, and a
charmingly wooded, rolling landscape on the other. In 1843
the large frame building, for many j-ears known as " The Insti
tute," was erected, as a school for Indian children, but, the sav
ages not taking veiy kindly to study, the mission was dissolved
in 1844, after whieh time the Oregon Institute becarae a sem
inary of learning for whoever chose to patronize it, although it
still reraained under the control of the Methodist denomination,
and was converted ultimately into a university.
Upon the sale of the mission propertj-, the town-site of Salem
was laid out by Mr. W. H. Wilson, and received its present
name. It is very handsomelj- located upon a gravelly prairie,
rising gradually, back from the river, which is skirted with

OTHER TOWNS OF THE WALLAMET VALLEY. 105
groves of tall trees. Other groves of firs and oaks relieve the
level monotony of the landscape for a couple of miles away to
the north and east ; while the hills across Mill Creek are wooded
like parks, with a varietj' of trees. Across the Wallamet, and
fronting the town, is a range of high land called the Polk
County Hills," which raakes the greatest charm of the whole
view of Salem. In outline and coloring, these hills are poet
ically beautiful. The town is placed in a setting of the Polk
County Hills to the west, the " Waldo Hills" (another arable
range) to the southeast, the Blue Cascade Eange with ils over
topping snow-peaks to the northeast, groves of fine, large oaks
and firs breaking tho raiddle distance ; while iraraediately about
us are level farms and fields of waving grain, with a substantial
farm-house, here and there, in their midst.
The residence part of Salom is comfortably built, with an air
of stability and propriety about it. The streets are wide, the
lots large, and the dweUings neat, often handsome, with well-kept
gardens attached. Shade-trees — locust and maple — line the
broad avenues, and tho public square is of libei'al proportions,
promising " lungs" to the city, should it grow large enough to
need this breathing-space in its midst. The business-houses
are handsome and commodious, and the public edifices are
numerous and costly. The eity has about twelve thousand
inhabitants. Salem is the eounlj'-seat of Marion County, as well as the
capital of the State. Bj' the constitution of Oregon the State
buildings are all located at tho capital. The county court-house,
which occupies a square, was erected at a cost of one hundred
and twenty thousand dollars. The State-house, not j'ot entirely
finished, has cost so far seven hundred and fifty thousand dol
lars. The State insane asylum is a magnificent structure, with
accommodations for one thousand patients. The State peniten
tiary, school for deaf and mute children, sehool for the blind,
and State Eeforra School are all worthy of this coraraonwealth.
The Willamette University, the outgrowth of the Oregon
Institute, is a prosperous sectarian sehool, with an average
attendance of three hundred of both sexes. The Catholics
also have a school for young ladies at this place. The public
high-school is a fine building, and the thirteen churches of dif-

106 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
ferent denominations give evidence of the prosperity of these
organizations. The great flood of the winter of 1889-90 carried away a fine
bridge whieh connected the city with the country opposite, but
it is being replaced by one raore costly. An excellent water-power
is furnished by a canal, only about one-third of which is utilized
by two large flouring-mills, a fiftj--thousand-dollar woollen-mill,
lumber-mills, and sash- and door-factories. The wages paid to
operatives in the different industries is three hundred thousand
dollars per annum. The city is furnished with water-works
and street-car lines ; has the navigable river on its front, and
the Southern Pacific at its baek ; and will soon, it is believed,
be connected by railroad with Astoria by the sea.
Of the two or more newspapers published in Salem, the
Statesman is the eldest. In the early history of the State it was
a power, ably conducted, and unrelentingly Deraocratic. Its
founder is at present a banker in this eity and a "bloated bond
holder," but delights in reminiscences of the time when the
Statesman ruled Oregon. Its files contain a complete history
of the State for ten years, — frora 1851 to 1861. Salem has no
public library, even the State library being sadly deficient, and
the State archives needing care.
It is needless to saj', that with all the advantages named,
Salem is the centre of a wealthy and important section of the
Wallamet Valley. There are eighteen or twenty small towus
in Marion County, each the centre of a farming coraraunity.
The government has an Indian school at Chemawa, a few
miles north of Salem, where the sons and daughters of Indian
parents are trained for eivilizod life. There are a number of
buildings of a modern appearance, and a farm and orchard
under iraproveraent. The superintendent reports to the govern
ment the condition of his charge, and I believe the scheme is
reasonably successful, considering the antecedents of the pupils.
About twenty miles above Salem the Wallamet receives the
Santiam Eiver, whieh separates Marion from Linn County.
The county-seat of Linn is Albany, ten miles farther south,
which is at the head of low-water navigation. Between Salera
and Albany are several small places, chiefly on the west side of
the river. Buena Vista is a thriving place, and manufactures

OTIIER TOAVNS OF THE WALLAMET VALLEY. 107
common potterj-. Monmouth is the seat of a denominational
college, and also the State normal school. Warehouses and ship
ping points are frequent along this portion of the river, for the
Wallamet hore borders some of the most famous grain-raising
counties. The Calapooia Eiver outers the Wallamet at Albany, on the
east side. This stream furnishes fine water-power up in the
foot-hills, where two towns — North and South Brownsville — are
located. The former is a manufacturing plaee, having a woollen-
mill, a flouring-mill, a planing-mill, and a tannery, besides
machine shops and other similar establishments.
Albany was laid out as a town- site in 1848, by two brothers,
Thomas and Walter Monteith. All that has been said of Salem
as a well located and well-built town applies equally to Albany,
which is the third in iraportance in the Wallamet Valley, if not
tho second, this being a mooted question between the two cities.
As a manufacturing place it surpasses its rival. Its water-
power is obtained by a canal from the Santiam, costing sixty
thousand dollars, several mills and the electric-light plant being
worked by this jjower. Like Salem, it is on the line of the
Southern Pacific, with a railroad assured to Astoria, and is on
the lino of the Oregon Pacific.
There are many pleasant drives and resorts about Albany,
and a fine view of that beautiful group of snow-peaks, the
Three Sisters. Although there is mueh level prairie, there are
also buttes and ridges so disposed about the valley as to give a
charming varietj' to an otherwise raonotonous landscape. Sweet
Home Valley is an oval shaped paradise surrounded by an
amphitheatre of hills, and facing the Santiam.
Lebanon, on the south fork of the Santiam, is a delightful
spot, in tbe midst of a fine farming country. A few railes
above Lebanon, at the falls ofthe Santiam, is Silverton, another
small town, with fiouring- and lumber-mills. Both of theso
places are tbe centres of a healthy business, dependent on agri
culture and manufactures.
Gatesville, on the line of the Oregon Pacific, is the base of
supplies for the Santiam mining district. King's Prairie, oppo
site Gatesville, is a thrifty farming settlement, and surrounded
by fine timber, which several mills are doing their best to con-

108 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
sume. Halsey, on the line of the Southern Pacific, ships annu
ally nearly three hundred thousand bushels of grain, and is a
flourishing town.
Above Albany the pine-tree begins to appear, mixed with the
fir, along the river-banks. The groves of timber are more scat
tering, and the country more level and open. Except the ash,
maple, alder, and willow of the river-bottoms, there is little
forest ; but the isolated trees of pine, fir, and oak which beautify
the plains are of the handsomest proportions.
CorvalUs, a dozen miles above Albanj-, on the west side of the
river, is about the same age with it. It first proprietor was J. C.
Averj', by whom it was incorporated in 1857. The situation of
Corvallis is remarkably handsome, having the river on one side
of it, and the Coast Eange sufficiently near it on the other to
give the landscape the look of being framed in a semicircle of
hills. Its name, Corvallis, a corruption of coeur de vallee, —
heart of the valley, — was given to it before Mr. Avery ever saw
it. He called his town site Marysville, but, there being another
Marysville on the California mail-route, the name was dropped,
and the more significant one restored. This pretty little city is
the seat of government of Benton County, whieh also has a
seaport town, naraely Newport, at Yaquina Baj', which is the
initial point of the Oregon Pacific Eailroad, and also a popular
summer resort. A commodious hotel is all that Newport needs
to bring many visitors there every season. At Seal Eock, eight
miles south of Newport, .about seventy persons can be accom
modated in cottages.
The entrance to Yaquina Bay in its natural state was not
good, there being not more than eight feet of water on the bar
at low tide, and three nominal channels. The channel raost used
was rendered dangerous by the presence of rocks, and the
shifting nature of the bar left none of thera safe for navigation.
In 1881 the government commenced the work of improving the
middle channel by a jetty three thousand seven hundred feet
in length, which in 1884 was extended to four thousand feet.
Another jetty, on the north side, was constructed in 1888, two
thousand three hundred feet in length, with the result that there
is now nearly twelve feet of water on the bar at low tide. A
line of stearaers runs regularly between Newport and San Fran-

OTHER TOAVNS OF THE AVALLAMET VALLEY. 109
Cisco, connecting with the Oregon Pacific Eailroad, greatly to
the relief of the central and southern portions of the Wallamet
Valley on the Avest side, which were without means of trans
portation. Corvallis labored energetically for twenty years to
bring about this iraprovement in its business facilities, the re
ward of which determination it is beginning to enjoj-.
The Oregon DoA'olopment Company, concerned in those ira
proveraents, owns one steamer, the " Willamet Valley,'' and
charters another, the "Farallon," both drawing, loaded, about
fourteen feet. Of course, thoy ean enter only on full tide.
A steam-schooner, drawing eight feet, was employed last
year in coasting between Yaquina and the river ports south,
naraelj-, Alseya and Sinslaw, carrying salmon, shingles, wool,
hides, etc., to Yaquina, and taking general merchandise as
return cargo. She raade twenty-five trips, carrying fiftj- tons
each waj-.
The total amount of imports by the company's vessels during
the year ending June 10, 1890, was eight thousand and three
tons ; and of exports, thirtj'-two thousand and eight tons, or
forty thousand and seventy-four tons total carriage. The San
Francisco line carried seven hundred and seventy-eight in
coming and four hundred and fifty-six outgoing passengers,
and had but one accident on tho bar, when a heavy sea boarded
the " Farallon" and washed overboard five men, two of whom
were lost. The steamer's fires were put out, and she suffered
damages which compelled her to return for repairs. A small
steamer runs upon the waters of the bay.
I have been thus particular in giving the result of an enter
prise which at first seemed unpromising, only to show what
opportunities remain for development in a eountry so rich in
resources. The Alseya Valley, in Benton County, has its own
little seaport at the mouth of the Alseya Eiver. The lower
portion is heavily timbered, but where cleared produces abun
dant crops, It has, besides, mineral resources — coal in the moun
tains, and gold in the back-sands. The upper part of the valley,
from one to three miles wide and twelve long, is mostly settled
up with thrifty and industrious people.
The pass through the Coast Eange, by which the Oregon
Pacific comes to Corvallis, perceptibly affects the climate of

110 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
Benton Countj-, giving it the benefit of a modified sea-breeze
in the summer season. The State Agricultural College, with an
endowment and considerable legislative aid, is located at Cor
vallis. The town is Avell built, and has a handsome court-house,
being the county-seat. Like all Oregon towns, it has churches
and schools without stint.
The faee of the eountry in this portion of the valley is ex
tremely picturesque and beautiful. The narrowing towards its
head brings mountains, plains, and groves within the sweep of
unassisted vision, and the whole resembles a grand picture.
We have not here tho heavy forests of the Columbia Eiver
region, nor even the frequently-recurring fir-groves of the mid
dle sections. The foot-hills of the mountains approach Avithin
a few railes on either side, but those nearest the valley are
rounded, grassy knolls, o\-er which are scattered groups of firs,
pines, or oaks, while the river-bottora is bordered with tall
cotton-woods, and studded rather closely with pines of a lofty
height and noble form.
Two tributaries enter the Wallamet between Corvallis and
Eugene, — the Muddy, from the east, and Long Tora frora the
southwest. The country on tho Long Tom is celebrated for. its
fertility, and for the uncompromising Deraocracy of its people.
The school-master and the Black Eepublican were in early times
alike objeets of aversion in that famous district. It is also
claimed for Long Tom that it originated the term " Webfoot,"
whieh is so universally applied to Oregonians by their California
neighbors. The story runs as foUoAvs: A young couple from
Missouri settled upon a land-claim on the banks of this river,
and in due eourse of time a son and heir was born to them.
A California " commercial traveller," chancing to stop with tho
happy parents overnight, made some jesting remarks upon the
subject, warning them not to let the baby get drowned in the
unusually extensive mud-puddles by which the premises Avere
disfigured ; when the father replied that they had looked out
for that, and, uncovering the baby's feet, astonished the joker
by showing him that they were webbed. The sobriquet of Web
foot, having thus been attached to Oregon-born babies, has con
tinued to be a favorite appellative ever since.
No inland town could have a prettier location than Eugene,

OTHER TOAVNS OP THE WALLAMET VALLEY. Ill
and few a more desirable one for other reasons. It has for a
background Spencer's Butte, so named in honor of the Secretary
of Stato, in 1841, by Dr. White of the Methodist mission. At
the head of the valley, it combines many advantages; Lane
County, of which it is the county-seat, extending from the sea-
coast to the Cascade Eange, and including grain- and stock-lands,
timber- and mineral-lands, Avith abundant water-power.
Eugene, with about four thousand inhabitants, is the seat of
the University of Oregon, founded in 1872, and opened for the
reception of students in 1876. Its affairs are managed by a
board of regents appointed by the governor of tho State for a
term of twelve j-ears. It has a permanent endowment of eighty
thousand dollars, realized from the sale of lands granted by the
general gov-ernment for university purposes, and a fund of
flfty thousand dollars donated by Mr. Henry Villard. It also
receives an annual appi-opriation of fiA'o thousand dollars from
the State. But there is need of more endowments to enable
this to become what it should be, a place of universal education.
Two handsome brick buildings, a growing library of valuable
books, astronomical, surveying, and chemical apparatus consti
tute the present visible features of the institution, to whieh I
would add, as not least, though last, the collection of Professor
Thomas Condon, illustrating tho geology, mineralogj-, and nat
ural history of the Northwest. This collection, tho result ofthe
labor of a lifetirae, is already well knoAvn, and justly noted for
laj-ing open the pro-historic record of Oregon. Professor Con
don is the discoverer of the dwarf fossil horse of Oregon, which
is claimed by Eastern scientists, to whom he imparted his dis-
coverj'. Eugene is on the line of the Southern Pacific Eailroad, and
has a good country trade. Undoubtedly railroads will be built
to the mouth of the Siuslaw Eiver, and into Southeastern
Oregon, from this point. A road into the Klamath Valley
leads from here by the Diamond Peak pass.
Three miles east of Eugene is the town of Springfield, a
thriving place, with flouring- and saw-mills, and several manu
factories. Following up McKenzie's Fork of the Wallamet to a
branch called the Mohawk, we find a region cut off from the
main valley by a range of hills, which is eelebrated for its

112 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
natural beauties and advantages of superior climate, excellent
water, rich prairies, and fine forest. It is being rapidly taken
up by dairymen, fruit-farmers, and others. Fine water-power
may be obtained in numerous places, owing to the rapid fall of
the streams coming out of the mountains. A glance at the
map will show the three principal forks of the Wallamet con
verging towards Eugene, each of whieh has tributaries with
small lateral valleys that eontain verj' choice tracts of land.
The amphitheatre of raountains, running down into the valley
in long slopes and ridges, furnishes it Avith superior facilities for
a great variety of manufactures Avbich depend on wood, water,
stone, and like materials. When these are to be found, together
with a varietj' of good soils adapted to all branches of farming,
there can be no doubt of the future of such a eountry. From
every side the riches of these hills will glide down into the lap
of that city.

CHAPTEE IX.
FURTHER REMARKS ON WEST OREGON.
The Wallamet prairies are not an uninterrupted level like those
of Illinois. In some parts they resemble the " oak openings" of
Michigan ; in other parts the plains are quite extensive, but
nowhere are we out of sight of large bodies of timber on the
raountains, or the groves that fringe the rivers. Eanges of hills
and isolated buttes occur frequently enough to save the land
scape from monotony, and furnish variety of soil as well.
The first thought in viewing West Oregon is that it must be
a country of perennial verdure, — a country of exhaustless food
resources for cattle. Such is not the faet, however, owing to
the absence of rain during about four raonths ofthe j-ear, when
the grass is dried up. For this reason it cannot furnish fresh
pasturage later than the first of July, until the rains begin in
October or November, when the chilly weather makes cattle
poor, although grass is abundant. Time was when the Wallamet
Valley waved in early sumraer with luxuriant native grasses,
red and white clover, and many beautiful flowering plants.
Cattle might wallow through grass breast-high on the prairies,

FURTHER REMARKS ON WEST OREGON. 113
and as high as their heads in the creek-bottoms. Stock-raising
Avas a lucrative business in an early day in Oregon : in the first
place, because cattle wero scarce among the settlers, and next,
because, after they became raore numerous, they were in de
mand for food by the mining population, with whieh gold dis
covery suddenly peopled the southern portion of the Stato.
The stock-owner then put his brand on his herd and tunied
them out to " summer and winter" themselves on the abundance
ofthe virgin prairies; but in course of time this indiscriminate
pasturing injured the grasses, reducing them to a shorter growth,
though it is said that when tho land is permitted to lie idle
under fence they recover their old luxuriance.
The lives of the early Oregonians, while they very often
lacked material corafort, were remarkably care-free. Tbe genial
climate and kindly soil rendered constant or excessive labor
unnecessary. Comparative wealth was easily attained when a
hundred cows represented a capital of ten thousand dollars. To
mount his "spotted cayuse" and scaraper over the prairie look
ing after his stock was a pastime ; good riding, good shooting,
and knowing how to throw the lasso, popular accomplishments.
Clad in his buckskin suit, and booted and spurred in true vaquero
style, it was his pleasure to scour the prairies day after day on
any errand, from cattle-hunting to looking for a w ife with three
hundred' and twenty acres to make a mile square with his own.
And well it might be — unless some of wild California stock
"got after him," Avhen a sharp race sometimes ended in the
cahallero being " treed."
This free and easy life in a eountry so beautiful had charms
not difficult to comjirehend, and was more profitable than the
laborious farming which made men too slowly rich "back in the
States." The larger part of the Wallaraet Vallej- was taken up
under the Oregon Donation Law of 1850, which gave three hun
dred and twenty acres to a married man, and the same amount
to his wife in her own right. This brought early marriages into
fashion, the courting which preceded it being often accom
plished while the would-be husband sat on his cayuse, and the
not unwilling bride of thirteen or fourteen summers stood on
the door-step. Large families who took up in this way adjoin
ing square railes were able to call a whole township their own.

114 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
But that was " In the olden, golden
Time, long ago."
Many a farmer sold his land, when remote from the settle
ments, for a raerely nominal price, and went tb reside in a town
where he eould send his children to school, in ante railroad days,
thus losing the benefit the government intended to bestow upon
the pioneers of this far-away region. That did not, however,
prevent his " living by the copulation of cattle," as the broad
acres of the A-alley were unfenced for the most part, and his
herds wandered whithersoever they would. Eailroads are fast
stamping out this primitive form of civilization, which is replaced
by scientific farming, and this means confining stock to certain
boundaries and providing for their subsistence. The farmer of
the Wallaraet Valley could not corapete in stock-raising with
the herders on the cheaper lands of the East Oregon ranges,
because his land was too valuable for other purposes ; nor could
he compete with the stock-raisers on the coast ranges where
grain- farming is impracticable, and where the moisture from the
sea keeps green tbe grass and herbage the sumraer through.
In the early history of the valley wheat was the only cereal
raised, and was used alike for food and for currency, a wheat
certificate, like a silver certificate of to-day, being a leggil tender,
and the only raoney in circulation before the discovery of gold.
The principal crops still are wheat, oats, and barley, in the order
named. The wheat crop for 1890 in this valley is estimated at
two hundred and fiftj' thousand tons, most of whieh goes to
foreign parts. This large traffic in wheat began about 1870,
when the first twenty miles of the Oregon and California Eail
road were completed. The same ships which brought out the
rails from England took back cargoes of Oregon wheat. Previous
to this time farmers had hauled their grain to Portland, or to
the other river towns, where it was boated to Portland and thence
shipped to San Francisco. For a long time this Oregon product
was shipped abroad as California wheat, and from its large size
and fine appearance was a credit to the State whieh exported it.
But, soe how time makes all things even. Millers have found
out that Oregon wheat is rather too soft, and is improved by
mixing with California's shrunken grain, and also that California

FURTHER REMARKS ON WEST OREGON. 115
flour gains bj' raixing Avith Oregon wheat. So tho dry and the
moist climates contribute to each other.
Oregon flour, notwithstanding this prejudice, sells well in
foreign markets, and has established itself in the markets of
China and Japan, four hundred tons, in 1890, being shipped
raonthly, the failure of the rice crop opening the way for its
introduction, and it is predicted that Avithin another decade the
Orient will consume the entire wheat product of tho Pacific coast.
Hops are a profitable crop, especially in the eoast counties
and the rich bottom-lands about the head of the Wallaraet.
Eoot crops and vegetables are fine and abundant. Potatoes
raake a good yield, and are exeellent in quality. Onions are
large, of a mild flavor, and as a crop very profitable. Cabbages
are large, and thc leaf is tender. All garden products grow
thriftily, and are of good quality ; and when the season of the
annual exhibit arrives, which is in the latter part of September,
the farmers are able to make a surprising show. But it is in
the spring and early summer that j'ou have eause to criticise the
Oregon producer. All the " earlies" on your table carae frora Cali
fornia, are high in price, and lucking in freshness. Why not
force the growth of certain spring edibles, and hasten those of
suramer by hot-house cultivation ? — why, only that the farmers
and gardeners are as "conservative" as the capitalists.
The dairies of Oregon do not supply the resident population,
notwithstanding this was originally a cattle country. The
reason has been pointed out ; still the fact reraains that the
comraon red clover whose roots go down to a great depth, would
endure the drouth of the rainless season, would seed itself, and
become green with tho first showers of autumn, furnishing an
evergreen crop on which to keep milch cows in condition.
Most of the hay cut in Oregon is from the natural grasses. Oats
are raised for hay, which is fed to horses ; but timothy, whieh
would do so mueh for the dairy interest, is neglected very gener
ally. The farmers are, however, in easy circumstances, and prob
ably eare nothing about a tourist's opinion of their methods.
The fruits raised in the Wallamet Valley are apples, pears,
plums, cherries, and prunes. Peaches grow well in sorae localities,
but, like Indian corn, they prefer the raore southern portion ofthe
State. Small fruits are abundant and excellent. Grapes do not

116 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
generally do well, except the Concord, which ripens deliciously ;
but all the fruits above named are of superior excellence.
The very best land for fruit-raising is that whieh has grown
a forest upon its soil. To clear it costs on an average forty
dollars per aere. An orchard near tho raouth of the Clackamas
is planted to one hundred and twenty-three varieties of apples,
fourteen varieties of pears, twelve of plums, five of prunes,
three of quinces, and three of grapes, besides the small fruits,
and walnuts, butternuts, and almonds.
The price of grain-land varies according to location, from five
to fifty or even two hundred dollars, but fair farming-lands ten
railes away frora towns ean be purchased at frora twenty-five to
forty dollars. The foot-hill lands, which are co\-ered wilh hazel
and other brush, and whieh make good fruit-farms, can be pur
chased cheaply. There is not any large amount of unsurveyed or
government land in this part of the State, and that whieh remains
is in the mountains. The State lands in West Oregon that were
immediately available are nearly all sold off, but some pieces
can still be found whieh are either overlooked or in the hands
of speculators who do not hold them high. The coming legis
lature, it is thought, will increase the price of school-land, which
it ought to have done years ago. The amount of government
land sold in West Oregon during the year just ended was four
hundred and ninety-two thousand acres, — two hundred and
ninety-two thousand in and bordering on the Wallaraet Valley,
and two hundred thousand in Southwestern Oregon.
Colurabia is the raost northerly county of this division of
Oregon, and really belongs to the Columbia Valley, as it faces
the Columbia Eiver. It is heavily timbered and mountainous,
with some rich farming-lands lying along the river and on the
farther side of the hills. Its forest is underlaid with coal, iron,
and other rainerals, which will sorae day raake it one of the
most wealthy districts of the State.
South of Columbia is Washington County, — the Tualatin
Plains of the pioneers, — which is one of the- oldest- settled
portions of Oregon, and belongs to the wheat-growing lands.
Hillsboro', the county-seat, was founded in 1850, by David Hill,
one of the exeputive coramittee under the provisional govern
ment of 1843. The population is about eight hundred.

FURTHER REMARKS ON WEST OREGON. 117
Forest Grove is the seat of the Paciflc University, with a
population of about one tbousand. The college is under the
patronage of the Congregational Church, although it is non-
sectarian in its teachings. It Avas founded in 1848 by Eev.
Harvey Clark and Mrs. Tabitha BroAvn, both of whom gave
almost all their worldly possessions and their personal efforts
to the work. Tho names of Marsh, Lyman, Collier, and Con
don are associated Avith its growth. Its grounds and buildings
are estiraated at fifty thousand dollars ; cabinet and apparatus,
four thousand dollars; productive funds, eighty-three thousand
dollars, Avith a library of five thousand volumes. The town of
Forest Grove is laid out, as its name implies, among the beauti
ful oak-groves at the base of a spur of the Coast Mountains,
half a mile from the Southern Pacific (west-side) Eailroad,
Cornelius, Dilly, and Gaston are stations along the line of the
road in this county, and Greenville is a farming settleraent in a
superb agricultural district.
Yamhill, or Che-am-ill, the Indian word for "bald hills," is
next south of Washington. It is ono of the earliest-settled and
most beautiful parts of Oregon. In fact, the early patent of
nobility in this region was to hail from Yamhill. The county-
seat is MeMinnville, with a population of two thousand two
hundred. It is situated on the Yamhill Eiver, and has com
munication by rail with all the important points on the west
side of the valley and wilh San Francisco.
Lafayette, a pretty place a few miles away, was formerly the
countj--seat, but lost this distinction through too much " conserv
atism." Daj'ton, at the mouth of the Yamhill Eiver, is another
pretty town, of fiA-e hundred inhabitants and a good trade,
Sheridan, the most western point on the Oregonian Eailway, is
nestled up at the foot of the Coast Eange near old Fort Hos-
Mns, and has a population of four hundred. There are eight
other sraall towns in this county, which is eelebrated for its
yield of grain.
Crossing the beautiful Che-am-ill Eange, we have a charming
view of the country, and see again the familiar peaks of the
Cascade Mountains. South of Yamhill we find ourselves among
the fertile rolling hills and alluvial vallej-s of Polk Countj'.
Although full of resources in soil, building-stone, timber, cabinet

118 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
woods, and minerals, Polk County has few towns of any size.
Dallas is the county-seat, with about seven hundred inhabitants.
It is situated on the Eiekreal (corruption of La Creole) Eiver,
nearly opposite Salem, in a charming region.
Concerning names and their origin, there are many absurd
conjectures made, quite as ludicrous as the frequent misnomers.
I read the other day that Joaquin Miller gave the origin ofthe
name of the Walla Walla tribe to be in the French ejaculation
Voild, voild I Mr. Miller cannot have read Lewis and Clarke with
mueh attention not to know that the Walla Walla tribe existed
before any French voj-ageur dipped paddle in the Colurabia.
Lewis and Clarko spell the word Wallawollah.
The most delightful instance that I remember to have seen
of the corruption of names was given by a newspaper eorre-
sp)ondont frora Colorado. The Spanish name of a river in the
southern part of that State is Fl Bio de los Animos, — Eiver of
Souls. This correspondent, not being acquainted with Spanish
partieles, says of Lost Souls, — and further, that the French fur-
traders, learning its meaning, called it Purgatoiro, or Purgatory
Eiver, which the "bull-whacker of the overland trail," in his
efforts to master the French, jironounced Picket-wire!
Lying west of Yamhill and Polk is Tillamook County, of
whieh it is said " there is no district of the Northwest so full of
possibilities. A magnificent soil, a heavenly climate, and scenery
that would deHght the hearts of poets and painters are here as
thoy are nowhere else ; but its streams and rivers, its roads and
its dales, its valleys, glens, and ravines are given over to the
empire of loneliness."
I am not authoritj' for this glowing stateraent, whieh may be
taken cum sails, but am ready to believe from collateral evidence
that it is the isolation, rather than the presumed ruggedness, of
this coast countj' which has heretofore raidred it lower than its
relatives on the hither side ofthe mountains. It has a sea-coast
of sixty miles in extent, and six rivers discharging into the sea,
one of which, Tillamook, has a good harbor at its entrance.
This bay was named by Lewis and Clarke, who made an ex
cursion to it in the spring of 1806. About one-fourth of this
county is occupied as an Tndian reservation.
Like other eoast counties, Tillamook has been cut off during

FURTHER EEMARKS ON WEST OREGON. 119
a great part of the year by the badness of the road over the
mountains, and the uncertainty of the route by sea. But the
Astoria and Albany Eailroad Company has promised to open up
this country. When tho road is constructed there will be a
market for the lumber, fish, garae, fruit, hay, vegetables, daiiy
products, and coal of this region. It will traverse, so it is said,
the valleys of the Miami, Nehalem, and Wilson Elvers, entering
the Wallamet Valley near Forest Grove. It is estimated that
there are ten million dollars' worth of " stumpage" in Tillaraook
County. The lumber whieh will be manufactured there will
furnish business for a railroad.
Tho town of Tillamook, on the Trask Eiver, is the county-
seat, with a population of six hundred, and has a saw-mill,
bank, church, school-house, court-house, and two newispapers.
Baj- City is located on Tillamook Baj-, at the head of deep-
water navigation, about five railes frora tbe sea. Its present
population is about two hundred, but its future, I ara told, is
considered assured. The Bay City Land Corapany bave taken
it in charge, and what land corapanies can do has been deraon
strated. " A young raan wiUing to work," going there now,
might turn out a millionaire at forty. The experiment is worth
trying, and doubtless will be tried.
The valley of the Nehalem Eiver, which is the northern
boundary of Tillamook County, is the seat of the Nehalem Co
operative Colony of Western Oregon, an association which is
putting in practice Edward Bellamy's socialistic ideas. Accord
ing to the report of the chief of the department of production
of the colony, the experiraent is resulting favorablj-. The colony
consists of twenty-five men, six women, and thirtj--fiA'e children.
The society put in three thousand dollars four j-oars ago, and
now owns a plant for which they have been offered one hun
dred and fifty thousand dollars, their property including four
thousand acres of land.
The water on the bar at the entrance to Tillamook Bay is
from ten to thirteen feet at low tide, with good anchorage in
side. When the jetty system has been applied, the channel
deepened six or eight feet, and a Ught-house erected, tho en
trance will be safe for any vessels except those of the largest size.
A Ught-house was erected on a rock about a mile from the

120 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
coast at Tillamook Head, thirty miles north of the bay, in 1879.
This £ippears to be the Avildest spot on the coast. The rock rose
one hundred feet above the water, and was only large enough to
afford ground roora for the workraen to carry on their operations.
In the raonth of October four raen were put upon the rock with
tools and provisions. Onlj- when the sea Avas smooth could a
boat reach the rock, and when, a few days later, five men at
tempted to land there, the foreman was drowned. The eight
remaining men suffered all the discomforts of shipwrecked
sailors, their onlj- shelter from rain and spray being a heavy
canvas tied to ringbolts fastened in the rock. They quarried out
a cove and built a cabin in it, which they bolted to the face of
the cliff. The next move was to quarrj' steps from the landing
to the top of the rock, having to work a part of the time on a
staging hung from the summit. Often the weather would not
permit them to work at all, and in Januaiy they had a hurri
cane which dashed the waves to the toj) of the rock. Their
supplies were washed away, and they expected to follow, but
were so fortunate as to outlive the buffeting their cabin received
from the elements. It was sixteen days before their situation
could be made known to persons on shore. A lino, fastened to
the top of the rock and cast loose, was picked up by a ship, and
supplies were transferi-ed from the ship's mast to the rock. By
May the quarrymen had cut down the rock to a height of eighty
foot, and made a level place for the light-house. In June the
corner-stone was laid, and on every fair day a load of hewn
material was taken out to the rock, and the building, fifty feet
square, constructed, in Avhicb were rooms for the keeper of the
Ught, with a room for the fog-signal raachinery. The tower
was raised forty-eight feet, placing the lantern one hundred and
lhirtj--six feet above the sea-level, and in January, 1881, the
Ught was put in operation. One month before a ship had gone
ashore, and twenty lives been lost within a mile of thc light
house. In some winier storms the waves have tossed boulders
as large as cannon-balls over tbe top of tbe tower.
The coast of Oregon in a " sou'wester" is extremelj' inhos
pitable. In summer it is mueh resorted to for pleasure, and has
been so from the time of the earliest settlement in tho Walla
met VaUey to the jDresent. The sea-beach at Tillamook, or the

FURTHER REMARKS ON WEST OREGON. 121
mouth of Salmon Eiver, in Polk Countj', was a favorite resort
for the people of the central portion of the valley. To come
here in July, camp out two or three Aveeks, flsh, ride, hunt, and
eat " rock-oysters" and blackberries, was thought to be a sani
tary as AveU as a recreative measure. The "rock-oyster," so
called because it is embedded in sandstone rock, has to be
released from captivity by hard blows with a hararaer. Wheu
extricated, it is pear-shaped, with the impression of a scalloped
sholl on the broad base of tho soft shell which encloses it. At
the small end, where the stera of a pear would be, is a foot or
feeler projecting, not only out of the shell, but reaching out
through an air-hole in the stem, and probably used to secure
food. They are never found aboA'o tide- water, and are comraon,
I think, to the California coast as woU, as I have seen them of
all sizes at Santa Cruz,
Crossing the plains gave, I fancy, a habit of out-door life to
the earlj' Oregonians which their children have inherited. To
"go camping" every summer is their delight, and they cling
to the primitive custom of camp-meetings, — " basket meetings"
they are called. That "the groves were God's first temples''
seems natural enough in " the continuous woods where rolls the
Oregon.'' Tbe devotional spirit comes more easily and quickly,
and with raore power, in immediate contact with Nature, than
when coaxed and stimulated into exercise by the appliances of
art. In the age when architecture Avas really and truly an art,
this truth was seized upon ; and those grand cathedrals which
still remain the glory ef Europe, in their pointed roofs, fretted
arches, and long colonnades, their deep shadows, and windows
of colored glass, staining the light they transmitted to the colors
of Nature's choicest hues, were intended to express that solemn
and subtile sense of beauty, which, in the presenee of great
Nature, lifts the heart above and away from raean or trivial
considerations. The people on the east side of the valley who do not go to the
sea-coast find no lack of deUghtful summer camps among the
foot-hills of the Cascade Mountains. The eastern half of Marion
County is a natural park, where green hills overtopped bj'
snow-peaks, solemn forest depths, mountain gorges, precipitous
cliffs, lakes, and cataracts, alternating with smiling vales, may

122 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
be reached in a few hours of travel. Silver Creek Falls, near
Silverton, is a noted resort of the Salera people. The creek
drops off a projecting shelf of rock one hundred and eighty
feet in height, being dashed into a white cloud of spraj-. The
visitor may stand behind this raistj- veil and look through a
cloud of rainbows. On another branch of the stream, at no
great distance, r& a si tnilar cataract. There are mineral springs
in Marion and Linn Counties, chiefij- soda, whieh are fitted up
with conveniences for invalid visitors ; but Oregon has not j'ot
attempted a fashionable watering-place.
Benton Countj', next south of Polk and TUlamook, extends
from the river to the sea, being prairie land in the eastern end,
and having rolUng, raountain, and eoast lands to the west, giv
ing it adaptabiUty to all kinds of farraing, dairying, and wool-
growing, and facilities for raanufactures of various kinds. The
Oregon Pacific traverses it, and it has seaports of its own at
Yaquina and Alsej-a Bays. The Alsej'a Eiver rises in Mary's
Peak near Corvallis, and runs west to the ocean. The Yaquina
Eiver flows into the bay of that name.
Lane County, the largest in the Wallamet Vallej-, extend
ing from the Cascade Eange to the sea eoast, combines rare
agricultural and manufacturing opportunities. It erabraces
within its liraits the three forks of the Wallamet, besides that
west branch bearing the sobriquet of Long Tom, and contains
thousands of acres of either grain, pasture, or timbered lands,
with abundance of water-power, — in fact the resources of a State
more than twice as large as Ehode Island. To the eye Lane
County presents a diversity of surface which is very attractive,
— prairies that from level beeome undulating ; hills that from
long swells, scantily wooded, rise gradually into high raountains
with crowns of evergreen forest, with pretty little valleys stretch
ing along the nuraerous streams.
Tho climate in this portion of the Wallaraet Valley is rather
drier than at the north end. The elevation aboA-e the Columbia
is four hundred feet. It is a beautiful sight to behold the lux
uriant wheat-fields about the last of June, just before the grain
begins to ripen, and when the elegant Lil{um Washingtdnium—
Oregon's embleraatie flower — stands head and shoulders above
the nodding stalks, scenting aU the air with its fragrance.

FURTHER REMARKS ON WEST OREGON.

123

The entire area of the Wallamet Valley has almost no waste
land in it, and most of it is under improvement, although not by
any means all weU cultivated. The old donation law, which
gave so much land to actual settlers, operated to prevent close
neighborhood and consequent iraprovement, with good farming,
school privileges, and roads kept in repair. The influx of pop
ulation within a few j'ears bas changed the old order of things
to a considerable extent, but not yet thoroughly.
People are beginning to understand that a few acres well
tilled are better than many left in neglect. Fruit-farming on
frora five to forty- acres is coming into fashion, to the benefit of
all concerned. It is said that five acres of cleared timber-land
will support a family in comfort. Until recently Oregon made
no atterajDt to raise fruit for export, except apples lo California.
This year choice apples were shipped to England, and pears,
pluras, and peaches to Chicago, Many prune orchards are being
set out, this fruit being raost profitable for export in a dried
state. Before closing my remarks on the western portion of Oregon
I will subdue ray dread of tables suffieiently to present one
giving the coraparative condition of the several counties at the
coraraenceraent of 1890, including also Southern Oregon.

T3

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a
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oC
oa
ll rf p
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o
°s
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r'?0
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03
ID
S'S
"--
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fl
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sa
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H
Dollare.
DoUars.
Dollars,
Dollars.
Dollars:
Dollars.
Dollars.
Benton . .
323,997
2,188,749
651,492
303,097
4,894.000
877,864
234,826
3,765,200
Clackamas
361,666
2,241,418
600,970
809,918
4,544,258
1,876,011
354,777
2,842,469
Clatsop . .
123,967
1,995,777
2,691,047
217,209
7,002,483
1,040,680
74,928
4.101,328
Columbia .
219,667
627,360
37 ,.580
179,915
1,249,837
168,046
131,137
850,654
Coos ....
291,903
1,292,892
835,633
243,884
2,615,875
889,001
249,649
1,976,705
Curry . . .
93,350
831,270
12,1,55
125,543
663,777
107,653
64,775
489,949
Douglas . .
479,317
179,445
242,185
489,205
4 208.975
1,128,655
298,610
2,781,710
Jackson . .
192,874
1,182,693
222,441
318,761
3,2a5,847
686,971
271,768
2,264,557
Josephine .
76,819
393,130
139,620
112,231
1.238,665
216,840
105,574
916,251
Lane .
466,266
2,783,981
926,867
606,943
6,609,577
1,292,192
615,062
4,802,323
Linn . .
463,056
4,756,421
908,463
600,132
7,897,211
1,794,357
465,349
5,629,813
Marion . .
396,637
4 418,380
1,488,948
570,058
9,209,269
2,370,529
521,811
6,317,429
Multnomah
158,402
6,671,840
16,638,970
178,185
40,099,000
10,170,500
243,770
29,684,670
Polk. , . .
233,275
1,874,000
50,790
821,700
3,937,689
1,017,250
253,925
2,666,514
Tillamook .
99,011
486,094
30,845
112,1.53
840,351
163,167
93,501
583,593
Washington
259,562
2,934,615
236,955
366,595
4,890,130
1,217,025
382,535
3,290,570
yamhiU . .
1,841,121
2,610,285
99,845
431,277
6,122,014
1,719,937
357,206
3,972,871
124 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
The amount of mortgages recorded against property in
. Multnomah County is $3,626,730 ; Benton, $202,438 ; Clackamas,
$423,076 ; Marion, $939,403, and Polk, $294,164.

CHAPTEE X.
WHAT I SAW IN SOUTHERN OREGON.
The southern division of Western Oregon is separated froin
the Wallamet Valley by a range of low mountains known as the
Calapooyas. Crossing this divide, we enter the Umpqua Vallej',
or series of valleys, constituting Douglas Countj-, naraed afler
Stephen A. Douglas, and extending from the Cascade Eange, in
the direction of the Umpqua Eiver, to the ocean, containing an
extent of territoiy greater than any county of its age in tho
State, notwithstanding its boundaries have several times been
altered. It covers an area of four thousand square miles.
It was a clear, sharp, October morning, when I first left
Eugene to go down into Southern Oregon. As the stage rattled
out of town in the direction of the Umpqua, I took a last,
lingering look at the fair, level valley we wero leaving; at the
encircling hills of russet-color, dotted with bits of green, in
groups of oaks or pines ; of Spencer's Butte, with its sharp,
dark-tinted cone ; and of the blue Cascades, now purpling under
the morning sunrise. From the most distant mountains, light-
gray mists were rising ; in the middle distanee was a purple
interval ; on the nearer hills, rich, yellow sunlight. The orb of
day was not yet high enough to shine on the hither side of the
peaks behind which he was mounting. They stood in their own
'shadow, and let his slant beams bridge the valleys between their
royal heights, until they rested on the hurabler foot-hills among
which we were wending our way, and touched with a golden
radiance the yellow leaves of the maples or silvered the ripples
in the Wallamet water.
Sueh gorgeousness of color never shone, out of the tropics, as
the vine-maple, ash, and white-maple display, along the strearas
in this part of Oregon. I had thought them bright, glowing,

WHAT I S.VW IN SOUTHERN OREGON. 125
radiant, on tho Columbia aud Lower Wallamet; but nowhere
had I found them so brilliant as at the head of the Wallamet
Valley. And, as Ave afterwards ascertained, this is nearly the
southern limit of the beautiful viue-maple. It was almost in
vain that we looked for its scarlet-flaming thickets flfty miles
farther south, and at a hundred miles it had disappeared from
the landscape altogether.
The Umpqua Valley, whichi could imagine in its June fresh
ness, was now sore with the long drought of a rainless summer.
The road, however, for some distance, led through the Calapooya
Mountains, and the gorge of a creek, where the thick woods, in
places, quite excluded the sun,— almost the light of day. Bright
iis the weather was, and dry as the autumn had been, there was
shadow, coolness, and moisture here, among the thick-standing,
giant trees, the underwood, and the ferns and mosses. A very
pleasant ride on sueh a raorning, but one which raight be ex
ceedingly uncomfortable in. the rainy season, though never an
uninteresting ono.
Dry as Avas the valley beyond, it was still beautiful, one so
soon learns to admire the soft coloring of these arid countries, —
the pale russet hues of the vallej'S, the neutral tints in rocks
and fences, the quiet dark -green of the forests, and the clear,
pale, unclouded blue of the heavens. The expression of these
landscapes is that of soft repose. Nature herself seems resting,
and it is no reproach to man that he, too, forgets to work, and
only dreams. But the men of this period are not dreamers.
Even in the saeredest haunts of Nature, they plot business and
talk railroad ! I certainly thought railroad, as my eyes wandered
over this beautiful, but isolated valley. But that was in a time
now half forgotten, so rapidly do conditions change in this
Northwest empire.
No longer without connection with the outside world, the
Umpqua Valley is emerging from its former condition of a
grazing and wool-growing region, and commencing to develop
its abundant resources. Unlike the Wallamet, it has no great
extent of level prairie-land bordering the river from which it
takes its narae, but is a rolling country, a perfect jumble of small
valleys and intervening ridges; the vallej's prairies, and the
hills wooded with fir on top, but generally bare, or dotted with

I
126 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
oak, on their long grassy slopes. It is a sort of country Avhere
a man may seem to have a little world to himself; owning
mountains, hills, plains, and water-courses, or at least springs of
water, and neither overlooked by nor at any great distance
from a neighbor.
Douglas Countj', extending from the Cascade Mountains to
the Pacific Ocean, with a seaport of its own, is in area more like
a State than a siraple division of one. Its climate differs from
that of the Wallamet as much as, by reason of its more southern
latitude, greater elevation, and mingling of sea-breeze with
mountain air, it might be expected to. The result is salubrity
and productiveness. Its prairies are adapted to wheat and all
cereals ; its creek-bottoms to Indian corn, melons, and vegetables ;
its foot-hills to fruit-raising ; and its uplands to grazing.
The sarae general variety of tiraber grows here as in the Walla
met Valley, and a few kinds in addition. The evergreen mj-rtle
is a fine cabinet wood not found in Northern Oregon ; the Avild
plum and wild grape also grow hei-e ; and the splendid Bhodo-
dendron maximum is a tall shrub, bearing a wealth of deep rose-
colored clusters of great beauty. The botany of the country is
very rich. Game abounds in the mountains, fish in the streams.
I saw, in October, apple- and pear-trees with a new set of blos
soms, some of the fruit having grown as large as a gooseberry.
In considering Douglas County, it must be taken into account
that the valleys are separated from the most western portion
by the Coast Eange, and that the mountains extend within a
distanee of forty or fifty miles of the sea. The passage of the
river through the mountains is a turbulent one, and the scenery
highly romantic and alpine in its character; therefore the pre
vious remarks on agricultural possibilities do not apply equally
to this portion of the county. But taken altogether its re
sources are numerous, including fruit-raising, dairying, agricul
ture, stock-raising, wool-growing, lumbering, gold-mining, coal,
oil, Umestone, marble, sandstone, salt-springs, sulphur- and soda-
springs, salmon- and oyster-fishing, and the last discovery is
natural-gas. In 1880 Douglas County shipped, it is said, one
milUon pounds of wool, and sold twenty-se\-en thousand sheep
to Nevada farmers. The population claimed is between thirteen
thousand and fourteen thousand.

WHAT I SAAV IN SOUTHERN OREGON. 127
The first town deserving any notice from the tourist is Drain,
situated just where the railroad emerges from the Pass Creek
caflon through the Calapooya Mountains, joining Elk Creek, a
branch of the Umpqua EiA'er. This plaee, founded twelve or
fifteen years ago by Mr. Drain, an old resident of the county,
and a whilom State legislator, was for a long time only a
station where passengers for Scottsburg, on the west side of the
Coast Eange, took stage for the rough but enjoyable journey
across the mountains.
And here I cannot refrain from saying that I think travel
suffers greatlj' from the levelUng influence of railroads. There
is nothing in the traveUer's rapid transit by the straightest
route, through the lowest passes, across the outskirts of nature
and of cities, confined to a seat Avhich you raaj- not have chosen,
and in propinquitj- with (perhaps) verj- undesirable fellow-travel
lers, eating un wholesomely, and sleeping uncomfortably, to com
pensate one for liberty to choose his route, to breathe unpolluted
air, to "take his ease in his inn" when he chooses, sleeping and
eating in comfort. It is all very well for tho demands of com
merce to be satisfied in this way, but travel — whj-, one does not
travel : he is snatched and tossed from place to place without
having enjoj-ed one of the foremost pur250sos of travel, which
is to gain health, pleasure, and instruction. Eailroads are great
eivilizers ; but they also need to be civiUzed in some directions.
The ride from Drain to Scottsburg furnishes all the deUghts
to be gathered from a magnificent forest, alpine heights, awful
declivities, gUmpses of a rapid river dashing itself over rocky
obstructions, the balsamic odors of the woods, pure stimulating
air, social converse, an hour for your dinner, and a friendly inn
at your journey's end. We are promised that all this, or much
of it, is to be changed in a year or two by a railroad from Drain
to the oeean, by a new route, and with new towns along it.
Glasgow and Eeedville are two which are not yet to be found
on the maps.
Scottsburg, situated at the head of tide-water, was naraed foi
Levi Scott, its founder, in 1850. A military road once connected
it with the interior, but thegreat flood of 1861-62 washed aAvay
the road and a large part of Scottsburg, since whiich it has
steadily declined. An attempt was made to render the river

128 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
navigable, and a light-draught stearaer was built to run up to
Eoseburg, but after one trip the enterprise was abandoned.
The town is situated in a narrow defile on the north bank of
the river, while on the south side the raountains rise abruptly
to a great height, and the whole aspect of the place is as Swiss
as anything could be in Araerica.
Eighteen railes below Scottsburg is Gardiner, naraed for Cap
tain Gardiner of the " Bostonian," a vessel wrecked at the en
trance of the river in 1850. It was founded by a San Francisco
corapany in 1851. Of that company, two were afterwards gov
ernors of Oregon, — A. C. Gibbs and S. F. Chadwick. Gardiner
was the seat of a customs-collection office for several years, but
is now simply a milling-town. A salmon-cannery on the south
bank of the river puts up the late run of fish in the Umpqua.
From Gardiner to the sea, about eight miles, the eountry is
a sandy plain. During the Indian wars in Southern Oregon,
Fort Umpqua was estabUshed on the north bank, between
Gardiner and the ocean, but was long ago abandoned. Here
General Auger was stationed during his ante-bellum experience.
Tho mouth of the Umpqua has not a A-ery good reputation
as a harbor, raany vessels having been wrecked in this vicinity,
and only those in the luraber trade go in and out. The gov--
ernment in the days of General Lane's delegateship erected a
light-house at the entrance of the river, but upon a sandy founda
tion, and, when the rains came and tho floods fell and the winds
beat upon it, it fell, and has never been replaced. And here it
raay be justly affirmed that the government has been remiss ;
for there are but four light-houses on the Oregon coast south
of the Columbia Eiver, — namely, at Tillamook Head ; Cape
Foulweather, near Yaquina Bay ; Cape Arago, near Coos Bay ;
and at Cape Blanco, near Port Oxford.
The capacity of vessels entering the Umpqua for lumber is
from six hundred and twentj'-five to seventeen hundred and
fifty tons, and their draught twelve to fifteen feet. The exports
frora Umpqua Eiver for the year last past amounted to 28,926.8
tons, consisting chiefly of luraber and laths, the remainder being
in grain, wool, leather (frora a tannery at Scottsburg), hides
and furs, and dairy products. The iraport in machinery and
general merchandise was fifteen hundred tons.

WHAT I SAW IN SOUTHERN OREGON. 129
The Siuslaw (pronounced Si-MSe-law) Eiver, which separates
Douglas from Lane County, has an entrance which raight be
improved, with a good harbor inside. The present channel is
tortuous and shifting, with six feet at low water, but it is posj-
sible to carry a ten-foot depth nearly to the head of tide, a dis
tance of twenty miles, and it will probably be so improved in the
near future. There are large bodies of exeellent timber on this
bay whieh would then be available, A project is already on
foot to build a railroad to the Wallaraet Valley Avhenever the
government makes desired improvement of the bar and channel.
There is reported a fine eountry on the upper Siuslaw.
The river scenery from Gardiner to Scottsburg strongly re
sembles that of the Columbia, though on a much smaller scale.
The river is in places very shallow, being almost quite inter
rupted by bars of rock, which engineering is busj- removing.
Eeturning to Drain's we find just beyond here Mount Yoncalla
(Eagle-bird, in the Indian tongue), a point of interest. It was
for nearly forty years the home of the grandest of those " men
of destiny," as he hiraself named them, who, in 1843, ojjoned a
road for wagons from the Missouri to the Wallamet Valley, —
Jesse Applegate, " the sage of YoncaUa." The mansion where
he dispensed wisdom and a free hospitality is given up to
strangers, and the places that knew him shall know him no
raore. Douglas County has two Methodist academies, orie at Oak
land, on a branch of the Umpqua about fifteen miles south of
Yoncalla, and another at Wilbur, ton miles farther south. Both
are charming locations. Oakland is Arcadian in beauty, its
groves and natural park-like scenery being ideally " academic."
The North Pork of the Umpqua is to be dammed at Win
chester, a short distance from Oakland, and a large woollen-mill
to be erected there, which it is expected will be followed by
other manufactories.
Eoseburg, originally Deer Creek, the present county-seat of
Douglas, and naraed after its founder, Aaron Eose, has a popu
lation of two thousand flve hundred. It is the gem of the
Umpqua Valley, resting upon the river Umpqua, where it is a
fine large stream bounded by beautiful park-like oak openings.
Nothing eould be finer than the sweep of the river as it comes
9

130 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
from the south, the railroad on one side, and teeming gardens
and attractive houses on the other. A handsome bridge spans
it in the centre of the town. Eoseburg, like Drain, is to have a
railroad to the sea.

ROSEBURG.

Proceeding south through a charming country to the Myrtle
Creek Hills, the scenery at this plaee strongly suggests Harper's
Ferry, without its costly improvements. Soon we enter the
canon of Cow Creek, a wild and wonderful pass, rendered his
toric in the winter of 1889-90 by the blockade of the Southern
Pacific Eailroad, which lasted for more than a month. This
reinarkable obstruction to travel Avas occasioned by a combina
tion of causes, but primarily by the construction of the road
itself through the canon, and the cutting away the foundation,
so to speak, of the steep hill-side where it occurred.
Cow Creek is a pure mountain stream, from fifty to a hundred
feet in width, not very deep at its usual stage, but very crooked,
the rugged points around whieh it makes its sharp turns neces
sitating frequent tunnels. As the caHon is narrow, the road
had to be eut along the mountain-side at a height sufficient to

AVHAT I SAW IN SOUTHERN OREGON. 131
insure it from inundation in seasons of freshet. The pass is
forty -five miles in length, Avith a fall of frora seventy to ono
hundred and twenty feet to the mile. Even in the best of order,
Avith the finest weather, one is conscious of a feeling of inse
curity as one side of the train looks down on nothing nearer
than the river-bed, and tho other seems ever just missing the
projecting roeks. Now you dash across a bridge, and anon you
dart into a tunnel.
But last winter (I think it was in February) the thing hap
pened, — not the one we were looking for, — it is always the un
expected whieh happens, — something which might have been
the most appalling accident in railway history occurred. More
than a hundred acres of earth, softened and loosened, A^ith its
lower side eut away, rushed down upon the railroad, completely
burj'ing a section of traek, obliterating a tunnel, and forcing
itself one hundred and fifty feet up the opposite mountain, effect
ually damming the river between. Eails twisted and doubled
up, with ties, tools, wagons, bridges, and shops, were carried up
the mountain-side. The river being dammed formed a lake
above from twenty to one hundred and fifty feet in depth,
which, however, soon forced a passage for itself, when the accu
mulated waters, in a wall seventj'-five feet high, roared down
the roeky chasm with race-horse speed, carrying trees, earth,
and stones upon their hissing crest. A lake a mile and a half
in length and sixty feet deep still remains as a memento of this
startling occurrence. Not ten minutes before the slide plunged
down, a freight-train passed the spot. Fancy runs on and asks.
What if a passenger-train had been hurled across the river, or had
been imprisoned in the tunnel ? Imagine archaeologists a thou
sand years hence, when people travel with wings, and railways
are a thing of the past, exploring and coming upon such an im
prisoned train, or even upon the buried tunnel, — what specula
tions ! I used to think this when my eyes beheld, painted all
along the rocky cuts of the Hudson Eiver Eailroad, the caba
Ustic letters I. X. L. : what would the scientists say in the year
5000, when cosmic dust had buried New York and its surround
ings out of sight, about the meaning of these characters? The
railroad has been rebuilt for a long distanee on the opposite
side of the river.

132 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
From Glendale, at the south end of Cow Creek CaSon, we
travel south, past the historic localities of Wolf, Leland, and
Jump-off-Joe Creeks, scenes of struggle between the aboriginal
and the imported inhabitants of the country in " the fifties ;"
past the Lucky Queen mining-camp, between the last two
streams, to Grant's Pass, so named from an opening in the Coast
Eange said to have been occupied at some time by Captain —
afterwards General— Grant.
This town is in Josephine County, situated on Eoguo Eiver,
and is a creation of the Oregon and California Eailroad. In
1883 it contained a single habitation — Dimmick's — on the old
road from Portland to Sacramento. In that year it was laid out
in tOAvn lots by som6 far-seeing speculator, and proved so good
a location that to-day it is the seat of government of Josephine
County, with a population of three thousand, and growing in
dustries, chiefly manufactures in wood, this being the centre of
the sugar-pine district. There are twenty saw-mills within a
radius of as many miles, and in the town are sash-, door-, and
shingle-factories, breweries, a broom- and a paint-factory. The
railroad also has its car-shops and round-house here ; and araong
the improvements under way are an iron bridge over the river,
an electric-light plant, a water-works system, and several sub
stantial brick blocks. A railroad is already projected from here
to Crescent City, California, eighty-seven railes, and thence
down the coast to Eureka in that State. Sueh a road would
make this a distributing point for Southern Oregon, and would
greatly reduce the high freight rates whieh have heretofore
prevailed in this section of Oregon. There were shipped from
here over the Southern Pacific in 1889, 100 car-loads of choice
watermelons, 73 of cantaloupes, 82 of sweet potatoes, 87 of
peaches, 830 of apples, 11 of nectarines, 19 of grapes, 18,000
pounds of almonds, 32,000 pounds of prunes, 48 car-loads ' of
hops, 36 of broom-corn, 113 of gold-quartz worth sixty-five
dollars per ton, $285,000 worth of gold-dust, and 1878 car-loads
of sugar-pine lumber and manufactured wood- work. The ship-
raents extended north to Seattle, and south to Los Angeles.
Land is not yet held high in this county, nor indeed in any part
of Southern Oregon ; and there is a good deal stiU open to entry,
and a vast amount of railroad lands, ranging from two dollars

WHAT I SAW IN SOUTHERN OREGON. 133
and fifty cents to twenty dollars per acre, which is yet to bo
settled. This tells the story of the resources of this part of
Oregon as far as developed. No wheat or cereals, — it would
cost too mueh to ship them to the sea-board ; no minerals except
gold-quartz, — thej- are not mined or manufactured for a similar
reason. Nothing against the soil or climate, but everything
against the transportation, or the lack of it. It is time that
Southern Oregon sought shorter and cheaper routes to markets.
I was shown a potato in Eogue Eiver Valley which weighed
seven pounds ! It was one of a lot of twenty whoso aggregate
weight was one hundred and one pounds, and the crop of whieh
they were a part matured without either rain or irrigation, on
land that had been planted to potatoes for twenty-eight consecu
tive years. The owner expected fortj' thousand pounds from one
acre. This was near Grant's Pass. Another farmer near Ashland
reported thirty thousand pounds of potatoes to the acre. None
of my readers are likelj' to believe this, but it is true.
The Oregon and CaUfornia, or, as it is now called, the Southern
Pacific Eailroad, from Glendale to Grant's Pass runs just inside
the eastern boundarj--line of Josephine County, a large portion
of which is still unsurveyed. It is here that it strikes Eogue
or Eascal Eiver, so named by tho fur-hunters of the Hudson's
Bay Company, who had, as well as later travellers, many a
skirmish to effect a crossing, the Indians lying in wait for them
at the ford. The name, applied to the natives and the stream,
became attached to the valley.
Eogue Eiver rises in the Cascade Mountains and courses
southwest and west to Grant's Pass, where it runs northwest,
and again southwest, receiving the Illinois Eiver, which drains
Josephine County, about twenty miles from the sea. Eogue
Eiver Valley, embracing all the country drained by that river
and its numerous tributaries, is an aggregation of smaller valleys,
dlA^ded by rolling hills, the whole encircled by elevated moun
tain ranges. The river is not navigable for any great distance
from the sea, but abounds in rapids and falls, furnishing abun
dant power for manufacturing purposes. It is a stream of un
surpassed beauty, with water as blue as the sky, and banks
overhung in some places with shaggy cliffs, and in others with
thickets of wild grape-vines and blossoming shrubs.

134 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
It is not claimed that there is as great an amount of rich
alluvial soil in this section of Oregon as in the valleys north of
it. It is rather more elevated, drier, and on the whole more
adapted to grazing than to the growth of cereals. Still, there
is enough of rich land to supply its own population, however
dense ; and for fruit-growing no better soil need be looked for.
A sort of comproraise between the dryness of CaUfornia and
the moisture of Northern Oregon and Washington, — warmer
than the latter, from its more southern latitude, yet not too
warm, by reason of its altitude, — the climate of this valley
renders it most desirable. Midway between San Francisco Bay
and the Columbia Eiver, what with its own fruitfulness, and
the productions of the Wallamet and Sacramento Vallej-s on
either hand, within a few hours by railway carriage, the mar
kets of the Eogue Eiver Valley can be freshly supplied with
both temperate and semi-tropical luxuries.
The grape, peach, apricot, and nectarine, which are cultivated
with difficulty in the Wallamet Valley, thrive excellently in
this more high and southern location. The creek-bottoms pro
duce Indian corn, tobacco, and vegetables equallj' well ; and
the more elevated plateaux produce wheat of excellent qualitj-
and large quantity, where they have been cultivated : still, as
before stated, this valley is commonly understood to be a stock-
raising, fruit, and wool-growing country, — perhaps because that
kind of farming is at once easy and lucrative, and because so
good a market for fruit, beef, mutton, bacon, and dairy products
has always existed in the mines of this valley and California.
Eogue Eiver Valley during a period of about twelve years
was the seene of active and profitable placer-mining, after which
for an equal tej-m the mines were abandoned to the Chinese ;
but in later years mining has revived, and several companies
are realizing good retums from investments in mining ditches
and quartz leads. The other minerals known to exist in this
region are copper, cinnabar, lead, iron, coal, granite, limestone,
kaolin, and marble. The latter is of very fine quality, white,
exceedingly hard, and translucent.
Like every part of Oregon, this valley has its mineral springs,
its trout-streams, game, and abundance of pure soft water. No
local causes of disease exist here, and it is hard to conceive of a

WHAT I SAW IN SOUTHERN OREGON. 135
country more naturally beautiful and agreeable than this. The
forest is confined to the mountains and hill-sides, and is not so
dense as towards the Columbia.
Eogue Eiver Valley is divided into three counties, — Jackson,
Josephine, and Curry. Jaekson County was created January
12, 1852, and Josephine was eut off from it in January, 1856.
The name of the former does not refer, as one might suppose,
to the deity of good Democrats, but to Jackson the discoverer
of the raines on Jackson Creek, after whom Jacksonville, the
county-seat, Avas also named.
Jackson was the owner of a pack-train which transported
provisions to the mines, who being encamped at this place made
himself and the locality suddenly famous by his discovery. For
manj' years the town enjoyed a good trade ; but Jacksonville
lost its opportunity when it permitted the Oregon and California
Eailroad to pass by on the other side. Medford, a few miles to
the northeast, is on the railroad, and takes away the trade that
formerly went to Jacksonville, which is noAV trying to recover it
by building a branch road to Medford, whieh has about tw-o
thousand inhabitants.
Ashland, ono of the prettiest towns in Oregon, has, on the
contrary, profited bj' being upon the line of communication be
tween two great States, and is prosperous. It was settled in
1852 bj- J. A. CardweU, E, Emery, and David Hurley, who, being
from Ashland, Ohio, named the place after their old home. It
is located where Stuart Creek comes dancing down from the
foot-hills of the Cascades, offering abundance of water-power,
and where tho view over the whole of Eogue Eiver Valley is
delightsome. Its manufactures are luraber, fiour, and Avoollen
goods. The population of Ashland is about three thousand, and there
are over a dozen sraaller towns in the county-, the population
of which is fifteen thousand.
Josephine Countj', named after Josephine Eollins, daughter
of the discoverer of gold on the creek also named after her,
differs somew-hat from Jackson County in being at once more
broken and more near the soa, which circumstances modify its
climate and its resources. The latter have been chiefiy confined
to mining products, gold, silver, and copper being found here.

136 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
but only gold being profitably mined, on account of the inac
cessibility of this portion of Oregon previous to the opening of
railroad transportation. For the same reason, and owing also
to the shifting nature of the population, agriculture has been
neglected. Yet this is a lovely country, of grand mountains
and quiet, fertile valleys lying between grassy slopes, with oak
groves Uke old orchards dotting their sides, and open woods of
the noble sugar-pine, where the balmy air is laden with the
perfume of sweet violets, with abundant wild fruits, and flowers
in every sheltered nook. " It is," said a lady to me, " a paradise
of beauty, where, if one had one's friends, life would be wholly
delightful." Yet it is one of the most sparsely-settled portions
of the State, and its whole taxable property is valued at Uttle
over one million dollars. Kirbyville, founded in 1852 by one
Kirbj-, a prospector, was formerly the county-seat, but Grant's
Pass has superseded it. Besides this, there are eight or ten
other mining-camps, the whole population of whieh is not more
than three thousand.
About thirty miles south of Grant's Pass, in the Siskiyou
Mountains, are the recently discovered Josephine County Caves.
Elijah Davidson, of Williams Creek, was the discoverer, having
followed a bear to its lair in the lower of the two caves. They
are situated on the steep side of a mountain, and the last ten
miles of the thirty are over a narrow trail.
The entrance to either is about eight feet wide, and high
enough to admit a man standing upright. From the entrance
of the upper cave the floor inclines somewhat, and it soon be
comes necessary to descend by a ladder to a passage averaging
eight feet in diaraeter either way, but having many projections
and contractions in its course. The first chamber entered has a
height of ten feet, and its walls and roof are brilliant with
stalactites. The passage from chamber to chamber is often
extremely difficult. Pools of water are met with ; and many
passages reraain unexplored, days being required to transverse
all that are seen to exist.
The lower cave has no stalactite formations, but is filled with
immense rocks piled one upon another, requiring long ladders
to surmount. A streara of cold, clear water flows from it, and
also a stream of cold air.

WHAT I SAW IN SOUTHERN OREGON. 137
The devil is always credited with an interest in remarkable
places, Avhich is a direct compUment to his royal nibs ; at least
so it appears to me. The Josephine Caves are no exception to
the rule, but have in the upper one a Devil's Banquet Hall,
seventy-five bj' a hundred and fifty feet, and sixty feet in height.
It is decorated with huge rocks suspended from the ceiling ap
pearing ready to fall at a breath ; black cavities yawn in the
distanee ; impish shadows haunt unexplored recesses ; over tho
floor are spread rocks great and small ; and so, perhaps, after
all, it is well enough to resign the proprietorship of so unlovely
a place to His Satanic Majesty ; especially since there are bright
and dazzling chambers, and pools and water-falls, more to our
taste in other parts of this wonder-house of nature.
Curry County, named after George L. Curry, who was gov
ernor of Oregon when it was organized, — that is, in 1855, — is
the coast division of the Eogue Eiver Valley, and, having no
transportation, except by pack-train or wagon, over the difficult
mountain passes, has, although highly productive, made small
progress in population and development. Only a small portion
of the countj- is surveyed. Its valuation is placed at about one
million dollars, and its population at not more than two thou
sand. Lumbering and salmon-packing are its principal indus
tries. EUensburgh was made the county-seat in 1858.
Port Orford is the seaport of Curry County and the whole
Eogue Eiver Vallej-, so far as Oregon is concerned ; although
Crescent City in California was the actual port in use in early
mining times, supplies being carried from that harbor over the
mountains to Yreka, and again over the Siskiyou Eange into
this valley by mule-trains. This picturesque feature of mining
life has disappeared, when at the head of a procession of long-
eared, neat-footed burden-bearers the " bell-mare" tinkled her
silvery commands to her followers as they climbed the rocky
steeps or wound through devious mountain defiles. Not in
frequently the cloud of dust raised by the train gave informa
tion to the dusky foe, and the ambush was prepared where the
trail led down a steep grade through a narrow pass, or across a
stream that must be forded. There the unlucky muleteers were
put to death or to fiight and the train confiscated.
When the Pacific Mail Steamship Company used to run

138 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
steamers to Portland under their contract with the government,
they were required to carry the mail to Gardiner on tho Umpqua
Eiver, but, one of their steamers being in danger of being lost
on the bar. Captain Tiehenor was instructed to look for another
port on the coast where passengers and mail for Southern
Oregon could be safely landed. In June, 1851, he put ashore
at Pwt Orford nine pioneers under the command of J. M. Kirk-
patrick, together with arms, tools, and provisions, and proceeded
on his voyage, leaving the party to raake sueh improvements as
they eould.
The Indians gathered near in alarraing numbers, and the
men fortified themselves on a high rock that sloped to the sea,
having dragged up to their fort a four-pound cannon. On
the second day a war-dance was held by the natives whose
" heath" was being thus invaded. After working themselves
up to a proper degree of courage the warriors advanced on the
works, the foremost one endeavoring to wrest a gun from the
hands of Kirkpatriek, who instead of giving up his arms seized
a firebrand and touched off the cannon, the charge doing execu
tion upon six of the assailants. The Indians sent a shower of
arrows among the white raen, wounding four of the nine. The
skirmish lasted about fifteen minutes, during which six more
Indians were killed, when they retreated. The party was then
unable to perform the most important part of their duty, which
was to explore a road to the interior, and after five days, the
enemy appearing to be preparing for another attaek, whieh they
were not in a condition to resist, they watched for an opportu
nity and took to flight under cover of the night and the forest.
On the Coquille Eiver, which, with (/Oos Eiver, they discovered,
they were near being confronted by a village of Indians, but
avoided them, and were in hiding two days, with only some
berries for food. Arrived at the Cowan Eiver, the natives
assisted them to cross, and on the eighth day they reached the
settlements on the Umpqua.
The "Seagull" on her next trip to Portland called at Port
Orford and landed forty men, who, finding the plaee deserted,
and evidences of a struggle manifest, believed the first party to
be all killed, and so reported. But the steamer on the return
voyage brought thirty recruits from Portland, headed by one

WHAT I SAW IN SOUTHERN OREGON. 139
T' Vault, a man famous among the pioneers of Oregon. This
T'Vault headed a corapany to explore a road iuto the Eogue
Eiver settleraents east of the raountains, and iu August thoy set
out ; but, becoming discouraged by the hardships of the trip, all
but nine of the company returned to Port Orford. The remain
der kept on, but finally became lost and entangled in the tropical
jungles of the Coast Eange, coming at last to the Coquille, which
one of the party, who had been in the first flight to the Umpqua,
recognized. This showed to them that they were nearing the
eoast instead of the valley, and determined thom to keep on to
the Umpqua settlements. While crossing the Coquille they were
attacked, and again four of the nine were killed. The remain
ing five, including T'Vault, reached Umpqua after six days of
wandering, subsisting on berries in tbe woods and raussels on
tho coast. All were more or less wounded. Oue Hodden, vvho
had been in the first fight, escaped with slight injury. In run
ning from the furious attaek of tbe ludians the party became
separated. A young man named Williams, whom we met at
Ashland, while being j)ursued was shot through by an arrow
whieh was broken off in his abdomen, where it remained four
years before it came out, without surgery. The history of
Southern Oregon is a nearlv endless chronicle of tbese personal
confiicts with the nati\-e nobilitj' of the country.
I confess in this public manner that I am not a worshipper of
the Indian, and I deelare that, even admitting one Alessandro to
be possible (which he is not), he would be one adorable character
among a thousand devils of his race. Yet there are examples of
a rude courage, partaliing of the nature of frantic bravery, which
one must admire. One of these savage heroes was Eogue Eiver
John, a chief of that tribe. After the conquest of the Indians,
and tbeir confinement on a reservation in Northern Oregon, he
was banished to Alcatraz Island, in San Francisco Bay, for
stirring up rebelUon araong his people. On the waj' to San
Francisco, when the stearaship was off Crescent City, he, witb
his son, attempted to take the ship, with the intention of swim
ming ashore and regaining their former homes. One or two
persons were wounded in the affray, but the chief's son suffered
most, receiving a wound in the struggle which caused the loss
of a leg. They were put in irons and were captives at Alcatraz

140 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
for some time, but finally were permitted to return to the reserva^
tion, where the chief died a few years later.
Port Orford has been selected for a harbor of refuge for this
part of the coast, and an appropriation of one hundred and fifty
thousand dollars has been secured to commence the work. CuiTy
County is well supplied with game and fish. Its splendid cedar
forests are worth more than gold-mines to whomsever will eon-
vert them into lumber. Cedars from three to eight feet in diam
eter and with not a limb on them for a hundred feet grow here.
Here sea-fogs keep vegetation forever green, and miasmatic
diseases are unknown. The residents of the valleys would Uke
to live upon the coast, were it not for the mountains whieh
divide it from their fertile prairies. Yet it is by these mountains
the cliniate is rendered what it is, —partially confining the fogs
and winds to the coast, making this section cool and moist,
and the interior warm and drj'.
EUensburgh, situated at the mouth of Eogue Eiver, is famous
for stirring scenes in the Indian war of 1855-56. It was at the
mouth of Eogue Eiver that a camp of volunteers, a company of
settlers, and the Indian agent, Ben. Wright, were surprised and
massacred. Wright was killed, and his heart cut out and eaten
by his Indian wife and hor people. The reason given by this
unchristianized Eamona for this repast was that her husband
had a. big (good and brave) heart, and that (on the accepted
principle that a part helps a part, as we saj- when we eat calves'
brains), herself and tribe would be made more courageous by it.
There are various myths extant about this same Ben. Wright.
By some he is represented as an illiterate, bad man, with a
record shocking to civilized sensibilities. It is said he deliber
ately poisoned a large number of Pit Eiver and Modoc Indians
whom he had invited to a council at Modoe or Tule Lake. By
others he is spoken of as a sort of Spanish caballero, riding a
glossy black horse, wearing the fringed buckskin suit, red sash,
broad-brimmed hat, and jingling spurs of the gente de razon of
California. It is said he had handsome features, fine dark eyes,
and wore his black hair long. Investigation seems to prove
that he was a Philadelphian by birth, of a good family, who
was drawn to the Pacific coast by the gold-mines, who dug gold
on the Klamath Eiver and about Jacksonville. In 1852 there

WHAT I SAW IN SOUTHERN OREGON, 141
was a great slaughter of immigrants by the Indians about Tule
Lake, and, a company being raised to go to the assistance of a
beleaguered train the handsome and popular Philadelphian was
chosen captain. The immigrants were relieved, and the volun
teers under Wright patrolled the dangerous part of the road
for several weeks until all had passed. Manj' harrowing inci
dents were connected with the murder and captivity of woraen,
which stirred the raanly blood of Wright and his comrades,
and doubtless the quality of their mercy would have been
rather strained had it been appealed to. But it was not. The
Modoes had laid a trap to cateh the volunteers and prevent
their getting out of the countrj-, which being discovered, Wright
turned the tables on his would-be slayers, and prevented their
getting back to their fastnesses in the Lava Beds.
Butthis had nothing whatever to do with his death a few years
later. The government had appointed him to act as its agent
with the Chotcoe and other coast tribes, and he was doing all
any agent eould do for them when they killed him. The settlers
who escaped the massacre at the mouth of Eogue Eiver took
refuge in a block-house erected a short time before, except a
fugitive who escaped to Port Orford, where a corporal's guard
of troops were stationed, whom the Port Orford people would
not permit to leaA-e had they so wished. Word had to be sent
to San Francisco, where troops were arriving on their way
to protect the interior of Eogue Eiver Valley. In the month
whieh intervened between the eomraencement of the siege of
the block-house and the arrival of the troops, great privation
and suffering were endured, and several . lives Avere lost in
making sorties to procure potatoes from a field, or milk from a
cow for the starving children.
In the mean time and before the army reached Crescent
City, a part of the few inhabitants of that plaee, commiser
ating the condition of the Eogue Eiver men, if living, deter
mined to discover their needs, and reinforce them, if possible.
They proceeded up the eoast as far as Pistol Eiver, where they
were attacked by the Pistol Indians and forced to defend them
selves in a hastily-constructed log-pen, where Colonel Buchanan
found them when he came marching up the same trail, and
soundly berated them for meddling in military matters, of

142 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
which they knew nothing ! It is not singular, everything con
sidered, that Indian philanthropists are so rare among the
border people.
The countj- of Coos, on the coast, is not a part of either the
Umpqua or the Eogue Eiver Valley-s. It is a basin drained
by the Coquille and Coos Elvers, which have many tributaries,
and when woll developed will prove to be one of the Avealthiest
divisions of Oregon. Coos is not an Indian name, the natives
calling their river Cowes. I have already spoken of the dis-
coverj- of this region by the fugitives from Port Orford. Cape
Arago, at the entrance to the bay at the mouth of Coos Eiver,
was named by Spanish navigators, who probably also saw the
Coquille, for they described it felicitously, comparing it to the
rivers of Aragon for beauty, and also for similarity of the trees
and shrubs growing upon its banks.
Soon after the Port Orford affair, in 1852, a small schooner,
bound to the Umpqua Eiver, entered Coos Bay by raistake, and
remained there for several weeks, looking for the settlements,
and in great fear of the Indians. Their plight was discovered
by the Umpqua Indians, who informed the inhabitants of Gar
diner, when thej- sent a pilot to bring the voj'agers to their
intended haven.
In 1853, P. B. Marple, of Jackson County, explored the Co
quille Valley, and organized a company of forty raen to settle
on Coos Bay. Gold-mining on the- coast began soon after at
Eandolph, near the mouth of Coquille, and a seaport town grew
up rapidly on Coos Bay, called Empire City, which became tho
seat of goA-ernment of Coos County, organized in Deceraber,
1853, and is the port of entry for the district of Southern
Oregon. It has a small population, while Marshfield, four miles
farther up the bay, and founded a Uttle later, by J. C. Tolman,
is a plaee of considerable importance, with a thriving trade.
Between the two is the lumbering establishment of North Bend ;
and on the river, above Marshfield, are the towns of Coos City,
Utter Citj-, Coaledc, Sumner, and Fairview.
Coal was very early discovered on Coos Bay, and has been
worked continuously for many years, employing a line of steam-
vessels to carry it to San Francisco. The quality of some late
discoveries in coal is claimed by experts to be of a verj' high

AVHAT I SAW IN SOUTHERN OREGON. 143
order. One analysis gives : fixed carbon, 47.23 ; volatile matter,
42.17; water, 2.30; ash, 8.25; sulphur, .60. Its coking capac
ity is 54.46. Others were nearly as good, and the quantity is
practically inexhaustible.
Coal-mining is the raost iraportant industry of this region,
lumbering the second, and ship-building tho third, the ship
yard at North Bend being the largest in the State. Many fine
vessels, finished inside with the beautiful cabinet-woods of this
section of Southern Oregon, have been launched from this yard,
and have assisted to build up the fortunes of tbeir owners and
the wealth of the countiy.
Farming has not been much followed in Coos County, its
market being chiefly supplied from California. This condition
of agriculture arises from two causes, — namely, the densitj' of
the forest about tbe baj-, requiring great labor and expense to
remove it and prepare the ground, and the movable character
of the people employed by corporations, tbe raajority of the pop
ulation being of this and the merchant class. Yet five acres
of this rich, loamy soil, if farmed to vegetables and small fruits,
would support a family in comfort. Tbe mild, moist climate,
furnishing feed all the year round, and the amplitude of pastur
age offered by unoccupied lands should make this a superior
dairy country. Dairying is followed to some extent, but not as
it should be. Fruit does well in this region, and fruit, both green
and dried, is one of the exports frora Coos Baj-.
The entrance to this harbor has not been regarded as favor
able to commerce, on account ofthe shifting nature of the sands
on the bar, and the insufficient depth of water. Accordingly,
Congress was petitioned for aid in reraoving tho obstructions to
trade, the cost of tbe work required being estimated at about
two and a half millions, of whieh two hundred and thirteen thou
sand seven hundred and fiftj'-six dollars have been appropriated,
and one hundred and ninety-seven thousand four hundred and
sixty-five dollars and eighty-one cents expended. This amount
has been applied to the construction of ajettj', which, although
corapleted for a distance of only seventeen hundred and sixty-
one feet, has sensibly- improved the bar, on which water enough is
found for vessels drawing over fifteen feet. The work planned,
it is expected, wiU make a good and permanent channel.

144 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
The average tonnage of vessels entering Coos Bay has been
300 tons. During the year ending June 30, 1890, the arrivals
were 354; the net tonnage of whieh was 89,188, and the gross
tonnage 117,726. The river and bay steamers are twelve in
number, and their gross tonnage 740. Five tugs are employed,
with a tonnage of 620, gross. The total exports of Coos Bay
for the year ending June 30 amounted to 221,329.1 tons, value
$1,992,903; and the imports to 18,000 tons, value $1,175,600;
leaving a balance in favor of the port of $817,303.
Coos Bay has hitherto been reached only by small' sea-going
vessels, or by mountain roads, with whieh the storms of winter
dealt severely, leaving them unfit for travel the greater part of
the year. The Scottsburg road frora Drain's was the one
usually taken. At the former place the stage was abandoned
for a small steamer to Gardiner, or to the mouth of the river
(I took the mail-carrier's small boat from Gardiner to the coast),
whence a beach-wagon conveyed passengers twenty miles to
the north side of Coos Bay, where they were met by a steamer
and taken across to Empire City. The beach ride is wearisome,
with the .perpetual roll of the broad-tire wheels over the un-
elastic wet sand, and the constant view of a restless waste of
water on one hand, with dry, drifting sand between us and the
mountains on the other, varied only with patches of marsh and
groups of scraggy pines at intervals.
All this is soon to be changed. Coos Bay is to bo reached by
rail from Drain's ; and as lovely and genial a spot of earth as
one could desire is to be made easily accessible. The prodigality
with whieh nature has adorned the hill-sides hereabouts with
the elegant rhododendron, the blue spirea, nutmeg, myrtle, and
other trees and shrubs famed in the poetry of the Adriatic, was
a constant joy to me while I remained here. The pleasure
derived from it was like that of coming upon a volume of the
odes of Callimachus or a painting by a master in an out-of-the-
way place.
One of the immediate results of the changed prospects of
Coos Bay is the founding of the town of Glasgow, on a fine site
commanding a view of the bay and of the bar at its mouth.
A wharf two thousand feet long has been constructed, and ex
tends over a bed of Eastern oysters which were planted there

WHAT I SAW IN SOUTHERN OREGON. 145
years ago, and almost forgotten, but which are now of good size.
MiUs and other improvements are going up at this plaee.
The CoquiUe Valley consists of tracts of fertile land on the
main river and its branches, aggregating a hundred miles in
length by one to three in width. Its population is moro agri
cultural than that on Coos Baj-, and has made greater improve
ments in farms, Coqiiillo City is situated on a bend of the
river about twelve miles from tbe .ocean, and is a pretty town
of about ono thousand inhabitants. Without having a harbor
of much csnsequence, Coquille has maintained for many years
a coasting trade in A-essels drawing from seven to nine feet.
Steamers run from Bandon, at tho mouth of the river, to Co
quille City, a distanee of twentj--three miles, and return, dailj-.
There are about a dozen schooners in the coasting trfide, and
four river boats in the trade of the Coquille, The exports are
chiefly of white-cedar lumber, for which this region is famed.
The import of general merchandise last j-ear was three thousand
five hundred tons.
The goA-ernraent has made sev-eral appropriations for the
improvement of Coquille Eiver and bar, bj- means of jetties at
the entrance, and clearing the river of impediments to navi
gation in the form of rocks and snags, A depth of ten feet at
low water has been obtained in the channel, and a greater depth
will yet be reached. To secure this result the people have
largely contributed, both in money and labor,
Eailroad connection wilh Eoseburg is now promised, and lands
all along the line, where formerlj' a single nearly impassable
raud road gave outlet to the interior, are being rapidlj' taken
up. In a few years this valley will be known as one of tho
choicest of raany choice sections of Southern Oregon. Thero
are now about twenty settleraents in the whole Coos Baj-
region. The scenery along the route frora Coquille to Eoseburg pos
sesses all the charras peculiar to the Coast Mountains, and En
chanted Prairie, the name of one of the valleys on the oast side
of the range, convej-s no sense of bombast to the beholder.
Tho river cuts deeplj- into the mountains from its source in
beautiful Camas Valley, the road approaching the edge ol' per
pendicular cliffs of aAve-inspiring height. From Camas, the
10

146 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
Eoseburg road soon emerges into the Umpqua Valley, the dis
tanee by this route from Coos Bay being about forty railes.
What further remains to be said of Southern Oregon wiU be
found under the specific heads of geology, mineralogy, mining,
botany, ete.

CHAPTEE XL
ABOUT Oregon's inland empire.
The whole extent of country, lying east of tho Cascades in
Oregon, consists of immense plateaux, crossed frora the north
east to the southwest bj' the Blue Mountains, from which numer
ous spurs put out in various directions. The best land in Bast
Oregon lies along near the base of this transverse chain of moun
tains, and in the valleys of the streams flowing frora it on either
side, the upper portion of these valleys being invariably the
best. All the timber of the countiy — fir, pine, cedar, spruce,
and larch — grows on the high mountain ridges, except the more
fringes of cotton-wood and willow which border the streams.
The Blue Mountains constitute a wall between the Columbia
Eiver Basin, to the nortb, and the Klamath Basin to the south ;
hence all the rivers of Bast Oregon head in these mountains,
and flow into the Columbia and Snake Eivers, only excepting
those in the Klamath Basin, which run south and empty
into marshy lakes or sinks. Along these rivers and about the
lakes there are large tracts of excellent land suitable for farm
ing. Subtracting from the whole area of East Oregon what may
be called tbe valley lands, the reraainder is high, rolling prairie,
with a considerable portion of Avaste, volcanic country in the
central and Avestern divisions. The country- raay be considered
well watered throughout, as the streams are nuraerous, and
water is to be found by stock at all seasons of the j-ear. Owing,
however, to the elevation of the plains above the beds of the
principal streams, irrigation cannot be effected over a large
portion of it, unless by artesian weUs or by conducting water
frora the raountains. Such are the general features of that por
tion of Oregon lying east of the Cascade Mountains.

-A.BOUT OREGON'S INLAND EMPIRE. 147
Attention was first draAvn to the fertilitj-of East Oregon bj' tho
population that rushed to the mines in 1861 and the three j'ears
immediatelj' following. It became necessaiy to provide for the
consumption of a large class of persons who dealt onlj- in gold.
The high prices they paid, and were willing to pay, for the
necessary articles of subsistence, stimulated others to attempt
tho raising of grain and vegetables. The success which at
tended their efforts soon lod to the taking up and cultivating of
all the vallej- lands in tho neighborhood of mines, and finali j-
to experiments with grain-crops on the uplands, where also the
farmers met with unexpected success. Tho nature of the soils on
the south side of the Columbia is light, ashen, and often strongly
alkaline on the j)lains, sandy and claj--loam at the base of the
mountains, and richly alluvial in the bottoms, whore it is often,
too, mixed with alkali. It is discovered that bn tho highest
uplands and tops of ridges there is a mixture of clay with
loam, whieh accounts for tbe manner in which wheat crops
endure the natural diyness of the climate in the growing season.
It would be difficult to generalize about East Oregon. The
tourist who enters the State by the usually travelled routes
would almost certainly receive a bad impression, because the
longer railroad lines, in order to shorten their routes, avoid the
better sections of the .country and run through the worse ones.
It is only by taking the branch lines, constructed later, that the
traveller learns to reverse his first judgraent in regard to this
portion of the State. It might be added, it is only by actual
experiment that an Eastern farmer acquires confidence in tbe
possibilities of a country so different in appearance from any
with which he is acquainted.
AU along the Colurabia, from The Dalles to the boundary be
tween Oregon and Washington, there is a strip of sandy land,
frora five to ten miles in width, which is not cultivable, — at least,
not without an abundance of water, — and which is a torment
to the traveller and a serious trial to the railroad company,
whose traek it coA-ers with drifts in many places.
For convenience the country may be said to be divided into
sandy land, agricultural land, and mountain land, and stiU there
remains the necessity of more special description, and to include
desert land. The mountainous portions furnish timber— pine.

148 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
fir, spruce, cedar, tamarack, and juniper — for lumber aud fuel,
and in summer pasturage for cattle and sheep. There are prob-
ablj- half a million sheep in the Blue Mountains everj- year,
from June to November. Thero are the saw-mills which man
ufacture lumber, which, with shingles, fencing, and fire-wood, is
shipped bj- railroad or hauled by teams to the prairies. Unlike
the mountains of West Oregon, these are traversable almost
anywhere, besides affording game, fish, and pure, ice-cold w-ater,
features which make them a pleasant retreat in summer from
the heat of the open country.
The so-caUed desert is that high, rocky portion lying along
the base of the Blue Mountains in the central part of East
Oregon, covered with sago, and blotched with frequent dark
piles of basalt, wbere for miles and miles no water is found.
Yet it is a fact that wherever the artemisia grows ranklj' other
vegetation will flourish if water be applied. Water is the one
great want of the "deserts" of the Northwest. The sceneiy
of this rugged portion of the State is peculiar. Beginning with
this " scabby" — a new word for basaltic out-croppings — land,
the countiy rises into ridges of loosely piled rock, gray with
lichens, and crow-ned with stunted junipers. Now and then
occurs a lake of alkaline waters, but more frequently the thirsty
traveller is deceived bj- the mirage, whioh is a feature of this
high and dry atmosphere, into thinking he sees in the distance
what nature calls out for, and hastens towards it only to be dis
appointed. Bej-ond all is the mountain mass, in Avhieh rise the
rivers flowing north through the caflons of such a depth as to
preclude the possibility of diverting them to the uses of culti
vation. Frost, too, comes early in this elevated region, which
the Creator has reserved to keep pure the air we breathe and
the thoughts we think.
Everywhere one goes in this middle land, between the
Cascade and the .Blue Eanges, the irapression is received of
newness, — I do not mean of men's work, but of God's work.
The country is not finished. The soil is still being formed upon
the bed-rock of the Columbia Basin, which in some places is
yet uncovered. In other localities it is from five to twenty
feet deep. Wherever it has sueh depth it is remarkably pro
ductive, for there is no better soil than that formed by the dis-

ABOUT Oregon's inland empire. 149
integration of the basalt and refinement of the other volcanic
matter poured out over this countiy in the distant ages. One
may still discover evidences that it was at one time a sea-bed;
that later it wa3 ground by monstrous icebergs ; and that later
still it was OA-erflow-ed with lava. Here stalked the mammoth
beside lakes now dried u-p, whose sands yet sepulchre his bones,
with those of other extinct animals. It is a countrj' full of won
ders, which should never be heedlessly- passed over, but should
be the favorite study-ground of science.
East Oregon contains fifty-eight thousand square miles, and
is divided into counties, fourteen in number, which often com
prise the vallej- of a river. Union County, for instance, occupies
the Grand Eond Valley, a circular grassy plain, long celebrated
for its beautj- and fertilitj-. Here, in the early times of overland
immigration bj- wagons, the traveller found food for cattle and
rest for hiraself in these delightful meadows, after the long, ex
hausting march over the hot, sterile sands of Snake Eiver. This
valley is thirty miles in diameter, well watered, and verj- pro
ductive in all the cereals, fruits, and vegetables of the temperate
zone. A considerable amount of the land is subject to overflow,
which makes it greatly esteemed as grass-producing. Timber is
also conveniently- near on the encircling mountains, where mills
are working up tho fir, pine, spruce, and tamarack forest into
lumber. Union City, the county-seat, was settled in 1862 during the
mining excitement in East Oregon ^nd Idaho, but is uot now as
large as it was at tbat period. La Grande is the principal town,
with tw-o thousand inhabitants. It also dates back to" the six
ties; but wben tbe O. E. and N. Eailroad approached to within
a mile without touching it, the sleepj' old town arose and shook
itself, and removed its business houses to the line ofthe railroad,
where its growth finally reunited it to the older portion. There
are a dozen saw-mills within a feAv miles of the town, tho lumber
being floated down by means of flumes to the shipping points,
this raethod being found to be more economical and safer than
driving down tho logs to be sawed here, although in some local
ities this can be done. A part of the car-shops of the O, E.
and N. Company have been removed from The Dalles to La
Grande. A sash- and door-factor j', a creamery, two brick-kilns.

150 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
a brewery, and a grain-elevator are among the industrial re
sources of the place. There Avere shipped from this point in
1888 one thousand ear-loads of lumber and railroad suppilies, and
one thousand car-loads of live-stock. Tbe mitieral region of
Baker County is supj)Ued chiefly from this direction.
La Grande has a bank, with a capital of sixty thousand dol
lars and deposits averaging seventy--five thousand dollars. It
has water- works, and an electric-light plant. The public schools
are good, and a large brick college building is standing idle for
want of an endowment, — the Blue Mountain Universitj', — but
the Methodists are about assuming charge. The Union Pacific
has completed a branch from La Grande to Elgin, twenty-two
miles northeast of here. It is to be extended to Wallowa.
Wallowa Countj- is comprised in the Wallowa Valley, this
river being a branch of the Grand Eond Eiver, which bounds
the county on the northwest, and having several branches of
its own, with small fertile valleys. This region is known as the
Tyrol of the Northwest, its average elevation being two thou
sand fiv-e hundred feet, and some of its lesser plateaux reaching
four thousand. This is the valley for the possession of which
Chief Joseph went upon the war-path in 1877. Its principal
town and county-seat is naraed Joseph, in honor of this chief.
It has alreadj' put on civilization, and is prepared, with news
paper, hotels, and churches, to utilize its resources, agricultural
and mineral, and its abundance of water-power.
Umatilla is another county contained in the vallej' of that
name. The reservation of the Cayuse, WaUa Walla, and
Umatilla' Indians occupies a considerable portion of this county-,
probabl J- one-third, whieh altogether has an area of about six
thousand square miles. Of tbe remaining tAvo-thirds, about
half is reckoned as agricultural land, and the balance as grazing
land of the very best qualitj'. Water is plenty and exeellent;
but timber, as already indicated, is found only on the mountains.
It is bounded on the east by the Blue Mountains, in whieh the
Walla Walla and Umatilla Eivers have their sources. Tbe wheat
output of this county in some years is as much as sixty thou
sand tons.
Pendleton, the county-town, on the river, and on the 0. E.
and N. Eailway, is also the terminus of a branch of the Oreo-ori

ABOUT Oregon's inland empire. 151
and Washington Territoiy Eailroad, or of what is known as tho
" Hunt Sj'stem," which connects it with the Northern Pacific
System, giving it access by two trans-continental roads.
It has a population of four thousand, good pubUc buildings,
and the best hotel in Oregon out of Portland,— the Holel Pen
dleton, — besides several others of less proportions. There are
two flouring-mills, foundry and machine-shops, sash- and door-
factory and planing-mill, city water-works, telephone connection
with everj- partof Bast Oregon, three banks, seven churches, good
eommon school, a Protestant and a Catholic academy, and nu
merous substantial and costly business houses, not the least
imposing of which is the office of the East Oregonian newspaper.
The Umatilla Eeservation will soon be open for settlement,
and will add one hundred and thirtj--five thousand acres of the
best land in East Oregon to the area of Umatilla County cul
tivable lands, and will greatlj' increase the wealth of Pendleton,
which lies just on the boundary.
This prosperous town was founded in 1868, and named after
George H. Pendleton. Here resides a descendant of that Alex
ander McKay who was on board Astor's vessel, the "Tonquin,"
which was destroyed by the Indians of the Washington eoast,
in 1812, and every- soul with hor murdered. His son Thomas,
then about fourteen y-oars of age, was left at Astoria when the
" Tonquin" sailed on this exjiedition, and so escaped the fate of
his father. Subsequently he came under the guardianship of
Dr. McLoughlin, who raarried bis raother, the widow of Alex
ander McKay. Thoraas McKay was a noted raan among the
fur companies of the Northwest — a brave man, and a witty one.
He married, first, a Chinook woman, and had three sons ; married
again, and had a son and daughter. The eldest of these chil
dren was William C. McKay, who was educated in the East
and studied medicine. He is the physician on the Umatilla
Eoservation. His half-brother, Donald McKay, distinguished
himself as a leader of scouts in the Snake and Modoc Indian
wars, and both men have rendered important service in the
struggles of the early settlers of the country with savagery.
Weston, Centreviile, Adams, Milton, and several other small
but thriving towns are in Umatilla County. The old town of
Umatilla Landing, on the Columbia, was in the days of mining

152 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
excitement in Boise and Owyhee a lively place, but its glory
has departed with the boats of the Oregon Steam Navigation
Company. Morrow Countj-, bordering Umatilla on the west, is drained by
Willow Creek and branehes. It has tho reputation of being the
banner county for stock, and a great wool-producing district.
Even the sandy belt along the Columbia is said to furnish ex
cellent range for cattle in the winter season, the grass growing-
well araong the sage brush. The county was named after J. L.
Morro AV, a member of the Legislature when it was organized in
1885. Heppner is the county-seat of Morro vv, and was named in
honor of Henry- Heppner, who served the county in its infancy
by securing mail connection^ and postal service. A railroad
connects it with the O. E. and N. line. It has four churches, a
public-school building, a newspaper, a bank, a fiouring-raill, and
various business firras. The wool-clip of 1890 delivered at
Heppner will, it- is said, exceed three million pounds.
Gilliam County, next Avest of Morrow, is a small district,
AA'atored by several small affluents of John Day Eiver. It em
braces a variety of surface, and has a greater A'ariety of resources
than some larger counties. The basaltic formation, so universal
elsewhere, disaj>pear8 in the southern portion of Gilliam County,
and, instead of lava, sandstone conglomerates, shales, and other
formations of the carboniferous era take its plaee. Beds of coal
have been discovered which promise to be of great value; also
coal-oil and iron.
Arlington, on the Columbia Eiver, was the county-seat, whieh
has been removed to Condon. FossU, situated on the head of
a smaU stream south of the basalt, as mentioned above, is so
named on account of the remarkable fossils found in the neigh
borhood by Professor Condon.
The olher towns in the county are Contention, Pletts, Clem,
Matney, Lone Eock, Olex-, Idea, Eockville, Blaloek, and Willows.
This county was named in remembrance of the pioneer, Colonel
Gilliam, who was killed near WiUow Creek by the accidental
discharge of a gun while going to the relief of the volunteers,
in the Cayuse Indian war of 1847.
Wasco County was organized in 1854, when it comprised the

ABOUT Oregon's inl-a.nd empire. 153
Avhole of Eastern Oregon, It has been divided and subdivided
until it is now contained between Des Chutes Eiver on the east
and the Cascade Mountains on the west, with a length from
north to south of about sixty miles. A great nuraber of streams
rising in Mount Hood make this elevated region one of tho
choicest portions of Bast Oregon for grazing, as it is for fruit-
raising and agriculture. Water-power is abundant, and timber
and wool also, which sbould suggest factories in this region.
The Dalles, whieh is the county-seat, has been spoken of in
another place. Hood Eiver, also on the Columbia, and the O.
E. and N. Eailroad, is one of the popular resorts of tbe people
from the west side. A Portland companj- has recently pur
chased a tract overlooking tho Columbia, with a grand view of
Mount Adams and White Salmon Eiver, on the Washington side,
Avith a lake in the immediate neighborhood, and other charms,
including pure air and good fishing, and here is to be erected a
comfortable hotel for visitors. The namo of the new resort is
Idlewilde. There are a dozen other towns and post-offices in
the county.
The latest division of Wasco County was in 1889, when that
part lying between Des Chutes and John Daj' Eivers was cut
off to make Sherman County, whieh honors General Sherman,
It consists of high rolling land, on whieh excellent crops are
raised, including the cereals, sorghum, fruit, and vegetables. It
has a number of towns and about two thousand inhabitants.
Crook County, south of Wasco, was named in honor of Gen
eral Crook, and shares with Wasco the trade of the Warm
Springs Indian Eoservation, where reside the warriors who aided
the general in his campaign against their old eneraies, the Snakes,
and who took part in the Modoc troubles. Crook County was
organized in 1882. It is divided, Uke Wasco, by Des Chutes
Eiver, and watered amply by Crooked Eiver and its affluents.
It contains a good deal of broken basaltic land, but is neverthe
less a good stock eountry, with many small agricultural valleys.
Prineville, the county-seat, enjoys a good trade. A wagon-road
to Eugene runs down the McKenzie fork of the Wallamet.
Although not on the main line of the Oregon Pacific, it will
have a branch. This road is laid out on the lands of the WU-
laraette VaUey and Cascade Mountain Military Wagon-Eoad

154 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
Company, which secured an immense grant upon the pretence
of constructing a public highway across the central portion of
East Oregon, but which forfeited its franchise. The two cora
panies are contesting their claims in the courts, and meanwhile
the land in question is withheld from sale. There haA-e been three
of these militarj' road projects across East Oregon, the other two
being The Dalles Military Eoad and the Oregon Central Military
Eoad, in the southern part of the State, neither having any just
claira to the lands obtained frora the govemment by misrepre
sentation and poUtical jugglery. The Oregon Pacific will, it is
expected, obtain title to the lands in dispute, when no doubt its
affairs will brighten. The road passes southeast through Crook
and Harney Counties, and makes its way to Snake Eiver through
the eaiion of Malheur Eiver, which, being very rockj' and very
tortuous, has demanded a heavy outlaj' in labor and capital.
When completed it will work a wonderful transformation in
this now remote region.
Grant County, occupying the central portion of Bast Oregon,
and consisting of a series of high plateaux, is chiefly given over
to sheep and cattle ranges. There aro considerable tracts of
pine, fir, and tamarack, and numerous smaU valleys where grain
and fruit yield abundantly. This county forraerly contained a
greater area than any other in Oregon, being two hundred railes
in length and ninety in breadth, but has recentlj' been divided
so as to include only the eountry drained by John Day Eiver.
Canyon City is the county-seat. It was first settled in 1862,
and incorporated in 1864, when it had two thousand five hun
dred inhabitants and was the centre of great mining aetivity.
It has to-day a population of eight hundred, having suffered the
decline to which raining towns are subject, and having been
devastated by fire. It is, however, having a revival of progress,
to which it has been stimulated by the prospect of railroad
connection with the 0. E. and N. line,
Harney County, the territory cut off from Grant, is one hun
dred and thirty-five miles in extent from north to south, and
ninety from west to east. It contains the Harney and Malheur
Lakes, and the Christmas or Warner Lakes, of which we have
all read in Fremont's explorations and other government reports.
All are more or less impregnated with alkali. Geologically they

ABOUT Oregon's inland empire. 155
are supposed to bo the last vestiges of that ancient sea which
once covered this inter-montane region, around whose shores
und in whose sands are found the fossil remains of prehistoric
fauna and flora. Their modern history is closely connected with
campaigns against the marauding tribes of Northern Nevada,
whom General Crook finally vanquisbed.
.Uariiey Valley contains about two hundred thousand acres
of excellent land, of whicb forty thousand is a natural meadow,
whieh is dotted over with numberless cattle and horses. The
entrance to this valley is a surprise, after the ruggedness of the
Blue Mountains. It is OA-al in shape, and lies encircled by ranges,
some near, some distant, which enclose it like the rim ofa bowl.
The iDopulalion is eighteen hundred and fifty, of whom about
Iavo hundred are Indians and Chinese.
Harney City, on the north side, near the site of old Camp
Harney, was formerly the countj'-soat. This has been removed
to Burns, fourteen miles south, on Silvio's Eiver, near the cross
ing of the Oregon Pacific, a new and growing town of five hun
dred inhabitants, and tbe most promising at present of any in
this region. Saddle Butte and Silver City are two other embrj-o
towns, witb little to support them at present.
East of Harnej- is Malheur County, which is in the same cat
egory as to isolation, — onlj' a wagon-road connecting it with
Grant or Harney. It is about one hundred and forty-four by
sixty miles in extent, with but a small portion populated, in
the fork of tbe Malheur and Snake Eivers. It is watered in the
southern jDart by tho Owyhee Eiver, and has Snake Eiver on
its eastern boundarj-.
The Oregon Short Line (Union Pacific) through Idaho crosses
the Snake Eiver near the northern boundary, and thus affords a
means of transportation for this ond of the countj-. The Ore
gon Pacific follows the course of the Malheur Eiver to or near
its mouth, where it crosses into Idaho, and when completed will
run to Boise City. The county was named from the river, which
received ils name (meaning unfortunate) from the earlj' French
explorers, who mct with disaster of some kind upon its banks.
The surface of the country is high, and the soil dry, but it is
^ good grazing region. The largest horse-farm in the United
States is located at Ontario, on the Snake Eiver, one company

156 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
owning ten thousand horses of iraproved blood. Vale is the
county-seat, besides whieh there are several other settlements.
Immediately north of Malheur is Baker County, named after
General E. D. Baker, who feU at Ball's Bluff. It embraces the
valley of Burnt Eiver, and shares with Union County the
valley of Powder Eiver, whose soil, according to a miner from
that region, is so fertile that, " if a crowbar should be left stick
ing in the ground overnight, it would be found in the raorning
to have sprouted tenpennj' nails."
But Baker County is raore celebrated for its mineral than its
agricultural products, about half ils population being engaged in
mining. There are several large lumber-mills in the county,
and the exports are chiefiy lumber, wool, and live stock, although
marble, limestone, and granite are abundant, and fruit is marketed
to some extent.
Baker Citj', on the 0. E. and N. line, and having connection
with the Northern Pacific, is the county-seat and chief town.
It is, in fact, rapidly developing into a city of considerable im
portance, having a population of four thousand five hundred.
It calls itself the Gateway of the Inland Erapire, or at least the
Southern Gatewaj' of the same, and is earning its honors bj-
a legitimate eourse of improveraent, A stock company with
a capital of two hundred and fifty thousand dollars has been
formed for the purpose of bringing the waters of Powder Eiver
in irrigating ditches to Baker City and surrounding eountry.
A railroad is being constructed fortj- or fifty miles west into
the mining districts at the head of the John Day Eiver, which
will not only facilitate mining operations, but will open up a
white-pine belt of great value, where a large mill is about to be
erected. A project not quite so far advanced is that of build
ing a railroad twentj'-five miles east into the Seven Devils
eountry in Idaho, where smelting ores of gold, silver, and
copper are found, — copper predominating. The traffic on the
upper Snake Eiver is at present supported by these mines,
which Baker City desires to make tributary to itself The
Union Pacific also contemplates a branch line to the Pine Creek
mines, sixty-five miles northeast of this eity.
There is no doubt of the enviable position of Baker. Colonel
J. W. Virtue, owner of the well-known Virtue Mine, and the

ABOUT Oregon's inland empire. 157
pioneer mining man of this region, places the output of the
placer mines at one million five hundred thousand dollars
annually, and of the quartz mines at two million dollars. A
company is being organized to bring water upon a dead river
channel, or lead similar to the Blue Lead of CaUfornia, from whieh
it is expected to derive one million five hundred thousand dollars
annually, and which will be tributary to Baker City. This
channel has yielded nuggets weighing from eight hundred
dollars to three thousand two hundred dollars. " Six miles from
Baker," says Cokmel Virtue. '• there are farms upon one end of
which the owner harvests forty, fifty, or sixty bushels of wheat
per acre, and on tho other end takes out gold dust at fifty cents
a pan from his placers."
Baker City has a highly picturesque situation, being upon a
level plateau of throe thousand feet elevation, surrounded by
cones and peaks of a variety of forms, some wooded, others bare,
and stUl others rising to the snow-Une. The eity is supplied
Avith excellent water frora three artesian wells, the water being
puraped into a reservoir at the rate of sixty thousand gallons
per hour. The religious sentiment of the population is repre
sented by five churcb-edifices, well filled on the Sabbath. A
thirty-thousand-dollar public-school building gives ev-idence of
the value set upon educational faciUties, as well as of the wealth
of the community. Tbe CathoUcs also bave a school for younf^-
ladies. There are three new.spapers, two of them dailies and
weeklies. An electric-Ught plant furnishes illumination to the
streets ; and a street-car line runs from the railroad depot
through the heart of the city. A now brick hotel — the War-
shauer — is being completed, at a cost of one hundred thousand
dollars. Tho foundation is laid by the Geroux Amalgamating
and Manufacturing Company, with a capital of two hundred
and fifty thousand dollars, for an amalgamator, and in connec
tion with it a foundrj' and general machine-works. The present
manufactures are confined to planing-mills, flouring-mills, brick-
j-ards, ete. The Warra Mineral Springs of Baker are much
resorted to. A national bank, assay offices, and a building and
loan association facilitate business ojjerations.
Baker City is the largest distributing point oast of the moun
tains in Oregon, and in 1863 it was a stage station on the road

158 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
to Boise. As the placer mines in Idaho and in East Oregon
were worked out, many gold-hunters turned farmers and settled
the fertile Powder Eiver Valley, finally founding a citj' here,
which has grown and prospered, while Auburn, a raining town
eleven miles away whieh once boasted ten thousand inhabitants,
is left like Goldsmith's Auburn, — a "deserted village."
Lake County, which lies south of Crook and west of Grant,
belongs to that division of Oregon which is drained bj' streams
not running in anj- general direction, but either sinking in the
earth or flowing into sorae of the alkaline lakes frequent in this
region. Salt marshes also are found, ono on Silver Lake and
another on Warner Lake, which produce salt of good qualitj'.
The soil is warm and productive, but, owing to the entire absence
of railroads, stock-raising and wool-growing are the chief indus
tries. The timber of the hilly portions is pine, juniper, and
mahogany, whieh, with the facilities afforded for milling bj-
the lakes, makes lumbering also an important business. It is
expected that a railroad branching off from the Southern Pacific
will cross this county some time in the near future'. Whenever
this section is raade accessible to travel it is sure to be rauch
sought by invalids, for the air is the most delightful that ean be
imagined, — so bright and sparkling, so warm and dry. The
sumraer's heat is not oppressive, although the raercury runs up
pretty woll. The Avinters are cold, owing to the elevation, but
are not long.
Lakeview is the county-seat and principal town. It is situ
ated near the northern end of Goose Lake, at thc foot ofa range
of wooded hiUs, and has tributarj' to it the whole Goose Lake
Valley. The population is about eight hundred. It has a good
court-house, two or three churches, a handsome public-school
building, a bank, a newspaper, and several substantial busi
ness houses, and is, in fact, a representative new town of the
West, — rather surprisingly modern and thrifty, considering its
remoteness. Klamath County, lying at the base of the Cascade Mountains
on the east, is an elevated region with a diversified surface : the
northern part being of a broken or "desert" character; the
middle part, devoted to the Klamath Indian Eeservation, con
taining a variety of land, — marsh, woodland, river-bottoms, and

ABOUT Oregon's inland empire. 159
plains; and in the southern portion the grassy vallej-s of Lost
Eiver and Link Eiver, and of the Upper Klamath, Lower
Klamath, Modoe, and other smaller lakes. Klamath Countj' is
Avell watered by Williamson, Sprague, and Lost Eivers, besides
its many lakes. Thero is also a canal for irrigation purposes,
starting from tho head of Link Eiver and running southeasterlj-
fortj' miles to Lost Eiver ; another taking water out of Klamath
Lake to fioat logs to a saw-mill twelve miles from the lake ; and
a third taking water to a large roller flouring-mill.
Klamath Countj- has been devoted to stock-raising, as it had
no means of moving crops. Yet it was wheat raised in this
countj- which took the premium at the National Exposition of
1884, at New Orleans, Both Lake and Klamath Counties raise
fine wheat at an elevation of four thousand and five thousand
feet, and grow excellent fruit and vegetables.
The water-power of Link Eiver is very inviting, there being a
fall of sixty-four feet in a mile and a quarter, the average breadth
of the sti-eam being three hundred and ten feet ; but only one
saw-- and one flouring-mill haA'o been erected upon it. I have
referred in another place to the peculiar features of the Klamath
basin, which make it a wonderland, — namely. Crater Lake, the
volcanic deposits, hot springs and cold springs, and rivers that
start frora nothing and after running sorae distance disappear.
Klamath County was long under the protection of Fort
Klamath, established on the border of the Indian Eeservation
in 1864. It was the scone in 1872-3 of tho Modoc War, and of
many bloody battles and massacres, the story of whieh will long
furnish raaterial for the novelist as weU as the historian.
Linkville, situated on Link Eiver, which unites the Upper
and Lower Klaraath Lakes, is the eountj'-seat and raetropolis
of this district. It has a population of about seven hundred,
a handsome court-house, supports a newspaper, a church, and
a graded publie sehool, has several factories, and is a resort for
health-seekers, who use the hot and cold baths furnished by
nature in the immediate vicinity. The town suffered greatly
by fire in September, 1889, but is being rebuilt in an improved
style and with many fine structures. Linkville was founded
in 1871 by George Nourse, who planted a nursery on the river-
bank at the foot of tho upper lake, which is stiU growing there.

160 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
furnishing fruit-trees to settlers. There are about a dozen other
hamlets in this district, which are Availing for transportation
faciUties. In this countj' resides, with his sons, the aged Lindsay Apple-
gate, brother of the " Sage of YoncaUa," and a historic character.
His father was Daniel Applegate, who fought in the Eevolution
ary War, and who married a daughter of John Lindsay, one of
Daniel Boone's associates in the settleraent of Kentucky. In
the year 1823 Lindsay Applegate accorapanied General Ashley
in an expedition up the Missouri, — the first Araerican company
that fitted out for fur-hunting in the Eockj' Mountains. Twenty-
years later he helped break the first wagon-road into Oregon,
where he has borne his part in building up a prosperous common-
Avealth. Soon the last of this class of Araerian State-builders
will have passed away with the times whieh called them forth,
but the coming generations should not be permitted to consign
them to obUvion. The noblest thing that tbe Oregon poet,
Joaquin Miller, has written refers to
" Those brave men buffeting the West
With lifted faces. Pull were they
Of great endeavor. Brave and true
As stern crusader. . . .
Made strong with hope they dared to do.
¦» * «• * * *
What brave endeavor to endure !
What patient hope, when hope was past I
What still surrender at the last
A thousand leagues from hope I How pure
They lived, how proud they died 1"
A drawback to the settlement of East Oregon has been the
large amount of land held by wagon-road companies, who in the
past, under a pretence of building a needed highway to the Idaho
or Oregon mines, secured grants from Congress upon terms
never honorably complied with. Theso grants, which will event
ually be declared forfeited, are still unsettled. Another class of
idle lands is that fraudulently taken up under the Swamp Land
Act, large tracts of which are being restored to the government
and opened for settlement along with the other government
lands. There are, however, good tracts free to entry, and de-

ABOUT Oregon's inland empire.

161

sirablo for homes, in everj- part of East Oregon, but chiefly in
the central and southern portions. As the countrj' settles up
the cattle-raisers will be restricted to narrower limits, and agri
culture force from the earth the wealth now Ij'ing unrecognized.
The following is a comparative statement of tho counties of
East .Oregon at the beginning of the j'ear 1890.

aia

«'

ii;i

¦3 i
¦St
"J
*«-•
H
,^
¦3.-S
_o
¦« fl
11
« a
S X
Is
cp
1
B
m
fc. ?
¦s-^
-^
¦S!^<
£-ca.
¦s
M
XjS
<!
f-
>
>-
u
HH
m
^
Dollars.
Dollars.
Dollars.
Dollars.
Dollars.
Dollars.
Dollars.
Baker . .
101,816
424,801
34I,M5
364,400
2,719,868
780,252
¦139,180
1,799,936
Crook.
81,799
396,276
62,505
862,877
2,008,822
570,130
128,400
1,310,272
Gilliam .
81,988
371,031
273,823
661,978
2,000,387
5-24,303
130,460
1,364,416
Harney .
154,520
396,276
9,422
1,011,224
1.727,024
189,039
66,449
1,472,486
Grant . .
114,716
300,415
10,260
990,123
2,249,356
572,396
. . .
1,684,390
Klamath .
841,437
662,612
88,314
480,317
1,607,491
345,063
146,865
1.115,663
Lake . . .
79,462
321,805
864,148
2,180,079
385,829
115,894
1,678,366
Malheur ,
103,863
231,699
¦ll,915
720,201
1,332,292
210,176
61.119
1,046,977
Morrow .
Sherman .
Umatilla .
126,279
417,735
158,365
624,533
2,344,415
810,176
255,444
1,333,824
380'.209
2,247,685
1,052,379
885,980
8 396,759
2,666,262
,590',760
5,065,469
Union . .
275,414
1,496,350
376,414
749,570
4,587,645
1.405,600
311,285
2,812,290
Wallowa .
72,731
426,1,54
1,291,642
383,875
151,209
756,567
Wasco . .
169,777
649,609
722,142
660,839
3,758,026
929,900
201,460
2,623,666
The amount of mortgages recorded against property in Baker
County is $88,191 ; GUUara, $159,207 ; Klamath, $80,223 ; Lake,
$192,194. Wagon-road land, not included in the above, is valued in Lake
County at $92,406 ; in Wasco the number of acres is estimated
at 68,609 ; in Crook County at 229,969. Eailroad land in Mor
row County is valued at $272,000.
Travel in Eastern Oregon is often not very agreeable, unless
one could choose his route, his season, and his conveyance.
Early spring gives the greater chances of corafort ; by which I
mean a more agreeable temperature than either sumraer or win
ter, and less dust and drought than auturan. The few railway
Unes, excepting the O. E. and N., are not fitted up for tourist
travel, but only for the short trips between local points. From
Tbe Dalles to Umatilla the road runs along the sandy belt near
the Columbia, with only the sullen river and the bare hills to
which to turn j-our ej'es. From Umatilla it whirls you across
six or eight miles of sage-brush, when it strikes the narrow
11
162 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
valley of the river of that name, which is cultivated and pretty
with its gardens, cotton-wood groves, and thickets of birch, alder,
sumach, and Avild roses in the sharp bends of the stream. Pro
ceeding up the vallej' you are constantly kept on the alert by
the dodging of tho train from one green vista to another, and
from the shelter of bare hills on one side to the shadow of-over-
hanging rocks on the opposite side of some promontory, or
making a straight run for some distanee under the perpendic
ular wall of a basaltic upheaval, to leap suddenly into a cotton-
wood copse with a little farm home-place elose by.
But all this is strictly local, and below the general level. The
road from Pendleton to Snake Eiver, running across the Blue
Mountains and through the Grand Eond and Powder Eiver
Valleys, has moro extensive views, and a greater variety of
features. From Wallula Junction to Pendleton the road Ues
the greater part of the distance through a cafion between hills
so high that only their sides are seen, bristling with rock or
tufts of dry grass, for miles. But Avhen we have crossed the
sand-belt, we observe that for other railes and railes towards
Pendleton a green blanket of growing wheat hangs over the
rounded tops of these high hilLs, giving promise of freight for
this line after haiwest.
Leaving Pendleton for Lewiston, our route takes in a better
country than that nearer the Columbia, skirting the Umatilla
Indian Eeservation, than which there is no finer body of land
in Bast Oregon. The road foUoAvs the sinuous course of Wild-
Horse Creek to the top of the ridge dividing the waters of the
Uraatilla from those of the Walla Walla -Elver, and from whieh
there is an extensive view of the surrounding country, Avhich is
one vast Avheat-field as far as tho eye can reach. From this
point tho Walla Walla Valley appears spread out as on a chart,
with the city of Walla Walla set in its midst and embowered
in trees.
From this ridge, after making a long circuit to head a small
side valley, and to gain distance for the train in descending,
steam is withheld frora the locomotive, and this becomes a
gravity railroad until we again strike a level, where the train
shoots ahead through fields of wheat, barley, and corn to Walla
Walla.

ABOUT OREGON S INLAND EMPIRE.

163

From this point to Snake Eiver two similar ridges are crossed
in a similar manner, the ascent and descent being made through
narrow and crooked caflons entirely shutting out the view, which
is seen only on top of the divides ; but from each of these there

WHERE EAILKOADS GO.

is the sarae grand spectacle of boundless wheat-fields rolling
off into billowy hills in all directions. Tbe railroad strikes the
Snake Eiver at Eiparia, in the Palouse country. There the
traveller is transferred to a steamboat for Lewiston, where he
is landed after a twelve hours' struggle with the rapid current
of the reptilian river. The distance is eightj' miles ; and when
you come down it you make the voyage in four hours.
The scenery along the Snake is the same as along the Colum
bia above Celilo, — a, strong, swift river between bare hills or
columnar cliffs of basalt, — the difference being that every here
and thero along tho Snake there are narrow shelves of warm

164 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
sandy loam at the foot of the cliffs whieh are taken up by fruit-
farmers. As thc steamer comes down, it being July, she gathers
up thousands of boxes of berries, peaches, and early apples, to
be shipped by rail to Walla Walla and Spokane Falls. These
small farms are irrigated by water led on to them from springs,
or pumped up fi,-om the river by steam-power.
Lewiston, although an Idaho town, was built up by Oregon
capital as an outfitting place for tbe Florence and Salmon Eiver
raines, in 1862. It is located on the point of land between the
Snake and Clearwater Eivers, Avhich form a junction here. It
was on the latter stream, some twelve miles above here, that
Lewis and Clarke encamped with the Nez Perces, with whom
they left their horses to be cared for while they visited the
coast, in 1805; and the town was named in honor of the ex
plorer, Merriwether Lewis.
The site of Lewiston is a particularly pleasing one, the land
sloping gradually up to the beautiful undulating country back
of it, and having a water-front on both sides of the point
bounded by the rivers. North of the Clearwater the land rises
abruptlj- to a great height. It is over beyond this bluff and on
this elevated plateau that the famous grain lands about Moscow
and Genesee are located, whieh are tributary to Washington,
being reached by the O. E. and N. and Spokane FaUs and Pa-
louse Eailroads.
Lewiston has a charming climate, albeit rather warm in
summer. It has about twelve hundred inhabitants, who are
waiting for a railroad to infuse new life into its business system.
It has gone ahead very little since the days when it had a tran
sient population of several thousands, the chief improvement
being in shade-trees. Both the Northern and the Union Paciflc
Eailroads are making preliminary moveraents towards giving
Lewiston the outlet it needs.
Between Lewiston and Mt. Idaho is a good farming country,
to see which one must travel by stage, passing the beautiful
Nez Perce Indian Eeservation, and climbing toilsomely to the
second plateau above Snake Eiver, where is a pleasant lake re
sort, — or what would be a pleasant resort were the Lake House
anything but a board shanty, — the fare being exeellent.
Thirty miles beyond, the traveller comes to a rolling plateau,

A CHAT ABOUT OREGON MOUNTAINS. 165
four thousand feet above sea-level, seatterinsly covered with
lofty pines, underneath which grows the short, thick grass
known as "pine-grass," giving, with the groups of cattle here
and there, a park-like aspect to the woodland. Beyond this
twenty miles, and five hundred feet lower, is the valley resem
bling Grand Eond, and known as Camas Prairie, with the
town of Mt. Idaho in the southeast corner.
Here let us stop, for avo are off our proscribed territory ; but
this pan-handle of Idaho naturally belongs to tbe Stato of Wash
ington, and has been repeatedlj- claimed bj- it. It contains,
besides a good deal of superior farming land, the Cceur d' Alone
mines, all of which territoiy is at present tributarj- to Washing
ton, and must in a great measure ever remain so, being shut off
by natural barriers from Southern Idaho. On the other hand,
the southern counties of this new State eould ill spare the best
of its farming territory, and, being now- a State, will not.

CHAPTEE XII.
A CHAT ABOUT OREGON MOUNTAINS.
If there is anything of which an Oregonian is more proud
than another, it is of his mountains, for everj- one exhibits
that personal interest in them which amounts to a sense of
proprietorship. Portland shop-windows are full of bad pictures
of Mount Hood, whieh, notwithstanding their deficiencies from
an artistic point of view, are yet pleasingly suggestive. That
they sell is certain, for the production never ceases.
I may as weU confess right here that I am myself responsible
for starting this particular fad. Years ago, on my first visit
to Oregon, I was delighted Avith the charming cloud-effects so
noticeably lacking in the drier climate of California, as well as
with the woods and the snow-peaks. My enthusiasm in my
correspondence Avith the well-known CaUfornia artist, F. A.
Butraan, " slopped over" to such an extent that he came up hero
and made a good many sketches. On returning he painted a
" Mount Hood" on a large canvas, with a beautiful foreground.

166

ATLANTIS ARISEN.

which, bj- the waj-, was a composition, for there is no sueh actual
foreground for the mountain in nature. I purchased the picture,
and rather thoughtlessly allowed it lo be photographed. From
that photograph, with A'ariations never original enough to dis
guise the source of inspiration, have been painted nuraberless
other Mount Hoods, which, could poor Butraan, long since gone
to the Hills Beautiful of a bettor countiy beyond the impassable
bourne, behold, he would wish to blot out.

ON" THE SUMMIT OF ST. HliLES.

The name of Oregon's principal range, the Cascades, which
has a nearly north-and-south course, probably came from the
fact that the only- passage known through them to the earlv
explorer, hunter, or tourist was the one at the five-mile rapids,
which rapids seem to have been always called tho Cascades.
These were of raore importance to the voyageur Avho had to
make a difficult portage than the mountains themselves, and
in speaking of the latter he simply said, to distinguish them

A CHAT ABOUT OREGON MOUNTAINS. 167
from others, " the Cascade Mountains," and so named thera for
all time.
But Oregon has several other though not as high ranges, —
namely, the Blue Mountains, so called from their color seen across
the tawny waste of the plains, Avhieh have a northeast and south
west course through Bast Oregon ; the Coast Eange, which fol
lows the trend of the west shore of the continent, near the sea ;
and three or four cross-ranges from the Cascades to the Coast
Mountains in the southern part of the State. All these ranges
have their peaks, but only the great Andean chain of the Cas
cades lifts up into the region of cold air its crumbUng volcanic
cones covered with snow, which even the fiercest heat of summer
only diminishes, but never dissipates except on the sharpest
ridges. The most southern of these, and noxt above California's pride,
— Mount Shasta, — is Mount Pitt, nine thousand two himdred
and fifty foot high, named after the British statesinan by British
subjects in Oregon before the boundary question was settled.
Frequent attempts have been made to change its namo to
Mount McLoughlin, in honor of Dr. John McLoughlin, the
benevolent governor of the Hudson's Bay Companj- in Oregon,
who rescued from starvation the immigrants of 1843, at a time
when the London board Avould far rather they had been left
to perish than have been rescued, to the injury of the fur-trade
and the weakening of England's claim on the territorj-. So
difficult is it, however, to make these changes understood, that
the Oregonians have compromised by naming a lesser peak in
Klamath County Mount McLoughlin.
Next north of Pitt is Union Peak, feeding the north fork of
Eogue Eiver. Thirty-five or forty miles farther north is Mount
Scott, — whether a namesake of the general or of an Oregon
pioneer I do not know, — eight thousand five hundred feet in
height. About the samo distance above Scott, and of the same
altitude as Mount Pitt, is Mount Thiolsen, so called in corapli
raent to General Thiolsen, of the Oregon Eailway and Navigation
Eailroad. This peak feeds the south fork of the Umpqua Eiver.
Again in thirty or forty railes rises Diamond Peak, five thousand
five hundred and ninety-five feet in height, which is the source
of the middle fork of the Wallamet on the west and of the

168 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
Des Chutes Eiver on the east. At the head of McKenzie's
Fork of the Wallamet is the remarkable group of snow-peaks
called the Three Sisters, with Black Butte and Snovv Butte
eighteen or twenty railes farther north, and feeding strearas on
the eastern slope of the range.
At the head of the Santiam Eiver is Mount Jefferson, — it
should be Mount Thoraas Jefferson, — named by Lewis and
Clarke in 1806, and standing well east of the centre of the
range. This is a verj- interesting mountain, and evidently has
been much higher than at present, which is equally true of all
the snow-peaks.
Mount Hood is situated about twenty-five miles south of the
Columbia Eiver, and sixty railes east of the Wallaraet, rising,
like Jefferson, from the eastern side of the main axis of the
range. The western view of it is that of a massive pyramid,
with sorae slight variations from exact Unes; but from the
Dalles its rugged features are more distinctly seen, and its out
line is broken into separate peaks and ridges. It was named
after Lord Hood by Vancouver's lieutenant, Broughton, Octo
ber 20, 1792. The early Oregon settlers, or some of thera,
wished to change the name to Washington, and to call the
Cascades the Presidents' Eange, but custom prevailed, and Hood
it remains. The height of Mount Hood has never been satis
factorily ascertained. The measurements taken have varied
frora eighteen thousand to eleven thousand feet, but later esti
mates make it about twelve thousand. Half its height is covered
wilh perpetual snow, — that is, it towers raore than a mile above
the range into the region of clouds and storms of whieh the
dwellers in tho valley know nothing, — ils venerable head buffeted
bj- icy blasts even in sumraer.
About seventy miles norlh and a Utile east of Hood is Mount
Adams, nine thousand five hundred and seventy feet in height,
named after President J. Q, Adams. It belongs to Washington,
but is one of the five peaks visible frora all parts of Northern
Oregon. It is not so high as Hood or St. Helen, but it has a
noble outline, and rerainds rae of a sleeping lion. Ono of the
curiosities of Mount Adams is a series of ice-eaves, lying at an
elevation of four thousand feet, the trail to which leads up the
White Salmon Eiver, which comes into the Colurabia opposite

A CHAT ABOUT OREGON MOUNTAINS. 169
Hood Eiver. In their vieinitj- the earth gives forth a hollow,
reverberating sound suggestive of openings beneath. The
entrance to the largest cave is down a well-like shaft, by means
of a rope. The apartment hero is about eighty feet in diameter,
and square. The walls are solid ice, the fioor and ceiling sup
porting huge formations resembUng stalactites and stalagmites,
which when illuminated by torches give out a splendid display
of colors. The air in these eaves is clear, eold, and drj-, the
temperature being too low to permit of extended explorations.
Is there buried hore an immense glacier, or does there exist a
combination of causes in tho form of chemical constituents to
produce ice ? Let the scientists decide.
Northwest of Mount Adaras, and a hundred miles or more
north of Hood, is Mount St. Helen, so named by Broughton, in
1792, — another mountain of Washington which enters into the
panorama of snow-peaks seen from the Columbia Eiver. It is,
presumablj-, nine thousand seven hundred and fifty feet in height,
and remarkable for its dome-like sj'mmetry of outline. It is
approached from the Columbia by the north fork of tho Cathla
pootle, or Lewis, Eiver, and is not difficult of ascent. Mount St.
Helen has been repeatedlj' known to throw out steam and
ashes, scattering the latter over the country for a hundred miles
to the eastAvard in 1832, so obscuring the daj'light as to make
it necessary to burn candles. On tho southern slope is a hot
spring that keeps the rocks always bare, whieh spot goes by
the name of The Bear, — no pun intended.
I do not pretend to have ascended even one of the many
snow-peaks of the Northwest. It requires strength and wood
craft, as well as alpine experience, to explore the Oregon moun
tains on their western fianks, where the caflons are deep and
steep, Avhere frightful precipices are to be sealed with ropes, and
changes of teraperature to be encountered, before reaching- the
snow-flelds. Therefore I have contented myself with achieving
an altitude of eleven thousaud feet in some places and between
seven thousand and eight thousand in others, and have taken
my impressions at second-hand for the greater heights. The
railroads of the West are great educators in this respect. They
carry us easily and without asking our consent right into the
heart of the great ranges, and show to the most delicate woman

170 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
or the city-bred man the wondrous things of a creation forever
going on,- equally by building up and breaking down.
Cite, for instance, the Southern Paciflc's entrance into Oregon.
It leaves the Sacramento Valley only to enter the long, winding
and beautiful caflon of tho Upper Sacramento Eiver, where the
hillsides are covered with pine, oak, and madrono forest, the
narrow bottoms Avith cotton-wood, poplar, and willow thickets,
while the banks are overhung with water-loving plants, and the
river dances down, down, bright, joyous, and tireless, towards the
sea, bearing with it the weariness which may have oppressed
us ; for who can be weary in sueh scenes ? Every now and then
the toiUng train glides past a settler's home, the chosen residence
of some man who loves tbese beautiful soUtudes better than the
busy life of towns or the raore genial climate of tho valley.
Then, again, up the caflon we catch a glimpse of Mount
Shasta, with its massive bulk divided iuto triple peaks piercing
the sky at fourteen thousand four hundred and forty feet, —
shining white with a blue sky over it.
Up and up we go. Lower Soda Springs, Upper Soda Springs
(and what delicious water !) ; Mosabrae Falls in a semicircle of
mossy rocks, — emerald and silver, — where the water seems to
come from the top of a mountain in many streams, a novel
and charming effect ; then up and up once raore, following ridges
and making long loops which take us past the spot we touched
twenty or thirty minutes before, but at an elevation above it of
several hundred feet ; — then Sissons. At Sissons is a fine view
of Mount Shasta, and an expanse of level eountry bej-ond, with
this and other peaks in sight continuallj-. Across this elevated
plateau runs the Klamath Eiver, and upon it is the once
populous mining town of Yreka, where A. D. Eichardsou dis
covered a palindrome on a sign, — Yrelia Bakery. I have no
doubt this literary curiosity still maintains its position, but the
railroad avoids the town, and travellers lose the opportunity of
verifying it.
Soon begins the ascent of the Siskiyou (seize cailleux) Moun
tains, with their long pinej- slopes and dome-shaped summits,
their cathedral-spire-Uke peaks, and magnificent forests sur
rounding them. By a winding way, with enchanting views on
every hand, we glide smoothly down the north side into the

A CHAT ABOUT OREGON MOUNTAINS.. 171
Eogue Eiver VaUey, having spent twelve hours amidst such
sceneiy as can be met with in few parts of the earth. And
this is onlj- one of several roads, which, so to speak, make a
feature of showing the mountains whieh traverse the North
west Pacific Coast.
But to return to the Oregon snow-peaks. First a word about
their explorers. Several young gentleraen of Portland, in Octo
ber, 1887, organized the Alpine Club of Oregon, tbe object of
which was to found and maintain a public museum, encourage
amateur photographj', and also alpine and aquatic exploration,
•and to look to the protection and preservation of game of all
kinds. It divides the work into four departments, as just indi
cated. The explorers are very enthusiastic.*
Tbe Alpine Club has made some special studies of Mount
Hood, having ascended it more than once, photographed it
from various points, and illuminated it with red fire ou the
evening of July 4, 1887, tbe illumination lasting fifty-eight
seconds, and being seen from Portland on the west, and Prine
ville on the east side of the range, the former sixty miles, and
the latter eighty miles distant. One hundred pounds of tho
combustible were used, which was dragged to the top by W. G.
Steel and Dr. J. M. Keene, three of the party having become
exha'usted two hours after passing the timber line.
The practice of the club is to deposit a copper box containing
a register of their names and a record of experiences on the
summit of each peak explored by them. This is chained to a
rock for seeuritj-, but left accessible to any visitors who raay
make the ascent and dosire to register. Tbe illumination of
Mount Hood was repeated in 1888, when heliographic com
munications Avere exchanged with the signal-serA-Jee officers at
Portland. This experiment suggests the use of a signal station
on the raountain in lime of war — provided the weather eould
be controlled.
¦* For the information of other similar associations wishing to correspond,
I give the names of the officers. President, George B. Markle ; Vice-Presi
dents, W. Gr. Steel, W. W. Bretherton, John Gill; Secretary, George H.
Hinies ; Treasurer, 0. M. Idleman. W. G. Steel is president of the explora
tion department, and M. W. Gorman Secretary. President of the photo
graphic department, W. W. Bretherton ; Secretary, E. E. Norton.

172 . ATLANTIS ARISEN.
The ascent of Hood is, considering its height, not difficult
on the south side. There are the usual obstructions to alpine
travel, — caflons to be crossed, precipices to be avoided, snow too
soft at mid-day and too icy at morning or evening, and a tem
perature, with wind, on the peak which raakes a protracted
stay, if not irapossible, undesirable and dangerous. A great
crevasse is to be crossed, whieh is opened in an immense glacier
extending quite across the side of tho raountain and constantly
moving south. The opening varies in width from a mere crack
to a gorge of thirty feet across. The walls of the chasm are
of solid ice, green for some distanee beneath the snow, changing
to blue, growing darker and darker until the line dividing it
frora space becomes invisible ; nor does sound reveal when the
rocks rolled into it reach bottom. This crevasse is crossed on a
bridge of ice, whieh brings tho adventurer to the last abrupt
ascent of four hundred feet to the summit, which is accom
plished by cutting steps in the ice.
The summit is an irregular are of a circle once surrounding a
great chimney voraiting forth molten lava, and is now rapidly
crurabling away. Sulphurous furaes and steam are still thrown
out at a point below the present summit called the crater, where
mountain climbers stop to warm and take refreshments.
Some changes are reported as recently occurring on Mount
Hood, the crevasses on the northwest side of the crater appear
ing to have widened, and the ice surface to he low-ered. One of
theso crevasses can bo seen to yawn conspicuously for fifteen
miles. Many rocks have beeome detached and rolled down ;
among others, the one to whieh the record box of the Alpine
Club was chained, which was, however, recovered in a battered
condition and replaced by a now one.
Whoever has the hardihood to make the ascent of Mount
Hood — and the number increases annually — has his reward in
the prospect to be gained from it. From this altitude all the
other peaks are plainly visible, both in Oregon and Washington,
and the coast range as well. Bast and west Oregon and a large
part of Washington are spread out like a map. The lordly
Columbia may be seen wending its way to the sea, a distanee of
a hundred and fifty miles, the capes at the mouth showing
plainly where it unites with the Pacific. A sunset view, with

A CHAT ABOUT OREGON MOUNTAINS. 173
the opening betAveen the capes filled with a flood of golden
glorj-, raaj' be enjoyed from tbe mountain-tops. "To witness
a scene like this," exclaims Steel, in his report, " manj' a man
would circle the globe." Iraagine the effect of moonlight upon
it — a full moon — " changing the day's brilliance into a subdued
glory." Surelj- there is raatter for inspiration here. But at
seven o'clock the wind blow fiercely, almost cariying the chron
icler from his feet, and he bad to keep in constant motion not to
freeze. It lasted but for an hour, and at eleven o'clock the red
fire Avas burned, casting a rosy glow over the whole raountain
side, bringing into relief every crag and pinnacle, and causing
the neighboring mountains to blush more delicately.
I have raj-self seen Hood only frora the common level, but
haA-e beheld him in raany moods and phases, when white, eold,
and stern he towered rigidly over a winter landscape, and when
draped from summit to base in a golden-tinted tissue of morn
ing mist, through which he peeped like a girl in trj'ing on a
robe of yelloAV gauze, — not quito shaken down on one side, the
petticoat of snow showing daintily underneath. Many are the
solid old mountain's masquerading airs, and, despite tho dignity
of his thousands of years, ho sometimes affects the blushes of
the rose.
To pioneers of 1845 and later Mount Hood is fuU of meaning.
The road over the range at its base, opened that year, was the
Eubicon which they passed in pain and peril. The most skil
ful driving was not skilful enough to guide the staggering oxen
through the way provided by the road-makers, and the constant
tendency of a forward wheel to run up a tree on one side or the
other was a dread to the drivers. But if wagons would run up
trees on ascending ground, what was their eourse when they
came to an incline of sixty degrees on the descending side, with
a load urging the jaded oxen from behind ? As succeeding
trains widened the way a new difficultj' arose. It was better to
be halted by a tree than not to be able to stop at all, and to find
one's team rushing down the side of a raountain Uke an ava
lanche, to death and destruction. To OA'ercome this tendency,
good-sized trees were attached by ehains to the rear of the
wagons, the branches left to act like grappling-irons, and hold
back the weight. But woe to the unfortunate wight whose im-

174 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
provised brake becarae uncoupled ! The best he could hope for
in that case was that a fore-wheel would dash up a tree. It
happened sometimes that the oxen struck their beads against
a solid fir-trunk, when their proprietor became suddenly minus
that pair of oxen, and plus a great manj- fragments of wagon
and contents. A well-graded highway now follows the survey
of the pioneers of 1845, and conducts the tourist to Cloud-Cap
Inn, at the snow line, where mueh comfort may be enjoyed for
four or four and a half dollars per diera.
About centrally situated with regard to the Oregon division
of the Cascade Eange, the Three Sisters may be ascended with
out difficulty from the eastern side. Indeed, to get a well-
formed idea of the mountains it is necessary to behold thom
from this side. There is no labor in travelling OA-er the piney
slopes of tho eastern incline. It is like riding through intermin
able parks, with little obstructing undergrowth, a dry soil, and
abundance of flowers, and occasional small game. Three or
four days' easy horseback travel from The Dalles through a
country abounding in natural wonders brings us to the foot of
the Three Sisters.
They stand in a triangular group, the base of the triangle
being towards the west. Though perfoctlj' distinct peaks, the
northernmost being highest, they are connected near their
base by lesser intervening elevations. Accustomed as we hav-e
become to mountains, the Three Sisters force from us >the pro
foundest expressions of admiration and delight. So lofty, so
symmetrical, so beautifully grouped! Nor are there wanting
adjuncts which augment tho interest of the seene. At the foot
of the group stands a single needle of basalt several hundred
feet in height, in its grim, black hardness looking like a sentinel
guarding the Olympian heights above.
Our party prepare to ascend tho north Sister. By reason
of the greater general elevation of the countrj- on the eastern
side ofthe Cascade Eange, and the more gradual slopes also, the
toil of an ascent is greatly diminished. By keeping along a
ridge we find it comparatively easy to clamber up. Two of our
party, however, decide to attempt a more abrupt ascent.
As we course along our rocky ridge we watch the advent
urers on the snow-field. After climbing over a sharp slope of

A CHAT ABOUT OREGON MOUNTAINS. 175
broken rock, thcj' come upon an incline of nearly eighty degrees
— in fact, the snow-field appears concave to us — and commence
crawling up it. By great exertion, and cutting steps in the
snow wilh their hunting-knives, they reach the edge ofthe first
croA-asse, where w-e see them pause, holding on to the edge and
looking into it. They ean proceed no farther. The crevasse is
fifteen feet across and hundreds deep. Could they throw them
selves over, they must inevitably slide back into it, from the
glassy surface above.
Starting cautiously to return, and. holding back by striking
their heels in the snow, raaking but slight impressions, first one,
then the other, loses his hold, and down they go, — swiftly,
swiftly, ever raore swiftly, — darting like arrows from their bows,
straight down tbe steep incline, towards the roeks below the
snow-line. Tho j'ounger and more active contrives to draw his
hunting-knife from its scabbard, and, by striking it into tbe hard
snow, to cheek his speed. What a grip he has ! I laugh, while
I am trembling with excitement, to see him swing quite round
the knife-hilt, like a plummet at the end of a string swung in the
fingers. He has arrested his descent in time to avoid the rocks.
Not so his clurasier companion, who comes down — luckily,
heels foremost — among the rockj' debris at the bottora. His
bruises, though raany, are not dangerous ; and this little ex
perience teaches our friends the needful prudence. They are
content thenceforth to take the longest waj- round, which is the
surest way to the object of their desires. After two or three
hours of clarabering, we reUeh the line of perpetual snow.
Just below it is a belt of cedars, Avith tops so fiat that we
walk out on them a distance of twentj' feet, either side their
trunks. Early in their struggle for existence their tops have
been broken off bj' the wind, and the weight of many winters'
snows has retarded their upright growth, until the result of a
centurj' of aspiration is a ludicrously short stump, and imraensely
long and broad lirabs. In this region we flnd a few stunted
mountain mahogany trees, but are quite above the pines.
Above this, in the snoAV, or rather in the thin layer of soil
deposited in places among the rocks where the sun's action pre
vents the snow from accumulating, are several varieties of flower
ing plants with which we are familiar ; the blossoms, however.

176 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
are but the miniature copies of their valley kindred. So fragile,
of sueh delicate hues are thej-, that a feeUng of tenderness is
inspired by their lonely position on this bleak summit ; and we
ask ourselves. For whose eye has all this beauty been spread, age
after age, Avhere human footsteps never come? Let those who
believe everything terrestrial was made for man search those
places of earth where only God is, and study their adornments.
The view from the peak of our mountain is one long to be
remembered. To the north of us stretches the Cascade Eange,
wilh its wilderness of mountains, from six to eight thousand
feet in height, overtopped by Mount Jefferson and Mount Hood.
To the south, the samo wilderness of mountains is seen over the
tops of the other Sisters, with Diamond Peak and Mounts Scott
and Pitt beyond, while in the far distance we fancy we discern
great Shasta.
To the east spread away iraraense plains, with their river-
courses marked as on a map, and bounded by the Blue Moun
tains. Just below is Des Chutes, and on the other side of it,
not far off, is the extinct crater ofa volcano, its remaining waUs
being only two or three hundred foet high. All around it the
eountry is covered with black cinders, ashes, and scoria. Turn
ing towards the west, we behold the lovely WaUamet Valley,
with its nuraerous small rivers, its hills and plains, and beyond
it the blue wall of tho Coast Mountains.
We resolve to return to the pine woods to carap, and with to-
raorrow's dawn to climb onee more to the sumrait, to behold
" morning on the mountains." The' siDectacle compensates for
the extra toil. When we arrive, there is a veil of mist hanging
between the valley and the mountain-top. We know that they
in the valley see nothing of the summits, while we of the sum
mits can discern nothing below this floating sea of vapor. How
beautiful! It is as if out of a sea of golden-tinted mist are
springing islands of dark-green, some of them crowned with
glittering snow, and overhead a cloudless heaven. With
every moment some new and beautiful, but almost impercep
tible, change comes over the misty ocean in which are bathed
those isles whose shores are abrupt mountain-sides; and, in
turn, all tints of gold, rose, amber, violet, float before our
enchanted eyes.

A CHAT ABOUT OREGON MOUNTAINS. 177
Not long the scene remains. An August sun quickly dis
perses the gossamer clouds, unveiling for us tho scene of yester
day in its morning sharpness of outline, Avith high lights and
deep shadows in the foreground, and with a soft, illusory glim
mer in the deep distance. We hardly wait for the full blaze
of day on the picture, preferring to remember it in this more
striking aspect.
Along the crests of the mountains are frequent lakes, sorae
of which occupy old burnt-out craters ; others may have been
formed by the damming up of springs by lava overflows ; others
by a change in the elevation of certain districts, leaving depres
sions to be filled by the melting snows or by mountain springs
and streams. These lakes occur generally where signs of recent
volcanic action in the neighborhood are most numerous, as in
the vicinity of Mount St. Helen, Mount Jefferson, the Three
Sisters, and Diamond Peak.
Pumice, cinders, scoria, and volcanic glass, with other evi
dences of eruption comparativelj- recent, abound all along the
eastern base of the Cascade Eange, and extend some distanee
through the central portion of East Oregon. The traveller
must ever be amply repaid for the labor of exploration by the
great and varied wonders which meet him at almost every- step
of his journey. It does not prejudice a country either, in a
practical sense, that it is of volanic formation. Sueh have been
the lands where civilization came to the greatest perfection.
Probably the east slopes of the Cascades will yet be celebrated
in song as " tho land of the olive and vine." It is certain
that grapes and peaches raised upon this soil are of exeellent
flavor. The lakes whieh are such a striking feature of the Cascade
Eange in both Washington and Oregon are not usually of much
extent. Echo Lake, on Mount St. Helen, is three miles long by
a quarter of a raile to a mile in width. It is filled with trout, and
bordered by bold shores covered with evergreen forest. The
character of the scenery here is of a gentler aspect than in
some other parts of the mountains, tempting whole families
every summer to encamp for two or three weeks in this
vicinity. On the contrary. Fish Lake, in the range east of Eoseburg, is
12

178 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
set in a deep rim of frowning rocks, shadowing the brown depths
where speckled trout disport themselves in ice-cold waters
which in a mile or two plunge headlong OA-er a precipice two
hundred and fiftj' feet in height between pillars of basalt.
South of Fish Lake about three miles is Mount Volcano,
with its western half blown off, leaving a sheer precipice six
hundred and fifty feet, descending into a basin semicircular in
shape, containing a forest of fir-trees, three charming lakes of
small size, and several green marshes, between which yawn
fissures opened agos ago when this basin was a fiery crater.
Many sueh scenes bave been discovered, and many yet await
discovery among theso half-explored mountains. Water-falls
abound, and a very pretty one, appropriately named Silver
Vail, occurs on a tributary of the Klaraath Eiver.
Some J-ears ago — it was just after the Modoc war — I crossed
the Cascades between Ashland and Linkville with a party, of
whom the " Sage of Yoncalla" was one. It was an interesting
trip frora every point of view. We had an ambulance, a bag
gage-wagon, and horses, and walked or rode as it pleased us to
do, taking three daj-s for the passage. Tbe first night we en
camped in the valley- of Jenny Creek, from which we took our
supper of fish, and, not knoAving any better, I left mj- shoes out
in the dew, of the effect of which I became unpleasantly aware
next morning; but I had a good sleep, quite undisturbed bj-
grizzUes, of which thero Avoro not a few in the mountains.
Next day our hunters killed a deer, and Avhile we waited for it
to be dressed, being in advance of the hunters, a huge brown
bear trotted leisurely across tho track in front of us ; but the
guns were behind, and wo quietly Avatched his departure, think
ing it was an escape on both sides. That night we encamped on
the suramit, and toasted venison on sticks around a blazing log-
fire. We told stories, sang songs, and slept well afterwards.
There was no dew to wet ray shoes this night; but I was
awakened about three o'clock in the morning by the voice of
the Sage, who, like those of old, called upon me to observe the
brightness of the morning star. And it was worth the misery
of being wakened at such an hour to behold the great golden
clusters S])arkling above us, — two or three times as large as
when seen through the murky air of the lowlands.

A CHAT ABOUT OREGON MOUNTAINS. 179
As we Avalked along next daj- the Sage told me the story
of the opening of this road — the Southern Immigrant Eoad it
was called — by hiraself and others, in 1846, when it was feared
in Oregon that there might be a war Avith Great Britain, and
it behooved them to be surveying out a track for the soldiers
of the United States to take in coming to protect the Oregon
settlers, which would be safer to travel than tho Columbia or
Mount Hood routes. He showed me, too, a tree near the cross
ing of the Klamath Eiver wbere some of Fremont's exploring
party carved their names in 18-13.
Linkville was at the time of this trip but a few months old,
and most of the settlers in Klamath Land had been driven out
bj- fear of the Modoes — most of those not murdered. I was
present at the trial of the Modoc prisoners at Fort Klamath,
and spent some weeks at the Klamath Indian Agency, visiting
notable places and studj-ing Indian mythologj- under the tutelage
of Captain O. C. Applegate, who is a master of Indianology.
But the crowning pleasure of those enjoyable weeks was an
excursion to a lake then little known, "but now famous in the
Northwest. It was discovered in 1853 by prospectors from
Jacksonville looking for gold, who, deeply impressed by its
weird beautj-, called it Lake Mjstorj-. Subsequently some
gentlemen from Fort Klamath v-isited it and caUed it Lake
Majestj-. Both those names were suggested by the effect upon
the beholders. But exploration convinced all that tho great
rockj' bowl containing these beautiful waters, whose rim was
eight thousand feet above sea-level, was an iramense crater, egg-
shaped in form, and six by seven miles in extent of surface.
This discoverj' changed the name to Crater Lake, which it is
now called.
According to the belief of scientists and other observers, there
once stood here a volcano higher by several thousand feet than
any existing mountain, the angle of the remaining mass carrj'-
ing an imaginary line to a height of thirtj- thousand feet. As
surveyed by government officers the depth of the crater is four
thousand feet, and of the water, two thousand feet over a large
extent of the bottom, the shallowest part away from the cliffs
being fifteen hundred feet. There is a crater within tho crater,
rising in a hollow cone above the water eight hundred and

180 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
forty-five feet, called Wizard Island, and another similar crater
fathoras deep beneath the lake's surface.
The miUtary road from Jacksonville to Fort Klamath runs
within about four miles of the lake, and is the route usually-
taken by tourists. But the approach from the east side is
mueh more easy, being a comfortable afternoon's drive from
the Agency- to camp at the turning-off point. Our party found
bear-tracks close to camp, and deer-tracks in tho ashes of our
burnt-out fire when we arose from our mosquito tormented
slumbers. Our ambulance was taken to tho summit, although
we walked a good part of the four miles, for the ground was
A'ory lumpy with rocks and frozen snowdrifts whieh July suns
had failed to liquefy, and which, to thera unaccountable, phenom
enon kept our mules in a greatly agitated state of nerves.
On arriving at the sumrait we found the earth light and
ashen, diversified by patches of snow, and by other patches of
alpine flowers, some of which were very pretty in form and
color. The air was bright and mild; we had left the forest
behind us ; there was nothing anywhere about more elevated
than our position, nor any living thing anj-where near us. We
were apparently on the highest point of the earth, for there
was nothing to look up to, and it would not have surprised me
to have been whirled off into space. The solitude of the situation
was thrilling.
One cannot, owing to the sunken position of the lake, discover
it until elose upon ils rim, and I say here, without exaggeration,
that no pen ean reproduce its image, no picture be painted to
do it justice; nor can it, for obvious reasons, bo satisfactorily
photographed. At the first view a dead silence feU upon our
party. A choking sensation arose in our throats, and tears
flowed over our cheeks. I do not pretend to analyze the emo
tion, but, if I were to endeavor to compare it with anything I
ever read, I should say it must be such a feeUng whieh causes
the Cherubim to veil their faces before God. To me it was a
revelation.*

* That this is not an uncommon effect of the first view of Crater Lake is
shoAvn by Captain C. E. Button's report of the survey, in which he says,
" It was touching to aee the worthy but untutored people who had ridden a
hundred miles in freight-wagons to behold it, vainly striving to keep back

A CHAT ABOUT OREGON MOUNTAINS. 181
The water of Crater Lake is of the loveUest blue imaginable
in the sunlight, and a deep indigo in the shadows of the cliffs.
It mirrors the walls encircling it accurately and minutely. It
has no well-like appearance because it is too large to suggest it,
yet a water-fowl on its surface could not be discovered by the
naked eye, so far below us is it. It impresses one as having
been made for the Creator's eye only, and we cannot associate
it with our human affairs. It is a font of the gods, wherein our
souls aro baptized anew into their primal purity and peace.
The Indians, who are easily impressed by the unusual as well
as the subUme iu nature, hold Crater Lake in great awe. They
have a legend running thiswise : A Klamath hunting-party came
upon it unexpectedlj-, and regarded it with silent fear, for they
knew at onee that the Great Spirit dwelt here, and that they
had no business with him ; therefore they silentlj- retraced their
steps down the mountain, and made a distant camp. But one
of their braves ventured to return, and passed the night on the
rim of the lake. This he did for several successive nights,
during which ho heard strange noises and voices coming from
the waters. Havins- familiarized himself after some months of
venturing to visit the lake, he descended lo the water and bathed
in it, repeating this feat many times, thereby gaining the power
to see spirits, and receiving supernatural strength. This led
others to imitate his example, who likewise received great
strength. But at length the first brave was impelled to kill a
monster which ho met with in the water, and for this act was
set upon bj' llaos or water-sprites, taken to the top of the cliffs,
torn into small pieces, and thrown baek into the lake to be de
voured. Sueh, they since believ-e, will be the fate of any Kla
math who ventures even to look upon this lake. A rock on the
northern side of the lake has been named Llaos Eock, in memory
of this superstition. Other points are named after persons and
resemblances, as Dutton Cliff, Cathedral Eock, Phantom Ship,
and — I mention it with due modesty — Victor Eock, in compli
ment to ray early visits to this then almost unknown wonder,
tears as they poured forth exclamations of wonder and joy akin to pain.
Nor was it less so to see so cultivated and learned a man as my companion
hardly able to command himself to speak with his customary calmness."

182 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
and a trifling feat of daring performed to get a view of a beau
tiful reflection under this overhanging stone parapet.
The approach to the lake is from the west or northwest. To
the right of the approach is a small grove of spruce-trees of
a good height, in a sort of sink with piled-up rocks behind it,
and on the south, inside the rira, are trees growing among the
rocks for some distance, as also on Wizard Island, which has a
belt of trees around its base ; but for the most part thero is no
vegetation shown in this locality.
Crater Lake lies on a plane raade by cutting off the top of a-
cone, its west side embedded in the range, and its east and south
sides rising clear from the plain eight thousand feet below. A
quarter of a mile from the lake one maj- stand on the edge of
the plane before mentioned and look over the Klamath Valley,
seeing distinctly the settlements fifty miles away. North of
the lake is only a jumblo of raountains, with Mount Scott and
Diamond Peak rising raore prominent than their neighbors.
Congress, in January, 1886, set aside Crater Lake aud a body
of land thirty miles long by twelve railes wide for a nalional
park, Oregon agreeing to preserve and keep it for the pleasure
of the people for all time. The boat used by Captain Dutton iu
his survey still remains at the lake, and as tourists multiply
other means of viewing it in its whole extent will be furnished.
The railway tourist Avould most naturally leave the train at
Medford, taking tbe old road to Fort Klamath and returning
tho same way. Eogue Eiver rises in the range near Crater
Lake, flowing for some distance through a deep canon along
tho edge of which the road runs.
Even here are evidences of the forces which have rent
the rocks asunder, as well as of the lapse of time which has
assisted the elements to mould and carve them into fantastic
shapes. Some distance off tbe road, we were told, is a locality
where blocks of pumice as " big as a meeting-house" may be
seen, which must have been produced in the furnace of the
great dead volcano to the east. In one place Eogue Eiver has
a foamy passage through a narrow gorge called The Dalles, be
low which it widens out in a series of rapids, after which it
gathers its waters for a plunge over a sheer precipice one hun
dred and eighty -six feet perpendicular. The mountains, too, are

A CHAT ABOUT OREGON MOUNTAINS. 183
delightful, being covered wilh a grand forest of the noble sugar-
pine intermingled with other trees of the sarae family, and with
tbe shrubby chinquapin, laurel, alder, and maple, according to
locality or altitude. The air is bright, clear, and buoj-ant,
alraost intoxicating in ils vivifying qualitj-, and svveot with thc
balsamic odor of the Pinus Lambertina. Wherever there is au
opening to the sun on the hillsides, there blossoms the rhodo
dendron, the mock-orange, the Spircea ariafoUa, and other orna
mental shrubs. Where tho dust of the road has lain undisturbed
irom the day before, it is full of prints of tinj' feet of birds and
olher timid creatures w-hich shun our observation by day, but
run about on their errands during the night or early morning.
Descending to the vallej-, the historical Table Eock, where
General Joseph Lane fought the Eogue Eiver Indians in 1853,
becoraes an objeet of interest. It is simply a high perpendicular
bluff overlooking Eogue Eiver, — tho Gibraltar of the Indians in
their wars. It brings us back to the contemplation of humanity
in phases ill in accord wilh our late impressions of nature. It
is a pity that the former should ever obliterate the latter.
I know how, if I were a painter, I should personifj- the young
giant Oregon. Lithe, strong, beautiful should he bo, with empire
written on his brow, and pow-er tempered by mildness beaming
frora his eyes. Of fair coraplexion he, with tawny blonde hair
and curling golden beard. His robe should be of roj-al purple
embroidered with wheat-ears, and his crown of burnished gold.
His throne should be among thc rugged mountains, with a lake
at his feet, rolling yellow plains on one hand, and smiling groen
vallej-s on the other. His sceptre, shaped like the tapering pine,
should be of silver, set with opals, emeralds, and diamonds.
On his right should roll the magnificent Columbia, to which
ships in the distance should seek entrance ; and over his shoul
der the white crest of Mount Hood stand blushing in a rosj'
sunset.

184 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
CHAPTEE XIIL
THE GEOLOGICAL FOEMATION OF OREGON AND WASHINGTON.
According to Mr. Condon, formerly Stale geologist, the Eocky
Mountains once formed the western breakwater of the continent,
as the Coast Mountains now do. Thej' were forced up by the
subsidence of the ocean bottom, and the consequent upfolding
of the earth's crust. Tho upheaval occurred near the shore-line,
but left a narrow strip of the old sea-bed east of the Eocky
Eange; enough to prove that the upheave! occurred in the
Cretaceous period. A large body of salt water was thus isolated,
whieh gradually, by natural drainage, became brackish only, and
finally quite fresh. This change is also proved by the nature of
the deposits.
After a long interval of quiet, another upheaval took place,
occasioned, like the first, by a subsidence of the ocean-bed. At
this second folding of the earth's crust, the Cascades and Blue
Mountains wero forced up, and onee more a large body of sea
water was divided off from the ocean, to form great salt lakes,
which gradually became fresh. The Blue Mountains formed an
island, separating the northern portion of these waters from the
southern, whieh were drained respectively by the Colurabia and
the Colorado Eivers ; but not until by deposits of various char
acter did the bottoms of these basins become sufficiently elevated.
In like manner, the later' upheaval of the Coast Eange caused
to be enclosed between these mountains and the Cascade Eange
another immense body of water, which became fresh in time
like the older lakes, and with the gradual elevation of the sedi
mentary deposits was finally drained off like them. That the
dates of the forraation of those lakes were widely separated is
evident frora tho fossils Of each, which indicate the geologic
period to which they belonged — the deposits of the Wallamet
Valley being tho most recent.
In the raean time vegetable and animal life flourished along
the shores of these inland seas or lakes. There are caflons in
East Oregon fifteen hundred feet in depth, whose walls present a

GEOLOGY OF OREGON AND WASHINGTON. 185
complete and undisturbed record of the geologic periods. First
of all in this record is the old ocean-bed of the Cretaceous
period, teeming with mj-riads of marine shells, perfectlj- pre
served in forra, though frequently- containing, as a mould, a
fiUing of chalcedony or calcareous spar, making specimens of
the highest beautj'.
Next above the salt-water deposits come those of the earlier
Tertiary periods. In this division we find the leaf impressions
of those grand trees that flourished during ages of tropical
Avarmth and moisture, — palms, yew-trees, immense ferns. In
some places an oak-leaf or an aeorn-cup has left its print in the
rocks. Contemjjoraneous with the palras and ferns Avere two species
of rhinoceros, and three or four species of Oreodon, an animal
allied in some things to the camel and in others to the tapir
familj'. Another aniraal of a tapir-lilie appearance, but called
by geologists Lophiodon, also lived during this period, and left
his bones in the muddy lake margins to become part of earth's
history. Also a peccary of large size, and an animal bearing
some reserablance to the horse, called the Anchitherium,— found
also in France and in the Mauvaises Terres of Nebraska. The
hipparion, or small throe-toed horse, and a great number of
eat-like, dog-like, and hyena-like animals, besides rabbits and
squirrel-like creatures, belonged to this period, as their fossilized
remains demonstrate.
Following this ago was one of volcanic action and the out
pouring of immense quantities of ashes and lava. By the lava-
streams issuing from the Blue Mountains new barriers were
raised, dividing the northern portion of the great lake of East
Oregon more completely frora the southern, which, by reason of
superior drainage, was the first to become dry land. The lake
on the northern side of the Blue Mountains, remaining longest
a lake, continued to receive the drift of its shores for a longer
period, and consequently offers a more perfect record of the
changes which took place through all the Tertiary periods.
Several of the strata formed in this lake are of pure volcanic
ashes, still rough as pumice stone to the touch.
Thus this Middle Tertiary period was closed in violence.
Volcanic fire, earthquake-shocks, and molten lava destroyed

186 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
and blotted out aU forms of vegetable and animal life. The
ao-os roU on, and onee more living forms of plant and animal
haunt the shores of these shallowing lakes. The oak, the yew,
the willow, have left their prints in the sedimentary rocks, and
the bones of new creations of animal life, sueh as the camel
and the horse, accompany them. But theso, too, in turn suffer
extinction by violence,— the whole country being covered more
than thirty feet deep in volcanic ashes. Indeed, deposits of
volcanic ashes exist in East Oregon which are ono h-andred feet
in depth.
After a long night of geological darkness, during which there
seems to have been a subsidence of earthquake and volcanic
outfiow, life onee more appears upon this portion of the earth
in the forms of elephant, ox, horse, and elk, accompanied by
sueh vegetable forms as were suitable for their subsistence.
Sdll another period of death was to ensue before the frame
work of the present Oregon was perfected. And this time the
desolation appears not to have corae from fire, but from frost
and flood. How long it continued, or what raighty seas of ice
raoved over the face of the earth, marking the hardest rock
wilh glacial abrasion, none can toll. But to have so clearly
written in the rocks of Oregon the geologic history of at least
one continent, is most interesting to scientist and araateur alike.
So far as can be seen, the Columbia Eiver Valley must become
the most desirable field for' the student of the earth's history,
and also of research into the record of prehistoric raan. For
here, soraewhere hidden in these aneient pages of rock, must
the beginning of man's history be preserved, like that of God's
other creatures, in tablets of stone.
From the brief sketch of Oregon's geologic history which has
been given it will appear what the agency has been of those
glistening white snow-peaks — Mounts Hood, St. Helen, Adams,
Jefferson, and all the rest — in forming the Oregon and Washing
ton of to-day. Time was when these mountains belched forth
molten lava, and rained hot ashes over many miles of country
on either side. For some reason— perhaps tho direction of the
prevailing winds — the ashes were chiefly deposited on the east
side of the range. The volcanoes themselves, in general, stand
on the east side of the suramit of the range. A coverinf of

GEOLOGY OF OREGON AND WASHINGTON. 187
basaltic rock conceals from sight the record we have referred
to, except where by the action of water the pages of the book
have been eut through from cover to cover — from ocean-bed to
overlying basalt.
For a distanee of sixty miles east of Dalles this last ov-erflow
may be traced, groAving thinner and thinner, until it becomes a
mere capping on the hills. Underneath it all is sedimentary,
except the interruptions, several in number, of the older out
flows of lava. It is owing to the large extent to which volcanic
ash enters into the composition of the earth and soil of this
portion of Oregon aud Washington that both earth and water
are so- often strongly alkaline. It' forms a soil inexhaustible in
fertility, and particularly adapted to the growth of cereals ; but,
owing to its elevation, aud to the depth of the stream below the
surface, togeiher with a drj' climate, is difflcult of adaptation
to the uses of the agriculturist.
Mr. J. Wesson, in an article published some years since in the
Overland Monthly, thus speaks of the geological formation of
the high plateaux and the lake region of Southeastern Oregon :
" Coming from the northeast, the' Blue Eange of Oregon, the
Cascade Eange from the norlh, and the Sierra from the south,
blend into or form a vast steppe or table-land of lava and sage-
fields, irrterspersod with a score of lakes, in size varying from
five to forty miles in length, and proportionate width. This high
separating belt of land and water commences at the Owyhee
Eiver and extends westward to the mountains, running at right
angles to the ocean — a length of throe hundred miles, and an
average breadth of one hundred and fifty. There are three
distinct chains of lakes in this district : The eastern, known as
tho Warner, inclusive of the Harney and Malheur. The second
chain of lakes raaj- be called the Goose Lake, including its
northern links, — Albert, Silver, and other smaller lakes. Goose
Lake nestles in the extrerae north end of the Sierra, and is
the source of Pitt Eiver, the main branch of the Sacramento.
This fact has been disputed, owing, perhaps, to the outlet being
underground in the drier seasons. The third and last, and larger
of the several chains, is the Klamath, erabracing Wright and
Ehett Lakes, farther south. The Warner Lakes string along
more like a river; and the rapid current, setting north at all

188 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
times, is suggestive that this line of water is really the outcrop
ping of a long, subterranean stream. The amount of wat^r is
apparently more than the natural drainage of the country adja
cent ; and the outline of a great river channel is distinctly- trace
able to the lakes of Harney and Malheur. The latter, however,
are strongly tinctured with the alkaline soil surrounding them."
Thus does the observing traveller confirm the views of the
student of geological science. The southern half of Bast Ore
gon retains yet some of the features of the undrained lake dis
tricts of Oregon and Washington.
That portion of Oregon and Washington which lies west of
the Cascades is part of a great trough, extending frofn the
Straits of Fuca to the Bay of San Francisco. It is not, like
East Oregon, elevated above the original sea-bed by iraraense
deposits of volcanic raatter ; but its older roeks are buried from
sight by deposits of the Tertiary and post-Tertiary periods.
There is a curious glimpse into the jjrehistorie record of man
given by the fossils of the Wallamet Valley. For instance, the
teeth and tusks of the elejphant have been found in Linn, Polk,
and Clackamas Counties, at ho great depth below tho surface, —
as in three instances they were discovered by men engaged in
digging mill-races, probably from eight to twelve foet in depth.
Side by side with this fact is the one that at a similar depth
some rude stone carvings have been discovered, buried in the
alluvial soil of the Lower Wallamet, about two miles above its
junction with the Columbia, in Colurabia County. Stranger
still, there has been discovered at a plaee just at the northern
end of Multnomah County, the remains of a camp-fire, with the
half-burnt brands lying in position, as if the fire had but just
gone out, and buried under twenty-seven feet of alluvial deposit.
Equally curious is the faet that in the Nehalem Valley, eight
miles back from the coast, and twenty -five feet below the sur
face, in a place where there is no suggestion even of a possible
land-slide, waa lately discovered a large knifo of pure copper,
with a stone handle. Here is a souvenir of the stone and copper
age 1 ShaU we ever be able to collect any facts concernino- these
aneient Oregonians? The paleontologists have here a splendid
field to delve in.
The work of the volcanoes is also very evident in West Ore-

GEOLOGY OF OREGON AND WASHINGTON. 189
gon. The valley of the Lower Columbia, in particular, reveals
the immense overfiows of lava in its forms of basaltic rock. In
numerous places it occurs in soUd masses of many feet in thick
ness ; in others it has assuraed the columnar form ; and in raany
more it is broken into sharply angular fragments, mixed with
«arth. The fracture in the latter case is foliated, — every fresh
cleavage showing what appears like the impression of palra-
leaves. The most interesting form of basalt occurs in sorae
columns in the high river-banks just below the town of St. Helen.
These columns have been brought to view by the gradual process
of denudation ; and now project a dozen feet or so of tbeir tops
from the incline of the high bluffs. They consist of uniform
blocks, of about ten inches in thickness, having six sides, — laid
one above another so as to appear like a solid pillai;. But their
great peculiarity is that each individual block has a similar-sized
chip off the lower side on its northwest corner or angle. With
this exception the blocks are flat. OccasionaUy one gets thrown
off, and so the columns never appear at any great height above
tbe earth; but their fragments strew the river bank for a long
distance. This basaltic outflow evidently came from Mount St. Helen.
On any of the sand-bars in the Lewis or the Cathlapootle
Eiver, which debouches into the Columbia on the opposite side,
are to be found water-rolled fragments of pumice-stone in abun
dance; and there are seasons of high water which bring down
from Mount St. Helen bj' some of its streams — tho Cowlitz in
particular — so much white volcanic ash as to render the water
milky in its appearance. It is soraewhat remarkable that, while
on the Oregon side the basalt covers every stratified rock or
sedimentary deposit, on the Washington side the hills are im
mense deposits of coarse gravel or sand and water-rolled stones.
About in the central portion of the Wallamet VaUey are some
gravel-beds of no great thickness ; while in Washington, along the
Columbia and in the Puget Sound region, the soil is gravelly to
an extent which renders it almost unfit for cultivation. Did the
facilities whieh the sound offered for drainage prevent the deposit
of soil-making matter during the period of its submergence?
There are evidences, in the elevated beaches of the Oregon
and Washington coast, of great changes of water level over

190 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
that portion of these countries west of the Cascades. At Shoal
water Baj', for instance, where the action ofthe surf has under
mined large portions of the bluff shore, breaking it off, there
are, exposed to tho eye of any observer, vertical sections of
sediraentarj' deposit one hundred feet above the present sea-
level. Mixed with this deposit, and soraetiraes occurring in
beds, are vast nurabers of sea-shells, of the kinds now common
to our oceans. The presence of oyster, clara, and other shells,
only found in shallow water ; as also of trunks of trees, leaves,
seeds, and cones, — their forms preserved unbroken, — proves
these fossils to have been deposited quietly in water of no great
depth, and to have remained undisturbed since. Granting this
apparent fact, the waters in which they were deposited must
have stood more than a hundred feet higher than the present
level of the ocean, or enough higher than the highest of these
deposits to have sufficiently covered them.
Mr. Condon's theory, to which reference has already been
made, supposes what is now the Wallamet Valley to have been
the basin of a large bodj- of water, to whieh, in an article in
the Overland Monthly, of November, 1871, he gives the name of
the Wallamet Sound. Tbe conclusion of that article has this
interesting summing up :
"And now, with our amended theory in mind, as a measuring-
rod, lot us retrace our steps to the lower country, — the Wallamet
Sound of tho olden time. Let the fall of the Columbia Eiver,
from this lake-shore oast of the Cascade Mountains to the mouth
of the Wallamet Eiver, be stated at eighty foot. Our fossil re
mains on this lake-shore are two hundred and fifty feet above
the present level of its waters, making a lotal of three hundred
and thirty feet as tho depth of those waters above the present
surface at the raouth of the Wallaraet Eiver. How naturallj'
one looks to the currents of such a vast body of water as the
agency corapetent to the heaping up of that long; sandy ridge,
one hundred feet high, through which the river has cut its way
at Swan Island, nortb of Portland. But let us follow it stiU
farther inland. Over where Portland now stands, these waters
were three hundred and twenty-five feet deep ; over Salem, one
hundred and sixty-five feet; over Albany, one hundred and fif
teen feet; over Tualatin Plains, one hundred and forty-five feet;

GEOLOGY OF OREGON AND WASHINGTON. 191
over Lafaj-ette, one hundred and seventy feet. A narrow strait,
over the present A-allej- of the Tualatin Eiver, ten or twelve
miles in length, opened westward upon a broad, beautiful bay,
extending over the present sites of Hillsboro' and Forest Grove,
to Gale's Peak, among the foot-hills of the Coast Eange. The
subsoil ofthe fine farras of that rich agricultural region is itself
tho muddy sediment of that bay. Farther south, over the cen
tral portion of the present vallej', and lying obliquely across the
Avidest part of that Wallamet Sound, there arose above those
Avaters an elevated island. It extended frora a point south of
Lafayette to one near Salera, and must have formed a fine cen
tral object in tho scene. Three or four volcanic islands extended,
in an irregular semicircle, where Linn County now is ; and the
islands of those waters arc the Buttes of to-day — Knox's, Peter
son's, and Ward's, One standing on the summit of either of
these Buttes, with the suggestions of these pages before him,
could so easily and vividly imagine those waters recalled, as to
almost persuade himself he heard the murmuring of their ripples
at his feet — so sea-like, the extended plain around him — so shore-
like, that line of bills, from Mary's Peak, on the west, to Spencer's
Butte, on the south, and only lost, on the east, among the intri
cate windings of extended slopes among the foot-hills of the
Cascades. How natural would seem to him this restoration of
one of geology's yesterdays !
"The shores of that fine old Wallamet Sound teemed with
the life of the period. It is marvellous that so few excavations
in the Wallamet Valley- have failed to uncover some of those
reUes of the past. Bones, teeth, and tusks, proving a wide
range of animal life, are often found in ditches, mill-races,
crumbling cliffs, and other exposures of the sediments of those
waters, and often within a feAv feet of the surface. Did man,
too, Uve thero thon ? The world feels an increasing interest in
facts that tend to solve the doubts that cluster around this natural
inquiry. A few more mill-races dug, a few more excavations of
winter floods, more careful search where mountain streams
wash their trophies to their burial under still waters, and this
question may be set at rest, as regards that Wallamet Sound.
Oregon does not answer it yet."
Washington, being formed by the same forces and at the same

192 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
period, presents in the Cascade Eange, which divides it into east
and west halves, the same general features found south of the
Columbia Eiver. It is noticeable, however, that there is a great
thickness of gravel-beds and sandy deposits on the north side
of this boundary, not to be found south of it. All along Puget
Sound to the Puca Strait this is apparent, but when we come
to the archipelago in the mouth of the strait, and north for
some distanee, the upheavals are basaltic, with rounded, dome
like peaks.
The coast of the Olympic peninsula bordering on the strait
is also basaltic, and this formation extends to and through
tho foot-hills of the Coast Eange to Mount Olympus. Here
the formation changes to slate, sandstone, gravel, and marl.*
Granite in plaee occurs rarely, but Ume deposits are found in
the streams, indicating the presence of lime-rock or marble some
where in their channels. The stratification is very much tilted,
and therefore displayed in the caflons as orderly- as books upon
a shelf The secrets of nature are revealed as plainly as in
Bast Oregon, and give evidence of the comparative youth of
these mountains. If other proofs were wanted, they are found
in their sharp peaks and jagged sides, where other precipices of
roek are found from one thousand to two thousand feet high.
Even the beds of the streams are little worn. Where they run
through deep caflons, it is where they have found and followed
fissures. Cascades are frequent, often plunging over soft slate
rock. Thin veins of quartz are seen in the slate and sandstone.
Granite boulders are found Avhich appear to be glacial, but there
is no evidence of volcanic overflow frora any j)art of this range.
A great deal of interest has been recently exhibited in the
exploration of the Olympic Eange, several expeditions being in
the field this present summer. It does not seem probable that
anything further will be learned concerning the general geo
logical features than is already known, but it is hoped to dis
cover some useful minerals. Indeed, since the explorations of
a year ago, a copper-mine has been opened which proraises weU.
Of this I shall speak more particularly in another place.

* This statement ia made by Charles A. Barnes, geologist of a party which
spent the wiuter of 1889-90 in exploring among the Olympic Mountains.

THE MINERALOGY OF OREGON. 193

CHAPTEE XIV,
WHAT I LEARNED ABOUT THE MINERALOGY OF OREGON.
The valuable rainerals whieh bave been worked in Oregon are;
first, tho precious raetals, gold and silver ; and, second, copper,
lead, iron, coal, marble, and salt.
Concerning the forraation of the metals, more especially of
gold, there are many theories. The age of the rocks associated
-.vith gold must serve as an indication of some value in piointing
out its origin, — the most probable theory of whieh seeras lo be
that, at a period when great changes were going on in the shape
of the earth, the upheaval of mountains and overflow of vol
canoes, certain vapors contained in the earth being forced bj-
heat and pressure inlo the fissures of rock alrcadj' hardened, or
even into the substance of rock not yet soUdified, became pre
cipitated in the form of gold upon the walls of the cavities
whieh shut them in. Much of this gold was subsequently sot
free by the action of tbe water, and is found mixed with sand
and gravel or earthy matter in old river-beds or vallej-s between
high mountains. Much of it still remains in its original position,
and has to be got out of the rock by blasting and crushing.
The gold-fields of Oregon lie along the bases of, or in close
neighborhood to, its mountain ranges ; and there is no mountain
chain which has not somewhere along it a gold-field, more or less
productive ; but in West Oregon their rugged nature and im
penetrable covering of timber have prevented their being mueh
prospected. It is only in the placer diggings of the southern
counties and the beach diggings of the coast counties that
mining for gold has been carried on to anj- extent.
After tlie rush of '49 to the gold-bars of the CaUfornia rivers
had made miners and experts of a hitherto purely agricultural
population in Oregon, thoy began to find indications on their own
soil of the existence of the precious metal. Travelling overland
to and from CaUfornia gave them opportunities of observing
the nature of the countiy, and it was not long before the gold-
hunters stopped north of thc California Une. As early as 1852
1.3

194 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
good placer diggings began to be discovered, and for a number
of years were worked with profit. They still yield moderately,
but are chioflj- abandoned to. the Chinese miners, Avho content
theraselves with smaller profits than our own people.
Jaekson County was formerly divided into several mining dis
tricts, the gold being placer and coarse gold. Forraerly nuggets
were found not far frora Jacksonville worth from ten dollars
to forty dollars, one hundred doUars, and even nine hundred
dollars ; but such discoveries are rare of late. I note, however,
the recent discovery of a three-hundred-dollar nugget in Jack
son County. From first to last Jackson County has contributed
thirty million dollars to the gold market of the w-orld.
Without going into mining geology, it is sufficient to remark
that the rocks of Eogue Eiver Vallej-, whore gold placers were
discovered on Jackson Creek in 1852, are of the Cretaceous
period mainly, instead of the earlier Jurassic. All the aurifer
ous rocks are metamorphio, and tilted up at high angles. It is
not among rocks of this formation that large or continuous
veins are to be looked for, while small gold-bearing veins of
quartz are numerous and often misleading. The annual pro
duction of gold in Jackson County had dwindled in 1870 to two
hundred thousand dollars per annum, which was mined by
Chinamen. At Wagner Creek, in Eogue Eiver Valley, are some quartz
mines that have yielded fairly well. Gold HiU, discovered in
1860, and located at the extreme western limit of tbe vallej-, is re
garded by geologists and miners with a curious interest, — by the
forraer because it is in the midst of a tract of eruptive granite
unlike anything else in this region, and by the latter on account
of its wonderful promise and pitiable failure. A pocket yielded
one thousand ounces por week at the first, which was expended
in mining machinery, and it was then discovered that the claim
was exhausted. Tho most recent discoverj' in Eogue Eiver
Valley is of a reputed silver-bearing ledge on Evans's Creek,
assaying ninety dollars per ton in silver and two dollars in gold.
There was scarcely a stream in Southern Oregon which would
not pay to work, and all were tested. The woll paying were
Jackson, Althouse, Applegate, and Illinois Eivers ; and the best
of those were the streams tributary to Applegate, lUinois, and

THE MINERALOGY OF OREGON. 195
middle Eogue Eivers. where mining is still carried on by the
hydraulic process, and where large sums have been expended
in the construction of mining ditches. The Stirling Mine, south
west of Jacksonville, is the most important hj'draulic raine in
the Stato, and is owned in Portland. Near Waldo, in Josephine
County, there is another well-equipped and paj-ing gravel mine.
The water is convej-ed to it bj- a ditch twentj'-three miles long,
capable of deUvering one million two hundred and fifty thousand
gallons per hour. Its width is eight feet at top and four at bot
tora, and it is throe feet deep. Tho hydraulic mean pressure
emploj-ed is three hundred feet, with three nozzles of six inches
aperture. The slope of this ditch is thirteen feet to the mile.
Near Uniontown is' a hydraulic claim owned and worked by
a Chinaman, who employs his countrj-men. Water is brought
to it bj' a ditch seven railes long, carrying one million four
hundred thousand gallons per hour during the season. The
cost of these ditches was ten thousand and twelve thousand
dollars respectivolj'. The Applegate ditch, which furnishes
water to several claims, is five miles long, with a width at top
of six foot, at bottom of three feet, and a depth of three feet.
The slope is twenty-two feet. Squaw Lake ditch, twelve and
a half railes long, cost, with the dam at the foot of the lake,
twenty-six thousand dollars. These ditches render available a
large extent of auriferous ground whose working would other
wise be debarred by elevation. Squaw Lake, situated on the
Oregon and California line, is a considerable body of water, with
an altitude of five thousand feet. A new hydraulic mine has
recently been opened in Southern Oregon, at a cost of twenty-
two thousand dollars, which promises to return double or treble
that amount per annum. It yields twelve and a half cents per
yard, whieh is considered rich dirt. Some nuggets have been
picked up in this claim valued at from three hundred and fifty
to five hundred dollars. This is a Blue Gravel mine, situated
on the Klamath, and there are other claims on this deposit.
Douglas County has several mining localities, the best of
whieh are on the affluents of the South Uraj)qua Eiver. Of these
the chief is Cow Creek, where the placers are extensive and have
been worked for thirty years. Quartz raines are also found in
the lateral canons. Two, the Lucky Queen and the Esther, have

196 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
onjoj'od sorae notoriety. They are just over the Une in Josephine
County, 'the Queen being a few miles only from Grant's Pass.
The companj' expended twenlj--five thousand dollars on it, but
abandoned it in 1879, since which it has been re-located. The
Esther was also abandoned and its macbinorj- sold, the company
having expended as much as the mine produced.
The mines of the southern part of Josephine County j-ield
annuallj' about sevontj' thousand dollars. The pocket mines of
Jackson County have furnished a total of about seven hundred
thousand dollars, nearly all of which was j'ielded in the years
from 1860 to 1865. The failure of quartz mining in Southern Ore
gon seems to be owing to a lack of skill and persistence quite
as much as to the quality of the roek, which yields assays that
should warrant the necessary expenditure to work them.
Coos and Curry Counties, being of the same geological forraa
tion as those iraraediate! j- east of them, have mines of the same
character, quartz, gravel, and placer, but not to so great an ex
tent as Josephine. Thoy have besides the black sand of gold
beaches, which has been rained quite steadily ever since its
discovery- in 1852 bj' some half-breed Indians, at a plaee a few
miles north of the Coquille Eiver. In 1853 they sold their claim
to McNamara Brothers for twenty thousand dollars. Pans of
black sand taken frora their claim yielded from eight to ten
dollars. Over one hundred thousand dollars were taken from
this claira, which led, as might be expected, to a rush from the
valleys to the sea-shore. But few locations paid like the first
one, and, although the sand continues to be worked, no one
makes more than fair wages.
An ancient sea-beach, three miles inland, was discovered by
Mr. Hineh, who took up a claim there whieh he sold for ten
thousand dollars to John Porshbaker & Co., Avho sold it again
for thirty thousand doUars. Like thc first location on the lower
beach, it was better than any afterwards taken.
The beach sands are black in color because they are composed
chiefly of magnetic iron, or oxide of iron, called magnetite. It
is hard, strongly magnetic, and infusible. The particles of gold
accompanying the sand are extremely sraall, and so flaky that
often they will float upon water, nor ean they be brought to unite
with quicksilver. This latter quality has caused miners to con-

THE MINERALOGY OF OREGON. 197
tend that each particle is coated Avith a filra of iron sulphide
Avhich prevents amalgamation, but the microscope reveals noth
ing to confirm this theory. It is easy to see that, with the sand
so heavj- and the gold so light, it must be difficult to capture a
fortune from beach mining, the sand of the ancient beaches
j'ielding an average of three dollars por ton. There are more
than a hundred of these auriferous beaches, extending from
Graj-'s Harbor on the north to Gold Bluff in California. Twenty-
seven of thera have been worked. The raost important of these
are at Yaquina, Alseya, Cape Lookout, Umpqua, Coquille, EUens-
burg, and Chetco. The production varies. The estimate for
1883 in Currj- Countj- was twenty thousand dollars. On the
other hand, one raine in Coos County yielded eighteen thousand
dollars in twelve raonths.
Quartz and gravel raining are now on a better basis in
Southern Oregon than forraerly. There aro raore raills, more
mining ditches, and altogether better facilities for extracting
the gold of the eountry, handled undoubtedly wilh a better
knowledge. What the farmer gets out of tbe earth in one shape
tbe miner extracts in another, and the exchange of products
results in a benefit to the agriculturist ; hence it is desirable
to have a mining population for consumers, a happy combina
tion which exists in Southern Oregon.
The mines of Lane County lie high up on the Middle Fork
and McKenzie Forls of the Wallamet Eiver in the foot-hills
of the Cascade Eange. • The Bohemia mining district, on the
Middle Fork, is about thirtj'-five miles southeast from Cottage
Grove, on the Southern Pacific. The rock of this district is slate
and granite, the veins cropping strongly and carrj-ing free gold
at the surface. In general the quartz is rose-colored, containing
gold and silver, with galena, pyrites, zinc blende, and occasion
ally antiraonj-. A small stamp-mill is at work in tliis district,
and some rich gold discoveries have been made within the present
year. The Blue Eiver raining district on McKenzie Fork is in a
rough and almost inaccessible region, abounding in the mag
nificent scenery of this range, well wooded and well watered.
The quartz veins in this district are in an amygdaloidal trap
roek, or graywacke, an altered and decoraposed forra of igne-

198 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
OUS rock, which rests upon granite. The veins are large, some
of them twelve feet in thickness. The rock is easy to excavate
near the surface, but will probably be found harder as it goes
down. Free gold is found at the top.
It has been known for twenty-five j'ears that gold existed in
this district, and the Treasure mino was worked by arastra for
a little time, but abandoned as unprofitable. More recently it
has been reopened by other parties, who find it to assay from
thirtj- dollars to forty dollars per ton, and to bo free milling.
There are several locations on the Blue Eiver ridge dating back
no further than 1887. Tho Eureka, just south of Treasure, is an
extension of the same. It has been tested in a small mill, and
yields from twenty dollars to thirty dollars per ton. A group
of throe locations, three-quarters of a mile west of Treasure,
are incorporated together uuder the name of the Blue Eiver
Mining Companj', and owned in Eugene, The assaj's of the
ore from the Croesus vary from three dollars and seventy-five
cents to one hundred and nine dollars per ton, and of the Im
perial from five dollars and fifty cents to twelve hundred dollars.
This corapany has a sraall mill.
Tbe Lane County Mining Corapany also own three claims in
this vieinitj-, but have worked only one, the Durango, which
assays from two dollars and twenty-five cents to eighty-seven
dollars per ton. The King-Bee, a large ledge, was worked to a
limited extent tvi-enty-fivo years ago, and abandoned. It assays
from three dollars and seventy-five cents to two hundred and
eleven doUars per ton, principally gold. Near the King-Bee is
the Buck, owned in Eugene, which assays from four hundred
dollars to nine hundred dollars. There are perhaps as many
more clairas on and immediately about Treasure HiU, whieh
have yet to be hoard from. But there seems little doubt that
this is a veritable gold-mining district.
Discoveries wore also made twentj--five years ago, g,s well
as more recently, at the heads of the Santiam and Molalla
Eivers, in the Wallamet Valley. On the latter, in Clackamas
County, is a very thick ledge of bluish-white quartz, cariying
free gold and pyrites, which assaj's twenty-five doUars in gold
and two hundred and thirty five doUars in sUver to the ton.
Specimens from this district are shown which assay seven hun-

THE MINERALOGY OP OREGON. 199
dred ounces of silver per ton, besides some gold. Other speci
mens not so rich eontain cubic galena, copper, iron pyrites, and
zinc blende, — a good smelting ore.
The mines near Wilhoit Springs, on a branch of the Molalla,
at an altitude of about twelve hundred foet above sea-level, are
found in roeks of a more recent geological era than elsewhere.
It is here that a deposit is found, of great extent, which is not
roek at all, but a soft, Ught, silver-bearing earth, in some places
sixty feet in depth, with a hardness about that of gypsum. In
color it is a gray, varying to red or brown, with a specific
gravity of 1.5. Tho silver contained varies from one to ten
ounces per ton, with a sraall admixture of lead. No practical
tests have been made of the value of this remarkable earth.
The raost promising mining districts of those bordering the
Wallamet Vallej' are situated on the North and South Forks of
the Santiam, and are reached from the Southern Pacific by
wagon from Turner, in Marion County. Tho formations are
porphyritic and granitic, similar to the belt along the range,
north and south. Some slate, silicious and approaching sand
stone, is found. Quartz is abundant, and float cariying gold is
frequently found in the water-courses. Greenhorn district was
discovered by Dr. E. O. Smith, of Portland, in 1864. Several
locations were made, of which the While Bull became famous
for giving to the world the most beautiful spiecimens of arbores
cent gold ever seen. The quartz was of the nature called
" rotten," — that is, crumbling and stained ; aud in it occurred
what were called "eagles' nests," Avhich, in fact, they resembled,
being cavities as large as tbe croAvn of a man's hat filled with
sticks or straws of gold, which, on examination, proved to be
skeins of the finest wire gold, as evenly twisted into threads
as if it had passed through a thread-mill. These skeins were
attached to the irregular angles of the quartz on the walls of
the eavitj-, and, crossing in everj' direction, held some bits of
quartz in the tangles thej' made. The effect of the whole was
surprising and magnificent. These elegant specimens, worth
twice the gold they contained, were simply ground up like com
mon ore. There was another class of quartz in this mine
which was hard, white, and stuck full of bits of gold from the
size of a pin-head to a bird-shot.

200 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
The sight of these treasures naturally caused great excite
ment, and gave the owners hope of fabulous riches. A quartz-
mill and saw-mill were purchased and set up in the district ; but,
like the Gold Hill mine in southern Oregon, which, indeed, it
resembled, it suddenly failed, the poeket being exhausted. Af
terwards the raill was burned. A second effort to make some
thing out of this mine by other parties was also a failure, and a
second mill was burned. It is believed, however, that with dif
ferent methods and concentration, this mine might bo made to
pay, and recent developments go to confirm it.
Another raine in this district, — the Canal Fork, — carries free
gold at the surface only. By working-test it yields from nine
teen dollars to thirty doUars per ton. Lower down the ore be
comes very base with galena, and assays frora two hundred dol
lars to five hundred ounces per ton of silver. There is a mill on
this mine whieh produced from two hundred tons five thousand
doUars, or twentj--five dollars per ton. The cost of the mill and
other exijonses were twentj- thousand dollars. Even at this
amount tho mine eould bo made, with good management, to
pay. Other raines in the adjoining district of Galena assay weU,
and quartz leads charged wilh lead, copj^er, iron, and zinc sul
phides, the galena carrying silver, are frequent. One galena
lode, four feet in width, assays forty ounces of silver to the ton,
with no rainerals prejudicial to sraelting accorapanying it.
The Bonanza mine, owned by the Albany Mining and Milling
Company, is in the Quartzville district of the Santiam. The ore
is free gold in decomposed quartz, and reserables the product of
the While Bull mine, assaying, in some instances, twenlj--six
thousand dollars to tho ton. At present this mine promises to
hold out for a year or more of milling, in which ease the com
panj- will seeure an ample fortune for all.
Why these mines are not more developed may be owino- to
several causes. Primarily, a heavy expense attends quartz
mining anywhere, and in a country so difflcult of access it is
increased. Again, these locations have not been made by prac
tical miners, but bj' merchants and farmers, who have an
assured living out of other pursuits, and who have neither the
knowledge nor tho capital to make a success of raining, but who

THB MINERALOGY OF OREGON. 201
hold their discoveries by patent away from improvement by
others. West Oregon has never had a mining population, except so
far as they became such temporarilj- through efforts to mend
tbeir fortunes in occasional rushes to placer diggings,* The
nearly irapenetrable character of the forest on the western slope
of the Cascades, hiding Irom observation by traveUers, and even
explorers, tho character of the rocks, is also a potential reason
why so little is known of the mining possibilities of the Wal
lamet Valley.
Quartz A-eins are found in rock — sandstone running into a
smooth Avhetslone rock, with limestone and soapstone sugges
tions of a cretaceous origin — in Tillamook County. A few
thousand dollars wore spent in exploiting a claim on Trask Eiver,
which exhibited sorae good top rock that soon gave out. A
working result of sixty-six dollars per ton was obtained frora one
location, but no development further has ever been made.
The most interesting recent discoverj' in mining is of a de
posit of nickel near Eiddlo, in Douglas County. It is owned by
a CaUfornia corapany who purchased it from the Oregon owners
for three hundred thousand dollars, and eastern capitalists are
negotiating for it. It is claimed that the ore can be worked and
refined at a profit of twenty-two dollars and fifty cents per ton.
Natural gas is a recent discoveiy, made in Linn and other
counties, which is regarded as of groat importance. The indi
cations are confirmed by tho very general presence of coal un-
derlj-ing tho foot-hills in almost any part of West Oregon, espe
cially along the lower Columbia and in the Ooast Eange. Iron
most frequentlj- is found near the coal-beds, a feature whieh
promises well for tho future manufacturing interests of the
State. Colurabia County, which faces on the Colurabia Eiv-er,
possesses these features in a striking degree, and corabined with
* An example of mining by unprofessional miners is this : WiUiam Ruble,
of Salem, a farmer, and well advanced in life, has been working a mine in
Josephine County for the past seven years. His claim consists of three hun
dred and fifty acres of gravel, out of which, without much capital, he has man
aged to obtain twenty-five thousand dollars, aud to get his ground into good
working shape. He could sell it now for ten thousand dollars per acre, but
it is worth more to hold and work.

202

ATLANTIS ARISEN.

an abundance of tiraber. Clatsop County has sirailar resources,
though less accessible.
Coal was discovered in Oregon before Washington was sepa
rated from it, or about 1852. The first coal, and so far the
only coal, rained in this State has been at Coos Bay. A vessel
named the " Chauncey" in 1854 was loaded with a cargo taken
frora a drift in a claim a mile and a half frora Coal Bank Slough,
and earried in wagons to that place, where it was transferred to
scows and taken to Empire City to bo put aboard the vessel.
After all this labor, the vessel and cargo were lost on the bar.
Another cargo was soon afterwards shipped in the same manner,
which reached San Francisco, where it brought forty dollars per
ton, the freight on it being thirteen doUars.
The following year the Newport and Eastpoi-t mines were
opened, and coramenced shipment in 1856, since whieh time
they have continued to furnish fuel to the California market.
The shipments amount to about five thousand tons monthly.
The mines opened, after the Newport and Bastport, were the
Hardy, in 1871; the Utter, in 1874; the HeniyviUe, the same
year; and the Southport, in 1875. Eecent reported discoveries
of a superior hard coal in the mountains about Coos Bay are
interesting capitalists.
Other coal-beds exist in different parts of Oregon, chiefly in
the region of the Coast Eange. The United States Geological
Survey for 1887 gives the following analysis :

Water.

Volatile Matter.

Fixed
Carbon.

Ash.

Coke.

Coos Bay 
Astoria 
Blue Mountain .
Camas Mountain . .

20.00 2,56 1.081.63

32.5946.2924.40 42.82

41.98 48.49 34.7144.94

5.342.74
39.81 10.71

Pair. Very good.
Non-coking.

THE MINES OF EAfiT OREGON. 203
CHAPTEE XV.
A GLIMPSE OF THE MINES OF EAST OREGON.
Wherever in East Oregon the irregular range of the Blue
Mountains has lifted itself above the high table-lands and the
sedimentary rocks, there are seen the metamorphic or mineral-
bearing roeks in which mines may be looked for. These erup
tive heights are divided by local noraenclature into Owyhee,
Powder Eiver, Pine Creek, John Day, Malheur, Cedar, and
Steen Mountains, The mining districts, so far as discovered,
are situated on the John Day, Powder, Malheur, and Burnt
Eivers and their branehes, as thoy come out of these raountains.
The John Day placer raines were discovered in 1862 by a
partj' of Californians en route to Salmon Eiver, in Idaho. These
placers were on Granite, Elk, Dixie, and Caflon Creeks, and
very productive, as many as five thousand miners being at work
there for several seasons. These placers are now given over to
a feAv rainers, raost of whom are Chinese ; but there are others
on the numerous creeks upon the head-waters of John Day
whieh are yielding good wages to white men.
The second discoverj- of any note was in 1863, at Humboldt
or Mormon Basin, which lies on the flat top of a ridge between
Burnt Eiver and Willow Creek, a fork of the Malheur. Along
the sides of this ridge and at its feet were the camps of
Eye Vallej-, Malheur City, Amelia, El Dorado, and ClarksviUe.
Mormon Basin was destitute of water, except that furnished by
two small streams, and the melting of the winter snows, which
give frora twenty to eighty days of a mining stage, according
to the season. The first j-ear one hundred miners made an
ounce a day to the hand as long as there was water. Later
their claims were abandoned, and ev-entually fell into the hands
of companies who worked the deep gravel mines by hydraulic
machinery, of which there are several plants in operation. One
firm employs twentj' six men, and uses two sets of sixteen -inch
sluices, eraptying into a thirty-inch flume two thousand feet
long. Their hydraulic aj^paratus consists of seven-inch pipe,

204 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
supplying two grants with two-inch nozzles, working under one
hundred to two hundred feet head. Their pay-dirt is from five
to twenty feet deep, and contains a great proportion of quartz
boulders, some weighing a ton or more, and raany showing
free gold. Several thousand dollars' worth of fine gold quartz
speciraens have been found in the sluices, which leads to the
belief that a valuable quartz mino will yet be discovered. The
claira yields from eight thousand to twenty thousand dollars,
according to the season. The other firms in Mormon Basin
clear up in a season about fourteen thousand four hundred and
fifty-six dollars. The total product in 1883 was thirty-five
thousand doUars, and at the present rate of working the mines
are likelj' to last for tvrenty j-ears longer.
El Dorado district, west of Mormon Basin, is furnished with
Avater by the great ninety-mile ditch of Burnt Eiver, and is one
of the most important in the State. The Weatherby placers, on
Burnt Eiver, produce ten thousand dollars a year by hydraulic
process ; and the Clarkeville raines, owned in Chicago, with
forty miles of ditches and extensive water-rights, carry on a
large mining business.
The product of the Granite Creek district, in tho John Day
Valley, is about twenty thousand dollars per annum^-a part of
this being from the silver-mines Cabell and Beagle. The Cabell
is named after a Nevada rainer of that narae, who, in searching
for smelting ores on tho Sout];i Fork of Powder Eiver, dis
covered a number carrying lead, gold, and silver in paj-ing
amount. The Cabell ships its ore to Omaha to be smelted, at a
cost of fifty-eight dollars per ton, and still makes a profit.
Dixie Creek district, alwaj-s a productive one, still pays about
forty thousand dollars a year frora placer mining. Thero are a
good manj- quartz locations, a dozen or more of which have
been worked, in this district, wilh unknown results. But the
annual output of the placers of East Oregon has been estimated
to be about three hundred thousand dollars, but, possibly, not
over two hundred and seventy-one thousand dollars.
The Nelson Mine, seven miles west of Baker City, is a deep
gravel property producing forty thousand dollars per season.
It consists of seventy acres of patented land with a deposit of
gravel one hundred and seventeen feet in depth, and lies high

THE MINES OF EAST OREGON. 205
enough to afford roora fiu- duraping. It is owned by Californians,
who bought it for three hundred thousand dollars in 1887, and
put in sixtj' thousand dollars' worth of iraproveraents. There
are other valuable gravel mines at Sumpter and Deer Creek,
besides manj- j-et to be developed. A railroad is being con
structed from Baker Citj' to Sumpter.
Quartz mining had not been profitably carried on fbrmerly
for several reasons, mainly the lack of capital and transporta
tion. The first mine discovered and worked was tho Virtue,
near Baker City. This faraous property comprises three thou
sand foet on a strong vein frora two to six feet wide. It has been
prospected ,for one thousand feet to a depth of two hundred and
fiftj- feet. The quartz is free milling costing onlj- seven dollars
and fiftj- cents, while the ore is w-orth forty dollars. It is
estimated that it has j-ielded two million dollars.
Another valuable free-gold quartz mine i's the Conner Crook
Mine, on Conner Creek, in Baker Countj', three miles from
Snake Eiver. Although not a high-grade ore, it is so cheaply
milled as to y-ield verj' large profits. It is partly owned in Port
land, and parity in Baker County. The Gold EidgeMine, four
miles frora Burnt Eiver, is a similar propertj', which pays ten
dollars per ton, but is now lying idle. It is owned in California.
Tho silver-mines of Baker County are the Green Discovery
and the Monumental, ihirtj'-fivo miles south of Baker City, in
Eye Valley, tbe Mammoth, thirty miles west of Baker, and the
Cabell, already referred to. The first named was found by
Green, a prospector, in 1869. The Green vein was large, but
only a few inches of it was pay-rock. The total production w-as
twentj--five thousand dollars, but the expenses were twice that
amount. The Monumental, belonging to the same company,
and only a milo distant, was sold to a Boston firm for fifty-five
thousand dollars, which brought the original company out about
even. The Mammoth Mine has a v-ein twentj- feet wide, of low-
grade roek, in granite. About forty thousand dollars had been
taken from this claim in 1888, from face-rock which paid twenty
dollars per ton in gold. There are other locations on the same
lode. Eecent discoveries in the Greenhorn Mountain district
are attracting much attention, and this is thought to be one of
the richest silver-producing districts in the Northwest.

206 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
The Keystone Gold-Mine, owned in Portland, is situated seven
miles north of Prairie City, in Grant County. It is the most
important property in this (Quartzburg) district. It comprises
three claims, and has a continuous length of forty-five hundred
feet. The quartz carries free gold, metallic silver, iron and
copper pyrites, zinc blende, and galena. Assays show one hun
dred and six dollars per ton in gold, and from ono hundred
dollars to one thousand dollars in silver. The property is valued
at fiftj- thousand dollars.
The Pine Creek mines, of whieh one hears a good deal, are
situated near the Snake Eiver boundary of Union County, and
are geologically interesting, as the streara on which they are
situated rises in rugged peaks of greater elevation than any
other in the Blue Eange, The geology of the district is clearly
seen in the canons of Pine Creek, which show that the founda
tion of this region is granite overlaid by slate, which, when the
internal heat of sorae volcanic period had fused the granite, was
Ufted up, broken, and thousands of its fissures filled with the
raoltonrock, by which means the eccentric granite dikes ofthe
district were formed. Other fissures were opened, cutting the
granite, which gradually filled wifh mineral solutions carrying
quartz, iron pyrites, copper, galena, and, in smaller proportions,
gold and silver. At some later period other convulsions followed;
during which dikes of lava, trachytic or porphyritic in charac
ter, were forced up through the strata, cutting the quartz veins.
At a still later period thero was an outburst of raelted trap rock,
which filled deep fissures, and cooled in thick sheets over all.
Water and ice wore away this coA-ering forming the soil of
East Oregon, as previously noted, and also in carving out the
perpendicular dikes left cavernous recesses in the cliffs, but the
lava dikes were left standing like monuments to the dead granite
and trap.
It is superfluous to remark that where successive meltings
and upheavals have occurred the quartz veins in the older
granite are offen interrupted and lost, and that no miner is safe
from such an ending to his enterprise. Nevertheless, the Pine
Creek raines enjoy a high reputation.
About 1862 sorae Umatilla Indians brought a quantity of gold,
which appeared to have been extracted from quartz in an im-

THE MINES OF EAST OREGON. 207
perfect manner, to a trader at Walla Walla, who Avilh others
attempted, on inforraation gi\'en by the Indians, to reach tbe
raines, but, failing, joined the gold-seekers then rushing into
Idaho through the Grand Eond Valley, and it was not unlU 1884
that the locality so long ago sought was discovered. Tbe raines
lie in granite, in granite and slate, and soraetimes in the plane
of contact between the tAvo.
The Contact Silver-Mine, sixty or seventy miles northeast of
Baker City, isan example of the latter vein. It is accessible
onlj- from Cornucopia, from which place itis distant three miles,
and two thousand feet higher. The vein runs along the south
side of the mountain, one thousand foet above tho stream, and
parallel with it. It has an average width of four foot, and lies
upon granite, with the slate above, dipping into the mountain
at an angle of forty-five degrees. The roek is easilj- mined, and
said to be rich.
Tho Whitman Mine has boon worked more than anj' other in
the district. It is owned in Louisville, Kentucky, by a company
with capital sufficient to develop whatever riches it may contain.
Thoy have at least found geological eccentricities enough to
confound the scientists.
Several claims opened only by prospect holes are located on
the mountain, of which Eed Jacket, Eobert Emmet, Union, and
Companion mines are most prorainent. On the middle fork of
tho Imnaha Eiver, graphic tellurium has been discovered in
Silver Tongue Mine, owned by private parties. Tho ore assays
from two hundred and twenty-five dollars to twenty-one thou
sand dollars per ton, in gold. A large country remains unpros-
peeted in the Pine Crook region, on the WaUowa County side,
where argentiferous galena and gold-bearing ores are known to
exist. Tbe ores of this district are base, and smelting will be a neces
sity. The free gold which appears on the surface is owing
simply to the decomposition of sulphurets into oxidized com
pounds of the other accompanying metals, which, being friable
and loose, haA'e been washed awaj', leaving the gold free ; but
this, although highly gratifying at first, cannot go below a
certain depth.
Metallurgical works havo been established at AUentown, for

208 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
chlorinating and leaching gold and silver ores. A roasting fur
nace for desulphurizing concentrations, a two-stamp mill for
working test lots, an assay-offleo, and other conveniences are
also to be found in the Pine Creek, or, as it is named. Granite
district. On the stage-road from Baker City- to Pine Creek are the
Sparta, Eagle, and Hog 'Bra districts. Tho first of these is old
placer raining ground, which formerly yielded thirt j--five thou
sand dollars per annum. A gold quartz mine, for whieh a Salt
Lake companj- paid fifty thousand dollars, is located in the latter
district. There is a ten-stamp raill hero, and a raill at Sparta.
A Salraon pulverizer and an arastra furnish crushing power to
the mines hereabouts.
It will be readily seen from the foregoing that quartz mining
is in its infancj' in Oregon, yet that its mineral resources aro
considerable. Just what amount of gold and silver is produced
cannot be shown, owing to the fact that ores are often milled
or smelted away from the producing locality, and the results
coined in the several mints of the United States, where tho
locale of the precious metals is not always known. Perhaps an
average of half a million of gold is obtained from the mines of
this State annuaUy. The silver-production is much less, this
metal never being found in placers, and requiring mills and
smelters to dislodge it from its matrix.
The mineral belt of East Oregon is but a continuation of the
Idaho metal-bearing mountains, as, for instance, the Seven Devils
country, north of the Weisor Eiver, and directlj- east of Union
County. This region has an elevation little above that of tho
Pino Mountains, and derives its Satanic appeUation from a group
of seven peaks which overshadow one of the greatest copper-
mines in. the world. This district covers a scope of country
fifteen by twenty-four miles, and contains vertical veins from
thirty to one hundred and fifty feet wide and thousands of feet
deep. This district was discovered twenty-five years ago by one
Levi Allen, who located the Old Peacock, the phenomenal sur
face mine of the world. He held it by doing one hundred dol
lars' worth of work on it annually untU 1888, when he was forced
to take in Montana parties, who now own thirteen-sixteenths.

THE MINES OF EAST OREGON. 209
The mine is valued at several raillions. The ground has been
sluiced off for half a mile for the froo gold it contained, exposing
twolv-e acres of copper running from thirtj- to eighty per cent.,
of a value of between five and six mUlions.
Thero are several other mines as rich in the Seven Devils
countiy. The Peacock group contains the South Peacock, with
ono hundred j-ards square of copper, of unknown depth; the
Bodie, Standard, Little Peacock (assaj-ing fiftj--seven per cent.
copper, thirtj' dollars gold and silver). Copper Kej-, Confidence,
and Side Issue. Then there is the Lockwood group of three
mines. Four tons of this oro make one ton of copper raatte,
with thirtj'-two dollars per ton of matte in gold. It carries its
own flux, as it bas sufficient iron in and near it to make it the
best smelting ore in the eountry.
The Eiver Queen, near Snake Eiver, is proraising to merge
into silver and gold, assaying fifty-six por cent, copper, ten dollars
and eighty cents silver, and five dollars in gold. It carries its
own flux also. The Decora has an extensive deposit of low-
grade ore and a fine mill-site. There are ten or a dozen other
mines and one hundred and twenty-five locations in this region.
Some capitalists of Montana have expended one hundred and
seventj--five thousand dollars in development, Tho possibilities
of Seven Devils mineral belt aro bej-ond computation.
The nearness of this wealth to the eastern counties of Ore
gon is of great significance to this part of Oregon. The diffi
culty hitherto has boon the inaceessibilitj- of these mines, which
were reached by two hundred miles of exceodinglj- rough and
dangerous travel. But capital, which smooths all our waj-s, will
find a raeans of making travel to these mines as easy as to any
others, and the scenery of the route is magnificent.
As I have endeavored to classify the other productions of the
Stato somewhat by counties, it may- not be without interest to
present the following table of mineral productions by counties,
which I borrow chiefly from statistics published by the State
Board of Agriculture.
Baker. — Gold in quartz and placers, silver in lodes, copper (native), coal(?),
building-stones, nickel ore, limestone and marble, cinnabar.
Benton. — Coal, building-stones, gold in beach sands, iron pyrites
14

210 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
Clackamas. — Iron ore and ochres, gold in quartz lodes, copper ores, build
ing-stones, galena, coal.
Clatsop. — Coal, potters' clay, iron ore, and jet.
Columbia. — Iron ore, coal, salt springs, manganese ore.
Coos. — Coal, gold in beach sand, stream placers, and quartz lodes, plati
num and iridosmine, brick-clays, chrome iron, magnetic sands (auriferous).
Crook. — G-old in placers and ledges, opal, building-stones, coal, mica, chalk,
moss-agate, iron and copper ores.
Curry. — Iron ore, gold in stream placers and beach sands, platinum and
iridosmine, chrome iron ore, s)lver(?), coal(?), borate of lime, building-
stones. Douglas. — Gold in lodes and placers, nickel ores, quicksilver, building-
stones, copper, native and ore, coal, salt springs, natural cement, chrome iron
ore, platinum, and iridosmine.
Gilliam.-— Go&\{'{).
Grant. — Gold in lodes and placers, silver in lodes, coal, iron ore.
Jackson. — Gold in lodes and placers, iron ore, quicksilver, mineral waters,
graphite, building-stones, coal, limestone, infusorial earth.
Josephine. — Gold in lodes and placers, copper ores, heavy spar, limestone,
and marble.
Jf^aJwoiA.— Mineral waters.
Lake. — Mineral waters.
Lane. — Gold in quartz and placers, zinc ores, coal(?), magnetic iron ore.
Linn. — Gold in quartz and placers, copper ores, galena, zinc blende.
Malheur, — Nitrate beds, alkaline salts.
Marion. — Gold and silver in quartz, limestone, bog iron ore.
Morrow. —
Multnomah. — Iron ore, building-stones.
Polk. — Building-stones, salt springs, mineral waters, iron pyrites, lime
stone. Tillamook. — Gold in beach sands, coal, rock-salt, iron ores, building-stones,
iron pyrites.
-Umatilla. — Gold in lodes on head-waters of Umatilla Eiver, placers on
Columbia Biver, coal and iron ore.
Drciora,- Gold in lodes and placers, silver in lodes, hessite, ochre.
-Wallowa.— GoiSi in lodes, silver in lodes, copper, building-stones.
Wasco. — Mineral waters.

FamAJK.— Mineral springs, iron pyrites.

THE FORESTS OF THE NORTHAVEST. 211
CHAPTEE XVI.
A TALK .-iBOUT THE FORESTS OF THE NORTHWEST.
In the Northwest the forests are found almost exclusively on
tbe raountains. Along the margins of streams there is usually -
a belt of timber a quarter of a milo in breadth ; and on Puget
Sound the timber reaches frora the mountains down to this
inland sea, the sarae as on the outer coast. On the Columbia
this belt, even on the low grounds, is wide, and, as there is a
range of highlands of considerable elevation extending from
the raouth of this river to and beyond its passage through the
Cascade Mountains, with only occasional depressions, there is a
great body of timber within roach of tide-water.
The base of the Coast Mountains on the west eoraes within
two to .six miles of the sea, and frequent spurs reach quite to
tbe beach, forming high promontories. From tho eoast to the
eastern base of tho Coast Mountains is a distance of from twenty
to thirty miles. AUoAving for the margin of lovel land toward
the sea and for openings among the foot-hills on the eastern side,
here is an immense body of forest lands extending the whole
length of the State, frora norlh to south.
Again, the Cascade Eange has a base from east to west of
about forty miles, including the foot-hills. All the west side of
this range is densely wooded, making another great supply of
timber. The east side, having an entirely different climate, does
not support the same heavy growth of trees.
These forests furnish a most interesting study to the botanist.
Beginning our observations on the coast, we flnd that near the
sea we have, for the characteristic tree, the black spruce {Abies
Menziesii), It grows to a diameter of eight feet, and to a con
siderable height, though not the tallest of the spruces. Its
branehes commence about thirty feet from the ground, growing
densely, while its leaves, unlike the other species, grow all
round the twig. The foliage is dark green with a bluish cast.
The bark is reddish and scaly, and the cones, which grow near
the ends of the branches, are about two inches in length, and

212 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
purplish in color. In appearance it resembles the Norway
spruce. It loves a moist climate and soil, growing on brackish
marshes and inundated islands. The timber is used in making
packing-boxes for fruit, as it has no strong flavor Uke thc flr.
Tho Oregon cedar {Thuya gigantea) grows verj- abundantlj'
near tho coast. This tree attains to a very great size, being
often from twelve to fifteen feet in diameter, but is not so high
as the 8j)ruce. Tho branches commence about twenty feet from
the ground. Above this the wood is exceedingly knotty; but
the lumber obtained from the clear portion of the trunk is
highly valued for finishing work in buildings, as it is light and
soft, and does not shrink or swell like spruce luraber. For
shingles and rails it is also valuable, from its durability.
The Indians make canoes of the cedar nearly as light and
elegant as the faraous birch canoes of more northern tribes.
Formerly they built houses of planks split out of cedar with no
better implement tban a stone axe and wedge. An axeman can
split enough in two or three days to build himself a cabin. This
tree is nearly allied to the arhor vitce, which it resembles in foli
age, having its leaves in flat sprays that look as if they had been
pressed. On the under side of the spray is a cluster of small
cones. The bark is thin, and peels off in long strips which are
used by the Indians to make matting, and a kind of cloth used
for mantles to shed the rain. It is also used by them to roof
their houses, make baskets, ete. Altogether, it is the most
useful tree of the forest to the native.
Hemlock-spruce {Abies Canadensis) is next in abundance near
the coast. It grows much taller than the cedar, often to one
hundred and fifty feet, and has a diameter of from six to eight
feet. The color is lighter and the foliage finer than that whieh
grows in tbe Atlantic States, and the appearance of the tree is
very graceful and beautiful.
Another tree eommon to the eoast is the Oregon yew {Taxus
hrevifolia). It is not very abundant, grows to a height of
thirty feet, and flourishes best in damp woods and marshy situ
ations. The wood is very tough, and used by the Indians for
arrows. When much exposed to the sun, in open places, the
foliage takes on a faded, reddish appearance. It bears a small,
sweet, coral-red berry, of which the birds are very fond.

THE FORESTS OF THE NORTHWEST. 213
A few trees of tho red fir {Abies Bouglassii) occur in the Coast
Mountains, but are not eommon ; also an occasional white spruce
{Abies taxifolia), and norlh of the Columbia small groves of a
scrub-pine (P. contorta) appear on sandy prairies near the sea-
beach. It grows only- about forty feet high, and bas a diameter
of two feot.
Of the broad-leaved, deciduous trees which grow near the
eoast, the white maple {Acer macrophyllum) is the most beauti
ful and useful. It grows and decays rapidly, — the mature tree
attaining to tho height of oightj' feet, and a diameter of six
feot; then decaj-ing from tho centre outward, lets its branches
die and fall off, while from the root other new trunks spring up
and attain a considerable size in four or five years. The wood
has a beautiful grain, and is valuable for cabinet raanufactures,
taking a high polish. Tho foliage is handsome, being very
broad and of a light green. In the spring long racemes of
yellow flowers give tbe tree a beautiful and ornamental appear
ance, which makes it sought for as a shade-tree.
The Oregon alder {Alnus Oregona) is another cabinet-wood of
considerable value. The tree grows to a height of sixty feet,
with a diameter of two or three feot. It has a whitish-gray
bark, and foUage much resembling tbe elm. On short stems,
near the ends of the branches, are clusters of very small cones,
not more than an inch in length. When grown in open places,
with sufficient moisture, it is a graceful and beautiful tree.
Three species of poplar are found near the coast, — the cotton-
wood {Populus Monilifera), the quaking asp, Populus Tremuloides,
and the balsam-tree (or P. Angustifolia). They are found on the
borders of streams and by the side of ponds or springs, but not
so abundant near the coast as east of the Coast Mountains.
Along the banks of creeks and rivers grows ono kind of willow
{Salix Scouleriana), about thirty feot in height, and not more
than a foot in diameter, with broad, oval leaves ; of very little
value. The vine-maple {A. Circina-ium) is more a shrub than a tree,
seldom growing more than six to tw-elve inches thick near the
ground, and not more than twelve to twentj-, rarely- thirtj-, feet
in height. It grows iu prostrate thickets, in shaded places,
twining baek and forth and in eveiy direction. The wood being

214 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
very tough, it is almost impossible to get through thom ; and
they form one of tho raost serious obstructions to surveying or
hunting in the raountains. The leaf is parted in seven dentated
points, and is of a light green. These bushes make a handsorae
thicket at any lime frora early spring to late autumn, being
ornamented wilh sraall red flowers in spring and with brilUant
scarlet leaves in auturan.
Another shrubby- tree, which makes dense thickets in low
or overflowed lands, is the Oregon crab-apple {Pyrus Rivularis).
This really- pretty tree grows in groves twenty feet in height,
and so closely as wilh ils tough, thornj' branehes to form im
penetrable barriers against any but the smaller animals of the
forest. Tho fruit is small and good-flavored, growing in clusters.
The tree is a good one to graft upon, being hardy and fine
grained. Another tree used to graft on is the wild cherry {Cerasus
Mollis), which closely resembles the cultivated kinds, excepit in
its small and bitter fi-uit. In open places it becoraes a branch
ing, handsome shade-tree, but in damp ravines sometimes shoots
up seventj- feet high, having its foUage all near the top.
When we undertake to pierce the woods of the Coast Moun
tains, we find, in the first plaee, the ground covered as thiokly
as thej' can stand with trees from three to fourteen feet in
diameter, and from seventy to three hundred feet in height.
Wherever there is room made bj- decay, or flre, or tempest,
springs up another thicker growth, of whieh the most fortu
nately located will Uve, to the exclusion of the others. Every
ravine, crook, margin, or springy piece of ground is densely
covered with viue-maple, cotton-wood, or crab-apple.
As if theso were not enough for the soil to support, every
interstice is filled with shrubs, sorae tough and woodj-, others
of the vining and thorny description. Of shrubs, the saUal
{Gaultheria Shallon) is most abundant. It varies greatly in
height, growing seven or eight feet tall near the coast, and only
two or three in the forest. The stem is reddish, the leaves
glossy, green, and oval, and the flower pink. Its fruit is a berry
of which the Indians are very fond, tasting much like summer-
apple. This shrub is an evergreen.
Tbree A-arieties of huckleberries belong to the same rano-e —

THE FORESTS OF THE NORTHWEST. 215
one, an evergreen, having fruit and flowers at the same time.
This is the Vaccinium Ovatum, with leaves like a myrtle, and a
black, rather sweet berry. The second has a very slender stalk,
small, deciduous leaves, and sraall acid berries of a bright scarlet
color. This is V. Ovalifolium. The third — V. Parvifolium —
resembles more the huckleberry of the Eastern States, and bears
a rather acid blueberry. In favored localities these aro as fine
as those varieties whieh grow in Massachusetts or Michigan.
In addition to these is a kind of false huckleberry, bearing no
fruit ; and a species of barberrj', resembUng that found in New
Bngland. Of gooseberries there are also three varieties, none of them
producing very good fruit. They are Bihes Laxiflorum, Bracte-
oseum, and Lacustre.
The salmon-berry {Buhus Spectabilis) is abundant on high
banks and in openings in the forest. It resembles the yellow
raspberry Of plants that creep on the ground there are several varieties,
some of them remarkably pretty. Of wild roses, spiraea, wood
bine, mock-orange, thorn-bushes, and other familiar shrubs, there
are plenty.
The devil's walking-stick {Fchinophanax horridum) is a shrub
deserving of mention. It grows to the height of six feet, in a
single, thorny, green stem, and bears at the top a bunch of
broad leaves, resembling those of the white maple. When en
countered in dark thickets it is sure to make itself felt, if not
seen. Add to all that has gone before, great ferns, — frora two
to fourteen feet in height, with tough stems, a,nd roots far in the
ground, — and we have the earth pretty much covered from sun
and light.
These are the productions, in general, of the most western
forests of Oregon. When we try to penetrate such tropical
jungles, we wonder that anj' animals of rauch size — like the
oik, deer, bear, panther, and cougar — get through them. Nor
do all these inhabit the thickest portions of the forest, but tho
elk, deer, and bear keep near the occasional sraall prairies which
occur in the raountains, and about tho edges of clearings among
the foot-hills, except when driven by fear to hide in the dark
recesses of the woods. In tho fall of the A-ear, when the acorn

216 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
crojj is good in the vallej- between the Coast and Cascade Moun
tains, great numbers of the black bear are killed by the farmers
who live near the mountains.
As this region just described is, so is the whole mountain
system of West Oregon and Washington. Along the eastern
slope of the Coast Eange, around Puget Sound, along the Co
lumbia highlands above a point forty miles from its raouth, and
on the western slope of the Cascades, the same luxuriance of
growth prevails. Indeed, nearly all the trees enumerated — tho
black spruce and scrub-pine are exceptions — belong equally to
lhe more eastern region. And the same of the shrubs.
But in this raore eastern portion grow some trees that will not
flourish in the soil and climate of the coast. Of these the most
important is the red fir {Abies Douglassii). Very extensive
forests of it inhabit the mountain-sides and Colurabia Eiver
highlands. It grows to a great height, its branches corameneing
fifty feet from the ground. The bark is thick and deeply fur
rowed, the leaves rather coarse, and the cone is distinguished
from other species by having three-pointed bracts between the
scales. The red fir is more used for lumber than any other kind,
though it is of a coarse grain and shrinks A-ery much. It is
tough and durable if kept dry. It is a very resinous wood,
from which eause large tracts of it are burnt off everj- j-ear.
Yet it keeps fire so badly in tho coals that there is little
danger of the cinders carrying flre when buildings constructed
of it are burned : it goes out before it alights.
The j'oUow fir (4. Grandis) is also a tree whieh does not like
sea-air, and is very valuable for luraber. It is distinguishable at
a distance by its superior height, often over three hundred feet,
and by the short branches of the top, Avhich give it a cyUndri
cal shape. It is admirably adapted for masts and spars, being
fine-grained, tough, and elastic. The best of lumber is raade
from this fir, and large quantities of it are exported from the
Columbia Eiver. The bark of the yellow fir is smoother and
uot so deeply furrowed as the red, and tbe oval eone is destitute
of bracts.
The other species of fir are Ahies concolor, called white fir in
California, and found in the mountains south of the Three

THE FORESTS OF THE NORTHWEST. 217
Sisters; Abies nobilis, inhabiting the mountains at an elevation
of three thousand to five thousand feet ; Abies amabilis, or lovely
fir, the most beautiful of its genus; and Ahies sub-alpina, a
mountain tree. The hemlocks are the mountain heralock,
known as Ahies Williamsonii and Pattoniana. Sitka cedar, Cu
pressus nutkaensis, is found at the base of Mount Hood ; and
Lihocedrus decurrens, thick-barked cedar, from Santiam Eiver
southward. Of foliaceous trees not found on the coast, is tbe oak {Quercus
garryana), whieh does not attain a very great size, not growing
more than fifty feet high, except in rich, alluvial lands, where
it attains fine dimensions. Another and smaller scrub-oak
{Quercus Kelloggii) is common, and the wood is good for axe-
helves, hoops, and similar uses. Tho wood of the larger variety
is used for making staves, and the bark for tanning.
Of all the trees growing along water-courses, the Oregon ash
{Fraxinus Oregona) is the most beautiful. In size it compares
closely with the white maple. Its foUage is of a Ught yellow-
green, the leaves being a narrow oval. Like the maple, it has
clusters of whitish-yellow fiowers, whieh add greatly to its
grace and delic-aey of coloring. The wood is fine-grained, and
is useful for raanufacturing purposes.
A little back from the river, j-et quite near it, we find the
Oregon dogwood {Comus Nuttalii). It is a mueh handsomer tree
than the dogvvood of the Atlantic States, making, when in full
flower and in favored situations, as fine a display of broad,
silvery-white blossoms as the magnolia of tho Southern States.
As an ornaraental tree it cannot be surpassed, having a fresh
charra each season, frora the white blossoms of spring to the
pink leaves of late sumraer and the scarlet berries of autumn.
Its ordinarj- height is thirty or forty feet, but in moist ravines
and thick woods it stretches up towards the light until it is
seventy feot high.
A very ornamental wild cherrj-, peculiar to Oregon— a species
of choke-cherry — is found near water-courses. The fiowers are
arranged in cylindrical racemes of the length of three or four
inehes, are white, and very fragrant. It flowers early in the
spring, at the same time with the service-berry, when the woody
thickets along the rivers are gleaming with their snowy sprays.

218 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
A broad-leaved evergreen is the arbutus {A. Menziesii), com
monly called laurel, whieh is found in the forests of the middle
region from Puget Sound, north of the Columbia, to California
and Mexico. In Spanish countries it is known as the madrono-
tree. The trunk is from one foot to four feet in thickness, and
when old is generally twisted. The bark undergoes a change
of color annually ; the old, dark, mahogany-colored bark sealing
off, as the new, bright, cinnamon-colored one replaces it. The
leaves are a long oval, of a bright, rich green, and glossy. It
flowers in the spring, and bears scarlet berries in autumn re
sembling those of the mountain-ash. Altogether, it is one of
the handsomest of American trees.
White oak, Quercus garryana, is common to all parts of West
Oregon and Washington, but the Quercus Kelloggii, or black oak,
is confined to the southern and middle counties of Oregon.
Mountain-ash, Pyrus sambucifolia, a beautiful ornamental tree,
is a native of the sub-alpine ranges. Chittim-wood or bear-
berrj-, Bhamnus purshiana, a shrubby tree growing in the valleys,
furnishes a bark whieh is an article of commerce, being exten
sively used in the preparation of cathartic and tonic medicines.
A very peculiar and ornamental shrub is the holly-leaved bar
berrj- {Berberis aquifolium). It has rather a vining stalk, from
two to eight feet high, with leaves shaped like holly leaves, but
arranged in two rows, on stems of eight or ten inches in length.
It is an evergreen, although it seems to east off some of its
foliage in the fall to renew it in the spring. While preparing to
fall, the leaves take the most brilliant hues of any in the forest,
and shine as if varnished. The fruit is a small cluster of very
acid berries, of a dark, bluish purple, about the size of the wild
grape, from which it takes its vulgar name of " Oregon grape."
In damp places away from the rivers grows the rose-colored
spirma {S. Douglassii), in close thickets ; it is commonly known
as hardback. Near such swamps are others of wild roses of
several varieties, all beautiful.
I am not able to give the names of all the numerous kinds of
trees and shrubs whieh grow in close proximity in the forests
of the Northwest, although I have been at some trouble to do
so. Beginning at the river's brink, we have willowl, from the
red cornel, whose crimson stems are so beautiful, to the coarse,

THE FORESTS OF THE NORTHWEST. 219
broad-leaved C. pubescens, ash, cotton-wood, and balsam-poplar.
On the low ground are roses, crab-apple, buckthorn, wild cherry ;
a Uttle higher, service-berry, wild cherry again, red-flowering
currant, white spircea, mock-orange, honeysuckle, low blackberry,
raspberry-, dogwood, arbutus, barberry, snowberry, hazel, elder,
and alder. Gradually mixing with these, as they leave the line
of high water, begin the various firs, which will not grow with
their roots in water. As the forest increases in density the
fiowering shrubs disappear, to reappear at the first opening.
The blue elder becomes a handsome tree forty feet in height in
the Columbia region, and two other varieties, with red and yellow
berries, are highly ornamental.
It would be imjDOSsible to exaggerate the beauty of such
raasses of luxuriant and flowering shrubbery covering the shores
of the strearas. Even the great walls of basalt which are fre
quently exposed along the Columbia are so overgrown with
minute ferns, and vivid-green mosses and vines, as to be much
more beautiful and picturesque than they- are forbidding.
In the Southern Oregon forests one finds some trees and
shrubs not found in the Wallamet division of Oregon, nor in that
part of Washington drained towards the Colurabia, — namely, the
myrtle, Umhellularia Californica {oreodaphne), a beautiful tree
with glossy foliage, and one hundred feet in height ; Port Orford
cedar, Cupressus lawsoniana {chamcecyparis), one of the most
valuable trees of commerce, growing two hundred feet high ;
redwood {Sequoia sempervirens), two hundred and fifty feet in
height ; nutmeg, resembling the myrtle, and found in the same
habitat, bearing a smaller nut than that of commerce. In the
southern vallej-s the live-oak {Quercus chrysolepis), chestnut-oak
(Quercus densiflora) ; on the foot-hills of the Cascade Range, the
chinquapin {Castanopsis chrysophylla), sugar-pine {Pinus lamber
tina), a magnificent tree, two hundred and fifty feet in height,
bearing cones eighteen inches in length, and having a sweet and
viscid sap, which when drj- resembles sugar ; and Pinus tuber
culata, a small tree found in patches. The flowering shrubs of
Southern Oregon, hot eommon to the Colurabia and WaUamet
regions, are the manzanita {Arctostaphylos pungens), blue spirsea,
found on the Umpqua and at Coos Baj-, and the Bhododendron
maximus, found there and also on the foot-hills of the Cascades.

220 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
It is a singular fact that this beautiful shrub reappears as far
north as Port Townsend, while it avoids intermediate eountry
in both Oregon and Washington.
On the east side of the Cascades and on the Blue Mountains,
the trees not common to the whole State are the larch, or tama
rack {Larix occidentalis), used for lumber ; Larix lyallii, a small
larch; Pinu^ albicaulis, a raountain pine; Pinus monticola, or
silver pine ; mountain mahogany, Cercocarpus ledifolius ; Juni
perus occidentalis, mountain juniper; and along the streams in
East Oregon and Washington a sraall bireh, Betula occidentalis,
the box-elder, and the sumach. Doubtless some few trees and
many shrubs have escaped notice, but the omissions are unim
portant. All that is here said of Oregon applies equally to
Washington, where Puget Sound might be read for Columbia
Eiver, while the trees of the raountain ranges and sea-coast are
the same in both States, with some local exceptions, sueh as that
of the Port Orford cedar.
Washington contains raore large bodies of timber standing on
level ground than Oregon does. An immense extent of fir and
cedar forest encircles the whole sound and borders all the rivers,
besides that which is found on the foot-hills of the Cascade and
Coast ranges. It is estimated that three-fourths of West Wash
ington is covered with forest, a large proportion of which is the
finest timber in tho world, for size and durability. It is nothing
unusual to find a piece of several thousand acres of fir, averaging
three and a half feet in diameter at the stump, and standing
two hundred feet without a limb, the top being seventy feet
higher. Three hundred feet is not an extraordinary growth in
Washington. It is estiraated that the area of forest land in
Oregon and Washington covers sixtj--five thousand square miles.
Not all of this timber is accessible, nor all of it valuable for
market, and yet the quantity is iraraense that is marketable.
Some day it will all be found fit for lumber-making, but at pres
ent only the largest and straightest trees aro sawed up, and these
in a very wasteful manner, a great deal being thrown away and
burned up, except in East Washington, where, timber being
scarce and tbe miUs located in the mountains, slab and unmar
ketable lumber is eut up into firewood.
The miUs of Oregon manufacture about one hundred and

THE FORESTS OF THE NORTHAVEST. 221
seventy million feet of lumber annually ; those of Puget Sound
and the East Washington mills, one billion foet. Most of the
Oregon production is consuraed at home, while the Washington
output is verv largelj- exported.
The kinds of timber adapted to lumbering purposes are knoAvn
as the red, white, and j-ellow fir, cedar, hemlock, and, in some
localities, pine and larch. The red fir constitutes the great bulk
of coramon luraber; tbe j-ellow fir is used where strength and
elasticity are required, as in spars of vessels, piles, wharves,
bridges, and house-building ; and cedar for foundations of houses,
fence-posts, and inside finishing of houses.
The cabinet-woods are maple, alder, and arbutus. There is
oak for staves and other purposes ; but nothing that answers for
wagon-raaking grows on theso mountains. Hemlock becomes
valuable as furnishing bark for tanning leather. Ash is used
for sorae mechanical purposes, and makes exeellent firewood.
The red fir, being very resinous, might be made valuable
for its pitch. Oregon turpentine is of superior quality, but,
owing to the high freights and high rates of labor on this eoast,
has not heretofore proved profitable as an export. It is eommon
to find a deposit of dried pitch or resin in the trunks of large fir-
trees— especially those that have grown on rocky soil — of one
to two inehes in thickness, either forming a layer quite round
the heart of the tree or extending for fifty feet up through the
tree in a square " stick."
Trees that have been destroyed by fire have their roots soaked
full of black pitch or tar, and even the branches of growing
trees drop little globules of clear white pitch on the ground.
This wood makes exceUent charcoal, in the burning of which
a great deal of tar might be saved by providing for its being
run off from the pit. There is also plenty of willow wood for
making charcoal growing on all the bottom-lands. Fires are
permitted to destroy much fine timber every year, settlers being
unable to remove the heavy growth by any other means.

222 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
CHAPTEE XVIL
ABOUT THE BOTANY OF THE NORTHWEST.
Many of the flowering shrubs of Oregon and Washington
have already been mentioned in the chapter on forests. One of
the first to blossom is the red flowering currant [Bihes sanguine-
rum), whieh puts forth its flowers before ils leaves are fully
expanded, like the Judas-tree of the Missouri Vallej', which it
resembles in color. There appear to be two or three varieties
of this species, as the color varies from a pale rose-color to a
fuU crimson. The flower is arranged in clusters upon a slender
stem like the green blossoms of the garden currant, but is much
larger, and of a different shape. The bush is highlj' ornamental
Avhen in blossom, and generally introduced into gardens for deco
ration. It flowers in March. East of the Cascades is a yellow
species very similar. Both of these grow near streams, and in
the edge of the forest.
Of the spircea there are several species. The wax-berrj', with
its tiny pink flowers and delicate leaves, is found in bottom-lands
and on river-banks. In autumn the bottoms of the Columbia
furnish thickets of wax-berries which, growing side by side with
the wild roses, make a pretty contrast to the crimson capsules
of the latter. In higher ground, yet subject to overflow, is
found the Spircea tomentosa, or hardback, as it is commonly called,
which grows in thickets and bears a cluster of a purplish-pink
color. But the most beautiful of the spiroeas is the kind known
as sea-foam {S. aricefolia), which its great creamy-white clusters
really reserable. This grows along the river-banks and in the
shade of the forest's edge, and blooms in June and July, accord
ing to its locality. It sometimes grows to a height of twenty-
feet in the shade, though usually about five or six feet high.
The steras are very delicate, like all the spirceas, and bend most
gracefully with the weight of the clusters.
Side by side, usually, with the last-named spircea is the beauti
ful mock-orange (Philadelphus), with its silvery-white flowers
crowding the delieate green leaves out of sight. Throughout

THE BOTANY OF THE NORTHWEST 223
Oregon this shrub is called sj-ringa, to which famUy it does not
belong. It is very- ornamental, and blooms in Juno and July.
Of wild roses there are several species and many varieties,
from the dainty little " dime rose," of a palo pink color, to the
large and fragrant crimson rose which grows in overflowed
ground. There are always some roses to be found frora June
to December. It is usual to find the shrubs here mentioned
growing in close proximity-; and these, with the flowers of the
woodbine {Lonicera Occidentalis), and the blossoms of various
kinds of wild fruit trees, make a perfect tangle of bloom and
sweetness along the river-banks in sumraer.
We have elsewhere spoken of the dogwood, whieh is as hand
some as a magnolia-tree when in blossom, and of the wild cherries
and other fruits w-hose flowers are sweet und beautiful. The
Oregon grape, or hoUj'-leavod barberry, bears a flower that is
very ornamental, of a bright yellow color, in clusters a finger
long. The leaves of this shrub are also very beautiful, which
makes it desirable to cultivate. Its fruit is ripe in August, and
is of a bluish-purple, like the damson plum.
In Southern Oregon, the Bhododendron maximum is ono of tho
glories of tho mountain-tops, with its immense branches df rose-
colored flowers. It is occasionally seen in gardens. The buff-
colored Azalea occidentalis is also confined to the southern and
eastern portions of Oregon. It is said that tho clematis grows
east of the Cascades, but we have not seen it ; and also the ilex-
leaved mabonia. The wild grape {Vitis Californica) is another
shrub or vino which is confined to the southern portion of Ore
gon. In the Eogue Eiver Valley, in October, it is a striking
ornament in the landscape, the foUage being turned a rich
rubj--red color, and forming cluraps upon the ground or hang
ing pendent frora Avay-side trees. It does not seem, however, to
furnish much fruit.
Of field flowers there are a groat many in all parts of Oregon
and Washington, beginning with the early spring to beautify
the earth, and kind succeeding kind throughout the suramer and
auturan. There are, especially near the Colurabia, where the
soil which covers the rocks is often a thin, black mould, countless
varieties and species of very minute flowers, so small frequently
as to need a microscope to analyze them successfully, but of

224 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
lovelj' shapes and colors. I have found within the range of an
acre forty kinds of flowering plants in the month of July, half
of them of this minute size.
Of the plants peculiar to the Northwest which boar handsome
flowers the Camas familj- is prominent. The Camasia esculenta,
or edible caraas, of whose roots tho Indians raake broad, grows
about eighteen inches high, and bears at top a bunch of star-
shaped flowers, of a beautiful lavender color, with a golden
centre. Tho leaves grow frora the root, and are lanceolate. The
places where thej- are raost abundant usually are. called " Caraas
prairies," and they form a feature of Eastern Oregon and Idaho,
Thoy are also plentiful in Western Oregon. The flowering
season is about the middle of May near the Lower Columbia.
There are several species of the caraas, one of which is poisonous.
Onlj- a very thorough and industrious botanist could enumer
ate the flowering plants native to this country. Among the
most useful is the yellow lupine, which with the white, blue,
and purple varieties grows abundantly in Bast Oregon. The
yellow A-ariety is found to be a pow-er in reclaiming the sandy
wastes where it is sown. The seed should be mixed with rye,
which grows faster and protects the young plant from thc en
croachments of the sand ; but onee the lupine is fairly above
tho ground it becomes aggressive, not only defending itself, but
absorbing the life of the rye. In the auturan the lupine sheds
its leaves, whieh form a pasty muck over the ground, while new
ones start out; and this it does for five years, when it dies,
having fulfilled its mission. The ground can now be sown with
grass and harrowed, when the grass comes up richly, and the
biUowy- sand waste is a verdant plain. It was by this moans that
tho railitary reservation and Golden Gate Park at San Francisco
were reclaimed. The same method might be appUed to raaking
the sandy Union Pacific Eailroad line along the upper Colurabia
more comfortable, as weU us more agreeable to the eye.
The blue iris, familiar to all ob.sorvers of tho brook-side in
spring, is not absent hore; nor the purple larkspur; nor the
musk-plant, Mimulus longiflorus ; nor the Mimulus luteus; nor j'et
the buttercup, Banunculus occidentalis. Violets blue and yellow
embroider the verdant earth-mantle, and anemone detroidea
shelters itself under every bush. Eunning over the o-round in

THE BOTANY OP THE NORTHWEST. 225
the open woods is the yerba buena, or "good herb, " after which
San Francisco was first named. It bears a tiny trumpet-shaped
flower close to the main stem. Botanists call it Micromeria
Douglassi, after David Douglass, Oregon's first explorer in this
field of science, who was killed by wild cattle on one of the
Hawaiian Islauds while in pursuit of his studies of plants. The
earlj' settlers used its aromatic leaves in plaee of tea, which
caused it to be called Oregon tea. Side by side with tho yerba
buena is the twiu-flovver, Linnoea borealis, with a verj' similar
leaf, vine, and flower, except that it supports, upon a slender
peduncle two inehes in length, a j^air of blossoras instead of a
single one.
The red columbine, Aquilegia formosa, looks quite at home
among the ferns in woodsy places and on mossy banks by the
roadside; and the adder's-tonguo keeps company with the anem
one among tbe bushes. The UUes, golden erythronium, Lilium
canadense, and Lilium Washingtonium, displaj- their royal robes
as in tho daj-s of King Solomon, some in the fence-corners, some
among the grass and ferns bj- the rivulet, and others in the
grain-fields. The Washingtonium is a native of the WaUamet
Valley. When it first opens it is a pure white dashed with
some purple pin points of color. As it grows to be a daj' or so
old it adds a pink blush to its whiteness, and in another day-
is of a very decided pink, so that, with several on a stalk in dif
ferent degrees of development, it offers a pleasing range of color.
In shape it resembles the tiger-lily.
The CaUfornia poppy, Eschscholtzia, is found in Southern
Oregon, and the golden coreopsis also. Tho Indian pink, Cas-
telia hrevifolia, asserts its right to look gaj- anywhere there is a
bank of loose warm earth. In tho shadowy edges of the forest
one may find the Indian pipe shooting up its colorless stem, and
the pretty " tobacco-pouch" cypripedium, with its striped white,
brown, and purple pocket held invitingly open.
In the fields and on sunny slopes grow the "shooting star"
(Dodecatheon Meadia), ot several colors; flax-flower (Linum);
"boj-s and girls" {Cynoglossum), pink and blue on the same
stem; convolvulus, while and pink; phlox {Clarkia); Oollomia
grandiflora, in old-gold color ; Mesperoscordum grandiflorum, white
stars marked with green lines; Hosackia hicolor, white and
15

226 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
J'ellow, and dicentra, white and scarlet. Tangled among tall
grass and bushes is the pea-vine ( Vicia Americana) ; while sueh
familiar plants as j-arrow, sheep-sorrel, St.-John's-wort, and
spearmint inhabit about cultivated ground.
Bending over springs maj- be found the ladj-'s-ear-drop {Del
phinium nudicaule), red ; and the dainty dew-bell (Cyclohothra
alba. Tho auturan fields displaj- the aster, golden rod, and sun
flower, but of lesser size than the same plants in the Eastern
and Middle States. The native dandelion, too, is a small and
ragged flower, Avhile tho imported plant blooms in extraordinaiy
splendor, to the distress of lawn-keepers.
It is, indeed, to be remarked that seeds take lodgement in Ihis
soil without the encouragement of cultivation. An instance of
this is to be seen in the valley of the Lower Umpqua Eiver.
A lady brought with her from Noav York some comraon flower
seeds earlj' in the " fifties," there being araong thera the snap
dragon. The wind scattered the seed frora her garden, which
took root outside of it, and these outside plants again scattered
their seed, by tho aid of the, wind, further away, until now the
whole vallej' about Gardiner for miles grows snapdragon as
a eommon weed, and very troublesome, because pioisonous, to
cattle-owners. The traveller on the O, E. and N. Eailroad may
observe, between The Dalles and Hood Eiver, a long stretch of
blue bachelor-button, self-sown from the garden of some early
settler. .The same evidence of fertiUty and adaptabiUty was
noticed at the old mission in the Walla Walla Valley, where the
red poppies from the mission garden spread tbemselves through
the meadows of Mill Creek, where thej' were blooming luxuri
antly a quarter of a century after the garden and all about had
been destroyed by savage warfare.
The prevaiUng colors of wild flowers west of the Cascades
are purple, yellow, and white, with a fair proportion of pink or
red. East of the mountains there are still fewer red flowers.
Blue flowers aro very rare in any portion of this country, as
they are everywhere. T remember to have seen some lovely
blue flowers growing in the sands between Wallula and the first
crossing of the Touchet, but they were unknown to me. Buff
or salmon-color is still rarer, the Collomia being the only one 1
remember seeing. Yet, with all the different shades of the

THE BOTANY OF THE NORTHAVEST. 227
common purple, yellow, white, and red, with their differing
forms, a great deal of beautj- maj- be expressed.
Southeastern Oregon has some handsome wild flowers quite
new to me ; and its marshes grow the Wocus, or yellow pond-
lily, the seeds of which furnish food in large amount to the In
dians, who macerate them and make them into a sort of oil-cake
for winier use.
Verj' feAv flowers are fragrant on the coast; while, on the
contrarj-, verj' many of those found east of the Cascades are
highly perfuraed, as they are also in Southern Oregon, where
the blue violet, quite scentless near the Columbia, is deliciously
fragrant. The soil and cUmate of Oregon and Washington are highly
favorable to the growth of flowers, and we may find in the
gardens here plants from almost every clime growing in raore
or less perfection. From the plenitude of moisture, they con
tinue to blossom very late in the season, a bouquet of roses
and a dozen otber varieties of elegant fiowers being often
gathered at Christmas. Frequently gardening can be resumed
in February, whieh gives a large proportion of the year to
the enjoyment of ono of the purest and most wholesome of
pleasures. The United States Exploring Expedition collected, in the year
1854-55, three hundred and sixty species of native plants, of
whieh one hundred and fifty are peculiar to the prairies of
Oregon and Washington.
• From a pamphlet published by Thomas Howell, of Arthur,
Oregon, in 1887, it appears that a list of all the species and
varieties known to exist in the territory west of Wyoming and
north of CaUfornia comprises twenty-one hundred and fifty-two
species and two hundred and twenty-seven varieties of plants,
or twenty-three hundred and seventy-nine in all.

228 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
CHAPTEE XVIIL
SOMETHING ABOUT GAME AND WILD SPORTS.
Notwithstanding the thick growth of the forests of Oregon
and Washington, the hunter may find sport, with game worthy
of his rifle, if he is not afraid of the exertion and foot-service.
There are nuraerous " openings" in the forest, and plenty of wild
country in the foot-hills, where game may be found if the hab
itat of each aniraal is known.
The raost forraidable of the bear family is the grizzly, which
inhabits less the thick forests of the north than the manzanita
thickets and the scrub-oak coverts of Southern Oregon. The
color of this bear is a silvery gray, its bulk immense, sometiraes
weighing two thousand pounds, and its habits herbivorous
chiefly, though it will, on sufficient provocation, kill and eat
other aniraals, and even man. It subsists in Southern Oregon
upon the berries of the manzanita, of whieh it is very fond, and
will foed upon any berries or fruits within its reach, — occasion
ally, as a relish, digging up a wasps'-nest for the sake of the
honey, not being able, Uke the black bear, to climb in search of
bees'-nests. In seasons when drought has destroyed its customary food in
the mountains of California, it has been known to descend into
the valleys and dig up gophers for food. If it scents fresh veni
son or beef, it will steal it if possible, and has been known to
take the hunter's provisions out frora under his head while
sleeping. In such a ease it is better to protend to be sound
asleep during the stealing, even if very wide awake, as is raost
likely to be the case, for any movement will be certain to bring
down the bear's paw with force upon the hunter's head, — "a
consuraraation most devoutly to be" avoided.
This trick of the grizzly — striking a man on the head, or
" boxing his ears" — is a dangerous one. It is not at all rare to
find men in the mountains and valleys where the grizzly ranges
who have had their skulls broken by tbe blow of its immense
paw. It is mueh to be dreaded in a personal encounter, and by

game and wild SPORTS. 229
no means easy to kill unless hit in the vulnerable spot behind
the ear. Those who fancy lion-hunting in the jungles of Africa
might find equally good sport in hunting grizzlies in California,
Oregon, and in some parts of tho Eocky Mountains.
During the summer months they- retire to the mountains;
but, as the berries ripen, they seek the foot-hills and river-banks,
to feed upon tbeir favorite fruits. If a cavern is not at hand
when winter eoraes on in tho cold regions, they make a bod
for themselves in some thicket, or sometiraes dig a hole below
the surface, in which they pass the winter sucking their paws.
It would seem that where the winters are as mild as in the
Coast Mountains of CaUfornia, they do not hibernate, as they
are met with all through the winter season, and kill, and are
killed, more than over at that time, on account of tbe scarcity
of berries.
There aro several curious facts in the natural history of this
bear, one of tho most singular of which is, that the period of
gestation is entirely unknown, even to the most observant and
experienced mountain men. No one has ever killed a female
carrying j'oung. at any time of the j'ear, though thej' are often
discovered with thoir cubs evidently but a few weeks old.
Where they hide themselves during this period, or how long it
lasts, no hunter has over been able to observe, though there are
men who haive spent half their Uves in the mountains, and
killed, in desperate encounter, manj' a grizzlj-, and at all times
of the year, even when hibernating.
The grizzly seems to be "a man of many miuds," with re
gard to attack. Usually, unless in charge of cubs, it quietlj-
avoids a meeting with the hunter, and at timea even seems
timid and easilj' alarmed. But because one grizzlj' has given
you room, j'OU must not depend upon the next ono doing the
same. It is quite as likely that he will challenge j'ou as you
pass ; and, unless well prepared to take up the glove, you had
better "take up" the first tree j-ou come to. It is not a pleasant
sight to see one of these raonsters on his hind-quarters, with his
fore-paws readj' for action ; and when it coraes to running, he
can run as fast as you can.
The brown, or cinnamon, bear is also a savage creature, with
many of the traits of the grizzly, but inferior in size. He in-

230 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
habits the same regions with the latter, and also is found in the
thick forests of Northern Oregon and Washington.
The black bear is common to every part of these countries,
living in the mountains in summer, and visiting the low Mils
and small valleys, or the banks of rivers, in autumn. When tho
acorn crop is good in the foot-hiUs, bears haunt the groves Avhich
furnish their favorite food. If they ean find a stray porker en
gaged in foraging, they embrace hira a little too tightly for his
health,— in short, "squeeze the breath out of hira," — after which
affectionate observance they eat hira. But, unless exasperated,
thej' never attack the human family, and are not regarded as
dangerous under ordinary circumstancos.
An animal which is ferocious, and not unfrequently met with
in the mountains, is tbe cougar, — an animal of the cat species,
with a skin soraething like a leopard's, and a long, ringed tail,
but a head with a lion-like breadth. It is variously called the
California lion aud American panther. We saw one large speci
raen, which was lying dead by the roadside on the Calapooya
Mountain, which measured seven feet from tip to tip. This
animal seldom attacks a man,- but is very destructive to calves
and colts in the vicinity of the mountains, especially in the
newly-settled parts.
There are three species of the wolf in Oregon and Washing
ton, of which the black is the largest and most ferocious. It
stands two and a half or three foet high, and is five to six feet
from tip to tip. Such was its destructiveness in the earUest
settlement of the country that special moans were resorted to
. for its extermination, until now it is rarely- ever met with. It
attacks young cattle and colts, as does the cougar.
The Avhito or gray wolf is another enemy to the stock-raiser,
though it is satisfied with smaller game than the black wolf,
contenting itself with full-grown sheep ; and, being more power
ful than a dog, is a great destroj'or of flocks in some localities,
and so sagacious that it is veiy difficult to poison. The coyote,
or barking wolf, is also a depredator, taking young pigs and
lambs. One of these little animals has the A-oice of several,
and ean imitate the barking of a whole pack. It is almost
too contemptible to be considered game, and is given over to
strj-ehnine.

GAilE AND AVILD SPORTS. ' 231
There are two or three species of Ij'ux, or wild-cat, also
troublesome to settlers near the forest, eaurying off young pigs
and such small farm stock. When not stealing from the farmer
they subsist upon young fawns, hares, squirrels, and game birds.
These pests are numerous in the woods of the Lower Columbia,
We have seen numerous good specimens depending from the
limbs of trees, where they had been hung after shooting.
Of foxes there are tho red, silver-gray, black, and graj- A'arie-
ties. It is thought that the black fox is a distinct species ; as is
also the gray, whieh is smaller. But the silver-graj' is said by
the Indians to be tho male of the red species, the feraale onlj'
being of a reddish color. This species, in all its varieties, is
very common on the eastern side ofthe Cascades, and the smaller
gray is raost abundant in Southeastern Oregon. Their skins,
though not as handsome as the silver-gray, are still very fino.
The gray is the " medicine fox" of tho Indians, a meeting witb
which brings misfortune.
Elk are found both in the Cascade and Coast Mountains, but
are most abundant in tho latter, especially in the Olympic Eange.
In suraraer they keep pretty high up, but when snow falls in
the mountains descend to tho plains and river-bottoms. They
travel in well-beaten trails and in large droves, which make
them easy game. When quite wild they show considerable
curiosity, stopping to look at tho hunter, thus offering a fair
shot. When wounded and in elose quarters they are formidable
antagonists, from their great size, heavy head, and large antlers.
The immense size of their antlers would appear to be an obstacle
to their escape when running in the forest, but by throwing
back their heads they drop them over their shoulders so well
out of the way as to enable them to pass through tho thick
woods without difficulty. There still are immense herds of them
in the mountains near the mouth of the Columbia, and raay be
hunted in suraraer by parties suffieiently hardy for overcoraing
the obstacles of the forest. But autumn and winter are bettor
seasons for hunting elk, as they then come down to more -open
ground. Elk-steaks are no rarity in Astoria, and occasionally
they are to be mot vvith in the Portland markets. It is estimated
that not less than one thousand elk were killed in one year in
Coos County alone, for the skins only.

232 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
Three species of deer are found in Oregon and Washington,
— the white-tailed, black-tailed, and mule deer. The two first-
named species inhabit the country west of the Cascades, the
black-tailed being most common. They also inhabit east of the
raountains, but have boon greatly decimated bj' the Indians, who
kill them wantonlj' in snowy winters when they cannot run. In
the mountains along tho Lower Columbia and Lower Wallamet
thej' are still very plentiful. Game-laws exist in Oregon for
protecting them during a certain season, and jet lawless per
sons are found who kill them without regard to their condition.
The mule deer is found only- east of the Cascades, and is not
common. It seems to be a hybrid between the antelope and
black-tailed deer.
The antelope was an inhabitant of Bast Oregon, and was
hunted bj' the Indians by a " surround," — for, though curieus
enough to stop lo look at the hunter, it is verj- fleet and soon
distances pursuit. Hence the Indian method of driving them
into a corral, by coming down upon a herd from all sides and
gradually forcing them into an inclosure made for the purpose,
— a very unsporlsraan-like waj- of taking such delicate game.
East Oregon also furnishes the raountain sheep. In the re
gion of John Day and Des Chutes Eivers, they were formerly
A-ery nuraerous. Their flesh is good, though likelj' to be flavored
with whatever thej- feed most upon. It appears from the testi
mony of early voyagers to this coast, that the Indians formerlj-
raade a kind of cloth from the wool of the raountain sheep, but
the process of its manufacture is unknown in Oregon at this
period. The fact of the sheep being native to the grassy plains
of East Oregon and Washington furnishes a hint bj' which
wool-growers have profited.
The prairie hare— a large, blue-graj' species — is found in Bast
Oregon and Washington, as well as on the mountains of Southern
Oregon, where it is very common. Tbe flesh is good eating.
In the Olympic Mountains of Washington Uves a curious crea
ture known as the whistling raarraot, or raountain beaver. It
is very nuraerous about the head of the Quileene Eiver. These
animals are about the size of a fox, and have long, bushy taUs.
When disturbed by the presence of raan, whora they probably
regard as an enemy, they run about frora rock to rock, sometimes

GAME AND AVILD SPORTS. 233
sitting bolt upright as if survej-ing the danger, sometimes lying
down as if to avoid it, but continually whistUng to each other.
They have two long front teeth for cutting, like the river beaver,
and feet like a squirrel. In the winter they burrow under the
snow, and their fur, which in summer is j-ellow, becomes a dark
gray. Of fur-bearing animals whicb are hunted for their skins, there
is the hair-seal in the Columbia Eiver, a prettj- creature of a
bluish-gray color spotted with white. They swira up the river
as far as the Cascades, and in high water as far as The Dalles.
Tbej- are smaller than the red seal of the Pacific, and very
docile in disposition. Instances have occurred of tbeir domes
tication, when thej' have shown the sarae attachment to their
masters that the dog does, following also by scent, oa-ou into the
thi»k woods, where they have torn themselves fearfully in their
efforts to overtake those who had deserted them. The Indians
roast and eat them.
Minks arc common to the waters of Oregon and Washington,
but are most numerous in the lakes and strearas of the latter.
It is said that when they inhabit the Sound they subsist upon
sh ell-fish. The beaA-er, which was nearlj' exterrainated during
the oceupancj' of the countrj- by the Hudson's Baj' Companj', is
again quite abundant in tho streams of all the wooded portions.
One of tho features of the Colurabia attractive to the sports
man is the sight of the hunting-boat — a scow with a house upon
it — which goes peering into all the creeks and sloughs leading
into the river, after garae of this sort, and, in the ducking sea
son, after water-fowl. The " California otter" also inhabits the
raountain streams, especially those which come down from the
Cascades. The pine-marten, or American sable, is found along the streams
of the Cascade Mountains, and clinging to the pine-trees on their
eastern slopes, in Oregon and Washington. Their skins are
quite valuable, though not colleeted except by Indians, who
prize them for ornament.
The sea-otter, whose fur is of such exquisite fineness, is
taken off the coast of Washington, from Damon Point, at the
entrance to Gray's Harbor, northward to Point Grenville, a dis
tanee of only twenty-four miles. Considerable preparation and

234 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
skill are required in this sport. The hunter constructs for him
self a derrick about fortj' feot high, this mechanism consisting
simply of three slim poles securely bolted together at top and
spread out like a tripod at bottora. This is placed on the beach
at a point raidway between high and low tide, firmly planted in
the sand, and braced, with the means of ascent and descent pro
vided by eross-pioces on the inland side. Near the top a plat
form is provided, with walls on the ocean sides to hide the
hunter from view, and screen him from the wind which often
is sharp and biting. At low tide the hunter betakes hiraself to
his eyry, and seating hiraself on the top ofthe tripod begins his
wateh, whieh lasts six hours. He is armed with a good pair of
glasses and a Sharpe's rifie. When the tide begins to flood his
range is six hundred yards, but as it runs in on the beach it is
shortened to half that or less. At either distance it requires
close calculation to got a good aim, or to overcome the effect of
the ocean swell and movement. The best marksman raay miss
ninety-nine times out of a hundred ; and no wonder, for when
the tide is full his derrick is in the raidst of the dizzying breakers.
The shooting is done during flood-tide, that the spoil may be
washed ashore, but it is often several days before it is beached,
and then an Indian may have gotten it. Bach hunter has a
particular mark by whieh his bullets are known, and if an
otter coraes ashore without a bullet in hira, it is the property
of the finder ; but an Indian would not trouble himself about
"brands." The natives hunt the otter in canoes, sometimes going far out
to sea and remaining for days. In fact, thoy drive them away
from shore, and injure the sport of the white hunters. The
season for killing is from May to October, and a hunter does
not take more than four in a season. The skins are valued
at from ninety dollars to one hundred and fifty dollars to the
hunter, but a Eussian or a Chinaman wiU pay for an otter-skin
overcoat from one thousand to two thousand dollars. The otter
will soon be hunted out, and disappear, even as forest animals
are doing.
Whales are frequently harpooned by the Neah Bay Indians
near the entrance to the Strait of Juan de Puca. It is a hazard
ous sport, requiring great " medicine" to succeed in ; but when

GAME AND WILD SPORTS. 235
a whale is captured the occasion is one of general rejoicing and
feasting — a potlatch of much consequence to the whole tribe.
The woods of the Pacific Coast have not been noted for sing
ing-birds, the songsters of the Atlantic States and Europe being
strangers to the Northwest. The meadow-lark is almost the
only bird which cheers the traveller on his way over the wide
plains of East Oregon aud Washington, where his short but
inspiriting warble greets one from everj- side. In the garden
trees of tho Wallamet Valley the native canary sings merrilj-,
and a variety of chirping, sober-hued, and shy winged and
feathered visitors make free with the fruit to be found there.
The lack of songsters impelled the Agricultural Society to im
port them, and a few years ago there wero brought from abroad
and sot free in the fields and woods the buUfinch, greenflnch,
gcfldfineh, nightingale, black-headed nightingale, chaffinch, ring-
ouzel, bobolink, black thrush, song thrush, starling, and singing
quail. How thej- were received bj- their forest brothers is not
known, but that they havo to some extent increased is evidenced
by the greater varietj- of notes Avhich one may hear any morning
in summer from his open window in the vicinity of trees.
Of game birds there are great numbers, as might be conject
ured from the nature of the country. The habits and habitats
of this kind of game aro too well known to need remark. The
most comraon are the mountain quail, valley quail, dusky grouse,
ruffled grouse, sharp-tailed grouse or prairie chicken, sage-cock,
curlew (the last three east of the Cascade Mountains), killdeer,
plover, golden plover, Virginia rail, English snipe, red-breasted
snipe, suramer duck, Canada goose, white-fronted goose, black
brant, maUard duck, canvas-back duck, blue-winged teal, brown
crane, green-winged teal, and several others omitted or unknown.
The golden pheasant of China (imported) is also beginning to
be a very familiar sight to the sportsman.
In autumn the waters of the rivers, lakes, and sounds are
swarming with water-fowl. A week's sport with a party in a
hunting-boat or steam-j'aeht, with good living on board, is
thought " worth the shot." When I add that the waters of the
country afford the best of sport for the angler, from a seventy-
pound salmon to a dainty speckled trout, it must be allowed
that there is arauseraent for pleasure-seekers, not to say health-

236 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
ful pastime for invalids, to be found here. There are also here,
what cannot be readily found in the Atlantic States, — men who
have made hunting and trapping the business of their lives, and
who, while they lend their knowledge of the craft to j-ounger
disciples, entertain them with voluraes of humorous and exciting.
personal adventure with every sort of game, from a beaver to a
grizzlj-, or a Blackfoot Indian.
The curious tourist may find in Oregon raen who were with
Sublette, Wyeth, and Bonneville in the mountains nearly sixty
years ago ; men who met there Stanley, the painter ; Douglas,
the botanist ; Farnham, the would-be founder of a communist
colony ; men who hunted beaver and Indians with Kit Carson ;
who laugh at Fremont as a pathfinder ; who served Wilkes on
his survej-ing expedition ; and who saw Oregon in danger of be
coming an independent government, but whose stanch patriotism
saved it to the republic of the United States.

CHAPTEE XIX.
FROM PORTLAND TO OLYMPIA.
I STARTED from Portland in the forenoon of May 2, 1890, to
" make the tour of the Sound," for in tbat familiar raanner do
Oregonians speak of a journey through that dlA'ision of Wash
ington which Ues west of the Cascade Mountains. Thoy have not
quite forgotten that Washington was once a part of Oregon,
and that in early times they warred with the British fur com
pany for its possession, holding on with courage and pertinacity
until the boundai-j- question was settled in 1846, and conducting
its affairs until 1853, when the territory north of the Colurabia
set up for itself under the name it now bears as a State.
This, however, was not the title chosen by the territorial con
vention whieh petitioned Congress for a separate organization,
at Monticello, on the Cowlitz Eiver, in 1852, which convention
asked for the adoption of Columbia as the name of their new
commonwealth. But the bill was amended by Stanton, of Ken
tucky, and Washington substituted.

FROM PORTLAND TO OLYMPIA. 237
The change is to be regarded as fortunate, for, had the country
north of the great river been called bj' the same name, the
individuality of the latter would have been destroj-ed, and this
mighty highway have seemed to constitute a part of a single
State, whereas it belongs, flrst and last, to several.
But to go back to tho beginning of a journey from Portland
to and through West Washington. The Northern Pacific
(Branch) road skirts tho Wallamet highlands and river for flf
teen or twenty- miles, the traveller getting glimpses of each, and
of SauA-e Island, as he rushes past old homesteads whose sacred
ness the " steam eagles" of civilization have invaded, the iron
traek often cutting in twain blooraing orchards, now laden with
the proraise of a rich harvest. There certainly never were such
cherry-trees as grow in the Northwest ; enormous in height and
spread of limb, and phenomenal in wealth of snowy blossoms,
quite concealing leaves and steras. And the wonder culminates
when we find the fruit has ripened after the same fashion, quite
concealing the branch on whieh it grows. Pears are blooming
with the sarae freedom, as aro also plums, although receiving no
care. All the pretty things of May-time are smUing at us frora
the wayside, and the dandelion, which is an iraraigrant to this
country, has " taken" it, iramigrant fashion, and the owners of
the soil have much difficulty to teach it its proper place in agri
cultural polities. But it looks prettj- and smiling and golden
against the groen sod, and I find it hard to have it corapared to
a dago. No breadth of cultivable land is seen along this road for sorae
distance, which finallj- eraerges into a good farming countrj'
about the head of Scappoose Bay, an inlet from tho Columbia at
the mouth of the Lower Wallamet. Suddenly the character of
the surface changes, and for a couple of miles, back of St. Helen,
a sheet of basalt, some tirae poured out of Mount St. Helen,
covers the underlying sand rock, and supports a thin soil on top,
sufficient to sustain scattering groups of trees, whieh have a
pleasing effect in contrast with the denser woods of the hill
sides. The crossing of the Columbia about twelve miles below St.
Helen is made bj' a forrj--boat large enough to convey the train
to the opposite side of the river, where we are landed on terra

238 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
firma at Kalama, a few mUes above the' mouth of the Cowlitz
Eiver. Kalama, like most railroad towns not terminal, is a failure,
because it ean show no raison d'etre. It was started when tho
Portland Branch of the Northern Pacific was being constructed
from the Columbia to the Sound, about 1870, and the company's
head-quarters were established there, which were, on the com
pletion of the road, removed to Tacoma. It was also made the
county-seat of Cowlitz County, which did not save it from de
cay. But I am assured that the plaee is feeling a return of
Ufe in sympathj' wilh the present upward and forward moA-e-
ment of the whole State, which has for several years been en-
joj-ing a rapid growth. We do not tariy long here, but speed
on our journey to the " Mediterranean of the Pacific."
About the time the N. P. Eailroad was being located from the
Columbia to the Sound I made my first visit to this region. In
that day we took an open mail-wagon at Monticello, near the
mouth of the Cowlitz, for the drive to Olympia, having to cross
Pumphrey's Mountain at the forks of the Cowlitz by a very
rough road with rarely a human habitation along it. But it
was in July, and I enjoj-ed the ride, break-downs and all. What
struck me then was the magnificence of the timber. Such
a forest as that on Pumphrey's Mountain was soraething to
have seen. Trees straight as Ionian columns, so high that it
was painful to bond one's neck to see the tops, and with a
diameter corresponding to their height. If there is anything in
nature for which I have a love resembling love to humanity, it
is for a fine tree. The god Pan and the old Druidical religion
are quite inteUigible as expressions of the soul struggling
" through nature up to nature's God," and one is at once in har
mony with the sentiments of grandeur and solemnity, akin to
worship, which a scene sueh as this inspires.
Added to the awe which the mighty shafts of fir, naked for a
hundred and fifty feet, and the " dim reUgious Ught" filtering
through their closely-meeting tops, awakened in my mind at
that time, was a secret dread of encountering in these shadow
halls of silence something unusual — and terrible  a brown
bear or a cougar, for instance ; but nothing more appalling than
a gray hare, some grouse, and mountain quail attempted to

FROM PORTLAND TO OLYMPIA. 239
cross our road. The larger game, if there were anj- near, took
warning frora the noisy rattling of our Avagon and hid them
selves from observation.
A few- J'ears later, when the railroad up the Covvlitz Valley
had been completed, I again visited Olyrapia, and found tho
road to run through a wild and denselj'- timbered country almost
from the Columbia to the Chehalis Eiver. There Avere, it is true,
a few stations cut out ofthe forest, with no excuse for being ex
cept that all railroads must have " stations" scattered along, — to
give tourists, by their forlon aspect, a contempt for the eountry,
I privatelj- remarked.
But on this Maj--daj', 1890, I found the stations had groAvn
into toAvns, and there were so many of them that I seemed to be
travelling over town-sites all the way to my destination. Not
that all of these twenty or more embryo cities were astoundingly
large and populous for their age, but that there was so mueh evi
dence of growth as to keep up a feeling of curiosity and surprise
as to what brought these people bore, and how they accomplished
so mueh in so short a time. How many sturdy strokes it took
lo clear away the heavj' forest to make roora for farms and
towns I Yet the work had been done, and in the plaee of the
noble firs I had so mueh admired stood homes, school-houses,
churches, hotels, stores, mills, and all the ordinary conveniences
of established sociotj-. It was a revelation.
That the Cowlitz Valley is a fertile one none ean doubt who
travel through it, but it is not a Avide or long one. It rather
consists of small side A'alleys, in each of which there is room for
a settlement. The real wealth of the Cowlitz eountry consists of ¦
lumber and coal, with other rainerals used in raanufactures.
At Kelso, which calls itself the " Gatewaj' to the Sound
Country," aro two saw-mills and four shinglo-miUs. Tho plaee
has about six hundred inhabitants, and is the prospective seat
of a Presbyterian Academy. Winlock and Toledo are two
thriving settlements within a few railes of each other, in Lewis
Countj'. The chief town of the county of Cowlitz is Castle Eock, which
has about eight hundred inhabitants. It is located in the midst
of good farming-lands, large coal-fields, and fine tiraber, and is a
point of suj)ply for several raines in their first stage of develop-

240 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
ment. It has railroad and river transportation, which, with its
natural resources, ought to seeure for it a pirosperous future.
There is a curious mixture of English and Indian words in
the nomenclature of this part of Washington, and indeed of
the whole State. Take tho names along the railroad frora the
Columbia to the Sound. There are Carrol, Kelso, Goweeman,
Freeport, Stockport, Tucker, Castle Eock, Olequa, Sopenah,
Little Falls, Mill Switch, Winlock, Napavine, Neioaukum, Che
halis, Centralia, Skookum-Chuck, Seatco, Tenino, Gillmore, Spur-
lock, Plurab, Bush Prairie, Tumwater, Olympia.
Thc railroad does nol touch the pretty village of Claquato, on
the ChehaUs Eiver, an old-fashioned, quiet, respectable-looking
place before the railroad brood of toAvns carae into existence.
We are not permitted a glimpse of its tidy orchards, gardens,
gray, unpainted frame houses, and its modest " Claquato Acad
emy," which shoAved the reverence of the pioneer for education,
and its equally- modest wooden church.
A short distanee from Newaukum, which is on a branch of
the Chehalis Eiver just east of Claquato, is Chehalis, the county-
seat of Lewis County. It was first laid off in 1873 and called
Saundorsville, after the owner of the land. Its location was a
fortunate one, and it became the seat of county governraent in
place of Claquato, which had long enjoyed that distinction. It
was the centre of a fine agricultural district, and, being upon
the railroad, soon began to show considerable activity. During
the j'oar just passed it has had a reraarkable growth, owing not
only- to its natural resources, but to railroad building on two
lines, either of which will connect it with the sea, one at Gray's
Harbor and another at Shoalwater Bay, or, as it is now called,
WiUapa Bay. These roads make the lumber business active.
Eastern men, I am told, are negotiating for a site for a woollen-
mill, water-power being conducted to the town by a flume from
the Newaukum. There is a pump-manufactor-y located here,
and other industries looking this way. A railroad Une is pro
jected to connect with Hunt's systera, in East Washington, via
Yakima Valley, which road will go to Willapa, it is said ; and
the Union Paciflc has made a survey frora Seattle to Portland
which closely parallels the Northern Pacific through ChehaUs
County. All this is very exciting to real estate dealers, and also

FROM PORTLAND TO OLYMPIA. 241
to settlers. Tho State Eeform Sehool is located at ChehaUs,
and a block of land has been deeded to the Catholic Chureh to
establish a Sisters' School in the town. An effort is being made
to secure the land-office which is to be opened in the district.
Thus, with land, railroad, lumber, and water companies, there is
enough to keep up tbo sjDirits of an aspiring new town.
But we havo hardly glanced at this healthy and sturdy place,
or had our queries answered, before we are at Centralia, at thc
junction of the Skookum-Chuck and Chehalis Eivers. This
J-oung eity is situated at about an equal distance from Puget
Sound and the Colurabia Eiver, and also midway between the
mountains on the east and the oeean on the west — henee its
name, which does not impress mo as being equal in dignity to
its prospects. On the Ist of January, 1889, Centralia had eight
hundred inhabitants. Ono y-ear from that date ils population
was three thousand two hundred. Eailroadbuilding had, no
doubt, some effect to increase the census ; but that there was a
verj- rapid growth during the year is evident from the iraprove
raents which one maj- see on every hand.' Its advantages are
identical with those of Chehalis, while it enjoys the still further
one of being only two miles from the coal-fields, which are being
slowly developed, and which will soon have a railroad to them
to bring out the mineral. Besides the railroads already named
whieh como to Centralia, the Port Townsend and Southern is
expected to reach here within a j-ear, on its waj' to Portland,
CentraUa is situated on a prairie, or rather on rich bottom
land, which would make a very productive hoi>farm or raise
small fruits in abundance. There is good fruit-land all about it,
and in the vieinitj' mightj- forests of the most valuable timber.
Lumber and shingles are shipped from here to the cities of
the East. Iron and copijor aro numbered among the minerals
within easy reach. It is, besides, a fit place to live in, with a
good public-school sj-stem, an academy, an opera-house, soA'oral
churches, a bank, a daily newspaper, and raany substantial
business blocks.
Speeding on, the next half-dozen miles brings us to Bucoda,
or Seatco, which is its post-office name. Here is located a large
lumber-mill and sash- aud door-factory. The population is one
thousand. Bucoda coal is beginning to have quite a good
16

242 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
reputation. Bucoda Avas destroj'od by fire, sustaining a loss
of one hundred and thirty-three thousand dollars, but is now
rebuilt better than before.
On leaving the Chehalis Valley we enter upon gravelly
prairies, separated bj' belts of timber. A particularly interest
ing section is Mound Prairie, which is covered with mounds
from two to two and a half feet high, as close together as potato-
hills in afield. Various theories have been advanced as to their
origin, but it is merely a matter of conjecture still.
At Tenino passengers for Olyrapia leave the Northern Pacific,
and take passage on the Olyrapia and Tenino Eailroad, recently
sold to the Port Townsend and Southern. The distance is only
about fifteen miles, but the road was a narrow-gauge, the track
in bad order, travel light, and the service anything but agree
able. I was told the track was to be widened and the road put
in good order, which has, I believe, been done by its new owners.
This little road, with all its faults, had mj' sympathies. It was
built by local capital and local labor, even the ladies of Olympia
assisting by having what thej' called " field days," when they
all went out with baskets, coffee-pots, and frying-pans, and fed
the volunteers upon the grade, who were tbe men of every rank
of society in the little capital city. The Northern Pacific had
disappointed its good people grievously by passing by and taking
a short cut to Commencement Bay-, — which its want of funds
probablj' forced it to do, — and the Olympians, with true Ameri
can pluck, determined to have a branch, and did have it, taking a
just pride in the successful accomplishment of their undertaking.
Most of the prairies about the head of the Sound Avere taken
up in early times, and bear the names of the first settlers upon
tbem. Bush's Prairie is perhaps the most noted of anj' on the
line of the road, simply because Bush, being a colored man,
of sound sense and a kind heart, who made himself useful to
his white neighbors, defended his well-deserved claim to a dona
tion, which the government finaUy granted him, although the
law read " white male citizen." His son exhibited wheat raised
on Bush Prairie, which received a medal at the Centennial Ex
position. Tumwater, which is the Chinook dialect for strong or rapid
water, is the name of a village at the head of Budd's Inlet, on

FROM PORTLAND TO OLYMPIA. 243
which Olympia is situated. There are mills and manufactories on
Des Chutes Eiver, whieh here falls into tide water, making a
verj' pretty cataract. The town itself is sleepy and old-fashioned,
and for that reason more interesting than those bran-new ones,
all bustle and discomfort. Here was made the first American
settlement, in 1845, Avhen seven eraigrants, five of whom had
families, forced their waj- through the forest along the Cowlitz
and the Chehalis Valley to Puget Sound. The leader of this
mighty host Avas Michael T. Simmons, a Kentuckian of the
Daniel Boone order, who selected this place for settlement, and
erected the first flouring-mill in all this region, a small affair in
a log-house, the millstones being hewn out of blocks of granite
found on the beach. Even unbolted flour was a luxury after a
J-ear of boiled wheat. Tumwater is a good place to listen to
pioneer stories and reflect what man can do.
A belt of timber about two miles in breadth encircles tho
Sound, even where the back country is prairie. Olympia there
fore was hewn out of the forest, but it has a pretty situation, and
resembles a Now Bngland town more than any other I have seen
in the Northwest. Perhaps I should say it did resemble a New
England town, for I found on the occasion of my late visit that
it was partaking of tho hurrj' and exhilaration of real-estate
transfers in anticipation of coming events — and railroads. I
prefer to speak of it as it had appeared to me on former occa
sions, when it had an air of home corafort and cheerful leisure,
produced by snug residences, good sidewalks, pleasant gardens,
shade-trees, and a neighborly friendliness joined to a frank in
dependence in its citizens, who withal were rather above the
average in intelUgence. And why not, when the capital had
always been here, and the people were used to hearing publie
questions discussed ?
One of Olyrapia's charms to me was its long bridges and
wharves — for the tide has a great rise and fall in this inlet. To
be suspended over water on a bridge, a long one, was always to
me fascinating. To be at rest over the restless water, and gaze
upon its instabiUty and dream ! In Olympia one ean do this,
when the tide is in. When it is out one ean wateh the millions
of squirming things left by the receding flood in the oozy mud.
Standing on the long bridge, too, we ean gaze upon the Olympian

244 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
Eange — the most aerial mountain view in this country of
mountains. Olympia was settled as a donation claim in 1846 by Levi L.
Smith, who had for a partner Edward Sj-lvester. Smith died,
and Sylvester remained in possession of the claim, which was
patented to him. Hero he Uved and died in peace and plenty,
leaving a handsome estate. In spite of the rivalry of other
towns, Olympia has alw-ays been tho choice of the people for
the capital, that choice being definitelj' confirmed by an election
held after Washington became a State. That matter being
settled, capital and corporations are now looking for invest
ments, and the quiet little town is in danger of blossoming
forth into a eity. Its present population is a little over eight
thousand. Its lumber trade araounts to five hundred thousand
dollars annually. It is connected with all the cities on the
Sound by stearaer lines, and with some of them by railroad, as
also with the Colurabia Eiver and Portland. _ It is expected
that the Port Townsend and Southern will be extended north to
Port Townsend and south to Portland. The Northern Pacific
will connect it with Tacoma and Gray's Harbor, with which
latter plaee it is already- in communication by steamer and rail.
The air is full of rumors of railroad projects by old and new
companies, but it is with facts accomplished that I prefer to
deal. West Washington, unlike West Oregon, has no chief river,
with its numerous tributaries, draining a great valley ; but it
has, nevertheless, its central body of water, into which flow
numerous small rivers, draining the Puget Sound Basin, whieh
is bounded, like the WaUamet Valley, by the Cascade and Coast
Eanges on the east and west, and by their intermingling spurs
on the south. Theso rivers, unlike those of Oregon, are all
affected by the ebb and flow of the tides, and have their lowest
bottom-lands overflowed. Tbe Sound itself is not one simple
great inlet of the sea, but is an indescribably tortuous body of
water which is not even a sound, being too deep for soundings
in some of its narrowest parts. So eccentric are its meander
ings that the whole county of Kitsap is inclosed so nearly in
the embraces of its several long arms as very narrowly to
escape being an island.

FROM PORTLAND TO OLYMPIA. 245
That particular arm of the Sound upon which Olympia is
situated is six miles in length by from one to one and a half
railes in width, narrowing to a quarter of a milo when opposite
the town. At low-tide tho water recedes entirely at this point,
leaving a mud flat all the waj- from here to Tumwater, a mile
and a half south. The mean riso and fall of tho tide is a Uttle
over nine foet; the greatest difference between the highest and
lowest tides is tw-enty-four feet.
The land adjacent to this inlet is considerably elevated along
tho shore, and rises yet higher at a little distance back, being
level, however, in some places. Tho same general shape of
country- surrounds the whole Sound, the land having a general
rise back from it for some distanee. This, of course, must be the
case where -a basin exists of the character of this one. That
portion of it which lies adjacent to tho Sound possesses a po
rous, gravellj- soil, nevertheless, heavilj- timbered with trees of
immense size. This belt of timber is several miles in width.
The roads through it and across the small prairies which Ue on
its outskirts are all tbat could be desired in the way of natural
macadam, and furnish delightful driving. One thing observed
regarding these ' beautiful prairie spots was, that along their
edges, where they receive the yearly accession to their soil of
the leaf mould of the forest, the orchards and gardens looked
very thrifty, and also that wherever thero was a piece of bottom
land on any small streara the hay-crop was the heaviest we had
ever seen.
About ten miles back from the Sound on tho east, tbo country
commences to improve, and from there to the foot-hills of the
Cascades furmshes a good grazing region, with many fine loca
tions for farms. Tho foot-hills themselves furnish extensive clay-
loam districts suitable for grain-raising, and will, when cleared,
beeome very valuable farming lands. Around the base of tho
Coast or Olympic Eange, on the Avest, there is also another
large body of clay-loam land, and to tho south, between tho
Chehalis and the Columbia, — or, more properly, between the
Columbia and the higher ground which separates the Columbia
Valley from the basin of the Sound, — there is a still larger dis
trict which may be converted to grain-raising. But the vicinity
of the Sound, Avithin a distance of from ten to twenty miles.

246 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
affords Uttle land that is good for grain, for, as before noticed,
these streams coming into the Sound are affected by the tides,
the lowest land being overflowed daily. That portion of each
A-alley whieh is free from submersion furnishes the most fertile
soil imaginable for the production of every kind of grain, fruit,
and vegetable, if wo except melons, grapes, and peaches, which,
owing to the cool nights, mature less perfectly than in East
Washington. The valleys of these small rivers, like those of
West Oregon, already described, are covered at first with a rank
growth of moisture-loving trees, such as the ash, alder, willow,
and poplar. But they are easily cleared, and the soil is of that
warm, rich nature that it produces a rapid growth of every
thing intrusted to its bosom. Owing to the faet that these
valleys are narroAv, and head in mountains at no great distance,
they are occasionally subject to floods. As floods never occur,
however, except in the rainy or winier season, a proper pre
caution in building, and harvesting his crops, should insure the
farmer against loss frora them when they do occur.
Olympia has a college, a hundred- thousand-dollar hotel, elec
tric lights, water-works, and street-railway service. The State-
House is a wooden structure whieh, although in good repair,
is no credit to the rich joung State of Washington, to whom
Congress has given one hundred and thirty- two thousand acres
of land for public buildings. The State constitution does not
locate all the public buildings at the capital, but distributes
thera araong the several towns and cities. Vancouver, on the
Columbia, has the State School for Defective Youth ; Medical
Lake, in the extreme eastern part of the State, has the Insane
Asylum ; Seattle, the State University ; and Walla Walla, the
State Penitentiary. Tho State Agricultural College will prob
ably soon be located by the commissioners at some point in Bast
Washington. I do not like this plan of distributing public
institutions so well as Oregon's plan of concentrating them at
the capital, making a handsome city at tho seat of government,
and keeping those affairs of the government under the eye of
the appropriating power.
Washington's Territorial Penitentiary was on McNeil's Island,
in Puget Sound, about twenty miles northeast of Olympia ; and
the Insane Asylum was at Steilacoom, on the mainland opposite,

FROM OLYMPIA TO GRAY'S HARBOR. 247
occupying the buildings erected by the general government
when SteUaeoom was a military post. Both institutions are
likely to be retained in use for some time.
Washinglon received as its portion when it assumed the bur
dens of statehood one hundred thousand acres for the estabUsh
ment of a scientiflc school ; one hundred thousand acres for
norraal schools; for other educational and reformatory institu
tions, two hundred thousand acres ; and will receive five per
centum of tho ijrocoeds of the sales of public lands lying within
her borders for the support of common schools, in addition to
the sixteenth and thirty-sixth sections in every township. As
the constitution of Washington raakes the minimum price of
school land from five to ten dollars per aero, according to quality,
the public sehool fund is likely to prove abundant for the needs
of the successive generations.

CHAPTEE XX.
FROM OLYMPIA TO GRAY'S HARBOR.
After a few days spent in Olympia, my impressions of whieh
remain most agreeable, I took steamer for Kamilche, the port
on Little Skookum Bay, whore ono is transferred to a railroad.
The weather was charming ; the Olympic Eange, with Mount
Olj'mpus draped in yet unmelted snow, on one hand, and Mount
Eainier on the other, towering over the dark range of the Cas
cades, grand and speckless, drew the eyes away frora the too
dazzling expanse of the quiet waters through Avhich we were
speeding, and the delightful air inspired one with a teeling of
overflowing vitality.
Little Skookura is one of half a dozen inlets similar to Budd's
whieh radiate from a eommon centre on Puget Sound, like a
cluster of small tubers on one large one. As we go down Budd
Inlet, Mount Eainier is on our right ; as vVe go up Skookum it
is on our loft, and, the eourse of the steamer being unnoticed
while I study the shores, now being dismantled in many places

248 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
of their forest dress, my ideas of locality become much dis
turbed. Kamilche is found to be a small new settleraent in the edge of
the woods, with a wharf and warehouse where passengers wait
three-quarters of an hour while the train backs down a sharp
grade to take us on. This railroad frora Kamilche to Montesano,
called the Satsop Eailroad, is an accident, or a necessity, or both.
It was commenced as a logging tramway to bring timber out of
the Chehalis Vallej' to tide-water, for towing to the great mills
down the Sound. The people of ChehaUs Valley, having no
faculties for travel, persisted in riding on the logging-trucks
until the owners were forced to put on a box-car. This conces
sion so increased travel that a better traek was laid, and a com
fortable passenger-car added to the equipment. At the time I
took passage there were two ears quite well filled. The distance
from Kamilche to Montesano is thirty-five miles, and the sarae
company own eleven other miles of road, from Shellon to the
timbered lands west of the Sound. The Kamilche and Monte
sano portion has recently been acquired by the Northern Pacific,
as a part of tho Tacoma, Olympia, and Gray's Harbor Eailroad,
now in progress.
Tbe ride through the forest was very pleasant, the road wind
ing in and out to accommodate itself to the variations of surface.
The various tints of green with the light faUing through made
a lovely study in color, and the woodsy vistas looked invitingly
cool, J-et with dashes of sunlight across them which relieved
them from gloom.
A feature of these forests, and particularlj' of the ChehaUs
VaUey, is the occurrence here and there of prairie spots with
not a tree upon them. These prairies were early taken up,
and aro known by the names of thoir first settlers, like those at
the head of the Sound. I counted eight of these openings in
the forest provided bj' nature to encourage settlement. On one
of theso, twelve miles above Montesano, is the town of Elma,
surrounded by hop-fields. It has also a flouring-miU, — the only
one in this region, where the mUls are aU lumber establishments.
Its position in the vallej' ought to insure its growth, which is
already quite proraising. On the last and largest prairie the
town of Montesano is situated. It is weU chosen for a town,

FROM OLYMPIA TO GRAY's HARBOR. 249
being at the head of tide-Avater nav-igation on tho Chehalis
Eiver, where we are transferred to a small steamer to continue
our journey. We had encountered a number of stations along
the railroad, and now found a great frequency in towns along
the river.
Montesano is the county-scat of Chehalis County, although
it is onlj- since 1886 that it has enjoyed that honor. Formerly
Montesano and the eountj--seat were on the south side of the river
two miles below the new town, at a plaoe now called Wj-nooche,
whieh has about two hundred inhabitants and is said to be a
prosperous little settlement. But it is quite overshadowed by
the raore modern town, which boasts a population of over two
thousand, good public and private schools, is lighted by electric-
itj-, has tw-o saw-mills, several manufactories, a good country
trade, well-stocked stores, and banks. Its countj- buildings are
good ; it has an " elaborate system" of water-works, and is
about to construct an electric railway. At least so said my in
formant, and the town had a thrifty look whieh bore out the
statement, besides snjjporting a daily and weoklj- newspaper.
A little way below Wynooche we passed Melbourne, a trading-
post and post-office. I could not sufficiently admire the winding
river and the overhanging shrubbery, — the vine maple, with
its delieate spring tones, the glossy gray-white catkins of tho
willows, tho dark-green of the crab-apple and alder, the silver
boughs of the hemlock, and the varnished whorls of the spruce,
beyond all of which was the dark background of cedar- and fir-
trees. This wealth of arboreal beauty reminded rae of tho rich
foliage of the Florida bayous, the comparison being strengthened
by the narrowness of the stream and its frequent turnings,
cutting off the views, so that we seeraed at the end of our voy
age, which unexpectedly recommenced a raoraent later.
But soon the river widened, and behold another town, A-ery
prettily situated, on the south side of the river, and looking
bright and new, although in fact the oldest in the Gray's Harbor
eountry, having been settled in 1860. This is Cosraopolis. Like
all the other places of consequence, it has a large saw-raill, whieh
furnishes eraployraent to a good many raen. The town has all
the modern features of a good hotel, good schools, public read
ing-room, and chureh organizations, besides a healthy trade

250 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
with the surrounding countrj-. Its population is about four
hundred. Three or four miles below Cosraopolis, and on the north side
of the river, is Aberdeen. It is situated at the raouth of the
Wishkah, a tributary ofthe Chehalis, and just inside the mouth
of the latter river, where it broadens out into an inlet of Gray's
Harbor. This point was settled, I am told, by Samuel Benn, in
1866, but no town was founded until 1884. As the little steamer
swung alongside the wharf, I was reminded of Astoria, so much
of the town is built upon wharves extending over tide-land.
The whole of the business part of the town is planked, and
raost of the residences are on the higher ground. Four large
saw-raills are located here, a salraon-cannery, a foundry and
machine shop, a brickyard, and a shipyard. It has an electric-
light plant, good hotels, schools, churches, banks, a population
of between two and three thousand, and two newspapers, the
Herald and Bulletin, Early in 1890 a company purchased land
on the south side of the river, laying it out in town lots, and
caUing it South Aberdeen. The first sale of any consequence
was raade just before I saw it, to a Michigan companj', who
bought seven hundred feet of the water-front for the purpose
of erecting a shingle-mill and box-factory of large capacity.
I was now in sight of my destination, — Hoquiam, on Gray's
Harbor, — to which we steamed on after disembarking a large
number of passengers at Aberdeen. A few minutes brought us
alongside a wharf at the head of the north channel, and to the
Uttle maritime city with an Indian name, which faces the south,
and lies at the mouth of the Hoquiam Eiver. Like Aberdeen,
it requires much planking, being laid out on land which Van
couver, in 1792, described as " low and apparently swampy, the
soil thin over a bed of stones and pebbles," and the country at
a small distance covered with wood, "principally pine of an
inferior growth." A hundred years may have elevated the land
somewhat, and havo increased the size of the trees, for there is
only the marsh grass and rushes of any tide-flat to liken it to a
swamp, and the trees are not at present of an inferior growth.
The beach, like most of these northern waters, is rough and
shingly ; the flats and shallows being unsightly with the drift
brought down by the rivers. And the mention of this feature

FROM OLYMPIA TO GRAY's HARBOR. 251
reminds me that the meaning of the word Hoquiam is " hungry
for wood."
The groAvth and business of CosmopoUs and the two Aber-
deens was incited by Hoquiam, which is the father of them aU.
The historj' of this section is interesting.
Gray's Harbor extends inland fifteen mUes, and has a width
for half that distance of twelve miles, gradually narrowing
tow-ards tho east until it forms a rather sharp point at the
raouth of the Chehalis Eiver. Tbe tout ensemble is not very
different from an arrow-head. The entrance is between two
sand spits. Point Brown, on the north, and Point Hanson (Che
halis, or Petersen's Point), on the south, and is a mile and a
quarter wide, wilh a nearly straight channel a little north of
east to the mouth of the river ; the water in the channel being
for the greater part of the distance twentj'-two feet at mean
loAv water, and thirtj--one feet and upwards at mean high water.
North Bay and South Bay are north and south of the entrance,
and separated from the sea only by long and narrow necks of
low land. Channels frora the main ono ramify into these bays,
also one to the raouth of John's Eiver, which enters on the
south side, another to Jones's Point, a little further east, which
continues on to the mouth of the Chehalis, and is known as the
South Channel. Thero is also a channel running north from the
main one to the mouth of the Huraptulips Eiver, an important
stream, and to two other strearas fiowing into North Bay, besides
sorae cross-channels ; and there is an anchorage of fully six
thousand acres in the harbor where twenty-five feet at low
tide is to be found. Nothing has ever been done to improve
Graj-'s Harbor. Its comraerce has been created by private
enterprise alone ; but there is a petition before Congress asking
for surveys and iraproveraents, and to have it made a port of
entry. A very favorable feature of this harbor is the absence
of the destructive teredo, so active in the waters of tho Sound.
So many fresh-water streams come into it that the teredo can
not Uve in it, and a ship's bottora covered with barnacles is
thoroughly cleaned in forty-eight hours.
Gray's Harbor was discovered by the same doughty Captain
Gray Avho discovered the Columbia, but he modestly named it
Bulfinch Harbor, after one of the owners of his vessel. He

252 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
spent three days in it with his vessel, trading with the natives,
who probably came out to him in canoes, as he makes no men
tion of any rivers or the appearance of the shores. Gray
pronounced the entrance a good one. Vancouver's lieutenant,
Whidby, was ordered to survey it, but, afler doing so, — very im
perfectly, it seems, — pronounced it " a port of little importance,"
Avhich afforded " but two or three situations Avhere boats eould
approach sufficiently near to effect a landing." He also declared
the water on the bar to be so shallow that it was impracticable
for vessels even of a very raoderate size to pass it except near
high water, and then "with the utraost caution," because he
believed it a shifting bar. Whether in compliment or not, he
renamed it Gray's Harbor.
So doctors disagree. But it happened, as it so often has, that
the professional was wrong and the non-professional right. The
bar is quite straight and well defined by breakers on each side,
with a channel through it a third of a mile in width, and a
depth of water at low tide of twentj'-two feet, and at high tide
of from eight to fourteen raore. Vessels go in and out all the
time with perfect safety ; but a new survey is in progress, which
will have the result — no doubt desired — of calling attention to
the actual merits of the harbor.
Whether it was the doubtful reputation of this port or other
inscrutable cause which prevented it, no commerce sought its
waters. It is true that in 1850-51 a town-site was laid out by
John B. Chapman, and named Chehalis City ; but nothing ever
came of it, and Chapman went to the Sound. In 1852 J. L.
Scammon and four others took clairas where Montesano now
stands, on the Chehalis; but the only raan who resided at the
mouth of the river was James A. Karr, who settled on the east
side of the Hoquiam Eiver in 1858, and who still resides there.
But one settler does not make a commercial port any more
than one swallow makes a summer, and Karr remained solitary
Avith aU Asia in front of him until some lumber-dealers bethought
themselves of the fine timber in the Chehalis Valley and deter
mined to get it to market. In 1882 the Hoquiam MiU Company
was organized, Avith Mr. George H. Emerson, manager, and a
new era was inaugurated.
The saw-mill of to-day is very unlike the saw-mill of the past.

FROM OLYMPIA TO GRAY^S HARBOR. 253
It means steam-power, a vast amount of machinery, possibly a
railroad, a large force of men both in the logging-camp and at
the mill, wilh capital to set all in motion. No attempt was
made at flrst, or at any time, by the mill company, to found a
town at Hoquiam ; but tho activity imparted to the lower Che
halis Valloy by the company's business led Mr. Benn, before
mentioned, to lay out a town on the Chehalis and invite other
lumbering establishments to locate in it by offering thera a gen
erous portion of his land. Theso offers A^'ere at once accepted,
and the town of Abei-deen was making rapid strides before the
Hoquiam Land Companj- was formed, which is a separate con
cern from the Northwestern Lumber Company which owns the
Hoquiam raills.
It was organized in 1889 by John G. McMillan and J. L.
Whitnej-. Lots were readily- disposed of to residents, and new-
coraers Avere attracted to this location, which had a greater
d«pth of water along its front and looked out on the fine ex
panse of the harbor. The town was a little more than a year
old when I paid my respects to it with the purpose of verifying
the reports of it which I had received, and had then about fif
teen hundred inhabitants. I found the Northwestern Lumber
Company to own thirteen hundred acres of fine tiraber, which
would jield from two hundred thousand to five hundred thou
sand feet Jier acre. Their mill turned out frora thirty-five thou
sand to one hundred thousand feet daily, which was used in
building and street imj)rovements with no need to export any.
The corapany also earried on a general merchandising business
amounting to two hundred and twenty thousand dollars per
annura. A second railling establishment had just coramenced
operations. The town boasted an opera-house, gas- and water
works, a bank, a newspaper, thc Washingtonian, and a board of
trade. It was just completing a hotel of metropolitan size and
elegance. The chief draAvback appeared to be the lack of trans
portation, steamship and sailing lines having not j-et arranged
regular schedules, and the steamboat and railroad lino to the
Sound being inadequate to the needs of this and all the other
communities in the Graj-'s Harbor countrj-. Great improve
ments rapidly followed, the traA-eller of to-day finding increased
faciUties of all kinds, and a town of a growth whieh has called

254 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
for several additions to the original town site. As a lesson in
town-making Hoquiam might be studied with profit.
Although the original business men of Hoquiam took no part
at first in founding cities, Aberdeen and Hoquiam had demon
strated the resources of Chehalis Valley and the importance of
Gray's Harbor as an outlet to them.
Mr. Emerson was the possessor of a tract lying three miles
west of Hoquiam, and directly facing the raain channel, but
not on it. It would require long wharves to reach out to deep
water, but did not commerce build a Venice in the midst of the
sea? and would it not more easily call into being a citj' whieh
required only- some expensive harbor iraproveraents ? He
answered this question by forming.the Gray's Harbor Company,
composed chiefly of eastern capitalists who were seeking a loca
tion. That company put money to his land, constructed a forty-
thousand-dollar wharf, cleared and improved the site of Gray's
Harbor Citj-, all of which was paid for out of the sale of lots'in
the first six months, and pointed out to railroads the short cut
to the seaboard, which they at onee proceeded to take.
The work of laying out the city began in the spring of 1889,
at which time the ground was covered with a heavy growth of
timber. By eraploying hundreds of laborers this Avas removed,
streets opened and improved, and at tho end of a j-ear elegant
buildings were going up where late the plumy fir and spruce
tossed in the sea-breeze. It is an oft-quoted saying that " Eome
was not made in a daj- ;" but we do things better now, and a
year or two suffices to estabUsh a eity. Two railroads are at
this writing striving to reach Gray's Harbor before the close of
1890, and they will very nearly do it. There is no longer any
doubt, if ever there was one, about the future of Gray's Harbor.
Additions are being laid out, which with the additions to
Hoquiam and Aberdeen will some time corapel a consolidation.
Already their several eity governments are proposing to have
one Chamber of Commerce.
The sito of Gray's Harbor resembles that of Tacoma in being
upon a high bluff with railroad tracks and wharves in front of
it on the beach, and also in having a grand view. Mr. Emerson
kindly explained to me the plan of the company to extend sev
eral of the streets out to the channel. This will be done by

FROM OLYMPIA TO GRAY'S HARBOR. 255
piling and cribbing and filling in with the material taken up by
dredgers. Between these " fills" will be channels kept open by
dredging. One of the " fills" will be used for milling purposes,
basins being provided for thera made by confining the water by
tide-gates. This will be an expensive but a very convenient
arrangeraent, and, as the nuraerous streams coming into the
Chehalis and the harbor will fioat the logs to the basins, the ex
pense of railroads into the forest wUl be obviated. The other
channels Avill furnish roora for shipping in the most compact
shape possible, where it will be safe from the most violent winds
that blow on the Pacific.
One advantage of Gray's Harbor is an abundance of exeellent
water on the bluff, obtained without going to any great depth.
Whenever extensive water-works are required, there are streams
and lakes in the high lands bordering the Chehalis Valloy, the
water from Avhich ean be brought down at comparatively small
cost. A feature eommon to all new cities where the people are
drawn together from older towns is the ease with which thoy
conglomerate. A coraraon interest levels for the time the usual
distinctions. I found in Hoquiam and Gray's Harbor, however,"
sufficient of an intellectual society to form a class, and enjoyed
its varietj', for it was made up of all professions. Among the
raost interesting men one meets in anew country are surveyors
and engineers. Thoir profession raakes thera accurate ; they
have more or less the poetical temperaraent, being close observers
of nature ; and they have had real adventures, which they tell
with becoraing raodesty.. I cannot swell the pages of this book
by describing tho people I have met, though I would Uke to do
so, but the reader will get the benefit, if benefit it is esteemed,
of sorae things I have learned frora them, in the course of these
chapters. One of my excursions from Hoquiam Avas to a logging-camp
several miles from town, the journey being performed in a small
boat propelled by oars in the hands of the owner of the camp,
who treated our party most politely, and by his exploits showed
himself a thorough lumberman. Our boating ended, wo walked
a mile or raore through the woods, over a very rough trail,
reallj' performing a portage around the dam constructed for

256 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
" chuting" logs into the stream below. HaA-ing been refreshed
with an excellent dinner in a comfortable mess-house, Ave were
taken to where the woodmen wore felling trees, standing on
tinj' platforras made by inserting a short board in a eut in the
tree, five, ten, or fifteen feet from the ground. I had supposed
that this was necessaiy, either on account of the size of some
trees at the butt, or because of the pitch contained in them ; but
our host assured me the great height at which some of the
choppers or sawyers stood was simply an exhibition of bravado
— tho common ambition to excel one's neighbor in skill or
daring. In felling a tree the foreman takes pains to direct its fall so as
not to injure any other valuable tree in its descent, and they do
this to a nicety by inserting wedges on the side opposite to the
direction in which it is to fall which give it the necessary tilt, —
for so straight are theso great firs and cedars that, frequently,
they will stand erect after they have been eut to the centre all
round, and wait for a breeze to- s-way thera to a fall.
It was evident there was an immense Avaste, ten or twenty
feet of a tree at the thickest part, and then the reckless destruc
tion of all that are unfit for the finest lumber. I was regretting
this to our host. " The timber grows as fast or faster than it is
consuraed," was the replj-. Admitting that this is true where
young tiraber is left undisturbed, the forest lands when cleared
by axe and fire are put under cultivation, except on the moun
tains, and thus the araount must be rapidly lessening.
Having seen a few trees fall, we were shoAvn the manner of
hauling them- to the stream, six or eight j-okes of oxen being
hitched to a single log. The lower side of the log has been
peeled before being placed on the skid, whieh is well greased.
The oxen are then driven by experienced men, who receive bet
ter wages than anj' but the foreman and cook. This latter ex
ception made me smile, but I find that cooks aro important
personages in camps everywhere. These western lumbermen
do not feed their men, as the Michigan lumbermen do, but give
them a variety of fresh and canned foods.
Having watched the hauUng of logs, and their skilful man
ageraent to prevent them from sUpping forward on the cattle,
and their descent into the basin above the dam with a deep

FROM OLYMPIA TO GRAy's HARBOR. 257
div-e, or a splash and a glide, we walked down to the dam to
witness a " shoot" of the chute when tho gate was raised. This
operation requires quickness and nerve, and was superintended
by our host. The water rushing out of the basin carries with it
a great weight of logs, which must not be aUowed to make a
"jam" against the dam. Tho men are on the logs with pikes
directing them so as to head thom for the opening and send them
endwise down the slide below the dam, when they take a header
into the stream with a mightj- splash, and go floating tumultu
ously doAvn the agitated water to be arrested by a boom at the
creek's mouth, and raade into a raft for Gray's Harbor.
The Avages paid to men in this camp is from forty dollars to
sixty dollars, the foreman getting one hundred and fortj-. The
price of logs is throe dollars and fifty cents per thousand feet
in the water. The price paid to the owner of the land is fifty
cents per thousand. The average per acre is fifty thousand feet
of fir and spruce. The cost of putting in a dam is from three
thousand dollars to ten thousand dollars ; the skidded road costs
one thousand dollars per mile ; the teams for hauling, one thou
sand dollars ; tho mess-house and dormitory, two hundred dollars
or three hundred doUars. Nine or ten mon at the wages named
above, with their board, cost per month about six hundred dol
lars, and the supplies for the oxen oightj' dollars. Those figures
make this camp cost for its first outfit, being very conveniently
located, about five thousand doUars, and its expenses for a season
of six months five thousand dollars more. Its profits depend,
of course, on the amount gotten into the water ready for the
mills. A good deal of money is disbursed in the towns of
Washington, every Avinter, by loggers.
As I shall have occasion to speak again of tho lumber interest,
I will leave it here for the present and return to the subject of
towns and settlements.
Facing tho south channel, and almost directly opposite the
city of Gray's Harbor is Gray's Harbor City, whichvhas not yet
become formidable as a rival to the towns on the north side. A
little distance beyond or west of it is South Harbor, another
sraall place, whieh has the advantage of being at a point where
the south channel approaches closely to the shore with a cross-
channel almost due north to the Gray's Harbor wharf. At
17

258 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
the mouth of Johns Eiver is the Markham post-office, and still
farther west is Bay Citj', at the head of South Bay. A milling
establishment — Laidlow's — has just thought of starting a sale
of town lots on the neck of land between South Bay and the
ocean. Thus the success of one point stimulates ambition in
others to compete with it.
About half-way between Markham and Bay City is the point
selected bj- the Northern Pacific Eailroad for a terminus on the
harbor, and its name is Oeosta. This terrainal eity was founded
on the first of May, 1890 ; therefore I was almost at its christen
ing. Over three hundred lots were sold on this occasion, but
the comjDany have exhibited but little interest since, and some
observers have expressed the opinion that it was the company's
intention to extend its line to Shoalwater Bay, about fifteen
miles south of Oeosta. But whether or not that is the com
pany's present intention, it can do so whenever there is a motive
for it.
The situation of Oeosta with reference to the channel is some-
Avhat sirailar to that of Gray's Harbor ; that is, long wharves
will have to be built out to it, if not as long as those on the
north side. It has a tide-flat in front, and the raain part of the
town plat on a level bench thirty-five to fifty feet above the flat.
There is good anchorage in South Bay, and a belt of timber
shelters tho site of the town from the strong ocean winds which
blow up and down the eoast not more than four miles west of
Oeosta. These are the main features of the new Northem
Pacific Terminus.
[I have learned authentioallj', since writing the above, that
the population of Oeosta now numbers (January 1, 1891) three
hundred, and about fifty buildings have been erected. A wharf
and warehouse have been built, and a saw-mill with a capacity
of seventy-five thousand feot per diem, a sash- and door-factoiy
about completed, and three shingle-mills have been added to
the substantial improvements of the town. A bank has been
doing business for two months. Two hotels entertain guests,
and a third is in course of construction, while the land company
and railroad corapany are planning one of those modern cara
vansaries which are the corner-stones of new western cities.
Oeosta, Uke Hoquiam and Aberdeen, has resorted to planking

FROM OLYMPIA TO GRAy'S HARBOR. 259
for improving its main business street. The railroad corapany's
shops and round-house will be here, and trains vvill be running
from Tacoma to Oeosta on the 1st of March, 1891. About the
same time, if not sooner, trains will be running from Tacoma to
the eity of Gray's Harbor, over the Tacoma, Olympia and Gray's
Harbor Eailroad, or, as people here call it, " Hunt's road." The
doA-elopments to follow ou both sides of the harbor will prob
ably far outdo the progress of the previous year.]
It is evident, from the superficial observations here recorded,
that the State of Washington has a good possession in the vallej'
of the Chehalis, from its eastern end, where it includes the coal
fields and lumber-tracts in the vicinity of ChehaUs City and
CentraUa, to the Pacific Oeean. Its destiny will be given shape
Avhen the two railroads now nearing completion reach the har
bor and have settled down to transportation business.
It maj- not be uninteresting to know that Hoquiam and
Gray's Harbor gave Hunt a bonus of one hundred and sixty
thousand dollars ; Aberdeen, one hundred and thirtj- thousand
dollars ; and Montesano, twenty -five thousand dollars. That is
not the way pioneers used to begin life.
The resources of this valley, whieh includes the whole of
ChehaUs, a corner of Thurston, and the western end of LoAvis
Counties, are prodigious. In the first place, the coal-fields at
its eastern end embrace one hundred and fifty thousand acres.
The qualitj' and reputation of lignite which attached to the
Chehalis coal-fields for a long time militated against their devel
opraent, but enterprises of a few recent years have established
the existence of a practically exhaustless body of clean bitu
minous coal in these fields, containing from ninety to ninety-five
per cent, of carbon, in veins of a thickness of six feet, with a
dip favorable to raining. Hence these railroads rivaUing each
other to cover this territorj'. And these coal-rain es lie beneath
a forest of merchantable timber. It will, no doubt, be a casus
belli between the railroads, — the control of the transportation
of coal and lumber from this favored section. But as the Pacific
Oeean is only from eighty to one hundred and thirty miles from
any of the coal-fields here referred to, Gray's Harbor has a
great advantage over the Sound or Columbia Eiver towns as a
direct route to the sea, there being a saving in distance over the

260 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
former of several hundred miles, and over the latter of about
eighty. It is claimed here that vessels loading or discharging
iu Gray's Harbor save seven hundred railes in going and return
ing to Puget Sound ports, from eight to ten daj-s of tirae, and
from six hundred dollars to one thousand dollars in towage, —
only ten miles of towing being required to take a ship out of
the harbor, — and that thej- decrease their rates of insurance by
aA-oiding the stormy coast of Cape Flattery, at the entrance to
the Strait of Fuca.
The arguments in favor of Gray's Harbor reach further, and
say that wheat from East Washington onee loaded onto cars
eould moro cheaply roll right on to Gray's Harbor over the
Northern Pacific or Hunt's road, and be transferred to vessels
there, than to sail the additional distance from Tacoma out
through the Straits. Certainly the dikes projected in front of
the city of Gray's Harbor will afford admirable sites for grain-
elevators, to be used in loading ship.^. With some comparatively
cheap improveraent upon the bar it is contended that this port
is equal, if not greatly superior in its faciUties for commerce,
to any on the Northwest coast. And it seems as if nature
should have provided such an outlet as this is claimed to be for
the wealth within easj' reach of it.
The tiraber which is tributary to the ChehaUs Valley is not
only that which covers so large an area in the valley proper,
and its tributary vallej-s, which is estimated at ninety billions of
feet, but there is an equal amount on the south and west of the
Olympic Mountains which can only be brought out in this direc
tion, and which is the largest and best timber in the State, un
surveyed and untouched bj' the axe of the logger. Great as
are the well-known timber resources of Washington, it appears
that more than a third of- the whole must find its outlet at
Gray's Harbor. A glance at the raap shows a stream every few
miles falling into Gray's Harbor or the ChehaUs, which seem
to have been designed for " driving" logs out of this immense
forest. Many of these are navigable for considerable distances
where not choked up with a "jam" of fallen timber, some of
them having a depth of forty feet and over.
The largest of the streams emptying into tide-water are the
Humptulips, Hoquiam, Wishkah, and Wynooche, all on the

PROM OLYMPIA TO GRAY'S HARBOR. 261
north, shoAving their sources to be in the Olympic Eange.
There are many lesser strearas on tho sarae side, and also many
coming from highlands south of the raouth of tho Chehalis.
AboA'o Montesano the Chehalis receives the Satsop from the
Olj'mpies, and Black EiA'or frora the Cascades, Tho aggregate
length of streams available for logging purposes is two thousand
miles. Sueh figures stagger comprehension, standing on the
shore of this broad, bright, but lonelj- bay, its townlets crowded
for room in the edge of those " continuous woods" which are
their dependence and their glory.
As to agriculture, its day has hardly begun. Tbe lands of
tho ChehaUs raise cereal and root crops, fruit, and hops equally
well. There is a ready raarket in the towns for everything pro
duced. The country near the coast, on account of its racist
and cool climate, is an excellent one for grasses and dairying.
The valleys of the streams named above are rich and fertile.
In the Humptulips are about thirty townships of excellent land,
little of which is occupied. Other valleys are almost unexplored.
The industries of the county are not yet shaped, if we except
lumbering, ship-building, and fish-canning. The only one I
heard spoken as about to bo coraraenced was brickmaking, there
being a quality of claj- near tho city of Graj-'s Harbor which it
was believed would raake a brick which could be vitrified, and
which was desired for tho construction of a grand hotel. I also
heard it mentioned that the hemlock growing so abundantly
near the coast offered inducements for tanneries to bo located in
this region.
There are banks of cod and halibut off the coast for deep-
sea fishing; salmon ("Columbia Eiver turkej-," I have heard
it called) in abundance in the harbor and riv-ers tributary,
and trout in the mountain-stroaras. There are in the harbor
poi-gies, tora-eods, rock-trout, flounders, herring, smelt, sardines,
and salmon-trout, while the tide-flats abound in clams and soft-
shell crabs.
Some idea of the commerce of the lower Chehalis Valley
maj' be gathered from tho fact that for one year, ending Julj- 1,
1890, there was imported seventy thousand tons of raerchan
dise. This trade was carried on witb San Francisco and Port
land. It remains to be seen what effect the completion of rail-

262 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
I'oads frora the Sound will produce, and whether Gray's Harbor
will not set up jobbing-houses of its own. In 1889 there was
but one stearaer a raonth from San Francisco ; in 1890 there
was one every twelve days. When the railroads are opened to
travel, that will of course be too slow, with such marvellous
quickness do affairs move in this wondrous wilderness.

CHAPTEE XXL

OLYMPIC GOSSIP.

There is a club-shaped pieee of territory north of the Che
haUs Eiver and Graj''s Harbor, fifty railes broad at its base and
probably eighty at its northern end, whieh has the Pacific
Ocean on the west, the Fuca Strait on the north, and Hood's
Canal on the east, and is known as the Olympic Peninsula.
It consists of a raass of mountains, highest and most broken on
the north and east, the range foUowing the strait and Hood's
Canal, and sloping off in a chaos of lesser mountains towards
tbe west and south.
It was a happy thought of the EngUshman Meares, on July
4, 1788, to name the highest peak of the main range Mount
Olympus, for sacred to the gods it has remained from the crea
tion until the present year, 1890. All that was known of it
during forty-five years of settleraent on Puget Sound was eon-
fined to a few miles of border land on the three sides bounded
bj' water. No government survej-s were made except at a few
points along the strait and a single oue on the sea-coast, where
a light-house was erected to warn off, not to attract, the curious.
Two Indian reservations were located on the sea-side, but nobody
on them knew anj-thing about the interior, — not even the In
dians. No "darkest Africa" could be more unknown. Imagi
nation peopled it with giants or pigmies, according to the taste
of the dreamer. Through it roamed the fiercest wild beasts,
and in the solemn gloom of its forest-hidden caves was concealed
treasure incalculable.

OLYMPIC GOSSIP. 263
History tells us of numerous native tribes who a hundred
years ago indulged in stratagems to board the unwary ship
master's vessel and massacre tho erew, and who entertained
dusky royalty with the exhibition of sawing off the heads of a
dozen or two of slaves to show kingly prodigality. They gave
the early settlers on Puget Sound a good deal of trouble, being
very actiA'6 pirates, and the opportunities for the invasion of
settlements, or capture and murder of small parties in boats,
being too convenient to be resisted.
The Makahs were porhaiJS the worst of these, Avhose reserva
tion is on the extreme northwest corner of tho peninsula. They
are brave fellows, and dare to chase whales in their sea-canoes.
When a whale is seen spouting tho faet is reported to a medi-
cine-raan, Avho allots to each canoe to be engaged in the chase
the requisite nuraber of skilled oarsmen and a harpoon-thrower.
This instruraent is raade of pieces of elkhorn, ornamented with
carving, joined together in the shape ofa V, and having a sharp
steel like an awl at the point, to which is fastened a long and
strong rope made from the sinews of a whale. When about to
be thrown the harpoon is inserted in a slender shaft of tough
yew wood, which drives it deep into the body of leviathan, where
the barbs hold it.
The chase is never undertaken wilhout the performance of
reUgious ceremonies or necromancy, intended to give the har
pooner the victory iu the coming struggle. The medicine-man
and the harpooner, blessed by him, occupy the leading canoe ;
then come the otber merabers of the whaling fleet, followed by
a reserve of two canoes. Tbey cross out over the breakers
with great skill, and put to sea to watch for the reappearance
of their game.
A whale usually plays along near the surface for some little
tirae, blowing at intervals, then throws himself out ofthe water
and dives deep down, remaining below for a corresponding time,
whieh the Indians from observation can calculate, as well as the
plaee where he will again eome to the surface. They take a
position near this plaee and watch for the auspicious raoment,
which is when the whale " humps himself" to make a dive.
The harpooner, his terra-cotta-colored figure nicely poised in
the bow of the canoe and harpoon raised above his head, waits

264 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
for the coraraand to throw. It comes, " latah I" and the instru
raent descends with cruel force and precision into tbe whale's
body, followed by others, and the oarsmen quickly back away
to escape the commotion whieh the creature's huge tail creates
in the water when it is wounded. Other lines are attached to
the harpoon-Unes, to whieh are fastened " floats" made of the
stomachs of the hair-seal, filled with air, to prevent the canoes
from being drawn under water.
In his agony the whale at first lashes the sea furiously, then
starts off on a run, and drags the canoes. But with half a
dozen harpoons in him he is doomed. Should night eome ou,
or the sea be rough, the canoes are detached, and the whale left
to die at his leisure, prevented from going to- the bottom by the
Unes of floats attached to him. He raay travel all night and all
tho following day, but not straight ahead, and is usually found
in the raorning, when if ho shows game the boats are again
fastened to the lines, and away they go onee more, raoving
about in a circle of fifteen or twenty railes. When at last the
whale succumbs, the carcass is towed ashore, the tide assisting
to beach it. When this happens there is a race to be the first
to touch tho body, as thereby one becoraes eligible to the offlce
of chief harpooner, or hoa-ehin-i-ea-ha.'''
The raedieine-man removes the whale's eyes, which he uses in
his incantations ; runners are sent out to collect the tribe, and
the whale's blubber is eut up and divided araong them. As
mueh as one thousand or fifteen hundred gallons of oil are
obtained from one whale. When all are present a " potlatch,"
or feast, is held, presided over by the " medicine," and tho fes
tivities close with libations of fire-water, poured, if not to the
gods of Olympus, down tho thirsty throats of these savages,
* This account of whale-chasing is merely a synopsis of a very interesting
description by an eye--witness, — H. D. C., — published in tbe Oregonian. On
the occasion of his observations at Neah Bay, one of the pursuing boats con
taining seven Indians became separated from the fleet and was lost. There is
a life-saving station at Neah Bay, which could, ho-wever, be of no use to a
canoe in distress in the open sea. The neighborhood of Cape Flattery is the
centre frequently of wild stoi-ms, and is often overhung with thick fogs. A
long list of vessels lost about this part of the ooast might be given, and yet
the life-saving station there is very ill equipped and inefficient.

OLYMPIC GOSSIP. 265
Whether by the dangers of Avhalo-chasing, the decimation of
Avars, or the importation of foreign diseases, most of the Makahs
have died off, and the pilaces that knew thera shall know them
no more.
On the Quinault (pronounced Keen-nut) reservation are
about four hundred and fifty raen, women, and children, who
occupy about one hundred and forty thousand acres. They are
a degraded tribe, whom the agents appointed to instruct thera
have been unable to elevate to a comprehension of the ideas
entertained by civilized people. Their houses are more com
fortable than those of the tribes of the interior, being con
structed of planks hoAvn from cedar or spruce, set up on end,
and roofed with like material. The floor is of earth, and is a
foot below the level of the ground. A raised platforra, which
serves for soat or bed, runs along the sides. Mats are used to
sleep on. Several faraiUes occupy one house, and cook at a
coramon fire in the centre, the smoke escaping from an open
ing in the roof The women are simply slaves. They provide
every-thing the family requires except game and fish, and
make all the clothing for both sexes. Chastity is not in favor,
the absence of it being more profitable. The food of the tribe
consists, after game and fish, of roots, berries, water-fowl, eggs
of wild fowl, and shell-fish. Meat is not much eaten, and at
their feasts thej- drink bear-, seal-, and whale-oil, and are not
particular about the condition of the whale-blubber, which they
consume in every state of putridity.
When an attempt Avas made to establish a salmon-cannery at
Quinault, it failed on account of the high price demanded by
the natives for fish, they shrewdly deciding, no doubt, that it
was uot good policy to encourage the too rapid destruction of
their food supply.
Whether from indolence or superstitious dread, these people
were as wholly ignorant of the interior of the peninsula as the
white intruders.
The names of tho streams coming down from the mountains
on the eoast side are Menotelops, Moclips, ChepaUs, Quinault,
Eaft, Queots, Ohalat, Bagaehiel KilUwah, Solduck, Dicky,
Quillayute, Osetto, and Waach. On the north, falling into the
Strait of Fuca, are Oleho, Clallam, Lyre, El wha, and Dungeness.

266 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
The most of these naraes, as will be seen, are aboriginal, while
Lieutenant Meares is responsible for Dungeness. On the east,
fiowing into Hood's Canal, are the Quileene, Leland, Sylopish,
and Skokomish, and many smaller ones without names. Several
of these rivers could be navigated with small steamers by sim
ply removing accumulations of drift.
The laying out of towns on Gray's Harbor and exploration
of its tributary rivers by " timber cruisers" awakened so great
an interest in the Olj-mpie Peninsula that, if any prospector or
party of adventurers penetrated even a few miles beyond the
heretofore known limits of exploration, the fact was quickly
given to the public with as much eclat as if it had been indeed
Darkest Africa, and these pathfinders all Livingstones and
Stanlej-s. Up to this time the most generaUy accepted theory of the
eountry in the interior, according to one writer, was that it con
sisted of vallej-s sloping inward frora the mountains to a great
central basin. In support of this belief it was pointed out that,
notwithstanding the country round about had abundant rain,
and that clouds constantly hung over the mountain-tops, all the
streams flowing towards the four points of the compass were
too insignificant to drain the great area shut in by the raountains.
(This was not true, as I have shown, concerning the south side.)
This writer fancied a great interior lake, but eould not account
for its drainage except by imagining a subterranean outlet. He
urged some adventurous persons to " acquire fame by unveiling
the mystery which wraps the land encircled by the snow-capped
range." " Superstition," remarked Governor Semple, in his official
report for 1888, " lends its aid to the natural obstacles in pre
serving the integrity of this grand wilderness. The Indians
ha\-e traditions in regard to happenings therein, ages ago, which
were so terrible that the memory of thera has endured until
this day with a vividness that controls the actions of men. In
those remote times, say the aborigines, an open v.illey existed
on the upper Wynooskie, above the caflon, in the heart of the
Olympic Eange. This valley was wide and level, and the
mountains hedged it in on every side. Its main extent was
open land, matted with grass and sweet with flowers, while' the

OLYMPIC GOSSIP. 267
edge of the river and the foot of the hills were fringed with
deciduous trees. Here peace was enshrined and the warriors
of the different tribes congregated onee a year, to engage in
friendly rivalry in the games that were known to them, and to
traffic with each other in such articles of commerce as they
possessed. No account exists of any violation of the neutrality,
but a great catastrophe occurred during the continuance of one
of their festivals from which only a few of the assembled
ludians escaped. According to tho accounts of the Indians, the
great Seatco, chief of all evil spirits, a giant who could trample
whole war parties under his feet, and who eould traverse the
air, the water, and the land at will, whose stature was above
the tallest fir-trees, whose voice was louder than the roar of
the ocean, and whose aspect was more terrible than that of the
fiercest wild beast, who came and went upon the wings of the
wind, who could tear up the forest by the roots, heap the rocks
into mountains, and change the course of rivers with his
breath, became offended at them and caused the earth and
waters to swallow thera up — all but a few, who were spared
that they raight carry the story of his wrath to their tribes,
and warn thera that they were banished frora the happy valley
forever.'' " The next person," says Semple, " to stand upon the scene of
the ancient convulsion wUl be tho all-conquering 'average man'
of the Anglo-Saxon race, vvho will tear up the matted grass and
the sweet flowers with his plow, and deprecate the proximity
of the snow-clad peaks because they threaten his crops with
early frosts and harbor the coj-ote that tears his sheep."
Sueh were the ideas entertained even by inteUigent people
as late as 1888, and hence " Olympic" and " Olympian" were
words very appropriately appUed to these mountains. The
trader Meares knew as little of these mysterious heights as the
Greeks of tbe summits of their Olj-mpus. The loftiest one is
eight thousand one hundred and fifty feet, while Mount Con
stance, the second highest, is seven thousand seven hundred and
seventy feet above the sea.
A few prospectors had penetrated a Uttle distance into the
mountains from the settlements along the Strait, who gave
glowing accounts of the possibilities of this region,— its im-

268 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
mense forests of fir, cedar, spruce, and hemlock, its numerous
small but rich valleys, and its minerals, including coal, gold,
iron, tin, valuable stone, and a variety of clays. The streams
were swarming with speckled trout, and the forests with game.
These rumors still further stimulated public curiosity and inter
est. I met at Gray's Harbor the first ladies to undertake a
journey into the Olympics, — Mrs. John Soule and Mrs. John G.
McMiUan, — who, with their husbands, went up the coast by a
trail as far as the government warehouse at Owyhut, and thence
to the Quinault Eeservation along the beach, crossing the rivers
at their mouths, where they were most shallow. On the Che
paUs one settler was found who had Uved there for nine years.
At the reservation they wore entertained by the family of the
agent. Captain WiUoughby, who, with Mrs. WiUoughby, related
to them many Indian legends. But in these legends I see little
to admire; they are exceedingly puerile and pointless, and not
worth preserving.
From the reservation the party ascended the Quinault Eiver
by canoe having Indian boatmen. The time occupied in getting
to the lake of that name, a distanee of forty miles, was three
days, many portages around "jams" having to be made. At
their first camp, made at an Indian rancherie, there was set up
before the house of the chief a figure-head of a wrecked vessel
as a totem. At the lake they found strawberries — time, last of
May, 1888 — on the banks, and delicious trout in the waters.
The valley of the lake was described to me as romantically
beautiful. They found the lake to be of an oval shape, lying
northeast by southwest, and about five by two and a half miles
in extent, with a depth of from seventy to two hundred and
twenty feet. The theory of its formation held by this party-
was that an avalanche had dammed the waters of the Quinault,
which finally found their outlet by a depression to the south
west, through which they cut a channel toward the sea. The
mountains on the sea-side are steep, and a ridge runs along the
north, but the valley lies on the east side. If the theory- of an
avalanche were true, the story of the Indians' happy valley of
long ago might have a shadow of foundation.
Having heard on the reservation that by going up the river
beyond the lake, which could bo done bj' the help of Indians, a

OLYMPIC GOSSIP. 269
walk of seven miles from the bead of canal navigation would
bring them to the head of a river flowing into Hood's Canal,
tho party determined to win fame by crossing the Olympics by
this route. It turned out, Iiowever, that the current of the
upper river was too rapid to admit of being navigated, at least
by its present mouth, and the old mouth into the lake half a
raile to the south was found to bo dammed by drifts. SmaU,
delicious salmon were found in the lake, and the party remained
for several days enjoying the raountains, the lake, the splendid
forest, salmon, strawberries, and freedom. This visit to the
Olympics was the occasion ofthe formation of Lake City Town
Company, which proceeded to plot six hundred and forty acres
on the south shore of the lake, where a summer-resort raight
very appropriately be located. It was even said that a raUroad
from tho Strait to Graj-'s Harbor would be constructed at an
eai-lj- daj-, whieh Avould bring Lake City within an hour and a
half of tbe Harbor,— namelj-, the Port Townsend and Quillaj'ute.
Quinault Citj-, at the head of navigation on the Hamptulips
Eiver, was also projected about this time, " on a beautiful eleva
tion, with half a mile of river front and a mill-site." So easy
is it to project enterprises and to dreara of future fulfilment in
this wilderness 1
I also met at Hoquiam Bx-Lieutonant-Governor Gilman, of
Minnesota, and his son, S. C. Gilman, who bad passed a winter
in quietly exploring the Olympics. They found three hundred
and fiftj' square railes of rich bottom-land along the streams,
and described the soil between the mountains and the ocean as
well adapted vvhen cleared to grazing, fruit-raising, or general
farming. There vvere few prairies, and those small ones, but they
found float-coal, croppings of iron, and quartz containing gold,
silver, copper, and tin. They entered the mountains from the
south and experienced little difficulty, while, by report, those
who attempted to enter from the north or east were met by
many and severe obstacles. That this is true is confirmed bj'
tho report of an exploration conducted under the auspices of
the armj-. as well as by the failure of several parties from the
Sound to effect a crossing frora the east side. The Gilmans en
countered dangers and performed feats of daring which to an
ordinary tourist like myself seemed extraordinary, but which

270 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
were as coldlj- recited as if it had been a usual thing to climb
perpiendicular walls, clinging like a limpet to its rock, or to
promenade on a shelf six inches wide above a frightful abj-ss.
There was also another party Avhich wintered in the Olympics
and had not yet come out when I was at Hoquiam. This Avas
an expedition organized by the Seattle Press, consisting of five
men and an Indian guide, who deserted when he discovered the
purpose of the explorers to penetrate to the interior of the
peninsula. Thej- started from Port Angeles, on the north,
with mules, boats, provisions, and a thorough outfit, proceed
ing up the Elwha Eiver. To recount their experiences would
require more space than can be aUowed to it in this volume.
Thoy were in the mountains from Deceraber 7 to May 21, and
came out at Aberdeen in a disreputable plight, plus hair and
beard, but minus those articles of clothing considered indis
pensable to propriety. Their report concerning the nature
of the eountry and the minerals to be found in it agreed with
that of the Gilmans, and they made many additions to the map
of the country, naming peaks and lakes whieh hitherto had not
been observed or named. Lake Crescent and Lake Sutherland
are both near the Elwha Eiver. Mount Brown is in that vicin
ity. Mount Seattle near the head of the Quinault Eiver, while
Mount Ferry, named after the first governor of the State, Mount
Childs, Barnes, and Grady are elevations -no longer without a
" local habitation and a name."
FoUowing the return of the Press expedition were half a dozen
lesser efforts to learn the character of the Olj-mpic Peninsula in
uU its parts, most of these being directed to the discovery of
minerals, and all bringing in sorae specimens. A copper-mine
discovered in Kitsap County east of and at the foot of the
Olympic Eange seemed to confirm the existence of copper
higher up.
I have spoken of the Peninsula as unknown and unexplored.
But it would ill beeome me to pass over other atterapts made
at a comparatively recent date to unveil the Olj-mpian mystery.
In 1881-82 Colonel Charabers, coramanding at Fort Townsend,
endeavored to construct a road frora the fort into the raountains,
the result of six raonths of toil being a trail to and across both
branches of tbe Dungeness Eiver, which was then abandoned

OLYMPIC GOSSIP. 271
as impracticable, from the density of the forest and under
brush, and tbe equally great obstacles of windfalls, caflons,
and precipices.
In 1885, Lieutenant J, P. O'Neil, being stationed at Fort
Vancouver, was detailed by General Miles to make a reconnois
sance of the " Jupiter Hills," and entered upon this duty with
enthusiasm. After a month of rather perilous adventures in its
execution, and losing one man, who strayed from tho trail and
perished, O'Neil was ordered to Fort Leavenworth, and the ex
pedition returned to Vancouver. Concerning his part in it
O'Neil reraarked that " the travel was difficult, but the adven
tures, the beautj' of tho scenery, the raagnificent hunting and
fishing, amply repaid all hardships, and it was with regret that I
left them before I had completed the work." He also said, " There
must be great mineral wealth here, for gold has been found in
the foot-hills, as has also coal. There are now two claims whieh
have first class coal located near Hood's Canal. Iron oro is in
some places most abundant and very pure, I also carried a
specimen out which was pronounced by a learned man to be
copper. The forraation of these mountains seems to speak
plainly of mineral wealth. . . . The day will come when the
State of Washington will glory in thoir wealth and beauty."
In the raonth of Julj-, 1890, General Gibbons sent out an ex
pedition to make a thorough exploration of the Olympic Eange,
and again Lieutenant O'Neil was placed in command. Accom
panying it were raerabers of the Portland and the Washington
, Alpine clubs, and the expedition, which consisted of fifteen rank
and file, started early in July- from Union City, at the raouth
of tho Skokomish Eiver, on Hood's Canal. They carried a box
sirailar to those placed on the tops of the Oregon snow-peaks.
containing a record book, to be deposited on the highest peak
of the Olyrapics, the summit of Mount Olj'mpus.
The trail lay bj- Lake Cushman, which is described as a para
dise for anglers. Nestled among the foot-hills at an elevation
of four hundred feet, it reflects in its placid bosom the overhang
ing crags and snow-jieaks. Tho Skokomish Eiv-er runs into and
out of it, as the Quinault does on the other side of its lake. A
trail led to some copjier deposits several railes frora the river, and
frora that point the only roads open to the explorers were the

272 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
elk-trails. In short, they had the same experience that all pre
vious explorers had met with, travelling over " a succession of
fine bottoras and precipitous raountain-sides, which in places
approach the grandeur of a caflon, until they arrived at a real
and impassable caflon whore the stream rushed out between
rocky walls one hundred feet in height." This experience was
repeated on an ever-increasing scale of grandeur, the incidents
of which the reader would find it wearisorae to follow, until the
sumrait of the range was attained, and tho party descended the
Quinault to the coast, and finally to Graj-'s Harbor, where they
were welcomed with enthusiasm. I had the pleasure afterwards
of hearing Lieutenant O'Neil deliver a lecture descriptive of his
expedition, at the close of which he made the interesting state
ment that Mount Olympus has forty glaciers, and the surprising
one that the Olympic Peninsula was good for nothing but a
National Park. Whether the people of Washington will agree
wilh him I know not, but I think it will take the strong arm of
the government to keep them from tho timber, minerals, and fish
which it contains.
The last explorer of note who proposed to raake the acquaint
ance of the Oljrapics is Lord Lonsdale, who was going to take
the route via Port Townsend, when Mr. J. T. Duncan, of Graj''s
Harbor, raot him at that plaee to persuade him to take the safer
and easier route from the south. It cannot be said hereafter
that the Olympics are terra incognita, but only that they are, for
the most part, an inhospitable country which, having once seen,
few would care to see again except at a distance, and at a dis
tance they are the raost beautiful of all the ranges in the North
west, — a joy forever to the resident on either side of the Strait
or the Sound.
As a country in whieh to hunt garae there is nothing raore
formidable than black bear, wolves, deer, and elk, the latter of
which are numerous and not at all shy.

SHOALWATER BAY OR WILLAPA HARBOR? 273
CHAPTEE XXII.
SHOALWATER BAY OR WILLAPA HARBOR?
While I Avas at Hoquiam I discovered that there was an
appearance of rivalry between the population of Gray's Harbor
and the inhabitants of the region about Shoalwater Bay, fifteen
miles south of that plaee. I was myself conscious of a preju
dice against this baj- on account of its name, although its his
tory for the last hundred years did not justifj- the feeling. In
faet, I think a part of my aversion to this harbor was that it did
not furnish a reason for this want of confldone?, by wrecking
some vessel, thus shovving its true character as indicated by its
name, — for shams of any kind are hateful to me.
Called to question my authorities on this subject, I could not
learn that this baj' had ever botraj'ed ils trust, but, on the
contrary, a number of vessels which had been unable to got
into the Colurabia Eiver, in forraer time-', had found shelter and
safety in Shoalwater Bay. The history of tho harbor since the
settlement of the countrj- is about this : A vessel or two in 1849,
having blundered into this port in looking forthe Columbia in
heavy weather, drew attention to the harbor and surrounding
countrj-. In 1850, C. J. W. Eussell settled on the bay, and, find
ing the extensive shoals a natural oj-ster-bed, opened a trade in
oysters with San Francisco. In 1851 the schooners "Sea-Ser
pent" and " Eobert Bruce" wore regularly emploj-od in supplj--
ing the California market. The "Bruce" was unfortunately
burned at her landing, whieh jjlace was called Bruceport, as hor
owners were named the Bruce Company; hence, Bruceport is
the oldest settlement on the bay. Another company were at the
same tirae cutting a cargo of piles for the San Francisco market
frora the grand forests around the port, and in 1852 a number
of immigrants settled on the streams emptying into it. A party
had already projected the laying out of a town on the baj-,
when their leader died. The first saw-mill was erected in
1852-53, near the mouth of North Eiver, by David K. Weldon,
one of this company. 18

274 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
In 1853-54 there were two hundred men on Shoalwater Bay
and its estuaries who lived by oystering, and these natural beds
furnished all the fresh oysters consumed on the coast until 1859,
when planting was begun. An unusual frost in 1861-62 de
stroyed nearly aU the oysters in the bay; but in 1874 one
hundred and twenty thousand baskets were sbiijped from here.
The oystermen of Shoalwater Bay and Puget Sound inlets have
to contend with the iraported eastern moUusk since the open
ing of transcontinental railroads, but the small native oyster
remains a favorite for its delicacy of flavor.
From what I have said it will appear that this part of the
Washington coast, although deserving well of the outside world,
received Utile attention from it for many years, the rich valley
surrounding it being sparsely settled, and even the wealth of
its forests remaining almost untouched.
The entrance to Shoalwater Bay is thirty-five railes north of
the Columbia Eiver entrance, although its south end reaches to
within four miles of that great river. This thirty miles of
water— actually shoal — south of tbe entrance is what gives the
bay its name, and it is separated frora the ocean by a long spit
of an average width of two railes. Inside the bay are no mud
flats such as are seen in Gray's Harbor, but the channel is raore
tortuous. The north headland of the bay, called Toke Point, after a
Chinook chief who had his home here, is a jutting headland
reaching out into the harbor for a distanee of seven railes in a
curving neck which protects a sraall bay called North Cove.
From this cove the harbor extends eight railes east to the mouth
of the Willapa (pronounced with a broad a, and accent on the
second syllable) and up this estuary for sorae distanee to a point
twenty miles inside the bar. The mean depth of watei- on the
bar is said to be over twenty-six feet, while inside and all the
Avaj' to the head of deep water in the Willapa the channel
carries from thirty-five to sixty feet. The harbor is perfectly
landlocked and safe from the sou'westers which blow in the
winter months.
Twenty miles from the ocean, on the south bank of the
Willapa Eiver, and three railes frora its mouth, is the town of
South Bend, first settled in 1881, and having an active growth,

SHOALWATER BAY OR WILLAPA HARBOR? 275
backed by a rich farming country forty miles long by three
miles in breadth, and a great body of fine timber. A large saw-
raill, in addition to the one already there, will be put in opera
tion soon, together with other mills and business enterprises.
South Bend is but forty miles west of the main lino of the
Northern Paciflc (Portland Branch), at ChehaUs City, and the
difference in the elevation of the two places is one hundred and
fiftj' feet. This raakes railroad construction easy, and in fact a
branch to South Bend is already being built bj- the N. P. cora
pany whieh will be corapleted early in 1891, or about as soon as
their line to Oeosta is opened, under the name of Yakima and
Pacific Coast Eailroad. This will bo a boon to the inhabitants
of the Willapa Valley, who have hitherto been compelled to
depend upon a chance vessel, or a small propeller from Hoquiam
to a landing on the south spit, whence a beach-wagon conveyed
passengers to North Cove — a very boisterous route in rough
weather. Or if communication with the Colurabia Eiver was
sought, again a chance vessel or tug earried travellers out to
sea and across the bar of the Columbia ; or raore recently to
Sealand on tho beach near Baker's Baj-, whence a local railroad
completes the journey to the Columbia via tbe sea-side resorts
described in a former chapter. When tbe Chehalis road is
finished ono can corae from Portland or Tacoma in four or five
hours bj- rail. Whereas South Bend was a hamlet of perhaps
twenty houses until this prospect opened up a future, it is now
an incorporated city which is spending large sums in street
Improvements, hotels, and business houses. A newspaper, the
South Bend Enterprise, represents the interests of the town and
Willapa Valley. Like Aberdeen, the principal streets of South
Bend are built upon piling to raise them out of the reach of
tho tides.
On tho north bank of the Willapa Eiver, at its confluence
with the harbor, on a level and open tract of land containing
about three square miles, another town has been laid out, with
broad avenues fronting on deep water, called Nori,h Pacific Ciij-.
It has not j'ot received much attention or been advertised after
the manner of new cities, from which I draw the inference that
the railroad powers are holding it until they are prepared to
give it a good send-off. If I were the son of a prophet I should

276 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
saj' that it is the intention of the powers just referred to, not
onlj- to bring the Yakima and Pacific Coast Eailroad here, but
also lo extend their Gray's Harbor line down to the same place.
So the strife for ascendency between the Gray's Harbor and
Shoalwater Bay towns is not without foundation in reason.
Within a distanee of fifty miles on the eoast are three com
peting points, Astoria, and the leading city, whichever that raay
prove to be, on each of the two harbors north of the Columbia.
It must be a surprise to the merchants in the interior, who have
always controlled the commerce of these two States, to discover
at this late daj- that trade-centres are not permanent, but locate
themselves according to natural advantages which are fixed,
other things being equal. The whole of West Washington is
so rich in resources that it now dep)ends upon tho capaci tj- of
anj- considerable portion of it to sustain a raore dense popula
tion to give superior power to a jDarticular eity, although for a
time it raay serve as a distributing point to a wide area of only
partiaUy occupied territory.
Within a short distance of Shoalwater Bay is a range of hiUs
in which rises the Nasel Eiver, a wild stream which in twenty
miles accompUshes a good deal of that kind of motion which
the water does that " comes down at Ladore." It is a favorite
region with hunters from the seaside resorts south of the bay,
the game being the same as that found in the Olj-mpics, and
more easily reached.
One of the attractions of Shoalwater Bay is the life-saving
station on North Cove. The crew is coraposed of a captain and
six men, who not only thoroughly understand their work, but
are kept in training by driU. There is no hour of the day or
night when the guard is broken, each raan being on watch four
hours of the twenty -four. When a wreck is discovered the
patrol burns a signal whieh by percussion emits a red light
that is visible a long distanee, and then gives his warning to
the erew in the boat-house by firing a small cannon kept ready
at the light-bouse on the point.
At the sound of the cannon the men spring to their places,
and the captain, trumpet in hand, takes command. Only last
December the " Grace Eoberts," a large bark from San Fran
cisco, was driv-en ashore fifteen miles south of the station, one

SHOALAVATER BAY OR WILLAPA HARBOR? 277
fiercelj' tempestuous daj- just at nightfall, and was not seen
until morning, when tho guard's keen vision espied it through
the mist, and for an instant only. The crew was at once put in
marching order, but, the distance being too great for rapid cora-
muuieation, the eaptain secured tho uso of a tug in the bay to
convey tho life-saving apparatus to a point opposite the wreck,
and distant four railes, the lifeboat being towed through a
tumultuous sea with the crew in their places. On disembark
ing, horses were hired, Avhich dragged the beach-wagon and
aijparatus on a run across the sand sjiit to the beach whore lay
the " Grace Eoberts," about four hundred yards from shore,
broadside on, and full of Avator, hor bulwarks and housing
washed away, and the crew lashed in the rigging, while the
spray from every inroUing wave was drenching and benumbing
them. In two hours from the time the wreck was discovered a
line had been shot on board, but so exhausted were the sailors
that it was with difficulty thej- succeeded in hauUng a havvser
on board, bj- means of which and the lifebuoy attached to it
nine lives were saved. Just as the last man — the eaptain — was
lifted, half frozen, out of the ear, up eame the crew from the
life-saving station I have before raentioned, at Cape Disappoint
raent, having made a run of twenty miles, hauling their beach-
wagon by- means of horses. These incidents show great effi
ciency in the service at these two stations. Captain John
Brown, of Toke Point, lost, in rescuing a erew, a son who had
already won a medal by saving lives. It is certainly the severest
service and the most humane of our public beneficent institu
tions, as well as one of the least rewarded.
To return to the nomenclature of this region, — it has been
decided by the residents that Shoalwater Bay is a misnomer,
and, the government being of the same opinion, tho name has
recently been changed on the government charts to Willapa
Harbor, by which appellation it will hereafter appear on the
map of Washington.

278 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
CHAPTEE XXIIL
THE CITY OF DESTINY.
Eeturning over the route by which we carae to Karailche
and Olympia, only touching at the capital long enough to take
on passengers for down the Sound, we find the same fair picture
of blue water, wooded headlands, distant raountains, and sum
mer skies whieh we enjoyed on the previous trip. Steilacoom
is the first place of any iraportance we corae to, and is really in
a beautiful location on a high gravelly prairie, diversified wilh
groves of fine tiraber, geramed here and there with small clear
lakes bordered by deciduous trees. It is said there is no finer
view of the Cascade snow-peaks, from Eainier to Hood, than is
to bo seen here, while the Olympics are also in full view across
the Sound.
The harbor at Steilacoom is good, and there is plenty of water-
power in Steilacoom Creek which eoraes in at this plaee, sorae
of whieh is already utilized for milling purposes, the head of
the creek being in a lake four miles distant and two hundred
feet higher. About a mile east of the harbor is the site of
old Fort Steilacoom, the buildings of whieh were turned over
to the Territory for an insane hospital. Tbe territorial peni
tentiary on McNeil Island, opposite Steilacoom, is a fine build
ing, and standing so prominently on these lorielj' shores re
minds one of Hawthorne : " The founders of a new colony,
whatever Utopia of virtue and happiness they might originally
project, have invariably recognized it among their earliest prac
tical necessities, to allot a portion of the virgin soil as a ceme
tery, and another as a site for a prison."
Steilacoom has long been a quiet and dull town of a few hun
dred inhabitants, — for it is one of the oldest in Washington,
having been founded in 1850 by Lafayette Balch, who owned a
brig and brought a cargo of goods to this port, where he built
a house and laid out a town. Since the admission of the State,
and even before, Steilacoom had started on a new career of
progress, and, being now connected with Tacoma, Olympia, and

THE CITY OF DESTINY. 279
other points bj' rail, is becoming a popular resort, owing to its
fine situation and the delightful drives in its vicinity.
About flve miles below Steilacoom the steamer enters "The
Narrows,'' a passage six miles long and one mile wide, through
which the water runs with great force at the ebb and flow of
the tide. This strait is the only passage between Puget Sound
proper and Admiralty Inlet. Along it the government has
several reservations for defensive or other purposes. The
steamer route down the Sound is another narrow water-way
directly north of the Narrows, named bj' Vancouver Colvo's
Passage ; but to reach Tacoma we turn Point Defiance on our
right, leaving Gig Harbor on our left, and take a southeast
course into Comraencement Bay, at the south ond of Admiraltj-
Inlet, which is separated from Colvo's Passage by Vashon Isl
and for about twelve miles. The bay is five or six miles long
bj' about two and a half wide, and is well protected by Vashon
Island. We steara along past old Tacoma, a milling town, and,
finding sorae friends, are cari-ied off to make acquaintance with
tho City of Destiny at our leisure.
To begin at the beginning, the old town of Tacoma was
founded by Morton M. McCarver, a Kentuckian, an immigrant
of 1843 to Oregon, from Iowa, where he laid out the town of Bur
lington, but, being of a restless and adventurous turn of mind;
migrated to the Pacific Coast, where ho figured in Oregon, and
afterwards in California, legislation. In 1868 he went to Puget
Sound with the intention of locating, in his own opinion, the
terminus of the Northern Pacific Eailroad. He made a good
guess, as it subsequently proved. The land which he, with two
associates, purchased belonged to Job Carr. Here he erected a
residence, and induced Hanson and Ackerson to locate a saw-
raill on the point where the old town stands. When the rail
road corapany in 1873 carae looking for their terminus, he was
not in thoir way-; he gave them two hundred or three hundred
acres, and helped them to acquire several thousand more. But
they put their terminus wbere Tacoma City now stands, and he
died two years later. If he could have lived until now the dis
appointment would have been softened to him, for the old and
new towns are practically one.
I find a good deal said about the name Tacoraa, which is

280 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
variouslj- spelled with a A in place of the c, or witb au h at the
end. It is generallj- beUeved to be an Indian vvord. The first
time it appears in literature is in Theodore Winthrop's "Canoe
and Saddle," where he professes to have been told that the In
dian name of Mount Eainier vvas Tacoma; but the word is not
found in the Indian tongue, and probablj-, as in fhe case of
Jonathan Carver with the word " Origan," he partly misunder
stood and partlj- invented. It is a very good word, however,
with as much right to be as other arbitrary names, and was
chosen, I have boon told, by Mr. Ackerson as the name of
McCarvor's town, and the railroad people, wilh verj- good taste,
eveiythiug considered, called their town the same, and soon
there will be no difference between the old and the new.
The first thing that struck me about Tacoraa was its appear
ance of not being an accidental town. It was evidently de
signed. No one eould stand on these sloping heights and ob
serve the scone carefully without seeing its intention. The
natural features are quickly enumerated. The elevated plateau
on which the citj' is built, the mouth of the rich Puj'allup Val
lej-, producing enorraously in coal as well as in lumber and agri
cultural products, with tide lands worth millions Ij'ing just on
the right of the eity front, with the Narrows on the west where
there could be no other town, and a country back of it suited to
the ej-e and to horaebuilding rather than to farraing, while tho
whole great inland sea opens its water-waj'S about it, all plainly
say, " Hero was destined to be a great eoramereiul metropoUs,"
These were the natural gifts to the City of Destinj-. But
look how raen have taken advantage of them. Look at the
harbor, the railwaj's, the Sound and oeean docks, coal-bunkers,
wheat-elevators, mills, drj- -dock, canneries, shingle-mills, brick
yards, Ej-an Smelter, and Great Pacific Mills along the front,
and the St. Paul and Tacoraa Lumber Company's milling plant
and factorj-. Commencement Baj' ImjDrovemont Companj-'s
ocean docks, warehou.ses, and manufacturing centre, and other
large mills being erected at the east end of the baj-. These
things did not come there like the accretions on an oyster-shell :
they were put there by design of men of brain and foresight,
and the end has justified the beginning.
The Puyallup Indian Eeservation comes down to Commence-

THE CITY OF DESTINY.

281

ment Bay, but alreadj' there is an Bast Tacoma laid out on it,
fiontin^- the harbor, and the Bast Tacoma Land Company's

MAP OF TACOMA.

Sound and ocean docks.
Coal-bunkers.Wheat-elevators.
Tacoma mills.
Steamship dry-dock.
Fish-canneries,Shlngle-milla. Brick-yards.
Ryan smelter.

10. Paciflc MiUs.
11, St. Pau] and Tacoraa Lumber Com
pany's milling plant.
12. Wheeler & Osgood's sash and door fac
tory.
13. Commencement Bay Improvement
Company's ocean docks, warehous
ing and manufacturing centre,
14, Site of Hart Brothers' mills.

15. Original plat of East Tacoma.

water front and site of proposed improvements, facing Ad
miralty- Inlet, is the projected seat of the terminal improve
ments of the Union Pacific Eailroad when it shall need them.

282 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
Directly north of the city is North Tacoma, on Maury's Island,
which is not quite an island although it bears that name, an
inlet called Quartermaster Bay running across the southeast
portion of Vashon Island, and -nearly cutting off this insular
fragment. I ara not at present able to seo why North Tacoma
exists, but have no doubt the projector of this town has an
objeet in vievv.
The evident intent visible along the water-front is equally
recognizable in the plan of the eity, with its wide avenues,
handsome business houses, tasteful dwellings, and . excellent
street-railway service. Nothing has been left to chance, but as
one takes in the whole view its design is as conspicuous as the
city itself, which being set on a hill cannot be hid. At the head
of the bay the slope of the ground is such as to offer faciUties
for railroad, manufacturing, and other business improvements,
and there we find thom. Further along towards the west and
under the high bluff are the wharves, to which ships ean sail.
The authors of the design of Tacoraa are to be found in the
Tacoraa Land Corapany, a corporation forraed of certain of the
preferred stockholders of the Northern Pacific Eailroad after
the selection of Tacoraa for a terminus. This company pur
chased three thousand acres already secured bj' the railroad
company, and thirteen thousand more. The railroad corapany
secured a majority of the stock of the land companj-, and re
served enough ground for its terrainal facilities, whieh comprise
many miles af track in the j'ards, freight and wheat ware
houses, coal-bunkers, freight and passenger depots and offices.
The land company, besides laj'ing off and improving the town-
site, has looked after its embellishment, healthfulness, and con
venience in manj- ways. A reservation was made of thirty
acres in the raidst of the city for a public park, which has been
partially improved by the eity governraent. Tacoma is, in fact,
unusually well provided with pleasure-grounds. The six hun
dred acres reserved by the United States Govemment at Point
Defiance has been recently dedicated to the city for a public
park, and the city council had secured a lease of two school
sections adjoining the city on the south and on the northwest
(which lands eould not be purchased before the admission of the
State), to be devoted to the public use as parks. Taking these

THE CITY OF DESTINY.

283

reserves in connection with several smaller ones, and with the
beautiful park-like countrj' extending south of Tacoma to and
beyond Steilacoom, it raight be thought that for so busj- a town
its preparations for play were too elaborate, if it were not per-
ceiv-ed that thej- are in keeping with everything else about us.

WHEKE SHIPS ARE LOADED.

What surprises me more, if possible, than anything else is
the extent of the Tacoman suburbs. You take a street ear on
Pacific Avenue and run out to the eastern end of the city. It
seeras a long way, but when you get there j-ou take another
line which goes somewhere, and find it takes you half a dozen
miles out into the country, or into the woods, for tho half-cleared
land is laid out in lots and built up all along the Une with com
fortable houses. Then j'ou come back and try another line
which branches off into the Puyallup Valley, running straight
through the thick woods for several miles, and designed to go
to the town of Puyallup, nine miles east from Tacoma.

284 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
You are told that it is the intention to give ibis slill uncleared
countrj- a chance to supiply not only Tacoraa, but other cities,
with small fruits and .garden products as well as to afford facili
ties for rapid transit to those desiring to establish suburban
homes. It is the intention to adopt a time-schedule for the
accommodation of business men and clerks whose interests are
in the city as woll as for the eight- and ten-hour workingmen.
Trains will be run to carry school-cbildren to the city and back
at the proper hours, and. theatre-trains as deraanded. Think of
it, ye metropolitan dwellers in your two-hundred-year-old cities,
AA-ho after a day down-town sink into your cushioned-seats for
an hour's ride to the suburbs wilh a sigh of contentment that
your lot is cast in the midst of civilization, — think how close
upon your heels come some of these Westem cities which have
not yet seen their second decade !
Next daj' I explore the west end of the city, and ride by
electric railwaj- seven miles in that direction. It is tho same
thing. Lots are staked out all the vvay, and hero and there a
house is going up. The ground along the edge of the plain
which tops the bluff has sorae defects in tho vvay of ravines
whieh cut into it and will have to be filled or bridged, but in a
scenic point of view these deep stoop gorges are worth looking
at. Narrow, wilh tall trees and a variety of shrubbery growing
up their sides, they stretch away down, down, until the brain
whirls in following the descent to the line of the Sound. But
how lovingly the eye rests on that tranquil sea with its hither
shore, the " white wings" fioating above, tho energetic steam
boat defiantlj' crossing thoir track, the asthmatic tug pulling at
something it has picked up at some little port down the Sound,
and a few oar-boats rippling the water near shore. The air
comes fresh from the northwest with an odor of the sea in it,
a Uttle cool, as if it bad touched in passing the silverj- snow
line of the Olj-mpics. There are but few persons in the car, for
it is an eariy hour of the morning to be going out of town.
" I should be perfectly satisfied to live here. I have always
wished to have a home where I could look on a view like this,"
says a lady to her husband.
"/shouldn't be satisfied," replied her consort, with contempt
in his tone. " Look at these town-lots staked off out here in

THE CITY OF DESTINY. 285
the woods. Do j-ou suppose any but a fool would buy them ?
Tacoma is not going to grow mueh more, but Seattle probably
wiU. / am going to Seattle."
A smile crept over mj- face, I suppose, for the lady turned to
me to get ray opinion,
" Of one thing I can assure you,'' I said, evasively, " you will
find this sarae beautiful view of the Sound at Seattle — it is
everywhere here — and j-our husband vvill find the woods around
Seattle laid out in town-lots,''
Then she told me tbej- were from Helena, Montana, which
explained her ignorance of this country ; they- had onlj- arrived
on the last train from tho mountains.
We went to the end of the uncompleted road and walked
about in the woods while the car ran off a little vvay to a mill
on a side track. How veiy new and unfinished it all is! But
I must be careful about putting it down in mj- book as being
unfinished, or by tbe time it gots to the reader the public will
not be able to recognize it. And when people are trying to do
so much, and are rather proud of succeeding so woll, ono must
not lessen the wind in their sails bj- so mueh as a pin's prick.
Tho Eyari smelter is in this neighborhood, and the railroad
will run to it shortly. It is said to be the largest on the Pacific
Coast, and cost nearlj- half a million, being built by a syndicate
in St. Paul. It will smelt gold, silver, lead, and copper ores ;
and its capacity will be five hundred and sixty tons daily, em
ploying one thousand men. It is expected to smelt Alaskan
ores, silver ores from South America brought as ballast in
vessels, and ores from the mines of the Okanogan country
east of the Cascades, as soon as transportation for them can be
obtained. But to return to street and suburban railways: the sy-stem is
only about one j-ear old, and j-et bere is another twelve-mile
road to American I;ake just opened (it runs to Steilacoom now,
arid is going on to Nisquallj- City, raore than half-way to
Olympia). This is the popular resort for pleasure-seekers. The
drive to it, over the lovel prairie carpeted vvith a short fine grass
and wild fiowers, is a charming one. Tho lake itself is onlj'
about three railes long and of irregular width, with some prettj-
wooded islands in it. A steam-launch, sail- and row-boats have

286 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
been placed upon the lake, with rustic seats and tables around
the margin, a band-stand, and other attractions. Gravelly Lake
is a small associate of American, besides whieh there are several
others within a few miles, and a speed-track in the neighbor
hood. A fine view of Mount Eainier frora this locality ia one
of its features.
American Lake was so named by Lieutenant Wilkes, who
celebrated the Fourth of July on its borders in 1841, and was
confirraed by the settlement on its border of a Methodist mis
sion party in 1842, during the occupancy of the Hudson's Bay-
Company, the Eev. J. P. Eichmond being the settler. It is
always interesting to know even a little about the origin of
things. Nisqually City (very recently platted for sale) is situated
about where the old fort stood, which onee represented as
ranch as there was of civilization in all this region, — and a one
sided civilization at that. The fort was very nearly taken by
the Nisqually Indians, at which time an American settler was
shot down at its gate, which event was the occasion of the hold
ing of the first eourt north of the Columbia Eiver by an Oregon
judge. Two Indians were hung for the murder, and after that
there was peace for a time.
All these points to which run suburban railroads, and indeed
all points to Avhich the Northern Pacific main line runs, are
counted as the " suburbs" of Tacoraa and tributary to it. It is
the policy of this railroad company to build up one lai-ge city-,
with a good many rainor ones to support it. I should myself
have noticed this had not a former president of the road given
utterance to sueh a statement. For some time, he says, these
new towns do not benefit the central citj', but in due eourse the
best business ability and most capital wiU seek it, for people
wiU go where thej- find superior advantages for whatever busi
ness they prefer to foUow. It is then this crop of suburban
towns yields a large profit. From which it seeras that not
only Tacoma itself, but many other places are designed by the
same brains.
I ask myself is there any reasonable objection to these
methods? There would not be — for these new places have
important help in starting — if no false inducements were held

NORTHERN PACIFIC RAILROAD YARDS, TACOMA,

Page 286.

THE CITY OF DESTINY. 287
out. Where there are several hundred people together they
should find something to do to make business, and they will if
they have energy and a little capital. But there are instances,
1 find, of grievous .disappointment, where land companies with
nothing to baek them have induced people to purchase their
property by misrepresenting its advantages, and loav-ing them
in tho lurch when their lots vvere disposed of Should a railroad
company be wilfuUj' guilty of such falsehood, an earthquake
ought to swallow it up. All that tbe central town would gain
in that case would be, possiblj', some discontented laborers,
driven to it bj' distress. In the raajority of Northern Pacific
towns there is some real merit, and their avowed policy benefits
the country bj- fiUing it up and connecting the settlements
with a market. Therefore I am not inimical to railroad
"raonopoly" in this country, which would be a half-century
behind the tiraes wilhout tbeir aid ; nor do I blame any com
munity for resenting an abuse of power. Let them try- to hold
the scales even.
It is tho largo number of towns laid out wherever any real or
pretended reason can be put forward for offering it whieh be
wilders and sometimes distresses the disinterested observer. Sup
pose we glance at a few of these, beginning with Detroit, situated
on an isthmus at tbe head of Case Inlet and the lower arm of
Hood's Canal. It belongs to the Detroit Land and Improve
ment Company, composed of Portland, Seattle, and Spokane
capiitalists, who recentlj' jDurchased five thousand acres of fine
timber-land, and proceeded to lay- out a city, grade streets, buUd
a large hotel, erect water-works, and advertise. There is no
doubt of the merits of the location as to timber, water, or har
borage. A good mniing-town raight be built hero, and railroads
be induced to eorae. Indeed, plans are already on foot for con
necting Tacoma by a Une twenty-eight miles long across Kitsap
County- to Gig Harbor opposite Point Defiance, for extending
such a line to Gray's Harbor, and another to Port Orchard. The
Union Pacific is expectod to come here from CentraUa on its
way to Port Orchard, Port Gamble, and to a point opposite
Port Townsend, thus tapping t-he United States Navy Yard
recently located at Port Orchard, and one of the other great
milling establishments of the Sound, as well as the Straits of

288 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
Fuca. These aro visible advantages which cannot be gain
said. But not twenty railes away, where Hood's Canal makes its
great bend, is Union City-, under the management of the Ore
gon Improvement Corapany. This is not a new town, haA'ing
had an existence for several years, but its pretensions are
sirailar to those of Detroit. Tho Port Townsend and Southern
will come here without doubt, and the Union Pacific also.
Lots are soUing at frora one hundred to one thousand doUars.
If you deraur to the latter price for lots lately carved out
of the forest, you will be told that it has cost something to do
the carving, and that you get certain iraproveraents in addition
which you have no right to expect in a new country, all of
which is true.
Then, again, there is Puget City, situated a little more than
half-way frora Tacoraa to Olympia in a straight Une, on the east
shore of the Sound. It is advertised by the Puget City Com
panj' as possessing a beautiful situation, besides whieh no com
merce frora any of the seven inlets at the head of Puget Sound
can reach the lower Sound " without passing before this rising
young metropolis." Its " unexcelled deep water facilities and
the railroads. Union and Northern Pacific," are among its
advantages ; and " the song of the saAV-mill is hoard all day
long," building being active.
And here is Des Moines, twelve railes from Tacoma, and about
an equal distance from Seattle. It was laid out in 1889 bj- the
Des Moines Improveraent Corapany, of Tacoma, who erected a
saw-mill, the output of which, twenty thousand feet per diem,
was appUed to the erection of business houses and residences.
A brick-j-ard, a pottery -factory, shingle-mill, and other indus
tries were at once inaugurated, and tho Avork went bravely on
until the company's raeans were exhausted. Now, I understand,
tbe population, which consisted principally of the corapany's
emplojees, is daily diminishing, and that those who remain are
in want.
Perhaps these reverses eame from bad raanagement, for there
is nothing to be said against the country that does not apply to
alraost every portion of the Puget Sound region, — namely, that
it requires labor and capital for its development ; and what now

THE CITY OF DESTINY. 289
country does not? We saj-, gliblj', that there are too manj-
tovvns for the population, and too largo a part of the population
in towns ; therefore, let us pilace tho people all on farms, each
settler to work out his own salvation. The result would be a
generation spent in lonely toil, and no market provided for the
products of farming. Is not the modern way of letting capital
do the work of development, of building up cities to furnish a
thousand emploj'inonts for the one of agriculture, aud of fur
nishing buyers of the farm productions of the country at good
prices, a better one ? Quien sabe ?
But, let us get back to Tacoma and hor other tributary terri
torj', indulging in some reminiscences bj- the way. At a meet
ing of the board of directors of the Northern Pacific Eailroad
Company held September 10, 1873, Judge E, D, Eice, of Maine,
vice-president, and Captain J. C. Ainsworth, of Portland, Ore
gon, managing director of the Pacific Coast, commissioners to
examine the eastern shore line of Puget Sound, throughout its
entire extent, for a suitable terminus, made a report, in accord
ance with which the companj' passed a resolution to locate and
construct its main road to the southerly side of Commencement
Baj-,' " and within the limits of the city of Tacoma," from
which it would appear that tho fact of Tacoma's existence had
been already determined, as indeed it was in tho mouth of June
prior to this report. Some transactions in real estate had taken
place previous to the failure of Jay Cooke & Co., and continued
to take place in a doubting waj', and without anj' excitement.
When tho railroad had recovered from this failure, and was
straining every nerve under Villard's management to make con
nection with Portland, and thence to reach the Sound by this
branch and avoid the expenditure of manj- millions in crossing
the Cascades, eame the second— Villard's — failure, ten j-ears
after the first. Public confidence was unsettled, not onlj- bj-
these financial difficulties, but by fears that the management
would not, after all, cross the mountains, or, if it did, that it might
make tho terminus at Seattle. Thus fourteen j-ears slipjied
awaj-, during whieh the Tacoma Land Company laid out the
first streets and made considerable improvements, C. B, Wright,
of Philadelphia, being verj- active in directing these. Under his
management the Hotel Tacoma was completed in 1884. Ho
19

290 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
built a handsome church, and endowed the Annie Wright Sem-
inarj- for girls, and Washington College for boys, with fifty
thousand dollars each.
Gas- and water-works were erected, wharves built, and with
theso things tbe value of real estate increased. But it again
declined, and frora 1884 to 1887, while thero was a doubt of the
final settleraent of the question of terrainus, there was a contin
ual depression. But vvhen on the 1st of July, 1887, the road
was opened to Tacoraa the reaction was Uke the rebound of a
bent bow. Sales of real estate were quadrupled in six raonths,
and in another twelve months had quadrupled again, after
which they increased by- about four raillion dollars annually.
In 1887 tho population was about nine thousand ; in 1889, thirty
thousand; in 1890, forty tbousand one hundred and sixtj- -five,
and Pierce County, until recently sparsely settled, contained
fifty thousand and sixty-five inhabitants.
Without stopping to inquire what brought all these people
together here in so short a space, or whence thej' carae, let us
consider what they havo dono. They have covered the land as
far as the view extends and for some distanee back from the
bay with tasteful homes on cleanly, sidewalked, and sewered
streets. To do this at the rate of thousands of houses a j-ear
implies an enormous araount of material and an incalculable
amount of labor in putting it in shape. The city's expenses for
street improvements in 1889 wero three hundred and fiftj--
three thousand seven hundred and eighteen dollars and ninety-
six cents.
In its infancy the city was compelled to import all kinds of
manufactures with the exeeption of luraber, coal, wheat, hops,
and hides, but the tide is turning, and already there are raachine-
shops, locoraotive-works, iron- and brass-founderies, furniture-
factories, sewer-pipe, tile, and pottery works, brick-yards, flour-
raills, shingle-raiUs, sash- and door-factories, with many minor
industries, the number of which is daily increasing.
Tacoma's public school property is valued at two hundred
thousand dollars. A Methodist university is being erected,
whieh has been endowed by a gift of seventy-five thousand
doUars frora citizens of Tacoma. The Pacific Lutheran Univer
sity is to be hero. There is also a business college, a Catholic

THE CITY OF DESTINY. 291
acaderaj-, the Tacoraa Academy (Protestant), Tacoma Kinder
garten, and olher private schools.
Of churches there are twentj--three, divided among tho vari
ous sects as follows: Presbyterian, Protestant Episcopal, Con
gregational, Baptist, and Lutheran, three each ; Methodist,
four; Unitarian, Free Evangelical, Christian, and Catholic, one
each, having their own ediflces ; while other organizations are
not J-et provided for.
Of charitable societies thero are a number. The Fannie C,
Paddock Hospital was first established when Tacoma was a
small town by Bishop Paddock, of this city, in memory of his
wife. With the growth of the town it has been enlarged by
frequent contributions until it is at present a noble institution.
The Tacoma Hospital is a private one. Tbe Seamen's Friend
Society, the White Shield Society, Humane Society and Union
Eelief Association, and Young Men's Christian Association, all
do good Avork. There are besides these the usual secret benevo
lent societies with a large merabership.
The last want to be recognized is tho intoUoctual or literary
need, because, forsooth, it scarcely exists during the rush and
whirr of the wheels of rapid material progress, but, as leisure
comes and quietude, it makes itself felt. Tacoma has no public
librarj- commensurate with its means, although the Young
Men's Christian Association Library and the Tacoraa Mercan
tile Library Association supplj- the place of one to a consider
able extent, or rather they fill their places well while they leave
room for the other. The Young Men's Christian Association
has a handsome building, and does a good work.
Of new-spapors Tacoma has three daiUes, the Tacoma Daily
Ledger, an eight-page morning paper; the Globe, also a morning
sheet ; and the News, an afternoon daily. The Sunday Times is
an illustrated eight-page journal, giving the society news of the
week ; besides which the Baptist Sentinel, Northwest Horticul
tural and Stock Journal, and the Real Estate Journal are week
lies. Of monthlies there are the Real Estate and Investment
Journal, the Bulletin, and Washington Magazine, a Uterary ven
ture. A Daily Hotel Reporter and the Puget Sound Guide are
weekly publications to inform the public of changes occur
ring in the faeUities for traA'ol and hotel accommodations.

292 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
The Puget Sound Printing Company is an institution of
Tacoma. The most conspicuous public buildings in Tacoma are the
Northern Pacific Headquarters, the Hotel Tacoma, Hotel
Eochester, Tacoma Theatre, Fannie Paddock Hospital (new),
Annie Wright Seminary, St. Luke's Church, New Presbyterian
Church, Swedish Lutheran Church, the Germania Hall, and
Chamber of Commerce. But just at this day and hour the
Tacoraa Land Company bave under consideration the plans for
a new hotel to surpass the " Tacoma," and to cost half a mUlion.
They are also looking for the source of a future water-supply,
the result of which will be something fino in the way of water
works. Everj' morning's paper tell us of some projected im
provement involving a great expenditure of money.
All this is nothing when compared with — let us say Chicago ;
but it is prettj- well for Tacoma, whoso real growth began four
years ago. The money to do these things, we suggest, was
drawn from the Bast. Yes, from the Eastern United States
largely, but also from the Orient, frora Great Britain, from
South Araerica, and from nearer home.
Take an example of the introduction of capital frora St.
Paul. The St. Paul and Tacoma Lumber Company- purchased
from the land deiiariment of the Northern Pacific Eailroad
Company a tract of timbered land coraprising the odd sections
in fourteen townships lying southeast of Tacoma and south
of Wilkeson and Orting in thc Puj-allup VaUey, comprising
eighty- thousand acres covered with a heavy growth of fir,
cedar, and spruce, estimated to amount to three billion feet.
One of the conditions of tho sale to the St. Paul and Tacoma
Luraber Company of this immense tract of valuable timber
was the construction bj- them of a railroad of standard gauge
and equipment from the town of Orting, on the line of the
Northem Pacific, in a southerly eourse to the Nisqually Eiver,
and thence eastward into the coal fields of the Cascade Moun
tains, to serve the double purpose of bringing out timber and
coal and opening up the country to settlement. The St. Paul
company also bound itself to cut a certain araount of timber
per year on these lands, which should be shipped to Tacoma,
where they were to build miUs with a capacity of one hundred

¦^ — Tl

THE CITY OF DESTINY. 293
million foet annually. Fortj- acres were purchased at the head
of Commencement Biij-, and costly improvements made, thereby
setting the example of utilizing tho tide-flats for business pur
poses, an example which was quicklj- followed by other com
panies. The St. Paul mill novv furnishes employment to four
hundred men, besides three hundred in the logging-camps and
as manj' more on contract work in the city. It manufactures
about five million feet of lumber pier raonth, nearly half of
which is sold in Tacoma, the other half going east by rail or
being shipped bj- vessels for a sea-voj-age.
The Commencement Baj- Land and Improvement Company is
a local one, which, seeing the value of the flats in the east end
of the Baj-, have purchased and aro constructing upon them
wharves, warehouses, and manufactories. — so quickly does one
act of development inaugurate a second.
But I had begun to saj' that not all the money expended here
in building up a model eity eoraes from tbe East, and these im
provements in tbe harbor reraind me to go baek to my theme.
It is, after all, only bj' taking account of Tacoma's exports that
we begin to understand how the monej' is to como back which
is expended here.
Lumber has alwaj's been and must remain one of tho princi
pal articles of export from Puget' Sound ports. The St. Paul
and Tacoma, Pacific Mill, Tacoma Mill (at old town), and the
Gig Harbor Mill, together manufacture two hundred million
feet of lumber annuallj', the exported portion of which output
is valued at- nearlj- nine hundred thousand dollars. The export
of coal frora this port is j-et in its infancj-, but in 1883, during
a coal famine in California owing to an avoidance of tho port
of San Francisco by vessels which asually bring coal in ballast,
there wore shipped from Tacoraa seventy eight cargoes, or two
hundred and sixtj--eight thousand tons, of coal, valued at one
milUon four hundred and seventj'-four thousand dollars. Fifty
of these cargoes wore Carbon Hill coal, which mine is the prop
ertj- of the Southern Pacific Eailroad of California, while the
South Prairie Mines in the Puyallup Vallej' and the Bucoda
Mines of Thurston County fumished the remainder, with tho
exception of one cargo of Durham coal.
The Eoslyn Mines, on the lino of the Northern Pacific, which

294 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
furnish fuel for this road, have not exported coal untU the past
year, when the output from them vvas one hundred and sixtj-
thousand tons, and since the improvement in the faciUties for
handUng coal on the water front ; but whether exported or con
sumed at home, when tbe demand increases with the population,
this contributes to the wealth of Tacoma.
The export from Tacoma of shingles by the train-load to the
East is a now itera of coraraerce which has already become
important. The old-fashioned shingle which was made witb
a drawing-knife and shaving-horse was sorae j'oars ago super
seded by the portable shingle-mill, and the making of shingles,
instead of being a haphazard, rainj'-day occupation for the
settler or lumberman, became a manufacture employing a good
deal of capital.
Thero were about eighty-five of these mills in West Wash
ington, sorae of whieh had no regular agencies or market for
their manufactures. In 1889 a combination of forty of thom
was effected bj- the organization of the North Pacific Consoli
dated Shingle Company, with a capital invested in its various
mills of one million dollars.
Tho shingles are made from red cedar, whieh neither shrinks
nor warps and is exceedingly durable, and are graded into
" extra" and " standard" lots.' Special sizes and fanej' butts are
furnished as ordered, Ono sees manj- of these used for siding,
on Tacoraa houses, with a very pi-etty effect, the lower edges
being rounded. They are onlj' used on the second storj- and on
houses of tho cottage order and of fanciful designs.
The Washington shingle is absolutely perfect, being cut frora
timber without a knot or flaw, and of regulation size. Hence,
with thoir other good qualities they are much desired bj- builders.
The Nortb Pacific Consolidated Corapanj- shipped in 1889 — its
first year of business — fifteen hundred car-loads, valued at four
hundred aud ten thousand dollars. Tho first train left Tacoraa
on tho 12th of August, with colors fiying and araid the cheering
of spectators. It reached Chicago on the 21st. Denver alone
took five hundred car-loads, the other two-thirds being taken in
tho Middle States,— New York and New England. Special
cars, it is thought, will have to be provided for them, and the
demand is already greater than the supplj-.

THE CITY OF DESTINY. 295
The only raills which raanufacture flour for export are located
at Tacoma, one already turning out two hundred barrels daily,
and another with a capacity of six hundred barrels about to be
erected. The value of wheat shipped from Tacoma in 1889 was esti
mated to exceed six million dollars, and it was believed that
this amount would be more than doubled in 1890, which it has
been, without doubt, but, owing to the overproduction of East
Washington this year, and the confusion ensuing upon the
crowded condition of warehouses, and lack of vessels to take it
away, the wheat export is still an unknown quantitj-.
Few in number as are the exports of Tacoma, thoy are the
same as those of the older Puget Sound towns. The time is
hastening, but has not j-et arrived, vvhen manufactures shall be
earried on upon a scale to exceed the local demand or even to
reach it. In the mean time imports are large. The only car
goes going East besides lumber, shingleSj and coal are ship-loads
of tea from the Orient, five of vvhich in 1888 aggregated eleven
million eight hundred and ninety-six thousand six hundred and
oightj' pounds.
The various small industries of the city employ an aggregate
capital of over five million dollars, and emploj- raore than three
thousand persons.
The commercial banks of Tacoma are nine in number, with
two savings-banks, six of the commercial banks being national
and three private. Tho aggregate capital of the nine is one
million one hundred and ninety thousand dollars, and of tho
two, one hundred and thirtj' thousand dollars. The deposits of
seven of the nine amounted in September, 1889, to four million
one hundred and ten thousand and thirteen dollars, an increase
of over a miUion in three months. The citj-'s finances are re
ported in a sound condition, and its debt small for the amount
of territoiy covered, showing good management.
The Charaber of Coraraerce of Tacoma was organized in
February, 1884, its first president being General J. W. Sprague ;
vice-presidents, J. M. Buckley and W. J. Thompison ; treasurer,
Byron Barlow ; secretary, Edmund Eice. It has plajed an
important part in the development of the eity and its most im
portant industries. Its first building was erected several years

296 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
ago on Pacific Avenue and Twelfth Street; but there is a new
and elegant building going up on Pacific Avenue and Seventh
Street better suited to the tastes and necessities of this august
body. It is six stories in height, built of stone, with carvings
ahd niches for statuary, and surmounted by a clock-tower one
hundred and ninety-five feet above the ground. The interior is
designed to correspond with the outside, and the " chamber"
alone will seat, with its galleries, one thousand persons.
Tacoma has a wholesale as well as an active retail trade, nearly
all lines of goods being represented. I am told that a conserva
tive estimate of its wholesale business in 1889 would be from
eight million to ten million dollars aside frora those productions
sold wholesale already raentioned, and this trade has but very
recently been attempted.
Groceries, alwajs an important branch of trade, are sold
wholesale by a number of houses, three of which are confined
exclusively to this business. The largest of these is the Tacoraa
Grocery Company, organized near the close of 1888, Charles E.
Hale, president, which sold goods to the amount of one million
dollars the first year.
Paints, oils, and glass seU enormously in Tacoma, besides
which hardware and farming impleraents is another good job
bing trade in a new countrj-, and Tacoma has several houses
which sell from seventy-five thousand dollars' to two hundred
thousand dollars' worth of goods annually. Farni-produce is
also jobbed at the rate of from seventy-five thousand dollars to
two hundred and fifty thousand dollars yearly, Dairj' products,
canned goods, dried fruit, grain, and fiour, each constitute a
wholesale business for several firms. One house deals exclusivelj'
in tea, coffee, and spices, wilh sales amounting to fifty thousand
dollars per annura ; and besides, sorae of the retail firms do a
business of ten thousand dollars a year in special Unes of goods.
The Tacoma Mill Company sells two hundred and fifty thou
sand dollars' worth of general raerchandise every year, at job
bing rates ; the Skagit Eiver Eailway and Logging Corapany,
a Tacoma corporation, as much ; and the St. Paul and Tacoraa
Luraber Corapany, three hundred thousand doUars annually.
One jobbing house in Tacoma seUs one million dollars' worth
of dry-goods and clothing every year, and carries a stock worth

THE CITY OF DESTINY. 297
a quarter of a million. Furniture and house-furnishing goods
rnay be purchased wholesale in Tacoma, and of every deserip-
lion, from the most elegant to the plainest, from two or tbree
furniture companies.
Tho Tacoma Trading Company- deals in building-material,
coal, haj', grain, and lime, has a cajDital of fiftj- thousand dollars,
and sells throe hundred and fiftj' tbousand dollars' worth of goods
to dealers in Washington and British Columbia. The Yakiraa-
Tacoraa Trading Company is in tho same business. When I say
that drugs, liquors, books, boots and shoes, leather, carriages,
and dressed meats for logging-camps are sold wholesale in this
J-oung eity, I have nearlj- covered the ground occupiied bj- job
bers in any city; and I have perhaps wearied the reader to
show him how these western towns commence life, — near the
top of the ladder, instead of at the bottom.
Let us now take a ride to old Tacoraa, and explore a little
further into the already almost forgotten beginnings of things.
This is a really pretty- sito for a settlement, being near the water's
edge, with a view of the bay in front, and sheltering hills at
the back. It has a rural air quite in contrast to tho ara,bitious
look of the newer city. I have the curiosity to call on Mrs.
McCarver, who occupies a modest horae in the place where her
husband died. We talk a little about him, and what local his
torians have said of him, and then I go to see the famous bell-
tower of St. Peter's little pioneer church round the corner. The
church is plain to dreariness, and the tower is simply a cedar-
tree sawed off fifty feet from the ground and wreathed around
with ivy. A bell is hung above it in a frarae-work, which is
toppeil with a roof like an extinguisher, surraounted by a cross.
It is a prettj- conceit, and tho only objeet at all picturesque in
the sleepy old place.
I breathe raore freely when I regain the heights of the new
citj-, and rest ray gaze on the roofs of Pacific Avenue where I
know brainj' raen are planning more railroads, a stearaship Une
to China, and other ways to control the trade of the Occident
and the Orient. My eyes wander further eastward, over the
head of tho bay, the Puyallup flats, the Indian reservation, and
the distant mountains, to Mount Eainier itself, where they rest

298

ATLANTIS ARISEN.

while I question whether I should j'ield to a local whim and eaU
the grand old peak Mount Tacoma. Eainier it has been for a
hundred years. It does not belong to one part of the Sound

m

-,V.''S?}«

j|Tlt«V ,

OLD TACOMA'S BELL-TOWER,
country more than another, and all other communities except
this one honor the old '' lord of the admiralty." Olympia and
Seattle cry out against the change, and, since Tacoma does not
hold any realty on the majestic mountain, the majoritj' raust
prevail, — raust it not ?
If you desire to get away frora Tacoma, you have the Northern
Pacific Eailroad to carry you east, south, or north by rail, and
steamboats to anj- part of the. Sound. The Unes controlled bj-
railroads are the Union Pacific (0. E. and N.) boats, which ply
between Tacoma, Olyrapia, and Kamilche ; between Tacoma,
Seattle, Port Townsend, and Victoria ; and between Tacoma and
the towns on Bellingham Bay, calling at Seattle.
The Canadian Pacific Eailroad runs a fine boat between
Tacoma and Vancouver, British Columbia, calUng at Seattle,

THE CITY OP DESTINY. 299
Port Townsend, Anacortes, Fairhaven, Sehome, and Whatcom.
The Pacific Navigation Company, a Tacoma corporation, runs
its steamers from Tacoma to Whatcom, stopping at Seattle,
Utsaladj-, Anacortes, Samish, Fairhaven, and Sehome; and also
on other routes coastwise, and among the islands in the San
Juan Archipelago.
The Whatcom, Sehome, and Fairhaven Company has a fleet
of seven boats which run on the several routes between Tacoma
and Whatcom; besides which thero are forty other steamboats,
including tugs, whieh ply on the Sound in and out of Tacoma
and to every place whei-e business is.
But as I wished to soe the countrj- tributary to Tacoma,
namely, the Puyallup Valley, 1 took the train for Seattle which
runs up the Valley as far as the town of Puj-allup, where the
Seattle branch comes in.
I have it from Hon. Elwood Evans, who eame to Washington
in 1853 with Governor I. I. Stevens, and who has ever been a
careful observer and student of Northwest history, that the
meaning of the Indian word Puyallup is shadow or gloom.
They attached it to the river frora the obscurity of its waters,
which ran darkling between banks overhung vvith the densest
of forest shrubbery, and shadowed by tall trees which covered
the Valley everj-vvhere except where there occurred those singu
lar small prairies referred to in my reraarks on the Chehalis
Vallej-. These prairies were early fixed upon by settlers, and
still bear the naraes of pioneers who as early as 1855 had ex
tended their improvements from Commenceraent Bay to South
Prairie. Then fell the blow which has so often fallen upon frontier
communities, and tho gloom which hung over the valleys ou
the east side of Puget Sound was not only that of the forest,
but that whieh had made a " dark and bloody ground" of alraost
every State in its turn, frora Massachusetts to Washington. In
1856, to satisfj' the Indians, the reservation first allowed them
by Governor Stevens was enlarged, and extended up the river
on both sides until it embraced a dozen claims of settlers who
were already driven from thom by massacre or flight. Not a
familj' dared retum to the Valley until 1859, wben a few ven
tured again to reside upon their former claims or take new ones.

300 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
One of these few was J. P. Stewart, who took for his claim
the land on which the town of Puyallup now stands, and in
1861 the post-office of Franklin Avas estabUshed there. Such
was the beginning.
Puyallup, which name seems to have superseded FrankUn, is
situated on the south side of the river, and just beyond the
Indian reservation. It is a town of two thousand inhabitants,
neatly built, with a good hotel and a general air of thrift.
Everything is on one level at Puyallup, and for a change frora
the diversity my cj-es have lately beheld, I am pleased with it.
This Vallej' was once an arm of the Sound, as is plainly evi
dent from the nature and direction of the water-courses on
the east of Admiralty Inlet. Look at the map. There is the
Pujallup Eiver coming down from Mount Eainier, and falling
quite abruptlj' inlo the Valley. There is White Eiver coming
down from another peak on the north of Nachess Pass, a coun
terpart of the Puyallup, only half a dozen miles from it, and
connected with it by the Stuck, a sluggish stream that flows
through raarshy ground north or south indifferently, according
to the state of the two rivers. Two or three railes north of
the Stuck junction with the White comes in Green Eiver, a
branch heading on the north side of the Stampede Pass. About
twelve miles north of Green Eiver Junction the White Eiver
unites with the Dwamish, which comes out of Lake Washington
and flows northwest into the Sound at Seattle. But the Dwam
ish is only another stretch of Cedar Eiver, whieh comes down
from the mountains also and fiows into Lake Washington, to
flow out again bj' the same raouth and become the Dwamish.
Lake Washington, twenty miles long, is connected with Sam-
mamish Lake, six miles east of it, by Samraaraish Eiver, which
reserables the Stuck for sluggishness, but which has seven
smaller streams coming into it from the north and east. Be
sides, Lake Washington is connected with the Sound through
Union Lake and a natural outlet into Salmon Bay. Green
Lake is also connected with Lake Washington, and there are a
dozen smaller ones between Puyallup Eiver and the larger lake,
which is in the centre apparently of a basin once occupied by
the waters of the Sound. This is the coal basin whence both
Tacoma and Seattle derive their present and prospective wealth ;

THB CITY OF DESTINY. 301
but only the southern portion of it is immediately tributarj- to
Tacoma. The soil of the Puyallup Valley is in general an alluvial do-
posit of groat depitb. About Puj-allup it is sandy, and espeeiallj-
adapted to hops, Avbich is the chief production of the fields in
this vieinitj-. Nothing could be prettier than these hop-fields
about harvest time, and few crops are so satisfactory as to
income. There wore raised this j-ear between Tacoraa and
Seattle, including one hop-farm at Snoqualmie, forty thousand
bales of two hundred pounds each, or eight million pounds. As
the price was verj- good this year, tho money realized, above the
cost of raising the crop, was one million six hundred and eighty-
thousand dollars. About ten thousand bales were raised in
other parts of the Stale, which brings the year's returns on this
one product of the valleys about the Sound up to tvvo million
doUars. I might say here, also, that the hop-crof) of Oregon
this year netted about one million dollars. And yet the extent
of territory covered by hop-farms is comparatively sraall. The
aei-e value of hops in a good j-ear is about three hundred and
fifty dollars ; this year it was more, on account of a poor crop
abroad. The Northern Pacific carried its flrst solid hop-train
frora the Puj-allup in September, 1890. It consisted of twenty-
five cars carrying fifteen thousand pounds each, or ono hundred
and eighty-seven tons. Thej' were shipped to Baltiraore to go
to London. I hear it said that hop-vines are to be used in
making paper and twine. If this is so, there need bo no waste
on the off years.
It is a great feature in favor of Puj-allup that its transporta
tion facilities are so good with the Nortbern Pacific, a transcon
tinental road, at its doors, a road to Seattle and Tacoma, and its
special local road to the latter, raaking it a suburb of that citj-.
Tho Valley is proUfic of vegetables and small fruits, as it raust
be of orchard fruits when they eome into bearing more generally.
Apples, pears, peaches, prunes, and apricots are said to yield
large crops. Tbus, with so favorable a soil and climate, and a
market within seven miles by rail, the farmers of this favored
region should becorae rich.
Continuing up the Vallej', Alderton is the next station we
eome to, a smaU jjlace, but with the same general and natural

302 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
advantages enjoyed by its neighbors, and just beyond is Meeker,
the junction of the Seattle branch. Lime-Kiln is what its
name implies, and then we have Orting, — " the Queen of the
Puyallup VaUey," — "an agricultural, business, and railroad
centre." It is quite that, unless appearances deceive us. I
have already spoken of the railroad being built by the St. Paul
and Tacoma Luraber Company south from Orting. A few
miles beyond are roads branching off from the main line of the
Northern Pacific to Carbondale and Wilkeson. All these roads
bring business to Orting, and so do the logging-camps and the
farms round about. It has, besides, a saw-mill, chair-factory,
and railroad shops, and, in short, seems likely to take care of its
future, although but an infant in years.
At the head of the Valley is Wilkeson, where the first coal
mines of the Northem Pacific were opened. I have spoken in
a general manner of the coal deposits of Washington, but will
quote a paragraph or two from W. H. Euffner, LL.D., on the
Puyallup Mines : " There are, however, onlj- three collieries at
work in this group. One is called the Carbonado Mines, which
are on Carbon Eiver. Three miles north, a little east, are the
famous Wilkeson Mines ; and two miles northwest of Wilkeson
are the South Prairie Mines, on South Prairie Creek.
" There are some differences in the coal at the three raines.
That at South Prairie was sold chiefly for raaking gas. The
best of the Wilkeson coal is made into coke, and is in demand
beyond the supply. The price is seven dollars a ton at the
ovens. The entire product of the Carbonado Mines is said to
go to tho Central Pacific Eailway."
Euffner's opinion of this group of raines is rather unfavoi'able,
on the whole. " To all appearance the amount of coal here is
not large, and the beds are sadly faulted, and pitch deep into the
ground." It is coraforting to knovv that, so large an area as the
whole eastern shore of the Sound and the Chehalis VaUey being
underlaid with coal, there wUl be sorae left when this group fails.
Wilkeson is a pretty nook at the very extremity of the VaUey,
where I fared well and had a pleasant chat with the superin
tendent of the mine, after which I returned toPuyaUup to take
the train for Seattle.

THE QUEEN CITY AND ITS DEPENDENCIES. 303
CHAPTEE XXIV.
THE QUEEN CITY AND ITS DEPENDENCIES.
There is little difference, in the aspect of tho country as we
proceed north through the basin described in the foregoing
chapter. Sumner, named after the statesman Charles Sumner,
is a small and pretty town inthe midst of hop-fields. Slaughter,
a little further on, is in a rich agricultural region, and ap
pears to be prosperous. It is naraed after Lieutenant W. A.
Slaughter, who was killed in this vicinity bj- Indians during
tho war of 1855. Kent is a place of considerable importance,
about one hour's travel from Tacoma. There are flne woods
all along, and hills in sight on one side or the other, show
ing that the valleys of the streams are narrow as they are rich.
A Uttle distanee bej-ond Kent is OrilUa, also in a good farming
country. Black Eiver, full in spring-time, winds among meadows valu
able for large haj--crops. Hj-de Park is a suburb of Seattle,
and seems given up to brickmaking at present, brick being in
demand since the great fire which swept Seattle on tho 6th
of June, 1889. From Hyde Park to the city is a continuous
suburban town. Indeed, the continuous settlements from the
Puyallup to Elliot Bay struck rae with surprise, knowing how
recently towns began to appear upon the maps of this thickly-
wooded region.
A dozen years ago I was in Seattle, and thought it the ugliest
of places, — thought, in fact, that it would be impossible to re
deem it frora ugliness. The hills, rising sharply frora the water
front, which was narrow and disfigured with rude structures,
were roughly terraced with streets running parallel to the bay,
and which were eut at right angles by other streets, steep and
by no means smooth, seemed to present hopeless obstacles to
the development of beauty. Long before the summit of the
ridge was reached the uncleared forest began, hemraing in the
town between water and woods. Along the business front was
a mass of sawdust, the accumulation of raany years, in which

304 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
the pedestrian's feet sank, and which the tides ke^jt water-soaked,
the only attractive feature of tho place being some wonderfully
large, bruad-leavcd maple-trees, growing down at tho south ©nd
of the water-front with thoir roots in the bay, and which, alas !
are no longer to be seen. In truth, there vvas little in the
Seattle of 1890 to remind ono of what had been.
What I saw, in place of the former town, was a city of fine
proportions spread over a sraooth slope, and extending not only
to the summit of the hills, but out of sight beyond, with lines
of cable and electric cars traversing the streets in every direction,
a solid front of docks and wharves where shipping lay, or carae
and went with the hours, and whieh had altogether the most
metropolitan look of any city in the Northwest.
Seattle is not, like Tacoma, a new town. It was founded in
1852, by D. S. Maynard, C. D. Boreii, A. A. Denny, and W. N.
Bell, who took claims side by side on the shore of the bay.
Henry L. Yesler was admitted to the company the sarae year,
and built the mill whoso sawdust helped to fill in the city's
front, as aforesaid. It was to Yosler's saw-mill more than
anything that the town was indebted for its growth, this being
the first mill to establish a luraber trade vvith Sau Francisco.
Its raess-houso was a place of general rendezvous for travellers
up and down the Sound for more than ono decade. Around
its rude but hospitable board, and about its ample hearth piled
high with blazing fir-slabs, were recounted the many strange
adventures which befell the numerous guests, including volun
teer Indian fighters, naval officers, judges of the courts, and
shipmasters. The founders of Seattle belonged to that class of men born
to follow the beckoning of the star of empire in its westward
orbit. Talk about Columbus discovering a new world ! What
was his voyage to the raonths of drearj' marcbing across the
continent, the setting out from Portland, then a cluster of rude
cabins, in a saiUng-vessel for the Sound, and the disembarkation
upon an uninhabited shore, in the midst of a November storm,
of women, children, and household goods I When they were
landed, after many hours of labor, "the woraen sat down and
cried," says one of their chroniclers. Alas, how often women's
tears bedew the earth which brings forth plentifully of its riches

THE QUEEN CITY AND ITS DEPENDENCIES.

305

for husbands and sons, but not for them, their strength being
spent !
The place where the pioneers of Seattle first landed was on
tho west side of tho peninsula which encloses Elliot Bay, and

MAP OF SEATTLE AHD HAKBOR.

this point thej- called by tbe Indian word Alki, which signifies
" bj' and by." Here was laid out a town, called New York;
but a chief of tho Duamish tribe of Indians informing them
during tho winter of a piass in the mountains to the east, and
other matters of interest, thej' decided to remove to the main
land, and, in acknowledgment of the services of this chief,
naraed the future city afler hira — Seattle. Among the West
Washington tribes was a superstition that if the name of a dead
20

306 ATLANTIS ARISEN,
person wero spoken tho spirit would be disturbed. This super
stition afforded Seattle a pretext for demanding pay while yet
alive for the discomfort tho frequent sound of -his name would
cause him after dealh, and thereafter he becarae a pensioner on
tho bounty of the Soattleites.
The New York of Alki Point, like all the manj' namesakes of
the great metropolis, came to nothing, and was forgotten until
very recently speculators bought up the land and laid out
West Seattle, since whieh period many improvements have been
made, with a railroad connecting the peninsula with the citj' on
the mainland. The grov^-tb of Seattle was slow so long as there
were no railroads in the country, and the coramerce of the
Sound was confined chiefly to an export trade with California
in lumber and coal, Avith some cargoes of lumber to foreign
ports. In 1870 the vvhoie exports of Puget Sound in foreign
and American vessels amounted to four hundred and forty thou
sand nine hundred and fifteen dollars, the largest part of which
was in luraber. Tbe imports from foreign countries were light,
amounting to only thirty-three thousand one hundred and five
doUars. Ship-building added something to tho business of the
Sound, but tho spell of loneliness which brooded OA-er these silent
shores had not then been broken, except by
" The first low wash of waves, where soon
Should roll a human sea."
Then eame the promise of a transcontinental railroad, and then
the road itself Presto, change I Up went business houses and
dwellings, with improvements of every kind. In 1880 the pop
ulation of this tweuty-eight-year-old town was three thousand
five hundred ; in 1888, one year after the railroad had crossed
the Cascades, it was twentj' thousand ; in 1889, when over seven
million dollars' worth of property was destroyed by fire, it was
twenty-seven thousand ; and in 1890 it is, accordiug to the census,
forty-one thousand four hundred and sixty-four. No wonder
that to repair the damages by fire, and to provide shelter for so
rapid an influx of people, the streets are obstructed vvith lumber,
brick, stone, and iron, while manj' tent-cloth houses are yet to
be seen. Order is, howev-er, in tho raain restored, and, as I have
said, the citj- has a metropolitan aspect, particularlj- when

THB QUEEN CITY AND ITS DEPENDENCIES. 307
viewed from the bay, which belongs lo no other town on tho
Sound. Seattle, like all towns in their formative periods, was, and
still is, a combination of the new and beautiful with the de
caying and grotesque, although the great conflagration was of
service in wiping out much of tho latter, as well as in intro
ducing even more largelj' the forraer. As it stands to day it
contains hundreds of buildings which would be a credit to any
city in the United States for grand proportions and grace of
outline. The Hotel Eainier and Hotel Denny are built upon
the heights, vvith magnificent A-iews on every side, themselves
constituting a part of that pleasing tout ensemble presented from
the approach by water.
Like Tacoraa,' Seattle has extended its suburbs in all direc
tions. It is a saj'ingthat the two cities meet half-waj', in spite
of their confessed rivalry. North, the street railways carry
J'OU to Queen Anne Town, the fashionable quarter ; Gilman's
Addition, the terminal centre of three railroads ; Ballard, another
addition just being put on the market, on Salmon Bay ; Bay
View Addition, on Salmon Bay ; Kilbourne's Division, on Green
Lake; Tremont, on Lake Washington. East, to Bryn Mawi
Park, on the west shore of this lake ; Boston Heights, on the
summit of the elevation between Elliot Bay and Lake Wash
ington, to Green's addition, and Summit addition, and I do not
know how many moro. A forrj' carries you to West Seattle,
where a company with half a million is making improvements,
as before mentioned.
In nono of these places do j'ou find the view lacking in inter
est, whether j-ou aro thinking of the wonders of nature or the
works of raon : both are here worthy of attention. West
Seattle sits upon a high sandy point, which having onee attained,
J-ou have water on everj- side except the southern, a citj- on the
east. Port Blakely mills, the largest in the world, the smoke
of whose burning sawdust aseendeth forever, and serves as a
beacon on the Sound, is a Uttle north of west ; and Port Orch
ard, the newly-selected site of the United States navy yard, is
a little south of west.
But transferring yourself to Seattle, and taking a cable-car to
Boston Heights, here again you have a water-view on both sides

308 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
of J-ou, but how different ! The city is at your feet, to and from
whose busy wharves all sorts of water-craft are darting and
departing, while the west shore of the bay. Port Blakely and
other headlands receding raelt into a dira distanee bounded bj'
the Olympic Mountains. On the other hand, Lake Washington
Ues just at the foot of the eastern slope, with green islands and
wooded shores, and Mount Eainier, towering in white, eternal
majesty above this suramer landscape.
The lakes about Seattle, to which I have before referred,
never ceased to be interesting to me from their evident physical
history ; at the same lime thej' are very prettj- from a scenic
stand-point, with sloping shores admirably adapted to villa sites,
for which they are being rapidly seized upon. Lake Union is
small, with a nuniber of settlements alraost 'surrounding it.
There are three astbmatic little stearaers running fi-om the rail
way approach to Fremont, Edgwater, Latona, and Green Lake,
ou its borders. Pleasure-boats are lo lot, and a dancing-hall
furnishes the foreign population tho opportunity of the waltz
on Sundaj'S.
A small canal, vvhich it has been Seattle's arabition to have
enlarged by the government into a ship-canal, connects Lakes
Washinglon and Union vvith the Sound, Had Congress seen
fit to undertake this not very expensive work, a naval station
might very woll havo been located hero where vessels eould lie
in fresh water, and doubtless the work will j-et be performed
for tho benefit of comraerce, vessels Ij-ing in the Sound waters
becoming heavilj- encrusted with barnacles. The teredo is veiy
destructive to any wood immersed in the Sound, and to the
supports of wharves, which frequentlj- succumb lo its ravages;
hence the value of a fresh-water harbor. Port Orchard has
several streams running into it which may suffice to cure this
ovU, but Lake Washington would have been raore certain to be
free frora it.
Tho falls of the Snoqualraie (Indian Snoqualiraieh) Eiver
haA'ing frequently boon mentioned to me as highly attractive, I
resolved to devote a day to an excursion along the line of tho
Seattle, Lake Shore and Eastern Eailroad, whose Avestern end is
in Seattle and its eastern end in Spokane, with a considerable
hiatus between. I found the following stations alon.>- tho road

THE QUEEN CITY AND ITS DEPENDENCIES. 309
in a distance of about forty miles: Boulevard, BaUard Junction,
Ballard, Eoss, Fremont, Edgwater, Latona, Eavenna Park,
Yesler Junction, Keith, Pontiac (a brickmaking settlement)^
Maple Leaf (a lumbering estabUshment), Terrence, Wayne,
BotboU, Snohomish Junction, York, Eedmond, Peterson, Ingle
wood, Monovon, Gilman, Preston, Falls City, Snoqualmie Falls,
Snoqualmie, and South Bend, — or a station every mile and ono-
ihird of the waj-,— which would lead one to expect a populous
countrj-. The road is, however, constructed for the most part
through an uncleared region, the vvhoie population being at
these several recently-opened settleraents.
Bothell is the location of the Huron Lumber Companj'. In
glewood is on the border of Sammamish or Squawk Lake, a
beautiful sheet of water in which there are standing submerged
trees, showing subsidence of this part of tho coal-basin. Mono
von, also on this lake, is a picturesque place, which witb the
water and the hills has quite a Swiss aspect. Gilman, close up
to the mountains, is a raw, unpainted settlement, whose promise
of future improveraent lies in a large hop-field.
The Vallej- is evidently very rich in soil. 1 noted some won
derfully high maple-trees curiously swathed in yellow raoss,
and alder-trees of great growth and beauty, their white and
gray bark mottled with splashes of light green, showing clearly
out from the gloom of the unbroken forest.
The train obliginglj- stops at the falls to give travellers an
opportunity to alight and enjoy a five-minute view of tho cata
ract. This is a very delightful five minutes, which I prolonged
into a half-hour by vA'alking back from the next station before
the train returned. The height of the fall is two hundred and
sixty-eight feot. The stream descends on either side of a
dividing island of rock, as at Niagara. On the east side of the
rock it is projected in two separate strands, which gyrate at
the start and twist together as steam comes out ofa locomotive-
pipe. Thc effect is to throw the water into garlands of foam
Avhich, falling upon one another and being projected a long dis
tance out, appear heaped up rather than faUing. On the Avest
side the water, dashed into foam,, descends in two other streams
— one fan-shaped — which, uniting half-way down, turn and join
the raain stream in one mass of feathery foam. The mist blown

310 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
over to the east side of the chasm gives a fine rainboAv. The
condensation forms numerous rills on the face of the almost per
pendicular walls, which descend like threads of silver over the
vividly green masses. There are rapids above and below the
fall, and higher up the streara another cataract one hundred
and twenty loot in height, the Indian name of which is Topan.
In short, the Snoqualmie is a mountain stream above here, with
a rapid current and jagged bed, and abounds iri good fishing, as
the woods do in game.
At Snoqualraie Station, where we dined, is a comfortable and
pleasantlj'-si tuated summer hotel. Here the Hop-Growers' As
sociation owns eleven hundred acres, three hundred and ten of
vvhich is in hops this season. The production of this farm is
from eighteen hundred to two thousand pounds per acre. Fruit
and root crops are successfully cultivated at Snoqualmie, giving
evidence of what may be expected from the Valley in the future.
I met a lady and her daughter going down to Seattle to witness
the graduation of a daughter and a sister from some institution
in tho city, and vvho li\-ed on a farm higher up the Valley, with
whieh they appeared to be well satisfied.
I returned to the city in time to note from my hotel win
dows a charraing evening scene : the Bay dotted with sail-boats,
stearaers coming and going, a fine veil of mist ov-erhanging the
Sound, the sun setting in a sea of golden cloud, from vvhich
flakes of gold fell off and floated away along the horizon. The
level rays of departing day bring out the headland opposite
with every building outlined, the surface of the Sound resem
bUng for roughness a Canton crepe in palo blue, creased with the
wakes of various water-craft, completed the first effect ; then
suddenly the heavens were flushed vvith a rosy radiance whieh
was reflected frora the placid water beneath, as if the day
should kiss the earth good-night and blush in doing it. I
thought about the Montana lady I had met in Tacoma, and
hoped she was enjoying the picture as she was capable of doing.
The subject whieh absorbs most of the business brain of the
Northwest, whether it be in. Tacoma, Seattle, or some of the
ocean ports, is how to obtain control of the trade of the Orient.
A glance at the map shows us that so far as location is con-

THE QUEEN CITY AND ITS DEPENDENCIES. 311
corned there is little difference. Seattle is a couple of hours
nearer to the Straits than Tacoma. But Tacoma, if time be
comes an object, can raake a short eut through Gray's Harbor,
and so also could Seattle. Therefore, supposing the latter to
have secured what Tacoma has, a direct transcontinental rail
road, the chances are so nearly even as to make the most saga
cious decline to venture a prediction.
Merchants vvill tell j-ou in a general way that the trade of
China amounts to one hundred and thirty milUon dollars annu
ally, that it is only in its infancy, and that it is principally iu
the hands of Groat Britain, but that the Pacific Coast of the
United States must compete so strongly for it as to divert it to-
itself. Thej' will tell j'Ou that in twenty-five years China will
have a trade hundreds of millions greater than at present, be
cause the empire will then be thrown open by railroads and
rapid transportation generally to commercial operations. Tho
Chinese vvill consume American wheat (which they are begin
ning to do now), wares, and manufactures. Besides this market
for our productions, there are also to be considered the fifty-
seven millions of people who inhabit those parts of Asia which
approach this continent moro nearly, as Japan, Manchooria, ,
MongoUa, and Siberia. To supply these people from Europe by
the present route and means of travel and transportation re
quires, we aro told, caravans numbering thirty-six thousand
camels and bullocks and one hundred thousand horses.
This state of affairs cannot be permitted to continue in this
the nineteenth century! and the question is seriously asked,
"Who is to have control of this vast trade?" and as seriously
answ-ered, America. Why- ? Because America has the capital,
material, energj', and pluck to obtain it. That point conceded,
the next one of importance is that of distance, and Seattle is
nine thousand six hundred and fiftj' miles nearer to the Amoor
Eiver than Liverpool. It is twelve hundred miles nearer Singa
pore, three thousand five hundred nearer Canton, six thousand
nearer Shanghai, and eight thousand miles nearer Vladivostok
than is Liverpool.
But that is not all. Seattle is five hundred miles nearer
Vladivostok than San Francisco is, three hundred and fifty
nearer Shanghai, three hundred nearer Canton, and three hun-

312 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
dred nearer Singapore. It has also slightlj- the advantage over
Portland in some of these distances, and very slightly ov-er
Tacoraa. It has nothing, then, to fear in the raatter of distance
except from some port upon the coast either of Washington or
British Columbia. And here conies in the consideration of
latitude and productions, which are in favor of Washington.
These are weighty topics to discuss in a railway or draw-ing-
room conversation, yet one hears them ev-erywhere. And they
aro stirring themes, too, when we remember that Jefferson and
Benton discussed them in the early part ofthe century, and tho
nation has been moving westward on the chosen line ever since.
Just what point will secure the prize of pre-eminence is not for
me to prophesy. Besides, the country is so vast and so rich in
resources that there is roora for all to grow and prosper. So.
let us leave the future to reveal itself, and coraraent upon Seattle
as it now is.
The volume of jobbing trade for Seattle in 1889 is variously
estimated at from seventeen raillion dollars to twenty raillion
dollars. The confusion in business incident to the fire prevents
a closer estiraate. Seattle raerchants carry large stocks of all
Jiinds of merchandise, although the tendency now is to separate
wholesale and retail business, and to segregate raerchandise into
special lines. Eetail trade is not dependent, as in other States,
upon the coming in of certain crops. June furnishes a heavy
hay croiJ and garden stuff. The immense wheat crop begins to
raove in August; hops in September; potatoes in October; fruit
in its proper seasons, from June to October; lumber and coal at
all times ; and cattle and dairy products during most of the year.
Manufactures are quite nuraerous in Seattle, but are still lack
ing in many things. Previous to the fire it had ten saw-mills,
whose plants cost four million dollars, and tributary to it, within
a radius of thirty-five miles, seven great miUing establishments.
It had ship-yards ; several sash- and door-factories ; shingle-,
barrel-, and furniture-factories; brick-yards and tile-factories;
carriage-factories; four breweries; foundries, brass and iron,
and boiler- works ; soda-works; and fifty other kinds of man
ufactures. The capital eraployed in factories in 1889 was
$6,285,000, and the value of production $10,407,488. It is men
tioned in the press of Seattle that there is roora for a large

THE QUEEN CITY AND ITS DEPENDENCIES. 313
tannery and boot- and shoe-factory; for a woodonware- and
willoAvvvare-factory ; for powder works ; for two flouring mills,
and for wholesale houses dealing in men's furnishing goods, in
hats, in paints, oils, glass, drugs, stationery, millinery, and gen
eral maehinory, as specialties. This gives a better idea of the
condition of trade than an enumeration of business firms.
Seattle has eleven banks, — uot as many as Tacoma by two or
Portland by flve, — with an aggregate capital of about four mil
lion dollars and deposits amounting to nearly six raiUion doUars.
The coal-mines of King Countj' which are tributary to Seattle
are the Franklin, Black Diamond, Cedar Mountain, Newcastle,
Gilman, and Durham. Their total output for 1889 vvas three
hundred and ninetj'-ono thousand ono hundred and eighty-three
tons. There was a suspension of production for a couple of
months while the coal-bunkers destroyed in the fire were being
rebuilt, which lessened the amount. The present faciUties will
enable the companies to reeeivo and discharge two miUion tons
a year. It is in conteraplation to erect iron- and steel-works at Kirk
land, on Lake Washington, which will employ ono thousand
men, a company having already been formed for that purpose,
with a capital of two million five hundred thousand dollars.
The ore is to be obtained from the Denny Mines in the vieinitj-.
The raanufacture of railroad material will be carried on in con
nection wilh the iron-works.
From those items, putting that and that together, it is safe to
say that Seattle is no bubble which a pin-i^rick will cause to
collapse, and that a century hence it will be here witb added
area, wealth, dignity, and historj-.
Speaking of historj- rerainds mo to give a loaf out of Seattle's
past. It is not about tho siege of the town by the Dwamish
and other Indians in 1856, when a stockade Avas built with Mr.
Yosler's lumber to protect the settlement, and when Captain
Gansevoort, of tho United States ship-of-war, which was fortu
nately in the harbor, eame to their relief, together with the terri
torial authorities, but concerns a period about ten years later.
The want of Washington during the territorial times was
women ; excepting the families of the original pioneers, few
had come to settle here, the majority of men who had drifted

314 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
to Puget Sound from the Fraser Eiver Mines, or by sea, being
unmarried. This condition of society resulted in the union
of Indian woraen with white men, and the degradation of the
latter. It was suggested to Governor Pickering that it would
be a philanthropic action to furnish the white bachelor popu
lation of Washington with wives from among the widows
and dauo-hters of soldiers killed in the war of the rebelUon.
'The man selected or permitted to take charge of the enterprise
was Asa S. Mercer, of Seattle, who, arraed with a certificate of
character, repaired to Washington, D.C., with the intention of
appealing for aid to President Lincoln, but arrived on the day of
his assassination, which seemed to put an end to the undertaking.
Hovvever, he thon forraed an iraraigration scheme of his own
and secured contracts with one hundred and fifty j-oung women,
and as many farailies, to take them to Washington and guaran
tee thera eraployraent at good wages, on the payraent to hira in
advance of a certain araount of passage-money. He made terms
with a steamship companj-, and, instead of notifjing all those
who had contracted with him, set sail for Puget Sound with
half the number, leaving the remainder to their vain regrets.
For this violation of trust he was sued in the Superior Court of
New York, which decided it had no jurisdiction, and his victims
were left without redress. As for the seventy-five young women
who reached this coast, an Inimigrant Aid Society had been
organized to provide homes and employment for them, and they
disappeared like morning dew before the sun, being too few to
create much of a change in Washington society or morals.
In this city, where such a movement was possible twenty-five
years ago, there aro now forty-three chureh organizations, — and
we all know that churches consist chiefly of women, — with over
eight thousand communicants. Sermons are preached in the
English, German, Swedish, Norwegian, Danish, and Welsh lan
guages, and sixteen denominations are represented. Half a million
dollars is to be expended this year in fifteen new ehurch edifices.
Seattle has four daily and several weekly newspapers, of
which the Post-Intelligencer and the Seattle Press are the princi
pal ones. The State University is located here, and in the heart
of the eity. Its endowment being inadequate to its needs, a
raovement is on foot to sell the ground, and with the proceeds

THE QUEEN CITY AND ITS DEPENDENCIES. 315
erect bettor buildings farther from the centre of the town, and
with the remainder enlarge the endowment. Thero is a large
Chautauqua circle here, and the society owns property on
Vashon Island, near Tacoma, where it holds its annual meeting.
A Young Mon's Secretarial Institute also owns twenty acres
adjoining tho Chautauqua-plat, whicb is about establishing a
training-school and gj-mnasium, with ball-ground, boating-club,
and a variety of phj'sieal-development accessories.
This institute consists in the first plaee of the secretaries of
the Young Men's Christian Associations throughout the North
west, and the stock is sold only to active members of the asso
ciations. Thej' will have twentj--five thousand dollars vith
which to make improvements in 1891. The tvvo organizations
promise to be helpful to each other, and together will make
Vasbon Island a popular summer resort. The institute has
already published among its rules that " boiled shirts" are not
admissible ; polished shoes only admissible on Sundays ; no study
to be allowed in afternoons ; the hours of sleep to extend from
ten o'clock in the evening to seven in the morning. The last of
tbese four rules may wisely balance the effect of the first three.
The comraon schools of Seattle are ofa high order, and the eity
has erected handsome structures for their accommodation. Tbe
city supports an Orphans' Homo and three hospitals. Provi
dence Hospital being the largest on tho Pacific Ctiast. The
charitable orders are numerous, as in other cities.
The tourist has a choice in departing frora Soattlo'of steamboat
or railway service. The railroads going out ofthe city are the
Puget Sound Shore Uno to Puj-allup, where it connects with the
Northern Pacific, and through that road with the Union Pacific,
or O. E. and N. Eailroad, and the Southern Pacific, or Oregon
and CaUfornia Eailroad. The Seattle, Lake Shore and Eastern
Eailroad I have already referred to. This is an extensive sys
tem, only partially completed. The Snoqualmie branch on whieh
I travelled opens up coal and iron fields in that region, and is
eighty miles in length. Another branch, one hundred and
twenty miles in length, known as the Seattle and West Coast
Eailroad, will connect with the Canadian Pacific, making Seattle
one of its terrainals. When corapleted the main line will cross

316 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
the Cascades by Cady's Pass, at the head of tho Skokomish or
north fork of the Snoqualmie Eiver, and join the eastern division
west of Spokane. Tho Columbia and Puget Sound Eailroad is
a narrow-gauge line connecting Seattle with the Newcastle,
Cedar Eiver, and Green Eiver coal-fields, by a system of branehes
aggregating sixty railes, and sustains an enormous trafflc. Its
ultimate destination is tbe Colurabia Eiver at WaUula. Of lines
projected but not built, the Seattle Southern is to run frora
West Seattle direct to Portland, to connect with the Southern
Pacific system. Thus the Queen. City looks to being tho ter
minus of three, if not five, transcontinental roads.
It seems tho intention to make West Seattle terrainal ground
for several roads, the initiative being given in the organization
of a West Seattle Terminal and Elevator Company, which is to
build on trestles across the bay at its southern end, and erect
wheat-elevators on the bluff shore. Thc height of the elevator
above the floor of tho warehouse, which is one hundred and
twenty by five hundred and thirteen feet ground area, is one
hundred and twenty feet. It will have a capacity of seventy
thousand bushels, and the warehouse of one milUon. A ship-
dock twelve hundred feet long will be constructed, with over
five thousand feet of side-tracks and other facilities for receiving
and discharging grain, the whole to cost two hundred and flfty
thousand dollars.
A belt-line railroad around Lake Washington is reported pro
jected, to be built by the Lake Shore and Eastern and Northern
Pacific. The Northern Pacific, it wiU bo observed, is at the
bottom of most of the greatest enterprises in the Evergreen
State. The Union Pacific would willinglj- enter into competition,
but circumstances havo not been favorable in the Puget Sound
region, where it is confined to the control of the leased steam
boats of the Oregon Eailway and NaA-igation Company, but
will construct in the near future a line from Tacoraa to Olyrapia
and Gray's Harbor, and, if we may beUeve rumor, several other
lines. But it is not for rae to say what railroad corapanies will
do ; there is more certainty about what they have done, a part
of their policy being to puzzle tbe public about their intentions
until they have secured whatever portion of " the earth" seems
to promise' the largest harvest. Eailroads are tricksy things.

THE QUEEN CITY AND ITS DEPENDENCIES.

317

It is only on great water-ways Uke the Columbia or the Sound
that one feels tho bounty, tho beauty, and the peace of the free
gifts of God. Such a highway is always at the door of these
mediterranoan cities. Upon it raay float a palace or a plunger.
Let us take something intermediate and v-isit some of Seattle's
outlying territories.
The first of these raaj- be said to come under the head of saw
mills, and to give an idea of tho importance of these to the
State of Washington, let me borrow some figures frora the Post-
Intelligencer for January 1, 1890, showing the number of feet of
lumber eut in the State for the jirevious year.

Mills.

Lumber.

Lath.

Pickets.

Port Discovery 
Washington, Hadlock, Port To-wn-
send
Port Blalcely 
Port Gamble . . : 
Port Ludlow . ....
Puget, Utsaladj- . . .
Tacoma, Tacoma . ...
St, Paul and Tacoma
Gig Harbor
Port Madison
Pacific, Tacoma . .
Local, in Tacoma . . ...
Local, in Seattle . .
On Bellingham Bay
Other Local, Puget Sound .

32,537,459
24,800,73762,092,70142,138,39925,040,695
20,781,721 53,578,168
36,000,000 14,722,971
25,400,00040,000,00094,500.000
140,500,000 35.000,00087,000,000

13,774,800 7,482,000
11,387,100
10,280,617 6,168,0767,897,247
18,156,250 3,750,0006,038,420
8,128,000
12,000,00012,000,000
¦ 18,000,000 5,000,0003,000,000

1,071,470 307,855629,038 181,180 63,66765,534
221,910300,000 98,820
800,000

Total Puget Sound

684,182,851

143,052,510

8,209,476

OTHER SECTIONS.
Five Gray's Harbor mills . 
Two Shoalwater Bay mills 
Six Columbia Eiver mills 
Nine mills bet"ween Columbia Eiver and the
Sound 
Eleven other mills 

Puget Sound mills

Lumber.
98,500,000 feet
35,000,000 76,000,000
. 81,000,000 92,000,000
382,500,000
. 684,182,851
1,066,682,851

318 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
About seven miUion feet was dressed lumber. The value of
this product for this one year was $12,800,284. The larger
mills own a fieet of vessels, but aside frora these hundreds of
vessels corae here to load. Statistics from eight Puget Sound
miUs show that four hundred and two cargoes sailed frora their
docks in 1889. Port Madison and Pacific mills furnished no
Ust of vessels, but they probably loaded another hundred.
These cargoes go to the ports of California, Mexico, Central
Araerica, Hawau, Peru, Chili, AustraUa, Brazil, China, and
Great Britain. The Port Blakely miU filled one order from
Cardiff, England, for one million feet in timbers sixteen by six
teen inehes square and sixty-one feet long, and twenty-four
inches square and ninety feet long. The value of this cargo
was seventeen thousand dollars.
Let us, then, go to see Port Blakely. It Ues ten miles west of
Seattle on the southern end of Bainbridge Island, and is owned
by Captain W. H. Eenton and associates. Most of the great
milling estabUshments of Puget Sound were founded about
1852-53, when the devastating fires of San Francisco's early
history suggested the need of luraber manufacture. Eenton
was one of the many sea-captains — chiefly Maine men — who
saw their ideal haven in Puget Sound. It is related that in
1851 Dr. Samuel Merritt, of San Francisco, sent a vessel, of
which he was owner, to these northern waters for ice. When
the vessel returned, the captain surprised the doctor by saying
as soon as they met, " Why, doctor, water don't freeze in Puget
Sound !" This was a revelation, and manj' a sea-going man
from the coast of New England, looking at tho waters which
never froze and the limitless forests, determined to stick his
stake thero.
And so it fell out that, in 1853, Captain Eenton joined C. C.
Terry on Alki Point in erecting a mill, which they afterwards
removed to Port Orchard, and subsequently sold. Eenton then
went to Port Blakely, and with a partner named Howard erected
in 1864 an estabUshment costing eighty thousand dollars, and
Avhich would cut fifty thousand foet a day. In 1880 its capacity
vvas increased to two hundred thousand feet per diem of twelve
hours. It now cuts three hundred thousand, and eould add
another one hundred thousand, having a great number of saws.

THE QUEEN CITY AND ITS DEPENDENCIES. 319
and a three-thousand horsepower. Captain Eenton resides here,
and employs two hundred and fifty raen, many of whom have
families. Their homes constitute a pretty village, with a public
hall and reading-room. Education and amusement are encour
aged to make pleasant the lives of the workers.
And surely they need it. I never behold great manufactories
like this without resentment towards the vandaUsm of progress.
What a creature is raan ! What dreadful maehinory he invents
to rend in pieces, to pull down, to drag along, to dig up, and to
build up— a fortune for himself I The forces of nature move
silently and majestically, but man's inventions harrow your
nerves and confound your understanding. They whizz, bang,
whistle, roar, shriek, clang, rattle, pound ; they break, crush,
tear ; thej- are violent ; they Avound and wearj' your spirit.
Yet here is Captain Eenton, who has spent a long life with the
scream of raachinery in his ears, and he is the kind friend of all
who serve him, himself deprived of his sight by an accident
whieh might any daj' befall them.
About eight miles farther down tho Sound, on tho north end
of Bainbridge Island, is Port Madison, an inlet so narrow that
our steamer is compelled to back out without tuming around.
The village lies on a smooth hill-side, made picturesque by sorae
large trees of broad-leaved raaplo.
Twenty miles or more north, and just at the entrance of Hood's
Canal, is Port Ludlow. This establishment, with one at Utsalady
on Caraano Island, opposite Crescent Harbor, and another at
Port Gamble, seven miles inside the canal, belongs to the Puget
Mill Company. The viUage at Port Gamble is called by the
pretty Indian narae of Teekalet.
The Washington Mill Company is located at Hadlock, at the
head of Poi't Townsend Bay. The last of these groat mills', all
of which contribute to the business of Seattle in some measure,
is on Port Discovery, well up towards the foot-hills of the
Olj-mpic Eange, and near the foot of Mount Constance. Thero
is a road across the peninsula between Port Discovery and Port
Townsend. Squira Bay is another inlet, three to five miles west
of Port Discovery, and the government has reservations on each
side of the entrance, as it has at all these harbors. On many of
them are Ught-houses whieh shine gratefully across the waters

320 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
as our steamer glides through the dusk of a sumraer night, and
brings us back by morning to Seattle.
The real countrj' tributary to the Queen City lies lo tho north
on the east shore of tbe Sound. Tbe first river falling into the
Sound north of Seattle is the Snohomish, formed by the junction
of the Snoqualmie and the Skykomish Eivers, about twentj--
five miles northwest of Snoqualmie Falls. The tourist can take
the Seattle, Lake Shore and Eastern Railroad, and by a branch
reach Snohomish City in about an bour and a half, or can take
a steamboat to that place.
There is Uttle to catch the eye of the traveller in the region
traversed by the railroad. It is a scene of newly-opened forest
with new settlements, such as we have soon so frequently, and
must continue to see wherever we go in the lower Sound countrj-
except on some of the islands. This is the case because the
chief and most profitable pursuits of the people hitherto have
been logging for the groat mills, growing hay and vegetables on
the rich bottom-lands, bee-culture, and cattle-raising. More
recently thoy have taken to lumbering, and a good many raills
have been erected in Snohomish Vallej-. Snohomish City- is a
town of three thousand inhabitants, located near the head of '
navigation by steamboat on the river. It is vvell situated on the
north bank, with several hotels, three churches, a scientiflc societj'
and museum, a fifteen-thousand-dollar school-house, two dozen
stores, a raore than average number of professional raen cA'on
for a county-seat, and other signs of an intelligent population.
Here and in the vicinity are half a dozen large saAv-miUs, five
shingle-mills, three sash-, door-, blind-, and moulding-factories,
and many logging-camps. The export trade of Snohomish Eiver
is of tho value of two milUon dollars annually, while the local
trad(3 between farmers, loggers, other people, and the merchants
exceeds that sum. It is estimated that the improvements of
1890 will be ofthe value of ono million dollars, and wiU include
a court-house and a theatre. The Snohomish Agricultural
Society and Turf Club will make a speed-track near Lake
Blackman, for the exhibition of blooded horses; from aU of
which it is evident that the people of Snohomish are progres
sive. Machias is a new town located on the Pillchuek, a branch of

THE QUEEN CITY AND ITS DEPENDENCIES. 321
the Snohomish, at the point of contact of the Seattle, Lake Shore
and Eastern, and near Lake Stevens, a beautiful sheet of water.
Lumbering is the great industrj' at present, but I hear a good
deal about mines of coal and of silver in the neighborhood.
Cathcart, Lowell, and Marysville are milling-towns on the
river below Snohomish. The river is crooked and not wide,
with low banks which must be overflowed in some seasons. It
parts into several channels five or six miles from Port Gardiner,
into which it flows by three mouths. Ou the north side of the
entrance is the Tulalip Indian reservation, including thirlj--eight
square miles of excellent land. On the south side of Port
Gardiner is Muckilteo, a fish-canning establishment,
I have not taken pains to collect any information about the
salmon fisheries of the Sound, whieh are in their general feat
ures the same as those of tbe Columbia. But the variety of
food fishes in the Sound is much greater than in the great fresh
water river. Halibut and codfish are plentiful, as well a.s
smaller fish, such as smelt and herring, but the business of pack
ing thera has not seemed to attract capital. The only companj-
I heard of was one on Scow Baj-, Port Townsend, and they wore
professional fishermen from Massachusetts who had recently
set up this establishment. They experimented by sending a
refrigerator ear to Now York packed vvith halibut on ice, and,
finding it practicable, went into the business. Oysters are suc
cessfully grown in the Sound, and clams of half a dozen varie
ties are native. Lobsters have been planted by the government,
as also carp and shad. This by way of parenthesis.
Twelve or fifteen nailes norlh of tbe Snohomish, the Stillaqua-
mish Eiver enters that part of the Sound called Port Susan by
Vancouver. It was somewhere about here, pierbaps on the south
shore of Port Gardner, that on tho king's birthday, June 4,
1792, Vancouver took formal possession of this region for his
Majesty, — hence the name " Possession Sound," yiven to the
eastern arm of this wonderful sea, which is no sound at all.
Edmunds is the seaport town of Snohomish County, and only
four years old. It boasts raany advantages.
On the Slillaquamish is one town — Stanwood — of considerabL
consequence as a milling and trading contre for that valley.
Marysville is also a thriving place. Centreviile is older, but
21

0

322 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
does less business. The Stillaguamisb, like the Snohoraish, has
three mouths, two opening into Port Susan, and one into a name
less portion of the Sound connected with Port Susan by a pas
sage not more than half a raile in width. A project is on foot
to connect Utsalady with the raainland railroads bj- a lino to
the mouth of the StiUaguamish, bridging this passage.
The rivers on this side ofthe Sound, especiaUy theso northern
rivers, have all this delta feature. They have rushed down from
the mountains for ages, bearing the soil formed from the rocks
and vegetable raould, which the tides have beaten baek again
until wide areas of the richest marsh-land have been formed. In
seasons of flood the river has washed out several channels by
which to get to deep water through this impediment. These
marsh lands when diked are the most productive in the State,
if not in the world, but in the amplitude of other resources
their value is not yet fully- appreciated.
Speaking of other resources, tho reader is referred for one of
the most iraportant, but undeveloped, to the chapter on geology
and mineralogy. All that is there said ofthe eountry immediately
north of the Stillaquamisb is undoubtedly true here. The east
shore of the Sound from Bellingham Bay to Nisqually Eiver is
rich in minerals, — coal, iron, silver, raarble, building-stone, asbes
tos, tin, and ores of other raetals. But there are not yet hands
enough in the State, however willing, to uncover this wealth.
Sultan, on a branch of the Skykoraish, is in a rich silver-bearing
district. When I speak of this eountry as tributary to Seattle, it is as
dependent upon the larger raarket of a coraraercial metropolis
for supplies. The same might be said of tho whole northern
part of West Washington, a condition of things which is not
likelj' to be perpetuated when its 'grand resources begin in
earnest to be developed.
Pointing our steamer's prow southward, we again enter the
raain body of tho Sound, Admiralty Inlet, and rounding Whid
bey Island proceed to Port Townsend.

ABOUT THE KEY CITY AND VICINITY.

323

CHAPTEE XXV.
ABOUT THE KEY CITY AND A'ICINITY.
Port Toavnshend — that is the waj- Vancouver spelled it — is
situated on the Quimper JPeninsula between Port To.wnsend anti
Port Discovery Baj'S. It does not face the Fuca Sea to the
north, nor even Admiralty Inlet, but is situated on the bay.

IN TH1-; STKAITS.

facing south, a fact which bewilders tho tourist, whose head is
already turned with the effort to keep his course on these wan
dering waters. Let no one begin a journey on the Sound with
out a map in his hand, — a good one, Uke that published by
Bastwick, Morris & Co., of Seattle, — for you learn nothing frora
the ordinary maps of the actual shape of land or sea.
The Quimper Peniusula has a general width of about four
miles, although onlj- two miles wide at its eastern end, being
shaped like a sickle vvith its point towards the east broken off,
leaving not one but two points at the end. The northem one,
on which there is a light-house, is called Point WUson, and the

324 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
southern one Point Hudson. It is under the lee of the latter
that the city is located. There is a strip of low-lying land along
the front where the business of tbe town is centred, and rising
abruptly back of it is a high bluff, level and bare, on which the
residence portion of the eity is laid off, whieh is much exposed
to winds from all quarters.
This is one of the oldest towns in Washington, having been
founded in 1851 byL. B. Hastings, F. W. Pettj-grove, C. C.
Baehelder, and A. A. Plummer. It was soon raade the port of
entry fbr this district, which it stiU reraains, and whieh gives it
the sobriquet of Key City. Por many years there was a raili
tary post on the Avest shore of tho bay, two and a half railes
distant. The customs oface, trade with the people at the fort
and tho scattered population along the shore of tho Strait of
Fuca, as weU as of the moro thickly inhabited Whidbey and
Camano Islands, with some local lumbering and ship-building
enterprises, kept the Port Townsend people fairly prosperous
during the period frora 1852 to 1888, and not only that, in an
oyster-like content, but with a wide-awake, intelligent, courteous,
and modish spirit. Tbey had enough, thoy were able to wait,
they cultivated social habits, and enjoyed the beauties of their
situation. For ono could not reasonably ask to be shown any
thing finer than can be seen from the bluffs at Port Townsend.
To the northeast is Mount Baker, with its ragged double peak
fretting the heavens. Iu the southeast is Mount Eainier ; on
the west. Mount Olympus ; on the east, Whidboy Island, the
garden of Puget Sound, and across the Strait the San Juan
group, in the Fuca Sea.
It is clairaed, and I have no doubt with truth, that the climate
of this localitj' is superior to other parts of the Sound country,
the average annual rainfall being sixteen or seventeen inches
against from forty to sixtj' at Olympia. The southerly winds
which prevail during winter, and bring copious rains to West
Washington when they reach the Strait, seem to be met by the
warm-air current from the Japanese gulf-stream and the rain-
clouds earried away eastward, for there is much less pirecipita-
tion on Quimper Peninsula and the islands in the Fuca Sea than
elsewhere. My attention was called to the fact that the flower
ing shrubs of three degrees farther south reappeared on the

ABOUT THE KEY CITY AND VICINITY. 325
bluffs about Port Townsend. Even the city of Victoria, on
Vancouver Island, enjoys this exemption from surplus moisture,
which at the mouth of the Strait is excessive. The superior
mildness of the climate of this locality and the archipelago still
farther north is to be attributed to the warmed Avater of tho
gulf-stream which fiows inland with the tides, warming the air
above it.
Port Townsend has a population of about seven thousand, a
good part of which has been gained in the two years just
passed. The recent sudden irapulse given to the growth of the
city was the effect of the inception of the Port Townsend and
Southern Eailroad, a local enterprise whieh was to connect it
with Portland, and thus with two transcontinental roads from
there, as well as with the Northern Pacific somewhere south of
Olympia, which would give it a third overland route. The
enterprise was soon taken in hand by the Oregon Improvement
Company, a syndicate which is closely allied to the Union
Pacific and the leased Oregon Eailway and Navigation Com
panies. Over one raillion dollars was expended in 1889 in the con
struction of new business buildings. The govemraent also be
gan work on a new custom-house, to cost two hundred and fifty
thousand dollars. A fine hotel, the " Eisenbeis," was erected,
three miles of street railway built, a company formed to supply
the city with Avater, and several new manufactories started.
Besides all this, half a dozen ". additions" were made to the old
town. Truly, the power of railroads, or even the prospect of
one, to give Ufe to business, is marvellous.
Besides the lumber-miUs before raentioned as being in the
vicinity of Port Townsend, there are the Puget Sound Iron-
Works at Chimaeura, or Irondale, near the head of the bay,
whieh tumed out in 1889 three hundred and fifty thousand dol
lars' worth of pig-iron, eraploying in the raines, the woods, and
the works six hundred men.
The rival, but hitherto an unsuccessful one, of Port Townsend
is Port Angeles, on the south shore of Fuca Strait, and west
about thirty miles. It has a good harbor, and there is no
natural reason why it should not be the port of entry instead
of Townsend. When, in 1861, Victor Smith was appointed col-

326 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
lector, he became one of a town company at Port Angeles, and
after a good deal of quarrelUng with other officials and tbe pro
prietors of Port Townsend, finally succeeded in removing the
offico to the new site, being sustained by the authorities at
Washington, D.C., in his action. But noAV behold the punish
ment which follows naughty deeds. In his absence, and during
the winter rains of 1863, a land-sUde occurred in tho hills back
of Port Angeles, damming up a stream already swollen, which,
after the restrained waters had formed a lake, broke through
the obstruction and precipitated such a flood upon the town as
destroyed it and cost several lives. Smith, however, continued
to keep the oflSee at Port Angeles until 1865, when he perished
by the foundering of the " Brother Jonathan," near Crescent
City, CaUfornia, after which the custom-house was restored to
Port Townsend, and the lots of the Port of the Angels went
back into acreage, so reraaining until within a year or two,
when it was now-created by the Port Angeles Land Company
and the Union Pacific Eailroad.
That Port Angelos has raerit as a site for a city is admitted.
General MeClellan, when he was surveying for a route for the
Northern Pacific in 1853-54, said of it that it was the " first
atterapt of nature on this eoast to form a good harbor," and in
a recent petition of the shipmasters of the Pacific Coast to the
Treasury Department, indorsed by the Chamber of Commerce
of San Francisco, asking for a sub-port of entry at Port Angeles,
the reasons given were that the .harbor was easy of access and
in the direct route of vessels bound up or down the Strait of
Fuca, that it was the first harbor on the American side after
entering the Strait from the ocean, and that it was protected
frora all winds, had good holding-ground, ample room, and no
rocks or shoals. On this presentation the prayer was granted,
and at the same time that Seattle and Tacoma were made sub-
ports of entry, Port Angeles opened her books. It means
much to vessels for that place, which otherwise would have to
go sixty miles to Port Townsend to enter.
A coal-field has been discovered Avithin a few miles of Port
Angeles ; the country back of it is good, and there appears no
reason, if people eorae here, why they should not prosper. The
best harbor, situated, too, nearest the sea, ought to go for some-

ABOUT THE KEY CITY AND VICINITY. 327
thing. The city of Victoria, B.C., is directly opposite, twenty
miles distant.
The coast lying east of Port Townsend, as far as the Elwha
Eiver, has long been settled, donation clairas being taken under
the Oregon Land Law on these remote shores in 1852 and 1853 ;
New Dungeness, Squim Bay, and Protection Island in front of
Port Discovery having been among tho earliest settlements in
the northern part of Washington, the pioneers slill clinging
fondly to their first choice.
Whidbey Island also, so much admired by both Vancouver
and Wilkes, was quickly appropriated by the immigranis from
the Western States, whose descendants inherit the lands won bj-
indescribable hardships and danger. The first permanent set
tlers were the Ebey- family-, in 1854. I. N. Ebey was a man of
unusual abilitj' and cultivation for his time and environments.
He was the second collector of customs on Puget Sound, for
whieh distinction he paid witb his life, being murdered in his
own house by the Northern Indians, or Hydabs, who landed on
the island in the night, and, to avenge sorae loss of thoir tribe,
cut off Ebej-'s head and carried it away. Tho family escaped in
thc darkness, and with them a Mr. and Mrs. Corliss, who after
wards went to Southern California lo live, on a sheep rancho,
where they were murdered in their house by unknown persons,
supposed to be Mexicans. Mrs. Corliss was a daughter of Peter
Judson, the first settler at Tacoma, whose family escaped tbe
Indian massacres of 1855-56. Yet her fate pursued her to her
death in a far-off home where no danger was apprehended.
Whidbey Island contains about one hundred and fiftj- square
miles, about six thousand acres of which is excellent prairie-
land, requiring no clearing, an agreeable cUraate, a favorable
position in the Sound, and many charras of scenery, frora which
characteristics it* obtained the title of Garden of Puget Sound.
CoupeviUe, on Penn's Cove, is the only town of any importance,
but an effort is being made to build up a place named Whidbey
City, and another which has beatified the bold navigator Juan
de Fuca, and called itself the city of San de Fuca. This am
bitious townlet, under the patronage of its before-unheard-of
saint, promises to expend two miUion doUars in cutting a ship-
canal across the mile and a half of land betvveen Penn's Coa-o

328 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
and the Strait, and in railroad building. Steamers could, in
case the canal vvas constructed, pass out of the east channels
into the Strait without going as far north as Deception Pass, it
is true, but it is doubtful if sailing-vessels would care to face the
wind which would be blowing on shore just at this point a good
]iortion of the j-ear.
Camano Island, with Whidbey, constitute Island County.
They are separated by Saratoga Passage, which in the nautical
parlance of the Sound is known as " the inside passage" in going
to Bellingham Bay or Victoria. To get into the Fuca Sea by
this route we must run through Deception Pass, between Whid
bey and Fidalgo Islands. So desirous was I of viewing the
reputed wonders of this passage that I spent most of a night in
looking for them, being rewarded towards daylight by the
actual scene. The pass is only about six miles long, being from
a quarter to half a mile in width, with rockj' shores rising
abruptly from the water, the rounded tops of which have a
time-worn appearance, and out of the crevices of which grow
evergreen trees of a size very inferior to those along the main
land shores. Through this rocky funnel the wind carouses, and
the tide runs with a swiftness which sometiraes holds a steamer
stationary. The very force whieh seems dangerous is a protec
tion, the flood running up the side of the channel and its reflex
action carrying the steamer back to raid-passage. So with
great whistling of the wind, rushing of water, and rattling of
cargo, we were earried safely through into smooth water in the
Fuca Sea.

CHAPTEE XXVI.
THE SAN JUAN AECHIPELAGO AND CITY OF THE SEA.
Being in the Puca Sea, let us have a talk about it and its
archipelago. Fidalgo, Guemes, Cypress, and Lummi Islands lie
east of Eosario Strait, and belong to counties on the mainland,
as Skagit (pronounced Skadgit) and Whatcom, while San Juan,

SAN JUAN ARCHIPELAGO AND CITY OF THE SEA. 329
Orcas, Lopez, Shaw, Blakely, Decatur, and numerous sraaller
islands constitute the county of San Juan and the San Juan
Archipelago. The island of that narae contains about fifty square raUos, and
is faraous for its Uraestone quarries and lime-kilns. It is also
famous as the seat of the San Juan war during tho contention
between Bngland and the United States concerning the owner
ship of these islands, England holding that Eosario Strait was
the main channel, while the United States held that the Canal
de Haro was such.

AMONQ THE ISLANDS.

A goose has been credited vvith saving Eome, A pig it was
that saved the San Juan group, for when collector Ebey, in 1854,
appeared on the island and proceeded to confiscate a British
pig or two on the refusal of tho owner to pay import duties on
a band of sheep from Vancouver Island, the British unicorn
exalted its horn and asserted its claim to the archipelago. So
serious did the dispute beeome that General Harney, comraand
ing the Departraent of the Colurabia, placed a force on the
island of San Juan to hold it at all hazards, and a post was
maintained there until the settlement of the controversy by

330 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
arbitration, in 1872, when Eraperor William of Germany de
cided in favor of the claim of the United States.
One should enter the Fuca Sea by the Strait of Fuca, fifteen
miles wide and sixty in length. At this gateway of the Pacific
stand, what it requires the help of our imagination to make out,
the Pillars of Hercules, of Vancouver. As we advance, Van
couver Island is on our loft, its general surface rather rounded
and sraooth, crowned wilh forest in the interior, its shores in
dented with lovely baj-s and coves of a most inviting appearance.
On the right is the mainland, with the Olj-mpic Eange lifting its
silvered summits and noble peaks. In front, rising frora the
Cascade Eange, is Mount Baker, with half a dozen lesser peaks
grouped about it.
Advancing still farther, we pass by the southern end of the
San Juan group, which scarcely shows an opening between the
islands, and find ourselves almost abreast Deception Pass. Let
us turn to the north, where we have not j'et been, and make
for Anacortes, where we desire to go, because we have heard
wonderful things of Anacortes. A half-dozen miles takes us to
Ship Harbor, or Guemes Canal, and half a dozen more to the
City of the Sea. ;
Fidalgo Island has all those eccentricities of shape which
characterize this group. Stretching north from Deception Pass
seven miles to Guemes Canal, with a Avidth varying from three
to six miles, it is flanked on the west by two small islands, and
cut into on the east bj' an inlet about three railes long from
north to south, forming, with Padilla Bay, a narrow peninsula
pointing north, while about nine square miles of its area are con
tained in another peninsula pointing south, and separated from
the raain island by Sirailk Bay, which meets Deception Pass on
the southeast. This portion of the i,sland is an Indian reser
vation, and is divided frora the mainland only by Swinomish
Slough, a narrow and shaUow but navigable channel between
Padilla Bay and that unnamed portion of the Sound before
referred to, north of Port Susan, and into whieh empties the
Skagit Eiver by several mouths.
Near the centre of Fidalgo Island is Mount Brie, twelve hun
dred and fifty feet in height, while several small lakes add to its
scenic attractions. To say that the view from the summit of

SAN JUAN ARCHIPELAGO AND CITY OF THE SEA. 331
Mount Erie is entrancing vvould be strictly correct, however
trite the expression. Behold hovv, far away south, the "Jupiter
HUls" seem to bathe their feet in the waters of the Strait, sur
passingly beautiful in outUne, delicately colored, tipped and
rimmed with shining lines and crests of snow — a marvel of
aerial effoQt — a poet's dream — a vision of the air ! Turn from
this exquisite subUmity to the half a hundred islands of the
archipelago, on the west and north, each vvith its peculiar shape
lo distinguish it, its miniature bays, capes, and promontories, its
bits of prairie or forest-crowned ridges, but always picturesque.
Turn tovvards the east and seo again Mount Baker and the
great raasses of forest that extend from the summits of the
Cascades to the shores of the Sound, markino- where the Skao-it
winds its devious way to its outlet, and fail to dream of the
future which awaits this region I Do we need to hear that the
Skagit A-allej- is fertile, or that its foot-hills are full of coal, iron;
and other valuable minerals? From what we have seen of
other parts of West Washington, we know this without being
told. But of course we are told so by everybody, as if the
discovery were a new one.
Let us talk a Uttle about the Skagit Eiver region while it is
in mind. Although this river is the largest which empties into
Puget Sound, the remoteness of the eountry from the beaten
track of commerce caused it to be overlooked for settlement
in the earlier history of the Sound. Its channel was obstructed
by frequent "jams" of drift, which prevented navigation for
more than a few miles. But in 1869 J. S. Conner located on a
rocky bluff at the southern end of Swinomish Slough, and com
menced diking and cultivating the lide-raarsh-land on the delta
at the mouth of the Skagit. So successful was he that others
soon gathered about him, and he laid out a town which he
called La Conner, after his wife, Louisa Agnes Connor, which
was until quite recently the only one in this region. It has now
flve hundred inhabitants and a good trade, a body of land ten
miles long by three and a half in width being reclaimed by
diking and converted into farms where from one hundred to
one hundred and fifty bushels of oats to the acre is the annual
product. This tract is known as the Swinomish Flats. South
of it is another tract of five thousand acres, also redeemed, but

332 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
from fresh-water overflow, at no great expense. This is the
Beaver Marsh, and is just as productive as the first named.
Both of these tracts have navigable sloughs through them,
whieh enable the farmers to ship their crops frora the banks.
Wheat and barley are grown on these lands, but the quality as
well as quantity of the oat crop renders this raore profltable.
Hay, fruits, and vegetables raake large returns. Olympia Marsh
is another reclaimed tract north of a ridge separating it from
Swinomish Plats, and has. a small settlement on the ridge, called
Bay View, which possesses a growing lumber-trade. At the
north end of Swinomish Slough is an island seven hundred and
fifty acres in extent, also wholly reclaimed.
On the low ground towards the mouths of the Skagit spruce-
trees grow and the earth is wet, but these lands also when re
claimed yield well, while ten miles up the river the valley when
cleared is perfectlj- well adapted to general farming. The
tiraber of the vallej' is red cedar and Douglas fir, the most
valuable in the State for milling purposes. The jams of drift
have been removed, and in their places are sometimes jams
of saw-log.s.
Logging-camps Avere the first settlements on the river, but
there are now several incipient towns. The first, Skagit City, is
at the point where the river divides into the several channels
forming tho delta, and is of little iraportance. Mount Vernon
is the county-seat, and was the principal town in the county
before the rise of Anacortes, Avith whieh it was recently brought
into connection by railroad. Sedro, at the crossing of the
Fairhaven and Southern Eailway, is simplj- a railroad station
whose future is undetermined, although if it makes good use of its
natural resources, as well as transportation advantages, it ought
to beeome a business centre. Lyman is prettily situated on the
rive.r, with a deep-water frontage, a saw-raill, a general mer
chandise estabUshment, a good school-house, and other signs of
prosperity. It is also on the line of the Seattle and Northern
Eailroad from Sedro to Anacortes.
Above Lyman a short distance is Hamilton, named after its
proprietor, Williara Hamilton, and famous for having a large
orchard bearing exceUent fruit, and for being opposite tho iron
mountain mentioned in another chapter and called Mount

SAN JUAN ARCHIPELAGO AND CITY OF THE SEA. 333
Columbia. This mountain is said to be filled with coal on one
side and with iron on the other. It is covered with heavy
timber, which is being removed to facilitate the opening of the
mines, and a tovvn site is being cleared, which wiU be required
when the mines are opened.
The river flows with a tvvelve-milesan-hour current at this
distance from the Sound; thirty-five mUes inland the passage
grows narrower aud the scenery more striking. Birdview is a
pretty spot, where a water-fall twenty-five feet in width comes
plunging down from a height, and runs the machinery of a
saw-mill. Above this point the faU in the river increases, and it
takes the steamer half an hour to pass through a roeky defile
three hundred feet in width, but of no great length.
Not far beyond this pass, Baker Eiver, a large streara, enters
the Skagit frora the south, seeraing scarcely to augraent its
volume. Its valley is heavilj- timbered, and, if rumor is correct,
the hills which border it are stored with coal, iron, and marble.
On the north bank of the Skagit, eight miles beyond the
junction of Baker Eiver, is Sauk City, at the mouth of Sauk
Eiver, a streara which comes down from Mount Baker through
a very rugged countrj'. Sauk Mountain, close to the river, is
six thousand feet in height. Beyond this point navigation be
comes difflcult, even in high water, and at Cascade we turn
about to descend.
The Seattle and Northern EaUroad, whieh is chartered to
build from Anacortes to Spokane, witb a branch to Seattle, and
which has already completed a connection with the Seattle, Lake .
Shore and Eastern, is survej-ing ils line east of the head of
navigation, making for the Skagit Pass. Until transportation
is afforded by railway, little development wUl take plaee in the
mining region beyond.
It is curious to note, that, whereas Ave set out with the ira
pression that our route lay through " twilight woods" almost
perpetuallj', we found quite a nuraber of good farms and com
fortable farm-houses in the Skagit VaUey as far as we proceeded,
so rapidly does achievement foUow upon attempt in this rich
and favored region. I wUl be quite honest, and say, what I
.think to be the trulh, that the very newness of the country
helps the beginner here, by the absence of elose competition.

334 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
By and by, when everybody has found his place and settled
dovvn to stay, the home market of the producer will not be
as good as it now is nor the prices so high. But by then he
will have placed himself in comfort, and need not worry over
market prices.
I am reminded by being at the raouth of the Sauk of a very
interesting talk I had with a gentleman at Olympia — Mr. F.
W. Brown — before coming hore. From him I learned that the
scenery on the Sauk, towards its head, is of the wildest descrip
tion. Jets of lava, poured out in former ages from Mount
Baker, thrust themselves up through the main ridge of the
Cascades where it is nine thousand feet above tho sea. The
Sauk Eiver is precipitated over frequent falls and rapids. A
park — Suiatl, pronounced Soo-i-at — is surrounded by basaltic
needles of great height, and in it is found the red snow seen
only in a few localities on the globe. Huge blocks of granite
occur in this region, and in one place a pillar of it five thou
saud feet in height. But the most curious discovery made was
of a canon coming down Mount Baker to Avithin half a mile of
the Skagit Eiver, forraed by hot lava cutting its way through
sand and limestone, and turning the sides of the canon thus
formed to obsidian. This volcanic glass is blue and green in
color, and verj' brittle. There is a field here for the scientist
and the tourist, whieh is waiting only until railroads make it
reasonablj- easj' to approach.
To return to the archipelago. In cruising about among these
•islands one is irresistibly reminded of Homer. Here might
have been enacted the scenes of the Odj-ssey. There is the
same idyllic simpUcity, and even the same occupations of the
people, who in the San Juan group are often of Canadian or
North -of-Europe stock. These islands are indeed preferable
to the " Isles of Greece
Where burning Sappho loved and sung,"
on account of the forestry upon them.
The San Juan group numbers thirty or more islands, large
and smaU, containing together tvvo hundred and fifty square
miles. The greatest elevation is two hundred and flfty feet,
excluding Mount Dallas, on San Juan, which is ten hundred

SAN JUAN ARCHIPELAGO AND CITY OF THE SEA. 335
and eighty feet, and Mount Constitution, on Orcas, which is two
thousand five hundred feet in height. San Juan, since the days
when the Araerican collector had the unpleasant episode with
the swineherd, has enjoyed a profitable trade in Ume, of which
thirty-eight thousand barrels are annually exported. There are
forty-two thousand eight hundred and ninetj--six acres of ira
proved land in the group ; but stock-raising rather than farraing
is the business of the inhabitants.
Orcas Island is the raost raodernized of the group, having, as
well as San Juan, several lirae corapanies, all doing a good busi
ness ; a luraber corapany, tvvo brick-yards, and other manufac
tories. A few J'ears ago hotels and suramer boarding-houses
were erected on this island, with the purpose of attracting
visitors and building up towns. But since the railroad era
dawned upon the Sound, the Orcas Island people have taken to
fruit-growing, whieh promises to be a great business on these
isles. They have organized a Fruit-Growers' Association; and,
since I knovv by actual tost that the fruit of all the northwest
part of Washington is superior in fiavor, I herebj' desire to
advertise the faet for the beneflt of all whom it may concern.
The head-quarters of the Orcas Fruit-Growers' Association is
at East Sound. Under the auspices of this societj- fruits will
bo packed and shipped in the most careful manner, and guaran
teed to purchasers. The secretary also will undertake to find
tracts of from ten to twenty acres, suitable for fruit-raising,
for those who desire to enter into this sesthetic branch of agri
cultural Ufe.
Summer apples raised here bring, at tbe wharf, eighty-five
cents to one dollar per bo.x holding about half a bushel. Winter
apples bring from one dollar and twenty-five cents to one dollar
and seventy-five cents, and keeping apples for spring market
still higher. Pears bring from one dollar and fifty cents to two
dollars per box. Apricots bring eight and a half cents per pound,
prunes for the drying-bouse three and a half cents per pound.
Strawberries and blackberries sell for ten cents a pound. The
most luscious peaches are grown among the mountains of the
islands. Cherries produce wonderful crops, and so with melons
and vegetables. Why should not one love to publish this
Arcadian region to the world ? Poets not yet born will sing of

336 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
it, and Avhen a thousand years from now orators shall seek to
embellish their speech, it will not be by reference to Greece, but
to these far western isles, the new Atlantis discovered by a
Greek navigator.
Like the Greeks, these islanders have fish in plenty, and fish
will always be counted among their resources. Twenty tons
of halibut have been taken in one day by a single boat. Game
is still plentiful in the hills, while the bays and sloughs swarm
with ducks, geese, and brant. The farra productions sent to
market, besides fruit, are chiefly mutton, hay, oats, cheese, and
butter. Talking about fish and fowl reminds me of the comical habits
of that absurd bird the crow, whose numbers on the beach anj'
where from the Columbia to the British boundary are iraraense.
Thej' swarm on these island beaches when the tide is out, and
fish for clams. Seizing their game, they mount high in the air
and drop the bivalve upon the roeks to break the shell, when
they proceed to make a meal off the contents. When pigs
running wild root for clams, the crows roost on thoir backs
until a elam is turned up, and, just as the shell is cracked by
the pig, will dart dovvn, seize the raoUusk, and retire to de
vour it.
The importance of this archipelago to the State of Washing
ton is suggested by the above observations. , Lj-ing at the head
of the Strait of Fuca, the only maritime entrance to the great
inland sea improperly called a sound, it is upon a naval depot
in this vicinity that the defence of the interior depends. The
United States, having weakly yielded the island of Vancouver
to the British govemment, must maintain offensive and defensive
establishraents at least equal to those of Great Britain, and
sufifieient to guard the Sound coasts against intrusion by any
foreign power.
It is interesting to know that the man who first gave signs
of coraprehending the significance of the archipelago at the head
of the Fuca Strait was by birth a British subject, by education
an American, and by name Araos Bowraan. He had been a
reporter for the New York Tribune during the civil war, had
studied medicine and engineering, had assisted in surveying the
boundary between CaUfornia and Nevada, and been reporter for

SAN JUAN ARCHIPELAGO AND CITY OF THE SEA. 337
the CaUfornia Legislature, before he finally went to Munich to
complete his engineering studies. While in Europe he reported
the noAvs of the Franco-Prussian war for the New York Tribune,
traveUing extensively in Eussia, Sweden, and Norway before
returning to California, where he raarried Miss Annie Cortes,
a lady perfectly suited to afford companionship to a mind so
broadlj- cultured.
In 1876 Mr. Bowman explored on the line of the Canadian
Pacific, becoming thereby well acquainted Avith the eountry
on both sides of the international boundary, and asked Mrs.
Bowman to select some spot in tho Fuean Archipelago where
she vvould consent to establish a home. This she did, and Mr.
Bowman purchased a quarter section of land on the northeast
corner of Fidalgo Island, buUt a house to reside in and a trading-
house, — for the exchequer had to be looked after, — asked the
Post office Department to establish an office for the Island at his
place, and to call it Anacortes, which prayer was granted, and
then set about unfolding his views.
The manner of doing this was exceedingly painstaking, and
required the courage of conviction. There were but few inhabi
tants on the island, and seldom any visitors to it, yet Mr. Bow
man published a newspaper. He made and published elaborate
maps, showing the position of Fidalgo Island to the whole
world, demonstrating the relation of Anacortes to transconti
nental and oceanic travel and trafflc, showing that it was the
shortest, quickest, and least expensive route between Great
Britain and Asia, via New York, the Great Lakes, Chicago,
Duluth, Spokane Falls to Anacortes and the Strait of Fuca.
He represented clearly the local advantages of Anacortes.over
anj' port on the Sound by careful measurement and lucid illus
tration. These maps — large, colored, and with full explanations
— were sent free or as "prizes" to subscribers and new-spaper
exchanges. By and bj- thej' began to awaken attention, and
about ten years frora the tirae Mr. Bowraan settled upon Fidalgo
Island he was receiving propositions frora railroad corapanies
which sought to make Anacortes a terminal point. In January,
1890, there were not twenty inhabitants in this plaee ; in Febru
ary, when the Oregon Improvement Company advertised that
it would sell lots, there were three thousand people on the
22

338 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
ground. The Seattle and Northem Eailroad was immediately
built to the coal-mines of the Skagit Vallej' at Harailton. The
Union Pacific graded a few railes, and transferred its rights to
the Northern Pacific, which for the present uses the track of
the Seattle, Lake Shore and Eastern from Sedro to Seattle,
giving Anacortes connection with Queen City before the end of
the first J-ear of its history as a town. The Seattle, Lake Shore
and Eastern Eoad will be extended to a connection with the
Canadian- Pacific in a few months, giving Anacortes as well
as Seattle a terminus, which, with the Seattle and Northern,
connecting vvith the Great Northern at Spokane, will give the
City of the Sea three transcontinental roads almost from the
first. These, with first-class steamers running to all points on
the Sound, to Victoria, and to San Francisco, leave the traveller
free to go whore he lists, the world being literally " all before
him where to choose."
Of the local advantages of Anacortes, one is that all the rivers
of that part of Washington east of the Fuca Sea and Strait
have their valleys opening towards Fidalgo Island, hence their
products should naturallj- centre here. These are the Snohomish,
Stillaguamisb, Skagit, Samish, and Nooksabk. The Samish—
the smallest of thera all, running into the south end of Belling-
hara Bay — furnished frora six logging-caraps last year ten mil
Uon six hundred and thirtj' thousand feet of luraber to the mills
of Puget Sound, which was but a small percentage of tho lum
ber production from the camps in this region. One camp on
the Skagit marketed in one year nine milUon feet, the price rang
ing frora six dollars and fifty cents to seven dollars per thousand.
There is wealth for you. Then follow all other kinds of wealth,
— raineral, agricultural, manufacturing, — and the market for
these is all the world, because the shipping of all the world
comes here.
Again, Anacortes places great stress upon the superiority of
Ship Harbor. The tidal currents in the channel in front of the
city are about three knots an hour, — never four, — whereas the
tidal currents of New York and San Francisco are six knots.
In the inner harbors of Fidalgo and Padilla Bays the currents
are very gentle, and these bays have deop-Avater branches
ultimately to be converted into slip harbors, the best of all,

AIRHAVEN AND BELLINGHAM BAY. 339
with unlimited room. Swinomish Slough, Avhich is navigable
for large vessels only at high tide, is to be deepened, when it
will afford a passage frora the south into Padilla Bay.
Sailing-masters find tho prevailing winds of tbe country to
be from the southeast and northwest. Both are fair winds into
Ship Harbor and out of it. Ships require no towing, but sail
up to their docks unaided, and such is the depth of water that
the largest vessel afloat need not fear to do so.
The present f)erraanent population of Anacortes is two thou
sand tvvo hundred and flftj'. At tho end of the flrst yoar it had
cleared tvvo thousand acres of forest, graded and planked ten
liiiles of streets, completed a sj'stem of water-works, built three
saw-mills, a sash- and door-factoiy, an iron-foundrj- and ma
chine-shop, blacksmith- and wagon-shops, a steam-laundry, a
ship yard, eleven railes of electric-railway (almost completed),
four railroad depiots, four hotels, five handsome brick blocks,
and expended altogether in building iraprovements over half a
milUon dollars, besides another quarter of a million in wharves
and warehouses. It has two newspaper estabUshments and
good pubUe schools. Banks and other moneyed institutions are
on the ground doing a good business.
Sueh is Anacortes, the Venice of the Pacific. I shall often
throw down my pon to dream of that raatchless sea, over which
she elects to preside and over which I floated in Juno daj's,
taking raental photographs which cannot fade, in company with
the kindest of entertainers.

CHAPTEE XXVIL
FAIRHAVEN AND BELLINGHAM BAY.
Leaving Anacortes early in the afternoon by a fine steamer, I
had a deUghtful voyage to Fairhaven, another new town on
BelUngham Bay. Of BeUinghara Bay, as a coal-mining port in
years past, I had often heard, the first coal ever mined in Wash
ington coming from here. The discovery was made by WiUiam
Pattle, a British subject, in 1852, who spoke of it to Henry

340 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
Eoeder and EusseU V. Peabody, Avhom he met at Olympia.
Eoeder was of German birth but brought up in the United
States, whUe Peabody was from Ohio. They had been in Cali
fornia together, and now determined, after hearing Pattle's
account of the country, to go to BeUingham Baj', and erect a
saw-mUl, whieh they did, on Whatcom Creek. They also took
donation claims, on one of which coal vvas found in 1854, sixty-
five tons of which were sent to San Francisco to be tested, and
found merchantable. Frora that time until the Seattle Mines
were opened this was the only coal mined in Washington.
About 1869 the mine caught fire and was fiooded, since which
time it has lain idle.
The town of Whatcom was laid off on Boeder's land whUe
the Fraser Eiver mining excitement was at white heat, in 1857,
and at one time contained ten thousand people, but an order of
Governor Douglas turning trafflc to Victoria caused it to be
deserted, and all the better buUdings to be removed to that place,
whieh acquired therebj- a very American growth and appear
ance for an EngUsh town. A single brick house remained,
which was converted to county purposes.
Whatcom remained uninhabited, except by its owners and
the coal corapany, until 1870, when the Northern Pacific, look
ing for a terminus, purchased all the land which could be
obtained fronting on the bay, — however, not including Whatcom.
In 1882, a Kansas colony numbering six hundred fixing upon
this locality, the owners of the town-site agreed to donate a
half-interest in the town if the colony would settle there, but
subsequently refused to make good their contract, when the
colonists laid off a town for themselves called New Whatcom, or
BeUingham, while others settled at Sehome, between the two.
The population of the three places continued to be insig-
uificant until 1889, when Fairhaven was taken in hand by a
company of whieh Mr. Nelson Bennet, the contractor who
constructed the Northern Pacific's great tunnel through the
Cascade Mountains, was president, and C. X. Larrabee, of Mon
tana, vice-president.
I cannot refrain from quoting from a monograph published
by the Fairhaven Chamber of Commerce, describing the methods
pursued in founding new cities, and particularly Fairhaven :

FAIRHAVEN AND BELLINGHAM BAY. 341
"Miners were sent into the mountains to search for coal and
iron-ore and veins of silver, lead, and gold-bearing ores. En
gineers with barometers strapped to their backs were ordered
into the highlands to search for railroad routes. Tiraber ex
aminers were ordered to examine the forests that stand between
the rugged flanks of the Cascade Eange and the waters of
Puget Sound to estimate the probable amount of marketable
lumber they contained. Other mon were sent to watch the
sweep of the tide.? through narrow passages and to examine
harbors. Presently gaunt men, toil-worn and haggard, and who
carried burdens on their backs, emerged from the forests and
stood on steamboat-landings. This man carried silver-ore, that
man iron-ore, and yonder was a man who was blackened vvith
coal-dust, and the sack that hung heavily- over his back contained
coking coal. That group of worn, tired-ej'od men vvith intelli
gent faces were engineers froni mountain-passes. Farther down
stood men the pockets of whose canvas jackets bulged with note
books that were stuffed with inforraation relative to the value
of the tiraber and the character of the soil of several counties.
Prora out of forests, floating down rivers in canoes, from off
the rapid tide-water, out of mountain-passes, from the plains
east of tho Cascade Eange, frora probable town-sites, raen hur
ried to Tacoma and to Nelson Bennett's office. The information
was gathered. It was attentively studied, laboriously compared,
and thoroughly digested. Maps Avere drawn and the resources
of tho region examined were marked on them. Slowly the
evidence was sifted. This point was rejected because of the
harbor, that because the land directly tributary was not arable
when cleared, and another because it was too far from coal and
iron. It was finally decided that the new city should be built
on the shores of BeUingham Bay. When this conclusion vvas
arrived at, to act followed instantly. An extensive tract of land
was bought for a large sura. A city Avas laid out. Engineers
located a railroad that extends from Fairhaven to New West
minster in British Columbia, and from Fairhaven to a point far
east of the Cascade Mountains. Hundreds of men began to fell
trees and to shovel dirt along the railroad Une. Other men cleared
the timber off of the town-site and burned it. Streets were
graded and town-lots offered for sale. Steel rails, locomotives.

342 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
and cars were bought, and in two months from the time the
first blow was struck at Fairhaven, which was in May, 1889,
trains of ears were running into and out of the town."
That is the story in a nutshell, of the founding of cities by
the intelligence of this age.
Bellingham Bay does not differ greatly in appearance from
the bay at Seattle. In front of Fairhaven, which is about
seventeen miles due north, and a Utile east of Anacortes, is a
narrow peninsula sirailar to that on which West Seattle is situ
ated, whieh is occupied as a reservation bj- tbe Lummi Indians,
and Lummi Island, extending a few miles south of the penin
sula. Tho town-site slopes down handsomely to the bay, pre
senting an attractive view to the passenger on the incoming
steamer, which is enhanced by the character of the buildings
alreadj- corapleted and in course of erection, sorae of whieh are
surprisingly ornate for the size and age of the town.
Mount Baker, with its broken cone, and faraily of lesser peaks
about it, Uos almost directlj' oast from Fairhaven, and is a noble
object with its ten thousand eight hundred and ten foet of height
overtopping the darklj'-mantled Cascade Eange. The scenic
attractions of Fairhaven and tho other BeUinghara Bay towns
are fullj- as groat as any of the cities farther on Puget Sound,
and its natural resources appeared to me to be almost identical
with those of Anacortes, except in the matter of distance from
the Strait and length of water-front. Vessels require no towing
to the wharves of either. The same valleys are tributary to
both, the same iron, coal, and marble deposits, the same timber,
and the same fisheries. It rains a little raore at Fairhaven than
at the head of the Strait, but only about half as mueh as at
Olympia, and tho temperature is perhaps a trifle less mild,
though flowers bloom ov-ory raonth of the year in the open
air. The Nooksabk Eiver erapties into tho north end of Belling
ham Bay, and therefore is more directly tributary to the towns
upon it than elsewhere. The valley of this river is very exten
sive, stretching from British Columbia to Whatcom, south, and
embracing a scope of country fifty miles in width due east of
BeUinghara Bay. Tho tiraber being reraoved, the soil produces
everything entrusted to it in raarvellous abundance, — as, for in-

FAIRHAVEN AND BELLINGHAM BAY. 343
stance, one hundred rutabagas of best average size, raised near
Lynden, on the Nooksabk, weighed two thousand pounds. It
is excellently adapted to fruit and hops, as weU as grass, grain,
and vegetables.
The mineral resources of the Nooksabk are yet undeveloped,
but are understood to be iron, coal, copper, lead, and sUver.
There is abundance of water-power. Tho country- is generally
level and not rockj-, with soft, pure spring-water in abundance.
All this is, of eourse, very valuable, and is for him who comes
and takes it.
There are manj- interesting resorts about Fairhaven. Lake
Whatcom, two and a half miles east of BeUinghara Bay, is an
irregularly-shaped lake, eleven railes long by ono and a half in
width, of eold clear water over ono thousand feot in depth in
the centre. Its shores slope gentlj-, and towards the east merge
in the mountains five thousand feet above. A summer hotel is
erected at Silver Beach, on the nortb ond of the lake, with a
boat-house and other encouragements to visitors. On its west
bank is the prettj- now tovvn of Geneva, and on ils waters tho
steamer of that name, whieh carries pleasure-seekers from one
end to the other. In its waters trout aro abundant. It is said
that within a stone's throw of tho lake gold, silver, coal, and
fire-clay have been found in situ, and, if true, the best feature of
the lake for a pleasure-resort, its seclusion, will be destroyed.
Tho outlet of this lake is Whatcom Creek, which runs into the
bay. On the shore of Lummi Island is Smugglers' Cove, a tinj'
harbor with a spring and water-fall, overhung by beetling crags
and lofty firs, but, best of all, with a legend belonging to it, of
a smuggler vvho took hiding here from the revenue officers, but
being pursued climbed up the dizzy precipice and was never
heard of more. The rest of the story is left to the iraagination
of the hearer.
One of the curiosities of Lummi Island is tho DovU's Slide,
a vein of nearly white sandstone of a shalj' formation, one
hundred feet in width and thirteen hundred feet in height,
which lies on the side of a mountain at an incUnation whieh
causes every detached seale to slide down into the bay. As
scales are detached every few minutes, the query is, when wiU

344 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
this disintegration, which has been going on tirae out of mind,
cease, and the vein be exhausted ?
On Eliza Island, in the bay, is a chicken-hatchery, which
turns out one thousand per week during the season. Vendori
Island, a high, roeky, and picturesque splinter of earth set in
the waters just where it produces the most beautiful effect
against the skj- and the far-off shore line, is a sheep rancho.
Chuekanut Bay, on the east shore of the greater bay, three
mUes south of Fairhaven, is the site of the famous sandstone
quarrj', upon which all the cities of the eoast have at times had
to draw for building-stone. It is in the sidp of a precipice,
and the people who Uve about the quarry are almost as isolated
by their elevation as the cliff-dwollers of Arizona.
Sehome and Whatcom are so near together, and so near to
Fairhaven, that all are in effect one eity, although under differ
ent municipal governments. Whatcom is the countj--seat, and
has a fine court-house. The streets are full of busy people, and
the town has a substantial and respectable air, as becomes its
age, though, truth to say, this appearance has been but recently
put on. Sehome has two large hotels, — the " Sehome" and the
" Grand Central."
Fairhaven, although so young, has four thousand aud thirty-
one inhabitants. Its finest hotel is the " Fairhaven," built of
brick and stone, well situated, with a fine view of the harbor.
It has an excellent system of water-works, four banks, two
newspapers, electric-Ught service, telegraph and telephone com
munication, three churches completed, and others building, good
schools, saw-raills, brick-j'ards, and factories. It has a railroad
being built to connect with the Westminster Southern, and
through that with the Canadian Pacific at Blaine (Fairhaven
and Northern, opened in February, 1891). The Fairhaven and
Southern is also being constructed, which is making for the coal
mines in the Skagit Valley, crossing the river at Sedro, proceed
ing south to Seattle to connect with the Northern Pacific, and
also building east up the Skagit to the coal-, marble-, granite-,
and silver-mines in that direction, and ultimately to go to
Spokane. Fort Bellingham, a stone fort, built in 1856 by Captain Pickett,
who became a general in the Confederate arraj-, is situated about

FAIRHAVEN AND BELLINGHAM BAY. 345
three miles frora Whatcom, on the shore of the bay. There
are several settlements, of small importance at present, on the
Nooksabk Eiver : Lummi, at the raouth ; Ferndale, just above
the Lurami Eiver, the northern outlet of the Nooksabk ; Nook
sabk post-office; and Lynden, on the line of the Fairhaven and
Northern, a growing town in a rich agricultural region. Yeager
and Licking are small places in the A-alley, where the people can
purchase necessary articles and got tbeir mail.
On the coast, and within two miles of the international
boundary, is Somahimoo, on the west side of Drayton Harbor;
and on the east side, touching the line, is the new city of Blaine,
the twin of a town of the sarae name on the British Columbia
side. The twin towns act together in the most friendly manner,
and are assuming considerable importance as the terminus of
the Westminster Southern Eailroad and starting-point of a line
being surveyed to Lynden, Whatcom, and Spokane FaUs. But
being pressed for time, I abandoned ray intention of proceeding
as far north as Blaine and Westrainster, and, taking steamer
again at Fairhaven, returned to Seattle.
As one floats for a hundred railes upon these placid waters,
always in sight of beauty and of positive if undeveloped wealth, it
is impossible not to see that there is a great deal in the claims
put forth by the people of this northwest coast concerning its
relation to the commerce of the world. Already Alaska is
demanding recognition of its commerce and mines. A few
years ago one steamer a raonth sufficed for its trade ; now it
requires one every week. Eailroads are projected, and will be
built, to connect the Pacific States with Asia, across Behring's
Strait. Already eoramoreial men are watching and waiting for
the completion of the Nicaragua Canal to shape by it new lines
of transportation.
The Pacific front of our republic, extending from ocean to
oeean, is to play a great part in the world's history, and it is
well for the founders to study the situation. The great effort
of to-day is to economize time and obliterate space. The hand
that from this new West reaches out farthest towards the oldest
East win grasp the prize. Why should not these thoughts
suggest what these waters will in tirae resemble, when palaces
shaU be reflected in their margins, and the white-winged mes-

346 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
sengers of commerce shall glide continuallj- frora point to point
of these now fir-clad slopes, laden with the precious cargoes of
the Orient, making this northern sea a second Bosphorus for
beauty and magnificence ?

CHAPTEE XXVIIL
GLIMPSES OF THE INLAND EMPIRE.
The Northern Pacific, which transports you to Pasco or
WaUula Junction, according to your destination, whether it be
Spokane or Walla WaUa, first has to elevate you two thousand
eight hundred and eighty-five feet to the great tunnel one thou
sand and ninetj--five feet lower than the suramit of Stampede
Pass. The scenerj' along Groen Eiver is wild in the extreme, making
one "pity the sorrows of the poor old man" — who of eourse
was a young one — -who engineered the Une of this road. To
the terrible grandeur of the scenery are added here aud there
glirapses of a milder form of beauty, but the general impression
given by the western slope of the mountains is that the ascent
is very abrupt. After passing tho groat tunnel, the change in
the appearance ofthe mountains is thesame which we notice in
passing through the gap of the Columbia, — the disappearance
of the firs, the longer slopes of the ridges, and the substitution
of pine timber for the fir, which graduallj' disappears.
The Starapede tunnel is two railes in length. It cost a great
deal of brain-work, as well as raanual labor and money. A
portion of it is lined with cement, to prevent the disintegration
of the earth above, by the action of the air. Few people, I
fiancy, in passing through it realize that they are one thousand
feet underground.
Just north of the Stampede Pass the Yakima Eiver has its
source in three small lakes, — Kitchelas, KaUchass, and Cle-ee-lum,
and the railroad follows down this streara to its entrance into
the Columbia. The valley of the Yakima is rather a great basin
than a vaUey, bounded by the Cascade Mountains on the west.

GLIMPSES OF THE INLAND EMPIRE. 347
the Wenatche Eivor on the north, and the Columbia Eiver on
the south and east, containing several smaUer valleys on the
west side, namely, the Wenass, Nachess, Atahnam, Pisco, Top-
unish, and KUckitat, with nuraerous sinall strearas debouching
into the Columbia.
The soil of tho Yakima basin is a uniform Ught sandy loam,
with more or less alkali in it. Near the mountains there is more
claj- and loam, which retains raoisture much longer than the
soil of the plains, and the river bottoras are largely alluvial
deposits. The countrj- comes under the general head of "arid
land," although as a natural slock country itis unsurpassed, the
cattle ranging upon it, instead of coming out in the spring with
htnk sides and rough coats, being as i-ound and glossy as if kept
up and curried.
This is the original home of the Yakima tribe of Indians,
who still have a reservation containing about thirtj'-six town
ships on the west side of the basin, watered bythe Atahnam
and Topunish Eivers. These people kept large herds of horses
before white men came among them, and now in addition
keep herds of cattle. White settlers at first imitated them in
the matter of neglecting agriculture for stock-raising, but the
advent of railroads and the outcome of sorae experiments in
farming have inaugurated very important changes. Irrigation
is now the demand, and the problem whieh science and capital
are attempting to solve. That it will be solved there ean be
no doubt.
The first place of any consequence which we eome to after
passing the mining towns of Cle-ee-lum and Eoslyn is Ellens-
burg, in Kittitass County. It was first settled in 1867, by two
famiUes. The present population is five thousand. It was
almost destroyed by fire July 4, 1889, one month after Seattle
was burned, and one month before another city of Washington
— Spokane — was destroj-ed by tho same element. One million
doUars was immediately expended in rebuilding tho burnt dis
trict with brick and stone, and the trade of that year amounted
to two milUon five hundred thousand doUars.
BUensburg was not entirely a creation of the great railroad,
but of the country whose resources have been developed by its
people. These resources are both mineral and agricultural.

348 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
There are four irrigating canals in the BUensburg district. One,
the Teanaway Ditch Company's canal, is fifty miles in length,
and can water seventy-five thousand acres of land. It is claimed
that, without irrigation, forty bushels to tho aere of wheat can
be produced I It is in evidence that the BUensburg Valley pro
duced, in 1887, one miUion bushels of wheat, without artificial
moisture. Fruit, vegetables, hops, and hay do well without ir
rigation ; but with it, they produce larger crops.
BUensburg is the county-seat of Kittitass County. It is
situated on Wilson Creek, a short distance from the Yakima
Eiver, on a plain sloping south. The Cascades and Mount
Eainier close in the western view ; the water-shed between the
Yakima and Wenatehee defines the valley on the northeast, and
the hiUs of tho Cowiche on the southwest, while the Yakima on
the southeast is closed in by highlands forraing a long, crooked,
and nari'ow deflle, shutting off aU the landscape on the farther
side. The town is regularly laid out, with wide streets, good
sidewalks, and well-kept public grounds. There has been a
large accession to the population since the completion of the
Cascade division of the Northern Pacific.
BUensburg controls the trade of a wide section, and is reach
ing out after that of the Okanogan raining region and the Big
Bend country. Its business men built a steamboat in 1889 to
run on the Columbia, between a point about thirty miles from
BUensburg and the mouth ofthe Okatiogan Eiver, and, although
it was run at a loss the first year, voted a subsidy to keep it on
the route the second year, a measure which is bringing its re
ward. All the freight from the West for the mines had hereto
fore been sent to Spokane Falls, and thence across the country
by rail- and wagon-roads, making a long and expensive detour.
The EUensburg and Northem Eailroad is being 'constructed to
the Columbia Eiver to connect with the steamer for the Okano
gan mines.
EUensburg has a good water-system, electric-light service, one
street railway, a telephone exchange, two banks, three news
papers, a foundry and machine-shops, and other manufactures.
There are six flouring-raills in the vallej', three saw.-mills, three
sash- and door factories, with numerous well-stocked general
merchandise establishraents. A company has recently been

GLIMPSES OF THE INLAND EMPIRE. 349
formed with a capital of one miUion dollars to develop the
mineral wealth of the Kittitass and tributary country. Among
other projects is one to buUd a smelter to reduce the ores of the
ConeonuUy Mines at the norlh, and another to organize an iron
and steel raanufacturing company. Limestone, sandstone, pum
ice, coal, gold, and other minerals, it is said, are only awaiting
the action of associated capital to create a great deal of wealth.
The second town in tho Yakima Basin is North Yakima.
Why- North Yakima ? Only because when sorae people of their
ovv-n accord had laid off a town tvvo or three railes south of
thera, then came the Northern Pacific Eailroad Company, and
in 1885 laid off a town of its own, on the most approved plan,
north of them, and drew to itself the trade of the country of
Yakima. This proceeding naturally was greatly- irritating to
tbe South Yakimas, who complained of tho treatment of the
railroad company. Tbe corapany as a corporation could not be
expected to have a soul, but it had a fair-to-middling kind of
brain, and raade a proposition to the residents of South Yakima
to corae over and dwell in the tents of the north town, or,
in other words, to let the railroad corapany remove them,
houses and inhabitants, on the railroad town site, where they
were to be given lots for those they left behind, and made wel
come. As the business of the place had already departed, the
majority felt forced to accept the proposition, and the company
aecordinglj- bad the south town reraoved, house by house, and
set down on its town-site. This procedure increased the
value of North Yakima real property. History is silent as to
the financial and mental condition of real-estate dealers in the
old town, but they probablj- threw themselves off a roek into
the sea.
North Yakima is a flourishing town, situated near the conflu
ence of the Nachess and Yakima Eivers. It is admirably laid
out, with streets from eighty to one hundred feet in width,
shaded by handsome trees, and irrigated by rivulets of pure
water flowing next the sidewalks. The county-seat is located
here, and its three thousand inhabitants pay taxes on an assessed
valuation of one million dollars, which is about one-fourth of
the actual value of the town propertj'. It is equipped, Uke aU
the new towns of Washington, with water, fire, light, and street-

360 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
railway service, and with a handsome public-school building,
half a dozen churches, and several benevolent societies. A
railroad to Portland is talked of, towards which one hundred
thousand dollars bonus is pledged.
The principal interests of Nortb Yakima are agricultural.
Irrigation schemes are the topic of conversation. Two canals
were completed in 1889 ; one from the Nachess Eiver extending
twelve miles towards town, with branehes which open up thirty
thousand acres of land, at a cost of sixty thousand dollars, and
the other between the lower Yakima and the Columbia, which
waters twenty-five thousand acres, and cost thirty thousand
dollars. The Northem Pacific and Yakima Irrigation Company
is suiweying for another canal, to cost si.x; hundred thousand
dollars, and to have a length of one hundred and ten miles. A
still greater scheme is on foot to expend about tvvo raillion dol
lars in extended irrigation and in constructing daras in the
mountains for the storage of water, which will be wanted when
the eight hundred thousand acres, now reserved for the pleasure
of the Indians, shall be thrown open to settlement.
Tho Moxoe Farm, near North Yakima, is a tract owned by a
companj', that is experimenting with the soil and other condi
tions of the land. It derives large profits from alfalfa, hops,
corn, tobacco, and fruits. Peaches boar profusely the second
year after transplanting, and grapes do well. A. fair average
crop of tobacco is one thousand pounds per acre, and nets six
hundred dollars. Hops net one hundred dollars. Fruit and
vegetables find a ready market at good prices. The company is
also experimenting with cotton and tea. It owns fourteen miles
of ditch, and can flood its fields if so disposed. Dairying and
raising blooded stock is a part of the business of the Moxoe
Farra. If one chooses to take a conveyance south about fifty miles
from North Yakima, he will strike Goldendale, the county-seat
of Klickitat County, lying south of the Indian Reservation.
He will find the ride interesting, even if there is no pioneer
present to relate to him incidents of the Yakima Indian War,
when Fort Simcoe was erected bj- Major Garnett, who was
afterwards a Confederate general in the civil war.

GLIMPSES OF THE INLAND EMPIRE. 351
There is a range of hills caUed the Siracoe Mountains, which
you cross, and find very pleasant, because Avooded, afler the
dun and raonotonous grass and sage-brush lands. The road
takes us across the reservation, and shows us a good raany fat
cattle and lusty aborigines, but Uttle improvement.
Goldendale is an agricultural town in a level valley among
hills. It is a pretty and prosperous place, and looks forward to
having railroad connection with Portland when the Hunt Sys
tem is completed lo that eity. It is making proposals to secure
the Soldiers' Home upon a tract of land near the town, and the
place seeras well adapted to the purpose, the plan being to erect
cottages Avith gardens attached instead of one grand institution.
Trout Lake, and the ice eaves mentioned in another chapter,
are in Klickitat County, to both of which a large number of
visitors repair in sumraer. Mount Adams is onlj- about thirty-
six railes northwest of Goldendale, and is the point of sight of
the people here, as Hood is of Portland and The Dalles.
A new town, called North Dalles, has sprung up opposite the
Oro"-on town, in Klickitat County, Washington. It is proposed
to erect manufactories hero, and it is said some are already
, secured. Manufactures on the Columbia, with free navigation
of the great river, are what are required lo give stability to
that development which capital has inaugurated in other
waj'S. " Keep your eye on Pasco!" is the injunction which meets you
in newspaper and hand-biU advertisements, making you curious
to behold it, as if it wero the What Is It. When you arrive,
you look about you for something on which to keep your eye,
which being blown full of sand refuses to risk raore than tho
briefest glimpses thenceforward. Thero is a hotel, of brick, and
some houses scattered about, built, I am told, by the Pasco Land
Company, whieh has also in contemplation a large irrigating
canal with which to make cultivable the wastes of sand and
sage-brash owned by it. A Chinamen, it is said, has a smaU
patch of ground behind his cabin which ho sprinkles with a
watering pot, thereby being enabled to grow flowers and vege
tables in luxuriant beauty and proportions. From this itis
inferred that the irrigation of these wastes wUl redeem them

352 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
from their present sterility ; but in the interim, keeping one's
eyes on Pasco is a painful experience.
Merely as a location for a city, Pasco, or Ainsworth, which is
a couple of miles beyond, at the crossing of Snake Eiver, either,
or both together, are fine town-sites. Mr. Villard, it is said, has
remarked that a large city must some day be built up at the
junction of the Snake and Columbia Eivers. It is more than
probable, and I hopois true, and that it wUl bo called Ainsworth,
to perpetuate the raemory of the man, than whom no single
individual has done so much to develop the Inland Empire.
Captain J. C. Ainsworth was a verj' young raan for the plaee
when he took comraand of a steamboat, as part owner, on the
upper Mississippi Eiver ; but, meeting vvith a painful bereave
ment, this, with the reports arriving at that time of the riches
ofthe California gold placers, gave hira a distaste for his manner
of life, and he was just in the mood to break away from it
when his friend WiUiara C. Ealston, also a stearaboat man in his
youth, returned from the golden shore with such representations
as put to flight all hesitation, and young Ainsworth became, as
so many others have become, a " raan of destiny." He spent a few
months in California, in 1850, as deputy clerk of the court at
Sacramento, being while there solicited to go to Oregon to take
command of the first steamboat built on tho Wallamet, — the
" Lot Whitcomb," — in which he bought an interest.
This was the beginning of a career vvhich lasted from 1851
to 1879 of continued progress in the development of transpor
tation by steamboat on the Oregon rivers, in which Captain
Ainsworth bore an active part. In 1859 he succeeded in form
ing — what he had long been aiming to do — a companj' which
he could control in a manner to help the country and benefit
hiraself This was the Oregon Steara Navigation Corapany,
composed at first of the combined interests of several hereto
fore antagonistic companies or individuals, who were gradually
bought off until the company consisted of a few men who could
work together harmoniously, and of this company Captain
Ainsworth was president for twenty years.
Chief officer though he was, he attended to every detaU of
the business. He exacted good service, and rewarded generously.
The company made money, but it was put back into transporta-

GLIMPSES OF THE INLAND EMPIRE. 353
tion facilities, and enterprises which changed Oregon from an
impassable wilderness to a charraing route for tourists. Tho
United States railitary officer who was conducting an Indian
campaign; tho miner who was exploring for, or had found the
precious metal ; the stOck-raiser who fattened his cattle on the
bunch-grass plains, and brought them back to raarket them at
home ; the farmer vvho learned rather late the productive qual
ity of the soil east of the mountains, as well as the immigrant
and the traveller, all bad reason to tbank the Oregon Steam Navi
gation Corapanj- for the raeans which made it possible for them
to earrj' on their undertakings with ease and safety,— made it
possible not frora motives of gain exclusively, but with intelU
gent foresi.ijht for the countrj', as vvell as the company.
No corporation that ever was in Oregon has done for it and
for the countrj' north of the Columbia what this Navigation
Company did. Its career as a civiUzer has been only equalled
in Washington by the Northern Pacific Eailroad, which suc
ceeded to the ownership of the O.-S. N. Compan j-'s property by
purchase, a short tirae before Jay Cooke's failure, whicb came
near losing the railroad corapany its lands on the Portland
branch. Ainsworth had been raade a director in tbe Northern
Pacific, and was general manager of its affairs out here. When
Cooke failed the branch frora the Columbia to the Sound was
not' completed, and the meu employed Avero deserting, when the
old Navigation Company came to tbe rescue with its own funds,
paid off the men, and completed the road to Tacoma. They
were able afterwards to buy baek again a majority of the 0. S.
N. stock, and made improvements in its property before seUing
out to Villard, and assisting him to organize the Oregon Eail
way and Navigation Company, the control of whieh Avas relin
quished to the Union Pacific. I hope I have shown why the
name of Ainsworth should be preserved in the nomenclature of
Oregon and Washington. While legislatures aro naming new
counties, why not reraember this and others of the founders ?
At Pasco the Walla WaUa passengers aro detached from the
through train, and proceed to Wallula Junction, crossing the
Snake Eiver, whieh is very wide here, by a handsorae bridge.
A few miles more brings us to Hunt's Junction, which is just
above Wallula Junction, and the new town of WaUula, which
23

354 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
in general features resembles the old one, where the Hudson's
Baj- Company had its fort, — once called Fort Nez Perce, but more
commonly Fort Walla Walla. It is now fallen into ruins. Could
those tumbling old waUs speak, strange, tragical, and humorous,
often, would be the stories they would tell. Here McKinlay, to
avert a massacre, sat on the keg of powder with a lighted
raatch, and threatened to touch it off, if the sullen Walla Walla
chief failed on the instant to cease frora his insolent demands
and lay down his arms. Here Peter Skeen Ogden related his
amusing but not always very dainty adventures ; and Tora Me-
Kaj- recaUed the death of his father, w-hen the northern Indians
seized the Tonquin.
Hore, also, in the palmj' daj-s of the O. S. N. Company, was
a large floating Avharf ; and here was the terminus of Dr.
Baker's railroad to Walla Walla. This road causes Dr. D. S.
Baker, of Walla Walla, to be classed among tho founders, he
having built the first railroad in East Washington, from Walla
Walla to tbe Columbia Eiver, about 1876. It was a narrow-
gauge, and treated its patrons to nothing more luxurious than a
wooden seat in a box-car. But then it was not built so much
for passenger service as for the transportation of wheat from
the Walla Walla Valley to the Oregon Steam Navigation Com
pany's boats. Wheat, in sacks, was piled up six feet high,_ for
an eighth of a mile along the beach, just after harvest, and it
was a pretty- sight to watch the loading of the steamers for
Portland. A goud deal of mirthful comment was provoked by
some of the doctor's devieos, as, for instance, the use of old tin
oil-cans to w-ater tbe engine, the service not yet having reached
the dignity of tanks and hose. It was effort and not money
which made the founders worthy, and therefore we honor them,
recognizing that " The attempt
Is all the wedge which splits its knotty way
Betwixt the possible and the impossible."
This road was finally sold to the Oregon Eailway and Naviga
tion Company, and made standard gauge. It is still the only
direct route to Walla Walla from the Columbia Eiver, although
from Hunt's Junction that city raay bo reached by the devious

GLIMPSES OF THE INLAND EMPIRE. 355
ways followed by the Hunt system, or, officially speaking, by
the lines of the Oregon and Washington Territory Eailroad
Company. This system was intended to furnish transportation
to the farming comraunities in the Walla Walla and Umatilla
Vallej-s, and as such has been an iraportant factor in the devel
opment of theso fruitful regions. Together with tho Snake
Eiver and the Oregon Eailroad and Navigation Corapany, Avhich
has roads extending through the Palouse country, or Whitraan
County, this portion of East Washington is already quite well
furnished with transportation, — that is, if the railroads had cars
and locomotives enough on the ground at the proper tirae, whieh
this year thej' did not have.
The distance from the Columbia Eiver to WaUa WaUa City is
thirty miles. The Walla Walla Eiver flows, with short curves,
directly west from Eound Mountain, in the Blue Eange, where
it has its rise. Its main branch, the Touchet (pronounced Too-
shay), rises on the opposite side of Eound Mountain, and de
scribes a semicircle, vvith the main river for its base, all the
other branches describing lesser curves inside of this one, an
arrangement by whieh this valley is well watered. These
streams also flow near the surface level, making them easily
available for irrigation.
The railroad follows the course of the river, and for about
twenty railes the eountry is roUing, but at Dry Crook Crossing
the aspect of the landscape suddenly changes, and a level basin,
or plateau, bounded by the foot-hills of the Blue Mountains on
the east, and stretching away into undulating prairie on every
other side, strikes the eye as soraething new and charraing after
the mountains, caflons, and bunch-grass hills passed during the
day's ride.
This beautiful valley contains about eight thousand square
mUes of land unsurpassed for fruitfulness. Its elevation above
sea-level is nine hundred and twenty-six feet, or six hundred
and one feet above the Colurabia at WaUula, Its cUmate is the
warmest of any part of Washington, having a mean tempera
ture of 54°. In July the mean is 73.8°, and in January it is
32.4°. The greatest amount of moisture falls in December and
January, but its only dry month is July. Spring opens early.

356 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
and is more delightful than in anj' part of the State, — I had
almost said of the United States,— and I speak whereof I know.
Some years ago, before the era of railroads, I chanced to travel
leisurely- through this Walla Walla country, and to go as far as
Lewiston on the Idaho border. What a charming journey it
was! The atmosphere was almost intoxicating with vitality.
Overhead blue sky and sunshine. All about waving grass and
wild flowers. On everj' side larks pouring forth their liquid
notes. Dodging about among the bunches of grass were prairie-
hens, grouse, and a long-necked bird, which I did not recognize,
and which my driver said was a curlew.
" What is the use of so mueh neek ?" I inquired.
" I don't knovv," was the Yankee response, " unless it is to eat
out of a bottle."
Then I told bim about the man who grew excessively- fat eat
ing mush and milk out of a jug with a knitting-needle.
Later, in the summer's close, I returned through the sarae re
gion, and saw immigrants taking up these lands. There were
small cabins of one or two rooms (for lumber is not so plentiful
here as in the Puget Sound country) to shelter the families,
and just across the road from the cabins were newlj'-broken
fields, surrounded by sod-fenees and ditches (no expense for
fencing). The seed was put in on the newly-upturned earth,
and left to do the best for itself that it could. Imagine the
pleased surprise of these immigrants when they harvested
twenty-five to forty bushels of wheat to the acre! It was not
long before the cabins disappeared and comfortable farm-houses
arose in the midst of golden grain-fields.
This plenty and prosperity were the joint result of soil and
climate, and I need not analyze the one or the other. But
as I have generalized rather than particularized when speaking
of the productiA-eness of the soil of Washington, I will now in
troduce sorae statistics, obtained from the most reliable sources,
concerning the Walla Walla Valley, which does not, Uke the
Yakima Valley, require irrigation to produce crops.
The Census Bureau quotes Washington as yielding twenty-
three bushels of wheat to the acre, whieh is the largest average
given for any State in the Union. The average of Bast Wash
ington should be placed at thirty bushels of wheat per acre, but

GLIMPSES OF THE INLAND EMPIRE.

357

many farms produce from fortj- to sixty bushels, and seventy-two
bushels have been raised per aere, Oats go from sevontj' to
ninety and one hundred bushels, barloj- from forty to eighty,
and corn from twenty-five to forty bushels to the acre. This is
not a corn-growing country, as Illinois is, because the nights
are too cool, but farmers usuallj- raise a few acres ofit. Alfalfa,
clover, and tiraothy yield heavj' crops, — ^the first named yield
ing from two to four crops a j'ears.
Mr. Philip Eitz, formerly of Walla Walla, was the flrst to
experiraent with fruit-growing in this valley. When his or
chard was three j'ears old frora the graft he reported as follows :
A-IELD OF EACH TREE, VINE, PLANT, AND SHRUB.
Ist year. 2d year. 3d year. 4th year.
Apples  20 lbs. 50 lbs. 125 lbs. 260 lbs.
Peaches  15 " 35 " 100 " 200 "
Pears .  20 " 50 " 125 " 250 "
Plums  20 " 50 " 125 " 250 "
Cherries  5 " 15 " 50 " 100 "

From Offshoot.

Blackberries 

1st year, 2d year.
. 3 lbs. 8 lbs.

3d year.
15 lbs.

ith year.
35 lbs.

Easpberries 
Strawberries 

. 3 " 10 "

20 "
2 "

40 "
2 "

Grapes (at 2 years) .
Gooseben-ies (at 2 years)

. 3 " 10 "
. 2 " 5 "

25 "
10 "

75 "
20 "

Currants (at 2 years) . .
Pie-plants (at 2 years) .

. 2 " 5 "
. 8 " 20 "

10 "
20 "

20 "
10 "

When the trees were seven years old he gave the average
yield, per acre, of his orchard :

Pounds.

Pounds.
Apples .
40,000
Grapes . .
. . 40,000
Peaches . .
. . . 30,000
Blackberries .
. . 15,000
Pears . . .
. . . 40,000
Easpberries . .
. . 15,000
Plums ....
. . . 50,000
Gooseberries .
. . 5,000
Cherries . . .
. . . 20,000
Currants . .
. . 10,000
The raoney results of fruit-raising may be learned from the
books of a WaUa Walla gardener, last year's crop from four
acres being as follows :
358 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
16,000 pounds strawberries, at 6 cents  $960
500 " raspberries, at 7 cents  . 35
1,000 " blackberries, at 8 cents , . '. . 80
4,000 " cherries, at 7 cents . .... 280
7,500 " prunes, at 3 to 5 cents  300
2,000 " apples, at 2 cents  40
500 ' ' pears, at 3 cents .  15
Total  $1710
The average yield of vegetables per acre, in bushels, was :
Bushels.
Turnips  300
Carrots  1,000
Parsnips  800
Cabbage, pounds . . 20,000

Bushels.
Peas . . . 40
Beans  36
Potatoes  500
Sweet potatoes .... 200

Vegetables will in one year pay one hundred per cent, on ex
penditures. The various cereals and fruits of this valley are harvested as
follows :
Wheat, from the 24th of June to 10th of July.
Oats, from 1st of July to 20th of July.
Barley, from 20th of June to 1st of July.
Eye, from 1st of July to 10th of July.
Corn, from 20th of August to 10th of September.
Strawberries, from 1st of May to 10th of June.
Easpberries, from 10th of June to 20th of July.
Blackberries, from 25th of June to 1st of August.
Gooseberries, from 20th of June to 1st of July.
Cherries, from 20th of May to 1st of July.
As an oxamjjle of what talent, grit, and opportunity may
sometimes accomplish, I quote the Blaloek Farm, near the eity
of Walla Walla. Dr. N. G. Blaloek, of Illinois, arrived here in
October, 1872, having eorae overland with tearas, bringing his
faraily. He at once coramenced earning monej', — for he did
not bring any, — both by the practiee of medicine and the use
of his teams, putting all his income that could be spared into
land along the base of the Blue Mountains, and cultivating these
acres, the outcome of whieh went into more land, until he owned
five thousand, and in 1881 harvested ninetj- thousand bushels
of wheat and barley. His practice is now so large that he has
no time for farming !

GLIMPSES OF THE INLAND EMPIRE. 359
But how would Dr. Blaloek have gotten his five thousand
acres except he had como at a time when land was cheap, or
gotten ninety thousand bushels of grain lo the seaboard, if he
had raised all that, before the day of Dr. Baker's railroad ? It
is just an instance of the raan aud the hour coming together.
Perhaps it was Dr. Blalock's action which caused Dr. Baker
and other citizens to attempt a railroad.
The most serious drawback — and every country must have
a drawback— to the perfect desirability of the Walla Walla
Valley for a residence is the lack of timber. The nearest lum
ber supply is in the Blue Mountains, about twenty railes distant,
but lumber is also brought by railroad from Puget Sound and
Portland, Fuel is supplied from the Blue Mountains in a novel
manner,— namely, by a V-shaped flume, which carries the wood
from the raountains to within seven railes of town, where it
is loaded on flat cars and taken to its destination, the "Blue
Mountain Flurao Company" formerly owning a narrow-gauge
raUway from the terminus of the flume to Walla WaUa, which
is now owned bj-the Oregon Eailroad and Navigation Companj-.
Tho wood consumed in tho city and at Fort Walla "WaUa
amounts to twentj- -two thousand cords, only a Uttle more than
half of which comes from the Blue Mountains. It soUs for six
doUars to six dollars and fifty cents a cord. When tbe coal
mines of the Cascades are sufficiently developed, coal will un
doubtedly come into general use in the treeless regions; but for
the present all the slab and refuse timber of the mills in the
Cascades is carried by rail down into the A'alleys to be used as
firewood. Walla WaUa Citj' is not oue of the new towns of Washington,
and never had anj- real-estate excitement. The long occupation
of the countiy bj' the Hudson Bay Company, sorae of whose
servants remained here with their Indian relatives after white
people of American blood were driven out, furnished a basis
of settleraent dating back to the second decade of the cen
tury. But it was not until 1858 that sorae Araerican citizens
established ihoraselA-es on the site of the present citj-, under the
protection of the United States fort, erected the previous j'oar.
In 1859 it was decided among the settlers to lay out a town-

360 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
site, half a mile long and a quarter of a mile wide, with its east-
and-west streets one hundred feet wide, and its north-and-south
streets eighty feet ; and to leave off calling the settlement Step-
toe City and name it Walla Walla, which was done. In 1862
the Territorial legislature incorporated the citj-, with an extent
of oightj- acres. It immediately became an iraportant point, on
account of the necessitj- of an outfitting plaee for miners then
rushing to the Oro Fino and Florence Diggings, in what is now
the State of Idaho, and from that time until now it has been
the centre of a largo trade, supported first by the mining inter
ests of tho upper country, and more recentlj- by the agricultural
interests of tho vallej-.
A word about the name of Walla Walla, which I observe is
frequentlj' translated to mean the " vallej' of waters." I had it
frora the lips of the faraous Nez Perce chief. Lawyer, that walla-
walla meant the confiuence of two rivers, and, being used to
designate the junction of the river which waters the valley
wilh the Columbia, became used by Indians and white people
to designate the natives who lived about the mouth and the fur
companj-'s fort at that place. From this the white men spoke
of the river, and then of the river-valley, as the Walla Walla
and " the Walla Walla countrj-." It is not the custom of tbe
Indians to name rivers arbitrarilj- as we do, but to speak of cer
tain localities by some descriptive word, and to call the tribe
or faraily living thero by that name.
Tho designation chosen for Walla Walla by her inhabitants is
" Garden City," and well does she raerit it, for trees and flowers
fairly obstruct the view. There are few pretentious buildings of
any character, the business houses being usually no more than
two stories, and the residences siraple cottages and villas. In
the outskirts are a continually- increasing nuraber of the latter,
surrounded by beautiful grounds.
The city- has a handsome court-house, this being the eountj'-
seat ; a large and costly- public school ; a collegiate institution, —
Whitman CoUege ; several banks ; three daily papers, the most
important of which is the Union, pubUshed ever since 1869 ; a
free library and club-room; a hospital; free postal deUvery;
water- works; gas lighting; churches of all denominations, and,
in short, just what one would expect to find in an Eastern town

GLIMPSES OF THE INLAND EMPIRE. 361
of seven thousand inhabitants, besides a board of trade and a
business worth eleven million doUars annually. The land-offico
for this district is located here. So is the State penitentiary.
The flour industry of tho city and county amounts to two
hundred and seventy thousand barrels annually; the oldest
miller in East Washington being Mr. H. P. Isaacs, who erected
in 1862 a mill, whieh has been twice rebuilt to keep pace with
tho improvements which he found desirable. The very best of
roller flour is manufactured here, vvhich finds a market in Liver
pool and San Francisco,
Walla WaUa, besides its grain and fiour trade, jobs one milUon
dollars' worth of general merchandise throughout the valley.
One firm, H. Dusenberry & Co., whieh has been here since 1858,
furnishes a number of establishments iu outlying towns, and has
connections with San Francisco. No, Walla Walla is not a new
town, nor has it ever been said of it that it is a raarvel of rapid
growth ; but I think 1 like it all the better that its growth is
natural and hardy. Whatever "moss" it has upon it now will
fall off with a few more j'oars' increase.
The drives about the eity- are exeellent. The chief point of
attraction to visitors is the garrison, just outside of the city
limits. The post was established, as I have said, in 1856, by
Colonel Steptoe, at a point now w-ithin the present corporation,
but removed in the following year to tho sUght eminence which
it now occupies, and improvements were then begun. I have
been informed that the first wheat sown in the Walla Walla Val
ley was sown in this year by the troops at the fort, under the
direction of Quartermaster-General E. G. Kirkham. If we except
the grain grown by the mission superintendent in the '40's, this
is probably- true. Both gentlemen took it for granted that only
the bottom-lands were fit for agriculture, devoting the valley in
general to stock-raising, and it was some years before it was
found that the uplands were i)rime wheat lands.
The post was abandoned in 1866, and re-occupied in 1873,
since which date there has been a strong force kept here, and it
is a handsome and comfortable place of residence for the officers
and soldiers here stationed. It cuts no Uttle figure, besides, in
the trade of the town, there being expended by the military
each year about four hundred thousand dollars.

362 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
Another plaee of interest, although associated only with pain
ful ideas, is the site of the Waiilatpu mission, about seven railee
west of the city, where, in 1847, perished Dr. and Mrs. Whit
man, Presbyterian missionaries, and about a dozen others, at
the hands of the Cayuse Indians. One comraon mound marks
the spot where they were hastily buried by volunteer troops
from Wallamet Valloy after the flesh had been torn from their
bones by wolves. A movement is on foot to erect a monument
to the meraory of Dr. Whitman. The most suitable monument,
it seems to me, would be an endowment for the college which
bears his name, with a tablet inscribed to him set in its waU.
Of the towns in the Walla Walla, Waitsburg is one of the
prettiest. It is in the vaUey of the Touchet, where it is joined
by the Coppei, in the midst of beauty and fertility-. The place
was first settled by Mr. S. M. Wait about 1864, who built a
flouring-mill, then very much needed by the settlers, frora
which he cleared five thousand doUars in two months after it
was running. Soon tx-adesmen of various kinds settled about
him, and a town grew up which does houor to its founder. Mr.
Wait was one of the first to experiment with grain on the
uplands. Waitsburg bas a population of one thousand, who raaintain
good schools, support a daUy newspaper, and enjoy life in this
garden of plenty, which is also a raodel of good taste.
Another pretty town is Dayton. Like Waitsburg, it lies in a
A-alley, and is erabowered in trees, while it is surrounded by
wheat-fields which would seera continuous but for here and
there a line of poplars pointing out where a farm-house is con
cealed. The swift, cool Touchet flows through the town, and
turns the wheels of two flouring-mills, and is joined by a
smaller stream with a French name Petite, anglicized into Pattit.
Dayton has a population of two thousand flve hundred, a
handsome court-house, four publie schools, foundry, furniture-
factory, brewery, and other industries, besides five saw-mills in
mountains near by. It has a national bank, is Ughted bj' elec
tricity, and has water-works. The streets are broad, with good
sidewalks, and tempting fruit-gardens just over the fence. The
town was founded in 1871 bj- Jesse Daj-, formerly of St. Paul.
Both Waitsburg and Day-ton are reached by the Hunt system

A SUBURB OF SPOKANE.

WHAT ABOUT SPOKANE? 3tj3
of railroads, giving them outlets to the Columbia and connection
with the transcontinental linos.
Between the Touchet and tho Snake Eivers, in Walla WaUa
County, is a strip of eountry twenty miles in breadth by flfty
in length, lying on the top of a bench ofthe high hills south of
tho Snake, of which thirty by ten miles is a flat, eaUed Eureka,
of rich, loamy soil, constituting a region unsurpassed for fruit
fulness, and through it the Hunt railroad is run. In this favored
grain-land has sprung up recently the town of Fairfield, whieh
promises to bo able soon to compete with any of the older towns
in the county- in growth and prosperity-.
From theso brief observations on this part of the Inland Em
pire it will, perhaps, be possible to cateh some general view of
it and those features whieh contrast so strongly with the Puget
Sound region. It is at the same time an admirable counterpart,
each being necessary to tho completeness of the other.

CHAPTEB XXIX.
WHAT ABOUT SPOKANE ?
The route of the Northern Pacific to Spokane from WaUa
Walla is a tortuous one, and for a large part of the distance an
uninteresting one. It is haying-time, the weather is warm,
and travel dusty. The road winds among hills after the manner
of water seeking its level. Prescott, named after an officer of
the companj-, is a pretty place between hiUs, the approach to it
being along the Touchet Eiver bordered by thickets of mock-
orange. From here to the Snake Eiver there is little to attract
the eye. The Palouse country north of the Snake appeared
more thrifty. Along the streams were dense groves of poplar,
bireh, and willow, and thickets of wild roses. Endicott is in a
good farming region, and well built for a small, new settlement.
I observed several tree plantations along the route through
Whitman County. About Colfax the hills are dotted with
pines. I had a glimpse of Steptoe's Butte, where that offieer
was badly beaten by the Spokane and Coeur d'Alene Indians in
1858. On that butte he buried most of his command and

364 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
cached his howitzers previous to a stolen retreat to the south
bank of the Snake Eiver.
Farraington seeraed a town of considerable population, with
good houses and fencing. Eockford is in the edge of a lurabering
region, and is an old town built scatteringly- on the piney slopes,
whieh furnish tiraber for milUng. Taking it all in all, there is
little to remark on the journej', whieh ends after nightfall.
I was told in Walla Walla that I should not Uke Spokane
Falls, because it was " right in the woods." If this had been
said about many places west of the Cascades, there would have
been no surprise ; but a town " right in the woods" in the arid
region called a halt to my previous and, as I believed, well-
founded impressions. It was therefore with curiosity that I
peered through the window beside rae, as night drew on, to catch
the first view of the northern forest whieh I was assured sur
rounded the Phoenix of the Plains. But before I had discovered
it the train rolled into the well-lighted streets of a cheerful-
looking town, and the guard called out " Spokane !" By good
luck I went to a hotel just below the falls which gave the city
its name, and where I enjoyed from my room a view different
from, but strongly rerainding one of, thc great cataract of Niag
ara. It is true there is not the heavy roar of a large lake pouring
over a great height as at Niagara, but there is enougb water and
enough fall, or rather succession of falls, all roaring and foaming
together, to make a good deal of noise and a very attractive spec
tacle. _To the music of these waters I slept joyously, if I may
be allowed the term, and waked the following morning with a
feeling of exhilaration to corii mence my quest for information.
What a strange town ! Ten years ago it was a pioneer settle
ment of half a hundred houses, and had been struggling up to
this degree of grandeur for a previous ten years. Only ten
months ago thirty business houses, valued at six million dollars,
were consumed by fire. To-daj' the only reminders of this dis
aster to a J-oung citj' are the piles, not of burnt rubbish, but of
fresh building-material, which obstruct the broad av-enues. Nor
are the buildings which are replacing tho former structures of
a temporary nature, but of granite, brick, and iron, from three
to seven stories in height, and fashioned after the most elegant
modern styles. An opera-house costing over a quarter of a mil-

AVHAT ABOUT SPOKANE? 365
lion, a hotel costing nearly- tvvo hundred thousand dollars, a hand
some post-office, cable and electric street railroads, electric and
gas lighting, the povver furnished bj- the falls, water-works, and
every other modern appliance of a luxurious civiUzation, are to
be found hero. Yet Spokane Falls is three hundred and seventy--
two miles west of Helena, the nearest citj- on the east, and four
hundred railes east of anj- western raetropolis, standing alone
between the Missouri Eiver and Puget Sound, with seven rail
roads radiating to all the points of the compass, and bringing
to it the contributions of an iraraense area of trade.
The population of Spokane Falls is about thirty thousand.
There are, I am told, a hundred business blocks, costing from
thirty thousand dollars to two hundred and fifty thousand dol
lars each, covering the burnt district, and a thousand residences
being erected. Theso latter are chiefly of a cost to suit people
of moderate means ; but the city contains a goodly number of
elegant and even sumptuous dwellings, excelled bj' few in any
part of the United States, and the impression conveyed by a
tour about the streets from whicb business is excluded is that
there is an unusual number of refined homes in proportion to the
population. This impression is confirmed by the testimony- of
house- furnishing establishments, more goods of a costly charac
ter being sold in Spokane Falls than in any other town in Wash-
ino-ton. How far the merchants themselves are responsible for
this extravagance — for in too many instances it is extravagance
— can only be conjectured ; but I know that the same fully pre
vailed in California in an early period, and that it was accounted
for not only by the faciUty with whieh money was acquired, but
by the fact that cheap goods were not imported, and thero were
no local manufactories, therefore people were compelled to buy
that which the market afforded. The excuse of the merchants
was that for such long distances and high rates of freight it
did not pay to import cheap articles. This truth at once points
to the importance of home manufactures.
The city has four daily newspapers and several weekUes,
nineteen churches, numerous schools, pubUc and private, three
colleges, a home for the friendless, seven banks, a mining ex
change, and many handsome publie buildings. It has mUls for
grinding wheat and sawing tiraber, a sraelter for the reduction

366 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
of ores, and a number of factories in lumber, stone, iron, pottery,
lirae, and other articles in daily deraand and use. The sales of
real estate in Spokane Falls for the year ending in Deceraber,
1889, amounted to eighteen million seven hundred and flftj'-six
thousand three hundred and twenty-three dollars, and for the
first seven months of 1890 to ten million eight hundred and
seventy thousand dollars.
If you inquire of a citizen of Spokane Falls what raakes his
city what it is, he wiU answer you that on one side Ues a
vast region of the richest agricultural lands, rapidly being pop
ulated by intelUgent farmers, whieh whether sown to grain or
used to pasture stock aro productive of great wealth, and on
the other hand there are mining and timber regions productive
of even greater wealth. The total output of lumber for 1889
was thirty million feet; while the ore shipments from Cceur
d'Alene Mines in the same period wero seventy -two thousand tons,
of an aggregate value of four million three hundred and twenty
thousand dollars. The total of freight brought by the raUroads
to this citj' in the last year was about fiftj' thousand tons, and
the freight-bills paid aggregated two million dollars.
The eity, notwithstanding its recent losses by fire, paid sub
sidies to railroads to the amount of four hundred and fifty thou
sand dollars, and subscriptions to various city institutions to
the amount of three hundred and sixty-six.thousand doUars.
Such are the figures presented to one. It is plain from these,
and from everything we soe about us, that there is an abun
dance of capital in Spokane Falls. Since the fire a good deal of
borrowed capital has been employed to build up again, and
rauch of the fine property in sight is covered with mortgages.
But this fact does not seem to depress, much less dismay, the
mortgagors. Thej' point to the wheat-fields of the Palouse
country, the mines of Kootenai, Coeur d'Alene, Colville, and
Okanogan, and enumerate with j^ride the several new railroads
whieh will soon open up other districts, agricultural and mineral,
and always mention the truly magnificent water-power which
is destined to '¦ turn the wheels of progress." With a popula
tion annually almost doubUng, it seems probable enough that
the paragon city will go on and on until it reaches a rank on the
Pacific eoast second to no interior city on the Atlantic slope.

WHAT ABOUT SPOKANE? 367
The plain on whieh Spokane Falls is built is finely adapted to
the purpose. The bluffs recede from the river by several broad
terraces to the high mountains of the Spokane and Cceur
d'Alene Eanges on tho north and east, and raelt away into tbe
roUing plains of tbe Palouse and Big Bend countries. The long
slopes up from the river are beautifully wooded with pines,
which stand apart wilh grassy- intervals, giving the country a
park-like appearance, and causing rae to smile vvhen I reraember
the repulsion of my WaUa Walla informant towards the forest
gloom I should encounter in this limber region.
Until within a comparatively recent period tho country about
Spokane Falls was unoccupied. Duriug the period of mining
exeitemoiit in the '60's, thero vvas a great deal of passing back
and forth to Colville and Nortihern Idaho, but the proA-alont
opinion that the eountry was worthless except for cattle-ranges
deterred settlers of a more enterprising class. About 1870 two
raen, J. J. Downing and S. E. Scrantou, built a sraall saw-mill
at the falls of the Spokane, which in 1873 thej' sold to James
N. Glover, vvho disposed of an interest to C. F. Yeaton. Thoy
had also laid out a town-site, which they did not sell. There
seems to have been some settlement by this time, for these
owners found it advisable to enlarge the capacity of their mill
frora five hundred feet to two thousand feet per diem. A trading-
post had been connected with the mill from the start, which the
new owners enlarged, and a few more people had gathered in
the viciuitj', waiting for tho Northern Pacific Eailroad, when
its financial agent, Jaj' Cooke, failed and railroad construction
ceased, and after a tedious waiting of five years, from 1873 to
1878, the mill was again sold, to A. M. Cannon and J. J. Browne,
together with a half-interest in the town-site laid out bj' tho
original owners. In 1876 a fiour-mill was erected (which is
evidence that the agricultural capacitj- of tbe country had been
discovered) bj' Frederick Post, after whom Post Falls in Idaho
is named. The occurrence of Indian *\ars in 1873 and 1877
drove many of the settlers out of the country, whom the mili
tary hastened in their flight.
It is arausingly- related, in view of the present status of the
country, that General Sberraan expressed himself in this wise:
" This eountry is not fit for white men, at any rate. Give it up

368 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
for a reservation for the Indians, and go elsewhere. If j-ou are
bound to stay, you may as well make up your minds to keep
your guns ready and fight it out. We cannot cover this ira
mense territory with a few comjjanies of troops." However,
a post was established at Cceur d'Alene, and named Fort
Sherman, and tho people reraained.
The resuraption of work by the Northern Pacific brought
an increase of population, and wben the road was opened to
Portland, or to the Colurabia Eiver, in 1883, Spokane Falls had
fifteen hundred inhabitants. At the present rate of increase it
will have in 1893 oightj- thousand. A great Northwestern ex
position is to be held here this year,* at whieh specimens of
minerals found in the adjacent mountain regions will be among
the most important exhibits, although grains, fruits, and woods
will attract mueh attention for their excellence.
I was shown a novelty recentlj' discovered at Fort Spokane,
at the mouth of the Spokane Eiv-er. It is a white sand of a
eubular form, looking like granulated sugar. When found it is
in a compact form like rock, but on being struck with a ham
mer falls into loose particles. Tho only mineral known to re
semble it is found in Fostoria, Ohio, and is used for making
glass. In this city this snow-white sand is used in finishing
plaster, and makes a wall like marble, on which the most deli
cate tints ean be brought out in frescoing. As for marble, there
are mountains of it along the Spokane Eiver, and a rose-colored
building-stone vvhich calls to mind Euskin's " Stones of Venice."
The second day after my arriA'al I took passage on the Seattle,
Lake Shore and Eastern for Medical Lake, fifteen miles from the
eity, and a popular resort. The road vvinds araong tho hills, in
company with the Spokane Eiver, whieh is, everywhere that I
saw it, most picturesque and interesting. The windings bring
into view over and over again the eity at the falls, until having
cUmbed high enough the road enters a region of fir, cedar,
pine, and tamarack, not much resembling the forests of West
Washington, but sufficiently woodsy to justify a plainsman in
warning a raetropoUtan against it.
* It was successfully held, and a beautiful " Souvenir" published.

WHAT ABOUT SPOKANE? 369
Along the river for a few miles I observed wood-cutting and
brick making, with farming and gardening, and a good deal of
settlement all the way. I found Medical Lake to be ono of four
small lakes, the others being named Silver Lake, Ceilar Lake,
and West Medical Lake. Silver Lake, the largest of the group,
is to be connected with Medical Lake by a " motor" line, but
whether the motor is to be steam or eloctricitj- I did not learn.
By comparing the locality- with my recoUeetions of historj-,
and with Lawrence Kip's " Arraj- Life on the Pacific," and " In
dian Council in the Valley ofthe Walla WaUa," I perceived that
this was historic ground, where Colonel Wright had fought the
Spokanes at the Battle of the Four Lakes, when he so humbled
them that thcj- have raade no moro trouble to the present tirae.
Medical Lake is two miles long bj- one-half mile in width, and
sixty feet in depth. There is a bluff shore on the west side
covered with pines, and on the east side a bold and treeless ele
vation, on which the town is laid out. Taking a carriage at the
train I drove by a pleasant road along tbe west shore of the
lake a mile or more to some pleasure-resorts on the water side,
and baek around the north end to a hotel near the lake, and
afterwards made a voj-ago to its south end in a steam-launch.
Having thus seen it from all points, I visited the works where
the salts are manufactured by evaporation of tho waters, and
was shown over them by their superintendent. Dr. Middaugh,
who also exhibited various testimonials to the remedial value of
the waters, and the salts extracted from them.
An analysis of a gallon of the water giv-es, in grains—
Sodic chloride  16.370
Potassic chloride  9.241
Lithic carbonate  Traces
Sodic carbonate  63.543
Magnesic carbonate  "33
Perrous carbonate  ^-^
Calcic carbonate  -1^6
Aluminic oxide  1'°
Sodic silicate  10,638
Potassic sulphate  Traces
Sodic diborate  Traces
Organic matter  -""l
101.463
24

370 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
Various tales are related as coming from the Indians concern
ing the cleansing and healing qualities of the lake water; but
the simple story of a herder with a band of seabbj- sheep who
after being washed in the lake recovered of their sores appealed
raost strongly to my belief, the sodic qualitj' being so evident in
the water as to recommend it without argument as an anti
scorbutic. All this is not at all romantic, — I always avoid
" health resorts" where one meets unAvholesorae people, — never
theless, Medical Lake is a pretty place, with a population of
nine hundred inhabitants, raany of whom, it is said, have been
healed of their infirmities by- the lake waters.
On the bluff west of tho lake is the State Hospital for the
Insane, a large and handsome structure, which is not yet fin
ished and fumished, but whieh adds a noble feature to the land
scape. At tho close of a pleasant day I returned to my hotel
to listen to the music of the falls, and again to ponder upon
the wonders of that strangely rapid develoiraient of material
resources which is seen in its most surprising forms in the
Northwest. Perhaps one should not be surprised who studies the situation
of Spokane Falls, which is the centre, as has already been in
dicated, of a great extent of produetiA-e countrj-, whose con-
forraation and arrangement are exceedingly fortunate. Within
one hundred and fifty miles of Spokane are no less than twelve
rivers. Of these tho Columbia, Snake, Okanogan, Pend
d'Oreille, Kootenai, and Sj)okane are important. The others
are the St. Mary's, St. Joseph's, Cceur d'Alene, Methow, Col
ville, and Priest. The branches of all these make up a fine
system of natural irrigation. Besides the use to Avhich these
streams can be put in floating the timber of the mountains to
raarket, thoy are objects of beauty, and a joy to the resident or
traveUer alike. Several of them are connected with lakes
charmingly picturesque in appearance and navigable. There
are, besides, a great nuraber of smaUer lakes within a radius of
forty raUes, — one for every mile, — while in a radius of one hun
dred miles there are, large and small, fuUy eighty. The best
known and raost beautiful of these are Lakes Cceur d'Alene,
Pend d'Oreille, Kanisku, Diamond, Loon, Spirit, Fish, Hoodo,
Hayden, Kootenai, Upper and Lower Arrow, Okanogan, and

WHAT ABOUT SPOKANE?

371

Chelan. Sorae of theso lakes are nearlj- one hundred miles
long, with a width of one-third that distance. Spirit Lake is
one of the smaller class, and a bit of Swiss seenerj-, while Coeur
d'Alene is widelj- celebrated for its beautj-, and Lake Chelan, in
the Okanogan countrj-, with an area of fiftj- square miles, is
onlj- wailing to be as well known to becorae its rival.
Clarke's Fork of the Colurabia, or that portion of it known
as the Pend d'OreiUe Eivor, furnishes some of the wildest and

LAKE rBITD D'OREILLE.
grandest scenery to be found anywhere. It is a stream from one-
half to three-quarters of a mile in width between tbo lake and
the Columbia, but when within twenty-five miles ofthe junction
it rushes through a canon twenty feot in width, wilh walls frora
two hundred' to six hundred feet in height. The water boUs
and tumbles, throwing its waves up forty feet. The gauge of a
former flood is seen in a tree-trunk lodged between the walls

372 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
two hundred feet above the ordinary stage. Below the canon
a few miles is a fall of great height. This is in the Metaline
mining district, of which I shall have more to say in another
plaee. Tbe whole of East Washington lying betw-een the fortj- -eighth
and fortj'-ninth parallels is divided into three parts of about
equal extent; that Ij ing east of the upper Columbia is spoken
of as the Colville countrj-, and is both agricultural and mineral
in its resources. A separate account being given of its several
raining districts it is nocessarj- hero only to remark that it con
tributes daily from forty to one hundred tons of smelting-oi es
to the works in Spokane Falls.
Colville Valley- is a body of rich land, whieh extends from
the mouth of ColvUle Eiver to within forty-five railes of Spo
kane Fails. In the days of the Hudson Bay Company's occu
pation Fort Colville vvas a point of the greatest importance to
the American raissionary settlements, one of which was on the
Little Spokane Eiver, and the others at Walla Walla and on the
Clearwater, in Idaho. All the wheat the southern missionaries
had to eat for several years eame from the Colville Valley, and
was carried on horseback to their station, one hundred and fifty
miles I
The Eoman Catholic fathers also established missions, a little
later than the Protestants, in the Colville country and among
the Coeur d'Alenes and Pend d'Oreilles. Ofthe Protestant mis
sions there remains hardly a trace, but the Catholics still hold
their ground. The first log house of the Catholic mission at
Kettle Falls, on the Columbia near the company's fort, may still
be seen, but the spirit of it has removed to the newer town of
Colville, a dozen miles east of the Columbia. This place was
the joint result of mining and military matters, a post having
been estabUshed here during the Indian disturbances of 1859,
which followed upon the rush to the British Columbia mines.
Some French and half-breed settlers, with a few Americans, re
mained in the vaUey upon farras, where civilization is at length
in danger of overtaking thera. A railroad— the- Spokane and
Northern— passes up the VaUey lo Colville, and terminates be
yond at Little Dalles of the Columbia, where the great river
offers one of its several obstacles to navigation.

WHAT ABOUT SPOKANE? 373
The railroad takes a neariy direct northeriy course, striking
the upper valley of the Little Spokane. Within a year con
siderable improvement has been made within reach of the road
as fast as it was opened. Walker's Prairie, named after Elkanah
Walker, Presbyterian missionary of 1837, and forty-five railes
above Spokane FaUs, has now a settlement,— Squire City, or
Springdale,— with several business houses, and a daily mail,
whereas twelve months ago there was no trading-post within
thirtj--five miles. The railroad and the discovery of mines at
Chemokane have raade the difference. Walker's Prairie is a
good farming eountry, where grain grows enormously high
and vegetables raarvellously large. There are few settlements
as yet in the southern part of Stevens County (named after
General I. I. Stevens), and those few quite insignificaiit.
Chewelah, a plaee of importance on account of its mines,
spoken of in another place, is at tho foot of the Colville Valley.
From here to Colville City, twenty-three miles, the road runs
through a natural meadow, and, as haj- is a profitable crop, there
is little inducement to cultivate the soil. The town of Colville,
which contains about eight hundred inhabitants, is picturesquely
situated at an altitude of about fourteeen hundred feet, with
the valley on the west defined by timbered hills beyond, and
mountain walls encircling it on the north and east. The air of
this region is recommended for throat diseases, and the beautiful
drives about ColviUe are certainly an inducement to test it.
The eountry around is adapted to dairj-ing, hop-growing, and
fruit-raising rather than to the production of cereals, which re
quire more room to become profitable. Streams are numerous.
Snow falls and remains without drifting during the winter
months, moiling into the earth in the spring.
But Colville does not depend upon the value of ils soil for
farming. It is the centre of a rich mining district, and boasts
of a smelter vvhich turns out throe and a half tons of buUion
per day, while already the erection of substantial improvements
in building has commenced.
The Spokane Northern Eailroad has a branch from Colville
to the Colurabia Eivar at Marcus, a distance of eighteen miles,
and from Marcus north along the Columbia to its terminus at
Little Dalles. A number of town-sites have been surveyed

374 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
along the line of the railroad from Colville to Little Dalles, of
vvhich Kettle Falls, below Marcus five or six miles, is the most
promising. Should tho government clear the channel of the
Columbia of the obstructions at this place, and the Indian reser
vation bo opened up, all of which seems probable in the future,
Kettle Falls might become a not unworthy rival of Spokane
Falls. Much of this now raerely suggested greatness wiU de
pend on the route of the Great Northern Eailroad.
The Colurabia from the mouth of Spokane River flows sharply
west, though with many a deviation from a true course, for
sixty miles as the crow flies, to the mouth of the Okanogan or
Okinakane Eiver, a large tributarj- from the north which
parallels the main river above the bend made at the mouth of
the Spokane, and forms the western boundarj' of a reservation
set apart for the Colville Indians after the disturbances of 1877.
This tiact of countrj' is unsurveyed and little explored, but is
understood to be a mountainous region, containing small and fer
tile valleys. It is doubtless rich in rainerals and timber, but at
present is held by about seven hundred Indians, who do (if they
do nothing else) a good deal to preserve a smaU portion of the
earth's surface in a state of nature.
West of the Okinakane is what is known as the Okanogan
countrj', which is interesting at present chiefly on account of its
mines, although the valley of lhe Methow Eiver is known to
be of great fertility, and tbe whole is a good grazing section.
The onlj' part which is surveyed is south of Lake Chelan and
tho forty-eigbth parallel, but farming settlements are being made,
and I heard of an orchard of eight hundred apple-trees and
^various small fruits, including peaches, apricots, and grapes,
all in a healthful condition of growth. Euby Citj-, Silver City,
and other mining camps are at present the only towns in this
section, whicb is regarded as exceedingly rich in minerals.
Streams are numerous, and, coming from the mountains, serve
admirablj' for mining or irrigating purposes, and their naraes
are those of aboriginal origin, like the Loop-Loop, Chilliwhist,
Eptiat, Zurvush, Chewuch, Stomekin, JTwursp, ConeonuUy,
Wenatehee at the southern boundary, and Similkaraeen at the
northern. This region is not, strictly speaking, tributary to

FORT SHERMAN, CCEUR D'ALENE CITY.

See page 368.

AVHAT ABOUT SPOKANE? 375
Spokane Falls, being west of the Columbia and quite as near
Tacoma as Spokane. But the latter is making all the effort to
connect it by railroad to itself, and will undoubtedly prevail,—
the Spokane and Northern and the Washington Central both
reaching out after it. A more particular account of the Okano
gan mines is reserved for another place.
The remainder of East Washington included between the
Colurabia and Snake Eivers on the west and south is divided
by popular consent into the " Big Bend country," consisting of
six or seven millions of acres enclosed by the western bend of
the Columbia, whose southeast line extends from a point twenty-
five mUes we'st of Spokane Falls to Pasco, near the junc
tion of the Columbia and Snake Eivers, and "the Palouse
country," vvhich includes all of Whitman County, or all the
country on the Palouse Eiver and its branches.
A subdivision of the Big- Bend country is known as " Sage
brush land," and this strip, unfortunately for the pleasure of
travellers of tbe present period, is on tho main line of tho
Northern Pacific Eailroad. Tho soil is a light sandy loam,
which is not anywhere available, without irrigation, for the pur
poses of agriculture, but in this case is also " scabby," or rough-
ened-with outeroppings of basalt.
The western part of«the Big Bend country, embracing be
tween four and five raillion acres, was originally covered with
the nutritious bunch-grass, and wherever bunch-grass grows the
land is good for farming without irrigation, — a discovery only
made in recent times. One may travel a whole day (by stage)
betvveen Moses's Eancho and tho raouth of the Okanogan Eiver
without seeing in any plaee ten acres of land which cannot be
ploughed and which will not return a rich harvest. I have it
from good authority. Judge W. Lair Hill, of Seattle, that the
Big Bend eountry contains "tsvo thousand square miles of the
finest wheat land on earth," and I learn from residents in it that
there are no less than fifty thousand acres in crop this year
which will yield twenty-five bushels to the acre. Its only waj-
out, however, is by wagon to EUensburg on the west side of the
Columbia. No wonder the people of Spokane, BUensburg, and
the Big Bend country are impatient for a railroad.
Waterville is the county-seat of Douglas County in this great

376 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
wheat-producing region, but is waiting for the completion of
the Washington Central to start it on a career of prosperity, to
be supplemented by tbe arrival of the Great Northern, whose
route is not yet selected.
There are a number of towns in that part of the Big Bend
country included in Lincoln Countj-, near the Columbia, araong
which Wilbur is spoken of as taking the lead as an agricultural
centre. A country that grows wheat and oats six feet, and rye
eight feet in height, should have towns every thirtj' miles, and
is a good land in vvhich to place the agricultural college.
Coulee City, on the Columbia, is a striking example of the
growth of towns in this age of town-building. A quarter
of a J-ear ago there was nothing here but a camp of railroad
graders. All about waved perennial grasses, while the view was
broken hero and there by dikes of crumbUng basalt, and the
only- moving things in the landscape, aside from the railroad
graders, vvere a few cattle feeding, a rabbit, perhaps, followed
by a sneaking coyote, or a curlew Ufting its watchful eyes and
long bill above a tuft of the prevaiUng bunch-grass. But now I
WeU levelled streets stretch from one side of the town-plot to
the other. Two good bridges span the creek on which it stands ;
substantial buildings are rising all along the main avenue ; well-
stocked stores and business houses of esvery class are in place,
and the improvements belonging to a railroad division station
are already here. A system of water-works is under construc
tion, a school-district is organized and a school-house under
waj-, with a church-building in contemplation, a seven-column
newspaper on the spot, and a bank proraised. Such is the
method of all these railroad or land-corapanj' towns. This one is
expected to be the terminal point for freight going to Okanogan,
Methow, Lake Chelan, Wanacut Lake, Waterville, Douglas City
(on the road frora Sprague), and the ConeonuUy countrj-. So
long as it holds this position it will make progress, and in the
end establish itself on the merits of the Big Bend eountry.
Coulee claims the attractions of being in the midst of " the
best agricultural lands to be found out of doors ;" a cool climate
in sumraer, but one that will bring to perfection all the fruits
of the temperate zone. In the vieinitj- is a bottomless lake
suiTounded by a natural park, and that by scenes of the utmost

WHAT ABOUT SPOKANE? 377
grandeur, all of whieh features conspire to raake this a charm
ing summer- resort. Most of this is evident and true. But one
wearies of the immensity and even of the scenic attractions of
the great Northwest : you travel so far to find something that,
although undeniably fine, differs from the view in some other
place only by so-and-so.
And yet right here we have at hand one of the wonders of
the earth,— the Grand Coulee. It used to be called the " Grand
Coulee of the Columbia," from an impression that the waters
of the great river had some time run through it. Closer obser
vation has done away Avith that theory of its formation, and it
is now seen to be a rent in the earth, over one hundred miles in
length, and from three to eight miles in breadth, with waUs in
many places over ono thousand feet in height. These walls are
basalt, thrown out at four several periods, as the roeks give
evidence. All the curious features of the place are easily ex
plained if we bear this faet in mind. But this rent in the lava
was made after the last of these outflows had cooled and
hardened, because the opposite sides match. There are no traces
of the action of water, no gravel, no water-rolled boulders,
no indications of detritus at its lower end, which is at Island
Eapids of the Columbia, as its upper end is just west of Coulee
City. Among the many curious forms of the rocks is one called
the Steamboat, from its resemblance to a river boat. It is in
the Coulee, about eighteen miles from Coulee City, and the
stei"n-post of the stearaer is fourteen hundred feet above the
bottom of the chasra. Only on the eastern side can one climb
to the deck, but onee there a flne view of this enormous crevasse
is obtained. About half-way up a five-hundredfoot slide of
loose angular roek, on the ascent to the Stearaboat, are two
deposits of ice, which melting a little on the surface furnish ice-
water to the thirsty, and are called " ice-springs." It is thought
the snows of winter furnish the water and a draught of cold air
the freezing, this having been carried on until a solid bodj- of
ice has formed among the roeks, 'which melts a little by day and
freezes again by night, so that the supply remains from season
to season. It is not clear to me, however, how it is that not
enough heat gets into the interstices of the rocks to liquefy the

378 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
ice in the course of a summer, when the sun's reflection from
the walls of this crevice is intense. In the bottom of the Coulee
are numerous lakes and ponds, vehich gleam like silver on their
emerald background.
Toward its southwestern ond the Grand Coulee is divided into
smaller fissures, but nowhere except here at Coulee City is there
a crossing which could be used by a railroad ; and this one fact
secures for this plaee a certain future.
That strip of country through whieh the Northern Pacific
raain line is built has no towns of any consequence, present or
prospective, unless Pasco, by its position with relation to the
Columbia Eiver and railroads, should come to be of significalice,
as before intiraated. It is the county-seat of FrankUn County,
as Eitzville is of the adjoining county of Adams. Eitzville is
named after Philip Eitz, formerly of Walla Walla, a noted fruit
grower, and an enterprising citizen of East Washington in ante-
railroad daj-s. There is a land-office at Eitzville. Lincoln
County lies north of Adams, and is out of the sage-brush belt.
It only partly belongs to the Big Bend country, and joins
Spokane County on the east. Its county-seat is at Sprague,
named after General J. W. Sprague, of Tacoma, for a long time
an officer of the Northern Pacific. It has a population of two
thousand, and is a point of shipment for wheat, cattle, wool, and
other productions of the country. It is well built and enjoys a
large trade.
Cheney, once the eountj--seat of Spokane County, and a seera
ingly prosperous place, has apparently lost its hold upon fortune,
and has a look of collapse about it. It is prettily situated on a
plain, with a growth of young pines on a gentle slope above it.
Frora Cheney the Northern Pacific runs a line northwest to
Medical Lake, and thence north, northwest, and west, through
a farraing country, to Davenport in Lincoln Countj', paralleling
the Seattle, Lake Shore and Eastern, and making, probably, for
the Big Bend country. Davenport is a new town of one thou
sand inhabitants, in a region which possesses grazing, agricult
ural, and mineral land. A good deal of fruit is raised and marketed
from here ; and there is a large area of good laud unimproved.
The Palouse country is comprehended within the liraits of

WHAT ABOUT SPOKANE? 379
AVhitman County, naraed in honor of Dr. Marcus Whitman,
superintendent of the Presbyterian missions in Oregon Terri
tory from 1S36 to 1847, when he was killed, with his wife and
others, by the Cayuse Indians, who had become jealous of and
infuriated against Americans, on account of the annual immi
grations arriving in the country for several years previous, and
for other reasons. As the first American settler in Washington,
Dr. Whitman is entitled to the, distinction of having his name
given to tho finest agricultural county in it.
The Palouse country, which really includes a portion of
Spokane County, is about one hundred and fifty miles in length
by an average Avidth of fifty miles, embracing four million fiv.e
hundred tbousand acres, two-thirds of which, or three million
two hundred thousand acres, is available for wheat-growing, and
yields more grain to the acre than any other portion of the
United States. But only about one-third of this three million two
hundred thousand acres is under improvement, and onlj' about
eight hundred thousand in wheat. At the low average (for this
countrj-) of twenty bushels per acre, the crop would amount to
sixteen raiUion bushels. If only twelve raillion bushels were
marketed at fiftj- cents per bushel, the crop would bring six
raiUion dollars ; and accordingly, as the fields are looking won
derfully well, bright hopes are entertained of a profitable year.
[But let me here write between the Unes that it is not every
year that a full crop raay be expected, and that the best farmers
suramer -fallow their fields, taking a crop only onee in two years,
thus saving the expense, as great for a poor as a good year, of
putting in and harvesting on the off year, while they get a
double crop after letting the land lie idle.
The year 1890 was a good one all over Bast Washington, and
the amount of wheat raised in the Palouse, WaUa Walla, and
Big Bend countries did not fall short of thirty million bushels.
Farmers looked at their fields and expected to grow rich quickly.
But behold how the unexpected happens I Although the trans
portation companies were informed of the prospects of an un
usual demand for their services, they raade no preparations to
meet it. The market prices opened fairly, but declined when it
was found there vvas an overplus. Wheat-elevators and store
houses were filled, and thousands of tons lay piled upon the

380 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
ground exposed to the weather. Freight-cars could not be ob
tained to carry it either to Chicago or Tacoma, and one general
wail went up from the Palouse country as prices w-ent down.
The railroad and elevator companies were accused of combining
against the farmers. The facts when sifted down seemed to
show that the railroads had been negligent; that the people
themselves were negligent in not securing river-transjiortation
to Portland or not making known to European ship-owners the
amount of the season's crop ; but, even if all the wheat raised
had been carried to Portland and the Sound, there was not
storage for it while vessels made a four-months' voyage from
Liverpool to receive it.
The lesson of that year seems to be that railroad and other
transportation companies, while they have caused and encour
aged the development of the country, have not themselves been
able to keep pace with it. It seems to teach also that there
should be intelligent organization amongst the agriculturists,
and means provided against loss. The Columbia Eiver is the
natural and economical outlet for the grain-fields of East Wash
ington and Oregon. Yet, since the Oregon Eail waj- and Navi-
tion Company have owned the steamboats on this river, naviga
tion has become so far secondary to wheel service that at The
Dalles, in November, sacks of wheat were piled ten feet high,
and frora a quarter to half a mile in length of line, besides that
which was housed I It was thus accumulated at first for lack
of transportation, and afterwards held for higher prices. Steam
boat service, sueh as the Oregon Steam-Navigation Company
formerly furnished, would have given the needed relief, the
grain have been moved earlier, and prices have remained firm
while vessels eame to take it away. But, why should vessels
comef Why do not American A-essels go as thej- are needed?
This being a question of poUtical economy to be settled by Con
gress or Legislature, I leave it unanswered.
It should here be remarked that this blockade in transporta
tion causes little distress. It is chiefly embarrassing as affect
ing the mercantile class whose collections are impeded by
it. The good effect will be to set tho farmer.s thinking what
they can do to prevent a recurrence of similar misfortunes.
Already the Palouse country agriculturists are agitating the

WHAT ABOUT SPOKANE? 381
proposition to build an independent railroad to Puget Sound,
while others along the Colurabia propose a steamboat companj-.
But the great railroads are not going to allow independent com
panies to succeed, although the fear of them may compel a
better service.]
It is not to grain alone that land-owners are nbw giving their
attention, although when wheat-raisers have a good year they
make money in one season. Fruit and vegetables are more
profitable per acre, and fruit once in bearing gives verj- regular
returns. To any observer it is evident that not more than half
enough fruit is raised for the requirements of the population.
Indeed, hovv should it be, when the population doubles everj-
year or two ? But fruit is no longer an experiment in the
Palouse country, and large orchards are being planted along the
Palouse Eiver, while in the Snake Eiver Valley this is the chief
interest of the settlers. Spokane depends on the Snake Eiver
Fruit Growers' Association for peaches, pears, prunes, and small
fruits. Even the Walla Walla crop of ben-ies and peaches may
have to be helped out by their abundance. But while fruit is
shipped from California, as it now is, to this distant region, it is
evident there is room for new orchards.
Colfax, at the south fork of the Palouse Eiver, of which I
have before spoken, is the county-seat of Whitman, and a
thriving place of seven or eight hundred. It was founded
about 1876, and is touched by raUroads frora three directions, —
roads that go everywhere but in a straight line, seeking freights
from the great grain centres. One of these is over the Une in
Idaho, at Genesee; another, also in Idaho, at Moscow; Garfield,
Farmington, Salteese, Oaksdale, EosaUa, all in Whitman County ;
and another at Eockford, in Spokane County. Most of these
roads were or are being constructed by the Oregon Eailway and
Navigation Company.
It will be readily seen how great an area and what vast re
sources Spokane FaUs claims as tributary to itself in Washing
ton. But there remains to be added the rich mineral regions of
Cceur d'Alene and Kootenai. There raay and will build up
rival cities in the ColviUe and Big Bend countries, at no very dis
tant day ; but the pan-handle of Idaho does not seem adapted
to such designs, at least in its northern end, therefore Spokane

382 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
seeras quite sure of a share in the wealth being extracted from
its mines.
But it is not for minerals alone that the Idaho annex to Wash
ington is valuable. Besides the rich lands about Moscow and
Genesee, the large bodies of timber on the Coeur d'Alene and
Pend d'Oreille EiA'ors, or that can be brought to the mills at
Spokane Falls, either by fioating frora the Coeur 'd Alone, or by
railroad when the Great Northern is corapleted to this eity, con
stitute one of its most valuable resources.
Lake Cceur d'Alene receives the Avaters of the Coeur d'Alene,
St. Joseph, and St. Mary's Eivers. Along each of these and on
the mountains grow the white and yellow pine, cedar, and tam
arack. The quality of this timber is equal to that of Puget
Sound, and the cost of getting it out is small. The business of
"booraing" logs to Spokane Falls is already begun, one mill
there cutting one hundred thousand feet per diem.
Clarke's Fork, or Pend d'Oreille Eiver, runs out of the lake,
whieh is a large one, and, as I have before said, falls into the
Colurabia, and consequently cannot be used for booraing logs to
Spokane Falls. But Priest Eiver, which flows out of Kanisku
Lake into Pend d'Oreille Eiver, near the lake, has upon its
borders one hundred thousand acres of pine, cedar, and tamarack,
some of the pines having a diameter of six feet, and trunks that
are clear of limbs one hundred feet from the ground.
There is on the upper Kootenai, or Flat-Bow Eiver, lying
chiefly within the United States, and on the eastern prong of
the bow which gives the river its name, an almost unknown
region, whieh is only now beginning to be heard of. It is
watered bj- raany streams falling into the Kootenai, namelj-, the
Mooyie, one hundred and fifty miles in length ; tbe Yakh, ninety
miles long, and half a dozen creeks of considerable size. The
mountains lying south ofthe Kootenai are heavily timbered,
and those on the north less densely covered, with the bunch-
grass growing between.
Along both banks the bottom-land is clear and covered with
grass. This strip is from six to ten miles in width, and sixty in
length, with a deep soil which wUl produce any kind of vegetables
or fruits of the temperate zone. The grass grows from March to
November, and mUUons of tons of hay mightbe saved annually.

CLARKE'S FORK OF THE COLUMBIA.

See page 371.

AVHAT ABOUT SPOKANE? 383
Eanchmen are already driving herds in here, which settlers will
in time drive out. The country will not be improved, however,
until it is drained, above the boundary line, by a canal from the
Kootenai Eiver to the Upper Columbia Lake, a distance of little
over a mile, a scheme in which an English syndicate is interested.
There is at present an annual overflow in tho bottom-lands
below the boundary, which it is believed will bo relieved by the
canal in British Columbia. Mineral discoveries are being sought
for in this region, and to some extent found, in galena and float-
coal. The route to this now wilderness is via the Northern Pacific
Eailroad to Kootenai Station, on Lake Pend d'Oreille, thence by
toll-road to Kootenai Eiver, eighty miles, and by boats of a
quaint fashion the remaining distance, or as far as the explorer
pleases to go,— for there is a good depth of water for over two
hundred miles up into British Columbia, where no doubt it will
soon be the fashion to go for a sumraer's outing.
At Hauser Junction on the Northern Pacific, which is just
east of the Idaho line, a branoh road runs south to Post Falls
on the Spokane Eiver, which is the outlet of Coeur d'Alene
Lake, and thence to Coeur d'Alene City at the head of the lake.
This beautifully-located place, with Fort Sherman, is rauch
resorted to by travellers and residents. On its southern shore
is about to be erected a club-house, whore the raining men resi
dent in Cceur d'Alene raining district may spend their Sundays.
Is this suggestive of Cape May or Long Branch? It is the
same thing with a. difference. It is nineteenth-century luxury
in the raidst of tho exciting race for wealth in a virgin world.
There is a mountain opposite Post Falls which the Indians
regard as having a benign influence upon tho lives of those
loA'ers who seek its influence at the time of their marriage. It is
haunted by a spirit which answers to the Greek god Hj'men.
Here are held the wedding festivities of the Coeur d'Alenes
who truly desire love and unity.
The scenery of these lumbering and mining regions is on a
grand scale. It educates the eye of the most coramonplace
beholder, as it also broadens his knowledge of natural science
by illustration and his views ofthe authorship ofthe great book
of creation by inference. The men found in wilderness places

384 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
are often an agreeable surprise, from the nuraber of things they
are able to teach the conventionally educated. But it is not
uncoraraon to find among prospectors, surveyors, miners, and
lurabermon, college-bred men, as well as specimens of the genus
homo of every other variety. The rarest of all is to find one
reserabling the type invented for literary effect by writers of
Araerican fiction, and badly copied by our cousins over sea. If
there is one in all this Northwest, he remains hidden from my
observation.

CHAPTEE XXX.
ABOUT GEOLOaY AND MINERALOGY IN WASHINGTON.
The history of the formation of the countrj- north of the
Columbia is given in about these words by Professor Condon :
" During the older geological period, when the Pacific Ocean
covered all Washington west of the Blue, Bitter Eoot, and
Coeur d'Alene Mountains, the Cascade Eange, one hundred and
fifty miles from the then ocean-beach, was being slowlj- lifted
up from the bottom of the sea, until it formed a barrier ex
cluding the ocean from Bast Washington, and changing the sea
shore to the west slope of the Cascades, where conditions favor
able to coal-deposits existed, resulting in the laying down of a
vast coal-field extending almost frora the northem to the south
ern boundary- of the State.
" After ages given to the draining and drj-ing up of the inland
sea and the deposition of rocks and soils east of the Cascades,
the Coast Eange was elevated in the same gradual manner, the
ocean, however, not being excluded frora the long north-and-
south depression between the two ranges. This is shown by
the fresh-water sediraent in the later rocks of the interior,
while the sediments in the rocks west of the Cascades are
marine. As in the former instance of upheaval, the conditions
again favored the deposit of coal, but of an inferior quality,
being lignites.
" The glacial period following the tertiary, grinding down the
mountains and scooping out the valleys, gave the country its

GEOLOGY AND MINERALOGY IN AVAWHINGTON. 385
most striking features. As these glaciers moved down the
mountains, mueh higher then than now, ico-fioes were formed in
Avhich were irabedded blocks of slate and boulders of granite,
and as these fioes floated on the waters or molted on the earth
where thej- were stranded, thej- deposited these fragments over
the futuro Stale of Washington, to be found and utiUzed in our
nineteenth centurj-. When the glacial period was passed the
waters distributed their mud, gravel, and sand, forming those
deep deposits found on the shores of Puget Sound, Gray's Har
bor, and Shoahv-ater Baj-. Then followed another period during
w-hich the waters wero drained off and the country assumed its
present general appearance."
From this history is deduced these facts in regard to minerals
in Washington: The coal-bearing belt on the west slope of the
Cascades belongs to the early cretaceous period, as do also the
gold-bearing slates, limestones, and marbles of East Washington.
But the sandstones, bearing marine shells of a later type, found
abundantly in tho hills bordering the Sound, the Chehalis and
the CovvUtz Eivers, and the lignite coals of West Washington,
belong to the tertiary period ; while the high, light-colored
bluffs on the Sound and the bays before referred to belong to
the quaternarj'.
Of the various rainerals belonging to the Northwest coast
already enumerated in the mineralogy of Oregon, few have
been to any extent developed in Washington, these few being
coal, iron, gold, silver, limestone, and sandstone.
Coal was known to exist in the Cowlitz Valley as early as
1848, when a small quantity was sent to San Francisco to be
tested, and declared worthless. Two years later it vvas dis
covered at Skookum Chuck, one of the forks of tho Chehalis
Eiver. Meanwhile it had been heard of at BeUinghara Bay,
and on the StiUaguamish Eiver about the same period. An
analysis of croppings was raade in 1851 for the Secretary of tho
Navy ; and tho Paciflc Mail Corapany, whose coal cost them
forty doUars per ton, employed agents to explore for this mineral
on both sides of the Columbia.
The first coal-claim taken up was by WiUiam Pattle, an Eng
lish subject, looking for spar timber on the eoast of the Fuca
26

386 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
Sea, in October, 1852. He located a tract immediately south of
the present town-site of Sehome. His associates, Morrison and
Thomas, took each a claim, and a company was formed called
tho Puget Sound Coal-Mining Association, which worked the
Bellingham Bay mines from 1860 to 1879, with an average
annual yield of thirteen thousand tons. A coal discovery was
also reported near Clallam Bay, on the Strait of Fuca, in 1867,
which vvas never worked.
About this sarae period a vein of coal was partially opened
on Black Eiver, ten miles southeast of Seattle, by Dr. E. H.
Bigelow, who sold it to a companj', which failed to make it
remunerative, on account of its reraoteness frora navigable
waters, and other causes. Coal had also been found in Squak
Valley, fourteen miles east of Seattle, and a few tons taken out
and sold. AU theso discoverie.j and efforts failed,- partly through
want of knowledge and greatly through want of capital.
At length, in 1863, a coal claim was taken up eleven railes
southeast of Seattle by Philip H. Lewis, Avhose exaraple was
followed bj' several others, and a corapany was formed. A road
was opened to Seattle, and one hundred and fifty tons of coal
were sold there for ten dollars a ton, and used on stearaers. This
drew attention to the mine, whieh was finally incorporated
under tho name of the Lake Washington Company, with a capi
tal stock of five hundred thousand dollars. In 1870 it sold out
to a new organization, styling itself tbe Seattle Coal Company.
There was a tramway built from the raine to Lake Washington,
a seow and sraall steamer, for towing, being placed on the lake.
With this beginning the Seattle corapany vvas able to make a
success of coal-mining.
The Eenton Mine, next in importance and point of time to
the Seattle Mine, was first worked about 1873, and has proved
profitable. A nuraber of locations were made on Cedar and
Black Eivers, about Seattle, and on the StiUaguamish, Snoho
mish, and Skagit Eivers, all on the east side of the Sound.
Tho first actual prospecting for coal in the Puyallup VaUey
was in 1874, when some exploiting was done on Flett Creek, a
tributary of South Prairie Creek, a branch of the PuyaUup, by
an association of three men. About the sarae time a surveyor
found coal on the Northern Pacific Eailroad land, half a mile

GEOLOGY AND MINERALOGY IN WASHINGTON. 387
distant, whieh led to a thorough exaraination of the eountry for
twenty-five square railes, and to tho working of the raines at
WUkeson and Carbonado, Quito recently the coal-beds in the
Skagit Valley have been opened and to a considerable extent
developed. One vein in what is known as the Cumberland Dis
trict is thirty feet in thickness, and another fourteen. The
quaUty of tho coal is said to be exceUent, and the field very
extensive. Its analysis gives fixed carbon 65.70, volatile matter
30.30, ash .038, sulphur .005. Its freedom from sulphur and
low percentage of ash are remarkable, promising a coking coal
of great density and purity. A third vein five and a half feet
through at the surface and gaining thickness with depth is also
being opened. This mino belongs to the Skagit €oal and Trans
portation Companj-, or Nelson Bennett and associates, who own
about three thousand acres of coal-lands near Sedro, twenty-nine
miles east of Fairhaven, with which it is connected by railroad.
The comparative values of the Seattle and Tacoma, or Green
Eiver and Puyallup coals, is given in the foUoAving table :

Seah.

.1,
ce o

o
-S6•a

o

d

Coke.

*o

?%

s

J3

^

W

g
a
E
¦?
>"
Lignites.
Newcastle 
4.16
44.84
43,86
7.14
0.98
None.
Green Biver, Seam (?) , .
7.27
36.02
28.48
28.23
0.79
"
 33.,.
9.98
40.63
41.07
8.32
1.01
"
 ^V. ¦
8.68
35,90
47,07
8.36
1.31
*'
BiTUMiKons Lignites.
Green Eiver, Seam 18 . .
2,50
45,71
48.37
3.42
1.06
Poor.
 9.
4,82
42,02
37.12
16.04
0.88
None.
 6 
3.34
39,39
41.49
15.78
1.05
*'
 3 
3.24
39,52
48.39
9.85
1.22
Worthless.
BrnjMiNODS Coals.
Wilkinson Field, Wingate Seam .
1.80
42.27
52.11
3.82
1.23
Very good.
Seam 123 ... .
3,98
28.64
64.10
13.28
1.88
None. (?) (b)
"18
1,33
25,88
60.67
12.12
2.34
Excellent.
" " 5
1,16
29.09
60.38
9.37
2.07
"
.... 1
1,54
28,17
59.70
10.59
212
Poor. (?) (b)
"53
0,61
29,58
56.18
13.63
1.89
Black and friable.
Extensive deposits are known to exist in the ChehaUs Vallej',
and, although geologists assign this to the tertiary period, I see
no reason why these coals should not be as valuable as those on
the coast, at Coos Bay or BelUngham. The cost of mining the
ATLANTIS ARISEN.

coals of Western Washington is light, aA-eraging one dollar and
ten cents per ton.
The onlj' coal-mine on the east slope of the Cascades is at
Eoslyn, on the line of the Northern Pacific Eailroad, to which
company it belongs. This mine furnishes the locomotives of the
road wilh steam fuel, and this coal is shipped to Montana, Dakota,
and Minnesota to grade up the inferior coals mined in those
States, while the Oregon Eailway and Navigation Corapany and
Oregon Short Line are glad to use any surplus which raay be
had. A vein of anthracite is reported discovered on the We
natehee Eiver, northeast of Eoslyn. The output of the various
mines for two years is thus tabulated in the report of the
governor of Washington for 1889.
Comparative Statement of Coal mined in First and Second
Districts for Years ending September 30, 1888 and 1889.

Name.

1888.

1889.

First Distnct.

Tana. 49,160 36,149 2,300
203,702 14,371

Tans. 26,60045,107 6,738
195,387 8,081

South Prairie  . ....
Wilkeson  
Carbon Hill 
Tacoma Goal and Coke Company 
Total  Second District.
Franklin 
Black Diamond 

305,682

281,913

182,921 186,522 52,813 13,528
234,201 158,134

186,844 105,256 23,12041,482
230,548 76,122
22,819

Cedar Mountain 

Q-ilman 
Koalyn 
Newcastle  
Durham 
Total 
Output first district 

828,119

635,690

305,682828,119

281,913 635,690

Output second district 
Total output 

1,188,801

917,608

GEOLOGY AND MINERALOGY IN AVASHINGTON. 389
The decrease in shipments in 1889 is accounted for by com
petition Avith British Columbia mines, and the decline of prices
in tho California markets. That this was not tho true cause
seems evident when it is known that during the autumn and
winter of 1889-90 there Avas almost a coal famine in San Fran
cisco, and that prices ruled high. It looks raore Uke a corabl
natlon among coal-miners to force prices up. The market in
San Francisco is variable, owing to the fact that English vessels
coming out in ballast to load with wheat and salmon carry coal
instead of rock in the hold, and sell to dealers for a moderate
price coal of a good qualitj-. This is a kind of competition
whieh cannot always be foreseen or provided for.
It is an interesting faet that the great Southern Pacific sys
tem of railroads is compelled to depend upon Washington for
steam-making fuel. That corporation owns the Carbon Hill
mines in the Wilkeson district, four in number, which furnish
about eight hundred tons dailj-. A railroad has been constructed
through the canon of Carbon Eiv-er, with a descending grade,
whieh carries the jjroduct of the mines to the bunkers at
Tacoraa, where it is loaded on a steamer carrying four thousand
tons whieh raakes thirtj--five trips a year. Sailing-vessels carry
the remainder of the output.
When this coal was used in its natural state it carried with it
so much dirt and grit that the lives of the engineers on the
Southern Pacific were rendered burdensome by the effort to
keej) up steam. A remedy was found in washing the coal,
whieh is now being shij^ped perfectly clean, the saving in trans
portation moro than paying the expense of washing, while the
danger from sparks is very much les.sened.
The other Wilkeson raines being worked belong to the Ta
coraa Coal and Coke Company, of whieh A. C. Smith is presi
dent; and the Wilkeson Coal and Coke Company, Hugh White,
president. The Bucoda mines are on the head-waters of the
Chehalis Eiver, in Thurston County. They once forraed tho
main supply of the Northern Pacific EaUroad, and belong now
to the Northwestern Coal and Transportation Corapany, of
whieh Sarauel Coulter is president. The superintendent says of
thera that the seara being worked is seven feet in thickness,
with dark-blue sandstone roof, with the sarae rock one hundred

390 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
feet thick for a fioor. Beneath this is another vein ten feet
thick, resting on a floor of fire-clay six feet thick and of good
quality. Under the fire-clay- is a Ught-colored sandstone one
hundred and sixty feet in thickness, overlying an eighteen-
feet seam of very good coal. The Bucoda coal is a black
lignite, preferred for domestic purposes. The three seams all
pitch five degrees to the oast, which makes it convenient to
work. The Northwestern Coal and Transportation Company shipped
forty-two thousand six hundred and seventy-five tons during
the J-ear ending December 1, 1889, which is a third raore than
mentioned in the report of the governor quoted above. The
coal-mines of West Washington employ over two thousand
miners and other laborers, and no miners receive less than three
dollars a day. This, too, is but the beginning of a verj' great
industry, and the tirae will soon arrive when Washington will
riv-al Pennsylvania in coal and iron piroduclion.
Iron follows naturally after coal, one being necessary to the
other in manufactures. This northwest corner of the United
States is fortunate in possessing them in conjunction. The iron-
ores of Washington comprise bog-iron or limonite, hematite, and
magnelic ore. Bog-ore is found underlying the flats bordering
Puget Sound. Large beds of magnetic ore occur in the Cas
cade Mountains, at a height above the water-courses of frora
tw-elve hundred to fifteen hundred feet. The largest discovered
deposit is on the Cle-elura Eiver, in Kittitas Countj' on the east
side of the range, aud about twenty-five miles north of the
Northern Pacific Eailroad. It is owned by the Moss Baj- Com
panj-, an English corporation which designs manufacturing
iron and steel on a large scale. Extensive deposits are also
found on the Snoqualmie Eiver, whieh are reached frora Seattle
by the Seattle, Lake Shore and Eastern Eailway. The ores
from this section are what are termed typical steel-ores, of a
superior qualitj-. Analysis gives a greater per cent, of raetalUc
iron than the average of Lake Superior or Iron Mountain,
Missouri, ores, with more sulphur and less phosphorus than
those, and with very little more siUca thau the former, and
mueh less than the latter. The present difficulty in working the

GEOLOGY AND MINERALOGY IN WASHINGTON. 391
Snoqualmie ore is tho gaugue-roek, and experiments are being
made at eastern iron-works with good results.
In the Skagit Vallej-, near Cedro, is Iron Mountain, separated
from Connor Mountain, in which are found coal deposits, onlj'
by a deep gorge. In this mountain are leu distinct veins vary
ing in thickness from tw.olve to seventy -five feet, and iu a favor
able position for tunnelling. The ore occurs in precretaceous
crystalline roeks, in which Umestone also occurs, and proof of its
true bearing and great magnitude is found in the drift and an
cient volcanic roek associated with it. The iron is of a rich
black color, of strong polarity and even fracture, surpassing in
purity and merit the Lake Superior ores occurring in the same
geological formation. Some of the ledges contain a high per
centage of manganese, which it is believed with proper treat
ment will make it valuable for the manufacture of steel. A
practical Avorking test of the ore in the Irondale smelting works
resulted in obtaining sixtj' per cent, of pure iron.
The only iron-mine in Washington aetuallj' developed is in
Chiraaeum Valloy, two and a half railes from the Irondale furnace
on Port Townsend Baj-. Tho ore in this case Ues in a blanket
from ten to twenty inches in thickness immediately under the
sod of the vallej'. is porous, but suflScientlj- solid to be dug in
lumps. Tho analysis gives :
Metallic iron .  41.83 per cent.
Phosphorus . . 0.751 '•
Phosphorus iu 100 parts iron . 1.795 "
In 1880 the Puget Sound Iron Companj-, Cj-rus Walker, presi
dent, erected a furnace 'for sraelting iron near Port Tow-nsend,
calling the place Irondale, and commenced work in Januarj-,
1881, the first iron raade in Washington being turned out on
the 23d of that month. The ore used was obtained from the
dairy farm of William Bishop, at Chimaeura, and from JTexeda
Island in the Fuca Sea. Thero is ore enough in tho Chimaeura
Mine to keep a fortj--ton furnace running for twenty years, but
it requires raixing with another qualitj' of ore. The Texeda
Mine is a fissure vein, eighty feot Avide, bearing sixty-two per
cent, of metal of exeellent quality and inexhaustible in quantity,
although the ore requires to be desulphurized by roasting. It

392 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
costs about two dollars a ton deUvered at the furnace. The
Chimaeura iron is soft, while the Texeda is hard, and by mixing
the proper densitj' is obtained. The charcoal used in smelting
is made from tho timber at hand, and the lime comes frora San
Juan and Orcas Islands at a dollar and a half a ton, the cheap
ness of all these materials adding greatlj- to the success of the
manufacture. The pig-iron produced here is equal to the best in
the United States.
The Union Iron Works of San Francisco have their smelting
works at Irondale, and it was here that tho material was manu
factured frora which the United States cruiser " Charleston'' was
constructed. Thus Washington furnishes both coal and iron to
the Golden State.
Magnetic iron-ore is found on San Juan Island, but it contains
so large a percentage of phosphorus as to be of little worth.
There are also large beds of raagnetic and red heraatite ores of
a high grade about twenty railes northeast of Vancouver, Clarke
County. In connection with iron, limestone may be named as of im
portance. The deposits which have been worked are found on
San Juan Island and in other parts of the archipelago, where
the supply is practieallj- unlimited. It was first made in 1860
bj' Augustus Hibbard and his partner N. C. Bailey, by whora he
was killed in a quarrel eight j-ears afterwards. The Avorks were
then closed until 1871, when Hibbard's heir appeared and claimed
thera, but died in 1873. In the raean time Bailey retumed and
took possession of his interest, but he also died, and James Mc-
Curdy, who held a mortgage on the propertv, came into pos
session. The capacity of the kilns previous to 1879 was twenty-
six thousand four hundred barrels per annum. In 1879 new
works were opened in two places on the island by other parties.
The lime-works on Orcas Island, opened in 1862, turned out
forty barrels per diem. For manj- j-ears those quarries supplied
the Pacific Northwest with lime for building and other purposes.
But it is now known that limestone and marble are to be found
in the Skagit Valley and in different parts of the Cascade Eano-e
in quantities suflScient not only for smelting the metals existing
in these localities, but for commercial purposes. In 1878 the

GEOLOGY AND MINERALOGY IN WASHINGTON. 393
Northern Pacific Eailroad Company opened a quarry in the
Puyallup Valley, their AA'orks having a capacity of two hundred
and seventy-fivo barrels. The production of Ume in Washing
ton in 1880 was sixty-five thousand barrels, worth eighty-four
thousand five hundred dollars. Limestone is also abundant in
the region of Fort Colville.
Copper is found in connection Avith gold and silver on both
sides of the Cascade Mountains aiid in the mineral regions of
Northeastern Washington. Eecent discoveries have been re
ported as having been made in tho Cascades of high-grade cop
per-ore, and late explorations in the Olympic Mountains reveal
the existence of copper in this range. Valuable copper ledges
ai'e said to exist eight miles from Hood's Canal in Kitsaj)
County. The Huraptulips Eiver, which flows into Gray's Har
bor, is said also to lead to a copper belt of great proportions,
the deposit being found in a formation of slate and limestone
quite accessible by railroad from the Chehalis Valley. For the
jiresent a movement is on foot to eut a trail from the h-ead of
navigation on the Wishkah Eiver to the vicinity of the indicated
mines. Among the specimens of minerals to be soon in the Skagit
Valley is a fine quality- of asbestos from a mine opened at an
altitude of two thousand feet. The sarae mineral has been
found at EUensburg, produced in tho Sebastian mining district,
thirtj'-eight miles north of that place. It is long-fibred and of
superior quaUty, but has never been mined.
In the Yakima Valloy, lower down, is a mountain of pumice
of a fino grain, which, as this volcanic jn-oduct has also a com
mercial value, is of importance to the country.
Clays of several qualities, from that used in brick-making to
tripoli and kaolin, are abundant in West Washington, although
not of equallj' good quality. While there exist deposits of
pottery-clay so uniform in texture as to be immediately con
vertible into dry-pressed bricks, or with a small hand press
moulded into tiles, whieh on being burned become vitrified and of
a deep red, the greater nuraber require thorough treatment by
the best processes known to ceramics in order to produce a
ware equal to that manufactured in thc East. There are good
brick-making and fire clays at no great distanee from Tacoma,

394 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
and also at Gray's Harbor, and porcelain clays in the Cowlitz
Valley, never j'ot thoroughly tested, but abundant.
The lesson taught by the great fire of Chicago was that iron
expands, cracks, twists, and gives waj' under heat and pressure ;
that granite will split and crumble if subjected to a great degree
of heat and weight ; that Umestone will be burned into quick
lime and slacked by water, or will blow out in masses, destroy
ing a building ; and that sandstone will becorae flaky and split
off under the action of a general conflagration; but that brick
raade of a high-grade refractory clay, properly manufactured,
will withstand the fiercest heat. Hence the value of building-
brick produced from the refractory clays, which, mixed with
those of a lower grade and burned until vitrified, ean be made
to withstand a heat that avUI melt and boil glass or steel.
The Puget Sound fire-clays vary in apjiearance, some of the
best resembling slate and being of a blue-black color. When
these are broken up and exposed to the rains of winter, they
are resolved into a pasty mud, whieh on treatment becomes re
fractory. Other of the fire-clays are a bluish-gray in color, and
look like stone when dry, but dissolve into paste when wet ; and
still others eontain an excess of silica, and resemble laminated
sandstone ; while sorae are soft and oily to the touch, and of
different degrees of color, frora very light to very dark. As a
foundation for future industries in Washington, this class of
mineral substances is likely to prove of iraportance to the new
State. An industry kindred to that of brick or pottery was
carried on in 1868 by the firra of Knapp & Burrell, of Port
land, on the north bank of the Columbia, at Knappton, — namely,
the manufacture of cement from nodules of a j'ellowish lime
stone, found near the mouth of the river. The yield was thirty-
five barrels dailj'.
The precious metals are not yet at all developed in West
Washington, although gold has been found in some of the
streams, and alleged discoveries have been made in the Cascade
and Olympic Eanges of quartz veins bearing gold and silver,
both separately and in conjunction.
Gold-mining in East Washington was begun in the spring of
1855, when gold in placers was discovered near Fort ColvUle,

GEOLOGY AND MINERALOGY IN AVASHINGTON. 395
being followed bj' the usual migration of thousands to that
locality, and the subsequent discovery of other placer diggings
in the upper Columbia region, followed by the organization of
the Territorj- of Idaho, which took aAvay from Washington
some of its raost valuable mining-lands. The yield of the
placer mines in the Colville and Okanogan districts was very
considerable, but could not be aceuratolj- stated on account of
the raanj- routes bj' Avbich gold was earried out of the country,
and also because the express companies, who were tho common
carriers of ti'easure, had no means of knowing from what dis
tricts came the gold intrusted to their keeping. It is interest
ing merelj' as an indication of the value of the placers of
Washington, Oregon, and the northwestern portion of Idaho in
a half-dozen years, covering the period of profitable placer
raining in the Northwest, to take such figures as Wells, Fargo
& Co. were able to furnish, as follows ; Shipped from Portland
in 1864, $6,200,000; 1865, $5,800,000; 1866, $5,400,000; 1867,
$4,000,000; 1868, $3,037,000; 1869, $2,,559,000 ; 1870, $1,547,000.
Add to these suras $419,657, shipped bj' Portland bankers in
1869, and we have $28,953,657 that can be accounted for. This
partial stateraent does not include the first and best product of
the Colville mines, or the output of the years 1862 and 1863,
when the yields of the Oro Fino, Florence, and Salmon Eiver
mines (then in Washington) were at the best.
Very little of the gold of Boise, Owyhee, or any part of
Southern Idaho went to San Francisco via Portland; therefore
the millions of which any account was taken were produced in
East Oregon, Washington, and the Panhandle of Idaho, which
Washington alwaj's claimed as belonging to her territory.
Quartz veins were discovered to some extent during the
placer-mining excitement, but wero disregarded. Ledges were
known to exist in the Okanogan District, and discoveries were
made on the eastern flank of the Cascades, on the Wenatehee
Eiver. The development of quartz is, hovvever, recent, for ob
vious reasons, capital and transportation being necessary to
quartz-raining enterprises.
The counties in East Washington where gold- and silver-
rainino- are earried on are Kittitass, Okanogan, Douglas, and
Stevens. The j-ield frora the deep mines of Kittitass for the

396 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
year 1880 was twenty-two thousand and thirty-six dollars, and
from placers one hundred and twentj' thousand and nineteen
dollars, and it had not increased in 1883. These mines are, in
fact, undeveloped, the iron and coal of the Cascades being
sought after rather than the precious metals. Silver-, lead-, and
copper-ores exist, but it is not known what tonnage thej' will
yield. The Wenatehee, Yakima, Lake Chelan, and Methow
Eiver Districts, all lying just east of the Cascades, are promising,
but imperfectly known. Silver is believed to exist in the
Olympic Eange, singly and in connection with copper. This
is, however, more presumptive than real knowledge, founded on
croppings of an apparently good character gathered up in recent
explorations. It is in the eountry lying immediately west of the Okinakane
Eiver and Colville Indian Eeservation, in Okanogan Countj-, and
in that part of Stevens County lying east of the Indian Eeser
vation and the Columbia Eiver, that quartz-mining is being
earried on with energy.
Euby District, in Okanogan County, is situated on Concon-
nuUy Creek (called Salmon Eiver on many maps), fifteen miles
west of Okinakane Eiver. This creek rises in a high and rugged
range, running southeast through deep canons to its junction
with the Okinakane. In the spring it is a strong and turbulent
stream, but diminishes with the dry season until it discharges ,
but about twelve cubic feet per second.
This district is approached from the east by a stage-road
either from Spokane Falls or Sprague, on the Northern Pacific,
the two uniting seventy miles west of Spokane, and continuing
west to tho head of the Grand Coulee and Condon Ferry on the
Columbia, thence to the Okinakane Eiver, which it crosses, and
to Eubj- City, the whole distance frora Spokane Falls being one
hundred and fifty railes. Tho western approach is via EUens
burg, either across the country, one hundred and ninety-five
miles, or by steamboat a part of the distanee. A railroad will
soon cross the country from Spokane Falls to Puget Sound,
affording better faciUties for travel to these mines.
Euby City is situated on ConconnuUj- Creek, at an altitude
of eighteen hundred feot, but surrounded by mountains rising

GEOLOGY AND MINERALOGY IN WASHINGTON. 397
four thousand and six thousand feet above sea-level. It is the
county-seat of Okanogan Countj-, and the centre of the mining
district. The principal mines are on the south side of the creek, in a
ridge rising abruptly from it to a height of two thousand five
hundred feot. There is plentj- of timber, but no water for
mining purposes, and the ores raust be conveyed over a very
rough trail, or by a wire tramway to reduction works on the
ConconnuUj-, a raethod whieh is entirely practicable.
The country rock of Eubj' district is granite, gneiss, mica,
and hornblende schists, which have been uplifted to nearly ver
tical positions. The Avidth of the zone of gneissoid granites and
schists is about throe railes, fianked on the southwest bj- a high
granite range, and the mineral belt is confined to this zone — the
silver-bearing lodes conforming substantially to the generally
southeast-and-northwest course of the schistose roeks, with a
dip varying from fifty degrees to the nearly vertical position,
with frequent local variations.
One of the latter is the ArUngton, which has a north-and-
south direction, and is situated in the southerly end of Euby
Mountain, about three hundred feet from the top, with a dip
into the raountain of from sixty to eighty degrees below the
horizontal. The lode is from three to nine feet wide, and has
been traced for a distance of seven hundred feet. The ore
assays one hundred and eighty-seven doUars in silver to the
ton, or, taking all classes of oro togeiher, eighty-six dollars and
sixty-four cents, with merely a trace of gold. Professor Clayton,
in a report on the Euby district, to whieh I am indebted for
flgures, estimated that a block of ground three hundred feet
long, sixty feet deep, and five in width, making ninety thousand
cubic feet of quartz in the lode, would give about six thousand
tons gross, and, assuming that half of that would assay eighty
dollars per ton, the gross value would be Iavo hundred and forty
thousand dollars. Deducting ten per cent, loss in milUng
(twenty-four thousand dollars) and twenty doUars per ton for
the cost of milUng, mining, and transportation (sixty thousand
dollars), there would reraain one hundred and fifty thousand
doUars net from this block of ground, whieh he considered a
safe estimate. What the actual yield is has not been made

398 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
known, but it is the leading mine in the district, and reduction
works have been erected, at a cost of three hundred thousand
doUars, at Euby Citj', for the extraction of sUvor from this and
other ores in this locality, with other iraproveraents involving a
large amount of capital. A concentrator has also been erected
at ConconnuUy, but these helps have only- j)artially relieved the
embarrassments of the rainers. The cost of transporting ore
to EUensburg, the nearest raUroad point by steamboat and
wagon-road, is two and a half cents per pound, a prohibitory
price for the carrying of any but the highest grade of ores.
Nothing like a general development ean take plaee until the
excessive cost of transportation is removed.
The other mines in the Okanogan eountry of the same gen
eral character of the Arlington are the Fourth of July, Euby,
and First Thought, in the Euby district. The Tuff Nut, Mam
moth, Lone Star, Home Stake, and Minnehaha, in Salmon Eiver
(ConeonnuUy) district, are not so purely sih'er-bearing, and
several in the Galena district carry enough lead for smelting.
The greatest advancement yet made in mining in Washington
has been in Stevens County. About fifty railes by rail north of
Spokane Falls, in the v-icinity of Chewelah, is a raining district
producing silver and lead ore which is reducible by sraelting.
The general character of the countrj' is lime, the walls encasing
the minerals being porphyry. These mines were discovered in
1883-84, but were not worked until about 1887. The Eagle
Mine ore assayed three hundred dollars in silver and forty per
cent, in lead. This property, situated about three railes east of
Chewelah, is owned by capitalists who are able to develop it.
In the A-ieinity are numerous mineral locations. The Shamrock
is a vein forty-one feet wide, assaying twenty-four dollars in
silver and thirty-five cents in gold, and the Pansy is an exten
sion of tho same formation, whieh is in porphyry. The Alpond,
one milo east of the Eagle, is a good propertj-, and many others
promise well.
On the west side of the valley, seven miles from Chewelah,
is the Finley, a vein of gray copper and chlorides, assaying
from thirty doUars to six hundred dollars per ton, and there
are several well-defined veins of the same quality of ore in the
vicinity.

GEOLOGY AND MINERALOGY IN WASHINGTON. 399
The mineral region extends eighty miles north, but it is in
the region of Colville that the greatest development has taken
place in mining. This country abounds in Ume-belts, whieh
pass through it from northwest to southeast at intervals of from
five to eight miles apart, varying in width from one thousand
yards to three miles. The deposits of ore are extensive, raany
of them bearing the minerals nocessarj- to their reduction.
Granite and porphj-ry enclose some of the veins, slate and
quartz others, and still others are found in Umestone. Some of
the ores aro iron carbonates, carrj-ing silver, gold, and lead in
paying quantities. The Old Dominion Mines, however, contain
ore in the form ofa chloride and black sulphate in limestone walls.
The Old Dominion Mine is six railes east of the town of Col
ville, and is an eight-foot fissure vein, assaying one hundred
and fifty ounces of silver, twenty-five per cent, galena, and
seven dollars in gold to the ton. The Old Dominion was dis
covered in 1885, and produced in 1886 eightj' thousand dollars'
worth of silver. Two years later it was estimated that half a
million had been taken out, and ore had been found which
assayed fifteen thousand dollars to the ton. On the same
raountain, and forming a group of chlorides, are the Ella, Eust-
ler, Paris Belle, East Side, West Side, War Eagle, St. Helena,
John Harris, and Portland. Until a recent period the ores
were shipped to Omaha for reduction, and only the highest
grade ores would paj- the expenses of mining, transportation,
and reduction; hence, districts loss rich than the Old Dominion
were left unworked.
The Young America, owned by the Young America Consoli
dated Company, is situated on the east side of the Columbia, in
a lime blutt' sixteen miles north of Coh'ille, and is one of the
largest, if not the largest, surface-showing mines in the State.
It was discovered in 1885, and within six months had been con
siderably developed. The ledge averages five feet in thickness,
and runs northeast and southwest, with a pitch to the east. In
1888 it had been tunnelled to a point one hundred and eighty
feet from the surface, following a heavy body of ore all the way,
and finding a solid deposit of eight feet of raineral, A working
test made in San Francisco showed ninety ounces of silver and
forty per cent, of lead to the ton. The ore is now shipped by

400 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
the Spokane and Northern Eailroad to Spokane, and reduced in
the Mutual Smelting and Mining Company's works of that eity.
The mine is valued at over a raillion doUai s.
The Bonanza, two railes east of the Young America, is in a
formation sirailar to the Young Araerica, which, while the ore is
not so valuable, is so mueh larger as to make up for it. It is
producing and shipping ore continuously.
Tho Little Dalles, thirty--eight miles north of Colville, is
another region rich in minerals. The ores are galena and lead
carbonate with silver. It was discovered in 1886, when the
Silver Crown and Northern Light claims attracted much atten
tion. They are true fissure veins located side by side, running
oast and west parallel with each other, and pitching towards each
other. Practically, thoy are one ledge, as they must raeet. The
ore assays frora eighty to three hundred ounces, and the ledges
are eighteen inehes in thickness.
The Silver Butte is an extension of the Silver Crown and
Northern Light properties, with almost as good a showing of
mineral; and the Amy, a short distance below Silver Crown,
shares in the richness of the district.
Bruce Creek is another locality where some large ledges of
galena are found ; and on Clugston, five railes east of Bruce
Creek and twelve miles north of ColvUle, there are some very
fine ledges of galena, including the Uncle Sam and Tenderfoot,
both of which are rich in lead, while carrjing silver enough to
defray expenses of transportation and reduction. Iron also
abounds in tho region of Bruce Creek.
The Daisj', in the Summit districl, twentj--four miles south of
Colville, was discovered in 1886, but not worked for a year or
more. It was found to bo a seven-foot vein of carbonates, worth
one hundred and fifty-one dollars in silver and a few dollars in
gold to the ton. In 1888 there were seventy thousand doUars'
worth of ore in sight.
A sraelter of twenty tons capacity was erected at Colville, to
which all these raining districts are tributary, by the Mutual
Smelting and Mining Company in 1888, whieh purchased ore or
did custom work for the miners, but had not a suflficient capacity
even at that time. The completion of railroad connection with
Spokane Falls has solved many difficulties.

GEOLOGY AND MINERALOGY IN AVASHINGTON. 401
The Metaline district, on Clarke's Fork of the Columbia, was
discovered late in 1886, It is situated on the west bank of the
river (recently called Pend d'Oreille Eiver), about one hundred
miles from Pend d'Orielle Lake, and near the northern boundary
of the State. It belongs to the Kootenai group of mines, whieh
extend into Idaho, and is approached by the riv-er from Sand
Point on the lake and on the Northern Pacific Eailroad.
The oros of this district are a low--gi-ade galena, and lead the
principal production, the aA-erage of that metal being from
seventj--five to eightj--fivo por cent., with no refractory metal in
the district. The ore is generally found in pockets in a lime
stone formation similar to the Frisco silver district of Southern
Utah. The Bell O'May Mine and Diamond E. are of this de
scription. The latter assayed six ounces of silver and eighty
per cent, of lead on top, and at a depth of twenty-seven feet
assayed seventy ounces of silver and fifty-eight per cent, of
lead. The Creole, owned in Spokane, is a vein mino, in lime
roek containing gray- copper and galena, the ore aA'oraging one
hundred ounces in silver. These mines are on the west side of
the riA'er, and within frora one to two and a half railes of the
town of Metaline.
A mile below the town, on the east side of the river, is Grand
View Mine, on a bluff eight hundred feet above the stream.
This ore assayed ten ounces of silver and seventj--five per cent.
of lead, and ^hoAved a four- hun dred foot square of galena on the
surface. Near the Grand View is the Friday Mine, running
high in lead and low in silver; and five miles above, on the same
side, is a six-foot vein containing a twelve-inch streak of gray
copper-ore running very high in silver.
Again, the Waters Mine, discovered in 1888, on Little Muddy
Creek, on the west side of Clarke's Fork, is a well-defined vein
in lime, containing two feet of galena assaying thirty ounces
silver and seventy-five por cent, lead, and two feet of galena
carbonates carrying ten ounces silver and fortj'-flve per cent.
lead. Gold is found in placers on SuUivan Creek on the east side of
Clarke's Fork a mile below Metaline. The diggings are from
three to six feet deep on gray slate bedrock; the ground is
spotted, and the gold is in heavy scales.
26

402 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
It has been remarked by intelligent prospectors that from the
international boundarj--line south to Spokane Falls there is a
fieculiar distribution of rocks on the surface, particularly from
Calispel Lake in the Colville eountry west to Oso-Yoos Lake in
the Okanogan country, between whieh points there is a stream
of granite boulders about a raile in width. This stream is the
same, no matter what the countrj- roek may be; whether lime,
slate, porphyry, or granite, these boulders are present on the
surface, some weighing many tons, and others smaller, but dis
tributed in a straight line on the mountains and in the vaUeys.
Some years ago some prospectors found a large piece of ga
lena ore on a mountain near the town of Marcus. Certain that
they, had made a valuable discovery they sold the ore, and
searched for the vein from whieh it had come until satisfled that
there was none in the vicinity. The theory, of course, is that
tho granite and other boulders so out of place were dropped
from icebergs that were breaking up as they floated over this
country, then covered with water. Where the bergs were formed
is a query stUl to be answered.
The Kootenai country in the Pan-Handle of Idaho is east of
the Metaline district, and, although belonging to another Com
raonwealth, is tributary to Washington. It has long been known
to be a mineral country, and was prospected for gold placers in
the early mining furore following the Fraser Eiver and Colville
excitements of thirty or thirtj--five years ago. The country is
mountainous and picturesque, and contains several of the most
beautiful lakes in tho Northwest, — the Coeur d'Alene, Pend
d'OreiUe, Kanisku, and a part of the Kootenai. It has five
hundred miles of navigable waters, and vast resources in timber
and minerals.
The flrst raining done in the Kootenai country was in the
Coeur d'Alene region, which is drained through the Spokane
Eiver. The distanee from Spokane FaUs to the nearest point
on the lake is twenty-five miles. The Coeur d'Alene Eiver has
two branches, on both of which placer gold-mining has been
earried on for eight or ten years, but most largely on the South
Fork. It was not until about 1883 that deep mining was under
taken, and previous to 1886 not much was accompUshed. It is

GEOLOGY AND MINERALOGY IN AVASHINGTON. 403
now, however, a busy and prosperous raining region. The ores
are argentiferous galena, with some gold in quartz. The veins
aro true fissures, accessible, and very thick, and carry from forty
to sixty per cent, of lead, five to fifty ounces of silver, and a few
dollars in gold to the ton. The strike of the principal lode,
which is three miles in length, is parallel to the river, at a
distanee from it of frora two to six railes, and it is frequently
cut at right angles by ravines, which afford facilities for
raining. There aro no fluxes in the Coeur d'Alene country except that
contained in the ore, and no great araount of fuel near the
raines, which raakes it more economical to carry the ores out
for smelting than to bring in the fluxes, — a faet in favor of
Spokane FaUs as a centre for reduction works. Mills and con
centrators on the ground reduce the expense of transporting
the ores, which, however, with the suppUes required by the
camps, furnish a profitable business to the Cceur d'Alene Eail
way and Navigation Corapany's lines, connecting with the
Northern Pacific Eailroad.
The Bunker Hill and Sullivan Mines, at the head of Milo
Creek, were the first discoA'ories on the lode, and have been good
producers. The ore as taken from the mine concentrates four
tons into one, which has a gross value of one hundred dollars,
and with the first concentrator, whose capacity was one hundred
and twenty tons daily, returned three thousand dollars per day
to the owners. The company emploj' one hundred and fifty
men, and are well equipped for profitable mining.
The Stemwinder, just bej-ond these raines, on the main lode,
is owned in Portland, and is a rich producer. Tho company
has a concentrator at Milo. The Tyler, also owned in Portland,
is a similar property, as well as the Emraa — Last Chance, owned
in Spokane.
The Sierra Nev-ada is a carbonate instead of galena, and yields
a large araount of ore, giving returns of one hundred dollars per
ton without concentrating. Specimens from this mine of crys
tallized silver and lead, consequent on sorae disturbance of the
formation, are beautiful and wonderful, fantastic in shape and
rich in color.
Silver King, Crown Point, and Eureka are also good mines in

404 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
the vicinity of Wardner; and there are very manj' equallj' as
good in other districts of the Coeur d'Alene countiy.
The first mine thoroughly developed in this region was the
Tiger, OAvned in Spokane, and located on Canj-on Creek, a feeder
of the South Fork. In order to secure this doA-elopment it Avas
necessary to construct a railroad for several miles through a
narrow defile of the mountains, and erect a concentrator of one
hundred tons capacitj'. There is enough ore in sight to keep it
running for years.
The Coeur d'Alene mines already wield a great influence in
the development of the Northwest, whieh is destined to increase
as they are developed. They make necessary railroads and
reduction works, and encourage various industries, whieh with
out them would reraain unatterapted for raany a decade.
Lightning Creek district, on the northeast side of Lake Pend.
d'Oreille, and five miles by a level road north of Clarke's Fork
Station on the Northern Pacific, is in the Kootenai country, and
was discovered in 1887. The veins have an east-and-west course
in a hard black lime and quartzite. The Maj-flower is high-
grade galena, one foot in thickness, averaging one hundred and
thirty-six ounces silver and twenty -five per cent. lead. The
Wallace, of the sarae size, gives one hundred and nine ounces
silver and forty per cent. load. Lightning Creek is twenty-eight
raUes long, and falls into the lake. It affords good sport to the
trout fisher.
West of Clarke's Fork Station, and little over a raile from
Hope Station, are the Silver Chord and Lake Shore Mines, with
a six-foot body of ore assaying at the start thirty ounces silver,
with a good jier cent, of lead. The formation is quartzite,
syenite, and slate.
On the south side of the lake, nearly opposite Hope Station,
is the Garfield Bay district, by water eighteen miles southeast
from Sand Point, and six miles northeast by rail from Cocolalla
Station on the Northern Pacific. Two railes baek frora the bay,
on the side of a raountain, is the Mountain Queen. The vein is
in trachyte and lime, and contains a hard whitish quartz spotted
with galena, which assays thirty ounces silver and a small per-
cen tage of lead. There are twenty or more locations in the

GEOLOGY AND MINERALOGY IN AVASHINGTON. 405
immediate vicinity, and all are owned in the Kootenai country
and Spokane Falls, unless recentlj- transferred.
On the south side of Lake Pend d'Oreille, where Gold Creek
'Comes in from the southeast, is a mountaiu of limestone, which
is being burned and shipped by the hundreds of barrels every
Aveek. Gold in quartz is also found on Gold Creek.
Kanisku Lake, forty miles northwest of Sand Point, is thirtj-
railes long bj- from three to seven railes wide, and has its outlet
through Priest Eivor, a crooked and swift stream which empties
into Clarke's Fork. North of Kanisku three miles, and con
nected with it by a stream, is Lake Abercrombie, six miles long.
north-and-south, and two wide. Those lakes have high, steep
hills surroundiug them and coming close down to the water,
except where the numerous streams feeding them find en
trance. These strearas have level raeadow-land extending back
for several miles, and whore the raeadows cease a fine cedar
forest begins, sorae of the older timber measuring fifteen
feet in diameter, with a grain so true that it can be split into
boards fifty feet long. White pine, hemlock, and tamarack
also are hero in large growths, and game, large and small, is
plentiful. In 1888 a five-foot galena vein was discovered at the head of
Abercrombie Lake, running northeast and southwest, in syenite
and granite, with one foot of soUd galena on the foot-wall, that
averaged thirty ounces silver and seventy- per cent. lead. The
general formation of the country is a cross-grained, hard, white
granite. Kootenai or Flat Bow Lake and Eiver embrace a A-ast region.
Together they forra an elongated ox-bow, pointing north, and
branching out until the points aro six hundred miles apart, the
east point being the source of the Upper Kootenai Eiver, and
the west point of the Lordeaux Eiver. The lake is on the
west arm of the bow, its south end being connected with Sand
Point by a level wagon-road. Its length is over one hundred
miles and its Avidth of an average of three railes. It seeras to
have been formed like the Grand Coulee by some great convul
sion of nature, as glacial action is nowhere apparent on the ad-

406

ATLANTIS ARISEN.

jacent mountains, although living glaciers of great size are at the
north end of the lake. The depth of this fissure is unknown,
— assuming it to be a fissure, — but by carrying out the angles
of the marginal mountains, which rise quite abruptly from the
water to a height of four thousand feel, a depth of at least three
thousand feet would be obtained. A sounding line of one thou
sand feet does not touch the bottom of its still, dark waters.
The outlet is on the west side, about forty-five miles from the
north Olid, which is in British Columbia. Thp Avaters of the
outlet are deep and still for twenty-flve miles. The mountains

ONB DAY'S HUNT.

wear their snowy helmets the year through at the upper ond of
the lake. Many streams fall into it, large and small, entering
through deep gorges, or tumbUng over mossy roeks among
green depths of forest. There is no more impressive scenery in
tho Northwest than in tho Kootenai country. The lake' is
stocked with fish, frora iramense sturgeon and char weighing
up into the hundreds, to thirty-pound silver trout, and other

GEOLOGY AND MINERALOGY IN WASHINGTON. 407
smaller pan flsh ; and the forest affords game in the caribou,
a species of large deer.
Kootenai Lake mining district lies on both sides of the lake
about fifteen miles north of the outlet. The Blue Bell Mine, on
the east side, is on Galena Baj-, and owned by the Kootenai
Mining and Smelting Company, which has its oflice at Kootenai
Station, on the Northern Pacific. It is a ten-foot vein of low-
grade galena in lime, extending north and south, assaj-ing eight
ounces in silver, with eighty per cent, of lead, and opened by a
one-hundred-foot incline. The Blue Bell was discovered and to
some extent developed previous to 1885, when, owing to a con
test over rights, Avork Avas suspended until the present company
acquired the propertj-. The Kootenai Chief, an extension of
the Blue Bell, is owned in San Francisco, but not at present
worked. On the opposite side of the lake are numerous loca
tions, araoug whieh aro the Highland, owned in Spokane, a
three-foot vein of clear galena, assaying from forty to two hun
dred and eighty ounces silver and sixty per cent, lead, opened
by a sixty-foot tunnel at a depth of one hundred and ten feet ;
the Jim Blaine, a narrow vein, owned in Butte City, Montana,
whieh shipped to the Wicks Sraelter three thousand five hundred
pounds of gray carbonate ore that netted over two hundred and
eighty-three ounces of silver, the vein being in a basin on top
of a raountain, and diflScult to reach or work. Out of a large
nuraber of claims, a dozen or more show a good grade of
galena. There are hot springs among this group of mines,
whicb continually deposit Ume.
The Bonanza district is situated six miles south of the
Kootenai Lake outlet, on Cottonwood Creek, whieh coraes inlo
the outlet from the south at a point twenty-two miles southeast
and doAvn from the raain Kootenai Lake. The principal loca
tions are at an altitude of five thousand four hundred feet, and
two thousand seven hundred feet above tho lake, cutting at
right angles through a tirabered ridge running northeast and
southwest, whieh slopes uniforraly down to the outlet. The
district was discovered in 1886 by parties frora Colville, and
located the following year. There are three parallel veins,
about six hundred feet apart, ranging from thirty to eighty feet
in width and running in an east-and-west direction, with a dip

408 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
of fbrty-five degrees to the south. The casing ofthe ore raatter
is a lirae shale, the whole extending across the eountry forraation
at right angles, and lying between a contact of granite and slate.
The veins carry ores known to raining men as copper-glance,
antimonial silver, gray-copper, " black raetal," or brittle silver,
peacock-copper, and hard brown, gold-bearing quartz. It is
claimed that no such conglomeration of ores was ever before
found outside of Mexico, where sirailar deposits exist. The
discovery was made by a party looking for placer claims at the
head of the Little Salmon, which comes into the Columbia from
the east a few miles north of the boundary-line of British
Columbia. The whole sumraer was spent in cutting a one-hun-
dred-raile pack-trail through the heavy timber of a eountry
extremely rough in its configuration. The canon of the Salraon
Eiver has stretches of twenty or raore railes whore the high
bluffs are perpendicular and faced with rock. The Bonanza
Eidge lies between the head-waters of a branch of the Salmon
and the Kootenai Lake outlet.
When the Colville party were, at the end of summer, making
prospect holes on this ridge, they stumbled on their bonanza ;
but it being near the season of snow in the mountains, they
were forced to relinquish the hope of securing any returns
for their labors at that time, and concealing their treasure re
traced their steps to wait for another suraraer. But the secret
was not so well kept but that it was guessed, and, when they
started in the following May for the land of promise, they were
watched and pursucd so closely as hardly to get to their desti
nation before others were also on the ground. This is a part of
the romance and excitement of mining. Many a lonely pros
pector while looking for his bonanza has laid his bones where
other equally evasive fortune-hunters eould not find thera. But
the bonanza found, then eoraes the struggle for possession, and
the race is to the swift. The discoverers of this one, named
Winslow Hall and William Oakes, with eleven others, organized
the Kootenai Bonanza Mining Companj-, and made three loca
tions, the Kootenai Bonanza, Silver King, and American Flag.
The Grizzly, Silver Queen, and Cariboo are extensions of the
above named.
The richness of the Kootenai Bonanza district is extraordi-

GEOLOGY AND MINERALOGY IN WASHINGTON. 409
iiary. In doing the opening work on the first two locations
twelve hundred tons of ore were taken out, which averaged one
hundred and fifty dollars to the ton, three hundred tons aver
aging two hundred dollars. Forty-six sacks of ore, from
which fortj'-eight assa.ys were made, averaged five hundred and
twelve ounces of silver, no assaj' being made for copper or gold.
Several assaj-s were made of " brittle silver," which averaged
eight thousand ounces of silver, and a chunk of brown quartz
showing wire and leaf gold gave ninety-seven thousand dollars
gold and three thousand dollars silver to the ton. The entire
vein carries thirty per cent, copper.
While there is this Arabian Nights' glamour of incredible
wealth about these discoveries, there is always the possibility
that nature has exhausted herself in producing this specimen
of her handiwork, and cannot repeat this profusion or long con
tinue it in one place. The reputation of this district, however,
has been well sustained and has increased tho value of the low-
grade ores in the Kootenai Lake district, both districts being
north of the boundary, in the British possessions, and low-grade
ores being dutiable. But if the value of silver exceeds that of
lead in ore, it ean be shipped into tho United States free of duty.
By mixing the high and low grades the whole can be taken
across the line free, and besides improve the ore for smelting.
The only outlet for this district is up the Kootenai Lake and
Eiver, one hundred and fifty-five miles, to Bonner's Ferry, thence
south thirtj- miles by wagon-road to Kootenai Station or Sand
Point, on the Northern Pacific, and thence sixty miles to Spo
kane Falls. The passage bj' water occupies forty-eight hours.
It costs seven dollars per ton to transport the ore from Cotton
wood Creek Landing to Kootenai Station. A railroad will soon
be made to penetrate the Kootenai country, and reveal to the
world a region well worth the attention of the business-man
and the tourist.
It was the intention ofthe Ainsworth Company, which owned
in the Blue Bell lead and had a grant from the colonial govern
raent, to have built a railroad out of the Kootenai country, but
the policy of the Parliament proved so narrow, owing to the
jealousy of their constituents towards railway connection with
the United States, that the company was compelled to abandon

410 ' ATLANTIS ARISEN.
the scherae. This ill treatraent by the colonial authorities for
several years retarded raining in this region. The Spokane and
Northern Eailroad will soon be completed to Little Dalles,
whence a line of sj:eamboats will carry passengers and freight
to this and other districts in British Colurabia. It was the
design of the Spokane and Northern to have continued its road
to Kootenai on the northeast, and through the Colville Indian
Eeservation to the Eock Creek raines of British Columbia on the
northwest, and finally to the Pacific coast, but tho Dominion
Parliament refused to grant charters fbr either of these branch
lines, much desired by- the people north and south of the
boundary, the Canadian Pacific being opposed. It will not be
possible much longer to prevent Araerican enterprise from ac
complishing its designs, even against the will of this govern-
raental raonopoly, in British Colurabia.

CHAPTEE XXXL
LAST WORDS.
A TOURIST, I suppose, may be pardoned for giving a rambling
account of the country run over. I desire to feel that my rara-
blings are of sorae value to ray readers. It is difficult to con
ceive, if we have not seen it, the rapid change being effected in
thc Northwest. But a study of the census, and the rapid growth
of American cities in all the States, will be found quite as sur
prising. Foreign immigration has filled up the country very
rapidly. I have sometimes felt, in a San Francisco street-car,
or other public conveyance, that it would be a pleasure to hear
ray mother-tongue spoken. Tn the North the foreign element is
not so marked, although there are colonies of Norwegians,
Swedes, and Germans, with the ever ubiquitous Irishman, and
a sprinkUng of Canadian English, Scotch, and occasional individ
uals from all nations. But the prevailing and governing class
is American ; and it is the American whom you meet, alert, ob
servant, ready, who controls the enterprises of this part of the
Pacific coast. Washington is pecuUarly New-England-Ameri
can, in the Puget Sound region particularly, because the New-

LAST WORDS.

411

Englander is commercial. In the agricultural portions of the
country are more people from the middle and westem divisions
of tho Atlantic States.
I will now proceed to give, as I did for Oregon, a tabulated
statement of the assessed valuation of different sections by
counties, which will help the reader to understand the relative

Counties.

Population, 1890.

Valuation, 1889.

Adams *
Assotin * .

2,085 1,575
9,2262,757
11,635 5,8883,161 693
3,898 1,774
8,304 5,150
8,761
65,031 4,623
11,463 9,313 2,813 1,465
4,348
50,775 2,097
8,731 776
8,511
37,402 4,3079,3642,526
12,215 18,351
19,072 4,455

$1,022,301 610,023
2,333,544 871,480
2,226,8538,698,340 1,097,0081,160,830 640,392
1,562,895 543,336
2,031,915 1,837,378
2,649,604
23,733,495 1, -243,470
1,884,8843,006,069 986,257502,098
891,116
26,352,125 879,090
1,833,030 158,055
1,610,922
14,584,363 684,819
2,637,366 516,572
7,833,965
3,682,9857,870,2182,820,261

Chehalis .
Clallam . .
Clarke . .
Columbia *
Cowlitz . .

Douglas *
Franklin *
Garfield* .
Island . .

Klickitat*Kittitass* .
Kinff . . .
Kitsap . .
Lewis . .
Lincoln *
Mason . .
Okanogan *
Pacific .
San Juan .
Skagit . .
Skamania .
Snohomish
. .
Stevens * .
Thurston .
Wahkiakum Walla Walla
WhatcomWhitman *
* 
Total 
335,464
$125,165,215
development of these districts, although the valuation is for
1889 and tho population for 1890, when there must have been a
large increase in valuation over 1889.
412 ATLANTIS ARISEN.
I have marked the East Washington counties Avith an asterisk
to point out the comparative wealth of the two great divisions.
The difference in favor of the nineteen western counties is over
fifty millions as against the fifteen eastern counties. The sev
eral large towns on Puget Sound should account for a greater
difference than that, and the comparison shows that relatively
the agricultural sections are as prosperous as, if not more so than,
the commercial ones. Dividing the whole assessed value of the
State (far below its actual v-alue), it gives three hundred and
seventy-three dollars to every individual in it, whieh is above
the ordinary proportion of the older States.
A feature of Puget Sound commerce is that among the great
nuraberof vessels which enter annually, — the entrances amount
ing in 1889 to one raillion five hundred and forty thousand and
fifteen tons, — th-e clearances exceed tho entrances by fourteen
thousand nine hundred and si.xty-four tons, showing the balance
of trade to be in favor of this new State as against the whole
world. The raotto adopted for the territorial seal — Alki — by and by
— was well chosen, significant, and prophetic. The younger
brother of Oregon, he will not be eontent with the younger
brother's portion, but will strive for the sceptro.
Modem writers bring w-eighty evidence to prove that the
tradition handed down to us by the ancient philosophers, of a
subraerged continent, occupying a portion of the area covered
by the Atlantic Ocean, was scientific truth. If one continent
sank, another raust have arisen to balance it. If America is the
Atlantis of Plato, or its substitute, as some believe, its west
eoast is the oldest, or that portion which was first elevated, as
geology proves. It is also, as we know, the latest to be brought
under development. It is the pioneer's last view out over the
oceans that encircle the known world. Henceforward man's
effort will be to restore to earth on this favored soil the glories
of the buried continent,, and to substitute for Atlantis lost,
Atlantis Arisen.

THE END.

3 9002 00586 5523

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