WEALTH ON WINGS 



the Mississippi Valley in this country in large part, 

 and in large part the Athabasca-Mackenzie River 

 valley in the Dominion of Canada. By the latter 

 valley I mean the waterway of the Athabasca, Slave, 

 and Mackenzie rivers, with their adjacent lakes and 

 streams. 



Very happily for us all there are breeding grounds 

 in that Far-Northern country where the railroad 

 never will go; but even this statement should be 

 made carefully. One of the greatest wildfowl re- 

 gions of that northern country is in the Peace River 

 delta and round Lake Athabasca, about four hun- 

 dred and fifty miles north of Edmonton, Alberta. 

 Especially is the fall goose shooting in that country 

 on white geese or wavies superlatively good, 

 though these birds do not nest there. But when we 

 reflect that within two or three years there may be 

 a railroad built to MacMurray, which will bring the 

 traveler within less than two hundred miles of 

 steamboat transport to Lake Athabasca, at Fort 

 Chippewyan, we begin to see that we ought not to 

 prophesy too sweepingly regarding the eternal isola- 

 tion of this breeding ground. 



Again, the southern and western shores of Hud- 

 son's Bay proper have been fine nesting grounds for 

 numbers of geese and different species of ducks 

 which come into our country in the fall. You would 



185 



