Medical Lake

1895

Down in southern Washington, on the great Columbian plateau, at an altitude of 2,000 feet above the level of the Pacific, is the Dead sea of America. The local geographers call it Medical lake because there is a belief that its waters are highly charged with curative properties.

It is about one-mile long and three-fourths of a mile wide, with an average depth of 60 feet. It has no inlet or outlet, and its level appears to remain the same. There must be salt, springs in the bottom that feed it about as fast as the waters are exhausted by evaporation, which is rapid in that country, where the air is so dry and rare. The waters are very heavy and very salt, its density and composition being almost exactly as those of the Dead sea in Palestine.

No vegetable life exists within a mile or more of its shores, which are a dry, hard clay. The only animal life is a little turtle or terrapin they call the boat-bug, and the walking fish, which is a curious creature about 8 inches long, with four fins that look like legs and are used for the same purpose. This walking fish is never seen elsewhere, I'm told. — Chicago Record.