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The dainty gear of the trout spinner gave birth to the trolling fleets of the Pacific Coast. At first the schools pass into the Straits of San Juan. Here the joint fleets of British Columbia and of Puget Sound begin to harry them. A week or ten days later the vanguard will be off Nanaimo.
For that matter, anyone fond of it might navigate the land-locked waters of Puget Sound and the Straits of Georgia in an open whaleboat with satisfaction in summer-time. There are islands everywhere, wonderful rock-walled inlets that one can sail into, beaches to which the primeval forest comes rolling down, and always above the blue waters tower tremendous ramparts of never-melting snow.
One of these ships was the "Columbia," which gave the name to the region, part of which still retains it, although the section we are now discussing now owns and boasts of the name of the "Father" of his and our country. Washington became a State five years ago. It is a great mining country, but is still more noted for its wonderful lumber resources. The trade from Puget Sound is tremendous.
Puget Sound, so justly famous the world over for the surpassing size and excellence and abundance of its timber, is a long, many-fingered arm of the sea reaching southward from the head of the Strait of Juan de Fuca into the heart of the grand forests of the western portion of Washington, between the Cascade Range and the mountains of the coast.
Once, when they were repairing the balcony of the town-hall at Toulon, one of those admirable caryatids of Puget, which support the balcony, became loosened, and was on the point of falling. Jean Valjean, who was present, supported the caryatid with his shoulder, and gave the workmen time to arrive. His suppleness even exceeded his strength.
The D'Wamish and other allied tribes number 3,600, and have five reservations, containing in all 41,716 acres, set apart by treaty made with them in 1855, and located at as many points on Puget Sound.
The huge opal dome now known as Mount Baker loomed up through the clouds of dawn and dusk on the southern sky-line. In fair weather the long pink ridge of the Olympics could be seen towards Puget Sound. Inland from Nootka were vast mountain ridges heavily forested to the very clouds with fir trees and spruce of incredible size.
The Oregon was on the West Coast, and made her famous voyage of 14,700 miles around Cape Horn in 79 days, at an average speed of 11.6 knots, leaving Puget Sound on March 6 and touching at Barbados in the West Indies an May 18, just as the Spanish fleet was steaming across the Caribbean. The cruise effectively demonstrated the danger of a divided navy and the need of an Isthmian canal.
Examination of claims against the United States by the Hudsons Bay Company and the Puget Sound Agricultural Company, on account of certain possessory rights in the State of Oregon and Territory of Washington, alleged by those companies in virtue of provisions of the treaty between the United States and Great Britain of June 15, 1846, has been diligently prosecuted, under the direction of the joint international commission to which they were submitted for adjudication by treaty between the two Governments of July 1, 1863, and will, it is expected, be concluded at an early day.
At present coal in abundance is to be had in the Puget Sound region, and this reason for constructing a Grand Canyon railway is done away with.
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