The New Eldorado. A Summer Journey to Alaska

We soon cross into the State of Washington, its northern boundary being British Columbia and its southern boundary Oregon, from which it is separated for more than a hundred miles of its length by the Columbia River. Its form is that of a parallelogram, fronting upon the Pacific Ocean for about two hundred and fifty miles, and having a length from east to west of over three hundred and sixty miles. This State has immense agricultural areas, as well as being rich in coal, iron, and timber. We pause at Spokane Falls for a day and night of rest. It is on the direct line of the Northern Pacific Railroad, and is the principal city of eastern Washington, having the largest and best water-power on the Pacific slope. Government engineers report the water fall here to exceed two hundred thousand horse-power, a small portion only of which is yet improved, and that as a motor for large grain and flouring mills. Here we find a thrifty business community numbering over twelve thousand, the streets traversed by a horse railroad, and the place having electric lights, gas and public water works, with a Methodist and a Catholic college. It commands the trade of what is termed the Big Bend country and the Palouse district, and is the fitting-out place for the thousands of miners engaged in Cœur d’Alene County. In spite of the late disastrous fire which she has experienced, Spokane, like Seattle, will rapidly rise from her ashes. Official reports show that over nine million acres of this State are particularly adapted to the raising of wheat. Our route, after a brief rest at Spokane Falls, lies through Palouse County, where this cereal is raised in quantities proportionately larger than even in Dakota, and at a considerably less cost. Thirty-five to forty bushels of wheat to the acre is considered a royal yield in Dakota and the best localities elsewhere, but here fifty bushels to the acre are pretty sure to reward the cultivator, and even this large amount is sometimes exceeded. One enthusiastic observer and writer declares that Palouse County is destined to destroy wheat-growing in India by virtue of its immense crops, its favorable seasons, its economy of production, and its proximity to the seaboard.

In the western part of the State, on Puget Sound, the lumber business is the most important industry, giving profitable employment to thousands of people. The productive capacity of the several sawmills on the sound is placed at two million feet per day, and all are in active operation. A new one of large proportions was also observed to be in course of construction. The forests which produce the crude material are practically inexhaustible. The pines are of great size, ranging from eight to twelve feet in diameter, and from two hundred to two hundred and eighty feet in height. No trees upon this continent, except the giant conifers of the Yosemite, surpass these in magnitude. United States surveyors have declared, in their printed reports, that this State contains the finest body of timber in the world, and that its forests cover an area larger than the entire State of Maine.

The most productive hop districts that are known anywhere are to be found in the broad valleys of this State, where hop-growing has become a great and increasing industry, yielding remarkable profits upon the money invested and the labor required to market the crop. The course of the railroad is lined with these gorgeous fields of bloom, hanging on poles fifteen feet in height, planted with mathematical regularity. Large fruit orchards of apples, pears, peaches, cherries, and other varieties are seen flourishing here; and residents speak confidently of fruit raising as being one of the most promising future industries of this region, together with the canning and preserving of the fruits for use in Eastern markets. We are reminded, in this connection, that the United States crop reports also represent Washington as producing more bushels of wheat to the acre than any other State or Territory within the national domain. This grand region of the far northwestern portion of our country is three hundred miles long, from east to west, and two hundred and forty miles from north to south, giving it an area in round numbers of seventy thousand square miles. That is to say, it is nearly as large as the States of New York and Pennsylvania combined.

The immigration pouring into the new State of Washington is simply enormous, its aggregate for the year 1889 being estimated at thirty-five thousand persons, the majority of whom come hither for agricultural purposes, and to establish permanent homes. One train observed by the author consisted of nine second-class cars filled entirely with Scandinavians, that is, people from Norway and Sweden, presenting an appearance of more than average sturdiness and intelligence.

As the Pacific coast is approached we come to the famous Stampede Tunnel, which is nearly ten thousand feet long, and, with the exception of the Hoosac Tunnel in Massachusetts, the longest in America. On emerging from the Stampede Tunnel the traveler gets his first view of Mount Tacoma, rising in perpendicular height to nearly three miles, the summit robed in dazzling whiteness throughout the entire year.

CHAPTER VI

Mount Tacoma. – Terminus of the Northern Pacific Railroad. – Great Inland Sea. – City of Tacoma and its Marvelous Growth. – Coal Measures. – The Modoc Indians. – Embarking for Alaska. – The Rapidly Growing City of Seattle. – Tacoma with its Fifteen Glaciers. – Something about Port Townsend. – A Chance for Members of Alpine Clubs.

The city of Tacoma takes its name from the grand towering mountain, so massive and symmetrical, in sight of which it is situated. We cannot but regret that the newly formed State did not assume the name also.

This is the western terminus of the Northern Pacific Railroad, and is destined to become a great commercial port in the near future, being situated so advantageously at the head of the sound, less than two hundred miles from the Pacific Ocean. Its well-arranged system of wharves is already a mile and a half long, while there is a sufficient depth of water in any part of the sound to admit of safely mooring the largest ships. The reports of the United States Coast Survey describe Puget Sound as having sixteen hundred miles of shore line, and a surface of two thousand square miles, thus forming a grand inland sea, smooth, serene, and still, often appropriately spoken of as the Mediterranean of the North Pacific. It is indented with many bays, harbors, and inlets, and receives into its bosom the waters of numerous streams and tributaries, all of which are more or less navigable, and upon whose banks are established the homes of many hundred thrifty farmers.

History shows that long ago, before any Pilgrims landed at Plymouth, Spanish voyagers planted colonies on Puget Sound. From them the Indians of these shores learned to grow crops of cereals, though according to the ingenious Ignatius Donnelly’s “Atlantis” they brought the art from a lost continent. Puget Sound may be described as an arm of the Pacific which, running through the Strait of Fuca, extends for a hundred miles, more or less, southward into the State of Washington. Nothing can exceed the beauty of these deep, calm waters, or their excellence for the purpose of navigation; not a shoal exists either in the strait or the sound that can interfere with the progress of the largest ironclad. A ship’s side would strike the shore before her keel would touch the bottom. Storms do not trouble these waters; such as are frequently encountered in narrow seas, like the Straits of Magellan, and heavy snow-storms are unknown. The entire expanse is deep, clear, and placid.

Tacoma has about thirty thousand inhabitants to-day; in 1880 it had seven hundred and twenty! The assessed valuation eight years ago was half a million dollars. It is now over sixteen million dollars, and this aggregate does not quite represent the rapid increase of real estate. Here, months have witnessed more growth and progress in permanent business wealth and value of property than years in the history of our Eastern cities. At this writing there is being built a large and architecturally grand opera house of stone and brick which will cost quarter of a million dollars, besides which the author counted over forty stone and brick business edifices in course of construction, and nearly a hundred two and three story frame-houses for dwelling purposes, of handsome modern architectural designs. Away from the business centre of the city the residences are universally beautiful, with well-kept lawns of exquisite green, and small charming flower gardens fragrant with roses, syringas, and honeysuckles, mingling with pansies, geraniums, verbenas, and forget-me-nots. It is astonishing what an air of leisure and refinement is imparted to these dwellings by this means, – an air of retirement and culture, amid all the surrounding bustle and rush of business interests.

The city claims an ocean commerce surpassed in volume by no other port on the Pacific except San Francisco. Its substantial and well-arranged brick blocks, of both dwellings and storehouses, lining the broad avenues, are suggestive of permanence and commercial importance, while a general appearance of thrift prevails in all of the surroundings. Pacific Avenue is noticeably a fine thoroughfare, – the principal one of the town. The place seems to be thoroughly alive, and especially in the vicinity of the shipping. The author counted fifteen ocean steamers in the harbor, and there were at the same time as many large sailing vessels lying at the wharves loading with lumber, wheat, coal, and other merchandise, exhibiting a degree of commercial energy hardly to be expected of so comparatively small a community. We were informed that four fifths of the citizens were Americans by birth, drawn mostly from the educated and energetic classes of the United States, forming a community of much more than average intelligence. Young America, backed by capital, is the element which has made the place what it is. It was a surprise to find a hotel so large and well appointed in this city as the “Tacoma” proved to be; a five-story stone and brick house, of pleasing architectural effect, and having ample accommodations for three hundred guests. It stands upon rising ground overlooking the extensive bay. The view from its broad piazzas is something to be remembered.

Across Commencement Bay is a point of well-wooded land, called “Indian Reservation,” where our government located what remains of the Modoc tribe who so long resisted the advance of the whites towards the Pacific shore. These former belligerents are peaceable enough now, fully realizing their own interests.

Statistics show that there is shipped from Tacoma, on an average, a thousand tons of native coal per day, mostly to San Francisco and some other Pacific ports. A large portion of this coal comes from valuable measures belonging to the Northern Pacific Railroad Company, situated thirty or forty miles from Tacoma, and some from the Roslyn mines farther away. The Wilkinson and Carbonado mines form the principal source of supply for shipment, and the Roslyn for use on the railroad. These last are thirty-five thousand acres in extent. One of the many veins of the Roslyn coal deposit is estimated to contain three hundred million tons of coal, conveniently situated for transportation on the line of the Northern Pacific Railroad.

The great Tacoma sawmill does a very large and successful business, finding its motor in a steam engine of fourteen hundred horse-power, and having over seven hundred men on its pay-roll. This number includes mill-hands, dock-men, choppers, and watermen, the latter being the hands who bring the logs by rafts from different parts of the sound. There are a dozen other sawmills in and about the city. The lumber business of this region is fast assuming gigantic proportions, shipments being regularly made to China, Japan, Australia, and even to Atlantic ports. A whole fleet of merchantmen were waiting their turn to take in cargo while we were there. We believe that Tacoma will ere long become the second city on the Pacific coast, and perhaps eventually a rival to San Francisco. Its abundance of coal, iron, and lumber, added to its variety of fish and immense agricultural products, are sufficient to support a city twice as large as the capital of California.

One sturdy gang of men, who are bringing in a large raft of logs, attracts our attention by their similarity of dress and general appearance, as well as by their dark skins and well-developed forms. On inquiry we learn that they are native Indians of the Haida tribe, who come down from the north to work through a part of the season as lumbermen, at liberal wages. They are accustomed to perilous voyages while seeking the whale and fishing for halibut in deep waters, commanding good wages, as being equal to any white laborers obtainable.

We embark at Tacoma for Alaska in a large and well-appointed steamer belonging to the Pacific Coast Steamship Company, heading due north.

The first place of importance at which we stop is the city of Seattle, the oldest American settlement on the sound, and now having a busy commercial population of nearly thirty thousand. It has an admirable harbor, deep, ample in size, and circular in form; the commercial facilities could hardly be improved. Here again are large substantial brick and stone blocks, schools, churches, and various public and private edifices of architectural excellence. Enterprise and wealth are conspicuous, while the neighboring scenery is grand and attractive. To the east of the city, scarcely a mile away, is situated a very beautiful body of water, deep and pure, known as Lake Washington, twenty miles long by an average of three in width, and from which the citizens have a never-failing supply of the best of water. The lake has an area of over sixty square miles, and is surrounded by hills covered with a noble forest-growth of fir, spruce, and cedar. Seattle has four large public schools averaging six hundred pupils each, and a university to which there are seven professors attached, with a regular attendance of two hundred students.

Among the great natural resources of this region there is included sixty thousand acres of coal fields within a radius of thirty miles of Seattle. These coal fields are connected with the city by railways. Tacoma and Seattle are also joined by rail, besides two daily lines of steamboats.

Great is the rivalry existing between the people here and those of Tacoma, but there is certainly room enough for both; and, notwithstanding the destructive fire which lately occurred at Seattle, it is prospering wonderfully. About four miles distant from the centre of business is situated one of the largest steel manufactories in this country, the immediate locality being known as Moss Bay. Here timber, water, coal, and mineral are close at hand to further the object of this mammoth establishment, which, when in full operation, will give employment to five thousand men. Real estate speculation is the present rage at Seattle, based on the idea that it is to be the port of Puget Sound.

Between the city and hoary-headed Mount Tacoma is one of the finest hop-growing valleys extant. It has enriched its dwellers by this industry, and more hops are being planted each succeeding year, increasing the quantity exported by some twenty-five per cent. annually. It may be doubted if the earth produces a more beautiful sight in the form of an annual crop of vegetation than that afforded by a hop-field, say of forty acres, when in full bloom. We were told that the land of King County, of which Seattle is the capital, is marvelous in fertility, especially in the valleys, often producing four tons of hay to the acre; three thousand pounds of hops, or six hundred bushels of potatoes, or one hundred bushels of oats to the acre are common. It must be remembered also that while there is plenty of land to be had of government or the Northern Pacific Railroad Company at singularly low rates, transportation in all directions by land or water is ample and convenient, a desideratum by no means to be found everywhere.

From the deck of the steamer, as we sail northward, the irregular-formed, but well-wooded shore is seen to be dotted with hamlets, sawmills, farms, and hop-fields, all forming a pleasing foreground to the remarkable scenery of land and water presided over by the snow-crowned peak of Mount Tacoma, which looms fourteen thousand feet and more skyward in its grandeur and loneliness. How awful must be the stillness which pervades those heights! As we view it, the snow-line commences at about six thousand feet from the base, above which there are eight thousand feet more, ice-topped and glacier-bound, where the snow and ice rest in endless sleep. There are embraced within the capacious bosom of Tacoma fifteen glaciers, three of which, by liberal road-making and engineering, have been rendered accessible to visitors, and a few persistent mountain climbers come hither every year to witness glacial scenery finer than can be found in Europe. Persons who have traveled in Japan will be struck by the strong resemblance of this Alpine Titan to the famous volcano of Fujiyama, whose snow-wreathed cone is seen by the stranger as he enters the harbor of Yokohama, though it is eighty miles away.

As we steam northward other peaks come into view, one after another, until the whole Cascade Range is visible, half a hundred and more in number.

The summit of Tacoma is not absolutely inaccessible. A dozen daring and hardy climbers have accomplished the ascent first and last; but it involves a degree of labor and the encountering of serious dangers which have thus far rendered it a task rarely achieved. Many have attempted to scale these lonely heights, and many have given up exhausted, glad to return alive from this perilous experience between earth and sky. Members of various Alpine clubs cross the Atlantic to climb inferior elevations. Let such Americans test their athletic capacity and indulge their ambition by overcoming the difficult ascent of Tacoma.

Port Townsend is finally reached, – the port of entry for Puget Sound district and the gateway of this great body of inland water. Tacoma, Seattle, and Port Townsend are all lively contestants for supremacy on Puget Sound. The business part of Port Townsend is situated at the base of a bluff which rises sixty feet above the sea level, upon the top of which the dwelling-houses have been erected, and where a marine hospital flies the national flag. To live in comfort here it would seem to be necessary for each family to possess a balloon, or that a big public lift should be established to take the inhabitants of the town from one part to the other. It is rapidly growing, – street grading and building of stores and dwelling-houses going on in its several sections. Vancouver named the place after his distinguished patron, the Marquis of Townshend. We were told that over two thousand vessels enter and clear at the United States custom-house here annually, besides which there are at least a thousand which pass in and out of the sound under coasting licenses, and are not included in this aggregate. The collections of the district average one thousand dollars for each working day of the year.

Port Townsend is nine hundred miles from San Francisco by sea, and thirty-five hundred miles, in round numbers, from Boston or New York. It is the first port from the Pacific Ocean, and the nearest one to British Columbia, besides being the natural outfitting port for Alaska. We were surprised to learn the extent of maritime business done here, and that in the number of American steam vessels engaged in foreign trade it stands foremost in all the United States. Its climate is said to be more like that of Italy than any other part of America. The place is certainly remarkable for salubrity and healthfulness, and is universally commended by persons who have had occasion to remain there for any considerable period. The view from the upper part of the town is very comprehensive, including Mount Baker on one side and the Olympic Range on the other, while the far-away silver cone of Mount Tacoma is also in full view. The busy waters of the sound are constantly changing in the view presented, various craft passing before the eye singly and in groups. Long lines of smoke trail after the steamers, whose turbulent wakes are crossed now and then by some dancing egg-shell canoe or a white-winged, graceful sailboat bending to the breeze.

Certain custom-house formalities having been duly complied with, we continued on our course, bearing more to the westward, crossing the Strait of Juan de Fuca, bound for Victoria, the capital of Vancouver Island and of British Columbia, at which interesting place we land for a brief sojourn. To the westward the port looks out through the Strait of Fuca to the Pacific, southward into Puget Sound, and eastward beyond the Gulf of Georgia to the mainland.

CHAPTER VII

Victoria, Vancouver’s Island. – Esquimalt. – Chinamen. – Remarkable Flora. – Suburbs of the Town. – Native Tribes. – Cossacks of the Sea. – Manners and Customs. – The Early Discoverer. – Sailing in the Inland Sea. – Excursionists. – Mount St. Elias. – Mount Fairweather. – A Mount Olympus. – Seymour Narrows. – Night on the Waters. – A Touch of the Pacific.

The city of Victoria contains twelve thousand inhabitants, more or less, and is situated just seventy miles from the mainland; but beyond the fact that it is a naval station, commanding the entrance to the British possessions from the Pacific, we see nothing to conduce to the future growth of Victoria beyond that of any other place on the sound. The aspect is that of an old, steady-going, conservative town, undisturbed by the bustle, activity, and business life of such places as Tacoma and Seattle. Vancouver, on the opposite shore, being the terminus of the Canadian Pacific Railway, bids fair to soon exceed it in business importance, though it has to-day less than ten thousand inhabitants. The population of Victoria is highly cosmopolitan in its character, being of American, French, German, English, Spanish, and Chinese origin. Of the latter there are fully three thousand. They are the successful market-gardeners of Victoria, a position they fill in many of the English colonies of the Pacific, also performing the public laundry work here, as we find them doing in so many other places. In the hotels they are employed as house-servants, cooks, and waiters. Yet every Chinaman who lands here, the same as in Australia and New Zealand, is compelled to pay a tax of fifty dollars entrance fee. The surprise is that such an arbitrary rule does not act as a bar to Asiatic immigration; but it certainly does not have that effect, while it yields quite a revenue to the local treasury. At most ports the importation or landing of Chinese women is forbidden, but some of the gayest representatives of the sex are to be seen in the streets of Victoria, with bare heads, having their intensely black hair, shining with grease, dressed in large puffs. The heavy Canton silks in which they are clothed indicate that they have plenty of money. They affect gaudy colors, and wear heavy jade ear-rings, with breastpins of the same stone set in gold. The lewd character of the Chinese women who leave their native land in search of foreign homes is so well known as to fully warrant the prohibition relative to their landing in American or British ports. The effort to exclude them is, however, not infrequently a failure, as with a trifling disguise male and female look so much alike as to deceive an ordinary observer. The Asiatics are up to all sorts of tricks to evade what they consider arbitrary laws.

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