Thanks to its being crossed by the old fur traders’ portage routes from Cumberland House, Fort à la Corne and Fort Carlton, on the Saskatchewan, to Frog portage on the upper Churchill and Methye portage on the Clearwater, the southern part of the region immediately under review has been known and written about for many years, but there is very little indeed in the ancient writings worthy of notice in this chapter. The first white travellers over the long and toilsome water routes of this beautiful country of swift-running rivers and isle-studded lakes were the enterprising fur traders from Montreal, who in course of time combined to form the Northwest Company. Their interests were all centred in the fur trade, and while travelling through the country, business, time and the exigencies of the commissariat combined to PREVENT THEM FROM EXPLORING the country with a view to investigating its natural resources, even if they had any inclination to do so, which is doubtful. At any rate such of these pioneer travellers through this country as ventured to write about their travels devoted their literary efforts to describing their adventures en route, their camps, the methods and habits of the voyageurs and Indians, the Indian camping places, and the rivers, lakes and overland trails traversed. Generally very minute details were given in these old books of travel as to the geographical features of the country, distances, bearings, the direction and currents of the rivers, the size, shapes and relative situation of the lakes, etc., but one reads over page after page, and book after book, without finding a single reference to the soil, or to the possibilities of the country from an agricultural point of view. In the course of time the opening up to the fur trade of the farther northwest on the banks of Athabaska and Mackenzie rivers resulted in a greatly increased amount of travel over the old canoe routes, but it did not attract attention to the natural wealth of this region, and until recent years the attractions this country offers to the agricultural settler have remained unrecognized. Sir Alexander Mackenzie, in his book (1801), states that “no part of this country has ever been cultivated by natives or Europeans, except a small garden at Ile à la Crosse, which well repaid the labour bestowed upon it.”