GEOGRAPHIC NOTES 



DR. BELL'S SURVEY IN BAFFINLAND 



'< T) AFFINLAND is a large island on 

 J3 the west side of Baffin Bay, or op- 

 posite to Greenland. It stretches from 

 Hudson Strait northwestwards through 

 twelve degrees of latitude, or from 6i° 

 40' to 74 north. It is the third largest 

 island in the world, being only exceeded 

 by Greenland and Australia. Its total 

 length is 1,005 English statute miles, 

 and its breadth varies from 200 to 500 

 miles, the average being 305. The area 

 is therefore about 300,000 square miles, 

 or about ten times that of Scotland or 

 Ireland. It 'forms, however, only about 

 one-tenth of the superficies of the Do- 

 minion of Canada. Notwithstanding its 

 immense extent, it appears to be of no 

 great value, since it is composed, as far 

 as we know, of barren rocks, partly cov- 

 ered with ice." So writes Dr. Robert 

 Bell, Director of the Geological Survey 

 of Canada, in a summary account of 

 work printed in the Geographical Journal 

 for July, 1901. The survey occupied 

 the summer of 1897, from July 20, when 

 the Diana put off the survey party in 

 a little yacht (with a year's supplies 

 against emergency) on the stormy and 

 tide-swept coast, until September 12, 

 when they were taken up by the same 

 vessel. The coast-line was found ex- 

 ceedingly complex and bordered hy lit- 

 eral thousands of islands — i. e. , the 

 country from North Baj^ nearly to Fox 

 Channel is a deeply incised plateau, in- 

 clining westward, and half submerged 

 beneath the waters of Hudson Strait. 

 The interior is mainly bleak and barren, 

 with scant herbage in places, a meager 

 fauna, and an Eskimo population esti- 

 mated at 670 for the whole of Baffin- 

 land. Much of the land is a permanent 

 ice-field like interior Greenland, and 

 glaciers of great extent feed bergs to 

 the adjacent seas ; while in the compar- 

 ative!)' ice- free interior there are several 



great lakes, hundreds of lakelets, and 

 many rivers. Dr. Bell discovered Lake 

 Amadjuak, about 120 miles long and 

 40 miles broad, at an altitude of about 

 290 feet, and, through Eskimo accounts, 

 located the still larger Lake Nettelling 

 at a somewhat lower level ; while the 

 coast surveys located a number of safe 

 harbors. The local nomenclature ap- 

 plied by Dr. Bell is a monument to con- 

 temporary geography and geology ; the 

 National Geographic Society Board is 

 perpetuated by McGee Lake, Gannett 

 Lake, Gilbert Lake, Merriam Lake, 

 Hyde Lake, and Greely Lake ; Powell 

 Lake, Winchell Lake, Walcott Lake, 

 Stevenson Lake, Franz Boas Lake, Orton 

 Lake, Emerson Lake, Bailey Island, 

 Chamberlin Island, and Cape Salisbury 

 commemorate well-known American 

 geologists and geographers, and British 

 geographers, geologists, and other per- 

 sonages are equally remembered, while 

 McKinley Island and Hobart Island pay 

 compliment to the neighboring nation ; 

 yet the old nomenclature, from Fro- 

 bisher down, is retained for larger fea- 

 tures, and the local Eskimo names are 

 applied wherever known. 



W J McGEE. 



NOTABLE WORK ON ALASKA 



MR. MARCUS BAKER is the au- 

 thor of an official geographic 

 dictionary of Alaska just published by 

 theU. S. Geological Survey. It consists 

 of 450 pages packed with information, 

 descriptive, geographic, and historical, 

 on the Alaskan territory. The volume 

 is a summary of almost every fact about 

 Alaska which the American wants to 

 know but does not know where to find. 

 Mr. Baker has been working a number 

 of years on this work. Ten years ago 

 the Board of Geographic Names decided 

 to prepare a geographic dictionary of 

 Alaska, and appointed a committee con- 



