SKETCHES OF WESTERN LIFE.

"Occidental, Transcontinental, Oriental" McDonald.

In the early fifties of the 19th century, there appeared on the waters of Puget Sound an eccentric character answering to the name of Joe Lane McDonald. He was a corpulent man of low stature, short bowlegs, a fat neck, a "pug" bulldog nose, with small but very piercing eyes and withal a high forehead that otherwise softened the first unfavorable impression of him.

The writer is relating personal observations of this unique character as he frequently saw him at the new and then thriving town of Steilacoom, then the center of trade for all of Puget Sound and to the Straits of San Juan De Fuca.

McDonald enjoyed the distinction of being among the first, if not the very first, trader among the 6,000 Indians of Puget Sound, for at that early day, 1853-55, there were but few whites to be seen. His sloop, about the size of an ordinary whaleboat, was decked over fore and aft and along each side, leaving an oblong open oval space in the center from which the captain, as he was frequently called, could stand at the helm and manage his sail, and eat a lunch easily reached from a locker nearby.

When once engaged in conversation, the unfavorable impression made by his physical deformities and unkempt condition disappeared, as he was glib of tongue and possessed a world of ideas far in advance of his compeers, and with knowledge to back up his theories. He would declaim almost by the hour portraying the grand future of Puget Sound, the "Occidental, Transcontinental, Oriental Trade", as he put it, that would certainly come in the near future and the grand possibilities for the embryo center of trade, the town of Steilacoom.

"Harping" upon the topic so much, McDonald came to be known more by the sobriquet of "Occidental, Transcontinental, Oriental" McDonald, rather than by his own given name.

The keep of his sloop was as neglected as that of his person, which of itself is saying a good deal. It was a fact that the odor from his boat (not to give it a worse name) could be detected, with favorable wind, a hundred paces away and from McDonald himself uncomfortably so in a close room.

Notwithstanding all this he was an interesting character, and always arrested attention when he spoke, though of course with differing views of his theories advanced.

McDonald clearly pointed out what was going to happen and what has happened, the building of a vast overland and oversea trade far beyond his greatest "flights of fancy," as so many of his pioneer friends were wont to call his teaching.

But the Indian war came, some white people were massacred, some Indians went on the warpath, the remainder of the six thousand went to the reservations and McDonald's occupation was gone, his sloop was taken over for Government use and he himself disappeared, doubtless to reach an early and unmarked grave.

These scenes were enacted now nearly sixty years ago. The then silent waters of Puget Sound, save by the stroke of the paddle upon the waves and the song of the Indians, is now displaced by great steamers navigating these waters; the overseas tonnage is in excess of McDonald's prophecies.

The transcontinental traffic that McDonald so prophetically pointed out is now almost beyond computation and cared for by six great railroad systems; the "Oriental" trade has assumed vast proportions, cared for in part by the regular sailing of 20,000 ton steamers; the coast tonnage has grown far beyond the most optimistic prophecy; the "dream of the star" to the flag has come true for the great State of Washington, as depicted by the poet: