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CRUISE ON PUGET SOUND.

Put yourself in my place, reader, for a time—long enough to read this chapter. Think of yourself as young again, if elderly (I will not say old); play you have been old and now young again, until you find out about this trip on Puget Sound fifty and more years ago. Then think of Puget Sound in an inquiring mood, as though you knew nothing about it, only a little indefinite hear-say; enough to know there is such a name, but not what manner of place or how large or how small; whether it was one single channel, like a river, or numerous channels; whether it was a bay or a series of bays or whether it was a lake, but somehow connected with the sea, and then you will be in the mood these two young men were, when they descended the hill with their packs on their backs and entered the town of Olympia in May, 1853. Now, if you are in this inquiring mood, I will take you in my confidence and we will live the cruise over again of thirty-two days of adventures and observation on Puget Sound sixty-two years ago.

I was but a few months past twenty-three, while my brother Oliver could claim nearly two years' seniority. We had always played together as boys, worked together as men, and lived together ever after his marriage until the day of his death, now nearly sixty years ago, and so far as I can remember, never had a disagreement in our whole life.

So, when we cast off the line at Olympia, on or about the 28th day of May, 1853, we were assured of one thing and that was a concert of action, be there danger or only labor ahead. Neither of us had had much experience in boating, and none as to boat building, but when we decided to make the trip and discard the idea of taking a canoe we set to work with a hearty good will to build us a skiff out of light lumber, then easily obtained at the Tumwater mill of Hays, Ward & Co., in business at that place.

We determined to have the skiff broad enough to not upset easily, and long enough to carry us and our light cargo of food and bedding. Like the trip across the plains we must provide our own transportation. We were told that the Sound was a solitude so far as transportation facilities, with here and there a vessel loading piles and square timber for the San Francisco market. Not a steamer was then plying on the Sound; not even a sailing craft that essayed to carry passengers. We did not really know whether we would go twenty miles or a hundred; whether we would find small waters or large; straight channels or intricate by-ways; in a word we knew but very little of what lay before us. If we had known a little more, we would not have encountered the risks we did. One thing we knew, we could endure sturdy labor without fatigue, and improvised camp without discomfort, for we were used to just such experiences. Poor innocent souls, we thought we could follow the shore line and thus avoid danger, and perhaps float with the tide and thus minimize the labor, and yet keep our bearings.

George A. Barnes sold us the nails and oakum for building the boat and charged us 25 cents per pound for the former, but could not sell us any pitch as that was to be had for the taking. However, articles of merchandise were not high, though country produce sold for extreme prices.

Recently I have seen a "retail prices current of Puget Sound, Washington Territory, corrected weekly by Parker, Colter & Co.," in which, among many others, the following prices are quoted in the columns of the only paper in the Territory then published in Olympia, the "Columbian," as follows:

Pork, per lb., 20c; flour, per 100 lbs., $10.00; potatoes, per bushel, $3.00; butter, per lb., $1.00; onions, per bushel, $4.00; eggs, per dozen, $1.00; beets, per bushel, $3.50; sugar, per lb., 12½c; coffee, per lb., 18c; tea, per lb., 75c and $1.00; molasses, per gallon, 50c and 75c; salmon, per lb., 10c; whisky, per gallon, $1.00; sawed lumber, fir, per M, $20.00; cedar, per M, $30.00; shingles, per M, $4.25 to $5.00; piles, per foot, 5c to 8c; square timber, per foot, 12c to 15c.

Thus it will be seen that what the farmer had to sell was high while much he must buy was comparatively cheap, even his whisky, then but a dollar a gallon, while his potatoes sold for $3.00 a bushel.

This Parker, of Parker, Colter & Co., is the same John G. Parker, Jr., of steamboat fame who yet lives in Olympia, now an old man, but never contented without his hand on the wheel in the pilot house, where I saw him but a few years ago on his new steamer the Caswell, successor to his first, the Traveler, of fifty years before.

Two or three other stores besides Barnes' and Parker's were then doing business in Olympia, the Kandall Company, with Joseph Cushman as agent; A. J. Moses, and I think the Bettman Brothers.

Rev. Benjamin F. Close, Methodist, held religious service in a small building near Barnes' store, but there was no church edifice for several years. Near by, the saloon element had found a foothold, but I made no note of them in my mind other than to remember they were there and running every day of the week including Sunday.

The townsite proprietor, Edmund Sylvester, kept the hotel of the town, the "Washington," at the corner of 2nd and Main Street, a locality now held to be too far down on the water front, but then the center of trade and traffic.

G. N. McConaha and J. W. Wiley dispensed the law and H. A. Goldsborough & Simmons (M. T. Simmons) looked out for the real estate and conveyances. Add to these a bakery, a livery stable, and a blacksmith shop and we have the town of Olympia in our mind again of possibly 100 people who then believed a great future lay in store for their embryo city "at the head of Puget Sound."

Three leading questions occupied the attention of all parties while we were in this little ambitious city, the new Territorial organization so soon to be inaugurated, the question of an overland railroad, and of an over mountain immigrant wagon road. The last was the absorbing topic of conversation, as it was a live enterprise dependent upon the efforts of the citizens for success. Meetings had been held in different parts of the district west of the Cascade Mountains and north of the Columbia River, and finally subscription lists were circulated, a cashier and superintendent appointed, with the result, as stated elsewhere, of opening the way for the first immigration over the Cascade Mountains via the Natchess Pass, but the particulars of this work are given in other chapters following.

As the tide drew off the placid waters of the bay at Olympia with just a breath of air, our little craft behaved splendidly as the slight ripples were jostled against the bow under the pressure of the sail and brought dreams of a pleasure trip, to make amends for the tiresome pack across the country. Nothing can be more enjoyable than favorable conditions in a boating trip, the more specially to those who have long been in the harness of severe labor, and for a season must enjoy enforced repose. And so we lazily floated with the tide, sometimes taking a few strokes with the oars, and at other times whistling for the wind, as the little town of Olympia to the south, became dimmed by distance.

At this southern extremity of the Sound without the accumulation of water to struggle for passage, as through the channel to the north, the movement is neither swift, nor disturbed with cross currents to agitate the surface—more like the steady flow of a great river.

But we were no sooner fairly out of sight of the little village and out of the bay it was situated upon (Budd's Inlet), than the query came up as to which way to go. Was it this channel or that or yet another one we should take? Let the tide decide; that will take us out toward the ocean we urged. No, we are drifting into another bay; that cannot be where we want to go; why, we are drifting right back almost in the same direction from which we came, but into another bay. We'll pull this way to that point to the northeast. But there seems a greater opening of waters to the northwest; yes, but I do not see any way out there. Neither is there beyond that point (Johnson's Point); and so we talked and pulled and puzzled until finally it dawned upon us that the tide had turned and we were being carried back to almost the spot from whence we came, into South Bay.

"Now the very best thing we can do is to camp," said the senior of the party of two, to which the junior, your humble writer, readily assented, and so our first night's camp was scarcely twelve miles from where we had started in the morning.

What a nice camping place this. The ladies would say lovely, and why not? A beautiful pebbly beach that extended almost to the water's edge even at low tide with a nice grassy level spit; a back ground of evergreen giant fir timber; such clear, cool water gushing out from the bank near by, so superlative in quality as to defy words to adequately describe; and such fuel for the camp fire, broken fir limbs with just enough pitch to make a cheerful blaze and yet body enough to last well. Why, we felt so happy that we were almost glad the journey had been interrupted. Oliver was the carpenter of the party, the tent builder, wood getter, and general roust-a-bout, to coin a word from camp parlance, while I, the junior, was the "chief cook and bottle washer," as the senior would jocularly put it.

At the point a little beyond where we landed we found next morning J. R. Johnson, M. D., with his cabin on the point under the pretentious name of "Johnson's Hospital," opened as he said for the benefit of the sick, but which, from what I saw in my later trips I think his greatest business was in disposing of cheap whisky of which he contributed his share of the patronage.

An Indian encampment being near by, a party of them soon visited our camp and began making signs for trade. "Mika tik-eh clams?" came from out the mouth of one of the matrons of the party as if though half choked in the speaking, a cross between a spoken word and a smothered guttural sound in the throat.

"What does she say, Oliver?" the junior said, turning for counsel to the superior wisdom of the elder brother.

"I'm blessed if I know what she says, but she evidently wants to sell some clams."

And so, after considerable dickering, and by signs and gestures and words oft repeated we were able to impart the information that we wanted a lesson in cookery; that we wanted her to show us how to cook them, and that we would buy some. This brought some merriment in the camp. The idea, that there lived a person that did not know how to cook clams. Without saying by your leave or anything else the motherly looking native began tearing down our camp fire.

"Let her alone," said the senior, "and see what she's up to," noticing that the younger man was going to remonstrate against such an interference with his well laid plans for bread baking. And so the kitchen of the camp was surrendered to the native matron, who quietly covered the hot pebbles and sand where the fire had been, with a lighter layer of pebbles, upon which the clams were deposited and some fine twigs placed on top, upon which earth was deposited. "K-l-o-s-h-e," said the matron. "Hy-as-kloshe," said her seignior, who sat squatting watching the operation with evident pride upon the achievement of his dame.

"What did they say?" innocently inquired the junior brother.

"I know what they said, but I don't know what they meant," responded the elder one, "unless it was she had done a good job, which I think she has," and thus began and ended our first lesson in the Chinook jargon, and our first introduction to a clam bake.

What memories hover around these three words, "the clam bake." Did you ever, may I ask my readers, other than those of ye olden times, did you ever participate in the joys of a regular old-fashioned clam bake, with or without the corn, with or without the help of the deft native hand? If you never have, then go straightway, before you die, to the end that you may ever after have the memory of the first clam bake, even if it be but a memory, and likewise be the last.

Our first clam bake gave us great encouragement. We soon learned that these bivalves were to be found in almost unlimited quantity, and were widely distributed; that the harvest was ready twice a day, when the tide was out, and that we need have no fear of a famine even if cast away in some unfrequented place.

"Yah-ka kloshe al-ta," said the dame, uncovering the steaming mass and placing them on a sliver found near by "de-late kloshe; kloshe muck-a-muck al-ta," and so, without understanding what she said, but knowing well what she meant, we fell to in disposing of this, our first clam dinner.

Dividing with them the bread that had been baked, and some potatoes that had been boiled, the natives soon withdrew to their own camp, where, before retiring for the night, we repaid the visit.

To see the little fellows of the camp scud behind the mother when the strangers entered, and shyly peep out from their retreat, and the mother lovingly reassuring them with kind, affectionate caresses, and finally coaxing them out from under cover, revealed the character of the natives we had neither of us realized before. We had been in the Indian country for nearly a year, but with guns by our side if not in our hands for nearly half the time, while on the plains, but we had not stopped to study the Indian character. We took it for granted that the Indians were our enemies and watched them suspiciously accordingly, but here seemed to be a disposition manifested to be neighborly and helpful. We took a lesson in Chinook, and by signs and words combined held conversation until a late hour, when, upon getting ready for taking leave, a slice of venison was handed us, sufficient for several meals. Upon offering to pay for it we were met with a shake of the head, and with the words, "wake, wake, kul-tus-pot-latch," which we understood by their actions to mean they made us a present of it.

This present from the Indian let in a flood of light upon the Indian character. We had made them a present first, it was true, but did not expect any return, except perhaps good will, and in fact, cannot now say we particularly expected that, but were impelled to do our act of courtesy from the manner of their treatment and from the evident desire to be on friendly terms. From that time on during the trip, and I may say, for all time since, I have found the Indians of Puget Sound ready to reciprocate acts of kindness, and hold in high esteem a favor granted if not accompanied by acts apparently designed to simply gain an advantage.

We often forget the sharp eyes and ears of little children and let slip words that are quickly absorbed to their hurt by affecting their conduct. While the Indian is really not a suspicious person, nevertheless, he is quick to detect and as quick to resent a real or supposed slight as the little five-year-old who discovers his elders in their fibs or deceit. Not that the Indian expects socially to be received in your house or at your table, yet little acts of kindness, if done without apparent design, touch their better nature and are repaid more than a hundred fold, for you thereafter have a friend and neighbor, and not an enemy or suspicious maligner.

All of this did not dawn on the young men at the time, though their treatment of the Indians was in harmony with friendly feelings which we found everywhere and made a lasting impression.

Subsequent experience, of course, has confirmed these first impressions with the wider field of observation in after years, while employing large numbers of these people in the hop fields of which I hope to write later. And so now must end this chapter with the subject of the "cruise" to be continued at another sitting.