ZOOLOGICAL CHAEACTEE OF UNGAVA. 81 



summer is abrupt, with but few days of intervening spring. The autumn is simply a 

 period during which the winter increases in intensity, a period extending from the last week 

 in August to the first week in October. The summer heat is only 85"5" and then 

 for but a few hours ; the warmest night shewed only 54° and the lowest monthly tem- 

 perature is never above freezing point. Snow lies from the end of September to the 

 end of June, and in the deeper ravines as late as the middle of July. Rain seldom falls 

 before the middle of May and rarely later than the middle of October. About sixty-five 

 per cent, of the days are cloudy, twenty-five per cent, fair, and the remainder clear ; the 

 fair and clear preponderating in the colder months. Storms of violent character succeed 

 each other rapidly ; the open country is laid bare in a few hours, the snow being swept 

 into valleys amongst patches of timber or thicket, where it lodges and protects the roots 

 from the cold of the quieter days. 



Vegetation. — So little fertile soil exists on the hillsides in the valleys that but few 

 species of trees exist, and the annuals shew that — such is the struggle to perpetuate their 

 kind — the leaves and stems have been sacrificed to the effort to blossom and mature 

 seeds. The length' of the day has long since begun to increase before the annuals are much 

 above the surface, and in the course of a few days, the plant-producing areas are clothed 

 with verdure as if by magic. The limit of trees is at the mouth of George Eiver, thence 

 trends south-west, passing about ten miles north of Fort Chimo and from there nearly 

 due west to Hudson Bay. North of that line, stunted willows and alders lie prostrate on 

 the hillsides, exposed to the south, and in the valleys that become quickly filled with 

 drifting snow. The northern part of the district produces but scanty patches of willows 

 and of such distorted growth as to be available for no useful purpose and of too small a 

 size to be fitted even for fuel. 



The principal trees are Piceu, Larix, Pojmlus, Betulu, Aluits, Salix, Jnniperus and several 

 heather-like bushes. Of annuals. Anemone, Baniinntlns, Drabu, Viola, Arenaria, Slellaria, 

 Astragal It. s , Oxylropus, Riihiia, Potenlilla, Saxifruga, Epilobium, Cornns, Senicio, Campanula, 

 Vaccinium, Cassiope, Pyrola, Pediculan's, Pingiticula, Polygonuvi, Empetrmn, Tofieldia and Iris ; 

 of sedges and grasses, Luzula, Jvncus, Scirpus, Eriophorum, Carex, Poa, Festuca and Elymus, 

 constitute the vegetation most abundant, except the cryptogamous plants which cover 

 fully nine-tenths of the surface of land. The black lichens that cling tenaciously to the 

 rocks, or the sponge-like sphaguous growths of the low lands, are so retentive of moisture 

 and consequently of cold, that in those situations the less hardy flowering species are but 

 scantily represented. 



Agriculture would be impossible, no portion of the district being suitable for pro- 

 diicing even the hardiest cereals. In some seasons, certain species of the native grasses 

 do not mature their seeds. This will not be wondered at when we consider that the 

 thermometrical records at Fort Chimo give a mean temperature of only 19° for a period of 

 two years during which continuous observations were taken. That station is situated 

 farther north than any other permanent dwelling of white people on the eastern main- 

 land coast of America and is fully 5° further south than St. Michaels on the Alaskan coast, 

 which has a mean temperature 10° higher, although exposed directly to the sea. 



Insects, etc. — The vegetation, though meagre in character, afibrds sustenance and 

 retreat for myriads of the simpler ibrms of insect life. In no other locality have I seen 



Sec. iv, 1887. 11. 



