The American Wilderness 13 



pers, only a few, such as the cougar, peccary, rac 

 coon, possum (and among birds the wild turkey), 

 find their nearest representatives and type forms in 

 tropical America. 



Of course this general resemblance does not mean 

 identity. The differences in plant life and animal 

 life, no less than in the physical features of the land, 

 are sufficiently marked to give the American wilder 

 ness a character distinctly its own. Some of the 

 most characteristic of the woodland animals, some 

 of those which have most vividly impressed them 

 selves on the imagination of the hunters and pioneer 

 settlers, are the very ones which have no Old- World 

 representatives. The wild turkey is in every way 

 the king of American game birds. Among the small 

 beasts the coon and the possum are those which have 

 left the deepest traces in the humbler lore of the 

 frontier; exactly as the cougar usually under the 

 name of panther or mountain lion is a favorite 

 figure in the wilder hunting tales. Nowhere else is 

 there anything to match the wealth of the eastern 

 hardwood forests, in number, variety, and beauty 

 of trees ; nowhere else is it possible to find conifers 

 approaching in size the giant redwoods and sequoias 

 of the Pacific slope. Nature here is generally on a 

 larger scale than in the Old- World home of our 

 race. The lakes are like inland seas, the rivers, like 

 arms of the sea. Among stupendous mountain 

 chains there are valleys and canyons of fathomless 



