CHAPTER XXVI. 



TROUTING IN THE EOCKY MOUNTAINS. 



SEPTEMBER, 1884, I joined a party of 

 genial sportsmen at Fort Missoula, Mont., 

 for a month's outing in the Bitter Root 

 Mountains. Our special mission was to hunt 

 large game ; but while perfecting arrange- 

 ments for the trip, which occupied two 

 days, and during the mornings and evenings 

 of the several days occupied in traveling up 

 and down the river to and from the hunting 

 grounds, those of us who had our fishing tackle 

 with us turned what would otherwise have been 

 long Lours of impatient waiting into merrily -fleeing 

 moments, by luring the grand mountain trout 

 (Salmo purpuratus) with which this river abounds 

 from their crystalline retreats and transferring them 

 to our creels and our camp table. 



The Bitter Root is a typical mountain stream, 

 rising among the snow-clad peaks in the vicinity of 

 the Big Hole basin and flowing with the mighty 

 rush imparted to it by a fall of 200 to 300 feet per 

 mile, fed by the scores of ice-cold brooks that tumble 

 out of the high ranges on either side from its source 

 to its mouth. After traversing a distance of per- 

 haps 200 miles, it empties its pure waters into the 

 Hellgate river, just west of Missoula. 



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