258 Thr Ottawa Naturalist. | February 



Society of Canada, Vol. VIII, Section IV, 1890, pp. 51-52. This 

 is as follows : 



" 'One further circumstance may, in conclusion, be referred to 

 here as being readily and intelligibly explicable on the hypothesis 

 of a considerable elevation of the land at about this time, (close of 

 the glacial period.) This is'the existence at the present day of 

 Caribou in the northern part ot Queen Charlotte Islands. 



"In a former report on these islands I have spoken of the 

 occurrence of the Elk or Wapiti on them. This statement was, 

 however, based merely on Indian report, as none of the animals in 

 question were seen. Since that time I have learneu from Mr. W. 

 Charles, that the animal in question is really the Caribou, and I 

 have been shown by him the skin and antlers of one of these ani- 

 mals. The Caribou is not now found anywhere else in the region 

 of the coast, either on the islands or on the Coast Ranges, though 

 it roams over high plateaux to the east of these ranges. The 

 shortest distance between any point of the Queen Charlotte Is- 

 lands and the nearest islands of the Coast Archipelago is thirty 

 miles, and the intervening strait is subject to rapid tidal currents. 

 The isolation of the Queen Charlotte Islands is in fact so com- 

 plete that the Deer, which inhabits all the other islands of the 

 coast, is not found in this group. 



"It is, therefore, in the absence of the Caribou from the 

 neighboring coast and its adjacent islands, and in consideration of 

 the width of the waterway which would have to be crossed, at 

 least highly probable that this animal reached the Queen Char- 

 lotte Islands under the present conditions. I am thus led to be- 

 lieve that the Caribou colonized the islands at a time at which 

 either the glaciers extending from the mainland attained to the 

 Queen Charlotte Islands, or by a land connection during a period 

 of greater elevation.* The latter is in every way the more pro- 

 bable supposition, and, if it be entertained, it may further be as- 

 sumed that the animal came to the islands at the date of the im- 

 mediately post-glacial elevation above indicated, and that it has 

 since, as an isolated colony, succeeded in maintaining itself 

 there. 



* Ths minimum amount of elevation required would be about 200 feet 

 above the present level, 



