control man's own domestic harvest, why should there not also be
unified departments to aid and control his harvest of the wilds? A
_Minister of Fauna and Flora_ sounds startling, and perhaps a little
absurd. But fisheries, forests and game have more to do with each
other than any one of them with mines. And, whatever his designation,
such a minister would have no lack of work, especially in Labrador.
But here we come again to the complex human factors of three
Governments and more Departments. Yet, if this bio-geographic area
cannot be brought into one administrative entity, then the next best
thing is concerted action on the part of all the Governments and all
their Departments.

There is no time to lose. Even now, when laws themselves stop short at
the Atlantic, new and adjacent areas are about to be exploited without
the slightest check being put on the exploiters. An expedition is
leaving New York for the Arctic. It is well found in all the
implements of destruction. It will soon be followed by others. And the
musk-ox, polar bears and walrus will shrink into narrower and narrower
limits, when, under protection, far wider ones might easily support
abundance of this big game, together with geese, duck and curlews. It
is wrong to say that such people can safely have their fling for a few
years more. None of the nobler forms of wild life have any chance
against modern facilities of uncontrolled destruction. What happened
to the great auk and the Labrador duck in the Gulf? What happened to
the musk-ox in Greenland? What is happening everywhere to every form
of beneficial and preservable wild life that is not being actively
protected to-day? Then, there is the disappearing whale and persecuted
seal to think of also in those latitudes. The _laissez-faire_ argument
is no better here than elsewhere. For if wild life is worth exploiting
it must be worth conserving.