Page:Oregon Historical Quarterly vol. 5.djvu/340

During the past winter, I have been continually picking up Musci and Jungermannire, and forming a collection of birds and other animals. My knowledge is somewhat limited in these families, so that I hardly dare to pronounce as to what may be new; but I take care to secure everything I can lay my hands upon. It would have been in my power to make my way to Montreal this season, and would have gladly embraced the opportunity of seeing such an extensive and interesting country as lies between; but to overlook the inviting prospect now before me was more than I could do. I rejoice to tell you of a new species of Pinus, the most princely of the genus, perhaps even the grandest specimen of vegetation. It attains the enormous height of from one hundred and seventy to two hundred and twenty feet, with a circumference of fifty feet, and cones from twelve to eighteen inches long! I possess one of the latter, measuring one foot five inches long, and ten inches round the thickest part. The trunk grows remarkably straight and destitute of branches till near the top, where they form a perfect umbel; the wood of fine quality, yielding a large quantity of resin. Growing trees of this Pinus, which have been partly burnt by the natives to save themselves the trouble of collecting fuel, a custom to which they are greatly addicted, produce a substance which, I am almost afraid to say, is sugar; but as some of it, together with the cones, will soon reach England, its real nature will then be correctly ascertained. This Pinus is found abundantly two degrees south of the Columbia River, in the country of the Umptqua tribe of Indians, who collect its seeds in autumn and pound them into a kind of cake, which they consider as a kind of luxury, using also the saccharine substance that I have described above, in the same way as civilized nations do sugar. I intend to bring home such an assemblage of specimens as will allow a correct figure to be taken of this tree, and also to try my success with a bag of its seeds.

I hope to make some addition to the genus Phlox, and to obtain P. speciosa (Bot. Reg. t. 1351), if it be in existence. Of Liliaceous plants I am sure there must be a great variety.

I heard of Captain Franklin's party from Cumberland Lake on the way to Bear Lake, their winter residence. Dr. Richardson did not write to me, as the party who brought me the news only spent a few minutes with them: I learn there is a Mr. Drummond attached to them as naturalist (whom I take to be Mr. D., of Forfar.) He is on the opposite side of the mountains at Peace River.

There is here a Mr. McLeod, who spent the last five years at Fort Good Hope, on the Mackenzie River. He informs me that if the natives, to whom he is perfectly known, can be credited, there must exist a northwest passage. They describe a very large river that runs parallel with the Mackenzie, and falls into the sea near Icy Cape, at the mouth of which is an establishment on an island, where they go to