The Willamette Sound. 69 



were controlled entirely by the level of the 

 Pacific ocean, and scarcely affected by the 

 flood levels in the river, and still less by any 

 extended lake system of the interior. 



And now, with our amended theory in 

 mind as a measuring rod, let us retrace our 

 steps to the lower country the Willamette 

 sound of the olden time. Let the fall of the 

 Columbia river, from this lake shore east of 

 the Cascade mountains to the mouth of the 

 Willamette river, be stated at eighty feet. Our 

 fossil remains on this lake shore are two hun- 

 dred and fifty feet above the present level of 

 its waters, making a total of three hundred 

 and thirty feet as the depth of those waters 

 above the present surface at the mouth of 

 the Willamette river. How naturally one 

 looks to the currents of such, a vast body of 

 water as the agency competent to the heaping 

 up of that long sandy ridge, one hundred 

 feet high, through which the river has cut its 

 way at Swan island, north of Portland! But 

 let us follow it still farther inland. Over 

 where Portland now stands, these waters were 



