Answer:
Nature is presented as superior to humans in all inevitability in the text.
Explanation:
When the text beings, the two brothers treat nature as something they can easily control as they wish to but as it progresses, the strife between the brothers begins to culminate. It represents the infighting between humans.
Von Gradwitz and Znaeym eventually lose to the nature, not to each other as they fought for a narrow strip of forest for so long.
They remain the true interlopers of the story and the nature triumphs as something that cannot be overcome by any man.
Foreshadowing. The like “he wanted to show that date ruled peoples lives and those who interferes with it did so to their sorrow” may prove it. I could be wrong tho.
I'm pretty sure it's when