Canadian Pacific coast. Its mouth is in latitude 54° 10' north, and its sources interlock with those of the Fraser, the Peace, and the Liard. It has a general course from north-east to south-west of 300 miles, through a region of snow-clad peaks and glaciers. The tide ascends it for about 25 miles, and it can be navigated by stern wheel steamers for about 30 miles farther.

Above this it is only navigable for small boats or canoes, with many interruptions by falls and rapids. The forks, or Hazelton, is situated on the left bank of the river, about 140 miles from the sea, and a little above the junction of the Wat-son-kua, a large tributary from the south-east. It stands on an extensive flat, elevated 10 or 15 feet above the river, and at the base of a terrace which rises very steeply to a height of 170 feet. Two or three traders live here, and there is an Indian village of about half a dozen barn-like buildings, each inhabited by several families. The low ground about the forks, and the wide valleys of the Skeena, the Watsonkua, and the Kispyox, seem to be shut in on all sides by high mountain ranges. A triangular area of some 350 square miles, circumscribed by the valleys of the Skeena, the Watsonkua, and Kitseguecla, is occupied by the Rochers Deboule's Range. The north-east angle of this compact mountain mass is a magnificent rocky summit, with an altitude of 5955 feet above Hazelton, or 6680 feet above the sea. Among some of the peaks near it is a small glacier, and great masses of snow still lay in June on the upper part of the range. Looking down the valley of the Skeena the axial mountains of the Coast Range occupy the horizon, the highest point attaining a height of 8000 to 9000 feet. The Skeena district cannot be regarded as of much value agriculturally. On the lower part of the river-with the possible exception of a few islands-there is absolutely no good land.

At

about 20 miles below the forks, however, the higher terraces at the sides of the river extend in some places several miles back from it, and show soil of a fair quality. It is stated that the valley continues to present the same appearance farther up, and it is certainly wide and low for some distance above the forks. A considerable breadth of land suited for agriculture is also found in the valley of the Kispyox to the north-westward. There may also be some good land in the wide valley of the Lakelse and Kitsumgallum, but unless in the event of some local demand arising, through the opening of mines, it will be long before these lands are utilised. The Skeena has been somewhat extensively used as a channel of communication between the Omineca gold mines and the coast, but it is by no means well adapted for this purpose. The large canoes that the Indians of the coast hollow from the cedar are generally employed on the Skeena. Large boats carrying about 15 tons have been worked up to the forks, but the native canoes are better adapted for the navigation. Freight brought up to Hazelton costs four dollars a hundred pounds. The Skeena River above the forks being exceedingly rapid, and the Babine River in the cañons quite impassable for canoes, the route for Babine Lake and the Omineca goldfields leaves the Skeena at the forks, and strikes nearly due east up the valley of the Suskwa River to Babine Lake, distant by the trail about 50 miles-in a direct line about 41. All goods are carried by Indians over this trail at a cost of $4.00 per 100 lbs. The Indians on the Skeena and the Nasse live in permanent villages. The total Indian population of the region is roughly estimated at 2075. From about 50 miles below the forks the country is occupied by rocks of Mesozoic age, in many places affording evidence of the probable existence of workable coal seams. These Mesozoic rocks are

associated with porphyrites and other felspathic rocks, which may be the result of contemporaneous eruptions of volcanic materials.

The Yukon, the largest American river flowing to the Pacific, discharges through several mouths opening into Bering Sea. Its length is estimated at 2000 miles, and it is navigable for steamers for 1200 miles from the sea. Its main northern branch, the Porcupine River, the mouth of which is near the limit of navigation, rises on the western slope of the Rocky Mountains, not far from tributaries of the Mackenzie; while the sources of its southern branch, Pelly River, interlock with those of the Liard or River of the Mountains, and of the Peel River, which flows northward to Mackenzie Bay on the Arctic Ocean. These three rivers, so far as known, drain the whole of the great triangular area in Canadian territory, the three sides of which, each about 700 miles in length, are formed by the northern boundary of British Columbia, the eastern boundary of Alaska, and the Rocky Mountains from Demarcation Point on the Arctic Ocean to the 60th parallel, enclosing an area of about 285,000 square miles. The Pelly River flows for 700 miles through this territory before entering Alaska. Of this northwesternmost corner of the Dominion but little is known with certainty. It has never been explored, and offers a fine field to enterprising travellers in search of untrodden tracts. In its mountainous character, and its rivers abounding with salmon, it chiefly resembles Norway; and had it included the coast of the Pacific, and the islands along with it, the resemblance would have been greater, for it would then have possessed a seaboard of fiords and inlets rendered temperate by the warm winds of the Pacific; but from Mount St. Elias down to Dixon's Entrance and Portland Channel, latitude 54° 40', the

boundary of British Columbia, a narrow strip of American -formerly Russian- territory, intervenes along the Pacific coast, reaching back to the summit of the nearest mountain range, but nowhere exceeding 35 miles from the shore. The Rocky Mountains on the east side, the Blue or Peak Range, and the Cascade Mountains and Coast Range, run nearly parallel to each other, northwestwardly through this territory, with many intermediate ranges and groups. The Rocky Mountains, whose highest peaks rise to 16,000 feet above the sea at the sources of the Athabasca, gradually decline in height northward to 4,000 or 5,000 feet. The Coast Range, on the contrary, attains its greatest height at Mount St. Elias, which is stated to be 14,970 feet in altitude. These ranges cover much of this territory; but there are valleys between and among them, some of considerable extent.

That but little is known of this remote region is not surprising as alpine in character as Switzerland and Tyrol, and eleven times as large as both together, it presents incomparably greater obstacles to exploration in the character of its climate and its inhabitants. It is certainly a natural bulwark to all military operations from the Pacific coast against the plain country to the east of it.

CHAPTER VII.

CLIMATE AND VEGETATION.

1. General Review.

THE study of the climatology of British America is yet in its infancy. There are, it is true, a number of records of the variations of the barometer and thermometer, and depths of rainfall, at various points, in addition to the valuable series of meteorological observations taken at Toronto and Montreal; but they have hitherto been disconnected, not viewed as contributions to the climatology of British America at large. One of the happy results of confederation will undoubtedly be the establishment of a system by which the corps of observers now scattered, or to be scattered, over all British America, will receive their instructions from a point within the Dominion, and transmit their experiences to a central station, not at Washington but in Canada, so that the critical examination of them may be made with a view to Canadian material interests, as well as to the advancement of climatological science.

Until such a system has been in operation for several years, it is impossible to write with accuracy a treatise on the climatology of British America. Nothing is more commonly misconceived than the climate of Canada. People do not seem to be aware that Canada stretches farther to the south than France, and that it reaches the latitude of Rome.

A line touching the most southern part of Canada on