Although it may be many years before Newfoundland is known as an agricultural country, every effort is now being made by the Government to make known the richness of the soil in many sections of the country. The fishing industry has been remunerative for so many generations that little attention has been devoted to the possibilities of the soil, and probably the close proximity of Canada, and its popularity as a country of great rewards for emigrants who are prepared to till the soil, have tended to keep Newfoundland in the background as a suitable Colony for the agricultural emigrants from England and the Continent. But whatever may be the future of agriculture, it is certain that the timber and minerals of the island will be a growing source of revenue each succeeding year.

Among the many minerals that have been discovered in Newfoundland are copper, iron-ore, chromite, pyrites, nickel, antimony, lead, manganese, silver, gold, slate, and coal. In the districts of Codroy Valley, Bay St. George, and the upper reaches of the Humber River, coal is considered to be plentiful, and British capitalists are now about to develop these areas. Iron-ore, however, is the most abundant mineral in the Colony, and Canadian companies have drawn millions of tons from Bell Island, in Conception Bay. It is calculated that the troughs in this island contain the enormous amount of 3,635,543,360 tons of splendid iron-ore. Most of the ore goes to the large smelting-works of the Dominion Iron and Steel Company, Sydney, Canada.

Many and dense are the great forests of Newfoundland. Those who were ignorant of the wealth of timber said that there was no future for the lumbering industry; but apart from the rapidly increasing exports of lumber, syndicates are now buying up the forests as rapidly as they can, in order to convert them into paper, upon which your stories, novels, and general news are daily printed. Only recently Lord Northcliffe has spent over 1,000,000 sterling in the erection of pulp and paper mills on the River Exploits. Over 20,000 men will be employed at the mills. The first paper manufactured in Newfoundland was at these mills in November, 1909.

The River Exploits, on which the Northcliffe Mills are built, runs through one of the finest lumbering sections of the Colony. “Between the Grand Falls and Badger Brook, at many parts on both sides of the main river, pine flourishes luxuriantly, much of which appears to be of excellent quality, being often of fair diameter, straight, and tall. These reaches also display a fine growth of other varieties of timber; and at some parts, especially above the forks of Sandy Hook, white birch often attains a very large size. About Red Indian Lake there is a superb growth of pine and spruce of large size, straight and tall.”

In spite of the loneliness of his life, the logger is usually a happy and a healthy man. You may miss the finely-chiselled features, intelligent eyes, and refined speech when you confront these loggers; but you have not spent a day in their camp before you realize that they possess something more wonderful than the above-mentioned qualities: they have a native wit, born of a struggle, year after year, with natural forces. Many of them are able to measure a tree exactly by a rapid glance of the eye from root to tip, and they can so manipulate a falling tree that it shall drop within an inch of the spot on which they desire it. If you entered one of their camps you would probably be disappointed because it looked so small and clumsy in comparison with modern villas; but if you stopped to examine one of their houses, and thought of the thousands of miles separating the logger from what is called advanced civilization, you would be deeply impressed by the skill exhibited in the construction of these wooden dwellings. The trunks of the pine are laid across the corners with discriminating exactness, and between the pines are layers of moss compressed so tightly by the weight of the trunks that neither wind, rain, nor snow can find its unwelcome way to the interior. About twenty men are the tenants of one of the improvised houses, and everyone takes care that the rooms are kept clean and tidy. The long bedroom is divided into sections by curtains, and at the one end of this is a large kitchen, with a big cooking-stove running towards the centre, around which the loggers smoke and tell yarns in the long winter evenings. Yes, the stalwart sons of Newfoundland are brainy enough when the forces of Nature call their brains into play. You can see them returning from the woods with timber, roughly hewn at first; but if you were to inquire for that same timber a few months afterwards you would be shown a beautiful schooner that had already been out and fought a battle with ice and wind, and now lay in the harbour, her sides bulging with fish, their snow-white bellies glimmering in the sunlight.

The ingenuity of the Newfoundlander is seen at its best, probably, when navigation opens in spring and the logs are sent down the river on their mad rush to the mills. Over 50,000 logs, as soon as they feel the impetus of a favouring wind, go tumbling over the rapids and down the broad river. The men skip across the logs as lightly as the deer steps from crag to crag. If the logs become jammed, in a few moments they are set at liberty, and breast forward goes the whole army once more. It is exhilarating labour. One great expanse of forest, field and water, a clear blue sky above, a fresh breeze blowing, the haunting cry of the great northern diver—who in the heart of a smoke-laden city would not sigh for a life such as this? When the logger’s work is finished in the evening he can sit by the side of the river, or take a punt across the lake and throw out his line for a few hours of sport with the salmon, trout, and other fishes.

One of the great charms of Newfoundland is the strong wind, that seldom rests a single day. Just as the sea gets into the blood of the fisherman and continually lures him to the “long dim rollers,” so the wind gets into the blood of the logger and lures him to the music of the forests.

What wild music the wind draws from the harp-strings of the pine! The clusters of spruce-trees quiver to their roots. Shrieking before the blast, the gulls skim down to their coverts in the rocks, only to rise again in a few moments, for one can tell that they love the wind as much as they love the sea.

Through that narrow gorge between two rugged cliffs the wind comes joyously on. It ruffles the moss on the slopes of the hills, scatters the scarlet leaves of the raspberry-trees, and sends the waters of the large blue lakes leaping in frolicsome waves up the beach to the feet of the rocking pines. Behind the hills to the west the clouds are tinged with amber, silver, and gold, and the clang of the woodman’s axe is caught in the clutches of the wind, to be carried o’er chasm and crag far out to sea. Yes, half the joy of life in Newfoundland is to be found in its soul-haunting wind. And those who have known the din of London’s busy streets appreciate it most. May the woodman still sing and chop, and may the wind still play its music to the spirits of the Indians who may still be dancing around camp-fires, invisible to mortal eyes!