16,268 and its maintenance involved an average annual loss of $832. The first public wash-house erected in Germany, having a public laundry, was built at Hamburg in 1855. Unlike the British wash-houses, it is said that most of the German wash-houses have proved self-supporting and sometimes yield a profit.
In America there are no municipally owned public laundries. In a few of the public bath-houses the bathers are supplied with conveniences for the cleansing of their wearing apparel. At the public bath-house in Rochester, N. Y., men and boys are allowed to wash their own clothes. This is also true at Buffalo, where the wash-room and drying-closets for underclothes were used by 1542 persons in 1897 and 3166 persons in 1899. In Philadelpliia the Public Baths Association operates a public wash-house in connection with the bath-house. The laundry, which at first was reserved for men on certain days, is now open to women only.
WASHING MACHINES. See Laundry Machinery.
WASH′INGTON. A Western State of the United States, popularly called the ‘Evergreen State.’ It occupies the northwestern corner of the United States proper, lies between latitudes 45° 32′ and 49° N., longitudes 110° 57′ and 124° 48′ W., and is bounded on the north by British Columbia, on the east by Idaho, on the south by Oregon, and on the west by the Pacific Ocean. In the northwest a deep inlet formed by the Straits of Juan de Fuca and Georgia separates the State from Vancouver Island. The greater part of the southern boundary is formed by the Columbia River. The State is roughly of rectangular shape, with an extreme length from east to west of 300 miles, and an extreme breadth of 240 miles. The area is 69,180 square miles, including 2300 square miles of water. Washington ranks sixteenth in size among the States.
Topography. Washington closely resembles Oregon in its main topographical features, and, as in Oregon, the Cascade Mountains divide the State into a smaller western and a larger eastern section, which are strongly contrasting in their climatic and other characteristics. The Cascade Mountains form a lofty plateau falling steeply on both sides, and eroded into a rugged complex of peaks and ridges nearly 100 miles wide. The main crest has an average altitude of about 5000 feet, but from the southern part of the plateau the three great volcanic cones of Mount Rainier (Mount Tacoma), which bears a number of glaciers, Mount Adams, and Mount Saint Helens rise, respectively, to altitudes of 14,526, 12,470, and 10,000 feet. In the northern part of the range the highest point is Mount Baker, with an altitude of 10,827 feet. From the eastern base of the Cascades and south of the Great Bend of the Columbia stretches the vast basaltic plateau, an undulating, treeless plain lying between 1000 and 2000 feet above the sea. Almost the only irregularities in its surface are the cañon-like valleys of the Columbia and its branches, and the coulées, more or less dry cañons, which indicate the former paths of the river. West of the Columbia, however, the lava field has been upturned in a series of monoclinal ridges running east and west as spurs of the Cascades, and south of the Snake River, in the southeastern corner of the State, there is another uplift, known as the Blue Mountains, exceeding 5000 feet in altitude. The northeastern quarter of the State, north of the Great Bend and the Spokane River, is rugged and mountainous, forming part of the Rocky Mountain system, and rising in some of its peaks to an altitude of over 6000 feet. The central feature of western Washington is the Puget Sound Basin, a longitudinal depression between the Cascade and Coast ranges corresponding to the Willamette Valley of Oregon. Its highest parts are scarcely over 100 feet above the sea, and it is penetrated through more than half its length by the numerous branching arms of Puget Sound, forming one of the most magnificent systems of harbors in the world. The Coast Range is not very pronounced in the south, consisting of broad irregular masses scarcely exceeding 2000 feet in altitude. In the north, however, it rises into a well-defined group called the Olympic Mountains, whose highest point is Mount Olympus, with a height of 8150 feet. The Pacific coast itself is straight and regular, practically the sole being Gray's and Willapa harbors.
Hydrography. The only large independent river in Washington is the Columbia, which drains the entire eastern section of the State. It enters the State near its northeastern corner and flows through the northern mountains and the lava plateau in a southwestward course with a large, winding bend. After turning finally westward it forms the southern boundary of the State until it enters the ocean. It would be navigable throughout its course within the State were it not interrupted at frequent intervals by rapids. Its principal tributaries within the limits of Washington are the Pend Oreille and the Spokane rivers in the northeast and the Snake River in the southeast. Its chief affluent from the east slope of the Cascades is the Yakima. Western Washington is drained by a large number of comparatively small streams flowing into Puget Sound and the ocean. The largest of those entering the sound are the Skagit in the north and the Nesqually in the south. Of the streams rising on the western slope of the Cascades only one, the Chehalis, breaks through the Coast Range and enters the ocean directly. There are a number of lakes in eastern Washington, but most of them are either expanded rivers, such as the long and narrow Lake Chelan, the largest in the State, or remnants of old river courses.
Climate. There is a great contrast between the climates of western and eastern Washington, owing to the fact that the Cascade Range condenses the greater part of the moisture in the west winds and shuts out the tempering influence of the sea. In western Washington the climate is equable, with a mean temperature for January of 39° and for July of 62°, while the minimum is generally between 10° and 20° and the maximum about 95°. In eastern Washington the mean for January is 30° and for July 74°, while the extremes range between 112° and 30° below zero. Western Washington has a humid atmosphere with an annual rainfall ranging from 54 inches at Olympia to 132 inches at Clearwater, on the Pacific coast. In some years the rainfall on the coast may be even more than 150 inches, a quantity exceeded in few places on the globe. The average normal rainfall for the whole of eastern Washington is 16 inches, and except on
