In this bitterly cold country, where the snow lies deep six months out of the twelve, the natives subsist principally on fish, of which there is an extraordinary abundance generally, and of salmon particularly. Salmon swarm in such numbers that the rivers cannot hold them. In June and July every rivulet, no matter how shallow, is so crammed with salmon that, from sheer want of room, they push one another high and dry upon the pebbles; and Mr. Lord[18] tells us that each salmon, with its head up, struggles, fights, and scuffles for precedence. With one's hands only, or more easily by employing a gaff or a crook-stick, tons of salmon have been procured by the simple process of hooking them out. Once started on their journey, the salmon never turn back. As fast as those in front die, fresh arrivals crowd on to take their places, and share their fate. "It is a strange and novel sight to see three moving lines of fish--the dead and dying in the eddies and slack water along the bank, the living breasting the current in the centre, blindly pressing on to perish like their kindred." For two months this great _salmon army_ proceeds on its way up stream, furnishing a supply of food without which the Indians must perish miserably. The winters are too severe for them to venture out in search of food, even if there was any to be obtained. From being destitute of salt, they are unable to cure meat in the summer for winter provisions, and hence for six months in the year they depend upon salmon, which they preserve by drying in the sun. But the Indian has another source of provision for the winter, fully as important as the salmon. The Candle-fish supplies him at once with light, butter, and oil.[19] When dried, and perforated with a rush, or strip of cypress-bark, it can be lighted, and burns steadily until consumed. Strung up, and hung for a time in the smoke of a wood fire, it is preserved as a fatty morsel to warm him when pinched with cold; and, by heat and pressure, it is easily converted into liquid oil, and drunk with avidity. That nothing may be wanting, the hollow stalk of the sea-wrack, which at the root is expanded into a complete flask, makes an admirable bottle; and so, when the Indian buries himself for long dreary months in his winter quarters, neither his larder nor his cellar are empty, and he has a lamp to lighten the darkness. The steamers have, however, frightened away the Candle-fish and the Indian from their old haunts, and they have both retreated to the north of the Colombia River. Amongst the other inhabitants of the salt and fresh waters of these regions are the Halibut and the Sturgeon, both of which attain to an immense size. The bays and inlets along the coast abound with marine wonders. There feasts and fattens the Clam, a bivalve so gigantic that no oyster-knife can force an entrance, and only when his shell is almost red-hot will he be at last constrained to open his dwelling.