1908.] 



EXPEDITION OF 1901. 



11 



various species to man, displaj^ed during the last decade or two in 

 other parts of Xorth America, rendered a more detailed study of this 

 northern region desirable. The recent increase in knowledge of the 

 zoology of Labrador, the Hudson Bay region, and Alaska left the 

 great interior region drained mainly by the Mackenzie (see Frontis- 

 piece) the most neglected large area in North America. The need 

 of material from this area became so urgent that the Biological Sur- 

 vey, in the early spring of 1901, determined to send there one of its 

 trained field naturalists to obtain representative collections of the 

 mammals, birds, and plants. This was the more necessary since the 

 early material, consisting mainly of alcoholic specimens or skins with- 

 out flesh measurements, is not now in a condition satisfactory for 

 comparison. As it was evident that only a j^art of the region could 

 be satisfactorily examined in a single season, it was determined to 

 make firsts reconnaissance of the region about Athabaska and Great 

 Slave lakes. Accordingly, in the spring of 1901 I was detailed for 

 this service, accompanied, as on the trip to Hudson Bay, by my 

 brother, Alfred E. Preble, then of Tufts College, Massachusetts. 



ITINERARY. 



EXPEDITION OF 1901. 



As on our previous trip,^ arrangements were made with the Hud- 

 son's Bay Companj", whose trading posts are scattered over nearly 

 the whole of British America, to furnish subsistence and means of 

 transportation. Realizing that it was desirable to start as early in 

 the season as possible, in order that the time of arrival of the migra- 

 tory birds could be noted, we left Washington on April 23, 1901, and 

 reached Edmonton, Alberta, the termination of our railroad journe}^, 

 on April 29, having stopped over a day at Winnipeg, Manitoba, to 

 confer with the officers of the Hudson's Bay Company. After per- 

 fecting plans and securing supplies we left Edmonton on the after- 

 noon of April 30 for Athabaska Landing, a small settlement and 

 trading post on Athabaska River, nearly 100 miles distant by wagon 

 road to the north of Edmonton, where our journey by canoe was to 

 begin. 



Because of the marshy character of the country, which had been 

 liberated only a short time from the grasp of the semiarctic winter, 

 the roads were almost impassable, and five days were consumed in 

 reaching Athabaska Landing. The Hudson's Ba}^ Company's scow, 

 sent annually to Fort Chipewyan on the opening of navigation, was 

 ready to depart, and on May 6 we left Athabaska Landing by canoe 

 in companj^ with the scow, on which a part of our heavy baggage 



a See N. Am. Fauna, No. 22, 1902. 



