Here at last the observations of science give to inquiry a solid support.

But a brief explanation shows how all its peculiarities are the result of natural causes which operate with a force as unerring as gravitation.

All this is now explained by known forces in Nature.

Of these the most important is a thermal current in the Pacific, corresponding to the Gulf Stream in the Atlantic.

The latter, having its origin in the heated waters of the Gulf of Mexico, flows as a river through the ocean northward, encircling England, bathing Norway, and warming all within its influence.

In the economy of Nature these thermal currents are only pipes of hot water, modifying the climate of continents by carrying heat from the warm cisterns of the South into the most distant places of the North.

Every ocean wind, from every quarter, traversing the stream of heat, takes up the warmth and carries it to the coast, so that the oceanic current is reinforced by an aërial current of constant influence.

These forces are aided essentially by the configuration of the Northwest Coast, with a lofty and impenetrable barricade of mountains, by which its islands and harbors are protected from the cold of the North.

For hot, cold, moist, and dry, four champions fierce, Strive here for mastery.

At present barley grows better, and there is reason to believe that it may be cultivated successfully very far to the north.

Under the operation of my amendment these profits would be slightly reduced, but not unduly, while the Treasury would receive an annual benefit of not far from six million dollars in coin.

A recent resident reports that there are no fruit-trees, and not even a raspberry-bush, and that he lost all his potatoes during one season by a frost in the latter days of July; but do not forget that these potatoes were the wall-flowers…

Other things may contribute to the scanty support of a household; but timber will, in all probability, be an article of commerce.

A profitable commerce in timber has already begun at Puget Sound.

The value of the lumber and spars exported abroad was over half a million dollars, while more than four times that amount was shipped coastwise.

Gold, which is so often a dangerous ignis-fatuus, did not appear to deceive them.

But coal, which is much more desirable than gold, was reported by several, and once at least with reasonable certainty.

The boat that landed from Behring, when he discovered the coast, found among other things “a whetstone on which it appeared that copper knives had been sharpened.” This was the first sign of the mineral wealth which already excites such…

A tree is conspicuous; a mineral is hidden in the earth, to be found by chance or science.

Gold is less important than coal, but its discovery produces more excitement.

The report of gold in any quarter stimulates the emigrant or the adventurer hoping to obtain riches swiftly.

But failure in one place will be no discouragement in another, especially as there is reason to believe that the mountains here contain a continuation of those auriferous deposits which have become so famous further south.

The first is the mountain range on the north of Cook’s Inlet and extending into the peninsula of Alaska, consisting principally of clay slate with permeating veins of diorite, the latter being known as a gold-bearing rock.

Trappers are “miners” of the forest, seeking furs as others seek gold.

In Kamtchatka, at the beginning of the last century, half a dozen sables were obtained in exchange for a knife, and a dozen for a hatchet; and the Kamtchadales wondered that their Cossack conquerors were willing to pay so largely for what…