“It’s more than two,” I said as I gazed up at the grand green spire of a Douglas pine, tapering gradually up, as if it intended to pierce the bright blue sky.
“Can’t be so high as that,” said Esau. “But I don’t know,” he cried. “Look at this stump; why, it must be twenty or thirty feet round. And look at ’em, hundreds and thousands of ’em, all standing as close together as they can. Oh, look! look! look! Can’t help it, I must shout. I don’t care about the trouble or the work, or the long voyage. I’d go through it all again to come to such a place as this. Oh, I do wish mother was here to see.”
I did not give vent to my feelings in the same way, but I felt as much; and all the time, as my heart seemed to swell with joy, there were tears rising to my eyes, and dimming the glorious view of river, mountain, and forest, while I kept on saying to myself, “Thank God for making such a lovely world.”
The first excitement over, and the feeling of wonder that we had not seen all this last night passed away, we went on along the clearing to the bank of the river, overlooking the shallows where we were to have our bathe.
The sun was shining down through the opening formed by the stream, and its waters were sparkling and flashing in the light, as we reached the spot Gunson evidently meant, and just then I caught hold of Esau’s arm, and stood pointing away toward the middle.
“I see ’em,” cried Esau, “just over those shallows. Just like shoals of roach in the Lea or the New River. They must be gudgeon.”
“Gudgeon!—nonsense! You forget how big everything is here. They’re salmon.”
“Go along with you,” he cried. “Think I don’t know better than that? Well, I am—”
This last was on seeing a bar of silver about three feet long shoot out of the water, describe a curve, and fall with a tremendous splash not half a stone’s throw from where we stood.
“Why, it is!” cried Esau, excitedly. “That was a salmon, and I can see ’em now—they are big—hundreds of ’em, and oh! not a bit o’ fishing-tackle of any sort, not so much as a line.”