an fifty thousand fishermen are engaged in catching them.
As the fish brings in yearly a revenue of several millions, this
easternmost island of North America may well be called a gold mine too."

THROUGH THE GREAT WEST

After a few profitable voyages on Lakes Michigan and Huron, Gunnar has
saved so much that he can carry out his plan of travelling to the
extreme West. He intends to let his dollars fly in railway fares, and,
after he has seen enough of the great cities of America, to settle down
in the most attractive district. There he will stay and work until he
has saved up enough to buy a farm of his own in his native country.

He sets off from Chicago and leaves St. Louis behind him, and is carried
by a train on the Pacific Railway through Missouri and Kansas westwards.
In the latter State he flies over boundless prairies.

Eventually a German naturalist enters Gunnar's carriage when the train
stops at a large station. He is dusty and out of breath, and is glad to
rest when he has seen his boxes and chests stowed away in the luggage
van. Like all Germans he is alert and observant, agreeable and
talkative, and the train has not crossed the boundary between Kansas and
Colorado before he has learned all about Gunnar's experiences and
plans.

Soon the German on his part explains the business which has brought him
out to the Far West.

"I have received a grant from the University of Heidelberg to collect
plants and animals in the western States, and I travel as cheaply as I
can so that the money may last longer. I love this great America. Have
you noticed how colossal everything is in this country, whether the good
God or wicked man be the master-builder? If you cross a mountain range
like the Rocky Mountains, or its South American continuation, the Andes,
it is the longest in the world. If you roll over a river, as the
Mississippi-Missouri, you hear that this also is the longest that
exists. If you travel by steamboat over the Canadian lakes, you are told
that no sheets of fresh water in the world surpass them. And think of
all these innumerable large towns that have sprung up within a century
or two. And these railways, these astonishing bridges, these
inexhaustible natural resources, and this world-embracing commerce. How
alert and industrious is this people, how quickly everything develops,
how much more bustle and feverish haste there is than in the Old World!"

"It is charming to see the Rocky Mountains b