^v. ^.\^^ IMAGE EVALUATION TEST TARGET (MT-3) ^^ ... ■«j* >j ^^ / Q^ V.x 1.0 I.I 1.25 !^ i^ IIIIIZ2 u U ill 1.6 V] <^ /^ 'c^l <^. VI ^/. y /A cv %'• i^- \ CIHM/ICMH Microfiche Series. CIHM/ICMH Collection de microfiches. Canadian Institute for Historical Microreproductions Institut Canadian de microreproductions historiques 1980 Technical Notes / Notes techniques The Institute has attempted to obtain the best original copy available for filming. Physical features of this copy which may alter any of the images in the reproduction are checked below. Coloured covers/ Couvertures de couleur Coloured maps/ Cartes gdographiques en couleur Pages discoloured, stained or foxed/ Pages ddcolordes, tachetdes ou piqu^es Tight binding (may cause shadows or distortion along interior margin)/ Reliure serrd (peut causer de I'ombre ou de la distortion le long de la marge intdrieure) L'Institut a rricrofilm6 le meilleur exempiaire qu'il lui a 6t6 possible de se procurer. Certains difauts susceptibles de nuire d la qualitd de la reproduction sont rotds ci-dessous. D D D D Coloured pages/ Pages de couleur Coloured plates/ Planches en couleur Show through/ Transparence Pages damaged/ Pages endommag6es The pos oft film The con or t app The film inst Ma| in upp bot foll( D Additional comments/ Commentaires suppldmentaires Bibliographic Notes / Notes bibliographiques D Only edition available/ Seule Edition disponible Bound with other material/ Relid avec d'autres documents n Pagination incorrect/ Erreurs de pagination Pages missing/ Des pages manquent n Cover title missing/ Le titre de couverture manque D Maps missing/ Des cartes g^ographiques manquent D Plates missing/ Des planches manquent l~~l Additional comments/ I V I Commentaires suppldmentaires Blank leaves added during restoration may appear within the text. Whenever possible, these have been omitted from filming. The images appearing here are the best quality possible considering the condition and legibility of the original copy and in keeping with the filming contract specifications. Les images suivantes ont 6t6 reproduites avec le plus grand soin, compte tenu de la condition et de la nettetd de I'exemplaire film6, et jn conformity avec les conditions du contrat de filmage. The last recorded frame on each microfiche shall contain the symbol —►(meaning CONTINUED"), or the symbol V (meaning "END"), whichever applies. Un des symboies suivants apparaitra sur la der- nidre image de cheque microfiche, selon le cas: le symbole —^- signifie "A SUIVRE", le symbole V signifie "FIN". The original copy was borrowed from, and filmed with, the kind consent of the following institution: Library of the Public Archives of Canada Maps or plates too large to be entirely included in one exposure are filmed beginning in the upper left hand corner, left tc right and top to bottom, as many frames as required. The following diagrams illustrate the method: L'exemplaire i\\m6 fut reproduit grSce d la g6n6rosit6 de I'^tablissement prdteur suivant : La bibliothdque des Archives pubjiques du Canada Les cartes ou les planches trop grandes pour dtre reproduites en un seul clich6 sont film^es d partir de Tangle sup6rieure gauche, de gauche d droite et de haut en bas, en prenant le nombre d'images ndcessaire. Le diagramme suivant illustre la mdthode : 1 2 3 1 2 3 4 5 6 t (Reprinted from The Canadian Reookd of Sciknoe, Vol. III., No. 1, 1888.) The Prairies of Manitoba. ( By a. T. Drummond. In AugU8t of this year, another opportunity occurred to mo of examining the superficial deposits around Portage la Prairie, Birtle and Kin brae — the last named place about thirty miles north-west of Fort EUice. The resulting facts will prove of interest in connec(ioi) with questions that have been discussed about the origin of the north-west prairies. At Portage la Praiiie the country is on all sides flat, and bears evidence of two to thi-ee ])eriods of growth and decay of grasses and reeds in shallow water, alternating with periods of subsidence of the land. The general surface is perhaps twelve feet above the Assiniboine Eiver, and that stream is in tui-n about the same number of feet higher than Lake Manitoba, which lies only fourteen miles to the northward. The banks of the river, in a height of twelve feet, show three layers of black loam, each from six to twelve inches or more in thickness, alternating with a creamy gi'ay clay, and the whole underlaid near the water's edge by a reddish clay. Boulders throughout this section of the country and eastward to Winnipeg are unseen, even in the bed of the river at low water. Towanls VVestbourne, the large tract of low land, usually covered with water, and lying between Rat Creek and the Westbourne marsh proper, and ti. rough which the Manitoba and Northwestern Rail- i 6Q) 40 Canadian Record of Science. way's track is built, was perfectly dry. That this was an oxceptionally dry year, was shown by the enormous num- bers of dead shells of Limruta, Planorhis, Physa and other genera, which, everywhere, rendered the ground crisp under the tread of the foot. The gi'ound was covered by a heavy growth of grasses of three or four species, scattered everywhere in great patches, each grass occupying its own patches to the exclusion of the other grasses. The soil is a heavy black loam, and the surrounding circumstances all clearly show how such soils have been formed in the val- leys of the Lower Assiniboino and of the Red Eiver, and around Lake Manitoba, by the annual decay of such marsh grasses. To the westward of the Big Grass Marsh and the "West- bourne Marsh, cii'cumstances are changed. The countiy, after leaving the gravel ridges which strike the line of the Manitoba and Noi-thwestern Eailway at Arden, becomes of a slightly rolling character, and increasingly so some dis- tance farther westward. As Neepawa is approached, the surface loam is underlaid by sand. Buulders become exposed in the river valley at Minnedosa and in the side valleys leading into it — washed out, no doubt, from the di-ift clays which at a greater or less depth underlie the surface soil. At Birtlo, the Laurentian boulders are not only common in tbe deep valleys, especially on the eastern side, of the Bird Tail and of Snake Creek, — appearing in almost a solid mass of both large and small boulders at one point at the creek level near Birtle — but aie also on the surface of the prairie above. They are in the latter case, generally more common in and upon the sui-face of the low ridges which here and there somewhat pai-allel each other. Proceeding still westward, boulders are not fi-equent in the valley of the Assiniboine Eiver at Foj't Eliice and at the railway crossing eighteen miles up the stream, but the bed of the river at the ford is formed entirely of very large sized gravel. Nor do boulders api)ear again until the country beyond Langenburg is reached. Heie there are two or three gi-avelly knolls rising twenty-tive or thirty feet above the general level, like the Spy Hills, also gravelly knolls, 'i vy/v/ o>- Prairies of Manitoba. 41 nearer Fort Ellice, In tlie vicinity of Kinbrae, the surface soil is a sandy loam with ridges of loam mixed with gravel. A well sunk here on George B. Fisher's farm, gave a section showing in descending order, one foot of sandy loam, eleven feet of clay, with a few rounded boulders in it, and thirty feet of sand, which grew coarser towards the bottom. At Langenburg, another well gave, before the sand was reached, one hundred and sixty feet of wet sticky clay, holding boulders. There was considerable difficulty in securing water at tbis latter place until this depth was reached. At neither yjlace was there any appearance of layers of black loam as at Portage la Prairie and Winnipeg. The boulders hoi-e and at Birtle ai-e relatively small, sel- dom exceeding two feet across, and, with the gravel, have rather the worn appearance resulting from tho action of ice than the rounded look which the water on a sea or lake coast would give them. Both boulders and gravel in the neighborhood of Kinbrae are Laurentian, intermixed with some of a limestone which weathers a buif in colour. One of these larger limestone boulders was heavily striated and was, otherwise, worn smooth to the condition of a slab. Nearly all of the sloughs woi-e drj'-, as a result of the drought this year, and some were, like the diy marshes near Westbourne already alluded to, dotted with the dead shells of Limncea and other fresh water mollusks. CONCLUSIONS. The conclusions I have formed are, that the Manitoba prairies oast of the Pembina and Hiding mountains are the most recently formed, and are still undergoing a process of extension in the great marshes still existing and on the shallow lake margins, through the annual growth and decay of the luxuriant gi-asses growing there. There had been two or three depressions of the land in the course of the formation of those prairies, during each of which, deposits of sediment, carried down by the muddy northern and Avestern rivers, wei-e made over the loam formed by such decaying grasses, giving thus the alternate loam and clay now observable. There is no evidence to' show that 4 42 Canadian Record of Science. during these de])ro88ions the HubHidcneo was Hufficiont for, or the other surrounding conditions favourable to, the action <>r oven the existence of Icobergn, though previous to this time, this section of the Northwest was no doubt also subject to the action of ice, all evidence being now covered up by the more recent deposits here i-oforred to. West of these lower and more recentlj' foi-med prairies, are the i-oUing prairies, which have an origin somewhat different. The stretches of sand, both on the sui-face and under the clays, point to the existence of extended lake and sea margins at more than one period. The extensive, some- what parallel gravel ridges at Arden, the gravel knolls, the smaller j-idges with boulders in and on them at Birtle and west of Langenburg, and the uneven, rolling nature of the surface of the pi-airie, all seem to me to point to the action of icebergs in the glacial or post-glacial seas, modified after- wards by the water duiing subsidence, and to indicate the direction of the force, whether wind or current or glaciei', which at these places impelled the bergs onward. Further, the thinner surface loam, mixed to the westward with some sand, would seem to point to a condition of growth and decay of plant life, less defined than and probably of a different chajacter from that on the lower prairies to the eastward. The Assiniboine, though presently a branch of the Red Rivei', was not always so, and is in its upper i-eaches above Brandon, a much older river. When the whole prairie east of the Riding and Pembina Mountains was a vast shallow lake, the Assiniboine was a large stream varying from half a mile to a mile and more in width for most of its course, discharging into this lake the surplus waters of the country to the northward and westward. As the whole surface of the continent here, to the east and west, but more especially to the westvvr^rd, continued to rise, in the long lapse of time, the Assiniboine, with the strongly increased current which its relatively higher level westward gave it, cut its way through the surface soils to its present great depth of about two hundred feet below the prairie level. Specimen of Lake Iron Ore. 48 Ah the land eastward of Brandon rose above the water level, the river had of necessity to form a continuation of its course to some new outlet for its waters. This new outlet was eventually found at Winnipeg, whore it joined the Red River, which must then have been a new stream, formed by the waters of the south, seeking, by reason of the rise of the land there, a new exit to the sea to the northward. That the Assiniboine had by this time become a small stream compared with its former proportions, is shown by the conti-acted banks of this newer part of its course, those at Winnipeg and Portage la Prairie being not more than from two to three hundred feet apart, and from twelve to fifteen feet high.