AND OTHER HUNTING ADVENTURES. 29 



on the latter, although the winter rains usually come 

 in November. September and October are the most 

 pleasant months for an outing in the Cascades. 



* * * It was late in October when my wife and 

 I started from Chicago for a tour of a month among 

 the bristling peaks of the Cascades and the pictur- 

 esque islands of Puget Sound. A pleasant ride of 

 fifteen hours on the Wisconsin Central Railroad to 

 St. Paul, and another of three days and nights on the 

 grand old Northern Pacific, brought us face to face 

 with the glittering crests and beetling cliffs that were 

 the objects of our pilgrimage. As the tourist goes 

 west, the first view of the range is obtained at the 

 Dalles of the Columbia river, from whence old Mount 

 Hood, thirty-five miles distant, rears its majestic 

 head high into the ethereal vault of heaven, and 

 neighboring peaks, of lesser magnitude, unfold them- 

 selves to the enraptured vision. As the train whirls 

 down the broad Columbia river, every curve, around 

 which we swing with dazzling speed, reveals to our 

 bewildered gaze new forms of beauty and new 

 objects of wonder. So many descriptions of the 

 scenery along this mystic stream have been writ- 

 ten, that every reading man, woman, and child 

 in the land must be familiar with it, and I will 

 not repeat or attempt to improve upon any of them. 

 To say the most extravagant representations are not 

 exaggerated, is to speak truly, and no one can know 

 how beautiful some of these towers and cliffs are 

 until he has seen them. 



The train arrived at Portland, that old and far- 

 famed metropolis of the North Pacific coast, at half 

 past ten o'clock in the morning, and after twenty- 



