The Unexploited West - A Compilation of all of the authentic information available - at the present time as to the Natural Resources of the

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Title: The Unexploited West - A Compilation of all of the authentic information available - at the present time as to the Natural Resources of the - Unexploited Regions of Northern Canada
Author: Chambers, Ernest J.
Language: English
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THE
UNEXPLOITED WEST

A COMPILATION
of all of the authentic information available
at the present time as to the
NATURAL RESOURCES OF THE UNEXPLOITED REGIONS
of
NORTHERN CANADA

By
Major ERNEST J. CHAMBERS, Corps of Guides
Gentleman Usher of the Black Rod

Published under the direction of
F. C. C. LYNCH
Superintendent of the Railway Lands Branch
Department of the Interior
Hon. W. J. ROCHE, Minister

OTTAWA
Printed by J. de L. TACHE, Printer to the King’s Most
Excellent Majesty
1914

DEPARTMENT OF THE INTERIOR,
Ottawa, September 19, 1913.
HONOURABLE W. J. ROCHE,
Minister of the Interior,
Ottawa.

SIR,—I have the honour to transmit herewith the manuscript of a
compilation of all available information on the Unexploited West
by Major Ernest J. Chambers, Gentleman Usher of the Black Rod.
This work, which was undertaken by Major Chambers under
instructions from this Department, is drawn from all known
sources. The information contained herein covers the whole of
the unexploited portions of Canada, west of Hudson bay, and it
is intended to fill a growing demand for complete information
regarding this territory.

I have the honour to be, Sir,
Your obedient servant,
F. C. C. LYNCH,
_Superintendent of Railway Lands_.

PREFACE.

The stream of immigration steadily flowing westward in ever-increasing
volume is rapidly exhausting the reserves of vacant land in that part of
the Canadian west which used to be known, to the detriment of the
territory farther to the north, as “The Fertile Belt.”

Already settlement has overflowed the northern frontier of the “belt of
supposed limited fertility” and many thousands of acres of agricultural
land have been surveyed by the Dominion Government immediately north of
the North Saskatchewan and in the Peace river valley, and the surveys
are being rapidly extended to keep up with the pressure of advancing
settlement. While the trend of immigration is turning northward, the
eyes of the capitalist are attracted in the same direction. Information
concerning the resources of the country once ignored is now sought for.
Facts about the climate, the soil, the timber, the rivers, the lakes,
the minerals, the fish, the game obtained at the risk of life and limb
by fur trader, explorer, missionary, geologist and sportsman, even those
facts regarded not so long ago as merely interesting, have now a
practical value.

The once prevalent notion that the whole of the immense territory north
of the North Saskatchewan was a sterile, frost-bound waste destined for
all time to remain a wilderness, is now largely a thing of the past, and
the opportunities which the latent resources of the silent places of the
unexploited northwest afford to the enterprising and adventurous at the
present moment challenge the attention of the world.

With interest powerfully attracted to the more easterly sections of the
country under review by the recent extensions northward of the limits of
the prosperous provinces of Ontario and Manitoba, and with easy means of
communication with the larger divisions farther west assured, thanks to
the progress of the construction of railways northward to Port Nelson on
Hudson bay and to McMurray in the Athabaska country, it certainly looks
as though the long neglected Northland were coming to its own at last.

By connecting with the three thousand miles of almost uninterrupted
steamboat communication on Athabaska, Peace, Slave and Mackenzie rivers,
and Athabaska and Great Slave lakes, the railway being pushed into the
Athabaska country will place the whole of Mackenzie basin within easy
reach of the prospector, the explorer, the sportsman and the tourist.
The line being constructed to Hudson bay, as soon as steamboat
connection is established therewith, will lay the very heart of that
alluring El Dorado which we call the Barren Lands, with its herds of
musk-oxen and caribou and its mineral wealth, open to the prospector and
the sportsman, for, via Chesterfield inlet, Baker lake and the Thelon,
there is a splendid, uninterrupted waterway from Hudson bay for a
distance of five hundred and fifty miles into the interior.

The exceptional attractions which the Northland holds out to the
sportsman are certain to contribute largely towards the discovery and
development of the natural resources of the country. A couple of years
ago Mr. W. T. Robson, General Advertising Agent of the Canadian Pacific
Railway, submitted to a convention of railway men a thoughtful paper on
the value of the tourist sportsman as a means of publicity for
undeveloped country, in which he pointed out that the cultured business
men who find their greatest pleasure, relaxation and physical benefit
from trips into the wilds, are quick to discern the commercial value of
water powers, timber and minerals, and he related a number of instances
where hunting trips had resulted either in the discovery of unexpected
natural resources or in large investments in the country visited.

The object of the present publication is to present, with some degree of
systematic arrangement, all of the authentic information available at
the moment as to the natural resources of the less-known and unexploited
portions of northern Canada lying west of Hudson bay and James bay and
east of the main range of Rocky mountains.

This general definition of area brings within the scope of this volume
the whole of that portion of the old provisional district of Keewatin
recently divided by act of parliament between the provinces of Ontario
and Manitoba, those portions of the provinces of Saskatchewan and
Alberta north of the unsettled and unsurveyed territory, the basin of
Mackenzie river, and that immense country north of the new provincial
lines extending from Mackenzie basin to Hudson bay, which has
apparently, undeservedly, come to be known as “Barren Lands” or “Barren
Grounds.”

In these immense regions there are wide areas of which we in this year
of grace 1912 know as little as was known of Bow river valley in 1812,
and that was nothing. On the other hand considerable is known in a
general way about certain portions of every one of the great districts
which form this vast territory, or, to be quite exact, considerable has
been written about them. The subject matter has been so widely
distributed that no one could be expected to be familiar with it all.

Practically the first authoritative data as to the natural resources of
Canada’s unexploited northland was contained in the published evidence
of a British parliamentary committee which sat in 1749 to enquire into
the resources of the country administered by the Hudson’s Bay Company.
With this as a nucleus, a considerable amount of information on the
subject has gradually accumulated. The journals of officials of the big
fur-trading companies have contributed to this fund of information and
so have the writings of missionaries, the reports of British, Canadian
and United States official government explorers, the narratives of
sportsmen and adventurous travellers, and the patrol records of that
inimitable and ubiquitous body the Royal Northwest Mounted Police. A
very wide range of information regarding the various sections of these
territories, too, has been placed on record as a result of several
Canadian parliamentary investigations.

Some idea of the large amount of literature relating to the great
northland which has accumulated, can be obtained from the fact that in
the preparation of the present book nearly three hundred publications
have been consulted, necessitating an amount of reading which was not
anticipated when the task was undertaken. Much of this reading was
absolutely unproductive, a considerable portion of the books written by
men who have lived in or travelled through the country being merely
narratives of travel and adventure, containing no direct information of
any value as to natural resources.

For various obvious reasons many books written by scientific and
observant men who have visited the still new west are of little value in
throwing light upon the questions of the natural resources of the
country. One of these reasons is referred to by Sir Alexander Mackenzie,
who states in the introduction to his narrative:—“I could not stop to
dig into the earth, over whose surface I was compelled to pass with
rapid steps; nor could I turn aside to collect the plants which nature
might have scattered in the way, when my thoughts were anxiously
employed in making provision for the day that was passing over me.” The
distances to be travelled in the far Northland are generally so great
that the slender stores of supplies carried by the explorer and
traveller do not permit of time being devoted to thorough investigation
by the way. Again, much of the travelling in the unsettled north has
been done in winter, when the surface of the ground was covered with
snow, making an examination of the soil and rocks impossible.

Nevertheless, the literature relating to the new Canadian northwest is
so voluminous that it contains, scattered throughout it, an aggregate
amount of practical information regarding the resources of even the more
remote sections of the country that, as assembled within the two covers
of a single volume, will probably astonish most readers.

The present volume, according to the instructions the undersigned
received from the Department of the Interior, is purely and simply a
compilation. Care has been taken to avoid the temptation to try and
produce a work of original literary merit, and in the following pages it
will be found that the compiler has introduced only as much original
writing as is necessary to introduce intelligibly the various
quotations, or to establish the connections between them, his aim being
to present all the data available in the original text, or as near to it
as the exigencies of compilation and space would permit.

With the object of properly introducing some of the chief authorities
quoted and of placing the reader, from the beginning, au fait with the
circumstances under which the principal information regarding the
resources of the country was obtained, the presentation of the data has
been prefaced by a brief historical chapter.

At the end of the book a list of the written authorities from which
quotations are made will be found.

It will be observed that, to avoid confusion, the vast region under
review has been divided into five distinct territorial units, and that
the matter relating to each unit is in turn divided into four sections,
relating respectively to the resources in the way of arable land,
timber, minerals, and fish and game. The compiler found that this system
of classification was satisfactory in his two previous volumes of a
somewhat similar type, “Canada’s Fertile Northland,” and “The Great
Mackenzie Basin,” and a continuation of the system will facilitate
reference between the present volume and those which were its
forerunners and its inspiration.

Perhaps I might be permitted here a word of personal explanation. I have
had only a slight acquaintance with any part of this great waiting
Northland, having campaigned a little over its southern margin between
North Saskatchewan and Beaver rivers, in Fort Pitt district, during the
operations against Big Bear’s Indians in 1885; but what I saw of the
country then, with its park-like groves of fine trees, its valleys
covered with luxuriant grasses, its sylvan lakes teeming with fish, and
every prospect a gem of nature’s own perfect landscape gardening, made
such an impression on my mind that I have ever since felt a personal
interest not only in that particular section but in the vast regions
beyond which have not the charm of the soft and lovely scenery of Loon
lake and Beaver river. Having this feeling towards the country I have
followed as a hobby the literature relating to it, and it has been
naturally a pleasure to contribute my mite in helping it along towards
its ultimate destiny.

The idea of the present volume was not mine but that of the late Mr.
Robert E. Young, D.L.S., Superintendent of Railway Lands and Chief
Geographer, the most enthusiastic believer in the Northland who ever
lived, probably, and whose untimely death was a grievous loss to the
country. If this book possesses any merits it is due altogether to his
original suggestion, to his wide knowledge and to his enthusiastic and
kindly co-operation.

ERNEST J. CHAMBERS.
The Senate, Ottawa.
May 11, 1912.

CONTENTS.

CHAPTER I.

HISTORICAL.

“The Fertile Belt.”—Influence of a Catchy Expression.—Northern
Canada Still a Terra Incognita.—The Hudson’s Bay Company.—Early
Explorations.—Kelsey, Hearne, Mackenzie, Franklin, Back,
Simpson and Dease.—The More Recent Explorers, Official and
Unofficial.—Parliamentary Investigations. 1

CHAPTER II.

THE KEEWATIN AREA.—Agriculture and Arable Land.

Early Agricultural Experiments and Their Success.—Evidence Before
the Parliamentary Committee of 1749.—Testimony of Official
Explorers and Residents.—Many Areas Fit for Agriculture
Described.—Wild Fruits Grow in Profusion.—Successful
Gardens.—Much Country Capable of Improvement by
Drainage.—Climate Inland Warmer Than Farther East.—Natural Hay
Meadows.—The Clay Belt. 30

CHAPTER III.

THE KEEWATIN AREA.—Tree Growth and Timber Resources.

Considerable Areas of Good Timber.—The Range of the More
Important Trees.—The Banskian Pine.—Forests of Trees in Many
Places that Would Make Good Logs, and Much Pulp
Wood.—Occasional Beautiful Forests of Aspen Poplar.—Magnificent
Coniferous Forest Northwest of Lake Winnipeg.—Water Power on
the Nelson.—Destruction Wrought by Forest Fires.—Ample Supply
of Timber For Fuel. 64

CHAPTER IV.

THE KEEWATIN AREA.—Economic Minerals.

The Rocks in Many Cases Highly Magnetic.—Norite Rock Similar to
That at Sudbury About Trout Lake.—Peat in the District North of
Lake Winnipeg.—A Large District Underlain By Keewatin and
Huronian Rocks “Has Large Possibilities.”—Gypsum.—Building
Granites.—Quartz Veins on Grassy River Below Reed Lake.—A
Possibility of Nickel Occurring. 81

CHAPTER V.

THE KEEWATIN AREA.—Game, Fur-bearing Animals and Fish.

Flocks of Wild Fowl That Obscure the Sky.—Six Species of Seal in
Hudson Bay.—Stocked with Animals of Various Kinds.—White Fish
Abound in Most of the Lakes and Streams.—Saw Eleven Moose in
One Day.—The Commercial Value of the Sturgeon Fisheries.—Future
Summer Playgrounds.—Barren Lands Caribou at Churchill. 88

CHAPTER VI.

NORTHERN SASKATCHEWAN.—Agriculture and Arable Land.

An Early Scientific Explorer’s Enthusiastic Description of Part
of the Country.—“Capable of Any Extent of Cultivation.”—An Old
Hudson’s Bay Company Official Who Considered it “A Splendid
Country to Settle in.”—Mr. Crean Reports That “It is No
Experiment” to Raise Wheat in North Saskatchewan.—Missionary
Farmers and Their Accomplishments.—Capable of Supporting “A
Dense, Thriving Population.”—“A Splendid Ranching
Country.”—Heaviest Rains Just When They Are Needed. 95

CHAPTER VII.

NORTHERN SASKATCHEWAN.—Tree Growth and Timber Resources.

A Rare Bit of Sylvan Beauty.—Ash-Leaved Maples Successfully Grown
From Seed.—Notes By the Way on Available Water Powers.—Much
Country Covered with Small Timber Not Generally of Commercial
Value.—Some Areas of Good Timber Which Will be Invaluable To
the Settlers. 117

CHAPTER VIII.

NORTHERN SASKATCHEWAN.—Economic Minerals.

Large Amount of Iron Ore In the Northeastern Corner of The
Region, On The North Eastern Side of Lake
Athabaska.—Indications Favourable For the Discovery of
Coal.—Nickel and Traces of Cobalt on Reindeer Lake.—Medicinal
Waters.—Bituminous Springs and Pit Coal on Cree River.—Tar
Sands Near Buffalo Lake. 124

CHAPTER IX.

NORTHERN SASKATCHEWAN.—Game, Fur-bearing Animals and Fish.

“So Fine a Country For The Chase That It May Be Regarded As An
Extensive Preserve.”—The Wood Buffalo Used To Roam Over It, But
Do Not Now.—Moose and Caribou Plentiful.—The Indians Kill The
Moose For Their Hides.—Fish of Various Kinds in
Abundance.—Sturgeon That Weigh A Hundred Pounds.—One Indian
Killed Eighteen Moose During One Season. 127

CHAPTER X.

NORTHERN ALBERTA.—Agriculture and Arable Land in the Eastern Section
of “Athabaska Country.”

A Section of The West Where Officials of the Hudson’s Bay Company
Were Directed to Cultivate Gardens.—Some Points Where Wheat has
been Grown, Including the Sample Which Took First Prize at the
Philadelphia Centennial Exhibition.—Crude Indian Gardens at
Cowpar Lake.—Livestock Grazing Out in December and January. 131

CHAPTER XI.

NORTHERN ALBERTA.—Agriculture and Arable Land in the Western Section
or “Peace River Region.”

Where Wheat Has Been Grown with Remarkable Success for Many
Years.—Scientific Explorers Early Recognized This as a Wheat
Growing Country.—A Head of Cabbage Fifty-three and a Half
Inches in Circumference.—Livestock Live Out of Doors in
Winter.—According to a Church of England Missionary, Peace
River Enjoys the Finest Climate in the World. 143

CHAPTER XII.

NORTHERN ALBERTA.—Tree Growth and Timber Resources.

An Abundance of Timber in the Vicinity of Chipewyan.—Much of the
Country Has Been Swept By Fires.—Most of the Timber is Along
the Rivers.—Millions of Cords of Pulp Wood.—Spruce and Black
Bark Poplar the Principal Varieties.—The Water Power
Possibilities Described as Tremendous. 175

CHAPTER XIII.

NORTHERN ALBERTA.—Economic Minerals.

Travellers, Explorers and Prospectors Describe the Country as a
Veritable Store House of Mineral Wealth.—Gold Found in the Bars
in Peace River.—Indications of Plentiful Supply of
Iron.—Lignite Found in Abundance.—Historic Deposits of
Salt.—The Famous Athabaska Tar Sands.—Their Commercial
Value.—Indications of Petroleum.—Boring Experiments.—Natural
Gas Under a Wide Area.—Travellers Use Natural Gas Jets to Boil
their Camp Kettles. 180

CHAPTER XIV.

NORTHERN ALBERTA.—Game, Fur-bearing Animals and Fish.

The Land of the Wood Buffalo.—Where the Last Remnants of American
Bison Living in a Wild State Roam.—A Splendid Moose
Country.—The Home of Numerous Fur-bearing Animals.—The Prolific
Fisheries of Lake Athabaska and Other Waters. 195

CHAPTER XV.

MACKENZIE RIVER REGION.—Topography, Agriculture and Arable Land.

Mackenzie River a King of Northern Waters.—Over Three Thousand
Miles of Water Way.—Domestic Cattle Have Succeeded.—Barley
Always Ripens at Fort Simpson.—Potatoes and Other Vegetables
have for Many Years Been Grown at Fort Good Hope, a few Miles
from the Arctic Circle.—Wheat and Barley Grown at Liard for
Many Years.—Interesting Comparison With the Russian Province of
Tobolsk.—A Large Town as Far North as Fort Wrigley.—Why Better
Results in Grain Growing May Be Expected in the Future. 208

CHAPTER XVI.

MACKENZIE RIVER REGION.—Tree Growth and Timber Resources.

Forests About Great Slave Lake and Slave River.—Remarkable
Extension of Forest Growth Northward Down the Mackenzie.—Wide
Distribution of the Economically Important Canoe
Birch.—Magnificent Forests of Spruce and Big Cottonwood Trees
in Liard Valley.—Useful Birch and Large Spruce Grow Within the
Arctic Circle.—Trees that are Centuries Old.—Northern Tree
Growth May Be Hastened by Drainage. 261

CHAPTER XVII.

MACKENZIE RIVER REGION.—Economic Minerals.

The Territory Has Never Been Thoroughly Examined for
Minerals.—Tar Springs on the North Shore of Great Slave
Lake.—The Devonian Rocks Throughout Mackenzie Valley are Nearly
Everywhere More or Less Petroliferous.—Lignite Discovered in
Many Places, Also Gypsum.—Large Deposits of Excellent
Salt.—Indications of Gold and Copper.—Indians Report Finding
Mica. 281

CHAPTER XVIII.

MACKENZIE RIVER REGION.—Game, Fur-bearing Animals and Fish.

Over Forty Moose Killed in One Season Near Fort Simpson.—Caribou
of Both Woodland and Barren Lands Varieties Plentiful.—Pass
Great Slave lake in Countless Numbers.—Mountain Sheep Plentiful
in the Mountainous Districts.—Incredible Numbers of Geese, Swan
and Ducks in Season.—Inexhaustible Supplies of Fish.—The
Speckled Trout, Lake Trout, Grayling, Herring, Inconnu, etc. 288

CHAPTER XIX.

BARREN LANDS OR “ARCTIC PRAIRIE.”—Topography, Soil, Climate and
Flora.

Explorers Declare The Term Barren Lands a Misnomer.—Some Notes
about the Chief Rivers and Known Lakes.—An Inland Waterway for
Steamers Via Chesterfield Inlet a Distance of Five Hundred and
Fifty Miles Into the Interior.—The Progression of The
Seasons.—The Country Similar to the Tundra of Siberia.—A
Limited Amount of Agriculture May Be Possible in
Places.—Natural Prairies in the Valley of the Thelon. 303

CHAPTER XX.

BARREN LANDS OR “ARCTIC PRAIRIE.”—Tree Growth and Timber Resources.

Phenomenal Extensions of Tree Growth Within Barren Lands Along
the Valley of Thelon River.—Black Spruce, Larch, White Spruce,
Banksian Pine and Birch.—Valuable Timber Along the Thelon,
About the East End of Great Slave Lake and Between Great Bear
Lake and Coppermine River. 317

CHAPTER XXI.

BARREN LANDS OR “ARCTIC PRAIRIE.”—Economic Minerals.

Deposits of Native Copper in the Far North.—Several Areas West of
Hudson Bay Contain Rocks Similar to Those at Sudbury.—Belts of
Huronian Rocks that are Expected by Geologists to be Eventually
of Great Economic Importance.—Vast Probable Mineral Bearing
Country in the Interior Which Can Now be Reached Via
Chesterfield Inlet.—Iron, Gold and Silver in Small Quantities
North of Lake Athabaska.—Free Gold in Melville
Peninsula.—Lignite and Soft Coal Along the Arctic Coast. 324

CHAPTER XXII.

BARREN LANDS OR “ARCTIC PRAIRIE.”—Game, Fur-bearing Animals and Fish.

Where Millions of Caribou Roam at Large.—Actual Value of These
Immense Herds Very Great.—Can They Become Domesticated or
Replaced by the Lapland Reindeer?—The Home of the Musk-Ox and
Many Fur-bearing Animals.—The Polar Bear.—Where the Wild Geese
Nest.—Lakes, Rivers and Sea Coasts Teeming With Fish.—The
Arctic Salmon, Trout, White Fish and Grayling. 342

BIBLIOGRAPHY 362

INDEX 370

LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS.

“Wheat field at Stanley, Churchill river”
“Oat field at Ile à la Crosse”
“Winter travel—Dinner time”
“Portage near Long Spruce rapids, Nelson river”
“Farm at Mount Nebo on Green lake trail, 65 miles from Prince Albert”
“Prairie Land on lower Nelson river”
“Portaging canoe at Long Spruce rapids, Nelson river”
“Portage on Moose river”
“Typical country on Hudson Bay Railway Survey”
“Log jam on Limestone river”
“Moose crossing Limestone river”
“Haying near Green lake”
“Flowers at Ile à la Crosse”
“Potatoes at Anglican Mission, Lac la Ronge”
“Oat field at Anglican Mission, Lac la Ronge”
“Oat field at La Plonge”
“Potatoes at Buffalo river”
“Green lake settlement”
“Oat field at Meadow lake”
“Prairie along Clearwater river”
“Landscape in Clearwater valley”
“S. S. Grahame at McMurray”
“Indian camp near Fort Smith”
“Indian Family arriving at McMurray for Treaty”
“Flour Mill at Fort Vermilion”
“View on Halfway river”
“Sheridan Lawrence’s Farm at Fort Vermilion”
“Vegetable Garden 15 miles west of Fort St. John”
“View of Pouce Coupé prairie”
“Saw Mill near Fort Smith”
“The 23rd Base Line between Townships 88 and 89, Range 14, West of the 6th
Meridian”
“Oil Well at McKay, Athabaska river”
“Royal Northwest Mounted Police Barracks at Smith Landing”
“Looking Across Slave river from Fort Smith”
“Roman Catholic Mission at Chipewyan”
“A Typical ‘Husky’ dog”
“An Eskimo Boy at Arctic Red river”
“Oat field at Fort Simpson”
“Potatoes at Fort Simpson”
“Mission Garden at Fort Providence”
“View on Peel river”
“Eskimos in Kyaks on Arctic Red river”
“Staff and Pupils, Church of England Mission, Hay river”
“Slave river near Fort Smith”
“Spruce Timber on Peel river inside the Arctic Circle”
“Anglican Church, School and Rectory at Fort Simpson”
“Roman Catholic Mission at Fort Resolution”
“A Fur Shipment of One Season from Mackenzie basin, estimated value over
two million, five hundred thousand dollars”
“The ‘Conny’ or ‘Inconnu’”
“The Midnight Sun”
“Some of the Difficulties of Northern Transportation:—Crossing a Swamp”
“A Survivor of Sir John Richardson’s Arctic Expedition wearing the Arctic
Medal given him for that Expedition”
“An Indian Dance Lodge”

[Illustration: DOMINION OF CANADA]

CHAPTER I.

HISTORICAL.

“The Fertile Belt.”—Influence of a Catchy Expression.—Northern
Canada still a Terra Incognita.—The Hudson’s Bay Company.—
Early Explorations.—Kelsey, Hearne, Mackenzie, Franklin, Back,
Simpson and Dease.—The More Recent Explorers, Official and
Unofficial.—Parliamentary Investigations.

When in 1867 the four principal British provinces in the eastern portion
of North America were confederated under the British North America Act
and became the original Dominion of Canada, the vast regions of the west
vaguely known under several designations such as the “Hudson’s Bay
Territory,” the “Northwest Territory” and “Rupert’s Land,” and extending
from the United States boundary to Arctic sea, and from the western
frontier of Ontario, James bay and Hudson bay to Rocky mountains,
remained under the rule of the Hudson’s Bay Company.

The Fathers of Confederation had in view, however, a union of all the
British possessions on the continent, and one of the measures passed at
the first session of the first parliament of the new Dominion provided
for the opening of negotiations for the union of the Hudson bay
territory with the confederated provinces. Thanks largely to the
diplomatic offices of the British government, the rights of the Hudson’s
Bay Company were eventually bought out by Canada, and this vast
territory, estimated at upwards of two million three hundred thousand
square miles, was transferred to the Dominion of Canada in the year
1867.

The cash consideration obtained by the company from the Dominion for the
relinquishment of its rights and titles was the sum of three hundred
thousand pounds sterling; but there was also a provision for the
retention by the Company of blocks of land adjoining each of its
stations; and the right was allowed the company for fifty years, from
1870, to “claim in any township or district within the fertile belt in
which land is set out for settlement, grants of land not exceeding
one-twentieth part of the land so set out.”

For the purpose of the agreement the “Fertile Belt” was described
therein as being bounded as follows:—“On the south by the United States
boundary; on the west by Rocky mountains; on the north by the northern
branch of the Saskatchewan; on the east by Lake Winnipeg, Lake of the
Woods, and the waters connecting them.”

THE TERM “FERTILE BELT.”

There is some uncertainty as to the origin of the term “Fertile Belt”,
thus arbitrarily defined in the historical agreement with the Hudson’s
Bay Company; but this much is certain:—the term came into general use
after the publication of the reports of the official exploratory
expeditions of Captain John Palliser of the British Army, of S. J.
Dawson, C.E., and Professor Henry Y. Hind of Trinity College, Toronto.
Captain Palliser was commissioned by the British government to explore
“that portion of British North America which lies between the northern
watershed and the frontier of the United States, and between Red river
and Rocky mountains and to endeavour to find a practicable route through
them.” The Dawson-Hind expeditions (there were two) were under the
auspices of the government of United Canada (Upper and Lower Canada) and
were for the purpose of inquiring into the resources of Red river colony
and the Assiniboine and Saskatchewan countries. The British expedition
extended over parts of four years—1857, 1858, 1859 and 1860, while the
Canadian ones covered two years—1857 and 1858.

In the preface to his report, published in 1860, Professor Hind
wrote:—“The establishment of a new colony in the basin of Lake
Winnipeg, and the discovery of a FERTILE BELT of country extending from
the Lake of the Woods to Rocky mountains, give to this part of British
America a more than passing interest.” In another place Professor Hind
wrote:—“North of the great American desert there is a broad slip of
FERTILE COUNTRY, rich in water, wood, and pasturage, drained by the
North Saskatchewan, and a continuation of the fertile prairies of Red
and Assiniboine rivers. It is a physical reality of the highest
importance to the interests of British North America that this
continuous BELT can be settled and cultivated from a few miles west of
Lake of the Woods to the passes of Rocky mountains, and any line of
communication, whether by waggon road or railroad, passing through it,
will eventually enjoy the great advantage of being fed by an
agricultural population from one extremity to the other.”

[Illustration: Wheat field at Stanley, Churchill river.]

The terms “Fertile Belt,” “Fertile Strip” and “Fertile Land” appear many
times in Captain Palliser’s report, published in 1863, the first of
these expressions being used no less than three times in one paragraph
of the report.

The influence of a “catchy expression” in attracting the world’s
attention is wonderful. Whatever the origin of the term “Fertile Belt”
in this connection, its emphatic application by these independent
official reports to the particular strip of territory between the United
States boundary line and Saskatchewan river had immediate and lasting
effects.

It arrested public attention in England and in Canada. That which had
often been asserted by independent travellers, and more often stoutly
denied by those whose sole interests were centred in the fur trade[1],
had been found by scientific explorers of unquestioned veracity to be an
actual fact. As Captain Palliser put it in his report:—“The whole of
the region of country would be valuable not only for agriculturists but
also for mixed purposes. I have seen not only excellent wheat, but also
Indian corn (which will not succeed in England or Ireland) ripening on
Mr. Pratt’s farm at the Qu’Appelle lakes in 1857.” Professor Hind, in
his report, quoted interviews with enthusiastic settlers, who, on their
prairie farms in Assiniboine valley, had for years been successfully
raising prime wheat at a yield of thirty to forty bushels to the acre,
“corn, barley, oats, flax, hemp, hops, turnips, tobacco and anything you
wish.” He showed that similar conditions of soil and climate extended
far to the westward, and, quite naturally, he wrote of this area as the
“FERTILE BELT.”

THE OLDER INFLUENCES.

The Right Honourable Edward Ellice, one of the oldest governors of
Hudson’s Bay Company, asked, when being examined before the British
Parliamentary Committee of 1857, what probability there was of a
settlement being made within the southern territories of the company,
replied:—“None, in the lifetime of the youngest man now alive.” (“The
Great Company”, p. 480).

Sir George Simpson, who was for forty years governor of the Hudson Bay
territories and had visited every portion of them, was examined before
the select committee of the British House of Commons appointed in 1857
at the instance of Mr. Labouchere, on the eve of the expiration of the
license for exclusive Indian trade issued to the Hudson’s Bay Company in
1838, to investigate the state of the British possessions administered
by the Company. Sir George, being asked his opinion as to the general
fitness of Rupert’s Land for colonization, replied:—“I do not think
that any part of the Hudson Bay territories is well adapted for
settlement; the crops are very uncertain.”

By officially establishing the existence of this rich, arable area in
the southern part of the territories governed by the Hudson’s Bay
Company, and by associating it with such an apt designation, the
Palliser and Hind expeditions brought strong popular support to those
who in Britain and Canada were at that particular period actively
working to secure the introduction of Canadian jurisdiction over the
whole of the western part of British North America, and materially
contributed to the success of the protracted negotiations which resulted
in the ultimate surrender of its rights of government, etc., by the
Hudson’s Bay Company. If any other proof was required to establish in
the popular mind the attractiveness of the “Fertile Belt” as a desirable
section for settlement, it was furnished by the written agreement under
which the country was handed over to the Dominion of Canada, the term
“Fertile Belt” therein receiving the stamp of the highest official
recognition, and by the Hudson’s Bay Company, famous as a shrewdly
managed corporation, stipulating that the grants of land to be made them
were to be located within the area so designated.

SETTLEMENT OF “THE FERTILE BELT.”

The term “Fertile Area” proved a very loadstone to the settler and the
capitalist. Ever since the settlement of the troubles which accompanied
the transfer of the great northwest to the Dominion of Canada there has
been a stream of immigration flowing into the country, and up to the
past few years the Fertile Belt has been the settler’s Mecca and El
Dorado.

In the summer of 1874 the region west of the original province of
Manitoba was ‘opened up’ by the Northwest Mounted Police as far as
Macleod in the south, and Edmonton in the north. In 1885 the completion
of the Canadian Pacific Railway main line gave western Canada direct
communication with the eastern provinces, and a fair chance to develop
her natural resources, particularly in the Fertile Belt, through which
the line was constructed.

In 1870 the population of the whole region east of Rocky mountains over
which the Great Company had so recently relinquished its rule as Lord
Proprietor amounted to but a few hundred; at the present time (census of
1911) it amounts to no less than one million, three hundred and
forty-eight thousand, one hundred and seventy two. And with the
exception of the partially settled areas in Beaver, Athabaska and Peace
districts, and a few small, isolated posts on Hudson bay and along
Mackenzie river, the whole of this population is located within the
“Fertile Belt” as defined in the Hudson’s Bay Company’s agreement of
1869. This is not to be wondered at considering the undoubted natural
attractiveness of the zone, its rapidly developed advantages in the way
of railway communication, and the benefit it derived from being
originally introduced to the world as a future paradise of agricultural
enterprise under such an apt and alluring designation as “The Fertile
Belt.”

But while the united energies of the capitalist, the railroad builder
and the agriculturist have been devoted to the exploration of the
Fertile Belt, the much larger area of virgin country extending from the
northern limits of the strip in question to Arctic sea and lying between
Hudson bay and Rocky mountains has been neglected.

This (not including the Yukon), the most northern section of the vast
western region formerly ruled by the big fur-trading company, comprises
no less than one and one-half million square miles of country, or
considerably more than the combined territory (on March 1, 1912) of the
provinces of Ontario, Quebec, Nova Scotia, New Brunswick, Prince Edward
Island and Manitoba. Its very vastness, coupled with its remoteness from
the great centres of population, has tended to keep it, as far as the
world at large is concerned, comparatively

A TERRA INCOGNITA.

The word “comparatively” is used advisedly, for while it is true that
the greater part of the unexploited northland is unexplored and unknown,
we have in one way or another obtained considerable useful information
about it. Now and again word has come from some missionary station or
trading post somewhere up in the far north, hundreds of miles beyond the
northern limits of the “Fertile Belt,” of root crops, barley, oats, and
even wheat being raised during a long succession of years with
phenomenal success. Explorers returned from the great north have related
how they were regaled upon potatoes and other vegetables grown a few
miles from Arctic Circle. A sample of wheat grown at Fort Vermilion in
north latitude 58·4°, three hundred and fifty miles north of Edmonton,
was awarded First Prize at the Centennial Exhibition at Philadelphia, in
1876, in competition with the whole world. Geological explorers have
reported vast deposits of coal and other minerals underlying immense
areas in the far north. Adventurous travellers, back from the least
promising regions of Canada’s great northland have disclosed the
existence of timber areas and of game and fish preserves of fabulous
richness.

And this great northern country long ago had its champions who
challenged the attention of the world by predicting for sections of it,
at least, an agricultural and industrial future. Mr. Malcolm McLeod,
formerly of the Hudson’s Bay Company, and, as a son of the North,
jealous of its reputation, stirred up the thought that in the glamour
attached to the original exploitation of the “Fertile Belt” the natural
resources of the vaster country to the north would be overlooked, and in
the preface of his book, published in 1872, on Sir George Simpson’s
canoe voyage from Hudson bay to the Pacific in 1828, wrote:—“The object
of the present brochure, at this juncture, is to direct attention—by an
account of a canoe voyage through the region—to the fact that
=beyond that belt of supposed limited fertility=, which is
implied in the term “Fertile Belt,” there is, in our north west, an
area, continuous in every direction and easily accessible to its utmost
limits, containing over three hundred millions of acres of wheat and
pasture lands, with forests of finest timber, and the largest known coal
and bitumen, and also probably the richest gold areas in the world—a
land teeming with animal and vegetable life, extending to the very
Arctic Circle, and owing its wealth in that respect to exceptional
causes. I refer to that area—comprised entirely of Silurian and
Devonian systems—watered by the great Athabaska, Peace and Mackenzie
rivers, with their countless affluents.”

The very year of Confederation the attention of the reading public of
the world was forcibly drawn to the latent natural wealth of the
northland. The writer of an article published in the Westminster Review
of July, 1876, (“The Last Monopoly”) pointed out that “nature marching
from east to west, showered her bounties on the land of the United
States until she reached the Mississippi, but there she turned aside to
favour British territory. To the north the good land of the western
states is prolonged beyond the forty-ninth parallel, where it enters
British territory as the Fertile Zone. The fertile zone curves towards
the north as it proceeds westward, so that the western extremity of the
belt is several degrees of latitude higher than the eastern, the curves
apparently corresponding pretty closely with certain isothermal lines.
The forest zone extends to latitude 61° on Hudson bay. Coal crops out at
intervals in seams of ten or twelve feet thick from the Mackenzie in the
far north to the Saskatchewan. Ironstone has been discovered in the
Athabaska. Sulphur abounds on Peace and Smoky rivers. Salt is plentiful
near Great Slave lake; plumbago and mineral pitch on Lake Athabaska;
copper, native and in the form of malachite, on Coppermine river.”

THE NORTHLAND’S FIRST CHAMPIONS.

To find the first champions of the great Northland as a prospective
theatre of enterprise and development, and to trace the history of the
exploration of the region from the beginning, it is necessary to go back
many years, to a date, in fact, only two years more recent than the
founding of Quebec by Samuel de Champlain.

Henry Hudson, the great English sea captain, was engaged in the search
for a northwest passage, when on August 3, 1610, he rounded the
northwestern shoulder of Labrador and entered the bay which he thus
discovered and which now bears his name. The exploration of this great
inland sea was begun, not for the sake of gaining a knowledge of the
country surrounding it, nor for the development of its resources, but in
the delusive hope of finding a passage through it to the western ocean.
In 1612, Captain (afterwards Sir) Thomas Button, commissioned to search
for Hudson and to look for a northern passage, entered the bay with two
ships, and, holding on his westward course, encountered land at about
60° 40′ north latitude. Being a Welshman, he called the land “New
Wales,” a name which afterwards gave place to “New North Wales” for the
northern part, and “New South Wales” for the southern; but all three
designations, as applied to the Hudson bay coast, are now only of
historic interest. Button wintered at Port Nelson, which he so named in
memory of a shipmaster who, with many of the sailors, died there. When
the ice broke up he went northwards past Cape Churchill and landed at a
place about 60° north which he called “Hubbart’s Hope.”

The southern coast of Hudson bay, east from Port Nelson (York Factory),
was visited and explored by Captains Luke Foxe of London and Thomas
James of Bristol in 1631, and again visited by James in 1632. These two
navigators met off the coast near the mouth of Winisk river on August
29-30, 1631. Each had given a name to the country to the southwest. Foxe
called it “New Yorkshire” and James “The South Principality of Wales,”
probably on account of the previous name “New Wales” given by Button in
1612 to the land southwest of Port Nelson. These two navigators sailed
together to the eastward, to the entrance to James bay, and there
separated, Foxe to go north and James to the southward, to winter. Foxe
called the bay he had left “Wolstenholme’s Ultimum Vale.” James, after
rounding the cape, determined its latitude (55° 5′) and called it
“Henrietta Maria Cape,” after the Queen, and also after his own ship.

[Illustration: Oat field at Ile à La Crosse.]

In 1668 Captain Gillam entered Hudson bay with a pioneer fur-trading
expedition under the patronage of some influential Londoners, at the
head of whom was Prince Rupert, Duke of Cumberland, Count Palatine of
the Rhine and cousin of Charles II, King of England. Thus was
inaugurated the regime of the Hudson’s Bay Company, but the Royal
charter to Prince Rupert and his associates, constituting them “The
Governor and Company of Adventurers of England trading into Hudson’s
Bay”, was not granted until 1670.[2]

“THE HUDSON’S BAY COMPANY.”

The company was organized to prosecute the fur trade, and not for
colonizing purposes. The few explorations into and from the company’s
first posts on the bay were made solely in the interests of the fur
trade. When in 1683 Governor Sargeant was urged to send men to penetrate
into the country, the object was distinctly stated to be “to draw down
the Indians by fair and gentle means to trade with us.” This was the
burden of many letters of instruction sent out to Hudson bay in those
days, but the response was not very promising. The company’s servants
were not easily induced to imperil their lives, particularly as they
complained of lack of encouragement. In 1688 Governor George Geyer, who
himself, in 1773, had volunteered to do some exploring, was instructed
to send the boy Henry Kelsey to Churchill river for an exploring trip
“because we are informed he is a very active lad, delighting much in the
Indians’ company and being never better pleased than when he is
travelling amongst them.” Thus began the adventurous career of one who
may be regarded as the pioneer explorer of the region under review.[3]
In 1690 Kelsey “cheerfully undertook a journey up into the country of
the Assiniboine Poets, with the Captain of that Nation.” The following
year he accompanied the Indians on a journey he computed at four hundred
or five hundred miles, penetrating as far as the buffalo and grizzly
bear countries. A diary of this trip was published, but it contained no
references to the natural resources of the country. There followed a
period of some activity in the matter of exploration by sea, the
discovery of a northwest passage being aimed at. Between 1719 and 1737
the Hudson’s Bay Company alone fitted out nine vessels to participate in
this discovery, but these voyages added nothing to the scanty knowledge
then available as to the resources of the territory ruled over by the
company.

Soon after the Hudson’s Bay Company obtained its monopolistic charter,
antagonism to it arose in England, and this hostility steadily
developed, the legality of the charter being flatly challenged. One of
the bitterest opponents of the company was Mr. Arthur Dobbs, a gentleman
of means and scientific attainment, intensely interested in the subject
of the northwest passage, who became embittered because he considered
the Hudson’s Bay Company had not furthered the exploration projects as
he thought they should have done. In 1744 he published a volume on the
countries adjoining Hudson bay, in which he arraigned the company for
keeping the country back. He declared that the company would not allow
their servants to make any improvements at the posts except it be to
plant turnip gardens. He proceeded:—“There might be comfortable
settlements made in most places, and very tolerable, even in the worst
and coldest parts of that continent, which are the northeast and
northwest sides of the bay; but in the southern and western sides of the
bay, there might be made as comfortable settlements as any in Sweden,
Livonia or the south side of the Baltic, and farther into the country,
southwest, the climate is as good as the southern part of Poland and
north part of Germany and Holland.”

AN EARLY PARLIAMENTARY INQUIRY.

In 1748, ten years before the capitulation of Montreal to General
Amherst, a motion was passed in the House of Commons “to enquire into
the state and condition of the countries adjoining Hudson bay and the
trade carried on there, and to consider how those countries may be
settled and improved, and the trade and fisheries there extended and
increased, and also to enquire into the rights the Company of
Adventurers trading into Hudson’s bay pretend to have by charter to the
property of lands and exclusive trade to those countries.” The result
was an investigation, which produced a considerable amount of evidence
throwing the first official light upon the natural resources of Canada’s
great northland.

Up to this time the territory about Hudson bay had been commonly
supposed “to be a mere waste and howling wilderness, wherein
half-famished beasts of prey wage eternal war with a sparse population
of half-starved savages; where the drought is more than Saharan, the
cold more than Arctic, and that woe would betide the mad and unfortunate
individual who might be so far diverted from the path of prudence as to
endeavour to settle in those parts.”[4]

Evidence heard before the committee revealed the fact that intelligent
men who have lived in the country several years considered that it
possessed decided attractions as a field of settlement, and held that
nothing but the policy of the fur-trading company kept settlement
back.[5]

Some of the evidence as to the resources of the country and as to the
conditions of the very slim white population is still edifying. The
attack upon the legality of the company’s charter, however, came to
nothing, and the revelations made as to the suitability of the country
for settlement had no practical result, which is scarcely to be wondered
at considering the conditions prevailing in both Europe and
America—conditions which in the course of a few years were to result in
momentous changes in the map of this continent.

No additional data as to the resources and geography of the great
northland were produced until the years 1770 and 1771 when

HEARNE MADE HIS HISTORICAL TRIP

of discovery. Many of the witnesses examined during the enquiry of
1748-49 had spoken of the statements of Indians regarding the rich
copper mines existing on a great river many miles to the northwest of
Churchill. The Indians who visited that post in 1768 so impressed the
governor, Mr. Moses Norton, with their version of the richness of the
copper deposits along the river they called the Neetha-San-San-Dazey
(the “far-off metal river”), that being in London the following season
he induced the Company to send out an exploratory expedition. The man
selected for the command was Samuel Hearne,[6] a capable and experienced
mariner, then serving as mate on the Company’s brig “Charlotte.”
Hitherto all of the exploratory expeditions from Hudson bay towards the
northwest had been in search of the northwest passage, and by sea, but
now it was decided to undertake exploration by land.[7] Hearne really
made three trips, two of which were unsuccessful. The first failed
because of the lack of provisions, and the second because Hearne was
plundered by his Indian companions and broke his sextant. On these trips
he attempted to penetrate to the northwestward through the so-called
Barren Grounds or Barren Lands, but on the third venture, leaving in
December, 1770, he kept more to the westward and, being in the wooded
country, was able to provide himself with provisions and to travel with
much less discomfort. As he was accompanied by a number of Indian
families as bearers and hunters, his progress was necessarily slow and
indirect, on account of the difficulty of crossing lakes and large
rivers, and of providing food for so large a party. His general line of
travel was at first a little north of west to Clowey lake, which was
reached May 3, 1771, and thence a little west of north to the eastward
of Great Slave lake, probably passing Artillery lake (his Catt lake?)
and Clinton-Colden and Aylmer lakes (his Thoy-noy-kyed lake?) to the
stream since called Coppermine river, which was reached probably near
Sandstone rapid.[8]

During the eighteen years or so following Hearne’s discovery of
Coppermine river, considerable knowledge was acquired as to the
resources of the more southern portions of the still unexploited north
country by the activities of the Canadian fur traders, including the
Northwest Company, in North Saskatchewan, Clearwater, Athabaska and
Peace river regions,[9] and the resultant extension southward of the
trading operations of the Hudson’s Bay Company.

MACKENZIE’S TRIPS OF EXPLORATION

including the discovery of the great river of the north which still
bears his name, were notable events in the history of the north country;
momentous events, in fact, in view of the knowledge first obtained
through them of the vast natural resources of the great Mackenzie basin.

[Illustration: Winter travel—Dinner time.]

Mackenzie set out on his first voyage from Chipewyan, at the head of
Lake Athabaska (a Northwest Company’s post), June 3, 1789, and proceeded
in canoes via Slave river, Great Slave lake, and Mackenzie river as far
as Whale island in the estuary of that stream. On July 16, he started on
the return trip by the same route, and reached Chipewyan on September
12. On his second trip, in 1792, Mackenzie proceeded from Chipewyan to
the summit of the Rockies via Lake Athabaska, Peace river, and its
affluents, making his way to the Pacific through the passes of the
mountains, and down the streams on the western slope as best he could.

David Thomson, an energetic but little known traveller, made a track
survey in 1799 of Lesser Slave river, and of the Athabaska from the
mouth of the Pembina to Clearwater forks. In 1803 he filled in the gaps
between the forks and Athabaska lake, and in 1810 ascended the river and
crossed the Rockies by Athabaska pass.

SIR JOHN FRANKLIN.

With the first journey of Lieutenant (afterwards Captain Sir) John
Franklin, R.N., in 1820, began a series of explorations which extended
over a period of about thirty years, in connection with which the study
of the natural history and geography of the far north country was
carried on more systematically than had hitherto been possible. Franklin
was fully equipped by the British Government for scientific work, and
was accompanied by Doctor John Richardson, Lieutenant George Back and
Lieutenant Robt. Hood—men of acknowledged skill and ability. The
expedition left York Factory on September 9, 1819, and, travelling by
way of Oxford House and Norway House, arrived on October 22 at
Cumberland House where they went into winter quarters. In order to
arrange in advance for the further progress of the expedition, Franklin,
accompanied by Back, left Cumberland House on January 18, 1820, and,
travelling by way of Carleton House, Ile à la Crosse and Methye portage,
arrived at Chipewyan on March 26. Finally the party again set out on
August 2, 1820, from old Fort Providence, on the north side of Great
Slave lake, to ascend Yellowknife river, and on August 20 he reached
Winter lake, near which he established his winter quarters. Here wooden
houses, dignified with the name of Fort Enterprise, were erected. In
June the following year the party descended Coppermine river, covering a
distance of three hundred and thirty miles to the sea, and paddled along
the coast eastwards, exploring the coast as far eastward as longitude
109° 25′ west and latitude 68° 19′ north, thus exploring Bathurst inlet
and Coronation gulf. The story of the dreadful hardships endured by the
party on the return trip, one-half of the whole number, including
Lieutenant Hood, dying of starvation and exposure, forms one of the most
ghastly chapters in the history of Canadian exploration, and its
publication did much to deepen the popular impression that the whole of
the great northland was a hopelessly inhospitable region. As a matter of
fact the disasters which overtook this expedition were due to its
commissariat being inadequately outfitted. The Admiralty, who planned
the expedition, knew practically nothing about the conditions of travel
in the regions that they proposed having explored, and depended for aid
upon the Hudson’s Bay Company. That corporation did its best, but was
unable to extend to Franklin any official aid after he left Great Slave
lake or to supply him with proper provisions. The bitter fight between
the two big fur-trading companies had reached a climax; every officer of
the Hudson’s Bay Company was needed in the Company’s service, and
supplies at the frontier posts were at the lowest ebb. So the expedition
plunged into the unexplored wilderness without enough food and
inadequately supplied with ammunition.

In spite of the disasters attending the return of this expedition, the
British Government, determined upon completing the exploration of the
Arctic coast line of the continent, satisfied itself that the route
overland was the best for the explorers to follow, and Franklin, having
been successful on this first trip in surveying a long stretch of coast
to the east of Coppermine river, was appointed to the command of the
second expedition to explore the coast to the west of that river. The
exploring party spent the winter of 1825-26

AT FORT FRANKLIN

at the west end of Great Bear lake, and on June 22, 1826, set out in
boats along Bear river and Mackenzie river for the coast. The principal
members were Captain John Franklin, Lieutenant George Back (second in
command); Doctor John Richardson, surgeon and naturalist; Thomas
Drummond, assistant naturalist; E. N. Kendall and P. W. Dease, a chief
trader of the Hudson’s Bay Company, who was afterwards associated with
Thomas Simpson in explorations west of the Mackenzie and east of the
Coppermine. At the delta of the Mackenzie the party separated, one
detachment under Doctor Richardson turning to the east and completing a
survey of the coast as far as the mouth of the Coppermine. In the
meantime Franklin and Back explored the Arctic coast to the westward of
the Mackenzie for three hundred and seventy-four miles, passing beyond
the northernmost spur of Rocky mountains and returned to Fort Franklin,
reaching there September 21. Franklin remained there until February,
1827, when, leaving Back to follow him in the spring, he left for
Cumberland House, where he joined Richardson on June 18, 1827.[10]

Some time before this expedition set forth, the crisis which had
developed in the rivalry between the Hudson’s Bay Company and the
Northwest Company[11] had resulted in the union of the two companies
under the name of the former and the reorganized company, when called
upon by the Admiralty for assistance, was in a better position than the
original one had ever been to assist in the work of exploration.
Consequently Franklin’s second expedition was properly provisioned and
attended by experienced and reliable men. As a result it was
unaccompanied by any of the tragic occurrences which marked the former
trip.

Meanwhile explorations were being prosecuted by sea among the Arctic
islands and channels to the far north, and some of the expeditions were
indirectly to contribute to the world’s knowledge of the northern part
of the Hudson’s Bay Company’s continental territory. Captain John Ross
left England in the “Victory” in 1829 and with his ship’s company was
compelled to abandon the vessel in the ice in Regent inlet. They spent
altogether four winters within the Arctic circle and were finally picked
up in their boats in Lancaster sound by a whaler. The prolonged absence
of this party caused great anxiety in England, and in 1833 a search
expedition was organized at the cost of the Hudson’s Bay Company and
Captain Ross’s friends with government assistance. At the head of the
searching party was Captain (afterwards Sir) George Back, R.N., who had
instructions to descend Thlew-ece-cho-dezeth or Great Fish river to the
coast, exploring the river and adjacent country, as far as possible, as
he proceeded. Some months after he had started, Back was notified of the
return of the Ross expedition, but was ordered to proceed with his trip
for exploratory purposes. Captain Back built as his winter quarters

OLD FORT RELIANCE

on a beautiful spot at the north east extremity of Great Slave lake. His
explorations extended over parts of Great Slave, Artillery,
Clinton-Colden and Aylmer lakes as well as the whole of Great Fish
river, and from the Indians Back obtained some interesting information
regarding the adjacent country.

Captain Back, in 1834, descended Great Fish river, since called Backs
river, to its mouth. He also surveyed the coasts of its estuary as far
as Cape Britannia on the one side and Point Richardson on the other,
leaving but a small space of coast line unexamined between his northern
extreme and the limits of earlier explorations. The return journey began
on August 16. Back reached the mouth of Great Fish river August 21, the
head of it on September 17, and Fort Reliance on September 27.

The next journey of exploration in this region was that of Thomas
Simpson and Peter Warren Dease,[12] officers of the Hudson’s Bay
Company. While the object of their expedition was to complete the survey
of the Arctic coast so nearly completed by Franklin, Richardson and
Back, they made some notes on the natural resources of the far northern
country. Simpson left Fort Garry, the site of the present city of
Winnipeg, on December 1, 1836, and, travelling on snowshoes, arrived at
Chipewyan on June 1, and, descending Slave and Mackenzie rivers,
explored the Arctic coast westward to Point Barrow. They then returned
to the Mackenzie, ascended it and Great Bear river, and, crossing Great
Bear lake, built a post near the mouth of Dease river, naming it Fort
Confidence, and there spent the winter of 1837-38. They left here June
6, 1838, and, after ascending Dease river as far as was practicable,
portaged to the Coppermine. They then descended that river to the sea
and explored the coast to the eastward as far as Point Turnagain, the
farthest point reached by Franklin in 1821. Being unable to proceed
farther, they returned to Fort Confidence, where they arrived on
September 14, and again wintered there.

An expedition which was to mark the beginning of a most notable epoch in
the explorations of the Arctic regions sailed from England, in 1845. Sir
John Franklin, with two ships, the Erebus and the Terror, with crews
numbering one hundred and twenty-nine persons, left England on May 26,
to complete the survey of the north coast of America and to accomplish
the northwest passage. The Erebus and the Terror were last seen by a
whaling captain July 26, 1845, moored to an iceberg, waiting for an
opening in the ice to cross to Lancaster sound.

As time passed without any word of the missing expedition being
received, the interest and sympathy of the world were powerfully
aroused, and not only England, but France and the United States also
despatched

SEARCH EXPEDITIONS

to the Arctic. From northwest Canada some historical expeditions made
their way overland. In all thirty-five ships and five overland
expeditions were engaged in this search. The entire northern coast line
of America and the shores of the Arctic[13] were explored with minute
care, and much scientific knowledge of value relating to magnetism,
meteorology, the tides, geology, botany and zoology was accumulated.
Several of the sea expeditions and all of the overland expeditions
contributed to our store of knowledge as to the resources of far
northern Canada.

For the purposes of this volume the most important of these expeditions,
because the most productive of data regarding the natural resources of
the region under review, was that dispatched overland from Athabaska
district via Mackenzie river in 1848 and 1849. From the rapids of Slave
river, Doctor John Richardson and Doctor Rae (both subsequently
knighted) pushed on with all possible speed, leaving the heavier boats
to follow with the winter supplies, and skirted the Arctic coast
eastward to the mouth of the Coppermine river. Thence they travelled
overland to the mouth of the Dease river on Great Bear lake. Near this
point, on the site of Fort Confidence, established by Dease and Simpson,
Rae, whose detachment had ascended Great Bear river and crossed Great
Bear lake for this purpose, had erected houses, and here the entire
party passed the winter of 1848-49. As early in the spring of 1849 as
the season allowed, the party divided on Arctic sea, and Richardson
returned to England, while Rae made an attempt to reach Wollaston land.
Failing in this, he returned to Fort Confidence, and ascended the
Mackenzie to Fort Simpson. In the summer of 1854, under the auspices of
the Hudson’s Bay Company, Rae made a journey of exploration along the
southern coasts of Wollaston and Victoria lands, still searching for the
Franklin expedition. In 1853, when no trace of Franklin could be found
elsewhere, Rae again turned his steps in the direction of Gulf of
Boothia. First he sought a short cut to the south of Backs river by
Chesterfield inlet and Quoich river, which he ascended in a boat for two
and a half degrees of latitude (up to 66° north), but finding the river
full of rapids and impracticable for his purpose, he returned and
hastened north to Repulse bay.

The reports of these expeditions contain several references to the
natural resources of the country, but they are not so valuable as would
have been the case had time been less a consideration, or had the
investigation of mineral deposits and other natural wealth of the
country been the chief objective.

Some information as to the resources of the north country was obtained
by the British Parliamentary Committee of 1857 already referred to (See
p. 3), but most of the evidence had reference to the southern part of
Hudson’s Bay Company’s territory now comprised within the settled parts
of the provinces of Manitoba, Saskatchewan and Alberta.

CANADIAN PARLIAMENTARY INVESTIGATIONS.

April 12, 1870, the Senate of Canada appointed a select committee on the
subject of Rupert’s land, Red river and the Northwest territory, with a
view to collecting information respecting the condition, climate, soil,
population, resources and natural products of the country, its trade,
institutions, and capabilities and the means of access thereto, with
power to send for persons and papers. The committee reported on April
25, 1870. This report with the report of the evidence was printed, in
extenso, as an appendix to the Journals of the Senate (33 Victoria).
None of the witnesses examined before the committee had ever been in the
district north of the North Saskatchewan. One, Joseph Monkman, explained
that he had been up the South Saskatchewan as far as Moose lake, and up
the north branch of the same river as far as Carlton. He testified that
although the country along the Saskatchewan looked promising from an
agricultural standpoint, there were “no farms along the river.” Most of
the witnesses were asked if they had any information as to the “far
northwest,” and all who had heard anything definite regarding that
region testified that their information was favourable.

Since the transfer of the northwest from the Hudson’s Bay Company to the
Dominion Government, a vast amount of reliable information regarding the
great northland has been obtained by Canadian Government explorers,
generally engineers reconnoitring in advance of railway construction,
members of the staff of the Geological Survey of Canada, or expeditions
despatched to various defined areas by the Department of the Interior
for the express purpose of investigating their natural resources and
determining their suitability for agricultural or industrial
developments. More or less extensive trips through sections of the great
northland by adventurous sportsmen and naturalists have also contributed
considerably to our knowledge of the country.

A very brief account of some of the more productive of these
expeditions, with special reference to the routes followed, is necessary
to enable the reader to appreciate intelligently the references to the
information obtained to be made in the succeeding chapters.

SCIENTIFIC INVESTIGATION OF THE COUNTRY.

In 1872, Professor John Macoun was sent from Edmonton by Mr. (now Sir)
Sandford Fleming, who was then exploring for the Canadian Pacific
Railway, to explore Peace river and see if there were a pass there.
Professor Macoun’s report attracted much attention to this district.

Professor Macoun had then already spent ten years study, theoretical and
practical, of botany, natural history and physical geography. In the
year 1875 he was appointed botanist to the expedition which, under the
leadership of the Director of the Geological Survey, explored Peace
river and Rocky mountains. Two years later he was asked by the Dominion
Government to write a report on the Northwest territories and availed
himself of all reliable information regarding the country. The summers
of 1879-80-81 were spent by Professor Macoun in traversing the least
known parts and investigating the fauna, flora, meteorology and physical
phenomena of the country.

During the years 1878-79 Doctor G. M. Dawson, of the Geological Survey,
in conjunction with a Canadian Pacific Railway survey party, made an
examination of the region between the mouth of Skeena river on the
Pacific coast and Edmonton, including Pine river pass and its
approaches, Smoky river and the fertile country north and south of Peace
river. The vast extent of country covered left but little time for
details, and caused the expedition to assume the character of a rapid
reconnaissance survey.

In 1873, Charles Horetzky, C.E., was commissioned by Mr. Sandford
Fleming to make a reconnaissance survey through Peace river country and
Peace river pass to assist the government in reaching a decision as to
the route of the Canadian Pacific Railway. Mr. Horetzky, who was
accompanied by Doctor Macoun, botanist, proceeded via Edmonton, Lesser
Slave lake, the confluence of Smoky and Peace rivers, Dunvegan, McLeod’s
lake, etc. Besides his official report, Mr. Horetzky wrote a popular
account of this trip under the title “Canada on the Pacific,” which
contained much interesting information as to Peace river district.

In 1875, Doctor Selwyn, Director of the Geological Survey, mapped and
reported upon the upper part of Peace river, as far down as the mouth of
Smoky river, and in the same year Professor John Macoun, who accompanied
him in the capacity of botanist, proceeded down the river to Lake
Athabaska, and returned east by the Athabaska-Clearwater route, while
Doctor Selwyn reascended Peace river, and returned by British Columbia.

Doctor Robert Bell, F.G.S., F.R.S.C., etc., in a period of active
service in the Geological Survey extending over more than forty years,
contributed very largely to our knowledge of Northern Canada. He was
medical officer, naturalist and geologist on the “Neptune,” the “Alert”
and the “Diana” expeditions to Hudson bay, and his reports of those
voyages, as well as of his overland trips, are very valuable. Three of
his exploratory trips, two in the eastern division, the other in the
western part of the country under review, are especially interesting. In
1878 he made a track-survey and a geological examination of the
boat-route from Lake Winnipeg to Hudson bay by way of Oxford and Knee
lakes, and the rivers thence to York Factory. He also made topographical
and geological surveys of the lower part of Nelson river, and of the
upper part of the same stream, from Lake Winnipeg nearly to Split lake,
leaving unfinished the central part. Between 1878 and 1891 he explored
Nelson river, the lower part of Grass river, and parts of Churchill and
Little Churchill rivers. In 1879, Doctor Bell, assisted by Mr. Cochrane,
completed his survey of Nelson river and Churchill river basins; the
country covered in that region included altogether Gull lake, Grass
river, Sipiwesk lake, Jackfish river, Knee lake, God’s lake, Island
lake, Split lake and the coast of Hudson bay for a few miles on either
side of Churchill. These explorations practically re-opened a section of
country which must have been familiar to those engaged in transportation
via the old route between Hudson bay, Red river and Saskatchewan river
districts. Before reaching Norway House, although diligent enquiry was
made by Doctor Bell, no reliable information could be obtained of the
Churchill, or the central part of the Nelson, or the country lying
between these two streams. And even at Norway House very little was
known on the subject. This arose from the fact that both these rivers
had long before been abandoned as “voyaging” routes by the Hudson’s Bay
Company, and also that no Indians lived at or near the parts to be
examined.

In 1882, a track survey and geological examination of Athabaska river
below the mouth of Lac La Biche river, was made by Doctor Bell.

In 1886, Doctor Bell conducted an exploration of portions of
Attawapiskat and Albany rivers, and of the country between Lonely lake
(Lac Seul) and James bay. Doctor Bell reached the Albany from Wabigoon
via Lake Minnietakie, and crossed the watershed to the Attawapiskat from
the highest of the chain of lakes on the Eabamet, which flows into the
Albany about ninety miles in a straight line below the outlet of Lake
St. Joseph. The Attawapiskat was followed to James bay.

A micrometer survey of the lower part of both Peace and Athabaska rivers
was made by William Ogilvie, D.L.S., in 1884, and in 1888, Mr. Ogilvie,
having completed some surveys in the Yukon, arrived at Fort McPherson
via Peel river to make

AN EXPLORATION OF MACKENZIE RIVER,

Great Slave lake and river, and Lake Athabaska. Mr. Ogilvie ascended
this great waterway and prepared a report which is still much consulted.
In 1891 Mr. Ogilvie, under the direction of the Surveyor-General, again
made an exploratory survey in the same region. Mr. Ogilvie’s
instructions were to make a thorough exploration of the region drained
by Peace river and its tributaries, between the boundary of British
Columbia and Rocky mountains and to collect any information that might
be of value relating to that region. As it was desirable that he should,
if practicable, connect the end of his micrometer survey of Mackenzie
river made in 1888 with that made on Great Slave river in the same year,
which he was then unable to accomplish on account of high water, Mr.
Ogilvie took with him the necessary instruments, but he found it
impossible to complete this work. This time, he descended the great
northwestern waterway from Athabaska to Fort Simpson, and, ascending the
Liard and “East Branch” or Nelson river, as it has since been officially
called, reached Port Nelson on September 15, ascending Nelson and
Sikanni Chief rivers and portaging through the woods to St. John on
Peace river. Another interesting report was the result of this really
hazardous trip.

In 1886, Mr. A. P. Low of the Geological Survey, accompanied by Mr. J.
M. Macoun, crossed Lake Winnipeg from Red river to Berens river and
ascended the latter to a portage to the head waters of Severn river,
making an exploration of the country from Lake Winnipeg to Hudson bay.

In 1887, Mr. R. G. McConnell, B.A., of the Geological Survey, descended
to Mackenzie river from the Yukon via Liard river, and during that year
and the following one explored a considerable part of Mackenzie basin
including Slave river, Salt river, Hay river, part of the western end of
Great Slave lake, etc. The result was embodied in a most interesting
official report (Part D. Annual Report, Vol. IV., 1888-89, Geological
Survey of Canada.) The country between Peace and Athabaska rivers north
of Lesser Slave lake, comprising an area of about forty-four thousand
square miles, remained entirely unknown until Mr. McConnell’s
exploration was undertaken.

In the years 1888, 1889, 1890 and 1891, Mr. McConnell effected a most
important exploration of the unexplored country between Peace river and
Athabaska river and in the basin of the Athabaska. He investigated as
thoroughly as he could the phenomena of the so-called tar-sand deposits
and the

OIL SPRINGS OF ATHABASKA REGION,

about which the few hunters, traders and travellers who had hitherto
penetrated so far had brought back such astonishing tales. His report,
printed in the annual report of the Geological Survey of Canada for
1890-91 (New Series, Vol. V, Part I), excited much interest at the time
throughout the scientific world, and is still regarded as the standard
authority on the subject.

In the summer of 1889, a well-known English sportsman set out upon a
trip to Great Slave lake district with the object of making some
explorations. This was Mr. Warburton Pike, and his book “The Barren
Ground of Northern Canada”, describing his trip, gives a great deal of
interesting information about that part of the “Barren Lands” just north
of Great Slave lake and the region about the headwaters of Backs river.
Mr. Pike, who combined the qualities of a good writer, a trained
explorer and a keen sportsman, proceeded during the summer of 1889 via
Great Slave lake and the canoe-portage route by Francois, de Mort, Nez
Croche, du Rocher, Camsell, Mackay and de Gras lakes to the headwaters
of Coppermine river. He spent the winter in camp just south of Mackay
lake and at Fort Resolution, and the following summer proceeded via
Great Slave lake, and a chain of lakes to the east of those he had
traversed on his canoe-portage route the previous season, to Aylmer
lake. Thence he proceeded down Backs river to Beechey lake, south of
Bathurst inlet. He came out via Clinton-Colden and Artillery lakes, and
from Athabaska district made a trip up Peace river.

Mr. J. Burr Tyrrell, of the Geological Survey, explored the country
bordering on the east shore of Lake Winnipeg in 1890 and 1891.

In 1892, Mr. Tyrrell, assisted by Mr. D. B. Dowling, made an exploration
of the country between Athabaska and Churchill rivers and north of the
latter waterway. The routes covered included a course from Prince Albert
northward through Cree lake and down Beaver river to Churchill river,
and north across the country by Cree lake to Black river, thence through
Wollaston lake and up through Geikie and Foster rivers to the Churchill.
In 1893 and 1894 Mr. Tyrrell conducted two important exploration
parties. In 1893 the route taken was via Chipewyan, Lake Athabaska, Fond
du Lac, Black lake, Chipman lake, Selwyn lake, Daly lake, Dubawnt river
and lake, Aberdeen, Schultz and Baker lakes, Chesterfield inlet,
Churchill, York Factory, Norway House and West Selkirk. In 1894 the
route followed was via Cumberland House, Sturgeon-weir river, Churchill
river, Reindeer river and lake, Cochrane river, Kasba lake, Kasba river,
Ennadai lake, Kazan river, Kathkyed lake, Kazan river again, Ferguson
lake and river to Hudson bay. Mr. Tyrrell and party came out via Split
lake, Norway House and Selkirk.

THE VAST WILDERNESS,

through which the lines of exploration upon these occasions passed, lies
for the most part north of latitude 59°, and extends from the coast to
Hudson bay, westward to Lake Athabaska, comprising an area of not less
than two hundred thousand square miles. The work of the party embraced a
survey of the north shore of Lake Athabaska, Chipman, Cochrane, Telzoa
or Dubawnt, Thlewiaza, Kazan and Ferguson rivers, in whole or in part,
Chesterfield inlet, and the shore of Hudson bay from Chesterfield inlet
to Churchill, as well as a line overland in winter, from Churchill to
York Factory, and another from Churchill to Split lake.

[Illustration: Portage near Long Spruce rapids, Nelson river.]

The distance travelled in 1893 was three thousand two hundred miles, one
thousand six hundred and fifty of which had not been previously surveyed
or reported on in any way. The whole distance of six hundred miles from
Churchill to Lake Winnipeg was covered on snowshoes. During the trip of
the following year Mr. Tyrrell travelled two thousand nine hundred
miles, one thousand seven hundred and fifty by canoe and seven hundred
and twenty-five on snowshoes, most of this distance being through
unexplored country.

Jas. W. Tyrrell, C.E., D.L.S., who formed part of this expedition,
subsequently published a popular account of the trip of three thousand
two hundred miles in a book entitled “Across the Sub-Arctics of Canada.”

During the summer of 1896 Mr. Tyrrell, travelling by canoe, made a
survey of the northeastern portion of the old district of Saskatchewan
and the adjacent parts of the then district of Keewatin, since annexed
to Manitoba, the territory covered comprising an area of rather more
than twenty-five thousand square miles, lying between north latitude 50°
40′ and 56°, and west longitude 97° 20′ and 122° 30′.

James Macintosh Bell, F.R.G.S., of the Geological Survey of Canada, made
a geological reconnaissance of the north arm of Great Slave lake in
1899, wintered at Fort Resolution, and in 1900, accompanied by Mr.
Charles Camsell, travelled to Great Bear lake, made a geological
exploration of its northern shores, and returned by a chain of lakes to
the north arm of Great Slave lake, proceeding to Edmonton the same
winter.

In the summer of 1899, Mr. D. B. Dowling of the Geological Survey
explored the upper part of Burntwood river from Three Point lake to its
head near Reed lake, Kississing river, from the north end of
Athapapuskow lake to its mouth on Churchill river, and the Churchill
from above Sisipuk lake to the end of the long arm running from Nelson
lake. During the summer of 1893 Mr. Dowling conducted an exploration in
that part of southern Keewatin just to the east of the then eastern
boundary of Manitoba, and north of the then northern boundary of
Ontario. The area covered, now forming part of the province of Ontario,
extends from English river and Lac Seul northwards to Berens river, the
eastern branch of which forms approximately the northern limit of the
area. To the east the exploration included the heads of streams flowing
eastward to Cat lake, and on the west White river, a southern branch of
Berens river, with the western end of Red lake, confines its extent in
that direction.

In 1900, J. W. Tyrrell, C.E., D.L.S., who had been assistant to his
brother in 1893, conducted an important exploration of the country
between Great Slave lake and Chesterfield inlet on Hudson bay. In all,
one thousand seven hundred and twenty-nine miles of survey were
accomplished, and in the performance of this four thousand six hundred
miles were travelled

WITH SLEDS AND CANOES.

Mr. Tyrrell proceeded via Resolution, Great Slave lake, old Fort
Reliance, Lockhart river, Pike’s portage, Artillery lake, Clinton-Colden
lake, Smart lake, Sifton lake, Hanbury river and Thelon river to a point
near the confluence of Dubawnt river. Hence a portion of the party under
the direction of C. C. Fairchild, C.E., was despatched to survey
Aberdeen, Schultz and Baker lakes, while Mr. Tyrrell returned up the
Thelon to devote his attention to the upper part of the river and the
divide between the upper Thelon and Artillery lake, traversing,
unattended, the one hundred and sixty miles between a small branch of
the Thelon and Artillery lake. The party was reunited at Artillery lake,
and returned to civilization via Resolution, Chipewyan and Edmonton.

In 1898, Mr. David T. Hanbury tried to reach the unexplored tract
between Chesterfield inlet and Great Slave lake via the
Norway-House—York-Factory—Churchill route. Finding that he arrived too
late at the latter place, he decided to spend the summer on the Hudson
bay coast and make preparations for an early start the following year.
In 1899, he made an interesting trip from Churchill to Great Slave lake
via Chesterfield inlet, Thelon and Ark-i-linik rivers, Clinton-Colden
and Artillery lakes, and Lockhart river. As he was the first white man
to explore Ark-i-linik or Thelon river, its most western affluent has
since been called Hanbury river. In 1901, Mr. Hanbury travelled from
Edmonton to Depot island in the northern part of Hudson bay, via Fort
Resolution, Great Slave lake, Artillery lake, Hanbury, Thelon and
Dubawnt rivers, Baker lake, Chesterfield inlet and Marble island. He
spent most of the winter in an Esquimaux camp near Baker lake, and in
February started on an adventurous trip back to civilization via
Aberdeen lake and Thelon river, thence overland to Buchanan river, down
that stream to Backs river, thence to the coast, westward along the
coast to the mouth of the Coppermine, up the Coppermine to Kendall
river, via Dismal lake, Dease river, Great Bear lake and Great Bear
river to Fort Norman. Mr. Hanbury gives an interesting account of these
trips in his book “Sport and Travel in the Northland of Canada.”

The United States Biological Survey, in the early spring of 1901,
determined to send Mr. Edward A. Preble, Assistant of the Survey and one
of its trained field naturalists, to obtain representative collections
of the mammals, birds and plants of the great interior region west of
Hudson bay drained mainly by the Mackenzie and described in the reports
of the Survey as the most neglected large area in North America. As it
was evident that only part of the region could be examined
satisfactorily in a single season, it was determined to make first a
reconnaissance of the region about Athabaska and Great Slave lakes. The
route followed by Mr. Preble’s party was via Great Slave lake, including
the north arm, to Fort Rae; the chain of lakes and rivers by way of Lake
St. Croix to MacTavish bay; Great Bear lake and Great Bear river to the
Mackenzie. It had been the intention of Mr. Preble, who was accompanied
by his brother and Mr. James MacKinley, formerly of the Hudson’s Bay
Company, to cross by one of the Indian routes to the upper Coppermine
and to descend that stream, but various circumstances rendered this
impossible and he was obliged to take the shorter and more westerly
route.

In the spring of 1903, the results of his work in 1901 having been
elaborated but not published, Mr. Preble was sent to complete his
investigations in the Mackenzie region. This was especially desirable,
since on the previous trip he had penetrated only as far as Great Slave
lake. Upon his second trip the survey was carried from Great Bear lake
to the Arctic coast line. The result of these trips was embodied in a
very complete and altogether admirable report—“North American Fauna,
No. 27.”—published by the United States Biological Survey in 1908.

In 1905, Mr. Alfred H. Harrison, one of that large class of adventurous
Englishmen who love to penetrate into the less known and totally unknown
portions of the world for the very love of sport and perilous adventure,
made a trip of exploration down Slave and Mackenzie rivers, and remained
for nearly two years in the country

ABOUT THE DELTA OF MACKENZIE RIVER

and Herschell island, and returned home in 1907 by the same route. Mr.
Harrison, before he made this trip, had considerable knowledge of the
Northland, for he had made a trip as far as Great Slave lake in 1902.
Mr. Harrison is, moreover, the son of a former officer of the Hudson’s
Bay Company, who in 1852 was stationed at the company’s post at Fort
Good Hope. Mr. Harrison, upon his return to England, wrote a book which
he entitled “In Search of a Polar Continent” which contains a large
amount of interesting information regarding the Mackenzie country.

During the seasons of 1903, 1904 and 1905, Mr. William McInnes of the
Geological Survey made explorations in that portion of the southeastern
section of this region drained by Winisk river and by the upper branches
of Attawapiskat river. These explorations extended from 51° 10′ to 55°
10′ North latitude and from 86° to 90° West longitude. The result was
embodied in a report printed in 1909 and numbered 1080.

Messrs. Wm. McInnes and Owen O’Sullivan of the Geological Survey were
employed during the summer of 1906 to explore the region along the
proposed route of the railway between the Saskatchewan and Churchill.
Mr. McInnes explored the country between the Pas and Split lake; Mr.
O’Sullivan, the country between Split lake and Churchill. Their reports
were published in the summary report of the Geological Survey for 1906.

Mr. McInnes’s route ran from Lake Winnipeg via Nelson river to Split
lake and thence along Burntwood river and File river and lake to Reed
lake, across Wekusko lake to a point between Grass and Burntwood rivers,
back to Reed lake and thence along the Nelson. Mr. O’Sullivan’s route
was from Split lake via Assean lake, Outawi river and lake, Waskaiowaka
lake, Little Churchill river, Recluse lake, Great Churchill river, Deer
lake and river, and Great Churchill river again. The return trip was
made via York Factory, Hayes river and Fox river.

In 1906 and 1907, W. Thibaudeau, C.E., acting under the instruction of
Doctor Deville, Surveyor-General, made some explorations in Churchill
district and along the route of the proposed Hudson Bay Railway from
Churchill to The Pas on the Saskatchewan. On his trip over the route of
the railway Mr. Thibaudeau proceeded from Churchill in a straight line
to near Deer river. Crossing the river he followed a route between it
and the Churchill, recrossing the Deer at a point a little more than a
hundred miles from Churchill. Thence he travelled in a straight line to
the Little Churchill, and followed the course of that river to
Waskaiowaka lake. Thence he crossed to a point near Assean lake and
continued his route via Split lake, Pipe lake, Grass river, Landing
lake, Sipiwesk lake, Grass river, and Cormorant and Atikomeg lakes.

Mr. Joseph Keele of the Geological Survey of Canada made a
reconnaissance across Mackenzie mountains on Pelly, Ross and Gravel
rivers, in the mountain region lying between the Pelly and the lower
reach of Mackenzie river in 1907 and 1908.

During the summer of 1908, Inspector E. A. Pelletier, of the Royal
Northwest Mounted Police, with a corporal and two constables, patrolled
the country between

GREAT SLAVE LAKE AND HUDSON BAY.

They left Fort Resolution on Great Slave lake on July 1 and travelled
via Pike portage, Artillery lake, Hanbury river and Thelon river, to
Hudson bay at Chesterfield inlet, where they arrived on August 31. No
natives or guides were employed from Great Slave lake to Hudson bay and
this portion of the journey was made without any mishap whatever.

Inspector Pelletier estimated the distances travelled on this patrol as
follows:—

Miles.
Fort Saskatchewan to Athabaska (teams) 90
Athabaska to McMurray (scow) 280
McMurray to Graham’s Landing (steamer) 290
Graham’s Landing to Fort Smith (teams) 12
Fort Smith to Fort Resolution (canoes) 180
Fort Resolution to Fort Reliance (canoes) 240
Pike portage route between Great Slave lake
and Artillery lake (portage and canoe) 25
Artillery lake to height of land (portage and canoe) 100
Height of land to Thelon river (portage and canoe) 170
Thelon river (canoe) 220
Beverly lake and river (canoe) 35
Aberdeen lake (canoe) 60
River between Aberdeen and Schultz lakes (canoe) 20
Schultz lake (canoe) 25
Schultz or Lower Thelon river (portage and canoe) 35
Baker lake (canoe) 60
River foot of Baker lake (canoe) 25
Chesterfield inlet, Hudson bay (canoe) 130
==
Total 1,997

Of the canoes used on this patrol, one was an eighteen foot length,
forty-two inch beam, the other eighteen and one-half foot length,
forty-three inch beam; both were eighteen inches deep, longitudinal
strip cedar, varnished, fitted with oars for hard pulling against strong
winds on the lakes. Inspector Pelletier had a good stock of paddles and
fifty-five foot lateen sails. Each canoe weighed one hundred and twenty
pounds portaging weight. The portage from Great Slave lake towards
Artillery lake was found to be about six miles from the site of Fort
Reliance, of which historic establishment a stone chimney alone remains
standing.

Some interesting topographical information regarding the region between
Hudson bay and The Pas was obtained through the surveys made under the
direction of John Armstrong, C.E., for the Department of Railways and
Canals in 1908 and 1909, for the purpose of determining a projected
location for a railway to Hudson bay from The Pas, the nearest point on
the Saskatchewan then having railway connection. From The Pas to a point
north of Pipestone lake a single route was laid down; thence two routes,
one to Port Nelson, the other to Churchill, were surveyed. Mr.
Armstrong, in his report (Sessional Paper No. 20 d.—1910), makes some
interesting references to the natural resources of the district covered
by the surveys.

All the expeditions which have been thus briefly passed in review made
additions to the knowledge we possess of the natural resources of the
great unsettled Northwest, but it will be observed that the acquisition
of geographical knowledge only was the object for which most of these
expeditions were equipped and sent forward. The trained explorers of the
Geological Survey of Canada have given us a fair idea of the geological
features and natural resources generally along the more accessible lines
of travel, particularly in the southern and western parts of this vast
unsettled and unsurveyed region, but it is only within the last few
years that systematic surveys have been undertaken there to determine
the adaptability of certain areas to agricultural development and
settlement.

In 1908, Frank J. P. Crean, C.E., of the Railway Lands Branch of the
Department of the Interior, was commissioned to explore and procure all
the information possible about that tract of country lying to the east
of Beaver river and Green lake,

[Illustration: Farm at Mount Nebo on Green lake trail, sixty-five miles
from Prince Albert.]

SOUTH OF CHURCHILL RIVER,

and extending east to the old canoe route from Cumberland House via Frog
portage to Stanley Mission. Mr. Crean was instructed by Mr. R. E. Young,
Superintendent of the Railway Lands Branch, to pay particular attention
to obtaining information about the character of the country away from
the travelled routes, and to ascertain the value of the district to be
traversed for farming, lumbering and mining purposes.

Mr. Crean left Prince Albert August 20, 1908, and returned there January
6, 1909. He proceeded by team to the south end of Green lake, and after
reaching that point travelled chiefly by canoe, making side trips
inland, where it seemed desirable to do so. After the ice formed he
procured dog trains to continue the exploration. On this trip Mr. Crean
explored the district bounded on the west by a line from Prince Albert
to Stanley mission; on the north by Churchill and Clearwater rivers; on
the west by Green lake, Beaver river, the western arm of Ile à la Crosse
lake, Buffalo lake, Methye river and Methye lake; and on the south by
the surveyed territory along the north bank of the Saskatchewan. Mr.
Crean gave the following statistics in his report:—“The gross area
explored, and about which some information has been collected, is
approximately sixteen million acres. The water covered area in this
tract (area of lakes and rivers) may be set down at approximately three
million acres—the remaining land area at thirteen million. I would
estimate that an area of fully three million five hundred thousand acres
is suitable for settlement as soon as surveyed and made accessible by
roads, and an area of about eight million acres of swamp or land
probably too wet at present for successful cultivation could be
reclaimed at a moderate expenditure. All swamp will, however, eventually
repay the cost of reclamation. The above figures are, of course, the
result of an exploration extending over only a few months, and must be
considered to be only approximate. The distance travelled was about
three thousand miles, of which one thousand two hundred was made running
behind dog trains.”

In 1909, Mr. Crean was again sent out to carry on his exploration of the
country north of the surveyed area in Saskatchewan and Alberta and
extending west from the territory covered the previous year. He was
instructed to cover as much of the country west to the Athabaska and

NORTH TO THE CLEARWATER

as time would permit. He left Prince Albert on June 17, 1909, completed
his season’s work at McMurray, and thence proceeded to Edmonton,
reaching there December 11, 1909. From Green lake, Mr. Crean travelled
principally by canoe, making numerous portages, some of considerable
length. On some occasions he hired horses and used them as a means of
transportation. The total area explored, or about which information was
thus obtained, is approximately twenty-one million acres. Mr. Crean
reports:—“Of this tract, not over two million acres is covered by
water—lakes and rivers. A conservative estimate of the land available
for settlement in its present state, when means of access are provided,
would be about ten million acres. The greater portion of the remaining
area, say nine million acres, could be drained, and, in my opinion,
would well repay the expenditure. Throughout the tract there is ample
fall which would allow of drainage being successfully carried out. A
portion of the tract lies on the head waters of Churchill river, and all
the streams contain numerous rapids and falls. On the west side of the
height of land sloping towards the Athabaska and the Clearwater there
are also excellent facilities for drainage. This tract is well supplied
with timber, some of which may be suitable for export.”

Mr. Crean, during this exploratory trip, visited the country between
Green lake and Meadow lake, Birch lake and Loon lake to the westward;
Waterhen lake and Island lake; Canoe lake and Burnt lake; White Fish
river and lake, and Watchush lake; Gipsy lake, Gordon lake and McMurray;
Gregoire lake. Pembina river. Cowpar lake, Winefred lake, Ipiatik lake,
Heart lake and Lac La Biche, all to the westward of the area
investigated in 1908.

Mr. Crean’s report of his exploration in the season of 1908 was printed
for public information, but owing to the great demand for copies the
edition was soon exhausted and it was decided therefore, to issue the
two reports in one new publication. The gross area covered by the two
reports, and as to which some information was gathered, might be stated
at approximately forty million acres.

Inspired with the wish to see for himself the country for the
administration of which he was responsible, the Hon. Frank Oliver, then
Minister of the Interior, in 1910 made the trip from Edmonton via
Athabaska, Athabaska river, Lake Athabaska, Slave river, Great Slave
lake, and Mackenzie river, to Fort McPherson, thence passing over to the
Yukon by trail to Lapierre’s House. Mr. Oliver left Edmonton June 2 and
reached Fort Yukon on July 14. From Athabaska to Grand rapids (one
hundred and sixty miles) and from McMurray to Chipewyan (two hundred
miles) the Minister and his private secretary made the trip alone in a
Peterborough canoe. The result of the Minister’s observations, as
communicated to the press, aroused considerable interest in the newest
northwest throughout Canada.

The reports of explorers and travellers as to the character and
resources of the great northwest have been supplemented by a
considerable amount of information received from Hudson’s Bay Company
officials, and others engaged in the fur trade, missionaries,
prospectors and pioneer settlers. Certain

RECENT PARLIAMENTARY INQUIRIES

resulted in the placing upon record of some of the most instructive of
this class of information.

Much data of a most valuable character was obtained by two select
committees of the Senate which sat during the sessions of 1887 and 1888,
under the presidency of the late Honourable Senator Schultz, who was
mainly instrumental in having the said committees appointed. The reports
of these committees, with the evidence taken, were printed as appendices
to the Journals of the Senate (1st Session, 6th Parlt., 50 Victoria, and
2nd Session, 6th Parlt., 51 Victoria).

During the parliamentary session of 1906-7, the Hon. Senator T. O.
Davis, of Prince Albert, was instrumental in having a select committee
of the Senate appointed to enquire as to the value of that portion of
the Dominion lying north of the Saskatchewan watershed and east of Rocky
mountains, comprising the northern parts of the provinces of Alberta and
Saskatchewan and Mackenzie territory, and the extent of navigable
waters, rivers, lakes, and sea-coast contained therein; also similarly
to enquire and report from time to time as to the value of the portions
of the Dominion on both sides of Hudson bay, including the territories
of Keewatin and Ungava, and the extent of navigable waters, rivers,
lakes and sea-coast contained therein. The committee, in accordance with
the authority delegated to it, sent for persons, papers and records
bearing upon the subjects submitted for its consideration, and examined
a number of gentlemen possessing special knowledge, through personal
experience or otherwise, of the regions named as the special subject of
enquiry. The evidence thus obtained was, under instructions from the
Senate, edited, condensed and arranged by the compiler of the present
volume, and published, first in the journals of the Senate (3rd Session,
10th Parliament), and subsequently in the book published under the
direction of the Department of the Interior, entitled “Canada’s Fertile
Northland.” It aroused much interest in the subject, not only in Canada,
but throughout the civilized world.

Taking advantage of this, the Minister of the Interior gave instructions
for the preparation of a summary or digest of the Schultz committee
reports of 1887 and 1888, at that time out of print, the work being
entrusted to the same compiler, under the direction of the late Mr. R.
E. Young, Superintendent of Railway Lands and Chief Geographer. The
result was the volume “The Great Mackenzie Basin”, the first edition of
which was published in 1908.

Altogether, from one source or another, during the three centuries which
have elapsed since the British flag first appeared in Hudson bay, a vast
amount of reliable information, covering many widely-separated districts
of the territory under review, has been obtained; but hitherto much of
the practical value of this useful data scattered through the pages of
publications of various descriptions has been lost for

LACK OF SYSTEMATIC COMPILATION.

In bringing all this information together and compressing it within the
limits of one volume, a difficulty presents itself in the tremendous
extent of country concerned.

In arranging the matter of this volume, with a view to enabling the
reader to follow more readily, the whole area under review has been
divided into certain arbitrary geographical sub-divisions. In a region
so vast, the differences of climate, soil and general physical character
of the country in the various districts are very considerable, and
emphasize the necessity of treating certain geographical sub-divisions
separately.

A glance at the map is necessary to enable the reader to understand the
divisions of the country which it has been deemed advisable to make in
projecting this volume, to permit of the intelligent treatment of the
subject.

The region designated “The Keewatin Area” comprises that part of what
was formerly the provisional district of Keewatin which lies east of the
province of Saskatchewan, south of the 60th parallel of north latitude,
west of James bay and southwest and west of Hudson bay. Its southern
limits are defined by the former (up to 1912) northern boundary of
Manitoba and the former (up to the same date) northwesterly boundary of
Ontario.

During the first session of the 12th Parliament of Canada (1911-12) the
whole of this territory was annexed to the two provinces lying
immediately to the south of it, Ontario and Manitoba. The dividing line
between the portion of the former district of Keewatin annexed to the
province of Ontario, and that annexed to the province of Manitoba, is
described in the legislation extending the boundaries of the two
provinces as a line from the extreme north end of the eastern boundary
of the province of Manitoba as it existed at the time of the extension
of boundaries, “thence continuing due north along the same meridian to
the intersection thereof with the centre of the road allowance on the
twelfth base line of the system of Dominion Land Surveys; thence
northeasterly in a right line to the most eastern point of Island lake,
as shown in approximate latitude 53° 30′ and longitude 93° 40′ on the
railway map of the Dominion of Canada, published, on the scale of
thirty-five miles to one inch, in the year one thousand nine hundred and
eight, by the authority of the Minister of the Interior; thence
northeasterly in a right line to the point where the eighty-ninth
meridian of west longitude intersects the southern shore of Hudson bay;
thence easterly and southerly following the shore of the said bay to the
point where the northerly boundary of the province of Ontario as
established under the said Act intersects the shore of James bay.”

At the date of the final revision of these pages for the press, the
division of the territory was too recent to permit of effective separate
treatment of newest Ontario and newest Manitoba as separate territorial
units, and any attempt to effect such separate treatment, it was felt,
would only result in confusion.

The “Northern Saskatchewan Region” comprises the whole of the province
of Saskatchewan, north of the surveyed area.

The “Northern Alberta Region” comprises the whole of the province of
Alberta, north and east of the surveyed area.

The “Mackenzie River Region” includes all the territory in the great
Mackenzie basin, north of the province of Alberta, extending northward
to Beaufort sea, west to the boundary of Yukon territory, and eastward
to the basin of Coppermine river, that of Yellowknife river, a line in
prolongation of the latter stream across Great Slave lake and following
the right bank of Slave river to the northern boundary of Alberta.

The area comprised within the designation “The Barren Lands” includes
the immense territory extending eastwards from that last defined to
Hudson bay, and including the bare, treeless, but wrongly called “Barren
Lands.”

With this brief and general outline of the various districts before him,
the reader will more readily follow the attempt to present in a
systematic and intelligible form all the data of practical value
available regarding the varied natural resources of this vast territory.

-----

[1] At the Semple murder trials at York in October, 1818, Sherwood, the
Northwest Company’s counsel, ironically described Red river valley
(Manitoba) as the “land of milk and honey, where nothing, not even a
blade of corn, will ripen.”

[2] “The nations of Europe had adopted the principle that discovery gave
title to the government by whose subjects or by whose authority it was
made, against all other European governments, which title might be
consummated by possession.” (Chief Justice Marshall.)

[3] This was the same Henry Kelsey who showed conspicuous bravery at the
capture of Fort Nelson by the French under d’Iberville in 1690, and who
subsequently became a Deputy Governor in the Hudson’s Bay service.—(E.
J. C.).

[4] “The Last Great Monopoly.”

[5] Joseph Robson, who had been employed as a stone mason and engineer
in the construction of Fort Prince of Wales at Churchill between 1733
and 1748, and had been up Nelson river for a distance of forty or fifty
miles, was one of the chief witnesses. Being asked as to the number of
British subjects in the Company’s settlements, he said that the first
year he was at York Fort there were 36 persons there, and at Churchill
44 or 45; that he never saw any British subjects there, except the
Company’s servants, nor any other people desirous to “fix” there, or
that the Company had ever offered encouragement to British subjects to
“settle” there. He expressed the opinion that some of the country about
Hudson bay might be settled and inhabited, if people would go up the
rivers till they found a better climate, and there erect settlements. He
declared that he did not doubt that he himself could find three or four
hundred British subjects, who would willingly go there to live winter
and summer, and, he added, he would go for one. He added that speaking
from his own experience, the cold of the Hudson bay winter might be
endured without any inconvenience, their clothing being adapted to the
climate. He had suffered more from cold in England, than ever he did at
Hudson bay. It was true that flesh will freeze, but he never knew any
person to lose his fingers from frostbite at Churchill or York.

[6] In 1773 Hearne established Cumberland House as a southern outpost of
the Hudson’s Bay Company. It was Hearne, the hero of this daring trip of
exploration, who, as governor of Prince of Wales fort (Churchill), in
1782, ignominiously surrendered that stronghold to the French squadron
under La Pérouse, without firing a shot.

[7] Governor Morton’s instructions to Hearne set forth the object of the
expedition in detail. They included the following:—

“The Indians who are now appointed your guides, are to conduct you to
the border of the Athapapuscow (Great Slave lake) and Indians’ country,
where Captain Matonabbee (an Indian chief) is to meet you in the spring
of one thousand seven hundred and seventy, in order to conduct you to a
river represented by the Indians to abound with copper ore, animals of
the fur kind, etc., and which is said to be so far to the northward that
in the middle of the summer the sun does not set, and is supposed by the
Indians to empty itself into some ocean. This river, which is called by
the Northern Indians Neetha-San-San-Dazey, or Far Off Metal river, you
are, if possible, to trace to the mouth, and there determine the
latitude and longitude as near as you can; but more particularly so if
you find it navigable; and that a settlement can be made there with any
degree of safety, or benefit to the Company.”

“Be careful to observe what mines are near the river; what water there
is at the river’s mouth; how far the woods are from the sea-side; the
course of the river; the nature of the soil and the productions of it;
and make any other remarks that you may think will be either necessary
or satisfactory. And if the said river be likely to be of any utility,
take possession of it on behalf of the Hudson’s Bay Company, by cutting
your name on some of the rocks, as also the date of the year, month,
etc.”

[8] A synopsis of the account of Hearne’s journey was published in
pamphlet form in 1773 and re-published in 1778-80, the complete account
being published in book form in 1790. (Beckles Wilson.)

[9] The history of the Peace and Athabaska country commences in 1778,
when Peter Pond, subsequently a partner in the Northwest Company,
pushing northwestward in search of new fur districts, reached the
Athabaska by way of Methye portage and Clearwater river, and descending
it, founded a fort known as “The Old Establishment,” about thirty miles
above its mouth. In 1788 this post was abandoned, and a new one built on
the south side of Lake Athabaska, on what is now known as “Old Fort
Point.” Still later, this site was also deserted and a better one
selected on the north shore, near the outlet of the lake. A general map
of the Northwest was published by Peter Pond in 1785.

Peter Pond’s venture proved extremely remunerative, and he was followed
by other traders who gradually spread themselves over the then unknown
country to the north and west. (J. M. McConnell’s report.)

[10] In 1827 Franklin returned from the northwest via Lake Winnipeg, the
great lakes and Ottawa river. In passing Ottawa, in August, he laid the
cornerstone of the lowest tier of locks on Rideau canal.

[11] The English Government, in 1821, after the union of the Northwest
Company with the Hudson’s Bay Company, granted the reorganized company a
license of exclusive trade over the country to the west of the watershed
of Hudson bay, or Rupert’s Land. The license was renewed in 1838.

[12] Dease was one of the Company’s chief factors; Simpson, who was a
cousin of Sir George Simpson, was an accurate astronomical observer.

[13] In all, 21,500 miles of coast line of which 5,780 miles were
previously unknown, had been examined. (“Cruise of the ‘Neptune’.”)

[Illustration: THE KEEWATIN AREA]

CHAPTER II.

THE KEEWATIN AREA.

(Newest Ontario and Northern Manitoba.)

Agriculture and Arable Land.

Early Agricultural Experiments and Their Success.—Evidence before
the Parliamentary Committee of 1749.—Testimony of Official
Explorers and Residents.—Many Areas Fit For Agriculture
Described.—Wild Fruits Grow in Profusion.—Successful Gardens.
—Much Country Capable of Improvement by Drainage.—Climate
Inland Warmer Than Further East.—Natural Hay Meadows.—The Clay
Belt.

The region west of James bay and southwest of Hudson bay, being the
southern portion of the area known up to the time of the creation of the
provinces of Alberta and Saskatchewan as the district of Keewatin, and
comprising the territory recently (1912) annexed to the provinces of
Ontario and Manitoba, was the first part of the still unexploited
northwest with which white men came into touch.

Some years elapsed between its discovery by Henry Hudson and Sir Thomas
Button in 1610 and 1612 and the establishment of the first posts therein
by the Hudson’s Bay Company at the mouths of Albany, Severn, Nelson and
Churchill rivers. These posts were established and have since been
maintained entirely for the purpose of the fur trade, and consequently
no settlements have sprung up around them, and there has been no
systematic attempt to exploit the agricultural possibilities of the
adjacent areas. Nevertheless, it was some of the older servants of the
big fur company who first drew attention to the fact that this region
had agricultural possibilities, and it was from the posts on the bay
that the first explorations of the interior were made. Of recent years,
much information as to the agricultural possibilities of this area has
been obtained by explorers of the Geological Survey of Canada, and
through the explorations attendant upon the surveys for the location of
the Hudson Bay Railway, which is projected to run in a northeasterly
direction across this region from The Pas to Port Nelson.

The main object of those who secured the appointment of a select
committee of the British House of Commons in 1749, to inquire into the
condition of the Hudson bay territory and the trade carried on there
(See page 8), was to secure the cancellation of the Company’s monopoly
and to throw the country open to settlement. With this object in view
much evidence was produced to show that the territory offered
inducements to colonists, and, as inscribed in the pages of the official
report, this gives us the earliest account of pioneer agriculture in
this region, and an idea of the possibilities of the country from the
old timers’ points of view.

Mr. Richard White, one of the witnesses examined before the committee,
said that he went to Albany Fort in the year 1726, as clerk to the
Company, and remained there seven years, and that he had been ten years
at Churchill, which was the northernmost fort. He testified that “the
Governor at Albany had a garden in which peas, beans, turnips and salad
grew as well and plentiful as in England, but he never knew of seed
raised in that country to have been sown again. He saw a small quantity
of barley growing near Moose river in August, which is about two months
before the cold weather, which barley was in the ear, but not full, but
as he has never been used to tillage, he is a very indifferent judge in
those matters.”

Mr. White stated that “he apprehended the countries adjoining to Hudson
bay might be settled and improved, and that in the southern parts, oats,
barley and peas would grow, but if persons were allowed to settle, he
did not apprehend they could at first subsist by the cultivation of
lands only he did not know why the Company did not grow their own corn,
nor whether any proposal had been made to them for that purpose, for he
really thought corn would grow there, which certainly would tend much to
the advantage of the Company, as well as to the security of persons
residing there. Their common provisions were fish and fowl, and they had
no bread but what came from England; that all grain kept there very
well, except peas; that in a general way they had two years’ provisions
beforehand in their forts, especially of bread.”

Being asked if the Indians could not cultivate corn for one-third of the
price it costs in Europe, this witness said—“The Indians are in general
a slothful people and cultivate no corn.”

SOIL GOOD AND CLIMATE MILD

Another of the witnesses examined before the committee, Mr. Matthew
Sergeant, stated that while in the Company’s service he had been twelve
miles up the country at York Factory, thirty miles up the river from
Albany Fort, and had travelled by land from Moose river to Albany Fort,
one hundred miles along the coast. The soil was good and produced good
turnips, the climate for four months in the year being mild.

The record of the evidence continues:—“The good soil is not quite two
feet deep, when you come to a stratum of loam and sand. In some places
the frost is never out of the ground, but you may dig through it. The
turnips he has eaten there are as good as ever he ate in England, but he
does not know whether seed raised there would produce the same. It is
the general opinion at York Factory that the soil is proper for wheat,
barley, rye or oats. He has seen very good peas and beans grow there,
but he never saw any corn grow there, except some wild oats; and that
his mess-mate did sow some corn there, which, though it grew a good
height, never came to perfection; but, in the opinion of the witness,
oats would ripen at Albany, where he has seen a cherry-tree bearing
black cherries. He has seen the Indians bring down currants, which, they
said, grew in their country. They also brought down sugar, which was
very black, and made from the tree of which their paddles are made; that
the Indians informed the witness that there are large lakes behind the
factory; that the witness had been in a lake ten miles long, without any
fall going to it.

[Illustration: Prairie Land on lower Nelson river.]

“It begins to thaw at Albany about April 8 or 10. There is a good soil
there for six or eight inches, which may be gained within about a
fortnight after the beginning of the thaw; that in two or three weeks
more, as the weather happens, it thaws to the depth of two feet,
commonly by the beginning of May. The frost sets in again about the
beginning of October, and when the witness was there, October 4, it came
in very hard. The witness believes there is time enough to grow wheat,
for if summer grain were sown early in the southernmost parts, he thinks
there would be time for it to ripen and to gather it in, but the frosts
break sooner up in the country and come in later. There are vast tracts
of land fit for cultivation, and the witness has seen very good lettuce,
spinach, dewberries, strawberries and black cherries. The Indians very
rarely eat any bread, nor do they live long enough in one place to raise
corn, nor have they any yams or potatoes, their provisions being fish
and flesh, which they preserve by drying it, not having the art of
salting. In case they were interested in the arts of tillage, he does
not know whether they would stay in a place long enough to raise corn,
for though they love bread dearly they would rather go hunting than
cultivate land. The wild oats he mentioned before never came to seed,
being little better than a species of grass. Grass grows there
sufficient for the support of cattle, and they have made hay at Albany.
If the Company were to grow corn, they apprehend the French would come
and take it as they did their sheep in the last war, but they might
protect their corn from the Indians. Witness does not think it to the
benefit of the Company to grow corn, because they must have a house
built at a distance from the factories, and men to watch it, to prevent
the home Indians from stealing it. They must also have men to cultivate
it, which would be very expensive. The witness cannot determine whether
it would not be more so than having their corn from Europe, and he
thinks the Company would sow it, if it were for their advantage.”

Mr. John Hayter, another witness, said that he had been house carpenter
to the Company six years at Moose river, three years at Churchill, and
six months at Albany, and knew that no other trade was carried on there
but that of furs. He had seen good barley grow at Moose river, and
helped the person who grew it to dig his ground and sow it. It produced
about the quantity of half a bushel, which he saw rubbed out. The ear
was large, and yielded as well, in the opinion of the witness, as the
barley sown on common ground in England. Some of the seed was sown the
next year, and it grew again but the witness did not see the produce of
it. The person who grew this corn told him the reason why he
discontinued sowing corn was that the Governor hindered him. Witness
further said that he had made hay at Moose river.

Mr. Edward Thompson, who had been three years at Moose river in the
Hudson’s Bay Company’s service as surgeon, being required to give an
account of the commodities, soil and climate there, before the
committee, said that the chief commodities were the furs of the beaver,
the marten, the fox and the bear. He testified that he had seen better
barley and oats grow at Moose river than ever he saw in the Orkneys, but
the quantity sown was but very small. The seed would bear sowing again,
but diminished in goodness. There was suitable enough ground for this
corn, but never any encouragement given for sowing it, but quite the
reverse, the Governor absolutely forbidding it, for no other reason, as
the witness apprehended, but that if corn had been sown, a colony would
soon have been erected there, and he could not say whether that would be
for the advantage of the proprietors. The witness himself sowed about
half a dozen corns of wheat, for a trial, in October, which lay in the
ground all winter covered with snow and came to perfection in August. It
was sown in a piece of good ground near the foot of a tree, which was in
some measure a fence to it. The witness thought that beans, peas, barley
and oats would grow there. He never tried it anywhere but at Moose
river, but apprehended that corn would grow in the inland countries at a
hundred miles distance, even as far north as Port Nelson, for he had
found the climate warmer the further one goes inland.

Enoch Alsop, who had been armourer to the Hudson’s Bay Company at Moose
river, informed the investigating Committee of 1749 that he had sown
barley and oats there, the same seed three years successively, and that
it grew very well. He sowed a handful or two of barley and oats at
first, mixed with dust and ashes, which produced two or three quarts or
a gallon of barley, and he thinks in the third year he had above half a
bushel. Governor Stanton then

FORBADE HIM TO SOW ANY MORE

but gave no reason for such prohibition.

Robert Griffin, another of the witnesses, stated that he had been
informed that the soil one hundred miles up the country would produce
corn. He had seen oats grow to perfection at Albany. He had also seen
peas, beans, turnips, salading (_sic_) and cabbage, and some few
carrots. The beans were generally blighted, but the turnips, peas and
cabbage, were “in great plenty and perfection.” They had fresh seed sent
over every year. The land was then cultivated for about a mile round
Albany, being dug with spades upon the breaking of the frost, which
generally happened from April 20 to 27.

In his evidence, Mr. Joseph Robson, perhaps the principal witness,
explained that there was grass in abundance a yard high in the most
northern parts of Hudson bay region he had seen. He did not believe corn
would grow in the far north but grain would grow over large areas. He
had eaten peas and beans which had been grown at York Factory, in
latitude 57°, but he never knew any other corn tried there. The quantity
of peas and beans he spoke of was as much as six or eight people could
eat, but there were a thousand acres of ground in latitude 57°, which,
if cultivated, would produce the same, and there was a much larger tract
to the southward. The peas and beans grew by common cultivation, without
any force, but the produce was not so large as in England.

Being asked if it would not be a great advantage to the Company to grow
corn at York Factory or their other settlements, Mr. Robson said it
would doubtless be so, and it was reasonable to think they would do it,
but there were many things not done which would be of great advantage
besides that, and there must be some secret cause for it to which the
witness was a stranger. It had been demonstrated that the soil about
Hudson bay would bear roots, such as carrots, radishes and turnips. It
also produced coleworts, and all of these roots and greens grew in as
great perfection as they do in England; yet he did not think that there
were two acres cultivated at both the factories where he had resided.

Being asked how long the frost was out of the ground at York Factory,
Mr. Robson said it was hardly ever quite out of it, for he had dug three
feet and a half deep, and then found a shell of ice under which the
ground was all soft. The hole he dug was in low ground, about thirteen
feet from high water mark. He never had an opportunity to dig up in the
country, but the surface of the ground was free from the latter end of
May to the latter end of August, and in the summer they had

EIGHTEEN HOURS SUNLIGHT AT CHURCHILL.

By the accounts of the people coming down, the frost breaks some months
sooner up in the country.

Mr. Robson said he had seen oxen and horses belonging to the Company at
Fort Prince of Wales (Churchill) which were brought from England and fed
with hay and corn, the hay being got there and made into stacks.

Robson, who first went to Hudson bay in 1733, and finally left there in
1747, serving for some time as a mason, and later as “mason and
surveyor,” in the construction of Fort Prince of Wales at Churchill,
published his book “An Account of Six Years’ Residence in Hudson’s Bay”
in 1752. In this volume he mentions going out in the “Mary” frigate, and
says, in writing of Churchill:—“We had brought over in the ship a bull,
four heifers, ten oxen and a horse. There was an Orkney bull there
before. Some of the heifers afterwards calved, and I think with care
they would have increased and done well, though this place is in 59°,
and the most northerly settlement in the bay.”

On page forty-two of his book, Mr. Robson states:—“It is not to be
imagined that the most northerly settlements in the bay should have as
good a climate as the southerly settlement, there being so great a
difference of latitude, as from 59° to 51° 30′. I was no farther up
Churchill river than eight or nine miles but can say that the soil is
very good, and that there are gooseberries and black and red currants
growing near the sea upon points that appear almost barren. Those I have
seen grow so low that the grass covers them. The marshes and low grounds
are full of good grass, and there is a patch of ground near the fort on
Eskimo point (near Churchill) which, though exposed to the north and
northeast winds, produces good radishes, coleworts, turnips, small
carrots, and lettuces, and other salading; blackberries also grow upon
the heath. Upon clearing away the snow in the spring, we generally found
the under part of it congested to ice, three or four inches thick, lying
hollow from the ground. Whether this was caused by the snow melting and
thawing downwards, and then congesting from the coldness of the earth,
and moistening the snow which was afterwards congested again, I am not
able to determine. I am inclined to believe the latter, because the top
of the snow was formed into a hard icy crust, and within was heavy,
though soft. However, beneath this arch of ice we found green vegetables
growing up an inch or two above the ground. Cattle here would live and
do well, if the same care were taken of them as is generally taken in
England. The horses I found among them had been kept several years, and
were constantly employed in drawing stones and other materials for the
use of the fort. And if they can subsist and be fit for service at
Churchill river in 59° they would surely subsist and increase also at
the bottom of the bay in 51° 30′, and in all the more southerly
settlements.

“The soil at York Factory, which is in 75° 10′, is much better than at
Churchill river. Most kinds of garden stuff

GROW HERE TO PERFECTION,

especially peas and beans. I have seen a small pea growing without any
culture, and am of the opinion that barley would flourish here, and
consequently in much greater perfection at Moose and Albany rivers,
which are 51° 30′ and 52°. Gooseberries and red and black currants are
found in the woods, growing upon such bushes as in England. Up the river
are very good patches of grounds, and bottoms under banks, so defended
from the north and northwest winds that there is a fine thaw below when
the top is freezing; here whole families might secure a comfortable
subsistence, if they were as industrious as they are in their own
country. Upon Hayes river, fifteen miles from the factory, is such a
bank as I have just mentioned, near which I pitched my tent. After
paling in some ground for a covey-warren, and for oxen, sheep, goats,
etc., I should expect by no more labor than would be proper for my
health to procure a desirable livelihood, not at all doubting of my
being able to raise peas and beans, barley, and probably other kinds of
grain.”

On page sixty-three, Mr. Robson expresses the opinion “that the lands
are capable of tillage, affording a good pasture for horses and cattle
in the summer, and good hay for their subsistence in the winter. At
Churchill, the most northerly factory, horses and cows have been kept in
winter, though greatly exposed to the frost and cold. All sorts of
garden stuff flourish at the factory, and where barley and oats have
been sown, they come to perfection. At Moose Factory at the bottom of
the bay, sown wheat has stood the winter frosts, and grown very well the
following summer, though the cold is greater and continues longer than
within land; black cherries planted here have also grown and borne
fruit, as would other trees if propagated.”

Reverting to the subject of climate, Mr. Robson states:—“I perceived
that the garden ground at York Factory and Churchill river thawed much
sooner and deeper in the space of one month than the waste that lies
contiguous to it, and the same is to be observed in England. By the heat
therefore which the earth here would acquire from a general and careful
cultivation, the frost might be so soon overcome that the people might
expect regular returns of seed-time and harvest.”

AN EXCELLENT FARMING COUNTRY.

Ed. Umfreville, in his volume “Eleven Years in the Service of the
Hudson’s Bay Company and Four Years in the Canada Fur Trade”, published
in 1790, speaking of latitude 55°, says:—“The Hudson’s Bay Company
servants have tried Indian corn and barley by way of experiment which
came to perfection. Potatoes, carrots, radishes, onions, etc., have been
reared and found as good as those in Canada (Quebec). The natives
collect vast quantities of wild cherries and bring them to the fort.
Raspberries, strawberries, currants, cranberries, and an infinity of
other kinds of which I do not know the names, are to be found
everywhere. The grass grows to a great height which fattens our horses
in a short time.

“The late Chief Factor Archibald, in his journal of Sir George Simpson’s
trip from York Factory to the Pacific in 1828, speaks of having had, on
July 12, two days after leaving York, “a peep at the Rock, an old
establishment with its gardens.”

The Rev. John Semmens, who spent many years as a missionary in the north
country, went to live on the banks of Burntwood river, at Nelson House,
in the year 1874. He remained there two years, and for a number of years
thereafter paid occasional visits to the locality and made journeys
through the adjacent country. He writes:—“The most of my tripping was
between Norway House and Nelson House, though I have been as far north
as Indian lake, as far west as Nelson lake, and as far east as Split
lake. The information I have to offer, therefore, concerns the lower
reaches of the Burntwood after its junction with Rat river at Nelson
House. Much of the country specified is hilly, with frequent outcropping
of granite rock, and some large tracts of muskeg or swamp land, but
there are found large areas of open country, and valleys of tributary
rivers, where the soil is rich and deep and where grazing and stock
raising could be very successfully carried on. The sheltering forests,
and the abundant water courses, the numerous beaver dams, and the rich
native grasses would indeed make this locality ideal to sheep raisers
and general ranchmen. The absence of anything like a market has hitherto
kept this country from being reported of, but if a railway becomes an
actual fact, Manitoba will add very much to her available resources,
when extension comes, and settlers will find that in soil, in wood, in
grasses, and in waters, this unknown land will afford comfortable homes
for thousands. It will be seen by the map that about one hundred miles
down the Nelson all the branches of that noble river unite in one. From
that point we are accustomed to strike across country to Landing lake,
Wintering lake, Pipestone lake and thence into Burntwood river. This
short cut has along its course many thousands of acres, such as I have
described, and for fishermen as well as ranchers must some day be a
paradise.

“The cold at Nelson House is no more intense than that of a winter in
northern Manitoba as at present constituted, but the frost sets in
rather sooner, and tarries rather longer than it does at the north end
of Lake Winnipeg. Roots and vegetables planted about May 24 do well and
are gathered about September 15. The presence of so much water so
regulates the temperature that there are few frosts either early or late
to make growth uncertain, yet, in my experience, wheat is not a sure
crop. All depends on the season. Oats and barley will do well any
time.”—(J. A. J. McKenna’s report on the Hudson Bay Route).

SPLIT LAKE REGION.

The Reverend Doctor John McDougall, one of the pioneer missionaries of
the west, has thus expressed himself regarding the region to the south
of Split lake:—“The summer begins early, and the growth and vegetation
are almost of a tropical character. This is attributable to the longer
hours of sunshine that prevail, and to the proximity of streams of
living waters everywhere in the district, each of which is conducive to
plant nourishment. There is considerable rock throughout the section
which indicates in the near future a season of development for the
mineral prospector but there are also countless acres of good land which
can be easily made to yield fruitful returns to the farmer, as has been
the case southward in Manitoba and westward in Saskatchewan and Alberta.
The soil is of clay sub-strata with sandy loam on the surface, and,
although wooded to a considerable extent, is a far more enticing
agricultural proposition than that which faced the early settlers on the
bush farms of Ontario and other eastern provinces fifty years ago, and,
with the advent of railways, a better market than the eastern settler
had would be always available. The district in which are situated Norway
House, Cross lake, Oxford House, Island lake, Nelson House and Split
lake, covers a wide area, and at each of these places garden vegetables
and grain for personal requirements have been successfully grown for a
term of years. Summer frosts are practically unknown and the germination
of vegetation, owing to the long hours of sunshine, is exceedingly
rapid.” (McKenna Report.)

Doctor Robert Bell, in the report of his exploratory trip from Lake
Winnipeg to Hudson bay in 1878 (See p. 17), states:—“Along the direct
overland route from Churchill to York Factory the timber is reported to
be generally small, and large prairie-like openings are said to occur,
in which the ground is dry and covered with grass or other herbage. I
saw very good potatoes and turnips growing in the gardens at Churchill.
Previous to the advent of Mr. and Mrs. Spencer, the cultivation of
potatoes had not been attempted, and the possibility of raising them at
Churchill when suggested by Mrs. Spencer was ridiculed by the oldest
inhabitants. However, in spite of predictions of certain failure, the
ground was prepared, seed planted, and a good crop was harvested. The
experiment has been repeated successfully for seven consecutive years,
so that the question of the practicability of cultivating potatoes on
the shores of Hudson bay in this latitude has been pretty well solved.

“Hay can be cut in abundance in the neighborhood of Churchill, and
cattle thrive well, yet the same ignorance or obstinacy, as the above
referred to, formerly prevented any attempt being made to breed stock on
the spot, so that every fresh animal required had to be brought from
some other place. Now, the small herd which is kept at the place is
recruited by raising the animals calved at the fort itself. The open
grassy land near the sea is practically of unlimited extent. Much of it
is dry and undulating, affording abundance of pasture for the cattle.
The butter made by Mrs. Spencer could hardly be excelled for quality and
fineness in any country.”

LAKE ST. JOSEPH SECTION.

In the report (Part G., Geol. Sur. Report, 1886) of his exploratory trip
in 1886 (See p. 18), Doctor Robert Bell, speaking of the country in Lake
St. Joseph section, in the extreme southern side of the region under
review, writes:—“The climate, in the immediate vicinity of the lake at
all events, appears to be sufficiently good to admit of the growth of a
variety of crops. At Osnaburgh House, near the east end, where the soil
is of a sandy nature, the principal crop cultivated at present is
potatoes, but early Indian corn, peas, beans, and a variety of roots and
other vegetables, to say nothing of a profusion of flowers, were in a
flourishing condition at the end of July. In former years, when cattle
were kept at the post, barley was said to have been a regular crop. Hay
grows very luxuriantly. I was creditably informed that pumpkins and
muskmelons had frequently ripened at this establishment.”

Doctor Bell, before the Senate committee of 1887, testified:—“Potatoes
and all such vegetables would grow in Hudson bay district, but the
immediate influence of the sea is unfavourable for gardens. Gardens
close to the sea do not flourish as well as gardens inland. The frequent
change from heat to cold and the fogs from the sea prejudicially affect
them, and cause a sort of blight on vegetation close to the sea shore.
But a few miles inland vegetation is more rank, and you can grow
potatoes and the ordinary root crops. There are plenty of grasses there
to keep cattle and sheep. There are many kinds of grasses there, also
sedges, wild peas or vetches and lentils. They would make splendid feed
for cattle.”

Mr. Fawcett (Annual Report, Dep. Interior, 1885, pt. II, p. 37),
speaking of his descent of the Wenassago to Lac Seul, says:—“In a few
places I noticed soil of vegetable mould and clay loam, which would be
well suited for the growth of grain and vegetables should the climatic
conditions be favourable. I also observed here that the best soil
generally produced a growth of poplar, and wherever it appeared large
and thrifty, good soil might be looked for, comparatively free from
rock. On the rocky ridges, as usual, scrubby pine was the prevailing
timber, while the flats and muskegs were invariably covered with spruce
and tamarack. The good land noticed seemed to be in belts three or four
miles wide and extending north and south for a considerable distance, as
might be expected from the geological formation, the depressions and
elevations succeeding each other in very regular order and much in the
same direction.”

On Big Black river, which flows into the east side of Lake Winnipeg, Mr.
A. S. Cochrane, of the Geological Survey, who surveyed that stream in
1882, reports the soil as “excellent, being a light-gray friable
clay. . . . . The land up to Pelican portage is first class, but above
this there is a low and swampy country, which extends to
‘Rapids-close-together’. A border of good land, on which some fair-sized
timber grows, runs along both sides of the river.”

FAVOURABLE LAKE AND SEVERN LAKE.

Mr. Low, in the account of his trip in 1886, reports that along the
shores of Favourable lake (which is from two to five miles in width)
“there are considerable areas of good land, the best being on the
peninsula and along the southern part of the lake, where the underlying
rocks are hornblende and chloritic schists; the northern part is more
barren, the soil resting upon gneiss. The soil is a fine, rich sandy
loam, quite suitable for growing good crops, and summer frosts seem to
be the only drawback to successful agriculture. These are said to not
occur at Trout lake, though situated further to the northeastward. At
the end of the peninsula the foundations of several old houses were
discovered, out of which trees twelve inches in diameter were growing.
These ruins evidently mark the site of some old Hudson’s Bay Company or
more probably North West Company trading post. . . . .

“There is much good land about Sandy lake. Indeed the greater part of
the land around these lakes would make good farms.”

A short distance above Severn lake, according to Mr. Low, there is a
considerable area of country “almost flat, with good timber and soil.”

Mr. Low describes Trout lake (east of Severn lake) as being forty miles
long by twenty miles wide. He states in his report that Mr. Tait, the
officer in charge of the Hudson’s Bay Company’s post at that point,
“says that good crops of peas, potatoes and other roots are raised here
yearly, and are very rarely injured by summer frosts. This being the
case, the country to the westward, between Severn and Sandy lakes, which
is more favourably situated, having all the appearance of a better
climate and a richer soil, must undoubtedly be well suited for
agriculture, and will at some future time prove valuable land for
settlement.”

Mr. Low reports the soil around Fort Severn as a heavy clay and very
swampy. Nothing but a few small turnips are with difficulty grown there.
On August 8, strawberries, then beginning to ripen, were picked by Mr.
Low on clearings around the post.

Mr. Low was examined at length before the Senate committee of 1907 (See
p. 27), and stated in his evidence that the country between Norway House
and Hudson bay is not very elevated. The highest points in it are
probably somewhere in the neighbourhood of one thousand feet above sea
level. For about half the distance to Hudson bay it is practically a
rolling plain, and the rocks are ancient rocks of the Laurentian and
Huronian ages. Beyond that there was an ancient deposit of limestone and
sandstone, extending in a wide line around the northern part about half
way across. These are large limestones, and they are lying almost flat.
The country for about half way down from Norway House to Churchill
slopes very gently towards the bay, so that the grade is not more than
eight or ten feet to the mile, if it is that. The northeastern part is
practically a plain.

There are considerable areas of low swampy lands. The surface going down
into Hudson bay after reaching the Wolstenholme country is fairly
swampy. The rivers have thrown up banks, and it is only at an occasional
place that a break through those banks occurred to let out the drainage.
In many places the river banks are from five to ten feet higher than the
surrounding country, and in consequence the land beyond is drowned more
or less, very often extending back for a distance as far as one can walk
in a day.

Mr. Low considered that probably half the country due east from Norway
House, say for one hundred miles, would be

FIT FOR AGRICULTURE.

He would rank the agricultural possibilities there as fair.

Of course there are very few settlements in there now, and the only one
Mr. Low visited was a Hudson’s Bay post at Trout lake, and they were
growing peas and garden truck of all kinds, also potatoes and fairly
decent looking crops. They were not bothered very badly with summer
frosts, as Mr. Low could see from the crop of green peas. The climate
seemed quite favourable for hardy crops. The soil areas that are fit for
agriculture are fairly large; the rocky hills crop out only at
intervals, and there is quite a large area there that Mr. Low thought
would be fit for future settlement.

The low flat plain, southeast of Nelson river, appeared to be largely
covered with muskeg and small spruce. He would suppose that there was
more muskeg and spruce land than hay areas. The subsoil is clay largely.
Down in the lower country near the bay there is a certain amount of sand
on top. There was a fair amount of vegetable growth. Mr. Low remarked
that he would not consider this low-lying area a good agricultural
country at present, but with some drainage he thought a great deal of
that country around James and Hudson bays is going to make a good
agricultural country.

With regard to that territory north of Lake Winnipeg and east of Norway
House and in the country southeast thereof, Mr. Low thought it would be
a somewhat rocky country, but probably not more than one-third would be
of that nature. Most of the land not rocky would be timber land. This
would run up to about the eighteenth degree or probably more.

Mr. Low, speaking as to the climate of the region west of Hudson bay,
explained that in the southern part, south of the Nelson, it is fairly
good, he thought, for settlement. The summer frosts are rare, and he
thought with the opening up of the country it would probably improve. He
considered that settlers in there would not have any more difficulty in
summer than they would in the settled part of the northwest. The summer
is probably equal to that of Saskatchewan. The length of the summer days
is an advantage. They get more sunlight during the summer than do the
people of older Ontario or other points farther south, and that is a
distinct help to vegetation.

[Illustration: Portaging canoe at Long Spruce rapids, Nelson river.]

In the summer of 1896, Mr. J. B. Tyrrell explored the country north of
the mouth of Saskatchewan river. As a result of the exploration he
states in his report:—“From Nelson river westward to longitude 100°
30′, and from the north end of Lake Winnipeg northward to beyond
latitude 56°, the country is generally covered with a coating of
stratified clay, varying in thickness from a few feet up to fifty,
sixty, or even one hundred feet. This clay is of much the same character
as that of Red river valley, having been, like it, deposited in the bed
of the old post-glacial lake that once occupied the basin of Lake
Winnipeg. The rivers have, as a rule, cut down through this clay to the
underlying rock, but away from the water-stretches rock exposures are
not of any frequent occurrence. The

SOIL IS RICH AND FERTILE,

and the country will doubtless produce in abundance all the hardier
roots and cereals grown in the province of Manitoba; and cattle, sheep,
and horses could be successfully raised. If the country were made
accessible by a railway passing through it to Hudson bay, it would
certainly support a considerable agricultural population.”

At page seven of his report (Part F. Geol. Sur. Rep., 1900, Vol. XII)
Mr. Tyrrell states:—“Much of the land is well adapted for agriculture.
At Norway House some fine barley had been sown and ripened in the
garden, and all the ordinary vegetables grown in Manitoba have been
raised for many years past. At Cross lake many of the Indians had good
large gardens of potatoes and other vegetables, and McLeod and Mclvor,
two fur traders, had excellent gardens in which were growing potatoes,
turnips, carrots, parsnips, radishes, cabbages, cauliflowers, onions,
lettuce, beans, peas, etc. At Nelson House in the extreme northern part
of the district explored, many of the Indians regularly grow potatoes,
and both the fur traders and the missionaries cultivate small patches of
ground on which they raise abundant crops of all the vegetables
mentioned as growing at Cross lake. It is probable that the hardier
varieties of grain would also ripen here, but at present there is no
object in growing grain of any kind for it could not be readily
utilized.”

In a foot note, Mr. Tyrrell states “Wheat ripens well at Norway House
and Cross lake on the Nelson.”

On page eight of his report Mr. Tyrrell says:—“During the summer of
1896 no frost occurred until August 29. At Nelson House we were informed
that, during the preceding seven years at least, no frost that would
injure garden produce had occurred at an earlier date.”

At page thirty-four of his report Mr. Tyrrell states:—“Wuskwatim lake
is a very pretty sheet of slightly murky water, six or seven miles long
and three miles wide, surrounded by sloping clay-covered hills wooded
with white spruce and poplar. Its surface is varied by a few islands
composed of clay overlying a floor of gneiss. The two falls above
mentioned, at and near its outlet, would furnish a large amount of

POWER FOR DRIVING MILLS

or machinery of any kind, while a supply of timber for building and fuel
could be obtained from the surrounding country, and the soil would grow
any of the ordinary roots or more hardy cereals, so that it is not
improbable that before long when this fertile country is made accessible
by the advent of a railroad from the south, one of the most prosperous
towns in the district may grow up on the shore of this now secluded
lake.

“Footprint lake, on the northern shore of which the Hudson’s Bay Company
have had a trading post for a number of years, and the Methodists have a
small church and mission house, has somewhat the shape of a rude cross,
seven miles long from east to west, and six miles from north to south.
The latitude of the trading post was found to be 55° 48′ 26′′ north. The
lake is surrounded by banks of light grey friable clay from thirty to
forty feet high, through which rise rounded hills of gneiss up to two
hundred feet or more in height. The clay extends over the lower portions
of these hills, but some of the higher summits appear to rise above it,
possibly having risen above the surface of Lake Agassiz where the
surrounding clay was deposited on its floor. When the lake was visited
in August last both the trader and the missionary had excellent gardens
in which they were successfully growing potatoes, cabbages,
cauliflowers, onions, radishes, lettuce, peas, beans, turnips, carrots
and other vegetables, and many of the Indians had patches of potatoes
sufficiently large to assist materially in the support of their families
throughout the winter.

“I enquired from the Indians who were living around the lake, how far
the fertile clay-covered country extended towards the north, and they
told me that it extended as far as Indian lake on Churchill river, north
of which the surface is either of sand or rock.”

Mr. Tyrrell reports that many of the smaller fruits grow on the
clay-covered country explored in great profusion. Among those that he
reports as especially abundant were raspberries, gooseberries, red and
black currants, strawberries, blueberries and headberries (_Rubus
Chameomorus_).

Strawberries were growing “in great profusion” in the tract about
Muhigan rapids on Muhigan river.

The country above Wuskwatim lake, according to Mr. Tyrrell, “seems to be
a great clay plain, cut through by the sloping trough of the river, and
trenched by wide lateral gulleys. The surface is generally covered with
small poplar, with some spruce in the valleys, and there are no signs of
rocky hills, or of rock, except here and there at the water’s edge.”

Mr. Tyrrell reports that McLaughlin river, throughout its whole course
from the long narrow lake to its mouth, flows through a level,
clay-covered country, the rock merely rising here and there in knolls
and ridges above the general level.

Mr. Tyrrell, reporting (Summary Rep. Geol. Survey, 1890-91) on his
survey of the district about Lakes Winnipeg and Winnipegosis, mentions a
cliff at Limestone bay, in the extreme northwest of Lake Winnipeg,
rising in some places to a height of forty feet, composed at the bottom
of a stiff, blue alluvial clay, and at the top of a mossy peat, and
further on in the report proceeds to say:—“A deposit of clay similar to
that on Mossy point extends all along the east shore of Lake Winnipeg,
and the waves washing against the soft cliffs become charged with the
mud from which the lake derives its name. This clay is also of great
economic interest, for instead of the east shore of the lake being an
uninhabitable rocky wilderness, as is generally supposed, it is largely
covered with

A RICH BLUE ALLUVIAL SOIL,

and the area of rock surface is relatively small. Much of this land is
covered with forests of poplar and spruce, while on account of the
retentive, impervious nature of the clay soil much of it is also boggy
and wet, but when it is cleared and drained it will form rich
agricultural land. At Badthroat river, Mr. Wood, the local Inspector of
Fisheries, had cleared a beautiful farm out of the midst of the poplar
forest, and he informs me that he grows successfully all the crops
ordinarily raised in Ontario. Mr. McKay, the Indian Agent at Berens
river, has also a clearing situated on the south side of the river in
the midst of what was a dense forest of small spruce. He has under
cultivation a nice garden, and this year the potatoes were not cut down
by frost till the middle of September.”

During his examination before the Senate committee of 1907, Mr. Tyrrell
described the whole stretch of country extending from Lake Winnipeg and
Split lake on the east to Churchill and Athabaska on the west[14] as a
“country essentially suited for agricultural purposes.” He could not say
what there was beyond the limits mentioned as he had not been there.
This was a forest belt. The eastern side of this tract would be Nelson
river. Not having been east of that river with the exception of twenty
or thirty miles, he could not speak of the country beyond. Mr. Tyrrell
declared:—“That belt of forest is for the most part excellent
agricultural land.” As far as the observations of Mr. Tyrrell went, he
believed that that country, while a little harder to settle up, and not
so attractive to settlers who are going in and looking for farms ready
made and cleared for them and ready to put the wheat in, would be as
fine an agricultural tract of land as there is in the Northwest.
Everywhere in travelling through it, the evidence of rich vegetation was
abundant, and everywhere where gardens or any kind of agriculture or
horticulture had been attempted in this forest belt, it had been
eminently successful. It is a forest country, a spruce covered country,
and lies southwest of Hudson bay, west of Nelson river, north of
Saskatchewan river, and extends to Mackenzie and Athabaska rivers. It
would be about two hundred miles wide from north to south. Witness did
not remember the length of it. It is land similar to that of Ontario,
and will grow practically everything that will grow in that province,
except possibly down in the southern peninsula. The summer is warm. The
winter does not count, because things do not grow in winter. There is a
good rainfall. A small part of the district is park country, half
wooded. It is a continuation northward of the Saskatchewan country.

Mr. Tyrrell said he had seen growing in that country all the garden
products that they grow in Ontario—potatoes, carrots, turnips, cabbage,
cauliflowers and all the ordinary garden produce. He saw excellent
potatoes in the district around Nelson House. He could not say what time
they were planted, because he was not there. The Indians constantly,
when hunting, plant little patches of potatoes here and there in the
spring and leave them all summer and dig them up when they go back to
their hunting grounds in the fall, and use them for their winter supply.
The witness had gone out and dug a pail of beautiful potatoes on several
occasions out of these little Indian patches buried in the woods. They
had never been hoed or cultivated in any way. They were not looked after
from the time they were planted in the spring until they were dug in the
fall. The potatoes seem to be able to grow sufficiently to keep down the
weeds. As a protection against wild animals these potato patches are
usually planted on islands. Witness had not actually seen wheat, barley
nor oats grown in that country. He has fairly good evidence that they
are grown there, but as far as he remembered he had not seen any
himself. He had been told and believed that they grow there. There is no
doubt whatever that the country described will support quite a large
population. North of Lake Winnipeg there is another magnificent area of
from five to ten thousand square miles of as fine country as there is in
Manitoba or anywhere else. When Mr. Tyrrell came out of that district in
1896, after spending a summer there, and said there was

A RICH AGRICULTURAL COUNTRY NORTH OF LAKE WINNIPEG

the Hudson’s Bay Company’s men and the people in the southern country
pooh-poohed the idea. They said they had been up at the head of the lake
and knew there was not a foot of good land there. But Mr. Tyrrell
emphatically declared that there is a magnificent stretch of country
there, which extends westward along the Churchill. These lands north of
Lake Winnipeg are clay lands, an extension of the same basin as the
Manitoba clays.

Mr. J. B. Tyrrell, in his evidence, pointed out that “the effect of the
large body of water in Hudson bay and James bay on the temperature,
summer and winter, of the surrounding country, was the equalizing of it
very much, making the summers colder and the winters milder. There is a
foggy climate around the bay. It is without much sunlight, so that it
has not a chance to dry. The mean temperature of the summer within one
hundred miles of the bay will not be so hot as it is back of that. The
thermometer does not fall very low in winter at Churchill. At the same
time any person will find it terribly cold on that coast, although the
thermometer does not fall very low. There are a great many different
matters in connection with temperature and climate that have to be taken
into consideration. There is the amount of moisture in the air; whether
the barometer is standing low or high; there are a great many of those
things that have to be taken into consideration in any question of frost
or of climate that arises. You may have frost with a north wind, while
if that north wind were blowing up over a wooded country, where all the
leaves were giving out their vapour from the ground into the air, you
would not have a sign of frost.”

As to the climate of the great belt of arable land, that he had
described to the Senate committee of 1907, Mr. Tyrrell said that at
Nelson House the snow leaves the ground in May. There is little or no
summer frost in that wooded country. He understood gardening commences
the end of May, and the frost does not appear in the fall until about
September 20. He had never known the potato crop to be lost through
summer frost.

Asked as to the isothermal line, Mr. Tyrrell remarked that the
isothermal is a line connecting points that have the same mean
temperature for the year round. It has nothing whatever to do with
vegetation. Things do not grow in the winter time. People have got to
put the winter temperature absolutely out of the question. The summer
temperature is the only temperature that counts for growth in the
northern country where there is frost. In dealing with that, you have to
take into consideration as between two places in different latitudes,
the length of the day and the amount of sunlight, in order to get at the
summer temperatures. Of course the sunlight has a great effect on the
growth, and where the days have eighteen hours’ sun a plant will grow
faster than where the day has only fourteen hours.

Mr. Tyrrell submitted to the committee a memorandum from Mr. R. F.
Stupart, Superintendent of the Dominion Meteorological Service,
comparing the temperature conditions of the district between Lake
Winnipeg and Split lake in the several months, May to September, with
European countries, as follows:—

May—50°-40°, with north of Scotland and southern Norway.
June—56°-54°, with Scotland.
July—63°, with south of England.
August—57·5°-55°, with Scotland.
September—50°-45°, with northern Norway and Sweden.

Mr. D. B. Dowling, reporting (Part F. Annual Rep. Geol. Sur. Vol. VII)
on his 1893 explorations (See p. 19) states:—“The agricultural
possibilities of the valley of upper Berens river seem to be limited,
and the areas suitable for cultivation are only to be found in isolated
patches. These are principally in the neighbourhood of the larger lakes.
The Indian reserves have been located with this end in view as they seem
to cover about the best land seen. The soil is a light grey clay with a
little vegetable mould, and the gardens made by the Indians produce
potatoes of fair quality, the only vegetable grown. In the southern part
of the district, better land is found and in greater extent than in
Berens river valley. On Lac Seul, at the mission and trading post, there
are

SEVERAL VERY GOOD GARDENS

in a flourishing condition, with all the ordinary vegetables growing
very satisfactorily. The Indians appear to care little for any gardening
except a very primitive attempt at raising potatoes. Land suitable for
gardening was seen at Mattawa, and indeed the best and largest extent
for this purpose is to be found between Lac Seul and Shallow lake.”

Mr. Dowling, writing of the northern branch of Berens river,
states:—“The land reserved for the Indians on the upper part of this
branch of Berens river, is a small tract situated on the north side of a
long arm or narrows, running to the eastward, from a lake to which the
name Pekangikum is given. The river enters at the eastern end of this
area, coming from Sturgeon lake by a short stretch of river half a mile
in length, in which there are two rapids. The Indian reserve appears
fairly well timbered—principally with Banksian pine of slender growth
and some spruce. The Indians have been able, in building their houses,
to obtain timber of suitable size for the walls and rafters, and spruce
of a diameter of fourteen inches is fairly plentiful. The shores of the
lake are rocky, but strips of country inland appear, on which there is
probably a fair quality of soil, though the surface is generally sandy.
On one of the islands in the larger part of the lake, soil of good
quality (clay) was seen, on which the Indians were growing potatoes. No
doubt there is better land for this purpose on the reserve they have
selected, but as they make their summer camp on a small island near the
deeper part of the lake for the purpose of fishing—by which they mainly
subsist—they naturally utilize the nearest land for their summer
gardens.”

Mr. Dowling, writing in his report of the country north of Lake Winnipeg
and south of Burntwood river, says:—“As the area is situated so far
north of the boundary of Manitoba, it might be presumed that much of it
is unfitted for settlement, but it is discovered that over a large part
there is good soil, and

THE EVIDENCE OF SEVERAL GARDENS

at various posts shows that for all the ordinary vegetables and coarser
grains the climate is not too rigorous. Splendid gardens were found as
far north as Nelson House, which is in the northern part of the area
here mapped. Proper drainage is needed, however, to bring much of the
surface into a condition fit for agriculture. Along the river banks this
is evident, for while the strip bordering the streams produces a great
variety of grasses, shrubs and trees, a short distance back this is
replaced by a swamp covered by moss and stunted spruce. This is more
noticeable in the western part of Nelson valley, where the country is
thickly covered by a coating of clay, and the surface is so uniformly
level that its gradual slope to the east is not sufficient to drain it.
The areas to which it would be possible to introduce a system of
drainage, would at first be restricted to a narrow margin along the
streams. The northwest corner of the district for present purposes may
be classed as without a sufficient soil for agriculture. This may
roughly be outlined as being composed of all the country lying to the
west of a line from the outlet of Burntwood lake to that of Reed lake,
and north of the escarpment which shows the northern limit of the
Trenton limestone. In this the surface is rolling and hilly, the rocky
ridges having a scanty coating of boulder clay and an occasional thicker
deposit in the depressions. It will probably remain the home of the
hunter and the trapper.

“To the south the country, underlain by limestone, has many of the
characters of the northern part of old Manitoba. In the valley of the
Saskatchewan there are large areas of rich soil formed principally by
the river itself, which has brought down an enormous amount of silt from
the upper part of its valley. The western part of the valley of Nelson
river is covered by a thick lacustral deposit which reaches west to
Burntwood lake and east to the channel of Nelson river. In this area
good soil is found in almost every part and where drained would no doubt
make fair farming land.”

Mr. Wm. McInnes describes the country about Winisk and Attawapiskat
rivers, explored by him in 1903, 1904 and 1905, as consisting of three
areas, the first a limestone area, along the bay shore, the second a
boulder clay area, behind it, and the third in rear of it again, a high
interior plateau. As to the latter area, he says:—“Although, considered
as a whole, the central, elevated region cannot be spoken of as
generally adapted for agriculture, there occur basins covered by heavy
deposits of stratified sand and clay that seem to have been laid down in
lakes held in between barriers formed by the walls of the retreating
glacier and ridges of drift. An examination of some of these clays by
Doctor Hoffman shows them to be highly calcareous and somewhat
siliceous, a composition that with the admixture of the surface
vegetable mould should produce an

EXCELLENT SOIL FOR GENERAL AGRICULTURE.

The question of climate, which is, of course, of the utmost importance
when considering the agricultural possibilities of a district, will be
referred to more particularly in another place. It may be said here,
however, that the climatic conditions are, if somewhat adverse, not by
any means prohibitory to the general cultivation of suitably situated
tracts.

“Muskeg, alternating with low ridges of gravel and boulders, covers wide
tracts. It was noticed that the surface drainage became more perfect in
that part of the region extending westerly towards Trout
lake. . . . . . . . . .

“The tract referred to as the boulder clay area consists of a broad belt
of country, about one hundred and fifty-nine miles in width, lying
between the Archaean highlands and the edge of the limestones of the
basin of Hudson bay, overlapping the latter, however, so that the
surface features of the two are generally quite similar. Gently
undulating, and with a slight slope northerly and easterly, its general
surface aspect is that of a great swamp, sparsely covered with stunted
and deformed trees, that reach a growth approaching their normal only
along the immediate banks of the rivers where drainage is afforded by
frequent short gullies into the trenches that constitute the river
valleys. The interior, to within a chain or two of the river-banks,
owing to the impervious character of the till,

IS QUITE UNDRAINED,

and consequently covered by a thick deposit of sphagnum moss from two
feet to ten feet deep, the surface layer still growing, and even the
bottom only bleached a little, but not at all oxidized. The short cool
summer season, and consequent low temperature of the water that
saturates the moss, is probably the principal reason for the absence of
any of the visible effects of decay. The rivers flowing through this
region have no real valleys, that is to say, they occupy trenches but
little wider than the immediate channels in which they flow, cut down
through the stiff, tough till, which stands up in nearly vertical walls
that rise from the freshet mark on either side. At low stages of the
water a slanting beach, often paved with boulders, slopes gradually from
the foot of the bank to the edge of the diminished channel. A more or
less continuous layer of marine clay, rich in fossil shells, overlies
the boulder clay, ensuring, wherever it is present, a soil of good
quality. The absence of other than swamp vegetation must be ascribed,
then, to the almost total absence of drainage, and to the generally
unfavorable climatic conditions.

“In the matter of the actual cultivation of these northern areas we have
little to go upon. At the Hudson’s Bay Company’s posts at Fort Hope and
Osnaburgh potatoes have been grown and small gardens maintained from the
time of the establishment of the posts, and little difficulty has been
experienced in maturing the common garden vegetables of Ontario, though
occasionally the frosts of late summer have cut off all but the hardier
kinds. As the posts were located with a view to their favourable
situation for the purposes of the fur trade with the Indians, neither
one is situated on ground well suited for cultivation, and much better
results might reasonably be expected were trials made on more favorably
situated tracts. An Indian cultivating a small garden plot at the head
of the Pineimuta branch of Attawapiskat river succeeds in raising good
crops of potatoes and turnips.”

As to this part of the country drained by Winisk and Attawapiskat
rivers, Mr. McInnes in his report says:—“The climate, as would be
expected in these latitudes, and in a wilderness country approximately a
thousand feet above sea-level, is somewhat severe. The summer
temperature, though on occasional days rising as high as 85° Fahr.,
averages very much lower, and the nights are practically always cool.
Frosty nights often continue into the early summer, and recur again in
the autumn before most grain-crops would be ready for harvesting.
Temperatures were taken with the thermometer during two seasons, and
these, averaged, gave the following results for the months of July and
August on lower Winisk river, and for July, August and part of September
on upper Winisk and upper Attawapiskat rivers:—

6 a.m. noon. 6 p.m.
Lower Winisk river 57° 69° 57°
Upper Winisk and Attawapiskat rivers 47.5° 61.6° 58°

“The only points in the region where any attempts at cultivation of the
land are made are the two Hudson’s Bay Company’s posts at Osnaburgh,
near the foot of Lake St. Joseph, and at Fort Hope, on Eabamet lake.

“At these posts small kitchen gardens and potato-fields are maintained
with some success, though neither place is favourably situated for the
purpose, the soil in both cases consisting of an almost pure sand.
Timothy and clover grow luxuriantly, and all the common

GARDEN VEGETABLES THRIVE AT BOTH PLACES.

Indian corn, however, is not sufficiently filled out for table use when
caught by the frost. Barley has been successfully grown at Osnaburgh,
and the potato crop, wherever a suitable tract of land has been
utilized, has been generally fairly good at both places.

“The first killing frost in 1903 occurred on the night of September 3,
and in 1904 on the night of August 30.”

Mr. McInnes (Geol. Survey Report for 1906, pp. 87 and following)
describes the region explored by him in that year as follows:—

“It is bounded by north latitude 53° 50′ and 56° 10′, and by west
longitude 99° 15′ and 101° 15′. Its general elevation above the sea is
between seven hundred and nine hundred feet. . . . . For purposes of
general description it may, in a broad way, be divided into three areas;
the limestone area embracing all the tract underlaid by the horizontal
or gently undulating, magnesian limestones or dolomites of northern
Manitoba; the Archaean area, a somewhat broken and rugged country
extending from the northern edge of the limestone escarpment northward
and eastward until covered by the lacustrine sediments of the third or
clay area. The latter, a gently rolling, clay-covered country, extends
from the valley of Nelson river on the east to a contour, westerly,
where the general elevation of the land is in the vicinity of nine
hundred feet above the sea, or to approximately west longitude 99° 30′.
The northern edge of the clay basin was not reached, but the Indians of
Burntwood river region agree in saying that Churchill river valley forms
its most northerly extension. The last of the three divisions is,
generally, well suited for cultivation, but throughout the first two the
areas suitable for agriculture are of limited extent. No part of the
region is prairie though along some of the valleys, and here and there
on the uplands, are found extensive hay marshes, with only occasional
small clumps of willows, that, with drainage, would become virtually
prairie lands. . . . . Northwest of the Hudson’s Bay Company’s post at
Split lake the country is generally low, swampy and intersected by a
network of small lakes; near Waskaiowaka lake, however, an extension
northeasterly of the clay land of lower Burntwood valley forms a
comparatively dry ridge.”

A GARDEN IN NEW MANITOBA.

Speaking of the Hudson’s Bay Company’s trading post at Norway House, Mr.
McInnes said:—“The chief factor in charge of the district cultivates a
large garden, where, on June 10, peas, beans, beets and other vegetables
were well started. Wheat had been successfully grown here as well as at
Cross lake farther down the river, in latitude 54° 40′. There are many
tracts of land along the river suitable for cultivation, though for long
stretches the banks show only rounded surfaces of biotite gneiss, smooth
and glaciated. The cultivable areas are confined to tracts overlain by
lacustrine clays which alternate along the shores with glacial gravels
and the bare rock surfaces devoid of any soil cover.”

* * * * *

Mr. McInnes also reports:—“Below Cross lake no land is under
cultivation until Split lake is reached, just north of latitude 56°,
where the postmaster for the Hudson’s Bay Company raises potatoes and
the commoner garden vegetables.”

* * * * *

Mr. McInnes reports that, ascending Burntwood river a few miles above
Odei or Hart river, there is much land “apparently well adapted for
cultivation. The clay is entirely free from boulders, and mixed near the
surface with enough vegetable humus to produce a friable and seemingly
productive soil. The gentle slopes give good natural drainage, and the
open character of the forests makes it a country easily cleared. For the
next nineteen miles the river valley and neighboring country present the
same general aspect. Where the valleys of the main river and the Odei
approach one another they are separated only by a dividing ridge a
little over a mile across, and a hundred and fifty feet high. The ridge
is clay covered to the flat summit, where knolls of gneiss project.
Beyond the valley of the Odei, to the north, is a rolling forested
country with hills clay-covered to the tops, rising by gradual slopes to
about a hundred feet above the intervening valleys, that are themselves
from twenty to fifty feet above the river level. For the next
twenty-eight miles the river, flowing in a rock-bound basin, has the
character of a long, narrow lake from half a mile to over a mile in
width. Covering the well-rounded ledges of gneiss that form the
immediate shores is the same thick mantle of clay forming

A COUNTRY OF VERY ATTRACTIVE APPEARANCE.

Rising gradually from the river level to heights of from twenty to fifty
feet, a flat or gently sloping plateau extends back from two to three
miles to another rise, where the general level is increased to about a
hundred feet. Recurring forest fires have not only denuded this section
of its trees, but the stumps have for the most part been burned away, so
that it is now covered only by an open growth of small white birch,
poplar, willow and Banksian pine, with an undergrowth of vetches,
grasses and small shrubs. Just above is Manasan falls where the river
pitches over a ledge of gneiss with a vertical descent of thirty feet.

“Above Manasan falls,” Mr. McInnes continues, “the river expands again
to form a long, narrow lake for the next ten miles of its upward course.
The same rolling clay plateau extends back from both shores of the lake,
rising gradually to an undulating, higher tract, perhaps one hundred
feet above the lake level. The forest growth is still very open,
allowing a good surface carpet of grasses, vetches and other vegetation.
Diversified here and there by small open tracts where the grass-covered
surface is free from trees, this country often presents quite a
park-like aspect. Throughout all the clay-covered region the absence of
erratics is striking; for miles no perched boulders nor transported
materials of any kind; other than the lacustrine sediments, are seen,
and even the country rock is deeply hidden under the heavy clay deposits
that seem to be very homogeneous throughout, not laid down in thin
layers as in the case of many clays of apparently similar origin in
eastern Canada, but, if stratified at all, only in very heavy beds that
seldom show their bedding planes. For the next fifteen miles to
Wuskwatim lake, the river has a quicker descent and its course is broken
by several small rapids. The surrounding country is slightly higher,
rising in places about two hundred feet above the river, and more
steeply from its shores. From the south shore a clay-covered bench a
quarter of a mile wide rises to a comparatively steep slope to a height
of one hundred and thirty feet, and extends back for miles at about that
level, with a gently undulating surface, free from boulders or rock,
excepting very rare exposures. As a matter of fact, but one small knoll
of the underlying rock was actually seen, rising through the clay at a
point about two miles back from the river. The Indians report that this
plateau-like country extends right across to the valley of Grassy river
with only gently swelling ridges and no high hills.”

Mr. McInnes estimates the size of Wuskwatim lake as eight miles by four,
with a long bay extending to the west from its southern end. He states
that “on all sides of the lake are large tracts of

NEARLY LEVEL CLAY LAND

extending back for several miles at heights of from fifteen to fifty
feet above water level, and beyond that continuing at a level of a
little over one hundred feet. . . . . The grass-covered slopes that rise
with very gentle gradients from the shores of the lake, make this a
country of most attractive appearance and one that apparently would be
well suited for cultivation. The Indian inhabitants of this section
cultivate with success small garden patches of potatoes.”

Country of the same general character, Mr. McInnes states, extends for
thirty miles up the valley of the Burntwood above Wuskwatim lake.

On the shores of Footprint lake, in latitude 55° 45′, small fields of
potatoes planted by the Indians were looking remarkably well, the vines
being eleven inches in height and about ready to blossom when this
locality was visited by Mr. McInnes, July 10, 1906. Above the lake broad
flats extend back from the river on both sides, rising, from half a mile
to a mile back, to fifty feet above the river. The greater part of the
flats and practically all the high land has been burned over within
twenty years, and is clothed now with an open growth of small mixed
timber; the land is free from boulders and gravel and has a good carpet
of native grasses, including such good meadow forms as the blue-joint
(_Calamagrostis canadensis_, _Calamagrostis hyperborea_) and the wild
rye (_Elymus dasystachum_). The open character of the forest permits a
somewhat luxuriant growth of these grasses, mixed with vetches,
strawberry vines, etc., and with currant, gooseberry and other small
shrubs and bushes.

“The land lying to the southward of the most southerly bend of the river
was found to rise with a comparatively steep slope to a height of sixty
feet above the river, and to extend back as a level clay-covered plain
with about five inches of clay-loam soil well mixed with vegetable
matter gradually merging downwards into pure clay. The plateau has a
gently rolling surface, the bottoms of the hollows, where small areas of
muskeg often occur, having a deviation forty feet lower than the slopes
of the ridges, and the highest land reaching not more than one hundred
feet above the river. For six miles back, the areas of muskeg that are
not sphagnum swamps, but rather grassy marshes, are comparatively
insignificant in extent, the higher land, wooded with Banksian pine,
poplar and spruce and diversified by many open grassy glades, largely
preponderating. Beyond this, however, a broad belt of wet, grassy marsh
land extends southwesterly across to the heads of brooks running into
Grass river below Wekusko lake, and forms practically the western limit
of the clay-covered uplands, though in the river valleys and along the
flanks of their bordering hills the clay land extends much farther west.

“Of the whole of this extensive plateau land, extending from the valley
of the Nelson river westward to near Burntwood and Wekusko lakes (west
longitude 90° 45′), northerly to beyond latitude 56°, and southerly to
the limestone escarpment, an area of

ABOUT TEN THOUSAND SQUARE MILES,

it may be said to be characterized by a heavy clay soil entirely free
from boulders. Lacustrine clays, composed of the rock flour once held in
suspension by glacial streams and deposited by them as they reached the
quiet waters of a great lake, are essentially the soils of this region.
There is no distinct surface soil clearly separable from the clay
subsoil; the one merges gradually into the other, the clayey character
of the soil being strongly apparent at the very surface where merely the
shallow cover of decaying leaves and other vegetation is scraped away.
Generally, for from five inches to over a foot down, the clay is deep
brown in colour from the admixture of vegetable matter, and quite
friable, and rootlets of even the smaller surface vegetation reach down
far below this level, though on the tops of many of the ridges the
light-buff coloured clay, without any appreciable coloration from
vegetable matter, comes quite to the surface. The rolling character of
the plateau generally provides fair drainage, but over considerable
areas in its central portion, far from the valleys of the larger
streams, there are large tracts that have not sufficient gradients for
the proper flow of the surface water, and which could be made available
for agricultural uses only by being artificially drained. The western
limit of the good country is about longitude 99° 45′.”

[Illustration: Portage on Moose river.]

Mr. McInnes reports that the country lying to the south of Reed and
Wekusko lakes, and stretching to Saskatchewan valley, contains very few
tracts of land suitable for settlement. Practically only the river
valleys, a few tracts adjoining some of the lakes, and parts of some of
the slopes flanking the limestone ridges, can be considered as affording
land suitable for cultivation. The upland is generally almost bare of
soil, flat-lying limestones forming its actual surfaces, and the slopes,
though covered to a good depth by clay, are for the most part too
bouldery for tillage. Limited tracts occur here and there, suitable for
individual holdings notably near some of the principal lakes. Of the
agricultural possibilities of the country south of Reed and Wuskwatim
lakes, Mr. McInnes writes:—“Experimentally but little is known of its
capabilities, though we have instances here and there throughout the
area, to beyond its northerly limit, of the cultivation of all sorts of
garden vegetables, including, at The Pas,

TOMATOES AND INDIAN CORN.

On September 6 of this year (1906), Indian corn well headed out was seen
in Mr. Halcrow’s garden at the Hudson’s Bay Company’s post, the ears
large and full and quite fit for table use. The Indian, never a very
enthusiastic agriculturist, succeeds everywhere in getting good crops of
potatoes, and at the homestead of an old settler named George Cowan, on
Cormorant lake, an exceptionally good yield of very large potatoes was
being dug in September.”

Mr. McInnes, during his explorations in 1906, gave particular attention
to the question of climate, which he rightly considered of vital
importance in connection with this region. He kept a careful record of
temperatures, and from the time it was begun, on June 19, until the
night of September 29, when the thermometer fell to 26, there was no
frost that affected even tender vegetation. On the night of August 10
the temperature fell to the freezing point, but did not get low enough
to do damage, at least not in the valley of Grassy river, though some of
the potato vines on the summit of the high ridge north of The Pas were
slightly touched. Mr. McInnes said he was convinced that the district is
not at all too cold for general agricultural operations. The longer
daily duration of summer sunlight in these high latitudes, he points out
in his report, must be taken into consideration, and, for purposes of
comparison with more southerly localities, yearly averages of
temperature are of no value. A region lying in a higher latitude, though
showing a lower yearly average temperature, may, during the growing
months, owing to its longer hours of sunshine, have quite as good an
average as one farther south. Mr. McInnes’s record showed that during
July the temperature at 6 o’clock p.m. was equal to or higher than the
noon temperature on fifteen days; during August on nine days; during
September on eight days. The 6 p.m. averages for these months were lower
than the noon averages by only 1°, 1½° and 2° respectively. For the
purpose of comparison, Mr. McInnes procured from the Director of the
Meteorological Service at Toronto an abstract of the same summer’s
temperatures at Minnedosa, Stony Mountain, Hillview and Brandon, and,
comparing them with his record, he concluded that the country along the
route of the proposed railway to the bay

IS CONSPICUOUSLY WARMER

than the same latitude four hundred miles further east.

Mr. McInnes, examined before the select committee of the Senate in 1907,
declared that the whole region from Split lake to a line about forty
miles north of the Saskatchewan is a clay-covered country. After leaving
Split lake, ascending the river, this clay-covered country shows
absolutely no boulders and no gravel. Even the shores of the lakes,
until you reach a height of about eight hundred feet, show no gravel
bars at all. There is absolutely nothing to interfere with the
cultivation of the soil there. It is a country that has been burnt over.
The witness assumed that Burntwood river got its name that way. It has
been subject to repeated burns. At the present time it is covered by a
very open forest. Grasses grow fairly luxuriantly. There are two species
of this, blue joint grass and a wild rye, that are the prevailing
grasses. He understood from Professor Macoun, though he was not very
familiar with the grasses himself, that these are very excellent meadow
grasses, and make excellent fodder. Mr. McInnes left Norway House in the
second week of June, and made the circuit and came out at The Pas on
September 6, so it was in June, July and August he was there. He saw
grass growing from eighteen inches to two feet high.

The witness computed the area of this country at about ten thousand
square miles. He did not mean to say, he explained, that all of that ten
thousand square miles is good land, but the basin characterized by this
deposit of clay has an area of about ten thousand square miles. It is
bounded on the north by Churchill river. The witness was at about the
centre of the basin. The Indians told him it extended north to the basin
of Churchill river. Beyond that, northwards, mud and gravel took the
place of clay. Starting at The Pas and proceeding towards Churchill, the
witness first passed through about one hundred and forty miles of
country underlaid by the flat limestone of northern Manitoba. He walked
for miles over

HILLS OF ALMOST BARE LIMESTONE

with hardly any soil. Beyond that—that is, about the contour he had
spoken of where this clay was deposited, there is about one hundred and
seventy miles to Split lake (Split lake is about two hundred and fifty
miles from The Pas), possibly in a straight line about as the railway is
projected, that is characterized by these clay deposits.

As to the flat country in Keewatin, beyond this clay area, it is a
country of a different character. The witness proceeded from the Albany
one hundred miles across country by the portage route to a large lake on
Agnooski river and then another one hundred miles across to Winisk lake,
and down Winisk river to the sea, and he crossed through the country
between Agnooski and Winisk by three different routes, perhaps forty or
fifty miles east and west from one route to the next, and the country is
very much the same character. It is a country that is very much denuded.
The country generally is characterized by hills of boulder and gravel
and intermediate valleys very largely muskeg. Except in the immediate
valleys of the larger rivers there is very little land that would be
suitable for agriculture. From one hundred and fifty miles inland down
to the sea, the country is of an entirely different character again;
that is to say, it is country that is originally overlain by from a very
few feet at its edge to one hundred feet or more, a very tough
impervious boulder clay, which holds up the water, and on which the
drainage, up to the present time, is of a very imperfect character. The
present drainage of that area is comparatively recent, and imperfect. An
instance of its imperfection is seen in Winisk river. There is a lake
near the head of the Winisk from which the main river flows, and from
which the west branch flows north. They come together at a point
(following the main stream) two hundred and fifty miles below, inclosing
an island two hundred and fifty miles long. There are two other islands
of this character

ALONG WINISK RIVER,

one eighty miles in length and the other about fifty.

The Winisk is a good large river. Mr. McInnes estimated the flow at some
twenty-five thousand cubic feet per second. It runs in size somewhere
between the Gatineau and the Ottawa, not quite so large as the Ottawa,
but larger than the Gatineau. Over the whole of the country in the last
one hundred and fifty miles down to Hudson bay, granting the proper
climate and proper drainage, this green clay would make an excellent
soil. In fact it is quite the same as the clay in the vicinity of
Ottawa, practically clay of the same soil, and is very impervious. There
are little streams running into the sides of the river, but they cut
very sharp-walled trenches, as steep as boulder clay will stand, and
that means an angle of say sixty degrees, eighty to ninety feet high.
You get on top of these banks and you have a mossy place, sometimes six
feet of moss. It is never peat, never having turned into peat. It is
simply a green moss which is pressed into layers of a couple of feet in
thickness at the bottom of the six or ten feet, but never apparently
oxydized or never carbonized at all, practically unchanged. The growth
is going on still. It is merely the successive layers which are pressed
down by subsequent layers on top of them, so that in places the
thickness is quite ten feet. There are no grasses in that mossy district
in the valley of the Winisk. A river of that size in places has some
shores, perhaps a quarter of a mile, here and there, beyond the actual
shore of the river, and it is grassy there. That is, there are
occasional bottom lands, but there is no extent of them. Mr. McInnes did
not think there is an agricultural country in that eastern district. It
is entirely different from the country of which he had been previously
speaking.

Upon Nelson river wheat has been grown successfully at Norway House, and
also at Cross lake. The Hudson’s Bay Company grow no grain at any of
their Keewatin posts nowadays. In the old days they grew it and ground
it in hand mills. Mr. McInnes saw potatoes that were grown about fifty
miles north of The Pas. “They were quite showy potatoes, great large
fellows like those you see exhibited in fairs—tremendously large, grown
on practically new land, and they had a very large crop of them.” There
are no settlers in Nelson district. The Indians, however, grow potatoes
at several points, even in the northern part of it, as far north as
Nelson House, about latitude 55° 50′. On July 11, when Mr. McInnes
arrived at Nelson House, the Indian potatoes had vines about eleven
inches high, and were almost ready to flower. When he got out on
September 6 to the Saskatchewan, at the Hudson’s Bay post there, at The
Pas, Indian corn was very well headed out, with very large fine ears
quite ready for table use, and there was no frost until September 29. He
knew that because he stayed there until then.

With eighteen hours of the daylight, and no frost in the summer,
vegetation is rapid. In a country where you can ripen Indian corn you
can grow practically anything.

Mr. McInnes explained that he could not closely indicate the isothermal
line on the part of the country he had explored the previous year, but
he could say that the country averaged in the summer months from four to
five degrees higher temperature than the same latitude farther west. He
thought that

THE ISOTHERMAL LINE

which would go past the north end of the country he had been speaking
of, would come down as far as the north shore of Lake Superior, which
would be a very long distance south. He had records kept during all
summer of the temperatures through that western country, and he had a
summary of the record kept in the preceding summers. He was rather
surprised at the warmth of that western country in summer, and at the
way heat kept up in the evenings. He kept the thermometer readings
morning, noon and six o’clock in the evening, and found the six o’clock
temperatures were almost as warm as the noon temperatures. That country
has a very long day in summer. The day in those high latitudes is very
much longer, and the growing time proportionately longer. In June they
have about eighteen hours of daylight.

As to the district where he found the one hundred and seventy miles of
agricultural land he had described, he reached there only about the
middle of June. There was no frost in the balance of June or in July,
and no frost in August, excepting once, on, he thought, the 29th, when
the thermometer dropped just to freezing point. There was not enough
frost to touch vegetation at all in the valley of the river where he
was. He noticed when he got out to the Saskatchewan there was rather a
high ridge on which there were a lot of half-breed settlers. He got
there on September 6, and noticed on top of the hills where they had
potatoes that they had been touched just on the tops, but down in the
villages the potatoes in the garden of the Hudson’s Bay post had not
been touched at all. He presumed that was the frost on August 29.

Owen O’Sullivan, C.E., of the Geological Survey of Canada, was one of
the witnesses before the Senate committee of 1907. He explained that in
1904 he was engaged as assistant to Mr. Wilson in examining the west
coast of James bay. They went up the river Kapiskau for one hundred and
fifty miles and surveyed it, and found mostly swampy ground, right to
about the headwaters of the Kapiskau, longitude 86°. His impression was
that the whole coast from the southern extremity of James bay, at the
mouth of the Hurricane, up to Cape Henrietta Maria, for an average of
one hundred miles in depth, is mostly swampy ground. It is partly peat
and wet spagnol (wet moss). There is a bluff of small spruce isolated
here and there.

In 1905 he was sent to survey the coast between York Factory and Cape
Henrietta Maria. The shore between these points was swampy as far inland
as he could walk in two or three days.

Mr. O’Sullivan testified that during the summer of 1906 he started from
Split lake, on the Nelson, and made for the headwaters of Little
Churchill river, going down the Little Churchill to the Big Churchill.
The country between Split lake and Big lake is mostly swampy. The
country about Big lake is a good loamy soil, with easy slopes
surrounding the lakes. From Big lake to the Big Churchill the country is
rocky and swampy, with a good deal of good loamy soil in places—a rich
clay loam. The rock is mostly granite and gneiss. It is very hard to
find out whether the land is suitable for agriculture on such an
expedition. It is hard to know the extent of the soil, but Mr.
O’Sullivan thought

THE CLIMATE WAS SUITABLE FOR AGRICULTURE.

There are lots of boulders all through the country, but it is possible
to cultivate what there is of the land. There are places where the land
extends to the size of a dozen townships, and then there would be three
or four times that much without having in it enough arable land to make
a good-sized township. In the vicinity of Churchill there is grass in
the valleys of very good quality. It occurs about half-way down the
Little Churchill.

Good potatoes are raised at Split lake. Mr. O’Sullivan had obtained a
bag of potatoes grown there. They were rather small, but very palatable.
That was in June, and they were grown the previous year. Split lake from
the coast, by the Nelson, would be about one hundred and seventy-five
miles. He went down Nelson river and north to Churchill. The general
character of the country from James bay farther north is good,
agriculturally. The country from Split lake rises to Wabishkok about two
hundred feet. That is about thirty miles in a straight line. Besides
potatoes, he had seen turnips, cabbage and lettuce growing, and all
appeared to be very good. The potato vines in September were touched
with frost rather severely. The potatoes were taken up on August 23 and
25, 1906.

Mr. O’Sullivan stated that he had been up near the head of Lake
Winnipeg, where the river leaves the lake. There is good agricultural
land around there. He never had such good potatoes as at Cross lake. He
did not see them growing, but had them in June and also in September.
The June potatoes would be the previous crop, and the September ones
possibly the new crop. They do not grow any grain there; they have no
cattle, and there are no settlers in there. The Hudson’s Bay factor
raised the potatoes. He had just enough to keep his own family. He had
them in three or four different quarters. Mr. O’Sullivan saw lettuce and
turnips growing at Churchill.

Mr. J. W. McLaggan, of Strathcona, Alberta, in 1907, made an exploratory
trip over a portion of the same country as Mr. McInnes, but going
farther west. He left Prince Albert on August 2 and reached The Pas on
August 15. On August 25 he crossed Clearwater lake. He describes the
country he passed through as low and swampy, and

WILD BERRIES OF ALL KINDS

as plentiful. The land north of Cormorant lake he found to be of good
clay loam, and capable of being farmed successfully on a small scale
after being cleared. A garden of potatoes, turnips, carrots and cabbages
looked well, and on August 27

SHOWED NO EVIDENCE OF FROST.

On upper Cowan river there are small hay meadows; the rest of the land
is poor and hard to clear. Approaching Reed lake the soil is a clay loam
which could be farmed if drained. The country about Herb lake and river
is rocky, with patches of fair land, suitable for raising vegetable and
garden produce. When the rapids of Grass river are passed the country
becomes low, but in places there is good soil of clay loam with sand,
and towards Setting lake there are good hay meadows. Although the
country between Setting and Paint lakes is very rough and rocky, there
is some good land. To the north of Paint lake there is a limited
quantity of good land; about Methy lake Mr. McLaggan considers the land
of little value for farming. Between Reed lake and Elbow lake there are
some small spots of good land, but as a general thing the country is
rough, rocky and swampy. The country between Elbow and Cranberry lakes
is mainly muskeg. There are some patches of good land towards the lower
end of Cranberry lake. There are some small hay meadows between
Cranberry and Athapapuskow lakes, but the ground is generally rocky with
some muskeg. There are some stretches of fairly good land along the
lower part of Goose river but the country generally is rough and rocky.
The country about the upper end of Goose lake was found to be boggy and
of very little use.

ALONG GOOSE RIVER, BELOW THE LAKE,

there is quite a tract of fairly good land, and there is another on the
Sturgeon, between the mouth of Goose river and Cumberland lake. The soil
is a clay loam mixed with a little sand. It is covered with brush and
small poplar and would be easy to clear.

Mr. McLaggan, after his trip, stated that the growing season seemed to
be satisfactory, “and where good land is found there should be no
trouble to raise good crops of all hardy grains and vegetables, but the
greatest drawback to farming would be the difficulty of making waggon
roads from place to place, as the country between the spots of good land
is rough and rocky.”

The climate seemed good to Mr. McLaggan. In the first week of September
the foliage was green; there was no sign of severe frost, and
butterflies, hornets and other insects were numerous and active. The
first frost noted was on August 31, “but not enough to damage wheat.”
The weather was fine in the morning and it rained in the afternoon. On
September 13 he noted that the weather was fine but cold, with a heavy
frost in the morning; that the leaves were falling, and that it began to
look like autumn. Considerable rain followed, which, on October 4, gave
place to snow, to be followed again by rain. The night of October 7 is
noted as the first really cold one of the season, but the morning
brought rain. There was snow again on October 8 with high wind and ice
on the water along the shore of Goose lake. It was “fine and warm” on
October 11, and “clear and cold” on October 13 when he reached The Pas
on his return.

W. Thibaudeau, C.E., states in his report (See p. 23):—“At Churchill,
potatoes, turnips and other vegetables have been successfully raised at
the Hudson’s Bay Company’s fort. For many years cattle and horses have
been successfully kept and bred at the Hudson’s Bay post; excellent
butter was also made. Splendid pasture and hay meadows are found on both
sides of the river above the harbour for a known distance of thirty-five
miles. At the head of Button bay there is an area of two thousand acres
upon which

GOOD HAY CAN BE CUT,

which has been pronounced by Professor Macoun as affording excellent
forage. Wild black and red currants and gooseberries are found in great
quantities, and are equal, if not superior in flavour, to garden
produce. Barrels of black currants can be picked around Fort Prince of
Wales. Cranberries exist in great abundance everywhere. Other berries
which are indigenous to the climate abound.”

As to the region examined in his exploration trip from Churchill to The
Pas, Mr. Thibaudeau states:—

“About thirty-five per cent. of the country travelled through is marshy
and swampy; more or less hay is grown. Under marsh or swamps the soil is
generally clay. I have no doubt that when the swamps and marshes are
drained, and the moss is stripped, they will be susceptible to farming
operations between Churchill and The Pas, and at a later period, after
the northwest is settled, this land will become valuable.”

Mr. John Armstrong, in his report of the preliminary survey conducted
under his direction in 1908 and 1909 for the proposed railway to Hudson
bay, mentions that as the greater portion of the survey work was
completed during the winter months when the ground was frozen and
covered with snow, it was impossible to obtain much information on the
subject of agricultural land and minerals. He continues:—“It may be
remarked here, however, that although these lands may require more or
less improvement in the way of clearing and drainage, the fact that they
are situated within a few hours’ run of an ocean port may give to these
lands a value not hitherto thought of, and may cause a more rapid
settlement than expected. At the inland Hudson’s Bay Company’s posts all
kinds of grain and vegetables have been grown successfully for years. A
study of the records of the Meteorological Office indicates that the
climate is quite as favourable for farming operations as that of Prince
Albert.”

[Illustration: Typical country on Hudson Bay Railway Survey.]

During the summer of 1910, an inspection of the timber along the line of
the proposed Hudson Bay Railway from The Pas to Split lake was made by
J. R. Dickson, B.S.A., M.S.F., Assistant Inspector of Dominion Forest
Reserves, and his report was printed by the Forestry Branch of the
Department of the Interior, as a Special Bulletin (No. 17) in 1911. Mr.
Dickson’s exploration covered a distance of some two hundred and
thirty-five miles along the line of railway. The line of inspection
followed was along the waterways on the northwest side of

THE PROPOSED LINE OF RAILWAY,

from which men were sent in at intervals of a few miles in each
direction so as to locate the timber. On the return journey the waterway
route to the south of the line was taken and similar inspections made
from it. The special object was to locate and estimate the areas of
commercially valuable timber that could be made use of in the work of
constructing the railways, and as a result a good idea of the character
and location of the timber along the line has been obtained.

The route followed by the party was from The Pas to Moose lake, thence
by portage to Mitishto river, down that stream and via Setting, Paint,
Wintering, Landing and Sipiwesk lakes to Cross lake. From the last
mentioned lake the party crossed to Minago river, and via that stream,
Moose lake and the Saskatchewan returned to The Pas. The area covered
was estimated by Mr. Dickson at eight thousand square miles. In addition
to the information about the timber of this district given in this
report there are many facts as to the topography of the country and its
natural resources.

Mr. Dickson’s party found that except for a varying percentage of rock
outcrop usually in the form of low ridges covered by stunted jackpines,
there is a great muskeg extending northeast along the whole course of
Mitishto river, and appearing in fact to blanket the entire watershed in
the region between Saskatchewan and Grass river systems.

Mr. Dickson’s exploring party, in passing from Setting lake to Cross
lake, by way of Paint, Wintering, Landing and Sipiwesk lakes, traversed
part of the so-called “clay-belt” which, according to Mr. Dickson’s
report “contains upon the whole from fifty per cent. to seventy-five per
cent. of arable land and probably has

A GOOD AGRICULTURAL FUTURE.”

The report as to the rocks and soils of the area explored says:—“The
bedrock for one hundred miles northeast of The Pas is
limestone—probably largely dolomite—and it frequently obtrudes through
the muskegs or shallow soils which blanket it. These outcrops form low,
narrow, flattened ridges, rising just above the general level of the
muskeg, and nearly always running northeast and southwest. The line of
contact between this limestone area and the Laurentian granite (upon
which it rests conformably) runs northwest and southeast from a point
ten miles east of Limestone bay on Lake Winnipeg across the southwest
end of Hill lake on Minago river to Cameron falls on the Mitishto,
thence passing in a westerly direction along the south shores of Reed,
Wekusko and Cranberry lakes. Along this line, especially in the vicinity
of Hill lake, there is a zone of deep clays of very promising
agricultural value. In the area of granite farther north, the whole
future, so far as agriculture or forestry is concerned, depends upon the
general depth of the boulder clay. From the mere fact that it is a drift
deposit, this depth constantly varies, but only a detailed soil survey
of each township could show where and how much. There are large areas of
almost pure rock outcrop and muskeg of little or no value even for
timber production. But in general, over the great clay belt, the soil,
which is almost uniformly

A VERY TENACIOUS BOULDER CLAY

(nearly free of boulders, however), averages between four and twelve
feet in depth, quite deep enough, therefore, for cultivation. It must be
understood that no hard and fast boundary line can be laid down as
showing the confines of this clay belt. The change is often so gradual,
and so many as yet unknown factors enter—as, for instance, soil depth
and possibilities of drainage—that any estimate of the bounds, area and
average arable content of this belt can, with our present very limited
knowledge, be given only in general terms. I estimate the area of that
portion included from north to south between Wintering and Cross lakes,
and from east to west between Setting and Sipiwesk lakes at two thousand
square miles.

“With regard to soil conditions, drainage is the great necessity
everywhere. To render the soil fertile for cropping, the heavy stiff
boulder clay must be opened up to the action of the air. Probably the
use of a subsoil plough might obviate the necessity for underdrainage
over large areas. But however secured, aëration is necessary to change
the present cold, dead, impervious soil to a warm, porous, friable one,
full of bacterial life, available plant food, and resulting fertility.
The soil is exactly similar to that around Cochrane in New Ontario,
which yields such large returns under right treatment.”

Mr. Dickson says in his report:—“The climate and the soil conditions
are the two basic factors which determine farming value. Where frequent
or recent fires have not resulted in the formation of purely ‘temporary’
or ‘fire types’—as e.g., young jackpine on heavy clay—a study of the
existing flora answers many questions as to the climate and the soil. On
well-drained spots as far north as Split lake the flora is almost
identical with that of similar sites in Riding mountains of Manitoba,
proving that during the growing season these localities lie under one
and the same isotherm, or nearly so, And yet Riding mountains are nearly
four hundred miles southwest of Split lake. Two other factors which help
vegetation in this northern clay belt are the low absolute
elevation—only five hundred to seven hundred feet—and the large
proportion of sunlight during the growing season, because of the long
day. No doubt also the large proportion of the country covered by water
has a tendency to prevent late spring and early fall frosts. In the
absence of weather records, it is impossible to say whether the summer
of 1910 was an average season or not, but certainly it was favourable
for farming operations. There were showers every week and the growth of
the native vegetation

WAS AMAZINGLY RAPID.

The total annual precipitation, including two or three feet of snow,
would appear to be about the same as for western Ontario, to wit, thirty
to forty inches. At Cross lake no damaging frosts occurred between June
8 and September 11, an interval of ninety-three days. But as a
‘sixty-day’ oat or barley in Ontario will mature in that region in
forty-five or fifty days—a general rule which applies as well to
fruits, roots and vegetables—there would appear to be no difficulty
from a climatic standpoint in growing all the hardier products of the
temperate zone. The size and the quality of the wild fruits between
Setting and Split lakes were first-class. During the last week of July
we enjoyed ripe raspberries, gooseberries, black and red currants,
blueberries, saskatoons and strawberries (late ones). The first three
mentioned were especially fine—the bushes loaded down with fruit as
large and juicy as many tame varieties in Ontario. The average
temperature of the growing season is about 60° Fahrenheit. Certainly
vegetables will grow to perfection anywhere between Cross lake and
Nelson House. At the former we ate potatoes weighing a pound and a half
each, dug on the last day of August, and when we left on September 10
the corn and tomatoes were still untouched by frost. I would
respectfully point out the advisability of the Dominion Government
placing several small experimental stations at suitable points within
the limits of this clay belt to make careful test of its seasonal
variations and cropping possibilities. When the railway is completed
such information will be of the utmost value to intending settlers. The
winters are quite as enjoyable as in Manitoba—probably more so. Mr.
Clifford, one of the railway location engineers, who has spent two years
between The Pas and Split lake, assured me that he

LIKED THE WINTER SEASON THERE

much better than the summer. Whereas in many parts of the continent the
summer of 1910 was a peculiarly dry one, in Keewatin it was just the
opposite. Rain fell frequently, and high winds, especially nor’easters
from Hudson bay, were almost constant and occasioned us some loss of
time on the larger lakes.”

Mr. William Beech, for many years back, and still, a resident of
Churchill, in a communication to the press in 1911, wrote:—“The opinion
generally entertained concerning the country around the bay and at
Churchill is that it is a barren waste, covered with ice and snow for
the greater part of the year, and devoid of any vegetation whatever. The
opinion is an erroneous one. At the head of the bay there is an area of
from two thousand to three thousand acres where in the summer months
good hay can be cut, and which Professor Macoun has pronounced as
affording excellent forage. There are many other places also where the
same condition exists, and where the country is covered with a rich
thick growth of grass. It would surprise you, wouldn’t it, if I should
tell you that there are at least half a dozen different species of wild
fruit which flourish in great abundance in the rocks and among the
mosses throughout the country round the bay. Wild black and red
currants, gooseberries, cranberries, crowfoot berries, and baked apple
berries may be gathered by the bushel in season, and make the very best
of preserves, so that we don’t really have to depend on dried apples up
there as many of you imagine. As for vegetables, I have seen radishes,
lettuce, and turnips raised right at Churchill.

“Of course it is generally understood that the winter climate of the
country round the bay is usually very severe. The lowest temperature I
have experienced there, however, was 39° below zero on Nov. 29, 1906,
with a strong wind blowing from the bay, which intensified the cold. It
is exceedingly rare to have winds off the bay in the winter months. In
winter the wind is generally from the west and northwest, while in
summer it is generally from the east and northeast. I have always found
the thermometer lower one hundred and fifty miles inland. It can never
be called dark in the north, even in the depth of winter.”

-----

[14] It will be observed that part of this evidence treats of other
districts than the one immediately under consideration; but it cannot
conveniently be eliminated here without awkwardly dislocating Mr.
Tyrrell’s evidence.—(E. J. C.).

CHAPTER III.

THE KEEWATIN AREA.

(Newest Ontario and Northern Manitoba.)

Tree Growth and Timber Resources.

Considerable Areas of Good Timber.—The Range of the More
Important Trees.—The Banskian Pine.—Forests of Trees in Many
Places that Would Make Good Logs, and Much Pulp Wood.—
Occasional Beautiful Forests of Aspen Poplar.—Magnificent
Coniferous Forest Northwest of Lake Winnipeg.—Water Power on
the Nelson.—Destruction Wrought by Forest Fires.—Ample Supply
of Timber For Fuel.

There is considerable evidence showing that there are, in different
sections of the territory immediately west and south of Hudson bay,
considerable areas of useful timber.

Mr. Richard White, one of the witnesses examined before the Hudson Bay
Investigation Committee in 1749 (See p. 8), stated that he saw fir-trees
on the banks of Albany river thirty-five or forty feet long, and
fourteen or sixteen inches square at the bottom, and ten at the top, and
here and there a small stick of birch; that there were a great many
other small pines; but he did not know whether pitch or tar could be
made from them, never having seen a trial.

Rev. John Semmens (See p. 36) writes:—“There is a good deal of timber
in the valleys and on the islands and lakes of Burntwood river course,
though it is sprucy and inclined to be small. I have cut timber as large
as two feet in diameter at the butt and fifty feet in height, but this
is exceptional. From ten to fifteen inches near the ground is a better
estimate of the average size of the trees. The very name of this river
suggests the historic fact that the natives of the country deliberately
and habitually set the woods on fire, their object being to attract the
deer which are known to be fond of the sweet grass which springs from
the ashes of a fire swept surface. The result is that large tracts of
country are denuded of their rich first growth of trees, and young
forests are just coming into the middle stages of growth, while many of
the hills stand bald and bare, giving silent evidence of the severity of
successive visitations of the devouring flame. Yet the charred stumps
and tangled roots here and there speak of a deep and fertile soil, as
well as of possibilities of growth which few have associated with a
so-called ‘frozen north.’ However, all the timber necessary for railroad
purposes and for the use of settlers in building or for commercial
cordwood can be found almost anywhere, the latter in illimitable
quantities.”

Doctor Robert Bell of the Geological Survey, in his report of his
explorations in the

VALLEYS OF NELSON AND CHURCHILL RIVERS

in 1879, states:—“Spruce and tamarac timber are found growing near the
sea coast, in favorable situations as far as Seal river, beyond which
their northeastern limit curves inland. The spruce, although not growing
as a continuous forest quite as far north as Churchill, is still found
of sufficient size in the neighborhood of this post to be used for
building houses, boats, etc. The balsam poplar is rare and of small size
at Churchill. White birch which was found on the main river, eighteen
miles above the forks, is said to occur at about sixty or seventy miles
west of the mouth of the river.”

Doctor Bell proceeds in his report to describe the range of the most
important trees over the area covered by his exploits as follows:—

“White Spruce—(the ‘Pine’ of Rupert’s Land),—This is the most northern
coniferous tree. On the east side of Hudson bay the last of it is seen
on the coast a short distance north of Richmond gulf. On the west side
it terminates about Seal river. Thence its limit runs northwesterly, and
is reported to cross Mackenzie river about two hundred miles below Peel
river.

“Tamarack,—(also called ‘Juniper’ and ‘Red Spruce’)—On the east side
of the bay it accompanies the spruce almost to the extreme limit. It is
abundant at York Factory. Along the lower part of Nelson river it is of
fair size, but on the Churchill it becomes small towards the sea. Its
northern limit runs northwestward to Mackenzie river which it is said to
cross below Peel river.

“Balsam Fir:—(also called ‘Single Spruce’ and ‘Silver Pine’)—Abundant
around the southern part of James bay and on good dry soil along Albany
river. Mr. Cochrane reports it as common around Island lake, but scarcer
on God’s lake. It is rare and of small size on Knee lake. In going down
Nelson river, it is scarce below Sea River falls, and the last tree
which I observed was at the outlet of Sipiwesk lake. On Grass river some
good-sized trees were seen as far north as Standing Rock rapid.

“Balsam Poplar:—(‘Rough-barked Poplar’, ‘Cotton Tree’, ‘Balm of
Gilead’, etc.)—On the west side of Hudson bay, this is the most
northern species of poplar. It is abundant around York Factory, and
attains a fair size along the lower part of Nelson river. In descending
the Great Churchill it becomes smaller and scarcer until the mouth of
the river is reached, when it is rare.

“Aspen:—(‘Trembling-leaved Poplar’)—This tree, which is so abundant
and of such a thrifty growth around the southern part of James bay and
on the border of the prairie regions of the Northwest territories, does
not extend as far north as York Factory. In ascending Nelson river it
was not met until within a few miles of lowest Limestone rapid. It
extends northward nearly to the junction of Little Churchill with Great
Churchill river.

“White Birch:—(‘Canoe Birch’)—This species terminates on Hayes river,
a few miles below Steel river. On the Nelson, the first tree was met
with at seven miles before coming to lowest Limestone rapid, or at
seventy from Point of Marsh. In descending the Little Churchill it
disappeared about midway between Recluse lakes and the mouth, and in
ascending the Great Churchill, it disappeared at eighteen miles above
the forks. Along Burntwood river and the upper part of the Nelson it is
large enough for building canoes, but becomes better for this purpose to
the northwestward, and it is said to be of very good quality around Lake
Athabaska.”

Doctor Bell states in his 1886 report (See p. 18):—“The timber all

AROUND LAKE ST. JOSEPH

has suffered greatly from forest fires at many different times, from
about a century ago to the present year. Parts of the main shores and
many of the islands, especially in the neighborhood of the Grand
Traverse, have escaped the fires, and here full-sized timber may be
seen. The second growth woods are of all ages, from seedlings of a year
ago, up to trees nearly as large as those of the original forests. As
elsewhere in these latitudes, where the old forests of spruce, tamarack,
balsam, white birch, etc., have been burnt, they are succeeded by a
growth of mixed aspens and white birch, with a sprinkling of spruce, or
else by one consisting entirely of Banksian pine. In regard to relative
abundance, the trees found around the lake may be mentioned in the
following order:—white and black spruce, tamarack, aspen, white birch,
Banksian pine, rough-barked poplar, balsam, white cedar, pigeon cherry,
rowan and black ash. The ground or mountain maple (_Acer spicatum_),
which is interesting as an indicator of climate, is common, and it was
traced for a long distance down the Albany. Of the above kinds of
timber, the white spruce and the tamarack are the most important
commercially. The cedar is confined chiefly to the immediate shores of
the lake, where it often forms a continuous but narrow border. About
twenty spruce logs, for sawing into boards, were lying at Osnaburgh
House at the time of our visit. They would average eighteen or twenty
inches in diameter at the butts, the largest being about two feet. The
six largest showed the following number of rings of growth:—one hundred
and thirteen, ninety-seven, one hundred and twenty-one, one hundred and
sixteen, one hundred and seven, and one hundred and twenty, or an
average of one hundred and twelve, these rings indicating, it is
supposed, a corresponding number of years. A new tamarack flag-staff,
which was about to be erected, measured about eighteen inches in
diameter at the butt and showed two hundred and forty-four rings of
growth.”

Doctor Bell reports that on the dry ground along Boulder river the
timber consists of black spruce, tamarack, balsam, aspen and white
birch, but on the wet, level tracts, it was principally black spruce.
All the rapids in Boulder river were overhung by thick groves of
good-sized white cedar, and the same tree was met with in groups in some
of the swamps at a distance from the river.

Doctor Bell, reporting on the country around Lake Lansdowne,
says:—“Except where forest fires have run, large spruce and tamarack
trees and some cedars were observed on the islands and on the mainland
near the lake, and also along the river between it and Nolin island.”

Doctor Bell writes in his report that

ALONG THE ATTAWAPISKAT,

“except where the timber has been destroyed by fire, there is a good
growth of spruce, tamarack, balsam, poplar and white birch, but it does
not extend far back, the country generally being open sphagnum swamps
with small scattered tamarack and black spruce trees.”

Doctor Bell, at one of his examinations before the Senate committee of
1887, produced as an exhibit a branch of the Banksian pine (_Pinus
Banksiana_), often called the jackpine and scrub pine. This is about the
only tree in North America which we can call strictly Canadian. Both its
northern and southern limits are practically in Canada. It extends
thousands of miles from the southeast in New Brunswick to the northwest,
in a belt, throughout the Dominion.

In height this tree grows one hundred feet and upwards. Doctor Bell had
seen them six feet in circumference. The largest trees that he had seen
of this species were on the upper waters of the southern branches of
Albany river. In general, trees attain their greatest perfection in the
centre of their geographical distribution. Sometimes they degenerate
into brush, at the outside edge of the territory in which they grow. As
you go north, south, east or west, they may become smaller and smaller
until they die out, but this is not the case with all kinds of trees.

The Banksian pine is not particularly valuable for lumber. It resembles
the red pine; it has a coarse, distinct grain and can be used for many
purposes. In England it would be used for the manufacture of fashionable
bedroom furniture.

It is something like the pine of Florida and Georgia, which has been
used for some years past in England in the manufacture of furniture. It
would

BECOME AN ARTICLE OF COMMERCE

if means of communication with the northern forests were provided. The
Banksian pine would make good ties, telegraph poles, and timber for
general purposes, besides fuel. In groves it grows very straight, but it
is more likely to be branchy than red pine. Doctor Bell had seen
hundreds of them in groves, affording logs of from twenty to twenty-two
inches in diameter—two or three logs to a tree. It grows very rapidly.
He had seen it, in his own experience, within fifteen years, growing to
be useful trees; whole tracts had been covered with good timber.

Asked while giving evidence before the Senate committee of 1887 whether
the shores of James bay and Hudson bay are wooded, Doctor Bell explained
that on the west side to Seal river, a little beyond Churchill,
commercial timber could be obtained from all the rivers flowing in from
the south, and jackpine from some, and spruce and tamarack from all the
rivers of James bay. This would be all of merchantable size, not
extraordinarily large, but plenty of it. The spruce might be described
as generally of a small size, but making up in quantity in the number of
logs that might be obtained. The tamarack, though, is large.

In the course of his 1886 report (See p. 18) Mr. A. P. Low of the
Geological Survey states:—“The trees around Favourable lake consist of
white and black spruce, aspen and balsam poplar, white birch, balsam and
tamarack, many of which exceed eighteen inches in diameter.” On the
shores of Sandy lake Mr. Low saw many trees of white spruce, poplar,
birch and balsam exceeding eighteen inches in diameter. Between this
lake and Severn lake there is a considerable area supporting a growth of
black and white spruce, tamarack, poplar and birch, slightly smaller
than those seen around the lakes.

As Severn river descends towards Favourable lake “the surrounding
country gradually becomes smoother and the timber larger until within
three miles of the lake, when the stream passes through low, swampy
land, covered with thick, wet moss and a small growth of black spruce
and tamarack.”

Mr. Low reports the soil about Deer lake as being “very thin and the
timber correspondingly poor, except on a few low points where some white
spruce, balsam and poplar exceed fifteen inches in diameter.”

Mr. Low (at the time Director of the Geological Survey), in his evidence
before the Senate committee of 1907, as to the resources of the more
southern sections of Keewatin which he had explored, namely, between
Norway House and Hudson bay, stated that the forest, as in a great many
other parts of Canada, had been largely destroyed by fire, but around
some of the large lakes and on the islands and other places,

A FAIR GROWTH OF TIMBER

is found in that region, with white and black spruce, pine, aspen,
poplar and white birch of eighteen inches diameter. The trees are fairly
clean, and a great many of them would probably make two or three logs,
so that what remains of the timber there is fairly decent and good,
except on the low swampy land where the growth is confined to black
spruce and tamarack of no great size. Throughout the more southern
region described by Mr. Low, there is a good deal of wood that could be
used in the manufacture of pulp.

All of the rivers in the region have waterpowers.

Mr. J. B. Tyrrell, in the report of his explorations in the southern
part of this region in 1896 (See p. 20), wrote:—“The surface is
generally forested, though most of the valuable timber has been
destroyed by fire. On Grass, Muhigan and Minago rivers, as well as on
the shores and islands of some of the lakes, there are still some
forests of excellent white spruce, but on the northern part of Burntwood
river white spruce is rather scarce, and at Nelson House timber for
house logs has to be collected from scattered groves and brought several
miles up or down the brooks or across the lake. Black spruce and canoe
birch grow on the more level and imperfectly drained tracts, and
Banskian pine may be seen here and there on the drier hillsides. Canoe
birch grows to a good size beside the lakes and streams, but aspen
(_Populus tremuloides_) is the commonest deciduous tree, as it grows on
the drier uplands everywhere,

OCCASIONALLY FORMING BEAUTIFUL FORESTS,

but more often, and especially towards the north, partly covering the
surface with scattered groves of small trees. Among the smaller trees or
shrubs, the rowan tree (_Pyrus Americana_) may be mentioned as growing
freely and having an abundant crop of berries along the face of the
limestone escarpment, especially around Wekusko and Reed lakes, and the
wild cherry (_Prunus Virginiana_) grows beside most of the lakes.

“The forests surrounding Reed lake are mostly of poplar, but there are
some good groves of fine large spruce up to twenty-five inches in
diameter.”

Mr. Tyrrell states that on the southeastern shore of Athapapuskow lake
“considerable areas are covered with large white spruce.” Almost all the
country surrounding Cranberry lakes has been swept by fire, but many of
the islands are still wooded with white spruce of fair size. At
Wintering lake, “the surrounding shores rise gently from the water, and
are densely wooded with a close forest of white spruce, growing on the
rich clay soil.”

Mr. Tyrrell describes finding the site of an old fur station near
Setting lake “completely overgrown with large spruce trees, quite
indistinguishable from those of the surrounding forest.” He adds:—“In
many other instances the sites of the ancient fur-trading posts could be
recognized as small, usually rectangular, poplar-covered areas, in the
midst of or on the border of the adjoining forest.”

Mr. Tyrrell reports the banks of the south branch of Gunisao river,
which flows into the northeast side of Lake Winnipeg, as being “wooded
with beautiful tall white spruce, apparently forming

A MAGNIFICENT CONIFEROUS FOREST

but how far back from the river this forest extends was not determined.
There is certainly here a large quantity of valuable timber, much more
than was seen anywhere else in the country immediately east of Lake
Winnipeg.” Spruce up to twenty-four inches in diameter was noted.

In the report of his explorations in 1899 Mr. D. B. Dowling of the
Geological Survey states:—“In the southern part of the district, north
of Lake Winnipeg, spruce of both the white and black species is found of
fair diameter, but in going north the size materially decreases. Over
the major portion of the rocky country Banksian pine is the principal
tree, which, though not large enough in general for timber, might in the
future be of use for pulp wood.

“The hilly country to the south of Sisipuk lake and northwest of Loon
lake is not well timbered but the lower land between the two and on the
islands is fairly well covered by groves of small spruce.”

Mr. Dowling, in his report of 1901 on Ekwan district (See p. 21),
states:— “The timber along the coast gradually becomes smaller as we go
northward and the tree-line recedes from the shore, leaving it finally
at the Opinnagow so that the country behind that cape is more or less an
open plain. The shore, where the trees are at a distance from the beach,
is generally an even mud slope, covered above high tide with grass,
followed by a wide belt of stunted willows (gray) which look somewhat
like the sagebush of the western plains. Behind this, a few isolated
spruces of small stature appear before the tree line is reached. In
sailing along this coast, it is impossible to know which way to steer so
as to run parallel with the land, as nothing can be seen ahead by which
to shape one’s course.”

As to the timber in the interior of Ekwan river district, Mr. Dowling
reports:—“Along the streams there is a narrow fringe of timber, but in
approaching the tree-limit this becomes very small. Back from the
immediate slopes of the rivers the surface is nearly level, and
moss-covered, with scattered groups of small spruce and tamarack. The
greater part of the interior is reported to be muskeg (open bog). A
small collection of about forty species of shore plants was made at the
mouths of Ekwan and Albany rivers.

“Mr. Dowling found the surface of the terrace of Ekwan river to be
covered with a thick coating of moss, and the timber on it is mostly
small spruce and tamarack. Some of the trees might be from six to eight
inches in diameter, but the average is much less. At the edges of the
bank a fringe of larger trees occasionally appears, but it does not
extend far from the stream.”

RED LAKE RIVER AND RED LAKE.

In his report of his 1893 explorations Mr. Dowling says the timber on
the banks of Red lake river “is mostly poplar of a fair size with a
sprinkling of birch and black spruce. The birch average twelve inches in
diameter, but only a few of the spruce trees were found over eighteen
inches.”

Mr. Dowling says the forest about Red lake “is somewhat varied, spruce
and Banksian pine alternating as the dominant trees. On all the dry and
sandy ground a thick growth of slender Banksian pine is found, and no
trees of large size are apparently to be seen in such areas, but in the
valleys and near the lakes black spruce is occasionally met with,
forming small groves scattered through the forests of deciduous trees.
Individual trees of larger size are common on the islands and points
over which forest fires have not run, and such trees may attain in some
instances a diameter of twenty inches, but the average is under eighteen
inches. Birch and poplar are almost always present wherever the soil
admits. On the richer and lower ground, between Red lake and Gull Rock
lake, and farther down the river, the poplar trees are well grown and
appear in groves in which nearly all trees average eighteen inches in
diameter near the base. Farther to the westward on the higher ground,
the soil being sandy, the Banksian pine is more abundant, and near the
western end of Pipestone bay, some trees of red pine form a small grove,
which appears to be the northern limit of the species in this basin.”

Mr. Dowling says the trees near Trout lake river are mostly poplar, with
slender spruce on the lower land just behind. Occasionally Banksian pine
is seen on the drier parts. Mr. Dowling mentions a tall forest of poplar
and birch as bordering the western branch of White-mud river.

Speaking of the country explored by him about Lac Seul, Mr. Dowling
says:—“The country is well covered by timber but of small average
growth. The sandy tracts are generally wooded by Banksian pine, but in
the river-valleys and on the heavier land, poplar, birch and spruce are
abundant. White and red pine are found in small groves south of Lac Seul
and are of good average size for timber. On the lake are scattered trees
of both varieties. The northern limit of red pine extends to Red lake,
where a few trees were observed. Cedar of inferior growth occurs in
isolated localities and extends northwest to the height-of-land, but
none seem within Berens river basin.”

BASINS OF THE WINISK AND THE ATTAWAPISKAT.

According to Mr. McInnes’s report of his survey of the region drained by
the Winisk and the Attawapiskat in 1903, 1904 and 1905 (See p.
23):—“The average size of the trees growing within the country explored
is not great. On exceptionally favourable tracts the spruces attain
sizes quite large enough for commercial use as sawn lumber, and large
areas would afford good pulpwood. Evidences of the constant recurrence
of forest fires over the area are everywhere plainly seen. The brulé
areas, varying from quite small patches to large tracts, are of every
age; some are so old the forest has attained the full height of the old
growth and the newer age of the trees can only be ascertained by a
reference to their rings of growth, and others so recent that no
vegetation covers the blackened surface. These fires are generally the
result of the carelessness of Indian travellers, but may sometimes be
traced to the igniting of a dry, standing tree-trunk by lightning. The
oldest trees found in the whole area were growing on a till-covered
island, about fifty miles from the mouth of Winisk river. The complete
isolation from the mainland by broad channels ensured its protection
from fires having their origin outside its own borders. The spruces
growing here were found by their rings of growth to be between two
hundred and seventy and two hundred and eighty years old. The diameters
and ages of trees, growing in a number of different localities
throughout the region, were noted, and are given in the list below:—

──────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────
Diam. Age
in in. by
3 ft. rings,
from of
ground. growth.
──────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────
Tamarack, Winisk river, 32 miles from 9 100
mouth
Black spruce " 32 " 12 125
" " 32 " 12 153
" " 32 " 8 75
" " 50 " 10 275
" " 65 " near bank 8 130
" " 65 " " 6 115
" " 65 " 10 chains back 3 105
Tamarack " 65 " " 3 80
Black spruce " below Wapikopa 10 130
lake
" " Wapikopa lake 9 145
" " " 6 135
" " Nibinamik lake 9 75
" " " 5 75
" " above 15 130
Nibinamik lake
Aspen poplar " " 15 130
──────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────
_Note_:—It will be observed that this paragraph and other portions of this
testimony really refer to the Athabaska country treated of in the
preceding chapter; but to save an awkward dislocation of Prof. Macoun’s
testimony, it has been kept intact. (E. J. C.)
──────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────

As to the region explored by him in 1906 (See p. 23), Mr. McInnes
reports:—“Though a wooded country throughout, there are but limited
areas where the forest growth is of a size to be commercially of much
value. There are no hard woods, the only deciduous trees that attain
merchantable measurements being the canoe birch, the aspen and balsam
poplars and the tamarack. Black spruce is the most abundant coniferous
tree and grows to a size sufficient at least for pulpwood. Associated
with tamarack, it covers all the more marshy tracts, giving way where
the land becomes drier to white spruce, which is the timber tree of the
region, and on the driest ridges to Banksian pine. Forest fires have
been widespread and most destructive throughout the whole region sparing
only the very wet muskeg areas and a few tracts isolated by surrounding
water or marsh.

“White and black spruce, tamarack, aspen, balsam and canoe birch form
the forest surrounding Cross lake, the deciduous trees for the most part
growing only in a fringe along the immediate shores.

TREES OF SUITABLE SIZE FOR SAWING

into eight and ten inch boards are found on the islands, along the
stream valleys and in places near the lake shores, but the general
average size of the trees inland is smaller than this.”

Mr. McInnes has the following to say of the timber he noticed in his
ascent of Burntwood river:—“Above Odei river the forest is mainly
spruce and tamarack of about sixty years growth, the larger trunks
reaching diameters of from eight to ten inches, but the general average
not more than six inches. In the valleys occasional white spruces and
tamaracks attain diameters as great as eighteen inches. These are trees
that have escaped when the surrounding forest was burned and are
sufficient evidence that, but for the repeated fires, there would be
large areas covered with good timber. In the fifteen mile stretch of the
Burntwood below Waskwatim lake, the low flat along the river is covered
by sixty years’ timber growth, mainly of Banksian pine and spruce. The
higher plateau is wooded principally with spruce from six to eight
inches in diameter, with scattered Banksian pine, poplar and white birch
succeeding an earlier burned forest. A mixed second growth forest,
mainly aspen poplar, covers all the uplands round Waskwatim lake, while
on the islands and on low flats bordering bays of the lake are found
white spruce and poplar of diameters up to one foot. The country north
of Footprint lake is described by Mr. McInnes as being covered for the
most part with a mixed second growth from ten to thirty years old, but
with here and there clumps of white spruce, with tall and straight
trunks a foot or more in diameter. As to the region just north of the
Saskatchewan, Mr. McInnes says the areas of forest, where the trunks are
large enough to be of commercial value, are limited. The principal
tracts of large standing timber are situated to the north of Moose lake,
to the west of Atikameg, in lower Grass river valley and on the ridge
separating Cormorant and Yawningstone lakes. The last named tract
contains white spruce of exceptionally large size with tall clear
trunks. Smaller areas are found on islands and points in the various
lakes, along the upper valley of Cowan river, and in clumps along all
the stream valleys in the district. Smaller timber, mainly black spruce,
that would be of value for pulpwood, is much more widely distributed
over large areas.”

Mr. McInnes made a computation of the age of the trees in the area he
explored and found that the

ANNUAL GROWTH IS SLOW.

They run from four to fourteen inches in diameter. They would furnish,
he thinks, very strong and firm lumber, and the smaller trees, owing to
their closely packed fibres and the comparative absence of open cellular
matter, would be especially well adapted for the manufacture of pulpwood
for paper making.

Mr. McInnes, in his evidence before the Senate committee of 1907, stated
that the western part of Keewatin has evidently been a country of good
timber generally, but unfortunately it has been almost all burned over,
so that the only areas of good timber that he knew of were the area
north of Moose lake, the area west of Clearwater lake, and the area
between Cormorant and Yawningstone lakes. He made cross-sections in that
country several times, and he found white spruce, and the largest tree
he found was thirty inches in diameter. He would say most of these trees
make about three fourteen-foot logs because they were growing thickly,
and it was a regular white spruce timber limit. There were a great many
from ten inches up to twenty-three inches. That is an area about six
miles long by two or three wide, and going through that there are areas
of swamp. He cross-sectioned through it, and would come to a quarter of
a mile of good trees, and then perhaps a mile of swamp land with black
spruce, and half a mile of good trees right across. North of that point
there are only a few isolated areas of timber that had escaped the fire.
On the islands and lakes there were pretty good timbers, and on some
little peninsulas that are nearly cut off; otherwise it had all been
burnt.

ABOUT WATERPOWERS.

Specially referring to waterpowers, Mr. McInnes, in the report of his
explorations in 1906 (See p. 23), says:—“Between Lake Winnipeg and
Split lake, a distance of about two hundred and twenty-five miles, the
Nelson river has a descent of approximately two hundred and seventy-five
feet. The current between the numerous lake expansions is generally
swift, and upwards of a dozen falls and rapids occur, some of the former
offering magnificent sites for water powers. The aggregate power that
could be generated along the river is enormous, as the amount of water
passing over the various falls is very great. The volume of the river
can be appreciated by a consideration of the extent of its drainage
area, which embraces all the country westward to the mountains between
the watershed of the Churchill and Athabaska on the north, and the
Missouri on the south, and eastward to the head waters of Albany river,
and within fifty miles of Lake Superior.”

Mr. Owen O’Sullivan, in his 1906 report (See p. 23), states that the
shores of Assean lake, which is about twelve miles long and a mile wide,
are “well wooded with black spruce, tamarack, and white birch.” The
forest growth at Waskaiowaka lake is chiefly black spruce and white
birch of from four to fourteen inches in diameter. Mr. O’Sullivan
describes a hill of drift “covered mostly with black spruce averaging
eight inches in diameter” as rising for two hundred feet above the level
of the water on the east side of the expansion of the Little Churchill
below Waskaiowaka lake. As far down as the junction of Switching river
the country on both sides of the Little Churchill produces black spruce,
white birch and tamarack of small size. From a point eighty miles down
the Little Churchill northward, the country, which was overrun by a fire
that occurred some forty years ago, is now partly covered with bunches
of second-growth black spruce, tamarack and white birch. Bunches of
spruce and tamarack that escaped the fires were frequently met close to
the water’s edge.

In his evidence before the Senate committee of 1907, Mr. O’Sullivan
stated that in his trip in 1906, the only timber he saw was at Split
lake—spruce, poplar and white birch, from four to eighteen inches in
diameter. The country between there and Big lake is swampy and bears
black spruce with small spruce averaging four to six inches in diameter,
which would make good pulpwood. Then around Wabishkok there are birch
and white spruce, and so on. They are a little larger, as large as six
to eighteen inches in some places, occurring in isolated groves. The
black spruce would average in the nice terraces and level clay slopes
from the lake about eighteen inches. They grow that size and more. North
of that, between there and the tree limit or the open barren ground, the
country was

RUN OVER BY FIRE

about forty years ago, and probably there was another fire which
occurred about five years ago, so there are no trees. Going down the
Little Churchill there are no trees to be seen on the heights, except in
the valleys of the river, where groves of spruce and poplar which
escaped the fire are standing. These spruce and poplars which are in the
valleys are sometimes twenty inches in diameter. The cottonwood grows to
about fourteen inches. It is tall and very healthy looking. The spruce
trees grow pretty long, and quite a number of sawlogs could be taken out
of each tree. The soil is pretty good, but the area is small. After
leaving Big lake, all the way down there is no timber at all. In the
valleys of all the streams there is timber, consisting of bunches of
spruce and tamarack. At the Big Churchill the clay hills are mostly
covered with moss. It has been burned over, and there are good large
spruce in the valleys of Little Churchill river away up to about
eighteen or twenty inches in diameter, but they are very few. They are
all very healthy looking trees.

In 1902, Mr. Alfred W. G. Wilson, of the Geological Survey, made a
reconnaissance traverse across the southern part of the unexplored area
lying to the north of Lac Seul and east of Trout lake, visiting Slate,
Marsh, Gull, Smoothbrook, Cat and St. Joseph lakes. He states in his
report:—“The forest growth is found chiefly around the lakes and
streams. The sands, sandy gravels, or clays, usually of glacial origin,
are generally forested, the trees varying with the character of the
soil. There are large areas of nearly bare rock, where only a few
stunted conifers or poplars grow in the crevices. Where the soil is
sparse, and the country low-lying but yet fairly well drained, there is
an open forest, chiefly black spruce, and the ground is covered with a
dense mat of moss interlaced with fibrous roots. The soil covered, and
the swampy areas, are usually thickly overgrown with small shrubs,
mostly alder. In general the timber is rather small, in most parts of
the district at present too small even for pulpwood or ties.
Occasionally along streams the trees are larger, especially north of the
east end of Lac Seul. Another area of good timber, chiefly black spruce
and tamarack, occurs along Root river between Lac Seul and Lake St.
Joseph.”

Mr. J. W. McLaggan, in the account of his trip in 1907 (See p. 58),
describes the country between The Pas and Clearwater lake as covered
with small, mixed timber. On the north side of Cormorant lake, and along
the creek which connects it with Lake Yawningstone, and on the south
side of the latter lake, he saw from three to five million feet of good
milling spruce timber. Along Cowan river the country is described as low
and flat, with small quantities of good spruce timber in spots until
within a few miles of Black Duck lake when bunches of good spruce,
estimated at ten million feet, come into view. After crossing Black Duck
lake the country continues low and marshy, with scattered bunches of
spruce and tamarack of a size suitable for ties or pulpwood. As Mr.
McLaggan approached Reed lake he passed through low and swampy country
covered with scrubby timber. To the south of Reed lake about a million
feet of medium sized spruce were sighted. The country back was found to
have been burned over and now growing poplar, which, in a few years,
will make good pulpwood. On the north side of Herb lake there are spruce
and poplar fit for railway ties and pulpwood, and along the river to the
rapids there are small bunches of jackpine and tamarack and of
merchantable spruce, but back from the lake and river the country
appeared all burned. Mr. McLaggan expresses the opinion that there must
have been a good timber area bordering these waters, and that, if fire
can be kept out,

REFORESTATION WILL SOON BE EFFECTED.

Along the shores of and on the islands in Setting lake there is, Mr.
McLaggan estimates, about ten million feet of young, sound, clear spruce
timber, averaging from twelve to fourteen inches in diameter. Between
Setting and Paint lakes are two falls of thirty feet, where splendid
power can be developed; the banks of the river become higher and there
are small bunches of spruce and poplar, but back from the river has been
burned over. On the south side of Paint lake there is a fairly good
bunch of spruce, suitable for railway ties or pulpwood. Back from the
lake the country has been burned over but is growing up again with
poplar and other trees. On Methye lake Mr. McLaggan found the timber to
be mainly jackpine and tamarack of small size, a limited portion of
which would be fit for railway ties. Traversing File river, with the
exception of a bunch of spruce of about half a million feet, averaging
twelve to fourteen inches in diameter, there was seen nothing but small,
scrubby mixed timber of but little value. The country back from the
river has been burned over. Between Reed lake and Elbow lake he saw
about two million feet of good spruce and poplar, averaging from twelve
to fourteen inches in diameter. Towards the lower end of Cranberry lake
there are bunches of good spruce. It is estimated that there are a
million feet in all. The country continues rough and rocky, with patches
of good land and some muskeg. In the country between Cranberry and
Athapapuskow lakes there is a poor growth of scrubby timber. Some small
bunches of spruce were seen along Athapapuskow lake near the portage,
and by Goose river, but the country has all burned over, leaving only
small clumps of spruce. Speaking generally of the timber in the area
explored, Mr. McLaggan reported:—“The fires seem to have burned over
nearly all the country and I was not able to walk far enough into the
interior to find any land not burned, and from information gathered from
Indians and trappers, would conclude that this burned land reached from
Grass to Burntwood river, with the exception of small pieces along the
lakes and rivers. There is a growth of young timber coming up, since the
fire, which may be of value in time.”

W. Thibaudeau, C.E. (See p. 23), states in his report that although
there is no merchantable timber in the vicinity of Churchill, there is
abundance of fine building stone and limestone to be found everywhere,
and there is also an ample supply of timber for fuel purposes for many
years along both banks of Churchill river and around Button bay. He
continues:—“Between October 24, 1906, and November 9, 1906, I made an
exploration of the country between North river and Churchill river for a
distance south of Button bay, of about twenty miles. On the

EAST SIDE OF BUTTON BAY

I found a strip of good timber, consisting of spruce and tamarack six to
ten inches in diameter, about half a mile wide and extending three to
four miles in length on the east side, between the southern ridge of
Churchill peninsula and the bay, and about three miles south of
Churchill. At the head of Button bay (and parallel with it), there are a
number of parallel ridges extending to North river. These ridges are
timbered with spruce and tamarack four to ten inches in diameter. Close
to North river there is a good spruce timber ten to thirty inches in
diameter in small scattered bunches, covering a distance of about four
miles. At the southern end of the south ridge of the western peninsula
at Churchill, there is a strip of good spruce timber, six to twelve
inches in diameter, extending about two miles by four miles; also on the
east side of the same ridge about one and one-third miles south of
Mosquito point, there is a strip of good timber for a distance of about
four miles.

“Between December 7, 1906, and December 17, 1906, I made an exploration
of the country between Churchill and Owl rivers. Four miles from
Churchill river in a southerly direction I crossed a ridge, running in a
northeast and southwest direction at about one and one-half miles from
Hudson bay, extending opposite to Mosquito point. From the point of
crossing to the bay, on the sunny side, the ridge is well timbered with
spruce six to twelve inches in diameter. Twenty-five miles from the
starting point, I crossed another sandy ridge with scrubby timber. Two
miles west of this point there is a barren hill known as White mountain,
three hundred feet in height by one mile in length. At the eastern woods
there are a few square miles of spruce and tamarack averaging six to
eight inches in diameter. Close to White Whale lake I crossed another
gravel ridge having no timber. On each side of Salmon creek there are
scrubs, willows and small spruce, with grassy meadows. At Broad river to
the left of the place of crossing, for about four miles there is a strip
of timber one-third of a mile in width, eight to fourteen inches in
diameter, consisting of stunted black spruce.”

The section about Waskaiowaka lake is fairly level and dry, with some
scrub timber. The banks are steep and covered with very thick mossy
peat, probably ten feet thick. The timber consists of black spruce and
white birch from five to sixteen inches in diameter. From the Hudson’s
Bay Company’s post on Split lake to the mouth of Grass river, the
country on the east side of the lake is undulating, and part of the
banks and islands is fairly timbered with spruce. Part of the shore of
Landing lake and the islands are well timbered with spruce six to ten
inches in diameter. Travelling from Landing lake to the head of Sipiwesk
lake, the country was found dry and well timbered with spruce from eight
to fourteen inches in diameter. The islands of Sipiwesk lake are well
timbered with spruce, some being thirty inches in diameter. On Reed
lake, the islands are well timbered with spruce six to fourteen inches
in diameter. From Reed lake to Station 616 the country is level, forty
per cent. being swampy. There is some spruce and tamarack timber four to
eight inches in diameter. On the north side of Cormorant lake, there is
a strip of timber, four miles wide by ten miles long.

[Illustration: Log jam on Limestone river.]

THIS TIMBER WAS THE BEST SEEN

while exploring around that country.

Mr. Thibaudeau describes the country from Split lake and extending to
The Pas, ten miles in width on each side of the proposed route of the
Hudson bay railway, as “a pulpwood belt”. He says in his report:—“On
this area, assuming one-sixth to be covered by pulp wood, the balance
being river, lakes, ponds, swamps, etc., and assuming ten cords per acre
of an average of six inches in diameter, there would be five million
seven hundred and fifty-six thousand six hundred and sixty cords. This
is a very low, but safe estimate.”

Mr. Thibaudeau makes the following reference to the water powers in the
region explored by him:—“Deer river at its mouth has a minimum flow of
seven thousand cubic feet per minute. A dam, eighteen feet high, can be
built at reasonable cost and would generate one thousand six hundred
horse-power. Two dams of the same height could be built within ten miles
of the river mouth, which is twenty-five miles from Churchill. North
river, which is three hundred and fifty feet wide during December, had a
flow of not less than two hundred and fifty thousand cubic feet per
minute. With a fifteen-foot dam, it would generate about five thousand
horse-power. On Churchill river, within sixty to eighty miles from
Churchill, large waterpower could be developed and transmitted to
Churchill. Nelson river, Burntwood river and Grass river have a number
of falls which could be utilized for the development of power for use in
pulp mills or other industries.”

That portion of Mr. J. R. Dickson’s report (See p. 60) referring to the
timber of the district between

THE PAS AND CROSS LAKE

explored by him in 1910 is especially valuable. He states:—“In the
region we traversed, only five species, namely,—spruce, poplar,
tamarack, birch and jackpine have any possible commercial value, and of
these, speaking generally, only one, spruce, is large enough for sawmill
purposes or railway tie material. The poplar, birch and pine are
invariably too short, spindly, limby and crooked for any use save fuel
or pulpwood, and what mature tamarack there was is now standing dead
from insect attack. We did not find over two hundred green tamarack
above ten inches in diameter all summer. This remnant is on the
northeast end of Bear island in Sipiwesk lake. Black spruce is easily
the predominant species in all that region, and, except on very
occasional well-drained tracts of spruce-flat type, where it reaches ten
to fourteen inches in diameter at breast height, it is a small spindly
tree, only four to eight inches diameter breast height at maturity,
useless even for second class ties. This is the condition in which the
jackpine also occurs. The white spruce, therefore, is the only species
large enough to furnish construction timber, sawlogs, or even railway
ties, and the supply is very limited. In the first place, this species
occurs only on the best drained spots, such as river and lake margins or
on the small islands; in the second, the fires of the past one hundred
years have destroyed nearly all the old stand. To sum up then, only a
mere fraction of one per cent. of the area we surveyed now carries
merchantable timber—a fringe along lower Mitishto and upper Minago
rivers, and on a few of the islands and peninsulas in the larger
lakes—as shown on the map. There is probably enough timber available to
build the rough construction work of the Hudson Bay Railway.

“From the mere size of the country and the density of the oncoming
second growth stands, the possible supply of firewood is enormous.
Because of its remoteness from settlement, however, it has no present
commercial value. Owing to the killing by bark beetles of practically
all the larger tamarack (or possibly killed by larch sawfly previous to
beetle attack, though we found no trace of the sawfly), there is almost
no green pile timber of any value in the whole region. Hence, unless by
importation, the only choice left is between dead tamarack and the
largest of the close-grained black spruce. The latter would remain sound
in soil contact for about ten or twelve years, which would
satisfactorily cover the first initial experimental stage in the
operation of the new road.

“Just at the present time, within the area we inspected, the timber is
too young and small upon the whole to be cut at a profit even for
pulpwood. But in the absence of fires for twenty years the now
eighty-year-old stands of four to eight-inch timber can be profitably
cut for this purpose, and it is probable that within the next quarter of
a century part of the

ENORMOUS ENERGY NOW RUNNING FREE

in the falls and rapids of Nelson and Grass rivers will be harnessed to
drive pulp and paper mills. The age of the reproduction is in nearly
every case a measure of the time which has elapsed since the last
destructive fire occurred. As a general rule, to which, however, there
are endless local exceptions and variations—the young growth is
approximately either forty or eighty years of age, the former being now
one to four inches in diameter, and the latter four to eight inches, but
none yet large enough for making railway ties. It will, however, soon be
suitable for pulpwood. Scattered trees from older stands occur in this
second growth, but not in sufficient number to repay the cost of
lumbering. The rate of growth in the very dense stands that are usual in
that latitude is decidedly slow except where the soil and drainage
conditions happen to be just right. Black spruce on semi-muskeg, a site
of average quality for that species, is only four to five inches in
diameter breast height at one hundred years. White spruce is rather
fastidious regarding moisture conditions and only appears on fairly
well-drained spots, attaining there a size of eight to twelve inches
diameter within a century. Poplar in that time reaches eight to ten
inches. As for jackpine, occasional trees reach twelve to sixteen
inches, but only after long immunity from fires, and such trees are too
limby for use. I saw no jackpine stand where the trees would average
even six inches in diameter. If the general drainage conditions could in
some way be improved so as to partially replace the unprofitable black
spruce with the white species,

THE WEALTH PRODUCING POWER OF THE REGION

would be immeasurably greater.”

Mr. William Beech of Churchill, in his communication to the press
referred to in the preceding chapter (See p. 63), writes of the timber
resources of Hudson bay region:—“Another valuable asset of the district
is the timber which everywhere dots the regions around the bay. The most
northerly species is the spruce, which extends north of Churchill about
forty miles, as far as Seal river, and which attains the height of about
thirty feet and an average diameter of from twelve to fifteen inches.
The balance of the timber is pulpwood and this exists in unlimited
quantities. When you consider that the best of water power is available
all along the rivers for the manufacture of this product, it will be
seen that this is but another of the valuable resources of the
district.”

As to the water powers available, Mr. Beech writes:—“There are a great
number of magnificent water power sites, within very easy access of the
surveyed route of the railway, all of which can be easily developed to
furnish almost unlimited electrical energy. Hydro-electric energy could
be developed at any one of these sites within a distance of thirty miles
from the road, which would make transmission to points along it, or
possibly operation of it actually, by electricity. It certainly assures
cheap power for any manufacturing or milling centre which may develop.
All these power locations must inevitably become very valuable. A few
years ago, no one, with the exception of one or two far-seeing and
experienced individuals, believed in the power propositions on Winnipeg
river where so much development is now taking place. To-day what are
they worth? They cannot be bought at any price. I believe the same will
be true of the sites contiguous to the Hudson Bay Railway.”

CHAPTER IV.

THE KEEWATIN AREA.

(Newest Ontario and Northern Manitoba.)

Economic Minerals.

The Rocks in Many Cases Highly Magnetic.—Norite Rock Similar to
That at Sudbury About Trout Lake.—Peat in the District North of
Lake Winnipeg.—A Large District Underlain By Keewatin and
Huronian Rocks Which “Has Large Possibilities.”—Gypsum.—
Building Granites.—Quartz Veins on Grassy River Below Reed
Lake.—A Possibility of Nickel Occurring.

The evidence contained in the report of the British parliamentary
investigation of 1749 shows that from the establishment of the first
trading posts along the shores of Hudson bay, the attention of the
officials and servants of the Hudson’s Bay Company was attracted by the
statements of the natives as to the existence in the country of deposits
of economic minerals. The earliest authorities of the trading company
appear, however, not only to have abstained from investigating the
mineral resources of the region, but to have discouraged their employees
from prospecting, desiring them to concentrate all their efforts upon
the fur trade. Many of the witnesses before the committee repeated in
their evidence statements obtained from the Indians as to the existence
of deposits of lead, and particularly of copper, in the north, doubtless
referring to the then unknown Coppermine district.

The only evidence heard before the committee, unquestionably bearing
upon the mineral resources of the territory immediately under review in
this chapter, was given by Alexander Browne, who had been six years in
the company’s service as surgeon at the bay, and who stated that he had
seen large quantities of red earth, which was obtained about thirty-six
miles to the southward of Churchill river; that he had tried some of it
in a crucible, and found it to contain a heavy metallic substance like
cinnabar, and a fluid like quicksilver. This trial was only to satisfy
his curiosity, having received no orders to make it; but the

GOVERNOR WAS PRESENT AT THE EXPERIMENT,

and upon the witness presenting his surprise to him that the company did
not endeavour to improve these discoveries, the Governor answered that
he was likewise surprised that they did not.

Rev. John Semmens (See p. 36), writing of his observations while on
service as a missionary in the Burntwood district, says:—“It was not my
business to seek for minerals, but having been a miner in earlier years,
I had my eyes open, and found many indications of deposits which, in my
opinion, at no distant day will contribute largely to the commercial
development of the north. I shall be surprised if one of these lodes is
not found at or near the southern outlet of Beaver Dam lake. And there
will be many others.”

Doctor Robert Bell, of the Geological Survey, describes the rocks of the
eastern part of Lake St. Joseph as “corresponding with some of those of
the Huronian series. On the northern side, three miles from Osnaburgh
House, there is a grey mica schist.” On the Albany, two and a half miles
below Shabushquaia river, “Huronian rocks make their appearance. They
consist of light-greenish, rather finely crystalline hornblende schist;
black, with some light-coloured schist, together with fifteen or twenty
feet of fine-grained banded magnetic iron ore, with slaty partings. A
specimen of this ore was analysed by Mr. Kenrick of the Geological
Survey, and found to contain 42·09 per cent. of metallic iron, and to be
free from titanic acid. Along with the magnetite is a band of iron
pyrites, a few inches thick, with traces of copper.” A dark green
hornblende schist occurs at two miles before coming to Shabushquaia
river. It holds patches of calc-spar and quartz running with the
cleavage. Specks of copper pyrites were found in small quartz veins in
the schist at the foot of the falls at the eighth portage below Lake St.
Joseph on the Albany. At the eleventh portage Doctor Bell examined a
number of veins of quartz holding epidote and hornblende, but no ores
could be detected.

Doctor Bell, before the Senate committee of 1887, referring to his first
voyage to Hudson bay, explained that lignite had been found inland in
the country south and west of James bay. It belongs to a more recent
geological formation than the lignite in the vicinity of Edmonton.

Mr. A. P. Low, in his report of his examination of the country between
Lake Winnipeg and Hudson bay, says “The rocks in several places

ARE HIGHLY MAGNETIC,

and probably contain large quantities of iron ore, both disseminated in
small crystals through the rock, and in large masses.” When being
examined before the Senate committee in 1907, Mr. Low, then Director of
the Geological Survey of Canada, drew attention to the fact that the map
of Keewatin showed a large number of lakes, like Gas lake, Island lake,
Favourable lake, Severn lake, Trout lake, etc., and remarked that
wherever these patches of water are seen it indicates softer rocks than
the other parts. These rocks are usually Huronian, and in many places
they carry good indications of minerals, copper pyrites and different
sulphides of that kind. At Trout lake there is a large area of what is
called norite rock. These are the rocks in which the nickel deposits of
Sudbury occur, and there is great probability of a small deposit being
found up there.

There have been no indications of coal discovered in Keewatin, but Mr.
Low explained that on hurried trips such as he had made it was
impossible to examine mineral deposits very much, and one is liable to
lose many of them. The general character of the southern part of
Keewatin as regards mineral resources is good.

In the bank of Nelson river, opposite the mouth of Pine creek, Mr. J. B.
Tyrrell reports a dark grey, rather fine-grained diorite or uralitic
diabase, probably forming part of a large dyke cutting the gneiss. “Near
the north end of Little Playgreen lake is a light reddish-grey massive
biotite-granite cut by veins, a foot or more in width, of red pegmatite
containing crystalline masses of molybdenite, with occasional crystals
of pyrite and magnetite.”

Mr. Tyrrell reports copper and arsenical pyrites in a diabase dyke
exposed in an island in Pipestone lake two miles and a quarter from the
mouth of the river.

He reports the cliffs on the lower part of Burntwood river as being
“occasionally overlain by a small thickness of peat.” He reports other
deposits of peat in the district north of Lake Winnipeg.

Before the Senate committee of 1907, Mr. Tyrrell explained that the
primary object in all his explorations was the mineral development of
the country, and any other information that he collected was incidental.
He stated that there is a district from Cumberland House northeastward
towards Nelson river which is underlain by what are known as

KEEWATIN AND HURONIAN ROCKS,

the same kind as those in which minerals are found in northern Ontario
at the present time. The very existence of those rocks was barely known.
There had been practically no exploration of them, no prospecting, so
that no one could say as to whether they were to be a barren portion of
those rocks which are rich elsewhere, or whether they were to be like
the Huronian and Keewatin rocks elsewhere, rich in mineral of some of
the kinds so much desired. Comparing them with the rocks in other
places, they have large possibilities. From that point there is an area
of sandstone in the vicinity of Cree lake which may contain copper, but
nothing much was known of it. It is about the age and character of the
rocks that are rich in copper around Lake Superior, but no mineral
wealth has yet been found in it.

Mr. D. B. Dowling, in his report on the survey of Burntwood-Nelson-Lake
Winnipeg district in 1899, predicts that the several large areas of
Huronian rocks which he outlines will at some future time be thoroughly
prospected, and, as has been the case in nearly all such areas, ores of
the useful and precious metals are likely to be found. “As it is at
present, a very hasty visit has shown that many quartz veins and
intrusive dykes cut these rocks, and indications of the precious metals
are not wanting. In the Pipestone area on Nelson river, mispickel and
copper pyrites are recorded by Mr. Tyrrell, as well as a promising
showing of mica on the south side of Indian Reserve island, on Cross
lake.”

In Severn district, in the southern part of the old district of Keewatin
(now part of Ontario), there is a large region lying to the southwest of
Cape Henrietta Maria, that had never been geographically explored before
1901. In the year named, Mr. Dowling was entrusted to do this work, and
was instructed to make an instrumental survey of Ekwan river, the
largest stream in this region. A micrometer survey of the river was made
to the mouth of the Washagami branch, a distance of one hundred and
fifty miles. The general valley was found to be a narrow cut through
clay, with cut banks on either side for most of the distance to the
first branch. As directed by his instructions, Mr. Dowling

LOOKED FOR GYPSUM

between Moose Factory and Albany, and found some loose pieces of it in
the vicinity of Nomansland.

“It is quite likely that this mineral occurs in situ in the vicinity,”
Mr. Dowling states in his report.

In another part of his report Mr. Dowling states:—“Silurian limestone
is found on Trout river, draining Mill lake, as well as in the bed of
this lake just north of the trap rocks. The rocks at the narrows of the
lake, described in the maps, as ‘high and romantic’ are cliffs one
hundred and fifty feet in height of trap, capping horizontal beds of
probably Animikie age. The trap overflow covers the uneven surface of
these rocks, in much the same manner as Nipigon bay in Lake Superior.
The underlying rocks are dark slates impregnated with iron ore, and
interbanded with beds of jasper. Some of the beds seem to contain a high
percentage of magnetite and hematite. On the east shore a section of
about ninety feet of these jasper and iron-bearing slates is exposed
above the lake, but on the west side they have been brought down to
below the water level by a series of north and south faults and the
exposures there are of trap alone. These rocks form an east and west
ridge reaching to the lakes on the Washagami and eastward to a large
lake on a branch of Trout river, which, as before stated, drains Sutton
Mill lake and runs to the north.”

Mr. Dowling reported iron ore in the vicinity of Sutton Mill lake, west
of James bay, and south of Hudson bay. On the east coast of James bay
and Hudson bay abundant evidence of iron ore had been discovered; in
fact, two large islands, Taylor and Gillis islands, are said to be
almost pure iron ore.

Mr. D. B. Dowling, in his report of 1902 (Part F.F. Geol. Sur. Report)
says:—“Small deposits of peat are to be found in various places, but
the most important, from an economic point of view, is the area north of
Lake Winnipeg described by Mr. Tyrrell. Along the valley of Burntwood
river, where it is cut through the thick clay deposit, the general
surface of the terrace is quite level. The drainage near the river is
general, but back from the edge of the valley, on the more level parts,
there is very often a wide expanse of swamp covered by a stunted growth
of spruce and carpeted by heavy layers of moss. These swamps may at some
future time supply peat for fuel.”

According to the report of Mr. Wm. McInnes, who explored in 1906 (See p.
23) the basins of Reed and Wekusko lakes and Grass river, there are
areas of intrusive granite, some of which, below Reed lake, are of even
texture and bright red colour and would furnish very beautiful stones
for monumental work and ornamental building. Palæozoic limestones cover
all the country between the Saskatchewan and an east and west line
cutting the southern ends of Reed and Wekusko lakes. The rocks are, as
far as examined, magnesian and are probably all dolomites. They occur in
flat-lying or gently undulating beds, varying in thickness from six feet
or more to quite thin and shaly, the latter occurring near the base and
the heavy beds forming the mass of the formation. Many of the heavy beds
are even-grained and uniformly bedded so that they can be readily taken
out in blocks of even thickness and of any required size. Many of the
low cliffs near the lakes are so situated as to be admirably adapted for
quarrying. Quartz veins are plentiful throughout the Keewatin belts,
but, with the exception of arsenical and iron pyrites and traces of
copper (near File lake), no valuable minerals were found in them, though
their character, particularly where exposed on Grassy river below Reed
lake, was

CONSIDERED PROMISING ENOUGH

for the occurrence of the minerals that are so often associated with
these rocks. The prevailing rocks exposed along Nelson river are biotite
gneisses. Only at two places on the shores are other rocks seen, at
Pipestone lake and on the southern shores of Cross lake, where a belt of
Keewatin rocks crosses, and for some miles follows the river valley. The
exposures at Cross lake are promising looking for the occurrence of
gold, resembling closely, as they do, the gold bearing strata of the
district east of Lake of the Woods. They are cut by intruded masses of
the same crushed granite with blue opalescent quartz, known locally in
the eastern region as _Protogene_.

Mr. William McInnes, in his evidence before the Senate committee of
1907, stated that in the region just west of Hudson bay there are only
two or three belts of what is known as the Keewatin rocks. These are the
rocks which in western Ontario hold gold. The witness found no minerals
in commercial quantities. He found traces of copper on File lake. At
Cross lake there is an area of these Keewatin rocks cut by intrusive
granite of the same character as the protogene of western Ontario, which
are almost always gold-bearing, but nothing has been found there. The
limestones would make excellent building material. There are some
intrusive granites on Grassy river which are of fine texture and
beautiful red colour, which would make very fine monumental stone
trimmings for buildings, etc., and would quarry very well. That would be
along the projected line of the railway.

NICKEL MAY BE FOUND.

An occurrence, which seemed to Mr. McInnes to be of particular interest,
was his discovery on upper Winisk river of a large area of so-called
norite rock. That is the rock in which the nickel of Sudbury occurs. It
is quite a characteristic rock. Mr. McInnes examined samples under the
microscope, and they are not to be distinguished from the Sudbury rock.
That led him to hope that there was a possibility of nickel occurring
there too, but he did not find any, although he examined as well as he
could. But he had not much time, and was too far away. There are two or
three areas of these Keewatin rocks occurring unfolded in the
Laurentian, but Mr. McInnes found no minerals in economic quantities in
them at all. Near Eabamet river, a tributary of the Albany, he saw
crystals of mica in the granite, two and a half inches in diameter. Of
course that is not large enough to amount to much, but it shows a
possibility that there might be something better there.

Mr. A. W. G. Wilson says of the district north of Lac Seul explored by
him (See p. 74):—“There seems to be little prospect of finding valuable
economic minerals in the region in paying quantities. In almost all the
bands of basic schists small, less often large, veins of quartz occur.
At the surface these veins and the associated schists present the usual
rusty appearance due to the decomposition of the pyrite. The granites
are occasionally cut by pegmatitic dikes. Near the head of Cross lake, a
rock, apparently of this character, carries a small amount of
molybdenite in crystals varying in size up to an inch and a half across;
it is uncertain whether the mineral is of economic importance, but the
small size and the poor character of the specimen seen, and the
difficulties of transportation point to the deposit being economically
unworkable. The extent of the vein is not known. Near the inlet into
Slate lake, about three-quarters of a mile from its northeast end, on
the eastern shore, is the only place where magnetic minerals were found
sufficiently segregated to produce a noticeable local variation of the
compass. Here, stringers of a metallic mineral, probably magnetite, were
found. Though this metal is sometimes a constituent of the basic rocks,
the more common occurrence of iron ore is in the form of ilmenite. No
hematite was noted in the district.”

In his report (See p. 60) Mr. J. R. Dickson speaks of the mineral
deposits of the area explored by his party south of Cross lake as
follows:—“Judging by such necessarily superficial observations as the
members of the party were able to make, the region we covered is not
well supplied with economic minerals.

TRACES OF COPPER

were found at Wekusko lake, and samples of iron ore at Sipiwesk lake,
and careful prospecting might perhaps disclose deposits of commercial
value, but everywhere else so far as observed, the obtruding bedrock was
either pure granite or limestone. The latter, however, is mostly
dolomite, the variety used as a flux in the reducing of iron ores, and
future ore discoveries may give rise to such demand. This dolomite also
will prove a valuable building stone for prairie towns, when made
available by the Hudson Bay Railway.”

According to Mr. McLaggan (See p. 58) the section of country about Reed
lake is very rocky. Dark coloured granite, streaked with white quartz,
extends along the lower end of the lake and for six miles along the
river. Four miles farther Mr. McLaggan found indications of iron and saw
a good water power. Above Herb lake he saw another splendid water power,
very easy to develop, and along the river below rapids in five places
from which fair power could be generated. At the lower end of Herb lake
and along the river, granite mixed with white quartz was seen, and at
the falls in the river, about twenty miles below the lake, good slate
was found. On this lake Mr. McLaggan noted indications of iron. In
places along and back from Grass river, on either side, quartz was seen.
The country has been burned over, leaving only a few bunches of spruce,
and the surface of the rock has been well exposed, so that prospecting
would be easy. Mr. McLaggan thinks that this part of the country may
prove rich in mineral.

On September 10, Mr. McLaggan reached Paint lake. Quartz was still in
sight, but not so frequent in occurrence. There are a number of islands
in the lake with rocky shores and small, mixed timber. Below Elbow lake
the river banks are high, the country becomes rougher, and fire has
bared the rocks of soil. White quartz crops out in considerable
quantities. Along the banks of Cumberland lake there are considerable
quantities of limestone, which may “become very valuable in time.”

Speaking of the region explored, as a whole, Mr. McLaggan considered
that as a mineral country it offers a wide field for prospectors. “In
the country travelled over there are indications of gold, silver, iron
and limestone, and Indians and white men from the north tell wonderful
stories of a place called Indian lake, north of Nelson House, and of an
island on Burntwood river where various minerals and oil are said to
exist.”

In his report on the preliminary surveys for the Hudson Bay Railway,
John Armstrong, C.E., states:—“Our definite knowledge of minerals is
limited to limestone and marble. The limestone occurs in the southern
portion of the line a short distance from The Pas, in unlimited
quantities favourable for quarrying, and will probably prove the future
source of supply for the greater part of the provinces of Saskatchewan
and Manitoba. Marble of a very high grade occurs on Marble island in
Hudson bay, and is also found of a fair quality at Churchill. Iron ores,
gold, silver, galena, mica and other minerals have been discovered by
the Geological Survey at various localities on the bay, all of which are
fully described in the reports of that department. Various specimens of
the precious metals have been shown to our engineers, but their origin
was preserved in so much mystery that they could not be treated as
evidence of the existence of the metal in that territory, and might have
been used with equal effect to demonstrate the richness of a deposit in
Colorado or Johannesburg.”

CHAPTER V.

THE KEEWATIN AREA.

(Newest Ontario and Northern Manitoba.)

Game, Fur-bearing Animals and Fish.

Flocks of Wild Fowl that Obscure the Sky.—Six Species of Seal in
Hudson Bay.—Stocked with Animals of Various Kinds.—White Fish
Abound in Most of the Lakes and Streams.—Saw Eleven Moose in
One Day.—The Commercial Value of the Sturgeon Fisheries.—
Future Summer Playgrounds.—Barren Lands Caribou at Churchill.

The immense resources of this territory in the matter of fur, fin and
feather, are traditional, but the testimony of residents and explorers
as to distribution, present conditions, etc., are interesting and
important.

Doctor Robert Bell, in his 1886 report (See p. 17), says the Indians
around Lake St. Joseph “live principally upon fish in summer and rabbits
in winter, but these resources are supplemented by geese and ducks in
the spring and autumn, and occasionally by larger game, such as caribou
and bears at any season. The fishes of the lake comprise whitefish, grey
trout, sturgeon, pike, pickerel, yellow-barred perch, grey and red
suckers, besides some smaller species.

“At seven miles before joining the Attawapiskat, Boulder river falls
into a lake three miles long, which the Indians call Sturgeon lake, from
the abundance of this fish to be found in it. While in the act of
setting our gill net, the evening we camped on its shores, a sturgeon,
measuring upwards of five feet in length, was caught in it.”

Doctor Bell reports that several lakes abounding in fish are said to
occur on the course of Henley river, which flows into the Albany ten
miles below the Forks.

Doctor Bell, in his evidence before the Senate committee of 1887, said
he had seen wild fowl in the region about Hudson bay in large numbers,
and if one were close enough up to them, and surprised them in a marsh,
they would rise in such clouds that

THEY OBSCURED THE SKY

for a few moments until they got away. They would not darken the land in
their flight, but they would prevent one seeing the sky or the sun for a
few seconds. On the shores of Hudson bay and straits are found nearly
all the sea birds that live in the northern part of this continent, and
some of those of Europe. Some species are abundant; surf ducks, scoters,
eider ducks, etc. The eider duck is valuable on account of its down. Of
geese, the grey goose and the blue and the white wavies are very
abundant in the spring and autumn on the shore of Hudson bay—and
especially towards the southern parts of James bay. Swans are common.
They breed on the islands, and some on the shores of Hudson bay, and
their skins are an article of trade. In former years swans’ down was
used for trimming ladies’ garments, and swans’ skins formed an item of
export for the Hudson’s Bay Company. White bears are found in the
northern part of Hudson bay, and there are plenty of black bears around
the southern part.

There are valuable fisheries, too. There are codfish in Hudson bay. The
variety the witness had seen is called the ‘rock cod,’ which is not of
so good a quality as the common variety of the Atlantic, but he
understood that it is the same species.

The variety of fish known as sea trout is found in the mouths of the
rivers running into Hudson bay and James bay. They do not go far up the
stream; they are never found beyond the first fall in a river. There are
sea trout in both Hudson bay and James bay, at the mouths of the rivers.
They are the same variety as that found on the Atlantic coast. They have
the same habits. There is also the speckled trout. The marine
animals—fishes and mammals of Hudson bay—have precisely the same
habits as similar species have on the Atlantic coast.

The fur seal is not found here, but the seals of Hudson bay are valuable
for their oil. They are tolerably abundant. There are

SIX SPECIES OF SEAL IN THE BAY.

There is the bearded seal, for instance, which grows to the length of
thirteen feet, the ringed seal, the Greenland seal in Hudson strait, the
grey seal, and the harbour seal, which is quite common in those waters,
also the spotted or fresh-water seal. The latter run up the rivers after
salmon and whitefish. It is a large spotted species with an almost white
or light grey coat, with distinct black spots thickly scattered over its
body. This seal ascends the rivers for long distances inland, sometimes
as much as two hundred miles. They live on fish, and they sometimes
remain in the lakes in the interior. The skins of these seals are
valuable, making very good coats.

As to James bay, the best fish there is a variety of whitefish,
apparently identical with the large whitefish of Lake Superior, only the
fish grow larger in the cold waters in the north. The whitefish live
equally well, if not better, in salt water. They run up the rivers also.
They belong to the salmon family. Then there are trout of different
kinds, and at the northern part of James bay there is Hearne’s salmon.
They are small salmon, but of very fine quality. The flesh is equal to
that of the common salmon, perhaps better. It is firm and red and well
flavoured. Hearne’s salmon seldom exceeds ten pounds in weight. It is
also found all around Hudson bay, and on both sides of Hudson strait.

The porpoise, or more properly speaking, the small white whale, is
abundant in James bay.

Doctor Bell expressed the opinion that the fisheries of Hudson bay will,
no doubt, be very valuable.

Mr. A. P. Low, before the Senate committee of 1907, stated that the fish
in the inland waters of Keewatin are like those in the other northern
parts of Canada, and fairly abundant especially in the larger lakes. The
chief fish are the whitefish and the lake trout. In Hudson bay the
whitefish and the ordinary river trout have sea-going habits, and the
Indians take quite a number along the shores in nets, more especially in
James bay.

Mr. Low reported sturgeon as being plentiful in Favourable lake.

Mr. J. B. Tyrrell in his report speaks as follows of the game and fish
in that area in the southwest of this region (See p. 19) explored by him
in 1896:—“The country is stocked with animals of various kinds. Moose
are abundant in some of the more thickly wooded tracts. Black bears are
somewhat numerous, and beaver, otters, martens, mink, muskrats and red
foxes are killed by the Indians in considerable numbers in the aggregate
every year.

WHITEFISH ABOUND

in most of the lakes and streams, while the lake trout seemed to be
moderately plentiful in the clear lakes near the head of Grass river. Of
the other fish, the sturgeon and pickerel (_Stizostethium vitreum_) are
the most important. The region was known among the early fur traders as
the Muskrat country. Trout and whitefish are said to abound in Reed
lake.”

[Illustration: Moose crossing Limestone river.]

Near the forks of the Muhigan large game was very plentiful, and Mr.
Tyrrell saw eleven moose in one day.

As to his survey of the Ekwan district in 1901, Mr. D. B. Dowling
reports:—“The principal fur-bearing animals of this region are foxes,
otters and beavers. Of the larger mammals few appear to be taken by the
Indians. In the interior the game birds are all very scarce, the fall
hunt for ducks and geese being confined to the shores of the bay. The
rivers afford a small supply of whitefish. The streams running to the
north into Hudson bay in this region are, at certain seasons, well
stocked with speckled trout. Sutton Mill lake is well supplied with a
slender variety of lake trout, and at the narrows, speckled trout were
also caught.”

Mr. Dowling mentions that at the foot of the first fall met with
ascending Trout lake river from Little Shallow lake, the Indians form
large camps in the autumn to catch whitefish as they are ascending the
river to the spawning grounds.

THE BEST FOOD FISHES.

Mr. McInnes, in the report of his explorations about Winisk and
Attawapiskat rivers (See p. 23), says:—“Whitefish and sturgeon are the
best food fishes, and occur in most of the lakes. Both are taken in
nets, and the latter also by spearing from scaffolds built out over
rapids in the river. Doré and pike are also generally distributed over
the whole area, and form an important source of food supply, though the
sucker among the fishes, like the rabbit among the mammals, holds the
most important place, as it can be caught everywhere, not only in the
larger lakes but also in the smaller ponds and streams. Brook trout were
actually caught only in Winisk river near its mouth, and in the streams
running into Albany river, but were seen in the rapids below Weibikwei;
the Indians assert that they occur also in the lake itself. Lake trout
were caught in large numbers in Trout lake at the head of Severn river,
but are not found in either the Winisk or Attawapiskat waters.

“The moose (_Alces americanus_) has been found as far north as the
southern shore of Weibikwei lake, in north latitude 52° 50′, though
tracks were actually seen during our exploration only as far north as
Attawapiskat river. Even here it is not nearly so plentiful as farther
south in the belt of country lying near the Canadian Pacific Railway and
extending for about one hundred and fifty miles north of it. Caribou
(_Rangifer caribou_) range all over the district. No red deer are found
anywhere throughout the region. The fur-bearing animals, though not so
plentiful as they once were, are still fairly abundant throughout the
district; the otter and the beaver from long-continued trapping are less
numerous, perhaps, than any other species.”

Bears, Mr. McInnes says, are taken in good numbers, and foxes, including
the red, silver, black and cross varieties are numerous. Otters and pine
martens are taken in good numbers and beavers occur more sparingly.
Minks and muskrats are plentiful. That the raccoon occasionally strays
as far north as north latitude 52° is shown by the fact of one being
taken by an Indian woman on upper Attawapiskat river in 1903.

Mr. McInnes describes Atikameg (locally known as Clearwater), Cormorant
and Reed lakes as “very beautiful sheets of clear water, well stocked
with fish, including lake trout and whitefish.”

Mr. McInnes, in his evidence before the Senate committee of 1907,
expressed the opinion that if the region lying west of Hudson bay were
opened up by railways there would be a considerable business in
exploiting the fisheries, because the sturgeon is valuable. They would
get the sturgeon on the lower Nelson and part of the Churchill. Big
lease-holding companies put steamers on the various lake expansions on
the Nelson, so that they reached down to within a few miles of Split
lake, and marketed sturgeon in that way. They put tramways on all the
portages. They ran that way for a couple of summers, but the distance
was too great and it did not pay. The larger lakes have good whitefish
and sturgeon. The head of the Adawadskit was particularly full of
sturgeon. Going out Mr. McInnes’s party was short of pork and stopped
one day to get supplies. In one night’s fishing the Indians caught so
many sturgeon that they had enough to carry them for one hundred and
fifty miles to the Hudson’s Bay Company’s post. One of the sturgeon

WAS THREE FEET LONG.

At the mouth of the Winisk the Indians were catching speckled trout and
whitefish in very large numbers. In fact the Indians of all that
interior country live on fish. They smoke and dry them to a limited
extent, and late in the autumn catch them before the larger lakes are
frozen over, when the temperature is low enough to freeze the fish. They
catch enough to put by for the winter. Some are sent to Chicago frozen.

In his report (See p. 60) of the survey made by his party in 1910 of the
area south of Cross lake, Mr. J. R. Dickson states:—“The deeper lakes
all abound in whitefish of the finest size and quality. In Paint lake
during the mayfly season (July up there) their dorsal fins could be seen
cutting the water everywhere. Pickerel, and of course jackfish and
suckers are likewise very abundant. We had no sturgeon net, but we saw
quite a number jumping in Sipiwesk lake. Altogether the fishing industry
should be a decidedly profitable one after the railway goes through.
Much of that region is suited only, and admirably, to producing a
permanent revenue from this source. The beaver have been almost
exterminated, but mink, fisher, muskrat and other fur-bearers are still
fairly numerous. As to large game, moose and caribou are plentiful, but
we saw no elk or bear. More stringent game laws will shortly be
necessary with the opening of the country to white hunters. Nearly all
those northern lakes are thickly studded with beautiful islands—quite a
similar Laurentian country to Muskoka, but on a more extensive scale.
Some future day these large island-studded lakes will become popular
summer playgrounds for the people of the prairies, for the July and
August weather is delightful. As yet of course, they are almost
inaccessible.”

Mr. McLaggan, who explored the country in 1907, describes the waters
between The Pas and Clearwater lake as abounding in trout, whitefish,
jackfish and pike. Reed lake is studded with many islands and replete
with large trout, whitefish, pike and pickerel. Grass river, where it
broadens into the long stretch known as Setting lake, is described by
Mr. McLaggan as one of the most beautiful sheets of water he has ever
seen and quite comparable to the St. Lawrence where it passes through
the Thousand islands. He looks forward to it becoming a great summer
resort. Goose river is very shallow and so teems with whitefish that
they seem to cover the bottom and can be killed with sticks. Generally,
along his route, Mr. McLaggan “found game in great plenty and immense
waters teeming with fish.” W. Thibaudeau, C.E., states in his report
(See p. 23):—“In September, October and part of November large shoals
of white whales (I counted thirty-five in one shoal) could be seen going
up river at Churchill at every tide. Salmon, trout and whitefish are
taken in the river and harbor all the year, but are more abundant in the
spring.

WITHIN A FEW MILES OF CHURCHILL,

in the fall and winter, large herds of barren lands caribou were
encountered. These herds supply fresh meat of an excellent quality for
the residents of Churchill. Polar bears are occasionally shot in the
vicinity of Churchill. Along the western peninsula Eskimo congregate in
the spring for the purpose of seal hunting, these animals frequenting
these shores in the spring in large numbers. Among the fur bearing
animals are found black fox, silver fox, red and white fox, marten, and
wolves both black and gray. Swans, geese, ptarmigan and many species of
duck in large numbers, and some spruce grouse are found along the shores
of Churchill harbour and river.

Referring specially to his exploration of that part of the country
between Churchill and Owl river in December, 1906, Mr. Thibaudeau
states:—“For one whole day we passed through an immense herd of barren
lands caribou. There must have been thousands of them.”

Reporting on the fish and game along the route of his exploration trip
from Churchill to The Pas, Mr. Thibaudeau says:—“From timber line on
Hudson bay to The Pas are found moose and caribou in fair quantities.
Rabbits are scarce throughout the country explored. Saw a few spruce
grouse; ptarmigan are found plentifully, but not further south than
Grass river. Whitefish abound in all the lakes from Churchill to The
Pas; also in some lakes are found trout, pike and suckers. Indians and
travellers rely upon this source of supply for dog feed.”

Mr. William Beech, of Churchill, in his communication to the press
already quoted, writes:—“Fur-bearing animals exist in large quantities,
and in many varieties, throughout the woods and along the shores and
rivers. I have seen enormous white polar bears three hundred yards from
my house as early as August 9, and at times they are very aggressive.
Wolves are numerous, and very bold at times, so bold in fact that I have
frequently heard them running round upon the roof above my head. White,
red and black foxes, and a few of the rare silver variety are to be
found at all seasons, and are

VALUABLE FOR THE FUR THEY BEAR.

Caribou roam in herds, and are very good eating, while seals, ducks,
ptarmigan, geese and swans abound throughout the districts round about.
Curlew, snipe, and loons also provide good shooting. Of fur-bearing
animals besides foxes there are beaver, otter, mink, ermine, and
wolverine, innumerable.

“Great sport is afforded to those who are so inclined in harpooning
whales. I have counted as many as twenty in one school, going up the
river at almost every tide, and an impressive sight it is. In summer at
Churchill the Hudson’s Bay Company capture many white whales, from ten
to fifteen feet in length and weighing from one thousand to two thousand
pounds, by the use of extra strong nets. The flesh is cut up and kept to
feed the dogs in winter, while the blubber is boiled down at the factory
and the hides are sent to England.

“It will surprise you, perhaps, when I tell you that we fish on dry land
at Churchill. That is a fact, nevertheless. The natives of Churchill,
both Indians and Eskimos, and also the white men, set their nets on dry
land. They set their nets, which are about fifteen feet long, with three
upright posts placed vertically on the shore. When they have set them
they simply wait for the tide to come in, and when it has come in they
simply wait until it has gone out, and there are their fish all ready to
be taken out without any trouble. The catch consists chiefly of
whitefish, salmon trout, and pickerel, all of good quality.

“When the Hudson bay route is completed, one of the best fishing trades
in the world will be opened up. There are five lakes, in all, in the
district, all full of fish, and the farthest teaming which is necessary
would be about forty miles. On lake Winnipeg at the present time, fish
are hauled a distance of one hundred and forty miles, and they are
teamed into Edmonton from Lesser Slave lake, a distance of one hundred
and seventy-five miles and made to pay. The salmon of the north averages
from four to ten pounds in weight, and is of good quality; the whitefish
is not so large as that of Lake Winnipeg, but it is of fine flavor, and
very firm. The caplin, a small fish resembling the sardine, is found in
such quantities at some seasons of the year that they are left in
thousands upon the shore when the tide goes out. Fishing usually
commences at the latter part of June and finishes at the end of August.”

[Illustration: NORTHERN SASKATCHEWAN]

CHAPTER VI.

NORTHERN SASKATCHEWAN.

Agriculture and Arable Land.

An Early Scientific Explorer’s Enthusiastic Description of Part of
the Country.—“Capable of Any Extent of Cultivation.”—An Old
Hudson’s Bay Company’s Official Who Considered it “A Splendid
Country to Settle in.”—Mr. Crean Reports That “It is no
Experiment” to Raise Wheat in North Saskatchewan.—Missionary
Farmers and Their Accomplishments.—Capable of Supporting “A
Dense, Thriving Population.”—“A Splendid Ranching Country.”—
Heaviest Rains Just When they are Needed.

To obtain a correct idea of the resources of that part of the province
of Saskatchewan north of North Saskatchewan river, one has to consider
that great extent of territory as consisting of two very distinct areas,
one to the south, the other to the north of Churchill river. While the
area to the south of the Churchill is a well-wooded, park-like country,
with great agricultural possibilities, the soil of the region north of
that river, so far as explorations up to this time have shown, is mainly
sandy and sterile.

Thanks to its being crossed by the old fur traders’ portage routes from
Cumberland House, Fort à la Corne and Fort Carlton, on the Saskatchewan,
to Frog portage on the upper Churchill and Methye portage on the
Clearwater, the southern part of the region immediately under review has
been known and written about for many years, but there is very little
indeed in the ancient writings worthy of notice in this chapter. The
first white travellers over the long and toilsome water routes of this
beautiful country of swift-running rivers and isle-studded lakes were
the enterprising fur traders from Montreal, who in course of time
combined to form the Northwest Company. Their interests were all centred
in the fur trade, and while travelling through the country, business,
time and the exigencies of the commissariat combined to

PREVENT THEM FROM EXPLORING

the country with a view to investigating its natural resources, even if
they had any inclination to do so, which is doubtful. At any rate such
of these pioneer travellers through this country as ventured to write
about their travels devoted their literary efforts to describing their
adventures en route, their camps, the methods and habits of the
voyageurs and Indians, the Indian camping places, and the rivers, lakes
and overland trails traversed. Generally very minute details were given
in these old books of travel as to the geographical features of the
country, distances, bearings, the direction and currents of the rivers,
the size, shapes and relative situation of the lakes, etc., but one
reads over page after page, and book after book, without finding a
single reference to the soil, or to the possibilities of the country
from an agricultural point of view. In the course of time the opening up
to the fur trade of the farther northwest on the banks of Athabaska and
Mackenzie rivers resulted in a greatly increased amount of travel over
the old canoe routes, but it did not attract attention to the natural
wealth of this region, and until recent years the attractions this
country offers to the agricultural settler have remained unrecognized.

Sir Alexander Mackenzie, in his book (1801), states that “no part of
this country has ever been cultivated by natives or Europeans, except a
small garden at Ile à la Crosse, which well repaid the labour bestowed
upon it.”

Examined before the British parliamentary committee of 1857, Richard
King, M.D., surgeon and naturalist to the expedition in 1833 in search
of Sir J. Ross, was asked:—“Are you under the impression that there is
any portion of the territory which you then saw that would be available
for the purpose of settlement?” He replied:—“Yes, I found a very large
country, as it appeared to me at that date. I hold in my hand one of
Arrowsmith’s very best and recent maps, he being the great authority
upon that country, and the square piece of country which I always looked
upon as a very fertile valley is there distinctly shown. It is bounded
on the south by Cumberland House, on the Saskatchewan. It is an enormous
tract of country. Cumberland territory is, according to Sir J.
Richardson, I find, several thousand square miles. Then it is bounded by
Athabaska lake on the north. I am not now exactly giving it north and
south. I may state that I passed through a great portion of that
country, but of course what I am saying as to the larger portion that I
am now speaking of, is not only from my own personal observation upon
it, but from an inquiry upon the spot, seeing the nature and extent of
that country. This large portion which I have described as within this
area I looked upon as the

MOST FERTILE PORTION WHICH I SAW.

“On this map it is very clear. You will see the country entirely
surrounded by water.”

Asked if he meant to express an opinion that the whole of that territory
was suitable, as regards soil and climate, for the purpose of
cultivation, Doctor King replied that he was told by the traders there
generally that it was precisely the same land as that which he passed
through, namely, a rich soil, interspersed with well-wooded country,
there being growth of every kind, and the whole vegetable kingdom alive.

Doctor King impressed upon the committee the fact that in going through
that country his position was that of a naturalist; he “came away
certainly with the impression that it was a very magnificent country in
many parts of it; of course there were barren portions, but upon the
whole, up to Athabaska lake, it appeared to me to be capable of any
extent of cultivation.”

Doctor King said that some time previous to his visit to that locality
there had been some agricultural activity at the Hudson’s Bay Company’s
post at Cumberland House due to the enterprise of Governor Williams.
Doctor King found capacious barns, and implements in fields which had
evidently been placed under culture. On approaching Cumberland House, he
had found a little new colony of thirty persons established, a Canadian,
an Englishman, and half-breeds. They had their fields divided out into
farms, and other things. It was described to him that they had formed a
little colony at Cumberland House but had been

ORDERED FROM THE IMMEDIATE VICINITY

by the Hudson’s Bay Company. The settlers told Doctor King that “at the
time they were ordered off, the Company would not allow them to go on
cultivating; that it was against the Company, and that therefore the
thing was to be broken up, etc., etc.”

As to the little new settlement, Doctor King stated that it appeared to
him, in going over the colonists’ farms, that they were very highly
cultivated. There was corn, wheat, and barley growing. He bought a calf
from them; he gave seven shillings for it. A fat bullock sold for twelve
shillings.

[Illustration: Haying near Green lake.]

Doctor King testified that when he went on to Cumberland House, he found
that the settlers were really borne out in what they had stated, for he
found that the barns and implements were in the fields, and that the
cows, oxen, and horses had all gone wild. He enquired the reason of it
and was told that Governor Williams had a penchant for farming and that
the Company had ordered him off somewhere else.

Hon. William Christie, formerly Inspecting Chief Factor of the Hudson’s
Bay Company, before the Senate committee of 1888, explained that there
was a vast extent of splendid country from Prince Albert on the whole
north side of the Saskatchewan, going away up until the traveller came
near Fort Pitt, keeping a little to the north. Then, when he would come
to the route of Green lake, there was two days’ journey through a
magnificent country, beautifully timbered, well watered and supplied
with abundance of fish. As he once travelled through it, he remarked to
one of his men,—

“WHAT A SPLENDID COUNTRY TO SETTLE IN.”

Green lake, witness explained, is north of Carlton, about eighty miles.
One crosses at Carlton and for two days can travel through a prairie
country with bluffs here and there, and lakes; it is a splendid country.
Then he would travel for two days through a forest to Green lake.

Professor John Macoun, in the Dominion Government Canadian Pacific
Railway Report of 1877-8, says:—“I was at Ile à la Crosse (almost due
north of Battleford) on September 22, 1875, and saw potatoes still green
as they were in July. I was told by Mr. Cummins that these potatoes
hardly ever were killed by frost in September. Here there was a flour
mill driven by horse-power and I am told that all kinds of grain ripen
successfully.”

Professor Macoun in his book “Manitoba and the Great Northwest,”
published in 1882, made the following reference to the northern portion
of Saskatchewan as an agricultural country:—“About fifty miles north of
Carlton the ‘Star Mission,’ in connection with the Church of England, is
situated. This Mission was established in 1874, and placed in charge of
the Rev. Mr. Hinds, who, besides being a minister, was a practical
farmer. He at once commenced to teach the old men farming and the
children English, and in less than one year had a number of small farms
commenced, and the children well advanced in the knowledge of English.
Since then he has been very successful, and in 1879 Mr. O’Keeffe,
D.L.S., writes of the Mission: ‘At Sandy lake the Indians under the
supervision of the Rev. Mr. Hinds, Church of England Missionary, were
cultivating successfully fine fields of grain and raising vegetables.’
Of the country in this vicinity the same writer says: ‘No finer country
could be desired than the section above described. The water is pure and
abundant, and the land extremely rich. Pea vine, vetches, grasses, and,
in fact, all herbaceous plants were luxuriant.’”

In the report of his explorations during the years 1893 and 1894, Mr. J.
Burr Tyrrell gives the following general description of this area:—“The
country between Saskatchewan and Churchill rivers is very different from
that north of the latter stream. From Prince Albert, situated on the
banks of the North Saskatchewan, at an elevation of one thousand four
hundred feet above the sea, the surface rises with a gentle slope
northward to a heavy stony moraine ridge, the highest point of which, on
Green lake trail, was found to have an elevation of about two thousand
two hundred and twenty feet. From this high ridge the country slopes
gradually northward, at first with a gentle rolling, and afterwards with
a more even surface, to the chain of lakes and extensive swamps that lie
along the edge of the district directly underlain by Archaean rocks.
This country has very much the general appearance of that portion of
northwestern Manitoba to the west of lakes Manitoba and Winnipegosis,
including Duck and Riding mountains, previously described by the
writer.”

Between Churchill and Saskatchewan rivers two lines were examined by Mr.
Tyrrell, one from Prince Albert northwestward by Green lake to Ile à la
Crosse, and the other from Stanley Mission southwestward by Montreal
lake to Prince Albert.

Writing of some of the more noticeable geographical features of this
area Mr. Tyrrell says:—“Churchill river from its northern source at
Methye portage, following its windings, has a length of four hundred and
eighty miles to the mouth of Reindeer river. It is a long series of very
irregular lakes filled with clear blue water, connected by short and
usually rapid reaches. Some of the rapids are produced by rocky
barriers, while others are over boulders and between banks of till, such
as is underlying much of the surrounding country.

“The largest tributaries flowing into the Churchill from the south are
Beaver, Sandy and Rapid rivers.

[Illustration: Flowers at Ile à La Crosse.]

“Beaver river rises on the Cretaceous plateau, not far from Lac la
Biche, and, flowing, first eastward for two hundred and fifty miles, and
then northward for a hundred miles, empties into the south end of Ile à
la Crosse lake. Its course northward was alone surveyed. Here it is a
rapid stream from one hundred to two hundred feet wide, flowing between
low clay banks, beautifully wooded with spruce and poplar. Much of the
land along the course appeared to be well adapted for agricultural
purposes, and the rank vegetation gave

PROMISE OF ABUNDANT HARVESTS.”

The Venerable Archdeacon J. McKay, one of the best known Church of
England Missionaries of the Canadian west, was examined before the
Senate committee of 1907. He stated that he was born on the eastern
shore of James bay, near Rupert’s House. His father was a Hudson’s Bay
Company’s officer. Witness had his education in Manitoba in the early
days. He had been more in the old country than in eastern Canada. He
lived at Moose Factory until he was eighteen.

Archdeacon McKay explained that he had been forty-five years in the
west, in charge of missions of the Church of England, and was ten years
at a place on Churchill river, a little north of Lac la Ronge. The
nearest point to Lac la Ronge on the map is where the Anglican mission
is situated, about ten miles north of Lac la Ronge, on Churchill river.
This is about due north from Prince Albert, and in a straight line it
would be considerably over two hundred miles from Prince Albert. He had
been for some time superintendent of the Anglican missions. For the two
years preceding his examination he had been at Lac la Ronge. He had been
as far north in this country as Lake Cariboo. In fact he had been away
to the north end of Reindeer lake. It is very poor country up there, and
the trees are not very large. From the Churchill he had been down to
Hudson bay, and he had been as far west as Ile à la Crosse lake and on
to Methye lake, which is not many miles south of Clearwater river and in
an east-southeasterly direction from McMurray.

The land between Lac la Ronge and Prince Albert in some places is very
good. It is all forest practically until to about thirty miles from
Prince Albert, or perhaps twenty or thirty. Then the open country begins
where it is not heavily timbered. To the west of Lac la Ronge the
country is very much the same. It is not rocky, some muskeg and some
pretty good land, but all timbered—in some places heavy timber. There
is spruce and poplar. The spruce is good enough for lumber, and of
course it would do for pulpwood. The witness had travelled the country
about Lac la Ronge pretty thoroughly, and if it were cleared of timber
it would, in his opinion, be generally

FAIR AGRICULTURAL LAND.

The rocky country is north of that.

So far as agriculture at Lac la Ronge is concerned, Archdeacon McKay
said he had raised good wheat at his former mission on Churchill river
for seven years in succession without having it frosted. The climate is
good. It is a rocky country, and there is not a great deal of good land;
but so far as the climate is concerned it is all right for raising
anything that can be raised in Saskatchewan generally. Potatoes grow
splendidly.

[Illustration: Potatoes at Anglican Mission, Lac la Ronge.]

He could not describe what the grasses are, but they are grasses that
grow mostly in moist land, something like slough hay, grasses that grow
on the margins of lakes, and along the rivers. There was not much stock
there, but he had stock when he lived on the mission on Churchill river,
fifteen head of cattle and two horses. That is a little north of Lac la
Ronge, and is practically the same country. As to the Lake Ile à la
Crosse country, he considered it fairly good. It is not rocky and there
is plenty of timber and plenty of hay as a rule—some prairie hay and
some swamp hay, and the soil is fairly good—better than Lac la Ronge.
It gets better as you go west. It is certainly better about Ile à la
Crosse than at Lac la Ronge, and there is no rock country about Ile à la
Crosse. The hay is long. It is very much the same as the natural hay in
Manitoba. The only whites in the country he had described north of the
Saskatchewan were the Hudson’s Bay Company’s officials and traders.
There is no agricultural settlement at Lac la Ronge. There are only
Indians there, and they have not gone into anything in the direction of
agriculture more than raising a few potatoes.

Archdeacon McKay stated that it is a peculiarity of that part of the
country around Lac la Ronge that the frosts are very late. On a small
island in the lake Archdeacon McKay has seen potatoes in the beginning
of October with the

VINES UNTOUCHED BY FROSTS

at that late season. That was of course on account of the large body of
water that equalized the temperature. On the mainland that would
probably not be the case, but two years ago he was at Lac la Ronge when
Mr. Chisholm, the Indian Inspector, came out to make treaty payments
towards the end of August, probably August 20, and the potato vines were
not touched at all either on the mainland or on the islands. The
snowfall is not very heavy. It is generally a little heavier than in
Prince Albert section of the country, but not always so. Three feet on
the level would be considered deep snow. As a rule the first frosts come
some time in September. In 1906 the potatoes were touched with frost
about September 15, but not seriously. In the spring one can put in
grain from May 5 as a rule. He used to sow wheat May 5 generally, and
plant potatoes from May 20 on. The lowest temperature in winter, judging
from his own sensations, was about the same as Prince Albert. In the
summer time it is quite as hot at Lac la Ronge as at Prince Albert. It
is farther north and the days are longer.

The weather at Lac la Ronge is moderately dry. Generally there is
sufficient rainfall for the crops. In the summer of 1906 there was quite
a long spell of dry weather, which affected the wild fruits. It was an
exceptional spell of dry weather, but generally there is a good
rainfall. The rainy season would be quite equal to Manitoba.

Richard S. Cook, Esq., Mayor of the city of Prince Albert, Saskatchewan,
was examined before the Senate committee of 1907. He stated that he had
at the date of his examination by the committee been engaged in farming
at Prince Albert for fifteen years. He had a large stock and dairy farm,
operated it successfully, and had made it pay every year. Mr. Cook
stated that he had travelled considerably over the country about Prince
Albert, particularly to the north and northwest of that city. He had
gone north from Battleford and down Beaver river. Little is known of
that country. It has always been travelled by canoe. Stanley Mission was
the farthest north he had been, two hundred and fifty miles north of
Prince Albert, and about the same distance north of Battleford. The
country in that northern district is fit to be an empire in itself, and
a wealthy one. People knew little of it yet, but it was going to prove
an excellent country for agriculture. It was such an immense country it
was hard to grasp the possibilities of it. One might travel over it for
years and know very little about it. There is very little open country
there, except where the fire has gone, but about seventy-five per cent.
of the soil in that country is good, capable of being cleared up and
becoming good agricultural land. The area must be at the least about two
hundred and fifty miles by two hundred and fifty miles. In travelling
about the country, he had examined the region about Fort Pitt, Beaver
lake, Moose lake and Cold lake. For a considerable distance immediately
back from Saskatchewan river the soil is light; not a very good country.
The country immediately behind Fort Pitt, however,

IS FIT FOR RAISING GRAIN.

[Illustration: Oat field at Anglican Mission, Lac la Ronge.]

The further north one goes in that country the better it is. The
altitude is gradually getting less, and on Chipewyan reserve, south of
Cold lake, there is as fine land as he had ever seen in his life. The
grass is four and one half feet long, and people had been known to grow
one hundred tons of hay the first season. Mr. Cook doubted whether wheat
would grow the first year.

Around Cold lake the fires had been very destructive. There had been
timber there, and where it had been burnt over the grass was good. The
soil was all right and the pea vine growing, and good rich grass, so
that he thought the country down the Beaver would be a fairly good
agricultural country. This district is one hundred and fifty miles north
of the Saskatchewan. It would be northwest of Battleford about one
hundred and fifty miles. At Stanley and Churchill, two hundred and fifty
miles north of Prince Albert, they were raising all kinds of stuff.
There was a sheaf of wheat in the Board of Trade in Prince Albert which
was brought from there, and it was certainly a very fine specimen. Mr.
Cook thought that in the area he had visited in the north there was a
country that would be settled up and sustain a large population. The
fires had been very destructive in parts of the Stanley country. The
soil throughout at one time was a good soil, but where the fires were
very heavy and hot it burnt the top of the soil. He would judge that
seventy-three per cent. of that country would have good agricultural
soil as soon as it was cleaned out.

Settlements had been started twenty miles north of Prince Albert, and
some years ago an American went in there and he now has a beautiful
farm. The witness brought in a collection of vegetables from that
country, and he never saw a better lot of farmers’ produce in his life.
This original American pioneer was growing Turner raspberries, and
anyone will tell you that where you can grow Turner raspberries, fall
wheat will grow, and where fall wheat will grow the climate is fit for
anything. The settler in question got the Turner raspberries from Mr.
Cook in Prince Albert. It takes a certain climate to grow that
raspberry, and they claim the same climate will grow fall wheat. It is
not the wild raspberry of the country, but a variety sent out from the
experimental farm in Ottawa. Wild raspberries grow all through that
country. That one man starting out demonstrated that the climate was all
right, and others followed suit, and there are now one hundred and fifty
or two hundred settlers in that country, which was considered a few
years ago as no good. The same remarks apply to the country clean out to
Candle lake. That country is fairly clear and open, and there is some
hazel brush, and where hazel brush will grow the land is considered
good, and where poplar will grow it is also considered good soil.

Mayor Cook expressed the opinion that

LACK OF MEANS OF COMMUNICATION

was all that kept the tide of settlement from flowing into that northern
country. He went on to explain that the people out on the Saskatchewan
and north of it anticipate being able to ship by the Hudson bay route.
They are all expecting it. They consider that there is not a question of
doubt but that it will be successful. They expect an open route via
Hudson bay for half of July, all of August, September, October, November
and part of December. Witness was speaking from the information received
from people who spent their lives on Hudson bay. Many of the Hudson’s
Bay Company’s officials came in to Prince Albert district to settle,
after they had been superannuated. From information obtained from these
old Hudson’s Bay Company’s men, his honest opinion was that it was a
perfectly feasible route for the months he had given:—half of July, all
of August, September, October, November and a part of December.

Mr. Cook, concluding, remarked: “When you are shipping out your cattle,
you are sending them by the short route, and the shrinkage will be
light. One feed, and probably none at all, would last to Churchill. The
short route would also make it possible to ship out at least one-third
of the crop before the frost sets in, which would be a great relief to
the settlers.”

W. F. Bredin, Esq., member of the Legislative Assembly of Alberta, for
the Division of Athabaska, and residing at Lesser Slave lake, was
examined before the Senate committee of 1907 and stated that at the date
of his examination he had resided ten years in the country north of
Edmonton. He had been from Edmonton north to Fort Wrigley, and he had
been on Peace river from Fort St. John, thirty miles inside the British
Columbia line, to about five hundred miles down the Peace—from that
point. Ten years previous to his examination he went down the Athabaska
to the Mackenzie in boats.

Mr. Bredin referred briefly to a trip he made east from Athabaska
district during the summer of 1906, when he travelled from McMurray up
Clearwater river and thence across to Prince Albert. The land on
Clearwater river for one hundred miles, in the bottoms, is very good. It
appeared to him, from the river, however, to be very sandy back on the
high rocks. He should think there would be a good deal of rock and
muskeg. From where he left Clearwater river in to Prince Albert, on the
North Saskatchewan, the country was more or less of a sandy nature.
There were beautiful lakes all the way, filled with good whitefish and
trout. The whole northern country is that way.

In his evidence before the Senate committee of 1907, Mr. H. A. Conroy
remarked:—“There is some good country along the Clearwater—very nice
country from an agricultural point of view.”

THE CREAN REPORTS.

A great amount of invaluable information as to the natural resources of
the region south of Churchill and Clearwater rivers is contained in the
report by Frank J. P. Crean, C.E., of his explorations (See p. 25) in
1908 and 1909. It is interesting to note that this work of exploration
was the first ever undertaken in a systematic way to ascertain the
agricultural possibilities of Canada’s northland.

The late Mr. R. E. Young, Superintendent of the Railway Lands Branch of
the Department of the Interior, under whose direction, and at whose
instance, these explorations were conducted, in forwarding Mr. Crean’s
first report, wrote:—“Mr. Crean’s report gives a great deal of useful
information about the district, and the results of his observations
appear to shew that mixed farming may confidently be expected to prove
successful over a large area. When the country is made accessible by
roads a considerable settlement of agriculturists may, I think, be
looked for. The country is also shewn by his report to be rich in
natural resources.”

In forwarding Mr. Crean’s second report to the minister, Mr. Young
wrote:—“The exploration in the year 1909 shows results even more
satisfactory as to the possibilities of the country for settlement than
the exploration of the previous year. A very considerable proportion of
the area explored is shewn by Mr. Crean’s observations to be well
adapted for mixed farming and to have natural resources of timber, hay,
fish and game which will be of much value to incoming settlers. Results
of actual operations in cattle raising are of a most encouraging nature.
At and in the vicinity of Meadow lake over one hundred miles north of
Battleford, there are herds of cattle aggregating over three hundred,
and over fifty horses, all of which are described as in a thriving
condition. At Cowpar and Winefred lakes towards the western part of the
track explored and in Clearwater valley to the north, conditions seem
also most promising for stock-raising. It may be of interest to note
here that recent reports of investigations in Siberia, Mongolia and
northern Manchuria by the Bureau of Plant Industry of the Department of
Agriculture of the United States, give accounts of the discovery of
three varieties of yellow-flowered alfalfa which are found growing and
thriving in a wild state under conditions of climate much more severe,
both as to cold in winter and snowfall, than are to be found in any part
of northwestern Canada as far north as there are any claims made as to
possibilities of settlement. It may therefore be considered reasonably
probable that whatever advantages alfalfa has over our native grasses as
fodder are assured for all habitable parts of our north country.”

As to the district about Lac la Ronge, Mr. Crean says in his report of
1908:—“Besides the mineral wealth supposed to be available there is
also considerable land to be found capable of being tilled.

IT IS NO EXPERIMENT

to endeavor to raise wheat in this section. It has already been done.
Stanley, or as it is sometimes called Stanley Mission, is worthy of
special description. It appears that Stanley is one of the best known
spots in the north. The village or settlement is situated on a most
picturesque point jutting into Churchill river. The country surrounding
it is rolling, and this adds considerably to the beauty of the locality.
From an agricultural standpoint the land is good. The soil is a rich
loam and the subsoil is sandy clay. The loam, however, attains a great
depth. I put one hole down almost four feet and had not then struck a
subsoil. This, however, was exceptional. Stanley’s fame rests altogether
on the energy and initiative of Reverend Mr. Hunt, a Church of England
clergyman, and the founder of a Church of England Mission there about
1851. Mr. Hunt, as far as I could ascertain, not only built the
celebrated and beautiful church, but also planted some wheat and barley.
This he found would grow successfully, and he established a small mill
to grind the wheat. At first he used a hand mill, which is still
standing at the Mission House. Later on, however, he built a small water
power mill and for a number of years this was in operation, used not
only by the Mission but also by the Hudson’s Bay Company.”

WHAT A MISSIONARY IS DOING.

On the north shore of the bay at the southwest end of the lake, the
Church of England Mission have a large school not yet completed, and
also an open air saw mill. The Reverend Mr. Brown is in charge of the
Mission and is endeavouring to establish a farm in order to teach the
natives to work. He has some cattle, pigs, and poultry. Reverend Mr.
Brown has a good garden, nothing in it suffering from frost. At Little
Hills, just at the mouth of Montreal river, wheat has been grown
successfully and Mr. Brown intends putting in a crop this year. I might
here be permitted to say that the Reverend Mr. Brown, who is materially
assisted by his wife in his Mission work, is deserving of the most
unstinted praise for his zeal and industry in the building up of the
Mission. Under somewhat disadvantageous circumstances he fills the
several positions of minister of the gospel, farm instructor and
mechanic to his flock, cheerfully and with good effect. The Hudson’s Bay
Company had a good garden last year, but most of the ground here is
stony. Revillon Frères have a post here and they, too, raise all the
vegetables they require.

Mr. Crean reports that on Deer lake (Montreal lake section) “just east
of the narrows a white man lives and he has a first class garden. Around
Deer lake the land is good and I see no difficulty in its development.
The soil at Deer lake is a good light loam inclined to be sandy, with a
blue clay subsoil. Muskegs occur, but they are generally small. There is
ample hay everywhere. I fancy this country might profitably be surveyed
and opened for settlement. I did not travel to the east of Montreal
lake, but from information obtained there is not any great difference in
the country from the west side.”

Mr. Crean goes on to say that there has been no attempt at agriculture
in Snake lake and Sandy river section. “The height of land dividing the
water sheds of Ile à la Crosse and Sandy river is not very high but is
clearly marked by a clay ridge. This ridge has been burnt off in recent
years and is covered with fallen timber and brulé. A poplar growth is
springing up now. This part of the section should make good agricultural
country. There is, however, a vast area of swamp in this section; I
cannot say if it could be drained. Sandy river flows through vast hay
meadows. These are not too wet and are by no means swamps. Of course
most of the meadows would be improved by clearing of scrub bush.”

[Illustration: Oat field at La Plonge.]

Mr. Crean reports having seen wheat and oats growing at the Roman
Catholic mission at the junction of Beaver and La Plonge rivers on
September 4, 1908. Mr. Crean says in his report:—“The wheat was a first
attempt, but will be tried on a much larger scale this year. The small
patch sown last year must have been put in late in the spring. It
appeared well matured but frosted; this I fancy was due to its being
planted close to the river. The priest has cleared a good sized patch,
perhaps about ten acres, which he intends sowing in wheat. The oats were
splendid and grew to a great height. The vegetables were especially
good. The variety astonished me. Almost every vegetable was represented
and appeared to thrive. Potatoes, cabbage, cauliflower, lima beans,
green peas, carrots, turnips, onions, lettuce, beets, parsnips, and
tomatoes all growing splendidly.

I NEVER SAW A BETTER GARDEN,

and indeed I don’t remember seeing as good in the west. This garden is
indicative of what can be done. The land around the mission is all good
and easily cleared as it is covered with poplar.

Mr. Crean reports that in 1908 the priests at Ile à la Crosse had about
three acres in use as a garden. The Hudson’s Bay Company’s post had
about thirty-five acres ploughed and five acres in oats, which sell at
that point at a dollar per bushel. “The Hudson’s Bay Company grows
potatoes for sale, but the native, being almost entirely a flesh eater,
looks on vegetables with contempt.”

Mr. Crean stated that there were some good gardens at Canoe lake. One
Chipewyan grew some barley but cut it too soon. At the southwest of
Canoe lake the country rises considerably, and the soil is good. There
is no settlement but the country is adapted to farming.

[Illustration: Potatoes at Buffalo river.]

“At Buffalo river there is quite a large settlement of Chipewyans. They
grow quite a little barley and some oats. The Chipewyans and some
half-breeds seem not to care for flour when left alone and so they grow
barley in preference to any other grain. It is easier to cook, being
just thrown in soup. The land on the northerly side of Buffalo lake is
good but there are no people living there. The Chipewyans at Buffalo
river told me that they never heard of the crop of barley being a
failure for the past fifty years.”

At Methye lake, according to Mr. Crean’s report, there is a Roman
Catholic Mission near the east end, and a priest, Father Pinard, is in
charge. He has a small garden and had a little patch of barley. Both did
well. At the Hudson’s Bay Company’s post, ten miles away, on the west
side of the lake, there is a garden of about an acre. It looked
splendidly on September 17. The potato tops were not touched by frost.
The swamp through which Methye river flows, though very wet, produces

A LARGE QUANTITY OF HAY.

The winter supply of feed for the cattle on Methye portage in its palmy
days was grown at Methye Post and at Buffalo lake at the mouth of Methye
river (hence called Bull’s House), but now there is no necessity for
raising grain or fodder, the Hudson’s Bay Company having abandoned this
route to the Mackenzie about the time of the Riel Rebellion in 1885. Mr.
Crean says:—“From conversation with the natives, the priest and the
Hudson’s Bay Company’s manager, I feel sure that the climate here would
be quite favourable to wheat raising. I am informed by the residents
that this section is not affected by early frosts, and the gardens which
I saw certainly bear out their statements.

“Pigs will, I firmly believe, thrive well in the north, and sheep will
at any rate not suffer from the raids of the coyote.

“Although the north may never seriously compete with the more southerly
latitudes in the wheat market, still, by judicious mixed farming, it
will eventually be equally productive and

SUPPORT A DENSE, THRIVING POPULATION.

Mr. Crean thus described Clearwater river and valley:—“The Clearwater
is a stream varying from one hundred to three hundred feet wide. It is
fairly rapid, and generally about four feet deep. At several points
along the river there is a considerable fall where a substantial amount
of power might be developed. The valley is from half a mile to three
miles wide, and generally contains magnificent soil. In the upper region
the timber is large and almost completely covers the valley. On the
slopes of the valley, which are from two hundred to six hundred feet
long and rather steep, the timber still continues, poplar and some
spruce, but once the bench land is reached there are some large
openings, and hay meadows to be found. When the railway reaches
McMurray, there is no doubt that a large agricultural settlement will
take possession of this beautiful valley.”

Mr. Crean writes in his report:—“The valley of Clearwater river would,
in my opinion, be a magnificent cattle range, and should be a farming
country. There are large open prairies, and the grass is splendid. Vetch
and pea-vine grow everywhere. I was greatly impressed with Clearwater
valley; it is quite similar to North Saskatchewan valley. The soil is a
good loam with a sandy clay subsoil. I had ample opportunity to observe
it carefully as the whole place in the vicinity of the portage is pitted
with prospect holes. The loam would be about a foot deep on an average.”

As to natural pasturage and hay in the area explored by him in 1908, Mr.
Crean states:—“Along Big river in the southern portion of the tract is

A SPLENDID RANCHING COUNTRY.

Hay abounds, and water and shelter is easily obtained. The country is
principally open, dotted with bluffs of poplar, and hay is to be had
everywhere. The grass cures here and the rolling hills would be blown
clear of snow which would afford a winter range for stock almost equal
to the Porcupine hills in southern Alberta. Farther north, however, the
country is too flat until Methye portage is reached. The valley of
Clearwater river below Methye portage would furnish a cattle range that
to my thinking would be hard to beat. I am informed that there is even a
better cattle range in the valley of Pembina river, southwest of Methye
portage, but I did not see it. Generally speaking, in my opinion mixed
farming would be the industry best adapted to the entire tract explored.
Everywhere I travelled there was an abundance of hay and along the main
routes hay was stacked in quantities in many places but always with an
eye to proximity to the trail. Sometimes the meadows would be small but
always numerous. At Green lake there were particularly fine meadows, and
I am told to the west of it is even better.”

Mr. Crean, in the report covering Green lake, Ile à la Crosse, Methye
portage, Snake lake and Lac la Ronge sections, writes:—“It may be said
that the whole tract though not exactly fitted for agricultural
settlement throughout in its present state, is still capable of
producing large quantities of cereals and farm produce and supporting a
large population. The over abundance of water and lack of natural
drainage, causing large swamps and muskegs, might in my opinion be
easily remedied by clearing out some of the rapids on Churchill river
and providing outlets for the surplus water where natural outlets are
lacking.”

Mr. Crean has the following general remarks to make as to the soil of
the district covered by his explorations in 1908:—“The soil throughout
the district varies so much that a general report of it would be
inadequate. In the southeasterly portion the soil is good, being a light
loam, with a blue clay subsoil; towards the west the soil is light loam
with sandy clay subsoil. North of Montreal lake the soil is still good
but large stones occur more frequently till at Lac la Ronge rock outcrop
is met with. There are of course fertile spots where the soil attains a
considerable depth, but no large compact areas of land occur in the
northeastern part of the tract explored, except at Stanley, where
perhaps three thousand acres of arable lands may be found in one block.
To the west of Lac la Ronge though rock outcrop continues; fertile spots
occur more frequently, till at Trout lake there is no sign of rock. The
soil around Trout lake is light and rather sandy. Muskegs occur
frequently until Snake lake is reached. Sandy river flows through a
large hay meadow, bounded on the west by a muskeg or peat bog, extending
westerly to Ile à la Crosse lake. This hay meadow varies in width from
one quarter of a mile to three miles. Abundance of good hay might be cut
along this river. This whole country between Snake lake and Ile à la
Crosse lake,

NEEDS DRAINAGE

and there are few high spots in it except along the shore of the lakes
or rivers. On the west side of Ile à la Crosse settlement there is
practically no land fit at present for cultivation, the country being
all low and almost a muskeg. I explored this side pretty thoroughly for
a distance of about sixty miles and found it to be practically all the
same, and almost the same level as the lake. Along what is termed Deep
river, connecting Ile à la Crosse lake and Little Buffalo lake, the
banks are higher and the land good, but this is only a fringe along the
river, seldom extending more than half a mile inland. These muskegs
could, of course, be easily drained. The soil around Buffalo lake is
light, but appears to be fertile. It is generally a light loam rather
inclined to be sandy, with a sandy subsoil. In some places the soil is
much heavier and is very fertile. Methye river flows through an immense
swamp, which extends for miles on each side, no ridges being even in
sight. At Methye lake the soil is very much better, being a heavy loam
varying from eighteen inches to almost any depth. Once the height of
land at Methye portage is crossed on the portage, the whole country
towards the west takes on a far better aspect, and the soil appears to
be as good as could be desired.”

With special reference to climatic conditions, Mr. Crean, in the report
of his explorations in 1908, says:—“The climate seems well adapted for
raising any cereal. In fact, wherever wheat has been tried it has grown
successfully. At Methye portage, which is considerably north (Latitude
56° 35′ 11′′), oats and barley have been grown. Wheat was not tried, but
I feel sure it would grow successfully, notwithstanding the relatively
high altitude. Methye portage has an altitude of about one thousand six
hundred and seventy-seven feet as compared with one thousand three
hundred and ninety-eight feet at Prince Albert. It is very much above
the general level of the country to the south and east.”

LOW ALTITUDE AND LONG SUMMER DAY.

Mr. Crean quotes Professor John Macoun’s remark that “in considering the
possibilities of agricultural development of all this modern country,
one fact to be kept steadily in mind is the advantage of the low
altitude and the long day, which are fixed conditions and will always
remain the same,” and gives a table verified by Doctor W. F. King, Chief
Astronomer of the Department of the Interior, to compare the hours of
sunshine on specified days during the summer at Ottawa, Prince Albert,
and Methye portage. On May 1 the length of the day between sunrise and
sunset at Ottawa (45 north latitude) is 14 hours, 4 minutes; at Prince
Albert (53 north latitude) 14 hours, 46 minutes; at Methye portage
(56.36 north latitude) 15 hours, 12 minutes. June 20, the hours of
sunshine are as follows:—Ottawa, 15 hours, 26 minutes; Prince Albert,
16 hours, 42 minutes; Methye portage 17 hours, 30 minutes. For August 20
the figures are:—Ottawa, 13 hours, 42 minutes; Prince Albert, 14 hours,
17 minutes; Methye portage, 14 hours, 36 minutes.

Mr. Crean states that in 1908 “The first frost registered by my
thermometer was on October 2, when the thermometer fell to 24 degrees
Fahr. I was at Methye portage on September 17, and the potato tops were
not frozen in the least. The garden was also quite untouched. Nor had I
seen any frozen vegetables on the way up. . . . . . . The lakes began to
freeze on October 20, but remained open for perhaps two weeks, the
weather turning quite mild again. There was not sufficient snow to
travel with dogs until November 20, and the snow was not deep until
December 15. The rainfall in this district is ample, though not
excessive, and its uniformity from year to year is a valuable feature.
As far as I could learn the heaviest rains occur in the early summer

JUST WHEN RAIN IS MOST NEEDED

for agricultural operations. The snow fall is not generally heavy,
seldom exceeding eighteen inches, and, as with the rainfall, is
uniform.”

[Illustration: Green Lake settlement.]

As to agriculture, actual and possible, in Green lake district, Mr.
Crean reports:—“At and around the Hudson’s Bay Company’s post on the
north end of Green lake there is a considerable settlement of
half-breeds. A Roman Catholic mission is established here. Revillon
Frères have also a post. The priest has a good garden having all kinds
of vegetables, and also a small fruit garden growing currants,
gooseberries, raspberries and strawberries. These all thrive and mature.
Green lake is important as a stopping place for freighters in winter and
consequently large quantities of hay are stacked. Some oats and barley
are grown but no real effort has been made to farm. Father Teston of the
mission says that he has grown oats and barley for fifteen years in
succession and so far has not had a failure. I interviewed a native
named Morin, who said that he had grown potatoes, oats and barley in
small quantities for thirty-five years and could not recall having ever
had a failure. He has never kept a record of when he sowed or when he
harvested, neither has the Reverend Father. Morin owns thirty-five head
of cattle and twelve head of horses. He has sown wheat on six or seven
occasions and it always ripened. In his opinion there is no doubt that
wheat could be raised anywhere in the locality. The ice in Green lake
goes out early and it is generally very late before it freezes. The
summers are always warm and there is ample rain. The gardens, which I
saw here, were certainly fine although they were not cared for as they
should have been. Weeds were allowed to grow in profusion.”

In his report of his explorations in 1909 along the west side of Green
lake, Mr. Crean wrote:—“The crops were not very far advanced when I was
there, nor indeed did any resident sow grain to any extent. There was a
small field of oats, a small field of barley and the usual gardens. The
gardens, as is customary in the fur country, are neglected; but yet the
vegetables seem to grow in profusion. Lettuce and radishes in fourteen
days grow from the seed to a size fit for table use. On Sunday, July 14,
I saw some radishes one and one-half inches in diameter, fourteen days’
growth.”

MEADOW LAKE DISTRICT.

[Illustration: Oat field at Meadow lake.]

Mr. Crean reports most favourably on Meadow lake district, west of Green
lake. He says:—“This section of the country is practically prairie and
contains, in my opinion, some of the very finest farm land in Canada.
The soil is exceedingly rich, there being in some portions twenty-four
inches black loam, with clay subsoil. The open prairie country is
perhaps twelve miles wide, and extends from Meadow lake almost to the
fourth meridian. At the Indian Farm Instructor’s house there was a plot
of about five acres of the finest of banner oats. I could not obtain any
data as to when these oats had been planted, but saw it on August 1,
when it looked very well with good promise of ripening in plenty of time
before the frosts. A settler named Evans is situated on the northern
boundary of the Indian Reserve. In his garden I saw beans, tomatoes,
peas, cauliflower, onions, carrots and parsnips, all doing very well.
Mr. Evans came into this country last winter, at least just before the
spring, broke this land, harrowing it as well as possible, and planted a
garden on the sod on June 12. At Meadow lake there are two or three
large herds of cattle which are thriving well. The grass at Meadow lake
grows perfectly, and is of the very finest quality for feed. The snow
may be deep here, but hay is so easily procured that I am of the opinion
that it would balance the scarcity of winter range. There was
considerable disagreement amongst the people living in this country as
to whether the grass really ripened. I satisfied myself later on (in
October) that it really does ripen. The few settlers agree that two
loads of hay will winter one animal, that is, two loads for each head of
stock, whether yearling or full grown. Hay grows in such profusion that
two loads to the animal could easily be obtained for even a large herd
of cattle. There is little doubt that cattle fed and finished make
better beef than range cattle, and the opportunity of procuring
finishing food (ensilage) is always present in the northern latitudes.
Hay here is by no means slough grass, but it is the

FINEST OF NORTHERN UPLAND HAY.”

Professor John Macoun speaks in the highest terms of the nutriment
contained in this kind of hay. That there is ample of it is a certainty.
An old settler in this country is Cyprian Morin, who is a fine specimen
of the old half-breed or native; born at Methye portage in 1834, he is
now as active as a man of thirty. Morin’s mother died four years ago at
the age of one hundred and nine years. She was at that time quite
capable of doing a good deal of work; in fact, I am told, attended to
all the baking. Morin who runs a trading post and has raised barley and
garden vegetables every year for twenty years, has also eighty head of
cattle and some thirty five horses; he has never tried wheat. He says
that the grass must ripen in this country (and it does), as the horses
remain fat all winter. About eight miles to the west of Morin, a man
named Fiddler has located, who has one hundred and fifty head of cattle
and sixteen horses. Last winter his losses were extremely heavy. He told
me that he lost seventy head of cattle, but said that it was because the
cattle had not recovered from their travelling over the trail from
Battleford. William LaRonde who also lives in this locality, his place
being situated on Meadow lake, has fifty head of cattle, all doing well.
Reverend Father Cochin has lately opened a mission here, and has a
rather nice little church, which is not yet finished. He has a good
garden this year.”

With reference generally, to the whole area of country explored by him
in 1909, Mr. Crean stated in his report:—“In estimating the area of
land available in its present state for agriculture, I do not wish it to
be understood that it is one large tract, but that ten million acres of
land in large and small tracts out of the total is capable of producing
crops, which will enable settlers to make a comfortable livelihood. The
land is almost entirely covered by a growth of small poplar. There are
some open places and a good deal of swamp. I will, however, refer to
this when dealing in detail with the tract. The climatic conditions
prevailing throughout offer no obstacle to farming, and wherever
experiments in agriculture have been attempted they have always been
successful.”

WHITEFISH LAKE DISTRICT.

Mr. Crean has this to say of Whitefish lake district (southwest of
Methye lake), which he explored in 1909:—“This section lies almost upon
the height of land between Arctic ocean and Hudson bay. The land is
drier and of a better quality than that to be found at or around Buffalo
lake; still, as is often the case in this north country, one finds
muskegs, almost impassable, either on top of, or very often half way up
a considerable hill. There are a great number of muskegs between Methye
portage and Whitefish lake, the country being flat and in need of
draining. Whitefish lake is two hundred and forty feet higher than
Methye lake, that portage which leads from it to Gypsy lake (eight miles
in length) crossing the actual height of land. From Gypsy lake the water
empties into the Clearwater, thence to the Athabaska and Arctic ocean.
The natives at Whitefish lake grow turnips, carrots, parsnips and
potatoes, but lack seed of any other kind. The potatoes are completely
worn out and change of seed is certainly necessary. Going southwest from
Whitefish lake towards Pembina river, the land improves, some very fine
semi-open country being encountered. The Indians at Whitefish lake, who
travel a great deal, use horses rather than canoes. The horses which I
saw were not noticeable either for their condition or their breeding,
the former being extremely poor, and the latter being absent,—Indian
cayuses of the common type.”

WATERHEN LAKE DISTRICT.

As to Waterhen lake district north of and across Beaver river from
Meadow lake district, Mr. Crean, in his 1909 report, states:—“The
country surrounding Waterhen lake is for the most part good, especially
that portion which lies to the west of the lake, where there is some
very fine land. Hay grows everywhere, and though the country can
generally be considered wooded there are large openings. The land around
Island river and Island lake (Lac des Isles) is included in this tract.
From Island lake to Beaver river there is a portage of twelve miles,
which passes through the finest semi-open country. Pea vine and vetch
are found in abundance. This good land extends to the fourth meridian,
perhaps beyond, but I did not go any farther. No crops are grown.
Indians there depend entirely on game, fish and fur for a somewhat
precarious living. Waterhen river passes through a very large hay swamp
shortly after flowing out of Waterhen lake. As it approaches Beaver
river, however, the land becomes more of a muskeg, and although there
are ridges containing arable land, the whole country may be taken to be
sorely in need of drainage.”

Mr. Crean did not go into the region north of Clearwater river, but he
made enquiries regarding it, and has the following to say about it in
his report:—“The country to the north of the Clearwater has not been
explored even by fur-traders or Indians. Occasionally one meets a
half-breed who has travelled through it, and the rumour current amongst
the fur-traders is that the country contains nothing but small lakes,
jackpine and rock outcrop. Still, the Indians who trap in this country
kill nothing but beaver, which, it is well known, live upon poplar;
therefore I concluded the country must be a poplar country and of some
promise agriculturally.”

NORTH OF THE CHURCHILL.

Most of the information we possess as to the most northern portion of
the region under review, namely the country north of Churchill river, is
contained in the report by Mr. J. B. Tyrrell of the exploration
conducted by him in 1892. This report covers an area of about sixty
thousand square miles, bounded on the south by Churchill and Clearwater
rivers; on the west by the lower portion of Athabaska river; on the
north by Athabaska lake, Stone river, with its expansions, Black and
Hatchet lakes, Wollaston lake and Cochrane or Ice river; on the east by
the lower part of Cochrane river, Reindeer lake and Reindeer river. It
lies between north latitudes 55° 20′ and 59° 37′, and east longtitude
101° and 111° 30′.

Mr. Tyrrell, in his report, gives some interesting information as to the
great lakes and the rivers which are such conspicuous topographical
features of this area.

Reindeer lake, from which Reindeer river flows, has an area of about two
thousand two hundred square miles, and an elevation above the sea of one
thousand one hundred and fifty feet. Its water is very pure and clear.

Wollaston lake is a large body of beautifully clear transparent water
lying in a general north-and-south direction, with a greatest length of
about fifty-five miles and an approximate area of eight hundred square
miles. Though smaller than Reindeer lake, it is very similar to it in
general character. Very many rocky islands rise abruptly out of its
clear blue water. Wollaston lake is the dividing line between the waters
flowing to Churchill river and those flowing to the Mackenzie, for it is
not only drained by Cochrane river, toward the Churchill, but Stone
river flows from its northwestern side, towards Lake Athabaska.

Lake Athabaska lies in a general east-northeasterly and
west-southwesterly direction, its southwestern end being in northern
Alberta. This lake has a greatest length of one hundred and ninety-five
miles, a greatest width of thirty-five miles, a shore-line of four
hundred and twenty-five miles and a total area of two thousand eight
hundred and fifty square miles. Its depth has not yet been determined.

Cree lake is a large elongated body of pure transparent water lying in a
general northeast and southwest direction, with a greatest length of
forty-nine miles and a width as yet undetermined. Cree river discharges
its waters towards Lake Athabaska.

Geikie river is, as far as is known, the principal tributary of
Wollaston lake. It rises in some small lakes near the source of Foster
river, and flows northeastward through a thickly drift-covered country.
For long stretches it is straight and without current, giving the
appearance of a wide, quiet river, or a chain of long narrow lakes.

The principal tributaries of the Churchill river on the north are
Mudjatik, Haultain, Foster and Reindeer rivers. Mudjatik river is a
swift, winding stream about eighty miles in length, generally flowing in
a shallow channel through a sandy plain, in the bottom of a wide
depression between ridges of granite. It is obstructed by comparatively
few rapids, and these are for the most part over ridges of boulders.

Mr. Tyrrell, and his assistant, Mr. Dowling, considered the whole of the
far northern part of this region as

ABSOLUTELY UNSUITABLE FOR AGRICULTURE.

It is mentioned, in the report, that, under the trees at White Spruce
rapid, on Geikie river, pembina berries, raspberries, etc., were growing
in profusion in July, but no areas of arable land were found. All
references to the soil are unfavourable, these for instance:—“There is
no soil of any value for agricultural purposes along Mudjatik river.”

“The country surrounding Cree river is sandy and very barren.”

CHAPTER VII.

NORTHERN SASKATCHEWAN.

Tree Growth and Timber Resources.

A Rare Bit of Sylvan Beauty.—Ash-Leaved Maples Successfully Grown
From Seed.—Notes by The Way on Available Water Powers.—Much
Country Covered with Small Timber Not Generally of Commercial
Value.—Some Areas of Good Timber Which Will be Invaluable To
the Settlers.

The wide belt of territory north of the Saskatchewan as far northward as
Churchill and Clearwater rivers, is pre-eminently a wooded country, its
resources in the way of timber being very valuable, and its
forest-clothed mounds, river valleys and lake basins imparting to it a
beautiful park-like appearance in marked contrast to the more monotonous
scenery of the great prairie country south of the Saskatchewan. There is
little doubt that the scenic beauties of the region, by attracting
travellers, will, when there is railway communication, contribute
materially to the development of the natural resources of this extremely
promising portion of the, as yet, unexploited northwest. Included in
this territory is the famous scenery of Methye portage, which for
upwards of a century has excited the admiration of explorers and
travellers as perhaps the most superb natural panorama of forest scenery
in North America. Of the many books and diaries of men who have had the
privilege of enjoying this view, there is not one which omits to pay
tribute to its beauty.

Alexander Mackenzie, in the account of his trip of 1789, describes the
height of land overlooking the Clearwater from Methye portage as
commanding “a most extensive, romantic and ravishing prospect. From here
the eye looks down on the course of the little river, by some called
Swan river, by others Clearwater or Pelican river, beautifully
meandering for upwards of thirty miles. The valley, which is at once
refreshed and adorned by it, is about three miles in breadth and is
confined by two lofty ridges of equal height, displaying a most
beautiful intermixture of wood and lawn, and stretching on till the blue
mist obscures the prospect. Some parts of the inclining heights are
covered with stately forests, relieved by promontories of the finest
verdure, where the elk and buffalo find pasture. These are contrasted by
spots where fire has destroyed the woods and left a dreary void behind
it. . . . . . . .”

Mackenzie, further, declares this “enchanting scenery” to be a
“wonderful display of uncultivated nature.”

MOST DELIGHTFUL NATURAL SCENERY.

Harmon, writing in 1800, gives us the following as his impression of
this view:—“About a mile from this end of the portage is a hill, which
towers majestically to the height of a thousand feet above the plain
below, and which commands a most extensive and delightful prospect. Two
lofty and extensive ridges enclose a valley about three miles in width,
which stretches far as the eye can reach. Little river, which is also,
by different persons, denominated Swan, Clearwater, or Pelican river,
winds in a most delightful manner along this charming valley. The
majestic forests, which wave upon these ridges, the delightful verdure
of the intervening lawn, and the beautiful stream which wanders along
through it, giving a pleasing variety to the scene, until these objects
become blended with the horizon, form, on the whole, the most delightful
natural scenery that I ever beheld.”

Sir John Franklin, in his account of his expeditions, writing of the
view from the heights above the Clearwater at Methye portage, describes
it as “the most picturesque and romantic prospect we had yet seen in
this country. Two ranges of high hills run parallel to each other for
several miles until the faint blue haze hides their particular
characters, when they slightly change their course and are lost to the
view.”

Captain (later Sir) George Back makes enthusiastic references to this
beautiful view, for instance the following:—“A thousand feet below, the
sylvan landscape lay spread before us, to the extent of thirty-six
miles, in all the wild luxuriance of its summer clothing. Even the most
jaded of the party, as he broke from the gloom of the wood on this
enchanting scene, seemed to forget his weariness, and halted
involuntarily with his burden

TO GAZE FOR A MOMENT,

with a sort of wondering admiration, on a spectacle so novel and
magnificent. . . . . . . . . . . There is something appalling in the
vastness of a solitude like this.”

Sir George Simpson, in his narrative, speaks of “that noble view of
Clearwater river which has been drawn with so much truth and beauty by
Sir George Back.”

Bishop Tache, in the accounts of his travels, writes of the
Clearwater:—“This delightful little stream, rising to the east of
Methye portage has, up to the present time, and in spite of the
difficulties of navigation, enjoyed almost the exclusive privilege of
supplying a route to Athabaska-Mackenzie. On descending the heights of
Methye portage one takes boat on this little river which, in order to
keep the traveller in the midst of the beauties it presents to his view,
places obstructions in the way, necessitating the portages of White Mud,
the Pines, Bigstone, the Horse and the Cascades.”

The early travellers were also impressed with the fine trees in this
section of the northwest, and occasionally mention extra fine groves
which attracted their attention. For instance, Simpson speaks of “firs
of great size” on a projecting point in Methye lake, and, referring to
one of his camps in Clearwater valley, says:—“One of the pines, under
shelter of which we took up our night’s lodgings, measured three yards
in girth at five feet from the ground.”

As in other parts of Canada, forest fires have wrought dreadful havoc in
parts of this belt, but there still remains considerable areas of good
timber.

The Venerable Archdeacon McKay, in his examination before the Senate
committee of 1907, stated that as to the country around Lac la Ronge
there is timber all through it, wherever it has not been destroyed by
fires. He explained that he put up a sawmill operated by water power at
Lac la Ronge in 1906. The logs that are sawn there are the kind of
timber found in that part of the country. They average seventeen logs to
the thousand feet. They would be logs fourteen or fifteen feet long. The
diameter would be about two feet across at the butt—good, large logs,
clean timber, very much the same timber as at Prince Albert. This good
timber is scattered all over the country, sometimes for miles. It
depends on the nature of the country.

Asked how far this timber area would outskirt to the east, west and
north, the Archdeacon replied he would say that kind of country extended
all the way through right down to Lac la Ronge, and down all the way to
the border of the province. Although he had not been through it, he had
travelled backwards and forwards on it a good deal, visited Indian camps
and so on, and it is very much the same kind of timber all through. In
some places it is muskeg, and in some places heavy timber. Reindeer lake
is not north of the tree limit. There are trees there, but they are
small. They do not grow so large as farther south. It is a good way
north of Reindeer lake before the barren grounds are reached. The
Archdeacon had never been farther north than Reindeer lake.

TIMBER ABOUT LAC LA RONGE.

Mr. Tyrrell describes the country immediately north of the Saskatchewan
as a thickly wooded belt, “which contains a large quantity of timber,
chiefly white spruce, trees up to eighteen inches in diameter. It is a
wooded country with trees from twelve to eighteen inches in diameter,
tall with clean trunks—good, nice timber. Of course, the timber does
not grow as large on high, dry, sandy ridges as it grows in the valleys.
Most of the timber is in good soil in the valley bottoms, but there is
more or less land all over. The poplar and birch affects the higher
land, and the spruce and hemlock the valleys.”

Mr. Dowling states that the sides of Green lake are “densely wooded with
poplar and spruce.”

PIONEER ARBORICULTURE.

Speaking of his visit to Ile à la Crosse lake, Mr. Dowling states in his
report:—“Some ash-leaved maples had been planted in the garden of the
Hudson’s Bay Company’s post, which are now from ten to fifteen feet
high, quite healthy and bearing abundant seed.”

According to Mr. Dowling’s report “The timber in the rocky country
bordered by the southern shore of Lac la Ronge is not large or abundant.
Southward there is some improvement, and large individual spruce trees
occur occasionally. The ‘lob sticks’ at Big Stone, Hudson’s Bay
Company’s post, are fine examples of these. On Montreal river, small
Banksian pine cover the eastern slope of the sandy plateau. No large
timber, spruce or pine, is seen till near the lake, where at the
southern end some groves of large spruce occur. On the watershed south
of Montreal and Deer lakes the largest timber is seen. Here the
formation of the country is evidently morainic, but southward the
country slopes gently towards Saskatchewan river.”

SOME MERCHANTABLE TIMBER AREAS.

Mr. Crean reports that a considerable quantity of merchantable spruce
timber is to be found in Methye lake section. There is some remarkably
fine spruce along the banks of Whitefish river, and it extends in not
very dense forest across to Methye lake, a distance of about eight
miles.

Summarizing the results of his explorations in 1908, Mr. Crean
reports.—“Although numerous prairie openings occur, this tract may be
spoken of as practically covered with small timber not generally of any
commercial value. The poplar is the principal growth, and, following the
rule so well known throughout the western prairie country, indicates
good land. Some spruce is found and large quantities of small second
growth jackpine. There is some tamarack. There is, of course, no white
or red pine. The poplar in some places would make fine pulpwood or
barrel staves. Generally speaking it is of no commercial value. There
are several small groves of good spruce along Churchill river, and at
Methye portage there is a large quantity of good spruce. Along Whitefish
river the timber is large and of good quality. On both the east and west
side of Green lake some good timber is found but it is scattered.
Generally there is ample timber for settlers’ use, but not enough to
supply any lumber industry.

“Throughout this district there are many points where a large amount of
water power could be developed, and there are numerous small power
sites. The district might be utilized so as to create great industrial
centres. The great advantage of the numerous water powers is the fact
that sufficient power can be obtained at many points to supply the needs
of a fair sized community. On almost every stream there are sites where
small powers could be easily developed and grist mills, saw mills,
lighting and pumping plants could be operated at the minimum of expense.
I did not gauge or measure the possibilities of any of the water powers,
but made rough estimates of a few prominent ones. On Beaver river at
what is termed Grand rapids probably

TEN THOUSAND HORSE POWER COULD BE DEVELOPED.

Rapid river, which enters the Churchill about seven miles below Stanley,
falls seventy feet in one cascade. This should afford a large amount of
power. Churchill river between Ile à la Crosse lake and Knee lake, a
distance of about twenty-five miles, has a fall of eighty feet. This
fall is practically all in three rapids, all of which have sharp
descents. At one rapid there is a cascade eight feet high. All the
tributaries on the north side of the Churchill afford ample opportunity
of development of power. Mudjatik river is a series of water-falls.”

Mr. Crean, in his report of 1909, says:—“Waterhen river is very rapid,
and along it are several small falls and steep descents. These would be
ample to develop power for a small community, but not enough for any
commercial proposition. On Clearwater river occurs one of the best
commercial water powers which I have seen. It could be easily and
inexpensively developed.”

All reports agree in saying that there are numerous water powers
susceptible of development throughout the area under review, but there
is not much detailed information given on this point.

[Illustration: Prairie along Clearwater river.]

Mr. Crean reports that along Whitefish river there is a considerable
quantity of good tamarack, but explains that although this timber would
be extremely useful to any settler going into the country, he did not
think there was sufficient for any commercial project. There is a
considerable quantity of timber north of Waterhen lake and river. There
are several scattered clumps of fine spruce in this locality which are
passed on the string of small portages when one is travelling from
Waterhen lake to Island river. The diameter would average perhaps twelve
inches, but running up to twenty-four inches.

THE NATIVE TIMBER TREES.

Mr. Crean incorporates in his report the following description, with
comparative values, of the most common kinds of timber found in the
north:—

“(1). White Spruce (_Picea canadensis_ (Mill) B., S. & P.)

The wood is light, soft, not very strong, straight grained, light
yellow, with hardly distinguishable sapwood. This is the best tree for
lumber purposes in the northern forest, and is also one of the best for
pulpwood. It usually grows on higher ground than the black spruce.

“(2) Black Spruce (_Picea mariana_ (Mill), B., S. & P.)

The wood resembles closely that of the white spruce, and as lumber or
pulpwood no distinction is made between them. The wood has a slight red
tinge and has paler sapwood. The black spruce grows usually in muskegs
and low places and owing to the coldness of the soil does not grow fast,
and is usually small, not usually over six or eight inches in diameter.

“(3). Jackpine (_Pinus Banksiana_, Am.)

The wood is light, soft, not very strong, close grained and dark, nearly
brown in colour, with light thick sapwood. This tree is used mostly for
railway ties and fuel, but is manufactured into lumber to some extent.
It is not equal in colour or smoothness to the wood of the spruce. It is
used for pulp, but has not so fine a fibre or colour as the spruce.

“(4). Tamarack (_Larix americana_, Michx.)

The wood is light brown, heavy, hard, strong, rather coarse grained and
very durable. It is used for railway ties, posts and dimension timbers.
It is not sawn into lumber, being more useful for other purposes, and is
not used for pulp.

“(5). Poplar, Aspen or White Poplar (_Populus tremuloides_, Michx.)

The wood is light brown with almost white sapwood. It is smooth and
easily worked. It is used for pulp and is cut into lumber for inside
finish. As it is a widely extended and quick growing tree it is used
largely for fuel. Next to the spruce it is the most valuable tree for
pulp. It is manufactured largely into finer grades of paper by the soda
process.

“(6). Balsam or Black Poplar (_Populus balsamifera_).

The wood is light brown, with thick sapwood. It is rather coarse and not
strong. It is chiefly used for fuel, though sometimes cut into boards
where other lumber is not available. It is not so valuable as the aspen
poplar.

“(7). Birch (_Betula papyrifera_, Marsh).

The wood is light, strong, tough, hard, very close grained, light brown,
tinged with red, with thick, nearly white sapwood. It is used for
spools, lasts and turned work generally. Birch fibre is short and
brittle, and not easily bleached, and is not suitable for pulp.”

REINDEER LAKE AND RIVER.

The district north of Churchill and Clearwater rivers, authorities
agree, is only thinly wooded, the growth becoming smaller towards the
northern limit. According to Mr. Tyrrell, the banks of Churchill river
from Methye portage to the north of Reindeer river are low and thickly
wooded with spruce and poplar. White spruce (_Picea Alba_) forms some
groves of fair size in the bottom lands along Reindeer river near
Churchill river, but farther north it is rarely seen except in some
particularly favorable localities. One small isolated grove of white
spruce was found in a high sandy island in Hatchet lake, standing out
conspicuously in the midst of the surrounding forest of small black
spruce. Poplar (_Populus tremuloides_) and Birch (_Betula papyrifera_)
are the only remaining trees of any importance. They are chiefly found
in the vicinity of Churchill river, though small scattered trees were
seen on the banks of Stone river. The rocky shores and islands of
Reindeer lake are generally thinly covered with a sparse growth of
small, black spruce. The irregular shores of Wollaston lake are chiefly
composed of thinly wooded, rocky hills. Geikie river flows between low,
sparsely-wooded banks. The banks of Mudjatik river are thinly wooded
with Banksian pine and spruce. As to Cree river, surrounding country is
sandy and very barren supporting but a scanty growth of black spruce and
Banksian pine, with very little underbrush. Some fine, large, white
spruce were noticed at spots on Geikie river.

NEAR LAKE ATHABASKA.

Mr. Tyrrell mentions that along the northeast shore of Lake Athabaska,
“Some good white spruce, up to fourteen inches in diameter, is growing
on the points.”

Mr. Tyrrell, before the Senate committee of 1907, in speaking of the
forests of the country north of the Churchill, explained that far in the
north there is the tract of country that has no trees on it; then a belt
of country from one to two hundred miles in width, with small Banksian
pine, spruce, larch, poplar and some white birch. He would not consider
any of those woods valuable for timber purposes, except locally. They
would serve for pulpwood, but the growth is not thick. Still over
considerable areas there might, of course, be a large quantity of timber
for pulpwood. In that belt the trees would average probably six inches.
Occasionally you would find some a good deal larger. The poplar grows on
the drier lands. It is not an indication of good land in an extremely
northern country. It indicates a dry, sandy soil, but further south it
indicates excellent soil.

CHAPTER VIII.

NORTHERN SASKATCHEWAN.

Economic Minerals.

A Large Amount of Iron Ore in the Northeastern Corner of the
Region, on the North East Side of Lake Athabaska.—Indications
Favourable for the Discovery of Coal.—Nickel and Traces of
Cobalt on Reindeer lake.—Medicinal Waters.—Bituminous Springs
and Pit Coal on Cree river.—Tar Sands Near Buffalo lake.

In the report of his explorations in 1892 and 1893, Mr. J. B. Tyrrell
notes the occurrence of several areas of Huronian quartzite along the
northeast side of Lake Athabaska. In one case, he states:—“At a
distance of a mile and a half from this island (four miles and a half
east of Beaver Lodge island) in a direction north 66° east, a
conspicuous red hill rises one hundred and twenty-five feet above the
water, its abrupt red cliff standing out boldly towards the southwest.
On its northeastern side, at its base, it is composed of thinly fissile
quartzose schist, very much reddened, striking north 30° west, and
dipping south 60° west, at an angle of 10°. Farther up the side of the
hill the rock is a quartzite, interbedded with layers of hematite, which
in some places forms the larger part of the mass. The summit of the
hill, several hundred yards in length, is composed of a highly hematitic
quartzite, mingled with a large quantity of limonite, especially on the
higher points. In places the rock is a conglomerate, with quartz
pebbles, and a matrix of limonite. Other similar red hills can be seen
in the distance on the strike of the rocks, and the total amount of iron
here and in the vicinity is doubtless very large.”

Mr. J. B. Tyrrell, before the Senate committee of 1907, stated that from
a line at Cumberland House, on Saskatchewan river, northwestward to
Churchill river, and westward along Churchill river, the country to the
south is underlaid by the more recent clay rocks of the plains, and the
mineral wealth that is to be looked for there is

COAL AND IRON.

He had considerable confidence in both those most useful products being
found in that country. Coal is found on Saskatchewan river at Edmonton,
and on Pembina river, west of Edmonton, and there are several more
outcroppings of coal down Saskatchewan river as far as Prince Albert.
Most of the country north of Saskatchewan river had not been explored
for coal. It is a country of gentle slopes covered with grass and wood,
and the coal outcropping in such a country is certain to be covered.
There is no possibility of seeing it as a natural outcrop. It has to be
looked for, but it has not been looked for in that country sufficiently
to find it, so he was perfectly confident that the same seams that
outcrop on the Saskatchewan, in the west at all events, would be traced
much further north.

Writing in his report of his survey of the west shore of Reindeer lake,
Mr. Dowling states:—“From Priest’s point (proceeding southward), the
lake gradually narrows from a minimum width of four miles, to a narrow
inlet less than a mile wide at the outlet, and the course of this part
lies very nearly southwest and northeast following in a general way the
strike of the rocks. A band of dark mica-schists is crossed, reaching
from near Priest’s point to twenty miles southwest, and along the course
followed through the islands many small dykes of a quartzose
fine-grained granite were found, in which iron pyrites is freely
developed. The beds of fine-grained gneiss on Camping island, ten miles
south from Priest’s point, are also found with many veins of pyrites and
on the hill in the centre of the island many of the beds are very much
rusted and decomposed. The pyrites are found to contain a small
percentage of

NICKEL AND TRACES OF COBALT.

At the north side of a small creek on the west shore, southwest from
Camping island, the Indians report a soft soapstone or serpentinous rock
from which they make pipes, but a visit to the locality did not result
in finding this rock, which was then said to be obtained in small pieces
from the shore and generally under the water. The rock there was,
however, a light green sericite-schist, and it is possible that
unfoliated or less cleavable portions of this might be soft enough for
the purpose named. The stratigraphical relations of this band with the
surrounding gneisses, could not in the time at the disposal of the party
be made out, so that it is problematical whether this may be a small
area of highly altered Huronian beds or not. The next rock occurring to
the south is a dark garnetiferous gneiss, followed by reddish granitic
gneiss to the outlet of the lake.”

Mr. Dowling mentions that in descending Reindeer river his attention was
attracted by the red colouring of a hill near the river, below the mouth
of Stump river. He states:—“On a nearer view, this red colouring is
found to be due to the debris of a decomposed band occupying the crest
of the ridge. The rock has been very highly charged with iron oxides and
pyrites. The strike of the beds is south 10° east, with dip eastward at
angles varying from 60° to 80°. Several large seams of red granite cut
into the hill and break up the beds somewhat.

“A section of the hill shows a light, coarse gneiss near the bottom,
with a dark mica-schist, followed by a bed of light, rusty coloured
gneiss having a thickness of about five feet. This in some places seems
to have been very rich in pyrites and is weathered out to a reddish
ochre. The outcrop is just below the crest of the ridge, and from it the
ochre falling down, stains the whole face of the hill. Above, on the
summit, the rock is mostly a dark-red gneiss.”

Archbishop Clut, examined before the Senate committee of 1888, stated
that he had seen sulphur springs on Clearwater river. Asked if he had
ever heard of the existence of valuable minerals in any part of the
country northeast of Lake Athabaska, Bishop Clut explained that he had
seen a man named McCarthy, at Fond du Lac, Lake Athabaska, who told him
that he had discovered gold, but as he was not an educated man, the
bishop did not know whether he was mistaken or not. The man said he
would not show it to anybody, but that he was almost sure that he had
found a gold mine. Nobody had brought to him specimens of gold, silver
or anything of that kind from that region.

BITUMINOUS SPRINGS AND PIT COAL.

Chief Factor A. McDonald chronicles in his journal having passed
bituminous springs on Cree river, south of Lake Athabaska, just above
the junction of the Pierre au Calumet or Pipestone river (McLeod’s
“Peace River”). He also reports having passed, the same day, “Large
strata of pit coal all along either side of the river.”

Mr. Alfred Von Hamerstein informed the Senate committee of 1907 that “on
Clearwater river there are first class medicinal springs. The natives
have been using the water right along, and it acts very well on the
bowels. It is like the well known Hunyadi mineral water. It is a very
nice, picturesque country, and the natives go up there and doctor
themselves.”

In the course of his examination before the Senate committee of 1907,
Mayor Cook, of Prince Albert, explained that nobody in the region north
of the Saskatchewan bothers about the coal. Coal had been discovered at
Lac La Ronge—there was no doubt about that. Good samples had been
brought in, but nobody bothered with it yet because wood was so
plentiful.

W. F. Bredin, M.L.A., stated before the Senate committee of 1907, that
on his way from McMurray to Prince Albert, he found that the tar sands
appeared on Buffalo lake, which is on the Churchill system of water, and
that, in his opinion, showed that the tar sands are both on the
Mackenzie water system and on the Churchill system, on both sides of the
divide there.

Mr. Crean in his 1908 report says:—“At the narrows between Little
Buffalo lake and Buffalo lake, there is a tar sand outcrop. The Indians
use it to pitch their canoes.”

Mr. Crean also says:—“Lac la Ronge district is claimed to have great
possibilities as a mineral district. The Laurentian range of rock crops
out here and is easily traced to the northwest. Whether this outcrop
really contains mineral of economic value is still unsettled. Numerous
claims have been staked at Nickel island in Lac la Ronge and on the
mainland close by, also on Churchill river above Stanley. I had not time
to prospect the country, but from casual observation I should think that
it would repay a closer investigation. The vein on Nickel island is very
distinct and about eighteen inches wide on the outcrop. Several small
companies have been formed and development work in a limited way is
progressing.”

So far there has been very little systematic prospecting for economic
minerals in the portion of the province of Saskatchewan north of the
river of that name, but the people of Prince Albert and Battleford and
the pioneers settled in the wilderness north of those towns, have for
years believed that coal, iron and other minerals will be found in the
vicinity; trappers, traders and Indians often return from the wilderness
with stories of mineral discoveries.

CHAPTER IX.

NORTHERN SASKATCHEWAN.

Game, Fur-Bearing Animals and Fish.

“So Fine a Country for the Chase That It May Be Regarded as an
Extensive Preserve.”—The Wood Buffalo Used To Roam Over It, but
Do Not Now.—Moose and Caribou Plentiful.—The Indians Kill the
Moose for Their Hides.—Fish of Various Kinds in Abundance.—
Sturgeon That Weigh a Hundred Pounds.—One Indian Killed
Eighteen Moose During One Season.

As fish has always been the staple food of the inhabitants of that part
of the province of Saskatchewan north of the river of that name, and the
fur trade their only industry, it goes without saying that the country
abounds in fish and game. A very few quotations from travellers and
explorers is all that is required to give an idea of the species of fish
and animals to be found in this region, and of their occurrence.

In his account of his passage through the Clearwater country, Simpson
writes:—“This is a fine country for the chase, and so little frequented
in winter, that it may be regarded as an extensive preserve. We saw
three moose deer on the top of one of the hills, and their tracks and
those of the wood buffalo were numerous in every direction. The valley
of the river is entirely sheltered from the inclement north and
northwest winds, but its exposure to the east usually rendered the snow
deep and soft, as we found to our cost. . . . . . . . . Just before
breakfasting we saw, on the northern hills, a large moose, and a band of
five wood buffalos sunning their fat sides—a sight sufficient to make
the mouths of the pemmican eaters water, but they were beyond our reach,
and, taking the alarm, quickly disappeared. The declivities of the hills
seemed, as we passed along, completely chequered with the tracks of
these and smaller animals.”

Mr. H. J. Moberly, chief trader of the Hudson’s Bay Company at Rapid
river, (Lac la Ronge) Cumberland district, forwarded the Senate
committee of 1887 evidence in writing regarding animal life in the far
northwest. He explained that he knew Saskatchewan (north) river and
valley from the mouth of the Saskatchewan on Lake Winnipeg up to its
source in Rocky mountains. He also knew Athabaska river and valley from
its source down to its mouth in Athabaska lake, and was well acquainted
with all the country between those two rivers, from Rocky mountains down
to Carlton, and from there, taking a line via Green lake, Beaver river,
Ile à la Crosse lake, Deep river, Buffalo lake, Methye river and lake,
Methye portage and down the Clearwater to its junction with Athabaska
river, as an eastern line and Rocky mountains as a westward. He knew
well all the country between Athabaska and Peace rivers, from their
mouths to their sources.

As to wood buffalo, at the time Mr. Moberly wrote, there was a band,
probably about two hundred, between the Saskatchewan and the Athabaska.
(There are none there now). They kept on the mountains between Lac la
Biche and McMurray. Another band, probably three hundred strong, was
between Athabaska and Peace rivers on Thickwood and Birch mountains. A
third band, probably seven hundred strong, was scattered through the
mountains between Liard and Peace rivers, and from Salt river to the
foot of Rocky mountains.

MOOSE RUN ALL OVER THE WOODED COUNTRY

north of the prairies and east of Rocky mountains.

The distribution of other game and fur animals in far northwestern
Canada was given by Mr. Moberly as follows:—Reindeer (cariboo),
large—all over the wood countries from Saskatchewan, to the barren
grounds of the north; reindeer, small—all over the barren grounds in
the north, and come south in winter as far as Lac de Brochet, Athabaska
lake and Peace river, close to Rocky mountains; red deer—Athabaska and
Peace river valleys; black tail deer, jumping deer and chevreux—same
country as the red deer; black and brown bears—all over the wooded
country and Rocky mountains; grizzly bears—Rocky mountains, valleys of
the Peace, Athabaska, Liard, and Fraser, but seldom farther than two
hundred and fifty miles from the foot of the Rockies; beaver—Athabaska,
Peace river and in fact all over the wooded country.

In his report of his exploration of the country between Churchill river
and Lake Athabaska in 1892, Mr. J. B. Tyrrell writes:—“The moose
(_Alces Americanus_), roams through the more thickly wooded parts of the
country as far north as Stone river, which is probably near the northern
limit of its range. Seven individuals in all were seen during the course
of the summer. The woodland caribou (_Rangifer caribou_) is said to
occur in the more southern portion of the district, near Churchill
river, but none were seen. The barren ground caribou (_Rangifer
Grœnlandicus_) comes south in winter to the south end of Reindeer lake
and the upper portion of Mudjatik and Foster rivers. It travels north in
spring to the Barren Lands, but a very few animals are occasionally left
behind, one having been shot in July near the north end of Cree lake.
The Canada lynx (_Lynx Canadensis_) is moderately abundant in some
seasons in the more southern part of the district. The gray wolf (_Canis
lupus occidentalis_) roams over the country, but is not plentiful. The
coyote (_Canis lisatrans_) is found occasionally as far north as the
height of land, one having been shot by the writer on one of the small
lakes near the source of Foster river. It is, however, certainly not
common in the district. Red, black and cross foxes (_Vulpes vulgaris_),
wolverine (_Guloluscus_), marten (_Mustela Americana_), weasel
(_Putorius vulgaris_), mink (_P. vison_) and skunk (_Mephitis
mephitica_) are all found in greater or less abundance in the rolling
wooded country underlain by Archaean rocks. The otter (_Lutra
Canadensis_) was found on all the streams north to Stone river. The
black bear (_Ursus Americanus_) roams over the whole country. A few
beavers (_Castor fiber_) may still be met with in many of the streams. A
considerable colony was found in the untravelled country near the source
of Geikie river, but our canoemen brought back word of this (to the
Indians) important discovery, and doubtless the beaver were killed
during the following winter. The muskrat (_Fiber zibethicus_) was seen
swimming in all the streams. The rabbit or American hare (_Lepus
Americanus_) is found everywhere in the denser woods, but it did not
seem to be anywhere abundant.

FISH IN ABUNDANCE.

“Fish seem to be everywhere abundant in the lakes and streams, but the
number of species is very limited. The lake trout, (_Cristivomer
namaycush_) is, however, the largest of any of the finny tribes. One was
caught near the mouth of Stone river weighing twenty-five pounds. The
whitefish (_Coregonus clupeiformis_) is found everywhere throughout the
district, but more especially in the shallower lakes. The blue fish or
Back’s grayling, (_Thymallus signifer_) was caught in Stone river at the
foot of the heavy falls below Black lake. Pike, (_Esox lucius_),
pickerel, (_Stozostethium vitreum_), methy, (_Lota lacustris_) and two
or three species of suckers, (_Catastomus teres_ and _Myxostoma
macrolepidota_) were found in almost all the water stretches.

Mayor Cook, of Prince Albert, when examined before the Senate committee
of 1907, explained that at that time he held the appointment of
inspector of fisheries. He testified that once, some years previously,
on Beaver river, he had seen thirty-two thousand whitefish caught in two
nights, which would average about two or two and one-half pounds each.
They put up the winter supply of fish in three or four nights. These
fish were caught by half-breeds and Indians. The fish were coming down
after spawning, and those catching them set the nets right across the
river. This happened in close season, “but they did not bother about
that; it was the fish they were after.” There are whitefish, trout,
jackfish and some sturgeon in Torch and Saskatchewan rivers. Reindeer
lake and the small lakes all around it are full of fish. They fish up
there until December 1. Sometimes the lakes are open until December 15,
and break up again about May 15 to 20. It depends upon the size of the
lake. If it is a very large lake it will take a little longer. Witness
had seen the lakes open on December 15. Those lakes are teeming with
fish,—whitefish, sturgeon and trout. The trout run as high as fifty
pounds.

The sturgeon run from ten to one hundred pounds. Witness had never seen
one over one hundred pounds. He had seen one whitefish that weighed
seventeen and one-half pounds, and trout that weighed fifty. He had them
for the exhibition in Ottawa, but the train was blocked and did not get
through. The biggest jackfish he had ever seen weighed forty-five
pounds. They have some little bits of things but they range up to that.
In other places they have big fish from ten to forty-five pounds in
weight.

According to Mr. Crean, Methye lake is a fine body of fresh water and is
well stocked with fish. “Wild fowl of every kind abound here. Moose and
caribou are plentiful. The result of Nature’s bounteousness, is that the
native, content with Nature’s provision, grows nothing. He kills the
moose for its hide.”

In his report on the area explored by him, in 1908, Mr. Crean
stated:—“The staple food of the native north of the Saskatchewan is
fish, and with this commodity he is amply supplied. Whitefish are found
in all the lakes and rivers. Green lake is stocked to repletion with as
fine whitefish as will be found anywhere. Ile à la Crosse lake is also
amply supplied. Canoe lake, Marten lake and all the immense water area
comprised of the numerous lakes in this district are well stocked with
this valuable food.

“Game of all kinds abound, the principal species being the moose, the
caribou, the deer, the black bear, the cinnamon bear, the lynx, the wolf
(timber), the fox, the wolverine, the otter, the beaver, the mink, the
marten, the muskrat, the rabbit, and the squirrel. Among the principal
birds found are swans, geese, ducks, partridges, ptarmigans, gulls,
jays, (whiskey jacks), kingfishers, crows, robins and loons.

MOOSE ARE STILL PLENTIFUL

but are being killed in large numbers by the natives and the wolves. The
same remark would apply to caribou of the woodland variety. The barren
land caribou or reindeer come down as far as Cree lake (one hundred
miles north of the Churchill) in numbers, and a few stray farther south.
I shot one in the muskeg just north of Lac Ile à la Crosse.”

[Illustration: Landscape in Clearwater valley.]

Mr. Crean states that an Indian living on Snake lake at the mouth of
Sandy river killed eighteen moose during the autumn of 1908.

“Game, particularly moose,” according to Mr. Crean, “is plentiful in the
Meadow lake district, and easily obtained. Beaver are plentiful in one
or two districts, particularly along Clearwater valley and the rivers
tributary to the Clearwater from the north. They are, of course, very
easily killed, and consequently form a large portion of the fur in the
north. When other fur is scarce, the Indian devotes his attention in
particular to the killing of beaver. Muskrat were extremely numerous and
were taken in very large numbers. Early in the fall, however, before the
fur could possibly be of any use they were being killed in great
numbers.”

[Illustration: THE ATHABASKA COUNTRY]

CHAPTER X.

NORTHERN ALBERTA.

Agriculture and Arable Land in the Eastern Section or
“Athabaska Country.”

A Section of the West Where Officials of the Hudson’s Bay Company
Were Directed to Cultivate Gardens.—Some Points Where Wheat has
been grown, Including the Sample which took First Prize at the
Philadelphia Centennial Exhibition.—Crude Indian Gardens at
Cowpar lake.—Livestock Grazing out in December and January.

A glance at the latest “Railway Map of the Dominion of Canada,”
published by the Department of the Interior, will show that the
surveyed, and consequently fully-explored, part of the province of
Alberta extends considerably farther north than do the lines which mark
the northernmost limit of the surveyed territory in Saskatchewan.

The areas of arable land in Northern Alberta are admittedly so extensive
and important, and there has been such a large accumulation of evidence
as to the latent agricultural wealth of the actual agricultural
experiments in this most promising region, that, with the object of
enabling the reader the more readily to follow the text, and to assist
him in locating the geographical points mentioned, it has been deemed
advisable to divide the material referring to arable lands and
agriculture in this territory into two separate chapters, corresponding
with two divisions of the area immediately under review. The country
readily lends itself to such a division; in fact, invites it.

The region west of the 114th meridian has long been known and designated
as “Peace river country,” and possesses characteristics, and to some
extent, a history quite its own. The remaining or eastern half of the
territory, at least as far north as the lower reach of Peace river, is
the main basin of the Athabaska and, as such, will be treated as a
distinct area in the present chapter, the one immediately following to
be devoted to the subject of the arable lands and agricultural
possibilities of Peace river country.

Athabaska river, which is the most southerly of the three great
tributaries of the Mackenzie, rises in Rocky mountains near Mount Brown,
at an altitude of about five thousand seven hundred feet, and pursues a
northeasterly and northerly course for nearly six hundred miles to
Athabaska lake, falling in this distance some five thousand feet, and
being interrupted by several series of rapids. In the first three
hundred miles of its course it falls about four thousand feet, and
receives in succession Baptiste river from the west, the Macleod and
Pembina from the south, and the Lesser Slave, draining the large lake of
that name, from the west. Below its confluence with the last named
stream, the Athabaska turns southeastward for some fifty miles and then
resumes its northerly course. In the course of the next one hundred and
fifty miles it receives, in succession, La Biche river from the east;
Quito or Calling river from the west; Big Mouth brook from the east;
Pelican river from the west; and House river from the east. Just below
the mouth of the last river the Athabaska strikes a range of low hills,
and in forcing a passage through them is deflected eastward, and for a
distance of about seventy-five miles contains many rapids, falling in
this distance some four hundred feet. At the lower end of this stretch
it receives the waters of Clearwater river, its principal tributary
below Lesser Slave river. The Clearwater rises on the height of land
between the Churchill and the Athabaska, and pursuing a nearly straight
easterly course for some one hundred and fifty miles, mingles its limpid
waters with the sediment-laden flood of the latter stream. In the lower
part of its course the Clearwater occupies a deep valley and is very
rapid. Thirty or forty miles above its mouth it is joined by the
Pembina, a stream of about equal volume. Below the mouth of the
Clearwater the Athabaska pursues a nearly direct course northward,
receiving Red, Moose, and Bar rivers from the west, and enters Athabaska
lake through a number of channels including alluvial islands.

Lake Athabaska was known to the pioneer fur-traders and explorers as
“Lake of the Hills,” and it is so described by Mackenzie and others.

The country drained by the Athabaska is

MAINLY A ROLLING PLAIN

and with the exception of a few areas of semi-prairie land, is well
wooded, with a forest composed mainly of spruce, fir, pine, tamarack,
poplar, birch and willow. A large part of its surface is occupied by
mossy swamps, called muskegs, and hundreds of ponds and lakes, of which
Lesser Slave, seventy miles in length, is by far the largest, occupy its
shallow valleys. Immense areas have been swept by fire, sometimes
repeatedly, and in some places the original forest covering has been
destroyed and small prairies have succeeded.

The first information we obtained as to the agricultural possibilities
of Athabaska basin came from explorers and travellers passing through
the most northern portion of it on their way to Peace river, Great Slave
lake and the Mackenzie via the old canoe route by Methye portage and the
Clearwater. In more recent years, particularly since the inauguration of
steamboat communication along the long navigable stretches of the
Athabaska and Mackenzie, the favourite route to the far northwest has
been down the Athabaska from Athabaska, and, as is only natural, our
knowledge of the resources of the country has increased greatly.

Sir Alexander Mackenzie, as far back as 1787, saw at a trading station
of Peter Pond, on Elk or Athabaska river, “as fine a kitchen garden as
he ever saw in Canada.”

It might be explained here, that in the spring of 1778, a number of the
Saskatchewan traders put their goods into a common stock, and placed Mr.
Peter Pond in charge of them, directing him to proceed to the Athabaska
and trade with the Indians. He took the present Hudson’s Bay Company’s
route, by Cumberland House, Frog portage, Ile à la Crosse, and on to
Methye portage and down Clearwater river to the forks of the Athabaska.
Here he built a house, and in the spring of 1779 planted garden seeds.

As a general thing, at the early trading posts, agriculture of any kind,
even the making of gardens, was neglected, and, rightly or wrongly, the
officials of the Hudson’s Bay Company got the credit of discouraging
such ventures. If this had ever actually been the settled policy of the
company, it was officially abandoned some time previous to the year
1826, for, writing in the year mentioned at Chipewyan (north latitude
58° 40′) of improvements in the country, the

RESULT OF JUDICIOUS ARRANGEMENTS

then recently effected by the directors of the Hudson’s Bay Company, Sir
John Franklin writes:—“They (the directors) have also directed, where
the soil will allow, a portion of the ground to be cultivated for the
growth of culinary vegetables at each of their establishments, and I
witnessed the good effect of this order, even at this advanced post,
where the ground is rocky; the tables of the officers being supplied
daily, and those of the men frequently, with potatoes and barley. Such
luxuries were very rarely found beyond Cumberland House on the route
that we travelled during my former journey.”

Sir John Franklin also mentioned a phenomenon which has a considerable
bearing upon the agricultural possibilities of this country, namely the
quick change from winter to summer and the rapid growth of vegetation.
He wrote of the advent of spring at Chipewyan in 1827:—

“There can scarcely be a higher gratification than that which is enjoyed
in this country in witnessing the rapid change which takes place in the
course of a few days in the spring. Scarcely does the snow disappear
from the ground before the trees are clothed with thick foliage, the
shrubs open their leaves, and put forth their variegated flowers, and
the

WHOLE PROSPECT BECOMES ANIMATING.”

Sir John also mentioned that the first flight of swans northward was
noticed at Chipewyan on April 15, the first geese on April 20, the first
robins on May 7, and the first house martins on May 12. Barley was sown
at Chipewyan on May 15, potatoes on May 21 and garden seeds on May 22,
and it was expected that all would be ready for use by the close of the
following September.

Sir George Simpson’s party were regaled with “new, but very small
potatoes,” on August 11, 1828.

Sir J. Richardson, before the British parliamentary select committee of
1857, asked to state to the committee any general opinion which he had
formed of the capabilities of any considerable portion of the country
which he had traversed, for the purpose of settlement and colonization,
replied:—“With regard to the production of cereals, wheat may be grown
up to the 58th parallel of latitude (same latitude as Fort Vermilion) in
favourable places, but only in parts.”

The report of the Dominion Government’s survey parties sent out in
advance of the Canadian Pacific contain important references to
agriculture in the country. In the report for 1877-78 (p. 332) appears
the following reference to Chipewyan (latitude 58·7°):—“Professor
Macoun there obtained in 1876, fine samples of wheat and barley—the
former sixty-eight pounds to the bushel and the latter fifty-eight
pounds. At the French mission, two miles above the fort, oats, wheat and
barley were all cut by August 26.” In 1880 report it is stated (p. 102),
“Reverend Gordon said in 1880 that wheat and barley raised at Chipewyan
received a medal at the Philadelphia Centennial Exhibition of 1876.”

In the report of 1877-78 (p. 326) there is this reference to McMurray
(latitude 56·7°):—“Professor Macoun on September 8, 1875, found
tomatoes, cucumbers, wheat and barley, under cultivation together with
all vegetables found in kitchen gardens in Ontario. He spent ten days
there and obtained specimens of wheat and barley which

HAVE ASTONISHED EVERYONE

to whom they were exhibited; many of the ears contained one hundred
grains and the weight of both wheat and barley was nearly ten pounds
above the ordinary weight per bushel. These grains had been raised on
soil comparatively poor—very poor for the district—and lying only a
few feet above the level of Lake Athabaska.”

In a report of his then recent trip through this country written by
William Oglivie, D.L.S., in 1884, he writes:—“A great deal of the soil
along the bank of the Athabaska was of very fair quality. At McMurray,
where there are a couple of small prairies or meadows, the soil is good,
and the root crops and garden produce raised there are generally very
good. The Hudson’s Bay Company have a garden at McMurray of upwards of
an acre in extent, and the Episcopal mission one of smaller area, but
the soil is very sandy. The Roman Catholic mission have a garden also,
most of which they obtained by draining a bog into the lake. In the
season of 1883 (which was a pretty favourable one in that district,
being free from summer frosts) the Hudson’s Bay Company raised about
four hundred bushels of potatoes, the Episcopal mission thirty bushels
on a small patch, and the Roman Catholic mission about five hundred
bushels. Many of the retired Hudson’s Bay Company’s servants also have
small patches which they cultivate, potatoes and fish being the
principal articles of food used during the winter.”

Doctor Robert Bell, before the Senate committee of 1887, testified that
they grew cucumbers and melons as far north as Lac la Biche. He had seen
them there himself, and he was not sure but that they grew pumpkins,
too. He pointed out that where cucumbers and melons grow pumpkins will
grow also. It is hard, Doctor Bell pointed out in the course of his
evidence upon this occasion, to induce the Indians to grow anything.
Even potatoes, which they all know to be a safe crop, they will not grow
unless encouraged by supplying them. If supplied with seed in the autumn
they will not preserve any over the winter. They would not take the
trouble to dig a pit or build a cellar in which to preserve the seed,
but in the spring, when the time comes for planting, if anyone were to
give them the seed they would plant it. Artichokes would be very
suitable to introduce amongst the Indians, because they are very hardy
and productive; the seed remains in the ground and the Indians could not
destroy it all.

Mr. Alfred von Hamerstein, who has lived in Athabaska district since
1897, trading and prospecting, was examined before the select committee
of the Senate of Canada in 1907.

[Illustration: S. S. Grahame at McMurray.]

The agricultural resources of the Athabaska district, as far as this
witness could understand, were indicated by the farming that was then
actually being conducted

WITH FAIRLY GOOD SUCCESS

at Athabaska. At Baptiste lake there was, when the witness first went
there, no agriculture attempted. He was the first man to introduce
farming there. He kept a trading store, and the natives insisted on
having different kinds of seeds. Amongst others he got some flower
seeds, and some lovely flowers were raised. The people raise some crops
there now. It is a very good ranching country—first-class. Several
people went up there with cattle. A man named Mailloux took one hundred
and twenty head of cattle, and they were in good shape. The kind of
grass there is a red top, a very big grass. The country has all been
burnt over and the timber has fallen, so the grass cannot be cut with a
mowing machine, but in some places they have cleared away the fallen
timber and can use machinery now. Vetches and wild pea vines grow all
over that country, but there is no bunch grass to be found; it is mostly
red top. How far north it grows witness could not say. He had traced it
up in very large quantities on Slave river. About a hundred or two
hundred yards from the river there is a big slough, and this grass grows
all along there very luxuriantly. There is no place along the northern
shores of Lake Athabaska where grass can be grown. It is mostly rock and
muskeg.

At McMurray, according to Mr. von Hamerstein, the land is good, and
between the junction of the Clearwater and the Athabaska there is a flat
of land about three miles long, and from a quarter of a mile to a mile
and a half or two miles wide, which is very fine soil; but the rest of
it is all hills covered by an inch and a half of moss, under the moss
being the limestone rock. They raise good garden stuff at McMurray. A
party there had good crops for three years.

Where there is soil to be found it is very good, mostly old river beds
or where eddies have accumulated soil; but the rest is sand and muskeg.
East of McMurray there are several lakes, the centre of what is
described as fine hay country. The natives there have from sixty to
eighty horses, and there are reported to be

GOOD GRAZING PATCHES

round the lakes. It is probably a better ranching country than an
agricultural one. To the northwest of this district are some muskeg
lakes, where the natives have quite a few horses and cut considerable
hay.

From Fort Smith, going in a southerly direction to a place called Salt
river they have a very fine large prairie, and it extends right through
to Peace point. The people there are not given to farming. It is against
their interests, because they could make a living much more easily by
hunting. People often ask why they do not farm, but it must be
remembered that in order to raise a crop of potatoes they would have to
stay by it the whole season; and there is more variety in hunting. But
some of them do farm and raise a few cattle. The country is difficult of
access; they do not get any new stock, and it has become badly inbred.
As a result he had seen cattle there having the head of a bull and the
body of a calf. There are not very many cattle in there; only certain
natives have them, and a man with four or five head of cattle is a very
rich man. Some patches of land are very good.

Mr. Elihu Stewart, who had travelled over the northwest while
Superintendent of Forestry, stated before the Senate committee of 1907
that along the Athabaska the country is composed of a succession of
rolling hills, and there is a good deal of light soil. The valleys are
very good, and Mr. Stewart understood that the country through by Lake
Waubascow, all the way to Lesser Slave lake, is through a good district
of country. Through this district there is good land—perhaps not all
the way through. Along the Athabaska the country is light, second-class
land, but Mr. Stewart found at Calling river, some sixty miles below
Athabaska, a man

RAISING WHEAT THERE.

He says he raises as good wheat as can be grown, but Mr. Stewart would
not consider from the appearance along the banks that there were the
same alluvial deposits that are found farther north.

Mr. H. A. Conroy of the Indian Department informed the Senate committee
in 1907 that the Indians and half-breeds told him that the country
between Great Slave river and Hay river is covered with buffalo grass,
excepting a little timber that grows in a fringe around Great Slave
lake. He had information from Indians living in that country that it is
an open country covered with prairie grass.

Mr. J. Burr Tyrrell, in his evidence before the Senate committee of
1907, remarked as to the country immediately north of Lake Athabaska
that it could not be considered as being within the arable area. The
arable belt, however, as one goes west from Hudson bay to Athabaska
river, widens enormously. He spoke generally of the vast country west of
Athabaska river to Peace river country, and said there is certainly a
large tract of agricultural land there. However, one or another may
differ about the value of any particular part of that country. In the
country, going west into Peace river region, there is certainly a large
area of good land that Mr. Tyrrell would not attempt to confine inside
of such a belt as he had been speaking of.

W. F. Bredin, M.L.A., in his evidence before the Senate committee of
1907, said that descending Athabaska river from McMurray, where
Clearwater river goes into the Athabaska, the elevation of the plateau
above the river is very much less than it is on the upper river. It
looks like a great alluvial plain, from the river all along from
McMurray to Lake Athabaska, two hundred miles. That country is more or
less timbered, and the soil is excellent. Going down Slave river to
Great Slave lake, for a distance of three hundred miles, on the east of
Slave river, it is all rocks; while west of the river the country is all
alluvial, and the soil is generally very good, right down to Great Slave
lake.

At Chipewyan on Athabaska lake the Roman Catholic priests have a farm
which was originally a muskeg, right amongst the Laurentian rocks, and
they grow wheat there that was awarded a

MEDAL AT THE CENTENNIAL EXPOSITION.

The muskeg between the Athabaska and the Peace can all be drained and
cultivated. These muskegs are from a foot to three feet deep until you
strike hardpan. The moss keeps the heat of the sun out. In fact there is
ice in some of those muskegs all the year round, covered with moss.

Mr. Frank Crean, in his 1909 report, gives the following information
regarding the country west of Methye and Buffalo lakes and south of
Clearwater river:—“Along Pembina river there are fine hay meadows which
should enable anybody who desired to keep cattle to procure ample feed
for the winter. To the west of Cowpar lake there is a large prairie
which would certainly afford magnificent summer range, though I am
informed that in winter the snow is too deep for cattle to range out.”
Northwest of Cowpar lake Mr. Crean saw some horses grazing in December.
Their owner had made no arrangement to winter them, and Mr. Crean was
told that the horses thrived.

Cowpar lake lies just south of latitude 56°. It is a small lake, and of
itself of no great importance. The surrounding country, however, is
exceptionally good farming land, and to the east and south at about ten
miles distance is found the commencement of a large prairie about forty
miles long and varying from twelve to fifteen miles in width. This
prairie is in its present state fitted for agriculture. The Indians from
Cowpar lake go there in the spring and plant gardens, leaving them until
the fall when they bring the produce to their homes at Cowpar lake.

Mr. Crean continues:—“Pembina river flows through the south end of this
prairie, and several small lakes touch it. The prairie is watered by
small creeks draining into these lakes, and altogether it is

AN IDEAL SPOT FOR THE PIONEER,

as hay, water, wood and fish are to be found in abundance throughout its
extent. The land adjoining Cowpar lake on the east and south is all
arable, being open and rolling. To the northeast, towards Whitefish
lake, the land is also good. It is easy to predict that Cowpar lake will
some day be a centre of a considerable settlement, although at present
the only occupants are about four families of Chipewyans.”

Winefred lake, according to Mr. Crean, is a large body of water amply
stocked with fine whitefish, and Indians both from the south and north
come to Winefred lake to catch fish in the fall. The country surrounding
the lake is mostly swampy hay land, but might, he thought, be easily
drained. A good deal of muskeg is found in this vicinity, indeed, more
than anywhere else that Mr. Crean travelled on the watershed of the
Athabaska.

About Heart lake the land is all good though somewhat rolling and
inclined to be broken. There is no more obstacle to farming around this
lake than there is anywhere else between it and Edmonton. The country is
identical with that passed through en route to Edmonton. In fact the
country is almost prairie, some bluffs of poplar being the only pretence
of woods.

With reference to the northern portion of the area explored by him in
1909, Mr. Crean states:—“In the matter of attempts at agriculture the
fact that there is no demand for agricultural produce in the north
prevents people who live there from carrying on even experimental work.
Wheat has been grown successfully at McMurray, which was about the most
northerly point touched by me. Here, too, all the ordinary vegetables
grown in the more southerly portions of the province are grown with the
greatest success.” Mixed farming would appear to be an industry which
most readily adapts itself to northern conditions. Wheat can be grown in
almost any part of the north which I have explored. It is undeniable
that northern latitudes increase the likelihood of summer frosts. If,
however, live stock is kept, the larger yield of grain to the acre, even
if slightly frosted, will pay quite as well converted into beef or pork
as a smaller yield of the better quality grain in more southern
latitudes.”

The officers of the Royal Northwest Mounted Police have contributed
considerable valuable information regarding the northern section of the
country under review in this chapter.

In his 1909 report, Inspector D. M. Howard, of the Royal Northwest
Mounted Police, referring to the northern section, wrote:—“In the
northern part of the district, Chipewyan and Smith Landing, very little
grain is grown. The Roman Catholic mission at Fort Smith have put in a
small crop of about fifteen acres under oats and barley this year as an
experiment. There are about thirty-five head of cattle all told in
Chipewyan sub-district, but the stock is not very good, being too much
inbred. The Hudson’s Bay Company brought in ten head of horses this year
from Edmonton and the Roman Catholic mission brought four from
Vermilion; this, with the three police horses, makes a total of about
forty head.”

During the winter of 1909 Sergt. R. W. Macleod, of the Royal Northwest
Mounted Police, made a patrol across country from Fort Vermilion to the
mouth of Hay river on Great Slave lake. In his report (p. 178, Annual
Report of the Royal Northwest Mounted Police for 1909), he states that
from Fort Vermilion for about sixty miles the country is prairie with
small poplar bluffs scattered over it, and the next twenty-five miles is
mostly pine bush with here and there a small prairie, then on into Hay
river at Horse track is prairie with poplar bluffs and willow scrub, a
total distance of one hundred and ten miles from Fort Vermilion. In 1905
the government had a road cut out, corduroyed, and graded the entire
distance suitable for a wagon road. Previous to that time an Indian pack
trail was the only way to travel. The Hudson’s Bay Company and Revillon
Brothers each built a sales shop and residence at the end of the wagon
road on the south bank of Hay river, and have been doing business there
in the winter only, for fur. There are no white people in the country
closer than Fort Vermilion. The country between Hay river and Fort
Vermilion is nearly

ALL APPARENTLY SUITABLE FOR FARMING,

with a splendid supply of wood and water. Hay river is about one hundred
yards wide at the Horse trace (local name) and is fed by numerous
muskegs to the north of Dunvegan on Peace river, and the southeast slope
of the divide between Peace and Liard rivers.

When Sergeant Macleod and his patrol were at Alexandra falls on January
29, they found that three small bands of Indian horses were wintering
out on the portage, which is a prairie with poplar bluffs.

Corporal Mellor (of the Royal Northwest Mounted Police) in September of
the same year, made a patrol with horses into the buffalo country
southwest of Smith Landing. In his report the Corporal states that from
Salt river “we proceeded northwest through about eight miles of small
poplar, and then across a large stretch of prairie country. This is not
prairie country in the generally accepted term, but simply ground of a
marshy nature, perfectly flat, and covered with a luxuriant growth of
grass. This would doubtless afford splendid land were it not that the
water thereon is intensely salty and quite unfit for use. These prairies
are of large extent stretching from Peace river, in the south, I am
told, to Buffalo river, in the north, a distance of over one hundred
miles. They are dotted all over with thick clumps of willows, the only
trees growing thereon.”

[Illustration: Indian Camp near Fort Smith.]

In the last annual report of Superintendent G. E. Sanders, D.S.O.,
commanding “N” Division at Athabaska, and dated October 1, 1911, that
officer describes the area from Athabaska river to Great Slave lake and
west to the Rockies as an agricultural country. He states:—“The general
state of the district from an agricultural and business point of view is
one of great development and progress. The stream of settlement into the
country round about Athabaska and to upper Peace river and Grande
prairie has continued to a much larger extent during the year. With the
influx of settlement traders have followed and a general

AIR OF PROSPERITY PREVAILS,

with very optimistic hopes for the future. The homestead entries at
Athabaska for the first three months of this year exceeded the entire
number for 1909, and for the past months the entries are upwards of one
hundred and seventy-five in excess of those received during the whole of
1910. The homestead entries at Lesser Slave lake and Grande prairie have
increased at an even greater rate. At the latter place, the first day
the Land Office opened there, seventy-five entries were received.”

“It was generally expected that the railway would reach Athabaska in
November, but the contractors have met with so many set-backs, due to
the weather, shortage of labour and, lately, sickness amongst their
horses, that it is extremely doubtful when the work will be completed.

“As a consequence of the coming of the railway the town of Athabaska has
experienced quite a boom in real estate, and the prices for lots in the
townsite and for land adjoining have become very high, lots that sold
for three hundred dollars last year are now exchanging hands at three
thousand dollars, and land within a mile has been sold for one hundred
and seventy-five dollars per acre. A great deal of building is going on
and every one predicts an important future for the place on account of
its many natural advantages, and its situation making it the
distribution point for the vast country to the north.”

In an interview, Hon. F. Oliver, ex-Minister of the Interior, stated,
after his long trip in 1910 (See p. 27) that along the rivers passed
through proceeding from Edmonton to the delta of the Mackenzie where the
banks are high the soil and climate conditions are perfectly good for
agriculture. So far as McMurray, conditions are entirely good for
agriculture, judging from what he saw himself and from what people told
him.

The minister explained this statement by pointing out that the
difference in latitude is neutralized by the great drop in altitude and
the

INFLUENCE OF THE WARM CHINOOK WIND.

[Illustration: Indian Family arriving at McMurray for Treaty.]

McMurray, while two hundred miles farther north than Edmonton, is but
eight hundred and fifty feet above sea level, while Edmonton had an
altitude of two thousand two hundred feet.

Mr. Oliver here made reference to conditions which are to-day recognized
by men of science.

According to Mr. E. A. Preble, of the U.S. Biological Survey (See p.
22), “The climatic conditions of the various parts of Athabaska valley
vary considerably, according to location. The more open portions of the
upper part of the valley, though lying at a considerable altitude, enjoy
the ‘Chinook’ winds, which so temper the climate that it compares
favourably with more easterly regions lying much farther south. Lack of
detailed data precludes the possibility of comparing absolutely the
climatic conditions of the upper and the lower Athabaska; but the
effects of the ‘Chinook’ winds are felt to some extent throughout the
course of the river.”

According to the same authority—“The climate of Athabaska lake is not
radically different from that of other parts of the Mackenzie region
which are practically removed from the influence of the warm Pacific
winds. Though it lies at a low altitude, the proximity of the lake to
the “Barren Ground,” from which winds are frequent, keeps its average
temperature rather low. An occasional warm west wind slightly tempers
the winter climate. The Peace and the Athabaska break up at their mouths
about May 1, but the neighbouring part of the lake usually does not open
until about the middle of May, and the eastern part probably not before
June. The lake usually closes at Chipewyan some time in November.”

Mr. H. A. Conroy informed the Senate committee of 1907 that he had
travelled through Athabaska-Peace river country once when for twenty-one
days in January he did not need his coat in the middle of the day. The
cattle were all out in the pasture fields. He had been going in there
every year for eight years, and had been there for five winters. Mr.
Conroy stated that he never saw a very deep snowfall in that country. He
felt pretty sure that the ‘Chinook’ winds go through to Athabaska lake.
He remarked that in that country in the winter he did not suffer as much
from cold as he had suffered in Ottawa, and he slept out every night,
sometimes under a tent and sometimes in the open. He travelled once with
a dog train and afterwards with ponies, and got along very well with
them.

[Illustration: THE PEACE RIVER COUNTRY]

CHAPTER XI.

NORTHERN ALBERTA.

Agriculture and Arable Land in the Western Section or “Peace River
Region.”

Where Wheat Has Been Grown with Remarkable Success for Many Years.
—Scientific Explorers Early Recognized this as a Wheat Growing
Country.—A Head of Cabbage Fifty-three and a half inches in
Circumference.—Livestock Lives Out of Doors in Winter.—
According to a Church of England Missionary, Peace river Enjoys
the Finest Climate in the World.

The more westerly (or Peace river) section of northern Alberta is
attracting much attention on account of its remarkable agricultural
possibilities; and the numerous settlements which have, during the past
few years, been established, have practically demonstrated that the
glowing accounts which have from time to time reached the outside world
as to the fertility of Peace river country, have not been exaggerated.

Peace river, which has lent its name to the country along its banks,
whether in British Columbia or in northern Alberta, is formed by the
junction of Finlay and Parsnip rivers, two transmontane streams, and is
the largest and longest of the tributaries of the Mackenzie. It rises in
and drains a large district west of Rocky mountains, and then continuing
eastwards, intersects the axis of that range and drains the country
lying along its eastern slopes, through four degrees of latitude. Its
length, from the confluence of Finlay and Parnsip rivers, to the point
at which it unites with the waters flowing from Lake Athabaska to form
Slave river, is seven hundred and fifty-seven miles, but measuring from
Summit lake, the source of its principal branch, it is approximately
nine hundred and five miles.

From the confluence of the Finlay and the Parsnip, the Peace flows in a
general easterly direction for some three hundred miles to its junction
with the Smoky, falling in this distance a little less than eight
hundred feet. The country through which it flows may be considered as a
plateau in which it has excavated

A RATHER DEEP VALLEY.

A number of streams, Pine river from the south being one of the largest,
discharge their waters into it. Back from the river the country is
mainly level or rolling, and is thinly wooded. Smoky river is the
largest tributary of the Peace. Its principal branches rise on the
eastern slope of Rocky mountains, and it drains a large extent of thinly
wooded and prairie country. Below the mouth of the Smoky, the Peace
turns and pursues a winding though general northerly course nearly to
Fort Vermilion. It is bordered at first by steep sandstone cliffs, but
its valley gradually becomes wider and shallower. Extensive plains
comparatively level and clothed with grass or a sparse growth of
poplars, border it on both sides. North of Fort Vermilion this character
of country is said to extend to the valleys on Hay and Buffalo rivers.
The country between Peace river and Great Slave lake, however, is very
imperfectly known.

One of the first records we have of successful agriculture in Peace
river country is in the famous diary of Daniel Williams Harmon of the
Northwest Company’s service, who spent several years there. He speaks
favourably of the situation of Dunvegan (north latitude 56°, west
longtitude 119°), where he found himself located in October, 1808. He
goes on to say in his diary:—“Our principal food will be the flesh of
the buffalo, moose, red deer, and bear. We have a tolerably good kitchen
garden, and we are in no fear that we shall want the means of a
comfortable subsistence.”

In an entry in his diary dated May 6, the following spring, Harmon
states:—“We have planted our potatoes, and sowed most of our garden
seeds.” Under date June 2, the same year, we find the entry:—“The seeds
which we sowed in the garden, have sprung up, and grow remarkably well.
The present prospect is, that strawberries, red raspberries,
shad-berries, cherries, etc., will be abundant this season.”

July 21 Harmon writes:—“We have cut down our barley and I

THINK IT IS THE FINEST

that I have ever seen in any country. The soil on the points of land
along this river is excellent.”

Under the date of September 1, the same year, Harmon noted the
commencement of the annual migration of wild fowl southward, and on
Friday, October 6th, he wrote in his diary:—“As the weather begins to
be cold, we have taken our vegetables out of the ground, which we find
to have been very productive.”

In his diary for the following year, Harmon records a summer frost on
June 23, writing:—“The last night was so cold, that the tops of our
potatoes were frozen.” The frost in question does not seem to have
damaged the crops, for on Wednesday the 3rd of the following October
this observant diarist wrote:—“We have taken our potatoes out of the
ground, and find that nine bushels, which we planted May 10 last, have
produced a little more than one hundred and fifty bushels. The other
vegetables in our garden have yielded an increase, much in the same
proportion, which is sufficient proof that the soil of the points of
land along the river is good. Indeed, I am of the opinion, that wheat,
rye, barley, oats, peas, etc., would grow well in the plains around us.”

It is very evident that all of the officials of the fur trading
companies who were on duty in Peace river country did not devote the
same intelligent attention to agriculture that Harmon and his colleagues
did.

When Charles Horetzky, C.E., was at Dunvegan in 1873 (See p. 17) there
was no bread used, and the only vegetables served at meals were some
“very diminutive potatoes.” Mr. Horetzky comments as follows on this
subject:—“Owing to the fact that the Company’s agents are liable to be
suddenly removed from one post to another, those people are, not
unnaturally, averse to the expenditure of time and labour necessary for
farming experiments; hence the absence of farm produce at these posts.
But the natural advantages of excellent soil of unlimited extent, and
the proverbially early disappearance of the snow in spring, would lead
one to believe that good crops of barley, potatoes, and fall wheat might
be successfully raised in this part of the Northwest.”

One of the strongest arguments advanced by Mr. Horetzky in his advocacy
of Peace river pass route for the Canadian Pacific Railway was that a
line built via this route would open up

A VAST FERTILE REGION

situated to the south of Peace river—“a region probably comprising an
area equal in extent to Manitoba, well wooded with abundance of fresh
water, of excellent soil, and in all probability possessing unlimited
quantities of good coal. The climate is most salubrious, and, by all
accounts, as mild as, if not milder than, that of Red river. On the
extensive plains bordering upon Peace river, both north and south of it,
snow rarely exceeds two feet in depth, and never packs.”

The travellers and traders who have been in Peace river country are as
enthusiastic about its picturesque appearance as about its apparent
fertility.

Mr. Horetzky reached Peace river a few miles above the mouth of the
Smoky September 30, 1873, and thus describes the scene:—“We feasted our
eyes on the glorious landscape now mapped out before us. A strong
westerly gale was blowing, but the air was so warm and balmy, that to
recline on the beautiful grassy sward, full face to the blast, was
positively delicious. For several miles, to the southwest, the noble
river, flowing eight hundred feet below us, on its silent course to
Arctic ocean, could be distinctly traced as it meandered through its
mighty valley. Several large and wooded islands dotted its surface here
and there, causing eddies and whirlpools, which in their turn made long
and faint streaks of foam, barely visible in the distance. From our
position, and embracing an angle of fully one hundred and thirty
degrees, or, in other words, from the northwest round to south, a
boundless and nearly level expanse of country could be taken in at a
glance, the only breaks being the great valleys of Peace and Smoky
rivers, than which nothing we had ever seen could be more beautiful, the
former especially, in its magnitude and depth, surpassing all we had
anticipated.”

The pioneer missionaries attached to the Church of England and Roman
Catholic missions appear to have done more towards demonstrating the
agricultural possibilities of Peace river country, and the whole
Mackenzie basin, than the fur traders.

In the “Mission Field” of January 2, 1882 (a London monthly publication
of the Society for the Propagation of the Gospel), the Right Reverend
Bompas, Bishop of the Church of England in Athabaska and Mackenzie
districts (his diocese comprising the centre Arctic watershed of British
America), published the following:—“The excellence of the land in Peace
river country for farming purposes is well known; the

SOIL IS RICH AND PRODUCTIVE,

and the climate most salubrious. A mission station is established at
Fort Vermilion under the charge of the Reverend Arthur Garrioch, and a
church is fast approaching completion. Other mission stations have been
started at different parts of the river, and in 1878 a mission farm was
begun which the bishop hopes will in time obviate the necessity of
procuring all the supplies of flour, etc., from Red river, the expense
of which, from heavy freights, is so great that every bag of flour by
the time it reaches the missionaries north of Athabaska costs upwards of
£5.”

It was as superintendent of the mission farms that the head of the
Lawrence family, the originators of farming on an extensive scale and by
scientific methods in Peace river country, was attracted there.

Besides the satisfactory pioneer attempts at tilling the soil of Peace
river country, the raising of live stock was many years ago demonstrated
to be successful. As early as 1823 there was an infant ranching industry
there, Sir George Simpson’s party having noted a small band of half a
dozen horses when approaching Dunvegan.

In the reports of the government explorers a great deal of interesting
information will be found as to the soil, climate, and agricultural
possibilities of Peace river country.

Professor John Macoun was the first scientific explorer to draw
attention to the agricultural possibilities of Peace river country,
after making a thorough examination of the natural flora, the soil,
climatic conditions, etc. Mr. Macoun had accompanied the first Canadian
Pacific Railway survey expedition, and had subsequently been botanist to
the geological survey party appointed to investigate this very country.
There was much information as to the agricultural possibilities of the
country in Professor Macoun’s official reports, and he summarized his
conclusions in his book “Manitoba and the Great Northwest,” published in
1882. He defines a tract lying between the upper reaches of Athabaska
river and the fifty-seventh parallel of latitude, in Peace river basin,
which he considers “may be classed as fertile,” and estimates its area
as about thirty-one thousand five hundred and fifty square miles.
Speaking of this tract, he states:—“Its average elevation may be stated
as little over two thousand feet, and this is maintained with
considerable uniformity, for though the general surface slopes slightly
from the north and south toward Peace river, the region as a whole may
be considered as a plateau through which the great gorge-like valley of
the Peace has been excavated.

“The northern banks of Peace river valley are also very generally open
grassed, and parts of the valley of the Smoky and other rivers have a
similar character. The total area of

PRAIRIE LAND, WEST OF SMOKY RIVER,

may be about three thousand square miles. The remainder of the surface
is generally occupied by second-growth forest, occasionally dense, but
more often open and composed of aspen, birch, and cottonwood, with a
greater or less proportion of coniferous trees. Some patches of the
original forest, however, remain, particularly in the river valleys, and
are composed of much larger trees, chiefly coniferous, among which the
black spruce is most abundant. Handsome groves of old and large
cottonwoods are also to be found in some of the valleys. Where the soil
becomes locally sandy and poor, and more particularly in some of the
more elevated parts of the ridges before described, a thick growth of
scrub pine and black spruce, in which the individual trees are small, is
found, and in swampy regions the taramack is not wanting, but grows
generally intermixed with the black spruce.

“Though the prairies are most immediately available from an agricultural
point of view, the regions now covered with second growth and forest,
where the soil itself, if not inferior, will eventually be equally
valuable. The largest tract of poor land is that bordering the valley of
the Athabaska on the north.”

Professor Macoun was examined before the Senate committee of 1888 and
gave a considerable amount of information, all valuable at the time, and
much of it still so, as to the character of Peace river country from
Macleod in latitude 55°, to Lake Athabaska, up the Athabaska to the
Clearwater, and up the Clearwater to its head.

Starting from the Parsnip and through Rocky mountains, the good country
for agriculture commences, according to Professor Macoun, at Rocky
mountains portage at Hudson Hope (in British Columbia) or The Hope of
Hudson, as Capt. Butler puts it. From that point down the country is
suitable for agricultural purposes, the whole distance; on the prairie,
not on the slopes of the river, but on the prairie above. The north bank
of the river, that is the one facing south, has hardly any wood, but is
covered with berries, and witness found the cactus growing there. The
other side of the river, facing the north, was covered largely with
spruce down to the river’s edge, the whole upward slope. It was only the
banks of the river that were wooded; above, all was prairie, with poplar
and willow in clumps. It was of the same character as the North
Saskatchewan, but with much taller grass.

Said Professor Macoun:—“While at Fort Vermilion, on Peace river, in
latitude 58° 24′, I was informed by old Mr. Shaw, who had charge of that
post for fifteen years, that

INDIAN CORN WOULD RIPEN

well every year there, and at Battle river corn ripened three years in
succession, and that frost never injured anything on this part of the
river. The whole country at Fort Vermilion is a plain, not elevated at
its highest point more than a hundred feet over the river, but the
greater part of it is less than fifty feet. The soil is wonderfully like
that of the second prairie steppe, in the prairie region, as the surface
is composed of black loam, mixed apparently with limestone gravel. From
Fort Vermilion, Caribou mountains are visible about forty miles off.
These may have the effect of keeping off the cold winds from Great Slave
lake, and hence the country is permanently warm. Both days and nights
have been warm down on this part of the river, whereas on the upper
parts, where high banks are, the cold was even felt at night in August.

“The grain at Fort Vermilion was sown on May 8 and 20, and was cut on
August 6. Wheat growing among the barley and by the fences was almost
ripe August 12, when I was there. At Rocky mountain portage (British
Columbia), where Peace river issues from Rocky mountains, latitude 56
degrees, we found a first rate garden with vegetables far advanced, July
21; new potatoes, onions, and carrots were part of our bill of fare.
That was in 1875. Five days later, at Fort St. John (B.C.) vegetation
was even further advanced, and all kinds of garden stuff were in the
greatest perfection. Nigger Dan’s barley was colouring on July 26, and
would be cut the first week in August. His potatoes were large, and
enough for fourteen men were dug on August 2.

“I may mention that strawberries were fully ripe on July 6, at Hudson
Hope (B.C.). At Dunvegan, barley was almost fit to cut August 4. Cabbage
in the priest’s garden were closing, and all his garden vegetables far
advanced.

“At Battle river pease were getting ripe August 8. At Fort Vermilion
potatoes were very large and many heads of barley contained sixty
grains, others many more. I never saw such fine barley before. Barley
was sown on May 8 and cut on August 6—that is at latitude 58° 24′. At
Red river (a small fort, fifty or sixty miles below Fort Vermilion),
they have no ploughs, and the ground was broken up with a spade or hoe.
The garden stuff

WAS WONDERFULLY LUXURIANT,

pease, Windsor beans and potatoes being far advanced; cucumbers started
and raised in the open air, a very large crop, and a number of them were
ripe on August 14.

“At Chipewyan mission, two miles from the fort, there were wheat, oats
and barley, a good crop as regards grain. Windsor beans were ripe and
pulled up on August 17. Wheat and barley were in stock August 26, and
specimens of these, which I brought to Ottawa, are here on the table.

“At Red river fort a Frenchman named St. Cyr had a garden, and he told
me he had a particular thing growing in the garden that he did not know
anything about. I went out to look at it, and there was a splendid patch
of cucumbers, many of them ripe. That was in August. I said: ‘These are
cucumbers; how did you start them?’ He said: ‘I got the seed from
England and put it in the ground, and that is what has come from it.’

“I passed down the Athabaska (from Chipewyan) to the Mission, and I
found growing on soil that would be of no value here whatever, sand and
muck, an old swamp where they had planted wheat on May 5, and I found it
in the stook on August 26, and brought away from it the grain that was
awarded the bronze medal at Philadelphia in 1876. It was forwarded to
me, but I said that it did not belong to me, but to the missionaries at
Athabaska. I exhibited this very lot of grain in Manitoba before Consul
Taylor and many other gentlemen, and the matter of the number of grains
in the fascicle was then discussed and made public. They took a quantity
of the wheat from me and shelled it, and Mr. Gouin, Inspector of Inland
Revenue, weighed it, and it showed a weight of sixty-eight pounds to the
bushel.[15]

“The wild pea or vetch grows all through Peace river valley, but was
particularly noticed on the plateau above Fort St. John (in British
Columbia) in latitude 56°. Here it was actually measured by myself and
was found to attain a height of eight feet, while the weeds, such as the
purple fire weed of the east (_Epilobium angustifolium_) attained a
height of seven feet. These are given in illustration of the wonderful
luxuriance of the commoner plants on that high plateau. The vegetation
throughout the whole Peace river valley is of the most luxuriant
character, and it seems

MORE LIKE THAT OF THE TROPICS

than a country drawing near the Arctic Circle.”

Professor Macoun explained that in Peace river country, the snow passes
off so easily that as soon as it is off the ground and a few inches of
the soil thawed, the ground is ready for seeding, because the soil is
friable and the snow of little depth. The character of the month of
September is almost identical with that of the very best Septembers in
Ottawa—a smoky atmosphere with occasional white frosts in the morning,
but generally a calm atmosphere. In October the frosts get more severe
towards the last of the month. About the 25th at Chipewyan ice begins to
form and the rivers and lakes soon close.

Professor Macoun furnished the committee with some data from notes kept
by Daniel Williams of Fort St. John, commonly known as “Nigger Dan.”
These notes showed that from 1872 to 1875 the date for planting potatoes
varied from April 25 to May 10, and for sowing barley and oats from
April 22 to May 7. After September 22, in 1874, Williams dug over one
hundred bushels of potatoes.

William Ogilvie, D.L.S. (See p. 18) in his report of 1884,
wrote:—“Opposite Fort Vermilion, on the north of the river, there is an
extensive tract of prairie and poplar bluff country, which extends from
the Peace to the watershed between Peace and Mackenzie rivers,
southwestward along the Peace for about forty miles or more, and
northeastward along the river a few miles, until it merges into the
country already described. This is said to be a first class country in
every way, well wooded and watered, with a rich, deep, black loamy clay
soil; and if the life of flowers and berries be any indication of
freedom from frost, this district is favoured in this respect, as the
berries ripen here when they are killed in the surrounding parts.

“The country southwestward from the end of this tract to Battle river is
described as woods and swamps, alternating with patches of prairie and
open woods, and from Battle river to the prairie near Dunvegan,
generally drier and with more prairie.

“It appears, therefore, that from Dunvegan, on the north side of Peace
river, down the river to Peace point, and thence to Salt river on the
Great Slave, there is a tract of country about six hundred miles in
length and forty miles wide, of which a large percentage is fit for
immediate settlement, and a great deal more could be very easily closed.

“Of the country southeast of the Peace, between it and the Athabaska,
very little is known. It was described by all whom I met, who had seen
any portion of it, as a rolling surface, the ridges heavily wooded with
fair timber, and many of the basins containing swamps and lakes of
considerable size. Out of one of the latter, Lake Wapisca, Loon river
flows into the Peace, and another stream called by the same name into
the Athabaska, at Grand rapids. Some of the ridges rise into high hills,
and in some of these, rock exposures are said to be visible.

“At Dunvegan, notwithstanding the severity of the frosts, the crops were
very good, both in quality and quantity. When I was there, the Roman
Catholic missionaries

HAD THRESHED THEIR GRAIN,

samples of which I brought back. The yield was as follows:—Fifty pounds
of wheat were sown on April 16 and reaped on August 20, and twenty-seven
bushels threshed of good clean grain; fifteen pounds of Egyptian barley
sown on April 18 and reaped August 20, and fifteen bushels threshed,
weighing fully sixty pounds to the bushel. The Hudson’s Bay Company and
the Church of England mission had not threshed, and could not give their
returns, but they were well satisfied with their crops of all kinds. The
Reverend Mr. Brick, of the Church of England mission, was already using
bread, when I was there, made from wheat of the present year’s growth.”

Mr. Ogilvie in his 1891 report wrote as follows:—

“For a distance of six or seven miles back from Peace river valley there
is much prairie and meadowland, with some woods and swamps scattered
over it. The soil is an excellent black clay loam as rich as any I ever
saw, and the growth of hay and grass bears testimony to this fact. The
dip of the valley from this plain is very sharp and the banks very
steep, falling about eight hundred feet in a mile.

“At Fort St. John the Hudson’s Bay Company have a small patch on which
they raise potatoes and garden stuff along with barley and oats. The
grain always ripens and the vegetables are as good as one would wish to
use. Mr. Gunn, the officer in charge here, has been in Peace river
district since 1883, and in the interval he has wandered around the
adjacent country a good deal.

“The Hudson’s Bay Company have several bands of horses in the vicinity
of Fort St. John, only a few of which have ever been broken. These
animals live on the prairie on the north side of the river, winter and
summer, and

VERY SELDOM ARE THERE ANY LOSSES,

except by wolves, or when the Indians are starving they may quietly
dispose of one or two and report them lost.

“At Dunvegan, the Company has grown wheat, barley, oats, potatoes, and
garden stuff generally for many years with astonishing success. When I
was there in 1883-84, I saw grain and vegetables fully equal in quality
and quantity to any I have ever seen anywhere, the garden vegetables
being especially fine. Last year everything was harvested and stored
when I got there, but what I saw of the produce was excellent. I saw two
sunflowers which measured fourteen inches across the disc. With the
corolla attached, these flowers would have been nearly two feet in
diameter. The seeds of each weighed fourteen ounces and measured nearly
a quart. A head of cabbage was shown from which I stripped off all the
loose leaves leaving it fit for cooking and then measured and weighed
it. It measured fifty-three and one-half inches in circumference, and
weighed twenty-eight and one-half lbs. This was an exceptionally large
head, of course, but the general run of both cabbage and cauliflower was
large and would be considered so anywhere. Mr. Round, the officer in
charge of the post, told me he two years ago made a departure from the
old fashioned method of growing these plants, and instead of developing
them in hot beds, he simply planted the seed once for all in drills in
the garden, and when they arrived at the proper stage, pulled out the
superfluous ones. He found this method just as satisfactory and much
less troublesome. The other garden vegetables were just as large and
good as one would wish to see them. Mr. Round informed me he planted
fifteen bushels of potatoes last summer, and after using them freely for
the sustenance of his family (five members) and the servants, in all
eight or ten, from the time they were fit for use, until they were
harvested, he harvested upwards of two hundred bushels. He sowed about
four bushels of wheat, and though the dry season much affected the
result he would have about sixty bushels. This grain is used in various
ways, some of it being ground into flour by the aid of small hand mills.
He sowed four bushels of oats, and though part of the crop was destroyed
by a hail storm, one hundred bushels were threshed. In 1890 he planted
twenty-five bushels of potatoes, and though they were freely used from
the time they were fit for use until harvested, seven hundred and twelve
bushels were harvested. The Anglican and Roman Catholic missions here
also successfully raise both grain and vegetables, the latter depending
for much of their subsistence on the results of their agricultural
labours.

“This post has been in existence for the greater part of a century, and
more or less farming has always been done at it during that time.”

Mr. Ogilvie embodied in his report a number of extracts from the
Dunvegan post journal which are interesting as conveying an idea of the

CLIMATE AND THE GROWTH OF VEGETATION.

Some of these extracts are worth requoting here:—

“1829. Ice began to move in the river April 12. Sowed barley April 17;
planted potatoes April 30; cut barley August 10; cut wheat August 25;
harvested potatoes September 24; first snow October 21; first drift ice
October 24.

“1830. Ice broke up April 28; sowed thirty quarts of wheat May 3; sowed
garden seeds May 4; planted potatoes May 5; cut wheat September 14;
commenced digging potatoes September 27; first drift ice October 29; ice
set fast November 25.

“1886. Ice started to break up April 13; sowed barley May 12; planted
turnips May 13; planted potatoes May 17; began harvesting operations
August 20; cut buckwheat September 2; harvested potatoes September 23;
stored nine hundred and eighty-four bushels; slight snow October 12;
first ice drifting November 10; ice set fast November 30.

“1887. Ice started April 27; sowed oats April 29; sowed other seed May
2; commenced planting potatoes May 5; sowed garden seeds May 9; sowed
peas May 11; finished planting potatoes May 28; planted fifty bushels;
severe frost June 7, injuring young vegetables, etc., severe frost again
on June 25, cutting down everything to the ground, potatoes and all;
July 29 new potatoes for the first time; first snow fell on September
16; commenced taking up potatoes September 20; harvested six hundred and
eighteen bushels; took up turnips and carrots September 5; first drift
ice in river October 24, but it cleared out again and returned November
12; set fast November 29.

“1888. Ice moved May 1; began sowing barley May 9; began planting
potatoes May 10; sowed oats and wheat May 15; sowed garden seeds May 16;
sowed turnips May 28; slight frost August 1, injured garden stuff; cut
barley September 5; cut oats September 7; started taking up potatoes
September 27; finished October 3, five hundred and twenty-nine bushels;
took up turnips October 5; first snow October 15; first ice in river
October 27; ice set fast November 27.”

Mr. Ogilvie continues, in his report:—

“I would now call particular attention to the mention of frost in June,
1887, and to the fact that it cut down vegetables to the ground. Alone
there is nothing very wonderful about the statement, as it is just what
we would expect frost to do; but in conjunction with using new potatoes
for the first time on July 29, just one month after the frost, and the
further fact that

SIX HUNDRED AND EIGHTEEN BUSHELS WERE HARVESTED,

it is most astonishing. Mr. Round, the officer who made the entry, was a
witness of the event, and he is a gentleman whose sanity I would as soon
doubt as his word. I questioned him about it and he assured me
emphatically of its correctness. He can offer no explanations, if it is
not that a fog generally settles on the river valley after a frost and
shields plants from the direct rays of the sun a good part of the day;
but even that does not account for this case, as he assures me the
potatoes were cut down, black, to the ground.

“The Reverend J. G. Brick, Anglican missionary, who spent some time at
Dunvegan, combining farming with mission work, in 1886 started what
might be called a branch farm at Old Wives lake, about thirty-six miles
from Dunvegan, on the cart trail, between the latter place and Smoky
river crossing, on the plateau above the immediate valley of the river.
Reference will be made to this later.

“In 1889, he established himself in the valley of the river on the north
side, about five miles above the mouth of Smoky river. Here he has
established a mission and a school for the education of the young, on
which he bases all his hopes for the improvement of the natives. He
keeps this school open during the winter months, and as an inducement to
attend, he gives all the children who live at a distance their dinner.

“This gentleman took in with him a large outfit of farm implements and
stock. He has a small grist mill and threshing mill, with which he
threshes and grinds his grain. By grinding his wheat twice it makes a
fair article of flour, but his facilities for bolting it are not quite
up to the times, consequently his flour is not quite so white as our
high grade flour, but it makes good bread, nevertheless.

“He is well satisfied with his success agriculturally. He furnished me
with the following information relative to his doings in 1891:—

“Began ploughing April 11; sowed first wheat April 15; ice broke up
April 20; river cleared April 26; commenced harvesting August 20; cut
wheat August 27; about nineteen acres under grain, total yield six
hundred and ninety-eight bushels.

WHEAT TWO HUNDRED AND FIFTY BUSHELS ON SIX ACRES;

oats two hundred bushels, barley two hundred and twenty-six bushels.
After all the grain was removed he raked the field and got twenty-two
bushels of grain from the rakings. He sowed two varieties of wheat,
Ladoga, and wheat he got in Manitoba, which he thinks is Red Fife, but
is not sure; both are beautiful specimens of grain. He has some
two-rowed barley which he procured while in England in 1888, when he
obtained one pound. The yield in 1891 was six hundred pounds of as fine,
clean, bright and plump grain as could be seen elsewhere.

“His Ladoga wheat was sown April 21 and harvested August 24, but he
allowed it to over-ripen, and thinks he lost at least four or five
bushels while harvesting. He sowed ninety pounds and threshed one
thousand five hundred. He obtained a sample of black Norway oats from
Webb and Company, England, which he sowed on five-eighths of an acre of
ground, last year. When harvesting it was all drawn off the field in one
wagon load, and when threshed it turned out sixty-four bushels of
first-class grain. Last year he tried Indian corn; it did not ripen, but
yielded excellent green corn; cucumbers were grown successfully, but did
not ripen. Yet I saw as good pumpkins fully developed both here and at
Dunvegan as one would wish for.

“Mr. Brick has about forty head of cattle, and several horses; last fall
on my arrival there he had about forty pigs, but killed some during my
stay, and only intended to winter about twenty-five. He employs a good
deal of local labour, and pays for it with food to a very large extent;
in fact it is the only way it could be paid for in the country. The hay
for wintering the cattle and horses is cut on the plateau about seven
miles from the farm. He generally allows his cattle to run out until
Christmas, the grass on the meadows being enough for them to feed on it
after the early snows have fallen. The horses not kept in for use are
wintered out. The Hudson’s Bay Company at Dunvegan have about one
hundred and fifty wild horses, and the Roman Catholic mission and the
Indians also have many which always winter out on the plains north of
the Post, which affords them both food and shelter, as the country
between Dunvegan and Smoky river, crossing on the north side, is
particularly park-like prairie to a distance of twelve to twenty miles
back from the river. The woods afford them shelter and on the prairies
the rich grasses grow. There are also large areas

WHERE EXCELLENT HAY GROWS.

[Illustration: Flour Mill at Fort Vermilion.]

No other attention is, or has been, given to these animals than to
occasionally send a man out to hunt them up and count them. This is not
so difficult a task as it would seem, as they run in bands; each band
consists of mares and a stallion, who will give fight to the death for
his mares. Each band is known by the name of its stallion, and as each
keeps pretty well in the one locality, it is not so difficult to keep
track of them as it would appear. I saw several bands on my way from
Dunvegan and all were very fat, notwithstanding that the cold winter
weather had set in a month before, and the snow had been a foot deep for
ten or twelve days. ‘Chinook’ winds occasionally visit this part of the
country and carry the snow off; here also they blow from the southwest.
The approach of one is known some little time before it arrives by the
roar it makes. Many people in the country call them the ‘high-winds’
they blow so strongly. They often visit Lesser Slave lake.”

Mr. R. G. McConnell of the Geological Survey, in the report of his visit
to the country, wrote in 1888:—“Vegetables of various kinds are grown
yearly without difficulty, at Fort Vermilion, Lesser Slave lake,
Whitefish lake and Trout lake, while potatoes are grown by the Indians
even on the summit of Birch mountain, at a height of two thousand three
hundred feet above the sea. Wheat and other cereals have been fairly
successful at Lesser Slave lake and at Fort Vermilion, the only places
where they have been tried. The prairie country round Fort Vermilion
equals in fertility the famous Edmonton district and appears to enjoy an
equally good climate, its higher latitude being compensated for by its
more western situation and by its lower elevation. This district is
about one thousand feet above the sea. In the interior, narrow strips of
aspen-covered, but excellent land, are usually found along the main
rivers, and surrounding many of the lakes, and numerous areas, often

EQUAL IN SIZE TO EASTERN COUNTIES,

might be selected, which appear well adapted for cultivation, but the
numerous swamps, muskegs and marshes which separate these areas detract
greatly from their value. The western, and especially the northwestern,
portion of this district contains the most promising agricultural
lands.”

Mr. McConnell, before the Senate committee of 1907, explained that his
exploratory work in Peace river country had been mostly along the
streams. He had, however, been over quite a bit of the tableland. He had
nearly always gone back from the river quite a bit, twenty or thirty and
forty miles in places. From Lesser Slave lake he started on foot with a
couple of men packing, and went through all the country between Lesser
Slave lake and Big Knife lake, a distance of about one hundred and fifty
miles. His mission was specially to look for minerals, but, of course,
he was supposed to keep his eyes open for anything. As to the extent of
land suitable for cultivation in Peace river country, Mr. McConnell said
there are aspen ridges all through that country which may be good, but
they are separated by muskegs everywhere, except on the table prairie.
These muskegs occur with solid ground in between them, and in those
places aspens grow, and where those poplars are found the land is nearly
always good. But the poplars do not grow to any size. The aspen is not
on the prairie; it is on the wooded country, in between the muskegs.
Besides there are occasional patches of prairie at Fort Vermilion,
following Peace river down, and also Grande prairie. There is no large
continuous prairie thirty miles from Edmonton towards the north. There
are occasional patches of prairie tableland with only small areas of
bottom land. The tableland decreases in height as going northward.
Farther down the Vermilion the prairie begins again. At Fort Vermilion
the country is not so much subject to frost as in the higher land. Wheat
has been grown there a great number of years. In the valley of the river
the low land on each side is fertile. There is no great quantity of it
on either bank. There are just these flats. Taking the aggregate it is a
large quantity because it is a tremendously long river. The valley is
probably a mile wide on both sides of the river.

Grande prairie, in upper Peace country, which is

ABOUT SEVENTY-FIVE MILES ACROSS,

is probably the largest area of open country, and there is a prairie
following Peace river about twenty-five miles. That disappears going
down Peace river, and the country is wooded and partly muskeg as far as
Fort Vermilion. Then there is another small prairie area. Taking the
upper stretches of the country, northward forty miles from the river,
the country is partly muskeg. Travelling across it with horses, one
would run into a muskeg every couple of miles, and there are ridges only
a few feet higher than the muskegs, and they are nearly always covered
with poplar, and those ridges seem to be fairly good agricultural land.
But they are always separated by these muskeg lands. This muskeg is very
deep. Mr. McConnell had had horses go down in it. Along all the streams
there is a certain amount of good land. There are a great many streams
in that country, and in the aggregate the amount of water is large.

As to Grande prairie, or north Peace river country, the soil is very
good there. There is a subsoil. It is a good wheat country, and in June
and July it is looked upon as the best wheat country in the world. He
had noticed the pea vine growing in that section, and so far as he could
judge from going over it, the country is a good agricultural one, except
for frosts. There happened to be some frosts both times he was there,
but apart from that the country is certainly good. There is swamp grass
growing about the margins of the small lakes. It was after the middle of
the month of August that he experienced frost there. He did not know
much about the growing of vegetables in Peace river country.

Mr. McConnell considered that at that date the value of Peace river
country as a whole as far as wheat-growing was concerned, was entirely
problematical. If one went there in June or July he would come to the
conclusion that it is the finest country in the whole wide world, but he
himself had been there twice in August and found a heavy frost on each
occasion. Things changed very rapidly about the end of August. He did
not know if there would be frost about the same time around Edmonton,
but the two years he happened to be in Peace river district there would
be about fifteen degrees of frost at night. That was in the elevated,
cattle country, which is considered higher than the surface of Peace
river. There were no crops there at that time. The soil in that district
is splendid. It is precisely the same as the country around Edmonton. It
might be good for the growing of hay, or in fact anything. There is no
question that the soil is good, and in June and July it is a

MOST ATTRACTIVE COUNTRY.

He went down Loon river, and found much of the country in there partly
muskeg; in fact, the greater part of it is muskeg; but there are patches
of country covered with aspen, which is probably good for agriculture.
He went all the way down Loon river and Red river, which flows into
Peace river, and another unnamed stream, and found it was a prairie
country down there. There is a grist mill at Vermilion, and a large
quantity of wheat is sent there. The wheat is all grown in that
vicinity. That country is too good a country to be wasted. The valleys
are protected from the wind, and the theory is that it is less liable to
frost on account of the wind being kept away. There is a magnificent
growth of grass on the plateau, and there is hay in the marshes. It is
very much the same country as that around Edmonton. It is a good place
for raising cattle, but they probably would have to feed them in the
winter time, as they do at Edmonton. Sheep ought to do well. They
appeared to have a fair rainfall. He thought that as far as the country
is concerned it is very much the same as Edmonton. It is well watered.

Mr. McConnell concluded that a farmer might succeed there even if he
could not grow wheat, if he could get a market. That was the only thing
that would prevent him from succeeding, he thought.

Much evidence as to the agricultural possibilities and climate of the
Peace country was taken by the Senate committee of 1888 (See p. 28).

Hon. William Christie, formerly Inspecting Chief Factor of the Hudson’s
Bay Company, in his examination before the committee, expressed himself
sanguine about the agricultural possibilities of Peace river country,
which he considered “is one of the finest countries that you would wish
to see. Upper Peace river country is as fine a country as I ever saw.”
He did not think Peace river country subject to droughts at all, but the
winter snow disappeared much more rapidly than it did in Manitoba. The
vegetation in Peace river country is very luxuriant; the grass is more
like that of Manitoba than that of Saskatchewan. He thought the wheat
crop would be as certain in upper Peace river district as in the
Saskatchewan district. Farther down, at Lac la Biche, they never have
wheat frozen; that may be affected by the temperature of the lake water.
On upper Peace river they are less subject to frost. He had always
understood that wheat grew well at Dunvegan.

At Fort Vermilion there was a splendid country. He once rode with
Governor Dallas sixty miles through a most magnificent country. The soil
was a beautiful dark loam, as they could see by the mole hills, and they
were struck with the charming appearance of the country. There were more
bluffs than were found on the Saskatchewan, and it was a beautiful
country all the way up to Dunvegan. Where the country was open, the
grass was higher than on the Saskatchewan. It was not very long—about
the same as in Manitoba. As to the testing of the capacity of the
country for agriculture, he explained that a good deal had depended upon
the characters of the officers in charge of the various forts whether
the capacity of the country in the vicinity for agriculture was tested.
In the journals of long ago he found that they used to raise splendid
wheat crops at Dunvegan, and cattle. Another officer, without any taste
for agriculture, going in there might find it very difficult to live. If
he had no taste for gardening or agriculture, nothing would be raised. A
great deal depended on the officer of the post whether he lived well or
not. If he was active and energetic he would always live very well.

Witness agreed with the remark that there is enough good land in Peace
river country

TO MAKE A NEW PROVINCE.

G. M. Dawson, M.D., LL.D., at the time Assistant Director of the
Geological Survey of Canada, was examined by the committee and explained
that he had personal acquaintance with the Athabaska from Athabaska to
Baptiste river; with Peace river valley from Smoky river to the
headwaters; and with the country between the above designated portions
of rivers.

Quoting from a report he had prepared in 1879-80, on the extent of
arable and pastoral lands in the region of Peace and Athabaska rivers,
Doctor Dawson showed that Peace river basin comprised an area of about
thirty-one thousand five hundred and fifty square miles. Its average
elevation may be stated as a little over two thousand feet, and this is
maintained with considerable uniformity, for though the general surface
slopes slightly from the north and south towards Peace river, the region
as a whole may be considered as a plateau, through which the great
gorge-like valley of the Peace has been excavated. This valley has in
general a depth of six hundred to eight hundred feet below that part of
the plateau bordering it, with a width of two or three miles from rim to
rim. Its tributary streams, at first nearly on the plateau level, flow
in valleys of continually increasing depth as they approach that of
Peace river. Those from the southeastern portion of the region rise
either in Rocky mountains or near the Athabaska, the tributaries
received by the latter stream, in this part of its course, from the
north and northwest being—with the exception of the Baptiste—quite
inconsiderable.

The ridges and hills by which this region is occasionally diversified,
appear in all cases to be composed either of the generally soft rocks of
the cretaceous, or of arenaceous clays containing erratics and
representing the boulder clays of the glacial period. These elevations
are generally slight, and with exceedingly slight, and gradual slopes,
the scarped banks of the streams constituting much more important
irregularities. These ridges, however, often resemble detached portions
of a higher plateau, and spread widely enough to occupy in the aggregate
a considerable area, of which the soil is not so uniform in character as
elsewhere. With these exceptions, the soil of the district may be
described as a fine silt, resembling the

WHITE SILTS OF THE NECHACCO BASIN,

and not dissimilar from the loess-like material constituting the subsoil
of Red river valley in Manitoba. This silt at a short distance below the
surface, is greyish or brownish in colour, but becomes mixed
superficially with a proportion of vegetable matter to a varying depth.
It has evidently been deposited by a comparatively tranquil body of
water not loaded with ice, probably toward the close of the glacial
period, and has either never been laid down on the ridges and
undulations above referred to, or has been since removed from them by
processes of waste. As evidenced by the natural vegetation its fertility
is great.

West of Smoky river, both to the south and north of Peace river, there
are extensive areas of prairie country, either entirely open, and
covered with a more or less luxuriant growth of grass, or dotted with
patches of coppice and groves of trees. The northern banks of Peace
river valley are also very generally open and grassed, and parts of the
valley of the Smoky and other rivers have a similar character. The total
area of prairie land west of the Smoky may be about three thousand
square miles.

Though the prairies are most immediately available, from an agricultural
point of view, the regions now covered with second growth and forest,
where the soil itself is not inferior, will eventually be equally
valuable. The largest tract of poor land is that bordering the valley of
the Athabaska on the north. This rises to an elevation considerably
greater than most of the region to the north and west, and appears,
during the submergence to which the superficial deposits are due, to
have been exposed to stronger currents which have prevented the
deposition of fine silt, causing it to be replaced by a coarser silt
which passes in places into actual sand, and alternates with ridges of
boulder clay. This region is often swampy, and, for a width of twenty to
twenty-five miles on the trail from Sturgeon lake to Athabaska, is quite
unsuited for agriculture, though still in many places capable of
yielding good summer grazing when the forest has been completely removed
by fire. To the northward, more particularly to the east of Smoky river,
peaty and mossy swamps occupy part of the surface, and these may be
regarded as permanently unsuited to agriculture.

There is also a sandy tract, though of small width, along the lower part
of Wapiti river near its junction with the Smoky. Deducting as far as
possible all the areas known to be inferior or useless, with about
twenty per cent. for the portions of the region under consideration of
which less is known, the total area of land, with soil suited to
agriculture, may be estimated as

AT LEAST TWENTY-THREE THOUSAND FIVE HUNDRED SQUARE MILES.

In the absence of complete maps, such an estimate cannot be otherwise
than very rough, but may serve to give some idea of the fact.

Doctor Dawson expressed the opinion that “the truly wonderful luxuriance
of the natural vegetation in Peace valley prairies indicated, not alone
the fertility of the soil, but the occurrences of a sufficient
rainfall.”

He went on to explain that the summer season of 1879 was an unusual one,
characterized by excessively heavy rainfall, with cold raw weather in
the early summer months. These conditions did not extend to the west of
Rocky mountains, but appeared to have been felt over the entire area of
the plains to Red river valley. As a result of this, the crops generally
throughout the Northwest were later than usual, and the mean temperature
of even the latter part of the summer appears to be rather abnormally
low. Notwithstanding this, on Doctor Dawson’s arrival at Dunvegan, on
August 16, small patches of wheat and barley in the garden of the fort
presented a remarkably fine appearance and were beginning to turn
yellow. On his return to the fort on August 31, these were being
harvested, their complete ripening having been delayed by overcast and
chilly weather which prevailed between these dates. At the
first-mentioned date potatoes were quite ripe, with the balls formed on
the stalks, and the garden contained also fine cabbage, beets, carrots,
onions, lettuce and turnips. Dwarf beans, cucumbers and squashes were
also flourishing and, though these plants are particularly tender,
showed no signs of frost. The two last-named, having been sown in the
open ground, did not appear likely to perfect their fruit. A few stalks
of Indian corn were also growing, though it is improbable that this
cereal would ripen in this district. When this garden was again visited,
on the last day of August, the beans, cucumbers, and squashes had been
cut down by frost, but not completely killed. The potato tops were also
slightly nipped.

Rev. Mr. Tessier, who had been at Dunvegan as a missionary for some
years, had always been

ABLE TO RIPEN SMALL, BLACK BUTTER BEANS,

but in some seasons not without difficulty, owing to frosts. He had also
tried a few grains of oats, which he procured accidentally, and obtained
a return of astonishing abundance. About the date just referred to, the
potato plants of Smoky river post (The Forks) were badly cut down by
frost, the tubers being, however, quite ripe, fine and large.

[Illustration: View on Halfway river.]

Doctor Dawson pointed out that Mr. Horetzky had been told that the
plains were often nearly bare up to the month of December, though the
winter usually sets in with the month of November. Sir Alexander
Mackenzie remarked the same absence of snow in the early winter months
of 1792. It was entirely gone on April 5, 1793, and gnats and mosquitoes
were troublesome on April 20. Horses almost invariably wintered out well
without requiring to be fed. Hay should be provided for cattle, to
ensure perfect safety, for a period of three or four months, though in
some seasons it was necessary to feed the animals for a few weeks only.
The Indians of ‘Cree Settlement’ on Sturgeon lake wintered their horses
without any difficulty round the borders of a neighbouring lake, the
shores of which were partly open. From Hudson Hope, the horses were sent
southward to Moberly lake to winter, and according to Mr. Selwyn, did
well there. Lesser Slave lake, with its wonderful natural meadows, has
long been known as an excellent place for wintering stock, and was
referred to as such by Sir J. Richardson.

From such comparison as could be made, according to Doctor Dawson, it
would be premature to allow that the climate of Peace river was inferior
to that of the region about Edmonton on the Saskatchewan. It was true,
he admitted, that in both Saskatchewan and Peace river districts the
season was none too long for the cultivation of wheat, but if the crop
could be counted on as a sure one—and experience even then seemed to
indicate that it might—the occurrence of early and late frosts might be

REGARDED WITH COMPARATIVE INDIFFERENCE.

The season was at least equally short throughout the whole fertile belt
from Peace river to Manitoba, though early and late frosts were not so
common in the low valley of Red river.

The almost simultaneous advance of spring along the whole line of this
fertile belt, Doctor Dawson pointed out, was indicated by the dates of
the flowering of the various plants, a point referred to by him in some
detail elsewhere. It was further unquestionable that the winter was less
severe, and not subject to the same extremes in Peace river and upper
Saskatchewan regions as in Manitoba.

Scientists, Doctor Dawson remarked, had already found reason to believe
that the early and late frosts, and not the absence of a sufficient
aggregate amount of heat, constituted the limiting condition of wheat
culture in the Northwest, but that neither Saskatchewan nor Peace river
countries lay upon the actual verge of the profitable cultivation of
wheat appeared to be proved by the fact that oats succeeded on the
Saskatchewan, and also—in so far as one or two seasons could be
accepted as evidence—on Peace river; while it was well known that this
cereal is less tolerant of summer frost than wheat.

This, Doctor Dawson remarked, is further proved by the fact that at Fort
Vermilion and Athabaska lake, one hundred and eighty and three hundred
miles, respectively, northeast of Dunvegan, Professor Macoun had found
wheat and barley ripening well, but in this instance the fact was
complicated by the circumstance of the decreasing altitude of the
country, which introduced a new condition.

DOCTOR DAWSON’S STRIKING ILLUSTRATION.

To give some idea of the value of a tract of generally fertile country,
such as that described, Doctor Dawson remarked: “Let us assume, as
above, that the area of actually cultivable land is twenty-three
thousand five hundred square miles, or fifteen million one hundred and
forty thousand acres. Let us suppose for simplicity of calculation, that
the whole area were sown in wheat, the yield, at the rate of twenty
bushels to the acre, would be three hundred million, eight hundred
thousand bushels.”

The Reverend J. Gough Brick, for many years in charge of the Church of
England mission at Dunvegan on upper Peace river, submitted some
interesting evidence in writing to the committee. He stated that on his
mission farm he had ploughed on April 8, and sown wheat on April 12, and
that wheat was cut about August 20. Wheat was generally sown from April
12 to May 1, and harvested at the end of August. The barley was sown
from May 10 to May 20, and harvested at the end of August. The time for
sowing and reaping oats was the same as wheat. Potatoes were planted
about May 16 and dug in September. Turnips planted at same date were
gathered October 10. The Hudson’s Bay Company had done a little farming,
in connection with other posts, at Dunvegan, Fort St. John, Hudson Hope
and Fort Vermilion, for very many years. Witness supposed that at
Dunvegan they had raised wheat, barley and potatoes for seventy-five to
one hundred years, and seldom had the crops turned out a total failure.
In 1884, he went up on to the height of the prairie country, some
thirty-six miles from Dunvegan, and broke up about three acres for an
experiment. In 1885 the crop on the land, only once ploughed, was fairly
good. In 1886 there was a magnificent crop of wheat, barley, peas,
potatoes, turnips and all other vegetables. In 1887, he was sorry to
say, the crop there was a total failure. A frost on July 26 killed out
everything.

The ordinary prairie grasses, with wild vetches and pea-vine, were found
in abundance, growing more or less all over the country. The soil was a
black loam, a large percentage he considered fit for grain, the rest for
pasturage. They had no insect pests in upper Peace country. The Indians
were raising a considerable quantity of potatoes. A few were raising a
little barley and wheat.

Mr. Brick informed the committee that he considered the climate of Peace
river country as

THE FINEST IN THE WORLD.

The usual snowfall in Peace river is from eighteen inches to three feet.
Ice begins to run in Peace river about November 5, but some seasons
remain open until December 20. It generally breaks up about April 10 to
15. The prevailing wind is from the southwest, and during the winter the
Chinook winds prevail in upper Peace river country. The three growing
months are very dry until about the middle of July; then some seasons
they get considerable rain. There were summer frosts some seasons; but
still they were not so destructive in Peace river country as farther
south. These frosts were purely local, and witness thought that were the
country settled they would be less likely to occur. The early part of
the summer is generally dry, while the weather in September and October
is very pleasant indeed.

Some interesting information was communicated to the committee by Mr.
Frank Oliver, then editor of the Edmonton Bulletin and member of the old
Northwest Council. Mr. Oliver explained that most of his information was
acquired from Mr. Murdock McLeod formerly of the Hudson’s Bay Company’s
service. Peace river country, according to this witness, was especially
noted for its abundant supply of berries of excellent quality. Although
berries of all kinds mentioned were plentiful in the upper Saskatchewan,
Indians used formerly to travel to Peace river, some two hundred and
fifty miles, to avail themselves of the supply there. Successive years
of experiment had demonstrated the practicability of the growth of
wheat, barley, oats and potatoes, at Dunvegan, Fort Vermilion and
Chipewyan, the two latter in latitude 58½°.

There has been considerable exploitation of the agricultural
possibilities of Peace country since 1888, and we now have data which
tend to show that the faith of the pioneer farmers of the country was
not misplaced. Much interesting information, as to more recent
agricultural enterprise in the country drained by the Peace, was
obtained from witnesses examined before the select committee of the
Senate of Canada in 1907.

Fred Lawrence, F.R.G.S., Justice of the Peace, etc., of Fort Vermilion,
gave some detailed and interesting evidence. Mr. Lawrence explained that
his father went out to Peace river from Montreal in 1879, in the employ
of the Church of England missions, becoming at once interested in the
problem of making the missions and Indian schools in Peace river, and
the whole of the northern country, self-sustaining. The settlement of
Fort Vermilion is in latitude 58·30°, almost as far north as the
northern part of Labrador. The place in 1907 (it has since increased
considerably) consisted of about five hundred people, white people, and
English-speaking half-breeds. The total production of wheat there in
1906 would be twenty-five thousand bushels, the average being

ABOUT TWENTY-ONE BUSHELS TO THE ACRE.

Of oats and barley about ten thousand bushels, mostly barley, was
raised. The wheat was ground and used to make bread for the people out
there. The first market was at Fort Vermilion and the surrounding
points, and whatever surplus there was was shipped down Peace river into
Mackenzie river district.

[Illustration: Sheridan Lawrence’s Farm at Fort Vermilion.]

Mr. Lawrence stated that in 1906 he had cut spring wheat, fully matured,
in eighty-six days. The time of cutting was the end of July. Wheat grown
at Fort Vermilion is harder than grain of the same variety grown in
Ontario. He explained that the river bottom proper only consists of
points or flats in the bottom of the bed of the river, which “bottom” is
practically about two miles in width, whereas, what is properly called
Peace river valley, is in reality a broad tract of country. When you
once get on to the height of land, this so-called “valley” covers three
hundred miles in width, and extends from Rocky mountains on to Lake
Athabaska. Peace river makes great bends, and on alternate sides of the
river you find wide flats, where there is probably the richest soil
there is in that northern country, made up of alluvial deposits all of
black soil. There are places on the lower part of these points which get
flooded, perhaps once in seven or eight years. Nearly all the points,
however, are above the high water mark, and when these flats are
cultivated the soil yields the heaviest of crops. On these flats
cultivation of the soil was first undertaken in that part of the
country, and it was supposed by many that they comprised the only part
of Peace river country that was suitable for cultivation. People
supposed that when they undertook the cultivation of grain on the height
of land they would get into the muskeg and swamp that adjoined the river
in many places, and grain could not be raised; but this has been proved
to be a fallacy. The tableland is sometimes called “bench land,” and
this bench land in some places is very wide. There are places in it, as
at the south of Fort Vermilion, and to the north and west, where there
is one hundred miles of this land on each side of the river.

This land is not all suitable for cultivation. It has its swamps and its
muskeg, and its

LOW PATCHES OF LAND,

that are found in almost any country where there is a large growth of
scrub timber; but the larger part of this land, as Mr. Lawrence had
found by travelling over the country away from the river, is suitable
for settlement.

Mr. Lawrence drew the attention of the committee to the fact that some
years ago, Doctor Dawson, after going through Peace river country,
reported that a large part of it was covered with muskeg and would be
permanently unsuited for agriculture. In 1903 he took a trip from Fort
Vermilion through Lesser Slave lake, through an unknown country two
hundred and fifty miles. Later than that he travelled away from Peace
river about fifty or sixty miles, and saw something that gave him an
idea of these muskegs. The muskegs had covered some large patches of
that country, and the moss was about three feet in thickness. There had
been large tracts of this moss burnt out. Forest fires had been running
through there, and Mr. Lawrence supposed that the fire burnt thousands
of acres that had formerly been muskeg, as shown by these large patches
of moss, sometimes a few feet across and sometimes larger, which were
left standing, where the muskeg had been. On this burnt area he saw
grass from four to five feet in height. There were thousands of acres of
it covered with the red-top grass, which is the standard grass of the
west. The reason these muskegs had been there for so many years was that
the moss formed a great sponge and retained the moisture. But when all
that land is drained and the moss removed, it will certainly raise good
crops of grass, and where grass can be grown, grain can be raised.

Mr. Lawrence stated that he would say that about one-tenth of the
district to the north is covered with moss. To the south of Grande
prairie there is a large proportion covered with moss, and Doctor Dawson
may have intended to refer particularly to that district. Mr. Lawrence
produced photographs of the grain raised on the soil that was formerly
covered by timber—low land and timber. He explained that he had farmed
at Vermilion for over twenty years, and had

NEVER HAD A FAILURE IN WHEAT

during that time, although he had as low as five and one-half bushels to
the acre. There was one very dry season which reduced the average, but
there was always a certain amount of grain raised there that was good
for seed and grinding purposes. There has never been a complete failure
from frost or any other cause. They have no rust on the wheat up there.
He had raised as much as sixty-six bushels of wheat to the acre. That
was the biggest yield, and accomplished without any fertilizer whatever.
The heads of wheat at Fort Vermilion often would grow to the length of
six inches, and at times he had counted sixty-five kernels in one head
of wheat. Barley sown after the middle of May is usually ripe in the
last week of July. The continuous daylight with about eighteen hours of
sunlight accounts for the rapid growth of all vegetables in these parts.

During the month of July, Mr. Lawrence stated, they have at Fort
Vermilion an occasional frost that sometimes cuts the potato vines down,
but never puts them back seriously—just enough to show the effect of
the frost on some of the top leaves. The potato vines, however, often
show no sign of frost until they are ripe, and the potatoes obtain their
full size and are matured. They had never had July frost severe enough
to ruin the potato crops. These frosts are very slight. In 1906 he
planted his garden during the week following May 24, and he planted
tomatoes, cucumbers, peas and other vegetables. In the fall, during
harvesting, his family had squash pie that was made from squash ripened
in their own garden. The squash were raised just the same as the peas
and other vegetables and took their chances, no hotbed and no special
care, and he also raised cucumbers and tomatoes. The tomatoes did not
ripen, but before they had a chance to freeze they were taken up. He
thought that with care such as is given to these things in Manitoba and
other parts of the Northwest, planting these tender vegetables early in
hotbeds, and giving them care, the same success could be had in raising
tomatoes, squash or other things of that kind as is had in Manitoba and
other districts. At Peace River Landing tomatoes were ripened in 1906 in
the open garden. Other garden vegetables, such as cabbages, and so on,
grow very well. He had raised cabbages at Fort Vermilion eighteen and
one-half pounds in weight, and swede turnips are raised in the open
field. Out of a three-acre patch

HE HAD SELECTED TURNIPS,

and a great many of them weighed from eighteen to twenty-five pounds.
They were of the purple-top variety. They had no special attention or
care, and they were good sound turnips.

Another of the witnesses examined before the same committee of the
Senate was Mr. W. F. Bredin, member of the Alberta legislative assembly
for the district. Mr. Bredin, in his evidence, stated that as regards
Peace river valley, he would judge that from the mountains to Peace
point, a distance of between seven and eight hundred miles, following
the winding of the river, there is an average of seventy-five miles in
width on each side of Peace river that is equal to the soil on any
similar length of the Saskatchewan. That would make Peace river country
about one hundred and fifty miles in width, and extending from the
mountains to Peace point, a distance of seven or eight hundred miles,
which is all equally good for agricultural purposes with the
Saskatchewan valley. That would extend considerably beyond the bottom
lands of the river, including also the table land back of the river. A
great deal of it is clean prairie, on the north especially. There is
more of it covered with scrub and small timber than there is clean
prairie, but the soil is equally good where the timber grows. Mr. Bredin
stated that he had a ranch at Grande prairie for six years, and raised
oats and vegetables every year there. He had cattle there for five
winters, and the average length of feeding them during those five years
was six weeks of each winter. That is south of Peace river, but within
this belt of one hundred and fifty miles. In that Spirit river country
he knew there were some white settlers, as well as half-breeds, who were
making their living by

RAISING STOCK AND FARMING.

That seven hundred or eight hundred miles of good country, of which he
spoke, would extend right to the foot of the Rockies. As to the question
of the uniformity of the quality of the soil, he had only been down to
what they call Wolverine point, near Fort Vermilion. He would say the
country is uniformly good from Rocky mountains to that point. At
Wolverine point the valley is much lower and perhaps the soil may be
blacker, and the black soil may be deeper on the lower stretches of the
Peace. All of that country would be good for stock. Both slough and
upland hay is abundant. The pea vine and all the small fruits that grow
anywhere else in the northwest grow up there, and all the wild flowers
that he knew of in the northwest grow there. This area in Peace river
country would compare on the whole with any part of Canada.

In reply to a question, Mr. Bredin stated that after his ten years’
experience of the country north of Edmonton he would consider that to be
quite as good a place for a man to settle in as the Saskatchewan valley
was twenty-five years previously. During the debate on the capital
question in the Alberta legislative assembly at Edmonton, Mr. Bredin
remarked, he had made an estimate of the good land north of Edmonton in
Alberta, and it figured up more than the good land south of that city.
If you were to add all the good land north of the Alberta boundary to
Alberta, you would have about twice as much good land in the province
north of Edmonton as there is south of that city.

ONE HUNDRED MILLION ACRES OF GOOD LAND.

Mr. Bredin submitted what he said he considered a careful estimate of
all the good land north of Edmonton, east of Rocky mountains. He
stated:—“My estimate of the area of the agricultural lands that will be
available in northern Alberta—say north of the 55th parallel of
latitude—and in the unorganized district of Mackenzie, is not less than
one hundred millions of acres.”

Mr. Bredin informed the committee that one spring, when he left Fort St.
John on the upper Peace, the grain there was up six or seven inches. He
must have been at least a month going to Edmonton, and when he got there
the grain there was just in the same stage of growth as the grain had
been when he left Fort St. John; so the season must be earlier at the
latter place. They very often sowed seed at Fort St. John in March, and
invariably no later than April. In 1906 they began cutting the wheat at
Peace River Landing on the last day of July, and the wheat was ready to
cut five or six days earlier than that. As a matter of fact, Mr. Brick,
the member for Peace river district in the Alberta legislature, started
to cut on the last day of July, and he told Mr. Bredin that the grain
was ready to cut a week earlier. Mr. Brick cultivated there, that year,
three hundred acres of land in wheat, oats and barley.

[Illustration: Vegetable Garden 15 miles west of Fort St. John.]

Stockmen west of Peace River Landing would have to feed their cattle,
taking one year with another, an average of seven weeks, and east of
that probably more.

Mr. Elihu Stewart, of the city of Ottawa, at the time Superintendent of
Forestry for the Dominion Government, since retired from the public
service to engage in private business, was one of the most important
witnesses examined before the committee. He explained that his knowledge
of the country beyond the Saskatchewan has principally been derived from
two trips that he made, one in 1902 to Peace river, and one during the
season of 1906 down the Athabaska, down Slave river, and down the
Mackenzie to the delta, and thence across to the Yukon, and back by the
way of Dawson. Mr. Stewart produced before the committee samples of some
of the grains that are grown at the end of Lesser Slave lake. One was a
sample of hulled barley, grown for the use of the mission schools;
another, wheat from Lesser Slave lake; a third, another quality of wheat
from the Roman Catholic mission at the end of Lesser Slave lake, grown
that year (1902). These exhibits were principally from the farm at the
end of Lesser Slave lake. The Roman Catholic mission there has

A VERY LARGE FARM AND STOCK,

and grain is grown there by others as well. Mr. Stewart said he had
noticed in discussions on Peace river that there was not enough
distinction made between the valley of Peace river and the tableland
above. There is a high level country, and all at once it drops down some
six hundred feet to a valley. He thought the difference between the
height of the banks and the water at Peace River Landing is something
like six hundred feet. In that valley there is no question at all about
the wheat ripening. He produced some specimens of grain grown in the
valley near Peace River Landing, also some tobacco grown there. The
width of Peace river valley is very narrow, not over two miles at the
crossing. The soil is good, perhaps a little heavy, with the exception
of a few miles which is light and covered with jackpine. The rest is
good agricultural land. There would not be a great quantity of it in the
valley of the river at that part. The altitude is pretty high, but down
the river towards Fort Vermilion it lowers, and probably the elevation
of the upland there would not be greater than the level of the water at
Peace River Landing. The grain-growing capabilities of that plateau all
depend on the elevation. Peace river district is an immense country
extending some six hundred miles from the mountains to the lake. Down at
Fort Vermilion crossing they raise large quantities of wheat. Of course,
at a very high altitude the same result cannot be expected, but wheat he
saw on the plateau above Peace river was uninjured on September 20. But
there was frost that night. He did not know whether it was enough to
kill the grain. However, if they had no frost up to September 20, there
should be

NO TROUBLE RIPENING GRAIN THERE,

because it ought to be fit for harvesting before the end of August. The
wheat in question was sown by an Indian and put in very late. Wheat
grown at Fort Vermilion took the first prize as the best wheat shown at
the Centennial Exhibition at Philadelphia, in 1876.

Mr. Henry A. Conroy, Inspector for the Indian Department under Treaty
No. 8, gave some very interesting evidence as to the agricultural
resources of Peace river country before the committee. Mr. Conroy stated
that he had been annually travelling through this northern country for
about eight or nine years. He starts in along Athabaska river, from
Athabaska, which is about one hundred miles from Edmonton and goes up
the river to the junction of Little Slave river, thence visiting all the
Indian reserves in the treaty district.

When Peace river district is reached via the route taken by Mr. Conroy,
the altitude is very high. It is certainly over one thousand feet from
the top of the bank down to the bottom of the river—tremendous banks.
The country, as he understood it, is very fine. Bunch grass grows all
along the north side extending through to Hay river. He had information
as to this country from Indians and half-breeds, and they say bunch
grass grows all along the way. Shortly after striking the Peace,
Dunvegan is reached. The country north of Dunvegan; all along the river
is, in the opinion of Mr. Conroy, fit for agriculture on both sides and
for any distance back. Of course one would have to go up to the top of
the banks to get the land. Fine buffalo grass grows in the district
north of Dunvegan up to Peace River Landing. As to the country running
across from Dunvegan to Fort St. John, it would not take a man very long
to cross it if he had a road.

A STARTLING COMPARISON.

[Illustration: View of the Pouce Coupé Prairie.]

Mr. Conroy stated emphatically that he was of opinion there is a large
area of valuable agricultural land on Peace river. Taking the whole
country there as far as he knew, there is as much agricultural land to
be settled as there is settled at present west of Winnipeg.

Mr. Conroy uttered a word of warning against some of the settlers
(old-timers). He remarked:—“Old-timers in there do not want anybody to
come in, and they tell people the country is no good. They have the
whole country to themselves. One man grows two thousand or three
thousand bushels of wheat every year and gets for it from one dollar to
one dollar and seventy-five cents a bushel from the Hudson’s Bay
Company, and he does not want anybody else to come in and compete with
him.”

Continuing his evidence, Mr. Conroy explained that from Fort Vermilion
northeasterly the limit of the agricultural country is reached, but
below that it could be made an agricultural country. There were no
settlers there at all then (1907). At Fort Vermilion there had been a
settlement for many years. Mr. Conroy said he had been there many times,
and knew all the settlers in that section. Some of the finest wheat he
ever saw, he saw growing in that settlement. He saw it only after it was
harvested; it was threshed. They had a roller mill there, an up-to-date
mill. The Hudson’s Bay Company manufactured flour at Fort Vermilion to
send north.

While at Peace River Landing with the Indian Treaty Expedition in 1899,
Mr. Charles Mair (“Through the Mackenzie Basin,” p. 89) made enquiries
as to the fertile areas of the upper Peace from the Indians, half-breed
hunters, and the few prosperous farmers and stockmen of the district.
The nearest farmer and rancher to Dunvegan, at that date, Mr. C.
Brymner, who had lived for ten years on Spirit river, told Mr. Mair that
during seven of these, though frost had touched his grain, particularly
in June, it had done little serious harm. Mr. Brymner informed Mr. Mair
that it was a fine hay country, even the ridge hay being good. Mr.
Brymner, himself, had at the time over a hundred head of cattle, which,
thanks to the Chinook winds, fed out late in the autumn and early in the
spring. Mr. Mair states that southeast of Fort St. John there is a
considerable area known as Pouce Coupé prairie, which was well spoken
of. The “Grande prairie,” to the southwest of Peace River Landing, which
connects with Spirit river country and is drained by Smoky river and its
branches, is a much more extensive open country. This is an extensive
district suitable for immediate cultivation, and containing valuable
timber for lumber, fencing and building.

Mr. Mair states that Rev. Father Busson told him in 1899 that at the
Dunvegan and St. Augustine mission farms White Russian and Red Fife
wheat had been raised since 1881, and during all these years it had
never been seriously injured whilst the yield had reached as high as
thirty-five bushels to the acre. Seeding began about the middle of April
and harvesting about the middle of August.

PRESENT CONDITIONS AND SETTLEMENT.

In his annual report (see annual report Royal Northwest Mounted Police,
1908), dated Athabaska, October 8, 1909, Inspector D. M. Howard of “N”
Division of the Royal Northwest Mounted Police gives much interesting
information regarding conditions at that recent date in Peace river
region. It will be observed that some of the Inspector’s references are
to districts immediately north and east of that directly under review in
this chapter, but they are none the less instructive here on account of
the similarity of climate and other conditions.

Those portions of the report referring directly to the districts treated
of in this volume are extremely interesting. The principal settlements
in the district at that date were stated to be as follows:—

“Lesser Slave lake, known as Grouard, so called after the Roman Catholic
bishop of the diocese, a well known pioneer of the country, is situated
six miles from the west end of Lesser Slave lake and has a population of
twenty-five whites, and one hundred and twenty-five half-breeds, who
make their living by hunting, fishing, and freighting in the winter
time. Most of them have a few head of cattle and horses, and small
gardens where they raise vegetables for their own use. The Roman
Catholic mission has a school, hospital and convent. The Church of
England also has a mission school for the Indian and half-breed
children.

“Salt Prairie and Heart River (settlement) has a population of twenty
whites and one hundred and seventy-five half-breeds.

“Prairie River (settlement) is considered one of the best settlements in
the district, the land being very good. It has a population of
eighty-five whites (Canadians, Americans and Swedes) and twenty-three
half-breeds.

“Sturgeon Lake (settlement) has a population of nine whites and two
hundred and ninety half-breeds and Indians.

“In Peace River Landing district there are six actual
settlements:—Peace River Landing, Shaftesbury, Silver Springs, Cold
Springs, Bear Lake and Little Prairie.”

The inspector proceeds to give some particulars about these pioneer
settlements.

Silver Springs (settlement) is situated about five miles from the farm
of T. A. Brick, on a high bench at the head of a spring named by the
settlers, Silver Springs.

Bear Lake (settlement) is used only as a winter camp, and for haying in
the summer. The lake from which it is named is about twelve miles long
by eight wide. It is very shallow and muddy, although the land about it
is very good and will make a good grain country, but as yet no one has
done anything in that line. There are no fish in this lake.

Little Prairie (settlement) is about twenty-two miles out from Peace
River Landing on the way to Lesser Slave lake. This prairie is about ten
miles long and one wide, but can be extended in all directions by
clearing the bush. The land is very good, and the little grain sown has
done very well this year. Two white men and a number of half-breeds are
the only settlers at present.

Peace River Landing (settlement) is what is known as round the crossing
of Peace river, extending about ten miles up on the north side of the
river, taking in the Roman Catholic mission, known as Smoky River
mission on account of its being opposite Smoky river where it joins the
Peace; this part is all surveyed with free grant lots to both whites and
half-breeds who had settled there before the treaty known as No. 8 was
made with the Indians.

Shaftesbury is the name given to the upper part of Peace River Landing
settlement, round the English Church mission, extending some sixteen
miles up the river, and comprising the balance of Peace River Landing
settlement.

THE POST OFFICE FOR THIS DISTRICT

is situated at Peace River Landing, and serves for all these
settlements.

Cold Springs (settlement) is located on high land about thirty miles
from Peace River Landing, near Old Wives Lake Indian reserve; several
settlers have taken up land there this year, and grain of all kinds has
done well.

Peace River Landing settlement, including Shaftesbury, Bear Lake and
Silver Springs settlements, has a population of about two hundred and
forty; twenty-nine French-Canadians, thirty Canadians and English, forty
Indians and one hundred and fifty half-breeds. Little Heart River has a
population of forty half-breeds and two whites (Americans).

As to industries and transportation, Inspector Howard stated in his
report:—“Steam sawmills are in operation at the following points in the
district:—Athabaska, Lesser Slave lake, Peace River Landing, Prairie
River, Fort Vermilion, Chipewyan and Fort Smith; one is also to be in
operation at Saskatoon lake in the Grande prairie country this winter.
The mill at this point does a good business, as a number of new houses
have gone up in the village this year, and a considerable quantity of
lumber is used annually in the building of the scows for the river
transport; few of these scows are brought back up the river, but are
broken up down below, and the lumber used for building purposes, scows
being built new at this point every year. Grist mills are also in
operation at Lesser Slave lake, Peace River Landing and Fort Vermilion.
At Sawridge two lime kilns are in operation and a good quality of lime
can be obtained at a reasonable price.

“The Northern Transportation Company has built a new steamer at this
point (Athabaska) this summer for use on the run between here and Moose
portage. This steamer is smaller than the ‘Northland Sun’ and of lighter
draught and will enable the company to run much later than in former
years. The river gets very low in the autumn before the freeze-up.

“Until the country has a railway affording the settlers entrance to the
markets, the grain acreage will not increase beyond sufficient to supply
the settlers’ own wants, and to meet local demands, but the advent of a
railway will change all this.”[16]

PRESENT DAY AGRICULTURE.

Inspector Howard gave the following information as to agriculture in his
district:—

“The general state of the district is satisfactory, and most of the
settlers, having had good crops, seem well pleased with their prospects
in this new country. In some parts of Peace river country a few suffered
loss from hail, and want of rain in other parts has affected the crops
of a few injuriously, but on the whole the crops were a very fair
average. In most cases threshing is not over, but in one case where the
crop has been threshed a Mr. L. H. Adair, of Baptiste lake, about twelve
miles west of Athabaska, really in the Athabaska country, threshed five
thousand bushels of oats from one hundred and twenty acres of land.
Nearly all the new settlers coming into the country this year have
settled at Grande prairie, in Peace river country, where the land is
very good. Most of these settlers were from Eastern Canada and the
United States, and in nearly all cases were supplied with a fair amount
of capital, stock and farm implements. Nearly all of them have put in
gardens, and have vegetables enough for their use in the winter, and
from reports I have received from the detachments, in no cases should
there be any shortage amongst the new settlers during the coming winter.

“Mixed farming is chiefly carried on in this district, oats and barley
being the chief grain grown. There is practically no market for wheat at
present owing to the want of railway communication. Potatoes and all
other kinds of vegetables are successfully grown, most of the farmers
having small vegetable gardens for their own consumption, but
practically none are grown for market.

“In Peace River district, Red Fife wheat was sown last spring from seed
supplied by the government. The wheat principally sown in this district
in former years was Ladoga, an early ripening grain, but the Red Fife
appears to have done just as well this year. The amount of grain raised
this year in Peace River Landing district is about:—Wheat, five
thousand bushels; oats, four thousand bushels; barley, one thousand two
hundred bushels. Threshing was not finished at the time this report was
made, so the above is only an estimate.

“There are about three hundred head of horses of all kinds and three
hundred and fifty head of cattle owned by settlers in Peace River
settlement, practically

EVERY FARMER OWNING A FEW HEAD

of each. In Lesser Slave lake district there are approximately six
hundred and one horses, seven hundred and fourteen cattle and one
hundred and forty-five pigs; in addition to these there are the
following registered stock: three stallions, five bulls, thirteen cows,
four boars and six sows.

“The crops through Peace River Landing and Lesser Slave lake
subdistricts have been a fair average. The grazing lands about Lesser
Slave lake, Grande prairie, Peace River Landing, Fort Vermilion and
other sections are very good, and hay is very plentiful and a supply for
the winter can easily be put up.

“The acreage under crop in Lesser Slave lake sub-district is about seven
hundred and thirteen acres of oats, three hundred and one acres of
barley, twenty-three acres of spring wheat, nineteen acres of fall
wheat, twelve acres of fall rye. One acre of sugar beets and mangolds
were grown this year as an experiment and turned out very successfully.

“The crop all round was good; only one farmer suffered any loss, about
twelve acres of his barley being damaged by hail.

“Next year there will be a much increased acreage under crop, a lot of
breaking having been done this summer and autumn.”

A PLEASANT COUNTRY TO LIVE IN.

Not only does the climate of the Peace country appear to be satisfactory
from the view point of the farmer, but it is also described by
travellers as exceptionally pleasant to live in. Mr. Warburton Pike, in
his book (See p. 19) refers enthusiastically to the beautiful autumn of
the Peace country. He writes:—“We reached Fort Vermilion late in
September, in the full glory of the autumn; the sharp morning frosts had
coloured the poplar leaves with the brightest golden tints, and the blue
haze of an Indian summer hung over prairie and wood. Away on Great Slave
lake a half-breed had told me of the beauties of Fort Vermilion as a
farming country, and had explained that all the good things of the world
grew there freely, so that I was prepared for the sight of wheat and
barley fields, which had this year produced a more abundant harvest than
usual; potatoes and other vegetables were growing luxuriously; cattle
and horses were fattening on the rich prairie grass, and it seemed that
there was little to be gained by leaving such a fertile spot in the face
of the winter that would soon be upon us.”

Speaking of his trip up the upper Peace between the date mentioned and
the end of November, Mr. Pike wrote:—“I do not remember to have ever
seen in any other part of Canada such a fine autumn as we enjoyed
between Vermilion and the Rockies. There was hardly a day’s rain the
whole time, and, although a sharp white frost usually made a cold camp,
the days were bright and at times almost too hot for tracking.”

That the climate of Peace river country is exceptionally healthy is
declared by all the white people who have lived there, and their
declaration appears to be borne out by the fact that a considerable
portion of the inhabitants have attained a very old age. Mr. Charles
Mair in his book “Through the Mackenzie Basin” mentions that when the
Indian Treaty expedition was at Lesser Slave lake in 1899 his attention
was drawn to the number of people of extreme old age among the
inhabitants. He especially mentioned the case of an aged half-breed
woman, Catherine Bisson, who was born on New Year’s day in the year
1793. She was blind at the time Mr. Mair saw her, and scarcely able to
walk, but was able to talk, and even cracked jokes with those about her.
In a footnote Mr. Mair states that this very old woman died in the
spring of 1908 at the remarkable age of one hundred and fifteen years.

-----

[15] It will be observed that this paragraph and other portions of this
testimony really refer to the Athabaska country treated of in the
preceding chapter, but to save an awkward dislocation of Professor
Macoun’s testimony it has been kept intact. (E. J. C.)

[16] The railway is now being constructed, and there has been a
remarkable development in this section since Inspector Howard penned
this report.

CHAPTER XII.

NORTHERN ALBERTA.

Tree Growth and Timber Resources.

An Abundance of Timber in the Vicinity of Chipewyan.—Much of the
Country Has Been Swept by Fires.—Most of the Timber is Along
the Rivers.—Millions of Cords of Pulp Wood.—Spruce and Black
Bark Poplar the Principal Varieties.—The Water Power
Possibilities Described as Tremendous.

The timber resources of northern Alberta, according to the evidence in
hand, are very considerable, a matter of not a little importance in a
new country. We will deal first with the eastern, or Athabaska division
of this section.

In his evidence before the Senate committee of 1888, Professor John
Macoun, Botanist to the Geological Survey, said:—“There is an abundance
of timber in the vicinity of Chipewyan on Lake Athabaska. There are as
fine spruce in the Athabaska delta as are to be found in any part of the
northwest. I have measured trees on the Embarass river that were two
feet and a half in diameter and were very tall. On Peace river,
likewise, especially on islands, there are many large groves of spruce
and poplar, which attain extraordinary dimensions.”

Mr. Alfred von Hamerstein informed the Senate committee in 1907 that
from McMurray up in a westerly direction, for about twenty miles, there
is very good timber. He had seen trees that would make one thousand feet
of lumber. From Athabaska to House river there is timber standing yet.
There had been some fires raging, but they had not burned it yet. The
timber consists of some patches of spruce of a fairly good size, and the
rest is poplar. From House river to McMurray there is no timber left. It
is all burned out. There are patches here and there along the river, a
couple of trees left standing, and there is some very fine timber in
that. There is some timber which Mr. von Hamerstein used for his oil
well boring work, and he had taken out strips sixty-four feet long, out
of which he had cut his walking beams. There are only patches of this
timber; the rest had been burned. A little further east there is some
fine timber at Chipewyan. From the mouth of Peace river to about Fort
Vermilion there is some good timber. Timber of the same quality ranges
north for a considerable distance. There will be a range of timber four
or five miles long, and then muskeg. From the Vermilion down there is no
timber left; it is all burned up. There is no young timber growing up to
speak of—at least Mr. von Hamerstein did not see any, except in a few
places where a little young timber is starting to grow. Indeed it is
mostly poplar, with patches here and there of spruce, but mostly poplar.

[Illustration: Saw Mill near Fort Smith.]

Mr. H. A. Conroy of the Indian Department, in his evidence before the
Senate committee of 1907, stated that he had been east of Lake Athabaska
as far as Fort à la Corne. All along the rivers there is good timber,
particularly on Great Slave river. On the lower levels of the Athabaska,
through to Athabaska lake, there is heavy timber all the way along. Mr.
Conroy did not know what was behind the timber belt, but believed it was
pretty muskeggy. That was what the Indians told him. He had been up the
river by boat every year for eight years. Taking the country as a whole,
there is quite

A LOT OF MARKETABLE TIMBER.

All the rivers and lakes could produce good timber. There are millions
of cords of spruce for pulpwood.

Mr. Conroy, in a report to the Superintendent of Forestry, January 17,
1910, wrote:—“That part of Athabaska river north from McMurray to Smith
landing is fringed with a heavy growth of spruce and black bark poplar.
The spruce is quite large, and from an economical standpoint will be of
great value in the future. A considerable part of this country is also
excellent for agricultural purposes. From McMurray southwest to
Athabaska there is quite a quantity of valuable spruce and poplar which
has been saved by the watchfulness of the guardian, William Biggs, who
makes his trips up and down that section of the river. He is one of the
most useful men in the north.

During the summer of 1910 Mr. W. Hayes, a capitalist and manufacturer of
Duluth, Minnesota, made an exploratory trip through the Athabaska
country with A. Violette. Mr. Hayes stated in an interview on his return
to Edmonton that there was timber enough in Athabaska district to supply
western Canada for the next half century. Agricultural prospects, he
declared, could not be better, while copper, iron and gold had been
found, and also petroleum, asphalt, limestone and oil. Fishing could be
developed into quite an industry.

Interviewed in Edmonton after his long trip in 1910 (See p. 27) the Hon.
Frank Oliver, Minister of the Interior, stated:—“All the way from
Edmonton to Fort Macpherson the country, along the rivers at least, is
level and forested. There is no prairie. On the upper part of Athabaska
river the banks are from one hundred to two hundred feet in length, and
the country is well wooded. There is a considerable amount of spruce of
good size, but the timber is chiefly poplar. The country has at one time
been altogether under spruce, but fires have wrought havoc in it. The
explanation of these fires is that all freight for the north country
goes down Athabaska river and the men who steer the scows down walk back
along the banks. They are careless with their camp fires and the result
is a continual danger of further destruction by fire.”

VALUABLE WATER POWERS.

With such knowledge as we now possess it is safe to say that within a
few years the water powers of the section of country under review will
constitute one of its most important natural assets.

Mr. William Ogilvie, in a letter published in the Ottawa Journal,
February 19, 1910, writing of the water power susceptible of development
on Slave river, stated:—“When making my survey in 1888, I deduced the
total fall in the river in this stretch by observing the angles of
depression or elevation of each survey station from the preceding one,
and with the distance from each station to station deducing the rise and
fall; in this way I found the total fall to be two hundred and
forty-seven feet. The instrument I had to use was not of a high order of
precision for this purpose; nevertheless, I feel safe in saying the fall
is between two hundred and thirty and two hundred and sixty feet. All
the drainage basins of Peace and Athabaska rivers, and Lake Athabaska,
are in one here, and with this fall in so short a distance the power
possibilities, when required, will be tremendous.”

Mr. Ogilvie, upon another occasion, speaking of Athabaska river,
said:—“The current averages well over four miles an hour, but the rate
varies much with the height of water. At Grand rapids falls, the fall is
about sixty feet in one quarter of a mile. They are a fine sight and
will, when required, develop a lot of power; I would say in the average
season fully as much as Chaudiere falls at Ottawa (say eighty thousand
horse-power).”

PEACE RIVER SECTION.

As to the timber resources of the western or Peace river division of the
section under review, Doctor G. M. Dawson, before the Senate committee
of 1888, after describing the prairie country, showed that the remainder
of the surface was generally occupied by second-growth forest,
occasionally dense, but more often composed of aspen, birch and
cottonwood, with a greater or less proportion of coniferous trees. Some
patches of the original forest, he said, remained, however, particularly
in the river valleys, and were composed of much larger trees, chiefly
coniferous, among which the spruce was most abundant. Handsome groves of
old and large cottonwoods were also to be found in some of the valleys.
Where the soil became locally sandy and poor, and more particularly in
some of the more elevated parts of the high ridges above described, a
thick growth of scrub pine and spruce, in which the individual trees
were small, was found, and in swamp regions the tamarack was not
wanting, and grew generally intermixed with the spruce.

East of Smoky river, and southward toward the Athabaska, the prairie
country was quite insignificant in extent, the region being
characterized by second growth forest, which was only beginning to
struggle up.

Whatever theory be adopted, and may have been advanced to account for
the wide prairies of the western portions of America further to the
south, the origin of the prairies of Peace river was sufficiently
obvious, Doctor Dawson thought. There could be no doubt that they had
been produced and were maintained by fires. The country was naturally a
wooded one, and where fires had not run for a few years, young trees
began rapidly to spring up. The fires were, of course, ultimately
attributable to human agency, and it was probable that before the
country was inhabited by the Indians it was everywhere densely
forest-clad. That the date of the origin of the chief prairie tracts now
found is remote, was clearly evidenced by their present appearance, and
more particularly by the fact that they were everywhere scored and
rutted with old buffalo tracks, while every suitable locality was pitted
with saucer shaped “buffalo wallows.”

[Illustration: The 23rd Base Line between Townships 88 and 89, Range 14,
West of the 6th Meridian.]

In its primitive state the surface was probably covered with a dense
heavy growth of coniferous trees, principally the spruce (_Picea
Engelmanni_ and _P. alba_), but with scrub pine (_Pinus contorta_) in
some localities, and interspersed with aspen and cottonwood. These
forests having been destroyed by fire, a second growth, chiefly of
aspen, but with much birch in some places, and almost everywhere a
certain proportion of coniferous trees—chiefly spruce—had taken its
place. The aspen being a short-lived tree, while the spruce reached a
great age and size, the natural course of events, if undisturbed, would
lead to the re-establishment of the old spruce forests.

Mr. Charles Mair (“Through the Mackenzie Basin”, p. 91), estimates the
prairie areas of upper Peace river at about half a million acres, “with
much country in addition, which resembles Dauphin district in Manitoba,
covered with willows and the like, which, if they can be pulled out by
horse power, as is done there, will not be very expensive to clear.”

Mr. Mair notes a wide and beautiful table-like prairie, begirt with
aspens, at Peace point.

Mr. Fred S. Lawrence explained to the Senate committee of 1907 that in
the valley of Peace river, the bottoms of the river, the islands—and
there are large islands in the river—and the points, are largely
covered with a heavy growth of spruce, which grows to a large size. The
largest he had ever measured was four feet four inches in diameter. A
tree of that kind would carry its trunk well up, clear of branches for
forty or fifty feet. Of course that is an unusual size, but timber three
feet in diameter is common on the hills, and in the lower part of the
bottoms. There is no oak, but there are spruce, birch and poplar. The
poplars grow to a large size. The cottonwood often grows to four feet in
diameter, and the poplar grows to a diameter of two feet.

CHAPTER XIII.

NORTHERN ALBERTA.

Economic Minerals.

Travellers, Explorers and Prospectors Describe the Country as a
Veritable Store House of Mineral Wealth.—Gold Found in the Bars
in Peace river.—Indications of Plentiful Supply of Iron.—
Lignite Found in Abundance.—Historic Deposits of Salt.—The
Famous Athabaska Tar Sands.—Their Commercial Value.—
Indications of Petroleum.—Boring Experiments.—Natural Gas
Under a Wide Area.—Travellers Use Natural Gas Jets to Boil
their Camp Kettles.

Northern Alberta, according to the reports of travellers, geological
explorers and prospectors, is a veritable storehouse of mineral wealth,
its natural richness in this respect including gold, iron, coal, gypsum,
salt, sulphur, galena, natural gas, petroleum, tar sands or asphaltum,
etc.

In his report of 1888, Mr. R. G. McConnell of the Geological Survey (See
p. 18) states:—“Gold was found in many of the bars in Peace river, and
in several places in sufficient quantities to deserve attention. Three
miles above the mouth of Battle river, a large bar nearly a mile long on
the left bank was examined, from which we obtained fifteen to twenty
colours of fine gold, by washing a few handfuls of the mixed gravel and
sand in an ordinary frying pan. We tried the bar at several points, and
always with the same result. A small stream descends from the plateau on
the opposite side of the river, and by leading its waters across the
river, which is here about one thousand feet wide, the bar might be
easily and inexpensively worked on a large scale. Twelve miles farther
up the river, another bar was examined, which yielded from twenty to
forty colours when washed in the same way. Numerous other bars occur in
this portion of the river, which would probably give as good results as
those examined.

“The presence of fine gold in some quantities in the bars above the
mouth of Battle river is probably due to the diminution in the strength
of the Peace river current which takes place here, and its consequent
loss of transporting power. The same fact is shown in the gradual
substitution of sand bars for gravel bars which occur at the same point.

“Besides the gold on Peace river, two colours were also washed out of a
bar on Loon river, an eastern tributary of the Peace.”

Mr. Alfred von Hamerstein, a German gentleman who has lived in the
Athabaska country for many years, latterly devoting his attention wholly
to prospecting for petroleum, was examined before the Senate committee
of 1907 and explained that before beginning boring operations for oil,
he had been engaged in gold mining in Athabaska and Peace river
districts. He had inspected McLeod river at a place called Assiniboia. A
half-breed took out one hundred and fifty dollars from a bar there. He
himself

TOOK OUT GOLD

at a little bar right opposite the mouth of Lesser Slave river in the
Athabaska. He worked it for part of two summers. He would take out
enough to last him for the winter, and then quit. It is hard work. The
Indians and natives have gold and diamonds on the brain. They had taken
to him rocks containing very nice garnets, but they were very mysterious
about them.

Mr. von Hamerstein explained he had also worked for gold on Peace river.
There is very good mining there, a little below Battle river, but the
gold is so very fine that for every dollar you save there, about four
and a half go away, and there are some peculiar things that no one can
account for. After you have got it there is trouble with the
quicksilver, which does not take up the gold. The method he adopted was
to run the quicksilver, and then before running it over again, to roll
it in acid.

Before the Senate committee of 1888, Bishop Clut stated that in Peace
river and Liard river, certainly there was gold in large quantities. On
Peace river, twelve or thirteen years prior to 1888, miners made from
fifteen dollars to twenty dollars a day washing, but in the winter and
when the water was high they could not work, and they abandoned the
mines. “If the country were settled,” the bishop remarked, “those mines
might be worked to better advantage, because the miners could find other
occupation in the winter and when the water was high.”

According to Mr. von Hamerstein, at Black bay, on Lake Athabaska, there
is first-class galena—none better. It carries gold, silver and copper.
They assayed some of the product at Chipewyan, and found that it carried
roughly about six dollars or seven dollars worth of gold, and some
copper. There is a big seam near Black bay, and one can follow it up
right along until it comes to an island. That is a very fine country for
gold, and there have been several attempts to make something out of it,
but the time is not ripe.

INDICATIONS OF IRON.

Indications of the presence of iron have been found on Peace,
Clearwater, and Athabaska rivers. A specimen rock from near Pelican
rapids on Athabaska river contained 12.4% of metallic iron. J. B.
Tyrrell found indications of iron in Churchill river district, and also
north of Lake Athabaska.

According to Mr. R. G. McConnell’s 1888 report:—Clay ironstone in
nodules and thin beds, is of universal occurrence in the Cretaceous
shales of the Peace region, but is especially abundant in some of the
outcrops of the Fort St. John shales on Peace river, between Battle
river and Smoky river. The ironstone, here, owing to the rapid erosion
of the soft shales, has been silted out, and in many places forms thick
accumulations at the foot of the cliffs lining the valley, some of which
may prove to be of economic value. The Pelican sandstone on the
Athabaska is usually capped with a bed of hemitiferous sandstone varying
in thickness from a few inches to four or five feet. A specimen of the
rock was examined in the laboratory of the Geological Survey, and found
to contain 12·4 per cent. of metallic iron.

Mr. von Hamerstein, in his evidence before the Senate committee of 1907,
stated that there are indications of iron along Clearwater river. He
found some very nice pieces of iron, and he found limestone in the
centre of Athabaska.

Once, in Peace river district, on the way from Lake Chipewyan, he found
a deposit of red stone; he did not know whether it was ochre or hematite
of iron. He had any amount of it, but upset with his canoe and lost it.
A large amount of ochre is found on the eastern bank of the Athabaska,
between Athabaska and Grand rapids. He had also observed what seemed to
him a large amount of hematite of iron between Athabaska and the mouth
of greater Slave river, while on Slave river itself, at a certain point,
large bodies of magnetic ore are indicated by the action of the compass,
which gets entirely out of order.

COAL AND LIGNITE.

Mr. von Hamerstein informed the committee that there is a fine seam of
coal at McKay, and went on to say that he had taken out, the season
before his examination by the committee, about twenty tons, right on the
river bank. There was a good quantity of bituminous coal, which could be
used for common blacksmithing, but not for welding. Where exposed and
worked, this seam goes down about five or six feet deep, and it seems to
be getting larger. There is quite a bit of coal taken out every year by
the people who live at Chipewyan.

There is, according to Mr. von Hamerstein, another fine seam of coal at
a little creek named Horse creek, which is about a mile and a half south
from McMurray on the east side of Athabaska river. Coal may also be
found in other places. There is a seam, for instance, about two miles
below Stony island.

W. F. Bredin, M.L.A., confirmed Mr. von Hamerstein’s evidence as to the
deposits of coal near McKay, which is about twenty miles north of
McMurray.

In his report of 1888, describing his explorations the previous season,
Mr. R. G. McConnell stated:—

“Lignite was found in Peace river sandstone in Peace river in several
places, but in seams too small to be workable. It also occurs in the
plateaus south of Lesser Slave lake. In one section at the latter place,
four seams, ranging in thickness from one to four feet, besides a number
of smaller ones, was found, distributed through about a thousand feet of
sandstone and shales. Drift lignite was also found in Marten river near
the base of Marten mountain, but it was not traced to its source. On the
Athabaska, the Grand rapid sandstone is lignitiferous, some of the seams
being from four to five feet thick, but the quality is usually inferior.
Several small seams also occur imbedded in the tar sands.”

DEPOSITS OF GYPSUM.

Mr. McConnell states in his report that “Gypsum is deposited in small
quantities by the mineral springs at La Saline, and it also occurs on
Peace river between Bouillé rapid and Peace point, where beds ten to
fifteen feet in thickness are said to exist. Blocks of gypsum several
feet in diameter were found on Peace river above its confluence with
Loon river, and on Red river a few miles above its mouth. They have
probably been derived from the Peace point exposures, and carried up the
valley of Peace river by ice during the Glacial period.”

Mr. Alfred von Hamerstein gave evidence to the same effect before the
Senate committee of 1907. He stated that there “are large deposits of
gypsum on the southern bank of Peace river, near Peace point, which is
situated somewhere near the mouth of Peace river. Very large deposits of
the same economic mineral are in the neighbourhood of Salt river.”

SALT MINES.

Harmon, writing in his journal at Chipewyan as long ago as 1808,
wrote:—“About sixty miles from this, down Slave river, there are
several places where almost any quantity of excellent, clean, white salt
may be taken, with as much ease as sand along the sea shore. From these
places, the greater part of the North West is supplied with this
valuable article.”

Before the Senate committee of 1907, Mr. von Hamerstein stated that at
Salt river, salt was found right on the surface. There is a spring which
comes out of the ground, and the water is so salty that it cannot take
up any more. Right at McMurray one hundred and fifty feet of rock salt
was found. The traders and Hudson’s Bay Company’s people come down and
take it with shovels, and they sell all the salt that is used along
there. It is taken from Salt river. Witness did not know what they got
for it.

In his report of 1888, Mr. McConnell writes:—“At La Saline, on the
Athabaska, twenty-eight miles below the Forks, and about two miles above
the mouth of Red Earth creek, several mineral springs occur about half a
mile east of the river on the edge of the valley there, sixty feet deep.
The deposits from the springs, consisting principally of calcareous
tufa, cover the face of the escarpment and have also built up a cone on
the top of the bank ten to fifteen feet high and about two hundred feet
wide. The water is strongly saline, holding a considerable percentage of
sodic-chloride. Sulphuretted hydrogen gas escapes from the bank in
several places and taints the air for some distance from the springs.
Besides the calcareous tufa the cone contains small deposits of common
salt, gypsum and native sulphur, while pure tar, derived from the tar
sands beneath, issues from the bank in two places. The springs feed a
shallow lake which is situated at the foot of the escarpment, and is
surrounded by a clay flat partly bare and partly covered with coarse
grasses.”

SULPHUR BEDS AND SPRINGS.

While giving evidence before the select committee of the Senate in 1907,
Mr. von Hamerstein explained that there are sulphur beds and springs
between McMurray and Lake Athabaska. Extensive sulphur deposits are
found on the east side of Athabaska river between McMurray and the lake.
It is inland about two miles, and in some places it is found in large
quantities, and beyond the lake, at several places on the east shore, as
well as the west shore of Great Slave river. In some places there is a
very large amount of sulphur. It comes from an old crater, in the shape
of saline water, containing a large amount of sulphur. This saline water
at spots runs over three or four acres, the water evaporates, and the
sulphur remains.

Mr. von Hamerstein also stated that on “the lower part of the Athabaska
the limestone which is exposed all along the river is of a very good
quality. There is also found clay fit for puddling and for making
brick.” He added that sand of the very best quality for making glass is
abundant, and this industry Mr. von Hamerstein said he believed was
bound to come into existence and be profitable through the existence of
cheap fuel, and intense heat in the shape of natural gas in the country.

THE FAMOUS “TAR SANDS.”

The occurrence of huge deposits of an oily bituminous or tarry substance
along Athabaska river was referred to in the journals of the pioneer
explorers of the region. In the account of his historical journal in
1879, Mackenzie mentions that the exudation of the “bituminous
fountains”, as he called them, when mixed with gum or the resinous
substance collected from the spruce fir, was used by the natives and
voyageurs to gum their canoes. After investigating the character of
these deposits, geologists have agreed in describing the black plastic
mass as “Tar Sands.”

Mr. McConnell described these deposits as resting on the limestone and
well exposed in high cliffs on both sides of Athabaska river. At Cascade
rapid, this formation is one hundred and fifty feet thick and is so
saturated that pure tar oozes out of the bank in several places and
streams down the slope. Mr. McConnell proceeds in his report to
say:—“The tar-sands mentioned above belong to the Dakota formation and
constitute in this region the basal member of the Cretaceous system.
They rest unconformably on the Devonian limestones. Lithologically they
may be described as soft sandstone, the cementing material of which is a
bitumen or inspissated petroleum derived from the underlying limestones.
The sands are siliceous and usually rather fine-grained, but also grade
occasionally into a coherent grit. The eastern boundary of the tar-sands
was not precisely defined, but their outcrop was estimated to have a
minimum distribution of fully one thousand square miles. In thickness
they vary from one hundred and fifty to two hundred and twenty-five
feet. The tar is unequally distributed through the sands, in some places
merely staining the grains, but in most of the sections examined it is
present in sufficient quantity to render the whole mass more or less
plastic. An analysis by Mr. Hoffmann of a specimen collected some years
ago by Doctor Bell gave by weight:—

Bitumen 12·42 per cent.
Water (mechanically mixed) 5·85 per cent.
Siliceous sands 81·73 per cent.

A cubic foot of the bituminous sand rock weighs, according to Mr.
Hoffmann, 117·5 lbs. This figure multiplied by the percentage of
bitumen, 12·42, gives 14·59 lbs. as the amount of bitumen present in a
cubic foot, or 14·59/63·7 = 22·9 per cent. in bulk, taking 63·7 pounds
as the weight of one cubic foot of rock. At the minimum thickness of one
hundred and fifty feet, and assuming the thickness as given above at one
thousand square miles, the bituminous sand rock in sight amounts to
28·40 cubic miles. Of this mass, if the preceding analysis is taken as
an average, although this is probably rather high, 22·9 per cent. in
bulk or 6·50 cubic miles is bitumen. This calculation can, of course,
only be regarded as an approximation, but will serve to give some idea
of the enormous outpouring of bituminous substances which have taken
place in this region. The amount of petroleum which must have issued
from the underlying limestones required to produce 6·50 cubic miles of
bitumen cannot be estimated, as the conditions of oxidation and the
original composition of the oil are unknown. It must, however, have been
much greater than the amount of bitumen.

“A few miles west of the Athabaska the sand rock, still saturated with
tar, passes below the higher divisions of the Cretaceous, and its
extension in this direction can only be ascertained by boring. It was
not recognized on Peace river nor on the lower part of Red river, and
must disappear somewhere in the intervening region.

“In ascending the Athabaska the tar-sands, after an exposure of over
twenty miles, pass below the surface at Boiler rapid and are not seen
again.”

COMMERCIAL VALUE OF THE TAR SANDS.

As to the actual value of these deposits, Mr. McConnell has this to say
in his report:—“The commercial value of the tar sands themselves, as
exposed at the surface, is at present uncertain, but the abundance of
the material, and the high percentage of bitumen which it contains, make
it probable that it may, in the future, be profitably utilized for
various purposes, when this region is reached by railways. Among the
uses to which it is adapted, may be mentioned roofing, paving,
insulating electric wires, and it might also be mixed with the lignite
which occurs in the neighbourhood, and pressed into briquettes for
fuel.”

Before the Senate committee of 1907 Mr. von Hamerstein was examined at
length regarding these beds of tar sands, or “asphaltum,” as he called
it, and as it is generally called in the district. He described these
beds as occurring where petroleum seemed to have broken through the
surface and soaked the ground for miles around. This substance, Mr. von
Hamerstein remarked, could scarcely be termed asphaltum. It is oil
gum—something the nature of tar. He produced a piece of this material
which he had taken out himself. He also produced a bottle containing
liquid taken from springs in the ground. He described it as nothing else
but a heavy petroleum, which comes out of the ground. There are
inexhaustible quantities of that. It has formed pools over the land
which are of considerable size in some places. In summer time it comes
out in large quantities, but it hardens in the winter, and of course the
springs take time to get started again. It is not flowing continuously,
but flows whenever it has a chance. The cold seems to draw it together
and bake it. This is the largest quantity of petroleum witness had ever
seen in the world. This area extends from McMurray for fifty miles along
the road.

Mr. von Hamerstein said he thought there was

NOTHING LIKE IT IN THE WORLD.

He had been in Texas, Kansas, and Indian Territory, and had looked over
the asphalt beds in California, but had found nothing to compare with
it. This “asphalt” does not resemble Trinidad asphalt, for the latter
comes from a crater, and the substance is not the same. The Athabaska
substance is not straight asphalt; it is nothing but oil gum, out of
which asphalt can be made. There is a large amount of petroleum in it.
He tested it himself, and got some paraffin out of it. If he could
obtain transportation, he could apply it for practical purposes. After
it is refined, and all the foreign substance taken out of it, it can be
used for road making.

Lubricating oil can be made out of it, and in fact he made cylinder oil
for his machinery out of it, and also got some paraffin out of it. The
rest he used for making tar paper. This product would certainly become
valuable as soon as there was transportation. The area covered by this
substance amounts to about twenty square miles.

Mr. J. B. Tyrrell, in his evidence before the same committee, referred
to these outcrops of tar sands. There is, he stated, an enormous amount
of sandstone there impregnated with hard thick petroleum of tar. The
probability is that when one gets back from the outcrop in some places
this substance will be found as a liquid oil instead of a hard tar that
is found there on the Athabaska. Mr. Tyrrell said he thought it quite a
fair and reasonable supposition that one would find good fluid oil in
the beds of the same geological age as the tar sand of Athabaska river.
This tar sand is very strongly in evidence along the river, and an
enormous amount of tar has actually gone to waste, as it were—floated
out and hardened there. The tar sand area extends for quite a number of
miles along the river. As you descend the river you get to those
tar-bearing beds, and then they are in evidence right along for a number
of miles down the river. Then you leave them altogether, and they do not
occur again. Mr. Tyrrell considered it highly probable that the
petroleum or liquid would be found in close proximity. Of course the
sandstone or tar would not have a marketable value at the present rates
of transportation, but, outside of that, probably it would be used as
paving material if it is ever needed in that vicinity. He thought it

COULD BE USED FOR MAKING PAVEMENT.

R. W. Ells, LL.D., F.R.S.C., in the Geological Survey report on “The
Bitumen or Oil Shales of New Brunswick and Nova Scotia, also on the Oil
Shale Industry of Scotland,” says:—“The celebrated tar-sands of
Athabaska river in Northern Alberta may at some time furnish material
for distillation, since all attempts to find oil by boring have hitherto
been unsuccessful. These tar-sands have been well described by Doctor
Bell, and other officers of the Geological Survey who have visited the
area. Doctor Bell, after describing the immense amount of tarry matter
found along the river, states that ‘the pitchy sand itself may be useful
for a variety of purposes. When chopped out of the bank in lumps like
coal it was found to burn freely, with a strong smoky flame, if
supported in such a way as to admit of the free access of air. As the
bitumen became exhausted the fine sand fell to the bottom.’ . . . . A
very superior lubricating oil may be manufactured from it. Doctor
Hoffmann of the Geological Survey, Mr. Isaac Waterman, the well known
petroleum refiner of London, Ontario, and Lieutenant Cochrane,
Instructor in Practical Chemistry at the Military College, Kingston,
have found it to contain twelve to fifteen per cent. of bitumen.
Although this proportion may appear small, yet the material occurs in
such enormous quantities that a profitable means of extracting the oil
and paraffin which it contains may be found. The high banks of the river
and its branches offer an easy means of excavating it, and as it burns
readily one part might be consumed to extract the oil from another,
there being practically no limit to the quantity which may be obtained
for the digging.”

[Illustration: Oil Well at McKay, Athabaska river.]

Doctor Bell, in a paper before the American Institute of Mining
Engineers, Toronto, July, 1907, said:—“Different experiments made with
the tar-sands show that while they yield some good illuminating fluid,
their principal value consists in the large proportion of

FINE LUBRICATING OIL

which they afford. This oil was found to remain liquid in the cold
winter temperatures of the Canadian prairie provinces, and therefore, it
is very suitable for car wheels and machinery working in the open air.”

Mr. Crean in the report of his explorations in 1909 states:—“The
outcrop of tar-sand commences about thirty miles south of McMurray on
Athabaska river. It continues to about forty miles below McMurray on the
river. It extends to the east and west for at least thirty miles, and
varies in thickness from twenty to two hundred and twenty-five feet,
with probably an average of one hundred and fifty feet
thickness. . . . . The value of this immense deposit on the Athabaska is
not known. . . . . During the past season representatives of interests
in England and France have made examinations of it on the ground. Should
it be found to be capable of being converted to any commercial use, the
enormous extent of it would ensure that industries of considerable
public importance would be established in connection with it as soon as
railway communication is provided. Since Mr. McConnell’s report was
published, several other outcrops of the mineral have been reported. A.
W. Ponton, D.L.S., reports an outcrop near the fifth meridian, which is
about ninety miles west of McMurray. I reported an outcrop of tar-sand
in my report of last season on Buffalo lake which is one hundred and
twenty miles southeast and in the province of Saskatchewan. That these
outcrops are part of the same field is probable.”

INDICATIONS OF PETROLEUM.

Apart altogether from the commercial value of the tar sands themselves,
they are regarded by many geologists and practical operators as chiefly
important as indicating the existence of deposits of petroleum. For
instance, as long ago as 1888, Doctor G. M. Dawson of the Geological
Survey stated before the Senate committee:—“The pitch found along the
Athabaska may probably be of considerable value in the future; but in
the meantime was most important as giving reason to believe that
extensive deposits of petroleum existed in the country in which it
occurred. The quantity appeared to be practically inexhaustible.”

Mr. McConnell, in his report, enters very thoroughly into this phase of
the question. He writes:—“The tar sands evidence an upwelling of
petroleum to the surface unequalled elsewhere in the world, but the more
volatile and valuable constituents of the oil have long since
disappeared, and the rocks from which it issued are probably exhausted
as the flow has ceased. In the extension of the tar sands under cover
the conditions are different, and it is here that oils of economic value
should be sought. In ascending the Athabaska, the tar sands are overlaid
at Boiler rapid by a cover of shales sufficient to prevent the oils from
rising to the surface, and in ascending the river, this cover gradually
thickens. The geological attitudes of the shales is not the most
favorable, as the beds dip away from the outcrop at the rate of five to
ten feet to the mile, and it is possible that a part, or even the whole
of the oil may have flowed northwards and eastwards through the sands,
and escaped where these come to the surface. It is unlikely, however,
that all the oil has escaped in this manner, as small anticlinals in the
covering beds are almost certain to exist, and a differential hardening
of the beds themselves may serve to enclose reservoirs or inverted
basins of large capacity. It is also possible that the sands at their
outcrop may, by the deposition of tarry substances, be plugged tightly
enough to prevent further egress. Favourable indications of the presence
of oil in the vicinity of the Athabaska are also afforded by the
existence of the natural gas springs.”

TAR SPRINGS REPORTED.

Mr. McConnell proceeds to show that “Indications of the presence of oil
in the district are not confined to the tar sands, as on Peace river and
Lesser Slave lake inspissated bitumen was found in a number of places
lining cracks in nodules, and at Tar island in Peace river small
quantities of tar are brought to the surface by a spring. Tar springs
are also reported from several other places, but their existence lacks
verification.”

In his Summary Report of the operations of the Geological Survey, for
the year 1894, Doctor G. M. Dawson, the director, referring to Mr.
McConnell’s explorations and report, wrote:—“The occurrence of great
quantities of bitumen or maltha along a portion of Athabaska river has
long been known, having been noticed and commented upon by the very
earliest travellers in the region. Beds of sand or very soft sandstone
of Cretaceous age, varying from one hundred and forty to two hundred and
twenty-five feet in thickness, are there found to be more or less
completely saturated with bitumen, for a distance of some ninety miles
along the river. These beds are known as ‘tar sands.’ More recently a
number of smaller occurrences of bitumen in the form of ‘tar springs’ as
well as sources of combustible gas, have been found at different places
over a very extensive district. All these circumstances point to the
probable existence of a great petroleum field, of which possibly some
parts have already exhausted themselves in saturating the lowest
Cretaceous sands, but of which probably the greater portion is still
effectually sealed by the thick covering of overlying rocks. It is
believed that the source of the petroleum which has given rise to the
deposits of bitumen is in the Devonian strata, which here immediately
underlie those of Cretaceous age.”

EXPERIMENTAL BORINGS.

In 1893, at the suggestion of Mr. McConnell and Doctor Dawson, the
Dominion government began experimental borings for petroleum in the
Athabaska region.

The importance of actually ascertaining by means of boring operations,
the existence or otherwise of economically valuable bodies of petroleum
in the region had been recognized for many years, but the remoteness of
the region and the apparent impossibility of immediately utilizing any
discoveries which might be made, had hitherto prevented the necessary
experiments. A vote of seven thousand dollars was obtained from
Parliament for the purpose of initiating this work, the arrangements for
which were entrusted to the Geological Survey. After careful
consideration, it was determined that a bore-hole should in the first
instance be sunk at Athabaska, at which place the depth of strata to be
passed through in order to reach the horizon of the “tar sands” had been
estimated by Mr. McConnell at approximately from twelve to fifteen
hundred feet.

On October 24 the bore-hole had reached a depth of one thousand and
eleven feet, when it was found necessary, owing to the incoherent
character of the rocks, to stop work pending the arrival of more casing.
This was placed in the hole during the winter, but the drilling itself
could not be resumed till the spring, as the great quantity of gas met
with rendered it dangerous to keep a fire in the derrick or anywhere in
the vicinity of the well. This first boring was unavoidably abandoned at
a depth of one thousand seven hundred and seventy feet, without reaching
the probably oil-bearing beds at the base of the Cretaceous formation
but within a short distance of attaining these beds.

During these particular boring operations, according to the engineer in
charge, at three hundred and thirty-four feet a large flow of gas was
struck. The roaring of the gas could be heard half a mile away from the
works. The foreman who had seen the big gas well at Kingsville, Ontario,
stated that the flow of gas was as strong as in that well.

SECOND AND THIRD BORINGS.

The second and third of the experimental borings in search of petroleum
in the northern part of Alberta were begun early in the summer of 1897
near the mouth of Pelican river on the Athabaska and at Victoria on the
Saskatchewan below Edmonton, respectively. The sites selected for these
borings were determined largely by the knowledge of the stratigraphical
succession and the thickness already gained in the first bore-hole at
Athabaska. The borings at Pelican and Victoria had reached depths of
eight hundred and twenty and seven hundred and five feet respectively
before winter. Operations were resumed at both places in the spring of
1898, as soon as the requisite arrangements could be made. Work had been
suspended at Pelican in 1897 because of a very large flow of natural
gas, under great pressure. It was hoped that most of this gas might blow
off during the winter, and it was found, in fact, to be considerably
reduced in amount when the locality was again reached by the engineer in
charge in 1898. Work was resumed, but additional and very strong flows
of gas were soon met with in the underlying beds, and after exhausting
every method of mastering them and continuing the boring, it became
necessary again to suspend operations.

In regard to the actual existence of petroleum, the results of the
government borings have not up to the present stage been satisfactory.

The boring near the mouth of Pelican river penetrated the lower sandy
beds of the Cretaceous for some distance and demonstrated the existence
in these beds of a thick tarry petroleum or maltha, besides that of
great reservoirs of natural gas. It proved impossible to carry out this
boring to the very base of the Cretaceous and into the underlying
formation, in which the existence of a more fluid and merchantable oil
was still to be hoped for.

Doctor Dawson, reporting upon the result of these operations,
stated:—“The bore furnishes additional evidence of the existence in the
Northwest territories of a vast gas-field. The seemingly uniform
continuity of the Cretaceous beds, makes it almost certain that
gas-wells may be obtained by boring, over a great area. Unfortunately
the Pelican boring, like the boring at Athabaska, did not penetrate deep
enough to furnish reliable information as to the existence or
non-existence of petroleum of a high quality. The presence of
low-quality petroleum—maltha—is demonstrated, but as the more liquid
oil may very probably underlie this, and as we did not reach a
sufficient depth to determine the point, the result is unsatisfactory.”

WHY THE BORING WAS STOPPED.

The following extracts from the report of the engineer in charge of the
boring operations at Pelican river, Mr. A. W. Fraser, are interesting,
and show how and why the operations came to an abrupt termination:—“I
used some of the heavy petroleum or maltha which flowed from the well in
raising steam, and it made an extremely good fuel.

“If the hard slate stratum at eight hundred and twenty-one feet six
inches had been pierced, a great flow of petroleum might have, in my
opinion, been encountered. Indeed it is altogether possible that at that
depth we were within a few feet of a large body of petroleum. Had it
been struck while the flow of gas was in an unconquered condition, the
result would have been disastrous, as there might have been no possible
means of checking the flow. The flow of gas was so great that a cannon
ball could not have been dropped down the pipe.

“At seven hundred and seventy three feet a heavier flow of gas was
struck. It made a roaring noise coming out of the bore, and had quite a
pronounced petroleum odour. Increased quantities of petroleum in the
cuttings at these depths were encountered.

“At eight hundred and twenty feet a tremendous flow of gas was struck,
which blew every drop of water out of the bore. The roar of the gas
could be heard for three miles or more. Soon it had completely dried the
hole, and was blowing a cloud of dust fifty feet into the air. Small
nodules of iron-pyrites, about the size of a walnut, were blown out of
the hole with incredible velocity. They came out like bullets from a
rifle. We could not see them going, but could hear them crack against
the top of the derrick. It was impossible to do anything with the bore
that day, so we were forced to let it stand just as it was. There was
danger that the men would be killed if struck by these missiles. The
next day a long stick was put on the tools, so that the men could turn
them without getting too close to the bore. In this way we succeeded in
penetrating through eighteen inches of a conglomerate mass of these
iron-pyrites nodules embedded in heavy petroleum. As we drilled through
this the gas blew out the nodules of iron-pyrites embedded in oil.

“At eight hundred and twenty-one feet six inches a very hard stratum of
slate was encountered, which we penetrated about three inches. We could
get no water down the well on account of the strong flow of gas, so we
could make no further progress with the drill in this hard cutting. The
danger to the men was so great that they refused to work longer over the
bore. We then put the four and five-eighths inch casing down to the very
bottom, hoping to shut off gas, but it failed to do so.”

TERRIFIC PRESSURE OF NATURAL GAS.

Work was resumed here in 1898 (Geological Survey Report, Vol. XI, page
33a). It was thought that the flow of gas might have decreased, but on
work being resumed and the hole being cleaned out “the gas which had
increased in power with the cleaning of the hole cut the walls down and
blew great clouds of sand and gravel higher than the derrick.”
Subsequently at eight hundred and thirty-seven feet such a strong flow
of gas was struck that they were obliged to suspend operations. Mr.
Fraser further says in the same report:—“I proved the general
excellence and utility of the gas during the season, using it for my
boiler, cookstove and for lighting. I had only a one inch pipe, tapped
into the side of the casing, and probably did not use the one-hundredth
part of the gas coming from the bore, but there was sufficient to make
all the steam necessary on my twenty-five horse-power boiler, keep fire
in the stove, and also to supply a strong flare-light. The gas burned
beautifully clean. In working at the bore, the screeching and hissing of
the gas, when at all confined by the presence of the tools inside the
casing, or from other causes, was so great that the men complained of
pains in their ears and heads.”

BEGGED TO BE EXCUSED.

When giving his evidence before the Senate committee of 1907 Mr. von
Hamerstein begged to be excused from divulging results of his work in
boring for petroleum in the McMurray district, as other people had
entrusted their money with him in the enterprise. He said he felt at
liberty to state that their works so far made him very confident that
they were going to have one of the biggest petroleum fields in the
world. There was no doubt he said, petroleum would be found all through
that country, from Athabaska river to Peace river. He remarked that when
his party was boring once they struck natural gas, and one hundred and
fifty feet of salt. They went down through a hundred feet of salt, and
then they abandoned it. At this particular place they went about eleven
hundred feet altogether. They never went lower than eleven hundred feet.

Mr. von Hamerstein added: “As far as petroleum is concerned, I have all
my money put into it, and there is other people’s money in it, and I
have to be loyal. As to whether you can get petroleum in merchantable
quantities, that is a matter about which I would not care to speak. I
have been taking in machinery for about three years. Last year I placed
about fifty thousand dollars worth of machinery in there. I have not
brought it in for ornamental purposes, although it does look nice and
home-like.”

In the winter of 1910, Corporal A. H. Schurer, of the Royal Northwest
Mounted Police, made a patrol from Athabaska to McMurray. In his report
he states:—“I visited the oil wells sunk by Baron A. von Hamerstein at
Poplar island, six miles below McMurray. I could see very little with
the exception of the machinery, as the snow had covered everything up. A
Mr. Falkner, supposed to be representing a party of eastern capitalists,
has been staking out claims between McMurray and McKay for oil, during
the past two months, and I understand that he is also to prospect
Clearwater river east of McMurray for petroleum and other minerals. In
December last Mr. Julius Alteschul, a German, claiming to be a
representative of a London, England, financial house, visited McMurray,
and after having been there for a few days, stated that he had found a
mineral more valuable than radium, and that as soon as Athabaska river
was navigable, he would place one hundred workmen and their families at
McMurray, where he intended to start an industry; what this industry was
to be Mr. Alteschul did not make clear. It is the general impression
that Alteschul was merely paying a visit to a much talked of place in
order to find out what minerals actually existed, but did not want his
mission to be known.”

NATURAL GAS.

Corporal Mellor states (Royal Northwest Mounted Police report of 1909)
that when patrolling the buffalo country near Peace point he came across
“a large natural gas spout burning in a muskeg and was informed it never
goes out.”

During his examination before the select committee of the Senate in 1907
Mr. von Hamerstein drew the attention of the committee to the waste of
natural oil gas at the government bore hole at Pelican portage or
Pelican rapids. It was still burning. When Mr. von Hamerstein went up in
the month of June, 1906, it blew about eighteen or twenty feet. About
four years previously he found it was about forty feet, a vertical
stream. It exploded with such force that not a hundredth part of the gas
had a chance to be inflamed. The ground all around it had fallen in. Mr.
von Hamerstein expressed the opinion that this is the biggest gas well
on the face of the earth. He had a gas expert, a Mr. Chamberlain, from
Petrolia, who told him that it was the biggest well in the world. Mr.
Chamberlain operated in Indiana, Kansas, and all over the United States,
and was the largest operator in the natural gas business.

In connection with their prospecting, mining and boring operations in
Athabaska district Mr. von Hamerstein’s parties use quantities of
natural gas for lighting purposes. They light their camps with it, and
do their blacksmithing with it, and it comes in very handy. They get the
gas at all kinds of depths, and get several veins of it. They never get
petroleum without gas, as they have to strike gas before they strike
petroleum, so there must be a large quantity of petroleum there.

According to Mr. von Hamerstein’s evidence upon this occasion, on Peace
river there is evidence of natural gas also, small amounts of tar and
also evidence of petroleum. That would be sixteen miles from Peace River
Landing, on an island called Tar island. The natural gas springs there
throw out small amounts of tar, and about thirty miles from the mouth,
on the north shore, there is also a spring. It is what Mr. von
Hamerstein called an oil spring or tar spring.

W. F. Bredin, M. L. A., before the Senate committee of 1907, stated that
for miles along Athabaska river the natural gas is all the time escaping
from the clay banks of the river and in the river itself, because all
across the river you can see the bubbles rising. The witness had lighted
some of the gas vents, and boiled his tea pail by hanging it over the
flame.

MORE IMPORTANT GAS SPRINGS.

According to Mr. McConnell, the most important natural gas spring in the
district occurs on the Athabaska at the mouth of Little Buffalo river.
The gas here forces its way up from the tar sands, through two hundred
and fifty feet of the Clearwater shales and issues from the surface in
numerous small jets distributed over an area fifty feet or more in
diameter. Some of the jets burn steadily when lighted, until
extinguished by heavy rains or strong wind, and afford sufficient heat
to cook a camp meal. A second spring was noticed on the left bank of the
Athabaska about thirteen miles below the mouth of Pelican river. The
volume of gas escaping here is less than at the mouth of Little Buffalo
river, and in order to reach the surface it is obliged to penetrate five
hundred and seventy feet of shales and sandstone which here overlie the
tar sands. Escaping jets of gas were also noted at several points
farther up the river; but these were mostly small and may possibly be
due to decaying vegetable matter. On Peace river natural gas issues from
the tar springs on Tar island, in small quantities.

Mr. McConnell adds:—“The natural gas springs have less value in
themselves at present than in the indications they afford of the
existence of petroleum beneath.”

In his introduction to Mr. G. A. Young’s descriptive sketch of the
geology and economic minerals of Canada (1909) Mr. R. W. Brock, Director
of the Geological Survey, wrote:—“Petroleum and natural gas are
obtained in Ontario; Alberta is also producing a large quantity of gas,
and will probably develop petroleum fields. . . . . The interior plain
(of the Canadian northwest) is underlain for the most part by
sedimentary rocks, chiefly of Cretaceous age, and containing coal,
building stones, clays, and cement materials. Natural gas over wide
areas and under great pressure has been tapped, and there is every
indication of a large oil field in the northern portion, at least, of
Alberta.”

CHAPTER XIV.

NORTHERN ALBERTA.

Game, Fur-bearing Animals and Fish.

The Land of the Wood Buffalo.—Where the Last Remnant of American
Bison Living in a Wild State Roam.—A Splendid Moose Country.—
The Home of Numerous Fur-bearing Animals.—The Prolific
Fisheries of Lake Athabaska and Other Waters.

As the northernmost portion of northern Alberta includes a considerable
part of the range of the herds of wood buffalo (_Bison athabascae_),
which are the sole remnant, living in a natural state, of the countless
millions of American bison which existed when the northwest was first
opened up, it is a country of especial interest to the naturalist and
sportsman. It seems to be agreed that the wood buffalo is exactly the
same species as the buffalo of the plains, being descended from herds or
individuals which drifted into the wooded country to the north for
pasturage or protection, and finding conditions congenial remained
there. Within the memory of living men the wood buffalo of northern
Alberta and beyond were immeasurably more numerous than they are to-day,
and they would probably have suffered extermination before this had the
Dominion government not stepped in and enacted laws to protect closely
the remaining herds.

The wood bison formerly ranged over immense areas north to Great Slave
lake and Liard river, but it is now restricted to a few small herds
inhabiting the region north of Peace river.

The bison was first recorded from this region by Samuel Hearne, the
first traveller to penetrate its unknown wilds. After crossing Great
Slave lake (his Athapapuskow lake) from the north, in January, 1772, he
entered the level country to the eastward of Slave river, and there
“found buffaloes very plentiful.” He travelled southward for some days
and then left Slave river and proceeded to the eastward, still finding
the animals abundant until he reached a point near the longitude of the
eastern end of Great Slave lake. (Preble.)

Hon. William Christie, ex-member of the Northwest Council, and late
Inspecting Factor of the Hudson’s Bay Company, examined before the
Senate committee of 1888 stated that at that date the wood buffalo
roamed over the Athabaska country, chiefly in the woods; but in the
summer they came down to lick the salt at the salt springs in the valley
of Salt river, which flows into Great Slave lake. He understood that
these wood buffalo were in small bands of four or five. Mr. Christie
considered the wood buffalo to be identical with the plains buffalo.
Long ago the latter species was found as far north as Peace river in
great numbers, and the plains Indians, the Sarcees and others, were then
in Peace river country. There is a place called Battle river in Peace
river valley, where these plains Indians had a tremendous battle, and it
is called Battle river from that circumstance. The plains buffalo were
in that country then in thousands, just the same as they were in the
plains. As they got hunted by the Indians, they moved out, and the
Indians moved out of Peace river country also after this great battle
and went into the plains. The battle in question was fought perhaps one
hundred years previously. A number of the plains buffalo got into the
woods and bred and remained there and were still living in the woods
there.

THEY HAD GROWN LARGER

in some way, but they were just the same as the plains buffalo. Those
who had killed some of them said they had increased in size in the
woods, possibly from not being disturbed so much and not having to move
about as the plains buffalo had to do. The wood buffalo lived in the
woods, on the grasses that they found. The buffalo does not scrape; he
breaks the snow with his nose and eats that way. Unless the grass was
pretty long he could not get his living there in the winter. About four
or five hundred pounds would be the weight of a wood buffalo. A buffalo
cow in the plains, after being dressed, would weigh about three hundred
pounds; one of these wood buffalo would weigh about three hundred and
fifty to four hundred pounds dressed.

Mr. Christie, speaking of the possibility of using the wood buffalo for
hybridization purposes, explained that as far back as 1842, the Hudson’s
Bay Company had at Edmonton a herd of buffalo. They began by taking some
calves, and from these the herd increased until they had some thirty
altogether. These used to herd out with the other cattle and come in
with them. All at once the buffalo came near Edmonton and this herd went
off with the others. It was the impression then, from their mixing with
the other cattle, that they would not cross, because there were not any
signs of it.

Mr. H. J. Moberly, another Chief Factor of the Hudson’s Bay Company,
submitted a statement in writing to the Senate committee of 1887 in
which he stated that as to wood buffalo there was a band, probably about
two hundred, between the Saskatchewan and the Athabaska. They kept on
the mountains between Lac la Biche and McMurray, and another band,
probably about three hundred strong, was between Athabaska and Peace
rivers on Thickwood and Birch mountains. A third band, probably seven
hundred strong, was scattered through the mountains between Liard and
Peace rivers, and from Salt river to the foot of Rocky mountains.

A TALE OF SLAUGHTER.

Mr. William Ogilvie, in his report of 1888 wrote:—“The wood buffalo
which formerly roamed around all the upper waters, is now nearly a thing
of the past. A few still remain scattered over a wide district. Could
some means be devised to protect them for some years they would probably
soon multiply and become a source of food supply and revenue to the
natives. Mr. McDougall (of the Hudson’s Bay Company), who has for some
years past been gathering information concerning the number of these
animals and their locality, has kindly given me the following notes:—In
the winter of 1887-88, on the head waters of Hay river, which flows into
point:—“Rumours that the wolves were destroying the buffalo were
current everywhere. Some went so far as to say that these wolves were a
new and larger race come in from the barren grounds, to prey on them.
Such rumours were repeated at every point in much the same words,
without details. This aroused my suspicions.”

At Smith Landing, where the party arrived June 7, the Inspector met
Pierre Squirrel, chief of the Chipewyans, and arranged for a meeting of
the chiefs and hunters who knew the buffalo country near there. At the
meeting next day, Mr. Jarvis told them he had come to investigate the
buffalo question, and if necessary, to take steps for the destruction of
the wolves; that he must go in person to the buffalo country, and if
possible see the buffalo and the wolves. Countless objections were
raised to his plans. The whole country was under from one to five feet
of water, according to one statement. The party would not get a dry spot
to sleep on, according to another. They would be devoured by flies;
would die of rheumatic fever; it was impossible to find the buffalo;
they might be hundreds of miles off at that moment.

[Illustration: Royal Northwest Mounted Police Barracks at Smith
Landing.]

On the thirteenth, Inspector Jarvis left Smith Landing and after a long
day’s march in a west-southwest direction reached Salt river. None of
the swamps so much talked of proved very serious, and it was evident
that all were dry in late summer. At one point only was a true bog seen
and it extended for only half a mile. The following day, following the
course of Salt river downward, the first buffalo were sighted. Inspector
Jarvis writes in his report:—“The trails, wallows and chips of buffalo
became noticeable, but as they were old we gave them only passing note.
But when two perfectly fresh ones appeared, we dismounted to follow them
on foot. I took charge of the horses as the flies were very thick. Great
Slave lake, and west of Battle river, a tributary of the Peace, the
Indians saw three bands containing seventeen, ten, and four,
respectively; they killed five, but Mr. McDougall did not ascertain
whether or not these were in addition to the above numbers. The same
winter three bands were seen between Salt river and Peace point on Peace
river, numbering fifty, twenty-five, and about twenty-five,
respectively. None of these are reported to have been killed. During the
winter of 1886-87, between the north end of Birch and the south end of
Thickwood mountains, distant about one day or thirty miles from McMurray
on Athabaska river, one band of about thirteen was seen. Since then five
of this band have been killed. Below Red river, a tributary of the
Athabaska, and between Birch mountains and Athabaska river, and ranging
down to Poplar point on the Athabaska, another band said to contain
about twenty was seen. Altogether we have only about one hundred and
eighty head of wood buffalo in this vast extent of territory. The
paucity of their number is, to some extent, a protection to them. If
they escape epidemics and such a winter as almost exterminated them on
the upper Peace some years ago, they may possibly increase. Whenever the
Indians come across a band they try to exterminate them whether they
need them for food or not. They try to drive them into a bog, if one be
convenient, and, if they succeed in this their object is soon
accomplished, for the poor brutes mire in the bog and are quickly
killed. The Indian feels, after accomplishing a feat of this kind, as if
he had won a battle, and never thinks of a reduction in his food
supply.”

Since Mr. Ogilvie’s report was penned; and partly as a result of it,
steps have been taken to protect the wood buffalo, and for years back,
the few members of the gallant Northwest Mounted Police in Athabaska
country have devoted considerable energy to enforcing the law which
prohibits the hunting of the buffalo. The most authentic portion of the
more recent information we have as to the present extent and condition
of the herds of wood buffalo is obtained from the reports of officers
and non-commissioned officers of the distinguished force mentioned.

PRESENT CONDITION OF WOOD BUFFALO.

In 1907 Inspector A. M. Jarvis, C.M.G., was specially despatched from
headquarters at Regina to the Athabaska country[17] to ascertain the
existing numbers and condition of the wood buffalo and to recommend
means for their protection.

Inspector Jarvis, accompanied by the well known naturalist, Mr. E.
Thompson Seton, left McMurray for the north on June 29. He wrote in his
report at this and sent Mr. Seton on with his camera. Beaulieu stalked
them exactly as he would a moose, and in about an hour led Mr. Seton to
an open glade where in plain view was

A HERD OF THIRTEEN BUFFALO,

two big bulls, one calf of this year, and the rest cows and yearlings.
Their photograph was taken three times at sixty yards, before they
became alarmed and ran off.

“Bear tracks abound everywhere, and that night Beaulieu shot an old bear
and two cubs within fifty yards of our camp.”

The Inspector reports as follows as to the next day’s
operations:—“Beaulieu and myself started out at 6:45 a.m. and travelled
around the west side of Salt mountain until 10:40 p.m., following fresh
tracks of two buffalo, until we came upon fresh tracks of what appeared
to be a large herd. We tied our horses in the woods and followed along
for about a mile through wet, swampy ground, until we came in sight of a
bunch, all of which were lying down except three large bulls. They were
on a large salt lick. We crawled up to within (which we afterwards
measured) fifty paces of them, through the brush. I took out my glasses
but owing to our position, could not get a correct count of them. After
resting for a little while we both walked into the open. I took out my
pocket book and wrote down as follows:—‘Four big bulls, one yearling,
four little calves, three two-year-olds, and eight cows.’ They then saw
us and got up one by one and stared at us, showing how easily they can
be approached and killed. Beaulieu then shouted and they galloped into
the woods. The bulls were magnificent looking animals. They had not yet
shed all their winter coat, but the cows were sleek and fine looking.
Before going into the open, Beaulieu, who had his rifle along, said,
‘Mon Dieu, major; let me kill him one cow.’ I explained to him that we
would be fined five hundred dollars and that I would lose my position.
He then said, ‘Let me kill him one for the Government.’ But I would not
permit it. We returned to the camp where we had left Mr. Seton and that
evening moved our camp to a spot where we thought these animals might
pass. But we saw no more of them. As we

HAD SEEN THIRTY-THREE OF THESE ANIMALS,

and the fresh tracks of ten or twelve more, possibly bulls, in the
woods, we concluded that we had seen all the buffalo in this particular
district. And as there was no time to go to Peace point and rapid de
Beaulieu, and keep our word with the guide, I decided to return, to go
to Fort Smith and arrange if possible to see the band reported to be in
the Caribou mountains, near Hay river. We looked everywhere for buffalo
bones, but found only four very old skeletons, with nothing to tell how
they had been killed. At all drinking places, muddy lakes, marshes and
salt licks, we looked particularly for tracks of wolves and found very
few. I got a glimpse of one small wolf, or possibly coyote, in the
woods, and heard one coyote calling, just as we were leaving the
mountain, he having smelt the bear we had killed. We found the skull of
one wolf killed years ago, but I am forced to conclude that wolves are
scarce here, and I found ample justification for my suspicion that the
constant cry of ‘wolf’ is a mere ruse to divert attention from the
two-legged depredators, who are really doing the mischief.

[Illustration: Looking across Slave river from Fort Smith.]

“Other game abounded. Bear tracks were seen on every side. Caribou are
said to be plentiful in winter. Moose are common. I saw one without
doing any hunting. This is important for the buffalo, as several well
known hunters claim this region as their hunting and trapping grounds.
They go in ostensibly to kill moose and come out abundantly supplied
with pemmican, but bring out very few moose skins. I am informed by the
traders here, that a few years ago these hunters begged sale for moose
skins, but of late years scarcely any have been brought out. This is
very suspicious, to say the least of it. These men did all they could to
prevent my going in, and I consider it no longer doubtful what is
destroying the buffalo.

“The following morning the guide announced that his time was nearly up
and he wanted to return to Smith Landing, which we did, arriving there
at 4 p.m. on the afternoon of June 16. It will be seen by the map, that
we barely entered the buffalo country, so were fortunate in seeing so
many head.

“In case it were desired to capture some calves for the purpose of
infusing fresh blood into other national herds, it could, I think, be
easily done, as in the early summer, when the calves are young, they
could be run down and roped. A fresh cow could be taken out from Smith
Landing or some other point, calves captured, and weaned on to the cow.
I consider this feasible.

“To sum up I conclude:—

“(a) That it is impossible for me or any one else in this country to
give you an intelligent report as to the numbers of the buffalo, without
first making a thorough patrol of the country, which would take from two
to three months with a complete pack outfit.

“(b) That the buffalo are in danger of extermination not by wolves, but
by poachers;

“(c) These poachers are all known and live at the village of Smith
Landing in the summer time;

“(d) They could easily be controlled by a local police patrol;

“(e) Without some protection the buffalo will not last five years
longer. Therefore I strongly recommend, as I did some ten years ago,
that, if it is the wish of the Government to protect the buffalo,
resident guardians be placed on the grounds.”

WOLVES NOT THE DESTROYERS.

Inspector Jarvis started from Fort Smith for his second trip on June 24.
The party proceeded in a westerly direction for about nine miles through
a level, dry country, covered with jackpine and poplar, following nearly
the course of Slave river to Gravel point, where they turned
southwesterly to Salt river, which they reached in another nine miles.
The party proceeded as far west as Little Buffalo river which flows into
Great Slave lake west of Slave river, but saw no signs of buffalo beyond
some old trails and wallows.

Reporting on this trip Major Jarvis wrote:—“Although we found no fresh
buffalo signs, we learned a great deal about the range and were glad to
hear that the main herd is the one we expect to reach by Canoe river. We
saw no signs of wolves, not even a trail, and I am confirmed in my
suspicion that the wolves are not the destroyers of the buffalo. In
conclusion I would point out that the range of the buffalo herds is very
limited; that it has certain natural boundaries; that the buffalo do not
attempt to leave this area; that it is removed from any village or
permanent habitation; and that, finally, it would be an efficient and
easy measure of protection if the whole area in question were at once
turned into a National Park. Animal life was not abundant. We saw no big
game whatever, and but few signs of moose or bear. Mr. Preble was
fortunate to find the nest and eggs of a very rare bird, the Bohemian
Waxwing, but we saw no game birds in the woods, and only a few ducks on
the ponds.”

THE LITTLE BUFFALO COUNTRY.

Major Jarvis, accompanied by Mr. Thompson Seton and Mr. E. A. Preble,
naturalists, made a third trip by canoe into the buffalo country from a
point on Slave river below Fort Smith. A water and portage route of five
and a half miles took them to the Little Buffalo, down which they
paddled to its mouth. On this trip fresh signs of buffalo were seen, but
no buffalo.

The Inspector writes in his report of this trip:—“We saw three bear,
three beaver, and some duck along this part of the river, and all along
we saw numerous signs, and fresh, of beaver, rat and mink. We also saw
an exposure of limestone on the left bank during the afternoon. We found
the river abounding with jackfish, Mr. Preble catching four with a troll
in a very short time. During the night Buffalo river seemed to be alive
with mink swimming forwards and backwards across it.”

As a result of Major Jarvis’s report more stringent regulations
regarding the protection of the buffalo were put into force. A system of
occasional patrols by selected non-commissioned officers and men of the
Royal Northwest Mounted Police into the buffalo country was inaugurated,
and some resident hunters were engaged as special constables.

A BAND OF SEVENTY-FIVE.

Corporal Mellor, Royal Northwest Mounted Police, on a patrol into the
buffalo country southwest of Smith Landing in 1909, found buffalo tracks
very numerous at Beaver lake and also on the “Big Salt prairie” at Hay
lake and about Peace point. In the district last named Corporal Mellor
was able to get within five yards of a band of about seventy-five
buffalo, and obtained a good look at them. He says in his
report:—“Owing to the fact that many of them were hidden from view in
the bush, I was unable to count them correctly. Those nearest to view
were nine large bulls, all splendid animals and rolling fat. I saw only
four calves in the band, although there may have been more in the bush,
but the guide, after examining the tracks, told me that there were no
more. We tried to get around to see them all, but something alarmed them
and off they went. This band was evidently composed of the different
small bands whose tracks we had been following at times.”

In the summer of 1910 Sergeant Mellor, accompanied by Constable Johnson,
ascended Big Buffalo river from Sulphur point on Great Slave lake to
Buffalo lake. The main object was to determine as far as possible the
northern boundary of the wood bison habitat. As a result of his
exploration Sergeant Mellor concludes that the wood bison never range as
far as Buffalo lake, nor across the Caribou hills, neither do they reach
Great Slave lake at any point; on the other hand, they come close to
Slave river from a point about fifty miles below Fort Smith right up to
Peace river, and also reach Peace river, at any rate, as far as Jackfish
river. Their habitat would therefore appear, he says, to be bounded on
the west by Caribou mountains, on the south by Peace river, on the east
by Slave river, and on the north by an imaginary line drawn from Caribou
mountains on the west to Slave river on the east, touching the latter at
about Point Ennuyeuse, and the former about fifty miles south of Buffalo
lake. The buffalo have, as far as he could make out from careful
inquiry, never been seen for many years north of these two points.

A TREMENDOUS ANIMAL.

Mr. H. A. Conroy of the Indian Department, in his evidence before the
Senate committee of 1907, said that he believed that there were then
approximately three hundred and fifty wood buffalo still roaming wild at
that date. He obtained a specimen for the Department of Agriculture in
1906 to be mounted. The Indians got it for him. This herd are the only
wild buffalo on the continent, he believed. They are very large, much
larger than the plains buffalo. One old Indian told the witness that
years ago they found a herd of buffalo between Liard and Hay rivers, and
one time they got a herd of them at Fort Providence, and they
slaughtered all that were in there. There had since been a close season
for buffalo for a good many years. The skin of the buffalo that the
witness procured for the department was a tremendous size, and he would
say that the animal must have weighed fourteen or fifteen hundred
pounds. Mr. Conroy in his evidence said:—“You do not require to enforce
the law to protect the buffalo. The Indians will not kill them. They
want to preserve them as much as any one else. They are the Wood Cree
Indians in the country north, as far as the 60th parallel, and the
Chipewyans north of latitude 60 degrees, until you come to the Aleutians
or Esquimaux. The Indians think if the buffalo are gone they will have
nothing left. The Wood Crees are benefiting by the errors of the Indians
south of the Saskatchewan. They know that the buffalo are all gone,
south of them, and they want to protect the wood buffalo.”

Sergeant R. W. Macleod, Royal Northwest Mounted Police, in the report of
his long patrol across country in December 1910 from Fort Vermilion to
the mouth of Hay river on Great Slave lake, corroborates the final
statement of Mr. Conroy. The sergeant states:—“The Indians I met were
familiar with the regulations for the protection of the buffalo and
protested strongly against a white man being permitted to kill any. The
Indians told me the extreme western range of the buffalo is thirty-five
or forty miles east of Buffalo lake, and there is certainly no feed for
them in any part of the country I passed over.”

During the summer of 1911 the special supervision of the wood buffalo
was taken out of the hands of the Royal Northwest Mounted Police, and
transferred to a government agent who is stationed at Smith Landing.

OTHER GAME AND FISH.

Some interesting evidence as to the general fish and game resources of
the whole north, and more particularly northern Alberta, was submitted
in writing to the Senate committee of 1887 by Mr. H. J. Moberly, a chief
trader in the Hudson’s Bay Company’s service. This gentleman, through
long residence and frequent travels therein, was quite familiar with
this country. According to his statement lake trout is found in almost
all the large lakes all over the country, and river trout in Athabaska
and Peace rivers and other streams close to Rocky mountains. Speckled
trout and mountain trout are found in waters on the east and west slope
of Rocky mountains; whitefish, all over the country from the
Saskatchewan north, in lakes and most rivers; pickerel, in most lakes;
jackfish or pike in most lakes; suckers, in all waters; gold-eye,
Athabaska river, Peace river and their tributaries; a peculiar kind of
salmon (doubtless the inconnu), in Mackenzie river as far up as Salt
river rapids, above Great Slave lake.

Ducks are found all over the country and geese and swans along the
Athabaska, the Peace, and the Mackenzie and the shores of Hudson bay;
cranes, along the Athabaska, the Peace and the Mackenzie; prairie
chickens, Athabaska and Peace river countries; ruffled grouse and spruce
partridge all over the Northwest Territories; ptarmigan, Athabaska,
Peace river, Hudson bay; plover and snipe, all over the Northwest
Territories.

According to Mr. Moberly, moose run all over the wooded country north of
the prairies and east of Rocky mountains.

The distribution of other game and fur animals in far northwestern
Canada was given by Mr. Moberly as follows:—Reindeer (cariboo), large,
all over the wood countries from Saskatchewan, to the barren grounds in
the north; reindeer, small, all over the barren grounds in the north,
and come south in winter as far as Lac la Brochet, Athabaska lake and
Peace river, close to Rocky mountains; red deer, Athabaska and Peace
river valleys; black tail deer, jumping deer and chevreux, same country
as the red deer; black and brown bears, all over the wooded country and
Rocky mountains; grizzly bears, Rocky mountains, valley of the Peace,
Athabaska, Liard, and Fraser, but seldom farther than two hundred and
fifty miles from the foot of the Rockies; beaver, Athabaska, Peace
river, and in fact all over the wooded country,

BACK’S GRAYLING.

Professor John Macoun, before the Senate committee of 1888, said he had
caught Back’s grayling in the tributaries of Peace river, in Rocky
mountains. It is both an Arctic and a mountain fish, and delights in
clear water. It is very gamesome and takes all kinds of bait. When it
took the bait it would jump clear out of the water, many times a couple
of feet or so, and of course, the beautiful colours (more beautiful than
those of the mackerel even), glistening in the sun, made the anglers
thrill with excitement. They are a white fleshed fish, and not anything
like as hard as the trout.

Writing of the immense quantities of fish caught in Lake Athabaska, Mr.
Wm. Ogilvie states in his report:—“At Chipewyan, the Hudson’s Bay
Company required, in the fall of 1888, thirty-six thousand fish for the
use of the post; the Roman Catholic mission, twelve thousand; and the
rest of the population at least thirty thousand more. Most of these were
caught in three weeks, while I was there. Sometimes they are numerous in
one place and sometimes in another, so that long journeys are often
necessary from the place where they are caught to the place where they
are to be used. This necessitates a large number of dogs to haul them
home, which is a very poor method, though it is the only one in use. To
overcome this inconvenience, Mr. McDougall, at Chipewyan, has built an
ice-boat, but has so far met with indifferent success, as the ice has
been unusually rough during both of the last two falls.”

As to the fish and game in the district explored by him in 1909, Mr.
Frank Crean reports that the principal fish to be found in the north is
the whitefish. The chief use made at present of this valuable fish is
for dog feed, large numbers being caught for this purpose in the annual
“fall fisheries,” as they are termed. Beside the whitefish, the jackfish
is also found in most of the lakes, and indeed in that country which
lies to the west of the height of land and on the watershed of Athabaska
river this is the principal fish. Although extremely good food in these
cold northern waters they are, of course, not to be compared with the
whitefish. The perch, or as the natives sometimes call them, the doré,
are found in most of the rivers and lakes. During the summer months they
form the staple diet, as the whitefish apparently go into the deep holes
in the lakes and are not caught by the natives, who rarely fish in deep
water.

[Illustration: Roman Catholic Mission at Chipewyan.]

Describing an ascent by him of Big Buffalo river, in 1909 Sergeant
Mellor states:—“The cutbanks are riddled with sulphur springs (the
odour of which overhangs the whole river), interspersed in peculiarly
intimate proximity with streams of beautifully fresh water. The river
was literally alive with ‘coneys,’ a species of fish somewhat resembling
a salmon, and which attains a large size; the name is a corruption of
the French name for the fish ‘poisson inconnu,’—‘the unknown fish.’
They were apparently ascending the river for spawning purposes; it was
quite unnecessary to use a net or line to catch them, as it was a simple
matter to throw them on land with a paddle or stick. For the next twenty
miles the river, while still running with great velocity, has not so
many rapids to encounter, and the going is considerably better. The
banks are lower, and in many places were clothed in berry bushes of all
kinds, and simply riddled with bear tracks. We did not have the good
fortune to kill one of these latter, although we saw them several
times.”

A MOOSE COUNTRY.

Sergeant R. W. Macleod, Royal Northwest Mounted Police, in a report of a
patrol in 1909 from Fort Vermilion to Hay river, states that while
descending Hay river on January 27 one of his men shot a two-year old
bull moose about one hundred yards from the river bank. After the patrol
got almost one hundred miles down the river from the Horse track they
saw moose tracks all the way as far as within twenty miles of Great
Slave lake, and they saw three moose, but did not shoot, as they did not
need the meat. They did not see a snow-shoe track in the whole distance
of two hundred and thirty-eight miles, which accounts for the moose
being so plentiful. One fox track was all the indication of fur to be
seen.

Between December 2 and 24, 1910, Sergeant Macleod made a patrol from
Fort Vermilion across country to the post at the mouth of Hay river on
Great Slave lake, a distance of five hundred miles. Sergeant Macleod
took advantage of some Indians travelling through to make the trip,
which was a very hard one, particularly on the dogs, as the snow was
deep. No white man is known to have made this journey before, and it was
twenty years since Indians had attempted it. The country is quite
unexplored. The width of Cariboo mountains is about one hundred miles
and the country is mainly moss-covered muskeg and lakes. Sergeant
Macleod made enquiries regarding a large unmapped lake he saw the
previous year and found that it is called Fish lake by the Indians. It
is as large as Lesser Slave lake and is in Cariboo mountains. This is
believed to be the lake which a Mr. Radford, an American naturalist,
claimed he discovered and reported to the Department of the Interior as
Lady Grey lake.

Sergeant Macleod reported that all the lakes he passed during this long
trip seemed to be deep for their size, and in the sergeant’s opinion
they no doubt contain whitefish and lake trout. In Fish lake there is
good fishing. There were three half-breed families belonging to Fort
Vermilion and two Chipewyan Indian families living on Deer Mountain
creek four miles southeast of Buffalo lake, it being a good place for
fall fishing. Caribou were plentiful on the mountain. Moose were
plentiful on the north side, and there were considerable fur tracks on
the north side of the mountain. Sergeant Macleod’s party “tracked” four
wolves.

The latest data available as to fish and game in the region immediately
under discussion appear in the annual report for 1911 of Superintendent
G. E. Sanders, D.S.O., commanding “N” Division, Royal Northwest Mounted
Police, with headquarters at Athabaska. In his report Superintendent
Sanders writes:—“The fur catch during the past season has improved;
lynx were plentiful in the far north; they have been very scarce for
some years and are now reappearing with the rabbits. The value of the
fur which passed through Athabaska this year on its way out of the
country is estimated at three hundred and fifty thousand dollars. Moose
were scarce in some parts where they are generally plentiful and
appeared in large numbers at points where they are not usually seen;
this is accounted for by the wolves moving them about. Wolves are
reported thick in all directions and at Peace River Landing a small pack
chased a moose through the settlement. Chicken and partridge are
numerous in the southern portion of the district. This year the chief
game guardian of the provincial government has notified that the close
season for beaver will remain in force. Hitherto it has been the custom
to open the season during the winter for a short time. The effort to
preserve the beaver by having a close season in this country fails
entirely, and I would repeat what I said last year in regard to this
subject about which I made careful inquiries. ‘I am strongly of opinion
there should be an open season for beaver. I found during my travels
that Indians kill more beaver when there is no open season than when
there is. When they do not kill for the fur, and there is no reason in
their minds to preserve the animals, they exterminate whole families for
food, whereas if they have an open season, and the fur is thereby more
valuable, they are careful not to destroy certain colonies, but leave
some to breed. They kill only when the fur is prime. The majority of the
hunters and trappers whom I consulted agreed that between October 15 and
December 15 would be the most suitable time for an open season.’”

Corporal S. G. Clay, Royal Northwest Mounted Police, made a patrol
through Grande prairie country in August, 1911, and in his report
states:—“Indians in this locality are in fairly good shape, moose and
bear being plentiful, and consequently there has been practically no
destitution amongst the Indians.”

-----

[17] A considerable portion of the wood buffalo range lies immediately
beyond the northern boundary of Alberta and is consequently within the
limits of the region particularly treated of in the later chapters
especially devoted to the “Mackenzie country.” On reference to the map
(and the map must necessarily be consulted frequently by the reader of
these pages) it will be noticed, also, that much of the data quoted here
really refers to those sections of the wood buffalo range within what is
arbitrarily defined in this volume as the Mackenzie country; but as the
southern part of the range is in northern Alberta, and as the wood
buffalo, probably on account of its scientific designation, is
associated in most people’s minds with the Athabaska region, it was
considered advisable to treat the question of the wood buffalo, as a
whole, in the present chapter. E. J. C.

[Illustration: THE MACKENZIE RIVER REGION]

CHAPTER XV.

THE MACKENZIE RIVER REGION.

Topography, Agriculture and Arable Land.

Mackenzie River a King of Northern Waters.—Over Three Thousand
Miles of Waterway.—Domestic Cattle have Succeeded.—Barley
Always Ripens at Fort Simpson.—Potatoes and Other Vegetables
have for Many Years Been Grown at Fort Good Hope, a few Miles
from the Arctic Circle.—Wheat and Barley Grown at Liard for
Many Years.—Interesting Comparison With the Russian Province of
Tobolsk.—A Large Town as Far North as Fort Wrigley.—Why Better
Results in Grain Growing May be Expected in the Future.

Northern Alberta, including the Athabaska and Peace countries treated of
in the chapters immediately preceding, is generally considered, and
properly, as forming part of the Great Mackenzie Basin, and that it has
been in this volume considered as separate from the immense region on
both sides of the Mackenzie, surrounding Great Slave lake, and on both
sides of Slave river from Fort Smith to its mouth at the lake in
question, is due to the purpose, previously expressed, of treating as
separate geographical units regions possessing particular
characteristics either of location, soil, climate or natural resources.

The region discussed in the present and immediately succeeding chapters
as “The Mackenzie River Region” includes the country north of the
Alberta and British Columbia boundary line (the 60th parallel of north
latitude) extending as far north as Beaufort sea. To the westward it is
bounded by the Yukon territory boundary line, and to the eastward by the
height of land east of Slave river, the height of land between the
valley of Coppermine river and the lake and river system extending from
the north arm of Great Slave lake to Great Bear lake, and a line in
prolongation thereof northward to the sea.

There might be some question as to the advisability of considering the
country north, south and east of Great Bear lake as part of the country
lying more immediately adjacent to the great river of the north. It is
true that the slight knowledge of the country north, south and
immediately east of Great Bear lake tends to show that it is a region
far less inviting than the immediate valley of the Mackenzie, and that
it practically forms part of the so-called “Barren Lands” which extend
as far eastward as Hudson bay. But this unfavourable evidence is not
quite conclusive, and after all, the whole of the country within the
limits decided upon is in the Mackenzie watershed, and has been
considered in a broad sense as part of the Mackenzie region by the
explorers, missionaries, traders, and travellers who have written of the
country. So the adoption of the limits decided upon should simplify the
geographical situation for the reader, and that is an important thing in
considering a territory so vast as that immediately under review.

A KING OF NORTHERN WATERS.

Mackenzie river is one of the longest and broadest streams in the world.
According to Mr. R. G. McConnell, of the Geological Survey, one of the
first to attempt a scientific survey of the river, the Mackenzie “drains
an area of six hundred and seventy-seven thousand, four hundred square
miles, and has an approximate discharge at a medium stage of the water,
according to some rough measurements made by the writer, of five hundred
thousand cubic feet per second. Its basin is traversed for nearly one
thousand three hundred miles by Rocky mountains, and the Mackenzie is
probably unique among the rivers of the world in the fact of having a
large proportion of its basin situated on the farther side of a great
mountain chain. Two of its principal tributaries, Liard and Peace
rivers, pierce Rocky mountains and drain large areas beyond, while the
third, the Athabaska, originates in the heart of the same range, and is
confined entirely to the eastern slope. The country from which the
Mackenzie draws its supplies is of the most varied description and
includes part of the broken plateau region west of Rocky mountains,
Rocky mountains themselves through fifteen degrees of latitude, the
northern part of the prairie district and the wooded and moss-covered
country which succeeds it towards Arctic ocean, while tribute is also
drawn from a wide belt of rough Laurentian country on the east, and from
portion of the “Barren Lands.” From Great Slave lake to the sea the
Mackenzie is an imposing stream, averaging about a mile in width with
occasional expansions for long distances to twice this size. It is
characterized by the comparative purity of its water, by its long
straight reaches and by the absence of sudden bends. Its valley, usually
shallow, follows closely all the sinuosities of the stream without the
intervention of large flats. Clusters of islands obstruct its channel in
a number of places, and are met with at intervals all the way down,
while ranges of lofty mountains run parallel with it for part of its
course, and form a fitting background to this king of northern waters.”

SILENT SWEEP OF A MIGHTY RIVER.

“Opposite Fort Simpson,” according to Mr. McConnell, “the main channel
of the Mackenzie is almost exactly a mile wide, and it maintains and
often exceeds this width for many miles below. Its course, as far as the
Great Bend, a distance of seventy miles, is north-northwest, and its
current in average stages of the water has a velocity of about four
miles an hour. The banks of the valley appear low owing to the great
size of the river, but in reality have often a height of two hundred
feet or over. The appearance of this part of the Mackenzie and of the
unending spruce forests which border it is monotonous and uninteresting,
and is only relieved by the majesty inseparable from the silent sweep of
a river of its magnitude.”

Slave river, which discharges the water of Lake Athabaska and Peace
river into Great Slave lake, is practically an upper reach of the
Mackenzie, its course being in the same general direction but the name
“Mackenzie” is given only to that long stretch of navigable water from
Great Slave lake to the sea.

As Mackenzie river itself is the outstanding geographical feature of the
country, as it is the main channel of communication, and as all the
settlements are situated upon its banks or those of its tributaries, a
table of distances along this gigantic waterway may prove to be a useful
guide to those readers of these pages, who are not familiar with the
geography of the country. The table is compiled from the report by Wm.
Ogilvie, D.L.S., of his survey, and the figures cover the route from
Fort Smith, on Slave river, practically on the Alberta boundary line, to
Fort McPherson on the delta of the Mackenzie:—

MILES.

Fort Smith 0
Fort Resolution 190·5
Buffalo creek 202·5
Buffalo river 249·5
Hay river 276·5
Great Slave lake 311·5
Fort Providence (lat. 61·4°) 357·5
Little lake 381·5
Yellowknife river 417·9
Head of Line 444·0
Fort Simpson (lat. 61·8°) 515·0
Nahanni river 590·2
Willow lake river 606·5
River between Two Mountains 645·5
Fort Wrigley (lat. 63°) 649·0
Le Vieux Grand Lac river 723·0
Gravel river 764·2
Fort Norman (lat. about 65°) 829·3
Great Bear river 829·5
Carcajou river 945·5
Mountain river 950·2
Sans Sault rapids 950·8
Beaver river 987·8
Ramparts 989·9
Fort Good Hope (lat. 66·16°) 998·8
Hare Indian river 1001·1
Loon river 1022·7
Large river entering on east side,
name unknown 1153·0
Red river 1213·4
Delta of Mackenzie 1241·4
Fort McPherson (lat. 67·26°) 1273·5

The Dominion census of 1911 gives us the following figures of the
population of these places, and of one or two other posts which will be
referred to later:—Fort Good Hope, 434; Fort Liard, 136; Fort
McPherson, 387; Fort Norman, 315; Fort Providence, 473; Fort Rea, 774;
Fort Resolution, 766; Fort Simpson, 375; Fort Smith, 50; Fort Wrigley,
79; Hay river, 146.

These figures do not represent only the local population at the posts,
but in addition the inhabitants, white and red, of the surrounding
districts.

MACKENZIE NAVIGATION.

For many years the Hudson’s Bay Company have maintained steam
communication on the Mackenzie from Fort Smith to Fort McPherson by
means of steamers. The pioneer steamer “Wrigley” is one of the
historical associations of the country. According to Mr. William
Ogilvie, the “Wrigley’s” log shows the following average between Fort
Smith, the most southerly part of her run, and Fort McPherson, the most
northerly, the distance between these points being about one thousand
two hundred and seventy miles. From Fort Smith to Fort Resolution,
nearly all on Great Slave river, average running time, about eighteen
hours; between Resolution and Providence about seventeen hours, of which
twelve and a half are in Great Slave lake; between Providence and
Simpson about fourteen hours; Simpson to Wrigley about ten and a half;
Wrigley to Norman, about fourteen hours; Norman to Good Hope, about
thirteen hours; Good Hope to McPherson, about twenty-four and a half
hours. The total running time is one hundred and twenty-three and
one-half hours, somewhat over ten and a quarter miles an hour.

[Illustration: A Typical “Husky” dog.]

On “up” runs the following averages have been made:—McPherson to Good
Hope, forty hours; Good Hope to Norman, thirty-four hours, Norman to
Wrigley, thirty-nine hours; Wrigley to Simpson; nineteen hours; Simpson
to Providence, about twenty-eight hours; Providence to Fort Rae, not
certain, appears to be about thirteen hours; Providence to Resolution,
about twenty hours; Resolution to Smith, about thirty-five hours;
Resolution to Rae, about fifteen hours and a return about the same, as
it is all lake water. The duration of these runs varied somewhat by the
force and direction of the wind. The total running from McPherson to
Smith as shown above is two hundred and fifteen and one-half hours,
which give a rate of 5·9 miles per hour. The mean of the up and down
times is a fraction over eight miles an hour, which is said to be her
normal speed.

A LONG NAVIGABLE STRETCH.

Mr. Ogilvie, in his report, points out:—“Excepting a short distance at
the head of Mackenzie river, where it is doubtful, it is certain that
vessels drawing at least seven or eight feet of water can navigate from
the delta of the Mackenzie to the rapids on Great Slave river, a
distance of one thousand two hundred and seventy-three miles. If
Mackenzie delta also allows that draught, we have about one thousand
three hundred and forty miles of navigable water from the rapids to
Arctic ocean.”

“Wherever possible the width of the river was determined by
triangulation. Between the narrows and Fort Good Hope it is never less
than a mile wide and is often more than two, even reaching three miles
at some points.

“Since I followed the shore, I cannot speak of the depth of water from
personal observation. Captain Bell, of the Hudson’s Bay Company’s
steamer ‘Wrigley,’ informed me that the shallowest water found by him in
any part of the river, in what he considered the channel, was eleven
feet. But as, when I saw him, he had made only two trips on the lower
river, he could not speak very definitely as to its depth. Sir Alexander
Mackenzie, who discovered the river and descended to its mouth in July,
1789, had a lead line with which to make soundings; but in the swift
current a short distance above Fort Simpson his lead caught in the
bottom, the line broke and the lead was lost. I have the depths
according to him, and will give them in their proper place. One would
expect, in such an expanse of water as this, to find some of it shallow,
but it appears from all the evidence I could gather that vessels drawing
from eight to ten feet of water would find no difficulty in navigation
as far as Great Slave lake. Although the river is reported to be shallow
where it leaves this lake, doubtless a channel could be found affording
the draught above mentioned.

“In the fall of 1887, a whale made its way up the river to the Ramparts,
remaining there the whole season, and before the river froze over it was
often seen blowing. At first the Indians were afraid, but they soon
became accustomed to the sight, and shot at the whale whenever it
approached the shore. In the spring its dead body was beached by the ice
on the west shore seven or eight miles below Fort Good Hope, and the
Indians used part of it for dog meat. I enquired its dimensions of
several who had seen it. They described it as being about twice as long
as one of their canoes and thicker through than their own height. This
would mean a length of from twenty-five to twenty-eight feet. I have
often heard it stated that all the channels of Mackenzie delta are
shallow, but the presence of this whale assures us that one of them at
least is over six feet deep.”

OVER THREE THOUSAND MILES OF WATERWAY.

Mr. Ogilvie claims that there is a grand total of three thousand three
hundred and sixty-nine miles of water in Mackenzie basin, all navigable,
except for eighteen miles, at but two points, one a rapid two miles long
on Peace river, and the other Sixteen Mile rapid on Great Slave river. A
thorough knowledge of the two great lakes (Great Bear and Great Slave)
with all their tributary streams would probably increase this vast
length of navigable water by several hundred miles. This does not take
into account the Mackenzie delta and sea near its mouth, of the
navigability of which nothing very definite is known at present.

Mr. Ogilvie, writing in 1890, figured out these distances in this
way:—“The Hudson’s Bay Company’s steamer ‘Grahame’ traverses the waters
of Peace and Athabaska rivers, the former from the falls to the rapid at
Fort Smith, and the latter up to McMurray. The distance from Chipewyan
to the post at the falls on Peace river is two hundred and twenty-two
miles.”

“During the last two years the Hudson’s Bay Company has had another
steamer, the ‘Athabaska,’ plying on upper Athabaska river, between
Little Slave river and Grand rapids. Both this steamer and the ‘Grahame’
on the lower river are flat bottomed stern-wheelers, drawing, when
loaded, not more than two and a half to three feet of water. They can
each carry about one hundred and forty tons.”

“Upper Peace river is navigable for steamers drawing three or four feet
of water, and, with a little improvement at two points, a draught of
five to six feet could be utilized. This upper Peace river affords a
navigable stretch of five hundred and fifty-seven miles, which, with two
hundred and twenty-two miles on lower Peace river, and two hundred on
Lake Athabaska, and, say, two hundred on the lower Athabaska, together
with the distance given in the above table, gives us two thousand five
hundred and sixty-nine miles of navigable water.”

“From our present knowledge, meagre as it is, I think we may assume that
Great Slave lake affords us at least five hundred miles more,
considering its length and its many deep bays. To this we may add two
hundred and forty miles on the Liard, and at least sixty on Peel river.”

THE SEASON OF NAVIGATION.

As to the length of the season of navigation on the Mackenzie, Mr. Wm.
Ogilvie, in his report, publishes some tables showing dates at which the
ice formed and broke up at Fort Norman (latitude about 65°), and Fort
Simpson (latitude 61° 52′ north). These tables were compiled from
figures taken from the journals kept at all Hudson’s Bay Company’s
posts. From these figures it appears that the first ice, between 1872
and 1888, never formed earlier than October 7 at Fort Norman, and in
1883 did not form until October 24. The earliest date at which the river
was closed by the ice was November 2, in 1879, and the latest November
18, in 1874. The earliest date at which the ice broke up was May 9, in
1879, and the latest May 24, in 1887.

At Fort Simpson, during the decade of 1876-1886, the drift ice was seen
as early as October 11, in 1884, and as late as November 12, in 1879.
The earliest date at which the river closed was November 17, in 1876,
and the latest was November 30, in 1882. The earliest date at which the
ice broke up was May 1, in 1883, and the latest May 14, in 1876.

LANDMARKS ALONG THE MACKENZIE.

Some notes culled from Mr. Ogilvie’s report as to the principal
tributaries of the Mackenzie between Great Slave lake and the sea, and
as to a few of the more remarkable stretches of the main river, will
prove interesting at this point. Seventy miles below Great Slave lake is
Little lake, which is about twelve miles long and ten to twelve miles
wide, being merely an expansion of the river, like Lakes St. Francis and
St. Peter in St. Lawrence system. Thirty-six miles lower down,
Yellowknife river enters the Mackenzie from the south. It would appear
from the statements of Indians to Mr. Ogilvie that this is the largest
tributary of the Mackenzie between the Liard and Fort Providence.
Twenty-seven miles below the confluence of the Yellowknife, and
continuing to a short distance above the confluence of the Liard, the
Mackenzie narrows to an average width of a little over half a mile, with
a generally swift current. This continues for seventy and a half miles
or nearly as far as Fort Simpson, near the mouth of the Liard and causes
this part of the river to be called “The Line,” from the fact that large
boats cannot be rowed against the current, but have to be hauled by a
line attached to them, and pulled by men on shore. This is the common
mode of navigation on all the northern rivers where there are no
steamers, as it is less laborious than rowing against a current.

By the survey it is seven hundred and fifty-eight and one-half miles
from Fort Simpson to Fort McPherson. The former fort is situated on an
island just below the junction of Mackenzie and Liard rivers.

Ninety miles below Fort Simpson, on the west side, a river flows in from
the southwest. Mr. Ogilvie had seen its name spelled Na-hone, but
remembered that it is spelled by the Reverend Father Petitot, Na-hauner.
It is, however, now known as North Nahanni river. This stream, as seen
from the opposite side of the river, seems about two hundred yards wide,
but it is shallow and rough at the mouth as was ascertained by the noise
of its waters being plainly heard across the Mackenzie, here a mile
wide. Mr. Ogilvie could get no information as to what it was like for
any distance above its mouth, but it pierces the range of mountains to
the west, which here come close to the river. The valley thus formed can
be seen extending southwesterly through the mountains for many miles.
The banks in the stretch of the Mackenzie from Simpson to this point are
alternately low and swampy and moderately high, consisting of gravel and
sand.

SOME TRIBUTARIES.

Sixteen miles below the confluence of the North Nahanni, but from the
opposite or eastern side, Willow lake river enters the Mackenzie. It is
a quarter of a mile wide, deep with a slack current. It is said to flow
out of a lake of considerable extent, not far from the Mackenzie.

Thirty-nine miles lower down, and three and a half miles above Fort
Wrigley, a stream known to the Indians as “The River between Two
Mountains” discharges into the Mackenzie from the east. It is about one
hundred and fifty yards wide and shallow.

Seventy-four miles below Fort Wrigley, on the west side, a river
discharges a large volume of clear, black water, which rushes bodily
half way across the Mackenzie, and preserves its distinctive character
for several miles before it mingles with the main stream. The name
applied to this river by the people at Fort Wrigley was “La Rivière le
Vieux Grand Lac.” It is said to flow out of a lake of considerable
extent lying not far from the Mackenzie. Many peaks can be seen up its
valley.

A little more than thirty miles lower down, on the same side of the
river, another stream enters, apparently not more than a hundred yards
wide at its mouth. Mr. Ogilvie saw it from the opposite side of the
river only, and heard nothing concerning it.

A small stream enters the Mackenzie opposite this place, and up its
valley, about two miles eastward from the river, a sharp peak rising one
thousand five hundred feet above the water was noted by Mr. Ogilvie.

GRAVEL RIVER.

Forty-one miles below the confluence of le Vieux Grand Lac river, or
sixty-five miles, by the survey, above Fort Norman, a large river enters
from the west. It is shallow at its mouth, as it is throughout its
course, according to the reports of the Indians. The current, they say,
is swift. They ascend it a long way in the winter to hunt, and descend
in the spring on rafts. How far they go up, Mr. Ogilvie could not learn,
their unit of distance being the unknown quantity of a day’s travel, but
they go much farther than on any other tributary of the lower river.

Mr. Ogilvie obtained the name from some Indians who had travelled it and
they called it “Pecat-ah-zah.” This translated means Gravel river, by
which name it is known to all the white men in the vicinity, on account
of its shallowness and numerous gravel bars.

Mr. Keele, reporting upon his descent of Gravel river in 1908,
wrote:—“On Gravel river the high mountains approach to within a
distance of about fifty miles of Mackenzie river, and are then replaced
by a belt of foothills about three thousand feet in height above
sea-level. These foothills in turn decline in elevation and finally die
out in a broken, wooded plain, about six hundred feet above sea-level,
bordering Mackenzie river. Gravel river has built up an alluvial flat at
its mouth, and several alluvial islands in the Mackenzie below this
point are probably due to the great load of sediment carried in at
flood-time. On account of the long period of sunshine during the days,
nearly all the snow disappears from Mackenzie mountains before the
summer ends. Vegetation advances very rapidly in summer, and where the
soil is good, vegetables of many kinds may be grown along the river
banks in the principal valleys.”

FORT NORMAN.

Fort Norman is situated on the east bank of the Mackenzie just above the
entrance of Great Bear river. This river is from two to three hundred
yards wide at the mouth, with a moderate current, but a short distance
up becomes shallow and the current increases. The color of the water is
a beautiful greenish-blue, although when Mr. Ogilvie passed it was
somewhat turbid.

Ten miles below Great Bear river, a stream about one hundred yards wide
comes in on the westerly side.

Eighty-three miles below Fort Norman, or six and one-half miles above
Sans Sault rapids, Carcajou river empties its waters into the Mackenzie
from the west.

Nearly five miles lower down again, a river called Mountain river flows
in from the west. It is from one hundred to one hundred and fifty yards
wide, and shallow.

SANS SAULT RAPID.

Less than a mile farther down Sans Sault rapid is reached. This is all
on one side of the river, which is here a mile and a quarter wide. As
Mr. Ogilvie went up the west side, and the rapid was on the other,
extending but little more than a third of the way across, he did not see
anything of it. He heard the roar plainly enough, but saw nothing except
a swift current. It is caused by a ledge of rocks extending partially
across the river. Captain Bell of the “Wrigley,” reported deep water in
the channel at the end of the ledge, and the steamer has no serious
trouble in ascending. In very low water it is said that this rock is
scarcely covered.

About a mile above the Ramparts there is a similar rapid when the water
is low, but when Mr. Ogilvie passed there was no sign of it.

Thirty-seven miles below Sans Sault rapid and twenty-one miles above
Fort Good Hope, Beaver river joins on the west, but as Mr. Ogilvie
continued only on the east side he saw only its mouth, which appeared to
be about one hundred yards wide. An Indian with him said that it took
its name from the number of beavers formerly found on it. This stream
rises in the mountains, but does not seem to be of any importance.

Somewhat less than two miles from Beaver river, and only a short
distance above the Ramparts, a river flows into the Mackenzie on its
west side. Mr. Ogilvie saw it only across the river, but it appeared to
be about two hundred yards wide at its mouth. All he could learn about
it at Fort Good Hope was that it came from far up in the mountains.

THE RAMPARTS OF THE MACKENZIE.

Mr. Ogilvie remarks in his report that in the more southwesterly part of
the country the Ramparts would be called a “Cañon.” Here, for a distance
of seven miles, the river runs between perpendicular and occasionally
overhanging walls of rock. At the upper end they rise fifty or sixty
feet above the water, but their height increases towards the lower end,
at which point they are not less than one hundred and fifty feet above
water. At the upper end the cañon is not more than half a mile wide, but
its walls gradually expand three miles down, and the width gradually
expands to nearly a mile at the lower end. Sir Alexander Mackenzie when
passing through sounded at its upper end, and found three hundred feet
of water, which accounts for the fact that, although the cañon is so
narrow, the current is not perceptibly increased.

According to Mr. McConnell’s description:—“The Ramparts form one of the
most interesting features of the Mackenzie. For some distance above, the
river is expanded beyond its usual size, but here suddenly contracts to
about five hundred yards in width, and bending to the east runs for
three or four miles between vertical walls of limestone and shale. At
the upper end of the gorge the bounding cliffs are a hundred and
twenty-five feet in height, but increase towards the lower end to about
two hundred and fifty feet. The current is steady and runs at the rate
of four or five miles an hour. In high water there is no sign of a
rapid, but in low water a considerable fall occurs near the head, and it
is only with difficulty that York boats are taken up. The Ramparts are
frequently the scene of great ice jams in the spring and the dammed-back
water is stated to have risen on one occasion over a hundred feet, and
on its recession left a boat stranded on the heights above.”

FORT GOOD HOPE.

Fort Good Hope is situated a couple of miles or so below the lower end
of the Ramparts. According to Mr. Preble (See p. 22), Fort Good Hope
probably existed in effect as a Northwest post early in the nineteenth
century, but accounts differ as to the precise location, both Sans Sault
rapid and the foot of the Ramparts being given as the earliest site. A
temporary post was built in the summer of 1805 at “Bluefish river,”
about sixty miles below the mouth of Bear lake river. (Masson, Les
Bourgeois, II, p. 104, 1890). It was established as a Hudson’s Bay
Company’s post on the west bank of the Mackenzie, about one hundred
miles below the Ramparts, about 1823, after the union of the rival
companies, being spoken of by Franklin in 1825, as “but recently
established.” It was removed about 1835 to Manitou island, below the
Ramparts, where its site may still be seen on the eastern shore of the
island nearly opposite the present establishment. It was destroyed in
June, 1836, by a flood caused by an ice jam in the Ramparts, and was
rebuilt on its present site in 1837.

THE GRAND VIEW.

The “Grand View” is a name given to an expanded portion of the Mackenzie
below Fort Good Hope, about twenty miles in length. Mr. McConnell
writes:—“The river here is almost straight, but curves gently to the
north, and is from two to three miles wide. Its great width gives it
more the appearance of a lake than a river, and in no other part of the
Mackenzie is the magnitude of the mighty volume of water which this
river carries to the sea, impressed so forcibly on the mind. The banks
are low and the sinuous shore-lines show a succession of wooded points
stretching out until concealed by the haze of the atmosphere. The
bordering plains slope gently down almost to the water’s edge, and are
covered with a scattered growth of willow, spruce and tamarack, with
here and there patches of aspens on the drier ridges.”

A little over two miles below Fort Good Hope, Hare Indian river flows
into the Mackenzie on its east side. It is about two hundred yards wide
at its mouth, and is said to preserve this width for a long distance.
The Indians report that this stream rises in a range of hills on the
northwest side of Great Bear lake, but about its navigability Mr.
Ogilvie could learn nothing.

Twenty-two miles lower down Loon river enters from the east. This river
is from eighty to one hundred yards wide. An old man whom Mr. Ogilvie
met at Fort Good Hope had explored this stream for some distance and
gave him the following notes:—For eight miles there is good navigation,
then a rapid half a mile long occurs, at the head of which is a lake
about three miles long and one broad, in which the Indians catch many
fish. This is called “Rorrie lake” and, some distance above it, is
another some two miles in diameter, and called “Round lake” from its
shape. Above this again is a succession of lakes for many days’ travel.

[Illustration: An Eskimo Boy at Arctic Red river.]

One hundred and thirty miles below Loon river a stream one hundred yards
wide enters from the northeast. This is a river which the old man at
Fort Good Hope described to Mr. Ogilvie as one up which a Hudson’s Bay
Company’s officer went many years ago to its source, which he found to
be not far from the head waters of Anderson river, which flows into
Arctic ocean. It would appear from the old man’s statement that several
trips up it have been made since, but this information was vague, and
Mr. Ogilvie afterwards met no one who could give him a reliable account
of this river.

Sixty miles lower down, Red river enters the Mackenzie on its west side
just at the foot of the Narrows. It is about two hundred yards wide at
its mouth and appears to be shallow. As far as Mr. Ogilvie could learn
from persons acquainted with the river, it comes from a flat, swampy
country.

WHERE THE RIVER BRANCHES.

Where the upper end of the branch of the Mackenzie channel on which Fort
McPherson is situated connects with Mackenzie proper, according to Mr.
Ogilvie:—“The channel is three-fourths of a mile wide, but it is only
one of four, there being four large islands there. The whole width of
the river cannot be less than three or four miles.

“Looking northward down the westerly channel the view is bounded by the
sky and widens in the distance so that one can fancy he is looking out
to sea. This can hardly be so; but, from the altitude of the bank where
I stood, added to my own height, the horizon must have been six miles
away, and a bank in the channel of equal height to that on which I stood
would have been visible twice that distance. Now, if the supposed bank
was timbered, as was that on which I stood, it would be visible ten or
twelve miles farther, but none was in sight.

“From the entrance of the small channel of Peel river to the head of the
upper island in the Mackenzie is nine miles. From the west shore to the
southerly point of this island is a mile and a quarter; from the island
to the east shore the distance is nearly as great, showing the river to
be more than two miles wide at this point. However, it gradually
narrows, and five miles above this is a little over a mile wide, which
it averages up to the narrows, about sixty miles from Fort McPherson, or
twenty-eight from where we entered it.

“A north wind raises quite a swell here and the salty odour of the sea
air is quite perceptible above the delta.”

AGRICULTURAL POSSIBILITIES.

Alexander Mackenzie and the explorers who immediately followed him down
the great river of the north, being fur traders, devoted no space in
their published journals to a discussion of the agricultural
possibilities of the country, and as their time was necessarily
restricted they took no time on their journeys to examine any part of
the territory, contenting themselves with noting the main features
affecting the navigation of the main stream, the mouths, the
tributaries, the occurrence of game, Indian camps, etc.

Following close upon the establishment of permanent trading posts and
missions, came the pioneer attempts at agriculture in Mackenzie valley,
and we find members of the first exploring parties sent to the country
for scientific research commenting upon the crude experiments of the
pioneer agriculturalists.

Doctor John Richardson, who accompanied Franklin’s expedition in 1826
(See p. 13), in his volume “The Polar Regions”, in a general description
of the resources of the country at that date, wrote:—“Wheat has not
been raised within the Arctic circle in America, nor indeed within six
degrees of latitude of it. It requires a summer heat of one hundred and
twenty days, but it is said to be cultivated up to the 62nd or 64th
parallel on the west side of Scandinavian peninsula. Barley ripens well
at Fort Norman on the 65th parallel, in the valley of the Mackenzie,
after the lapse of ninety-two days from the time of its being sown. All
attempts to cultivate it at old Fort Good Hope, two degrees farther
north, have failed. Sixty-six degrees of latitude may therefore be
considered as the extreme limit of the barley in Norway. Oats do not
succeed so far north as barley here.

“At Fort Good Hope, on the Mackenzie (the new fort), in latitude 66¼
degrees north, a few turnips and radishes, and some other culinary
vegetables, are raised in a sheltered corner, which receives the
reflection of the sun’s rays from the walls of the house, but none of
the cerealia will grow, and potatoes do not repay the labour.”

DOMESTIC CATTLE INTRODUCED.

Doctor Richardson again referred to the same subject, after his return
from his trip with Doctor Rae in 1848 in search of Sir John Franklin’s
missing party, and we find in his book published after his return to
England, “The Arctic Searching Expedition” (Vol. 1., p. 153), the
following:—“We reached Fort Resolution at 10 a.m. and having received
some supplies of fish, and two or three deals for repairing the boats,
we resumed our voyage, after a halt at the Fort for an hour. Domestic
cattle have been introduced at this place, and at the posts generally
throughout the country, even up to Peel river and Fort Good Hope and
within the Arctic circle. At this season the moschetoes (mosquitos)
prevent them from feeding, except when urged by extreme hunger, and
fires are made for their accommodation near the forts, to which they
crowd, and lying to leeward amidst the smoke, ruminate at their ease.”

At page 165, regarding Fort Simpson (61° 51′ 25′′ north 121° 51′ 15′′
west) Richardson in the same book writes:—“Barley is usually sown here
from May 20 to 25, and is expected to be ripe on August 20—ninety-two
days. In some seasons it has ripened on August 15. Oats do not thrive
quite so well, and wheat does not come to maturity. Potatoes yield well
and no disease has yet affected them, though early frost sometimes hurts
the crop. Barley in favorable seasons gives a good return at Fort
Norman, which is farther down the river; and potatoes and various garden
vegetables grow there. The 60th parallel of latitude may, therefore, be
considered as about the northern limit of cerealia in this meridian; for
though in good seasons and in warm sheltered spots a little barley might
possibly be reared at Fort Good Hope, the attempts hitherto made there
have failed.

[Illustration: Oat field at Fort Simpson.]

“A number of milch cows are kept at Fort Simpson, and one or two fat
oxen are killed annually. Hay for the winter provender of the stock is
made about one hundred miles up the river, where there are good meadows
or marshes, and whence it is rafted down in boats in September.”

LAPLAND REINDEER.

The occurrence of immense numbers of caribou in the Canadian Northland
(see chapters XVIII and XXII), and the fact that this animal in its
appearance and habits is practically identical with the Lapland
reindeer, which has been successfully introduced into Labrador and
Alaska, have led to the belief that the last mentioned animal might be
introduced with splendid results into the country, and the Department of
the Interior has inaugurated an experiment to ascertain if the plan is
feasible. In September, 1911, three carloads of reindeer were despatched
to Fort Smith, where they are being taken care of. As these animals
serve as beasts of burden, as well as provide meat, milk and leather,
this experiment might have an important effect upon the future
development of all these northern areas.

GRAIN GROWING AT FORT LIARD.

At page 170 in the same volume, referring to Fort Liard, Richardson
states:—“Though this post is more elevated than Fort Simpson, by at
least one hundred and fifty feet, and is only ten degrees of latitude to
the southward, its climate is said to be very superior, and its
vegetable production of better growth and quality. Barley and oats yield
good crops, and in favorable seasons wheat ripens well. This place,
then, or the 60th parallel, may be considered as a northern limit of the
economical culture of wheat.”

Whatever the discouragements of the pioneer agriculturalists in
Mackenzie valley may have been, there was sufficient encouragement to
induce the missionaries and employees of the fur companies stationed in
the country to persevere.

Mr. A. Isbister, a native of the West, who had lived for three years in
Mackenzie river district, but left that country when under twenty years
of age, examined before the British parliamentary committee of 1857,
stated that he had himself raised barley, oats and potatoes as far north
as Fort Norman on Mackenzie river, upwards of a thousand miles from the
United States boundary and near the Arctic circle. On the Liard, large
crops could be raised, as the soil is better on that river, and wheat
had been occasionally raised there. It was possible that settlement
might extend to Great Bear lake. There would be sufficient territory in
the north to make “a very large state indeed.” Asked if he thought that
the whole country on Mackenzie river was all adapted to the wants of
civilized man, Mr. Isbister remarked:—“The climate is very severe
there, but the soil, so far as I have an opportunity of judging, is
tolerably well adapted for cultivation. You can raise barley and
potatoes very well indeed, without any risk whatsoever.”

BARLEY ALWAYS RIPENED THERE.

In the Dominion Government Pacific Railway report of 1878 it is stated
(p. 333):—“Mr. Hardisty, late Chief Factor in charge of Fort Simpson in
latitude 61·8°, informed Professor Macoun that barley always ripened
there; that wheat was sure four times out of five. Melons if started
under glass ripened well, frost seldom doing them much harm.” In the
1880 report Reverend D. M. Gordon is quoted (p. 102) as authority for
the statement that “wheat is grown as far north as Fort Simpson.” In the
report of 1878 (p. 333) it is also stated:—“Chief trader Macdougall, in
1875, said all kinds of grain and garden stuff always come to maturity
at Fort Liard (latitude 60·25°).”

In 1882 Doctor Bompas, the heroic Church of England Bishop of Mackenzie
river, in the course of a report to the Society for the Propagation of
the Gospel, wrote:—“The English schoolmaster at Simpson has made
successful experiments of farming in that northern region, and through
his energetic labours a good crop of barley was raised in the mission
fields; also some wheat and potatoes, beans, pease, beet roots and other
vegetables.”

The evidence taken before the select committee of the Senate of Canada
in 1888 as to agricultural possibilities in Mackenzie valley, excited
general interest.

MANY NATURAL PRAIRIES.

The Right Reverend Isidore Clut, O.M.I., missionary Bishop of Arindele,
whose diocese included Mackenzie basin, and whose name is still held
with reverence throughout this country, examined before the Committee
stated that in several places in the basin of the Mackenzie there were a
great number of natural prairies, those with round hay and those with
flat hay. The round hay, in certain places, grew from three to five feet
in height. The flat hay was also very fine but a little shorter. It grew
everywhere in the low and wet places.

At the Roman Catholic mission at Providence, the residence of the
bishop, one year he had one thousand four hundred and forty barrels of
potatoes—(one barrel, ten gallons)—from sixty kegs of seed, but this
was a very favourable year. They had been greatly favoured by the heat
and by rain at opportune times. On two or three occasions they had had a
thousand and twelve hundred barrels of the same roots.

At the Providence mission there was an excellent clay, which was very
good for cultivation. Throughout the country in general the bishop found
all sorts of land, black soil, loam, clay, sand, marl, etc. Generally
they harvested their potatoes at Providence from September 20 to 30.
Turnips, carrots, beets, etc., they harvested a little later. Wheat on
the banks of Peace river and Liard river was ripe towards the end of
August; at Athabaska and at Providence from September 15 to 25. Barley
was ripe a little sooner throughout. Rye does not ripen any sooner than
wheat, but witness had not made many experiments, for the reason that
they like wheat better than rye. Oats they harvested at the same time as
wheat, but they had sowed them only once. Potatoes they harvested at
Athabaska and at Providence, from September 20 to 30. Turnips, carrots,
beets, radishes, etc., they harvest later. Indian corn generally cannot
get ripened below Athabaska or on the Mackenzie. Strawberries commenced
to ripen towards July 15; gooseberries ripened towards the end of
August, and at the commencement of September. Raspberries and currants
come after the strawberries. There were also in places many blueberries,
cranberries, and other small fruits, such as poires sauvages
(Saskatoon), etc. Barley ripened at Fort Norman, at the mouth of Great
Bear lake river. Consequently it grew at Fort Wrigley, Fort Simpson, and
at Fort Providence. In Liard river and Peace river countries it
succeeded also very well. Brother Kearney and the Hudson’s Bay Company
had grown potatoes at Fort Good Hope (Arctic circle). At the mission at
Providence, and at all the Roman Catholic missions on Mackenzie river,
Liard river, Peace river and Slave river, etc., potatoes and other
vegetables were

CULTIVATED VERY SUCCESSFULLY.

Wheat grew, according to the Bishop’s evidence, at Providence mission,
and at Fort Simpson, but it rarely arrived at perfect maturity. It
ripened much better on the borders of Liard river and Peace river. At
the mission of the Nativity (Chipewyan at Lake Athabaska) they had often
grown fine wheat. At the mission of the Nativity (Athabaska), at Fort
Resolution (Great Slave lake), at Fort Smith, at the mission of Fort
Providence, they sowed from the time the land began to thaw, that is to
say, from May 15 until June 8 or 10. Throughout the length of Liard and
Peace rivers, sowing began a little earlier. At the end of August they
had already harvested barley and wheat.

Plants which were deep in the ground, such as potatoes, took a good deal
of time to spring up because of the ground being frozen below, but those
which were near the surface of the ground commenced to grow very soon,
and the nearer one approached the north, for example at the Arctic
circle, the more rapidly did the vegetation begin, because of the
greater length of the days, or the days being without nights. In 1886
the bishop observed the matter at Good Hope. Towards June 7 or 8,
vegetation commenced, and in five or six days the leaves of the trees
had reached their natural size. It was because it commenced to be warm
then, and very warm, and that continued, save when sometimes north winds
set in, which would bring back the snow and cold and sometimes injure
the crops.

It was difficult, Bishop Clut remarked, to say the extent of country fit
for pasturage, and the cultivation of cereals or other plants, for the
reason that cultivation had not been tried, except by the missionaries,
and a little by the Hudson’s Bay Company.

During his examination before the committee, Bishop Clut was
asked:—“How far north has the potato been grown to your knowledge?”

He replied:—“We raise potatoes even as far north as the Arctic circle,
at Fort Good Hope, but they are very small. We have no bread there, and
an Irish brother has

RAISED POTATOES EVERY SUMMER.

Once I passed a winter there and they had very little potatoes. Out of
five bushels planted they got only six bushels. Two years ago I passed
the winter there, and out of ten kegs planted they got twenty-five.” The
bishop added that there were then at nearly all of the missions gardens
in which were raised potatoes, carrots, beets, onions, cabbages, turnips
and lettuce. Even at Fort Good Hope they raised turnips and carrots.

Wild roses grew in abundance as far north as Good Hope.

Horses, at that date, had not been taken farther than Great Slave lake,
but cattle had been taken as far north as Fort Good Hope. They were
found at the principal establishments of the missionaries, and at the
forts of the Hudson’s Bay Company.

Bishop Clut stated that he was certain that if Mackenzie country became
settled and cultivated on a large scale, the occasional white frosts of
the summer months would be much less frequent. That was the result which
they had already observed at their principal mission posts; the more
they cleared to any extent the less were the fields susceptible to
frost. The months of September and October were generally dry, and the
blue sky made them charming. In general they had a clear sky without a
cloud and that is what makes the climate so healthy in the basin of the
Mackenzie. People could live there to a greater age than in any other
part of the globe.

“CHINOOKS” AT THE ARCTIC CIRCLE.

At Arctic circle the southwest “Chinook” wind often made its effect
felt, even in winter. The Rev. Father Séguin and Brother Kearney, who
had been at Good Hope for twenty-eight years had observed its effect.
The bishop had observed it also himself during the winters of 1885 and
1886. This wind modified the temperature a good deal. The missionaries
had not remarked that the intensity of the frost had any effect on the
native trees of the country. The bishop had not kept account himself of
the degrees of heat in summer, but he was able to say that it was
excessively hot; and the farther one went towards the north the warmer
he would find it becoming; and that heat lasted the twenty-four hours of
the day, without sensibly diminishing in its intensity from 10 p.m. to 3
a.m.

Ex-Judge Malcolm MacLeod, Q.C., of Aylmer, Que., a northwesterner by
birth, on examination before the committee produced a number of letters
received by his father while he held the appointment of senior officer
of the Hudson’s Bay Company in the northern district. Among these
letters was one which showed that the original explorers of the country
between the Mackenzie and the Yukon described it as “a land of milk and
honey.”

Judge McLeod added:—“We know for certain that at Fort Liard, wheat is a
reliable crop for four years out of five, at any rate.”

Hon. William Christie, ex-member of the Northwest Council, was at one
time inspecting chief factor of the Hudson’s Bay Company service. This
witness was examined before the committee and explained that as
inspecting factor of the Hudson’s Bay service he was in charge of all
the districts from Red river to Fort Simpson—from Fort Garry
northward—Red river district, Swan river district, English river
district, Athabaska river district, and Mackenzie river district. All of
these were

UNDER HIS SUPERVISION.

He had travelled over the whole of them and descended Mackenzie river as
far as Fort Simpson. He did not think that any authoritative attempt had
ever been made up to that time to collect statistics, etc., as to
resources of this region. The business of the Hudson’s Bay Company was
confined to the fur trade, and if there were any scientific
investigations in the old days these were conducted under the authority
of the British government. The Hudson’s Bay Company’s posts on Mackenzie
river were established at convenient points for the fur trade all the
way down the river. Fort Simpson was at the head of the whole Mackenzie
river district.

[Illustration: Potatoes at Fort Simpson.]

There was no settlement around any of the company’s forts. The white men
in the forts were largely from England and Scotland—gentlemen’s
sons—and some were married to Indian girls and French half-breeds.
Traders, other than those of the company, were at that date going in for
furs, up as far as Great Slave lake. The Hudson’s Bay Company opposed
them the best way they could, but had sold the country to the Canadian
government. The Church of England, as well as the Roman Catholic Church,
had missions throughout the region, and had had them for many years.

Mr. Christie informed the committee that he did not think there would be
any difficulty in navigating with suitable steamers the Mackenzie from
its headwaters to Arctic ocean, because the year before his examination
they had had the experience of a successful voyage of the Hudson’s Bay
Company’s steamer from Fort Simpson down Mackenzie river nearly to its
mouth, below Peel river. They could have gone through to Arctic sea if
they had wished to do so, but having no pilot, and not knowing which of
the channels they should take, they did not like to venture. It would
have been a disastrous thing to the company if that steamer had met with
any accident which would have prevented it from returning to Slave river
that season.

REACHED THE MACKENZIE FROM THE NORTH.

As to outside communication via the north, Mr. Christie considered
navigation by Hudson bay more certain than by Behring strait. During the
search for Sir John Franklin’s lost expedition, however, Commander
Pullen, of H.M.S. _Plover_, sailed from Honolulu for Behring strait and
Mackenzie river. He went as far north as he possibly could get with the
_Plover_. Then with Lieut. Hooper and some sailors he took to the boats
and coasted along to the outlet of Mackenzie river. The party ascended
that river with their boats to Fort Simpson the same fall—tracked their
boats. The _Plover_ returned to Honolulu that same season.

Donald McIvor, farmer, of Kildonan East, Manitoba, who had been sixteen
years in the Hudson’s Bay Company’s service, and had been stationed in
Mackenzie river district for over six years, communicated in writing to
the committee a very interesting series of answers in response to a
schedule of questions submitted by the committee. Witness explained that
he considered he had fair knowledge of the district watered by
Mackenzie, Athabaska and Slave rivers.

The soil is black loam chiefly, sometimes a little sandy. Witness
considered three-fourths of the country fit for pasturage or coarse
grains. Barley and potatoes had been grown successfully as far north as
Fort Norman. He saw some wheat, very fine, at Methye portage, grown by
an Indian, but did not know of its being tried further north then. He
never saw any Indian corn during his stay in the district. At Fort
Athabaska, barley sown the middle of May was ready the first or second
week in August. Farther north, at Fort Norman, barley sown the middle of
May could be reaped the middle or the last week in August. In cases
where wheat was grown it ripened about the last week in August, potatoes
the first of September. The ground was usually fit for seeding about
three weeks after the first spring flowers showed. The summer rains
began about the latter end of May. At the time witness was in the
country nothing was done to any extent in agriculture. Stock raising was
carried on at most of the forts, and succeeded admirably.

TEN YEARS AT FORT LIARD.

Written answers to a set schedule of questions prepared by the committee
were submitted by Mr. William James McLean, chief trader of the Hudson’s
Bay Company, Lower Fort Garry, Manitoba.

Witness explained that his personal knowledge of the country under
investigation covered trips over the following routes:—From the
watershed of Mackenzie river basin at the height of land whence
Clearwater river takes its rise, down the aforesaid river to its
confluence with Athabaska river, thence down Athabaska river to Lake
Athabaska and from there to Great Slave lake down Slave river, and out
Lake Athabaska, and on through that lake down Mackenzie river to Fort
Simpson, thence up Liard river to Fort Liard, where he was stationed for
ten years, from 1863 to 1873. He stated that he planted potatoes and
barley at Fort Liard generally about May 10, and reaped barley about
August 20. Potatoes were fit for use about that time, but were generally
taken out of the ground about September 20. Turnips were planted and dug
about the same date as the potatoes. Wild flowers first appeared in the
spring about May 25 at Fort Liard, and June 10 at Fort Simpson. Wild
strawberries were ripe about the first week in July, gooseberries about
the first of August. Other small fruit came in from the middle of July
to August 10. The wild vetch or pea grew at Fort Liard, but not to any
great extent. Good barley grew at McMurray, Chipewyan, and at Forts
Resolution, Simpson and Liard.

WILD BERRIES PLENTIFUL.

Among some information as to the fertility of Mackenzie basin
communicated in writing to the committee by Mr. Frank Oliver of Edmonton
was the following:—Berries of various kinds were the only considerable
natural food product of Mackenzie river country. They were plentiful in
their season throughout the whole of the wooded region which extended to
within one hundred miles of the Arctic coast. The blueberry was the most
plentiful and was found throughout the whole region. It resembled the
huckleberry of the east. The blackberry and mossberry come next in
quantity in the far north. The former was not the blackberry of Ontario,
and the latter somewhat resembled the strawberry. From Liard river south
to the Saskatchewan, the raspberry, strawberry, Saskatoon berry,
gooseberry, high and low bush cranberry, chokeberry, and black and red
currants flourished as well, besides numerous minor varieties of
berries. In some years berries were much more plentiful than in others.
In plentiful years they formed an important item of the Indians’ food.
There was every reason to believe that the varieties found there which
were cultivated profitably in other countries could be as satisfactorily
cultivated there, at least from the 61st parallel southward, between the
main streams of the Mackenzie and Rocky mountains.

Mr. Oliver explained that the information communicated was chiefly
acquired from Murdock McLeod, of Edmonton, who spent the years 1862-63
and part of 1864 in the Hudson’s Bay Company service at Fort Anderson,
since abandoned, east of the Mackenzie and about eighty miles up
Anderson river from Arctic coast. In the summer of 1863 he accompanied
an expedition undertaken on behalf of the Smithsonian Institute, along
the Arctic coast from the mouth of Mackenzie to that of Coppermine
river. In 1865 he was at Fort Liard. Mr. McLeod stated that in the
summer of 1865, while in the Hudson’s Bay employ, at Fort Liard,
latitude 59¾°, he sowed about three acres of wheat on May 26; this was
in the stook on August 1. It was good grain, though somewhat smutty, and
had not been frosted; barley sowed at the same time did equally well,
also potatoes. During several summers’ residence at Fort Liard, Mr.
McLeod never saw summer frost. He also stated that at Fort Simpson, in
latitude 62½° wheat, barley and potatoes had done well. This was borne
out by the statement of Reverend Mr. Spendlove, missionary at Fort
Simpson, except that in 1887 the barley was frosted.

PROFESSOR MACOUN’S TESTIMONY.

Professor John Macoun (See p. 16), Botanist to the Geological Survey of
Canada, examined before the committee stated that barley ripens at Fort
Simpson, latitude 62°, every year between August 12 and 20. Barley and
potatoes had been grown at Fort Norman at the mouth of Great Bear lake
river, about latitude 65°, and even at Fort Yukon, in the Arctic circle,
barley is a sure crop. These are not particular points noted for their
good soil, but located solely for the fur trade. Five-sixths of the
country is just as good as these points, and will in future produce as
good crops. There is no point east of the Mackenzie suitable for
agriculture.

Professor Macoun said he had been informed by Chief Factor Hardisty,
brother to Senator Hardisty, who had charge of Mackenzie river district
for many years, that wheat was a sure crop at Fort Simpson four times
out of five, but that the country around Fort Liard, on Liard river, was
much superior to Fort Simpson for agricultural purposes. All kinds of
garden produce succeeded well, and melons, after being started in a hot
bed, ripened well.

According to Professor Macoun’s evidence Mackenzie valley and the whole
of the northern prairie country has a soil that is largely composed of
what is called alluvium; and passing northwards farther down Peace river
to the Mackenzie the surface, from all he could gather from what he had
read, is precisely of the same character as the second prairie steppe,
which is the surface of black mould mixed with limestone gravel and
deeper down there is more gravel and sand in the subsoil.

The whole of the country from Edmonton northwesterly to Arctic ocean in
Mackenzie valley, Professor Macoun explained, is underlain by Devonian
or cretaceous rock, and by the disintegration of these rocks good soil
is produced always. From everything he could gather, the whole region
naturally out to the Arctic coast, west of Mackenzie river, has a good
soil. Easterly is a land of barrenness. The line of the Mackenzie is not
exactly the line. Geologists know that there is a portion of the valley
east of the river and up to the base of the Laurentian rocks where the
land seems to be good—as regards the soil. Professor Macoun said he was
decidedly of opinion that domesticated animals would in the future be
raised in Mackenzie basin. Sheep, horses, pigs and cattle could and
would be raised there. It is a law of nature that they cannot fatten
cattle in southern Texas because it is not cold enough to solidify the
fat, as it were, and they have to drive the Texan cattle north and
fatten them. As you go north you find that the cattle

PRODUCE MORE FAT,

and are more easily fattened, because it is a law of nature that in cold
climates fat should be laid up.

Asked as to the native grasses, Professor Macoun remarked:—“As to the
natural grasses of this country, having just completed an examination of
the whole grasses of the Dominion, I am safe in stating that they are
the grasses best suited for pasturage of any known to stock men or
farmers. The grasses referred to are those known as red-top and Kentucky
blue grass, or, scientifically, _Poa Pratensis_ and _Poa Seratna_, _Poa
Tenniflora_ and _Ceasia_. These four species are well known to American
stock men and are considered of the highest value. They are the
commonest of the grasses in our northern forest region and along the
foot hills of Rocky mountains. Three of these species are known in the
eastern provinces. One of them is exclusively western and the greater
part of the common pasturage of Ontario is altogether composed of _Poa
pretensis_ (Kentucky blue grass, or red-top).”

EXPERT INVESTIGATION.

While a committee of the Senate was hearing this evidence as to the
natural resources of Mackenzie country, two experts, scientific
explorers, Messrs. McConnell and Ogilvie (See p. 18) were enquiring into
the subject on the spot on behalf of the Dominion government. The
publication of the official reports of these gentlemen, in due course,
strengthened the impression made upon the public mind by the evidence
taken by the Senate committee, but the practical result was not much,
for there was at that date still plenty of free land to be had in the
so-called “Fertile Belt”, and lack of communication effectually
prevented any deflection of the tide of immigration towards Mackenzie
river.

Mr. R. G. McConnell in 1887 explored Hay river from its mouth at Great
Slave lake as far as Alexandra falls, about thirty miles in a direct
line up. He reports that for some distance up and while passing through
the delta, the river is wide and encloses a line of alluvial islands,
but on getting above these it contracts to about one hundred yards in
width. Its banks are low and grassy, and the country on both sides is
thickly forested. Proceeding up the river the general elevation of the
country increases, and the valley becomes higher and wider, and
bordering flats make their appearance.

Grassy and partly wooded plains skirt its southern shores and extend
southward towards Peace river, and Hay river may be regarded as
practically the northern limit of the prairie country, although small
isolated plains occur much farther north in the vicinity of Slave river.

PICTURESQUE WATER-FALLS.

As to Alexandra falls, so named by Bishop Bompas in honour of the then
Princess of Wales, Mr. McConnell states that they present a clear
unbroken sheet of falling water, and are exceedingly picturesque in
appearance. The gorge through which the river below flows here suddenly
ceases, and the river precipitates itself over the hard limestone band
through which the latter is cut, with a sheer descent of about
eighty-five feet, as measured by a single reading of the aneroid
barometer.

From the base of the falls the river flows along rapidly for about a
mile, and then makes a second leap of about fifty feet, below which are
three miles of rapids. At the lower falls the cliff is broken down near
the centre, and the descent of the water is interrupted by projecting
ledges. Above the falls the river loses its valley almost altogether,
and has failed to produce more than a feeble impression on the hard
limestone beds which floor the surrounding country. Near the foot of the
rapids below the falls “a graceful effect is produced by a couple of
small streams which fling themselves on either hand over the brow of the
cliffs bounding the valley and make one clear leap to the floor
beneath.”

AGRICULTURE AT RESOLUTION.

Mr. McConnell reported the western arm of Great Slave lake “bordered all
around by a flat wooded country, which has been proved to be adapted to
cultivation of barley, and of potatoes and other vegetables. The soil is
usually a loam, but in the ridges is often sandy, and in low places
passes into a clay. The alluvial lands along Slave river and the grassy
plains on Little Buffalo river are the best sections of the district,
and deserve the first attention. At Fort Resolution a few acres of land
are farmed every year with good results by the Hudson’s Bay Company. Mr.
Flett, who has charge of this post, informed me that barley is usually
sown on May 15, and requires about one hundred and ten days to reach
maturity. Potatoes are planted about the same date, and are dug about
September 15; wheat, according to the same authority, has been tried
three times with only one failure. At Hay river, sixty miles west of
Fort Resolution, some potatoes are annually grown by the Indians, and
even at Fort Rae, which is situated on a bleak island in the northern
arm of the lake in latitude 62° 39′, some gardening has been attempted
by the energetic Roman Catholic missionaries who are stationed there.
The soil at this place is very stony, and much difficulty was
experienced in removing the boulders, and in bringing the ground into a
proper state for cultivation. When this was once effected several kinds
of vegetables were grown without trouble. Potatoes planted on May 25 are
dug in the middle of September, and yield twenty fold, and the list of
garden vegetables raised here includes turnips, onions, cabbages,
carrots, radishes, beets and peas. Wheat and barley have not been tried
on a large scale, but a few grains were sown at the end of May one
season, and became mature, the latter on August 26, and the former four
days later. A less favourable spot for farming purposes, than this rocky
island, could scarcely be obtained, and the successful raising here
affords a promise that the more fertile lands to the west and south will
one day be utilized.”

Mr. McConnell in his report on the exploration of Slave river states
that the soil there “is often sandy, but good crops of potatoes and
other garden vegetables are grown at Fort Smith, and also by the Indians
on the east side of the river.”

WHEAT AT FORT PROVIDENCE.

Mr. McConnell referred specially in his report, also, to the
agricultural operations at Fort Providence (where he wintered), Fort
Simpson and Fort Good Hope. He wrote:—“Fort Providence is surrounded by
flat arable lands of good quality, and capable of producing excellent
crops. Agriculture is engaged in here both by the Hudson’s Bay Company
and the Roman Catholic Mission, and large quantities of farm produce are
annually raised. Wheat has been sown at the Hudson’s Bay Company’s farm
for nine years, and, according to Mr. Reid, has never been a complete
failure, although on some occasions it has been slightly touched by
summer frosts. It is usually sown about May 20, and requires about three
months to ripen. As much as twenty-nine bushels have been obtained from
one bushel sown. Barley is a sure crop. It is sown at the same time as
the wheat, and is ripe almost a week earlier. Potatoes are planted
between May 16 and 25, and are taken up about September 20. Turnips,
cabbage, beets and numerous other garden vegetables are grown with
scarcely greater difficulty than in latitudes ten degrees farther south.
The soil is a stiff clay, with in some places surface beds of sand, and
is seldom thawed out to a greater depth than six feet. The muskegs which
cover a considerable proportion of the country back from the river are
permanently frozen at less than two feet from the surface. It must be
borne in mind, however, in this connection, that the histories of other
districts have shown that when the country is cleared and the moss burnt
off, the penetrative powers of the summer thaw is at once greatly
increased, and lands have become productive, which at first appeared
hopelessly barren. A number of cattle are kept at Fort Providence, but
require to be fed about seven months in the year. Hay of excellent
quality is obtained in abundance from neighbouring marshes.”

THE FARM AT FORT SIMPSON.

“Like the other posts Fort Simpson has its farm, and according to some
statistics which I received from Mr. Laviolette, the various crops
raised, with the exception of wheat, which does not ripen, and the dates
for planting and reaping are much the same as those previously stated
for Fort Providence. Potatoes are usually planted between May 15 and 20,
but this season (1888) were not put in, owing to the unusually late
spring, until May 28, and require about four months to mature. In the
ordinary year forty bushels of seed will yield from six to seven hundred
bushels, but the crops are sometimes injured by summer frosts. Barley,
which is the only cereal grown, is sown about May 20, and is usually
ripe by September 20. No difficulty is experienced in raising such
garden vegetables as cabbages, turnips, beets, etc., and Mr. Camsell
seemed sanguine that even melons and tomatoes would ripen if properly
tried. The soil here is a stiff clay loam. . . .”

[Illustration: Mission Garden at Fort Providence.]

“Fort Good Hope is situated a short distance below the Ramparts and is
the lowest fort on the Mackenzie. It was originally built over one
hundred miles lower down, and has been moved several times before the
present site was finally selected. It is situated only a few miles south
of the Arctic circle, but this does not prevent some gardening from
being attempted. Potatoes, turnips and other garden vegetables are
raised in some quantity, and even barley has occasionally been ripened,
although the ground is permanently frozen three or four feet from the
surface. Cattle and poultry are kept at the fort, but the former have to
be fed over seven months in the year. . . .”

CAN FURNISH LOCAL FOOD SUPPLY.

In summing up the result of his explorations, Mr. McConnell stated in
his report:—“At all the posts of the Hudson’s Bay Company, along the
Mackenzie and its tributaries, with the exception of Fort McPherson,
small plots of land are annually cultivated and large quantities of
potatoes, turnips, beets and other vegetables are grown for use in the
district, while at Fort Liard and Fort Providence, the two most
southerly posts in the district, both wheat and barley have been tried
with success. There is, however, little reason to hope that Mackenzie
river district as a whole, or even the southern part of it, except in
limited areas, will ever be able to support a purely agricultural
community, or that its products will ever be able to compete in the open
markets of the world with the produce of more favoured regions. Its
agricultural development will depend on a local market being obtained.
When the time comes, as come it must, when the undoubted mineral
resources of the region are drawn upon, the food required by the mining
population, or the greater part of it at least, can be supplied locally.
The amount of arable land is small compared to the total area, and is
mostly confined to the vicinity of the larger streams. Away from the
rivers, frozen marshes and muskegs and shallow lakes cover the greater
part of the surface. The alluvial lands along Slave river, the upper
part of Mackenzie river, and the country bordering the Liard for some
distance above and below Fort Liard and west of the mountains, are the
best parts of the district.”

CLIMATE OF MACKENZIE REGION.

Mr. McConnell, in his report of his explorations of both 1887 and 1888,
makes the following references to the climate along Mackenzie
river:—“The warm weather which commenced at Fort Simpson on May 1,
continued throughout the month, and under its influence the snow quickly
disappeared, and the spring advanced with astonishing rapidity.

“In the lower part of the river the ice was broken up at Fort Wrigley on
May 18, at Fort Norman on May 19, and at Fort Good Hope on May 21. The
ice on the river above Fort Simpson, between the mouth of the Liard and
Great Slave lake, did not, however, move until after June 1.”

May 31, 1888, Mr. McConnell found _Anemone patens_, the first flower of
the season, in full bloom above Fort Wrigley. When Mr. McConnell left
Fort Norman June 12, 1888, the trees were still leafless, but the
various species of willows and birches had hung out their catkins, and
the early flowering anemones and other flowers brightened the valley
with colour. June 18, when Mr. McConnell left Fort Good Hope, _anemone
patens_ and other early flowering plants were in bloom, but the general
forest still remained leafless.

THE LIARD DISTRICT.

Mr. McConnell’s report gives us occasional comprehensive glimpses of the
territory on either side of the Mackenzie. He says that the surface of
the country bordering the Mackenzie in the latitude of the Liard, on
both the lower and higher levels, is usually more or less undulating,
and is diversified by innumerable shallow lakes of all sizes, while a
large proportion is underlaid by muskegs and marshes, covered with
sphagnum or bog-moss, which remain frozen throughout the year. The
higher lands and ridges separating the lakes and marshes are usually
rather densely forested, chiefly with white spruce (_Picea alba_), the
Banksian pine (_Pinus Banksiana_) and the aspen (_Populus tremuloides_).

As to the basin of the lower Liard itself, Mr. McConnell mentions the
following facts:—On his way down to the Mackenzie in 1887 he arrived at
Fort Liard, fifteen miles below the mouth of the Nelson, on July 29. In
the reach from the Nelson to Fort Liard, the river is generally wide and
filled with sandbars and wooded islands. It is bordered in many places
with wide alluvial flats, covered with tall, straight cotton wood, large
spruce and canoe birch. Its valley is wide and shallow and lined with
gently sloping, spruce-clad banks. On some of the flats the Indians have
built houses, and fenced in small plots for farming purposes, for which
the greater part of this section of the district seems well adapted. Mr.
McConnell passed one small Indian farm about thirteen miles below the
mouth of the Nelson, and another one at the mouth of Fishing creek, a
few miles above Fort Liard, while others were noticed in the lower part
of the river.

FORT LIARD AND ITS ENVIRONMENT.

Fort Liard is situated on a fertile flat, part of which has been
cultivated for years with unfailing success. Wheat and barley are grown
here year after year, while potatoes, cabbages, turnips, and other
vegetables are raised without the least difficulty. At the time of Mr.
McConnell’s visit, August 1, “all the crops were well advanced and in
good condition; the barley was just turning colour, and the potatoes
were almost large enough to eat. There is no reason, either climatic or
otherwise, why the whole country bordering the Liard, from Beaver river
to near its mouth, should not, when needed, support an agricultural
community.” Mr. McConnell climbed one of the mountains near Fort Liard
to a height of three thousand feet and “obtained an extensive view from
the summit, over the plains to the eastward. The country in that
direction rises gradually from the river in easy undulations, and
appears to culminate at a distance of twenty-five or thirty miles in a
low plateau through which Black river has cut a wide gap. A dense
forest, relieved in places by gleaming lakes and light green marshes,
stretches to the horizon.”

Mr. McConnell also states in his report that the valley depression for
some distance below the fort is insignificant in size, and farther down
disappears altogether, and the river undulates through a low, level
plain, elevated only a few feet above its surface. Liard river is over a
mile wide at its mouth.

A MACKENZIE VALLEY PLATEAU.

Ten miles above the Blackwater, Mr. McConnell, in his descent of the
Mackenzie in 1888, made a visit to a small plateau which there borders
the river at a distance of three or four miles. The valley of the
Mackenzie there has a depth of two hundred feet. After leaving it Mr.
McConnell crossed a level plain which stretches eastwards to the foot of
the plateau. This plain proved to be exceedingly wet and swampy, and
most of the way across he was walking knee-deep through yielding moss or
ice-cold water. It is partially wooded with small pine, spruce, aspen
and tamarack, none of which had a diameter exceeding six inches. From
the top of the plateau, the main range of Rocky mountains, which is here
too far from the left bank of the river to be seen from the valley, came
into sight to the west, while in an opposite direction a good view was
obtained of the rocky range which borders the river to the east. The
plain between these ranges, through which the river flows, has a width
of sixty or seventy miles. It shows numerous lines of wooded heights
running parallel with the river, but possesses no conspicuous
elevations.

Mr. McConnell explains that rugged limestone ranges are visible along
the reach below Fort Norman on both sides of the river, but seldom
approach within thirty miles of each other. The plains between, and
lower slopes of the mountains, are continuously clothed with forests of
small spruce and aspen. The depression in which the river flows has a
depth of from one to four hundred feet and a width of from two to three
miles. River flats are seldom present, and the banks of the valley slope
more or less steeply up from the edge of the water.

MR. WILLIAM OGILVIE’S REPORT.

Mr. Ogilvie, in the splendid report of his survey in 1888 (Sessional
papers, 4th Ses. 6th Parlt.), made a special and most comprehensive
reference to the agricultural capabilities of the Mackenzie country. Mr.
Ogilvie’s reputation as an experienced and most accurate observer
justifies an extended quotation from this section of the
report.—“Everywhere, the Mackenzie basin”, he wrote (p. 82), “is quite
as capable, so far as quality of soil is concerned, of supporting an
agricultural population, as the greater part of the provinces of Ontario
and Quebec. The soil, as seen from the river, is generally good, and the
probability is that it continues so at least as far back from the stream
as the woods extend. This extent is said to vary from twenty to forty
miles on the east side, where no stream flows in, but where there are
streams the distance is much greater, as the timber follows the valleys.
Beyond the fringe of timber we come to the so-called barren lands, on
which nothing but mosses and lichens grow and which, except as the
pasturage of the musk-ox and a few other animals, are practically
useless, so far as known at present. On the west side of the river the
woods extend to the timber line on the mountains.

“Assuming the limits to be as above, the area of the fertile soil can
readily be found. Speaking only of that portion of Mackenzie basin
extending from Athabaska lake to Arctic ocean, we have a strip of land
nine hundred and forty miles long, and something over sixty wide. This
gives in round numbers sixty thousand square miles of land, the
agricultural capabilities of which we may reasonably discuss. I think
the above area is less than that actually wooded, but on the west side
much of the surface is probably at such an elevation, being near the
mountains, as to be outside the limits of our discussion. Theoretically,
the points involved are the prevalent temperatures during the growing
months, the period of vegetation and the duration of sunshine.

TEMPERATURE AND SUNLIGHT.

“I do not know of any regular record of temperature having been kept at
Fort McPherson, the most northerly point at which anyone is permanently
settled in the district. The only information which I have is my own
record for the last ten days of June while I was camped in the valley
near the fort. The lowest temperature during that period was 37.3° Fahr.
on June 20, and the mean minimum from June 20 to June 30 was 43.3° Fahr.
The highest observed temperature during the same period was 74° Fahr. at
1:30 p.m. on June 21, and the mean temperature at that hour for the ten
days was 62° Fahr. The lowest of these temperatures would not injure
vegetation. The mean minimum for the whole month would be below this,
probably two or three degrees, but even that would not arrest vegetable
growth. When, in connection with the temperature, we consider the number
of hours of sunshine in June and July, it seems evident that Fort
McPherson has all the essentials for the successful cultivation of most
cereals and vegetables. At this northern point refraction extends the
time during which the sun does not set, so that there are about
twenty-four hours of sunshine each day from June 1 to July 15. On May 1,
the sun is up for about seventeen and one-half hours, and during August
the hours of sunlight vary from nineteen on the 1st to fifteen on the
31st. The total hours of sun are seven hundred and six in May; seven
hundred and twenty in June; six hundred and eighty-four in July; and
five hundred and twenty-seven in August; in all two thousand six hundred
and thirty-seven hours of sun out of the total, day and night, of two
thousand, nine hundred and fifty-two hours in the four months. As
twilight continues while the sun is less than eighteen degrees below the
horizon there is actually no darkness during this period. When the
temperature is suitable, vegetation under these conditions thrives to an
almost incredible degree, as the following shows. When I arrived at Fort
McPherson on June 20, the new buds on the trees were just perceptible,
and on the evening of June 22, the trees were almost fully in leaf.

“The mean minimum temperature for the month of July was 45.4° Fahr. The
mean temperature for 1:30 p.m. was 64.7° Fahr., but on two occasions the
thermometer went to 78° in the shade, and ten times to 70°. These
temperatures were noted along the river, at different points of course,
although during the greater part of the month my latitude did not change
very much.

[Illustration: View on Peel river.]

“This combination of favorable temperature and long hours of sunlight
promises well for vegetable growth, but there are interfering causes.
Unfortunately snow storms are apt to occur at any time during the year
at Fort McPherson. On July 2, five inches of snow fell and the
thermometer went down to 25° (7° below freezing point), yet, strange to
say, the frost did not appear to hurt anything. A northeast wind
continuing for a day or more, lowers the temperature in a few hours from
pleasant, summer heat to what reminds one of the approach of winter.

“As far as I could learn, no attempt at cultivating cereals or roots has
been made at Fort McPherson. But at Fort Good Hope some of the people
grow potatoes and other garden produce, and, as the difference of
latitude is not much over a degree, the same things ought to grow nearly
as well at Fort McPherson. The potatoes grown at Fort Good Hope are
small, averaging about the size of a large hen’s egg. Those which I
tasted were bad, as if they had been frozen, but they were of the
previous season’s growth, and it was then the middle of July. Even in
Ontario potatoes of that age are not very palatable. This tuber appears
to have always vitality enough to increase, as at Fort Good Hope they
have had

NO CHANGE OF SEED FOR SEVERAL YEARS.

This tends to show that the frosts are not very severe, during the time
potatoes are growing and ripening. When I passed, the onions, lettuce
and other things planted in the gardens were pretty well advanced, the
onion stalks being about as large as pencils. No cereals had been sown,
but I think barley would succeed fairly well. I am not aware of any
continuous record of temperature at Fort Good Hope, so I cannot say
whether the climate at that place is suitable for the growth of plants
during June, July, and August. While I was there the days were pleasant
and warm and the nights not unpleasantly cool. Nor, if we omit July 2,
when snow fell, did I anywhere note any temperature below freezing
during July and August.

“It may be said that my observations extended over too great a range of
latitude, to be of any value in indicating the temperature any period or
any place, as while they were being taken we were constantly moving
south. This is true, but it must be remembered that in moving south we
were leaving the area of constant sunlight and getting to where night
has a cooling effect, so that the objection has not the same weight it
would otherwise have.

“The statement given below of the duration of sunlight in the months of
May, June, July and August, serves to show that a difference in latitude
has not the same effect in changing the summer temperatures of places in
high latitudes as it has in more southerly localities. Unfortunately,
the records at posts in the district are too few and meagre to either
confirm or disprove this theory, and to use the records of such places
as Fort Franklin, on Great Bear lake, and Fort Rae, on Great Slave lake,
is hardly fair. These points are over three hundred miles apart in an
air line, and the temperature at either or both may be influenced by the
local conformation of the ground, or other unknown causes. However,
taking the records at these places, we have the following comparison:—

Mean temperature Fort Franklin, Fort Rae,
during lat. 65° 12′ lat. 62° 40′
May, 35.2° Fahr. 27.7° Fahr.
June, 51.4° 51.4°
July, 52° 61.2°
August, 50.6° 56.5°

“The Fort Franklin data are given in Professor Loomis’s Meteorology,
published in 1875. He gives as his authority Dove’s tables in the report
of the British Association for 1847. Who the observer was is not stated,
but it was probably Franklin. The Fort Rae statistics were furnished by
Mr. Carpmael to the Senate committee appointed to inquire into the
resources of Mackenzie basin, and cover the same months as those given
for Fort Franklin. These statistics, as far as they go, confirm the
theory, for the extremes at Fort Franklin differ 16.8°, while at Fort
Rae the difference is 33.5°, and the monthly differences at the former
place are much less than the latter.[18]

“I have computed the following table which shows comprehensively the
different durations of sunlight for the latitudes of Ottawa, Chipewyan,
and Forts Simpson, Good Hope and McPherson.

Ottawa. Chipewyan. Simpson. Good Hope. McPherson.
Latitude 45° 26′ 58° 43′ 61° 52′ 66° 16′ 67° 26′

H. Sun. H. M. H. M. H. M. H. M. H. M.
May 1: 14 08 15 34 16 05 17 06 17 30
June 1: 15 16 17 36 18 39 21 04 24 00
June 21: 15 30 18 44 19 14 22 48 24 00
July 1: 15 24 18 36 19 02 22 04 24 00
Aug. 1: 14 32 16 16 16 56 18 16 19 24
Aug. 31: 13 08 13 52 14 08 14 36 14 44

H. Sun. H. H. H. H. H.
May: 456 514 538 592 706
June: 462 549 570 662 720
July: 464 530 558 625 684
Aug.: 423 467 481 519 527
—— —— —— —— ——
Totals. 1805 2060 2147 2398 2637

“The number of hours of sunlight in each month has been obtained from
the mean of the numbers at the beginning and ending of the month. This
does not give a strictly correct result, as the sun’s declination, on
which the length of the day depends, does not change uniformly, the
daily change in June, when the sun has attained its greatest
declination, being small as compared with that of September, when the
sun is near the equator. Were the light of each day separately computed,
the difference would be even more decidedly in favor of the north. In
computing the above table, refraction has not been taken into account
except in the case of Fort McPherson. Allowance for refraction would
increase the duration of sunlight at all the other places, but much more
in the north than in the south. As the table now stands it assigns to
Fort McPherson eight hundred and thirty-two hours, or thirty-four and
two-third days more sunlight than Ottawa, during a total period of two
thousand five hundred and fifty-two hours. A better mode of comparison
is to reduce the number of hours of sunlight at each place to days. It
stands thus:—Ottawa, seventy-five days, five hours; Chipewyan,
eighty-five days, twenty hours; Fort Simpson, eighty-nine days, eleven
hours; Fort Good Hope, ninety-nine days, twenty-two hours; Fort
McPherson, one hundred and nine days, twenty-one hours, and this out of
a total of one hundred and twenty-three days.

AGRICULTURE AT FORT NORMAN.

“At Fort Norman, the Hudson’s Bay Company had a garden planted with
turnips, potatoes and other garden produce. I was at that point during
the last days of July, at which time potato vines were from six to ten
inches long, and did not promise a good yield. The Roman Catholic
mission had two patches, together about an acre in extent, planted with
potatoes. The soil here was much better than in the first patch, being a
warm clay loam, while in the other it was nearly all decaying vegetable
matter, commonly called ‘muck’. The mission potatoes were much stronger
in the vines than the Hudson’s Bay Company’s, and, at the time, nearly
covered the ground. The Anglican mission had planted a small piece of
ground near the river on a sheltered bench below the top of the bank and
facing the south. Here the growth was much stronger than at either of
the two other places. Some barley had been sown in it, and was well
grown, the stalks averaging from two to two and a half feet high, and
the heads being long and just beginning to fill. The growth of grass on
this flat is luxuriant, and nettles grow as strong and large as any I
have seen elsewhere. Near the edge of the woods wild vetches grow as
long and vigorous as they do near Edmonton. Everyone complained of the
cold, wet weather which prevailed during the summer and much retarded
vegetation. The Roman Catholic missionary in charge of the mission here,
told me that in twenty years’ residence at the place he did not
recollect such a cool, damp, cloudy summer.

AT FORT WRIGLEY.

“At Fort Wrigley some slight attempts had been made at cultivation, but
I do not consider them a fair test of the capabilities of the place.
When I was there, on August 15, the people were gathering blueberries,
then fully ripe and as large and well-flavored as they are in Ontario.
Ripe strawberries were found on August 9 ninety miles below this, and a
few raspberries soon afterwards. Above Fort Wrigley wild gooseberries
and both red and black currants were found in abundance, some of the
small islands being literally covered with the bushes. The gooseberries
were large and well flavored, and the currants would compare favourably
with the same fruit as cultivated in the vicinity of Ottawa, the black
currants being especially large and mellow. This was the middle of
August, latitude 63°.

ONE THOUSAND ONE HUNDRED AND FIFTY MILES FARTHER NORTH THAN OTTAWA.

“At Fort Simpson the Hudson’s Bay Company has a large plot of ground
planted with turnips, potatoes, onions, and other garden produce such as
is generally grown without artificial means in Ontario. On August 24,
when I visited this place, the growing vegetables looked almost as good
as the same kinds seen at the Ottawa market at the same date. Lettuce
particularly was very large and fine. There was also a large area of
barley, which looked well and promised an abundant return if allowed to
ripen. The grain was then full and plump and just beginning to harden,
but fears were entertained that a frost might come and spoil it. The
people there claimed that the prevailing cool, cloudy weather had
retarded its growth, as otherwise it would then be out of danger from
frost. This cereal has been grown with success at Fort Simpson for many
years. I understood that wheat had been tried, but with indifferent
success. The garden altogether presented an appearance hardly to be
expected at a point eleven hundred and fifty miles farther north than
Ottawa. It is situated on an island in the river, and the presence of
the large body of water may moderate the climate and account for the
fine appearance of the garden. Whether the same fine result can be
attained a mile or more away from the river can only be decided by
trial. I am strongly of the opinion that it cannot.

“On the high river bank below Fort Providence wild gooseberries and
currants were very plentiful, though on the eighth of September they
were somewhat over-ripe.

“At Fort Providence the usual garden produce is grown every year and
generally turns out well. Barley is also grown with success, but in 1888
it was, as everywhere else in the valley, much retarded by cool weather.
Up to my departure from the post, the lowest temperature, exclusive of
July 2, was 31.8° on August 29. The mean minimum for the month of August
was 43°. When I was at Fort Providence the barley was beginning to
change color, and, unless a very severe frost came soon after, would
ripen. Wheat has been grown here for many years by the Hudson’s Bay
Company, generally being fairly ripe before it is touched by frost and
sometimes escaping altogether. The wheat is ground in a small hand mill,
and the flour used in the ordinary way by the people of the fort. While
there I ground a few pounds of the crop of 1887, and had the flour made
into a cake, which, though not quite so good as that made from ‘XXXX’
flour, was palatable, and would probably sustain life as effectually as
any other, those using it appearing as well and strong as could be
desired. I brought home a sample of this wheat for inspection.

PEA VINES STILL GREEN IN SEPTEMBER.

“At Fort Resolution the Hudson’s Bay Company were growing potatoes,
turnips and barley. The first were of good quality and size, but there
would be no yield of the last. The Anglican missionary also had a garden
in which were potatoes, cabbage, cauliflowers, turnips, onions and peas,
the latter still green on September 21. The potatoes and cauliflowers
were both good in size and flavor. I was informed that small potatoes
were grown in a garden at Fort Rae, situated on a long arm of Great
Slave lake, but, according to report, there is not much land around the
lake available for farming, even were the climate suitable, as it is
nearly all rock. At Fort Smith nothing of importance from an
agricultural point of view had been done, and the autumn frosts were
very severe.

“In conclusion, I may say that I do not wish to be understood as
representing this country as suitable for agricultural operations, as I
do not think it is. I have merely presented the results of the attempts
which have been made. These results are doubtless much more favorable
than might be expected, but how far they would hold good elsewhere than
in the immediate vicinity of the river is not known. It is probable that
the presence of such a large body of water, with a temperature of about
55°, has a beneficial influence on vegetation.

“Before that part of our territory will be required for settlement,
there will be ample time to determine by experiment exactly what it is
worth for agriculture.

EUROPEAN COMPARISONS.

“In looking over the world for countries lying in the same latitude to
compare with it, we find Norway extending from latitude 58° to 70° 30′,
with an area of one hundred and twenty-three thousand two hundred and
six square miles, and a population of one million eight hundred and six
thousand nine hundred. Of her territory only about one-thirtieth is
under cultivation, one-fourth being covered with forest, and the rest
barren mountain land. But as Norway is exposed throughout its whole
length to Atlantic ocean, the comparison is hardly apposite. Better
suited for comparison is that division of Russia known as Finland, lying
between 60° and 70° north latitude, with an area of one hundred and
forty-four thousand two hundred and fifty-four square miles, and a
population of two million one hundred and forty-two thousand and
ninety-three.

“This shows us that we must not regard the district as altogether
useless nor despair of its ultimate occupation to at least the same
extent as the countries named. When we take into consideration also the
adaptability to settlement of Athabaska and Peace river valleys, which
are parts of the same great drainage basin, we may look forward with
confidence to its ultimate occupation by several millions of
inhabitants.”

In the report of his trip in 1891, Mr. Ogilvie gives the following notes
on agriculture in Mackenzie valley:—

“Fort Providence was infested with grasshoppers to such an extent that
every bit of grain sown there was cut to the ground, nothing but the
stubs of the stalks being visible. Wheat has been grown there with
varying success for many years, and the fact that in latitude 61° 20′
38′′ it has been completely devoured by grasshoppers is itself worthy of
record.

“At Simpson the garden stuff, although very nice in appearance, was not
up to what I saw there in 1888, just at the same time of the year too,
though it would compare very favourably with the appearance of those in
places ten and fifteen degrees farther south. At that date (August 25 to
28), garden stuff was well advanced, green peas were in use, as were
cabbage, potatoes, carrots and other vegetables, all large and well
flavoured. The barley sown was short and stunted looking from drought,
but of fair quality.

“In 1888 the Company’s officer in charge planted ash-leaved maples sent
in from Manitoba to see how they would stand the climate, eleven degrees
farther north than their native home. Last year they were quite large
and seemed to flourish as well as they would have done in their native
soil. Many head of cattle were kept here, which seem to thrive as well
as they would anywhere else in our country. The hay for their winter
subsistence is cut on the hills south of the fort.

AT LIARD IN 1891.

“At Fort Liard the same drought seems to have prevailed, and prevented
the usual development of what was planted. At the date (September 4) of
my arrival, the barley had been harvested some days, and though the
straw was short the grain was plump and hard and of fair yield. Potatoes
were of good size and of fair quality. Wheat had often been grown here
successfully, but as it can only be used whole, it is considered better
to grow barley, which can be, and is, used as cattle food. Cattle are
kept here, and seem to thrive as well as they do in other places of the
country. At this post the soil is a rich, black loamy clay, and the
surface is thickly wooded all around. As seen from the high ground on
the opposite side of the river, the country to the south and east
appears undulating, rising into extensive ridges all heavily wooded.
This condition is said to continue through to Hay river. In the valley
are many lakes, some of considerable extent, and many large swamps. I
could not learn anything of the character of the soil, but it is fair to
assume from the general character of the woods, that it is of fair
quality.

“While at this fort I examined the daily journal of events kept at every
post, for the purpose of getting some information as to the times of the
general run of farming events, opening or closing of the river, or any
other fact of agricultural, meteorological, or general interest. I will
here make a few explanatory remarks with regard to these journals. It is
a standing rule in the Company’s service that a journal of daily events
be kept at every post, but each officer seems to have a different idea
of what a daily journal even is, and there seems to be a want of
continuity, so to speak, in the records when there is a change of
writers or officers, some officers aiming at making it what it was
intended or ought to be, a chronicle which could at any time hereafter
be consulted with confidence regarding historical, meteorological and
agricultural events in particular, and information generally.
Unfortunately, many seem to have considered it an unpleasant duty, and
put it off from day to day, until a long interval had elapsed, then went
at it in desperation and made the best record they could from memory, of
course often omitting many items of interest and general importance. In
many of the journals I have seen there are great gaps, the officer at
the place being absent on a journey, or sick or otherwise unable to
write the journal at the post.

NOTES FROM LIARD JOURNALS.

The journals at Liard gave me the following dates and facts:—

1878. Planted seed May 9; reaped barley, omitted; first ice
drifting in the river, October 18; ice set in river, October 29.

1879. Planted seed April 22; reaped barley August 14; first ice
in river October 15; ice set fast November 7.

1880. Planted seed May 7; reaped barley August 14; first ice in
river October 25; ice set fast November 9.

1881. Planted seed May 5; reaped barley August 12; first ice in
river October 10; ice set fast November 13.

1882. Planted seed May 9; reaped barley August 22; first ice in
river October 16; ice set fast November 7.

1883. Planted seed May 3; reaped barley August 10; first ice in
river October 29; ice set fast November 9.

1884. Planted seed May 1; reaped barley, omitted; first ice in
river October 10; ice set fast October 29.

1885. Planted seed May 22; reaped barley August 11; first ice in
river October 23; ice set fast, omitted.

1886. Planted seed May 7; reaped barley August 19; first ice in
river November 9; ice set fast November 20.

1887. Planted seed May 3; reaped barley, omitted; first ice in
river October 22; ice set fast November 9.

1888. Planted seed May 9; reaped barley, omitted; first ice in
river October 20; ice set fast November 5.

1889. Planted seed April 16; reaped barley, omitted; first ice
in river October 28; ice set fast November 14.

1890. Planted seed April 30; reaped barley, omitted; first ice
in river October 15; ice set fast November 14.

Potatoes are generally harvested about September 20. The ice
generally breaks up in the river about May 1.

BETWEEN THE LIARD AND THE PEACE.

“On the west side of Liard and East Branch rivers it is not very far to
the mountains, consequently the area of land which might be utilized
agriculturally is not very extensive on that side. On the east the same
character of surface holds I believe from the Liard southward to the
Peace watershed, high dry ridges with many intervening swamps and lakes,
many of the swamps being very extensive. This is as the Indians and one
or two white men who have made journeys into it have said of it. The
soil is generally of fair quality, some of it good. On my return from
Sikanni Chief river to Peace river I found the same general
characteristics, ridges with swamps between. I am afraid the elevation
above the sea level along this route (the average reading of the
barometer being about 27.00 inches while I was on it) is too high to
allow farming in the sense in which we understand it. On the streams
flowing into the Peace, there is much prairie, but it is confined mainly
to the immediate valleys of the streams; much of it is springy and wet,
evidently the water from the adjacent swamps percolating through. The
soil is all good, and if the climatic conditions were suitable, a very
large percentage of good country would be found in this section. Many of
the swamps could be drained as the natural facilities for drainage are
good. Although it was in October I passed over it I witnessed no severe
frosts, very little ice being visible anywhere, and the flora giving no
evidence of having been much injured by the frosts. In the prairies
along the creeks, the grasses and plants are generally of as luxuriant
growth as in places much farther south and east. The grass was generally
long and meadow-like, but as we approached Peace river it became more
like true prairie grass, until extensive areas of true prairie were
passed over along the tributaries of Peace river.

“The weather for some days previous to my arrival at Nelson (September
15) had been showery and unsettled; this culminated on September 16 in a
very heavy rainfall which changed to snow on September 17 and 18. This
was damp and stuck to and loaded the trees in the forest to such an
extent that the weight broke thousands of them. The snowstorm appears to
have been local, as I afterwards learned that it had not extended to
Peace river nor more than one hundred miles south from Nelson. The
weather cleared on September 19.”

In a communication to the press in 1910, Mr. Ogilvie wrote:—“From Fort
Vermilion to Fort Liard on Liard river, where wheat has been
successfully grown for more years than many people would credit, is
three hundred and ten miles; by trail, say three hundred and fifty. On
this stretch just across Peace river Hay river prairies are highly
spoken of, and certainly look well from the river. A railway line would
probably follow down Black river valley to Liard, and extensive meadows
in this valley were reported by natives when I was there in 1891.”

EVIDENCE BEFORE THE LATE SENATE COMMITTEE.

The select committee of the Senate of Canada which sat in 1907 devoted
considerable attention to the agricultural possibilities of Mackenzie
valley. Mr. R. G. McConnell of the Geological Survey was examined before
the committee and said he did not happen to be in places where there was
any farming going on, but was at Fort Providence in the autumn and
wintered there one winter, and ate potatoes, turnips and other
vegetables like that all winter that had been grown there. That is north
of Great Slave lake. Going down the Mackenzie, Mr. McConnell explained,
once you get away from the river flat you get into a rolling country
partly with muskeg, with hard ridges between. The only possible part of
that country suitable for agriculture, he thought, would be the large
flats down Mackenzie river. It is a wide valley, but there is the same
thing there: you never know exactly beforehand what is going to happen.
Certainly it does not look like a favourable country for agriculture
once you get away from the river.

The prairie on Liard river is a little north of the 60th degree of
latitude. There is a lot of marsh hay growing around Great Slave lake.
It would be good for feeding stock. Along Great Slave lake itself there
is a large tract of flat country which may come in some time. Most of
the grass Mr. McConnell saw there was a heavy marsh grass. It is not
jointed, though there is some of that kind. He remembered seeing patches
of it on Hay river.

Asked as to the extent of good agricultural land in the country, Mr.
McConnell said it depended on what was called good agricultural country.
He knew that at Fort Good Hope, right down on the circle, they can raise
good potatoes, because he saw them, and there is no reason why they
cannot raise vegetables all the way down the Mackenzie as far north as
that. The land on both sides of the river suitable for agriculture does
not extend far. There are flats two or three miles wide—bottom flats of
the Mackenzie a mile to a mile and a half wide. Once you get up out of
the valley the country is rolling and partly muskeg. There is a large
tract of that sort of country extending as far north as Fort Good Hope.
It is about a thousand miles altogether from Great Slave lake to the
sea, and that flat would be six or eight hundred miles in length.

INTENSE SUMMER HEAT.

Mr. Elihu Stewart (See p. 136), describing his trip to the far north
before the Senate committee of 1907, said that after leaving Lake
Athabaska there is rock along the Athabaska, but there are plains, said
to be good land, extending from Slave lake down to Peace river. Below
Fort Smith there is a deposit of alluvial soil very similar in
appearance and in character to that of the prairie, extending as far as
Rocky mountains, below Fort Simpson, and even along the valley then all
the way down as far as Mr. Stewart went. It was a surprise to him. Mr.
Stewart was at Fort Providence on July 15, 1906. Fort Providence is near
Slave lake, on Mackenzie river, in latitude 61·25°. This is nine hundred
and seventeen miles by travelled route from Athabaska, but, as near as
Mr. Stewart could calculate it, about five hundred and fifty miles
farther north than Edmonton. He saw there on July 15 wheat in the milk,
potatoes in flower, peas fit for use, tomatoes, turnips, rhubarb, beets,
cabbage, onions, and other garden vegetables. The tomatoes were not
fully formed, and Mr. Stewart did not think they ripened. They grew them
under glass. The strawberries ripen at any time; in fact they had ripe
strawberries before that, also raspberries, currants, gooseberries and
saskatoons. The wheat that Mr. Stewart saw there was just in milk. He
inquired when it was sown, and was told May 20. It seemed incredible,
until it was remembered that there is scarcely any darkness during
summer there. There were about twenty hours’ sun each day, and the heat
was greater for several days than anything Mr. Stewart had ever
experienced in Ottawa. Along the lower Athabaska and at Chipewyan, Mr.
Stewart and his fellow travellers had it over one hundred in the shade
for several days. There was a thermometer on the steamer in the shade.
Perhaps the heat was greater on the boat than it would have been ashore.
Certainly it was exceedingly hot weather, and continued all night. There
was very little night at that time. The hot wave extended down to the
Arctic sea as Mr. Stewart ascertained from Indians who had come from
Rampart House, near the Alaskan boundary, to meet the steamer, the
“Wrigley.” He returned with them instead of coming back with the boat,
and they lost two of their dogs from the heat, and that in the Arctic
circle. From his observations along the river, that portion of the
Mackenzie he travelled through presented a better appearance than
Athabaska basin. He did not see much hay around Slave lake. He was not
travelling through the country there.

NINE HUNDRED AND SEVENTY MILES NORTH OF EDMONTON.

Fort Good Hope, in latitude 66·16°, is nine hundred and seventy miles
farther north than Edmonton, yet Mr. Stewart saw cabbages, onions and
other garden vegetables growing in the gardens there. Beyond Fort Good
Hope the frost is so near the surface of the ground that it is pretty
hard to raise anything. At Fort Macpherson, and in that neighbourhood
where the portage is crossed, there is frozen soil. The vegetables at
Fort Good Hope looked as good as any others. The soil there was very
fertile. The fort which is nearest to the mouth of the Mackenzie is
“Point Separation.” It is not on the Mackenzie, and was so named because
it was there that Sir John Franklin and Doctor Richardson separated on
Franklin’s memorable second trip. There were no evidences of vegetation
along the river that far north that would lead the witness to conclude
that agriculture could be carried on there. As far as Fort Good Hope, on
this side of that place, and around Providence the country is a fine
one. It is a wooded country.

In Mr. Stewart’s 1906 official report (p. 13) he writes:—“On July 15,
the garden at Fort Providence (latitude 61·4°) contained peas fit for
use, potatoes in flower, tomatoes, rhubarb, beets, cabbages, onions.
Besides vegetables, there were cultivated flowers and fruits such as red
currants, gooseberries, strawberries, raspberries and saskatoons. But
most surprising thing of all was a small field of wheat in the milk, the
grain being fully formed.” This was stated to have been sown on May 20
and harvested before July 28, slightly over two months from sowing.

SIT OUT ALL NIGHT AND READ.

Mr. H. A. Conroy of the Indian Department (See p. 136) informed the
Senate committee that he had been down at Fort Providence mission in
1902. The missionaries had a splendid farm about latitude 62·30°, and he
saw beautiful crops of wheat, oats, barley and peas. He left there on
July 28, and their barley was fit to cut, and they were cutting it.
Their oats and wheat would be ready to cut in a day or two from the
looks of it, and the priest later told him all their grain was cut
without a bit of frost. They have lots of sunlight. One could sit out
all night and read. The altitude is low, and you can see the reflection
of the sunset and sunrise.

W. F. Bredin, M.L.A., (See p. 104) in his evidence before the committee,
remarked that the southern shore of Great Slave lake seems to have good
agricultural prospects. One notable place there is Hay river. There they
raise barley and all the common vegetables. At the mouth of Great Slave
river and at the mouths of all the rivers running in there, large
quantities of hay grow. In fact there is a very rank growth of grass
along all those streams as far north as one likes to go. Where the
ground along the river is not covered with trees, grass grows. At Fort
Providence, about forty miles down the Mackenzie from Great Slave lake,
they raise barley and all the vegetables every year, and some years
wheat and oats.

One hundred and seventy miles below, north of Fort Providence, is Fort
Simpson, where Liard river comes in. The Hudson’s Bay Company for many
years have raised barley and vegetables at that point. In some years
they might raise wheat, but not every year. At all those Hudson’s Bay
Company’s posts they always raise vegetables. They do not pretend to
raise any other grain regularly but barley, because

THEY USE BARLEY FOR SOUPS.

They pound the hull of it in a hollow piece of wood and use the grain
for soups. At Fort Simpson he saw cauliflowers, cabbages and cucumbers
growing under exactly the same conditions as they would grow them in
northern Alberta. The cucumbers were simply planted in a hotbed, and
allowed to remain there protected in the early spring from the frost,
and then allowed to grow in the hotbeds, with the sashes off, in the
summer time.

One hundred and forty miles north of Fort Simpson is Fort Wrigley (north
latitude 63°). That is where Mr. Bredin stated he once wintered. In the
spring they put in a garden there. The Hudson’s Bay Company officials
plant gardens every year at that point. The spring that Mr. Bredin was
there they got their seed potatoes from Fort Good Hope, which is
fourteen miles south of the Arctic circle. They went there for seed
because they had none, having used up theirs during the winter. Mr.
Bredin saw those potatoes. They were a played-out seed, a white-blue
variety. They were not the improved potatoes but they were a fair size.
They had the same class of potatoes at Hay river, but since that they
got in new seed (the Early Rover) from outside, and they grow very much
better crops. The season at Wrigley is quite long enough, because the
sun shines there during all the growing season. That is the great secret
of the growth in that country. There is not much fertile land at
Wrigley. Down there Rocky mountains are on both sides of the river, and
there is a great deal of muskeg. The garden at Fort Wrigley

WAS ORIGINALLY MUSKEG

and covered with moss. As soon as the timber is cut off a muskeg the
moss dies, the frost comes out of the ground, and gardens can be
cultivated. The trees throw out their leaves in Mackenzie basin about
the middle of May, before the ice goes out of the river. The year Mr.
Bredin was there the ice went out of the Mackenzie at Fort Wrigley on
May 23, and the trees were all out in leaf before that time. On
Mackenzie river the trees leaf out almost in a few hours. The quickness
with which the leaves appear on the trees in the spring is simply
marvellous.

Mr. Bredin was never up Liard valley, but heard a great deal about it at
Fort Simpson, and he had seen the journals of the Hudson’s Bay Company
that were kept at Fort Liard, two hundred miles up Liard river. From
these sources he gathered that they raised all the cereals there, such
as wheat, oats and barley, as well as all the vegetables of the commoner
varieties.

Mr. Bredin informed the committee that the spring he was at Fort Wrigley
the months of March and April were the finest he ever saw. He was there
just one spring, and it was as pleasant weather as he ever saw in his
native province of Ontario, for those two months, while the winters were
no worse than he had seen them in Manitoba. Mackenzie river closed on
November 19 that year and there was a little snow then—and it lasted
until March. Practically all the snow went off the latter part of March.

Mr. Edward A. Preble of the United States Biological Survey (See p. 22),
speaking of his trip down the Mackenzie in 1904, states that the country
about Fort Providence is level and is mainly grown up to poplars
(_Populus tremuloides_). Back from the river are many muskegs, with
their characteristic tamarack and spruce forests. The Roman Catholic
mission established is now one of the largest in the north. The Hudson’s
Bay Company’s post was established there in 1868, and the post at Big
island was abandoned. Both establishments cultivate large fields of
potatoes and the various root crops.

Mr. Preble reports that on June 17, below Fort Norman, a small quantity
of snow fell. On June 21, at Fort Good Hope, the leaves on most of the
trees were about half grown. On the same date the sun was visible at
midnight from a low hill near the post, and many birds were in full song
at that hour. For the next three weeks, north of this point, the sun was
continually above the horizon. Vegetation now advanced rather faster
than Mr. Preble’s rate of travel northward, but was not at its height
when he reached the delta of the Mackenzie on June 30.

UNITED STATES OFFICIAL REPORT.

Mr. Preble in his published report (North American Fauna No. 27)
presents a map of the Northland, showing the “life zone.” What he calls
“the Canadian zone” extends from the southern margin of the map to an
irregular line trending in a northwesterly direction from a point about
52·30° north latitude, just south of Hudson bay, to a point about 58·30°
north latitude at Rocky mountains. The main irregularity in the course
of the northern boundary of this zone is due to a wedge shaped
projection into the zone to the north, due to the well known northern
trend of the isothermal lines from a point in eastern Saskatchewan. The
line from about longitude 150° runs direct across Lake Athabaska,
cutting it in half practically, then to the mouth of Slave river on
Great Slave lake, thence in a sweep to where the 65th parallel of north
latitude strikes the Mackenzie. Thence the line runs back southeast to
the Liard, following that stream to the western margin of the map.

North of the “Canadian” zone, the “Hudsonian” zone is represented, its
northern limit being an irregular line running northwesterly from north
latitude 55·11° on Hudson bay to the delta of the Mackenzie. This zone
is represented as extending northward in wedge shaped projections for
some distance down the valley of the Dubawnt, down that of the
Coppermine, and into the lake country north of Great Bear lake. All of
the country north of this is described by Mr. Preble as the “Arctic
zone.”

Mr. Preble remarks in his report:—“The northern border of the Canadian
zone in the Mackenzie region limits the successful cultivation of
barley, potatoes, and the more hardy root crops, although with special
care most of them are raised in certain favoured localities in the
southern part of the Hudsonian. Even in the Canadian, however, an
occasional failure occurs, in the case of the less hardy crops, because
of the occurrence of unusually late spring or early autumn frosts. In
most parts of Peace river valley, and even in lower Liard valley, wheat
is a successful crop. Peas, potatoes, radishes, turnips, beets, carrots,
cabbages, lettuce and onions are raised with a considerable degree of
success as far north as Fort Norman, near latitude 65°, near the
northern extremity of the Canadian strip. Nearly all of these meet with
a fair amount of success at Fort Rae and also at Fort Good Hope, in the
lower Hudsonian, but at Fort Rae the situation is specially favourable
as regards slope exposure, and the permanent frost, which remains near
the surface in most parts of the Hudsonian, probably retreats to a much
lower depth. At Fort Good Hope the almost continuous sunlight of summer
probably compensates in part for its extreme northern position.”

The importance of these extracts from Mr. Preble’s report lies in the
fact that this is an official report of a trained, scientific explorer
who has lived in the north country for months, who has travelled
extensively, and whose sole object as a responsible salaried official of
a foreign country is to provide indisputable data for scientific study.

AN ENGLISH TRAVELLER’S TESTIMONY.

[Illustration: Eskimos in Kyaks on Arctic Red river.]

Mr. Alfred H. Harrison, the English traveller and explorer (See p. 22),
in his volume “In Search of a Polar Continent” relates that just as he
was leaving Fort Simpson in 1905 for the descent of the lower Mackenzie
“Père Vacher appeared with a sack of potatoes which he had grown in his
own garden, and which were as good as any we can get at home.”

When Mr. Harrison reached the post at the mouth of Arctic Red river on
October 4, he found that that tributary had been frozen fast for three
weeks, and it was reported that a few miles lower down the Mackenzie
itself was ice-locked.

In his account of his return trip up the Mackenzie in 1907, Mr. Harrison
writes (p. 268):—“On July 25 we arrived at Fort Good Hope, where I was
glad once more, to meet Mr. Gaudet, who, it will be remembered, was in
charge of this post. I was particularly impressed here by the gardens
which I visited. They produced fine crops of nearly every kind of
vegetable that we grow at home. I did not, indeed, see either pease or
beans, but I noted how very fine the potatoes and cabbages were, as also
the onions, beet root, lettuces, and turnips. We took some of these
vegetables on board, and they tasted every whit as good as they looked”.

Mr. Harrison devotes several pages of his book to what he describes as
the commercial geography of the country extending from Athabaska to the
delta of the Mackenzie. He writes:—

AS TO ILLINOIS, IOWA AND MISSOURI.

“The natural resources of this country are very great. I remember once
hearing my father say that the states of Illinois, Iowa, and Missouri
were commonly believed, when he was a young man, to be barren wastes,
where agriculture was impossible, and where no white men could live, but
that by the few who knew of the capabilities of that region great hopes
were entertained of its future. To-day these very states are the most
productive in the Union. In like manner one might be tempted to hazard a
prophecy as to the importance and prosperity of that country, so vast,
but so little known, which lies to the north of the new province of
Alberta; and, accordingly, I will venture briefly to submit an estimate
of the commercial prospects of what may well be a career of immense
industrial expansion which seems to await the great region now known as
Mackenzie river basin.

“Canada, be it remembered, has an area greater than that of the United
States, and at the last census (that of 1901) the smaller country showed
a population of eighty millions, as against the mere five millions at
which the larger was registered. If, therefore, the resources of the
larger of these two countries are relatively as great, the scantier
population will admit of being increased fifteen times. The question of
resources thereupon emerges, and before speaking of these in detail, it
may be noted (1) that the soil here is as good as in other parts of the
Dominion; and (2) that the winters are not more severe than those which
are undergone in other portions of Canada. Six months, moreover, of open
water may be reckoned upon—from the beginning of May to the beginning
of November. The lakes and rivers abound with fish; there are inconnu,
or Mackenzie salmon, whitefish, pike, and suckers, doré, trout, and
herrings. The large inland sheets of water—such as Great and Lesser
Slave lakes, Athabaska and Bear lakes—teem with fish, which forms
to-day the staple food of the scanty inmates of these tracts. The
fishing, indeed, would of itself be no slight asset were there any means
of shipping the produce out of the country.

“This brings me to the subject of transport. Population will not merely
increase with, but will itself enable the increase of,

THE MEANS OF COMMUNICATION.

The two will advance, like a couple of boys playing at leap-frog, each
by the aid of the other—and will advance, like those youngsters, ‘by
leaps and bounds.’ As the settlers become more frequent the great
waterways will be rendered navigable, and their banks, like the land
abutting the railways that will make a trellis-work of the country, will
be dotted with noble cities and with prosperous towns. There are at the
present day three huge tracts that would quickly be inhabited were they
invaded by the locomotive. A railroad from Edmonton to Athabaska river
would give access to two hundred and ten miles of waterway, in one
direction, up to Lesser Slave lake, and one hundred and sixty-five miles
of stream running down to Grand rapids. A railroad from Edmonton to
Peace river would open up six hundred miles of a river yet finer, and
running through a finer country, than that approached by the first-named
line. The third railway to be looked for would connect Athabaska river
at McMurray with Prince Albert, hereby giving easy access to the
name-sake lake from this fort.

“It might be objected that there are no markets in this country, but
this objection we have already virtually forestalled. Given the spread
of railways and the inflow of settlers, the establishment of markets
will follow as a matter of course. Let me conclude my statement of the
country’s capabilities by mentioning its lime and stone, its oil and
gas, its asphaltum, coal, and salt.

“In cherishing these sanguine hopes as to its future, I do not think I
am alone. They are shared by a few who have gone off the beaten tracks,
and made themselves acquainted with the country. When the immensity of
these northern lands is realized, one cannot wonder that few men should
be familiar with them. In my travels there I have met with only one man
who really knows the country from end to end, and if asked whether he
did so, he would doubtless answer that he did not. I refer to Mr. Conroy
(of the Indian Department) who has traversed its entire length year
after year, has departed from the beaten tracks, and has in many places
penetrated far into the interior. How, then, in the absence of railways,
can men whose enterprise and qualifications are less eminent than his
obtain in a lifetime an adequate knowledge of this outlying region?”

MOUNTED POLICE REPORTS.

We get some interesting information regarding unknown or little known
sections of the Mackenzie country from recent reports of the Royal
Northwest Mounted Police.

Inspector Jarvis, C.M.G., in the report of one of his patrols in 1907
into the wood buffalo country about Fort Smith and the Little Buffalo,
wrote:—“We went westerly from Fort Smith through a level dry country,
covered with jackpine and poplar for about nine miles, following nearly
the course of Slave river to Gravel point, where we turned southwesterly
through a region of swamps and muskegs for nine miles more. This brought
us to Salt river where we camped for the night. The next day we went
northwesterly along the banks of Salt river, in a region of extensive
prairies, some of them wet, some dry, but all covered with a fine growth
of grass and capable of supplying unlimited quantities of hay. After
three miles we came to the crossing of Salt river, and went up the
thickly wooded slope of Salt mountain, which is here, as farther south,
a plateau of no great elevation. From there on the country was
beautiful, the ground was slightly rolling with occasional lakes, the
soil rich, and the timber, spruce, poplar, jackpine and tamarack. The
pasture was of the richest description, so that the horses fared well in
spite of the swarms of the mosquitoes and bulldogs (flies). We now left
the mountain to cross this open stretch and at noon reached the east
side of this prairie, where we camped. Thence forward we travelled
through dry poplar woods of scattered large trees, under which the
richest grass abounded. The whole of this region seemed ideal for stock.
About 3 p.m. we once more reached Salt river, and followed its banks
through the same dry poplar country to its junction with Slave river,
which we reached at six o’clock. A boat was handy so we put all baggage
in this, and swam the horses, camping for the night. On June 28 we broke
camp at 8 a.m. and rode southerly for two miles through a dense growth
of spruce, varied with a few stumps. This gave place to the open poplar
woods with rich pasture which continued for seven miles, bringing us to
Gravel point.

“There is a good deal of swamp in this region. There is, however, much
land that is dry, rich, and eminently suited for ranching and mixed
farming.”

The inspector relates how, northeast of Little Buffalo river, “we came
to the top of the mountain and had a clear view of a great extent of
country below us. To the north were some muskegs, but northeast were the
open plains of Salt river stretching away for many miles.”

LIARD IN 1909.

Sergeant (at that date Corporal) A. H. L. Mellor, Royal Northwest
Mounted Police, made a patrol from Smith Landing to Fort Liard in 1909.
In his report he says:—“Fort Liard enjoys a much more temperate climate
than this country (Fort Smith) and splendid gardens are raised there.
The Roman Catholic mission has been growing wheat and barley there for a
considerable time, always with success. I am sending herewith a sample
of their last year’s wheat.”

Sergeant Mellor ascended Buffalo river from Great Slave lake in 1910 and
made detours inland on foot at several points for the purpose of getting
some idea of the nature of the country, and found the whole region to be
of a swampy nature, with here and there a sandy stretch. Along the
southern shore of Buffalo lake is a “dreary muskeg country, thicketed
with dwarf spruce and riddled with innumerable streams of water, both
sulphur and clear.”

HAY RIVER AND RESOLUTION.

Sergeant R. Field, in charge of the Chipewyan sub-district, under date
August, 1909, reported:—“The gardens at Hay river and Resolution look
very promising, especially the potato crop. The Reverend Vale at Hay
river informed me that he grew one thousand bushels of potatoes last
year on three acres of land, and also splendid cabbages and
cauliflowers, besides all other kinds of vegetables. The potato crop at
Chipewyan is going to be very poor this year owing to the extremely hot
weather and very little rain.”

In his annual report for 1910-11, Superintendent G. E. Sanders, D.S.O.,
commanding at Athabaska, gives this interesting reference:—“As regards
weather conditions the winter of 1910-11 was one of the coldest known,
the thermometer at different times in January and February registering
60° below zero at Athabaska, Lesser Slave lake and Fort Vermilion. In
the far north the same months were cold, but the thermometer did not go
as low, 58° being the severest at Fort McPherson and 40° at Herschell
island. Forty below on the coast, however, would be much more trying
than 60° below inland. It is interesting to note that Athabaska river
and Mackenzie river, one thousand eight hundred miles farther north,
froze over within four days of each other, the former on November 8 and
the latter on November 4. The ice left the Athabaska on April 22, and
the Mackenzie on May 13.”

TO THE EAST OF THE MACKENZIE.

It will no doubt be remarked that so far very little has been said with
reference to arable land and agriculture in that section of the
territory to which this chapter is devoted, east of the actual valley of
Mackenzie river itself. This is easily explained.

In the first place, except at Fort Rae on the north arm of Great Slave
lake, no attempts at practical agriculture have been made in the eastern
division of the region being treated of, for there are no posts there.
Fort Confidence and Fort Franklin on Great Bear lake, and Fort
Enterprise near the head waters of the Coppermine, were never ordinary
trading posts, being merely winter headquarters, deserted by their
tenants as soon as travelling was practicable.

[Illustration: Staff and pupils, Church of England Mission, Hay river.]

In the second place, the question of the country’s agricultural
possibilities have not been considered by the few lightly equipped
explorers who have hurried through sections of it intent upon some
special mission or other. The only references we find in the journals of
such travellers as have ventured through this region in summer, are such
as we get in Mr. Preble’s account of his trip via the lake, river and
portage route from Great Slave lake to Great Bear lake, when he states
that on August 24 “Currants (_Ribes rubrum_ and _prostratum_) were
abundant and ripe” along the route.

Doctor Richardson (See p. 13), commenting upon the observations made by
himself and colleagues of the Franklin expedition at Fort Franklin at
the southwest corner of Great Bear lake, gives the following notes
regarding the progression of the seasons:—“The relative temperatures of
December, January, and February differ considerably; any one of these
months may be the coldest in different years. In some years snow exposed
to the sun thaws very slightly during these months; in other winters
there is no thaw whatever. The snow attains its greatest depth, about
three feet, in March. By April 10, the snow begins to thaw decidedly in
the sunshine. From May 1 to May 6, the earlier waterfowl arrive. The
small streams break up about May 10 or 12. Between the middle and the
end of May, most of the small birds arrive. At the end of May or early
in June, the earlier shrubs and herbaceous plants flower and sprout
their leaves. Frogs are heard at the same time. By the last week of May
there is

BRIGHT LIGHT AT MIDNIGHT.

No snow, excepting the remains of deep drifts, is left. On June 8
(1826), the small lake was clear of ice, having been frozen for two
hundred and forty days. By the middle of June the summer is fairly
established. Great Bear lake begins to break up about June 20, and drift
ice sometimes obstructs navigation until the first or second week in
August. By July 25 blueberries (_vaccinium uliginosum_) are ripe. At the
beginning of August or first of September snow falls. Several frosts set
in by the last of September. In October, when the soil begins to freeze,
the summer thaw has penetrated about twenty-one inches, beneath which
the ground is perpetually frozen. The small lakes are frozen over by
October 10 or 12, and the last of the waterfowl depart. The bays of
Great Bear lake are filled with new ice by the end of October or early
in November, but the centre of the lake does not freeze over until
December. The ice attains a thickness of about eight feet.”

Bear river opens at its head early in May, the result (according to
Richardson) of its being fed by warm water from the depths of the lake.
Probably from the same cause the lake remains open at the outlet until
very late in the autumn, or throughout the winter. At the rapid of Bear
river the ice forms from the bottom and sides and finally completely
blocks the stream. The resulting overflow continually adds to the volume
of ice, which reaches an enormous thickness. The heat of an ordinary
summer is insufficient to melt this mass entirely, and great quantities
of it usually exist on the south or sheltered bank throughout the
season. This vast accumulation of ice probably prevents the lower part
of the river from opening as soon as the early disruption of its upper
part would seem to justify. Richardson states that the lower part
usually opens in June, while Petitot gives the usual time as the last of
May. In 1904 it was already open when the Mackenzie broke up at Fort
Norman on May 21.

Great Bear lake, according to the Geological Survey, has an area of
approximately eleven thousand four hundred square miles and lies three
hundred and ninety-one feet above the level of the sea. Its shores, with
the exception of parts of MacTavish bay, are rather low.

The area between Great Bear lake and the Arctic coast is said to be
fifty thousand square miles, or about equal to England in size. It is
nearly all to the north of the Arctic circle, and it is doubtful if it
has any agricultural value, unless Doctor Grenfell’s idea of introducing
reindeer ranching as a commercial enterprise develops.

ANDERSON RIVER COUNTRY.

According to Mr. MacFarlane’s description of Anderson river region,
north of Great Bear lake, the greater part of the ground is every season
covered with short grasses, mosses, and small flowering plants, while
patches of sedgy or peaty soil occur at longer or shorter distances. On
these, as well as along the smaller rivulets and river and lake banks,
Labrador tea, crow-berries, and a few other kinds of berries, dwarf
birch, willows, etc., grow. Large flat spaces had the honeycombed
appearance usually presented in early spring by land which has been
turned over in the autumn. There were few signs of vegetation on these,
while some sandy and many other spots were virtually sterile.

The area between Great Bear lake, the Mackenzie and the western part of
Great Slave lake, represents some thirty-five thousand square miles.
With respect to this region, the indefatigable missionary, Abbé Petitot,
made numerous journeys through it, of which he subsequently published an
account. They are, however, merely valuable on geographical and
geological grounds. References to these reports will be found elsewhere.

Mr. Preble states in his report:—“To the westward of the northern arm,
and north of the main body of Great Slave lake, lies a low, broad
plateau, dotted with many lakes and muskegs. It contains no rivers of
consequence and is mainly rather thinly wooded, though a number of large
prairies occur in the western part, north of the outlet of Great Slave
lake.”

RUSSIAN PROVINCES IN THE SAME LATITUDE.

Reference has already been made in this chapter to an interesting
comparison made by Wm. Ogilvie, D.L.S., between the Mackenzie country
and Finland and Scandinavia.

In his examination before the Senate committee of 1888, Doctor G. M.
Dawson instituted a comparison between parts of northwestern Canada and
a province of northern European Russia as follows:—“I have a few notes
here worth considering while we are dealing with the question of this
northern country. I looked up the circumstances of the northern
provinces of Russia and I found that the province of Russia which seemed
to compare most nearly with that shown on this map, both in its relation
in Russia to the Atlantic, corresponding to the relation of this country
to the Pacific, and also in its latitude, is the province of Vologda.
That province has a total area of one hundred and fifty-five thousand,
two hundred and sixty-five square miles, and it is chiefly drained to
the north like the country shown here. It lies between latitudes 58° and
65°. It is about seven hundred and fifty miles in greatest length and
three hundred miles greatest width. It is drained by the Dwina river
chiefly. Its products are carried by this river to Archangel and
exported thence in vessels by White sea in the same way that we hope
this northern country of ours may be served by the Mackenzie and Arctic
sea. The mouth of the Dwina is in latitude 65°, only a little south of
the latitude of the mouth of the Mackenzie. The climate of the two
countries is very similar. The winters are severe and the summers warm.
There is no very heavy rainfall, such as we find near the western coasts
bordering on the Atlantic and on the Pacific. The exports from that
province of Vologda are oats, rye, barley, hemp, flax and pulse. The
mineral products are salt, copper, iron and marble. Horses and cattle
are reared, while the skins of various wild animals, as well as pitch
and turpentine, are exported. This province supports a population of one
million, one hundred and sixty-one thousand inhabitants.[19]

“That province is not in Siberia but in Russia proper. Now, we have
areas to the north which may make several provinces like Vologda, and
for the purpose of illustrating this point I have made a very rough
calculation here, which as it is founded largely on suppositions, is
perhaps scarcely worthy of being presented to the committee, but may
serve to give an idea. With reference to the agricultural area of Peace
river, I confine myself to a tract roughly marked on the map as to which
I have some personal knowledge. Without going over what I have already
written in reply to that question and which is largely embodied in a
report published some years ago, I may say that the area which is
included in the upper portion of Peace river country, is about
thirty-one thousand five hundred square miles. The proportion which I
estimated as arable land is twenty-three thousand, five hundred square
miles. That would give ninety-four thousand quarter-sections if it were
subdivided. Reckoning a family of five persons on each, that area would
be capable of supporting a population of four hundred and seventy
thousand, or in round figures say five hundred thousand. I do not think
it would be at all beyond the mark (though I am speaking now from the
report of others, because I have not been farther down Peace river
myself) to assume that there is another area at least equally great of
arable land in Mackenzie valley to the north of this. That will give
another population of say five hundred thousand. Now, if we take the
headwaters of the Mackenzie and the Yukon west of the mountains, I think
we shall be well within the limits of probability if we say that we have
there thirty thousand square miles of that region which may be
cultivated with advantage. This, on the same basis as before, would
support a population of six hundred thousand persons, or a total of say
one million, five hundred thousand persons in Mackenzie valley, and
adjacent tracts, to the north altogether of the Saskatchewan watershed,
and on the west of the mountains, north of British Columbia. I think we
might, without exaggeration, by including miners, fur traders, hunters,
lumbermen and those engaged in transport or trade, besides those in
outlying fertile sections not included in this—double the total just
arrived at. This will give us a population of three million people in
that part of the Dominion alone. As I am not personally familiar with
lower Mackenzie region east of the mountains, I may have underestimated
its value.

A SIBERIAN PROVINCE.

Along the same lines the late Robert E. Young, D.L.S., at that time
Superintendent of Railway Lands and Chief Geographer, giving evidence
before the select standing committee of the Canadian House of Commons on
Agriculture and Colonization, March 11, 1908, instituted in a graphic
manner a comparison between Mackenzie basin and the Siberian province of
Tobolsk.

Mr. Young had prepared a map of the province of Tobolsk drawn to the
same scale as a map of Canada hanging in the room, and attached the
small map to the larger, overlying part of the valley of the Mackenzie,
taking care that the lines of latitude corresponded exactly.

This demonstrated that rather more than half the province of Tobolsk is
north of the 60th parallel, which is the southern limit of the country
immediately under discussion, although the southern portion of the
Russian province extends in a narrow point as far south as 52° 15′′, its
general southern boundary is, in latitude, about ten miles north of
Athabaska or one hundred miles north of Winnipeg.

Mr. Young proceeded to point out on the map of Tobolsk, the location of
the chief cities of the Russian province:—Tobolsk, with a population of
twenty thousand, four hundred and twenty-seven, situated at exactly the
latitude of Fort Vermilion on Peace river; and Omsk, on the line of the
great Siberian Railway, with a population of thirty-seven thousand, four
hundred and seventy, situated at a spot corresponding with a point ten
miles north of Athabaska, and about a hundred miles north of Edmonton.
Mr. Young also pointed out the situation of the city of Tomsk, with
fifty-two thousand and five population, a province adjoining Tobolsk,
situated at about the same latitude as Chipewyan on Lake Athabaska, or a
trifle farther north. Mr. Young went on to explain that in 1900 the
population of the province of Tobolsk was one million five hundred
thousand.[20]

A LARGE TOWN NORTH OF WRIGLEY’S LATITUDE.

Asked how far north the line of habitation extended, Mr. Young
replied:—“I might say that two-thirds of the way up we find a road
marked on the map which would indicate settlement, I suppose. I also
have figures here of the population of some eight or ten towns in the
province of Tobolsk. There is one of one thousand, another of three
thousand, another of seven thousand, one of eight thousand, and so on.
The farthest north is the town of Bere-zoff, with a population of one
thousand two hundred and in latitude 63·50°” (some ten miles north of
Fort Wrigley).

Mr. Young, being asked as to the number of convicts who had been sent
into Tobolsk, replied:—“I do not know as to that. Whether they were
convicts or not, in 1900 they raised six million, four hundred and
eighty thousand bushels of wheat, three million odd bushels of rye, nine
hundred and seventy-two thousand bushels of barley, and ten million, six
hundred and seventeen thousand bushels of oats. These figures are
contained in the Encyclopedia Britannica.” (In 1906 the figures
were:—Wheat, eleven million, seven hundred and seventy-nine thousand
bushels; rye, four million, three hundred and forty-four thousand
bushels; barley, eight hundred and twenty-nine thousand bushels; oats,
thirteen million, eight hundred and eighteen thousand bushels).[21]

Asked if it was not the southern portion of the province in which most
of these crops were raised, Mr. Young replied:—“It certainly would be.
I think there is no question that it would be in the most southerly
portion. All the information I have would go to show that settlement
would not extend to the most northerly regions. Still the fact that
there were towns of one thousand people in the northern portion would go
to show that there must be something being done there that would support
a town of that size. I have tried to work out some parallel between the
climatic conditions there and our own country, but I am not able to give
it to you exactly. I think that the figures given by the Russian
government would probably be the most favourable that they could
furnish. The mean temperature for the period from September 1 to June 1,
which would include the winter months—I think that is all it is
necessary to discuss—would for the province of Tobolsk be practically
the

SAME TEMPERATURE AS AT FORT SIMPSON.

It is a very striking thing that a million and a half of people live in
that province, and that they raised six million, four hundred and eighty
thousand bushels of wheat in 1900. Surely if our country is as good as
we think it is, we ought to people it to as great and even a greater
extent, and to complete the parallel between the two, I think I can say
without any hesitation that we have something which they have not got,
and that is the benefit of British institutions.”

Mr. Young, later on in his evidence, remarked that there are a great
many other statistics about Siberia that are interesting. For instance,
from a province adjoining Tobolsk they exported forty thousand pounds of
honey in 1900.

SAMPLES OF NORTHERN GROWN WHEAT.

Mr. Young, during his examination upon the occasion here referred to,
gave a great deal of information regarding agricultural development and
possibilities in the Mackenzie country. He showed the committee a sample
of Ladoga wheat grown at Fort Simpson, and in producing it said:—“I got
it from Doctor Saunders, Director of Experimental Farms. Fort Simpson is
the farthest north of these red points[22] just short of latitude 62° or
just about it. I showed that wheat to a gentleman who is accounted an
authority on the subject, and I think you could not get a better
authority; I am referring to Senator Finlay Young. I said, ‘Mr. Young,
would you please look at that wheat, but do not refer to the label on
the bottle, and tell me what you think of it?’ Mr. Young examined the
sample in the way that men who are experts on wheat often do. I think he
saw nearly every grain of it; he took good care to do so. He said, ‘It
is very nice wheat, I would call it good wheat. It has been slightly
frosted, but I think that wheat would go about sixty-four pounds to the
bushel.’ Well, the label on the sample says ‘Ladoga wheat, grown at Fort
Simpson on Mackenzie river, sixty-two pounds to the bushel.’”

Producing another sample of grain, Mr. Young remarked:—“Now gentlemen,
here is a sample of wheat from Fort Vermilion.” I showed that also to
Senator Young and got his opinion on it. In both instances he expressed
his opinion before he knew where either of the samples came from. He
said, “That is pretty nice wheat. It is not so nice a wheat as the
other, but I think it would make first rate flour; it is good wheat.”

BETTER RESULTS EXPECTED.

Mr. Young, in his evidence, drew attention to the fact that the posts in
the far north at which grain had been grown had not been selected for
wheat raising, but because they were convenient locations for the fur
trade. He proceeded:—“I want to discuss that point a little further. I
say there are three reasons why we can expect better results in wheat
raising in our northern country than has been accomplished up to the
present time.

“(1) I will quote what Professor Macoun has stated in a pamphlet
relating to the Yukon:—‘When grain ripens in the country and is again
sown there, it will take on the conditions of its environment and mature
earlier, and early frosts like those attributed to Manitoba will have no
effect, as the crop will mature before they come. I may remark here that
the wheat in the northwest ripens earlier now than it did twenty years
ago, and many people believe that it is the climate that has changed,
whereas it is only that the wheat has adapted itself to its
environment.’ I think that any gentleman who has been following the
trend of affairs in the northwest will agree with me that the conditions
are better with respect to possible injury by summer frosts than they
were twenty years ago. I think that cannot be questioned. That is one
reason that is given.

“(2) Now, a few days ago, I asked a gentleman who is better able to
express an opinion on the point than I am, what he thought of that
statement of Professor Macoun’s. He said:—‘I don’t altogether agree
with that statement. I do not hesitate at all in saying that the
improvement is marked, but I will account for it in another way. If you
raise wheat on virgin soil on the prairie it will grow to perhaps about
the height of a man’s shoulder the first year. The next year it will not
be quite so high. The third year it will be perhaps not so high as the
second year, but it will mature earlier. Devote that land to some other
use for a year or two and then go back to the cultivation of wheat
again, and you will get the wheat growing to the height of about the
second or third year, but it will mature earlier. The soil is
sharpened.’ He explained to me that in Red river valley, where the land
is heavier, it would take very many years to bring about that result,
and it would not be of so much value to this generation, but in the
lighter soil, farther west, it has a marked effect, and, as he argued,
there is no question about it.

“(3) The third reason why we can expect better results in that north
country is because the staff at the Experimental Farm have been steadily
carrying on experiments with a view to obtaining a variety of wheat that
will ripen a few days earlier, and if they can shorten the term for the
ripening of wheat by four or five days or a week, it will bring into the
certain line, as to wheat growing, an enormous area of land. There is no
question about it. They have accomplished some good things already, and
they expect to accomplish a great deal more.”

Mr. Young stated before the committee on this occasion that “there is no
question about it that in the north country there are grasses of the
greatest possible value to cattle raising, finer grasses than there are
in other parts of the northwest.”

PROFESSOR MACOUN’S ESTIMATE STILL HOLDS.

Speaking in his evidence generally about the suitability of the far
northwestern country for agricultural pursuits, and specially discussing
the climatic condition, Mr. Young remarked:—“About three weeks ago I
wrote to Professor Macoun and gave him a list of questions about that
country to which I asked him to give me answers. I think it is a very
remarkable thing that in his reply he says: ‘In my report to Mr.
Alexander Mackenzie in 1877, just when I was fresh in the northwest, I
gave details about certain districts of the northland which I could not
give in a letter, but I would suggest that extracts from this report may
be taken and placed upon file with this letter, as my statements and
conclusions as printed thirty years ago still remain without impeachment
at the present time.’ I think it is a remarkable thing that with respect
to the country through which Professor Macoun went in 1872 and 1873, and
which excited his enthusiasm—this is the country that I am trying to
tell you about—he now says of it: ‘My statements remain without
impeachment at the present time.’ Now, he speaks in this letter of two
facts that I think are very striking. He says, ‘In conclusion, I may say
that the climate of the whole northland is a stable one, and as local
conditions change it will improve, and where small spots are now called
good land, whole areas will take that term. The low altitude and the
long day are fixed conditions and will always be the same. The forest
will be cleared and the muskegs drained, and as the land becomes drier
the frosty conditions will pass away and a good country will result.’”

-----

[18] Franklin (“Narrative of a Journey, etc.”) relates that the
thermometer during the month of October, 1820, at Fort Enterprise
(headwaters of the Coppermine) never rose above 37° but never fell below
5°. The mean temperature for the month was 23°. The highest temperature
at the same place in the following April was 40° above zero, the lowest
32° below. The mean was 4° above zero. May 9, the snow had disappeared
from the ground. The first robin appeared May 14. The average
temperature for May was nearly 32° above zero; the greatest heat 68° and
the lowest 8°. At the end of the month there was constant daylight.

When the Franklin expedition was at Fort Franklin (west side of Great
Bear lake) in 1826, the first flower was gathered on May 27. (“Narrative
of a Second Expedition, etc.”)

[19] The population of Vologda, in 1910, the latest available, was one
million, five hundred and ninety-seven thousand, five hundred, or ten
per square mile. (E. J. C.)

[20] The figures for 1906 were:—city of Tobolsk, twenty thousand, eight
hundred; Omsk, forty-three thousand, four hundred; province of Tobolsk,
one million, six hundred and fifty-six thousand, seven hundred. In 1910,
the total population of the province of Tobolsk was given as one
million, seven hundred and sixty-nine thousand, eight hundred. According
to latest statistics available the population of the four million, eight
hundred and seventeen thousand, six hundred and eighty-seven square
miles comprising Siberia is eight million, two hundred and twenty
thousand, one hundred. Siberia in 1910 raised one hundred and seventy
million poods of cereals. A pood equals thirty-six pounds. E. J. C.

[21] According to a blue book issued by the Board of Trade of Great
Britain in 1905, the province of Tobolsk in 1901 contained three
million, eight hundred and four thousand, eight hundred and forty-seven
head of life stock, and from one district alone, viz: Kurgan (about the
latitude of Peace river) there was exported in 1902, nineteen million,
seven hundred and eleven thousand, four hundred and forty-six pounds of
butter, which was largely marketed in Great Britain. E. J. C.

[22] Referring to the map produced by Mr. Young before the committee, on
which he had shown the position of places where wheat had been grown in
northwestern Canada by a scheme of red discs appearing on the map.

CHAPTER XVI.

THE MACKENZIE RIVER REGION.

Tree Growth and Timber Resources.

Forests About Great Slave lake and Slave river.—Remarkable
Extension of Forest Growth Northward Down the Mackenzie.—Wide
Distribution of the Economically Important Canoe Birch.—
Magnificent Forests of Spruce and Big Cottonwood Trees in Liard
valley.—Useful Birch and Large Spruce Grow Within the Arctic
Circle.—Trees that are Centuries Old.—Northern Tree Growth May
be Hastened by Drainage.

The splendid forests along the banks of Slave and Mackenzie rivers have
been remarked by all who have ever travelled along the truly magnificent
waterway of the far northwest, and the fact has been abundantly
established that the growth of timber extends, along the rivers at
least, far beyond the Arctic circle, and well down the delta of the
Mackenzie. It is true that there are large muskeg and rocky areas in the
basin of the Mackenzie which support no tree growth, but the aggregate
forest wealth of the country is immense.

Mr. Elihu Stewart, formerly Superintendent of Forestry, testified before
the Senate committee of 1907 that the principal tree between Rocky
mountains and the plains is the spruce, mostly the white spruce, and
from its position near the prairie there is no doubt that it will be
more sought after to meet the increasing demands from that quarter. The
country along the upper waters north of Saskatchewan, Athabaska and
Peace rivers, is partly prairie and partly wood. The varieties of timber
are principally aspen and balsam poplar, the former predominating, and
white spruce. The poplars, as we go north, seem to increase in size and
height. Below the junction of the Smoky they grow very clean and
straight, not over a foot or fourteen inches in diameter, but reaching a
height of seventeen or eighteen feet, making excellent building timber,
as well as fencing and fuel. In some parts there are stretches of good
spruce well adapted for lumbering purposes. There has so far been but
little destruction from fire in this quarter. The land is mostly level,
soil excellent, and if the summer frosts do not prevent it, the country
will begin soon to settle up and there will be an ample supply of timber
for local uses, if not for export to the adjoining prairie regions. Mr.
Stewart said he never saw as fine poplar as he saw there. A considerable
number of poplars were over a foot, but a foot would be a fair average.
He had seen poplar in all parts of the prairie country, but never saw
anything growing up as straight.

LIMIT OF TREE GROWTH FAR NORTH.

Mr. Stewart explained that spruce suitable for commercial purposes grows
to Arctic sea. He was astonished to find that the limit of tree growth
extended as far north as it does. He thought it extended probably ten
degrees farther north in this district than in Labrador. The different
kinds of trees that grow in Mackenzie basin include white spruce, black
spruce, the larch or tamarack, which is found as far north as the
spruce, the jackpine and the balsam. Mr. Stewart did not see any balsam
in the Arctic circle; aspen, white poplar, balm of Gilead and birch are
all found down as far as Fort McPherson. The natives make their canoes
out of birch bark at Fort McPherson. The size of the timber becomes less
towards the north. There is timber probably fourteen inches in diameter
growing near the junctions of Peace and Slave rivers. Below Fort Good
Hope the timber is smaller. Some of it has been made into flooring, and
lumber is made from the timber there. There is a large supply of spruce
suitable for pulp as far north as that.

Mr. Stewart, replying to a question, said he thought it possible to use
this poplar wood for commercial purposes. It is very good poplar. It
will make pulp, and where it is large enough it can be sawed. It makes
excellent flooring. The white poplar in the north is of a better quality
than the poplar in Ottawa district. In Saskatchewan district and in the
far west it is different. In a colder climate it grows more slowly.

As to the extent of the forests, Mr. Stewart remarked that wherever
there was a stream there would be a belt of timber.

Along Athabaska river there is a very big waterpower. There are Grand
rapids and various other points eighty miles north. On Slave river there
are about sixteen miles of rapids, which constitute the interruption to
navigation, and it would make excellent waterpower. There is no
waterpower on the Mackenzie below Fort Smith, on the main stream. From
Smith Landing to Fort Smith the timber is jackpine, some of which is
quite large enough for railway ties. The timber on the heavier soil
consists of black and white poplar, spruce, birch and willow of small
size and of little value.

TIMBER ALONG SLAVE RIVER.

Mr. McConnell states (Geol. Survey Report, 1887-8) that on both sides of
Slave river below Salt river are level plains, which extend without any
evident elevation as far as the eye can reach, and support extensive
forests of white spruce and Banksian pine mingled with larch and rough
and smooth barked poplar. The spruce frequently attains a diameter of
eighteen inches and makes excellent timber. In the vicinity of Slave
river rapids the country is mostly level, and is covered with white
spruce, Banksian pine, the rough and smooth barked poplars and various
species of willow and alder. The Mackenzie river steamer “Wrigley” was
built here in the winter of 1887, and the timber used in construction
was all obtained from the surrounding forest.

Mr. Wm. Ogilvie says in his report:—

“The level country surrounding the lower half of Great Slave river is
all well timbered with fine large spruce, equalling in this lower
Athabaska and Peace rivers, and I think, when the time comes, that here
will be found this district’s principal supply lumber. On the high,
light soil round Fort Smith, the trees are small and generally of no
value except for fuel. Along the river, between the rapids and Lake
Athabaska, there are many small areas of flat, swampy ground which would
supply some very fair timber.

“The varieties of trees along the lower part of the river are few,
spruce, with a few small tamarack, some small birch, and a few poplar
constituting the bulk of the forest. The spruce far outnumber all the
rest. On some of the islands there is much shrubbery, willows, and
alders growing in profusion in the swampy places; but, in general, the
undergrowth is stunted and thin, especially on the uplands.”

Mr. E. A. Preble of the United States Biological Survey, describing
Slave river in his report writes:—“Here the willows and poplars which
border the stream alternate with stretches of fine white spruce (_Picea
canadensis_), some of which attain a diameter of three feet and rear
their summits to a height of one hundred and fifty feet.”

The aspen poplar (_Populus tremuloides_), according to Mr. Preble,
occurs nearly throughout the wooded region. In favourable places along
the Athabaska and Slave it attains a large size, and this is the case
also about Fort Simpson.

[Illustration: Slave river near Fort Smith.]

THE WHITE SPRUCE.

Mr. E. A. Preble states that the white spruce (_Picea canadensis_)
reaches its perfection in the alluvial bottoms of Slave river
valley:—“In favourable places along Slave river it attains a diameter
of three feet, and a height of nearly one hundred and fifty. This
species, usually called ‘pine’ in the north, is the commonest timber
tree of the region, and occurs north to the limit of the forest. Along
certain rivers which enter the Barren Grounds from the southward, the
range of this species is extended far beyond its general limits, and
sometimes the isolated colonies are of large extent. Most of the lumber
used in building and general constructive work throughout the region is
furnished by this species. Its wood is soft and easily worked, and
though admirably adapted for some purposes, is used for others only from
necessity. Its slender fibrous roots, split into long strips are used by
the natives to sew together the pieces of birch bark in the constrution
of canoes and various utensils. Its bark, stripped from the trunks in
early spring, forms the usual roofing material, taking the place of
shingles throughout the region, except at a few favoured posts.”

Mr. Preble states that the Banksian pine (pinus divaricata) is the only
species of pine north of the Athabaska. He reports that along Slave
river it appears only occasionally, usually where high gravelly banks
approach the river. It is common, however, on the rocky hills about
Chipewyan and Smith Landing, and is the predominating tree on the
rolling sandy plains on Smith portage and about Fort Smith.

A COMPREHENSIVE SUMMARY.

A very comprehensive summary of the evidence available as to the timber
resources of the Mackenzie was prepared by R. E. Young, D.L.S., and
submitted by him to the House of Commons committee on Agriculture and
Colonization in 1908. In this document, Mr. Young had his information
classified according to valleys, a very convenient arrangement
considering that the best of the timber growth is in the valleys, and
that the rivers are the only routes of exploration as yet generally
available. Some additional data have since been obtained which will be
incorporated with Mr. Young’s statement, or substituted for portions of
it, this being according to a suggestion made by Mr. Young himself
shortly before his most regrettable death. The succeeding pages of this
chapter consist largely of Mr. Young’s own statement (see report of
committee, pages 159 to 188).

Of the excellence of the forests from Salt river down there can be no
doubt. As long ago as 1772 Samuel Hearne, the first white man to reach
Great Slave lake on his return journey from the mouth of the Coppermine,
entered the mouth of Slave river and went up it some distance before
starting inland on his journey back to Hudson bay. It is very
interesting to note what Hearne at that distant date said: “The woods
around this river, particularly the pines and poplars, are the tallest
and stoutest that I have seen in any part of North America. The birch
also grows to a considerable size and some species of the willow are
likewise tall, but none of them have any trunk like those in England.”
On the island of the lake near the mouth of the river, Hearne saw great
quantities of driftwood. He says: “some of this wood is large enough to
make masts for the largest ships that are built. The woods through which
we were to pass were in many places so thick that it was necessary to
cut a path before the women could pass with their sledges, and in other
places so much of the woods had formerly been set on fire and burnt that
we were frequently obliged to walk farther than we otherwise should have
done, before we could find green brush enough to floor our tents.”

Bishop Clut, O.M.I., before the Senate committee of 1888, stated that
from Fort Smith to Fort Resolution there is a great quantity of
beautiful forest, white spruce or ordinary larch. Spruce from two to
three feet in diameter is found. The birch of the country is very hard
and would make good furniture. It is from birch that they make traineau,
buggies, chairs and snowshoes. In the country lying to the south and
west of Great Slave lake there is a good deal of forest of beautiful
coppice wood, ordinary spruce, and black or red spruce.

THE TIMBER ABOUT GREAT SLAVE LAKE.

Hay river flows into the southwest part of Great Slave lake. Of the
country around, Mr. McConnell says: “Grassy and partly wooded plains
extend northwards from Peace river and skirt its southern shores. It is
the northern limit of the prairie region. Near its mouth the country on
both sides is thickly forested with Banksian pine and white spruce to
Alexandra falls.”

The country from here east to Slave river is known to be well wooded,
but strange as it may seem, the country from Slave river east has never
been explored since Samuel Hearne passed through it in 1772, one hundred
and thirty-six years ago. Somewhere southeast of the lake, Hearne spoke
of a long narrow lake “entirely surrounded with high land which produces
a vast quantity of fir trees, but none of them grow to a great height in
those parts. Their branches, however, spread wider than those of firs
three times their height and thickness do in Europe, so that they
resemble an apple tree in shape. They seem rich in tar as the wood of
them will burn like a candle and emit as strong a smell and as much
black smoke as the staves of an old tar barrel. The under woods were so
thick in these parts as to render travelling through them very
difficult.” Of the part of Great Slave lake where Hearne crossed it, he
says: “The point where we crossed it is said to be the narrowest. It is
full of islands most of which are clothed with fine, tall poplars, birch
and pines, etc.”

Mr. E. A. Preble, in his report, has this to say of Great Slave
lake:—“Great Slave lake lies wholly within the forested region, though
some of its eastern affluents drain large areas of treeless country. Its
southwestern shores, being watered by rivers coming from the south and
southwest, are well wooded, while the northern shores, exposed for most
of the year to cold winds from the north and watered by colder streams,
are poorly wooded. The soil conditions, also, being more favourable on
the southern side of the lake, exert a marked influence on the
foresting. The eastern arm of the lake, however, is largely removed from
these modifying influences, and the conditions on its northern and
southern borders are more nearly uniform.”

FORESTS NORTH OF THE LAKE.

The country to the north of Great Slave lake has been much more
thoroughly examined.

R. G. McConnell (Geol. Rep., 1887-88) wintered at Fort Providence on the
Mackenzie and made a winter journey northeast to Fort Rae, on the long
arm of the lake that reaches out to the north. From Fort Providence to
Birch lake, half the distance across, he crossed the Grand Brulé, the
scene of a former destructive fire, wherein he says there were three
wide prairies with the intervening timber belts. From here on he crossed
first a well wooded country where some excellent spruce was seen, then a
more scantily clad country with groves of spruce, poplar, birch and
alder, and thence to Fort Rae a thick spruce forest.

J. M. Bell (Geol. Rep., 1904) describes the country along Martin river
and chain of lakes emptying into the long northern arm of the lake as
thickly wooded with aspen, balsam poplar, canoe-birch, white spruce and
Banksian pine.

Mr. Preble made the trip from the north of Great Slave lake to Great
Bear lake via the lake, and portage route. August 25, a few days after
passing the height of land, he reports:—“The portage track led over
rocky ground on the left bank. Favourable spots at the rapid supported a
good growth of spruce, with a luxuriant undergrowth of _Viburnum
pauciflorum_, _Rosa acicularis_, _Rubus strigosus_, and _Vaccinium
uliginosum_. Since leaving Lake Hardisty I had observed an increased
luxuriance in the forest growth, evidently the result of a more
favourable soil and the slightly decreased altitude.”

Mr. Preble states that the Banksian pine “occurs commonly about the
northern arm of Great Slave lake. On my route to the northward of Fort
Rae it was seen in many places on Grandin river, reaching a diameter of
eighteen inches, but not growing very tall. North of the height of land
it was rare, but I saw many trees on a portage a few miles north of the
outlet of Lake Hardisty.”

Mr. Preble states that on the canoe route between the north arm of Great
Slave lake and Great Bear lake the white spruce is common, varying in
luxuriance according to the local conditions.

THE CANOE BIRCH.

The canoe birch (_betula papyrifera_), according to Mr. Preble, is a
common tree throughout the wooded region. It reaches its perfection in
the southern part of the country and northward gradually decreases in
size. On the canoe route north of Fort Rae, it was found to be common,
reaching a diameter of nearly one foot as far north as Lake St. Croix. A
tree five inches in diameter, examined near that lake, had sixty-five
annual rings. Another specimen one and three-quarter inches in diameter,
on the shores of Lake Hardisty, had been growing twenty-five years, and
one three-fourths of an inch thick was fifteen years old. This tree is
of great economic importance to the natives of the region. Its wood,
though soft when green, is rather hard when seasoned, and takes a high
polish. The frames of snowshoes, the runners of sleds and toboggans, and
the handles of axes and other tools are usually made of it. In addition
to furnishing the covering for canoes, its bark is used in the
construction of baskets, and various household utensils, and to some
extent for constructing shelters.

The natives gather up the sap in spring and boil it down into syrup. An
incision is made with the axe on the side of the tree, and the sap
gathers and drops from a projecting point of bark. At Fort Simpson in
1904, the sap was running freely from April 20 to May 1.

Yellowknife river flows into the eastern side of the north arm of Great
Slave lake coming from a northern direction. Sir John Franklin, who
ascended and descended this river in his journeys of 1819-22, says that
this river flows between high rocky banks on which there is sufficient
soil to support pines, birch and poplars, but in the upper stretches the
country has a very barren aspect. From here to Fort Enterprise the
country is much the same. Mr. Back (afterwards Sir George Back), one of
his party on his winter journey back from Fort Enterprise, wrote that
after passing Reindeer lake “the scenery consisted of barren rocks and
high hills, covered with lofty pine, birch and larch trees. There was a
visible increase of wood, consisting of birch and larch, as we inclined
to the southward.”

FORT ENTERPRISE.[23]

In his journal of August 19, 1820, Sir John Franklin, speaking of his
winter quarters known as Fort Enterprise, says: “The trees were numerous
and of a far greater size than we had supposed them to be yesterday,
some of the pines being thirty or forty feet high and two feet in
diameter at the root.” Near by was the Winter river, whose banks, he
says, were well clothed with pines. On the same day they unfortunately
set fire to the woods. “A fire was made on the south side of the river
to inform the chief of our arrival, which, spreading before a strong
wind, caught the whole wood, and we were completely enveloped in a cloud
of smoke for the three following days.” Their winter quarters were made
from wood cut in the vicinity, though of the size of the logs no mention
is made. From here to Coppermine river the only trees were scattered
dwarf pines.

Mr. Wm. Ogilvie states that on the flats between Great Slave lake and
Fort Simpson, as well as those adjoining the lake, “there is much forest
that would yield a large amount of good sized spruce and poplar.”

Mr. Elihu Stewart says that the land at the entrance to Mackenzie river
is low and covered with spruce and tamarack of small size. Islands
covered with green timber are numerous and the appearance is suggestive
of the lower St. Lawrence. The timber along the Mackenzie to Fort
Simpson is smaller than that found along Slave river, but nevertheless
it is of sufficient size in some cases for lumber.

Sir John Franklin (Journey, 1819-22) says that around Fort Providence
the surface of the hills is generally naked, but in the valleys between
them a few spruce, aspen and birch grow.

Sir Alexander MacKenzie (1789) also speaks of the country north of the
Mackenzie after leaving Slave lake as follows: “He (an Indian) at the
same time informed us that a river falls in from the north, which takes
its rise in Horn mountain, now in sight, which is the country of the
Beaver Indians, and that he and his relatives frequently meet on that
river. He also added that there were very extensive plains on both sides
of it, which abound in buffaloes and moose deer.”

Mr. R. G. McConnell (Geol. Survey Rep. 1887-88) says that from Fort
Providence southwest along Beaver river to Lake Bis-tcho is a desolate
looking plain scantily covered with spruce and tamarack. Lake Bis-tcho
is surrounded by a flat country, wooded with spruce, birch and tamarack
of fair size.

ABOUT FORT SIMPSON.

James Anderson of Winnipeg left Fort Simpson in 1852 when eleven years
old (Senate Report 1888). He says: “Round Fort Simpson itself, I
remember the timber was very large. It was fir, poplar and birch.” He
calls the fir hemlock but no doubt means the spruce. Poplar and birch he
says were the other varieties. He says that the fir was a very large
kind. The men used to square the timber to about one foot square, for
building their houses, and the fort itself was built of squared timber.
He says the way he remembers the birch was that it was used so much in
the making of snowshoes and other things.

Mr. Stewart (1906) says there is a small-sized sawmill at Fort Simpson,
not now running, in which lumber twelve inches in width was cut and used
in buildings at this post. “One cannot but be struck,” he says, “with
the vast quantity of spruce along the route traversed (from Fort
Providence to Fort Simpson), which is a little under size for lumber but
would make excellent pulpwood.”

Mr. R. G. McConnell, in his evidence before the Senate committee of
1907, stated that the timber about Fort Simpson is confined to large
spruce. White spruce is the main tree all through that country. Spruce
from a few inches up to two feet through occurs all the way along the
Mackenzie, on the flats, and on nearly all the tributary streams.

Reporting upon the Banksian pine Mr. Preble states:—“On the Mackenzie
it is common north to about latitude 64 degrees. About Fort Simpson, in
suitable localities, it forms groves of well-grown trees reaching a
diameter of eighteen inches. A tree eleven inches in diameter near the
base, examined at Fort Simpson, had one hundred and two annual rings. On
the north slope of the Nahanni mountains, seventy-five miles below Fort
Simpson, the species ascends to about one thousand feet and then becomes
a dwarfed shrub and disappears. On the southern slopes of the same
mountains it occurs as a fairly well-grown tree about two thousand feet
near the summit.”

As to the balsam poplar (_Populus balsamifera_) Mr. Preble
reports:—“The balsam poplar inhabits the entire length of Athabaska,
Slave, and Mackenzie rivers, reaching its greatest perfection of habit
on Athabaska, Slave, Peace, and Liard rivers. On the Mackenzie, at Fort
Simpson, it is a stately tree, but below that point it rapidly decreases
in size, and on the lower Mackenzie and Peel rivers occurs only as a
small tree. Its wood is put to very little use except for fuel, and even
for this purpose it is not well adapted.”

THE TAMARACK AND ITS USES.

Mr. Preble reports the Koch tamarack (_Larix Laricina_) “is common at
Fort Simpson and reaches a good size. On June 1, 1904, the leaves were
just beginning to appear, tinging the swamps with their beautiful shade
of green. As I descended the river the progress of vegetation kept pace
in a general way with my rate of travel. At Fort Norman, on June 11, the
leaves and cones of the tamaracks were just appearing and at Fort Good
Hope, ten days later, they were about half grown.

“The tamarack is found throughout the region north to the limit of the
forest, occurring mainly in muskegs where it is sometimes the
predominating tree. Since its wood is tougher than any other native to
the region, it is used to a considerable extent to form the keels and
gunwales of boats, and for other purposes where extra strength is
required.”

According to the evidence of Mr. R. G. McConnell before the Senate
committee of 1907:—“Along the Liard there are good bunches of timber,
and it is the same with all these tributary streams. Once away from the
flats the timber is sparse and the trees are small. Small black spruce
grow on the muskegs. The timber is simply on the flats and extends back
two or three miles from the river. That is not solidly timbered on
either side of the river. The poplar does not grow to a large tree as it
does down here. It runs about three to six inches through. The rough
bark poplar grows up to a foot or more.”

MAGNIFICENT FORESTS OF SPRUCE.

Bishop Clut, before the Senate committee of 1888, stated that on Liard
river, the south branch of which he had ascended often, and on Peace
river also, there were magnificent forests of spruce. The trees were
from eighty to one hundred feet high on the islands.

The branch of the Liard which extends south is called the Nelson.
William Ogilvie explored this whole region across to the Peace, coming
out at Fort St. John. Across the height of land the timber is very poor.
On the Nelson above the forks where the Sikanni Chief branch flows in,
it is heavily timbered. Mr. Ogilvie passed many extensive flats covered
with beautiful spruce trees. The valley is quite wide and clothed with
fine timber for a distance above the forks of about thirty miles.
Farther down, above Fort Nelson, there are many extensive areas of open
woods which almost might be classed as prairie, no doubt the result of
forest fires.

Of Fort Nelson, Mr. Ogilvie says it is surrounded by dense, high forest,
and as the clearing around it is only a few acres in extent, much of the
sun’s warmth is lost during the day. The surface is all heavily wooded
and there are many very large trees, both spruce and balsam poplar. He
selected the average sized balsam poplar at Fort Nelson, cut it down and
made the following measurements of it:—Diameter at stump, exclusive of
bark, twenty-nine inches; at first limb, exclusive of bark, seventeen
and one-half inches; stump to first limb, ninety feet; number of growing
rings, one hundred and forty-five. The bark would add at least four
inches to the diameter.

LARGE TREES OF LIARD VALLEY.

Entering the valley of the Liard, from the Mackenzie, Mr. Elihu Stewart
says, there is a good deal of fine large spruce, which would make better
lumber than most of the spruce used in the settled part of the
territories, but as it is on the Arctic water system it is practically
out of reach. The balsam poplar, or as it is called here, cottonwood, is
very plentiful and very large, trees nearly four feet in diameter being
often seen, though between two or three feet is the average diameter of
the trees. These two trees constitute the great mass of the forest. A
few small white birches are occasionally seen and more frequently the
aspen or poplar. There are also, sometimes, a few balsam pines on the
top of sandy knolls.

A man who had explored the Liard told Mr. Stewart that he had never seen
finer saw-log timber anywhere. He also said that good birch, which is
highly prized by the Indians for bark for their canoes, was found there.

Mr. R. G. McConnell, in his report of his explorations in 1887, stated
that along the lower Liard the trees observed consisted of white spruce,
aspen and tall, straight cottonwood, with some Banksian pine and canoe
birch, and an undergrowth of willows and alders.

According to Mr. Ogilvie the country about Wrigley is wooded. He noticed
a spruce log near the post that was twenty inches in diameter. Mr.
Ogilvie states in his report: “It may, in short, be said, that away from
the immediate vicinity of the river, there is no timber of value in the
sense in which the term is used in the east. Below Fort Wrigley, and
even above that point, in some places the banks are low, flat and
swampy, with trees much larger than those on the higher lands, many of
them being fit to make fairly good lumber.”

Mr. Joseph Keele reported in 1908:—“The timber resources of Gravel
river (which flows into the Mackenzie from the westward above Fort
Norman) are very moderate, the white and black spruce trees of any
importance being confined to the alluvial flats, which on this river are
very limited in extent, and the best white groves average about ten
inches in diameter. Generally very few trees grow higher than about one
thousand feet above the river, owing to the steep slopes of rock and
talus of the valley walls.”

FORT NORMAN REGION.

According to Mr. Preble, the white spruce on the Mackenzie does not
attain the size reached farther south, but is still a stately tree. One
measured by Richardson on the Mackenzie above Fort Norman was one
hundred and twenty-two feet in height. On the alluvial banks and islands
of lower Mackenzie and Peel rivers it attains a diameter of eighteen
inches. On the northern slopes of the mountains near the mouth of the
Nahanni this tree ascends to timberline, but above an altitude of five
hundred feet seldom exceeds a height of twenty-five feet.

As has been already said, the general aspect of the forest does not
alter in the descent of the Mackenzie. The white spruce continues to be
the chief tree. In the Fort Norman quarter (speaking generally) it
attains a girth of four or five feet, and a height of about sixty in a
growth of from two to three hundred years, as shown by the annual layers
of wood. One tree, cut down in a sheltered valley near Clark’s hill,
south of Great Bear river which flows into the Mackenzie at Fort Norman,
measured the unusual length of one hundred and twenty-two feet, but was
comparatively slender. Most of the timber is twisted, particularly where
the trees grow in exposed situations. The Banksian pine was not traced
to the north of Great Bear river, but the black spruce, in a stunted
form, is found on the borders of swamps as far as the woods extend.

Great Bear river is described by J. M. Bell (Geological Survey Report
1904) as follows:—“The clear waters of Great Bear river join the
Mackenzie through a deep wooded valley. For the first forty miles the
banks are well wooded with white spruce, canoe birch, aspen and balsam
poplar. Mount Charles rises to a height of one thousand five hundred
feet on the left side of the river. In climbing the hill I was surprised
at the size of the trees around its lower slope. White spruce of about
twenty inches diameter were quite common as well as fine specimens of
canoe-birch, balsam, poplar and aspen. At the lake the country is quite
destitute of trees, as they have all been used for fuel by the Indians.”

Doctor Dawson stated before the Senate committee of 1888 that Richardson
had described the white spruce as attaining a girth of four or five
feet, and a height of sixty feet in Mackenzie valley as far north as
Bear lake river. One tree in that locality measured one hundred and
twenty-two feet in height. It appeared that the white spruce was the
most prevalent tree throughout Mackenzie valley, and its wood was fairly
good for all constructive purposes.

THE BLACK SPRUCE.

Mr. McConnell (Senate Committee Report, 1888) says that jackpine occurs
in places as far north as Fort Good Hope. Although not growing very
large some of the trees would be big enough for railway ties. He
explained that the country is not forest continually as it is here
(Ontario), but most of the country is open wood. Nearly all the muskegs
are covered with, or surrounded by, black spruce. Mr. McConnell agrees
with other travellers of this region in saying that very little change
in the character of the forest was observed in descending the Mackenzie,
and with the exception of the Banksian pine, which disappears south of
Bear river, the same species as previously noticed by Richardson are
found from Great Slave lake to the mouth of Peel river.

The Mackenzie has no rapids suitable for waterpower, but the streams
flowing into it must have.

Mr. Preble says of the black spruce (_Picea Mariana_):—“The black
spruce extends northward to the limit of the forest, but is confined
mainly to the muskegs, seldom growing on the alluvial bottom lands,
where the white spruce attains its perfection. It furnishes a poorer
quality of lumber than the white spruce, and is put to fewer uses. I
noted it in places all along the main route to the mouth of the
Mackenzie and on my canoe route to the eastward, nearly to Great Bear
lake.”

Mr. McConnell (Geol. Survey Report 1887-88) reports that along part of
the reach of the Mackenzie below Fort Good Hope the banks are low, and
the bordering plains are covered with a scattered growth of willow,
spruce and tamarack, with here and there patches of aspen on the drier
ridges. The spruce along part of this reach presents a remarkably
stunted and dwarfish appearance, but this is due more to the marshy
character of the ground than to climatic severity, as the same tree,
straight and well grown, was found much farther north.

BELOW FORT GOOD HOPE.

Mr. McConnell reports that the Mackenzie below the site of old Fort Good
Hope, where the stream takes a sharp turn to the west-south west, as far
as the mouth of Red river, is bordered by wooded plains. Groves of white
spruce were seen along this reach, containing trees measuring over
fifteen inches in diameter, but the average tree does not exceed six
inches. Mr. Stewart says that on an island near Fort Good Hope very good
spruce timber is cut into lumber by whipsaws. Below this the timber
seems to get poorer, although it improves again farther north. Mr.
Stewart says that below Fort Good Hope the timber is smaller although
some of it has been made into flooring and lumber is made from the
timber there. There is a large supply of spruce suitable for pulp.

Northeast of Fort Good Hope, through a chain of lakes to the headwaters
of Iroquois river, R. MacFarlane (Canadian Record of Science, vol. IV.)
says that the country appeared to be well timbered in every direction
with pines, juniper, several species of willow, and a few small groves
of poplar and birch.

On the Mackenzie itself the forest continues to within a comparatively
short distance from the Arctic ocean. The following extract is from Sir
John Richardson’s journal in 1848:—“The agency of man is working a
change in the aspect of the forest even in the thinly peopled north. The
woods are wasted by extensive fires, kindled accidentally or
intentionally, which spread with rapidity over a wide extent of country,
and continue to burn until they are extinguished by heavy rains. These
conflagrations consume even the soil of the drier tracts, and the bare
and whitened rocks testify for centuries to the havoc that has been
made. A new growth of timber, however, sooner or later springs up, and
the soil, when not wholly consumed, being saturated with alkali, gives
birth to a thicket of aspen instead of the aboriginal spruce.”

WITHIN THE ARCTIC CIRCLE.

Mr. Elihu Stewart explained before the Senate committee of 1907 that
spruce suitable for commercial purposes grows to Arctic sea. He was
astonished to find that the limit of tree growth extended as far north
as it does. He thought it extended probably ten degrees, or nearly seven
hundred miles farther north in this district than in Labrador. The
different kinds of trees that we have in Mackenzie basin include white
spruce, black spruce, the larch or tamarack, which is found as far north
as the spruce, the jackpine and the balsam. Mr. Stewart did not see any
balsam in the Arctic circle, but aspen, white poplar, balm of Gilead and
birch are all found down as far as Fort McPherson near the delta of the
Mackenzie.

Mr. Ogilvie states in his report:—“On the lower Mackenzie, the timber
large enough for commercial or manufacturing purposes is all in the
river valley. On the plains above, the trees are small and unfit for
anything except for fuel or the few uses to which trees six to seven
inches in diameter can be applied. There is some fine material for
lumber on some of the islands in the river, but many are bare, with the
exception of a few willows.”

According to Mr. R. G. McConnell’s report:—“From the head of the delta
of the Mackenzie the coast is low and sandy, and is exposed to the full
rigour of the arctic storms, and the general vegetation of the bordering
plains is stunted and diminutive in appearance, but is relieved by the
presence of a few large spruce trees, which look like survivors from an
ancient and more luxuriant forest. Some of these trees have a girth of
over six feet, and are tall and well shaped, while the average spruce in
this latitude does not exceed six or seven inches in diameter.”

[Illustration: Spruce Timber on Peel river inside the Arctic Circle.]

TIMBER OF THE DELTA.

Sir John Richardson descended the delta to the ocean in 1848, and the
following is his account of the timber:—

“Most of the islands constituting the delta of the Mackenzie are
alluvial and many of the smaller ones are merely a ring of white spruce
trees and willows on a sand or mud bank. Twenty-two miles below Point
Separation the banks of the river and the numerous islands are well
wooded. The balsam poplars rise to the height of twenty feet and the
white spruce to forty or fifty feet. At the creek which bounds Harrison
island on the north, the valleys and borders of the river are well
wooded, but the summits of the eminence present only scattered spruce
firs, with stunted tips and widely spreading depressed lower branches.
The canoe-birch is frequent, and the trees we measured were about five
inches in diameter. The balsam poplar grows to the height of twenty
feet. In latitude 68° 55′ north, the trees disappeared so suddenly that
I could not but attribute their cessation to the influence of the
sea-air. Beyond this line a few stunted spruces only were seen
struggling for existence and some scrubby canoe-birches clinging to the
bases of the hills.”

According to Mr. Elihu Stewart’s official report “At Point Separation,
which lies between the junction of Mackenzie and Peel rivers, and where
Franklin and Richardson were camped, are two spruce trees, which were
marked as lob-sticks at the time of their separation and in
commemoration of that event. Both are still standing (1906), though one
of them is dead. Judging from their appearance at a distance, I would
say that they are about sixteen inches in diameter and seventy feet in
height, and this nearly one hundred miles _beyond_ the Arctic circle. I
have been very much interested in the tenacity of life shown in the
growth of trees under the adverse conditions prevailing in this north
country. Since crossing the Arctic circle we have seen no vegetation,
but trees such as the spruce, birch, tamarack and willow are seen all
the way.” Mr. Stewart adds that as his boat rounded Point Separation and
ascended Peel river he noticed that spruce lined the banks.

Mr. Alfred H. Harrison, in his book “In Search of a Polar Continent,”
describes a visit to these lob-sticks in September 1906:—“After leaving
Point Separation, we came to a very shallow place about half-way between
this point and what are called the Lob-Sticks. At the last-named spot
the river turns sharply to the east. These Lob-Sticks, which are
supposed to have been trimmed by Commander Pullen some sixty years ago,
are two pine trees. The branches have all been cut off, but the tops
remain. One of them is a very fine old tree, and the other, which is
much younger and smaller, stands directly in front of its nobler
brother.”

ARCTIC GROWN BIRCH.

Mr. Preble points out that along the Mackenzie the canoe birch occurs as
an economically important species even north of the delta.

According to Mr. Stewart, birch about the delta of the Mackenzie attains
a size of twelve to sixteen inches and is used at Fort McPherson not
only for their log buildings, but it is also whip-sawed into lumber for
general use, and the birch bark here is used by the Indians for their
canoes. For a distance of a few miles from the Peel the country is
partially wooded with spruce, birch, balsam-poplar and willow, but after
this the only timber is that found skirting the shores of the small
streams on the way. A fringe of timber, mostly small spruce, lines the
banks of the Bell, but apparently does not extend far back.

Mr. Malcolm Macleod, in his statement to the Senate committee of 1888,
said:—“As to the wood of that far north I would observe that it is
remarkably hard. I have a pair of snowshoes of peculiar shape, made
right and left, of birch for frame, like iron in texture, and though
perhaps about a hundred years old, perfectly sound.”

The frozen subsoil of the northern portions of the woodland country does
not prevent the timber from attaining a good size, for the roots of the
white spruce spread over the icy substratum as they would over smooth
rock. As may be expected, however, the growth of trees is slow in the
high latitudes. On the borders of Great Bear lake, four hundred years
(according to Sir John Richardson) are required to bring the stem of the
white spruce to the thickness of a man’s waist. When the tree is exposed
to high winds, the fibres of the wood are spirally twisted, but in
sheltered places, or in the midst of the forest, the grain is straight
and the wood splits freely.

GREAT BEAR LAKE COUNTRY.

As to the country about Great Bear lake and its tributaries, Sir John
Richardson, in 1826, reported that there were pine trees in clumps on
Dease river, and the valley to the north was well wooded.

Mr. Malcolm Macleod informed the Senate committee of 1888 that in a
letter of Thomas Simpson to his father he says that the wood at Fort
Confidence had been found suitable for house and boat building. Doctor
J. M. Bell says that the location of Fort Confidence was one of the few
well wooded spots in Great Bear lake and the trees are fine specimens
worthy of a more southern latitude.

Between Keith bay and Smith bay, Doctor J. M. Bell found a small lake
well wooded with white spruce, willows and alders, but none of them of
great size. Here he saw the most northern specimen of white birch. The
surrounding country was wooded in the valleys. It was, he says, a
pleasing change from the cheerless, gravelly, treeless shores, to reach
Limestone point thirty miles west of Fort Confidence, with its
pronounced shore-line and white spruce in the bay. West of Fort
Confidence along the coast of Dease bay for some distance the deep bays
are well wooded, but towards Cape McDonnell the land gets barren and
continues so till the coast turns east again where the trees improve.

“Some forty-five miles east of Cape McDonnell,” says Doctor Bell, “a
good sized river enters, probably the Takaatcho. Near its mouth,” he
says, “we found great quantities of driftwood among which were some
good-sized trunks. I was rather surprised to see these, but learned
afterwards that in the interior the valley of this river is well wooded.
All the eastern shore of McTavish bay is wooded. In the valleys in the
interior and around the bays and sheltered channels this timber may be
of economic importance. White spruce is the prevailing forest tree,
although canoe-birch is found as far north as Eda Travers bay, and is
sufficiently large in Klarondesk bay to permit of its bark being used
for making canoes. Tamarack and both balsam poplar and aspen abound in
Klarondesk bay, although not of any great size.”

South of this, the eastern part of the lake, Doctor Bell describes
Camsell river and chain of lakes as all well wooded. At Lake Ray
Banksian pine was noticed.

TREES A HUNDRED AND THIRTY YEARS OLD.

Sir John Franklin, in his description of the country around Fort
Franklin on Great Bear lake (1825), wrote:—“The trees at some distance
from our fort consisted of black and white spruce, and larch, generally
small, though a few of the better grown measured from four to five feet
in girth, and were from fifty to fifty-five feet high. Doctor Richardson
ascertained, by counting the annual rings, that some of them, in a sound
state, were upwards of one hundred and thirty years old, while others
which were not much greater in size, had two hundred and fifty rings,
but these were decayed at the heart.”

Mr. E. A. Preble of the United States Biological Survey, the most recent
scientific explorer of Great Bear lake and its basin, in his report,
states:—

“The northern shores of Great Bear lake are mainly low and thinly
wooded, although the country at some distance inland is better wooded.
The tributaries of Great Bear lake are comparatively few in number.
Dease river, which discharges into the northeastern extremity of the
lake, is probably the best known of its feeders. It rises on the
treeless height of land between Dease bay and the lower Coppermine.
Several important streams enter the lake from the north. Several others
draining a very large extent of country to the southward enter MacTavish
and McVicar bays. The latter receives also the waters of a chain of
large lakes lying north of Marten lake, which discharges into Great
Slave lake. The country drained by the southern tributaries is very
rough and rocky, though fairly well wooded, and is traversed in various
directions by ranges of low mountains.

“The southern and western shores are well wooded, while its northern and
eastern borders are more thinly forested. The immediate shores are
mainly of sand or gravel and are usually devoid of trees, but are well
clothed with willows and various ericaceous shrubs and herbaceous
plants. In most places along the south shore this treeless stretch is
only a few hundred yards in width, and in the bays the forest extends to
the water’s edge. In the vicinity of Leith point, however, a treeless
area stretches from near MacTavish bay to McVicar bay, and extends
inland for several miles. On this area the faunal and floral conditions
are practically those of the Barren Grounds.”

THE SPRUCE OF GREAT BEAR LAKE.

According to Mr. Preble, along the southern shore of Great Bear lake,
the white spruce “forms the bulk of the forest. In exposed situations
near Leith point it is somewhat dwarfed, seldom exceeding a diameter of
one foot and a maximum height of forty feet. A few miles back from the
shore, in slightly more favourable locations, trees two feet in diameter
at the base were seen, but none of these exceeded thirty feet in height.
A tree twelve inches in diameter growing in an exposed situation near
the shore had two hundred and fifty-seven annual rings. In this specimen
the outer layers were exceedingly thin and could be counted only by the
aid of a fine-pointed needle. At this rate, the age of a tree of twice
this diameter can scarcely be estimated at less than one thousand years.
Farther west along the shore the species attains greater perfection of
habit, especially in some of the sheltered bays. At Fort Franklin it is
the commonest tree, but at present is represented by scarcely any
individuals of the original forest, which has been removed for building
purposes. Trees over eight or nine inches in diameter are rare. A
sapling four feet in height and one inch in diameter, on the site of
Fort Franklin, had been growing for thirteen years.”

THE SITE OF FORT FRANKLIN.

“The country about Fort Franklin (which Mr. Preble visited September 16,
1903) is slightly undulating, and except for certain semibarren points
near the shores of the lake, is well wooded with spruce, tamarack,
willow, and the usual sub-arctic vegetation. Much of the ground is
covered with lichens of the genus _Gyrophora_ and various mosses. At the
time of our visit the leaves of the tamaracks, willows, and other
deciduous trees were falling. The site of the post itself is the summit
of a rather steep bank elevated about fifty feet above the shores of the
lake. The buildings have long since been destroyed, and only the debris
of the stone chimneys and the faint outlines of the sills of the
principal houses now remain to mark the spot. The original clearing is
partially grown up to willows, but much of the ground supports only a
growth of grasses and herbaceous plants. The site overlooks, to the
southward, the broad expanse of Keith bay, at the extremity of which at
a distance of four or five miles, Bear river has its efflux.

“The banks at the head of Bear river are low, but rapidly increase in
height. The bordering country is mainly swampy and is well wooded. The
more gently sloping banks are grassy or wooded, and a dwarf willow
(_Salix reticulata_) is a conspicuous shrub for some distance below the
lake.”

Mr. Preble reports the Koch tamarack (_Larix Laricina_) as “rather
common along the southern shores of Great Bear lake, where the large
stone seen, near Leith point, was about twelve inches in thickness at
the base, but was not over thirty feet in height. While travelling along
this shore in the autumn of 1903, I first noted the leaves of the
species beginning to change colour on September 12, near McVicar bay.
Two days later its yellow foliage gave a decided impress on the scenery.
On September 18, at Fort Franklin, its leaves were dropping, and soon
afterwards the trees were bare.”

Mr. Preble states that along the southern shores of Great Bear lake the
canoe birch occurs only in a somewhat dwarfed state, but it reappears as
a fair sized tree on Bear river.

THE BASIN OF ANDERSON RIVER.

Mr. R. MacFarlane, chief factor Hudson’s Bay Company, was sent in 1857
by James Anderson to explore Anderson river. The report of his trip was
published in the Canadian Record of Science, vol. iv., and the following
notes therefrom give some idea of the timber along the rivers and lakes
draining the country north of Great Bear lake into Arctic ocean:—At
Canoe lake, the headwaters of Iroquois river, the main tributary of the
Lockhart, the country is tolerably wooded. The batiks of the Iroquois
seem to be all wooded, as Mr. MacFarlane found the navigation impeded by
immense quantities of driftwood, and he says the ridges on both sides
were well covered with pine and willow.

The country along Lockhart river below the Iroquois is better timbered.
On the banks of the Anderson below the Lockhart, there is timber of
medium size gradually disappearing towards the north.

On his return trip Mr. MacFarlane proceeded up the Anderson from the
Lockhart and found the banks well wooded. Further on, near a succession
of rapids, he found the banks tolerably wooded. He says:—“The country
along the Anderson was latterly very well wooded, and some goodly pines
were seen. The tract of country embraced by a line drawn west from the
borders of the woods on the Anderson to the Mackenzie, southward to Peau
de Lièvre river (Hare Indian river), at Good Hope, is very well
timbered.

He says the banks of Ross river are partially timbered. A chain of well
wooded hills, Mr. MacFarlane says, encircle Colville lake or more
probably the large lake west of the lake marked Colville. The banks of
Simpson lake are well timbered. From here southwest towards Hare Indian
river, Mr. MacFarlane found the country well wooded. He says “the timber
consists of pine, juniper, fir, willow, and a few groves of poplar and
birch. Some of the pines were of a large size. The belt of timber which
at Fort Anderson extends for over thirty miles to the eastward, rapidly
narrows and becomes a mere fringe along Anderson river, and disappears
to the northward of the 69th parallel of latitude.”

Running parallel with Anderson river is MacFarlane or Wilmot Horton
river. Mr. MacFarlane says that one or two intersecting affluents of
Wilmot Horton or MacFarlane river flow through valleys in which a few
stunted spruce, birch and willows appear at intervals. On the banks of
one of these, near its mouth, he observed a sheltered grove of spruce
and willows of larger growth. They met with no more spruce to the
eastward.

Mr. Preble passed up Lockhart river, and thus describes the stream and
its banks:—“Our route lay up the left fork. The shores here are low and
the channels winding, and much obstructed by fallen trees. Above here we
paddled through several small marshy ponds and portaged past a small
fall. We then passed through a rocky defile above which we made four
portages, and ascended several small riffles with paddles or with the
help of the line. On August 3 we avoided eight falls or rapids by making
portages and ascended several others with the line. At the last rapid,
where we encamped, the river rushes for a hundred yards through a rocky
gorge. The spruce woods about here have escaped the fires which have
devastated most of this section. Some of the small ponds and channels
passed through were bordered by banks of clay, clothed mainly with white
birch.”

Mr. Preble states that the belt of timber which at Fort Anderson extends
for over thirty miles to the eastward, rapidly narrows and becomes a
mere fringe along Anderson river, and disappears to the northward of the
68th parallel of latitude.

Mr. Hanbury reports that he found Dease river (east of Great Bear lake)
to be completely concealed by a heavy belt of spruce.

HOW TO INCREASE NORTHERN TREE GROWTH.

In a letter published in the _Ottawa Journal_ on February 19, 1910, Mr.
William Ogilvie, the well-known surveyor and explorer, and ex-governor
of the Yukon, wrote, in speaking of Athabaska and Mackenzie
regions:—“As time goes on much increase to the commercial timber area
might be made by draining the swamps, and drying the moss on the surface
which now keeps the ground beneath cool, indeed preserving the frost in
it during the whole summer. Once dried the moss would die, and instead
of keeping the ground cool would absorb heat and help to warm it. Anyone
who has travelled in the north cannot help noting the difference in the
size of the timber on mossy ground, as compared with that where there is
no moss. On mossy ground you will see trees from one hundred to two
hundred years old, according to the annual growth rings, only three,
four or five inches in diameter, while only a few yards away where there
is no moss or moisture, trees of seventy and eighty years’ growth will
be nearly a foot in diameter, and of a different quality of lumber.”

[Illustration: Anglican Church, School and Rectory at Fort Simpson.]

In the same communication Mr. Ogilvie wrote:—“Those who have never seen
a northwest forest, when told of it, naturally compare it with others
they have seen, but one from the eastern parts of Canada would find a
great difference between his native woods and those of the northwest.
The varieties of trees are fewer, and smaller in size, than those in the
east and south. Of varieties the principal are spruce and poplar; of the
poplar there are two kinds, one of which, the balsam poplar, in some
places grows to be a very large size. On the lower stretches of Liard
river I have seen them well over four feet in diameter, stump high, but
generally such large ones are unsound and full of cracks. The other kind
seldom grows more than a foot thick, and the trunk is seldom suitable
for turning out lumber.

THE SPRUCE BEARS THE PALM.

“When dry it makes good fuel but is not comparable as a heat producer
with the eastern hardwoods. As commercial lumber the spruce bears the
palm, metaphorically, as well as literally. It seldom grows to more than
fifteen to seventeen inches in diameter near the ground, and where it
stands thickly together grows to a good height with straight tapering
trunk, but where scattered it is not so long nor so graceful,
consequently less useful. It supplies all the lumber for local demand
all over the northwest, and north, and is found from the forty-ninth
parallel of latitude to Arctic ocean, and on the alluvial flats of
Mackenzie delta I have seen specimens about as large as any I have
noticed elsewhere in the territories. The other varieties of trees are
so few and far between that they are hardly worth mentioning except
white-birch which is found all over, but is seldom of sufficient size or
shape to be useful. I have seen a few tamaracks at odd spots, and on the
Athabaska I saw a small grove of Canada balsams, the only place I ever
saw them in the northwest. They seemed as vigorous as any I ever saw,
which proves that they would grow there if given the opportunity, and if
they, why not other specimens of our more southern trees. It has often
occurred to me that it would be well to try planting our white pines and
other commercial trees in those northern forests, to see if they would
naturalize, and if so, increase greatly the value of the northern
domain. It would cost very little to do it, and a fostering care of them
might by selection at last make a success of the experiment, if it did
not succeed from the start.”

-----

[23] Fort Enterprise is a little east of the eastern limit, of the tract
of country defined in a preceding chapter; but as it is in the Mackenzie
watershed, it may well be treated of in this chapter.

CHAPTER XVII.

THE MACKENZIE RIVER REGION.

Economic Minerals.

The Territory Has Never Been Thoroughly Examined for Minerals.—
Tar Springs on the North Shore of Great Slave lake.—The
Devonian Rocks Throughout Mackenzie valley are Nearly Everywhere
More or Less Petroliferous.—Lignite Discovered in Many Places,
Also Gypsum.—Large Deposits of Excellent Salt.—Indications of
Gold and Copper.—Indians Report Finding Mica.

Ever since Sir Alexander Mackenzie first passed down the river which now
bears his name on his famous voyage of discovery in 1789, and described
the burning beds of coal and the salt springs along its banks, the
district now under review in these pages has excited the interest of the
geologist and the prospector, but on account of the remoteness of the
country from civilized settlement and the difficulties of transport,
very little, comparatively, is known of the actual extent of mineral
wealth of this immense area of country. True, expert explorers like Sir
John Franklin, Sir John Richardson, Mr. R. G. McConnell, Mr. William
Ogilvie, and Doctor J. M. Bell have conducted scientific surveys along
the chief waterways and over some routes overland, and their reports
have been splendid and valuable, but from scantiness of their equipment
and the omnipresent necessity to economize time, these surveys, from a
geological point of view, can be considered only as reconnaissances.

Comparatively brief summaries of what some of these explorers and some
others have written and said as to the mineralogy of Mackenzie valley
below the 60th parallel of latitude, will suffice to give an idea of
what we really know on the subject.

During his explorations about Great Slave lake in 1887, Mr. R. G.
McConnell, of the Geological Survey, inspected the tar springs on the
north shore. The springs are situated a couple of hundred yards from the
shore, at the base of a low limestone cliff, which runs inland from the
lake, and are three in number, each of them being surrounded with a
small basin, three to four feet in diameter, filled with inspissated
bitumen, while the soil and moss for some distance away is impregnated
with the same material. A small quantity of pitch is annually taken from
these springs and used for boat building purposes, while a much larger
supply could be obtained if needed. A sulphur spring resembling those at
Sulphur point on the south shore of the lake, but much more copious,
issues from the foot of the cliff in close proximity to the bituminous
springs, and feeds a considerable stream. The rock through which the
petroleum ascends here is a heavily bedded greyish, rather coarsely
crystalline cavernous dolomite, and is entirely unlike the bituminous
beds south of the lake and down the Mackenzie, which in most cases
consist of calcareous shales. The dolomite is everywhere permeated with
bituminous matter, which collects in the numerous cavities, and oozing
up through cracks, often forms small pools on the surface of the rock.

It was also reported to Mr. McConnell that sulphur and tar springs occur
at a point half way between the springs he visited and Fort Rae. On the
south shore bituminous shales and limestones outcrop at several points,
and it would thus appear, according to Mr. McConnell, that the
oil-bearing beds underlie the whole western part of the lake.

PROMISING INDICATIONS OF OIL.

The Devonian rocks throughout Mackenzie valley, Mr. McConnell reports,
are nearly everywhere more or less petroliferous, and over large areas
afford promising indications of the presence of oil in workable
quantities. He states that he noticed, in descending the Mackenzie, that
bituminous limestones outcropped at the “Rock by the River Side”, at
Bear Rock, at the Ramparts, and at numerous other places. Near Fort Good
Hope several tar springs exist, and it is from these that the Hudson’s
Bay Company now obtain their principal supply of pitch. The springs are
situated at some distance from the river and were not examined. Still
farther down, in the vicinity of the site of old Fort Good Hope, the
river is bordered for several miles by evenly bedded dark shales of
Devonian age which are completely saturated with oil. The possible oil
country along Mackenzie valley, he concludes, is almost co-extensive
with that of the valley itself. On the Mackenzie, the Tertiary beds at
the mouth of Bear river hold several seams of lignite, ranging in
thickness from two to four feet, and one seam which was concealed at the
time of Mr. McConnell’s visit is reported by Richardson to be nine feet
thick. The lignite there is of inferior quality, and has been burnt in
many places for some distance from the surface by fires which have been
in existence since the river was first discovered. Gypsum occurs in
large quantities in the Devonian rocks of Bear mountain at the mouth of
Bear river.

DEPOSITS OF EXCELLENT SALT.

Mr. McConnell also explored part of Salt river in 1887. He
reported:—“Several salt springs drain into Salt river, near Fort Smith,
about twenty-five miles above its mouth. The springs are enclosed by
small evaporating basins, the largest of which is about fifteen feet in
diameter, and is crusted with a remarkably pure deposit of sodic
chloride. The salt obtained here is of excellent quality, and has been
used in Mackenzie river district for many years. Salt is also reported
to occur on the headwaters of a small stream which enters the Mackenzie
about fifteen miles above Fort Norman.”

Mr. McConnell in 1887 examined the Nahanni Butte at the junction of
Nahanni river with the Liard, below Fort Liard, and he states that
copper stains were noted in a number of places, but no specimens
indicating deposits of economic value were obtained.

In his 1893 report regarding his investigation of the Athabaska
tar-sand-petroleum deposits, Mr. McConnell mentioned, as indicating the
presence of petroleum deposits over an immense area, that north of
Athabaska district “tar occurs at intervals in the Devonian limestone
exposed along the valleys of Slave river and the Mackenzie, all the way
to Arctic ocean.”

SOME NOTES BY REV. FATHER PETITOT.

Professor Robert Bell submitted to the Senate committee of 1888 a letter
received from Rev. Father Petitot, O.M.I., of Fort Good Hope, dated
August 16, 1873, in reply to a letter from Professor Bell, written May
30, the previous year.

The reverend gentleman explained in his letter that he had travelled
extensively through this vast region, and proceeded to give a most
interesting geological account of the country, although he undoubtedly
disclaimed any merit as a geologist.

Points of practical interest to which attention was drawn in this
communication were the following:—

“To the south and to the east of the banks of Great Slave lake are
flats, composed of alluvium and gravel. On the islands off shore asphalt
is found, the hardened debris of which is strewn on the beach.

“Six miles above Fort Norman, and for an extent of from eight to ten
miles, the Mackenzie is bounded on its right bank by a precipice which
reaches at first about one hundred and fifty feet in height, and
gradually diminishes to a height of thirty feet. It is a vast Tertiary
deposit composed of alternate stratifications of friable schist,
lignite, pipe-clay and vegetable mould. The schists are in a state of
combustion winter and summer, but the subterranean fire which shows
itself on the surface through smoke holes, stinking of bitumen, is
intermittent, and breaks out sometimes at one point, sometimes at
another. It is not always visible at the surface, but at others is very
active. The soil is very hot, damp and movable in the neighbourhood of
these smoke holes.

CRUDE FORMS OF LIGNITE.

“The lignites are not fit for forging work. Sometimes even the trunks of
the trees which form the beds of it have been transformed into clay;
however, all this debris has evidently undergone the action of fire.

“Great Bear lake river, or Franklin river, presents alternations of
granite, limestone, and coal-bearing sandstone.

“Traces of fire are visible in the mountain range at the mouth of the
discharge of Great Bear lake. A little lower down, below the rock, the
beaches of the Emir present unequivocal traces of other schistose holes
which have been extinct for a long time, but which the writer of the
letter found in combustion in 1869.

“The left bank of the Mackenzie, opposite Rocher Rouge, exudes
ferruginous water, which stains all the water-borne shingle of the beach
with oxide of iron. Three or four leagues below Fort Good Hope, iron
pyrites is found on the beach, and the Peaux de Lièvre Indians formerly
used it in striking fire.

“On the right bank opposite the site of the old Fort Good Hope, there
are natural ramparts of limestone or schistose sandstone at the mouth of
Thunder river. One finds there hematite, or oxide of iron; sulphate of
iron and sulphate of magnesia; alum, which exudes from the fissures in
the stone; and red ochre. It was here that the Peaux de Lièvre Indians
discovered in ancient times the hematite, which on account of its
colour, resembling the dung of the black bear, they called Sa-ts-anne,
that is to say, bears’ excrement.

EXUDE ALUM AND SALTPETRE.

“The second ramparts of the Mackenzie, called the Detroit or Narrows,
are composed of lias and limestone, which exude alum and saltpetre.
Lower down are schistose sandstones of which the Esquimaux make the
heads of their arrows.

“On the sea coast and the right bank the Esquimaux have told me that
there are caves containing fossilized bones of large antediluvian
animals, particularly of the mastodon, of which they have shown me
pieces of tusks of the finest ivory which they call _killagvark_, and
which they know how to distinguish from the ivory of the walrus, or
_turark_. They have also told me that there are, upon the sea shore to
the eastward, Tertiary deposits in combustion, similar to those at Fort
Norman.”

Writing in his report of the information he had obtained as to the
deposits of economic minerals in Mackenzie valley, William Ogilvie,
D.L.S., wrote as follows:—“On the Mackenzie, the first coal I heard of
was a seam of which Mr. McDougall at Chipewyan told me, and which is
situated in the base of the mountain just above Rapid Sans Sault, on the
east side of the river. He could not give me any details concerning its
extent, more than that he believed it to be about four or five feet
thick, and that it was in the limestone rock of the mountain. If this is
true, it indicates that this coal is older than the lignite coal of the
country, and probably much harder and better. I did not know of its
existence until I got to Chipewyan, or I would have tried to have had a
specimen sent out after me.

“About three and a half miles above Fort Norman, on the east bank of the
river, two extensive exposures of lignite crop out. The upper one is
overlaid by about fifty feet of clay and a few feet of friable
sandstone, and is about fifteen feet thick. The other seam is probably
forty feet below this. When I was there it was nearly all under water.
It is said to be as thick as, if not thicker than, the upper one.

ON FIRE FOR OVER A CENTURY.

“The upper seam has been on fire for over one hundred years, as it was
burning when Sir Alexander Mackenzie passed in 1789. The place is
locally known as le Boucan. The fire extends at present about two miles
along the river, not continuously but at intervals. When I passed, it
was burning in three or four places. After it has burned a certain
distance into the seam the overlying mass of clay falls down and, to
some extent, suppresses the fire. This clay is in time baked into a red
colored rock, in which are found innumerable impressions of leaves of
plants. Some specimens of these I brought home, and handed to Doctor
Dawson. Traces of this red rock were noticed on the bank fourteen miles
below Fort Norman, but no trace of lignite was seen near it, having
probably been all burned.

“The burning seam appears to be of poor quality, containing much shale
and sand, which is converted by the heat into scoriæ. It did not appear
to me that it would be difficult to cut off all the burning places, and
thus stop the further advance of the fire, which is destroying what yet
may be of use. In order to find if the combustion could be checked I
took a shovel at one place and soon had all the burning coal for a short
distance cut off completely, so that the fire ceased for a time at that
spot. It is a pity that at least an attempt to put out the fire is not
made. Many persons in that district have an idea that it is
subterraneous, and that the seat of it cannot be reached. This is a
mistake, as at the point mentioned I cleaned off the fire from the face
of the seam to its base and found underneath no trace of burning. The
lower seam appears to be of better quality, there being no shale or sand
mixed with it, so far as I could see. Heavy rain detained us here for
two days, and we burned a good deal of lignite from the lower seam, as
we could not reach the top of the bank to procure wood, and could find
only a log or two of driftwood. The coal burned well in the open air,
and threw out a much stronger heat than a wood fire. These seams are
visible at frequent intervals along the bank for eight and a half miles,
after which not a trace of them appears for seven miles, where there is
another small exposure at the water’s edge. This seam appears, from the
reports of many travellers, to extend up Great Bear river for a
considerable distance. No other traces of coal were observed on the
river.

“While at Fort Good Hope I noticed that many of the outbuildings and
fences were painted with a dull red coloring matter, which, on inquiry,
I found consisted of the ashes of wood that had lain in the river for
some years. It was said poplar trees yielded the best paint and that
logs that had been in the river long enough were known by the dull blue
color of the wood. A sample of the ashes I brought home, and handed to
Doctor Dawson. It may be that the color is due to the presence of oxide
of iron; if so, this would indicate the existence in the water of iron
in solution. But where the iron comes from is a mystery, as none of this
peculiar wood was seen or heard of in the upper river. The inference is
that the iron occurs far down in the river, but whether in the soil or
in the beds on some of the tributary streams, or whether it is iron at
all, has yet to be determined.

INDIANS REPORT MICA.

“The Indians report very large deposits of mica on the south side of
Great Slave lake, and have brought small samples of it to Fort
Resolution. While there I tried to get a specimen, but none was
available. It is described as being very abundant.

“No other minerals of economic value were seen or heard of, except
bitumen. On the way up (from Fort Providence to Chipewyan) the first
indication of this was seen on Great Slave lake, in the form of the
bituminous limestone which has already been referred to. Tar springs, as
they are called in the vicinity, exist on the lake. I do not know of any
of them on Slave river, but they abound on the Athabaska from near the
delta for over two hundred miles up, and one is reported only a few
miles from Athabaska, less than one hundred miles from Edmonton.”

Mr. von Hamerstein, in his evidence before the select committee of the
Senate in 1907, stated that up the rivers that flow into the Mackenzie
there are large quantities of native salt thrown up. It is mostly
underground, and there seems to be a crater. The salt appears to be
close to the ground in large quantities.

[Illustration: Roman Catholic Mission at Fort Resolution.]

Mr. Keele, in the report of his explorations in 1908, states:—“Drift
lignite is found on the lower part of Gravel river, which is no doubt
derived from the Tertiary coal-bearing areas of Mackenzie basin.
Hematite occurs on Gravel river about ten miles below the mouth of Natla
river. This iron ore is coarsely laminated with red siliceous slate,
having a thickness of from fifty to one hundred feet, and is interbedded
between conglomerate and dolomite. An assay of an average sample of this
ore was made at the assay office of the Mines branch, and gave only
twenty-five per cent. of iron.”

TWO HUNDRED SQUARE MILES OF COAL.

Mr. Brock, Director of the Geological Survey, in his report for 1909,
quoted an estimate made by Mr. D. B. Dowling that the known available
coal area in Mackenzie district is two hundred square miles,
representing five hundred million tons of lignite.

Tertiary coal is known to exist in large quantities along the Arctic
coast east of the Mackenzie and in the Arctic islands. Doctor Armstrong
found it on Banks Land and Doctor Richardson mentions that “the Garry
islands, lying off the Mackenzie, contain beds of a Tertiary coal which
takes fire spontaneously on exposure to the atmosphere. Higher up the
Mackenzie, at the junction of Bear lake river, on the 65th parallel of
latitude, there is a Tertiary coal deposit of considerable extent, which
yields hand specimens entirely similiar to Garry island ones.”

In his annual report for 1911, Superintendent Saunders, D.S.O., of the
Royal Northwest Mounted Police, commanding the force in the Athabaska,
Peace and Mackenzie countries, wrote:—“Very little progress has been
made over last year in the development of the mineral resources of the
country. Three companies are boring for oil near McMurray but I cannot
ascertain that they have met with much success. No work is being done in
connection with the tar sands although very favourable reports have been
made as to their value for asphalt and street paving, probably the lack
of transportation facilities is the reason of the delay.

“From Mackenzie river sub-district I have reports of a few prospectors
in different parts, but of no success. Mr. D. F. McRae, however, who
went down the Mackenzie in 1910 and went out the same year, has returned
again with a party and well equipped outfit, consisting of a powerful
gasoline launch, three scows with provisions, two horses, etc. He and
one of the other members have their wives with them, and are wintering
near the mouth of Herschell river. The fact of his having gone back in
this manner would indicate that he has made a discovery of some kind,
the nature of which has not been disclosed, as the whole party are very
reticent.”

CHAPTER XVIII.

THE MACKENZIE RIVER.

Game, Fur-bearing Animals and Fish.

Over Forty Moose Killed in one Season Near Fort Simpson.—Caribou
of both Woodland and Barren Lands Varieties Plentiful.—Pass
Great Slave lake in Countless Numbers.—Mountain Sheep Plentiful
in the Mountainous Districts.—Incredible Numbers of Geese,
Swans and Ducks in Season.—Inexhaustible Supplies of Fish.—The
Speckled Trout, Lake Trout, Grayling, Herring, Inconnu, etc.

Everyone who has visited Mackenzie river region seems to have been much
impressed with the variety and the quantity of the fish and the game
there, all the books written by the explorers, traders, missionaries and
sportsmen who have visited the country, containing numerous references
to its wonderful resources in this respect. As a matter of fact the fish
and the game of the country have hitherto been and still are the support
of the slender resident population, and will play a very important part
in the ultimate development of the region. Without discussing the
commercial value of the apparently inexhaustible inland and coastwise
fisheries, it might be pointed out that once settlement begins to flow
into the country the fine waters and immense game ranges of this huge
country will contribute most usefully towards the support of the pioneer
settlers during the critical period when the local agricultural,
lumbering and mining industries are in their early experimental stages.
Undoubtedly, too, the game and fisheries will contribute, as they have
done elsewhere, to the ultimate development of the country by attracting
to more remote sections sportsmen who by reason of their natural
intelligence, world experience, education and influential connections,
are sure to discover and to attract attention to natural resources at
present unthought of.

[Illustration: A Fur Shipment of One Season from Mackenzie basin,
estimated value over two million, five hundred thousand dollars.]

Frequent references have been made in the preceding chapters to the work
accomplished by Mr. E. A. Preble, of the United States Biological
Survey, in the Mackenzie country in 1901 and 1903, and to his report
“North American Fauna, No. 27,” published by the Biological Survey at
Washington in 1908. In no respect is this altogether admirable report
more instructive than in its complete references to the game and the
fisheries. Mr. Preble naturally devotes much attention to that monarch
among northern game animals, the moose.

THE MAJESTIC MOOSE.

Mr. Preble points out that “Hearne was the first to record moose from
the Mackenzie region, finding them ‘very plentiful,’ on the south side
of Great Slave lake, east of the mouth of Slave river, during the winter
of 1771-72, while on his way back to Churchill during his famous journey
of exploration.” Harmon noted their occurrence on the plains of Peace
river in 1808. “During Franklin’s first northern journey a moose was
killed near Fort Enterprise in the spring of 1821.” During his second
expedition moose were killed on Ellice island, near the mouth of the
Mackenzie, in the summer of 1825, and near Fort Franklin in September of
the same year, and in February, 1826. During the spring of 1834, while
Back’s expedition was wintering at Fort Reliance, a moose was killed on
“Fish river” (in all probability the Thelon, or Ark-i-linik) several
days’ travel east of Great Slave lake. Simpson reports that tracks of
moose were seen on MacTavish bay, Great Bear lake, during the winter of
1837-38. Ross recorded specimens taken at Fort Good Hope and Fort
Simpson. Lockhart, writing in 1865 on the habits of moose, states that
they were rarely killed in the vicinity of Fort Rae, though they were
quite numerous at Big island and along the south shore of Great Slave
lake, and that the moose of Peel river and the Yukon are much larger
than those in Great Slave lake region. While exploring in a country
between Athabaska lake and Churchill river in the summer of 1892, J. B.
Tyrrell found that the moose occurred throughout the more thickly wooded
parts of the country as far north as Stone river, near the eastern end
of Athabaska lake. Russell states that a moose was killed near the mouth
of Yellowknife river, Great Slave lake, in August 1903. A. J. Stone
records the moose from several points in lower Mackenzie valley, giving
evidence as to the large size of the animals found there, and from the
headwaters of Nahanni river, where they abound.

“During the early autumn of 1895 a moose was killed by a member of
Loring’s party near the headwaters of McLeod river. In the autumn of
1896, fresh tracks were seen almost daily along the trail between Smoky
river and Jasper House.

FOUND TO BE RATHER COMMON.

“In the spring of 1903, while descending Athabaska and Slave rivers to
Great Slave lake, we saw tracks of moose occasionally, but observed none
of the animals. During their return trip in the fall, however, my
brother and Cary saw a young one on the Athabaska above Athabaska. In
the lake country between Fort Rae and Great Bear lake, during my
northward trip in the same autumn, the moose was found to be rather
common, and became more abundant as we approached Great Bear lake, owing
to the country being better suited to its needs. Tracks were often seen
on the portages, and a large bull was observed on an inlet of MacTavish
bay on August 25. Along the southern shore of Great Bear lake we found
it a common and in some places an abundant species. Even in the exposed
and semibarren country in the region of Leith point a few are found, and
a female was killed there by my Indian canoeman on September 1. Owing to
the rocky nature of its haunts, the hoofs of this animal were much worn
and blunted. West of McVicar bay, especially along the base of Grizzly
Bear mountain, the species was found to be abundant and numerous fresh
tracks were seen wherever we landed. Its abundance here is partially
explained by the fact that there are immense areas abounding with its
proper food. A party of natives seen near Manito islands had repeatedly
started moose without killing one, while my Dogrib (Indian) canoeman, in
a far more difficult country, had secured the only animal he hunted.
Moose are seldom found about Fort Franklin, owing doubtless to the place
having been a favourite resort of natives since time immemorial, but
they are said to be common along Bear river. While ascending the
Mackenzie in October we frequently saw fresh tracks.

OVER FORTY MOOSE KILLED.

“During the winter of 1903-4 upwards of forty moose were killed within
twenty-five miles of Fort Simpson, and moose meat comprised an important
item of our food. During a trip down the river in January I saw the
tracks of a band of four or five about thirty miles below Fort Simpson.
An area of considerable size on the sloping side of the valley, grown up
to willows, had afforded a fine feeding ground, and was well trampled.
The animals had wandered out on the snowy surface of the river also, and
had trotted about apparently with no particular aim, perhaps in play.”

Mr. Keele, in the report of his reconnaissance across Mackenzie
mountains, and down the valley of Gravel river to the Mackenzie, in 1907
and 1908, says:—“There are a few moose scattered along the valley of
Gravel river, but it is not a good moose country, as there are no small
lakes, and on account of the narrow valleys, and low timber line, the
area over which they can feed is restricted.”

Mr. Preble observed numerous tracks of both moose and bear along the
left fork of Lockhart river, a tributary of the Anderson.

THE CARIBOU OR CARIBOO.

Mr. Preble also devotes considerable space in his report to information
about the caribou (often spelled “cariboo”), another of the notable
larger game animals of this region. He writes:—“Mr. Brabant, of Fort
Smith, informed me that caribou were unusually common in that vicinity
during the winter of 1902-3. Captain Mills, of the steamer Wrigley, told
me that he saw one on Slave river, near McConnell island, on July 5,
1903. The Dogribs say that a few are found in the country between Fort
Rae and Great Bear lake. Along the lower Liard the animals are
occasionally detected in small bands and are often killed. Caribou meat
was several times brought in to Fort Simpson during my residence there,
but all my efforts to secure a specimen failed. The natives about there
distinguish between the wood caribou of the lowlands and those of the
mountains, and say that the former is smaller and lighter in colour than
the mountain animal. Woodland caribou still occur along the Saskatchewan
near Edmonton, and E. E. Whitley, who lives on Sandy creek, twenty miles
south of Athabaska, Alberta, stated that he had seen a few in that
vicinity.

THE WOODLAND CARIBOU.

“The presence of the woodland caribou in this region was first noted by
Hearne, who refers to the species as ‘Indian Deer.’ During his journey
southward from Coppermine river he saw many in the sparsely wooded
country north of the eastern part of Great Slave lake in December, 1771.
While crossing the lake on the ice he found the wooded islands ‘well
stocked’ with the same species. Deer (caribou) are enumerated by
Richardson among the animals said to inhabit Birch mountain west of
lower Athabaska river. While exploring in the region between Athabaska
lake and Churchill river in the summer of 1892, J. B. Tyrrell
ascertained that the woodland caribou was reported ‘to occur in the more
southern portion of the district, near Churchill river, but none were
seen.’

“R. MacFarlane, in a letter to the United States Biological Survey,
written in January, 1902, states that the woodland caribou inhabits the
country between Lake Winnipeg and Athabaska lake, and though nowhere in
large numbers is more abundant on the southern than on the northern
shores of this lake. Between Athabaska and Great Slave lakes he states
that “the animal is chiefly met with on the west side of Slave river,
and through all the country lying between Peace river and Great Slave
lake.

THE MIGRATORY HERDS.

“Along the southern shore of Great Bear lake, especially at the point
where we reached it on MacTavish bay, numerous well-worn trails testify
to the great numbers of caribou that pass back and forth in spring and
fall. They arrive from the Barren Grounds about the time of the first
deep snows, usually by the middle of October, and sometimes extend their
migration west to the outlet of the lake, though they are not common in
that vicinity. In the spring the greater number return, though a few
remain through the summer on the semibarren areas near Leith point, and
westward to the vicinity of McVicar bay. We saw fresh tracks of a number
near our camp east of Leith point during the early days of September.

“The Hare Indians living about the southern and western shores of Great
Bear lake, repair to its eastern end about the end of July, usually
coasting the southern shore, and spend a month or two among the caribou
on the treeless country between the eastern end of the lake and the
lower Coppermine, returning to their winter hunting grounds early in
October.

“During the winter of 1903-4, caribou reached the Northern Arm and the
eastern part of Great Slave lake in great numbers and some were killed
within a short distance of the buildings at Fort Rae for the first time
in several years.

WEST OF THE MACKENZIE.

“Mr. John Firth, of the Hudson’s Bay Company, for many years stationed
at Fort McPherson and on Porcupine river, informed me that the herds of
caribou west of the Mackenzie have a semi-annual movement to and from
the sea-coast. In their journeys they head toward the prevailing winds,
and consequently occasionally pass to the eastward of the mountains,
though usually to the westward. The southward movement commences in
August, and extends only about four hundred miles. They start to return
in March. Though the bulk of the animals then proceed to the coast, a
few remain throughout the summer in the elevated and semibarren country
between the Peel and the Porcupine. The Indians from La Pierre House,
who arrived at Fort McPherson during my stay there early in July, 1904,
having crossed the mountains on foot, had killed a few of these animals
on the way.

THE BARREN GROUND CARIBOU.

“During Franklin’s first northern journey, the Barren Ground species was
first met with on the upper part of Yellowknife river, about the middle
of August, 1820; toward the end of September it had become common about
Fort Enterprise; on October 10 an estimated number of two thousand were
seen during a short walk in the vicinity; by October 26, they had
departed southward, but about the middle of November, on account of
warmer weather, they returned to the neighbourhood. During the following
summer, while the party was exploring the Arctic coast to the eastward
of Coppermine river, caribou were found to be rather common at the mouth
of Hood river, and were noted also on Parry bay and at Point Turnagain.
During Franklin’s second journey, reindeer were killed near Fort
Franklin, Great Bear lake. J. C. Ross states that great numbers were
seen about the Isthmus of Boothia.

“During Richardson’s journey along the Arctic coast east of the
Mackenzie, in the summer of 1848, he observed the species near Liverpool
bay in August, and on Darnley bay later in the same month, and saw many
at Bloody fall, on the lower Coppermine, on September 5.

“West of the Mackenzie they are still abundant along the barren coast
and in the mountains south of it. They migrate southward in autumn, but
how far is not known. Rampart House was a ‘deer post,’ being situated in
a pass traversed semi-annually by the caribou.

“The whalers reported that the caribou were abundant among the islands
between the mouth of the Mackenzie and Cape Bathurst in July, 1894.”

GAME AT FORT CONFIDENCE.

Ex-Judge Malcolm Macleod, in his evidence before the Senate committee in
1888, referred to a very interesting letter his father had received from
Mr. Thomas Simpson, the Arctic explorer, dated from Fort Confidence at
the northeast end of Great Bear lake. Fort Confidence was, at the time
this evidence was given, the most northerly habitation on this continent
that was inhabited by white men. It was within the Arctic circle (67
degrees 53 minutes and 36 seconds). Simpson spoke of the food resources
of Fort Confidence as being abundant. The distances between posts were
so great that even Dease and Simpson’s, which was a Hudson bay
expedition thoroughly equipped, could carry food barely sufficient for
use on the way. They were there three winters (those of 1836-37, ’37-38
and ’38-39), nearly three years, and never failed a single day to have
an abundant supply of food. Franklin suffered more, because his party
was not so well equipped at times, but it is a striking fact that,
notwithstanding the severity of the climate, especially in 1838, when
the letter was written—an exceptionally severe season—they never ran
short of food. They had abundance of fish, deer (caribou), musk ox, and
meat of other kinds at all times.

Fort Rae, on the northern branch of Great Slave lake, according to Mr.
R. G. McConnell, who visited it in 1888, is surrounded by a deer
country, and is looked on rather as a provision post than as a fur post,
although it also ranks high in the latter respect. In the winter,
thousands of the “Barren Lands” caribou, which have been driven south by
the severity of the climate, are slaughtered in its vicinity, and their
flesh is converted into dry meat for use in the district.

Mr. Keele says in his report:—“Caribou were observed only at one
locality on Gravel river, near the edge of the first timber, about
twenty miles from the divide.”

IN COUNTLESS NUMBERS.

Mr. A. H. Harrison, writing of his first visit to Great Slave lake in
1902 and 1903 (“In Search of a Polar Continent”), makes the following
statement:—“The first winter that I spent on this lake I went out after
caribou and when we got among them, after six days’ hard travelling,
they were in countless numbers. This is no exaggeration. They were on a
lake ten miles in length and five in width, and it was packed so closely
with deer that you could not catch a glimpse of the ice-flooring
anywhere. We started from Fort Resolution on that occasion with thirty
sledges, but only five of these arrived. The mode of hunting employed
was curious. Clad in deerskin, the hairy side of which was outermost,
one Indian walked right through the deer to the other end of the lake,
without any of them taking much notice of him. This surprised me very
much, nor was the cause for surprise at an end. Two more Indians, clad
in the same way, followed at a distance of about two miles behind the
first, one on each side of the lake, and each of these was similarly
followed by yet another, whilst I myself remained where I was at the
lower end of the lake. When the foremost Indian had reached the other
end, he began to shout, and the deer, not knowing which way to go,
started running round and round the lake. I killed half a dozen myself,
and my companions each brought home a load. Had I cared to do so, I
could have killed many more.

“At the north end of Great Slave lake lies Christie bay and thirty miles
northeast of this bay is a second bay, of considerable size, enclosing
an island, on which, upon another occasion, I had pitched my camp. I was
just cooking my midday meal, when a herd of deer passed within a few
yards of the camp fire, and I killed five of them in as many minutes. In
this locality I stayed for a whole month, with one Indian, and after
catering for ourselves and for our dogs, I made a cache of fifty deer,
some of which I gave to the mission, and some to Mr. Gaudet, in charge
of the Hudson’s Bay Company’s post here. The end of November and the
whole of December is the best time of year for going from Fort
Resolution after caribou.”

Mr. Harrison also mentions that his party, while camping or travelling
about the country around the delta of the Mackenzie in 1905 and 1906,
often shot caribou.

OTHER BIG GAME—THE MOUNTAIN SHEEP.

In a previous chapter lengthy reference has been made to the wood
buffalo, the most northern port of whose range lies in the southern part
of the country immediately under consideration. Besides the moose,
caribou, and buffalo, the game animals of the Mackenzie include the red
deer, bears of several kinds, the lynx, the hare, the wolverine, the
mountain sheep, etc., etc. Mr. Keele, in his report of his
reconnaissance across the Mackenzie mountains in 1907 and 1908, states
that mountain sheep are plentiful on parts of Gravel river, particularly
on the low mountains between the Sayunei and the Tigonankweine ranges.
Among the hundreds of sheep seen by the writer in this locality none but
those with pure white wool were observed. The sheep are highly prized
for their heads, and on account of their flesh, which is the best of all
the wild meat; consequently they are hunted to extermination in any of
the accessible localities.

As to the smaller fur-bearing animals, the beaver, mink, otter, marten,
ermine, fox, etc., they exist in great numbers and sustain the only
present industry in the country, the fur trade.

FEATHERED GAME.

As to the feathered game there are grouse and ptarmigan, and in season
ducks of all kinds, geese, etc. In his evidence before the Senate
committee of 1888, Bishop Clut stated that Mackenzie river, where it
leaves Great Slave lake, and the mouths of Athabaska, Peace, Salt and
Great Slave Lake rivers, were places where the imperial birds
(outardes), the grey goose, the white goose, large and small, and the
swan prefer to stop to fatten themselves. They were there in such
numbers sometimes in the spring and the autumn that one could hardly
sleep when camping near them. These fowl remained there nearly six weeks
each spring and as long in the autumn. The ducks passed all summer
there. The outardes, the grey goose, white goose (large and small),
swans, ducks of numerous species and varieties are of great value, and
constitute the greater part of the people’s food in the spring and the
autumn. These fowl are very numerous. The number of them is
incalculable.

INEXHAUSTIBLE SUPPLIES OF FISH.

The wealth of the Mackenzie country in fresh water fish may be said to
be a tradition.

One of the most interesting sections to sportsmen, of that part of Mr.
Preble’s report referring to the fish of the Mackenzie basin, is that
under the heading “Speckled Trout,” in which he says:—“Under this
general heading I include a few notes collected from various sources
regarding the occurrence of speckled or brook trout, probably of several
species, in a number of widely separated localities in the Mackenzie
basin. Mr. John Firth, of Fort McPherson, assured me that speckled trout
are found in West Rat river, a tributary of the Porcupine west of Fort
McPherson. It is probable that these are either _Salmo mykiss_ or
_Salvelinus malma_, both of which are known to occur in Alaskan streams.
In East Rat river, also, which is connected with the westward flowing
stream (and therefore may contain trout of the same species), but which
flows eastward into the Peel, he said that speckled trout are common.
Mr. Firth also informed me that a form of speckled trout is found in the
stream which enters the sea a short distance west of the mouth of the
Mackenzie. Mr. MacFarlane states that speckled trout have been taken in
lower Anderson river. As anadromous trout of the _Salvelinus alpinus_
type are known to occur in the Coppermine, these records may refer to
the same species. I also learned from several independent sources that
speckled trout occur in Tawattinaw and in one or two other tributaries
of the Athabaska, but I was never able to procure specimens.”

THE ARCTIC GRAYLING.

Before the Senate committee of 1888, Doctor G. M. Dawson stated that in
all the waters tributary to the Mackenzie, the Arctic grayling, or
Back’s grayling, which is an excellent fish, was to be found. It is a
fish resembling the trout in appearance and size, but has a very large
back fin. It is a very game fish very much like the trout, takes the fly
and is excellent eating. That fish witness found in the headwaters of
the Mackenzie, as far up as the very source of Peace river, and also
that of Liard river. It also occurs in Nelson river to its headwaters.
It is a purely fresh water fish, and a two-pounder would be a fair sized
one.

Mr. Keele, speaking of his reconnaissance explorations in 1907 and 1908,
says that grayling, herring and a variety of brook trout were found in
Gravel river, there being an abundance of grayling, but herring and
trout were rarely taken.

Mr. E. A. Preble has the following to say in his report with reference
to this fine fish:—

“The Arctic grayling, usually called bluefish in the north, has a very
extensive range. It occurs throughout the region from Peace river and
Athabaska lake northward and northwestward to Arctic ocean. I can not
find that it has been detected in the Athabaska. As it prefers clear
streams it is somewhat local in distribution, occurring but seldom in
the main rivers, which are usually muddy, but being abundant in many of
the clear tributaries and the lakes which they drain. During my
explorations I met with the grayling in the lake country between Great
Slave and Great Bear lake and at a number of points on the Mackenzie. It
was especially abundant in the rapid stream which I descended to
MacTavish bay in August, 1903, and I caught many while fishing for trout
with a spoon hook. It was common also in Great Bear lake near Fort
Franklin a little later, where many were being taken in the whitefish
nets.

“The grayling is said to be scarce in the Liard below the mouth of the
Nelson, but to be common above that point. It is also found in most of
the tributaries of the Mackenzie, several of which have local names
referring to its occurrence.

“As an index to the distribution of this interesting fish I have
selected the following references: Back recorded it from the mouth of
Hoarfrost river, Great Slave lake; from the head of Backs river; and
from Lake Pelly on the same stream. Doctor G. M. Dawson reported its
capture in upper Peace river, and in the Finlayson, a tributary of the
upper Liard. MacFarlane has recorded it from Anderson river.

“I am not aware that the grayling has been recorded from any stream
tributary to Hudson bay, except in one instance. Doctor Bell mentions
that it was taken in tributaries of the lower Churchill, and that a
specimen was identified by Professor Gill as _Thymallus signifer_. A
possible explanation of the occurrence of this fish in the Churchill is
suggested by the fact that there is a direct water connection between
Churchill river and Athabaska lake. The grayling occurs in Black or
Stone river, which flows from Wollaston lake into Athabaska lake. The
waters of another outlet of Wollaston lake, Cochrane river, flow by way
of Reindeer lake into the Churchill, thus affording to a torrent-loving
species like the Arctic grayling a ready means of communication.”

GREAT SLAVE LAKE FISHERIES.

The marvellous productiveness of the fisheries of Great Slave lake and
many of the rivers in its vicinity have been time and time again
commented upon by travellers.

In the account of his journey in 1772, Samuel Hearne, writing (p. 249)
of the fish in Great Slave lake (his Athapapuskow), states:—“The fish
that are common in this lake, as well as in most of the other lakes in
this country, are pike, trout, perch, marble, tittameg, and methy. The
two last are names given by the natives to two species of fish which are
found only in this country. Besides these, we also caught another kind
of fish, which is said by the northern Indians to be peculiar to this
lake; at least none of the same kind have been met with in any other.
The body of this fish much resembles a pike in shape, but the scales,
which are very large and stiff, are of a beautifully bright silver
colour; the mouth is large, and situated like that of a pike, but when
open it much resembles that of a sturgeon, and though not provided with
any teeth, takes a bait as ravenously as a pike or a trout. The sizes we
caught were from two feet long to four feet. Their flesh, though
delicately white, is very soft and has so rank a taste, that many of the
Indians, unless they are in absolute want, will not eat it. The trout in
this lake are of the largest size I ever saw; some that were caught by
my companions, could not, I think, be less than thirty-five or forty
pounds weight. Pike are also of an incredible size in this extensive
water. Here they are seldom molested, and have multitudes of smaller
fish to prey upon. If I say that I have seen some of these fish that
were upwards of forty pounds weight, I am sure I do not exceed the
truth.”

MULTITUDES OF FISH.

Richardson in his “Arctic Searching Expedition” (Vol. 1, p. 160),
speaking of Demarais’s fishery on Great Slave lake, writes:—“During the
whole summer, in the eddies between the islands of this part of the
lake, multitudes of fish may be taken with hooks, and by nets, such as
trout, white fish, pike, sucking carp, and inconnu. In spring and autumn
wild-fowl may be procured in abundance at several places in the
neighbourhood which are their accustomed passes, and the fishery on the
north side of Big island seems to be inexhaustible in the winter. With
good fishermen, and a proper supply of nets, a large body of men may be
wintered here in safety and plenty. In no other part of the Hudson’s Bay
Company’s territories, with which I am acquainted can so many people be
maintained, with so much certainty, on the resources of the country.”

THE ORDINARY FISHING SEASON.

Mr. R. G. McConnell reports that during the ordinary fishing season on
Great Slave lake, which usually lasts from September 20 to October 10,
the fish leave the deeper parts of the lake and migrate in vast numbers
to certain favored waters where almost any quantity desired can be
obtained. The Big island fishery supplied Fort Simpson and Fort
Providence in 1887 with about forty thousand fish, besides affording
constant support to a number of Indians. At the mouth of the Beaver
about twenty thousand were taken, and the fisheries at the mouth of Hay
river, in the bay in front of Fort Rae, and near Fort Resolution,
besides other places, yielded corresponding quantities. Mr. McConnell
estimated the total yield of the lake for the year 1887 at about half a
million pounds. The most abundant and valuable of the fishes of the lake
is the widely distributed whitefish (_Coregonus clupeiformis_). With the
whitefish are associated the lake trout (_Salvelinus namaycush_), which
often attains a weight of over fifty pounds, the inconnu (_Stenodus
Mackenzii_), the pike (_Esox lucius_), and the sucker (_Catostomus
longirostris_), besides others of less importance. A stray salmon was
captured about forty miles below the outlet of the lake, and was
described by Mr. Reid of the Hudson’s Bay Company as being identical
with the common Yukon salmon, probably _Oncorhynchus Chouicha_, but
visitors of this kind are very rare.

Mr. McConnell informed the Senate committee of 1907 that there are great
quantities of whitefish in nearly all the lakes. Mr. McConnell wintered
at Fort Providence, just below Great Slave lake, and in ten days there
were about one hundred and forty thousand fish caught. They come into
the shallow part of the lake about September 15. They are caught by the
Hudson’s Bay Company, the missions and some Indians, and are used to
feed the men and dogs. It is the staple food of the country, or was the
year witness was there. They catch the fish at all seasons, but late in
the fall is the particular time for catching them for the winter supply.
They get salmon trout there also. At the Fort he had had them weighing
fifteen to twenty pounds, and they told stories about catching them
forty pounds in weight. There was one king salmon caught at Fort
Providence—only one. They also get pike or jackfish. Mr. McConnell did
not know about pickerel.

The inconnu is a fine fish, and is caught all the way along the
Mackenzie and up Slave river as far as the rapids. It is a large fish
weighing from ten to twenty pounds.

A SPECIMEN HAUL.

Mr. A. H. Harrison says (“In Search of a Polar Continent.”):—

“Most of the small streams which run into Slave river come from large
lakes that abound with fish. To these lakes we often went up in a small
canoe, and set a net, which, as a rule, if left out all night, contained
a couple of dozen fish the next morning; or, to give the component
weights of a specimen “haul”, we had on one occasion two pounds of
whitefish, twenty-five pounds of inconnu, ten pounds of trout, and
twenty pounds of pike. We had always, in fact, to throw back a great
number keeping only two or three for immediate eating. In the spring of
1903 I had taken an Indian and his family with me on to this river to
shoot duck and geese, and before a fortnight was out we had killed
sixty-three geese and a great quantity of duck. I had trouble, however,
with this Indian, who was but a poor spirited fellow, and he left me by
myself at the mouth of a small river that ran down from a lake about
sixty miles from Fort Resolution. Here for a whole month I was encamped
alone, and had no difficulty in keeping myself—fish, wild-fowl, and
black bear being plentiful. I had a net in the water, thereby securing,
as I have already intimated, some two dozen fish a day, the bulk of
which I threw back. In Slave river itself, which is very muddy, I have
never caught many fish, but the lakes off the river swarm with them.

“Fort Resolution is a delightful place. I spent a winter there in
1902-03, making many excursions into the surrounding country. There are
three trading posts there, also a Roman Catholic mission, where Bishop
Breynart makes his headquarters, and a convent in which about forty
native children are educated. Everyone relies upon fish and reindeer for
subsistence. I heard a story of a trout weighing eighty-four pounds
having been taken in Great Slave lake, but though I saw many trout that
were caught during my stay there, I never set eyes upon any weighing
more than forty-five pounds. While passing through on my recent journey
I offered fifty dollars, or ten pounds, sterling, to anyone who should
bring me a trout that scaled fifty pounds, but when I came back Mr.
Harding of the Hudson’s Bay Company said that he had not in the meantime
seen any which weighed over forty-three pounds. Even this, of course, is
a large weight for lake trout. The whitefish, however, rather than the
trout, is the chief food. It weighs about two pounds, and is caught in
great quantities. The dogs never get anything to eat except fish, and
they thrive on the diet. Two pounds of fish apiece daily is barely
enough to keep them alive, but two fish weighing two pounds each are an
ample ration for a dog.

BISHOP CLUT’S TESTIMONY.

During his examination before the Senate committee of 1888, Bishop Glut
emphasized the fact that an important natural resource of the Mackenzie
basin lay in immense quantities of fish found in the great lakes, the
Athabaska, Great Slave and Great Bear. East of those lakes there were
many other great lakes which were full of fine fish.

The bishop had not been at Great Bear lake, but from reports of Fathers
Petitot, O.M.I., and Ducot, O.M.I., he knew that the lake was immense
and abounding in fish. There was an abundance of small fish, which he
believed to be herring.

To the eastward of Mackenzie river, separated from it by a chain of
mountains, running in the same direction as the great river, a
succession of beautiful and magnificent great lakes, full of fish, was
found. They had named them “Pius IX”, “Demazenod” and “Tache”. These
were the three largest lakes. The bishop had crossed them in winter from
Fort Good Hope to Fort Norman.

Lakes were innumerable in the basin of the Great Mackenzie, and nearly
all of them abounded in fish of different kinds. The regions east,
northeast, and north, above all, abounded in lakes of all sizes, and
were very rich in fish. Lake Athabaska furnished a very great quantity
of whitefish, of small and large salmon trout, of pike, of pickerel, of
carp, of large loches, etc. The whitefish weighed at least three pounds;
the small trout from four to ten; the large trout from ten to
thirty-five; the pike from four to twenty pounds; the carp the same. In
Clear lake pike were caught weighing from twenty-five to thirty-five
pounds. Whitefish, pike, pickerel, carp and trout were caught in nets in
which the meshes were four and a half inches in size.

Great Slave lake produced the same species of fish that Great Athabaska
lake did, and also in much greater quantity. They find there also the
inconnu, a species of salmon which came from Arctic ocean. It was
undeniable that it comes from the sea. It was found all the way up the
Mackenzie as far north as the river at Fort Smith. There the rapids and
the cascades prevented it ascending higher. It was a beautiful and fine
fish—the shape of the whitefish, but much larger. It weighed from eight
to thirty pounds.

HERRING AND THE INCONNU IN THE MACKENZIE.

W. F. Bredin, M.L.A., in his evidence before the Senate committee of
1907, stated that herring from Arctic ocean ascend the Mackenzie to
about Fort Wrigley. They are good fish. He said he had been told that
Great Bear lake just teems with that same herring.

In his report, William Ogilvie, D.L.S., gives the following information
about the chief fishes of Mackenzie river:—“Fish are numerous in the
Mackenzie, the principal species being that known as the ‘Inconnu.’
Those caught in the lower river are very good eating, much resembling
salmon in taste, being also firm and juicy. The flesh is a light pink in
color, but as they ascend the river and become poor, this turns white
and the flesh gets soft and unpalatable. They average ten or twelve
pounds in weight, but have often been caught weighing thirty or forty.
They ascend as far as the rapids, on Great Slave river, where they are
taken in the fall in great numbers for dog-feed, being then so thin that
they are considered unfit for human food, if anything else is
obtainable. This fish is not fed to working dogs, unless scarcity of
other fish compels it. There is a small fish known locally as ‘herring’
somewhat resembling the inconnu in appearance, and which does not grow
larger than a pound or two in weight. The staple fish of the district,
and for that matter, of the whole northwest, is the whitefish. They
abound in many parts of the river, but especially in all the lakes
discharging into it, and form the principal article of diet during the
greater part of the time, as very little food is brought into the
country. This fish is caught in large numbers everywhere.”

FISH IN GREAT BEAR LAKE.

Mr. Hanbury mentions that one August night his party’s nets in Great
Bear lake caught sixteen whitefish, “some of them very large, seven or
eight pounds; none of them under four pounds. This was the largest
average of whitefish of which I had heard. In Great Slave lake their
average weight is three pounds.”

Mr. E. A. Preble describes the lake trout so often referred to
(_Cristivomer naymacush_) as a beautiful fish inhabiting nearly every
body of water in the north, but abounding in the larger sheets of water,
including Great Bear lake, and as the water is there beautifully clear
the traveller frequently sees them pursuing their prey in the depths, or
lying motionless near the bottom.

A trout taken by Simpson’s party at Fort Confidence, Great Bear lake,
measured four and one-half feet in length and twenty-seven inches in
girth, and weighed forty-seven pounds.

Richardson states that Franklin’s party, during eighteen months’
residence at Fort Franklin in 1825-26, took three thousand five hundred
trout weighing from two to thirty pounds each.

THE LOWER MACKENZIE.

Writing of his visit to the small post at the mouth of Arctic Red river
on the lower Mackenzie in the autumn of 1905, Mr. Harrison (“In Search
of a Polar Continent”) remarks:—“Before starting we loaded up nine
sledges, at the mouth of Arctic Red river, with dried fish, which was
now to be obtained in abundance. On reaching this post, indeed, I had
calculated that there were about twenty thousand dried fish hanging up
there, which had all been caught in nets and smoked over the camp fires.
This industry of catching fish is busily and extensively carried on each
year upon Mackenzie river. The natives begin operations in August and
continue as long as the river is open; few fish are taken after the ice
has set fast. The chief kinds of fish which are caught are the inconnu
(or Mackenzie river salmon, though it would seem rather to be a sort of
herring), the white fish and the trout. The inconnu, which turns the
scale at anything between twenty and forty pounds, is excellent
provender alike for men and for dogs; when dried, it becomes, of course,
much lighter by shrinkage, and can conveniently be carried on sledges.
The whitefish, as I have previously stated, average about two pounds a
piece; the heaviest I saw here weighed eight pounds. The whitefish,
moreover, furnish a more toothsome repast than any other kind obtainable
in these waters. There are numerous trout in the surrounding lakes, but
I seldom procured any of them.”

[Illustration: The “Conny” or “Inconnu.”]

Mr. Harrison mentions that in 1906 in the country between Point
Separation on the Mackenzie delta and Liverpool bay on the Arctic coast,
at the mouth of a small river, his Esquimaux caught several huge pike,
one of which he weighed and found to scale forty-two pounds. They were
excellent eating, but they tore the nets to pieces. This stream, Mr.
Harrison says, is fifty yards wide, and is thickly timbered on both
banks.

THE WHALING INDUSTRY.

It is not proposed to discuss here the fisheries of Arctic ocean and of
the islands which lie therein, but having come down to the mouth of the
Mackenzie we might well devote a couple of paragraphs to a fishing
industry actively prosecuted in the immediate vicinity.

In his annual report dated Fort Macpherson February 16, 1910, Inspector
G. L. Jennings makes the following reference to the whaling industry in
northern waters: “In August, 1909, the steamer _Karluk_ arrived at
Herschel island. She is an independent whaler, the stock of the venture
amounting to thirty-two thousand dollars, being owned by the captain,
the officers, and some merchants of San Francisco. The _Karluk_ cruised
in the neighbourhood of Baillie island and Banks Land until the close of
navigation. She returned to Herschel island on September 23, having
killed eleven bowhead whales, eight of which I understand were taken in
Canadian waters, north and east of Cape Parry. The value of this cargo
of eleven head is, by an estimate at the present low price of bone,
eighty-five thousand dollars. The _Karluk_ is wintering at Herschel
island and will return to the eastward by first open water. As she will
have the field to herself for at least six weeks before any other ships
can arrive from the westward, the chances are that she will make another
large catch, and will no doubt leave in the fall of this year for San
Francisco with a cargo of bone valued from one hundred and fifty
thousand dollars upwards. The value of the trade of the _Karluk_ in
pelts will also be several thousand dollars. I think it is greatly to be
regretted that no Canadian whaling ships or traders from our Pacific
coast come into this territory, instead of leaving everything to the
Americans. With a good class of trade goods, no cheap trashy stuff, and
having no duty on these goods, selling or trading at a reasonable
profit, the whole trade of our Arctic coast could easily be secured. I
think it is but a matter of a very few years before American trading
concerns open stations at Herschel island, Kittigazuit and Baillie
island. If a Canadian firm was established first there would be no
opposition.”

In a later report the same year, Inspector Jennings states that the
_Karluk_ had killed nine whales during July, making twenty in all for
two seasons with an approximate value of one hundred and thirty thousand
dollars. He had also fur to the value of ten thousand dollars received
in trade. On leaving Baillie island on August 14, the _Karluk_ cruised
along the south and west coast of Banks Land, north of Cape Kellett, to
north latitude 72·31°. She left Herschel on August 26 and reached Nome,
Alaska, on September 3.

[Illustration: THE ARCTIC PRAIRIE]

CHAPTER XIX.

THE BARREN LANDS OR “ARCTIC PRAIRIE”.

Topography, Soil, Climate and Flora.

Explorers Declare The Term “Barren Lands” a Misnomer.—Some Notes
About the Chief Rivers and Known Lakes—An Inland Waterway for
Steamers via Chesterfield Inlet a distance of Five Hundred and
Fifty Miles Into the Interior.—The Progression of the Seasons.
—The Country Similar to the Tundra of Siberia.—A Limited
Amount of Agriculture may be Possible in Places.—Natural
Prairies in the Valley of the Thelon.

Most of the recent explorers and travellers who have visited the vast
sub-arctic region extending from the present boundaries of the provinces
of Manitoba, Saskatchewan and Alberta to Arctic sea, and lying between
Hudson bay and the heights of land defining the eastern limits of the
watersheds of Mackenzie river and of the rivers flowing into the Arctic
sea, north of Great Bear lake, have protested against the application to
the country of the term “Barren Lands.” For instance we find Mr. David
T. Hanbury (See p. 21) in his well known volume “Sport and Travel in the
Northland of Canada” writing:—“I have always maintained that ‘Barren
Ground’ is a misnomer for the northland of Canada. No land can be called
‘barren’ which bears wild flowers in profusion, numerous heaths,
luxuriant grass, in places up to the knee, and a variety of moss and
lichens. It is barren only in the sense that it is destitute of trees,
hence the name ‘Dechin-u-le’ (no trees), which is the Indian name for
it.”

In 1907, Mr. Ernest Thompson Seton, the author and artist, made a trip
into the barren lands via Athabaska river, Lake Athabaska, and Great
Slave and Great Bear lakes. Describing his trip in a course of lectures,
Mr. Seton declared that the barrens were not in reality barren in any
sense of the word. Nature had seized every available cleft in the rock,
and had massed it with anemones, Athabaska roses, and beautiful flowers
of all hues. Between the vast flower stretches the bare rock was covered
with rich mosses of varying colours. “In fact,” he said, “it seems that
nature began at the barrens with a full palette, and when she got down
to the tropical regions there was nothing left in her tubes but green.
The scenery surpasses that of the central west in the beauty of the
hills and the manifold variety of wild flowers.”

TERM “BARREN LANDS” A MISNOMER.

Mr. E. A. Preble gives us this sketch of the scenery of the Barren Lands
eastward of the Coppermine:—“Thousands of lakes dot its surface, and
they are often bordered by grassy plains and gentle slopes, on which,
during the short summer, the bright flowers of a profusion of shrubby
and herbaceous plants lend their beauty to the landscape, and prove the
appellation “Barren Grounds” to be a misnomer, though in many parts,
from the nature of the soil, there is little plant life. Alders (_Aldus
alnobetula_) occur in a more or less dwarfed condition in favourable
places well into the treeless area, and several species of willows, some
of which here attain a height of five or six feet, border some of the
streams as far north as Wollaston Land. These are the only trees which
occur even in a dwarfed state on the barren grounds proper.”

Mr. J. B. Tyrrell, in one of his reports, describes the Barren Lands as
consisting “very largely of rolling plains, underlain by stony till and
covered with short grass or sedge.” He adds:—“Doubtless the ground is
permanently frozen a great distance below the surface, and the surface
in summer is almost constantly wet, like the plains of Assiniboia and
Saskatchewan in early spring. Rounded rocky hills rise here and there
through the clay, and on these, as well as often on the more stony parts
of the till, the surface is dotted with a thick growth of lichens, such
as _Alectoria ochroleuca_, _A. divergens_, and _Centraria Islandica_.
Many flowers brighten these plains during the short summer months.”

As the country has been so long known as the Barren Lands, it would at
present scarcely be recognized by any other designation, although when
the exploitation of its mineral wealth once attracts population, it will
some day be known by some other and more suitable name—“Hearne,” for
instance, after the cognomen of the first white man who undertook to
explore its natural resources.

Authorities differ in their definitions of the limits of the Barren
Lands. Some consider the territory coming under that designation as
extending much farther south in the vicinity of Hudson bay; others
include in the Barren Lands most of the area immediately north of Great
Bear lake. Mr. Preble, the most recent scientific explorer to report
officially upon the country, under the heading “The Barren Grounds”,
includes the area lying to the northward and northwestward of Great Bear
and Great Slave lakes. J. B. Tyrrell, M.A., B.Sc., F.G.S., in a paper
read before the British Association at its Toronto meeting in 1897
entitled “Natural Resources of the Barren Lands,” confined himself to a
roughly triangular area bounded on the north by the Arctic ocean, on the
east by the west coast of Hudson bay and Fox channel, and on the
southwest by a line extending from the vicinity of Churchill on Hudson
bay, northwestward, roughly at right angles to the magnetic meridian,
crossing Kazan river at Ennadai lake, Telzoa river at Boyd lake, passing
south of Clinton-Colden and Aylmer lakes, across Point lake and down the
east side of Coppermine river to within fifty miles of its mouth, and
thence striking westward across Anderson river till it reaches the
Arctic coast near the mouth of Mackenzie river.

MR. TYRRELL’S DEFINITION.

According to Mr. Tyrrell, this line follows very closely the line of the
mean summer temperature of 50° Fahr. south of which some of the most
hardy trees can grow and ripen their fruit, while north of it the summer
is not sufficiently long or warm, to allow even the most hardy trees to
bring their fruit to perfection.

This portion of the Barren Lands, according to Mr. Tyrrell, has a
greatest length from the southeast to northwest of twelve hundred miles;
a greatest breadth from southwest to northeast of seven hundred and
fifty miles, and an area of four hundred thousand square miles, a region
twice as large as the province of Ontario, or more than three times as
large as the whole United Kingdom.

It will be observed that Mr. Tyrrell leaves out of consideration in this
paper a couple of areas included in the term “Barren Lands” as used in
this chapter, namely the country south and southeast of the eastern arm
of Great Slave lake, and a triangular piece of country in the angle
between the same sheet of water and Yellowknife river. Mr. Tyrrell also
considers the Arctic strip of country north of Great Bear lake to the
mouth of the Mackenzie as forming part of the Barren Lands.

In this paper, Mr. Tyrrell makes the following comprehensive reference
to the physical geography of this extensive region:—He says:—“In
general character the country is a vast undulating plain, underlain by a
stony clay, and covered with a short grass or deciduous Arctic plants.
In certain sections no rising ground can be seen for miles around, and
in other sections rocky hills rise through the general covering of clay.
The whole land reminds one forcibly of the great plains of Western
Canada, the chief points of difference being caused by the differences
in the underlying rocky-floor. The boulder-clay underlying the plains is
deposited on a floor of soft Cretaceous shales and sandstones, and even
where the soft rocks crop out at the surface they rarely form
conspicuous hills; the boulder-clay underlying the Barren Lands is
deposited largely on a floor of igneous, or hard, highly altered rocks,
which, wherever they appear at the surface, form rocky knolls that stand
up distinctly above the surrounding clay, while the boulder-clay itself,
being formed out of material derived from the hard granitoid rocks, is
much more stony than the clay of the more southern plains.

NO HIGH ALTITUDES.

“No part of the country rises to any great altitude above the sea, the
highest point being probably the ridge of rocky hills called Stony
mountains, which run along the east side of Coppermine river, and are
said to rise about fifteen hundred feet above the sea. Ennadai lake lies
eleven hundred feet above the sea, Dubawnt[24] lies five hundred feet,
and the Yathkyed lake three hundred feet.

“The country may conveniently be divided into two distinct portions,
namely, the Interior Upland and the Coastal Plain.

“The Interior Upland includes all those parts of the country lying above
the highest ancient shore-line, either of Hudson bay or of Arctic ocean,
and has a mean elevation of from nine hundred to one thousand feet above
the sea. Its surface is composed largely of sandy boulder-clay, and
rounded boulders or broken fragments of the underlying rock. Low ridges
and rugged, irregular hills are common over the surface, while eskers,
or long straight ridges of sand or gravel, extend in uninterrupted
courses over hills and valleys alike. Here and there some ancient
beaches mark the positions of small lakes which have long since
disappeared.

THE COASTAL PLAIN.

“The Coastal Plain lies between the highest ancient post-glacial
seabeach and the present seashore, sloping gradually from a height of
five hundred to six hundred feet down to the sea-level. Much of this
plain has a stony surface, like that of the Interior Upland, but it is
diversified with sandy plains, and on all the steeper slopes gravel
terraces or coast cliffs mark the lines of the old seashore. Many of the
terraces fill narrow gaps between adjoining hills, and the lower ones
are often strewn with shells such as are found in Hudson bay at the
present time. The waves have reduced the surface irregularities of this
portion of the country to some extent, but the more rocky districts,
such as those in the vicinity of Chesterfield inlet are still, except
for the presence of the little terraces, as rough and rugged as before
they were covered by the sea, and the highest parts are probably barer,
for any loose material that had been left on them by the ice-sheet of
the glacial period has been washed by the waves into the depressions.
The breadth of the plain in the vicinity of Churchill is about fifty
miles. Farther north it becomes broader, until, in the latitude of
Yathkyed lake, it has a breadth of one hundred and twenty-five miles,
and at the north end of Dubawnt lake extends westward for three hundred
miles. North of Dubawnt river its extent is not yet known, but many of
the old sand plains and terraces reported from the banks of Backs river
probably mark old shore-lines on this Coastal Plain, there sloping
northward toward Arctic ocean.

“In a few places the coast-line is fairly high but as a rule it is low,
and slopes gently down into a shallow sea. The whole country has a
fairly general slope northeastward, and the three principal streams
which drain it have a more or less parallel course in that direction,
while other smaller streams flow more directly towards the coast,
northward to Arctic ocean and eastward to Hudson bay.

THE THREE PRINCIPAL RIVERS.

“These three streams are Thlew-e-cho, Great Fish or Backs river, Telzoa
or Dubawnt river and Kazan river.

“Backs river rises in Sussex lake about fifty miles within the edge of
the Barren Lands, in a basin surrounded by sandy hills, at an elevation
of about five hundred and fifty feet above the sea, and after a course
of six hundred miles empties itself into Arctic ocean a short distance
south of the magnetic pole. This stream will always possess a melancholy
interest for every man or woman of British stock, for at its mouth the
crews of the Erebus and Terror, the two ships taken out by Sir John
Franklin on his last ill-fated expedition, dropped in their tracks and
died as they attempted to reach a place of safety and plenty.

“Telzoa or Dubawnt river rises in Daly lake a short distance south of
the Barren Lands, and flows northeastward, roughly parallel to Backs
river, until it strikes the wide valley which extends inland from
Chesterfield inlet, where it turns abruptly eastward and flows into the
west side of Hudson bay, its total length, including Chesterfield inlet,
being eight hundred and seventy-five miles.

“Kazan river rises in Kasba lake, fifty miles east of Daly lake, and
flows approximately parallel to Telzoa river for about four hundred and
ninety miles to enter the south side of Baker lake though the exact
position of its mouth has not yet been determined. Of the smaller
streams the Anderson, Ferguson and Coppermine are the only three which
have been explored.”

DUBAWNT LAKE.

In his official report of his trip of exploration in 1893, Mr. Tyrrell
gave some particulars about Dubawnt lake, situated a little south of the
middle of the Barren Lands. He writes:—“Dubawnt lake is a body of clear
cold water of unknown extent, the southern and eastern shores indicated
by dotted lines on the map, having been laid down from rude sketches
made by the Eskimo. Its western and northern shores were surveyed for
one hundred and seventeen miles, but from the summits of the highest
hills the opposite shores were nowhere distinctly seen. Its approximate
altitude above the sea level is five hundred feet. By the Chipewyan
Indians it is called Tobatna or Water-shore lake, possibly from the fact
that the main portion of the lake is always covered with ice, and that
in summer there is a lane of water between this ice and the shore. Its
Eskimo name is Tulemalugua. Judging from subsequent Eskimo reports, it
has two principal affluents. One of them flows into its southern side,
and has scattered groves of white spruce on its banks. The other is
Dubawnt or Telzoa river which we had descended.

Before the Senate committee of 1907, Mr. Tyrrell explained that the
outline of the lake as he sketched it still appears on the maps. He
added that the most recent government maps of the Barren Lands do not
pretend to be complete. They merely show the lakes that are known. There
are thousands of others that we know nothing of, because nobody has been
through there. Some of the larger ones are sketched in. Mr. Tyrrell
sketched in many, from the reports of the Esquimaux, and they still
appear as he so sketched them on the map. The whole country is studded
with lakes.

WATER ROUTES VIA CHESTERFIELD INLET.

From the reports of Messrs. Tyrrell and Hanbury and Inspector Pelletier,
we have obtained a pretty good idea of the outstanding features of the
great system of inland waterways which find their outlet at tidal water
at Chesterfield inlet.

In his report, speaking of Thelon river, which he discovered during his
trip in 1890, Mr. J. W. Tyrrell describes it as “one of the finest in
Canada, navigable for river steamers and other boats of light draught
all the way from Hudson bay to the forks of the Hanbury, a distance of
five hundred and fifty miles, excepting perhaps at two rapids on the
river above Baker lake, where some improvements to the channel may be
made.”

He continues:—“Just what length of time this route may be open for
navigation I am unable to say precisely, but would judge that the river
portion must be open for at least five months, and the inlet and larger
lakes about a month less, that is during the months of July, August,
September and October.”

Mr. C. C. Fairchild, who was attached to Mr. Tyrrell’s expedition and
surveyed the waters between Baker lake and Chesterfield inlet, writes in
his report:—“I am unable, owing to the short time at my disposal, to
make anything but a cursory examination of the general depths of the
water traversed, but I took soundings enough to satisfy myself that
vessels

DRAWING TEN FEET OF WATER

would have no difficulty in travelling from Hudson bay to the west end
of Baker lake. Here boat navigation must end as far as the river between
Schultz and Baker lakes is concerned, owing to rapids at either end of
the river that would in low water not permit of the passage of any craft
larger than a York boat.”

“Chesterfield inlet in the main channel exceeded five fathoms in depth
at all points tried, and soundings were only taken when I could see
bottom, which was plainly visible at thirty feet and even more.”

Inspector Pelletier of the Royal Northwest Mounted Police, who went down
that river on his way from Great Slave lake in 1908, describes the lower
reach of Thelon river just above Beverly lake as flowing through “low
lying country with willows and grass. A high ridge of bare hills is seen
in the distant north, running east and west. The river follows along the
range, winding through what I would call foothills, until it opens on
Beverly lake. The country there is low lying.”

Beverly lake to Hudson bay is a stretch of barrens. No wood grows on
that stretch but a few small willows in some very scattered spots and
far between. Beverly lake is surrounded by comparatively low lying sandy
country. At the lower end the land is higher. Just entering into
Aberdeen lake the shores are rocky and immediately give place to low
sandy soil. This extends for about thirty miles, when the country again
takes a rocky appearance and the ridges get higher and higher to the
lower end where hills of from four hundred to five hundred feet in
height are seen, with solid rock formation. The north shore of Schultz
lake is of high rocky ridges, in places four hundred feet high. When
getting to the lower end it alters to sand and gravel and becomes low
lying. At the outlet of Schultz river it again becomes rocky. Below the
last rapid, near Baker lake, the country immediately becomes low lying
and sandy and gravelly. The north shore of Baker lake is high and rocky;
in places the bare rocky ridges advance and run into the lake, forming
rough, bare points. The lower end of Baker lake is high, the ridges
being about four hundred feet. Baker river flows between high banks of
solid rock. The formation of the country along Chesterfield inlet is
mostly rocky, and is quite low lying, with here and there a prominent
rocky point, but none above two hundred feet, except at the lower end,
near Deer island, where there is a collection of fairly high ridges.

UPPER REACHES OF THE THELON.

As to the higher reaches of the Thelon, Mr. J. W. Tyrrell says in his
report:—“About two miles below the junction of Hanbury river, where we
made camp, some measurements of the Thelon were made, from which the
volume of the flow at the time was found to be over fifty thousand cubic
feet per second. The width of the stream measured one thousand two
hundred and twenty-seven feet, depth of channel five feet, and velocity
three and a third miles an hour. These measurements being taken near the
forks, show a less depth but greater width than exists at most parts.

“Eight miles farther down the stream soundings were taken, showing a
depth of fourteen feet in mid-channel. At this point well grown spruce
trees were plentiful on both banks.

“About thirty or thirty-two miles below the forks, two slight rapids
occur where ridges of rock project into the stream, but they are so
slight as not to seriously interfere with the navigation of the river
either by canoes or large river boats.”

ARTILLERY LAKE REGION.

In the report of his 1908 patrol, Inspector Pelletier thus describes
Artillery lake,[25] northeast of Great Slave lake, and the portages
thereabout:—“The south end of Artillery lake is rocky, the ridges are
of solid rock, and hills do not rise above three hundred to four hundred
feet above the lake. Farther up the general character of the country
changes into rolling plains of sand, with more or less vegetation. In
places bare sand ridges are seen of fine yellow colour. This again
changes at the upper end of the lake. There the formation is more
broken, solid rock ridges are few, but large boulders are numerous, and
sand gets coarser, I might say gravelly, a mixture of clay and gravel,
with boulders more or less numerous. All the country is comparatively
flat; there are no high hills anywhere more than two hundred to three
hundred feet above water. At the northern end of Artillery lake are some
sand ridges, also at the northern end of Kasba lake. At the portages the
ground is clay, with gravel and boulders, and in places, if one walks
over the same spot a while to and fro, he will find that the ground will
move under his feet and become dangerous. In poking a stick through the
crust, water, air and mud immediately rush out. The whole country is
covered with these places; they are usually bare of vegetation, and
level and free from stones, affording good camping ground, but one has
to be careful not to bustle too much or he will find himself sinking
into a mud hole.”

Mr. Pelletier, in his report, speaking of his route from Artillery lake
to Hanbury river, says:—“The stretch from Height of Land to below Lac
du Bois is not considered as a stream. It is only a succession of lakes
separated by short, shallow and turbulent streams of no size. Hanbury
river proper begins from below Lac du Bois, where it takes the
appearance of a river. Above it can only be called the headwaters of
Hanbury river. The general conformation of the country is low, and only
ridges of gravel, or stones, not exceeding eighty feet in height, are
seen. There are no cutbanks of any account. The slopes are gradual in
most cases.

A few notes, as to the progression of the seasons in various parts of
the Barren Lands, taken from the journals and reports of a number of
explorers, will prove interesting.

A SMART THAW EARLY IN MAY.

Back records “a smart thaw” at Fort Reliance at the extreme eastern end
of Great Slave lake, on May 6, 1834, and mentions that patches of green
were daily becoming visible. He farther on states:—“On May 13, a single
goose, the harbinger of summer, flew past the house, and during the day
it was followed by five more, all of which took a northerly direction.
This was six days later than they had been seen in 1836 at Fort
Franklin, though a higher northern latitude. A fly and a flock of small
birds appeared in the evening, and during the three succeeding days we
had gulls, orioles, grosbeaks, yellow legs, robins and butterflies.

“On May 18, the catkins of the willows were half an inch long, and the
snow was fast disappearing from the ground.

SULTRY TOWARDS THE END OF MAY.

“Towards the end of the month (May) the weather became sultry, the
temperature in the sun being 106°—an extraordinary contrast to that of
January 17, when it was 70° below zero. The snow was all gone, except
that which had been drifted to a great depth in the narrow valleys, and
under steep precipices, and the Al-hel-dessy, to the westward, had burst
its icy fetters, and opened a clear channel to the portage opposite the
house; loons, gulls, and ducks took possession of the water, and seemed
to contend which should make the most noise; some small birds also, very
prettily marked, hovered about a short time, and then both they and the
ducks suddenly deserted us.”

Mr. Hanbury, writing specially of the region northeast of Chesterfield
inlet, states:—“There is never much snow on the ‘Barren Grounds’, and a
few warm days suffice to lay the country bare. If spring overtook us far
inland on rough ground, we should have an almost impossible march over
bare ground to the Arctic coast. I therefore decided to begin that long
journey not later than February.”

SPRING AT CHESTERFIELD INLET.

Mr. Warburton Pike, writing of May 1, 1887, at a whaler’s camp on Hudson
bay in the vicinity of Chesterfield inlet, states:—“Water was standing
in pools over the ice in the bay; the snow had disappeared except in the
drifts; a light rain was falling, and the first goose was killed from
the door of the master’s house; small bands of wild-fowl were passing
frequently, and cranes were calling in the swamps to the southward;
daylight lingered in the sky all night, but there was always a sharp
frost while the sun was down.”

Mr. Hanbury, after crossing from Chesterfield inlet to the Arctic coast,
writes:—“June is the one perfect month in the northland. The
temperature is just right; there is not a fly or mosquito to trouble
one. The land is clear of snow, with the exception of a few deep drifts
and banks, and the walking is good, for the land dries with wonderful
rapidity. The ice is still good to travel over. Plenty of salmon are now
running.”

Mr. Warburton Pike, on his canoe and overland trip in 1890, when north
of the east end of Great Slave lake on June 16, wrote:—“A few warm days
made a great difference in the appearance of the country. Leaves began
to sprout on the little willows, and the grass showed green on the
hillsides; sober hued flowers, growing close to the ground, came out in
bloom, and a few butterflies flapped in the hot sunshine, while we were
still walking on eight feet of solid ice. Mosquitoes appeared in
myriads; in the daytime there was usually a breeze to blow them away,
and the nights were too cold for them, but in the calm mornings and
evenings they made the most of their chance to annoy us.”

On June 25, Mr. Pike’s party planted their lodges on a high ridge
overlooking Lake Mackay.

ICE ON AYLMER LAKE JUNE 25.

At that same date the ice on Aylmer lake was still solid.

In 1821, when Franklin’s party started to descend the Coppermine on July
1, the lakes on its upper course were still covered with ice. Apparently
the river had opened only a short time before. In 1849, Doctor Rae noted
the breaking up of the same river near its mouth on June 28. At this
time the leaves of the dwarf birches were out, and the leaf buds of the
willows had begun to develop. The lower part of the river remained
blocked with ice until July 13.

Mr. Pike relates that about July 10 the weather in the neighbourhood of
the headwaters of Backs river “was variable in the extreme; two or three
hot days would be followed by a snowstorm and once we were visited by a
hurricane that did much damage to lodge-poles, and caused us to shift
camp hurriedly to the lee-side of a steep cliff hanging over the river.
July 10 was exceptionally hot in the morning, with the mosquitoes at
their worst; in the middle of the day there was a thunderstorm, and at
five o’clock the ground was covered with snow. The ice now began to show
signs of rotting, and the channel of open water round the weather edge
of the lake grew rapidly broader.”

SUNSET AT HALF PAST ELEVEN.

On July 19, according to Franklin, the sun set at the mouth of
Coppermine river at half past eleven.

From the official report of Inspector Pelletier we find that at
Artillery lake on July 23 “the atmosphere was quite smoky and warm.” On
the morning of August 12 on Thelon river the ground was white with
frost, and the ice on a kettle of water was a quarter of an inch in
thickness. The sun got up warm, and the weather during the day was
perfect. August 13 (Beverly lake) was “a warm still day”. August 31
(Chesterfield inlet) was “a nice still day, very warm.”

While on their way from York to Lake Athabaska, and descending Cree
river, Sir George Simpson’s party, in 1823, picked “a good many ripe
raspberries, currants and gooseberries on the portages” on July 30.

Mr. Tyrrell reports snow banks on the hillsides and great piles of
rafted ice on the shore at Markham lake on Dubawnt river, south of
Dubawnt lake, on August 3, 1893.

As to the close of the Barren Lands summer, Back mentions that while
ascending the river which has since been given his name, on September 4,
1834, “a hard gale from the northwest indicated the commencement of the
fall weather, and, while we were travelling, many hundreds of geese flew
high past us to the south.”

Mr. Hanbury mentions that one year during his travels two inches of snow
fell during the night of September 18 and ice formed on the smaller
lakes north of Baker lake. He remarks:—“On my journey in 1899 we
travelled on the ice with dogs the last days of June, and were beset by
ice on Schultz lake on July 31. Now in the middle of September we had
ice again, and it looked as if it had come to stay. We had not gone far
when we were obliged, by the state of the weather, to put ashore and
camp. The rest of the day was spent in repairing our tent, which had
suffered considerably during the recent storm.”

Warburton Pike states (“The Barren Ground of Northern Canada”) that the
ice on Great Slave lake is usually not safe for travel till the middle
of December.

ULTIMATE DEVELOPMENT OF THE COUNTRY.

In his paper read before the British Association at Toronto, Mr. J. B.
Tyrrell, referring to the temperature of the Barren Lands and its
bearing upon the question of the ultimate development of the country,
had this to say:—

“In this connection it may be stated that while the mean summer
temperature (which is below 50¼° on the Barren Lands) determines the
limit of the forest and the possibility of the growth of trees, the mean
winter temperature would probably determine the habitability of the
country by human beings.

“Now Churchill is the coldest inhabited place on this continent, with a
mean winter temperature of -20.5° Fahr., and it is not likely that any
part of the Barren Lands has a mean winter temperature of -30° Fahr.,
while Yakutsk, a town of about five thousand inhabitants in Siberia, has
a mean winter temperature of -40.4° Fahr., and many other places in
Northern Asia have a still lower mean, one place having a mean winter
temperature of -50.2° Fahr. Most of these places have, however, a higher
summer temperature than is found in the Canadian Barren Lands, and are
therefore within the limit of woods.

“It can thus be seen that Europeans and Asiatics live and thrive in a
much more rigorous climate than is found even in the most inhospitable
parts of northern Canada, and that therefore the climate does not offer
any insuperable objection to settlement in that country.”

PRESENT INHABITANTS TWO THOUSAND ESKIMOS.

According to Mr. J. B. Tyrrell (paper before the British Association):
“The permanent inhabitants of the Barren Lands are about two thousand
Eskimos, who live either along the coast or on the banks of Kazan and
Dubawnt rivers. They subsist entirely by hunting and fishing, and the
animals on which they live are chiefly the Barren Land caribou and
several species of seals. Besides these, about five hundred Chipewyan
Indians usually penetrate a short distance into the Barren Lands from
the south during the summer in their annual deer-hunt, but they retire
southward into the forest to spend the winter.”

LIKE THE TUNDRA OF SIBERIA.

Doctor (later Sir John) Richardson was one of the first explorers to
draw attention to the resemblance of the Barren Lands to the tundra of
Siberia. In one place the learned scientist writes:—“The general
character of the tundra of the east of Siberia is like that of the
American barren grounds.”

Again he writes:—“In character the Siberian tundra is very similar to
the American ones. Thus Wrangell says,—‘When one coming from the naked,
frozen moss-tundra reaches the valleys of the Aninuik, which are
sheltered by mountains from the prevailing cold winds, and where
birches, poplars, willows, and low creeping junipers (_Juniperus
prostratus_) grow, he thinks himself transported to Italy.’”

All who have visited the Barren Grounds agree that the prospect of
agriculture ever being successfully followed there on a large scale is
very slight, unless it is proved possible to develop the breeding of the
Lapland reindeer and make of it a profitable meat raising industry, or
is found practicable to domesticate the native reindeer or caribou. Some
of the scientific explorers, however, think there is a prospect of a
certain amount of barley agricultural produce, even grain of hardy
varieties being raised in one part—the valley of the Thelon.

LIMITED AGRICULTURE POSSIBLE.

Mr. J. W. Tyrrell says in his report:—“The Thelon valley, though
affording good grazing ground for musk-oxen and caribou, can scarcely be
looked upon as a desirable agricultural district, although I judge from
the growth and great variety of plants observed there, that some of our
cereals and most of our hardy vegetables could be grown in the Thelon
valley.”

Mr. J. B. Tyrrell, brother of Mr. J. W. Tyrrell, in his evidence before
the Senate committee of 1907, stated that to the west of Hudson bay and
north of the line of the forest which runs from Churchill northwestward
through Ennadai lake, and a short distance south of Dubawnt lake, there
is practically no agricultural land. Mr. Tyrrell would not consider that
any of the land north of the limit of forest growth was of any value for
agriculture. The tree line starts practically at Churchill and runs
northwesterly. South of that there are trees, and north there are none.
The country north of the tree line is partly rock, but the greater part
broken rock and boulders, a rough stony country without any great
elevation, and very little vegetation of any kind, except a great many
Arctic plants and sedges. Mr. Tyrrell believes the country is
permanently frozen. It did not appear to him that there would be any
possibility whatever of growing anything on it. That, in Mr. Tyrrell’s
opinion, eliminates from an agricultural standpoint that portion
northeast of that line.

To the west of Hudson bay and south of the line of the treeless land
which runs from Churchill northwestward through Ennadai lake, and a
short distance south of Dubawnt lake, there is a belt from one to two
hundred miles in width of country that is sparsely wooded. It is not a
forest country, but it is wooded along the streams, and in the more
protected places, but there is comparatively little wood of any value
upon it.

In that country there are, Mr. Tyrrell said, some low lying areas along
the streams and in odd places that would support a northern vegetation,
but it is not eminently suited for agriculture. The ordinary plants that
are grown in many northern countries could doubtless be cultivated in
many places. There is very little humus, very little decomposed soil
there, except just in the valleys.

Inspector Pelletier, speaking in the report of his 1908 patrol of his
route from Artillery lake to Hanbury river, says:—“There are large
stretches of arid country covered with boulders. Nevertheless all over
is good feeding ground for deer.”

The country surrounding Hanbury river, Inspector Pelletier states,
alternates from rocky ridges to sandy stretches and rocks broken up,
with country scattered with boulders. Moss and grass grow very poorly
down to Dickson canyon. From there on vegetation improves gradually
until when, below the last fall, it becomes most luxuriant. The contrast
is very noticeable.

GOOD PASTURAGE ALONG THE THELON.

August 9, while descending Thelon river, Inspector Pelletier’s party
camped for the night on a big grassy flat with a clump of trees at the
back of it on a little mound. The inspector says in his report:—“I got
to the top of the mound, and with my glasses I could see an immense
tract of prairie country growing good grass with a few little low trees
in the far distance. This tract of land, if situated in a more
accessible spot, would certainly make the very best ranching country,
and there are many more stretches like this on Thelon river.” The day
previous they had passed places where the banks of the river had washed
away “showing very good and fertile soil.” Towards evening of August 10,
the country, which had got quite barren about noon-time, resumed again a
green and fertile appearance and became well-wooded.” The following day
another section “barren in places” was passed, while later again quoting
the inspector’s report:—“the country assumed a better appearance, and
timber became larger and thicker, until it became a continuous forest
alike on both banks, and as thick as on any river in the timbered belt.
This kept on for about ten miles, and we camped near a bluff about
eighty feet high, at the edge of the timber. The country then alters to
low lying ground, and timber again grew, but very stunted, and only in
bunches, which gradually became more scattered, and after fifteen miles
disappeared totally to give place to long willows along the banks with
large grassy flats farther in.”

HARDY VEGETABLES MIGHT GROW THERE.

In his summary of observations on this section of his trip Inspector
Pelletier states in his report:—“There are large stretches of prairie
country (along the Thelon) growing grass profusely. The soil seems to be
most fertile. I am told the river opens in May. If such is the case I
would judge that some of the hardy vegetables would grow there. The days
are very long in summer.” Accounting for the absence of native
settlements from this valley, Inspector Pelletier says the Eskimos do
not like timber on account of the flies in the summer and soft snow in
the winter. They like the open barren coast, where the wind has full
sweep, where the snow packs hard in winter and where game is permanent.
The Indians, on the other hand do not inhabit this tract because it is
far from trading posts, and because there is no birch for them to make
their canoes.

Mr. J. W. Tyrrell, in his book “Through the Sub-Arctics of Canada,” says
“Agricultural development is not to be expected anywhere in the northern
parts of the district, but throughout the more southerly wooded portions
there are great possibilities in this direction.”

[Illustration: The Midnight Sun.]

THE NATURAL FLORA.

As to the natural flora of the country, Mr. J. B. Tyrrell, in his
expedition of 1893 across the Barren Lands, collected one hundred and
twenty-four species of plants exclusively of algae and fungi. Reference
has already been made to some observations made by explorers as to the
flowers and other natural vegetable growths.

Inspector Pelletier, Royal Northwest Mounted Police, reports that
between Beverly lake and Hudson bay “grass grows in favoured spots, but
the balance of the country is bare.”

Describing the country at Bloody fall on the Coppermine, Franklin writes
in his narrative:—“The ground is well clothed with grass and nourishes
most of the shrubs and berry-bearing plants that we have seen north of
Fort Enterprise, and the country altogether has a richer appearance than
the barren lands of the Copper Indians.”

Mr. A. P. Low, of the Geological Survey, passed a winter in the far
north near Cape Fullerton in the “Neptune”. He expressed the opinion
before the Senate committee of 1907 that the whole northern region about
Chesterfield inlet and Fullerton is unfit for agriculture. The tree line
ceases on the coast close to Churchill and crosses off to the northwest
towards the Mackenzie. The country on the mainland about Chesterfield
inlet is quite low. The hills never extend more than three hundred or
four hundred feet. There are no forests up there, and the only natural
resources would be probably the minerals, the furs, and the sea and lake
fisheries.

THE LURE OF THE BARREN LANDS.

Mr. Hanbury, describing a view in the Barren Lands on July 23, writes in
his book:—“Artillery lake looked very picturesque in the bright
sunlight; the water, which was of a beautiful blue, was fanned into
ripples by the gentle summer breeze. The ‘Barren Ground’ lay on either
side beautifully green, and decked gay with a variety of wild flowers.
Its charm, and the sense of freedom which it gives, are very impressive,
but cannot be described.”

The following is a pretty descriptive bit from Mr. Warburton Pike’s book
“The Barren Grounds of Northern Canada”:—“To the man who is not a lover
of nature in all her moods the Barren Grounds must always be a howling,
desolate wilderness, but for my part, I can understand the feeling that
prompted Salatha’s answer to the worthy priest, who was explaining to
him the beauties of Heaven. ‘My father, you have spoken well; you have
told me that heaven is very beautiful; tell me now one thing more. Is it
more beautiful than the country of the musk-ox in summer, when sometimes
the mist blows over the lakes, and sometimes the water is blue, and the
loons cry very often? That is beautiful, and if Heaven is still more
beautiful, my heart will be glad, and I shall be content to rest there
till I am very old.”

-----

[24] The Geographic Board of Canada has adopted “Dubawnt” as the
standard spelling of this lake and the river of the same name. The name
is a corruption of the Indian name “Tobatna”, meaning “water shore”. (E.
J. C.)

[25] So named by Captain George Back in 1833, out of respect to the
Royal Artillery, to which distinguished corps some of his crew who
joined him in Montreal belonged, “and from a grateful remembrance of the
deep interest manifested by its officers for the success of the
expedition, and of their friendly courtesies” to himself.

CHAPTER XX.

THE BARREN LANDS, OR “ARCTIC PRAIRIE.”

Tree Growth and Timber Resources.

Phenomenal Extensions of Tree Growth Within the Barren Lands Along
the Valley of Thelon river.—Black Spruce, Larch, White Spruce,
Banskian Pine and Birch.—Valuable Timber Along the Thelon,
About the East End of Great Slave lake and Between Great Bear
lake and Coppermine river.

In his valuable report, Mr. E. A. Preble, of the United States
Biological Survey, states that Coppermine, Thelon, and many of the
smaller rivers of the Barren Lands are wooded to some extent on their
upper portions, but by far the greater part of the area drained by them
is treeless.

Mr. Preble traces the northern boundary of the great transcontinental
forest from the western shore of Hudson bay to the mouth of the
Mackenzie as follows:—“Starting from the mouth of Churchill river,
Hudson bay, the tree-line follows the shore closely for a few miles and
then curves gently inland. Thence it extends northwesterly crossing
Nueltin, or Island lake, Ennadai lake on Kazan river and Boyd lake on
the Dubawnt. Just north of 63 degrees on Artillery lake is the next
point where we have a definite dividing line. Between the Dubawnt and
Artillery lake is the valley of the upper Thelon or Ark-i-linik, along
whose banks the forest extends in a narrow line far into the general
treeless area. From Artillery lake the line extends northwestward to
Point lake, curving toward the southwest in the interval and crossing
Lake Mackay, south of latitude 64 degrees. From Point lake, whose shores
are practically devoid of trees, nearly to latitude 67 degrees the banks
of the Coppermine are so thinly wooded that the river may be taken as
the approximate boundary of the woods. Spruces occur on the Coppermine
as far north as the mouth of Kendall river, but are absent from the
summit of the divide between there and Great Bear lake and reappear on
lower Dease river. Between Dease river and the lower Anderson the
boundary of the woods is not well known.”

It will be remembered by those familiar with the subject, that, in
defining the eastern end of the forest line, Mr. Preble has closely
followed the definition laid down by Mr. J. B. Tyrrell in the official
report of his exploration of the country south and east of Dubawnt lakes
and Chesterfield inlet. Mr. Tyrrell states in his report:—

“The region may be divided into Forests, and Treeless Plains or ‘Barren
Lands’, by a line which curves around the bottom of Button bay, and then
continues within sight of the shore as far as Hubbart point, beyond
which it strikes northwestward almost at right angles to the magnetic
meridian, crossing Kazan river at the southern narrows of Ennadai lake,
and Telzoa river about the middle of Boyd lake.”

BLACK AND WHITE SPRUCE AND LARCH.

“The forested country is chiefly wooded with small black spruce (_Picea
nigra_) and larch (_Larix Americana_) while the lowlands are almost
everywhere covered with deep mossy swamps. Proceeding northwards, the
woods become confined to the lowlands and the tops of the hills remain
treeless. Such are the conditions of the surface around Kasba and Daly
lakes. Farther northward the wooded plains give place more or less
suddenly to level or rolling grassy plains, which constitute the Barren
Lands. As the forest disappears, much of the surface is covered by deep
frozen mossy bogs or tundras, but these occur only along the edge of the
forest, and do not form part of the Barren Lands proper.

“Besides the two species of trees above mentioned, the white spruce
(_Picea alba_) grows to quite a large size on some of the dry estuaries,
and on the stony, well-drained banks of Telzoa river. It extends
northward almost to Dubawnt lake, forming a larger tree than either of
the others. At Churchill, near the shore of Hudson bay, small white
spruce were found to have entirely replaced black spruce in the swamps.
A few miles farther inland, black spruce again takes its normal place in
similar swamps, and white spruce almost disappears.

“Banksian Pine (_Pinus Banksiana_) grows on the sandy plains along Stone
river, and northward, on dry sandy ridges, as far as Selwyn and Theitaga
lakes, but it does not extend as far north as either spruce or larch.
Canoe Birch (_Betula papyrifera_) grows to a fairly large size at the
head of Thlewiaza river but as a rule it is a small tree in this region.
It gradually decreases in size and disappears at the edge of the Barren
Lands. Some small aspen trees (_Populus tremuloides_) were seen as far
north as Daly lake on Telzoa river, latitude 60°, on the headwaters of
Thlewiaza river, and at the mouth of Churchill river on Hudson bay.

Mr. Tyrrell’s expedition of 1893 did not find much timber along Dubawnt
river. Mr. J. W. Tyrrell (“Through the Sub-Arctics of Canada”) mentions
that the party found a little clump of white spruce trees on the north
shore of Carey lake on the Dubawnt in latitude 62° 15′ north. Two feet
above the ground the trunk of the largest tree measured eight feet in
circumference.

Mr. Tyrrell also states that the southern affluent of Dubawnt lake “has
scattered groves of white spruce on its banks.”

TIMBER ALONG THE THELON.

There is considerable timber along the Thelon and the main tributary of
its upper reach, the Hanbury, so named from the original explorer of
both streams. Mr. Hanbury, describing his exploratory trip,
writes:—“The peculiarity of the Ark-i-linik (the Indian name then
applied to the Thelon and its tributary the Hanbury) is that, though so
far north, it is wooded on either bank, and in places one might even say
heavily timbered, spruce trees, with butts measuring one and one-half to
two feet across, being by no means uncommon. It is a long way north of
the limit of trees marked on the maps, and there is a large extent of
country to the south of it destitute of trees. I can find no explanation
of this peculiarity from the geological formation, for the same red and
white sandstone which prevails nearly the whole length of the river
occurs at places which are without trees.

“The woods as a whole amount only to a rather deep fringe, the trees for
the most part being scattered and not continuous. Here and there along
the banks are spots and short stretches quite bare of timber. After a
short walk away from the river on either side one reaches the outer edge
of the woodland fringe beyond which the land is typical prairie. Along
the creeks and effluents, however, the growth extends to a considerable
distance, in places as far as the eye can reach the trees diminishing in
size until the spruce is mere scrub.”

Ascending the main branch of the Thelon, Mr. Hanbury describes the
timber as beginning about fifty miles above the mouth of the river at
Beverly lake. That far northeast he states “spruce of fair-size growth
is to be found, and the woods then increase in size of timber and in
extent until the river divides, the larger branch coming in from the
south, the smaller—which we followed up—joining from the west.”

OF GREAT VALUE TO CANADA.

Mr. J. W. Tyrrell, in the official report of his exploration along
Hanbury and Thelon rivers for the Dominion government in 1900,
remarks:—“The timber supply of the Thelon should be of great value to
Canada.”

Mr. Tyrrell mentions a grove of spruce on the Thelon, two miles below
the junction of Hanbury river, and relates that eight miles farther down
stream “well grown spruce trees were plentiful on both banks. Here, and
for many miles below, the Thelon is a really fine and beautiful river,
having grassy banks—well wooded in places by spruce trees—some of
which measured some fifteen inches in diameter.

“The wooded or partially wooded banks of the Thelon extend altogether
for a distance of about one hundred and seventy miles below the forks of
the Hanbury. This distance is not to be understood as a continuous
stretch of timber, but over that distance many fine spruce groves, as
well as more or less continuous thinly scattered trees are found. The
largest trees measured from twelve to fifteen inches in diameter, but
would average about six inches.”

In his book “Through the Sub-Arctics of Canada” Mr. Tyrrell again refers
to the timber along the Hanbury and the Thelon, writing:—“In the
valleys of the Thelon and some other rivers there are valuable belts of
spruce and tamarack timber for local supply when required.”

In the official report of his long patrol in 1908 Inspector Pelletier
writes:—“A good amount of wood for fuel is available on Hanbury river.
In places timber is of fair dimension. In one or two ravines near
Dickson canyon I would judge the timber to be of sufficient size to
erect a comfortable log camp.

A SIXTY MILE STRETCH OF SPRUCE TIMBER.

“The banks of the Thelon are very well stocked with timber. Of course
there are fairly long stretches on which wood is very scarce,
principally at the lower end, but still fuel is found everywhere, either
drift or standing. The best stretches of solid timber are from about
twenty miles below the Hanbury and extend for sixty miles. The stretch
is nearly without interruption. There is another stretch of about ten
miles, fifteen miles below Lookout point, and at numerous other points
good timber, but in small quantity, is seen. This timber does not extend
very far inland. It varies from a few yards deep to two or three miles.
In some parts, the timber extends still farther inland. Lumber of fair
size from six to ten inches in diameter is abundant. All the timber is
spruce.”

Inspector Pelletier speaks of a ten mile stretch on the Thelon, where
there “was continuous forest on both banks, and as thick as on any river
in the timbered belt.”

Inspector Pelletier also reports:—“On Beverly lake (Thelon river) any
amount of driftwood is to be found, on Aberdeen lake very little, and
below none at all.”

THE THELON SPRUCE GROVES PHENOMENAL.

Mr. E. A. Preble, of the United States Biological Survey, in his report
has this to say as to the growth of timber along the Thelon:—“The
northern extension of the coniferous forest along the banks of
northward-flowing rivers has already been referred to. The most
remarkable example of this phenomenon is found on the Thelon or
Ark-i-linik, a stream tributary to Hudson bay. It was first explored by
Hanbury in 1899, and by J. W. Tyrrell during the following season. From
a point near latitude sixty-two and one-half degrees, which is as far
south as the river has been explored, and which is within the main area
of the Barren Grounds, a more or less continuous belt of spruce borders
the river as far north as latitude sixty-four and one-half degrees, a
distance of over two hundred miles by the river. A few species of
woodland-breeding birds follow these extensions of the forest to their
limits.”

EASTERN PART OF GREAT SLAVE LAKE.

Inspector Pelletier also gives us some information as to the timber
resources of the eastern part of Great Slave lake and along the canoe
and portage route to Hanbury river. He writes:—“On the south shore of
Great Slave lake much good timber was met. On the north shore timber
diminishes very perceptibly in size, and the farther one proceeds the
more it gets stunted and scattered; only in some favoured spots is
timber of any size, but no large area. It consists chiefly of spruce,
birch, poplar and jackpine. At the upper end of the first portage from
Great Slave lake timber gets very scarce, at French lake a large open
spot and at Acres lake we are practically at the beginning of the
Barrens, although there is a good lot of wood close to the shore and in
sheltered spots. At north end of Burr lake is a nice grove of good sized
trees. The country gets rocky and barren, grass growing only in favoured
spots.

“At the southern end of Artillery lake, along the small ravines on the
east bank, is a fair amount of wood good for fuel and building dog
sleighs, but as soon as one crosses Lockhart river where the lake gets
wider, wood is seen here and there only in small bluffs. It is small,
bent and dwarfed by the wind storms and snow. There is very little
substance in the soil, and vegetation must be very slow. Trees grow
mostly in the shelter of a bank, whether stone or sand. At about half
way up the lake on the east side the last woods are met; on the edges
they are low, bent and creepy, as if in readiness to grasp the soil for
support to resist the force of the elements. Nothing further grows but
some grasses in favoured spots, and at the rapids, where there is a lot
of dampness, willows grow between the crevices of upturned boulders.
Above Kasba lake on the route followed even willows do not grow. In the
eddies at the foot of the rapids on Kasba river I have seen sticks, some
of which had been cut with an axe or other tool. Those pieces of wood
were small but of a size which leads me to believe that somewhere on
Clinton-Colden or farther west on Aylmer lake, timber of some kind is to
be found. These sticks or pieces of wood were very old as if they had
been tossed up and washed by water for a long period. Moss grows in
places and for fuel purposes a few experiments with the different kinds
will demonstrate which is the best. We found the black thick sort, which
grows on the stones, is very light and dry and burns the best. One makes
a tunnel with stones and places the door towards the wind, the more wind
and draught the better.”

SCATTERED TIMBER EAST OF GREAT SLAVE LAKE.

In the report of his trip in 1900, Mr. J. W. Tyrrell also gives us some
glimpses of the timber about the east end of Great Slave lake and the
lakes and river to the east and northeast of that locality. According to
Mr. Tyrrell, “Fairchild point (near old Fort Reliance), which is about
ten miles in length, is well wooded with white spruce from six to twelve
inches in diameter and is notable as being the source of timber in that
locality.

“The shores of Carlton harbour are sparingly wooded with small spruce
and a few Banksian pines. It might be noted here that on Fairchild point
a few black poplars were observed, the last seen on our outward journey.

“At Fort Reliance, here and there, are to be seen the charred remains of
large stumps, indicating the apparent recent destruction of the original
forest.

“The largest young trees, which showed thirty-four to thirty-five years’
growth, were from four to six inches in diameter two feet from the
ground, and were not of stunted appearance.

“At the north end of Burr lake there is situated a nice grove of white
spruce timber, containing trees of ten to twelve inches diameter. It
proved to be the last timber of any consequence met with before entering
the barren lands, excepting some on the west shore of Artillery lake
near Timber bay.

“On the western side of Artillery lake, about ten miles from the south
end, the shore is quite well timbered with small spruce and they
continue northerly, although thinly scattered, for a distance of twenty
miles, eight miles farther north than the last grove on the east shore.
There the woods cease entirely.”

It is interesting to recall that Back pointed out that “the pines are
said to disappear along Artillery lake.”

Mr. Warburton Pike thus describes the same country at the time he passed
through it:—

“Scattering timber, spruce and birch, clothed the sloping banks to the
sandy shores of the lakes; berries of many kinds grew in profusion; the
portages were short and down hill; and caribou were walking the ridges
and swimming the lakes in every direction. A perfect northern fairyland
it was, and it seemed hard to believe that winter and want could ever
penetrate here.”

TIMBER OF THE FAR NORTH.

The first reference to the timber of the northern part of the Barren
Lands we find in the report of Samuel Hearne, who in 1771, speaking of
his discovery of Coppermine river, writes:—“Before I proceed farther on
my return, it may not be improper to give some account of the river, and
the country adjacent; its productions, and the animals which constantly
inhabit those dreary regions, as well as those that only migrate thither
in summer, in order to breed and rear their young, unmolested by man.
That I may do this to better purpose, it will be necessary to go back to
the place where I first came to the river, which was about forty miles
from its mouth. Near the water’s edge there is some wood, but not one
tree grows on or near the top of the hills between which the river runs.
There appears to have been formerly much greater quantity than there is
at present, but the trees seem to have been set on fire some years ago
and, in consequence, there are at present ten sticks lying on the ground
for one green one which is growing beside them. The whole timber appears
to have been even in its greatest prosperity of so crooked and dwarfed a
growth as to render it of little use for any purpose but firewood.

“Besides the stunted pines already mentioned, there are some tufts of
dwarf willows; plenty of Wishacumpuckey (as the Indians call it, and
which they use as tea); some jackatheypuck, which the natives use as
tobacco; and a few cranberry and heathberry bushes; but not the least
appearance of any fruit.

“The weeds grow gradually thinner and smaller as you approach the sea,
and the last little tuft of pines that I saw is about thirty miles from
the mouth of the river, so that we meet with nothing between that spot
and the sea-side but barren hills and marshes.”

Sir John Franklin on his first journey, in 1819-22, reached the upper
part of Coppermine river at Point lake just east of the southern arm of
Great Bear lake. He found the “valleys on its border intersected with
clusters of spruce trees. On the borders of such of these lakes as
communicate with Coppermine river, there are a few groves of spruce
trees, generally growing on accumulations of sand.”

COPPERMINE VALLEY.

Sir John refers as follows to the timber growths on the small lakes or
expansions of the Coppermine as observed during the descent of his
party:—

“Red Rock lake is in general narrow, its shelving banks are well clothed
with wood, and even the hills, which attain an elevation of four hundred
or five hundred feet, are ornamented half way up with stunted pines.”

“At Rock-Nest lake (just north of Red Rock lake) the only wood is the
pine, which is twenty or thirty feet high, and about one foot in
diameter.

“At Fairy lake the river flows between banks of sand thinly wooded, and
as we advanced the barren hills approached the water’s edge.”

West of that part of Coppermine river which is nearest to Great Bear
lake, Sir John Richardson in 1826 said that they met with wooded valleys
and saw much wood in the valleys far to the west. From the height of
land between Coppermine river and Great Bear lake they had an extensive
view of a lower and well wooded country.

Of the country above Bloody falls, on the Coppermine, Sir John Franklin
writes:—“In the existence of many scattered stumps of decayed spruce
fir trees, and the total absence of young plants, one might be led to
infer that of late years the climate has deteriorated and that the
country was no longer capable of supporting trees so near the sea coast
as it had formerly done. The largest tree in the clump in which we
bivouacked had a circumference of thirty-seven inches at the height of
four feet from the ground. Its annual layers were very numerous and fine
and indicated centuries of growth, but I was unable to reckon them.”

FINE SPRUCE NORTHEAST OF GREAT BEAR LAKE.

In 1848, writing of the area between Dease bay (the extreme northeastern
arm of Great Bear lake) and Coppermine river, Sir John Franklin
states:—“At two we came to another branch of the Kendall, which runs
through a ravine of red and spotted sandstone, under whose shelter there
grew a remarkably fine grove of white spruces. The best grown tree
measured sixty-three inches in circumference and did not taper
perceptibly for twenty feet from its root. Its total height was from
forty to fifty feet. Other trees of equal girth tapered more, and one
decayed trunk, which lay on the ground, looked to be considerably
thicker.”

Hanbury mentions that along the north shore of Barry island in Bathurst
inlet he “picked up some drift sticks which evidently must have come
from Hood river” which flows into Arctic waters some distance east of
Coppermine river.

Sir George Back describes the banks of Backs river as being rocky and
treeless (“without a single tree on the whole line of its banks”).

CHAPTER XXI.

THE BARREN LANDS OR “ARCTIC PRAIRIE”.

Economic Minerals.

Deposits of Native Copper in the Far North.—Several Areas West of
Hudson bay Contain Rocks Similar to Those at Sudbury.—Belts of
Huronian Rocks that are Expected by Geologists to be Eventually
of Great Economic Importance.—Vast Probable Mineral Bearing
Country in the Interior Which Can Now be Reached Via
Chesterfield Inlet.—Iron, Gold and Silver in Small Quantities
North of Lake Athabaska.—Free Gold in Melville Peninsula.—
Lignite and Soft Coal Along the Arctic Coast.

From time immemorial tradition has ascribed to the great northern
wilderness which we have come to know as the Barren Lands or Barren
Grounds, untold mineral wealth, and what tradition has so long asserted
is substantiated by the testimony of scientific experts.

The original exploratory expedition despatched into the country, that
under Samuel Hearne in 1771, was inspired by the desire of the Hudson’s
Bay Company to locate the copper mines in the far north of which the
natives spoke to the pioneer traders.

Many of the principal witnesses examined before the British
parliamentary committee of 1749 referred to the prospective mineral
wealth of the country northwest of Hudson bay. Mr. Joseph Robson, at
whose instance largely the investigation was held, testified that he had
seen copper worn by the Indians about their necks and arms. He had also
seen about a pound and a half of copper ore, which he understood from
the Indians they had brought from a great distance.

Another witness, Alexander Browne, who had been six years in the
company’s service at Hudson bay as surgeon, informed the Committee that
he had seen both copper and copper ore at Prince of Wales’ Fort on
Churchill river, which the northern Indians informed him they brought
from an isthmus of land which lies by a lake at the farthest extent of
their country. It was hard to ascertain the distance from the accounts
of the Indians, but he judged it to be about three or four hundred
miles. He never heard the Indians say whether there was a passage to
this place from Hudson bay by water, but they informed him their river
ran by it. They brought down the copper for ornaments, and the ore at
the request of Governor Norton. Witness had seen about four or five
pounds of it, both before it was smelted, and after, and he

TOOK IT TO BE A RICH ORE,

but did not understand metals. He had heard of lead ore at Hudson bay,
but never saw any. He never saw the Indians smelt the copper, but they
informed him that the earth was washed from the ore by showers, and that
they smelted it on a fire until it ran, and then beat it, it being very
malleable. Witness never heard of a copper mine on the large arm of the
sea, but the ore was brought down by canoes to the open sea, and the
rivulet which washed the said copper is not known to have any
communication with Hudson bay, the mine being about fifteen miles from
the open sea, by the accounts of the Indians. He believed that the
Indians came a little to the northward of Whale cove, “which bears a
point or two to the west of the north from Churchill.” If the Indians
were encouraged they would bring great quantities of ore, as well as
smelted copper to Whale cove, but if persons were sent up to the mine
they would labour under a difficulty for want of fuel, the country
producing no wood, and what the Indians smelt, they do in small
quantities with moss.

Doctor Thompson, another of the company’s surgeons, testified that he
had heard the natives talk of a sea to the westward, which, by their
accounts, is not far distant, and of a copper mine, which lay on the
side of a “Streight”, which takes them five days in crossing. They
described the water of this “Streight” to be very deep, and they could
not reach the bottom with two deerskins cut into thongs. If a sloop
could be brought alongside this copper mine, they say they could fill
it, in a little time, and by their account, this “Streight” has a
communication both with the bay and the south sea.

Doctor Thompson further informed the Committee, “that he went with
Captain Middleton on the discovery of the North-West-Passage, and
likewise with the last adventurers.”

Christopher Bannister, who had been armourer and gunsmith to the
Hudson’s Bay Company, and had resided in the bay about twenty-two years,
informed the Committee that he had seen lead ore at Moose river, which
came from the northward, but he could not say whence. He had seen a good
quantity of it, and some of it was tried by Mr. Longdon’s apprentice,
and it seemed extraordinary good lead, the boy

MAKING A PAIR OF BUCKLES OF IT.

The witness could not say what proportion the lead bore to the ore. The
boy put in a piece of ore as big as a man’s fist, and got lead enough to
make a pair of large buckles. The witness was sure nothing was put in
but the ore, none being present but himself, and the boy who brought it
down. That was about three years previous to the investigation and
witness never saw any lead ore at any other time. He had seen copper
frequently brought down by the northern Indians, a piece of which he
produced before the committee. He said he had seen great quantities of
it there, and was informed by a young man, who is now at Hudson bay that
the Indians told him that it was brought from a mine, in search of which
the young man would gladly have gone.”

HEARNE AT THE COPPER DEPOSITS.

In the record of his famous trip (pages 173 to 176) Hearne makes the
following references to his investigation into the subject of the
traditional copper mines of the Indians on Coppermine river:—“After a
sleep of five or six hours we once more set out, and walked eighteen or
nineteen miles to the south-southeast when we arrived at one of the
copper mines, which lies, from the river’s mouth about south-southeast,
distant about twenty-nine or thirty miles. This mine, if it deserve that
appellation, is no more than an entire jumble of rocks and gravel, which
has been rent so many ways by an earthquake. Through these ruins there
runs a small river, but no parts of it, at the time I was there, was
more than knee-deep. The Indians who were the occasion of my undertaking
this journey represented this mine to be so rich and valuable, that if a
factory were built at the river, a ship might be ballasted with the ore,
instead of stone, and that with the same ease and despatch as is done
with stones at Churchill river. By their account the hills were entirely
composed of that metal, all in handy lumps, like a heap of pebbles. But
their account differed so much from the truth, that I and almost all of
my companions expended near four hours in search of some of this metal,
with such poor success, that among us all, only one piece of any size
could be found. This, however, was remarkably good, and weighed above
four pounds. I believe the copper has formerly been in much greater
plenty, for in many places, both on the surface and in the cavities and
crevices of the rocks, the stones are much tinged with verdigrise.

“Before Churchill river was settled by the Hudson’s Bay Company, which
was not more than fifty years previous to this journey being undertaken,
the Northern Indians had no other metal but copper among them, except a
small quantity of iron work, which a party of them who visited York Fort
about the year one thousand seven hundred and thirteen, or one thousand
seven hundred and fourteen, purchased, and a few pieces of old iron
found at Churchill river, which had undoubtedly been left there by
Captain Monk. This being the case, numbers of them from all quarters
used every summer to resort to these hills in search of copper; of which
they made hatchets, ice-chisels, bayonets (sic), knives, awls,
arrow-heads, etc. The many

PATHS THAT HAD BEEN BEATEN

by the Indians on these occasions and which are yet, in many places,
very perfect, especially on the dry ridges and hills, is surprising; in
the valleys and marshy grounds, however, they are mostly grown over with
herbage, so as not to be discerned.

“The Copper Indians set a great value on their native metal even to this
day, and prefer it to iron, for almost every use except that of a
hatchet, a knife, and an awl; for these three necessary implements,
copper makes but a very poor substitute.

“There is a strange tradition among these people, that the first person
who discovered these mines was a woman, and that she conducted them to
the place for several years, but as she was the only woman in the
company, some of the men took such liberties with her as made her vow
revenge on them, and she is said to have been a great conjurer.
Accordingly when the men had loaded themselves with copper, and were
going to return, she refused to accompany them, and said she would sit
on the mine till she sunk into the ground, and that the copper should
sink with her. The next year, when the men went for more copper, they
found her sunk up to the waist, though still alive and the quantity of
copper much decreased, and on their repeating their visit the following
year, she had quite disappeared, and all the principal part of the mine
with her, so that after that period nothing remained on the surface but
a few small pieces, and those were scattered at a considerable distance
from each other. Before that period they say the copper lay on the
surface in such large heaps, that the Indians had nothing to do but turn
it over, and pick up such pieces as would best suit the different uses
for which they intended it.”

Sir Alexander Mackenzie is authority for the statement that there was a
tradition among the Chipewyan Indians that their ancestors first reached
the continent of America at Coppermine river. “Where they first made
land, the ground was covered with copper, over which a body of earth had
since been collected to the depth of a man’s height.” The tradition is
interesting as indicating the fact that the Indians knew of the famous
copper deposits for many generations.

[Illustration: Some of the Difficulties of Northern
Transportation:—Crossing a Swamp.]

SIR JOHN FRANKLIN’S VISIT.

When Sir John Franklin’s party in 1821 visited Copper mountains they
found only a few small pieces of native copper. Franklin says in his
narrative (p. 340) “The annual visits which the Copper Indians were
accustomed to make to these mountains when most of their weapons and
utensils were made of copper, have been discontinued since they have
been enabled to obtain a supply of ice chisels and other instruments of
iron by the establishment of trading posts near their hunting grounds.
That none of those who accompanied us had visited them for many years
was evident from their ignorance of the spots most abundant in metal.”

Doctor G. M. Dawson, director of the Geological Survey of Canada,
examined before the Senate committee of 1888, stated that as to the
Barren Lands, it was a fact that an immense district—nearly half a
million square miles of country—was at that date, except along its
watercourses, as utterly unknown as the interior of Africa. Coppermine
river runs through the Barren Lands and so does Back’s Great Fish river,
on which there are mineral indications. There was every reason to
believe that there is a repetition along Coppermine river, and in its
vicinity of those rocks which contain copper, on Lake Superior and which
have proved so rich there. At the time Doctor Dawson gave his evidence,
he stated, it seemed to be beyond the reach of the prospector. The
Hudson’s Bay Company sent Hearne up there in the latter part of the
preceding century to discover where the copper found in the hands of the
natives came from, but he could do nothing but report that he found
copper there. The sea to the north was ice-bound, so he did not see his
way to utilizing it. Hearne travelled the barren grounds more than any
one else, but he was not a scientific explorer. He travelled with the
Indians in winter under circumstances of great hardship, and Doctor
Dawson said he believed we had not yet got sufficient information up to
that date about these “Barren Grounds.” What mineral discoveries might
be made there it was impossible to say.

Bishop Clut informed the same committee that copper was found on
Coppermine river in great pieces. Witness had seen little crosses made
of it by the savages themselves when they were not able to have other
metal.

SIMILAR TO LAKE SUPERIOR DEPOSITS.

Mr. J. B. Tyrrell, in his paper read before the British Association for
the Advancement of Science at its Toronto meeting in 1879, mentioned
that the descriptions of Doctor Richardson, who visited the locality of
Coppermine river in 1821 and again in 1826, show that some of the rocks
which occur on the banks of the Coppermine are precisely similar to
those on Dubawnt and Baker lakes, though they also indicate the
occurrence of the underlying Animikie series, and they also show that
the conditions under which the copper there occurs are very like those
under which it occurs on the south side of Lake Superior.

The Keewenawan rocks (so called from the district so named on the shore
of Lake Superior) would appear, according to Mr. Tyrrell, to have been
first seen by Doctor Richardson on Red Rock lake, a short distance below
Point lake, on Coppermine river, and thence they occupy the banks of the
river through most of the distance down to its mouth.

Continuing to discuss Doctor Richardson’s report, Mr. Tyrrell proceeds
in his paper to say:—“At ‘Rocky Defile,’ ‘the walls of the rapid’ are
said to ‘consist of a very dark purplish red, compact felspar rock,
alternating with a rock which is composed of a light reddish and greyish
felspar and quartz, the former indistinctly crystallized,’ evidently
referring to different varieties of quartz-porphyry or porphyrite. ‘This
rock is everywhere exposed in the bed of the river for ten or twelve
miles below the rapid.’

“In the beds of the torrents flowing into the main river he (Richardson)
found many rock fragments, most of which were probably derived from rock
in places in the vicinity, and the list might readily be duplicated from
the copper-bearing rocks of Lake Superior; he mentions ‘fragments of
reddish grey, granular, foliated limestone, of deep red sandstone, of
gray sandstone, of red syenite. There also occur fragments of pale red
sandstone, composed principally of quartz and a little felspar, with
imbedded circular concretions of quartz, and of reddish quartzite
sandstone. Fragments were also found of dark-greenish felpathose trap,
of greenstone, of dark flesh-red felspar in granular concretions, with
imbedded patches of hornblende, of red felspar partly coloured with
hornblende, and containing amygdaloidal portions of prehnite.’

COPPER MOUNTAINS.

“Copper mountains consist principally of trap rocks. The great mass of
the rock in the mountains seems to consist of felspar in various
conditions; sometimes in the form of felspar-rock or claystone,
sometimes coloured by hornblende and approaching to greenstone, but most
generally in the form of dark reddish brown amygdaloid. The amygdaloidal
masses contained in the amygdaloid are either entirely pistacite
(epidote), or pistacite enclosing calc-spar. Scales of native copper are
very generally disseminated through this rock, through a species of trap
tuff which nearly resembles it, and also through a reddish sandstone on
which it appears to rest. The rough, and in general rounded and more
elevated parts of the mountain are composed of the amygdaloid but
between the eminences there occur many narrow and deep valleys, which
are bounded by perpendicular mural precipices of greenstone. It is in
these valleys, among the loose soil that the Indians search for copper;
masses of epidote containing native copper; of trap rock with associated
native copper, green malachite, copper glance or variegated copper ore,
of greenish gray prehnite in trap with disseminated native copper; the
copper in some specimens was crystallized in rhomboidal dodecahedrons.
We also found some large tabular fragments, evidently portions of a vein
consisting of prehnite, associated with calcareous spar and native
copper. The Indians dig wherever they observe the prehnite lying on the
soil, experience having taught them that the largest pieces of copper
are found associated with it. The Indians report that they have found
copper in every part of this range, which they have examined for thirty
or forty miles to the northwest. We afterwards found some ice-chisels in
possession of the Esquimaux, twelve or fourteen inches long and half an
inch in diameter, formed of pure copper.”

“The surrounding country is underlain by a light-brownish red sandstone
and gray slate clay in horizontal strata, cut here and there by dykes of
greenstone.

“It is hardly possible to imagine two more similar sets of conditions in
such widely separated localities, as in Copper mountains and on Keewena
point (Lake Superior), the native copper occurring in both places
associated with prehnite and epidote, chiefly in an amygdaloid, cut by
dykes of greenstone.

LONG RANGE OF COPPER-BEARING ROCKS.

“The copper-bearing rocks would seem to extend along the Arctic coast,
both east and west of Coppermine river, for about five hundred miles in
all, and probably many of the smaller islands off the coast are also of
the same rocks and the total area covered by these rocks undoubtedly
amounts to many thousands of square miles.

“Comparing the early account of the occurrence of native copper on Lake
Superior with the accounts which we now possess of the copper on
Coppermine river, and considering the enormous extent of the northern
deposit, we have reasonable grounds for hope that before many years the
Coppermine area will produce as much copper as is now mined in northern
Michigan. The amount mined there in 1896 was one hundred and forty-four
million pounds, valued at between fifteen and sixteen million dollars,
or about a sixth of the total amount of copper mined in the world that
year.”

A RECENT VISIT TO THE COPPER COUNTRY.

In the spring of 1902, having spent the winter with the Eskimos, Mr.
David T. Hanbury made an examination of some of the places along the
Arctic coast where the natives obtain copper for their implements. He
was first informed that the copper deposits were to be found on Dease
strait, but later ascertained that the islands in Bathurst inlet are the
source of supply, and proceeded thither. Mr. Hanbury from the natives on
Fitzgerald islands obtained a good many copper articles, such as
snow-dags, ice-chisels, etc. They appeared to be rich in copper
implements. They stated that some of their copper had been obtained in
Victoria Land, and some from the islands to the north.

Shortly after landing on Barry island in Bathurst inlet, two small
fragments of copper were picked up by one of his Eskimos. Mr. Hanbury
proceeds, in his book, “Sport and Travel in the Northland of
Canada”:—“The next day we devoted to examining the rock formation and
searching for copper. We were successful in finding the copper, which
appears to be abundant and widely distributed. Whether it would ever be
worth working is another matter, and one on which I am not competent to
give an opinion.

“The underlying basalt dips west at an angle of about twenty-five
degrees, and it is in this rock that the native copper occurs. The
copper is plentiful, for the quantity we obtained was found after but a
brief search, and on a neighbouring island, Kun-nu-yuk, a mass of copper
had just been found, so large that a man could hardly lift it. There
also copper is found in the tide-way. The whole of the lower levels on
Barry island are covered with debris from the basalt, and where the rock
has been disintegrated by weathering,

COPPER HAS FALLEN OUT,

so that flakes of the metal may be found along the seashore. In many
places, too, green patches indicate that nuggets or flakes of copper
have recently fallen out from their matrix.

“The copper-bearing rock also contains crystalline quartz some of which
forms beautiful amethystine veins, of which some specimens were taken.
There is here some further evidence of coastal elevation in the
occurrence of saucer-shaped lines of water-worn debris at from twenty to
forty feet above the present level of high tides.

“The question whether it would ever pay to work the native copper of
these regions remains for the consideration of experts. I have always
understood that native copper occurring in small flakes or nuggets and
sparsely distributed, is of but little practical value, and that copper
can only, as a rule, be successfully worked from ores that are rich and
easy of access. Much depends doubtless on its abundance and regularity
of distribution. This island, Barry island, or Iglor-yu-ullig, is
several miles in length, and perhaps three or four miles across. The
island to the south-southeast, Kun-nu-yuk, is still larger, besides
which there is an island to the southwest which has given much copper,
and there are copper-yielding islands to the north. The copper-bearing
formation holds good everywhere except on the summit cappings of the
islands.”

Later Mr. Hanbury examined a part of Lewis island also in Bathurst
inlet. He relates in his book:—“At the northwest point of Lewis island,
Bathurst inlet, we stopped to smoke. The formation of rock being similar
to that on Barry island we commenced to search for copper, which proved
to be plentiful. First of all only a few flakes could be found, but the
longer we searched the more plentiful did the copper become. Finally

IT GOT TOO COMMON

and we resumed our journey. The metal occurred in flakes and small
chunks; the former were wedged in the rock always vertically. The rock
was easily knocked to pieces by a light tap with the axe, the cleavage
being both vertical and horizontal. Between two and three pounds of this
native copper were picked up in the course of half or three-quarters of
an hour, while we rested. The metal appeared to be very persistent in
its occurrence in the partly decomposed basalt of which all the islands
we passed that day consisted. The flakes of copper seemed to be always
vertical when in their rock matrix. The rocks of this island, where they
are not disintegrated, are well smoothed by glacial action, and the
striæ are numerous and distinctly trend south and southeast.”

Writing of a more northerly point on Lewis island, also visited, Mr.
Hanbury (p. 266) writes:—“Although we did not find so much copper here,
the green marks on the rocks were more numerous, but we did not spend an
hour altogether in the search. One of our Eskimos knew of a large mass
of copper on the southwest shore of the island, which he stated to be as
much as five feet in length and three inches thick. It protruded from
the rocks under the water, it was said, but there was too much ice for
us to find the copper. A piece of quartz with copper ore and native
copper was picked up on the seashore. Another specimen of the
copper-bearing rock here is a decomposed basalt, fine grained, and
vesicular.”

Ascending Kendall river on his way to the headwaters of the Dease,
whence he descended to Great Bear lake, Mr. Hanbury relates:—“We had
the good luck to meet the Eskimos from the Arctic coast, who resort to
this river to obtain wood for their sleighs. These natives had never set
eyes on a white man before, and had no articles of civilization
whatever. They were all dressed in deerskins, and armed with long bows,
arrows and spears,

BEATEN OUT OF NATIVE COPPER.

The use of tobacco was quite unknown to them, and firearms they had only
heard about. They gave me a good deal of information about their country
and the copper deposits along the Arctic coast, and I obtained from them
several copper implements, such as dags, spear and arrow-heads, needles,
etc., all beaten out of native copper, giving them in exchange knives,
files and needles, which last appeared to have by far the most value in
their eyes,”

Mr. Wm. Beech of Churchill, in a communication to the press in 1911,
stated that he had noticed that the Eskimos who visit Churchill yearly
have nearly all their tools, such as snow-knives, ice-chisels, and
fish-hooks, made out of native copper. They use copper tops over their
pipes while smoking, and any break in their guns is usually mended by a
strip of native copper.

So much for the deposits of native copper along the northern sea coast
of the Barren Lands and on the islands off the coast, which were the
means of originally attracting attention to the mineral wealth of this
vast region.

Unquestionably the most comprehensive review of the geological features
of the Barren Lands with respect to the prospective development of the
country’s mineral resources was that made by Mr. J. Burr Tyrrell in his
paper read before the British Association for the Advancement of Science
at Toronto in 1897 on the resources of the Barren Lands. The review in
question was so thorough that no excuse is needed for quoting it here at
length. Mr. Tyrrell wrote:—“It is to the minerals of this region that
we must look for any large contributions to the national wealth, and
failing these it is difficult to see how the country can be any thing
but a serious burden on those Canadians who live in the midst of more
congenial surroundings. What are the prospects of finding minerals of
sufficient value to induce people to open easy means of communication
with that northern country, and to settle in it? Let us examine this
question ground for hope in the future of

A SUB-ARCTIC MINING PROVINCE.

“The western arm of the Archaean horseshoe, around which the remainder
of the American continent has been built up during successive geological
ages, strikes the west coast of Hudson bay near Churchill, and thence
extends northward, with an average breadth of from five hundred to six
hundred miles to Arctic ocean. This Archaean belt is composed chiefly of
Laurentian and Huronian rocks, but in the depressions are some large
areas of rocks of a later age.

“As the only exact geological information at present available is that
collected by the two expeditions sent out by the Canadian Geological
Survey in 1893 and 1894 which I had the honour to lead, I shall describe
the rocks as seen on those two expeditions and afterwards attempt to
bring together such other information as has been recorded by others,
and assign to it such value as it would seem to possess.

“The Laurentian system, as here seen, consists almost exclusively of
crystalline, massive, or altered crushed and contorted rocks of the
‘Basement Complex’, consisting of granites and diorites, and granite and
diorite gneisses. As a rule, the massive and foliated rocks are very
similar in composition being probably different phases of the same fluid
or semi-fluid magma. These rocks are so similar to the Laurentian rocks
of the northern Ontario, which are familiar to any one who has spent a
summer in Muskoka or in Thousand islands, that it is unnecessary to
describe them in greater detail here. They are not usually rich in
valuable minerals except where they come in contact with the overlying
Huronian rocks.

“On Dubawnt river they underlie the country northward from Daly lake,
and thence continue northeastward along the west shore of Dubawnt lake
and down Dubawnt river to Lady Marjorie lake, over which distance they
were often seen in contact with overlying Huronian and Cambrian strata.
North of Lady Marjorie lake they disappear under the Cambrian
sandstones, and they were not again seen until the Cambrian belt was
crossed and the north shore of Schultz lake was reached.

“On Kazan river they extend from Ennadai lake to beyond Yathkyed lake,
with the exception of a small Huronian area near Angikuni lake.

“On the low flat shore of Hudson bay, between Seal river and Cape
Eskimo, the few rock exposures seen were of granite and gneiss of
typical Laurentian aspect. For forty miles north of Cape Eskimo no rock
in place was seen, and thence northward to Baird bay some of the points
were seen to consist of granite and gneiss, though the shore generally
was underlain by Huronian rocks.

“On the upper portion of Ferguson river Laurentian rocks prevail and
similar granites and gneisses occur along the north shore of Baker lake,
and down both shores of Chesterfield inlet to its mouth, whence they
extend southward along the shore of Hudson bay to a short distance north
of Baker’s foreland. Any information which we possess about geology of
Great Fish river and Coppermine river would seem to show that the
Laurentian granites and gneisses outcrop with greater or less frequency
along their banks, so that we may safely infer that the Barren Lands are
largely underlain by these ancient igneous rocks, and consequently there
are large areas which will not produce valuable minerals.

“But as farther south we find quartzite, greywackes, and highly altered
eruptive rocks of Huronian age, folded in here and there with typical
Laurentian rocks, so in the far north we may confidently expect to find
the same set of conditions prevailing.

“Such is to be found the case in the country lately examined immediately
west of Hudson bay, where several areas of Huronian rocks, precisely
similar to

THOSE FOUND AT SUDBURY,

Lake of the Woods, and at many places around Lakes Huron and Superior,
have been discovered. The largest of these areas extends more or less
continuously for one hundred and twenty miles along the west coast of
Hudson bay, from near Baker’s foreland to a point forty-five miles north
of Cape Eskimo, and from the bay shore for seventy miles inland on the
course of Ferguson river. A smaller area crosses Dubawnt river between
Schultz and Baker lakes, a third occurs on the Kazan river below
Angikuni lake, a fourth was recognized in the basin of Ennadai lake.

“Two more areas are represented by outcrops of white clastic quartzite
on the north shore of Dubawnt lake, and on the east shore of Wharton
lake.

“The rocks constituting the system in this region have been divided into
three more or less distinct groups, viz: Marble island quartzites; the
greenish quartzites and greywackes; and the more or less highly altered
and often schistose diabases and gabbros.

“The Marble island quartzites are composed of hard white quartzite,
consisting of more or less rounded grains of quartz, of fairly regular
size, cemented together by interstitial silica. They are distinctly
stratified in thick and thin beds, and the surfaces of the beds are
often covered with beautiful ripple-markings. The thicker beds also
often show distinct false bedding. They are usually in a more or less
inclined position, but they were nowhere seen to be very much crumpled
or squeezed into minute folds. These quartzites on the north shore of
Quartzite lake dip regularly northwestward, away from a hill of diabase
which lies to the south, and the latter therefore probably underlies the
quartzite, though it is not necessarily older than it. In other places
very little evidence was obtained of the relative ages of the white
quartzite and the other parts of the Huronian. However, it would seem
probable that, in the region near the shore of Hudson bay, this
quartzite is

THE OLDEST PART OF THE HURONIAN,

and that the diabases, and other basic eruptions which are associated
with it, have been intruded beneath it, and have also flowed over it.
That Marble island quartzites were once spread over a large portion of
the region under consideration is shown, not so much by the few
scattered outlines here mentioned, as by the fact that the overlying
Cambrian conglomerates, which cover large areas between Dubawnt and
Baker lakes, are composed chiefly of pebbles of this white quartzite.

“Dark green eruptive rocks, chiefly diabase, are largely developed in
the Huronian, composing a considerable proportion of the rocks of the
system. In many cases these rocks have been crushed and sheared, a slaty
cleavage or schistose structure has been superinduced, and the original
minerals have been broken and altered, both in their shape and
composition. In other cases the rock remains massive, or there is
developed in it a concretionary or bomblike structure, the bombs, often
a foot or two in diameter, being usually separated by somewhat schistose
bands, which differ slightly in colour from the rest of the rock.

“On the east side of Hudson bay this rock was found to have,
disseminated through it, a large amount of both iron and copper pyrites,
while these minerals were often found collected somewhat more closely
together in the numerous veins of quartz and calc-spar which almost
everywhere traversed the rock. No large deposits of the sulphides were
seen, but when they are so freely distributed through the mass of the
rock it is not at all improbable that large masses may be found
segregated out along the zones where these green schists are in contact
with masses of eruptive granite or gneiss. Very little of the vein rock
has been collected for assay, but some pieces of vein quartz, picked up
by Doctor Rae near the south side of Corbett inlet, were found to

CARRY A SMALL AMOUNT OF GOLD.

“On Great Fish river, Mr. Pike speaks of the ironstone formation, of
dark fissile slates or schists, probably belonging to the Huronian
system extending down the river from Musk-Ox lake to Beechey lake, a
distance of seventy-five miles.

“The shores of Point lake, one of the expansions of Coppermine river,
have been described by Sir John Richardson, who passed through that
country in company with Sir John Franklin in 1821, and from his
descriptions there is no difficulty in recognising the Huronian rocks.
The following is his description of the rocks, slightly
condensed:—Greywacke passing into greywacke slate, greywacke with small
imbedded crystals of hornblende, dark greenish or blackish grey clay
slate. Several of the islands in the lake consist of greenstone. A rock
standing apart from the neighboring hills on the border of the lake,
having a rounded summit, but bounded on three sides by mural precipices
about two hundred feet high, is composed of compact earthy greenstone,
containing disseminated iron pyrites, covered with layers of greenstone
slate. On the north side of the lake there is a high bluff hill with a
precipitous side, which seems to consist principally of a conglomerate.
The basis is earthy-clay slate. The embedded masses have an ellipsoidal
form and smooth surface, are from one to two feet in diameter and appear
to consist of the same material as the basis, but impregnated with much
silica, and not showing evident slaty structure. When broken they
present an even fine-grained fracture.

“‘During our first and second days’ journey down Point lake from the
above mentioned encampment, being eleven and one-half miles on a
west-northwest course, the rocks we had an opportunity of examining
consisted of greenish grey clay-slate, generally having a curved
structure, and splitting into slates of very unequal thickness.’

“From these few isolated and widely separated occurrences it may be seen
that, as in the Archaean areas of northern and western Ontario, so on
the Barren Lands, Huronian rocks occur at more or less frequent
intervals, squeezed in between adjacent areas of Laurentian granite and
gneiss.

“That these belts of Huronian rocks will eventually prove

OF GREAT ECONOMIC IMPORTANCE,

there can be no doubt whatever. In Ontario the wonderful general
richness of these rocks is just beginning to be recognized, but from
them were taken in 1896 gold to the value of one hundred and twenty-one
thousand dollars, nickel to the value of one million one hundred and
eighty-nine thousand dollars and copper to the value of three hundred
and twenty thousand dollars; while in the states adjoining Lake Superior
the total production of iron ore in 1895 from these rocks was ten
million two hundred and sixty-nine thousand long tons, valued at about
twenty million dollars. This was 62·31 per cent. of the total amount of
iron produced in the whole United States. The rapid progress with which
these mines are being developed is shown by the fact that the Mesabi
range was first opened up in 1892, and in 1895 the product of the mines
in the range was two million eight hundred thousand tons. Thus you will
see that in these rocks there is a prospect of discovering extensive
deposits of valuable minerals.

THE LOWER CAMBRIAN ROCKS.

“But perhaps the most interesting rocks known in the Barren Lands are
those which are regarded by the Canadian Geological Survey as being of
Lower Cambrian age, and which are very similar in character to the
Nipigon or Keewenawan rocks of Lake Superior.

[Illustration: A Survivor of Sir John Richardson’s Arctic Expedition
wearing the Arctic Medal given him for that Expedition.]

“In the exploration of this country recently made these rocks were first
met with about the centre of the west shore of Dubawnt lake, whence they
were found to extend north-northeastward for one hundred and twenty-five
miles to the forks of Dubawnt river. From this point they were traced
eastward for one hundred and seventy-five miles to the outlet of Baker
lake, at which point they veered off to the south. Towards the west this
series probably extends a long distance up the valley of Thelon river,
and may perhaps cross the low watershed and connect with similar beds on
the shores of Great Slave lake.

“The basal portion of this series is here represented by reddish
thick-bedded sandstones and conglomerates, which are comparatively
unaltered and undisturbed over large areas. In some places, as on the
islands near the northwest shore of Dubawnt lake, they dip regularly at
a moderate angle. The pebbles in the conglomerates are well rounded and
water-worn, and consist almost entirely of white clastic quartzites like
that of Marble island (Huronian) beds. The occurrence of quartzite
pebbles, to the almost total exclusion of pebbles of Laurentian or other
rocks, would indicate that these Cambrian strata were deposited off a
shore composed very largely of Huronian quartzites. The sandstones and
conglomerates are cut by dykes and masses of both acid and basic
eruptive rocks. The acid eruptions were first met with on a hill of red
quartz-porphyry at Teall point, on the west shore of Dubawnt lake. A
similar massive quartz-porphyry forms a heavy east and west dyke, some
distance farther north on the shore of the same lake, and in the
vicinity of the dyke the surrounding conglomerate is very hardened, so
that it breaks indifferently through the matrix or through the pebbles.

“Towards the north end of Dubawnt lake the orthoclase in the rock is
replaced by plagioclase, the porphyry thus becoming a porphyryte. This
porphyry is largely developed, and seems to underlie a large tract of
country, along Dubawnt river between Lady Marjorie lake and the Forks,
and again it was found on the island towards the east end of Baker lake.

“Dark-green basic eruptions, chiefly, or perhaps exclusively, in the
form of dykes, are extensively developed throughout the area covered by
the rocks of the Cambrian system. On Dubawnt lake and on Dubawnt river
near the Forks, most of these dykes

ARE OF TYPICAL DIABASE,

with interlocking lath-shaped crystals of plagioclase, between which are
crystals, or crystalline masses of augite, often altered to chlorite.

“A heavy diabase dyke, crossing Dubawnt river at Loudon rapids, cuts the
surrounding acid eruptions, and is clearly newer than they. It is also
interesting to note that the rocks in this vicinity are very freely
stained with green carbonate of copper, indicating the presence of a
considerable amount of copper disseminated through the rock, just as
copper occurs under similar conditions in similar rocks south of Lake
Superior.

“Lithologically the whole of this terrain presents a remarkable
resemblance to the red sandstones and quartz-porphyries of the
Keewenawan (copper-bearing) rocks of Lake Superior. This resemblance is
so strongly marked that small hand-specimens of the rocks from the shore
of Dubawnt lake are usually indistinguishable from specimens from Lake
Superior.

“Native copper was nowhere found, but it is not unlikely that it may
occur in the vicinity of some of these basic dykes.”

Mr. Tyrrell then proceeds to discuss the deposits of native copper in
the far north as already quoted in this chapter and continues:—

“Besides copper a narrow vein of pure galena has been found on the shore
of Bathurst inlet.

“Whether any other metals but copper and lead will be found in that
region remains to be discovered, but the evidence of the presence of
Animikie slates and limestones would indicate the possibility of the
occurrence of silver, such as was found at Silver islet on Lake
Superior.

“This northern country, which, as we have seen, gives abundant evidence
of rich mineral wealth, has up to the present been very remote from any
settlements, but now it can actually

BE REACHED WITH VERY LITTLE TROUBLE

and expense either from Mackenzie river or from Hudson bay, and its
general even unmountainous character would render the building of roads
across it a matter of comparatively little difficulty.

“From Mackenzie river to Great Bear lake is only sixty-five miles, and
from that lake to Coppermine river only another sixty-five miles, while
the Keewenawan rocks on Baker lake may be reached by ocean-going
steamers which can ascend Chesterfield inlet to its head, which is open
for three months of the year. From the head of Chesterfield inlet it is
only four hundred miles, over a gently undulating country, to the east
end of Great Slave lake, or five hundred and eighty miles to Copper
mountains west of Coppermine river.

“South of Chesterfield inlet good harbours exist, from which the
Huronian rocks could readily be explored, or, if rich mines were
discovered, would serve as means of access and outlet to and from these
mines.

“Churchill, at the southeastern extremity of the Barren Lands, has long
been known as an excellent harbour, having been surveyed by Joseph
Robson, an engineer, as long ago as 1746. On an average it is open five
months of the year, from June 19, to November 18, the shortest open
season known being four months and eight days, and longest season five
months and eighteen days.

“It is true that in going to live in that northern land, one would leave
far behind the forest, meadows, and pleasant orchards of this beautiful
province (Ontario), but the wealth torn from the rocks would enable the
people to procure all the products of more genial climates, and with the
health and strength derived from a well-fed, but active and energetic
existence, the country would be covered with homes as happy as could be
found in any part of the world.”

IRON, GOLD AND SILVER.

Mr. Tyrrell was examined before the select committee of the Senate in
1907 and in his evidence upon that occasion stated that north of Lake
Athabaska, for a certain distance, there are Huronian and Keewatin rocks
which certainly contain iron and small quantities of gold and silver,
but larger quantities have not yet been discovered. Ore being a mass of
mineral that can be worked at a profit, no ore has yet been found there,
but there are precious minerals. The country north of Lake Athabaska is
one of the most likely looking mineral countries that Mr. Tyrrell had
ever been in. After leaving the Huronian rocks north of Lake Athabaska,
one then strikes through a granite country for seven hundred miles on
the routes that he travelled which does not show much evidence of
minerals. Then as he got to Dubawnt lake he got on copper-bearing rocks
similar to the copper-bearing rocks of Lake Superior, and those are
undoubtedly the same copper-bearing rocks which extend across Coppermine
river, and which have there been known to produce native copper—at
least the Esquimaux bring in the copper from Coppermine river to make
implements.

Mr. Tyrrell said he would not expect to find silver in connection with
the copper. They do not find silver in any quantity with the copper of
Lake Superior. They do find silver in places, but not on the Calumet
peninsula. The silver appears in a slightly different formation. While
it occurs in rocks of somewhat similar age, still it is not immediately
associated with copper, and the rocks that one finds from Dubawnt lake
northward, covering quite a large area, are very similar to the
copper-bearing rocks on Lake Superior. Taking a set of specimens from
the copper-bearing rocks of Lake Superior, Mr. Tyrrell declared he could
duplicate them almost exactly from a set of specimens from these
northern rocks in all the peculiar minerals—and there are a great many
of them. He saw a small amount of copper in many places in these rocks,
and we know that it occurs in the rock, because the Esquimaux pick up
native copper and make their implements from it. So that he looked for a
large development at some time of a copper industry in that country
between Chesterfield inlet and Coppermine river. He had never been at
Coppermine river himself. Really the principal exploration of Coppermine
river, he explained, was done nearly one hundred years ago, and there
has been very little exploration of it since. It was visited by Doctor
J. M. Bell some three or four years previous to 1907, but he just barely
touched it, and Sir John Richardson, in the early part of last century,
really furnished all the information that is known about Coppermine
river.

A LARGE AREA OF MINERAL COUNTRY.

In the far northern region, Mr. Tyrrell stated upon this occasion, there
is a large area of mineral bearing country. As you come out to the mouth
of Chesterfield inlet there is an area of Keewatin and Huronian rocks,
similar to the conglomerates of northern Ontario, which have been found
to be so rich there, and these rocks are known to contain a certain
amount of gold and copper. Mr. Tyrrell saw them himself there, and he
had, he said, every confidence that that area too will produce minerals
of value—workable ores. There was no indication of nickel in any part
of the country.

Mr. A. P. Low, of the Geological Survey of Canada, who was a witness
before the same committee, stated that he had spent one winter at Cape
Fullerton, north of Chesterfield inlet. He explained that on the
mainland where there are marked indentations, there is a large
development of Huronian rocks, which contain four per cent. of copper
pyrites. These rocks have not been properly prospected yet, and there
have been no claims taken up on them. They have not been proven in any
way. Between Chesterfield and Fullerton there are several fairly decent
deposits of iron pyrites, and some of these contain small deposits of
gold. Gold was found by Doctor Wright somewhere in Whitcher inlet, but
beyond those discoveries nothing of a definite character is known of the
minerals of the far north.

The island of Southampton east of Fullerton is formed of limestone, and
a band of ancient Huronian Laurentian rocks, which crosses at the north
side of it.

FREE GOLD IN MELVILLE PENINSULA.

Examined before the select committee of the Senate in 1887, Doctor Robt.
Bell of the Geological Survey stated that free gold had at that date
been found in quartz in Repulse bay, south of Melville peninsula, which
is the extreme northeastern point of the continent, and considerably
north of Fullerton. The free gold he spoke of as coming from Repulse bay
was noticed by Professor James Tennant, of King’s College, London,
England. Plenty of copper had been found up there. Witness had found it
in small quantities himself, and it had been found as occurring in large
quantities among specimens brought from the west coast of Hudson bay by
others.

Speaking of his voyage by sea to Hudson bay, Doctor Bell said he had not
had an opportunity to satisfactorily investigate the mineral resources
of the country. His own opportunities for discovery had been limited on
account of the fact that when he was at the most likely places for
finding gold or silver he had very little chance to get ashore. He had
to take just what opportunity he had when going ashore with boats for
ballast or to land materials at the stations. The main object of all the
expeditions was to establish and supply the stations. If he had had an
expedition under his own control, fitted out for that object, he had no
doubt he could make valuable discoveries of minerals. He saw some quartz
ledges himself. They varied in size. He could not look entirely for
economic minerals, for in the few hours he had at any place he had to
ascertain as much as possible of the geological structure of the
country, and incidentally, if he found anything worthy of notice, he
brought away specimens. He saw many large veins of quartz, but those
from which he brought the specimens which happened to contain gold and
silver were not so large as others he had seen. Some were several feet
wide. He did not find visible gold at all.

As to the gold prospects in the central part of the Barren Lands,
Inspector Pelletier, Royal Northwest Mounted Police, states in his
report:—“In many places along the Thelon, great sand bars are
prominent, creeks flowing into it do so over gravel beds and when this
country is prospected I expect to hear of placer gold discoveries. It is
a good country for prospectors. A prospecting outfit going there would
find plenty of good timber to build their camp, and any amount of fuel.
They would have to carry only certain kinds of provisions, for fish is
abundant. Musk-ox and deer at certain times of the year are very
numerous.”

LIGNITE AND SOFT COAL.

Large areas of lignite and soft coal have been discovered along the
shores of Arctic sea between the Mackenzie and the Coppermine and in the
islands off the coast.

Doctor Richardson in 1826 found the Arctic coast east of Cape Bathurst
to consist of precipitous banks, similar in structure to the bituminous
shale cliffs at Whitby in Yorkshire. This shale was in a state of
ignition in many places.

According to the same authority “carboniferous limestone exists on the
northwestern coast of Banks island, on Melville and Bathurst islands. At
Village point, in latitude 76° 40′ and longitude 97° west, at Depot
point, Grinnell land (of Belcher), latitude 77° 5′ north, and at various
other places in the carboniferous limestone tract there are coal beds.
These coal beds are considered by Professor Houghton to be very low down
in the carboniferous series.”

In a valley in Banks island some distance from the coast and three
hundred feet above sea level, Richardson relates that Captain McClure
and Doctor Armstrong visited a carboniferous deposit. “The ends of
trunks and branches of trees,” says the last-named officer, “were seen
protruding through the rich loamy soil in which they were imbedded. On
excavating to some extent we found the entire hill to be a ligneous
formation, being composed of the trunks and branches of trees, some of
them dark and softened, in a state of semi-carbonization.”

CHAPTER XXII.

THE BARREN LANDS, OR “ARCTIC PRAIRIE.”

Game, Fur-bearing Animals and Fish.

Where Millions of Caribou Roam at Large.—Actual Value of These
Immense Herds Very Great.—Can they Become Domesticated or
Replaced by the Lapland Reindeer?—The Home of the Musk-Ox and
Many Fur-Bearing Animals.—The Polar Bear.—Where the Wild Geese
Nest.—Lakes, Rivers and Sea Coasts Teeming With Fish.—The
Arctic Salmon, Trout, White Fish and Grayling.

The fish and game resources of the Barren Lands have hitherto been the
sole support of the small human population, and unquestionably they
could support an infinitely larger number of people than have hitherto
resided in the far northern wilderness. As every explorer of the region
from Hearne until the present date has had to depend primarily
practically wholly upon fish and game for sustenance while in the
interior, we know much more about the resources of the country in those
respects than any of the others. The occurrence of fish and game has
been a matter of life or death to the explorers, and naturally they have
all dwelt upon the matter in the narratives of their trips. That so many
adventurous and lengthy trips through the country have succeeded
testifies to the abundance of fish and game even in the far north of
this vast region.

The chief source of the food supply of the natives and of explorers in
the Barren Lands is the Barren Lands caribou, _Rangifer arcticus_
(Richardson). Mr. E. A. Preble of the United States Biological Survey,
in his report so often quoted in the preceding pages, says:—“This
famous animal, usually in the north called ‘deer,’ and often mentioned
in the narratives of Arctic travel, occurs more or less abundantly on
the barren grounds of the region treated of, and on the large islands to
the northward. It is the caribou, more than any other animal, which
renders human residence in this desolate region possible.

“Within this great area it is probable that there are two or more races,
perhaps distinct species, since the animals are separated by the
physiographic conditions of the country into different herds, or
aggregations of herds, which never associate with each other at any time
of the year, and which have somewhat different habits. A series of skins
and skulls will be necessary to a decision as to the number of
recognizable forms. For the present, however, all the caribou of this
region, excepting the woodland species, may without violence be

CONSIDERED AS ONE SPECIES,

for which the name _arcticus_, applied by Richardson to the animal
inhabiting the main area of the Barren Grounds between Great Bear lake
and Hudson bay, may be used. It is reasonably certain that within this
latter area but one species is represented.”

One of the recent explorers, Mr. J. B. Tyrrell, and his brother, Mr. J.
W. Tyrrell, give us perhaps the most complete first-hand information as
to the caribou. In notes of the fauna of the country lying between the
eastern part of Athabaska lake and Churchill river, explored in the
summer of 1892, J. B. Tyrrell says:—“The Barren Grounds
caribou. . . . . . comes south in winter to the south end of Reindeer
lake and the upper portion of Mudjatik and Foster rivers. It travels
north in spring to the Barren Grounds, but a very few animals are
occasionally left behind, one having been shot in July near the north
end of Cree lake.”

Fort Fond du Lac (east end of Lake Athabaska) is stated by Mr. Tyrrell
in the same report to be “on one of the principal lines of travel of the
Barren Ground caribou, in their regular migrations north and south.”

In the report of his expedition down the Dubawnt valley and Chesterfield
inlet in 1893, Mr. Tyrrell mentions that his party first saw caribou (he
calls them _Rangifer Grœnlandicus_) on July 28 on Barlow lake, “and on
July 29, we met a vast herd of Barren Ground caribou collected on a good
feeding ground on the eastern shore of Carey lake.”

Mr. Tyrrell gives the following details:—“Four miles below Barlow lake,
the river Dubawnt enters the south end of Carey lake, so called in
honour of the Reverend Doctor Carey of St. John, N.B. After paddling up
the lake for five miles, directing our course towards a high point with
a large boulder on its summit, afterwards called Cairn point, we saw

AN IMMENSE HERD OF CARIBOU

(_Rangifer Grœnlandicus_) moving along the east shore. We at once
paddled towards the land, and found the deer standing on low wet grassy
land near the water, at the foot of a long stony slope.

“The following extract from my daily journal, with the photographs in
the front of the report, will give a fairly clear idea of the number of
deer seen:—

“July 30.—Yesterday was the first clear warm day that we have had for a
long time, but to day is also clear and warm, with a gentle breeze
blowing from the west. We spent the day skinning and cutting up the
fattest of the bucks we killed yesterday. Our camp is a hundred yards
from the lake, near the edge of a bog, with a scattered grove of larch
and black spruce just behind us. All day the caribou have been around us
in vast numbers, many thousands being collected together in single
herds. One herd collected in the hill behind our camp, and another
remained for hours in the wet bog on the point in front of us. The
little fawns were running about everywhere, often coming up to within a
yard or two of us, uttering their sharp grunts as they stood and looked
up at us, or as they turned and ran back to the does. About noon a large
herd had collected on the sides and summit of the hill behind us. Taking
the small hand camera with which we were supplied, we walked quietly
among them. As we approached to within a few yards of the dense herd, it
opened to let us in, and then formed a circle round us, so that we were
able to stand for a couple of hours and watch the deer as they stood in
the light breeze or rubbed slowly past each other to keep off the black
flies. The bucks, with their beautiful branching antlers, kept well in
the background. We obtained a number of photographs, which show the
animals in many positions; later in the afternoon a herd of bucks
trotted up to us, and stood at about forty yards distance. This was a
most beautiful sight, for their horns are now full grown, though still
soft at the tips, but unfortunately we had not the camera with us. We
did not shoot any to-day.”

In his paper before the British Association in 1897 Mr. Tyrrell said
that this herd at Carey lake must have contained between one and

TWO HUNDRED THOUSAND HEAD OF CARIBOU.

They were migrating southward towards the edge of the woods, where they
would spend the winter.

[Illustration: An Indian Dance Lodge.]

Mr. J. W. Tyrrell, who was with his brother upon this occasion, in his
book “Through the Sub-Arctics of Canada”, speaks of the caribou seen at
Carey lake as forming “many great bands literally covering the country
over wide areas. The valleys and hillsides for miles appeared to be
moving masses of caribou. To estimate their numbers would be impossible.
They could only be reckoned in acres or square miles. We walked to and
fro through the herd of caribou, causing little more alarm than one
would by walking through a herd of cattle in the field.”

Near the head of Dubawnt lake the Tyrrells, in August, noticed scattered
bands of deer, also two or three wolves and a wolverine.

In 1894, when Mr. J. B. Tyrrell’s party was descending Kazan river, they
first fell in with the Barren Lands caribou on the west side of Ennadai
lake about latitude 61°, on August 14. Mr. Tyrrell in his report says
the deer were travelling southward in large numbers. The country was
open and treeless, and the deer were rather difficult to approach, but
twelve were shot and cut up, and their meat was spread out to dry in the
sun and wind.”

Mr. J. W. Tyrrell mentions seeing some caribou and many signs of them
during his exploration of Hanbury and Thelon rivers in 1900. “While
descending Hanbury river, to the eastward of Great Slave lake, during
the early part of July, only an occasional straggling caribou was met.
On July 23, however, on the Thelon, he observed a large band moving
southward. In his report Mr. Tyrrell states:—“The Thelon was evidently
frequented on both sides by numbers of caribou, as their tracks were
everywhere to be seen, though few of the deer were met with, until the
lower stretches of the river were reached, their migration having
preceded us.”

Back relates that on July 15, 1834, while his party was descending Backs
river, at Beechey lake the swampy prairies, “which near the cascades
might be called plains,” were “all thickly inhabited by deer.” Back
calls the caribou “_Cervus tarandus_” (Linn).

Mr. David T. Hanbury found large bands of caribou, comprising adults of
both sexes and their young, proceeding southward along Hanbury river
about the last of July.

MIGRATION OF THE CARIBOU.

Writing of the migratory habits of the caribou, Mr. Hanbury
states:—“There is no doubt that caribou migrate. They go south in large
herds in autumn, and north in spring. They cross the country east of
Great Slave lake, round Artillery lake, and some distance east of it.
They do not appear on the main Ark-i-linik river, but between Aberdeen
and Schultz lakes they pass with some regularity. The migration takes
place on such a large scale, and over such a wide tract of country, that
it has been assumed that all caribou migrate; the fact seems to be that
the majority of animals remain in the north throughout the year. I have
myself shot caribou in winter along the west coast of Hudson bay, and
inland from the bay; along the north and south coasts of Chesterfield
inlet; in the country north of the head of the inlet as far as Garry
lake on Backs river, and along Backs river. I have also killed them to
the north and south of Baker, Aberdeen and Schultz lakes in winter, and
I know others who have killed them in winter in the country about Wager
river and Repulse bay. On the Arctic coast, at White Bear point, and on
Kent peninsula, and at other places which will be mentioned later,
caribou are always to be found during the winter. Thus, I think it may
be held as proved that very great numbers of caribou do not migrate.”

Mr. Hanbury, in another part of his book, mentions that on October 26,
1901, he hunted caribou near Baker lake, west of Chesterfield inlet. He
writes:—“On looking out I could see deer in thousands away to the west.
They seemed like small black stones in the distance, but with the glass
their movements could be distinctly seen.”

Mr. Hanbury announces that he was informed by the Eskimo of Ogden bay
that caribou are found on Kent peninsula, at Cape Barrow, and near the
coast of Victoria Land, throughout the winter, but that none remained
during that season between Cape Barrow and the Coppermine or near Ogden
bay.

Mr. Warburton Pike (See p. 19) in his book “The Barren Grounds of
Northern Canada” makes frequent and interesting references to the
caribou. He mentions that during his journey northward into the Barren
Grounds from the eastern part of Great Slave lake, in the autumn of
1889, caribou were first met with on Lake Camsell, about seventy miles
north of Great Slave lake, on September 15. The animals were then on
their way south, and many were seen during the remainder of September as
the party travelled northward.

DESCRIPTION OF A MIGRATION.

Mr. Pike encamped for the winter on the south shore of Mackay lake and
while there witnessed the migration southward, which he thus
describes:—“Scattered bands of caribou were almost always in sight from
the top of the ridge behind the camp, and increased in numbers until the
morning of October 20, when little Baptiste, who had gone for firewood,
woke us up before daylight with the cry of ‘La Foule! La Foule!’ and
even on the ledge we could hear the curious clatter made by a band of
travelling caribou. La Foule had really come and during its passage of
six days I was able to realize what an extraordinary number of these
animals still roam in the Barren Ground. From the ridge we had a
splendid view of the migration; all the south side of Mackay lake was
alive with moving beasts, while the ice seemed to be dotted all over
with black islands, and still away on the north shore, with the aid of
the glasses, we could see them coming like regiments on the march. In
every direction we could hear the grunting noise that the caribou always
make when travelling; the snow was broken into broad roads, and I found
it useless to try to estimate the number that passed within a few miles
of our encampment. We were just on the western edge of their passage,
and afterwards heard that a band of Dogribs, hunting some forty miles to
the west, were at this very time in the last straits of starvation, only
saving their lives by a hasty retreat into the woods, where they were
lucky enough to kill sufficient meat to stave off disaster. . . . . The
caribou, as is usually the case when they are in large numbers, were
very tame, and on several occasions I found myself right in the middle
of a band with a splendid chance to pick out any that seemed in good
condition. . . . . This passage of the caribou is the most remarkable
thing that I have ever seen in the course of many expeditions among the
big game of America. The buffalo were for the most part killed out
before my time, but, notwithstanding all the tall stories that are told
of their numbers, I cannot believe that the herds on the prairie ever
surpassed in size ‘La Foule’ of the caribou.”

NO DANGER OF STARVATION.

On his way north, the following spring, Mr. Pike first fell in with the
caribou in June. In his book, “The Barren Grounds of Northern Canada”,
referring to this event, Mr. Pike states:—“From this time, all through
the summer, till we again reached Great Slave lake late in August, we
had no difficulty about provisions; although there was many a time when
we could not say where we might find our next meal, something always
turned up, and we were never a single day without eating during the
whole day. I really believe it is a mistake to try to carry enough food
for a summer’s work in the Barren Grounds, as the difficulty of
transport is so great, and after the caribou are once found there is no
danger of starvation.

“We were now travelling with the bull caribou, which had just left the
thick woods, and made easy marches from lake to lake in a northeast
direction; the weather became cold again for the last time, and June 7
was like a bad winter’s day with a strong north wind and snowstorms.
Then the summer came suddenly, and on June 11 we were obliged to camp on
a high gravel ridge to await _le grand dégel_, which rendered travelling
impossible, till the deep water had run off the ice.”

When descending Lockhart river on his way from Artillery lake to Great
Slave lake, on his way back to civilization, Mr. Pike remarked “caribou
walking the ridges and swimming the lakes in every direction.”

A MIGRATION NEAR ARTILLERY LAKE.

Inspector Pelletier, Royal Northwest Mounted Police, in the report of
his patrol from Great Slave lake to Hudson bay, makes special reference
to the numbers of caribou, then migrating southward, seen during the
passage of his party from the eastern end of Great Slave lake, to Thelon
river. He writes:—“As we were approaching the portage from Burr to
Toura lake we sighted a large herd of deer coming out behind the grove
of trees. This was the first we had seen. They were mostly does, but a
few young bulls were scattered amongst them. We killed a small one which
proved a great addition to our larder. They were not much frightened by
us although they kept at a distance. They were in sight all the while we
were portaging. From Burr lake to Artillery lake we were practically
surrounded by deer. We camped for the night of July 21 at the fifteen
yards portage north of Toura lake and during the night deer kept passing
to and fro close to our tents in large numbers. On July 22 near the foot
of Artillery lake we saw thousands and thousands of deer, mostly bulls,
coming over the ridge behind our camp, making for the water and crossing
where it was no more than half a mile wide. Gradually the ridges on each
shore and the traverse itself were alive with them. It was a wonderful
sight seen late at night.

“At the south end of Artillery lake countless deer were seen; the bucks
and does seemed to belong to separate herds. They were crossing and
recrossing at that point where the lake is quite narrow, ranging from a
quarter mile to one and a half miles in width. For a distance of about
two or three miles the hills were covered with them and the water was
bridged in two or three different places at a time. This might appear to
be exaggerated; I would never have believed there were so many deer in
the north, only now that I have seen them, I must. The natives we met at
that place told us what we had seen was not the main herd but part of
it, that the main body was a few miles up the lake on the west shore;
they had just been there in their canoes the previous day. If what we
had seen was not the main herd I wondered how large the main herd could
be.

CARIBOU ALONG THE THELON.

“Deer were seen in good numbers along Sifton lake, near Timber rapids,
and at Timber rapids; they also were sighted in other places. At the
high sand ridge, about twelve miles below Sifton lake, a large herd was
feeding on an island. At the lower end of Timber rapids the stream
scatters and gets shallow, full of boulders, and while winding around
little channels a herd of deer was crossing, we could not possibly stop
without getting into some mix up. Luckily the deer sighted us and heard
us (we were making all the noise we could to frighten them). They rushed
through, leaving our little channel open. We could have touched them
with the paddle, they were so near. We grazed one rock, and that was due
to our attention being diverted by the deer.

“No game was seen on the Hanbury but a deer or two at the upper end.
Innumerable paths beaten by them were very distinct all the way, but we
saw no fresh tracks denoting recent passage.”

Writing of Thelon river itself, the Inspector states in his report:—“At
the lower end deer are very numerous at certain times of the year. At
their favourite traverses or crossings the ground is netted with deep,
well-defined deer trails. We saw only one deer on the whole of the
Thelon. I am told by natives that deer in the fall and spring are seen
by the thousands on their migrations north and south.”

WEST OF CHESTERFIELD INLET.

As to the series of lakes through which the waters of the Thelon and
Dubawnt are discharged into Chesterfield inlet, Inspector Pelletier
reports:—“From Beverly lake down to Hudson bay deer were met almost
daily, but not in large herds. Most were seen along the lower end of
Schultz lake, Schultz river rapids and along Baker lake. At Beverly lake
we met a camp of Eskimos, a few men and women. They were well provided
with everything in the line of arms, ammunition, clothing and
necessaries of life. At the foot of Baker lake is another camp of
natives, numbering about twenty-five. They were well stocked with
everything, killing a good number of deer, and laying in a stock of meat
and deerskin for the winter.”

A few notes from journals or reports of other travellers as to the
distribution and migration of this remarkable animal are instructive.
During Anderson and Stewart’s journey down Backs river in the summer of
1855 caribou were found to be numerous about Clinton-Colden and Aylmer
lakes, and the species was observed on Adelaide peninsula in the far
north.

In the summer and autumn of 1879 the party of Frederick Schwatka,
searching for relics of Sir John Franklin, found large numbers of
caribou on King William island and on the lower part of Backs river.

FOURTEEN DAYS IN PASSING.

Frank Russell, who passed the winter of 1893-94 at Fort Rae on the north
arm of Great Slave lake, says, concerning the Barren Ground caribou:—“A
few years ago they were often killed from the buildings and throughout
the winter might be found near the post. In 1877 an unbroken line of
caribou crossed the frozen lake near the fort. They were fourteen days
in passing and in such a mass that in the words of an eye witness
‘daylight could not be seen through the column’. They were now seldom
seen within several miles of Rae.” During the winter he spent there only
one small band crossed the lake towards the west.

Mr. W. J. McLean states that in 1899 the caribou arrived in the
neighbourhood of old Fort Reliance, at the extreme east end of Great
Slave lake, on August 12.

Doctor J. M. Bell states that on his trip eastward along the north shore
of Great Bear lake, in 1900, he first met with caribou sixty miles west
of Fort Confidence late in July, and later found them fairly numerous
between Fort Confidence and the lower Coppermine.

ACTUAL VALUE OF THE CARIBOU.

As to the actual value of the caribou to the country, Mr. J. B. Tyrrell
stated in his paper before the British Association:—“Their flesh is
excellent eating, and the animals will doubtless furnish an important
food-supply for explorers and pioneers in that country. Whether they can
be tamed, and thus brought permanently into the service of man or
whether they must disappear like most of the other denizens of the
wilderness, remains to be seen; but even if they should be doomed to
disappear, it seems quite possible that they might be replaced by tame
reindeer from Lapland who would feed in summer on the vast grassy
plains, and in winter would take kindly to a diet of Canadian lichens.”

Mr. J. W. Tyrrell considers the Barren Ground caribou “is the same as
the reindeer of Lapland.” He states in his book “Through the Sub-Arctics
of Canada”:—“As a source of venison it cannot be excelled, especially
in the autumn season, when it is in prime condition. During September
and October the males are rolling fat, and as food their flesh is then
equal to the finest beef. Of all the meats I have ever tasted certainly
reindeer tongues takes the first place for daintiness and delicacy of
flavour.”

Captain Back, writing in 1835, stated of the reindeer or caribou:—“It
furnishes food and clothing to the Dogrib and Copper Indians, the
Chipewyans, the Swamp or Coast Crees, and to the Esquimaux, but none of
the American tribes have domesticated it like the Laplanders. Every part
of the animal is eaten, even to the contents of its stomach, and the
half-dried tongue when roasted is perhaps the greatest delicacy that the
fur countries afford. Reindeer meat, when in the best condition, is not
only superior to that of the moose deer and bison, but, in my opinion,
it surpasses the best mutton or English-fed venison.”

Mr. Ernest Thompson Seton, lecturing on his trip to the Barren Lands in
1906, stated while in the region of perpetual day or night, his party
had a caribou at hand whenever they wanted one for a meal. When they
pitched tents near trail, the shaggy animals loped along during the
night and tripped over the guy-ropes.

“Cutting in half the estimates of explorers who went before me, and
making a most conservative estimate there are not less than

THIRTY MILLIONS OF THESE CARIBOU

letting the wind blow through their whiskers in that northern country,”
said the lecturer. “There is absolutely no destructive war on them, and
no possibility of their destruction. When the great northland is opened
up, it will be for Canadians to decide what is to be done with those
animals, and how is that beautiful country to be opened up? Some say
that the reindeer will be the medium, but I hold that it will be the
yak, which roams through the north of China. This animal is strong and
sturdy, can bear the heaviest burdens, and can stand any extreme of
climate.”

THE EXPERIMENT IN ALASKA.

In view of the suggestions that have been made as to the domestication
of the Barren Lands caribou, and recalling the fact that through the
agency of Doctor Grenfell of Labrador, Lapland reindeer have been
recently (1912) sent out to the Athabaska region as an experiment, the
following paragraph from the “Christian Herald” of a recent date is
interesting: “It is only a few years since the United States Government,
as an experiment which it was hoped would help the Eskimos and Indians
of northern Alaska, imported a few score reindeer from Norway, with a
number of Lapps skilled in their care. Subsequently other reindeer were
brought from the opposite coast of Asia, and although it was known that
the particular form of moss or lichen on which these animals live, and
which flourishes under the snow, was abundant within the American Arctic
circle, the attempt to introduce reindeer was regarded by a majority of
our citizens as being quite as wild and visionary as was the purchase of
Alaska by Secretary Seward in 1867.

“The few score reindeer have grown to twenty-seven thousand three
hundred and twenty five distributed in forty-two herds. More than
one-half, or fourteen thousand nine hundred and ninety-three, is owned
by natives who before the advent of the reindeer were in a state of the
most wretched poverty. Of the remainder three thousand seven hundred and
thirty are owned by the United States, four thousand one hundred and
ninety-four by missions and four thousand four hundred and seven by
Lapps. The total income of the Eskimos from the reindeer industry during
the last year reported was twenty-four thousand six hundred and
thirty-six dollars.”

FUTURE SUPPLY OF CHEESE, MEAT AND LEATHER.

A newspaper despatch is authority for the statements that the first
shipment of reindeer meat has been shipped from Alaska to Seattle, and
that the gentleman in charge of the reindeer in Alaska for the United
States government says that in a quarter of a century there will be
three million beef reindeer in Alaska, and that they will thrive and
multiply and fatten on the Arctic vegetation where even a goat could not
live. Their flesh, he asserts, is more palatable than either beef or
mutton.

In view of the success of this experiment in Alaska it is predicted that
in the far north of America, as in the far north of Europe, the reindeer
will be the principal domestic animal, supplying the people not only of
the northland itself, but of more southerly latitudes, with cheese, and
meat, and leather.

THE MUSK-OX.

Mr. J. B. Tyrrell is authority for the statement that besides the
caribou, musk-oxen (_Ovibos moschatus_) are the only other large
herbivorous animals that live in the open plains of the north, and they
scorn the shelter of the forest even in winter, their long shaggy coat
of hair furnishing sufficient protection against the severest gales. Mr.
Tyrrell in his report of his explorations along Dubawnt and Kazan rivers
states that the habitat of the musk-ox seems to be confined to that
country north of the portion of Dubawnt river between Dubawnt lake and
Hudson bay. None were seen in the course of either of the two
expeditions mentioned, but Eskimos met with at the head of Chesterfield
inlet had a number of fresh skins. The Eskimos on Kazan river reported
to Mr. Tyrrell that there were no musk-oxen in their neighbourhood.

Mr. E. A. Preble states in his report:—“This famous ruminant within
historic times ranged over the entire extent of the Barren Grounds, from
the mouth of the Mackenzie to Churchill. It has now become extirpated
over large areas at the eastern and western extremities of this range,
but still exists in great numbers in the less accessible parts of its
habitat.”

Captain Back records on July 13, 1834, while descending the river which
now bears his name, he noticed two or three hundred deer, and, apart
from them, herds of musk-oxen were either grazing or sleeping on its
western banks, which there (above Beechey lake) looked green and swampy,
and were all more or less cloven by inconsiderable ravines, with a
clayey surface. Back mentions that his party killed a musk-ox on
Montreal island, off the mouth of Backs river, August 3, 1834. While
ascending that river on his return trip, on September 1, Back near Lake
Pelly noticed a herd of musk-oxen and a few straggling deer quietly
feeding on the sand-hills, “and many of the white, brown, and laughing
geese were flying about, and seemed to be collecting for their southerly
migration.”

THE MEAT OF THE MUSK-OX.

Back states that the musk-ox “feeds, like the reindeer, chiefly on
lichens, and the meat of a well-fed cow is agreeably tasty and juicy,
but that of a lean cow and of the bull is strongly impregnated with a
disagreeable musky flavour, so as to be palatable only to a very hungry
man.”

In his evidence before the select committee of the Senate in 1888, Hon.
William Christie, formerly Inspecting Chief Factor of the Hudson’s Bay
Company, stated that the company at that time got a few—a very
few—musk-ox hides at Churchill and Fort Rae. This animal kept pretty
well in the open country along the Arctic coast. Witness was four years
at Churchill, and was asked by a friend to get a musk-ox robe for him,
and was two or three years before he obtained it.

Hon. Frank Oliver informed the same committee that Mr. Murdoch McLeod, a
retired Hudson’s Bay Company’s official, told him that a musk-ox bull
which he helped to kill weighed fourteen hundred pounds, dressed, and
the robe measured fifteen feet from nose to rump. The musk-oxen were
found generally in bands of ten to forty. Some winters they were more
scarce than others, which could not be explained.

Mr. D. T. Hanbury, writing of the original exploration by him of Thelon
and Hanbury rivers, states:—“After ascending the main Ark-i-linik
(Thelon) river for about thirty-five miles, musk-ox tracks commenced to
get very numerous. The muddy shores in places were so ploughed up with
their tracks as to give the idea that a drove of cattle had passed
along.” In this vicinity the explorer saw several herds of musk-oxen.

A MUSK-OX PRESERVE.

In another place in his book “Sport and Travel in the Northland of
Canada”, Mr. Hanbury writes:—“On the main Ark-i-linik (Thelon) river
there is a stretch of country about eighty miles in length into which no
human being enters. The Eskimos do not hunt so far west, and Yellow
Knives and Dog Ribs from Slave lake do not go so far east. To penetrate
this country in the dead of winter would be simply to court starvation.
Then the deer have all departed, and to depend on finding musk-oxen at
the end of the journey would be risky indeed. Thus there remains the
spot in this Great Barren Northland which is sacred to the musk-ox. Here
the animals remain in their primeval state, exhibiting no fear, only
curiosity. I approached several herds within thirty yards, photographed
them at my leisure, moving them round as I wished, and then retired,
leaving them still stupidly staring at me as if in wonder. When the deer
were not procurable a musk-ox was killed. The height of a large bull
which I killed in 1896 at a spot about fifty miles farther north was
fifty-five inches; horns twenty-seven inches.”

A MIDNIGHT MUSK-OX HUNT.

In the official report of his exploratory trip from Great Slave lake to
Chesterfield inlet via Thelon river in 1900 Mr. J. W. Tyrrell states
that his party first encountered musk-oxen among the lakes in the
vicinity of the height of land between the basin of Great Slave lake,
and that of the Thelon. He thus refers to this event:—“Whilst sailing
northward into Sifton lake we encountered a gale, which drove us ashore
at the focus of the four arms. Thus finding a little leisure time thrust
upon us, Mr. Fairchild and I, providing ourselves with compasses and
field glasses, made an exploratory tramp of a few miles. The season had
now advanced to June 27, and at such time in our latitude (63° 44′), we
had no darkness, although the sun dipped below the horizon for a short
time. The hours of night were, therefore, as suitable for travel as
those of day, and hence it was ten p.m. when, scanning the valleys and
hillsides with my powerful stereoscopic field glasses, I observed a band
of musk-oxen feeding a mile or two to the northward. Fifteen of them
were counted in all, and this with genuine surprise, as we had not
expected to see any of these animals for some time to come. They were
none the less welcome, for our camp was much in need of fresh meat, and
stimulated by this knowledge we procured two rifles from camp and set
off in one of the canoes with two Indians, on a midnight hunt. The lake
had now become quite calm, and the northern sky a glow of lurid light,
making the scene a most enchanting picture, such as can only be seen
within the shadow of the Arctic. For three miles our light canoe glided
over the glassy surface of the lake in perfect silence, excepting for
the faint rippling of the water against its sides, until when near the
shore there suddenly appeared over the adjoining ridge the huge black
forms of nine musk-oxen.”

MUSK-OXEN IN THELON VALLEY.

The following paragraph from Mr. Tyrrell’s report is also interesting
under this head:—“As we glided quickly and quietly down Thelon river,
one of the most interesting features met with was the occurrence of
numerous bands of musk-oxen feeding upon the luxuriant grass or sleeping
on the river bank. Attempts were made to obtain photographs of some of
these noble brutes, but such were not very successful for two reasons;
first, because of the wariness of the animals, and second, because of
the weariness of the photographers.

“It was observed that when bands of cows with their young were met with,
they were usually very timid and fled at first approach of danger, but
in the case of straggling bulls, which were frequently seen, they were
much more fearless and allowed us to approach as closely as prudence and
their defiant attitudes would permit. On one occasion, when Mr.
Fairchild climbed the river bank in order to photograph a fine specimen,
he had no sooner snapped his camera and turned his back, than the brute
charged and followed him to the bank. He was at once covered by our
rifles, but as Fairchild stepped safely into the canoe, no shots were
fired. Indeed day after day we passed numbers of musk-oxen, without
molesting them in any way except by trying to photograph them. A notable
fact in regard to the musk-oxen was that every one seen was on the north
side of the Thelon, or on islands on the river. On one occasion when
three musk-oxen were met with on an island they immediately plunged into
the water and swam rapidly to the north shore, after gaining which they
could be seen galloping across the plains for miles.”

In his report Mr. J. W. Tyrrell classes the herds of musk-oxen as among
the resources of the country “which are of great value to Canada.” He
adds:—“For the preservation of the musk-oxen—which may be so easily
slaughtered—and are already rapidly diminishing in numbers, I would
suggest that the territory between Thelon and Backs rivers, be set apart
by the Government as a game preserve.”

APPEARANCE OF THE MUSK-OX.

In his interesting volume “Through the Sub-Arctics of Canada,” Mr.
Tyrrell writes:—

“The musk-oxen are claimed as relatives both by the sheep and ox
families, though they perhaps more properly represent a distinct family
by themselves.

“In general appearance they may be said to somewhat resemble a huge
brown, horned sheep, but in size and weight they much more nearly
resemble the ox, or better still, the buffalo, the monarch of the
prairies a generation ago.

“Like the buffalo, the musk-ox (_Ovibos moschatus_) is gregarious in its
habits, but where the former existed in thousands the latter is found
only in tens—a band of twenty or thirty being as many as are commonly
found together. The above comparison of numbers may also be taken as
approximately representing the whole existing musk-ox family as compared
with that of the buffalo in his palmy days.

“In prehistoric times, as shown by the exhumed remains, the musk-ox
occupied a very wide area of the earth’s surface, both in Europe, Asia
and America, but now his range is limited to the northern parts of
Canada and Greenland. From personal observation I have found the
southern boundary of the musk-ox habitat to-day to be Hudson strait and
bay, Chesterfield inlet, Thelon river, Clinton-Colden and Aylmer lakes;
whereas in the time of Samuel Hearne, one hundred and fifty years ago,
we have his assertion that musk-oxen frequented the vicinity of
Churchill, four hundred miles south of their present haunts.

“It is no doubt a fact, not only have the musk-oxen been driven farther
and farther from the haunts of men, but that their numbers have been
correspondingly reduced from year to year by natives who have long
pursued a policy of systematic slaughter in quest of the princely robes
so much in demand by the fur-traders.”

MUSK-OX ROBES STACKED LIKE HAY.

“The musk-ox is one of the noblest and most valuable animals of the
northern shore of Hudson bay and adjacent territory. It is found in very
considerable numbers and affords most luxurious robes. I have seen
musk-ox robes stacked by the Eskimos like hay-cocks, along the shore of
Chesterfield inlet, awaiting the opportunity to market them.”

On Thelon river, from the junction of the Hanbury down for over half its
length or about one hundred and fifty miles, Inspector Pelletier, during
his long patrol already several times referred to, saw innumerable
tracks of musk-ox, some fairly fresh and on both banks. In his official
report the Inspector states:—

“On August 9 (the day after the descent of Thelon river was begun), we
sighted our first musk-ox. He was on a small island, lying down asleep,
and looked very much like a large overturned sod until suddenly he rose
and we were astonished at his size. I had always heard a musk-ox was not
a large animal. This one we saw was a large bull of not very great
height—perhaps, I would judge, about thirteen hands, but of immense
size and weight; he would have scaled very close to fifteen hundred
pounds. The long hair was coming down nearly to the ground, and when he
decided to run away the fur on him was of such thickness and length that
it waved up and down at every gallop as the wings of a bird flying. A
few miles farther down about noon we sighted another musk-ox. He was on
the north shore, sleeping on the top of a grassy bank. We made much
noise to attract his attention. He suddenly rose, and looked straight at
us. While doing so I took a snapshot of him. I was hurrying another
exposure in place when all at once he turned right about and disappeared
over the bank. He was a large animal, but not so large as the first one.
We were on the lookout for more, but saw none that day. We sighted one
musk-ox on the morning of August 10. It was the third and last we saw.
We saw innumerable tracks though, and at certain times of the year large
herds must frequent the shores of this river.”

THE MOOSE AND FUR-BEARING ANIMALS.

The moose (_Alces Americanus_) being a woodland animal, is not found in
the interior of the Barren Lands, but it is found in places in the
sparsely timbered margins of the country and in the narrow wooded strips
and points which extend from the forested areas along the rivers and
lakes well into the treeless plains. Mr. J. W. Tyrrell states that
during his party’s exploration of the upper Thelon in the summer of
1900, on two occasions moose antlers were found embedded in the sand of
the river banks. Hanbury states that moose are found in Thelon river,
below its junction with the Hanbury, and mentions seeing numerous fresh
tracks and places where the animals had browsed on the willows. In
August, 1902, while descending Dease river, northeast of Great Bear
lake, he found tracks along its banks.

Inspector Pelletier, speaking in his official report of the game along
the Hanbury and Thelon, states:—“There is good fur to be had in winter
besides musk-ox, such as foxes, wolves, wolverines, brown bears, and
perhaps mink and marten. . . . Many wolves were seen at the foot of Ford
falls (on the Hanbury). Five were in a pack.”

Mr. J. B. Tyrrell in his paper before the British Association at Toronto
stated:—“The white wolf and the wolverine are the two most common
predatory animals in the interior, while the white bear and white fox
are common in places along the coast.”

Mr. J. W. Tyrrell (“Through the Sub-Arctics of Canada”) states:—“Black
and red as well as white foxes are also commonly found in the country
north of the timber line. I have seen and handled a single black foxskin
which realized for its owner the sum of one thousand six hundred
dollars.”

THE POLAR BEAR.

As to the polar bear, which is found all along the shores of Hudson bay,
and the northern coast, Mr. Tyrrell (“Through the Sub-Arctics of
Canada”) states:—“In the animal world the polar bear is admittedly the
monarch of the north. He is the bear of bears, being described by all
Arctic travellers as possessing enormous strength and great voracity. Of
the score of polars whose more or less intimate acquaintance I have had
occasion to make, I have seen at least two whose tracks in the snow
measured fifteen by eighteen inches, whose length measures over nine
feet, and whose slain carcases tipped the steelyard at from fifteen to
sixteen hundred pounds.”

In the same volume Mr. Tyrrell states:—“Of feathered game there is a
great abundance, particularly of waterfowl, the most important of which
are:—Brant, Hutchins and snowy geese; northern, American and king
eiders; squaw ducks, swans, loons, nurres, guillemots and many other sea
fowls. In many places I have seen geese in such numbers that they could
be killed by hundreds with sticks. Ptarmigan, also, are found in great
numbers in many places in the open country. They are commonly caught by
the natives with nets, and form a staple article of food.”

WHERE THE WILD GEESE NEST.

Mr. J. W. Tyrrell mentions that two young broods of geese were seen on
Dubawnt lake on August 15, 1893. He adds:—“It is commonly said that the
breeding place of the wild goose has never been discovered, but here, at
any rate, was the breeding place of these.”

In the official report of his trip in 1900, Mr. Tyrrell states:—“Many
broods of geese were observed on the low grassy banks of the Thelon.
They were of a small grey species, with black necks and heads and white
bands around the latter. Later in the season great numbers of moulting
geese were met with, and thirty or forty of them were knocked over with
sticks for supplying our kettles.

“Ducks and ptarmigan were also met with, though not in great numbers,
whilst the spruce woods were enlivened by the songs of singing birds,
notably American robins.”

Hearne (p. 170) thus refers to the feathered game in Coppermine river
region:—“When at the sea-side (at the mouth of Coppermine river),
besides seeing many seals on the ice, I also observed several flocks of
sea-fowl flying about the shores, such as gulls, blackheads, loons, old
wives, ha-ha-wies, geese, Arctic gulls, and willicks. In the adjacent
ponds also were some swans and geese in a moulting state, and in the
marshes some curlews and plover; plenty of hawkes-eyes (i.e., the green
plover), and some yellow-legs; also several other small birds that visit
these northern parts in the spring to breed and moult, and which
doubtless return southward as the fall advances. My reason for this
conjecture is founded on a certain knowledge that all these birds
migrate in Hudson bay, and it is but reasonable to think that they are
less capable of withstanding the rigour of such a long and cold winter
as they must necessarily experience in a country which is so many
degrees within the Arctic circle, as that is where I now (July 1771) saw
them.”

FLIGHT OF THE WATERFOWL.

Back mentions the fact that while at Artillery lake on September 5,
1833, “impending storms were threatened by the cackling of hundreds of
geese, which at an immense height were winging their flight to the
southward. Ranged according to their families, the grey, or bustard, the
white and the laughing geese came past in quick succession, vying in
swiftness, as if anxious to escape from the wintry horrors of the
north.”

Speaking of his exploration of Thelon and Hanbury rivers, Mr. Hanbury
(“Sport and Travel in the Northland of Canada”), referring to feathered
game along the route, states:—“Ptarmigan are very numerous in the
willow beds all along the river. Excellent sport might be had by any one
with time and ammunition to spare. On a journey small game is not
interfered with unless other meat and fish give out. The ptarmigan were
very handsome at this time of year (summer). But for a few white
feathers in the wings, they might easily have been mistaken for grouse,
the colour, flight and call (both in the early morning and when flushed)
exactly resembling that of the red grouse. The young birds were strong
on the wing, fully forward as grouse in the north of Scotland about the
middle of August.”

Inspector Pelletier states that when he descended the Thelon waterfowl
were seen only on Baker lake, and then only a few, while on the other
lakes and rivers none were seen. Ptarmigan were fairly plentiful in
places all along the lower stretch from Schultz lake down.

INEXHAUSTIBLE SUPPLIES OF FISH.

The resources of the Barren Lands in the way of fish are tremendous. We
know that the salt, tidal waters which lave the eastern and northern
shores of this huge area teem with fish and that the same can be
truthfully said of the lakes and rivers which have been explored and are
indicated on the map. We also know that the country is dotted with
innumerable lakes and drained by many rivers and streams which have
never been visited by white men, and which consequently find no places
on any map. And these too contain fish.

Hearne’s journal contains many references to the fish supply of the
region he travelled through in 1771 between Churchill, the mouth of the
Coppermine, Great Slave lake, and Lake Athabaska. One of the pioneer
explorer’s fish stories is particularly interesting. At pages 158, 159
and 160 of his book he relates that his party, in retreating up the
Coppermine after the brutal massacre by his Indians of the Eskimos at
Bloody falls (as he called the spot after the massacre), saw an old
woman, almost blind, “sitting by the side of the water, killing salmon,
which lay at the foot of the fall as thick as a shoal of herrings.”
Hearne proceeds:—“It may appear strange, that a person supposed to be
almost blind should be employed in the business of fishing, and
particularly with any degree of success, but when the multitude of fish
is taken into account the wonder will cease. Indeed they were so
numerous at the foot of the fall, that when a light pole, armed with a
few spikes, which was the instrument which the old woman used, was put
under water, and hauled up with a jerk, it was scarcely possible to miss
them. Some of my Indians tried the method, for curiosity, with the old
woman’s staff, and seldom got less than two at a jerk, sometimes three
or four. Those fish, though very fine, and beautifully red, are but
small, seldom weighing more (as near as I could judge) than six or seven
pounds, and in general much less. Their numbers at this place were
almost incredible, perhaps equal to any thing that is related of the
salmon in Kamschatka, or any other part of the world. It does not appear
that the Eskimos have any other method of catching the fish unless it be
by spears and darts, for no appearance of nets was discovered either at
their tents, or on any part of the shore. This is the case with all the
Eskimos on the west side of Hudson bay; spearing in summer and angling
in winter are the only methods they have yet devised to catch fish,
though at times their whole dependence for support is on that article.”

Captain Back mentions having observed grayling rising to flies at the
outlet of Pelly lake on Backs river, July 15, 1834. Back also mentions
that while descending Backs river in July, 1883, his party met a party
of Eskimos who were camped at the foot of a fall below Pelly lake, where
they had come to get a supply of fish. Thousands of whitefish and small
trout, caught in the eddy below the fall, lay about, split, and exposed
to dry on the rocks.

Back’s party caught an inconnu (which he calls _Salmo Mackenzii_) with a
number of other fish in the eastern arm of Great Slave lake August 14,
1833.

THE ARCTIC SALMON.

Before the Senate committee of 1888, Mr. Christie, Chief Inspector of
the Hudson’s Bay Company, stated that salmon were found in large numbers
on the Churchill, as soon as the ice cleared out of the river, about the
middle of July. They entered the river and went out of it with the tide.
They did not run up the river to spawn. He thought these salmon quite as
large as those he had seen in Scotland.

Mr. A. P. Low, Director of the Geological Survey of Canada, examined
before the Senate committee of 1907, stated that in the far northern
waters there are no true salmon, but there is the Arctic salmon, which
is found along the east side of Hudson bay from Cape Jones, and on the
west side, north of the mouth of Churchill river. These are in many
places very abundant and are caught freely in the summer time when they
are out in the sea. They go into the sea about July and return to the
rivers and lakes again some time in September. They are only out there
about two months. This Arctic salmon is an excellent fish, beautifully
coloured, a very fine salmon colour, and it is not so rich a fish as the
Atlantic salmon. It resembles the western salmon more than it does the
eastern or Atlantic salmon. The salmon fishery on Hudson bay would no
doubt have commercial value were there an outlet to a market. The
whitefish of Hudson bay is a very fine flavoured fish.

The portion of Hudson bay in the vicinity of Southampton island is where
the whale fishing is done. Formerly it extended to Marble island.

In reply to various questions, Mr. Low said he had no knowledge of
herring or mackerel going into Hudson bay, but there are some cod there.
He had taken them up near Cape Fullerton and along that coast, but they
have not been found very plentiful yet.

In the report of his explorations in 1893 and 1894, Mr. J. B. Tyrrell
says:—“It is probable that some of the true salmon ascend the inlets
and streams west of the northern part of Hudson bay, but the fact was
not definitely determined.” Before the select committee of the Senate in
1907 he stated he did not know what fish there are along the shores of
Hudson bay. “The Eskimos report that there are salmon and other fish
there, but I did not see them myself.”

PLENTY OF SALMON RUNNING.

Mr. Hanbury, speaking of his trip across country from Chesterfield inlet
to the Arctic, reported “plenty of salmon running” in the northern
rivers in June.

Mr. J. W. Tyrrell (“Through the Sub-Arctics of Canada”) states:—“Salmon
of the very finest quality are found in abundance both in Hudson bay and
strait. I have several times procured them from Eskimos and can testify
as to their superior quality.” Mr. Tyrrell does not state whether any of
these salmon were caught on the west side of the bay.

We find the following interesting paragraphs as to the fish along the
Arctic coast in “Sport and Travel in Northern Canada” (Hanbury):—“On
May 29, after travelling about ten miles, I obtained an observation for
latitude which gave 68° 25′ north. Three miles more brought us to the
east coast of Kent peninsula, or rather to a small inlet of the coast,
where several Huskies were fishing with their copper fish-hooks through
holes in the ice. In the evening they brought me seven of the fish they
had caught, which proved to be codling, the same in appearance and size
as those we have found around the coast of Great Britain. I was
surprised to see these fish, for the Hudson bay Huskies had always
denied the existence of any sort of cod in Hudson bay. The Arctic Husky
name for these codling was u-wuk, and they were reported to be very
plentiful along the coast at this time of year.”

According to Doctor Richardson:—“Trout of various kinds and of large
size inhabit the rivers that fall into Arctic sea, and on the coast near
the mouth of Coppermine river, a species closely resembling the
sea-trout of England was abundant in the shallows.”

FISH IN THE DUBAWNT AND THE KAZAN.

Mr. J. B. Tyrrell in the report of his exploratory trips down Dubawnt
and Kazan rivers in 1893 and 1894 states:—“Fish seemed to be everywhere
abundant in the lakes and streams though very few were caught. The lake
trout (_Cristivomer namaycush_) and whitefish (_Coregonus clupeiformis_)
appeared to be the most abundant and valuable food fishes, the latter
being especially abundant in Dubawnt lake. Pike (_Esox lucius_) and one
or more species of suckers were also seen.

Mr. Tyrrell states in his evidence before the Senate committee of 1907
that as far north as Dubawnt lake (63° north latitude) the whitefish and
trout were plentiful in all the streams. Mr. Tyrrell caught them in
Dubawnt lake. Farther northwards he did not catch any. There are great
quantities of fish. The fact is there are all the fish the lakes will
hold—they are as full as the water can supply food for them.

While Mr. Tyrrell’s party was descending Dubawnt river in August, 1894,
they made a big haul of trout and whitefish below Markham lake;
according to Mr. J. B. Tyrrell (“Through the Sub-Arctics of
Canada”):—“The whitefish ranged from six to ten pounds in weight; the
trout went up to twenty-five pounds.”

In his paper before the British Association Mr. J. W. Tyrrell
stated:—“Whitefish and lake trout are plentiful in the lakes and
streams; but as yet very little is known about the character and
distribution of the denizens of most of the water stretches.”

FISH PLENTIFUL IN THE THELON.

Mr. Hanbury in describing his exploration of the Ark-i-linik (Thelon and
Hanbury rivers) states:—“Fish were plentiful all along the Ark-i-linik;
in fact, I never saw such a grand river for fish. Trout, whitefish, and
toolabies (very similar to whitefish) abound, and large numbers can be
taken with nets of from three to four and one-half inch mesh. There are
few rivers equal to the Ark-i-linik for food fishes.”

All travellers agree that there are large numbers of fish in the eastern
arm of Great Slave lake and in the lakes between that sheet of water and
the Thelon. Mr. J. W. Tyrrell in the report of his trip in 1900
states:—“The resources of Artillery lake and vicinity, outside of any
mineral wealth it may possess, lie in its fisheries, its furs and meat
supplies. In regard to the fisheries, I can testify that its deep, cold
waters abound with the finest specimens of lake trout as well as
whitefish, pike and carp. At one place in about fifteen minutes, with a
single spoon hook, one of my men pulled out eighteen fine trout, some of
which were brought to camp, strung on a pole and photographed by me.
Some of these fish were from sixteen to twenty pounds in weight. In
regard to the fish of Artillery lake, I was told

A MOST ASTONISHING STORY

by the Indian “Pierre Fort Smith” and his companion. They affirm that
they have frequently seen fish of from twenty to thirty feet long in the
water, and described them as being of black colour, with long slender
horns or feelers. They say they have never killed one of them—being
afraid of them—but that they are frequently seen in the deep waters
when crossing the lake. When I smiled at their story with some
expression of doubt, they became very indignant and with one accord
stoutly declared every word of it to be true. I offered them ‘one
hundred skins’ if they would capture or kill one of these fish for me,
but they only said they could not do so; they were too big, and they
were afraid of them.”

In the report of his patrol from Great Slave lake to Chesterfield inlet,
Inspector Pelletier gives us the following notes on fish and game along
his route:—“We saw no game along the lake (Great Slave lake) such as
deer, bears, etc., no water fowls, partridges or ptarmigan. Fish, on the
contrary, are very plentiful. Large lake trout weighing up to
twenty-five pounds take well to the troll, but this trout is not a game
fish, and is very coarse food. The smaller trout are better in every
way. Whitefish is abundant, and of splendid quality. We saw no
‘Inconnus’, the season being too early.”

ARTILLERY LAKE TEEMS WITH TROUT.

Artillery lake teems with trout, some of large size, and at the foot of
the rapids on “Kasba river trout are taken by the troll, some weighing
eighteen and twenty pounds. There must be larger ones but we did not
secure any.

“At the foot of every rapid on upper Hanbury river trout and grayling
can be caught. Some trout are very large, over twenty-five pounds. The
best eating are the small ones about two pounds, the flesh of which is
very red. They do not rise to the fly, but catch the spoon very well.
The ordinary maskinonge pattern proved the most successful.”

As to Thelon river, the Inspector states:—“Fish are abundant. Anywhere
where nets are set whitefish of splendid quality are caught.” As to the
long reach of lakes above Chesterfield inlet he says:—“Fish are
plentiful in all the lakes. On Baker lake we saw some very large trout
jumping near the mouth of a small river emptying into the lake.”

The Indians and the few white travellers who have been there report a
plentiful supply of fine fish in all the large lakes north of Great
Slave lake and about the headwaters of Backs river, which used to be
known as Great Fish river on account of the large fish caught in its
waters. Mr. Warburton Pike was at Aylmer lake in June 1890 and writes in
his book (“The Barren Grounds of Northern Canada”):—“At the head of
every bay a stream ran into the lake, and the open water at its mouth
was always a sure find for trout; forty or fifty large fish were often
caught in a day with a hook and line at these places, and, as we could
always kill caribou, even the dogs were getting fat in this land of
plenty.”

We have this testimony from Hanbury (“Sport and Travel in the Northland
of Canada”) as to the fish life of the lakes still farther north and on
the height of land dividing the Coppermine watershed from that of Great
Bear lake:—“We all regretted leaving Teshi-er-pi or Dismal lake. It
certainly did not appear ‘dismal’ to us, but quite the reverse. I do not
remember ever having come across a lake where fish were so numerous.
Large trout, some of which ran up to twenty-five pounds, could be seen
swimming in the clear water as we paddled along. The tollabies we caught
averaged nearer five pounds than four, and as before remarked, were most
excellent eating. Arctic trout were numberless.”

BIBLIOGRAPHY.

The reader of the preceding pages will have observed, from the variety
of publications from which quotations have been made, that the
literature relating to the far northlands of Canada is
considerable—quite extensive in fact. Below is a partial list of
written authorities consulted in the preparation of this book. It does
not pretend to be a complete bibliography of the country by any means,
many publications which were carefully read through not being mentioned
because they do not throw any direct light upon the natural resources of
the region, being merely books of adventure, or publications relating
wholly to those topographical features of the country which are clearly
indicated in present-day maps. The following list includes works from
which enquirers for additional knowledge of the country are likely to
obtain serviceable information.

ADAM, G. MERCER.—“The Canadian Northwest, its History and its
Troubles.”—Rose Publishing Co., Toronto, 1885.

AMI, H. H., D.Sc., F.G.S., F.R.S.C.—“Resources of the Country between
Quebec and Winnipeg, along the line of the G.T.P. Ry.”—(Sessional paper
143), King’s Printer, Ottawa, 1903.

ANDERSON, JAMES.—“Extracts from Chief-Factor James Anderson’s Arctic
Journal.”—Journ. Roy. Geog. Soc., Vol. XXVII, pp. 321-328, 1857.

ARMSTRONG, JOHN.—Report of the Preliminary Surveys for a Proposed
Railway to Hudson bay, (Sessional paper No. 20 d., 1910). King’s
Printer, Ottawa.

BACK, CAPTAIN GEORGE, R.N.—“Narrative of the Arctic Land Expedition to
the mouth of the Great Fish River, and along the shores of the Arctic
Ocean, in the years 1833, 1834, 1835,” by Captain Back, R. N., Commander
of the Expedition. Zoological Appendix by John Richardson. London and
Philadelphia, 1836.

BELL, JAMES MACINTOSH, M.A.—“Report on the Topography and Geology of
Great Bear lake and of a chain of lakes and streams thence to Great
Slave lake.” Part C., Annual Report, Vol. XII, Geological Survey of
Canada, King’s Printer, Ottawa, 1901.

BELL, ROBERT, I.S.O., M.D., C.M., D.Sc., LL.D., F.R.S.—Reports in the
Annual report of the Geological Survey of Canada particularly from 1877
to 1908. King’s Printer, Ottawa.

BELL, DR. ROBT., I.S.O., etc.—Special reports in Geol. Survey Reports
1877-78, 1882-84 and 1885.

BELL, DR. ROBT., I.S.O., etc.—Reports on Hudson bay and some of the
lakes and rivers lying west of it. Report Progress Geological Survey of
Canada, 1879-80, pp. 10-113-C. Queen’s Printer, Ottawa, 1881.

BELL, DR. ROBT., I.S.O., etc.—“The Geology of the Hudson’s Bay and
Strait,” in the report of the Hudson’s Bay Expedition, 1885. Department
of Marine, Ottawa.

BELL, DR. ROBERT, I.S.O., etc.—“Geology and Economic Minerals of
Hudson’s Bay and Northern Canada,” (abstract) in Trans. Royal Soc. Can.,
vol. ii, sect. iv., p. 241, Ottawa.

BELL, DR. ROBERT, I.S.O., etc.—“Report on an Exploration of Portions of
the Attawapiskat and Albany rivers, Lonely lake to James’ bay.” Part G.,
Annual Report Geol. Survey, 1886. Dawson Bros., Montreal, 1887.

BERNIER, CAPTAIN J. E.—“Report on the Dominion of Canada Government
Expedition to the Arctic Islands and Hudson Strait on Board the D.G.S.
‘Arctic.’” Ottawa, Government Printing Bureau, 1910.

BOULTON, MAJOR C. A.—“Reminiscences of the Northwest Rebellions.” Grip
Printing and Publishing Co., Toronto, 1886.

BROWN, HON. C.P.—“Report of the Select Committee of the Legislative
Assembly of the Province of Manitoba appointed to Procure Evidence as to
the Practicability of the Establishment of a System of Communication
with the Province via Hudson Bay”. Printed by order of the Legislative
Assembly. Winnipeg, 1884.

BRYMNER, DOUGLAS—“Reports on Canadian Archives for 1888 and 1890,”
Notes E. and C., respectively. Queen’s Printer, Ottawa.

BUTLER, CAPTAIN W. F., F.R.G.S.—“The Great Lone Land; a Narrative of
Travel and Adventure in the Northwest of America.” London, 1872.

CHAMBERS, CAPTAIN E. J.—“The Book of Canada.” Montreal and Toronto,
1905.

CHAMBERS, CAPTAIN E. J.—“The Royal Northwest Mounted Police. (A Corps
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CHAMBERS, CAPTAIN E. J.—“Canada’s Fertile Northland.” Containing the
evidence heard before the Select Committee of the Senate of Canada of
1906-07 and the report based thereon. Ottawa, Government Printing
Bureau. 1907. Several later editions. The last under the title “The New
Northwest.”

CHAMBERS, CAPTAIN E. J.—“The Great Mackenzie Basin.” A Summary of the
Reports of the Schultz Committees of the Senate of Canada (1887-88) and
of the evidence heard before said Committees.” Ottawa, Government
Printing Bureau, 1908.

COUES, ELLIOTT.—“New Light on the Early History of the Greater
Northwest. The Manuscript Journals of Alexander Henry, Fur Trader of the
Northwest Company and of David Thompson, Official Geographer and
Explorer of the same Company, 1799-1814,” in three volumes. Francis P.
Harper, New York, 1897.

CREAN, FRANK J. P., C.E., F.R.G.S.—“The New Northwest. Report of
Exploration.” Government Printing Bureau, Ottawa, 1908. Second edition,
1909.

DAWSON, G. M., D.S., F.G.S., F.R.S.C., etc.—“Notes to accompany a
Geological Map of the Northern portion of the Dominion of Canada, East
of the Rocky Mountains,” Queen’s Printer, Ottawa, 1887.

DAWSON, G. M., F.G.S., etc.—Numerous reports in the annual reports of
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Printing Bureau, Ottawa.

DICKSON, J. R., B.S.A., M.S.F.—“Report on Timber Conditions, etc.,
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Branch—Bulletin No. 17. Government Printing Bureau, Ottawa, 1911.

DOBBS, ARTHUR—“Account of the Situation, Climate and Trade of the
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DODDS, JAMES—“The Hudson’s Bay Company, its Position and Prospects.”
London, 1866.

DOWLING, D. B., B. Ap. Sc.—“Report on the Country in the vicinity of
Red Lake and Part of the Basin of Berens River, Keewatin.” Part F.,
Annual Report (Vol. VII), Geological Survey of Canada. Queen’s Printer,
Ottawa, 1896.

DOWLING, D. B., B. Ap. Sc.—“Report on an Exploration of Ekwan river,
Sutton Mill lakes and part of the West Coast of James’ Bay.” (Annual
Report Geol. Sur. of Canada, 1901, Part F., Vol. XIV, New Series).
King’s Printer, Ottawa.

DOWLING, D. B.—“Report on the Geology of the West Shore and Islands of
Lake Winnipeg.” (Geol. Survey report for 1898, Vol. XI). Government
Printing Bureau, Ottawa, 1901.

DOWLING, D. B.—“Report on the East Shore of Lake Winnipeg and Adjacent
Parts of Manitoba and Keewatin. From notes and Surveys by J. B.
Tyrrell.” (Geol. Survey report for 1898, Vol. XI). Government Printing
Bureau, Ottawa, 1901.

DOWLING, D. B.—“Report on Geological Explorations in Athabaska,
Saskatchewan and Keewatin Districts.” Part F. F., Annual Report (Vol.
XIII), Geological Survey of Canada, King’s Printer, Ottawa, 1902.

DOWLING, D. B.—“Report on an Exploration of Ekwan River and Sutton Mill
Lakes and Part of the West Coast of James’ bay.” Part F., Annual Report
(Vol. XIV), Geological Survey of Canada, King’s Printer, Ottawa, 1904.

FRANKLIN, CAPTAIN JOHN, R.N., F.R.S.—“Narrative of a Journey on the
shores of the Polar Sea, in the years 1819-20-21 and -22.” Zoological
Appendix; Mammals and Birds, by Joseph Sabine; Notice of the fishes,
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FRANKLIN, CAPTAIN JOHN, R.N., F.R.S., etc.—“Narrative of a Second
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FISHER, HON. SYDNEY—“Some Economic Aspects of Agriculture in Canada.”
Address before the Canadian Club, Ottawa, Jan. 22, 1910.

GEOLOGICAL SURVEY OF CANADA—“Annual Reports,” more particularly the
following: 1872, 1878, 1879, 1880, 1884, 1886 (Part R), 1888 (Vol. XI,
part A), 1890-91 (Vol. V., part D), 1894 (Vol. VII, part A), 1896 (Vol.
IX, part F), 1897 (Vol. X, part A), 1900 (Vol. XIII), 1901 (Vol. VIII,
part D). King’s Printer, Government Printing Bureau, Ottawa.

GRANT, GEORGE M.—“Ocean to Ocean, Sandford Fleming’s Expedition through
Canada in 1872. Being a diary kept during a journey from the Atlantic to
the Pacific with the Expedition of the Engineer-in-Chief of the Canadian
Pacific and Intercolonial Railways.” London, 1877, and Belford Bros.,
Toronto.

HANBURY, DAVID T.—“Sport and Travel in the Northland of Canada.” New
York, The Macmillan Company. London, Edward Arnold. 1904.

HARMON, DANIEL WILLIAMS—“A Journal of voyage and travel in the Interior
of North America. Between the 47th and 58th Degrees of N. Lat. extending
from Montreal nearly to the Pacific, a distance of about 5,000 miles.
Including an account of the principal occurrences during a residence of
nineteen years in different parts of the country.” By Daniel Williams
Harmon, a partner in the Northwest Company. With introduction and Map.
Andover, 1820.

HARRISON, ALFRED H.—“In Search of a Polar Continent.” London, 1908.

HEARNE, SAMUEL—“A Journey from Prince of Wales Fort in Hudson’s Bay to
the Northern Ocean. Undertaken by Order of the Hudson’s Bay Company for
the discovery of Copper Mines, a North West Passage, etc., in the years
of 1769, 1770, 1771 and 1772.” London, 1795. Dublin, 1796. London, 1807.

HECTOR, JAMES, M.D.—“Physical Features of the Central part of British
North America,” in Edinburgh “New Philosophical Journal,” 1866.

HEER, PROF. O.—“On the Miocene Plants discovered on the Mackenzie
River,” Proc. Royal Soc., London, Vol. XXX, 1880.

HENRY, ALEXANDER—“Travels and Adventures in Canada and the Indian
Territories.” New York, 1809.

HIND, HENRY YOULE, M.A., F.R.G.S.—(Professor of Chemistry and Geology
in the University of Trinity College, Toronto, in charge of the
Assiniboine and Saskatchewan Expedition.)—“Narrative of the Canadian
Red River Exploring Expedition of 1857, and of the Assiniboine and
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1860.

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HORETZKY, CHARLES—“Canada on the Pacific.” Montreal, 1874.

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INDEX

Agnooski and Winisk rivers, description of country between, 55

Agricultural country, rich, north of lake Winnipeg, 44-45

Agricultural Experiments, early, and their success, 30

Agricultural land, good, around head of lake Winnipeg, 58

Agricultural possibilities of the country south of Reed and Wuskwatim
lakes, 53
of the country from Prince Albert to Fort Pitt, 97-98
at Ile à la Crosse, 98
at Lac la Ronge, 100-102
around Deer lake, 106
at Methye lake, 108-109
in Green lake district, 112-113
at Chipewyan, 133
at Baptiste lake, 135
at Calling river, 136
at McMurray, 136
at Chipewyan, 137
around Cowpar lake, 137-138
in country west of Methye and Buffalo lakes and south of Clearwater
river, 137-138
around Heart lake, 138
around Winefred lake, 138
in Peace river country, 144
at Fort Vermilion, 147-148
at Red River fort, 148
at Fort St. John, 150
at Dunvegan, 150-154
at Grand Prairie, 155-156
at Fort Vermilion, 157, 163-164
around Edmonton, 166-167
of Mackenzie river region, 208, 219

Alluvium on banks of Great Slave lake, 283

Alsop, Enoch, testimony of, 33

Anderson river, basin of, 277
fairly well wooded, 277

Animals, fur-bearing, in Keewatin area, 88
about Winisk and Attawapiskat rivers, 91
in the area south of Cross lake, 92
at Churchill, 93
of Clearwater country, 127
in the far northwest, 127-128
in the country between Churchill river and lake Athabaska, 128-129

Arable Land of Mackenzie river region, 208

Arctic grayling in Peace region, 296

Armstrong, Mr. John, report of, on the preliminary survey of 1908 and 1909
for the proposed railway to Hudson Bay, 60
on the preliminary surveys for the Hudson Bay railway, 87

Artillery lake, 309

Aspen:—(‘Trembling-leaved Poplar’), 65

Asphalt on Great Slave lake, 283

Athabaska lake, 116
timber on the shores of, 123
minerals near lake, 124
evidence of Archbishop Clut before the Senate Committee of 1888 as to
minerals in country northwest of, 125-126

Athabaska river and tributaries, 131-132
basin, Sir John Franklin’s report of the agricultural possibilities of,
133
valley, climate conditions in various parts of, 141-142
water power on, 177
iron found on, 181
general description, 245
summers very hot on, 245
timber, 261
water power along river, 262
country has fine balsam poplar, 268
petroleum, 282
moose, 290
woodland caribou, 291
fish, 299

Attawapiskat river, 66-67

Attawapiskat and Winisk rivers, basins of the, 70-71

Attawapiskat and Winisk rivers, fish of, 91

Aylmer lake, 311

Back, Captain, explorations of, 13, 14
impression of the view from the heights above the Clearwater at Methye
portage, 118
report on timber of Reindeer lake, 267

Back’s grayling in the tributaries of Peace river in Rocky mountains, 204

“Balsam Fir” also called “Single Spruce” and “Silver Pine”, 65

Baptiste lake, agricultural possibilities of, 135

Barley and oats grown at Chipewyan settlement on Buffalo river, 108

Barren Lands, the, area comprised in, 29
topography, soil, climate, flora, 303
tree growth and timber resources, 317

Battle river, gold found in the bars above the mouth of, 180

Bears, white, in the northern part of Hudson bay and black in southern
part, 89

Bear and Moose along Lockhart river, 291

Bear river, birch on, 277
gypsum, 282

Bear lake settlement, 171

Beaver plentiful along Clearwater valley, 130

Beech, Mr. William, description of, of the country around Hudson bay and
at Churchill, 63
of the timber resources of Hudson bay region, 79-80
of the water power available in Hudson bay region, 80
of fish and animals at Churchill, 93-94

Bell, Doctor Robert, F.G.S., F.R.S.C., exploratory trips of, 17, 18
report of his exploratory trip from lake Winnipeg to Hudson bay in 1878,
37, 38
testimony before the Senate Committee of 1887, 38
report of his explorations in the valleys of Nelson and Churchill rivers
in 1879, 65-66
1886 report, 66
before Senate Committee of 1887, 82
description of the rocks of the eastern part of lake St. Joseph, 82
1886 report as to fish, animals and game in Keewatin area, 88
evidence before the Senate Committee of 1887 as to fish, animals and
game in Keewatin area, 88-89
evidence before the Senate Committee of 1887 as to agriculture in
Athabaska district, 134-135
opinion of the tar sands in Athabaska river in his paper before the
American Institute of Engineers, Toronto, in 1907, 187

Bell, James Macintosh, F.R.G.S., exploratory trips of, 21
description of country along Martin river, 266
description of Great Bear river, 271
fine timber at Keith bay, 275

Birch, 122
canoe birch at Fort Rae, 266
grown within Arctic circle, 274
on Bear river, 277

Bituminous Spring on Cree river, 126

Bitumen from Fort Providence to Chipewyan, 285

Black bay on lake Athabaska, galena found at, 181

Bompas, the Right Reverend, opinion of, of the soil in Peace river
country, 145-146

Boulder river, timber along, 66

Bredin, W. F., Esq., evidence of, before the Senate Committee of 1907, 104
evidence before the Senate Committee of 1907 as to tar sands on Buffalo
lake, 126
as to agriculture in Athabaska district, 137
as to agriculture in Peace river country, 165-167
as to the natural gas along Athabaska river, 193

Brick, Reverend J. Gough, evidence of, before the Senate Committee, as to
agriculture and climate in Peace river country, 161-162

British North America Act, 1

Brock, Mr. R. W., opinion of, of petroleum and natural gas in northern
Alberta, 194
of coal deposits, 286

Browne, Alexander, evidence of, on the mineral resources of the country
around Hudson bay, 81

Buffalo lake tar sands, 126

Burntwood river, timber along, 72

Button, Captain Thomas, 7

Button bay, timber on, 76

Calling river, agricultural possibilities on, 136

Canoe lake, good gardens at, 108

Caribou in country between Churchill and Owl river, 93
south of Athabaska, 291
between Fort Rae and Great Bear lake, 291
between Athabaska lake and Churchill river, 291
west of the Mackenzie, 292
pass Rampart House semi-annually, 293
of the Barren Lands, 292, 343
value of, 349
an experiment by Dr. Grenfell, 350

Cereals in Mackenzie river region, 221

Champions of the north, 5, 6

Chesterfield inlet, water routes via, 307
spring at, 310

“Chinooks” at Arctic circle, 224

Chipewyan settlement, 108
advent of spring at, 133
agricultural possibilities at, 133, 137
timber in the vicinity of, 175

Christie, Hon. William, evidence of, before the Senate Committee of 1888
as to the agricultural possibilities of the country from Prince Albert to
Fort Pitt, 97, 98
as to the agricultural possibilities of Peace river country, 157
as to wood buffalo in northern Alberta, 195, 196

Churchill and Owl rivers, timber in the country between, 76, 77

Churchill, fur-bearing animals near, 93
fish, 93, 94

Churchill river, 99
country north of, 115, 116
tributaries, 116
waterpower, 120
timber along the banks, 120, 122
timber north of, 123

Churchill and Clearwater rivers, resources of the region south of, 105
timber north of, 122, 123

Clay Belt, the, 61

Clay, Corporal S. G., report of, of his patrol through Grande prairie
country in 1911, 207

Clearwater lake and Pas, timber in the country between, 75, 76
Mr. McLaggan’s description of the waters between, 92

Clearwater river, country good along, 104, 105
river and valley as described by Mr. F. J. P. Crean, 109, 110

Clearwater valley from Methye portage, description of the height of land
overlooking, 117, 118
described by Bishop Tache, 118
water power, 121
sulphur springs on, 125, 126
animals, 127
beaver plentiful along, 130
iron found on, 181

Climate of the country lying south of Reed and Wuskwatim lakes, 54
of district explored by Mr. Crean in 1908, 111
in various parts of Athabaska valley, 141, 142
in Peace river country, 149
at Dunvegan, 151, 152
at Fort Vermilion, 165
in Peace river country, described by Mr. Warburton Pike, in his book,
173, 174
of Peace river country exceptionally healthy, 174

Clut, Archbishop, evidence of, before the Senate Committee of 1888 as to
minerals in country northeast of lake Athabaska, 125, 126
as to gold in Peace and Liard rivers, 181
as to timber, 265, 269
on feathered game, 294

Coal found south of Saskatchewan and Churchill rivers, 124
on Saskatchewan river, 124
along either side of Cree river, 126
at Lac la Ronge, 126
at McKay, 182
along Mackenzie river, 281
two hundred square miles, 286

Cobalt found on west shore of Reindeer lake, 125

Cold Springs settlement, 171

Conroy, Mr. H. A., evidence of, before the Senate Committee of 1907 as to
agricultural possibilities in Athabaska district, 136, 137
as to the climate conditions in Athabaska-Peace river country, 142
as to the agricultural resources of Peace river country, 168, 169
as to timber in Athabaska country, 176
his report to the Superintendent of Forestry, January 17, 1910, as to
timber in Athabaska country, 176

Cook, Richard S., Esq., evidence of, before the Senate Committee of 1907,
102, 104
as to mineral in region north of the Saskatchewan, 126
as to the fish in country north of the Saskatchewan, 129

Copper around File lake, 85
found at Wekusko lake, 86
at the junction of Nahanni and Liard rivers, 282
in Barren Lands, 325
deposits rival those around lake Superior, 328

Cowpar lake, agricultural possibilities around, 137, 138

Crean, Frank, J. P., C.E., explorations of, 25, 27
natural resources of district south of Churchill and Clearwater rivers,
105, 115
description of Clearwater river and valley, 109, 110
report on water powers, 120, 121
reports on timber areas, 120, 122
as to minerals in country north of the Saskatchewan, 126
as to fish and game in country north of the Saskatchewan, 129, 130
as to agriculture in the country west of Methye and Buffalo lakes and
south of Clearwater river, 137, 138
as to the tar sands on Athabaska river, 187, 188
fish and game in district explored by him in 1909, 204, 205

Cree lake, 116

Cree river, timber on the shores of, 123
bituminous springs on, 126
coal along either side of, 126
minerals reported by Chief Factor A. McDonald on, 126

Cross lake and Pas, timber of the district between, 78, 79

Dawson-Hind expeditions, 2

Dawson, Doctor G. M., exploration of, 17
report of 1879-80 as to agriculture in Peace river country, 157-161
evidence before the Senate Committee of 1888 as to timber in Peace river
country, 177-179
description of petroleum along the Athabaska in his Summary Report for
1894, 189
reports spruce as far north as Bear lake river, 271
on Back’s grayling, 295

Dease, Peter Warren and Thomas Simpson, Exploration of, 14

Dease river, 278

Deer lake, timber around, 68
agricultural possibilities good, 106

Deer at Fort Resolution, 293-294

Dickson, J. R., B.S.A., M.S.F., inspection by, in 1910, of the timber
along the line of the proposed Hudson Bay railway from Pas to Split lake,
60-61
report as to climate and soil conditions of the area between Pas and
Split lake, 62-63
report on the timber of the district between Pas and Cross lake,
explored by him in 1910, 78-79
report of the mineral deposits of the area explored by him south of
Cross lake, 86
report of the area south of Cross lake as to fish, animals, and game, 92

Distances estimated on the patrol of Inspector E. A. Pelletier of the
Royal Northwest Mounted Police, 24

Dowling, Mr. D. B., explorations of, in 1899, 21
report of his explorations in 1893, 46-47
report of his explorations in 1899, 69
report of 1901 on Ekwan district, 69-70
report of his 1893 explorations, 70
explorations of Severn district in 1901, 83-84
report in 1901 of the game, animals and fish in Ekwan district, 90-91
report on the timber in the country around Green and Ile à la Crosse
lakes and Lac la Ronge, 119-120

Dubawnt lake, 307

Dunvegan, agricultural possibilities at, 150-154

Economic minerals, report of Mr. Wm. Ogilvie on, 284

Edmonton, agricultural possibilities around, 166-167

Ekwan district, timber in, 69
game, animals and fish, 90-91

Ells, R. W., LL.D., F.R.S.C., opinion of, on the tar sands of Athabaska
river as stated in the Geological Survey report, 186-187

Explorations, Dawson-Hind, 2

Explorations of Doctor John Richardson and Doctor Rae, 15

Explorations of Doctor Selwyn, Director of the Geological Survey, and
Professor John Macoun, 17

Explorations of Doctor G. M. Dawson, 17

Explorations of Captain Back, 13, 14

Explorations of Thomas Simpson and Peter Warren Dease, 14

Explorations of Arctic Regions by Sir John Franklin, 14

Explorations conducted by the Canadian Government, 16

Explorations of Mr. A. P. Low of the Geological Survey, 18

Explorations of Mr. R. G. McConnell, B.A., 18, 19

Explorations of Doctor Bell, F.G.S., F.R.S.C., 17, 18

Explorations of Mr. William Ogilvie, D.L.S., in 1884 and 1888, 18

Explorations of Great Slave lake district by Mr. Warburton Pike, 19

Explorations of Mr. J. Burr Tyrrell, 19, 20

Explorations of Mr. D. B. Dowling of the Geological Survey in 1899, 21

Explorations of Mr. David T. Hanbury, 21, 22

Explorations of the country between Great Slave lake and Chesterfield
inlet on Hudson bay, by J. W. Tyrrell, C.E., 21

Explorations of James Macintosh Bell, F.R.G.S. 21

Explorations of Mr. Edward A. Preble of the United States Biological
Survey, 22

Explorations of Mr. William McInnes, 23

Explorations of W. Thibaudeau, C.E., in Churchill district, 23

Explorations of Frank J. P. Crean, C.E., of the Railway Lands Branch of
the Department of the Interior, 25, 26, 27

Explorations of Mr. J. W. McLaggan of Strathcona, Alberta, in 1907, 58, 59

Explorations of W. Thibaudeau, C.E., in 1906, of the country between
Churchill and Owl rivers, 76, 77

Explorations of Mr. Wm. McInnes in 1906 of the basins of Reed and Wekusko
lakes and Grass river, 84, 85

Explorations for minerals of the district north of Lac Seul by Mr. A. W.
G. Wilson, 85, 86

European districts compared with northwestern Canada, 241

Evidence before the Parliamentary Committee of 1749, 30, 31

Evidence of Doctor Bell before the Senate Committee of 1887, 67

Evidence of Mr. Low before the Senate Committee of 1907, 68

Evidence of Mr. McInnes before the Senate Committee of 1907, 73

Evidence of Mr. Owen O’Sullivan before the Senate Committee of 1906, 74

Evidence contained in the report of the British parliamentary
investigation of 1749, 81

Evidence of Mr. Wm. McInnes before the Senate Committee of 1907, 85

Evidence of Doctor Bell before the Senate Committee of 1887, as to fish,
animals and game in Keewatin area, 88, 89

Evidence of Mr. A. P. Low before the Senate Committee of 1907 as to fish
in inland waters of Keewatin, 89, 90

Evidence of Mr. McInnes before the Senate Committee of 1907, as to fish in
region lying west of Hudson bay, 91, 92

Evidence of Richard King, M.D., before the British Parliamentary Committee
of 1857, as to the agricultural possibilities of northern Saskatchewan,
96, 97

Evidence of Hon. William Christie before the Senate Committee of 1888 as
to the country from Prince Albert to Fort Pitt, 97, 98

Evidence of the Venerable Archdeacon J. McKay, Church of England
Missionary of the Canadian West, before the Senate Committee of 1907, 99,
100

Evidence of W. F. Bredin, Esq., member of the Legislative Assembly of
Alberta for the Division of Athabaska, before the Senate Committee of
1907, 104

Evidence of the Venerable Archdeacon McKay, before the Senate Committee of
1907, as to the timber in the country around Lac la Ronge, 119

Evidence of Mr. Tyrrell, before the Senate Committee of 1907, as to the
forests of the country north of the Churchill, 123

Evidence of Mr. J. B. Tyrrell, before the Senate Committee of 1907, as to
minerals along Saskatchewan river, 124

Evidence of Archbishop Clut, before the Senate Committee of 1888, as to
minerals in country northeast of lake Athabaska, 125, 126

Evidence of Mayor Cook, of Prince Albert, before the Senate Committee of
1907, as to minerals in the region north of the Saskatchewan, 126

Evidence of Mr. Alfred von Hamerstein, before the Senate Committee of
1907, as to medicinal springs on Clearwater river, 126

Evidence of W. F. Bredin, M.L.A., before the Senate Committee of 1907, as
to tar sands of Buffalo lake, 126

Evidence of Mr. H. J. Moberly, chief trader of Hudson’s Bay Company at
Rapid river, Cumberland district, before the Senate Committee of 1887,
127, 128

Evidence of Mayor Cook, of Prince Albert, before the Senate Committee of
1790, as to the fish in country north of the Saskatchewan, 129

Evidence of Sir John Richardson, before the British Parliamentary Select
Committee of 1857, as to the capabilities of the country traversed by him,
for the purpose of settlement and colonisation, 133

Evidence of Doctor Robert Bell, before the Senate Committee of 1887, as to
agriculture in Athabaska district, 134, 135

Evidence of Mr. Alfred von Hamerstein, before the Select Committee of the
Senate of Canada in 1907, as to the agricultural resources of Athabaska
district, 135, 136

Evidence of Mr. Elihu Stewart, before the Senate Committee of 1907, as to
agriculture in Athabaska district, 136

Evidence of Mr. H. A. Conroy of the Indian Department, before the Senate
Committee of 1907, as to agriculture in Athabaska district, 136, 137

Evidence of Mr. J. B. Tyrrell, before the Senate Committee of 1907, as to
the country immediately north of lake Athabaska, 137

Evidence of W. F. Bredin, M.L.A., before the Senate Committee of 1907, as
to agriculture in Athabaska district, 137

Evidence of Mr. H. A. Conroy, before the Senate Committee of 1907, as to
the climatic conditions in Athabaska-Peace river country, 142

Evidence of Professor Macoun, before the Senate Committee of 1888, as to
the character of Peace river country, 147-149

Evidence of Mr. McConnell, before the Senate Committee of 1907 as to
agriculture in Peace river country, 155-156

Evidence of Hon. William Christie, before the Senate Committee of 1888, as
to the agricultural possibilities of Peace river country, 157

Evidence of Reverend J. Cough Brick, before the Senate Committee of 1888,
as to agriculture and climate in Peace river country, 161, 162

Evidence of Mr. Frank Oliver, before the Senate Committee of 1888, as to
agriculture in Peace river country, 162

Evidence of Fred Lawrence, F.R.G.S., Justice of the Peace, of Fort
Vermilion, before the Senate Committee of 1907, as to agriculture and
climate in Peace river country, 162, 165

Evidence of Mr. W. F. Bredin, before the Senate Committee of 1907, as to
agriculture in Peace river country, 165-167

Evidence of Mr. Elihu Stewart of Ottawa, before the Senate Committee of
1907, as to agriculture in Peace river country, 167, 168

Evidence of Mr. Henry A. Conroy, before the Senate Committee, as to the
agricultural resources of Peace river country, 168, 169

Evidence of Mr. Charles Mair as to the agricultural resources of Peace
river country, 170

Evidence of Mr. Charles Mair in his book “Through the Mackenzie Basin”, as
to the climate of Peace river country, 174

Evidence of Professor Macoun, Botanist to the Geological Survey, before
the Senate Committee of 1888, as to timber in Athabaska country, 175

Evidence of Mr. Alfred von Hamerstein, before the Senate Committee of
1907, as to timber in Athabaska country, 175

Evidence of Mr. H. A. Conroy of the Indian Department, before the Senate
Committee of 1907, as to timber in Athabaska country, 176

Evidence of Doctor G. M. Dawson, before the Senate Committee of 1888, as
to timber in Peace river country, 177-179

Evidence of Mr. Fred S. Lawrence, before the Senate Committee of 1907, as
to timber in Peace river country, 179

Evidence of Mr. Alfred von Hamerstein, before the Senate Committee of
1907, as to gold in northern Alberta, 180, 181

Evidence of Bishop Clut, before the Senate Committee of 1888, as to gold
in Peace and Liard rivers, 181

Evidence of Mr. Alfred von Hamerstein, before the Senate Committee of
1907, as to iron and coal in northern Alberta, 182

Evidence of Mr. von Hamerstein, before the Senate Committee of 1907, as to
minerals in northern Alberta, 183-186

Evidence of Mr. J. B. Tyrrell, before the Senate Committee of 1907, as to
the tar sands on Athabaska river, 186

Evidence of Mr. von Hamerstein, before the Senate Committee of 1907, as to
petroleum in country from Athabaska river to Peace river, 192

Evidence of W. F. Bredin, M.L.A., before the Senate Committee of 1907, as
to the natural gas along Athabaska river, 193

Evidence of Mr. von Hamerstein, before the Senate Committee of 1907, as to
natural gas in northern Alberta, 193

Evidence of Hon. Wm. Christie, before the Senate Committee of 1888, as to
wood buffalo in northern Alberta, 195, 196

Evidence of Mr. H. A. Conroy of the Indian Department, before the Senate
Committee of 1907, as to wood buffalo in northern Alberta, 202, 203

Evidence of Mr. H. B. Moberly, before the Senate Committee of 1887, as to
game and fish in the north, 203, 204

Evidence of Professor John Macoun, before the Senate Committee of 1888, as
to fish in the north, 204

Evidence of Mr. McConnell before the Senate Committee of 1907, 268

Evidence of Bishop Clut before Senate Committee of 1888, 269

Evidence of Mr. von Hamerstein, before the Senate Committee of 1907, 286

Evidence of Ex-Judge MacLeod, before the Senate Committee of 1888, 291

Evidence of Mr. W. F. Bredin, before the Senate Committee of 1907, 299

Extracts from Mr. Robson’s book “An Account of Six Years’ Residence in
Hudson’s Bay”, published in 1752, 34, 35, 36

Extract from Mr. Ed. Umfreville’s volume “Eleven Years in the Service of
the Hudson’s Bay Company and Four Years in the Canada Fur Trade”,
published in 1790, 36

Extract from the writings of the Reverend John Semmens, 36, 37

Extract from Mr. J. A. J. McKenna’s report on the Hudson bay route, 37

Extract from Doctor Robert Bell’s report of his exploratory trip in 1886
of the country in lake St. Joseph section, 38

Extract from the Annual Report, Department of the Interior, 1885; what Mr.
Fawcett says of his descent of the Wenassago to Lac Seul, 38, 39

Extract from Mr. John Armstrong’s report of the preliminary survey in
1908-9 for the proposed railway to Hudson bay, 60

Extracts from the report of the engineer in charge of the boring
operations at Pelican river, Mr. A. W. Fraser, 190-192

Fathers of Confederation, the, 1

Favourable lake, 39
vegetation around, 67
sturgeon, 90

“Fertile Belt”, the, 1

Fir trees (splendid) near Great Slave lake, and in the country east to
Slave river, 265

Fish in Sturgeon lake, 88
in Keewatin area, 88
in lake St. Joseph, 88
in Hudson bay, 89
in James bay, 89
and game in region explored by Mr. J. B. Tyrrell in 1896, 90
in Winisk and Attawapiskat rivers, 91
in region lying west of Hudson bay, 91-92
in the area south of Cross lake, 92
in the waters between Pas and Clearwater lake, 92
between Churchill and Pas, 92-93
staple food of inhabitants of country north of the Saskatchewan, 127
in the lakes and streams in the country between Churchill river and lake
Athabaska, 129
in Torch river, 129
in Saskatchewan river, 129
in Reindeer lake, 129
in Methye lake, 129
in the north in general, 203-204
in Big Buffalo river, 205
and game of Mackenzie region, 288
of the Mackenzie country, 295
in Athabaska river and Great Slave lake, 297
of Mackenzie river, reported on by Mr. Wm. Ogilvie, 300
in the “Barren Lands”, 357
the arctic salmon, 358
in the Dubawnt and the Kazan, 359
in the Thelon, 360

Flour manufactured at Fort Vermilion, 169-170

Footprint lake, 51, 52

Fort Enterprise, description of country surrounding, 267

Fort Franklin, 13
trees a hundred and thirty years old, 275
country is well wooded, 276

Fort Good Hope, 217
fine tamarack, 268
fine jackpine according to Mr. McConnell’s report of 1888, 271
tar springs reported by Mr. McConnell, 282

Fort Liard, 221, 226, 233, 241

Fort Norman, 215, 238
fine tamarack, 268
fine spruce, 270
soil, 283

Fort Providence, bitumen near, 285

Fort Nelson is all prairie land, 269

Fort Rae and surrounding country, canoe birch at, 266

Fort Resolution, 240
deer, 293, 294

Fort St. John, agriculture at, 150

Fort Simpson, 220
in 1904, the sap was running freely from April 20 to May 1, 266
to Great Slave lake is all forest according to Mr. Ogilvie’s report, 267
fine tamarack, 268
moose, 290

Fort Smith, salmon up Mackenzie to, 299

Fort Vermilion, agriculture at, 147-148, 157, 163-164
climate at, 165
flour manufactured, 169-170

Fort Wrigley, 239

Foxe, Captain Luke, 7

Franklin, Sir John, 12
exploration of Arctic regions, 14
impression of the view from the heights above the Clearwater at Methye
portage, 118
report of the agricultural possibilities of Athabaska basin, 133
in his journal of August 19, 1820, on Fort Enterprise, 267
reports on Yellowknife river, description of soil and timber, 267

Franklin river, granite along, 283

Galena found at Black bay on lake Athabaska, 181

Game in Keewatin area, 88
plentiful near forks of the Muhigan, 90
between Churchill and Pas, 92, 93
plentiful in Meadow lake district, 130
in the far north, 203, 204
at Fort Confidence, 293
feathered, on Mackenzie, Athabaska, Peace, Salt and Great Slave lake
rivers, 294
and fur-bearing animals in far northwestern Canada as given by Mr.
Moberly, 203, 204

Geikie river, 116
timber on the shores of, 122, 123

Gillam, Captain, 7

Gold found in a bar on Loon river, 180
in the bars above the mouth of Battle river, 180
in the bars in Peace river, 180
in Repulse bay, 340

Grande Prairie, agricultural possibilities at, 155, 156

“Grand View” on Mackenzie river, 217

Gravel river, timber along, 270
plenty of moose, 290
fish, 295, 296

Great Bear lake, black spruce around, 271
timber, 276, 323
soil of the surrounding country, 265
fish, 300

Great Bear river, description of, by Mr. J. M. Bell, 271

Great Slave lake to Fort Simpson is all forest according to Mr. Ogilvie’s
report, 267
tar springs, 281
soil, 283
asphalt, 283
moose, 288
woodland caribou, 291
fisheries, 296
timber, 320

Great Slave river well timbered like that of lower Athabaska and Peace
rivers, 262

Green lake district, agricultural possibilities of, 112, 113
timber, 119
fish, 129

Griffin, Mr. Robert, testimony of, 33, 34

Grouard, 170

Gypsum in vicinity of Nomansland, 84
near Peace river and Slave river, 183
at the mouth of Bear river, 282

Hanbury, Mr. David T., explorations of, 21, 22
on the Barren Lands, 303
on copper deposits of the north, 330

Harmon, Mr. Daniel Williams, impression of, of the view from the heights
above the Clearwater at Methye portage, 117, 118
on the agricultural possibilities in Peace river country, 144

Harrison, Mr. Alfred H., trip of exploration of, down Slave and Mackenzie
rivers, 22
on Mackenzie basin, 240

Hayter, Mr. John, testimony of, on Hudson bay region, 33

Hayes, Mr. W., opinion of, of timber in Athabaska country, 176

Hearne, Mr. Samuel, historical trip of, 9, 10, 11
fine timber on Coppermine and in other northern parts, 264

Heart lake, agricultural possibilities around, 138

Hind, Professor, report of, 2, 3

Horetzky, Charles, C.E., reconnaissance survey of, through Peace river
country, 17
report as to agricultural possibilities in Peace river country, 144, 145

Howard, Inspector D. M., 1909 report of, as to agricultural possibilities
in northern part of the district, Chipewyan and Smith Landing, 138, 139
as to agricultural possibilities in Peace river country, 170-173

Hudson, Henry, 6, 7

Hudson bay, timber on the shores of, 67
fish, 89
seal, 89

Hudson bay and Norway House, timber between, 68

Hudson bay region, timber resources of, 79-80
water powers available in, 80

Hudson’s Bay Company, 7, 8

Ile à la Crosse, agricultural possibilities at, 98
garden at, 108
timber in the country around, 119

“Inconnu”, the, 301

Industries and transportation in Peace river district, 171, 172

Investigations by the Canadian Parliament, 16

Iron ore on Taylor and Gillis islands, 84
at Sipiwesk lake, 86
south of Saskatchewan and Churchill rivers 124
found by Mr. J. B. Tyrrell in Churchill river district and also north of
lake Athabaska, 181
found on Peace, Clearwater and Athabaska rivers, 181
found along Clearwater river, 182
on Mackenzie river, 283

Iron, gold, silver, north of lake Athabaska, 339

Jackpine, 122

James, Captain Thomas, 7

James bay, west coast of, 57
timber on the shores of, 67
fish, 89

Jarvis, Inspector A. M., C.M.G., report of, as to wood buffalo in
Athabaska country, 197, 202

Jennings, Inspector, reports of, 302

Keele, Mr. Joseph, reconnaissance across Mackenzie mountains on Pelly,
Ross and Gravel rivers, 23
reports on timber of Gravel river, 270
on his explorations, 286
on moose in Gravel river valley, 290
fish in Gravel river, 295

Keewatin region, the, 28, 29
first part of the still unexploited northwest with which white men came
into touch, 30
diameter and ages of trees growing in different localities throughout,
71
timber in the southern part of, 68, 69
timber in the western part of, 73
mineral resources, 82
geological formations, 83
game, fur-bearing animals and fish, 88

Keith bay, timber around, 275

Kelsey, Henry, 8

King, Doctor Richard, evidence of, before the British Parliamentary
Committee of 1857 as to the agricultural possibilities of northern
Saskatchewan, 96, 97

Lac la Ronge and Prince Albert, country between, 100

Lac la Ronge district, agricultural possibilities of, 100
mineral possibilities, 126
coal, 126
general, 105, 106

Lac Seul, timber in the country about, 70

Lansdowne, lake, timber around, 66

Lawrence, Mr. Fred, F.R.G.S., evidence of, before the Senate Committee of
1907, as to agricultural possibilities and climate in Peace river country,
162, 165
evidence before the Senate Committee of 1907 as to timber in Peace river
country, 179

Liard valley from the Mackenzie has fine large spruce, 269

Lignite found inland in country south and west of James bay, 82
in its crude form, 283

Little Prairie settlement, 171

Lockhart river well timbered, 277
bear and moose, 291

Low, Mr. A. P., exploration of, 18
personal account of his trip in 1886, 39
evidence before the Senate Committee of 1907, 39, 40, 41
his report of 1886, 39
evidence before the Senate Committee of 1907, 68
report of his examination of country between lake Winnipeg and Hudson
bay, 82
examination before the Senate Committee of 1907, 82
evidence before the Senate Committee of 1907 as to fish in inland waters
of Keewatin, 89, 90

Lumber for building, fine, along Mackenzie, 274

MacFarlane, Mr. R., Hudson’s Bay Officer, report on Anderson river by, 277
timber, 278
on woodland caribou between lakes Winnipeg and Athabaska, 291

Mair, Mr. Charles, evidence of, on agricultural resources of Peace river
district, 170
climate of same, 174
timber in same, 179

Mackenzie, Mr. Alexander, trips of exploration of, 11
overlooking the Clearwater from Methye portage, 117
country north of the Mackenzie after leaving Slave lake, 267

Mackenzie river region, area comprised in, 29
agricultural possibilities, arable land and topography, 208
extent of watershed of, 209
table of distances, 210
navigation, 210
open season on Mackenzie river, 213
tributaries of Mackenzie, 214
ramparts of cañon of Mackenzie, 216
the “Grand View”, 217
cattle, 219
reindeer, 221
cereals, 221
root crops, 221
Professor Macoun’s testimony, 227
stock-raising, 228
R. G. McConnell, 229
William Ogilvie, 234
timber, 261, 262
muskeg and rocky areas, 261
fine balsam poplar, 268
waterpower, 271
timber, 274
coal, 281
salt springs, 281
salt, 282
iron, 283
fish and game, 288
caribou, 292
feathered game, 294
fish, 295

Macleod, Sergt. R. W., report of, on country between Fort Vermilion and
Hay river, 139-140
on buffalo in the country between Fort Vermilion and the mouth of Hay
river in Great Slave lake, 203
reports of his patrols in 1909 and 1910 from Fort Vermilion to Hay
river, 205-206

Macleod, Mr. Malcolm, before Senate Committee of 1888, 274, 275

Macoun, Professor John, report of, on the Northwest Territories, 16
and Doctor Selwyn, expedition of, 17
reference of, to northern portion of Saskatchewan as an agricultural
country in his book “Manitoba and the Great Northwest”, 98
opinion of the agricultural possibilities of Peace river country as
stated in his book “Manitoba and the Great Northwest”, 146-147
evidence before the Senate Committee of 1888 as to the character of the
Peace river country, 147-149
evidence before the Senate Committee of 1888 as to the timber in
Athabaska country, 175
evidence before the Senate Committee of 1888 as to fish in the north,
204
on Mackenzie basin, 228

Manasan falls, 51

Marble found on Marble island in Hudson bay and also at Churchill, 87

McConnell, R. G., B.A., explorations of, 18, 19
report on agricultural possibilities of Peace river country, 154-155
evidence before the Senate Committee of 1907 on agricultural
possibilities in Peace river country, 155-156
report on gold in northern Alberta, 180
on iron in Peace region, 181
on minerals in northern Alberta, 182, 183, 185
on petroleum in the tar sands, 188-189
opinion of the natural gas along the Athabaska river, 193-194
report on Mackenzie basin, 229
on the Mackenzie, 265
from Fort Providence along Beaver river to lake Bis-tcho, 267-268
timber about Fort Simpson, 268
timber along Liard river, 269, 270
jackpine grows as far north as Fort Good Hope, 271
timber below Fort Good Hope, 271, 272
tar springs about Great Slave lake, 281
indications of oil throughout Mackenzie valley, 282
fish in Great Slave lake district, 297

McDonald, Chief Factor A., report of, on minerals of Cree river, 126

McDougall, The Reverend Doctor John, opinion of, of the region to the
south of Split lake, 37

McInnes, Mr. William, explorations of, 23
description of the country about Winisk and Attawapiskat rivers, 47-54
report in 1903, 1904 and 1905 of his survey of the region drained by the
Winisk and the Attawapiskat, 70-71
report on region explored by him in 1906, 71-73
evidence before the Senate Committee of 1907, 73
explorations in 1906 of the basins of Reed and Wekusko lakes and Grass
river, 84-85
further evidence before the Senate Committee of 1907, 85
report of his explorations about Winiskand Attawapiskat rivers, as to
game, fish and animals, 91
evidence before the Senate Committee of 1907 as to the fish in region
lying west of Hudson bay, 91-92

McKay, The Venerable Archdeacon J., evidence of, before the Senate
Committee of 1907, on Lac la Ronge district, 99-100
evidence given on the timber in the country around Lac la Ronge, 119

McKay, coal found at, 182

McLaggan, Mr. J. W., exploratory trip of, 1907, 58-59
account of his trip in 1907, 75-76
explorations for minerals, 86-87
description of the waters between Pas and Clearwater lake, 92

McMurray, agriculture at, 136

Meadow lake district, 113-114
game plentiful, 130

Medicinal springs on Clearwater river, 126

Mellor, Corporal, report of, on the country south west of Smith landing,
140
the buffalo country in northern Alberta, 202
fish in Big Buffalo river, 205

Methye lake, district, agricultural possibilities, 108-109
famous scenery, 117
timber, 120
fish, 129

Mineral resources of the country around Hudson bay, 81
observations of Rev. John Semmens in Burntwood district, 81-82
extensive rich deposits in southern part of Keewatin, 82

Missions, Church of England, 100, 106

Moberly, Mr. H. J., evidence of, before the Senate Committee of 1887
regarding animal life in the far northwest, 127-128
statement in writing to Senate Committee of 1887 as to wood buffalo in
northern Alberta, 196
evidence before the Senate Committee of 1887 as to game, fur-bearing
animals and fish in the north, 203-204

Monkman, Mr. Joseph, testimony of, 16

Moose north of prairies and east of Rocky mountains, 128
on Snake lake at the mouth of Sandy river, 130
a moose country, 205-206
Great Slave lake, 288
Mackenzie region, 289
Athabaska and Slave rivers, 290
around Fort Simpson, 290
Barren Lands, 355

Mounted Police, Royal Northwest, reports on Mackenzie basin, 251

Mudjatik river, timber along, 122-123

Musk-Ox, the, 351

Natural gas on the Athabaska at mouth of Little Buffalo river, 193, 194

Navigation on Mackenzie river, 209
open season on Mackenzie, 213

Nelson House, potatoes grown as far north as, 56

Nelson river country, 56

Nickel found on west shore of Reindeer lake, 125
may possibly be found on Upper Winisk river, 85

Northern Alberta region, area comprised in, 29

Northern Saskatchewan region, area comprised in, 29

Northland’s first champions, the, 6

Norway House and Cross lake, wheat grown successfully at, 56

Norway House and Hudson bay, timber between, 68

Ogilvie, William, D.L.S., exploratory trips of, in 1884 and in 1888, 18
report on agricultural possibilities in the Athabaska basin, 134
on soil and climate in Peace river country, 149-154
on waterpower on Athabaska river, 177
on waterpower on Slave river, 177
on wood buffalo in northern Alberta, 196, 197
on fish in lake Athabaska, 204
on Mackenzie basin, 234
much forest between Great Slave lake and Fort Simpson, 267
dense forest around Fort Nelson, 269
on timber on lower Mackenzie, 272
on deposits of economic minerals in Mackenzie valley, 284
on fish of the Mackenzie, 300

Oil springs of Athabaska region, 19

Oil throughout Mackenzie valley, 282

Oliver, Hon. Frank, trip of, made in 1910, 27
his opinion of the agricultural possibilities of the country between
Edmonton and the Mackenzie, 141
evidence before the Senate Committee as to agricultural possibilities in
Peace river country, 162
opinion of timber in Athabaska country, 177

O’Sullivan, Owen, C.E., on the west coast of James bay, 57
testimony before the Senate Committee of 1907, 57, 58
1906 report, 73, 74
further evidence before the Senate Committee of 1907, 74

Owl and Churchill rivers, timber in the country between, 76, 77

Pallister, Captain John, report of, 2, 3

Parliamentary inquiry, an early, 8, 9

Parliamentary inquiries of recent date, 16, 27

Pas and Cross lake, timber of the district between, 78, 79

Pas and Clearwater lake, Mr. McLaggan’s description of the waters between,
92

Patrol of the country between Great Slave lake and Hudson bay by Inspector
E. A. Pelletier of the Royal Northwest Mounted Police, 23, 24

Peace river district, 131
river and tributaries, 143-144
climatic conditions, 149
settlements, 170, 171
transportation and industries, 171, 172
climate exceptionally healthy, 174
timber, 177-179
gold found in the bars in river, 180
iron, 181
timber, etc., 261, 262
fine balsam poplar, 268
woodland caribou, 291
feathered game, 294
arctic grayling, 296

Peat deposits in the area north of lake Winnipeg, 84

Pelletier, Inspector E. A., patrol of, of the country between Great Slave
lake and Hudson bay, 23, 24

Petitot, Rev. Father, O.M.I., of Fort Good Hope, evidence of, before
Senate Committee of 1888, 283

Petroleum, indications of, in the tar sands found along Athabaska river,
188
borings for, in Athabaska region, 189-194
all over Athabaska district, 282

Pike, Mr. Warburton, explorations of, of Great Slave lake district, 19
description of the climate in Peace river country, in his book, 173, 174

Pine (Banksian), 67
Mr. Preble’s report, 268

Point Separation and country surrounding is well wooded, 273, 274

Polar bear, the, 356

Poplar, Balsam, Rough-barked poplar, Cotton Tree, Balm of Gilead, etc., 65
aspen or white poplar, 122
balsam or black, 122
around Athabaska, Slave and Peace rivers, 268

Potatoes grown as far north as Nelson House, 56
fifty miles north of Pas, 56
at Split lake, 58

Prairie land around Fort Nelson, 269

Prairie River settlement, 171

Preble, Mr. Edward A., of the U. S. Biological Survey, exploratory trips
of, 22
report on climatic conditions of various parts of Athabaska valley, 141,
142
on Mackenzie basin, 247
on the Barren Lands, 303
description of Slave river, 263
report on Great Slave lake, and its affluents, 265
on timber along Athabaska, Slave, Mackenzie and Peace rivers, 268
on Banksian pine, 268
on tamarack and its uses, 268
black spruce found up to Great Bear lake, 271
describes Lockhart river and its banks, 278
reports on game and fisheries, 288
on fish of Mackenzie basin, 295

Prince Albert, settlement north of, 103, 104

Pulpwood belt, a, 77

Quartz veins plentiful throughout the Keewatin belts, 85

Rae, Doctor, and Doctor John Richardson, expeditions of, 15

Range of growth of various trees in western Canada, 65

Red lake river and Red lake, timber on the banks of, 70

Reindeer lake, 116
cobalt found on shore of, 125
Mr. D. B. Dowling’s report on minerals, 125
nickel found on shore of, 125
fish, 129

Reindeer in Mackenzie region, 221

Report on the Northwest Territories by Professor John Macoun, 16

Reports of Mr. Frank J. P. Crean, C.E., on northern Saskatchewan, 26, 27

Report of Doctor Robert Bell of his exploratory trip from lake Winnipeg to
Hudson bay in 1878, 37, 38

Report on the country north of the mouth of Saskatchewan river by Mr. J.
B. Tyrrell, 41, 42, 43

Report of Mr. D. B. Dowling on upper Berens river district, 46, 47

Report of W. Thibaudeau on agricultural possibilities in Churchill
district, 59

Report of Mr. John Armstrong of the preliminary survey of 1908 and 1909
for the proposed railway to Hudson bay, 60

Report of J. R. Dickson, B.S.A., M.S.F., on the rocks and soil of the area
between Pas and Split lake, 60, 61

Report of Mr. J. R. Dickson on the climate and soil conditions of the area
between Pas and Split lake, 62, 63

Report of Doctor Robert Bell of his explorations in the valleys of Nelson
and Churchill rivers in 1879, 65, 66

Report of Mr. A. P. Low, on timber in Favourable lake district, 67, 68

Report of Mr. J. B. Tyrrell of his explorations in the southern part of
Keewatin in 1896, 68, 69

Report of Mr. D. B. Dowling on timber north of lake Winnipeg, 69

Report of 1901 of Mr. Dowling on Ekwan district, 69, 70

Report of Mr. Dowling on his 1893 explorations in Red lake district, 70

Report of Mr. McInnes of his survey of the region drained by the Winisk
and the Attawapiskat in 1903, 1904 and 1905, 70, 71

Report of Mr. McInnes on region explored by him in Cross lake district,
71, 73

Report of Mr. McInnes on his explorations in 1906, with reference to
waterpowers, 73

Report of 1906 of Mr. Owen O’Sullivan, on timber in Keewatin area, 73, 74

Report of Mr. Alfred W. G. Wilson in 1902 of a reconnaissance traverse
across the southern part of the unexplored area lying to the north of Lac
Seul and east of Trout lake, 74, 75

Report of W. Thibaudeau, C.E., on Churchill district, 76, 78

Report of Mr. J. R. Dickson on the timber of the district between Pas and
Cross lake, explored by him in 1910, 78, 79

Report of the British Parliamentary investigation of 1749, 81

Report of Mr. D. B. Dowling on the survey of Burntwood-Nelson lake
Winnipeg district in 1899, 83

Report of Mr. Wm. McInnes, who explored the basins of Reed and Wekusko
lakes and Grass river in 1906, 84, 85

Report of Mr. J. R. Dickson on the mineral deposits of the area explored
by him south of Cross lake, 86

Report on the preliminary surveys for the Hudson bay railway by John
Armstrong, C.E., 87

Report of Doctor Bell in 1886 on fish, animals and game in Keewatin area,
88

Report of Mr. J. B. Tyrrell on the fish and game in the south west of
region explored by him in 1896, 90

Report of Mr. D. B. Dowling, in 1901, on the game, animals and fish in
Ekwan district, 90, 91

Report of Mr. McInnes on the game, fish and animals about Winisk and
Attawapiskat rivers, 91

Report of Mr. J. R. Dickson on the fish, animals and game in the area
south of Cross lake, 92

Report of W. Thibaudeau. C.E., on fish and game between Churchill and Pas,
92, 93

Reports of Frank J. P. Crean, C.E., on region south of Churchill and
Clearwater rivers, 105, 115

Report of Mr. J. B. Tyrrell on his explorations of 1892, 115, 116

Reports of Mr. F. J. P. Crean on timber areas, in northern Saskatchewan,
120-122

Reports of Mr. J. B. Tyrrell of his explorations of 1892 and 1893,
minerals near lake Athabaska referred to in, 124

Report of Mr. Dowling of his survey of the west shore of Reindeer lake,
reference to minerals in, 125

Report of Mr. Crean in 1908 on minerals in country north of the
Saskatchewan, 126

Report of Chief Factor A. McDonald of minerals on Cree river, 126

Report of Mr. J. B. Tyrrell of his explorations of the country between
Churchill river and lake Athabaska in 1892 as to animal life, 128, 129

Report of Mr. Crean in 1908 on fish and game in country north of the
Saskatchewan, 129, 130

Report of Sir John Franklin on the agricultural possibilities of Athabaska
basin, 133

Report of Dominion Government survey parties sent out in advance of the
Canadian Pacific railway with reference to agricultural possibilities of
the country, 134

Report of William Ogilvie, D.L.S., of his trip in 1884, with reference to
agricultural possibilities in Athabaska basin, 134

Report of Mr. Frank Crean in 1909 on agriculture in country west of Methye
and Buffalo lakes and south of Clearwater river, 137, 138

Report in 1909 of Inspector D. M. Howard of the Royal Northwest Mounted
Police on agriculture in the northern part of the district about Chipewyan
and Smith Landing, 138, 139

Report in 1909 of Sergt. R. W. Macleod of the Royal Northwest Mounted
Police on the country between Fort Vermilion and Hay river, 139, 140

Report in 1909 of Corporal Mellor, of the Royal Northwest Mounted Police,
on the country southwest of Smith Landing, 140

Report of 1911 of Superintendent G. E. Sanders, D.S.O., on agricultural
possibilities in the country from Athabaska river to Great Slave lake and
west to the Rockies, 140

Report of Mr. E. A. Preble of the U. S. Biological Survey on the climatic
conditions of various parts of Athabaska valley, 141, 142

Report of Charles Horetzky, C.E., on agricultural possibilities in Peace
river country, 144, 145

Reports of William Ogilvie, D.L.S., on soil and climate of Peace river
country, 149-154

Report in 1888 of Mr. R. G. McConnell of the Geological Survey on
agricultural possibilities in Peace river country, 154, 155

Report of G. M. Dawson, M.D., LL.D., in 1879-80 on agricultural
possibilities in Peace river country, 157-161

Report in 1909 of Inspector D. M. Howard of Royal Northwest Mounted Police
on agricultural possibilities in Peace river country, 170-173

Report of Mr. Conroy to the Superintendent of Forestry, January 17, 1910,
on timber in Athabaska country, 176

Report of Mr. R. G. McConnell of the Geological Survey, in 1888 on gold in
northern Alberta, 180

Report of Mr. R. G. McConnell in 1888 on iron in Peace river region, 181

Report of Mr. McConnell in 1888 on minerals in northern Alberta, 183-185

Report of Mr. McConnell on petroleum in the tar sands of Athabaska
district, 188, 189

Report of Doctor G. M. Dawson on petroleum along the Athabaska in his
Summary Report for 1894, 189

Report in 1910 of Corporal A. H. Schurer, of the Royal Northwest Mounted
Police as to minerals in the country between Athabaska and McMurray,
192

Report of Mr. William Ogilvie in 1888 as to wood buffalo in northern
Alberta, 196, 197

Report of Inspector A. M. Jarvis, C.M.G., on wood buffalo in Athabaska
country, 197-202

Report of Sergeant R. W. Macleod in 1910 on buffalo in country from Fort
Vermilion to the mouth of Hay river in Great Slave lake, 203

Report of Mr. William Ogilvie on fish in lake Athabaska, 204

Report of Mr. Frank Crean on fish and game in the district explored by him
in 1909, 204, 205

Reports of Sergeant R. W. Macleod of his patrols in 1909 and 1910 from
Fort Vermilion to Hay river, 205, 206

Report of Superintendent Sanders in 1911 on fur-bearing animals in the far
north, 206, 207

Report of Corporal S. G. Clay, of his patrol through Grande Prairie
country in 1911, 207

Reports of Mr. E. A. Preble, of the U. S. Biological Survey, 263, 265,
266, 268, 278

Reports of Mr. R. E. Young, D.L.S., on timber of Mackenzie region, 264

Reports of R. G. McConnell, 265, 267-268, 270, 272, 281, 282

Report of Sir George Back on timber around Reindeer lake, 267

Report of Mr. William Ogilvie on timber and coal of Mackenzie river
region, 267, 284

Report of Sir John Franklin on timber along Mackenzie river, 267

Report of Mr. E. Stewart in 1906 on timber of Mackenzie region, 268, 274

Report of Senate Committee of 1888, 268

Report of Mr. Ogilvie, on country around Fort Nelson, 269

Report of Mr. Joseph Keele on timber on Gravel river in 1908, 270

Report of Mr. J. M. Bell on timber along Martin and Great Bear rivers,
266, 271

Report of Dr. Dawson before Senate Committee of 1888, 271

Report of Mr. Macleod before Senate Committee of 1888, 274, 275

Report of Mr. Brock on coal area of Mackenzie district, 286

Report of Supt. Saunders on Athabaska, Peace and Mackenzie rivers, 287

Report of Mr. Keele on moose, 290

Reports of Bishop Clut, O.M.I., before Senate Committee, 265, 269

Resources of northern Saskatchewan, 95, 96

Resources of the region south of Churchill and Clearwater rivers, 105

Richardson, Doctor John, and Doctor Rae, expedition of, 15

Robson, Mr. Joseph, testimony of, 33, 34

Ross, Captain John, 13

Ross river partially timbered, 278

Russian provinces, comparison with, 255

St. Joseph, lake, section, 38

Salmon at Fort Providence, 298
up Mackenzie to Fort Smith, 299

Salt found at Salt river, 183
salt springs on Mackenzie river, 281
in Mackenzie river district, 282
at Salt river near Fort Smith, 282

Salt Prairie and Heart River settlement, 170

Salt river, feathered game along, 294

Sanders, Superintendent, D.S.O., report of, on agriculture in the country
from Athabaska river to Great Slave lake and west to the Rockies, 140
fur-bearing animals in the far north, 206, 207
report on Athabaska, Peace and Mackenzie countries, 287

Sandy lake, timber around, 67-68

Sans Sault rapid, 216

Saskatchewan, resources of the northern part of, 95, 96

Saskatchewan and Churchill rivers, description of country between, 98, 99

Saskatchewan river, coal found on, 124
fish, 129

Scenery of Methye portage, 117

Scenic beauty of the country between the Saskatchewan and Churchill and
Clearwater rivers, 117

Schultz Committee reports of 1887 and 1888, compilation of a summary of
the, 28

Schurer, Corporal A. H., report of, on the minerals in country between
Athabaska and McMurray, 192

Scientific investigation of the country, 16

Seal, six species of, in Hudson bay, 89

Search expeditions, sent out by England, France and the United States, in
quest of Sir John Franklin and party, 14, 15

Select Committee of the British House of Commons in 1749, main object of
the, 30

Selwyn, Doctor, Director of the Geological Survey, and Professor John
Macoun, expedition of, 17

Semmens, Rev. John, opinion of, of the timber in Burntwood river district,
64
mineral observations in Burntwood river district, 81, 82

Senate Committee of 1907, 244

Senate report of 1888 about Fort Simpson, 268

Sergeant, Mr. Matthew, testimony of, 31, 32

Seton, Mr. Ernest Thompson, on the Barren Lands, 303

Severn district, Mr. D. B. Dowling’s explorations of, in 1901, 83, 84

Severn lake and Favourable lake, 39

Simpson, Thomas, and Peter Warren Dease, explorations of, 14
Clearwater country animals, 127
moose around Great Bear lake, 289

Silver Springs settlement, 171

Slave river, water power on, 177
splendid forests, 261
timber between Peace and Slave rivers, 262
country has fine balsam poplar, 268
moose, 290

Smith bay to Keith bay, timber from, 275

Split lake region, 37
description of the country from Split lake to a line about forty miles
north of the Saskatchewan, 54, 55
between Split lake and Big Churchill river, 57, 58
potatoes, 58
between Split lake and Pas, 77

Spruce, white, 121
black, 121, 122
fine timber on Bear lake river, 271
Liard valley, 269
as far north as Bear lake river, 271
on the Mackenzie above Fort Norman, 270
Great Bear lake, 276
Dease river, 278
MacFarlane river, 278
“Spruce bears the palm”, 279, 280

Stanley or Stanley mission, 106

Stewart, Mr. Elihu, evidence of, before the Senate Committee of 1907 on
agriculture in Athabaska district, 136
agricultural possibilities in Peace river country, 167, 168
timber of upper waters of Saskatchewan, Athabaska and Peace rivers, 261
timber along Mackenzie to Fort Simpson, 267
good timber about Fort Simpson, 268

Stupart, Mr. R. F., tables compiled by, comparing the temperature
conditions of the district between lake Winnipeg and Split lake in the
months May to September, with European countries, 45, 46

Sturgeon lake fish, 88

Sturgeon lake settlement, 171

Sturgeon plentiful in Favourable lake, 90

Sulphur springs on Clearwater river, 125
between McMurray and lake Athabaska, 183, 184
about Great Slave lake, 281, 282

Tache, Bishop, description of, of the Clearwater valley, 118

Tamarack, range of, 65, 122
around Fort Simpson, 268
Fort Nelson, 269
Fort Good Hope, 269

“Tar sands”, the famous, 126, 184, 281, 285

Temperature and sunlight in Mackenzie river region, 235

Temperature conditions of the district between lake Winnipeg and Split
lake in the months May to September compared with European countries, by
Mr. R. F. Stupart, Superintendent of the Dominion Meteorological Service,
45

Tessier, Rev. Mr., experiences of, in agriculture at Dunvegan, 159, 160

Testimony of Mr. Joseph Monkman, 16
Mr. Richard White, 30, 31
Mr. Matthew Sergeant, 31, 32
Mr. John Hayter, 33
Mr. Edward Thompson, 33
Mr. Enoch Alsop, 33
Mr. Robert Griffin, 33, 34
Mr. Joseph Robson, 34, 35
Doctor Robert Bell before the Senate Committee of 1887, 38
Mr. Low before the Senate Committee of 1907, 39-41
Mr. Tyrrell before the Senate Committee of 1907, 43-45
Owen O’Sullivan, C.E., before the Senate Committee of 1907, 57, 58
Mr. Richard White before the Hudson bay Investigation Committee of 1749,
64

Thelon river, 308, 314
timber, 318
phenomenal growth, 320

Thibaudeau, W., C.E., explorations of, in Churchill district, 23
agriculture at Churchill, 59
from Churchill to Pas, 60
between Churchill and Owl rivers, 76, 77
timber around Button bay, 76
description of the country from Split lake to Pas, 77
fish and game between Churchill and Pas 92, 93

Thompson, Mr. Edward, testimony of, on soil, climate, etc., of Moose
river, 33

Timber, inspection of, in 1910, along the line of the proposed Hudson bay
railway, from Pas to Split lake, by J. B. Dickson, B.S.A., M.S.F., 60,
61
in the valleys and on the islands and lakes of Burntwood river course,
Rev. John Semmens’ opinion of the, 64
areas good south and west of Hudson bay, 64
around lake St. Joseph, 66
along Boulder river, 66
around lake Landsdowne, 66
along the Attawapiskat, 66, 67
on the shores of James bay and Hudson bay, 67
around Favourable lake, 67
around Sandy lake, 67
between Norway House and Hudson bay, 68
around Deer lake, 68
in the southern part of Keewatin, 68, 69
in Ekwan district, 69
along Trout Lake river, 70
on Red Lake river and Red lake, 70
about Lac Seul, 70
diameters and ages in Keewatin area, 71
along Burntwood river, 72
in the western part of Keewatin, 73
north of Lac Seul and east of Trout lake, 74, 75
between Pas and Clearwater lake, 75, 76
on the east side of Button bay, 76
between Churchill and Owl rivers, 76, 77
between Pas and Cross lake, 78, 79
Hudson bay region, 79, 80
between the Saskatchewan and Churchill and Clearwater rivers, 117
about Lac la Ronge, 119
immediately north of the Saskatchewan, 119
around Green lake, 119
around Ile à la Crosse lake, 119
along Churchill river, 120
around Methye portage, 120
along Whitefish river, 120, 121
in northern Saskatchewan, 120-122
north of Waterhen river and lake, 121
north of Churchill and Clearwater rivers, 122, 123
on Churchill river from Methye portage to north of Reindeer river, 122
around Wallaston lake, 122
on Mudjatik river, 122, 123
on Geikie river, 122-123
on Cree river, 123
on northeast shore of lake Athabaska, 123
north of the Churchill, 123
in Athabaska river valley, 132
in the vicinity of Chipewyan, 175
in Peace river country, 177-179
Mackenzie river region, 261
between Athabaska and Peace rivers, 261
along Slave river, 262
around Great Slave lake, 265
around Reindeer lake, 267
along Mackenzie river to Fort Simpson, 267
about Fort Simpson, 268
along Liard river, 269
along Gravel river, 270
on Mackenzie river below Fort Good Hope, 272
from Keith bay to Smith bay, 275
around Fort Franklin, 275
timber growth, how to increase northern, 278

Torch river, 129

Transportation and industries in Peace river district, 171, 172

Trees, range of the most important, 65, 66

Trout Lake river, 70

Tyrrell, Mr. J. Burr, exploratory trips of, 19, 20
report on the country north of Saskatchewan river, 41-43
testimony before the Senate Committee of 1907, 43-45
report of his explorations in southern part of Keewatin in 1896, 68, 69
mineral report, 82, 83
evidence before Senate Committee of 1907, 83
report of the fish and game in the southwest of region explored by him
in 1896, 90
report of his explorations in 1893 and 1894 of country between
Saskatchewan and Churchill rivers, 98, 99
report on his explorations of 1892, 115, 116
description of country immediately north of the Saskatchewan, 119
evidence before the Senate Committee of 1907 as to forests of country
north of Churchill, 123
report of his explorations of 1892 and 1893 as to minerals near lake
Athabaska, 124
evidence before the Senate Committee of 1907 as to minerals along
Saskatchewan river, 124
report of his explorations of the country between Churchill river and
lake Athabaska in 1892 as to animal life, 128, 129
evidence before the Senate Committee of 1907 as to country immediately
north of lake Athabaska, 137
evidence before the Senate Committee of 1907 as to tar sands on
Athabaska river, 186
on the Barren Lands, 304

Tyrrell, J. B., C.E., D.L.S., exploration of, in the country between Great
Slave lake and Chesterfield inlet on Hudson bay, 21

von Hamerstein, Mr. Alfred, evidence of, before the Senate Committee of
1907 on medicinal springs along Clearwater river, 126
on agricultural resources of Athabaska district, 135, 136
on timber in Athabaska country, 175
on gold in northern Alberta, 180, 181
on iron and coal in northern Alberta, 182
on deposits of gypsum and salt in northern Alberta, 183
on minerals in northern Alberta, 183-186
on petroleum in country from Athabaska river to Peace river, 192
on natural gas in northern Alberta, 193
on salt in Mackenzie basin, 286

Waterhen lake district, 115
waterpower, 120-121
Waterhen river and lake, timber north of, 121

Waterpower of Nelson river district, 73
northern Manitoba, 78
Hudson bay region, generally, 80
on Churchill river, 120
northern Saskatchewan, 120-121
on Waterhen river, 120-121
on Clearwater river, 121
on Athabaska river, 177
on Slave river, 177
along Athabaska river, 262
whaling industry, 301

White Birch (canoe birch), 65

Whitefish lake district, 114-115

Whitefish river, timber along, 120-121

White, Mr. Richard, testimony of, 30, 31
testimony before the Hudson Bay Investigation Committee in 1749, 64

White spruce, 65, 121

Wild geese, 356

Wilson, Mr. Alfred W. G., report of, on a reconnaissance traverse across
the southern part of the unexplored area lying to the north of Lac Seul
and east of Trout lake, 74-75

Yellowknife river, soil and timber of, 267

York Factory and Cape Henrietta Maria, survey of the coast between, 57

Young, Mr. R. E., report on the timber resources of the Mackenzie by, 264

TRANSCRIBER NOTES

—Misspelled words and printer errors have been corrected.

—Illustrations were moved to facilitate page layout.

—Inconsistencies in punctuation have been maintained. The use of
periods and centered periods varied throughout the original text. In
this edition weights, measurements and time have been standardized as
follows:

-Time: colon (e.g. 1:30 p.m.)
-Temperatures: period (e.g. 32.5°)
-Per cent.: centered period (e.g. 10·5 per cent.)
-Pound/lbs: centered period (e.g. 10·5 lbs.)
-Miles: centered period (e.g. 4·5 cubic miles)
-Latitude: centered period (e.g. 58·4°, 56° 35′ 11′′)

[The end of _The Unexploited West_, by Ernest J. (John) Chambers.]

*** End of this LibraryBlog Digital Book "The Unexploited West - A Compilation of all of the authentic information available - at the present time as to the Natural Resources of the - Unexploited Regions of Northern Canada" ***

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