308 Postelsia 
occupied this valley possessed a remarkable 
vigor. It then gathered the waters now filling 
several streams; the imperial Fraser of British 
Columbia, the Nooksachk, the Skagit, the Sky- 
komish, the White and a score of others were 
confluent at places now in the bed of Puget 
Sound and formed the great river which flowed 
through the strait when its channel was a thou- 
sand feet higher than today and the Pacific 
coast line many miles west of its present position. 
At that time Port Renfrew bay was a narrow 
river carrying a tumultous torrent, the confluent 
waters of the San Juan and Gordon rivers, then 
high mountain streams, into the River Fuca 
many miles above its mouth. The beautiful 
delta at the head of the bay could not then have 
existed; the projecting rocks on which the dock 
is now built formed a_ bold and sightly cliff 
hundreds of feet above the water. The eagle 
looked from his aerie down a narrow channel, 
like that of the Gordon now, across the waters 
of one of the largest rivers of the continent. 
The site of the Minnesota Seaside Station was 
then a lofty hillside, a rocky situation many 
