102 NORTH AMERICAN FAUNA. [no. 27. 



sundial, across whose leaden face have fallen the shadows of many 

 a yearly cycle. Surrounding; the post on three sides are the fields, 

 where in former years large crops of potatoes, barley, and other 

 staples were raised, and where a considerable amount of farming is 

 yet carried on. A small herd of cattle is kept for draft purposes. 

 In one of the little-used stores is the museum, containing mounted 

 specimens of many of the native birds, some mammals, and remnants 

 of collections of eggs and fossils. The library, once extensive, but 

 now much reduced, is kept in one of the rooms of the main dwelling 

 bouse. The most striking modern improvement is the electric light 

 plant, whose dynamo is run by the engine from the steam launch of 

 a disappointed Klondiker. 



Between Fort Simpson and Nahanni River, a distance of 75 miles, 

 the Mackenzie follows a nearly direct west-northwest course. Its 

 banks are high and well wooded, and gravelly or bowldery beaches 

 are exposed at the ordinary stage of water. Several groups of long, 

 low islands, well wooded with spruce, balsam poplar, willows, and 

 the usual undergrowth, are encountered in this stretch. The only 

 tributary large enough to bear a name is Martin River, which comes 

 in from the southwest 8 miles below Fort Simpson. 



Near latitude G2° 15' the Mackenzie approaches the mountains, and, 

 making a sharp turn, runs for a long distance nearly due north, at a 

 short distance from their base." At the v Great Bend ' the Nahanni, 

 emerging from a deep, narrow valley, mingles its waters with those 

 of the main river. The apex between the Nahanni and the Mackenzie 

 is occupied by a mountain called by some of the natives Tha-on'-tha, 

 i. e., 'standing alone' (PI. XI, fig. 2). It rises abruptly from the 

 swampy plain to a height of about 2,500 feet. Its northern face is 

 steep — in places precipitous — and is formed of several superimposed 

 terraces. It is as well wooded as the nature of its soil will allow. 

 The white spruce (Picea canadensis), tamarack (Larix laricina), 

 Banksian pine (Pinus divaricata),3Lii(\ aspen poplar (Populus tn mu- 

 loides), with their attendant shrubs, ascend the slopes to an altitude 

 of about 2,000 feet, occurring at their upper limit as depauperate 

 shrubs. Willows (Salix myrtillifolia and alaxensis) occur in a 



"On (lie right bank of the Mackenzie, near where the river bends northward, 

 stood formerly a Northwest Company's post. On the map accompanying 

 Franklin's narrative of his second journey (182S) its sile is placed opposite 

 the mouth of I he Nahanni. Concern inn' this post, Masson says: " In 1800, Mr. 

 John Thomson, a cleric in the Northwest Company. * * * established a 

 trading post on the Mackenzie River 'in full view of the Rocky Mountains at 

 whose smallness I was greatly surprised' and called it Rocky Mountain Fort. 

 It was soon after abandoned and in 1805, Mr. Alexander MacKenzie, the 

 Partner in charge of the Great Bear Lake Department, already calls it 'Old 

 Rocky Mountain House.' It was then going to ruin." (Les Bourgeois, II, 

 P. L'T. 1890.) 



