During the time the Fraser and Columbia rivers are rising,—and the rise is very rapid, about thirty feet above the winter level, owing to the melting snow,—sturgeon are continually leaping. As you are paddling quietly along in a canoe, suddenly one of these monsters flings itself into the air many feet above the surface of the water, falling back again with a splash, as though a lit rock had been pitched into the river by some Titan hand. It appears to be only play, as they never leap for insect-food; neither have I ever observed them do it during low-water; perhaps the intense cold of the snow-water begets a desire for exercise. The systems of catching sturgeon in use amongst the Indians of the Fraser and Columbia rivers are widely different, as indeed are all their modes of taking fish. This mainly arises from the fact of the Columbia river having numerous deep falls, that impede the ascent of all fish going up to spawn. These falls, as I have said, are quite impassable for even the salmon until the snow-water floods the river. The Fraser, on the other hand, offers no hindrance at all until after Fort Hope is passed, and the principal Indian fishing-stations are all below this point: hence it is that on the Columbia, the fish, both salmon and sturgeon, are speared, trapped in baskets or weirs, and the sturgeon also taken with hook and line whereas, on the Fraser, salmon are principally taken in nets, and sturgeon speared. I shall first describe the mode adopted by the Indians of the Columbia to catch sturgeon with hook and line. The best months for fishing are February and March, and the time of day either early in the morning, or late in the evening. The Dalles is a favourite fishing-station. The first thing is to prepare the bait. The old wooden fish-hook is now amongst the things that _were_, its place having been supplied by its civilised Birmingham brother, bartered by the Indians from the Hudson’s Bay Company. The fishing line is either made of native hemp, or the inside bark of the cypress-tree spun into cord. The bait is a long strip cut from the underside of a trout, at one end of which the point of the hook is inserted; the strip being then wound tightly and evenly round the hook, and up the line about three inches, the silvery side outermost. It is then firmly whipped over with white horsehair, a pebble slung on as a sinker, and the deception is complete. Five or six long barbed spears are stowed away in the canoe, the line coiled carefully in the bow, and the baited hook laid on it. Two wily redskins man this frail bark, the paddler squatting on his heels in the stern, the line-man standing in the bow.