STONE — ON THE SACEAMENTO SALMON. 1(0 



on all sides. This open space was filled with hay to weaken the force 

 of concussions and to equalize the temperature inside. The cover of 

 the crate was then put on, and I took them twenty-two miles down the 

 stage-road to Kedding, and thence one hundred and seventy miles by 

 rail to Sacramento City, where, after unpackino- the boxes and moisten- 

 ing the moss very thoroughly with cold water, I repacked tlie boxes in 

 the crate, and shipped them East, in care of Wells, Fargo & Co., by way 

 of the Pacific Kaihoad. 



I packed two tin boxes of eggs, also, and inclosed them in pails of 

 sawdust, with the expectation of hanging up the pails in the car, and so 

 avoid in some degree the jolting of the trains ; but on examining the 

 car, and considering the number of changes of car between here and the 

 Athmtic, I concluded that it was more dangerous to hang them up than 

 to have them rest on the floor of the car. Accordingly, all the packages 

 of eggs were carried like any other merchandise, on the floor of the 

 express-car. 



Permit me to add that, during the fall, I traveled the whole length 

 of the Sacramento Eiver, from its sources around Mount Shasta to its 

 outlet at the bay of San Francisco, and also ascended the McCloud 

 Eiver as far as it is accessible, which is about twenty miles, and col- 

 lected quite a complete series of specimens of the 8alinonid(c of the Sac- 

 ramento and McCloud Kivers, a catalogue of which I transnut here- 

 with. The specimens and accomi)anying drawings have been forwarded 

 to you, at the Smithsonian Institution. 



B— THE SALMONID.g^ OF THE SACRAMENTO RIVER. 



11. — THE SACRAMENTO EIVER. 



In order to make what follows more clear, permit me to describe 

 briefly the course of the Sacramento River. 



The Sacramento River proper has its sources in Mount Shasta, and 

 in the Siskiyou Mountains to the west of Mount Shasta, about four 

 hundred miles by the river channel from its outlet into the ocean at 

 San Francisco. A few miles below Mount Shasta, on Shasta Butte, as 

 it is called in California, the smaller sources form a clear, rocky, and 

 swift-running stream, about a hundred or a hundred and fifty feet 

 across, and so deep that it can just be waded with high rubber boots at 

 its shallowest parts. Its temperature is here very low, and probably 

 does not average over 50° F. the year round. From this point, for 

 nearly eighty miles, it falls at the rate of thirty-seven feet to the mile, 

 running nearly due south, and retains its character of a clear and cold 

 stream all the way. Down to this point it is known as the " Little Sac- 

 ramento," and receives the w^aters of many small streams, but no large 

 ones till it reaches its junction with Pitt River. At this stage of its 

 course it has swollen to three times its original volume, and with the 

 additionof the contents of Pitt River makes a stream six times the bulk 



