34 
BOTANY OF THE ROUTE. 
this was washed away by a rain following after it. It again snowed on the night of the 5th, 
and cleared olf so cold that ice formed along the shore of the bay. On the 9th the warm 
southwest winds again prevailed, and there was scarcely any cold weather .afterwards. 
January 14.—It was so warm that a bat came out and flew about the house for some hours 
before dark. “January 27. The weather has been, lately, growing daily warmer, with a SE. 
wind. Observed to day many frogs and striped snakes, and the large slugs and salamanders 
are crawling about. In the evening frogs are piping their serenade, the pleasant harbinger of 
early spring. The myrtle-leaved huckleberry is beginning to blossom, and the buds of trees 
are bursting; everything seems as advanced as in April at home.” 
This clear, warm weather continued until February 1, when it rained again, almost constantly 
for two weeks. Then came another mild, clear term, followed by cold weather, ice forming 
^-inch thick. 
February 20. — ‘ 1 Nardosmia palmata , Rubus spectabilis, and Trillium grandiflorum are in 
flower.” On the 23d I went up the Chehalis river, and to Puget Sound, which I soon after 
descended as far as the Straits of Fuca. There, as early as March 17, I found that the delicate 
little humming bird, swallows, and warblers had already reached the extreme northwest corner 
of the Territory, and I was disappointed in my hopes of obtaining some rare winter visitors from 
the north. The flowering currant, strawberries, and many other flowers were there blooming, 
and the winter was, of course, ended. During this winter more than twenty land and sixteen 
aquatic species of birds were almost constantly about the bay, some leaving only for a few days 
during the coldest part of January. A comparison of these numbers and species of birds with 
those remaining through winter in the same latitudes on the eastern coast will show very 
strikingly the difference in climate on the opposite sides of the continent. 
FRESH WATERS OF THE TERRITORY. 
Some general remarks upon the waters of the Territory, and their peculiar relations to their 
animal and vegetable productions, are necessary to complete these notes on the natural regions. 
Taking the fresh waters first, they being, with few exceptions, branches of the Columbia, 
and those which are not so being small and few, I shall treat of them as if they were, knowing 
but few differences in their natural products. Closer examinations will, doubtless, disclose the 
fact that these different waters have many arfimals, especially small fish, peculiar to each of 
them, but those which are amphibious can migrate from one to another, and plants are generally 
extended throughout them by means of their seeds, which are transported by birds, winds, &c. 
I have already alluded to the fact that an extensive group of plants inhabiting marshes were 
of identical species with those found in similar places throughout the northern part of this 
continent, and even of Europe and Asia. A smaller series, more truly aquatic, presents the 
same fact in a remarkable manner, ( Scirpus lacustris, Typlia latifolia, Polygonum ampMbium, 
and others.) 
The low temperature of the rivers, and of the springs which form most of the marshes, 
accounts in great measure for this similarity in vegetation at the level of the sea, and at a 
height of 5,000 feet on the mountains. The original source of all these waters (except those 
arising in the Coast range south of the Chehalis) is in the perpetual snows of the mountains, 
and in their rapid course to the sea they become heated only in those few places where 
expanded into small lakes and sloughs. The very perfect drainage of the country prevents 
the formation of extensive swamps, and no doubt accounts for the remarkable healthiness of a 
country exposed to such great moisture from rains. An inspection of the map will show that, 
