LIFE AND HABITS 33 



eat. Onward they go, increasing their speed, under the 

 able leadership of the older does, while the advance guard 

 of winter whitens the country as though anxious to conceal 

 the trails of those that travel. 



This brings us to the Third Period in the lives ot our 

 animals — the period of desolation and suffering, when 

 Nature in her stern way thins out the weakling, prunes the 

 Caribou tree of all branches that are not strong and healthy. 

 The gates close behind the travelling herds, lakes and rivers 

 are frozen, the treacherous bog pools become more 

 treacherous as the ice forms and is covered with snow, so 

 that no animal can see where the safe road winds its way 

 across the open country from forest to forest. As the 

 winter continues the snow lies deeper and deeper covering 

 all things, levelling the irregularities, and making the life of 

 the wild a hard and terrible light from which only the 

 strongest and cleverest emerge. On the flat land conditions 

 are entirely unfavourable for the Caribou ; the snow has 

 covered their ground food, so that nothing can be found 

 except the tree mosses. In the higher lands, therefore, 

 they must live until the approach of spring. A dreary 

 prospect, but one to which they are accustomed by the 

 inherited experience of countless generations. In the high 

 lands the wind helps the animals by sweeping the snow 

 from the ground and thus exposing their food. The cold 

 accompanying these fierce northerly gales must be intense, 

 and any animal less well suited to the conditions would 

 soon succumb, but the Caribou has been well provided by 

 Nature to withstand even the keenest cold. Their coats are 

 extremely thick, and though they have but little oily wool 

 next to the skin, the hair is so constructed that it offers the 

 greatest possible protection. Not only is the hair long and 

 very close, but it is hollow, like miniature quills, so that a 



