During 1926, the Atlantic Experimental Station at Halifax, under the direction of Professor A. J. Huntsman, gave several outstanding contributions towards the processing of fish. After careful investigations it was shown that the complicated operation of smoking fish could be so controlled as to make possible the regulation of the smoking, so that a standard product could be obtained.

Another important investigation at this station-expected to be far-reaching in results-was that in connection with the freezing of fish. It was demonstrated that the method of freezing fish in air requiring many hours and much ice, could be replaced by a new process-that of immersing the fish in brine for a few minutes, the ice required being much less than in the old method and the product of a superior quality.

Improved methods of canning sardines, preserving lobsters and drying fish also engaged the attention of the workers at the Halifax station.

At the Nanaimo Station the tagging of salmon already described formed an important feature of the work during 1926. The life of the shipworm, destructive to wharves and wooden vessels was also studied.

At Prince Rupert investigations were made of: the value of quick freezing of halibut; the chemical changes taking place to the flesh during freezing; the factors causing the discoloring of the skin of halibut kept in the holes of vessels; and the character, vitamin content and value as food for poultry and stock of the liver oil of dog fish.

The

The American Buffalo; The Caribou and Reindeer. buffalo at Wainwright Park thrived so successfully during 1926 and preceding years that there is now little possibility of this noble animal meeting the fate of the dodo and the passenger pigeon.

As Wainwright Park is only 13 miles square it can support but 8 thousand head of buffalo. Therefore, it was necessary during 1926 to ship two thousand head to the Wood Buffalo Park, south of the Great Slave Lake. The surplus of over two thousand head were slaughtered and their flesh sold.

Buffalo robes used extensively 40 years before and since almost unpurchaseable were again put on the market in 1926-27 and owing to the improved methods of tanning the hides by Government experts at Wainwright Park, they were of a finer quality than those formerly obtained from the wild buffalo.

Several observations during 1926 indicated that the caribou, an animal very closely resembling the reindeer of Northern Europe, had changed the course and range of its migrations. Superintendent Telford, stationed at Dawson, reported in November, 1926, that on an inspection trip on the Yukon River so many caribou were encountered swimming across the stream that it was necessary to steer the steamer very carefully and on several occasions to

stop it in order to avoid striking the animals. Major L. Burwash also reported that the caribou that formerly migrated in the Summer to King William's Island in the Arctic Ocean, in 1926 came no farther north than Adelaide Peninsula.

Reports of the rapid depletion of the caribou, the chief food of the Indians and Eskimos indicated the urgency of utilizing the Northern Plains of Canada for the pasturing of reindeer. The reckless use of rifles was so diminishing the herds that every Winter brought an increasing number of deaths from starvation to the population.

During 1926 the North-West Territory and Yukon Branch of the Department of the Interior undertook an investigation of the reindeer industry in Greenland and Alaska. The Porslid brothers, Danish experts, were engaged to study the situation in Alaska and then to travel on foot through the Arctic coastal region to Aklavik in the Mackenzie River delta and onward to Coronation Gulf and Chesterfield Inlet, on Hudson Bay. They were to note as they proceeded the best routes for migration and to study the vegetation suitable for fodder. They entered on the field in June 1926, and by March, 1927 had reached Point Barrow, Alaska.

About 1923, a company, which had obtained a lease of a large tract in Southern Baffin Island for the herding of reindeer, stocked it with several hundred animals. An observer, sent out to study their progress, returned in June, 1927, and reported that the whole herd had been exterminated. Many died of starvation, as the meagre vegetation did not supply sufficient food, and the remainder were destroyed by wolves.

Physics and

Chemistry

Professor H. T. Barnes of McGill University, Montreal, in a communication to the Royal Society early in 1927 described the results of experiments on the disruptive effect of igniting thermit in the interior of an iceberg. When a charge of one hundred pounds of this inflammable substance was ignited in a cavity three feet deep in an iceberg of five hundred feet diameter, the intense heat wave that penetrated the ice mass turned ice to steam and rent fissures with explosive violence. The noise could be heard five miles away and continued for many hours. Before the action ceased the whole interior of the iceberg, 125 feet high, had crumbled Other experiments showed still further how effectively icebergs could be destroyed by thermit.

Lake Levels and Water Surveys. Between April 1926 and April 1927, a rise in the level of all the lakes occurred, the increase being over a foot in Lakes Superior and Ontario, nearly a foot in Lake Huron and but only 6 inches in Lake Erie. Lakes Superior, Huron and Erie, during April 1926, were the lowest in sixty-seven years during which levels had been recorded.

Although all rose between April, 1926, and April 1927, the levels at the latter date were still lower than the average for the sixty-seven years, Lake Superior being about 4 inches lower, Lake Huron, 2 feet, 2 inches lower; Lake Erie, 1 foot, 1 inch lower; and Lake Ontario, 4 inches lower. During the month of May 1927, the levels of all the Lakes continued to rise, Lake Superior rising almost 6 inches and Lakes Huron and Erie about 4 inches above the height in April.

The Canadian Hydrographic Surveys of the Department of Marine was engaged during 1926 in charting the waters of the lower St. Lawrence River, especially the Channel near Anticosti Island, used more largely by steamers on account of the shorter distance, thus avoiding the Gaspé Current.

Owing to the lowering of the water in the Great Lakes, Georgian Bay was re-surveyed. During the Summer of 1926 the entrance to Key Harbour was chartered.

The Winnipeg River, as far as Pine Falls, and its entrance to Lake Winnipeg were also charted and marked with buoys in order to make it safe for navigation.

New Pacific Cable. The Pacific cable between Bamfield, Vancouver Island and Suva, Fiji Islands via Fanning Island, a distance of five thousand nautical miles, was duplicated in 1926 at a cost of $11,300,000—the work being completed about the middle of November of that year.

The stretch of cable between Bamfield and Fanning Island (3,440 miles) is the longest single length of cable in the world. The Telegraph Construction and Maintenance Company of London, England, which secured the contract of laying the cable, did not have a ship in its fleet that could carry the cable required. The Company ordered the Steamship Dominia- the largest cable ship in the world, being 509 feet in length-to be constructed with four special tanks in which the cable could be stored. Special attention was given to her engines, so essential is it in the delicate operation of cable - laying that these should function quickly and reliably at all speeds whether going ahead or astern.

The cable was paid out at a rate slightly faster than the rate of the ship. This extra cable known as the slack was for the purpose of preventing strain due to any irregularities of the ocean bed. The cable lies at great depth, and at some points is more than twenty thousand feet below the surface.

*NOTE. Taken from a summary supplied by the Canadian Hydrographic Service. and The Monthly Bulletin.

The cable used is what is called the "continuously loaded" type. The inductive loading which has brought this remarkable advance consists in surrounding the copper conductor of the cable with a thin winding of a special nickel iron alloy. The characteristic property of this alloy is that it is easily magnetized and demagnetized by small magnetizing influences. This loading made possible the sending of 1,100 letters per minute over the new cable, whereas the capacity of the old cable was only 250 letters per minute. With the completion of the duplicated cable from Bamfield to Suva in 1926, the Pacific Cable Board became the owner and operater of 16,555 nautical miles of cable in the Pacific Ocean.

New Surveys.* The Topographical Survey of Canada during 1926 had twenty-two parties in the field, making surveys in every Province except Prince Edward Island. Through these surveys a more accurate visual representation of Canada's physical and cultural features was given by maps and plans. A national topographic map series to cover the whole country was well advanced, and during 1926 data for at least six new maps was gathered.

It was especially in the field of aerial surveying that marked advance was made, placing Canada without a rival in this field. The myriads of lakes that dot the surface make excellent landing places for the hydroplanes used in this work. During 1926 nearly 60,000 square miles were photographed from the air, and over four per cent. of Canada's area was so photographed. The chief field

of operations during the year was in Northern Manitoba, and by April, 1927, preliminary maps showing water, cultural features, stands of merchantable timber, burnt-over areas, muskegs, etc., had already been issued for the information of foresters and road makers. No less than 41,703 aerial photographs were taken during 1926.

The

Dominion Observatories and National Parks. Dominion Observatory at Ottawa during 1926 was engaged in many astronomical observations, most of which are of too technical a character to be described. The Seismological Department recorded on its instruments 361 earthquakes during the year, but the most of these were not violent. The regions most affected were the East Indies, especially near the Solomon Islands, and the Pacific Ocean near Central America.

A very interesting record was obtained from a tree trunk, which, after being embedded in a glacier for thousands of years, was dropped from its terminal moraine. The annual rings of growth on the tree revealed a variation of growth every 111⁄2 years, showing that the sun-spot cycle has obtained for many thousands of years.

At the Astrophysical Observatory in Victoria, B.C., the work during 1926 was of a highly technical character, spectra of many stars being studied in order to compute their radial velocity.

NOTE.-Taken from a summary prepared by the Topographical Survey of Canada.

Canada's National Parks never attracted so many tourists as during 1926. This was due to the fact that the marvellous attractions of these beauty spots had become better known, and especially because the Department of the Interior was continually making them accessible by motor roads. During 1926, the Kicking Horse Trail was completed. This highway runs from Lake Louise in Rocky Mountain Park across the Great Divide, through the beautiful Kicking Horse Valley, through Yoho Park to Field; thence to the west end of the park, from which a provincial highway proceeds to Golden. This highway gives access to the famous Yoho Valley for the first time.

Waterton Lakes Park in Southern Alberta in the past attracted little attention, but a new hotel, under course of construction in 1927, and a bus service connecting it with Banff and another bus and boat service connecting it with the adjacent Glacier National Park in Montana was expected to make it rival in popularity some of the more northern parks.

In May, 1927, a new national playground was established by the Department of the Interior in Central Saskatchewan to be known as Prince Albert Park. It is situated north of Prince Albert, covers 1,377 square miles, and preserves in perpetuity for the Canadian people a region covered with forests, dotted with beautiful lakes, teaming with fish, and bordered with beautiful sand beaches. Canoeists can travel in every direction with few and easy portages, and with little difficulty they can travel right through to Hudson Bay.

Exploration

Major L. T. Burwash, who left Aklavik, at the delta of the Mackenzie River, July 1st, 1925, on an expedition of nine thousand miles across the Northern Plains of Canada spent the Winter of 1925-26 in a hut on the bleak King William Island in the Arctic Ocean, from which he made explorations in all directions. In the Spring of 1926 he sledded across to Hudson Bay and travelled south in an open boat to Chesterfield Inlet. He sailed through Hudson Strait in August, 1926 and reached Ottawa early in September. The chief purpose of his trip was to study the Eskimo and estimate their number. He visited every tribe between Alaska and Hudson Bay and found they numbered about three thousand. Some in the interior and on the Arctic coast had scarcely before ever seen a white man and were untouched by civilization. They knew nothing about Canada, their Sovereign, or the British Empire. Major Burwash made this trip unaccompanied by a white man. He was to submit a full report of his work to the North-west Territories and Yukon Branch of the Department of the Interior.

J. Dewey Soper, formerly of the University of Alberta, returned in October, 1926, from two years' exploration in the interior of Baffin Island, during which he travelled more than three thousand miles and collected over three thousand five hundred scientific