"^18«)"'] PROCEEDINGS OF THE NATIONAL MUSEUM. 461 



the map. Thus I have endeavored to make a record of the distribution 

 of forests in 1885, for evidently no natural feature is more likely to 

 change in a few years than the extent of woodlands. The line limiting 

 the coniferous forest on the south is copied from the forestry map issued 

 with the Tenth Census report of the United States. It is suspiciously 

 straight and even, but is doubtless correct when understood merely as 

 a broad generalization. I regret that I am without the material neces- 

 sary to define this limit more accurately. To the southward of Car- 

 berry is a small isolated forest of spruce that is known as the Spruce 

 Bush or the Carberry Swamp, bj which names it is herein referred to. 



Water. — The province is plentifully, almost too plentifully, supplied 

 with water. In addition to the numerous extensive lakes indicated on 

 the map are thousands more of smaller extent, while the region of the 

 Red River Valley in particular is diversified by vast stretches of marsh 

 and lagoon. The various lakes are of two kinds, first the sweet water 

 or live water lakes, fed and drained by living streams, teeming with fish, 

 and varying in size from that of a mere pond to that of Lake Winne- 

 peg; second, the alkaline lakes, which are mere drainage basins and 

 depend solely on evaporation for the removal of their accumulated 

 waters. 



They owe their alkaline impregnation not to anything of the nature 

 of salt-bearing strata, but to the continual influx and evaporation of 

 surface water very slightly impregnated with alkali through running 

 over the prairies strewn with the ashes of the annual fires. These " dead 

 waters" never, so far as I know, contain fish, but they are usually 

 swarming with a species of amblystoma and numerous kinds of leeches 

 and aquatic insects. These lakes abound on the prairies and in the 

 sand hills, but are usually of very small extent. They have, I believe, 

 several peculiar species of sedge, and are especially frequented by cer- 

 tain kinds of birds that seem to avoid the fresher waters, e. g., Baird'a 

 Sparrow, Avocet, etc. 



Salt springs, etc. — The following extract from Professor Macoun's 

 well-known work on " Manitoba and the great Northwest, 1883," will 

 prove an interesting item of physiography: 



Lying farther south [than the Silurian], and possibly underlying the greater part or 

 the western side of the Manitoba Plain, is the Devonian Series. These rocks are 

 known to be largely developed on both sides of Lakes Manitoba and Winnepegosis. 

 Numerous salt springs are found in connection with them, and during the last sum- 

 mer the writer saw salt springs and brooks of strong brine flowing from them in 

 various localities at the head of Lake Winnepegosis. The subjoined list of salt 

 springs known to occur on Lakes Manitoba and Winnepegosis may tend to excite 

 interest in these extensive deposits: 



1. Crane River, Lake Manitoba. 



2. Waterhen River, Dickson's Landing. 



3. Salt Point, east side of Lake Winnepegosis. 



4. Salt Springs, Winnepegosis. 



5. Pine River, Winnepegosis. 



6. Rivers near Duck Bay. 



