68 . LABRADOR 



Mugford, Hind has estimated to cover fifty-two hundred 

 square miles. Beyond the outer banks the bottom drops 

 off into water hundreds of fathoms deep at the real edge 

 of the continental plateau. 



As a rule, the tides are practically unimportant in the 

 navigation of the Atlantic coast of the peninsula. They 

 are to be reckoned with in the narrow parts of Belle Isle 

 Strait and in the region about Cape Chidley. The only 

 overfalls likely to affect a small boat are to be expected 

 off Forteau, off Point Amour, in the narrow tickles near 

 Cape Chidley, and in Belle Isle Strait. In the strait the 

 current runs about three knots an hour both to the east 

 ancl to the west. On the northeast coast the current 

 generally runs slowly to the southward. Strong winds 

 will affect these velocities about a knot an hour either 

 way. 1 



The tides of the far north are, on the other hand, quite 

 remarkable. On one occasion I attempted to force the 

 nine-knot steamer Strathcona against a full ebb tide in the 

 tickle south of Cape Chidley Island. At the narrowest 

 place, where the defile is only a hundred yards in width, 

 the water was a boiling torrent, filled with whirlpools. 

 The steamer, though at full speed ahead, was carried astern. 

 We were forced to run back and await the turn of the tide. 

 We reckoned the current at fully ten knots an hour. 



The range of tide on the Atlantic coast varies from five 

 to eight feet; at Cape Chidley it is thirty-five feet, while 



1 Fuller information may be obtained in the monograph on the tides 

 of this coast by Dr. W. Bell Dawson, Engineer in charge of tidal 

 surveys for Canada, Department of Marine and Fisheries, Ottawa, 

 Canada. 



