ill untrodden by the foot of man! The polar current
steals from the unknown North its ice treasures, and lends them
with no niggard hand to this seaboard. There is a never-wearying charm
in these countless icebergs, so stately in size and so fantastic in
shape and colouring.

[Illustration: A LABRADOR BURIAL]

The fauna and flora of the country are so varied and exquisite that
one wonders why the world of science has so largely passed us by.
Perhaps with the advent of hydroplanes, Labrador will come to its own
among the countries of the world. Not only the ethnologist and
botanist, but the archaeologist as well reaps a rich harvest for his
labours here. Many relics of a recent stone age still exist. I have
had brought to me stone saucepans, lamps, knives, arrow-heads, etc.,
taken from old graves. It is the Eskimo custom to entomb with the dead
man all and every possession which he might want hereafter, the idea
being that the spirit of the implement accompanies the man's spirit.
Relics of ancient whaling establishments, possibly early Basque, are
found in plenty at one village, while even to-day the trapper there
needing a runner for his komatik can always hook up a whale's jaw or
rib from the mud of the harbour. Relics of rovers of the sea, who
sought shelter on this uncharted coast with its million islands, are
still to be found. A friend of mine was one day looking from his boat
into the deep, narrow channel in front of his house, when he perceived
some strange object in the mud. With help he raised it, and found a
long brass "Long Tom" cannon, which now stands on the rocks at that
place. Remains of the ancient French occupation should also be
procurable near the seat of their deserted capital near Bradore.

My friend, Professor Reginald Daly, head of the Department of Geology
at Harvard University, after having spent a summer with me on the
coast, wrote as follows:

"We crossed the Straits of Belle Isle once more, homeward bound. Old
Jacques Cartier, searching for an Eldorado, found Labrador, and in
disgust called it the 'Land of Cain.' A century and a half afterward
Lieutenant Roger Curtis wrote of it as a 'country formed of frightful
mountains, and unfruitful valleys, a prodigious heap of barren rock';
and George Cartwright, in his gossipy journal, summed up his
impressions after five and twenty years on the coast. He said, 'God
created this country last of all, and threw together there the refuse
of his m