nity with the brekekex of Asia Minor, and closely resembles the braying sound of a watchman's rattle; but a hundred of the latter, sprung in a circle, would not have equalled the voices of the frogs that we heard at one time. A smaller species, called la grenouille, inhabits the same places, and has a shrill, less unpleasing note than the other, yet which was, nevertheless, tiresome from its monotony. As a contribution to what is known of the geographical distribution of reptiles, on the east side of the Rocky Mountains, frogs may be set down as attaining the 68th parallel of latitude; snakes, as reaching the 56th; and tortoises, as disappearing beyond the 51st, at the south end of Lake Winipeg. There the Emys geographica of Le Sueur, named asate by the Chippeways, occurs; and also one with a flexible neck, called by the same people miskinnah, which is probably the snapping turtle.* free and cylindrical, that is, scarcely tapering, and truncate at the end." (I. E. Gray in let.) By the same post which brought me a proof of this sheet, I had a letter from Mr. Murray, dated on the River Yukon, in which he informs me that "a frog" and "a grass snake" had been killed near his encampment, and that another snake had been killed on the north bend of the Porcupine River, far within the arctic circle. CHAP. VII. PEREGRINE FALCON. -THE RAPID. -RAMPARTS.-HARE INDIANS. ISLAND. FOREST. ISLAND. RICHARD'S ISLAND.-POINT ENCOUNTER. SACRED WE continued to descend the river until 7 in the evening, when we encamped for the night, as I did not consider it to be safe to drift here, there not being one person in the boats who had ever been in this river before, but myself, and I could not trust to my recollections of the best channels after the lapse of so many years since my former visit. About twelve or fourteen miles below the influx of Great Bear River, the channel of the Mackenzie approaches the spur on its eastern bank, and flows parallel to it for some distance. At the spot where we encamped the beach was formed of displaced bituminous shale with imbedded granite boulders, both evidently derived from the ruined bank, a section of which showed layers of gravel consisting of rolled pieces of shale and a few lime stone pebbles, alternating with sand and coarser rolled pieces of limestone. This seemed to be a tertiary deposit formed out of the subjacent beds, but not by the river flowing at its present level. In the course of the day's voyage we noticed a peregrine falcon's nest, placed on the cliff of a sandstone rock. This falcon is not rare throughout the Mackenzie, where it preys on the passenger pigeons and smaller birds. Mr. M'Pherson related to me one of its feats, which he witnessed some years previously as he was ascending the river. A white owl (Stryx nyctea), in flying over a cliff, seized and carried off an unfledged peregrine in its claws, and, crossing to the opposite beach, lighted to devour it. The parent bird followed, screaming loudly, and, stooping with extreme rapidity, killed the owl by a single blow, after which it flew quickly back to its nest. On coming to the spot, Mr. M'Pherson picked up the owl, but, though he examined it narrowly, he could not detect in what part the deathblow had been received; nor could he, from the distance, perceive whether the peregrine struck it with wing or claws. July 27th.-Embarking at 3 this morning, we continued our voyage down the river, and for upwards of twenty miles pursued a course nearly parallel to the spur which the Mackenzie crosses at the influx of Great Bear River. In latitude 65° 32′ N., longitude 127 W., we were opposite to a magnificent cliff in this ridge, only two or three miles inland, apparently about four hundred feet high, and some miles in length. The escarpment faces directly southwards, is remarkably white, and the layers composing it are nearly horizontal, but with some undulation. The heights of the peaks appeared to me to be about eight hundred feet above the water. The beach is composed of fragments of bituminous shale with pieces of lignite; and five or six miles further down, there is a good section of the shale beds interstratified with darkcoloured sandstone. At the "Rapid" the Mackenzie crosses another spur, making three elbows in its passage through it. The channel of the river there is formed of limestone, and is shallow, producing, when the water is low, a considerable fall on the east side, and a shelving rapid on the west. At the elbow of the river, above the rapid, one of the hills, which rises steeply from the water's edge on the east bank, is composed of limestone beds, wrapping over one another like the coats of an onion, and curving, at the place where this structure was most distinctly seen, at a spherical angle of 65°, or thereabouts. These inclined beds. are capped and covered on the flanks by strata of sandstone, which breaks down readily and forms a steep talus of pale-red sand. A cliff of the upper and more compact sandstone overhangs the crumbling layers beneath it. Another eminence of the same spur, which rises from the rapid a few miles lower down, shows the same conical elevation with curved concentric beds. In one spot there is a fault, with dislocation of the beds. On both flanks of these inclined beds there are layers of aluminous shale interstratified with limestone and sandstone. Where these shale beds rest on the inclined rocks, they are also inclined, but they rapidly assume the horizontal position as they recede from the hill. In the earlier part of the summer, a steam-boat could ascend the rapid without difficulty; and this great river might be navigated by vessels of considerable burden, from the Portage of the Drowned in Slave River, down to its junction with the sea, being a navigation of from twelve to thirteen hundred miles. In a dilatation of the river, about ten miles below the rapid, bituminous shale lies horizontally in the hollows of undulated beds of limestone. Having cooked supper at this spot, we embarked to drift for the remainder of the night. At 5 in the morning of the 28th, we were at the commencement of the Ramparts, where the river is hemmed in to the width of from four hundred to eight hundred yards, and has a strong current. This is the "second rapid " of Mackenzie, |