650 EEPOET — 1880. 



supposed it to be the ' Toothless Fish ' River of the Hare Indiaus (Beg-hui-la on 

 his map.) M. Petitot has also traced and sketched in several lakes and chains of 

 lakes, which support his opinion that this region is partaking of that operation of 

 elevation which extends to Hudson's Bay. He found the wild granite basin of 

 one of these dried up, and discovered in it, yawning and terrible, the huo'e funnelled 

 opening by which the waters had been drawn into one of the many subterranean 

 channels which the Indians believe to exist here. 



These geogi-aphical discoveries are but a small part of I'Abbe Petitot's ser^dces. 

 His intimate knowledge of the languages of the Northern Indians has enabled him 

 to rectify the names given by previous travellers, and to interpret those descriptive 

 appellations of the natives, which are often so full of significance. He has pro- 

 foundly studied their ethnology and tribal relations, and he has added greatly to 

 our knowledge of the geology of this region. 



It is, however, much to be regretted that this excellent traveller was provided 

 with no instruments except a pocket watch and a compass, which latter is a 

 somewhat fallacious guide in a region where the declination varies between 35° 

 and 58°. His method has been to work in the details brought within his personal 

 knowledge, or well attested by native information, on the basis of Franklin's 

 charts. 



M. Petitot expresses his persuasion that the disti-ict of Mackenzie river can never 

 be colonized — a conclusion no one, who has visited it, will be disposed to dispute ; 

 but he omits to point out that the mouth of that river is about 700 miles nearer 

 the port of Victoria, in British Columbia, than the mouth of the Lena is to Yoko- 

 hama, and far more accessible. It needs no Nordeuskjcild to show the way. Its 

 upper waters, the Liard, Peace, Elk, and Athabasca rivers, drain an enormous 

 extent of fertile country, not without coal or lignite, and with petroleum in abun- 

 dance. As the geological survey has not yet been extended so far, we are not 

 fuUy acquainted with its mineral resources ; but I can add my testimony to that of 

 more recent travellers, as to the remarlcable apparent fertihty, and the exceptional 

 climate of the Peace River valley. It is no extravagant dream that sees in a dis- 

 tant future the beneficent influence of commerce, reaching by this great natural 

 channel, races of mankind in a high degree susceptible to them, and alleviating 

 what appears to us to be the misery of their lot. 



There are few subjects of greater physical interest, or which have received 

 less investigation, than the extent to which the soil of our planet is now per- 

 manently frozen round the North Pole. Erman, on tlieoretical grounds, affirms 

 that the ground at Yakutsk is frozen to a depth of 630 feet. At 50 feet be- 

 low the surface it had a temperature of 28°*6 F. (-6° R.), and was barely up 

 to the freezing point at 382 feet. It is very different on the American 

 continent. The rare opportunity was afforded me by a landslip on a large 

 scale, in May 1844, of observing- its entire thickness, near Fort Norman, on 

 Mackenzie river, about 200 miles further north than Yakutsk, and it was only 

 45 feet. At York Factory and Hudson's Bay it is said to be about 23 feet. Tlie 

 recent extension of settlement in Manitoba has led to wells being sunk in manv 

 directions, establisliing the fact that the permanently frozen stratum does no't 

 extend so far as that region, notwithstanding an opinion to t!ie contrary of the late 

 Sir George Simpson. Probably it does not cross Churchill river, for I was assured 

 that there is none at Lake a la Crosse. It depends, in some measure, on exposure. 

 In the neighbourhood of high river banks, radiating their heat in two directions, 

 and in situations not reached by the sun, the frost runs much deeper than in the 

 ■open. The question, however, to which Sir John Richardson called attention so 

 long ago as 1839, is well deserving of systematic inquiry, and may even throw 

 some light on the profoundly interesting subject of a geographical change in the 

 position of the earth's axis of rotation. 



The Saskatchawan was first navigated by steam in 1875, when a vessel of 

 about 200 tons ascended from the Grand Rapid to Edmonton, 700 miles. There 

 is, however, an obstacle at Cole's Falls, below Carlton House, which has led to a 

 break of navigation, and a small steel steamer, originally intended for the Upper 

 Athabasca, has recently been transferred to the Upper Saskatchawan ; between 



