Vol. X, pp. 45-52 March 9, 1896 



PROCEEDINGS 



X 



OF THE 



BIOLOGICAL SOCIETY OF WASHINGTON. 



ON A SMALL COLLECTION OF MAMMALS FROM 

 LAKE EDWARD, QUEBEC. 



BY OUTRAM BANGS. 



Early in September, LS95, ray brother, E. A. Ban«;s, and I 

 made a short collecting trip to Quebec. Our original plan was 

 to spend all our time at Roberval, on I;ake St. John, the most 

 northern locality reached b}^ railroad in eastern North America. 

 But Lake St. John proved a great disappointment. The town 

 of Roberval lies in a dreary valley, that seems wholly destitute 

 of mammalian life. The forest has l)een cleared away and the 

 barren fields and desolate scrub are wholly unfit to supply the 

 needs of even the smaller mammals. Had we been fitted for 

 camping out we could undoubtedly have found a rich field up 

 one of the many rivers that pour their waters from every direc- 

 tion into this great basin ; but we were not. After wasting two 

 days in a vain endeavor to find any place within walking dis- 

 tance of Roberval suited to our work, we turned our backs on 

 Lake St. John and went down the railroad about sixty-five miles 

 to Lake Edward. 



The town of Lake Edward is on the northern end of the lake 

 of the -ame name, and lies in the heart of a rich Hudsonian 

 forest. The lake is about twenty-three miles long and termi- 

 nates in the Jeannotte river. A great part of the shores of both 

 lake and river are still clothed in primeval forests, Init the busy 

 saw-mill at Lake Edward, with its daily consumjition of five 

 hundred logs, is fast eating up this old growth and leaving be- 

 hind only white birch and small second-growth spruce and fir. 



7— Biol. Soc. Wash., Voi,. X, 1896 (45) 



