CRUISE ON PUGET SOUND.

By the time the tide had turned, night had come and we were in a quandary as to what to do; whether to camp in our boat, or to start out on unknown waters in the dark. Our Indian visitors began making preparations to proceed on their journey, and assured us it was all right ahead, and offered to show us the way to good camping grounds in a big bay where the current was not strong, and where we would find a great number of Indians in camp.

It did not occur to us to have any fear of the Indians We did not at all depend on our prowess or personal courage, but felt that we were among friends. We had by this time come to know the general feeling existing between Indians and whites, and that there was no trouble, as a class, whatever there might be as to individuals. I do not want my reader to understand we thought we were doing an heroic act in following a strange party of Indians into unknown waters and into an unknown camp of the natives after dark, or that I think so now. There was no danger ahead of us other than that incident to the attempt of navigating such waters with so frail a boat, and one so unsuited in shape as well as build, for rough waters, and by persons so inexperienced on the water.

Sure enough, a short pull with a favorable current, brought us through the Narrows and into Commencement Bay and in sight of numerous camp fires in the distance. Our Indian friends lazily paddled along in company, while we labored vigorously with our oars as we were by this time in a mood to find a camp where we could have a fire and prepare some food. I remember that camp quite vividly, though cannot locate it exactly, but know that it was on the water front within the present limits of the city of Tacoma. A beautiful small rivulet came down a ravine and spread out on the beach, and I can remember the shore line was not precipitous and that it was a splendid camping ground. The particular thing I do remember is our supper of fresh salmon. Of all the delicious fish known, give me the salmon caught by trolling in early summer in the deep waters of Puget Sound; so fat that the excess of oil must be turned out of the pan while cooking. We had not then learned the art of cooking on the spit, or at least, did not practice it. We had scarcely gotten our camp fire under way before a salmon was offered us, but I cannot recall what we paid, but I know it was not a high price, else we would not have purchased. At the time we did not know but trolling in deep water for this king of fish was the only way, but afterwards learned of the enormous quantities taken by the seine direct from salt water.

Two gentlemen, Messrs. Swan and Riley, had established themselves on the bay, and later in the season reported taking two thousand large fish at one haul with their seine, three-fourths of which were salmon. As I have a fish story of my own to tell of our experience later, I will dismiss the subject for the present.

We were now in the bay, since made famous in history by that observing traveler, Theodore Winthrop, who came from the north a few months later, and saw the great mountain, "a cloud compeller," reflected in the placid waters of the Sound, "Tacoma" [4] as he wrote, Rainier, as we saw it. A beautiful sight it was and is whatever the name, but to us it was whatever others said it was, while Winthrop, of a poetic mind, was on the alert for something new under the sun, if it be no more than a name for a great mountain.

Winthrop came in September, while we were in the bay in June, thus ante-dating his trip by three months or more. To Winthrop belongs the honor of originating the name Tacoma from some word claimed to have been spoken by the Indians as the name of the mountain. As none of the pioneers ever heard the word until many years afterwards, and not then until after the posthumous publication of Winthrop's works ten years after his visit, I incline to the opinion that Winthrop coined the word out of his imaginative brain.

We again caught sight of the mountain the next day, as we approached the tide flats off the mouth of the Puyallup River. We viewed the mountain with awe and admiration, but gave no special heed to it, more than to many other new scenes engaging our attention. It was land we wanted whereby we might stake a claim, and not scenery to tickle our fancy. Yet, I doubt if there lives a man, or ever did, who has seen that great mountain, but has been inspired with higher thoughts, and we may say higher aspirations, or who has ever tired looking upon this grand pile, the father of five great rivers.

We floated into the mouth of the Puyallup River with a vague feeling as to its value, but did not proceed far until we were interrupted by a solid drift of monster trees and logs, extending from bank to bank up the river for a quarter of a mile or more. We were told by the Indians there were two other like obstructions a few miles farther up the river, and that the current was "de-late-hyas-skoo-kum," which interpreted means that the current was very strong. We found this to be literally true during the next two or three days we spent on the river.

We secured the services of an Indian and his canoe to help us up the river, and left our boat at the Indian's camp near the mouth.

The tug of two days to get six miles up the river, the unloading of our outfit three times to pack it over cut-off trails, and the dragging of our canoe around the drifts, is a story of constant toil with consequent discouragement, not ending until we camped on the bank of the river within the present limits of the little thriving city of Puyallup, founded afterwards by me on a homestead claim taken many years later. The little city now contains over six thousand inhabitants and is destined to contain many thousand more in the lapse of time.

The Puyallup Valley at that time was a solitude. No white settlers were found, though it was known two, who lived with Indian women, had staked claims and made some slight improvements—a man by the name of Hayward, near where the town of Sumner is now located, and William Benson, on the opposite side of the river, and a mile distant from the boundaries of Puyallup. An Indian trail led up the river from Commencement Bay, and one westward to the Nisqually plains, over which pack animals could pass, but as to wagon roads, there were none, and as to whether a feasible route for one could be found only time with much labor could determine.

When we retraced our steps, and on the evening of the third day landed again at the mouth of the river after a severe day's toil of packing around drifts and hauling the canoe overland past drifts, it was evident we were in no cheerful mood. Oliver did not sing as usual while preparing for camp, or rally with sallies of wit and humor as he was wont to do when in a happy mood. Neither did I have much to say, but fell to work mechanically preparing the much needed meal, which we ate in silence, and forthwith wrapped ourselves in our blankets for the night, but not for immediate slumber.

We had crossed the two great states of Illinois and Iowa, over hundreds of miles of unoccupied prairie land as rich as anything that "ever laid out of doors," on our way from Indiana to Oregon, in search of land on which to make a home, and here, at what we might say "at the end of our rope" had found the land, but under such adverse conditions that seemed almost too much to overcome. It was a discouraging outlook, even if there had been roads. Such timber! It seemed an appalling undertaking to clear it, the greater portion being covered with a heavy growth of balm and alder trees, and thick tangle of underbrush besides, and so, when we did fall to sleep that night, it was without visions of new found wealth.

And yet, later, I did tackle a quarter section of that heaviest timber land, and never let up until the last tree, log, stump, and root disappeared, though of course, not all of it by my own hands. Nevertheless, with a goodly part, I did say, come, boys, and went into the thickest of the work.

But, of the time of which I am writing, there was more to consider than the mere clearing, which we estimated would take thirteen years of solid work for one man to clear a quarter-section; the question of going where absolutely there were no neighbors, no roads, no help to open them, and in fact, without a knowledge as to whether a feasible route could be found, compelled us to decide against locating.

A small factor came in to be considered. Such swarms of mosquitoes we had never seen before. These we felt would make life a burden, forgetting that as the country became opened they would disappear. I may relate here a curious phenomenon brought to light by after experience. My donation claim was finally located on high table land, where no surface water could be found in summer for miles around, and there were swarms of mosquitoes, while on the Puyallup homestead taken later, six miles from the mouth of the river, and where water lay on the surface, in spots, the whole summer long, we seldom saw one of these pests there. I never could account for this, and have long since ceased to try; I only know it was so.

If we could have but known what was coming four months later, doubt not, notwithstanding our discouragement, we would have remained and searched the valley diligently for the choicest locations. In October following, there came the first immigrants that ever crossed the Cascade Mountains, and located in a body nearly all of the whole valley, and before the year was ended had a rough wagon road out to the prairies and to Steilacoom, the county seat.

As I will give an account of the struggles and trials of these people later in this work, I will here dismiss the subject by saying that no pioneer who settled in the Puyallup Valley, and stuck to it, failed finally to prosper and gain a competence.

We lingered at the mouth of the river in doubt as to what best to do. My thoughts went back to the wife and baby in the lonely cabin on the Columbia River, and then again to that bargain we had made before marriage that we were going to be farmers, and how could we be farmers if we did not have the land? Under the donation act we could hold three hundred and twenty acres, but we must live on it for four years, and so it behooved us to look out and secure our location before the act expired, which would occur the following year. So, with misgivings and doubts, we finally, on the fourth day, loaded our outfit into our skiff and floated out on the receding tide, whither, we did not know.