Exploration of the Labrador Peninsula. 135 



paring each particular geological formation with its nearest 

 representative. On the grounds alone, therefore, of geo- 

 logical knowledge, and of the discovery and definition of 

 the reserves of the country in timber and minerals, the 

 exploration of all these unknown or little-known regions 

 may be amply justified. 



The exploration of the great unknown districts of the 

 Northern and Western Canada has in the past been carried 

 out chiefly by the Dominion Geological Survey, which most 

 useful Department of the public service, in addition to the 

 very numerous calls made upon it by the more settled 

 portions of the country, with their many and fast develop- 

 ing mining industries, has continued from time to time to 

 send properly equipped exploratory parties into the north- 

 ern forests and moors and thus gradually building up an 

 accurate knowledge of the character and resources of many 

 of these remoter parts of the Dominion, and these explor- 

 ations, often very difficult and dangerous, have attached to 

 the staff of the Survey several of the most intrepid and 

 successful young explorers on the continent. 



Since Dr. Dawson's paper was read, parties have travers- 

 ed and carefully examined some of the largest and most 

 desolated of these unexplored portions of the Dominion. 

 Thus in the summer of 1893, Mr. J. B. Tyrell, of the Geo. 

 logical Survey, carried a survey over the Barren Grounds 

 from Lake Athabaska to the west coast of Hudson Bay 

 crossing an unknown region much larger than Great 

 Britain and Ireland combined, and somewhat larger than 

 Sweden, while Mr. Albert Low, of the same Department, 

 has just returned from an exploration extending over nearly 

 two years, in the largest unknown tract of the Dominion, 

 the interior of the Labrador Peninsula or North-East Terri- 

 tory, comprising some 289,000 square miles, an area equal 

 to twice that of Great Britain and Ireland, with the 

 addition of an area equal to that of Newfoundland. Mr. 

 Low has crossed this area from south to north, and from 

 east to west, and his detailed report when published will 

 contain the first trustworthy account of this great region, 



