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Afackenzie River and traversing the hitherto unknown area between 

 that river and the Pacific Ocean. As rbe result we know very 

 accurately the botany, the natural history and to a large extent the 

 general distribution of the several geological formations which there 

 occur. We now have ascertained the welcome fact that in acquiring 

 the North-West Territories we have become possessors of millions of 

 acres of the choicest soil, adapted to the raising of the finest cereals, while 

 its mineral wealth is widely distributed and practically inexhaustible, as 

 we can witness in the great coal seams of the eastern Rocky Mountain 

 slopes in which larger and even more iinportant seams have recently 

 been discovered, which will furnish a supply of the most excellent fuel, 

 sufificient for the wants of the country for thousands of years. Consider 

 also thewouderful extent of the great petroleum basin of the Athabasca 

 River district where, for many miles the sands and gravel are cemented 

 by thickened oil, and present a succession of black cliffs along the 

 course of that stream, with indications which point to this area as 

 probably, in the near future, likely to become one of the greatest oil 

 producing districts in the world. Consider also the rich silver mines in 

 the western section of the Rocky Mountain chain, along the Illicillawan, 

 and more recently the great developments of the Kootenay district and 

 vicinity which bid fair to rival the great Comstock deposits south 

 of the boundary, with the great deposits of salt, the rich areas of placer 

 gold, and the great masses of iron ore, concerning the existence and 

 importance of all which but little was known prior to the labours of the 

 Geological Survey fifteen years ago, and in some cases even at a much 

 later date. 



You will remember two years ago, in a lecture before this club by 

 Or. G. M, Dawson on "the unexplored areas of Canada," the fact was 

 pointed out that there yet existed in our Dominion, at least one 

 millioi of square miles of which it may be said we know practically 

 nothing. While this is true, it may also be said of many other hun- 

 dreds of thousands of square miles, that our information has been 

 obtained only by traverses along river courses or lakes, and that the 

 great resources of these portions must as yet of necessity be practically 

 unknown. But such a lack of information about so much of our 

 Do.nuuon in spite of the fact that the labours of the Geological Survey 



