1914] The Ottawa Naturalist. 23 



The basin of the Mackenzie comprises three main physical 

 features: On the west is the great series of parallel mountain 

 ranges known as the Rocky Mountain system, into which many 

 of the stronger tributaries of the Mackenzie cut deeply. On the 

 east is the low-lying, rocky, broken Laurentian plateau, which 

 in its northern part is treeless and is known as the Barren Lands. 

 Between these two strongly marked features lies the broad low- 

 land, through which the Mackenzie flows northward to the 

 Arctic. The Mackenzie lowland is the northward extension of 

 our own Great Plains region. It is a country of numerous lakes 

 and of rivers flowing in shallow valleys, and its general level is 

 only broken by occasional low ranges of hills. It corresponds to 

 a certain extent with the region to the south, through which 

 the Mississippi flows southward to the Gulf of Mexico. In con- 

 trast to the Mississippi region, however, the Mackenzie lowland is 

 forested northward to its mouth and it embraces also within its 

 limits some of the largest lakes on the continent. 



The physical features of the Mackenzie basin then are these: 

 A mountainous highland on the west, a low-lying, rugged, rocky 

 and partly treeless plain on the east, and in the middle a broad, 

 almost level, forested loAvland, with the trunk stream, like a 

 great artery, fl.owing northward to the Arctic sea, fed on the 

 one hand from the melting snows of the mountains and on the 

 other hand from the numberless lakes of the plateau region on 

 the east. 



The Mackenzie ranks as one of the eight large rivers of the 

 earth. It is exceeded in length, drainage area and volume by 

 the Mississippi, but has a greater length and drainage area than 

 the St. Lawrence. Its length is reckoned at 2,550 miles to the head 

 of the Peace river and its volume at about half a million cubic 

 feet per second, or nearly ten times as great as the mean volume 

 of the Ottawa river. 



It is navigated by river steamers for 1,300 miles without a 

 break, from its mouth up, and above that again on the Peace, 

 Athabasca and other tributaries for a total length of about 

 1,400 miles in three sections. If we include its great lakes and 

 those tributary streams that have already been explored, it has 

 an estimated length of navigable river and lake shore line of 

 nearh' 7,000 miles in length. 



History. 



The history of the Mackenzie river district is intimately 



bound up with that of the fur trade, and particularly with that 



of the Hudson Bay Company. Organized in 1670, under the 



name of "The Honourable Company of Merchant Adventurers 



