29 



ON SOME OF THE LxiRGER UNEXPLORED REGIONS OF 



CANADA. 



(By G. M, Dawson, D.S., Assoc. R.S.M., F.G.S., F.R.S.C.) 



(Read 7th March, 1890.) 

 If on reading the title of the paper which I had promised to contribute 

 to the Ottawa Field-Naturalists' Club, any one should have supposed 

 it to be my intention to endeavour to describe or forecast the character 

 of the unexplored areas mentioned, I must, in the first place disclaim 

 any such intention. The very existence of large regions of which little 

 or nothing is known, is of course stimulating to a fertile imagination 

 ready to picture to itself undiscovered " golden cities a thousand leagues 

 deep in Cathay," but such unscientific use of the imagination is far 

 removed from the position of sober seriousness, in which I ask your 

 attention to the facts which I have to present. 



Fortunately, or unfortunately as we may happen to regard it, the 

 tendency of our time is all in the direction of laying bare to inspection 

 and open to exploitation, all parts, however remote, of this comparatively 

 small world in which we live, and though the explorer himself may be 

 impelled by a certain romanticism in overcoming difficulties or even 

 dangers met with in the execution of his task, his steps are surely and 

 closely followed by the trader, the lumberer, or the agriculturist, and 

 not long after these comes the builder of railways with his iron road. 

 It is, therefore, rather from the point of view of practical utility than 

 from any other, that an appeal must be made to the public or to the 

 government for the further extension of explorations, and my main 

 purpose in addressing you to-night is to make such an appeal, and to 

 show cause, if possible, for the exploration of such considerable portions 

 of Canada as still remain almost or altogether unmapped. 



What I have to say, in fact, on this subject, resolves itself chiefly 

 into remarks on the map exhibited here, upon which the unexplored 

 areas to which I am about to refer, are clearly depicted in such a 

 manner, I believe, as almost to speak for themselves. 



Tt is very commonly supposed, even in Canada, but to a greater 

 extent elsewhere, that all parts of the Dominion are now so well known 

 that exploration, in the true sense of the term, may be considered as a 

 l hing of the past. This depends largely upon the fact that the maps of 



