that there are numerous veins of mineral coal in this section. The observations that I made on the quality of the soil induce me to believe that these deposits of coal extend as far as the numerous coal mines which exist in the territories watered by the Saskatchewan and Athabasca lake, of which I have already spoken, in my letters in 1845 and 1846, after traveling over those places.
Evident tokens convince the traveler that the immense plains that he is crossing, and on which not even a shrub grows, have not always been destitute of wood. Petrified trunks and entire trees frequently meet the eye. Astonishment and admiration seize the mind, and excite conjectures concerning the manner in which these changes have been
wrought. But what answer offer to the question, " Why are not these lands wooded as they must have been in former times?" The steppes of Asia, the pampas of South America and the western prairies of this hemisphere, seem to posses a common and uniform character; generally speaking, they have neither trees nor shrubs on them. Some observers attribute it to the action of frequent fires which have passed over these localities; others to the change undergone in the climate, or to the natural sterility'of the soil; and there are some who pretend that some operation or convulsion of nature has destroyed the forests which formerly existed here, and has reduced them to their present condition. I have examined different localities; and the enormous heaps of shells of the testaceous kind and of the genus muscula, which I found a few feet from the summits of the loftiest hills, and which were incorporated in alluvial earth and mingled with sand and water-worn pebbles, convince me that this portion of land has undergone changes as great as they are amazing. .
On the same day we traversed a mountainous elevation which stretches as far as the Owl-head Buttes. These buttes or mounds, in this ocean-like prairie, serve as guides to the warrior, the traveler and the hunter, who can perceive them thirty miles off. From the summit of this extensive emi-