As to the region explored by him in 1906 (See p. 23), Mr. McInnes reports:—“Though a wooded country throughout, there are but limited areas where the forest growth is of a size to be commercially of much value. There are no hard woods, the only deciduous trees that attain merchantable measurements being the canoe birch, the aspen and balsam poplars and the tamarack. Black spruce is the most abundant coniferous tree and grows to a size sufficient at least for pulpwood. Associated with tamarack, it covers all the more marshy tracts, giving way where the land becomes drier to white spruce, which is the timber tree of the region, and on the driest ridges to Banksian pine. Forest fires have been widespread and most destructive throughout the whole region sparing only the very wet muskeg areas and a few tracts isolated by surrounding water or marsh. “White and black spruce, tamarack, aspen, balsam and canoe birch form the forest surrounding Cross lake, the deciduous trees for the most part growing only in a fringe along the immediate shores. TREES OF SUITABLE SIZE FOR SAWING into eight and ten inch boards are found on the islands, along the stream valleys and in places near the lake shores, but the general average size of the trees inland is smaller than this.” Mr. McInnes has the following to say of the timber he noticed in his ascent of Burntwood river:—“Above Odei river the forest is mainly spruce and tamarack of about sixty years growth, the larger trunks reaching diameters of from eight to ten inches, but the general average not more than six inches. In the valleys occasional white spruces and tamaracks attain diameters as great as eighteen inches. These are trees that have escaped when the surrounding forest was burned and are sufficient evidence that, but for the repeated fires, there would be large areas covered with good timber. In the fifteen mile stretch of the Burntwood below Waskwatim lake, the low flat along the river is covered by sixty years’ timber growth, mainly of Banksian pine and spruce. The higher plateau is wooded principally with spruce from six to eight inches in diameter, with scattered Banksian pine, poplar and white birch succeeding an earlier burned forest. A mixed second growth forest, mainly aspen poplar, covers all the uplands round Waskwatim lake, while on the islands and on low flats bordering bays of the lake are found white spruce and poplar of diameters up to one foot. The country north of Footprint lake is described by Mr. McInnes as being covered for the most part with a mixed second growth from ten to thirty years old, but with here and there clumps of white spruce, with tall and straight trunks a foot or more in diameter. As to the region just north of the Saskatchewan, Mr. McInnes says the areas of forest, where the trunks are large enough to be of commercial value, are limited. The principal tracts of large standing timber are situated to the north of Moose lake,