ENDICOTT MOUNTAINS. 41 



Pronounced faulting and uplift are evidenced by marked deformation of the strata 

 and in some places by fault scarps miles in extent. 



The comparatively regular southern edge of the range trends approximately east 

 and west, in latitude 67° 10', -while the northern edge, where it was crossed, in the 

 reo-ion of Anaktuvuk River, latitude about 68° 25', presents a concave front to the 

 north, as shown on the maps (Pis. II and III). This crescentic feature is repeated by 

 several low concentric ridges in the Anaktuvuk Plateau to the north. These seem to 

 have been formed by a part of the same orographic uplift as the main range, for 

 they lie parallel with its front and grow weaker and finally die out northward with 

 increase of distance from the seat of maximum uplift. 



West of the Anaktuvuk the crescentic front of the range soon gives way to 

 a more nearly westward trend, bearing in the direction of Cape Lisburne. To the 

 east of the Anaktuvuk, however, the curved front continues in a northeasterly and 

 finally north-northeasterly direction, so that in about latitude 70° and longitude 117° 

 it reaches a point within 35 miles of the coast, where it merges with the Franklin 

 Mountains, one of the northern groups previously noted. From this point eastward 

 to Mackenzie River the northern edge of the mountains contiuues near the coast. 



Along the one hundred and fifty-second meridian the range is somewhat higher 

 in the northern than in the southern part, and contains two distinct orographic axes, 

 the surface of the northern having an elevation of a little more than 6,000 feet, and 

 that of the southern somewhat more than 5,000 feet. Between these axes there is a 

 slight depression, where the surface has apparently been somewhat more rapidly 

 reduced by erosion in soft rocks. This is notably true on the west side of John 

 River, somewhat north of the middle of the range, where in the region of the sixty- 

 eighth parallel and the one hundred and fifty-third meridian the country between the 

 head of Hunt Fork, which flows southeastward into John River, and the head of the 

 Colville on the northwest, probably does not exceed 5,000 feet in elevation. 



The topography of the range varies, depending on the character and structure of 

 the rock formations. That of the Fickett series, composed of phyllites, slates, 

 quartzites, and conglomerates, is characterized by sharper crests and peaks than the 

 limestone areas, whose ridges, being broader and more rounded, are often studded 

 by knobs and bordered by steep cliffs, with extensive slopes of heavy talus at their 

 foot. 



Though marked cliffs and precipices occur, the side slopes of the valleys, as shown 

 in PL VI, A, can generally be ascended without difficulty. They are moss covered 

 to within about 2,000 feet of the top of the mountains, where steeper slopes of barren 

 rock and talus begin. Exceptions occur in the faulted Paleozoics in the northern 

 side of the range, at the head of the Anaktuvuk, where some scarps rise abruptly to 

 a height of several thousand feet above the valley. 



