488 APPENDIX 



no artificial preparation of tlie kind could be expected to possess. 

 It will in all probability be found that a very slight treatment 

 will render it suitable for employment in the construction of 

 roads, footpaths, courtyards, etc., for asphalting the flooring of 

 granaries, basements of warehouses, and the like, and further 

 as a roofing material. Should it be deemed more expedient 

 to separate the bitumen, this may be effected by simply boiling 

 or macerating the material with hot water, when the bituminous 

 matter, entering into fusion, will rise as a scum to the surface 

 and may be removed by skimmers, whilst the sand falls to the 

 bottom of the vessel. 



An experiment was made in order to ascertain the greatest 

 state of purity to which the bitumen could be brought by this 

 method; it was found that of the 81.73 per cent, sand, 69,26 

 per cent, had been removed, the extracted bitumen containing 

 50.1 per cent, sand, and — owing to the extreme fineness of a 

 portion of this latter, as already mentioned — it may be ques- 

 tioned if the purification by this method could be pushed much 

 beyond this. 



The sand separated by this process, when carefully con- 

 ducted, is free or almost free from bitumen, and might, after 

 being heated to redness in a reverberatory furnace — to destroy 

 any little adhering bitumen — be advantageously employed for 

 the manufacture of one of the better qualities of glass. 



The above treatment requires but the simplest of appli- 

 ances, and might be readily carried out on the spot. 



The amount of maltha at my disposal was far too small to 

 warrant any attempt at its distillation. Should it occur in 

 sufficient quantity it might possibly, amongst other uses, be 

 advantageously employed as a crude material for the manu- 

 facture of illuminating and lubricating oils and paraffin. 



THE BAHEEN GEOUFDS TO THE EAST OE 

 ANDEESON EIVEE.* 



By Eodeeick MacEaklane. 



The belt of timber, which at Eort Anderson (established on 

 Anderson Eiver in 1861, and abandoned 1866; approximate 

 latitude, 68° 30' north) extends for over thirty miles to the 

 eastward, rapidly narrows and becomes a mere fringe along the 

 Anderson Eiver and disappears to the northward of the sixty- 

 ninth parallel of latitude. The country is thickly interspersed 



* Published in the Canadian Record of Science, January, 1890. 



