In his examination before the Senate committee of 1888, Doctor G. M. Dawson instituted a comparison between parts of northwestern Canada and a province of northern European Russia as follows:—“I have a few notes here worth considering while we are dealing with the question of this northern country. I looked up the circumstances of the northern provinces of Russia and I found that the province of Russia which seemed to compare most nearly with that shown on this map, both in its relation in Russia to the Atlantic, corresponding to the relation of this country to the Pacific, and also in its latitude, is the province of Vologda. That province has a total area of one hundred and fifty-five thousand, two hundred and sixty-five square miles, and it is chiefly drained to the north like the country shown here. It lies between latitudes 58° and 65°. It is about seven hundred and fifty miles in greatest length and three hundred miles greatest width. It is drained by the Dwina river chiefly. Its products are carried by this river to Archangel and exported thence in vessels by White sea in the same way that we hope this northern country of ours may be served by the Mackenzie and Arctic sea. The mouth of the Dwina is in latitude 65°, only a little south of the latitude of the mouth of the Mackenzie. The climate of the two countries is very similar. The winters are severe and the summers warm. There is no very heavy rainfall, such as we find near the western coasts bordering on the Atlantic and on the Pacific. The exports from that province of Vologda are oats, rye, barley, hemp, flax and pulse. The mineral products are salt, copper, iron and marble. Horses and cattle are reared, while the skins of various wild animals, as well as pitch and turpentine, are exported. This province supports a population of one million, one hundred and sixty-one thousand inhabitants.[19]