151’ 
For K S 1' AND S T R E A M 
April, 1919 
The cabin of a gold prospector 
the river and the dark cliffs here and 
there in the mountains too steep to retain 
the snow. Winding in and out through 
the canyons and flats with the bright sun 
overhead and the glistening white moun- 
tains on either side was most enchanting. 
Everything went well until some water 
in the gasoline caused the engine to stop 
and we drifted at the mercy of the swift 
current. We had no anchor, a serious 
oversight. Conover and one of the crew 
took the end of a rope and pushed off 
ahead in a canoe as the rope was played 
out to them until they got far enough 
in advance of the boat to drop ashore 
and take a hitch around a fallen tree and 
secure the boat to the bank. We had 
gone about one and a half miles in a very 
short time, and it is due to the skill of 
our pilot that we kept in deep water and 
clear of snags. 
The long daylight enabled the boat to 
travel all one night and lay up but five 
hours another. On the way up we met 
three parties of Indians from Telegraph 
Creek who had followed the ice for the 
purpose of trapping beaver. 
We reached Conover’s cabin early in 
the morning of the sixteenth. It is lo- 
cated about five miles above the Clear- 
' water and is all alone in a big cotton- 
wood flat. When the cabin was built it 
was near the deep water, but now the 
channel has moved to the other side of 
the river. The channel of the Stikine is 
ever changing. 
Saved From Remorse 
W ~ EARIED from our two nights on 
the gasoline boat we slept after 
breakfast and then adjusted an 
out-board motor to the canoe. By the 
time that was finished I located a bear 
feeding on the mountain side across the 
river. An examination of the surround- 
ings with a field glass indicated that he 
might be reached from an old mining 
trail which passed below him. It must 
be borne in mind that everywhere, except 
immediately along the shore line, the 
snow was still deep and soft in the day- 
time, so that going to a bear by direct 
line was impossible. We tried the mine 
trail after dinner but could not make it. 
On our return we passed a miner’s 
cabin and, borrowing his fishing pole and 
line, caught several mountain trout at 
the mouth of a small brook. Where the 
clear mountain stream met the muddy 
river there were plenty of trout. After 
supper I saw another bear in a much 
nearer place. Tried for him also but when 
I reached the location where he had been 
he had moved so high up among the 
rocks and brush that it was too late to 
reach him. 
We spent the next day in the canoe 
slipping noiselessly along the river and 
through some sloughs watching for griz- 
zlies, but saw none. They hibernate at 
higher altitudes than do the blacks and 
the deeper snow higher up was evident- 
ly keeping them in. 
We saw four or five black bear that 
day. One we stalked to within about one 
hundred and seventy-five yards and from 
a steady rest I overshot. She had a cub 
with her and my poor marksmanship 
spared me the remorse which might have 
resulted from having made a cub bear an 
orphan. I saw the cub before I shot but 
did not think of the remorse until after I 
had missed the shot, which is poor ethics. 
Up the Clearwater 
E verything was now in readiness 
for a hunt of several days up the 
Clearwater. Our object was to get 
to its headwaters as soon as possible 
and then float back in the canoe, hunting 
on the way, thereby enabling us to make 
the hunt in comfort and without the dis- 
comfort we would encounter in the deep 
and wet snow. Floating with the cur- 
rent our movements would be noiseless 
and hardly noticeable to game near the 
river. Trout fishing along the Clear- 
water was excellent. By putting out a 
set pole baited with meat we could al- 
most invariably land a two or three 
pound trout upon return to the pole. 
With rod and reel I caught a Dolly Var- 
den weighing about four and one-fourth 
pounds and twenty-seven inches long. It 
put up an interesting fight. Ducks were 
flying in abundance, having returned 
from their winter in the south. 
However, we were neither fishing nor 
duck hunting but looking for the grizzly 
bears that hibernate in dens in the higher 
altitudes and leave their winter quarters 
in the spring with the disappearing 
snows. These bears as a rule are better 
furred than those feeding on the salmon 
and living near the sea. The coats of 
the latter are often badly rubbed, man- 
gy and coarse. But this spring the dis- 
appearance of the snow was tantalizingly 
slow. As we could not find any bear 
tracks in the snow we were forced to 
the conclusion that the unusually late 
spring was prolonging their hiberna- 
tion. There was feed for them in abun- 
dance along the river. The odors borne 
by the breezes announced the presence of 
many carcasses of salmon that died late 
the previous fall, and had been frozen 
all winter. We passed the unmolested 
remains of two moose, equally redolent. 
These moose had drowned in attempting 
to cross the ice, for even in this cold cli- 
mate the swift water or some warm 
springs on the bottom of the river may 
render certain places dangerous to heavy 
creatures crossing on the ice. 
Running ice in the Stikine RiTer 
