Oct. 12, 1907.] 

FOREST AND STREAM. 

A Sea Angler Ashore.—VII. 
(Conclusion.) 
THE biggest rainbows have their home in a 
land of dreams, on the slope of the Cascade 
Mountains of Oregon, where the great fir forests 
‘have fought for ages to hide grim beds of lava, 
|showers of rock, which bombarded the earth un- 
‘told ages ago. Shasta, with its small seasonal 
\elaciers, is not far away, and from the slopes of 
/Mount Pitt, 9,700 feet in air, the angling invader, 
‘armed with rod and reel, looks down on the fair 
jlake of Klamath environed by lofty peaks and 
franges of mountains that roll away in every 
direction, some capped with eternal snow, some 
!garbed in tints of pearl or blues of infinite beauty 
i—all volcanic, the aftermath of a time when 
‘Titans lived and played at bowls among the 
lofty peaks and ranges of the Siskiyous. 
| Away to the north is a wonder of the world, 
}Crater Lake, a dead volcano a mile above the 
\sea, filled with water nearly half a mile in depth, 
la gleaming sapphire suspended like the Roc’s egg 
lon top of and over the world. Indeed, I could 
‘not divest myself of the belief that Upper Kla- 

math Lake, with its shallow waters thirty or 
more miles in length, fed by eternal and _ icy 
springs, was not the last work of: a mighty 
volcano burnt out and dead. As I found it, 
Upper Klamath was two or three days from 
anywhere.* We reached it from the little 
siation of Thrall by a_ picturesque mountain 
railroad, which switches back and forth, climb- 
jing the lofty Siskiyous, crossing or skirting 
\deep cafions, carrying one above’ mighty 
forests, by splendid streams, cascades and falls, 
ltwenty or more miles to Pokegama. Here we 
took a six-in-hand stage for a thirty-mile ride 
lthrough the fir and pine forests of the range, 
|often crawling along the side of a steep cafion 
|high above the rushing Klamath, or through deep 
|mysterious forests, dark and beautiful, where the 
|wind was ladened with the perfume of things 
juntouched, uncontaminated and resinous. The 
very road was a rich dark red, the ground bark 
of giant firs that had lived and died ages ago. 
jlt wound through the forest according to its 
fancy a mile above the sea, then dipped into 
}some cafion half a mile lower, always the forest, 
}reaching away and around the visible world, 
always the murmur of the distant sea played by 
| the wind on pine needle castanets, rising and 
falling, a requiem of the forest glades. 
And so we climbed the Cascades, then on to 
the eastern slope, which overlooked the land 
lof the Modocs, thirty miles distant, pitched 
down to lands half a mile high and discovered 
|Keno, a little hamlet that doubtless belies its 
| name; then over level plains, along shining 
j waters, rolled into Klamath falls | in the crisp 
evening air. We had heard of big trout long 
jbefore this down the road and laughed at the 
Istories. The natives evidently took us for ten- 
|derfeet, and spoke of ten and even twenty- 
pound trout without emotion, as though such a 
catch was an every day affair, but when we wan- 
dered down to the rushing and muddy Klamath 
and saw hundreds of trout rising and leaping, 
}eaught glimpses of monsters two feet long and 
\broad of back, the realization came that here, in- 
deed, was the land of the biggest rainbow, the 
piscatorial Elysium seen but in dreams. But 
these giants would not rise to a fly, and we were 
itold of a region thirty miles beyond, at Pelican, 
where this hiatus could be accomplished. 
“Why, boss,’ said a native, who had a string 
of fish to sell, just as we were going aboard the 
}steamer, “I’ve seen a twenty-four-pound rain- 
}bow caught on a Benson fly, a ten-pounder on 
jthe second fly. I disrecollect what the doggone 
{thing was called, but it looked like a cross be- 
tween a helgramite and a wum.”’ 
I felt it my duty to save that man. “Hold on, 
my friend. No matter about the weight on that 
ithird fly; but the Benson fly—where can I buy 
one; what does it look like?” 
“Look like!’ repeated the native. “Why, 
stranger, it look like what it naturally is, a grass- 
hopper, discovered, patented, copyrighted by the 
}whitest man in Oregon, Jedge Benson. It’s a 
dead shore proposition, and don’t you forget it, 
1 
| 
| 
5 
| 

*Now reached by railroad. 

PROF, HOLDER AND HIS BIG RAINBOW TROUT. rf = es 
Its weight was 934 pounds—the record for September. >) Pras, > 
is the Benson fly, and that fish on the third Ben- beds was carried on. Everywhere forests of 
” 
son weighed for 
But just then someone yelled, “Pull that plank 
aboard,’ and I rushed down the gangway and 
the steamer pulled out into the stream. Surely 
she was a near relative of that mystic ship with 
“three decks and no bottom,” which sailed in 
a heavy dew, as she was as high as a frigate, 
but drew only a foot or two of water. She was 
a stern wheeler, picturesque and accommodating 
to a fault, and somehow she recalled pictures of 
the ark I had seen in family Bibles long ago. 
The captain and engineer were good fellows and 
sportsmen, and in some vague undefined man- 
ner I gained the impression, very possibly an 
unjust suspicion, that transportation and mere 
business was not the real object of the Winona, 
but merely an excuse or subterfuge to enable 
the genial owners to reach the pools of big trout, 
the tule lands of Pelican, where the blue winged 
teal, the mallard, deer and grouse made their 
home. This may not have been so, but I was 
in full sympathy with the idea; it appealed to 
me in many ways. We sat on the gun deck 
about the boiler, as it was cool, told stories with 


the engineer, and watched some loggers play 
“peanuckle,” occasionally going on deck as the 
steamer ran into some little impossible creek 
to leave a passenger or letter. As I stood by 
the gang plank at one of these landings, a pas- 
senger going ashore stopped and said: ‘Mister, 
Hank Martin asked me to tell you that the 
weight of that fish on that third Benson was 
fourteen pounds. He said you'd understand it.” 
Nowhere was the lake over twenty feet deep. 
and everywhere could be seen the evidence of 
large trout leaping or rising, a fascinating allur- 
ing sight to the angler who, perhaps, has been 
educated on a diet of quarter-pounders, 
The upper lake is thirty miles long, here and 
there fifteen miles wide, surrounded by cliffs 
and hills and mountains from fovr to six thon- 
eqand feet in height. Away over yonder are the 
Modoc hills where the famous war of the laya 
fir came down to the rippling waters to reach 
up to mountains whose summits pierce the air 
a mile or two above the sea. The little steamer 
skirts the left shore, and toward night enters 
Pelican Bay which seems to lie at the base of 
Mount Pitt guarded by Mount Pelican and 
Beebe which rise on either side crowned with 
forests. 
The lake had been muddy and thick; the bay, 
while shallow, was clear as crystal, the water flow- 
ing from countless icy springs. Slowly the craft! 
moved on; the passengers left the boiler and 
gathered on the “upstairs deck.” Then with- 
out warning the skipper, high up in the pilot 
house, put the wheel hard a-starboard, and the 
ship headed for the mouth of a little river or 
creek, which invitingly opened up with snow- 
capped Pitt, seemingly at its head, a little wind- 
ing river, spring born, abounding in pools from 
ten to twenty feet deep, clear as crystal, and 
here we caught a first glimpse of the biggest of 
rainbows. They had been lying in the deep 
pools, and as the steamer plowed in, swinging, 
bounding, bumping from bank to bank, they 
turned and passed her by, trout that one had 
dreamed of, trout so large that the observer could 
hardly believe the evidence of his eyes; big dig- 
nified fellows which would tip the scales at from 
four to ten or possibly fifteen pounds. Wind- 
ing in and out the steamer finally headed for 
the whitecap of Pitt, and at the head of the 
river a log hunting lodge loomed up; little cot- 
tages sprinkled about on the edge of the big 
fir forest, and a greensward reaching up to 
them. The steamer ran into the bank and we 
were in the land of the big rainbows. 
Who discovered Pelican Bay and its trout no 
one knows, but the Modoc and Klamath In- 
dians speared them years ago, and I saw a queer 
high dugout canoe propelled by Klamaths, wind 
ing in and out among the tules. White anglers 
have fished here for a decade possibly. but they 
have wisely said little about the good things of 

