i6 CAMP-FIRES IN THE CANADIAN ROCKIES 



easy march of twenty-two miles. A mile above Charlie 

 Smith's ranch a deer was seen bounding away toward 

 the river. At Frank Harmer's ranch, four miles farther 

 on, we found the fresh tracks of a bear, and it was with 

 some difficulty that I checked a digression into the 

 jack pines to look for their maker. To Mr. Phillips it 

 seemed morally wrong to let that bear go unscotched. 



Harmer's ranch is enclosed by a fence each panel of 

 which was made of three big jack pine logs, a foot in 

 diameter and about thirty feet long, neatly laid one above 

 another, resting at each end on three logs of the same 

 size about four feet long, laid squarely across the axis 

 of the fence. Both in looks and utility it is a good 

 fence, but rather heavy to build. 



At Connor's ranch, fifteen miles from town, we 

 bought a pailful of delicious butter, at thirty-three cents 

 a pound, and continued our northward flight. We 

 forded Elk River, over an awful bed of bowlders that 

 seemed certain to break a leg for each horse in the out- 

 fit. A mile or so beyond that crossing we forded Ford- 

 ing River and entered a long and beautiful stretch of 

 jack pines, which revealed several interesting pages of 

 natural history. 



In British Columbia the jack pine is not merely a 

 tree; it is an institution.* At its best it is an arboreal 

 column from ninety to one hundred and ten feet in 



* The Western Jack Pine, or Lodge-Pole Pine {Pinus dtviricata). Its 

 average height in the good soil of the Elk River valley is very close to one 

 hundred feet, hut its diameter is very small. The spread of a one-hundred- 

 foot tree is only ahout eight feet. 



