CANADA. 



505 



Probably the most important district in this respect is the Lake 

 St. John region. This is an immense hydrographic basin, whose 

 size can best be realized by comparison. It is two and a half times 

 as big as Holland and nearly as large as the whole State of Maine, 

 containing 30,000 square miles (19,200,000 acres). Numerous rivers 

 empty into the lake from the heights above, passing through prime- 

 val forests. Much of the district has been known as the sportsman's 

 paradise, but now the eye of commerce is fixed on a tract which 

 supplies at once the material for manufacture and the means to do it. 

 How great the water power is may be shown by taking as an example 

 the stream of the Great Peribonca, at the foot of the Grand Falls: 

 Average rapidity of current, 72 feet per second; flow of water per 

 minute, 976,013.28 cubic feet, or 7,187,192 gallons. The capabilities 

 of such a current, when harnessed, are at least 40,000 horsepower. 

 This is but one fall, the river within a few miles hurling itself over 

 seven, whose accumulated forces are equal to 300,000 horsepower. 

 Niagara's limit is set at 350,000 horsepower, and that only at a great 

 expense, while the formation on the Peribonca is such that it is 

 claimed the whole can be transformed at a trivial cost. 



This is but a type of what we find in the whole surrounding 

 district, as the following table shows: 



Turning from the power to the material to be manufactured, we 

 find that out of the 19,200,000 acres, less than 500,000 are cleared, 

 the rest being covered with forests, 75 per cent of which are white, 

 black, and red spruce, the rest being made up chiefly of b-alsam fir, 

 white birch, cypress, and pine. It will readily be seen that this 

 immense forest stretch offers an almost inexhaustible supply of raw 

 material. 



The official forestry returns give the Swedish forests as 40,000,000 

 acres, the Norwegian as 17,000,000 acres, and the Prussian as 20,- 

 000,000 acres, in round numbers. As these are the chief pulp- 

 manufacturing countries, it can easily be seen how formidable a 

 competitor Quebec is likely to be, when one district has over 19,000,- 

 ooo acres, and when its magnificent water powers are considered. 



