THE UNIQUE ISLAND OF MOUNT DESERT 



87 



tion of our burned or deforested areas 

 will in the course of hundreds or thou- 

 sands of years develop a sufficient hu- 

 mus carpet to support again the original 

 forest flora and with it the forest fauna, 

 it is of course impossible to say. It is, 

 however, unfortunately apparent that, 

 should that time ever come in the future 

 history of our continent, the original na- 

 tive plants and animals will have become 

 so depleted that the task of resettling fu- 

 ture forests with indigenous life will be 

 an impossible one. 



It has, therefore, long seemed to the 

 writer that the only way in which to con- 

 serve for the enjoyment and study of 

 future generations any portions of our 

 country which by good fortune are still 

 somewhat in their natural condition is 

 the reservation of all such tracts as may 

 properly be set aside, with the explicit 

 stipulation that they be left essentially in 

 the hands of Nature herself to care for. 



This brings me to the crucial point : 

 v/here is the best spot, if only a single 

 spot can be thus preserved, for the per- 

 fection of this ideal? A detailed knowl- 

 edge of the geography; the flora, and to 

 some extent the soil conditions of east- 

 ern North America, acquired through 25 

 years of active exploration in New Eng- 

 land, the Maritime provinces, Quebec, 

 Newfoundland, and Labrador, naturally 

 brings several regions to mind; but as a 

 single area within the possible reach of 

 this hope, the Island of Mount Desert, 

 with its adjacent islets and headlands, 

 stands out as offering the greatest nat- 

 ural diversity. 



This comes obviously from the fact 

 that Mount Desert is the highest land on 

 the Atlantic coast of North America 

 south of the Gulf of St. Lawrence, its 

 hills reaching altitudes of almost mon- 

 tane character. 



The exposed headlands and bogs of 

 the Mount Desert region support be^' 

 tween two and three hundred species of 

 plants which are typical of the arctic, 

 subarctic, and Hudsonian regions of 

 America, and which on the eastern coast 

 of New England or the alpine summits 

 of the White Mountains reach their ac- 

 tual or approximate southern limits — 

 such plants, for instance, as the black 

 crowberry (Bmpetnim nigrum), the 



baked-apple berry (Rubus Chamcemo- 

 rus), the creeping juniper {Juniperus 

 horizontalis) , the Greenland sandwort 

 (Arenaria grcenlandica) , the rose-root 

 {Sedum roseum), and the Banksian pine 

 (Pinus Banksiana). 



But the flora of the Mount Desert re- 

 gion is not by any means entirely arctic 

 or subarctic. There we find essentially 

 all the common plants of the Canadian 

 Zone, and mingling with them in shel- 

 tered nooks or meadows or on warm 

 slopes, many scores of plants which reach 

 their extreme northern or northeastern 

 limits on Mount Desert or the immediate 

 coast — such plants as pitch pine (Pinus 

 rigida), the bear oak (Querciis ilici- 

 folia), the sweet pepperbush (Clethra 

 alnifolia), the swamp loosestrife (Deco- 

 don verticellatus), the meadow beauty 

 (Rhexia virginica) , and the maple-leaved 

 viburnum {Viburnum acerifoliuni). 



This extraordinary accumulation within 

 one small area of the typical plants of 

 the arctic realm, of the Canadian Zone, 

 and in many cases of the southern coastal 

 plain, cannot be duplicated at any point 

 known to the writer. 



In its rock and soil composition Mount 

 Desert offers a most attractive possi- 

 bility. Much of the island consists of 

 granitic rocks, with their consequent acid 

 soils; but the soils derived from some of 

 the metamorphic series, slates and shales, 

 are, judging from the native vegetation, 

 of a basic or even limy character, and 

 many of the swamps are covered not 

 with the heath thickets of acid bogs, but 

 with the characteristic grasses and sedges 

 of sweet areas. 



Several plants of the island, sometimes 

 of rock habitats, sometimes of swamps, 

 suggest themselves at once as species, 

 which in their wide range show a strong 

 preference for sweet or limy habitats : 

 the shrubby cinquefoil (Potentilla fruti- 

 cosa), the showy lady's slipper (Cypri- 

 pedium hirsatum), the hemlock parsley 

 {Conioselinum chinense) , etc. 



These features are sufficient, it would 

 seem, to indicate the remarkable possibili- 

 ties for the future if a tract like Mount 

 Desert can be preserved from the de- 

 struction of its natural charms by the 

 judicious guarding of what it now pos- 

 sesses and the re-introduction O'f what it 



