Whaling, sealing and deep-sea fishing are Dominion and international affairs; and whaling, at all events, is soon to engage the attention of statesmen, experts and the public—­let us hope, to some good end.  The inland birds and mammals from the St. Lawrence to Ungava now come under the Province of Quebec; though no effective protection has ever reached the Canadian Labrador.  Beyond this, again, lies the Atlantic Labrador, which is entirely under Newfoundland.  So I would suggest that the Commission should try a five-year experiment in the conservation of seabird life along the Canadian Labrador, because this would not come into overlapping contact with any other exercised authority, because it is bound to be successful, because it will only cost a sum that should be had for the asking, because it is most urgently pressing, and because it can be begun at once, to the lasting advantage of all concerned.

The “Canadian Labrador” is the last remaining vestige of the No-Man’s-Land which, only a hundred years ago, began at the Saguenay, within 120 miles of Quebec.  Then, as the organised “North Shore” advanced down stream, the unorganised “Canadian Labrador” receded before it.  Fifty years ago the dividing line was at Seven Islands, 300 miles below Quebec.  To-day it runs just east of Natashquan and is a full 500 miles below.

There is no stranger country anywhere than this Canadian Labrador.  Dr Grenfell’s Labrador, which has nothing to do with Canada, is known to everyone.  But the very existence of our own Labrador, with its 200 miles of coastline and its more than 20,000 islands, is quite unknown, as a separate entity, to all but a very few outside of its little, but increasing, population of 1200 souls.  It lies on the north shore of the Gulf, just inside the Straits of Belle Isle, and runs from Bradore in the east to Kegashka in the west.  Here, close beside the crowded track of ocean liners, and well below the latitude of London, is by far the most southerly arctic region in the world.  It is a land of rock and moss; for, except along the river valleys, there are neither grass nor trees.  No crops are grown or ever can be grown.  There are no horses, cattle, poultry, pigs or sheep.  Reindeer are said to be coming.  But there are none at present.  The only domestic animals are dogs, that howl like wolves, but never bark.  And yet it is a country which is rich, and might he richer still, in fish and fur, and which seems formed by Nature to be a perfect paradise of all that is most desirable in the wild life of the north, especially in the seabirds that are now being done to death among its countless archipelagoes.