Page:The first and last journeys of Thoreau - lately discovered among his unpublished journals and manuscripts 2.djvu/87

 and white, and they were emaciated so as to be a mere mass of skin and bone.&quot; (It was said that they did not feed in fresh water.) The author of the Zoölogical Report quotes also from Harmon's Travels (1820) as quoted by Richardson. Harmon says of the salmon of British Columbia:

&quot;For about a month they come up in crowds, and the noses of some of them are either worn or rotted off; and the eyes of others have perished in their heads; yet in this maimed condition they are surprisingly alert in coming up rapids. The maimed fish are generally at the head of large bands, on account of which the natives call them mee-oo-tees or chiefs. The Indians say that they have suffered these disasters by falling back among the stones when coming up difficult places in the rapids which they pass.&quot;

This quotation seems to have little connection with the daily journal, and may have been made in Concord before starting, with the idea that Thoreau would go farther west on the Oregon Trail than he had either time or strength for, upon trying. June 13, before leaving Mrs. Hamilton's, which he did