Four miles more, and the tourist comes upon a point of considerable geographical interest, the three mountain streams just mentioned pouring their waters into a common channel, to form the Missouri river. It is through a rocky canon, abounding in wild and magnificent scenery, that the greatest river on the continent enters upon its long course of 4,450 miles. For nearly fifty miles, the line follows its various windings, until finally the river runs away northward through that profound chasm known as the Grand Canon of the Missouri, or the Gates of the Rocky Mountains. Visitors to Helena will find an excursion to the Grand Canon, occupying not necessarily more than two days' time, one of the most delightful experiences of their transcontinental journey. The most important town between Bozeman and Helena, is Townsend, the shipping and distributing point for no inconsiderable portion of one of the best counties in Montana. It has daily communication by coach with White Sulphur Springs, a health resort of great local repute. This coming rival of older and hitherto more famous spas, lies in a beautiful valley, 5,070 feet above sea-level, and surrounded by the grandest of Rocky Mountain scenery. Its accommodations for visitors of all classes are most excellent, including, as they do, one of the best hotels in the Territory. Six miles distant are Castle Mountain and Crystal Cave, the latter a cavern of great extent, having twenty-three separate chambers, full of curious and beautiful stalactitic and stalagmitic formations. The town, mountain and cavern were all fully described and admirably illustrated in the _West Shore Magazine_ for July, 1885. Not so much by way of tribute, either to its own beauty or that of its situation, as in recognition of its wealth, its commercial importance and the commanding position it has so long occupied in the mining world, Helena, the capital of the Territory, is called the Queen of the Mountains. Situated on the eastern slope of the continental divide, 1,155 miles from St. Paul, it became a great distributing point and financial centre, even when hundreds of miles of mountain and prairie separated it from the nearest railroad. Dependent upon the Missouri river for its commercial intercourse with the world, it was in a state of well-nigh complete isolation during the greater part of every year. Under other conditions, this comparative isolation would have stunted its growth and cramped the energies of its people. But with the assured product of their labor such a commodity as gold, with its universality of demand and stability of value, the sturdy settlers in Last Chance Gulch had always the most powerful of incentives to restless energy. With the steadily increasing production of the precious metals, if not in its own immediate vicinity, at least in the country it dominated, Helena grew rich, until now it claims to be the wealthiest city of its size in the United States.