valley. Flats are usually open, exception being covered
lightly with willow and poplar. Altitude ranges from
2,175 to 2,300 feet. First-class lands are in southern
part. Of second class, 60 per cent. include tracts suitable
for grazing. Meadows and muskegs are negligible.
Patches of fir and spruce occur. Outside Necoslie River
there is little natural water-supply and wells would be
required on 40 per cent. of lots. A road reaches 10 miles
south of the block, serving pre-emptions in Necoslie
Valley. The river, flowing north-west, is 5 to 2 miles
distant from Stuart River, flowing in reverse direction,
with little height of land between. A number of settlers
have clearings, including Esthonians who formed a colony
here in 1923.

To west and south of surveys at south of Stuart Lake
the country is hilly and broken. Sanchi Creek, entering
5¥2 miles west of Stuart River, is rapid and large boulders
hamper canoe navigation a mile up. It drains small! lakes
surrounded by hills in a broken, timbered area. On west
side of Stuart Lake low-lying lands and slopes reach about
12 miles north-west to a creek draining from hills near
Whitefish Lake, which, like Camsell, Grassham, Ogston,
and Tomas Lakes farther south, is surrounded by hills.

STUART-BABINE PORTAGE.

The portage-road from Nancut, 33 miles from Fort St.
James, to Babine Portage on Babine Lake, with branch to
Cunningham Lake, crosses some good land, with many
good meadows between slopes west. of Whitefish Lake
and Cunningham Lake, reaching south about 4 miles wide
to Babine Lake and Sutherland Valley. A fish-hatchery
is operated on a creek entering Cunningham Lake, which
is surrounded by steep rocky hills except at both ends,
where are tracts of fairly level agricultural land, also good
grazing land where fire has removed timber.

On the portage several settlers are located, and Indians
of Nancut raise a few crops adjoining their village at
mouth of the creek entering a reed-strewn bay, on an
arm of which is the abandoned warehouse used when the
Hudson's Bay Company portaged with wagons between the
lakes. The portage crosses slightly rolling country sloping
north-east and south-west from the divide 350 feet above
Stuart, 300 feet above Babine Lake. About two-thirds to
width of 5 miles is well suited to agriculture. A small
portion on the summit is stony. The creeks are small,
irregular, sluggish, draining to Stuart Lake. Babine Port-
age is a small village with warehouse, store, and several
houses of Indians and white settlers.

SUTHERLAND VALLEY.

Sutherland River, small, winding, drains a valley 1 to 2
miles wide, heading in rolling plateau and hill country 35
miles south-east. A trail from Fraser Lake crosses through
a low pass in hills north of Ormonde Lake, and via Peto

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