I would never have ventured to suggest this plan to the Commission if I had not been encouraged by one of your own most valued members, Dr Robertson.  But as soon as he told me what your powers were I saw clearly that, in this particular case, the Commission and the Canadian Labrador were each exactly suited to the other.

Under all these circumstances I have no hesitation in making the strongest possible appeal for action before it is too late.  The time has come when the seabird life must be either made or marred for ever.  And I would ask you to remember what seabird conservation means down there.  It means fresh food, the only kind the people ever get, apart from fish.  It means new business, if the eiders are once made safe in sanctuaries; for we now import our eider down from points outside of Canada.  And it means the quickening of every human interest, once you encourage the people to join you in this excellently practical form of “Neighbourhood Improvement”.

There is another and very important point, which I discussed at considerable length in my Address, but to which I return here, because it can only be settled by a body of men, who, like this Commission, are national trustees.  This point is that certain parts of Labrador are bound to become ideal public playgrounds, if their wild life is only saved in time.  The common conception of Labrador as being inaccessibly remote is entirely wrong.  It is accessible all round a coast line of 3000 miles at the proper season and with proper care; and its vast peninsula lies straight between the British Islands and our own North West.  So there is nothing absurd in expecting people to come to Labrador to-morrow when they are going to Spitzbergen, far north of the Arctic Circle to-day.  Of course, Spitzbergen enjoys an invincible advantage at present, as its wild life is being carefully preserved.  But once Labrador is put under conservation the odds will be reversed.  And I what is true of Labrador in general is much truer still of the Canadian Labrador.  Here is a country which is actually south of London, which is only 2000 miles from England, 1000 from New York, and 500 from Quebec; which stands beside one of the most frequented of ocean highways; and which has a labyrinth of islands, a maze of rivers, and an untamed hinterland, all formed by Nature for wild “zoos”, preserves and open hunting grounds.  And here, too, all over the civilized world, are city-bound men, turning more and more to Nature for health and recreation, and willing to spend increasingly large sums for what they seek and find.  Surely, it is only the common sense of statesmanship to bring this country and those men together, in the near future, under conditions which are best for both, by making the Canadian Labrador an attractive land of life and not a hopelessly repellant land of death.