I gave my heart to the mountains the minute I stood beside this river with its spray in my face and watched it thunder into foam, smooth to green glass over sunken rocks, shatter to foam again. Alders caught in the current sawed like things alive, and the noise was louder. It was rare and comforting to waken late and hear the undiminished shouting of the water in the night. And at sunup it was still there, powerful and incessant, with the slant sun tangled in its rainbow spray, the grass blue with wetness, and the air heady as ether and scented with campfire smoke. By such a river it is impossible to believe that one will ever be tired or old.
Every sense applauds it.
In most rivers that fish would have weighted three or four. I have seen ten pounders here barely twenty-six inches long. All the very large trout here are relatively young fish for their size. They have the small heads, deep bodies, and thick backs of healthy young fish. But these fish I have seen are grossly fat fish, deep and thick, with the belly of a sumo wrestler.