234 



A. Yes, sir. 



Q. That is all the interest you have? 



A. That is all the interest I have; the farms up in there are called 

 farms, because there is no other name for them, but the inhabitants 

 generally have a pretty hard time to make a living; they make a- living 

 in this way, during the summer they till this unproductive soil; in 

 the winter they have a team ; that they go into the woods and haul 

 logs, and work all winter for the lumbermen, and thereby make both 

 ends meet. 



Q. You live in that region ? 



A. Yes, sir. 



Q. Within the 2,000,000 acres? 



A- No; I live just on the outside, about twenty-five miles from there, 

 but I live in what is known that northern country there. 



Q. We saw some of the people during this investigation; my 

 observation led me to think they made a pretty good living. 



A. , Does the gentleman refer to me ? 



By Mr. Connelly: 



Q. Will you ask Mr. Basselin to explain to the committee some of 

 the largest detachments of land are outside of the blue lines, and the 

 lines were made by the commission, and why those detachments were 

 left outside of the lines ? 



A. I covered that ground last night, I thought, when I said I thought 

 it was for the interest of the park to confine it to 2,500,000 acres and 

 that in our report we suggested that the acquiring of lands within 

 that-park could be done more readily by exchange for lands that the 

 State owned outside of the park; if we took in all of the land the State 

 owned in this wilderness, we would have none to exchange, and in 

 order to take in the State lands and not take in more than 2,250,000 

 acres, we would have to make a park that I don't believe any 

 surveyor or woodsman in this country would have been able to 

 follow the lines; in making these lines we endeavored, as far as may 

 be, to follow given surveys of lot lines', township lines and river 

 courses so that if the Legislature, br we so intended, we could take a 

 deed from the description of these lines as they, now are, without going 

 to the expense of a costly survey. 



Mr. Anibal. — I want to ask the committee one question. There is a 

 little of the topography of the Adirondack wilderness which I want 

 to call especial attention to, and I want to call it from persons who 

 have been actually over the ground for themselves, for instance 

 Mr. Gannon and Mr. Kittridge, what would be the line of the com- 



