THE OTTAWA I^ATURALIST. 



Vol. XVIII. OTTAWA, JANUARY, 1905. No. 10 



A LANDSLIDE ON THE LIEVRE RIVER. 



By Alfred Ernest Barlow. 



(Published by permission of the Acting-Director of tlie Geological Survey 



of Canada.) 



The people of the city of Ottawa and surrounding- country 

 were shocked and alarmed by reading- in the early morning- paper 

 of Monday, October 12th, 1903, that a landslide of very large pro- 

 portions had occurred in the vicinity of Poupore Post Office on the 

 Li^vre river, nearly twelve miles north of the town of Bucking-ham 

 in the Province of Quebec. Many of the details of this catastrophe, 

 as gleaned from the newspaper reports, are no doubt well remem- 

 bered by most of those who will read this article, which is written 

 in order to describe with greater technicality than is usual in a 

 newspaper contribution, some of the more salient features, fur- 

 nishing- what are considered the main reasons determining- and 

 even favoring- this wholes ile movement of mother earth. The 

 accompanying reproductions, from actual photographs will serve, 

 in a measure, to illustrate the general appearance, two days after 

 the landslide occurred, of the portion affected. xAn inspection of 

 these will, it is believed, convey a much more adequate idea than 

 is possible by mere words of the great havoc and ruin v* rought to 

 what had previously been the scene of peaceful and happy home- 

 steads, whose inmates harbored no suspicion of disaster. The 

 first intelligence reaching Ottawa that such a calamity had over- 

 taken this peaceful community, in the grey dawn of that Sunday 

 morning, was conveyed in a telephone message sent to Dr. Henry 

 M. Ami, by the Rev. William Patterson of Buckingham. • This 

 news was received about 10 o'clock, five hours after the movement 



