IN AUDUBON'S LABRADOR 



How can we explain the seeming paradox? 

 Like many things in nature, the explanation, 

 which I chanced upon in a walk over the plains 

 to Anse Eclair, is very simple. The answer is, 

 There has been no change; here are forest con- 

 ditions at the present day, and here are plenty 

 of forest-trees right before our eyes. Where 

 the ancient white stumps are so prominent, the 

 forest has been cut away, as is apt to be the 

 case near settlements, but farther away to the 

 east and west along the coast there are regions 

 where forest conditions of darkness and quiet 

 reign as truly as in the forest aisles where the 

 trees rear their heads to the skies and wave and 

 sough in the wind. The forest vegetation is the 

 same in both cases. 



One is at first disposed to deny these state- 

 ments and say there are no trees here, merely 

 spruce and fir bushes, insignificant things with 

 flat tops clipped as it were by the Arctic blasts, 

 but a close examination reveals true forest con- 

 ditions. This examination is extremely difficult 

 unless one is provided with an axe, or, better 

 still, finds a place where wood-cutting has re- 

 cently taken place, and the actual habits of the 

 wood-cutter can be learned. This gives the key 

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