A LABRADOR SPRING 
and their exposure to the full fury of all the 
winds that blew, appeared to be particularly 
difficult places for the growth of trees, yet it 
was evident that it was only by the slow growth 
through many years of these trees and bushes 
that the bog was consolidated and became fitted 
for the support of a large growth. The forest 
works in from the sides and extends in islands, 
so gradually that centuries must elapse before 
the progress iseven noticeable. The truth of 
this statement is made probable by the follow- 
ing observations on trees of the bogs. Thus 
in one of the bogs on top of Esquimaux Island, 
a balsam fir whose trunk was three-quarters of 
an inch in diameter, whose height was twelve 
inches and the extent of whose branches was 
twenty-four inches showed by its rings a 
struggle of twenty-four years. A black spruce 
six inches high with a trunk one and one-half 
inches in diameter was fifty-three years old. 
Another black spruce nine inches high and 
one-half an inch in diameter was sixty-two 
years old. 
Larches are common enough in the bogs, but 
one must look carefully in order to pick up a 
little tree with a trunk one-eighth of an inch 
210 
