ve WE lf pai ie Se eg] NAS VOLUME xv \ VAS ROE STAT a SS ee ON Pf © GEOGRAPHIC.” MAGAZINE APRIL, 1925 CONTENTS 4 } The Mother of Rivers—The Great Columbia Ice Field of the Canadian Rockies F With of tihastratlons EWIS cE The Land of the Yellow Lama With 40 Tihustrations Geographic Society’s Yunnan xpeditionShe LEAGUE co 7) sk of the rugs--about doce The rich Orientals thor-adorn fine homes...the ices...the banker's, the ask any of these rugs about the shoes that walk on them. So many of them—if they could talk—would tell you of men who wear Banistes i Not that shoes of themselves carry men up to suc- cess, But successful men carry their niceties of choice and judgment even down ta shoes. They demand the last word in appearance and comfort. Therefore, for eighty years gone by, for now, and for untold years to come, these shoes, have been, are, and will be chosen by such men: Someme ner you sells Banticer Skoer. Don't ow knows sho? Then write to ws and permit xs 10 tell yom Thanh rem JAMES A. BANISTER CO. Newatk, New Jeney B HISTER hoes SINCE 1845 THE CHOICE OF GENTLEMENVor: XLVI, No. 4 WASHINGTON Aprin, 1925 THE NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC MAGAZINE Bese carer a THE MOTHER OF RIVERS An Account of a Photographic Expedition to the Great Columbia Ice Field of the Canadian Rockies By Lew R. Fre Cannon on Yine Copoanag,” am rue Naviowas: Canaan Manze Avrine imvreame first regions of thie Canadian Rocks tw he visited by a white explorer was alo one of the last to be scientifically investizated and comprehensively photo- graphed. ‘This is the land of tall peaks and. glaeier-choked valleys arvinnd the head of the Athahaska River. Here one finds the most striking Alpine scenery af the Western Hemisphere. David ‘Thompson, the astronomer-ex- plorer of the Northwest Company, who was later to ran the Astors s0 close a race for the establishment of the first furs rrading post on the Pacific coast of what is now Oregon, crassed the Continental Divide during the first decade of the roth century, He followed the Whirlpool Ianch of the Athailiaski to its head, and descended to the Hig Benil of the Colum bia: by a stream he vamed the Mortage River, pow called the Wood (ste map, page 382). ‘The tral thus blazed later became the main transcontinental route of the Hid son's Bay Company traders between the great Canadian plains and their posts on the upper and Fower Colimbia Thus ft chanced that a thin, but fairly stenidy, stream of travel flowed back and forth across the Continental Divide at the head of the Athabaska difring the half century of more ih which the remainder I IS a strange fnct shit one of the MAN ot the extetisive area covered ly thie ‘anadian Rockies was rarely visited hy white men, TRADERS AND TRATVERS FOUND ThE C ROUTE Intent mainly on finidinge the lowest passes anil the easiest routes of travel, the early trailers and trappers must have been almost, if not quite, ignorant of the existence, 2 few miles to the south, of the most extensive ice field on the conti the iretic and subarctic regions of the far north. The Canadian Pacitic through the Rockies an 80 to. 100 miles south of the Ce Ice Field, while the Grand 'Troml—ater the Canadian National—foundl a lower and easier route as far to the north. Careful studies for bath lines added little, if any, kriwledge of the still un- trodden heights of the icelocked terra incognita between. Not until the Laterprovineial Survey completed its lihors along the Continental Divide between Alberta and British Cor Inmbia did definite and dependable data on this hithert) alinost unknown. fegion finally become available, Among many valuable geographical and. topographical facts revealed by the work of the Interpravincial Sieve: