r creature found in great abundance on these coasts is the true
lobster,[2] which filled as important a part in the diet of the
Beothuk natives, before the European occupation, as the salmon did in
the dietary of the British Columbian tribes.

[Footnote 2: _Homarus americanus_. The lobster of Newfoundland and the
coasts of North-east America is closely related to the common lobster
of British waters. These true lobsters resemble the freshwater
crayfish in having their foremost pair of legs modified into large,
unequal-sized claws. The European rock-lobster of the Mediterranean
and French coasts (the _langouste_ of the French) has no large claws.]

The next most striking feature in the geography of Eastern North
America is NOVA SCOTIA. AS you look at it on the map this province
seems to be a long peninsula connected with the mainland by the narrow
isthmus of Chignecto; but its northernmost portion--Cape
Breton--really consists of two big and two little islands, only
separated from Nova Scotia by a very narrow strait--the Gut of Canso.
On the north of Nova Scotia lies the large Prince Edward Island, and
north of this again the small group of the Magdalen Islands,
discovered by Cartier, the resort of herds of immense walruses at one
time. Due west of Nova Scotia the country, first flat (like Nova
Scotia itself) and at one time covered with magnificent forests, rises
into a very hilly region which culminates on the north in the Shikshok
Mountains of the Gaspe Peninsula (nearly 4000 feet in height) and the
White Mountains (over 6000 feet) and the Adirondak Mountains (over
5000 feet). The White, the Green, and the Adirondak Mountains lie just
within the limits of the United States.

North of the Gaspe Peninsula, in the great Gulf of St. Lawrence, is
Anticosti Island, which rises on the south in a series of terraces
until it reaches an altitude of about 2000 feet. This island, which is
well wooded, was said to have swarmed with reindeer at one time, and
perhaps other forms of deer also, and to have possessed grizzly bears
which fed on the deer, besides Polar bears visiting it in the winter.

[Illustration: MAP OF CANADA]

Newfoundland is separated from the mainland of LABRADOR on the north
by the Strait of Belle Isle, and from Cape Breton Island on the south
by Cabot Strait. Labrador is an immense region on the continent, where
the coast (except for the deep inlet of Melville Lake) soon rises into
an elevated plateau 2000