224 
Canadian Agriculture. 
retained, most of this northern area being covered with dense 
forests of evergreen trees. 
The whole of the prairie region has a gradual but gentle 
slope from west to east, amounting for the entire area to about 
5 feet per mile. Along two lines, however, which are more or 
less parallel, and which trend in a north-west and south-east 
direction, a rise decidedly marked, but not abrupt, is encoun- 
tered in proceeding from east to west ; these are the escarpments 
which form the boundaries of the second and third prairie 
steppes. The lowest and most eastern prairie-level is that 
which comprises the Red River valley, and Lake Winnipeg 
with its adjacent lands on the west. The average altitude of 
this plain is about 800 feet, the surface of Lake Superior being 
627 feet above the sea ; its average breadth exceeds 100 miles, 
and its area is about 56,000 square miles, of which one-fourth is 
water. This level is bounded on the east by the Laurentian 
plateau, and on the west by the first escarpment, which is 
ascended in the neighbourhood of jNIacgregor, 80 miles west of 
Winnipeg. This escarpment trends north-west, through the 
"mountains" lying to the west of Lake Winnipegoosis. 
When the summit of the first escarpment is reached, in the 
neighbourhood of Macgregor, a vast open country, called the 
Great Plains, and forming the second prairie steppe, is entered 
upon. On the 49th parallel of latitude this second steppe is 
230 miles wide, while farther north, on the 54th parallel, its 
width is not more than 200 miles. Its average elevation is 
about 1600 feet, and it is bounded westward by the remarkable 
physical feature known as the Grand Coteau of the Missouri 
(Fr. coteau, a hill-slope), which is chiefly a great mass of glacial 
detritus and ice-travelled blocks, resting upon a sloping surface 
of rocks of Cretaceous age, and extending diagonally across the 
central region of North America, from south-east to north-west 
for a distance of about 800 miles. On the 4yth parallel the 
Coteau is 30 miles wide, and it broadens out somewhat as it is 
traced northward. As the Coteau is ascended from its eastern 
base, the surface is seen to become gradually more undulating, 
and in its upper parts the drift materials are confusedly accu- 
mulated into low hills, which, however, seldom attain a greater 
height than 100 feet above the level of the Coteau, the average 
elevation of which, at the 49th parallel, is 2000 feet. The 
Coteau belt is practically destitute of drainage valleys, hence 
the waters of its pools and lakes are charged with salts, parti- 
cularly magnesium and sodium sulphates. The western part 
of the Coteau contains wide deep valleys, with tributary coulees, 
which are mostly dry, or else occupied by chains of small 
lakes, which dry up in summer, and thus leave large white 
