14 



The mining industry is also only in its initial and 

 experimental stages, but promises a rapid development. 

 The mineral resources of the district include, bituminous 

 coal in considerable areas in the valleys of the Telkwa 

 and Bulkley rivers and other places, and lignitic coal 

 on Driftwood creek. Numerous discoveries of metalli- 

 ferous veins, some of large size, have also been made. 

 These usually occur in the vicinity of intrusive masses 

 which cut the rocks of the Hazel ton formation, and are 

 especially abundant in the mountains bordering the 

 Bulkley on the east, south of Hazelton, and in the Hudson 

 Bay, Babine, and Rochers Deboules mountains. Silver- 

 bearing galena and chalcopyrite are the principal valuable 

 minerals present. The associated minerals include pyrite, 

 arsenopyrite, zinc blende, stibnite, tennantite, and tetra- 

 hedrite. 



Development work is in progress on a number of the 

 properties, and on a few, considerable bodies of good ore 

 have already been opened up. 



GEOLOGY. 



The formations traversed along the route of the 

 excursion embrace the granitoid rocks and included schists 

 of the Coast Range batholith, bordered on the west by 

 altered sedimentaries, and on the east by a complex of 

 partially altered volcanics. The latter are overlaid and 

 succeeded eastward by a wide belt of middle Mesozoic, 

 mostly tufaceous, rocks, intruded at numerous points by 

 granite stocks. 



A marked feature of the section is the preponderance 

 along it of rocks of igneous origin, both intrusives and 

 extrusives being widely represented. 



The rocks have been subdivided into the following 

 groups : — 



SEDIMENTARIES AND VOLCANICS. 



Lower Cretaceous Skeena formation. 



Jurassic, possibly including some 



Lower Cretaceous Hazelton formation. 



Triassic? Kitsalas formation. 



Upper Paleozoic? Prince Rupert formation. 



