course of eighty miles, previous to passing through the range of Cascade mountains, in {285} a series of falls and rapids that obstruct its flow, and form insurmountable barriers to the passage of boats by water during the floods. These difficulties, however, are overcome by portages.
From thence there is a still water navigation for forty miles, when its course is again obstructed by rapids.
Thence to the ocean, one hundred and twenty miles, it is navigable for vessels of twelve feet draught of water at the lowest state of the river, though obstructed by many sand-bars.
In this part it receives the Willamette from the south, and the Cowelitz from the north. The former is navigable for small vessels twenty miles, to the mouth of the Klacka-*mus, three miles below its falls; the latter cannot be called navigable except for a small part of the year, during the floods, and then only for canoes and barges.[100]
The width of the Columbia, within twenty miles of its mouth, is much increased, and it joins the ocean between Cape Disappointment and Point Adams, forming a sand-pit from each by deposit, and causing a dangerous bar, which greatly impedes its navigation and entrance.
Frazer's river next claims attention. It {286} takes its rise in the Rocky mountain, near the source of Canoe river, taking a north-western course of eighty miles; it then turns to the southward, receiving the waters of Stuart's river, which rises in a chain of lakes near the northern boundary of the Territory.[101]
- [Footnote: surveys of Frémont (published in 1848), as a northern affluent of the Columbia,
between the Cascades and the Dalles; it would appear to correspond, therefore, either to Klickitat or White Salmon River.—Ed.]*
