REPORT BY GEORGE M. DAWSON. 19

general level of the plateau is here about 850 feet above the Fraser, or
2,550 feet above the sea. On its surface terrace-flats.cease to appear,
and are replaced by low rolling hills and hillocks, formed of boulder clay,
here a hard, partly arenaceous material of pale fawn colour, charged
with rolled pebbles and boulders of very various origin, but for the most
part of rocks which may be attributed to the Lower Cache Creek series.
Basalt is not seen in place on the part of the plateau over which the trail
passes, but in boulders is pretty abundant where the plateau-level is first
reached, on leaving the Fraser Valley. In some places the low drift hills
show a very general tendency to north and south arrangement of their
longer axes, and in one locality a small rocky hill, projecting through
the thick drift covering, was seen with a fan-shaped mound of detrital
matter on its south side. A range of low hills rising above the plateau
to the south-west of the trail, appears to run with a general course of
N. 55° W. The summits may stand 500 feet above the general level. On
reaching Goose or Herkyelthtie Lake,—half way from Quesnel to Black-
water Bridge,—this range breaks down, and an irregularly hilly and
rolling conntry stretches westward. The lake is about 1,050 feet above
the Fraser. Beyond Goose Lake a rather extensive gently undulating
terrace-plateau, with an average elevation of 1,012 feet above Quesnel,
or 2,706* above the sea, was noted. The material of this plateau and
that covering the surface of the country generally is boulder clay of the
type above described, which, though implying water deposit, is in some
places so much broken into mounds and ridges as to suggest moraines,
In a few miles the range to the west again becomes pretty well defined,
and with the same height as at first, runs parallel with the trail at an
average distance of about three miles, but separated from it by a broad
valley which holds a chain of small lakes, with wide swampy meadows.
From the northern brink of the Blackwater Valley a very extensive
view is gained, showing the north-western continuation of this,—the
Telegraph Range,—and the lower country toward Fort George.

Fires have passed extensively and often over the country between
Quesnel and Blackwater, destroying the original thick growth of western
scrub pine (P. contorta), and Douglas fir (Ab/es Douglasii), and in some
places, over considerable areas, almost completely removing the wind-
fall. Small alders, aspens and scattered scrub-pines come up on these
burnt areas, with grass which, though sometimes wiry and “sour,” is
often of good quality and mixed with wild pea and vetch. It is evident

_* The height of the flat on which Quesnel is built being, by a simultaneous series of barometer obser-
vations there, and on an instrumentally levelled line 1,694 feet.

Plateau between
Quesnel and
Blackwater.

Effect of
forest fires.