TOWNS OF PUGET SOUND 



But, though young and loose-jointed, they 

 are fast taking on the forms and manners of 

 old cities, putting on airs, as some would say, 

 like boys in haste to be men. They are already 

 towns "with all modern improvements, first- 

 class in every particular," as is said of hotels. 

 They have electric motors and lights, paved 

 broadways and boulevards, substantial busi- 

 ness blocks, schools, churches, factories, and 

 foundries. The lusty, titanic clang of boiler- 

 making may be heard there, and plenty of the 

 languid music of pianos mingling with the 

 babel noises of commerce carried on in a hun- 

 dred tongues. The main streets are crowded 

 with bright, wide-awake lawyers, ministers, 

 merchants, agents for everything under the 

 sun; ox-drivers and loggers in stiff, gunomy 

 overalls; back-slanting dudes, well-tailored and 

 shiny; and fashions and bonnets of every 

 feather and color bloom gayly in the noisy 

 throng and advertise London and Paris. Vig- 

 orous Ufe and strife are to be seen everywhere. 

 The spirit of progress is in the air. Still it is 

 hard to reaUze how much good work is being 

 done here of a kind that makes for civilization 

 — the enthusiastic, exulting energy displayed 

 in the building of new towns, railroads, and 

 mills, in the opening of mines of coal and iron 

 and the development of natural resources in 



253 



