dition which is so congenial, and in most cases, necessary to their 

 growth, and accounts thus for their absence. 



The section of country surrounding Lake Superior has a peculiar 

 flora. On the lake margin, but especially on its jutting headlands 

 the vegetation has almost a semi-Arctic type. The beech and 

 white oak are everywhere absent, while on the north shore the red 

 oak, rnaple and basswood are almost entirely wanting. But it is 

 less among the trees than among the herbaceous forms that the 

 vegetation is striking. On Keweenan Point and Thunder Cape 

 are semi-Arctic plants the remnants like the Maritime plants of 

 this and other great lakes of a former flora, and suggestive of the 

 colder climate of that part of the country in a now- past epoch. 

 The moist, cool but equable atmosphere, resulting from the 

 presence of such a large body of deep water as Lake Superior, 

 readily accounts for the continuance of these little plants there, 

 and has much to do with the absence of so many of the larger 

 forms of vegetation. A short distance inland from Thunder Bay 

 and this no doubt is a mere illustration of what occurs everywhere 

 on the coast of the lake there is, however, a remarkable change. 

 As the effect of the lake air becomes less perceptible, plants of 

 more temperate range appear, until at about two miles or more up 

 the Kaministiquia River no boreal or semi-Arctic plants are met 

 with, and the vegetation has much the appearance of that of the 

 river valleys of Central Canada. 



The vegetation of the projecting headlands of the lakes is 

 affected by the action of the general flow of the waters of these 

 lakes towards the sea, plants peculiar to the southern and west- 

 ern sides of the lakes being thus found on the immediate shores 

 of the northern sides as well. On the other hand, the coasts of 

 the Lower St. Lawrence are influenced by the cool atmosphere 

 attending the Labrador Arctic Current, a branch of which enters 

 the Gulf of St. Lawrence by the Straits of Belle Isle. 



So rapidly has the Western Ontario Peninsula been brought 

 under cultivation that we can hardly now realize the extent to 

 which it was covered by magnificent forests fifty or more years ago. 

 In 1834 this part of the country was visited by Robert Brown and 



