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 government, and Governor Stevens at once set to work to extinguish the Indian titles to land and to survey a route for a railway, which was later to become the Northern Pacific. The Indians, alarmed by the rapid growth of the white population, attempted to destroy the scattered settlements and the wandering prospectors for gold, which had been discovered in eastern Washington in 1855. Between 1855 and 1859, after many sharp contests, the Indians were partially subdued.

Shortly after 1846, the British began to assert that the Rosario Strait and not Haro Strait (as the Americans held) was the channel separating the mainland and Vancouver Island, thus claiming the Haro Archipelago of which San Juan was the principal island. Conflict of authority arose, and in 1859 San Juan was occupied by U.S. troops commanded by Captain George E. Pickett (1825-1875), and for a time hostilities seemed imminent. By agreement joint occupation followed until, by the Treaty of Washington (May 8, 1871), the question was left to the German emperor, who decided (October 21, 1872) in favour of the United States. Meanwhile Oregon was admitted as a state (February 14, 1859) with the present boundaries, and the remnant of the territory, including portions of what are now Idaho and Wyoming, was added to Washington. The discovery of gold in this region, however, brought such a rush of population that the Territory of Idaho was set off (March 3, 1863) and Washington was reduced to its present limits. Rapid growth in population and wealth led to agitation for statehood, and a constitution was adopted in 1878, but Congress declined to pass an enabling act. The development of Alaska and the completion of the Northern Pacific Railroad to the coast (1883) brought a great increase in population. A large number of Chinese coolies who had been introduced to construct the railway congregated in the towns on the completion of the work, and in 1885 serious anti-Chinese riots led to the declaration of martial law by the governor and to the use of United States troops. Finally the long-desired admission to statehood was granted by Congress (February 22, 1889) and President Benjamin Harrison (November 11, 1889) formally announced the admission complete.

Since admission the progress of the state has continued with increasing rapidity. The Alaska-Yukon Exposition, designed to exhibit the resources of western America, held at Seattle June-October 1909, was a complete success. In politics the state has been Republican in national elections, except in 1896, when it was carried by a fusion of Democrats and Populists. A Populist was elected governor and was re-elected in 1900.

.—For general and physical description see the Annual Reports (1902 sqq.) of the Washington Geological Survey—in vol. i. there is a “Bibliography of the Literature referring to the Geology of Washington” by R. Arnold—; O. L. Waller, Irrigation in the State of Washington (Washington, 1909), Bulletin 214 of the U.S. Department of Agriculture; and Water Supply and Irrigation Papers, 55 and 118 (1901 and 1905) of the U.S. Geological Survey. W. L. Davis and J. H. Bowles's Birds of Washington (2 vols., Seattle, 1909) is an excellent work. For administration see R. A. Ballinger and A. Remington, Codes and Statutes of Washington (ibid., 1910). For history see H. H. Bancroft, The Northwest Coast (2 vols., San Francisco, 1884), and Oregon (2 vols., ibid., 1886-1888), Washington, Idaho and Montana (ibid., 1890); George Vancouver, Voyage of Discovery to the North Pacific Ocean (3 vols., London, 1797); Elwood Evans, Washington (Tacoma, Washington, 1893); and E. S. Meany, Washington (New York, 1909). See also the bibliographies under and.  WASHSTAND, a table or stand containing conveniences for personal ablutions. In its 18th-century form it was called “basin stand” or “basin frame,” and is still sometimes described as a “washhand stand.” Its direct, but remote, ancestor was the monastic lavabo, ranges of basins of stone, lead or marble fed from a cistern. They were usually of primitive conception, and a trough common to all was probably more frequent than separate basins. Very occasionally they were of bronze adorned with enamels and blazoned with heraldry. Very similar usages obtained in castles and palaces, fixed lavatories being constructed in the thickness of the walls for the use of their more important residents. These arrangements were obviously intended only for the summary ablutions which, until a very late date, sufficed to even the high-born. By degrees the lavabo became portable, and a “basin frame” is mentioned as early as the middle of the 17th century. Examples of earlier date than the third or fourth decade of the 18th century are, however, virtually unknown. Thenceforward, until about the end of that century, this piece of furniture was usually literally a “stand.” It was supported upon a tripod; a circular orifice in the top received the basin, and smaller ones were provided for a soap dish and a water-bottle. Sometimes a stand for the water-jug when the basin was in use was provided below, and very commonly there was a drawer, sometimes even two drawers, below the basin. Great numbers of these stands were made to fit into corners, and a “corner wash-stand” is still one of the commonest objects in an old furniture shop. Chippendale designed such stands in an elaborate rococo fashion, as well as in simpler form. As the 18th century drew to its close the custom of using the same apartment as reception room by day and sleeping room by night produced a demand for what was called “harlequin furniture” —pieces which were contrived a double or triple debt to pay. Thus a variety of complicated combination washstands and dressing tables were made, and fitted with mirrors and sometimes with writing conveniences and drawers for clothes. Sheraton developed astonishing ingenuity in devising a type of furniture which, if we may judge by the large number of examples still existing, must have become highly popular. With the beginning of the 19th century and the expansion of ideals of personal cleanliness, the washstand grew in size and importance. It acquired the form of an oblong wooden table provided, like its smaller predecessors, with orifices for basins and fitted with a broad shelf-like stretcher upon which the jugs were placed when they were removed from the basins. Ample space was provided for soap-dishes and water-bottles. These tables were single or double, for the use of one or two persons. The washstand, as we know it in the 20th century, took its final form when the wooden top was replaced by marble, unpierced, the basins being placed upon the slab, which, in the beginning almost invariably white, is now often of red or other warm-tinted marble.  WASP (Lat. vespa), the common name for a well-known sort of stinging insect. The order Hymenoptera is divided into two sub-orders, the Symphyta and the Apocrita. The latter is subdivided into several sections, one of which, the Vespoidea, includes all the true wasps; in addition to the ruby wasps and many of the “Fossores” or digging wasps.

The true wasps (forming the old section Diploptera) are in their turn divided into three families—(1) the Vespidae, (2) the