Moconnett, | FINLAY RIVER. 13 ©

Lake, reaching the latter about half a mile below the old landing.
Three miles from the landing a sharp descent of 700 feet was made
over the face of an escarpment running parallel with the lake.

Tacla Lake is one of those long narrow bodies of water so prevalent Tacla Lake.
throughout British Columbia. 1+ occupies a great longitudinal valley,
running parallel with that at the western base of the Rocky Moun-
tains which now holds the Finlay and Parsnip. The two valleys are
separated by about eighty miles of rough mountainous country.

Tacla Lake was not examined except for three or four miles south of
the landing. It is from two to three miles in width, and is bordered
on both sides by heavily timbered flats several miles wide. It is sep-
arated from Babine Lake, which occupies a somewhat similar valley
farther to the west, by the Fire-pan Mountains.

The most notable feature of the country in the latitude of the Mountainous
Omenica and Finlay rivers, or from latitude 55° 30! to latitude 57° or CumUY-
beyond, is its universal mountainous character. In this latitude, the
whole country from the eastern edge of the Rocky Mountains west-
ward to the Pacific Ocean is destitute of plains of any considerable
extent, and with the exception of the breaks where the region is
crossed by the valleys mentioned above, is covered with a succession
of mountains and mountain ranges varying in height from 3000 to
5000 feet above the valleys. In no other part of British Columbia is
the country so persistently mountainous across the whole Cordilleran
belt.

Finlay River.

The Finlay River is named after John Finlay, who ascended it in Finlay River.
1824 in the interests of the North-west Company. The journal kept
by Mr. Finlay on this journey has never been published. It is now at
Cumberland House in the possession of Mr. James McDougall of the
Hudson Bay Co., where it was seen and some extracts taken from it Previous ex-
by Mr. J. B. Tyrrell in 1894. Miners are also reported to have as- Oe:
cended the river to varying distances during the Omenica excitement,
and in 1891. an exploring expedition sent by the British Columbia
Government ascended it to Fort Grahame a distance of about forty-five
miles.

The Finlay River is much the larger of the two streams which form General char-

Peace River, and is practically the upper part of that river. It has a ay R ce in-