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diff --git a/39130-h/39130-h.htm b/39130-h/39130-h.htm new file mode 100644 index 0000000..5bec481 --- /dev/null +++ b/39130-h/39130-h.htm @@ -0,0 +1,4605 @@ +<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Transitional//EN" "http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-transitional.dtd"> +<html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml"> +<head> + <meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=utf-8"/> + <meta name="generator" content="pph (1.09)"/> + <meta name="title" content="Dr. Grenfell’s Parish"/> + <meta name="author" content="Norman Duncan"/> + <meta name="date" content="1905"/> + <title>The Project Gutenberg Canada eBook of “Dr. Grenfell’s Parish,” by Normal Duncan</title> + <style type="text/css"> + body {margin: 10% 10%; text-align: justify;} + h1 {text-align:center; font-size: 1.4em; font-style: italic; margin-bottom: 2em} + h2 {text-align:center; font-size: 1.2em; font-style: italic; margin-bottom: 2em} + hr.tb {border:none; border-bottom:1px solid black; width:40%; margin-top:10px; margin-bottom:10px; clear:both;} + p.caption {text-align:center; margin-left:20%; margin-right:20%; font-size:smaller;} + p.c {text-align:center; margin: 0 auto;} + p.ad {font-size:1.4em; font-style:italic;} + h2.chapter {font-style:normal; font-size:1.2em; text-align:center; margin: 2em auto 1em auto; font-weight:normal} + div.bq {margin-left:10%; margin-right:10%;} + div.title {margin:4em auto} + div.title p {text-align:center; font-style:italic;} + div.verso {margin:4em auto} + div.verso p {text-align:center; font-size:smaller;} + div.front {margin:4em auto} + table {margin:0 auto; clear: both;} + .fnanchor {font-size:80%; text-decoration:none; vertical-align: 0.25em;} + .footnote {font-size: 90%;} + .footnote a {text-decoration:none;} + </style> +</head> +<body> + + +<pre> + +The Project Gutenberg EBook of Dr. Grenfell's Parish, by Norman Duncan + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org/license + + +Title: Dr. Grenfell's Parish + The Deep Sea Fisherman + +Author: Norman Duncan + +Release Date: March 13, 2012 [EBook #39130] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: UTF-8 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK DR. GRENFELL'S PARISH *** + + + + +Produced by Roger Frank and the Online Distributed +Proofreading Canada Team at http://www.pgdpcanada.net + + + + + + +</pre> + +<h1>DR. GRENFELL’S PARISH</h1> + +<div style='text-align:center'> +<img id='ilink01' src='images/illus-001.jpg' alt=''/> +<p class='caption'>“A DOCTOR ... THE PROPHET AND CHAMPION OF A PEOPLE”</p> +</div> + +<div class='title'> +<p style='font-size:1.6em'>Dr. Grenfell’s Parish</p> + +<p style='font-size:1.2em'>The Deep Sea Fishermen</p> + +<p style='font-size:1.2em'>By<br/> +NORMAN DUNCAN</p> + +<p style='font-size:0.8em'>Author of<br/> +“Doctor Luke of the Labrador”</p> + +<p><br /></p> +<p><small>New York Chicago Toronto</small><br /> +Fleming H. Revell Company<br/> +<small>London and Edinburgh</small></p> +</div> + +<div class='verso'> +<p>Copyright, 1905, by<br/> +FLEMING H. REVELL COMPANY</p> + +<p>THIRD EDITION</p> + +<table summary='offices'> +<tr><td>New York: 158 Fifth Avenue</td></tr> +<tr><td>Chicago: 63 Washington Street</td></tr> +<tr><td>Toronto: 27 Richmond Street, W</td></tr> +<tr><td>London: 21 Paternoster Square</td></tr> +<tr><td>Edinburgh: 100 Princes Street</td></tr> +</table> +</div> + +<div class="front"> +<p style='font-style:italic; text-align:center;'>TO<br/> +THE CREW OF THE “STRATHCONA”</p> + +<table summary='crew'> +<tr><td>Henry Bartlett,</td><td align='right'><i>Skipper</i></td></tr> +<tr><td>Munden Clark,</td><td align='right'><i>Second Hand</i></td></tr> +<tr><td>William Percy,</td><td align='right'><i>First Engineer</i></td></tr> +<tr><td>John Scott,</td><td align='right'><i>Second Engineer</i></td></tr> +<tr><td>Archie Butler,</td><td align='right'><i>Hospital Hand</i></td></tr> +<tr><td>James Hiscock,</td><td align='right'><i>Cook</i></td></tr> +<tr><td>Alec Sims,</td><td align='right'><i>Ship’s Boy</i></td></tr> +</table> +</div> + +<div class="front"> +<p style='text-align:center; font-style:italic; font-size:1.2em;'>TO THE READER</p> + +<p>This book pretends to no literary +excellence; it has a far better reason +for existence—a larger justification. +Its purpose is to spread the knowledge +of the work of Dr. Wilfred T. Grenfell, +of the Royal National Mission to Deep-Sea +Fishermen, at work on the coasts of Newfoundland +and Labrador; and to describe +the character and condition of the folk whom +he seeks to help. The man and the mission +are worthy of sympathetic interest; worthy, +too, of unqualified approbation, of support +of every sort. Dr. Grenfell is indefatigable, +devoted, heroic; he is more and even better +than that—he is a sane and efficient worker. +Frankly, the author believes that the reader +would do a good deed by contributing to +the maintenance and development of the +doctor’s beneficent undertakings; and +regrets that the man and his work are presented +in this inadequate way and by so +incapable a hand. The author is under obligation +to the editors of <i>Harper’s Magazine</i>, +of <i>The World’s Work</i>, and of <i>Outing</i> for +permission to reprint the contributed papers +which, in some part, go to make up the volume. +He wishes also to protest that Dr. +Grenfell is not the hero of a certain work of +fiction dealing with life on the Labrador +coast. Some unhappy misunderstanding +has arisen on this point. The author wishes +to make it plain that “Doctor Luke” was +<i>not</i> drawn from Dr. Grenfell.</p> + +<p style='text-align:right'>N. D.</p> + +<p> <i>College Campus,<br/> + Washington, Pennsylvania, January 25, 1905.</i></p> +</div> + +<div class='front'> +<p style='text-align:center; font-style:italic; font-size:1.2em;'>CONTENTS</p> + +<table id='toc' style='margin:auto' summary='TOC'> +<tr><td><a href='#clink01'>I.</a></td><td><span style='font-variant:small-caps'>The Doctor</span></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href='#clink02'>II.</a></td><td><span style='font-variant:small-caps'>A Round of Bleak Coasts</span></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href='#clink03'>III.</a></td><td><span style='font-variant:small-caps'>Ships in Peril</span></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href='#clink04'>IV.</a></td><td><span style='font-variant:small-caps'>Desperate Need</span></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href='#clink05'>V.</a></td><td><span style='font-variant:small-caps'>A Helping Hand</span></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href='#clink06'>VI.</a></td><td><span style='font-variant:small-caps'>Faith and Duty</span></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href='#clink07'>VII.</a></td><td><span style='font-variant:small-caps'>The Liveyere</span></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href='#clink08'>VIII.</a></td><td><span style='font-variant:small-caps'>With the Fleet</span></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href='#clink09'>IX.</a></td><td><span style='font-variant:small-caps'>On the French Shore</span></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href='#clink10'>X.</a></td><td><span style='font-variant:small-caps'>Some Outport Folk</span></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href='#clink11'>XI.</a></td><td><span style='font-variant:small-caps'>Winter Practice</span></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href='#clink12'>XII.</a></td><td><span style='font-variant:small-caps'>The Champion</span></td></tr> +</table> +</div> + +<div class='front'> +<p style='text-align:center; font-style:italic; font-size:1.2em;'>LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS</p> + +<table id='loi' style='margin:auto' summary='LOI'> +<tr><td><a href='#ilink01'>“A Doctor ... the Prophet and Champion of a People”</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href='#ilink03'>“It is an Evil Coast”</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href='#ilink04'>“Bound North”</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href='#ilink05'>“A Turf Hut”</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href='#ilink06'>“Set Sail from Great Yarmouth Harbour for Labrador”</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href='#ilink07'>“Appeared with a Little Steam-launch, the Princess May”</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href='#ilink08'>“The Hospital Ship, Strathcona”</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href='#ilink09'>“The Labrador ‘Liveyere’”</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href='#ilink11'>“At Indian Harbour”</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href='#ilink12'>“Set the Traps in the Open Sea”</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href='#ilink13'>“The Bully-boat Becomes a Home”</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href='#ilink14'>“The Whitewashed Cottages on the Hills”</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href='#ilink15'>“Toil”</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href='#ilink16'>“The Hospital at Battle Harbour”</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href='#ilink17'>“The Doctor on a Winter’s Journey”</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href='#ilink18'>“A Crew Quite Capable of Taking You into It”</a></td></tr> +</table> +</div> + + +<p style='text-align:center;font-size:1.4em;font-style:italic'>Dr. Grenfell’s Parish</p> + +<h2 class='chapter' id='clink01'><a href='#toc'>I—<i>THE DOCTOR</i></a></h2> + +<p>Doctor Wilfred T. Grenfell +is the young Englishman +who, for the love of God, practices +medicine on the coasts of Newfoundland and +Labrador. Other men have been moved +to heroic deeds by the same high motive, +but the professional round, I fancy, is quite +out of the common; indeed, it may be that +in all the world there is not another of the +sort. It extends from Cape John of Newfoundland +around Cape Norman and into +the Strait of Belle Isle, and from Ungava +Bay and Cape Chidley of the Labrador southward +far into the Gulf of St. Lawrence—two +thousand miles of bitterly inhospitable +shore: which a man in haste must sail with +his life in his hands. The folk are for the +most part isolated and desperately wretched—the +shore fishermen of the remoter Newfoundland +coasts, the Labrador “liveyeres,” +the Indians of the forbidding interior, the Esquimaux +of the far north. It is to such as +these that the man gives devoted and heroic +service—not for gain; there is no gain to +be got in those impoverished places: merely +for the love of God.</p> + +<hr class='tb' /> + +<p>I once went ashore in a little harbour of +the northeast coast of Newfoundland. It +was a place most unimportant—and it was +just beyond the doctor’s round. The sea +sullenly confronted it, hills overhung it, and +a scrawny wilderness flanked the hills; the +ten white cottages of the place gripped the +dripping rocks as for dear life. And down +the path there came an old fisherman to +meet the stranger.</p> + +<p>“Good-even, zur,” said he.</p> + +<p>“Good-evening.”</p> + +<p>He waited for a long time. Then, “Be +you a doctor, zur?” he asked.</p> + +<p>“No, sir.”</p> + +<p>“Noa? Isn’t you? Now, I was thinkin’ +maybe you might be. But you isn’t, you +says?”</p> + +<p>“Sorry—but, no; really, I’m not.”</p> + +<p>“Well, zur,” he persisted, “I was thinkin’ +you might be, when I seed you comin’ +ashore. They <i>is</i> a doctor on this coast,” +he added, “but he’s sixty mile along shore. +’Tis a wonderful expense t’ have un up. +This here harbour isn’t able. An’ you isn’t +a doctor, you says? Is you sure, zur?”</p> + +<p>There was unhappily no doubt about it.</p> + +<p>“I was thinkin’ you might be,” he went +on, wistfully, “when I seed you comin’ +ashore. But perhaps you might know +something about doctorin’? Noa?”</p> + +<p>“Nothing.”</p> + +<p>“I was thinkin’, now, that you might. +’Tis my little girl that’s sick. Sure, none +of us knows what’s the matter with she. +Woan’t you come up an’ see she, zur? Perhaps +you might do something—though you +isn’t—a doctor.”</p> + +<p>The little girl was lying on the floor—on +a ragged quilt, in a corner. She was a fair +child—a little maid of seven. Her eyes +were deep blue, wide, and fringed with +long, heavy lashes. Her hair was flaxen, +abundant, all tangled and curly. Indeed, +she was a winsome little thing!</p> + +<p>“I’m thinkin’ she’ll be dyin’ soon,” said +the mother. “Sure, she’s wonderful swelled +in the legs. We been waitin’ for a doctor +t’ come, an’ we kind o’ thought you was +one.”</p> + +<p>“How long have you waited?”</p> + +<p>“’Twas in April she was took. She’ve +been lyin’ there ever since. ’Tis near August, +now, I’m thinkin’.”</p> + +<p>“They was a doctor here two year ago,” +said the man. “He come by chance,” he +added, “like you.”</p> + +<p>“Think they’ll be one comin’ soon?” the +woman asked.</p> + +<p>I took the little girl’s hand. It was dry +and hot. She did not smile—nor was she +afraid. Her fingers closed upon the hand +she held. She was a blue-eyed, winsome +little maid; but pain had driven all the +sweet roguery out of her face.</p> + +<p>“Does you think she’ll die, zur?” asked +the woman, anxiously.</p> + +<p>I did not know.</p> + +<p>“Sure, zur,” said the man, trying to smile, +“’tis wonderful queer, but I <i>sure</i> thought +you was a doctor, when I seed you comin’ +ashore.”</p> + +<p>“But you isn’t?” the woman pursued, +still hopefully. “Is you sure you couldn’t do +nothin’? Is you noa kind of a doctor, at all? +We doan’t—we doan’t—want she t’ die!”</p> + +<p>In the silence—so long and deep a silence—melancholy +shadows crept in from the +desolation without.</p> + +<p>“I wisht you <i>was</i> a doctor,” said the man. +“I—<i>wisht</i>—<i>you</i>—<i>was</i>!”</p> + +<p>He was crying.</p> + +<p>“They need,” thought I, “a mission-doctor +in these parts.”</p> + +<p>And the next day—in the harbour beyond—I +first heard of Grenfell. In that place +they said they would send <i>him</i> to the little +maid who lay dying; they assured me, indeed, +that he would make haste, when he came +that way: which would be, perhaps, they +thought, in “’long about a month.” Whether +or not the doctor succoured the child I do not +know; but I have never forgotten this first +impression of his work—the conviction that +it was a good work for a man to be about.</p> + +<hr class='tb' /> + +<p>Subsequently I learned that Dr. Grenfell +was the superintendent of the Newfoundland +and Labrador activities of the Royal National +Mission to Deep Sea Fishermen, an +English organization, with a religious and +medical work already well-established on +the North Sea, and a medical mission then +in process of development on the North Atlantic +coast. Two years later he discovered +himself to be a robust, hearty Saxon, strong, +indefatigable, devoted, jolly; a doctor, a +parson by times, something of a sportsman +when occasion permitted, a master-mariner, +a magistrate, the director of certain +commercial enterprises designed to “help the folk +help themselves”—the prophet and champion, +indeed, of a people: and a man very +much in love with life.</p> + +<h2 class='chapter' id='clink02'><a href='#toc'>II—<i>A ROUND of BLEAK COASTS</i></a></h2> + +<p>The coast of Labrador, which, in +number of miles, forms the larger +half of the doctor’s round, is forbidding, +indeed—naked, rugged, desolate, +lying sombre in a mist. It is of weather-worn +gray rock, broken at intervals by long +ribs of black. In part it is low and ragged, +slowly rising, by way of bare slopes and +starved forest, to broken mountain ranges, +which lie blue and bold in the inland waste. +Elsewhere it rears from the edge of the sea +in stupendous cliffs and lofty, rugged hills. +There is no inviting stretch of shore the +length of it—no sandy beach, no line of +shingle, no grassy bank; the sea washes a +thousand miles of jagged rock. Were it not +for the harbours—innumerable and snugly +sheltered from the winds and ground swell +of the open—there would be no navigating +the waters of that region. The Strait Shore +is buoyed, lighted, minutely charted. The +reefs and currents and tickles<a id='fna1'></a><a href='#fnt1' class='fnanchor'><sup>[1]</sup></a> and harbours +are all known. A northeast gale, to be sure, +raises a commotion, and fog and drift-ice +add something to the chance of disaster; +but, as they say, from one peril there are +two ways of escape to three sheltered places. +To the north, however, where the doctor +makes his way, the coast is best sailed on +the plan of the skipper of the old <i>Twelve +Brothers</i>.</p> + +<p>“You don’t cotch <i>me</i> meddlin’ with no +land!” said he.</p> + +<p>Past the Dead Islands, Snug Harbour, +Domino Run, Devil’s Lookout and the +Quaker’s Hat—beyond Johnny Paul’s Rock +and the Wolves, Sandwich Bay, Tumbledown +Dick, Indian Harbour, and the White +Cockade—past Cape Harrigan, the Farmyard +Islands and the Hen and Chickens—far +north to the great, craggy hills and +strange peoples of Kikkertadsoak, Scoralik, +Tunnulusoak, Nain, Okak, and, at last, +to Cape Chidley itself—northward, every +crooked mile of the way, bold headlands, +low outlying islands, sunken reefs, tides, +fogs, great winds and snow make hard sailing +of it. It is an evil coast, ill-charted +where charted at all; some part of the +present-day map is based upon the guess-work +of the eighteenth century navigators. +The doctor, like the skippers of the fishing-craft, +must sometimes sail by guess and +hearsay, by recollection, and old rhymes.</p> + +<div style='text-align:center'> +<img id='ilink03' src='images/illus-003.jpg' alt=''/> +<p class='caption'>“IT IS AN EVIL COAST”</p> +</div> + +<p>The gusts and great waves of open water—of +the free, wide sea, I mean, over which +a ship may safely drive while the weather +exhausts its evil mood—are menace enough +for the stoutest heart. But the Labrador +voyage is inshore—a winding course among +the islands, or a straight one from headland +to headland, of a coast off which reefs lie +thick: low-lying, jagged ledges, washed by +the sea in heavy weather; barren hills, +rising abruptly—and all isolated—from safe +water; sunken rocks, disclosed, upon approach, +only by the green swirl above them. +They are countless—scattered everywhere, +hidden and disclosed. They lie in the +mouths of harbours, they lie close to the +coast, they lie offshore; they run twenty +miles out to sea. Here is no plain sailing; +the skipper must be sure of the way—or +choose it gingerly: else the hidden rock +will inevitably “pick him up.”</p> + +<p>Recently the doctor <i>was</i> “picked up.”</p> + +<p>“Oh, yes,” says he, with interest. “An +uncharted rock. It took two of the three +blades of the propeller. But, really, you’d +be surprised to know how well the ship got +along with one!”</p> + +<hr class='tb' /> + +<p>To know the submerged rocks of one +harbour and the neighbouring coast, however +evil the place, is small accomplishment. +The Newfoundland lad of seven years would +count himself his father’s shame if he failed +in so little. High tide and low tide, quiet +sea and heavy swell, he will know where he +can take the punt—the depth of water, to +an inch, which overlies the danger spots. +But here are a hundred harbours—a thousand +miles of coast—with reefs and islands +scattered like dust the length of it. The +man who sails the Labrador must know +it all like his own back yard—not in +sunny weather alone, but in the night, when +the headlands are like black clouds ahead, +and in the mist, when the noise of breakers +tells him all that he may know of his +whereabouts. A flash of white in the gray +distance, a thud and swish from a hidden +place: the one is his beacon, the other his +fog-horn. It is thus, often, that the doctor +gets along.</p> + +<hr class='tb' /> + +<p>You may chart rocks, and beware of +them; but—it is a proverb on the coast—“there’s +no chart for icebergs.” The Labrador +current is charged with them—hard, +dead-white glacier ice from the Arctic: +massive bergs, innumerable, all the while +shifting with tide and current and wind. +What with floes and bergs—vast fields of +drift-ice—the way north in the spring is +most perilous. The same bergs—widely +scattered, diminished in number, dwarfed +by the milder climate—give the transatlantic +passenger evil dreams: somewhere in the +night, somewhere in the mist, thinks he, they +may lie; and he shudders. The skipper of +the Labrador craft <i>knows</i> that they lie thick +around him: there is no surmise; when the +night fell, when the fog closed in, there were +a hundred to be counted from the masthead.</p> + +<hr class='tb' /> + +<p>Violent winds are always to be feared—swift, +overwhelming hurricanes: winds that +catch the unwary. They are not frequent; +but they <i>do</i> blow—will again blow, no man +can tell when. In such a gale, forty vessels +were driven on a lee shore; in another, +eighty were wrecked overnight—two thousand +fishermen cast away, the coast littered +with splinters of ships—and, once (it is but +an incident), a schooner was torn from her +anchors and flung on the rocks forty feet +above the high-water mark. These are exceptional +storms; the common Labrador +gale is not so violent, but evil enough in its +own way. It is a northeaster, of which the +barometer more often than not gives fair +warning; day after day it blows, cold, wet, +foggy, dispiriting, increasing in violence, +subsiding, returning again, until courage +and strength are both worn out.</p> + +<hr class='tb' /> + +<p>Reefs, drift-ice, wind and sea—and over +all the fog: thick, wide-spread, persistent, +swift in coming, mysterious in movement; +it compounds the dangers. It blinds men—they +curse it, while they grope along: a +desperate business, indeed, thus to run by +guess where positive knowledge of the way +merely mitigates the peril. There are days +when the fog lies like a thick blanket on the +face of the sea, hiding the head-sails from +the man at the wheel; it is night on deck, +and broad day—with the sun in a blue +sky—at the masthead; the schooners are sometimes +steered by a man aloft. The <i>Always +Loaded</i>, sixty tons and bound home with a +cargo that did honour to her name, struck +one of the outlying islands so suddenly, so +violently, that the lookout in the bow, who +had been peering into the mist, was pitched +headlong into the surf. The <i>Daughter</i>, running +blind with a fair, light wind—she had +been lost for a day—ran full tilt into a cliff; +the men ran forward from the soggy gloom +of the after-deck into—bright sunshine at +the bow! It is the fog that wrecks ships.</p> + +<p>“Oh, I runned her ashore,” says the castaway +skipper. “Thick? Why, <i>sure</i>, ’twas +thick!”</p> + +<p>So the men who sail that coast hate fog, +fear it, avoid it when they can, which is seldom; +they are not afraid of wind and sea, +but there are times when they shake in their +sea-boots, if the black fog catches them out +of harbour.</p> + +<div class="footnote"> +<p><a id="fnt1"></a><a href="#fna1">[1]</a> +A “tickle” is a narrow passage to a harbour or between two islands.</p> +</div> + +<h2 class='chapter' id='clink03'><a href='#toc'>III—<i>SHIPS in PERIL</i></a></h2> + +<p>It is to be remarked that a wreck on the +Labrador coast excites no wide surprise. +Never a season passes but some craft +are cast away. But that is merely the fortune +of sailing those waters—a fortune +which the mission-doctor accepts with a +glad heart: it provides him with an interesting +succession of adventures; life is not +tame. Most men—I hesitate to say all—have +been wrecked; every man, woman, and +child who has sailed the Labrador has narrowly +escaped, at least. And the fashion +of that escape is sometimes almost incredible.</p> + +<hr class='tb' /> + +<p>The schooner <i>All’s Well</i> (which is a fictitious +name) was helpless in the wind and sea +and whirling snow of a great blizzard. At +dusk she was driven inshore—no man knew +where. Strange cliffs loomed in the snow +ahead; breakers—they were within stone’s +throw—flashed and thundered to port and +starboard; the ship was driving swiftly into +the surf. When she was fairly upon the +rocks, Skipper John, then a hand aboard +(it was he who told me the story), ran below +and tumbled into his bunk, believing it +to be the better place to drown in.</p> + +<p>“Well, lads,” said he to the men in the +forecastle, “we got t’ go this time. ’Tis no +use goin’ on deck.”</p> + +<p>But the ship drove through a tickle no +wider than twice her beam and came suddenly +into the quiet water of a harbour!</p> + +<hr class='tb' /> + +<p>The sealing-schooner <i>Right and Tight</i> +struck on the Fish Rocks off Cape Charles +in the dusk of a northeast gale. It is a +jagged, black reef, outlying and isolated; +the seas wash over it in heavy weather. It +was a bitter gale; there was ice in the sea, +and the wind was wild and thick with snow; +she was driving before it—wrecked, blind, +utterly lost. The breakers flung her on the +reef, broke her back, crunched her, swept +the splinters on. Forty-two men were of a +sudden drowned in the sea beyond; but the +skipper was left clinging to the rock in a +swirl of receding water.</p> + +<p>“Us seed un there in the marnin’,” said +the old man of Cape Charles who told me +the story. “He were stickin’ to it like a +mussel, with the sea breakin’ right over un! +’Cod! he were!”</p> + +<p>He laughed and shook his head; that was +a tribute to the strength and courage with +which the man on the reef had withstood +the icy breakers through the night.</p> + +<p>“Look! us couldn’t get near un,” he went +on. “’Twas clear enough t’ see, but the +wind was blowin’ wonderful, an’ the seas +was too big for the skiff. Sure, I <i>knows</i> +that; for us tried it.</p> + +<p>“‘Leave us build a fire!’ says my woman. +‘Leave us build a fire on the head!’ says +she. ‘’Twill let un know they’s folk lookin’ +on.’</p> + +<p>“’Twas a wonderful big fire us set; an’ it +kep’ us warm, so us set there all day watchin’ +the skipper o’ the <i>Right an’ Tight</i> on Fish +Rocks. The big seas jerked un loose an’ +flung un about, an’ many a one washed right +over un; but nar a sea could carry un off. +’Twas a wonderful sight t’ see un knocked +off his feet, an’ scramble round an’ cotch +hold somewheres else. ’Cod! it were—the +way that man stuck t’ them slippery rocks +all day long!”</p> + +<p>He laughed again—not heartlessly; it +was the only way in which he could express +his admiration.</p> + +<p>“We tried the skiff again afore dark,” he +continued; “but ’twasn’t no use. The seas +was too big. Sure, <i>he</i> knowed that so well +as we. So us had t’ leave un there all night.</p> + +<p>“‘He’ll never be there in the marnin’,’ +says my woman.</p> + +<p>“‘You wait,’ says I, ‘an’ you’ll see. I’m +thinkin’ he will.’</p> + +<p>“An’ he was, zur—right there on Fish +Rocks, same as ever; still stickin’ on like the +toughest ol’ mussel ever you tasted. Sure, +I had t’ rub me eyes when I looked; but +’twas he, never fear—’twas he, stickin’ there +like a mussel. But there was no gettin’ un +then. Us watched un all that day. ’Twas +dark afore us got un ashore.</p> + +<p>“‘You come nigh it <i>that</i> time,’ says I.</p> + +<p>“‘I’ll have t’ come a sight nigher,’ says +he, ‘afore <i>I</i> goes!’”</p> + +<p>The man had been on the reef more than +forty-eight hours!</p> + +<div style='text-align:center'> +<img id='ilink04' src='images/illus-004.jpg' alt=''/> +<p class='caption'>“BOUND NORTH”</p> +</div> + +<p>The <i>Army Lass</i>, bound north, was lost +in the fog. They hove her to. All hands +knew that she lay somewhere near the +coast. The skipper needed a sight of the +rocks—just a glimpse of some headland or +island—to pick the course. It was important +that he should have it. There +was an iceberg floating near; it was massive; +it appeared to be steady—and the sea +was quiet. From the top of it, he thought +(the fog was dense and seemed to be lying +low), he might see far and near. His crew +put him on the ice with the quarter-boat +and then hung off a bit. He clambered up +the side of the berg. Near the summit be +had to cut his foothold with an axe. This +was unfortunate; for he gave the great +white mass one blow too many. It split +under his feet. He fell headlong into the +widening crevice. But he was apparently +not a whit the worse for it when his boat’s +crew picked him up.</p> + +<hr class='tb' /> + +<p>A schooner—let her be called the <i>Good +Fortune</i>—running through dense fog, with +a fair, high wind and all sail set, struck a +“twin” iceberg bow on. She was wrecked +in a flash: her jib-boom was rammed into +her forecastle; her bows were stove in; her +topmast snapped and came crashing to the +deck. Then she fell away from the ice; +whereupon the wind caught her, turned her +about, and drove her, stern foremost, into a +narrow passage which lay between the two +towering sections of the “twin.” She +scraped along, striking the ice on either +side; and with every blow, down came +fragments from above.</p> + +<p>“It rained chunks,” said the old skipper +who told me the story. “You couldn’t +tell, look! what minute you’d get knocked +on the head.”</p> + +<p>The falling ice made great havoc with +the deck-works; the boats were crushed; +the “house” was stove in; the deck was +littered with ice. But the <i>Good Fortune</i> +drove safely through, was rigged with +makeshift sails, made harbour, was refitted +by all hands—the Labradormen can build +a ship with an axe—and continued her +voyage.</p> + +<hr class='tb' /> + +<p>I have said that the Newfoundlanders +occasionally navigate by means of old +rhymes; and this brings me to the case +of Zachariah, the skipper of the <i>Heavenly +Rest</i>. He was a Newf’un’lander. Neither +wind, fog nor a loppy sea could turn his +blood to water. He was a Newf’un’lander +of the hardshell breed. So he sailed the +<i>Heavenly Rest</i> without a chart. To be +sure, he favoured the day for getting along, +but he ran through the night when he was +crowding south, and blithely took his +chance with islands of ice and rock alike. +He had some faith in a “telltale,” had +Zachariah, but he scorned charts. It was +his boast that if he could not carry the +harbours and headlands and shallows of +five hundred miles of hungry coast in his +head he should give up the <i>Heavenly Rest</i> +and sail a paddle-punt for a living. It +was well that he could—well for the ship +and the crew and the folk at home. For, +at the time of which I write, the <i>Rest</i>, too +light in ballast to withstand a gusty breeze, +was groping through the fog for harbour +from a gale which threatened a swift descent. +It was “thick as bags,” with a rising +wind running in from the sea, and the surf +breaking and hissing within hearing to +leeward.</p> + +<p>“We be handy t’ Hollow Harbour,” said +Zachariah.</p> + +<p>“Is you sure, skipper?” asked the cook.</p> + +<p>“Sure,” said Zachariah.</p> + +<p>The <i>Heavenly Rest</i> was in desperate case. +She was running in—pursuing an unfaltering +course for an unfamiliar, rocky shore. +The warning of the surf sounded in every +man’s ears. It was imperative that her +true position should soon be determined. +The skipper was perched far forward, peering +through the fog for a sight of the coast.</p> + +<p>“Sure, an’ I hopes,” said the man at the +wheel, “that she woan’t break her nose on +a rock afore the ol’ man sees un.”</p> + +<p>“Joe Bett’s P’int!” exclaimed the +skipper.</p> + +<p>Dead ahead, and high in the air, a mass +of rock loomed through the mist. The +skipper had recognized it in a flash. He +ran aft and took the wheel. The <i>Heavenly +Rest</i> sheered off and ran to sea.</p> + +<p>“We’ll run in t’ Hollow Harbour,” said +the skipper.</p> + +<p>“Has you ever been there?” said the +man who had surrendered the wheel.</p> + +<p>“Noa, b’y,” the skipper answered, “but +I’ll get there, whatever.”</p> + +<p>The nose of the <i>Heavenly Rest</i> was turned +shoreward. Sang the skipper, humming it +to himself in a rasping sing-song:</p> + +<p> +<!-- epub-compatible --> +    “When Joe Bett’s P’int you is abreast,<br/> +    Dane’s Rock bears due west.<br/> +    West-nor’west you must steer,<br/> +    ’Til Brimstone Head do appear.<br/> +<br/> +    “The tickle’s narrow, not very wide;<br/> +    The deepest water’s on the starboard side<br/> +    When in the harbour you is shot,<br/> +    Four fathoms you has got.”<br/> +</p> + +<p>The old song was chart enough for Skipper +Zachariah. Three times the <i>Heavenly +Rest</i> ran in and out. Then she sighted +Dane’s Rock, which bore due west, true +enough. West-nor’west was the course she +followed, running blindly through the fog +and heeling to the wind. Brimstone Head +appeared in due time; and in due time the +rocks of the tickle—that narrow entrance +to the harbour—appeared in vague, forbidding +form to port and starboard. The +schooner ran to the starboard for the +deeper water. Into the harbour she shot; +and there they dropped anchor, caring not +at all whether the water was four or forty +fathoms, for it was deep enough. Through +the night the gale tickled the topmasts, but +the ship rode smoothly at her anchors, and +Skipper Zachariah’s stentorian sleep was +not disturbed by any sudden call to duty.</p> + +<p>And the doctor of the Deep Sea Mission +has had many a similar experience.</p> + +<h2 class='chapter' id='clink04'><a href='#toc'>IV—<i>DESPERATE NEED</i></a></h2> + +<p>It was to these rough waters that Dr. +Grenfell came when the need of the +folk reached his ears and touched his +heart. Before that, in the remoter parts of +Newfoundland and on the coast of Labrador +there were no doctors. The folk depended +for healing upon traditional cures, upon old +women who worked charms, upon remedies +ingeniously devised to meet the need of the +moment, upon deluded persons who prescribed +medicines of the most curious description, +upon a rough-and-ready surgery of +their own, in which the implements of the +kitchen and of the splitting-stage served a +useful purpose. For example, there was a +misled old fellow who set himself up as a +healer in a lonely cove of the Newfoundland +coast, where he lived a hermit, verily +believing, it may be, in the glory of his +call and in the blessed efficacy of his ministrations; +his cure for consumption—it was +a tragic failure, in one case, at least—was a +bull’s heart, dried and powdered and administered +with faith and regularity. Elsewhere +there was a man, stricken with a +mortal ailment, who, upon the recommendation +of a kindly neighbour, regularly +dosed himself with an ill-flavoured +liquid obtained by boiling cast-off pulley-blocks +in water. There was also a father +who most hopefully attempted to cure his +little lad of diphtheria by wrapping his +throat with a split herring; but, unhappily, +as he has said, “the wee feller +choked hisself t’ death,” notwithstanding. +There was another father—a man +of grim, heroic disposition—whose little +daughter chanced to freeze her feet to +the very bone in midwinter; when he +perceived that a surgical operation could +no longer be delayed, he cut them off +with an axe.</p> + +<p>An original preventative of sea-boils—with +which the fishermen are cruelly +afflicted upon the hands and wrists in +raw weather—was evolved by a frowsy-headed +old Labradorman of serious parts.</p> + +<p>“<i>I</i> never has none,” said he, in the fashion +of superior fellows.</p> + +<p>“No?”</p> + +<p>“Nar a one. No, <i>zur</i>! Not <i>me</i>!”</p> + +<p>A glance of interested inquiry elicited +no response. It but prolonged a large +silence.</p> + +<p>“Have you never <i>had</i> a sea-boil?” with +the note and sharp glance of incredulity.</p> + +<p>“Not me. Not since I got my cure.”</p> + +<p>“And what might that cure be?”</p> + +<p>“Well, zur,” was the amazing reply, “I +cuts my nails on a Monday.”</p> + +<hr class='tb' /> + +<p>It must be said, however, that the Newfoundland +government did provide a physician—of +a sort. Every summer he was +sent north with the mail-boat, which made +not more than six trips, touching here and +there at long intervals, and, of a hard +season, failing altogether to reach the +farthest ports. While the boat waited—an +hour, or a half, as might be—the +doctor went ashore to cure the sick, if +he chanced to be in the humour; otherwise +the folk brought the sick aboard, +where they were painstakingly treated or +not, as the doctor’s humour went. The +government seemed never to inquire too +minutely into the qualifications and character +of its appointee. The incumbent for +many years—the folk thank God that he +is dead—was an inefficient, ill-tempered, +cruel man; if not the very man himself, +he was of a kind with the Newfoundland +physician who ran a flag of warning to +his masthead when he set out to get very +drunk.</p> + +<p>The mail-boat dropped anchor one night +in a far-away harbour of the Labrador, +where there was desperate need of a +doctor to ease a man’s pain. They had +waited a long time, patiently, day after +day. I am told; and when at last the +mail-boat came, the man’s skipper put +out in glad haste to fetch the government +physician.</p> + +<p>“He’ve turned in,” they told him aboard.</p> + +<p>What did <i>that</i> matter? The skipper +roused the doctor.</p> + +<p>“We’ve a sick man ashore, zur,” said he, +“an’ he wants you t’ come——”</p> + +<p>“What!” roared the doctor. “Think +I’m going to turn out this time of night?”</p> + +<p>“Sure, zur,” stammered the astounded +skipper. “I—I—s’pose so. He’s very sick, +zur. He’s coughin’——”</p> + +<p>“Let him cough himself to death!” said +the doctor.</p> + +<p>Turn out? Not he! Rather, he turned +over in his warm berth. It is to be assumed +that the sick man died in pain; it is to be +assumed, too, that the physician continued +a tranquil slumber, for the experience was +not exceptional.</p> + +<p>“Let ’em die!” he had said more than +once.</p> + +<p>The government had provided for the +transportation of sick fishermen from the +Labrador coast to their homes in Newfoundland; +these men were of the great Newfoundland +fleet of cod-fishing schooners, +which fish the Labrador seas in the summer. +It needed only the doctor’s word to get the +boon. Once a fisherman brought his consumptive +son aboard—a young lad, with but +a few weeks of life left. The boy wanted +his mother, who was at home in Newfoundland.</p> + +<p>“Ay, he’s fair <i>sick</i> for his mother,” said +the father to the doctor. “I’m askin’ you, +zur, t’ take un home on the mail-boat.”</p> + +<p>The doctor was in a perverse mood that +day. He would not take the boy.</p> + +<p>“Sure, zur,” said the fisherman, “the +schooner’s not goin’ ’til fall, an’ I’ve no +money, an’ the lad’s dyin’.”</p> + +<p>But still the doctor would not.</p> + +<p>“I’m thinkin’, zur,” said the fisherman, +steadily, “that you’re not quite knowin’ that +the lad wants t’ see his mother afore he dies.”</p> + +<p>The doctor laughed.</p> + +<p>“We’ll have a laugh at <i>you</i>,” cried the +indignant fisherman, “when <i>you</i> comes t’ +die!”</p> + +<p>Then he cursed the doctor most heartily +and took his son ashore. He was right—they +did have a laugh at the doctor; the +whole coast might have laughed when he +came to die. Being drunk on a stormy +night, he fell down the companion way and +broke his neck.</p> + +<hr class='tb' /> + +<p>Deep in the bays and up the rivers south +of Hamilton Inlet, which is itself rather +heavily timbered, there is wood to be had +for the cutting; but “down t’ Chidley”—which +is the northernmost point of the Labrador +coast—the whole world is bare; there +is neither tree nor shrub, shore nor inland, to +grace the naked rock; the land lies bleak +and desolate. But, once, a man lived there +the year round. I don’t know why; it is +inexplicable; but I am sure that the shiftless +fellow and his wife had never an +inkling that the circumstance was otherwise +than commonplace and reasonable; and the +child, had he lived, would have continued to +dwell there, boy and man, in faith that the +earth was good to live in. One hard winter +the man burnt all his wood long before the +schooners came up from the lower coast. It +was a desperate strait to come to; but I am +sure that he regarded his situation with surprising +phlegm; doubtless he slept as sound, +if not as warm, as before. There was no +more wood to be had; so he burnt the furniture, +every stick of it, and when that was +gone, began on the frame of his house—a +turf hut, builded under a kindly cliff, sheltered +somewhat from the winds from the +frozen sea. As, rafter by rafter, the frame +was withdrawn, he cut off the roof and +folded in the turf walls; thus, day by day, +the space within dwindled; his last fire was +to consume the last of his shelter—which, +no doubt, troubled him not at all; for the +day was not yet come. It is an ugly story. +When they were found in the spring, the +woman lay dying on a heap of straw in a +muddy corner—she was afflicted with hip-disease—and +the house was tumbling about +her ears; the child, new born, had long ago +frozen on its mother’s breast.</p> + +<div style='text-align:center'> +<img id='ilink05' src='images/illus-005.jpg' alt=''/> +<p class='caption'>“A TURF HUT”</p> +</div> + +<p>A doctor of the Newfoundland outports +was once called to a little white cottage +where three children lay sick of diphtheria. +He was the family physician; that is to say, +the fisherman paid him so much by the year +for medical attendance. But the injection +of antitoxin is a “surgical operation” and +therefore not provided for by the annual +fee.</p> + +<p>“This,” said the doctor, “will cost you +two dollars an injection, John.”</p> + +<p>“Oh, ay, zur,” was the ready reply. “I’ll +pay you, zur. Go on, zur!”</p> + +<p>“But you know my rule, John—no pay, +no work. I can’t break it for you, you +know, or I’d have to break it for half the +coast.”</p> + +<p>“Oh, ay! ’Tis all right. I wants un +cured. I’ll pay you when I sells me +fish.”</p> + +<p>“But you know my rule, John—cash +down.”</p> + +<p>The fisherman had but four dollars—no +more; nor could he obtain any more, though +the doctor gave him ample time. I am sure +that he loved his children dearly, but, unfortunately, +he had no more than four dollars; +and there was no other doctor for +fifty miles up and down the coast.</p> + +<p>“Four dollars,” said the doctor, “two +children. Which ones shall it be, John?”</p> + +<p>Which ones? Why, of course, after all, +the doctor had himself to make the choice. +John couldn’t. So the doctor chose the +“handiest” ones. The other one died.</p> + +<p>“Well,” said John, unresentfully, the day +after the funeral, “I s’pose a doctor haves a +right t’ be paid for what he does. But,” +much puzzled, “’tis kind o’ queer!”</p> + +<hr class='tb' /> + +<p>This is not a work of fiction. These incidents +are true. I set them down here +for the purpose of adequately showing the +need of such a practitioner as Wilfred T. +Grenfell in the sphere in which he now +labours. My point is—that if in the more +settled places, where physicians might be +summoned, such neglect and brutality could +exist, in what a lamentable condition were +the folk of the remoter parts, where even +money could not purchase healing! Nor +are these true stories designed to reflect upon +the regular practitioners of Newfoundland; +nor should they create a false impression +concerning them. I have known many noble +physicians in practice there; indeed, I am +persuaded that heroism and devotion are, +perhaps, their distinguishing characteristics. +God knows, there is little enough gain to +be had! God knows, too, that that little is +hard earned! These men do their work +well and courageously, and as adequately +as may be; it is on the coasts beyond that +the mission-doctor labours.</p> + +<h2 class='chapter' id='clink05'><a href='#toc'>V—<i>A HELPING HAND</i></a></h2> + +<p>While the poor “liveyeres” and +Newfoundland fishermen thus depended +upon the mail-boat doctor +and their own strange inventions for relief, +Wilfred Grenfell, this well-born, Oxford-bred +young Englishman, was walking +the London hospitals. He was athletic, adventurous, +dogged, unsentimental, merry, +kind; moreover—and most happily—he was +used to the sea, and he loved it. It chanced +one night that he strayed into the Tabernacle +in East London, where D. L. Moody, +the American evangelist, was preaching. +When he came out he had resolved to make +his religion “practical.” There was nothing +violent in this—no fevered, ill-judged +determination to martyr himself at all costs. +It was a quiet resolve to make the best of +his life—which he would have done at any +rate, I think, for he was a young Englishman +of good breeding and the finest impulses. +At once he cast about for “some +way in which he could satisfy the aspirations +of a young medical man, and combine +with this a desire for adventure and definite +Christian work.”</p> + +<p>I had never before met a missionary of +that frank type. “Why,” I exclaimed to +him, off the coast of Labrador, not long +ago, “you seem to <i>like</i> this sort of +life!”</p> + +<p>We were aboard the mission steamer, +bound north under full steam and all sail. +He had been in feverish haste to reach the +northern harbours, where, as he knew, the +sick were watching for his coming. The +fair wind, the rush of the little steamer on +her way, pleased him.</p> + +<p>“Oh,” said he, somewhat impatiently, +“<i>I’m</i> not a martyr.”</p> + +<p>So he found what he sought. After applying +certain revolutionary ideas to +Sunday-school work in the London slums, in +which a horizontal bar and a set of boxing-gloves +for a time held equal place with the +Bible and the hymn-book, he joined the +staff of the Royal National Mission to +Deep Sea Fishermen, and established the +medical mission to the fishermen of the +North Sea. When that work was organized—when +the fight was gone out of it—he +sought a harder task; he is of that type, +then extraordinary but now familiar, which +finds no delight where there is no difficulty. +In the spring of 1892 he set sail from Great +Yarmouth Harbour for Labrador in a +ninety-ton schooner. Since then, in the +face of hardship, peril, and prejudice, he +has, with a light heart and strong purpose, +healed the sick, preached the Word, clothed +the naked, fed the starving, given shelter to +them that had no roof, championed the +wronged—in all, devotedly fought evil, poverty, +oppression, and disease; for he is bitterly +intolerant of those things. And——</p> + +<p>“It’s been jolly good fun!” says he.</p> + +<div style='text-align:center'> +<img id='ilink06' src='images/illus-006.jpg' alt=''/> +<p class='caption'>“SET SAIL FROM GREAT YARMOUTH HARBOR FOR LABRADOR”</p> +</div> + +<p>The immediate inspiration of this work +was the sermon preached in East London +by D. L. Moody. Later in life—indeed, +soon before the great evangelist’s death—Dr. +Grenfell thanked him for that sermon. +“And what have you been doing since?” +was Mr. Moody’s prompt and searching +question. “<i>What have you been doing +since?</i>” Dr. Grenfell might with propriety +and effect have placed in Mr. +Moody’s hands such letters as those which +I reprint, saying: “What have I been +doing since? I have been kept busy, sir, +responding to such calls as these.” Such +calls as these:</p> + +<blockquote> +<p> +Docter plase I whant to see you. Doeher +sir have you got a leg if you have Will you +plase send him Down Praps he may fet and +you would oblig. +</p> +<p> +Reverance dr. Grandfell. Dear sir we +are expecting you hup and we would like +for you to come so quick as you can for my +dater is very sick with a very large sore +under her left harm we emenangin that the +old is two enchis deep and tow enches wide +plase com as quick as you can to save life +I remains yours truely. +</p> +<p> +Docker,—Please wel you send me somting +for the pain in my feet and what you +proismed to send my little boy. Docker I +am almost cripple, it is up my hips, I can +hardly walk. This is my housban is gaining +you this note from +</p> +<p> +To Dr. Gransfield<br/> + Dear honrabel Sir,<br/> +I would wish to ask you Sir, if you would +Be pleased to give me and my wife a littel +poor close. I was going in the Bay to cut +some wood. But I am all amost blind and +cant Do much so if you would spear me +some Sir I should Be very thankfull to you +Sir. +</p> +<p> +I got Bad splotches all over my Body and +i dont know what the cause of it is. Please +Have you got anything for it. i Have’nt +got any money to Pay you now for anything +But i wont forget to Pay you when i gets +the money. +</p> +<p> +doctor—i have a compleant i ham weak +with wind on the chest, weaknes all all over +me up in my harm. +</p> +<p> +Dear Dr. Grenfell.<br/> + I would like for you to Have time to +come Down to my House Before you leaves +to go to St. Anthony. My little Girl is +very Bad. it seems all in Her neck. Cant +Ply her Neck forward if do she nearly goes +in the fits, i dont know what it is the +matter with Her myself. But if you see +Her you would know what the matter with +Her. Please send a Word By the Bearer +what gives you this note and let me know +where you will have time to come down to +my House. i lives down the Bay a Place +called Berry Head. +</p> +</blockquote> + +<p>“What have you been doing since?” +Dr. Grenfell has not been idle. There is +now a mission hospital at St. Anthony, near +the extreme northeast point of the Newfoundland +coast. There is another, well-equipped +and commodious, at Battle Harbour—a +rocky island lying out from the +Labrador coast near the Strait of Belle Isle—which +is open the year round; when the +writer was last on the coast, it was in +charge of Dr. Cluny McPherson, a courageous +young physician, Newfoundland-born, +who went six hundred miles up the coast by +dog-team in the dead of winter, finding shelter +where he might, curing whom he +could—everywhere seeking out those who needed +him, caring not a whit, it appears, for the +peril and hardship of the long white road. +There is a third at Indian Harbour, half-way +up the coast, which is open through +the fishing season. It is conducted with +the care and precision of a London hospital—admirably +kept, well-ordered, efficient. +The physician in charge is Dr. George H. +Simpson—a wiry, keen, brave little Englishman, +who goes about in an open boat, whatever +the distance, whatever the weather; he +is a man of splendid courage and sympathy: +the fishing-folk love him for his kind heart +and for the courage with which he responds +to their every call. There is also the little +hospital steamer <i>Strathcona</i>, in which Dr. +Grenfell makes the round of all the coast, +from the time of the break-up until the fall +gales have driven the fishing-schooners +home to harbour.</p> + +<div style='text-align:center'> +<img id='ilink07' src='images/illus-007.jpg' alt=''/> +<p class='caption'>“APPEARED WITH A LITTLE STEAM-LAUNCH, THE PRINCESS MAY”</p> +</div> + +<h2 class='chapter' id='clink06'><a href='#toc'>VI—<i>FAITH and DUTY</i></a></h2> + +<p>When Dr. Grenfell first appeared +on the coast, I am told, the folk +thought him a madman of some +benign description. He knew nothing of +the reefs, the tides, the currents, cared nothing, +apparently, for the winds; he sailed +with the confidence and reckless courage of +a Labrador skipper. Fearing at times to +trust his schooner in unknown waters, he +went about in a whale-boat, and so hard did +he drive her that he wore her out in a single +season. She was capsized with all hands, +once driven out to sea, many times nearly +swamped, once blown on the rocks; never +before was a boat put to such tasks on that +coast, and at the end of it she was wrecked +beyond repair. Next season he appeared +with a little steam-launch, the <i>Princess May</i>—her +beam was eight feet!—in which he +not only journeyed from St. Johns to Labrador, +to the astonishment of the whole +colony, but sailed the length of that bitter +coast, passing into the gulf and safely out +again, and pushing to the very farthest settlements +in the north. Late in the fall, upon, +the return journey to St. Johns in stormy +weather, she was reported lost, and many a +skipper, I suppose, wondered that she had +lived so long; but she weathered a gale that +bothered the mail-boat, and triumphantly +made St. Johns, after as adventurous a voyage, +no doubt, as ever a boat of her measure +survived.</p> + +<p>“Sure,” said a skipper, “I don’t know +how she done it. The Lord,” he added, +piously, “must kape an eye on that +man.”</p> + +<hr class='tb' /> + +<p>There is a new proverb on the coast. The +folk say, when a great wind blows, “This’ll +bring Grenfell!” Often it does. He is impatient +of delay, fretted by inaction; a gale +is the wind for him—a wind to take him +swiftly towards the place ahead. Had he +been a weakling, he would long ago have +died on the coast; had he been a coward, a +multitude of terrors would long ago have +driven him to a life ashore; had he been +anything but a true man and tender, indeed, +he would long ago have retreated under the +suspicion and laughter of the folk. But he +has outsailed the Labrador skippers—out-dared +them—done deeds of courage under +their very eyes that they would shiver to +contemplate,—never in a foolhardy spirit; +always with the object of kindly service. +So he has the heart and willing hand of +every honest man on the Labrador—and of +none more than of the men of his crew, who +take the chances with him; they are wholly +devoted.</p> + +<p>One of his engineers, for example, once +developed the unhappy habit of knocking +the cook down.</p> + +<p>“You must keep your temper,” said the +doctor. “This won’t do, you know.”</p> + +<p>But there came an unfortunate day when, +being out of temper, the engineer again +knocked the cook down.</p> + +<p>“This is positively disgraceful!” said the +doctor. “I can’t keep a quarrelsome fellow +aboard the mission-ship. Remember that, +if you will, when next you feel tempted to +strike the cook.”</p> + +<p>The engineer protested that he would +never again lay hands on the cook, whatever +the provocation. But again he lost his +temper, and down went the poor cook, flat +on his back.</p> + +<p>“I’ll discharge you,” said the doctor, angrily, +“at the end of the cruise!”</p> + +<p>The engineer pleaded for another chance. +He was denied. From day to day he renewed +his plea, but to no purpose, and at +last the crew came to the conclusion that +something really ought to be done for the +engineer, who was visibly fretting himself +thin.</p> + +<p>“Very well,” said the doctor to the engineer; +“I’ll make this agreement with you. +If ever again you knock down the cook, I’ll +put you ashore at the first land we come to, +and you may get back to St. Johns as best +you can.”</p> + +<p>It was a hard alternative. The doctor is +not a man to give or take when the bargain +has been struck; the engineer knew that he +would surely go ashore somewhere on that +desolate coast, whether the land was a barren +island or a frequented harbour, if ever +again the cook tempted him beyond endurance.</p> + +<p>“I’ll stand by it, sir,” he said, nevertheless; +“for I don’t want to leave you.”</p> + +<hr class='tb' /> + +<p>In the course of time the <i>Princess May</i> +was wrecked or worn out. Then came the +<i>Julia Sheridan</i>, thirty-five feet long, which +the mission doctor bought while she yet lay +under water from her last wreck; he raised +her, refitted her with what money he had, +and pursued his venturesome and beneficent +career, until she, too, got beyond so hard a +service. Many a gale she weathered, off +“the worst coast in the world”—often, +indeed, in thick, wild weather, the doctor himself +thought the little craft would go down; +but she is now happily superannuated, carrying +the mail in the quieter waters of Hamilton +Inlet. Next came the <i>Sir Donald</i>—a +stout ship, which in turn disappeared, +crushed in the ice. The <i>Strathcona</i>, with a +hospital amidships, is now doing duty; and +she will continue to go up and down the +coast, in and out of the inlets, until she in +her turn finds the ice and the wind and the +rocks too much for her.</p> + +<p>“’Tis bound t’ come, soon or late,” said a +cautious friend of the mission. “He drives +her too hard. He’ve a right t’ do what he +likes with his own life, I s’pose, but he’ve a +call t’ remember that the crew has folks t’ +home.”</p> + +<hr class='tb' /> + +<p>But the mission doctor is not inconsiderate; +he is in a hurry—the coast is long, the +season short, the need such as to wring a +man’s heart. Every new day holds an opportunity +for doing a good deed—not if he +dawdles in the harbours when a gale is +abroad, but only if he passes swiftly from +place to place, with a brave heart meeting +the dangers as they come. He is the only +doctor to visit the Labrador shore of the +Gulf, the Strait shore of Newfoundland, +the populous east coast of the northern +peninsula of Newfoundland, the only doctor +known to the Esquimaux and poor “liveyeres” +of the northern coast of Labrador, +the only doctor most of the “liveyeres” and +green-fish catchers of the middle coast can +reach, save the hospital physician at Indian +Harbour. He has a round of three thousand +miles to make. It is no wonder that he +“drives” the little steamer—even at full +steam, with all sail spread (as I have known +him to do), when the fog is thick and the +sea is spread with great bergs.</p> + +<p>“I’m in a hurry,” he said, with an impatient +sigh. “The season’s late. We must +get along.”</p> + +<hr class='tb' /> + +<p>We fell in with him at Red Ray in the +Strait, in the thick of a heavy gale from +the northeast. The wind had blown for two +days; the sea was running high, and still +fast rising; the schooners were huddled in +the harbours, with all anchors out, many of +them hanging on for dear life, though they +lay in shelter. The sturdy little coastal +boat, with four times the strength of the +<i>Strathcona</i>, had made hard work of it that +day—there was a time when she but held +her own off a lee shore in the teeth of the +big wind.</p> + +<p>It was drawing on towards night when the +doctor came aboard for a surgeon from Boston, +a specialist, for whom he had been waiting.</p> + +<p>“I see you’ve steam up,” said the captain +of the coastal boat. “I hope you’re not +going out in <i>this</i>, doctor!”</p> + +<p>“I have some patients at the Battle Harbour +Hospital, waiting for our good friend +from Boston,” said the doctor, briskly. +“I’m in a hurry. Oh, yes, I’m going +out!”</p> + +<p>“For God’s sake, don’t!” said the captain +earnestly.</p> + +<p>The doctor’s eye chanced to fall on the +gentleman from Boston, who was bending +over his bag—a fine, fearless fellow, whom +the prospect of putting out in that chip of a +steamer would not have perturbed, though +the doctor may then not have known it. +At any rate, as though bethinking himself +of something half forgotten, he changed his +mind of a sudden.</p> + +<p>“Oh, very well,” he said. “I’ll wait until +the gale blows out.”</p> + +<p>He managed to wait a day—no longer; +and the wind was still wild, the sea higher +than ever; there was ice in the road, and +the fog was dense. Then out he went into +the thick of it. He bumped an iceberg, +scraped a rock, fairly smothered the steamer +with broken water; and at midnight—the +most marvellous feat of all—he crept into +Battle Harbour through a narrow, difficult +passage, and dropped anchor off the mission +wharf.</p> + +<p>Doubtless he enjoyed the experience +while it lasted—and promptly forgot it, +as being commonplace. I have heard of +him, caught in the night in a winter’s +gale of wind and snow, threading a +tumultuous, reef-strewn sea, his skipper +at the wheel, himself on the bowsprit, +guiding the ship by the flash and roar +of breakers, while the sea tumbled over +him. If the chance passenger who told +me the story is to be believed, upon that +trying occasion the doctor had the “time +of his life.”</p> + +<p>“All that man wanted,” I told the +doctor subsequently, “was, as he says, ‘to +bore a hole in the bottom of the ship and +crawl out.’”</p> + +<p>“Why!” exclaimed the doctor, with a +laugh of surprise. “He wasn’t <i>frightened</i>, +was he?”</p> + +<div style='text-align:center'> +<img id='ilink08' src='images/illus-008.jpg' alt=''/> +<p class='caption'>“THE HOSPITAL SHIP, STRATHCONA”</p> +</div> + +<p>Fear of the sea is quite incomprehensible +to this man. The passenger was very much +frightened; he vowed never to sail with +“that devil” again. But the doctor is +very far from being a dare-devil; though +he is, to be sure, a man altogether unafraid; +it seems to me that his heart can +never have known the throb of fear. Perhaps +that is in part because he has a blessed +lack of imagination, in part, perhaps, because +he has a body as sound as ever God +gave to a man, and has used it as a man +should; but it is chiefly because of his +simple and splendid faith that he is an +instrument in God’s hands—God’s to do +with as He will, as he would say. His +faith is exceptional, I am sure—childlike, +steady, overmastering, and withal, if I may +so characterize it, healthy. It takes something +such as the faith he has to move a +man to run a little steamer at full speed in +the fog when there is ice on every hand. +It is hardly credible, but quite true, and +short of the truth: neither wind nor ice +nor fog, nor all combined, can keep the +<i>Strathcona</i> in harbour when there comes a +call for help from beyond. The doctor +clambers cheerfully out on the bowsprit +and keeps both eyes open. “As the Lord +wills,” says he, “whether for wreck or +service. I am about His business.”</p> + +<p>It is a sublime expression of the old +faith.</p> + +<h2 class='chapter' id='clink07'><a href='#toc'>VII—<i>THE LIVEYERE</i></a></h2> + +<p>Doctor Grenfell’s patients are +of three classes. There is first the +“liveyere”—the inhabitant of the +Labrador coast—the most ignorant and +wretched of them all. There is the Newfoundland +“outporter”—the small fisherman +of the remoter coast, who must depend +wholly upon his hook and line for subsistence. +There is the Labradorman—the +Newfoundland fisherman of the better +class, who fishes the Labrador coast in +the summer season and returns to his +home port when the snow begins to fly +in the fall. Some description of these +three classes is here offered, that the +reader may understand the character and +condition of the folk among whom Dr. +Grenfell labours.</p> + +<p>“As a permanent abode of civilized man,” +it is written in a very learned if somewhat +old-fashioned work, “Labrador is, on the +whole, one of the most uninviting spots on +the face of the earth.” That is putting it +altogether too delicately; there should be +no qualification; the place is a brutal desolation. +The weather has scoured the coast—a +thousand miles of it—as clean as an old +bone: it is utterly sterile, save for a tuft or +two of hardy grass and wide patches of crisp +moss; bare gray rocks, low in the south, +towering and craggy in the north, everywhere +blasted by frost, lie in billowy hills +between the froth and clammy mist of the +sea and the starved forest at the edge of +the inland wilderness. The interior is forbidding; +few explorers have essayed adventure +there; but the Indians—an expiring +tribe—and trappers who have caught sight +of the “height of land” say that it is for +the most part a vast table-land, barren, +strewn with enormous boulders, scarce in +game, swarming with flies, with vegetation +surviving only in the hollows and ravines—a +sullen, forsaken waste.</p> + +<p>Those who dwell on the coast are called +“liveyeres” because they say, “Oh, ay, zur, +I lives yere!” in answer to the question. +These are not to be confounded with the +Newfoundland fishermen who sail the Labrador +seas in the fishing season—an adventurous, +thrifty folk, bright-eyed, hearty in +laughter—twenty-five thousand hale men +and boys, with many a wife and maid, who +come and return again. Less than four +thousand poor folk have on the long coast +the “permanent abode” of which the learned +work speaks—much less, I should think, +from the Strait of Belle Isle to Cape Chidley. +It is an evil fate to be born there: the +Newfoundlanders who went north from their +better country, the Hudson Bay Company’s +servants who took wives from the natives, +all the chance comers who procrastinated +their escape, desperately wronged their posterity; +the saving circumstance is the very +isolation of the dwelling-place—no man +knows, no man really <i>knows</i>, that elsewhere +the earth is kinder to her children and fairer +far than the wind-swept, barren coast to +which he is used. They live content, bearing +many children, in inclemency, in squalor, +and, from time to time, in uttermost poverty—such +poverty as clothes a child in a trouser +leg and feeds babies and strong men alike +on nothing but flour and water. They were +born there: that is where they came from; +that is why they live there.</p> + +<p>“’Tis a short feast and a long famine,” +said a northern “liveyere,” quite cheerfully; +to him it was just a commonplace fact of +life.</p> + +<hr class='tb' /> + +<p>There are degrees of wretchedness: a +frame cottage is the habitation of the rich +and great where the poor live in turf huts; +and the poor subsist on roots and a paste of +flour and water when the rich feast on salt +junk. The folk who live near the Strait of +Belle Isle and on the gulf shore may be in +happier circumstances. To be sure, they +know the pinch of famine; but some—the +really well-to-do—are clear of the over-shadowing +dread of it. The “liveyeres” of +the north dwell in huts, in lonely coves of +the bays, remote even from neighbours as +ill-cased as themselves; there they live and +laugh and love and suffer and die and bury +their dead—alone. To the south, however, +there are little settlements in the more +sheltered harbours—the largest of not more +than a hundred souls—where there is a degree +of prosperity and of comfort; potatoes +are a luxury, but the flour-barrel is always +full, the pork-barrel not always empty, and +there are raisins in the duff on feast-days; +moreover, there are stoves in the whitewashed +houses (the northern “liveyere’s” +stove is more often than not a flat rock), +beds to sleep in, muslin curtains in the little +windows, and a flower, it may be, sprouting +desperately in a red pot on the sill. That +is the extreme of luxury—rare to be met +with; and it is at all times open to dissolution +by famine.</p> + +<p>“Sure, zur, <i>last</i> winter,” a stout young +fellow boasted, “we had all the grease us +wanted!”</p> + +<p>It is related of a thrifty settler named +Olliver, however, who lived with his wife +and five children at Big Bight,—he was a +man of superior qualities, as the event +makes manifest,—that, having come close +to the pass of starvation at the end of a +long winter, he set out afoot over the hills +to seek relief from his nearest neighbour, +forty miles away. But there was no relief +to be had; the good neighbour had already +given away all that he dared spare, and +something more. Twelve miles farther on +he was again denied; it is said that the +second neighbour mutely pointed to his +flour-barrel and his family—which was +quite sufficient for Olliver, who thereupon +departed to a third house, where his fortune +was no better. Perceiving then that he +must depend upon the store of food in his +own house, which was insufficient to support +the lives of all, he returned home, sent +his wife and eldest son and eldest daughter +away on a pretext, despatched his three +youngest children with an axe, and shot +himself. As he had foreseen, wife, daughter, +and son survived until the “break-up” +brought food within their reach; and the +son was a well-grown boy, and made a +capable head of the house thereafter.</p> + +<div style='text-align:center'> +<img id='ilink09' src='images/illus-009.jpg' alt=''/> +<p class='caption'>“THE LABRADOR ‘LIVEYERE’”</p> +</div> + +<p>The “liveyere” is a fisherman and trapper. +In the summer he catches cod; in +the winter he traps the fox, otter, mink, +lynx, and marten, and sometimes he shoots +a bear, white or black, and kills a wolf. +The “planter,” who advances the salt to +cure the fish, takes the catch at the end of the +season, giving in exchange provisions at an +incredible profit; the Hudson Bay Company +takes the fur, giving in exchange provisions +at an even larger profit; for obvious reasons, +both aim (there are exceptions, of course) to +keep the “liveyere” in debt—which is not +by any means a difficult matter, for the +“liveyere” is both shiftless and (what is +more to the point) illiterate. So it comes +about that what he may have to eat and +wear depends upon the will of the “planter” +and of the company; and when for his ill-luck +or his ill-will both cast him off—which +sometimes happens—he looks starvation in +the very face. A silver fox, of good fur and +acceptable colour, is the “liveyere’s” great +catch; no doubt his most ecstatic nightmare +has to do with finding one fast in his +trap; but when, “more by chance than +good conduct,” as they say, he has that +heavenly fortune (the event is of the +rarest), the company pays sixty or eighty +dollars for that which it sells abroad for +$600. Of late, however, the free-traders +seem to have established a footing on the +coast; their stay may not be long, but for +the moment, at any rate, the “liveyere” +may dispose of his fur to greater advantage—if +he dare.</p> + +<p>The earth yields the “liveyere” nothing +but berries, which are abundant, and, in +midsummer, “turnip tops”; and as +numerous dogs are needed for winter travelling—wolfish +creatures, savage, big, famished—no +domestic animals can be kept. There +was once a man who somehow managed for +a season to possess a pig and a sheep; he +marooned his dogs on an island half a mile +off the coast; unhappily, however, there +blew an off-shore wind in the night, and +next morning neither the pig nor the sheep +was to be found; the dogs were engaged in +innocent diversions on the island, but there +was evidence sufficient on their persons, so +to speak, to convict them of the depredation +in any court of justice. There are no +cows on the coast, no goats,—consequently +no additional milk-supply for babies,—who +manage from the beginning, however, to +thrive on bread and salt beef, if put to the +necessity. There are no pigs—there is one +pig, I believe,—no sheep, no chickens; and +the first horses to be taken to the sawmill +on Hamilton Inlet so frightened the natives +that they scampered in every direction for +their lives whenever the team came near, +crying: “Look out! The harses is comin’!” +The caribou are too far inland for most of +the settlers; but at various seasons (excluding +such times as there is no game at all) +there are to be had grouse, partridge, geese, +eider-duck, puffin, gulls, loon and petrel, +bear, arctic hare, and bay seal, which are +shot with marvellously long and old guns—some +of them ancient flintlocks.</p> + +<p>Notwithstanding all, the folk are large +and hardy—capable of withstanding cruel +hardship and deprivation.</p> + +<p>In summer-time the weather is blistering +hot inland; and on the coast it is more often +than not wet, foggy, blustering—bitter +enough for the man from the south, who +shivers as he goes about. Innumerable icebergs +drift southward, scraping the coast as +they go, and patches of snow lie in the hollows +of the coast hills—midway between +Battle Harbour and Cape Chidley there is a +low headland called Snowy Point because +the snow forever lies upon it. But warm, +sunny days are to be counted upon in August—days +when the sea is quiet, the sky deep +blue, the rocks bathed in yellow sunlight, +the air clear and bracing; at such times it +is good to lie on the high heads and look +away out to sea, dreaming the while. In +winter, storm and intense cold make most +of the coast uninhabitable; the “liveyeres” +retire up the bays and rivers, bag and baggage, +not only to escape the winds and bitter +cold, but to be nearer the supply of game +and fire-wood. They live in little “tilts”—log +huts of one large square room, with +“bunks” at each end for the women-folk, +and a “cockloft” above for the men and +lads. It is very cold; frost forms on the +walls, icicles under the “bunks”; the thermometer +frequently falls to fifty degrees below +zero, which, as you may be sure, is exceedingly +cold near the sea. Nor can a man +do much heavy work in the woods, for the +perspiration freezes under his clothing. Impoverished +families have no stoves—merely +an arrangement of flat stones, with an opening +in the roof for the escape of the smoke, +with which they are quite content if only they +have enough flour to make hard bread for all.</p> + +<p>It goes without saying that there is neither +butcher, baker, nor candlestick-maker on the +coast. Every man is his own bootmaker, +tailor, and what not; there is not a trade or +profession practiced anywhere. There is no +resident doctor, save the mission doctors, one +of whom is established at Battle Harbour, and +with a dog-team makes a toilsome journey +up the coast in the dead of winter, relieving +whom he can. There is no public building, +no municipal government, no road. There is +no lawyer, no constable; and I very much +doubt that there is a parson regularly stationed +among the whites beyond Battle Harbour, +with the exception of the Moravian +missionaries. They are scarce enough, at any +rate, for the folk in a certain practical way to +feel the hardship of their absence. Dr. Grenfell +tells of landing late one night in a lonely +harbour where three “couples wanted marrying.” +They had waited many years for the +opportunity. It chanced that the doctor was +entertaining a minister on the cruise; so one +couple determined at once to return to the +ship with him. “The minister,” says the +doctor, “decided that pronouncing the banns +might be dispensed with in this case. He +went ahead with the ceremony, for the +couple had three children already!”</p> + +<hr class='tb' /> + +<p>The “liveyere” is of a sombrely religious +turn of mind—his creed as harsh and +gloomy as the land he lives in; he is superstitious +as a savage as well, and an incorrigible +fatalist, all of which is not hard to +account for: he is forever in the midst of +vast space and silence, face to face with +dread and mysterious forces, and in conflict +with wind and sea and the changing season, +which are irresistible and indifferent.</p> + +<p>Jared was young, lusty, light-hearted; +but he lived in the fear and dread of hell. +I had known that for two days.</p> + +<p>“The flies, zur,” said he to the sportsman, +whose hospitality I was enjoying, “was +wonderful bad the day.”</p> + +<p>We were twelve miles inland, fishing a +small stream; and we were now in the +“tilt,” at the end of the day, safe from the +swarming, vicious black-flies.</p> + +<p>“Yes,” the sportsman replied, emphatically. +“I’ve suffered the tortures of the +damned this day!”</p> + +<p>Jared burst into a roar of laughter—as +sudden and violent as a thunderclap.</p> + +<p>“What you laughing at?” the sportsman +demanded, as he tenderly stroked his +swollen neck.</p> + +<p>“Tartures o’ the damned!” Jared gasped. +“Sure, if <i>that’s</i> all ’tis, I’ll jack ’asy about +it!”</p> + +<p>He laughed louder—reckless levity; but +I knew that deep in his heart he would be +infinitely relieved could he believe—could +he only make sure—that the punishment of +the wicked was no worse than an eternity +of fighting with poisonous insects.</p> + +<p>“Ay,” he repeated, ruefully, “if that’s +all ’twas, ’twould not trouble me much.”</p> + +<p>The graveyard at Battle Harbour is in a +sheltered hollow near the sea. It is a green +spot—the one, perhaps, on the island—and +they have enclosed it with a high board +fence. Men have fished from that harbour +for a hundred years and more—but there +are not many graves; why, I do not know. +The crumbling stones, the weather-beaten +boards, the sprawling ill-worded inscriptions, +are all, in their way, eloquent:</p> + +<div style='text-align:center'> +<img id='ilink10' src='images/illus-010.jpg' alt=''/> +<p class='caption'>“Sarah Combe died the fourth of August, 1881,<br /> +aged 31 years.”</p> +</div> + +<p>There is another, better carved, somewhat +better spelled, but quite as interesting and +luminous:</p> + +<p style='text-align:center;'>In<br/> +Memory of John<br/> +Hill who Died<br/> +December 30 1890<br/> +Aged 34</p> + +<table summary='inscription'> +<tr><td>Weep not dear Parents<br/> +For your lost tis my<br/> +Etarnel gain May<br/> +May Crist you all take up<br/> +The crost that we<br/> +Shuld meat again</td></tr> +</table> + +<p>These things are, indeed, eloquent—of +ignorance, of poverty; but no less eloquent +of sorrow and of love. The Labrador +“liveyere” is kin with the whole +wide world.</p> + +<h2 class='chapter' id='clink08'><a href='#toc'>VIII—<i>WITH The FLEET</i></a></h2> + +<p>In the early spring—when the sunlight +is yellow and the warm winds blow +and the melting snow drips over the +cliffs and runs in little rivulets from the +barren hills—in the thousand harbours of +Newfoundland the great fleet is made ready +for the long adventure upon the Labrador +coast. The rocks echo the noise of hammer +and saw and mallet and the song and shout +of the workers. The new schooners—building +the winter long at the harbour side—are +hurried to completion. The old craft—the +weather-beaten, ragged old craft, which, +it may be, have dodged the reefs and out-lived +the gales of forty seasons—are fitted +with new spars, patched with new canvas +and rope, calked anew, daubed anew and, +thus refitted, float brave enough on the +quiet harbour water. There is no end to +the bustle of labour on ships and nets—no +end to the clatter of planning. From the +skipper of the ten-ton <i>First Venture</i>, who +sails with a crew of sons bred for the purpose, +to the powerful dealer who supplies on +shares a fleet of seventeen fore-and-afters +manned from the harbours of a great bay, +there is hope in the hearts of all. Whatever +the last season, every man is to make +a good “voyage” now. This season—<i>this</i> +season—there is to be fish a-plenty on the +Labrador!</p> + +<p>The future is bright as the new spring +days. Aunt Matilda is to have a bonnet +with feathers—when Skipper Thomas gets +home from the Labrador. Little Johnny +Tatt, he of the crooked back, is to know +again the virtue of Pike’s Pain Compound, +at a dollar a bottle, warranted to cure—when +daddy gets home from the Labrador. +Skipper Bill’s Lizzie, plump, blushing, merry-eyed, +is to wed Jack Lute o’ Burnt Arm—when +Jack comes back from the Labrador. +Every man’s heart, and, indeed, most men’s +fortunes, are in the venture. The man who +has nothing has yet the labour of his hands. +Be he skipper, there is one to back his skill +and honesty; be he hand, there is no lack +of berths to choose from. Skippers stand +upon their record and schooners upon their +reputation; it’s take your choice, for the +hands are not too many: the skippers are +timid or bold, as God made them; the +schooners are lucky or not, as Fate determines. +Every man has his chance. John +Smith o’ Twillingate provisions the <i>Lucky +Queen</i> and gives her to the penniless Skipper +Jim o’ Yellow Tickle on shares. Old +Tom Tatter o’ Salmon Cove, with plea and +argument, persuades the Four Arms trader +to trust him once again with the <i>Busy Bee</i>. +He’ll get the fish <i>this</i> time. Nar a doubt +of it! <i>He’ll</i> be home in August—this year—loaded +to the gunwale. God knows who +pays the cash when the fish fail! God +knows how the folk survive the disappointment! +It is a great lottery of hope +and fortune.</p> + +<p>When, at last, word comes south that the +ice is clearing from the coast, the vessels +spread their little wings to the first favouring +winds; and in a week—two weeks or +three—the last of the Labradormen have +gone “down north.”</p> + +<p>Dr. Grenfell and his workers find much +to do among these men and women and +children.</p> + +<hr class='tb' /> + +<p>At Indian Harbour where the <i>Strathcona</i> +lay at anchor, I went aboard the schooner +<i>Jolly Crew</i>. It was a raw, foggy day, with +a fresh northeast gale blowing, and a high +sea running outside the harbour. They +were splitting fish on deck; the skiff was +just in from the trap—she was still wet +with spray.</p> + +<p>“I sails with me sons an’ gran’sons, zur,” +said the skipper, smiling. “Sure, I be a old +feller t’ be down the Labrador, isn’t I, zur?”</p> + +<p>He did not mean that. He was proud of +his age and strength—glad that he was still +able “t’ be at the fishin’.”</p> + +<div style='text-align:center'> +<img id='ilink11' src='images/illus-011.jpg' alt=''/> +<p class='caption'>“AT INDIAN HARBOR”</p> +</div> + +<p>“’Tis a wonder you’ve lived through it +all,” said I.</p> + +<p>He laughed. “An’ why, zur?” he asked.</p> + +<p>“Many’s the ship wrecked on this coast,” +I answered.</p> + +<p>“Oh no, zur,” said he; “not so many, +zur, as you might think. Down this way, +zur, <i>we knows how t’ sail</i>!”</p> + +<p>That was a succinct explanation of very +much that had puzzled me.</p> + +<p>“Ah, well,” said I, “’tis a hard life.”</p> + +<p>“Hard?” he asked, doubtfully.</p> + +<p>“Yes,” I answered; “’tis a hard life—the +fishin’.”</p> + +<p>“Oh no, zur,” said he, quietly, looking +up from his work. “’Tis just—just <i>life</i>!”</p> + +<hr class='tb' /> + +<p>They do, indeed, know how “t’ sail.” +The Newfoundland government, niggardly +and utterly independable when the good of +the fisherfolk is concerned, of whatever complexion +the government may chance to be, +but prodigal to an extraordinary degree +when individual self-interests are at +stake—this is a delicate way of putting an unpleasant +truth,—keeps no light burning beyond +the Strait of Belle Isle; the best it does, I +believe, is to give wrecked seamen free passage +home. Under these difficult circumstances, +no seamen save Newfoundlanders, +who are the most skillful and courageous of +all, could sail that coast: and they only because +they are born to follow the sea—there +is no escape for them—and are bred to sailing +from their earliest years.</p> + +<p>“What you going to be when you grow +up?” I once asked a lad on the far northeast +coast.</p> + +<p>He looked at me in vast astonishment.</p> + +<p>“What you going to <i>be</i>, what you going +to <i>do</i>,” I repeated, “when you grow up?”</p> + +<p>Still he did not comprehend. “Eh?” he +said.</p> + +<p>“What you going to work at,” said I, in +desperation, “when you’re a man?”</p> + +<p>“Oh, zur,” he answered, understanding at +last, “I isn’t clever enough t’ be a parson!”</p> + +<p>And so it went without saying that he +was to fish for a living! It is no wonder, +then, that the skippers of the fleet know +“how t’ sail.” The remarkable quality of +the sea-captains who come from among them +impressively attests the fact—not only their +quality as sailors, but as men of spirit and +proud courage. There is one—now a captain +of a coastal boat on the Newfoundland +shore—who takes his steamer into a ticklish +harbour of a thick, dark night, when everything +is black ahead and roundabout, steering +only by the echo of the ship’s whistle! +There is another, a confident seaman, a +bluff, high-spirited fellow, who was once delayed +by bitter winter weather—an inky +night, with ice about, the snow flying, the +seas heavy with frost, the wind blowing a gale.</p> + +<p>“Where have you been?” they asked him, +sarcastically, from the head office.</p> + +<p>The captain had been on the bridge all +night.</p> + +<p>“Berry-picking,” was his laconic despatch +in reply.</p> + +<p>There is another—also the captain of a +coastal steamer—who thought it wise to lie +in harbour through a stormy night in the +early winter.</p> + +<p>“What detains you?” came a message +from the head office.</p> + +<p>“It is not a fit night for a vessel to be at +sea,” the captain replied; and thereupon he +turned in, believing the matter to be at an end.</p> + +<p>The captain had been concerned for his +vessel—not for his life; nor yet for his comfort. +But the underling at the head office +misinterpreted the message.</p> + +<p>“What do we pay you for?” he telegraphed.</p> + +<p>So the captain took the ship out to sea. +Men say that she went out of commission +the next day, and that it cost the company +a thousand dollars to refit her.</p> + +<hr class='tb' /> + +<p>“A dunderhead,” say the folk, “can <i>cotch</i> +fish; but it takes a <i>man</i> t’ find un.” It is a +chase; and, as the coast proverb has it, “the +fish have no bells.” It is estimated that +there are 7,000 square miles of fishing-banks +off the Labrador coast. There will be fish +somewhere—not everywhere; not every man +will “use his salt” (the schooners go north +loaded with salt for curing) or “get his load.” +In the beginning—this is when the ice first +clears away—there is a race for berths. It +takes clever, reckless sailing and alert action +to secure the best. I am reminded of a +skipper who by hard driving to windward +and good luck came first of all to a favourable +harbour. It was then night, and his +crew was weary, so he put off running out +his trap-leader until morning; but in the +night the wind changed, and when he awoke +at dawn there were two other schooners +lying quietly at anchor near by and the +berths had been “staked.” When the traps +are down, there follows a period of anxious +waiting. Where are the fish? There are +no telegraph-lines on that coast. The news +must be spread by word of mouth. When, +at last, it comes, there is a sudden change +of plan—a wild rush to the more favoured +grounds.</p> + +<p>It is in this scramble that many a skipper +makes his great mistake. I was talking +with a disconsolate young fellow in a northern +harbour where the fish were running +thick. The schooners were fast loading; +but he had no berth, and was doing but +poorly with the passing days.</p> + +<p>“If I hadn’t—if I <i>only</i> hadn’t—took up +me trap when I did,” said he, “I’d been +loaded an’ off home. Sure, zur, would you +believe it? but I had the berth off the point. +Off the point—the berth off the point!” he +repeated, earnestly, his eyes wide. “An’, +look! I hears they’s a great run o’ fish t’ +Cutthroat Tickle. So I up with me trap, for +I’d been gettin’ nothin’; an’—an’—would you +believe it? but the man that put his down +where I took mine up took a hundred +quintal<a id='fna2'></a><a href='#fnt2' class='fnanchor'><sup>[2]</sup></a> +out o’ that berth next marnin’! +An’ he’ll load,” he groaned, “afore the +week’s out!”</p> + +<div style='text-align:center'> +<img id='ilink12' src='images/illus-012.jpg' alt=''/> +<p class='caption'>“SET THE TRAPS IN THE OPEN SEA”</p> +</div> + +<p>When the fish are running, the work is +mercilessly hard; it is kept up night and +day; there is no sleep for man or child, +save, it may be, an hour’s slumber where +they toil, just before dawn. The schooner +lies at anchor in the harbour, safe enough +from wind and sea; the rocks, surrounding +the basin in which she lies, keep the harbour +water placid forever. But the men set +the traps in the open sea, somewhere off the +heads, or near one of the outlying islands; +it may be miles from the anchorage of the +schooner. They put out at dawn—before +dawn, rather; for they aim to be at the trap +just when the light is strong enough for the +hauling. When the skiff is loaded, they put +back to harbour in haste, throw the fish on +deck, split them, salt them, lay them neatly +in the hold, and put out to the trap again. +I have seen the harbours—then crowded +with fishing-craft—fairly ablaze with light +at midnight. Torches were flaring on the +decks and in the turf hut on the rocks +ashore. The night was quiet; there was +not a sound from the tired workers; but the +flaring lights made known that the wild, +bleak, far-away place—a basin in the midst +of barren, uninhabited hills—was still astir +with the day’s work.</p> + +<p>At such times, the toil at the oars, and at +the splitting-table<a id='fna3'></a><a href='#fnt3' class='fnanchor'><sup>[3]</sup></a>, whether on deck or in +the stages—and the lack of sleep, and the +icy winds and cold salt spray—is all bitter +cruel to suffer. The Labrador fisherman +will not readily admit that he lives a hard +life; but if you suggest that when the fish +are running it may be somewhat more toilsome +than lives lived elsewhere, he will +grant you something.</p> + +<p>“Oh, ay,” he’ll drawl, “when the fish is +runnin’, <i>’tis</i> a bit hard.”</p> + +<p>I learned from a child—he was merry, +brave, fond of the adventure—that fishing +is a pleasant business in the sunny midsummer +months; but that when, late in the fall, +the skiff puts out to the trap at dawn, it is +wise to plunge one’s hands deep in the +water before taking the oars, no matter +how much it hurts, for one’s wrists are then +covered with salt-water sores and one’s +palms are cracked, even though one take +the precaution of wearing a brass chain—that, +oh, yes! it is wise to plunge one’s +hands in the cold water, as quick as may +be; for thus one may “limber ’em up” before +the trap is reached.</p> + +<p>“’Tis not hard, now,” said he. “But, +oh—oo—oo! when the big nor’easters blow! +Oo—oo!” he repeated, with a shrug and a +sage shake of the head; “’tis won-der-ful +hard those times!”</p> + +<p>The return is small. The crews are comprised +of from five to ten men, with, occasionally, +a sturdy maid for cook, to whom +is given thirty dollars for her season’s work; +some old hands will sail on no ship with a +male cook, for, as one of them said, “Sure, +some o’ thim min can’t boil water without +burnin’ it!” A good season’s catch is one +hundred quintals of dry fish a man. A +simple calculation—with some knowledge +of certain factors which I need not state—makes +it plain that a man must himself +catch, as his share of the trap, 30,000 fish if +he is to net a living wage. If his return is +$250 he is in the happiest fortune—richly +rewarded, beyond his dreams, for his summer’s +work. One-half of that is sufficient +to give any modest man a warm glow of +content and pride. Often—it depends +largely upon chance and the skill of his +skipper—the catch is so poor that he must +make the best of twenty-five or thirty +dollars. It must not be supposed that the +return is always in cash; it is usually in +trade, which is quite a different thing—in +Newfoundland.</p> + +<hr class='tb' /> + +<p>The schooners take many passengers +north in the spring. Such are called +“freighters” on the coast; they are put +ashore at such harbours as they elect, and, +for passage for themselves, families, and +gear, pay upon the return voyage twenty-five +cents for every hundredweight of fish +caught. As a matter of course, the vessels +are preposterously overcrowded. Dr. Grenfell +tells of counting thirty-four men and +sixteen women (no mention was made of +children) aboard a nineteen-ton schooner, +then on the long, rough voyage to the north. +The men fish from the coast in small boats +just as the more prosperous “green-fish +catchers” put out from the schooners. +Meantime, they live in mud huts, which +are inviting or otherwise, as the women-folk +go; some are damp, cave-like, ill-savoured, +crowded; others are airy, cozy, +the floors spread deep with powdered shell, +the whole immaculately kept. When the +party is landed, the women sweep out the +last of the winter’s snow, the men build +great fires on the floors; indeed, the huts +are soon ready for occupancy. At best, +they are tiny places—much like children’s +playhouses. There was once a tall man +who did not quite fit the sleeping place assigned +to him; but with great good nature +he cut a hole in the wall, built a miniature +addition for his feet, and slept the summer +through at comfortable full length. It is a +great outing for the children; they romp +on the rocks, toddle over the nearer hills, +sleep in the sunshine; but if they are eight +years old, as one said—or well grown at +five or seven—they must do their little +share of work.</p> + +<hr class='tb' /> + +<p>Withal, the Labradormen are of a simple, +God-fearing, clean-lived, hardy race of men. +There was once a woman who made boast +of her high connection in England, as +women will the wide world over; and when +she was questioned concerning the position +the boasted relative occupied, replied, “Oh, +<i>he’s</i> Superintendent o’ Foreign Governments!” +There was an austere old Christian +who on a Sunday morning left his trap—his +whole fortune—lie in the path of a +destroying iceberg rather than desecrate +the Lord’s day by taking it out of the +water. Both political parties in Newfoundland +shamelessly deceive the credulous +fisherfolk; there was a childlike old +fellow who, when asked, “And what will +you do if there <i>is</i> no fish?” confidently +answered: “Oh, they’s goin’ t’ be a new +Gov’ment. <i>He’ll</i> take care o’ we!” There +was a sturdy son of the coast who deserted +his schooner at sea and swam ashore. But +he had mistaken a barren island for the mainland, +which was yet far off; and there he +lived, without food, for twenty-seven days! +When he was picked up, his condition was +such as may not be described (the Labrador +fly is a vicious insect); he was unconscious, +but he survived to fish many another +season.</p> + +<hr class='tb' /> + +<p>The mail-boat picked up Skipper Thomas +of Carbonear—then master of a loaded +schooner—at a small harbour near the +Straits. His crew carried him aboard; +for he was desperately ill, and wanted to +die at home, where his children were.</p> + +<p>“He’s wonderful bad,” said one of the +men. “He’ve consumption.”</p> + +<p>“I’m just wantin’ t’ die at home,” he said, +again and again. “Just that—just where +my children be!”</p> + +<p>All hearts were with him in that last +struggle—but no man dared hope; for the +old skipper had already beaten off death +longer than death is wont to wait, and his +strength was near spent.</p> + +<p>“Were you sick when you sailed for the +Labrador in the spring?” they asked him.</p> + +<p>“Oh, ay,” said he; “I were terrible bad +then.”</p> + +<p>“Then why,” they said—“why did you +come at all?”</p> + +<p>They say he looked up in mild surprise. +“I had t’ make me livin’,” he answered, +simply.</p> + +<div style='text-align:center'> +<img id='ilink13' src='images/illus-013.jpg' alt=''/> +<p class='caption'>“THE BULLY-BOAT BECOMES A HOME”</p> +</div> + +<p>His coffin was knocked together on the +forward deck next morning—with Carbonear +a day’s sail beyond.</p> + +<hr class='tb' /> + +<p>The fleet goes home in the early fall. +The schooners are loaded—some so low with +the catch that the water washes into the +scuppers. “You could wash your hands on +her deck,” is the skipper’s proudest boast. +The feat of seamanship, I do not doubt, is +not elsewhere equalled. It is an inspiring +sight to see the doughty little craft beating +into the wind on a gray day. The harvesting +of a field of grain is good to look upon; +but I think that there can be no more stirring +sight in all the world, no sight more +quickly to melt a man’s heart, more deeply +to move him to love men and bless God, +than the sight of the Labrador fleet beating +home loaded—toil done, dangers past; the +home port at the end of a run with a fair +wind. The home-coming, I fancy, is much +like the return of the viking ships to the old +Norwegian harbours must have been. The +lucky skippers strut the village roads with +swelling chests, heroes in the sight of all; +the old men, long past their labour, listen to +new tales and spin old yarns; the maids and +the lads renew their interrupted love-makings. +There is great rejoicing—feasting, +merrymaking, hearty thanksgiving.</p> + +<p>Thanks be to God, the fleet’s home!</p> + +<div class="footnote"> +<p><a id="fnt2"></a><a href="#fna2">[2]</a> +A quintal is, roughly, a hundred pounds. One hundred +quintals of green fish are equal, roughly, to thirty of dry, which, +at $3, would amount to $90. +</p> +<p><a id="fnt3"></a><a href="#fna3">[3]</a> +A “clever hand” can split—that is, clean—thirty +fish in a minute.</p> +</div> + +<h2 class='chapter' id='clink09'><a href='#toc'>IX—<i>On The FRENCH SHORE</i></a></h2> + +<p>Doctor Grenfell appears to +have a peculiar affection for the +outporters of what is locally known +as the “French Shore”—that stretch of +coast lying between Cape John and the +northernmost point of Newfoundland: it is +one section of the shore upon which the +French have fishing rights. This is the real +Newfoundland; to the writer there is no +Newfoundland apart from that long strip of +rock against which the sea forever breaks: +none that is not of punt, of wave, of fish, +of low sky and of a stalwart, briny folk. +Indeed, though he has joyously lived weeks +of blue weather in the outports, with the +sea all a-ripple and flashing and the breeze +blowing warm, in retrospect land and people +resolve themselves into a rocky harbour +and a sturdy little lad with a question—the +harbour, gray and dripping wet, a cluster of +whitewashed cottages perched on the rocks, +towards which a tiny, red-sailed punt is +beating from the frothy open, with the white +of breakers on either hand, while a raw +wind lifts the fog from the black inland +hills, upon which ragged patches of snow +lie melting; the lad, stout, frank-eyed, tow-headed, +browned by the wind, bending over +the splitting-table with a knife in his toil-worn +young hand and the blood of cod +dripping from his fingers, and looking wistfully +up, at last, to ask a question or two +concerning certain old, disquieting mysteries.</p> + +<p>“Where do the tide go, zur, when ’e runs +out?” he plainted. “Where do ’e go, zur? +Sure, zur, <i>you</i> is able t’ tell me that, isn’t +you?”</p> + +<hr class='tb' /> + +<p>So, in such a land—where, on some bleak +stretches of coast, the potatoes are grown in +imported English soil, where most gardens, +and some graveyards, are made of earth +scraped from the hollows of the hills, where +four hundred and nineteen bushels of lean +wheat are grown in a single year, and the +production of beef-cattle is insignificant as +compared with the production of babies—in +such a land there is nothing for the young +man to do but choose his rock, build his little +cottage and his flake and his stage, +marry a maid of the harbour when the spring +winds stir his blood, gather his potato patch, +get a pig and a goat, and go fishing in his +punt. And they do fish, have always fished +since many generations ago the island was +first settled by adventurous Devon men, and +must continue to fish to the end of time. +Out of a total male population of one hundred +thousand, which includes the city-folk +of St. Johns and an amazing proportion of +babies and tender lads, about fifty-five thousand +men and grown boys catch fish for a +living.</p> + +<p>“Still an’ all, they’s no country in the +world like this!” said the old skipper. +“Sure, a man’s set up in life when he haves +a pig an’ a punt an’ a potato patch.”</p> + +<p>“But have you ever seen another?” I +asked.</p> + +<p>“I’ve been so far as Saint Johns, zur, an’ +once t’ the waterside o’ Boston,” was the +surprising reply, “an’ I’m thinkin’ I knows +what the world’s like.”</p> + +<p>So it is with most Newfoundlanders: they +love their land with an intolerant prejudice; +and most are content with the life they +lead. “The Newfoundlander comes back,” +is a significant proverb of the outports; and, +“White Bay’s good enough for me,” said a +fishwife to me once, when I asked her why +she still remained in a place so bleak and +barren, “for I’ve heered tell ’tis wonderful +smoky an’ n’isy ’t Saint Johns.” The life +they live, and strangely love, is exceeding +toilsome. Toil began for a gray-haired, +bony-handed old woman whom I know when +she was so young that she had to stand on +a tub to reach the splitting-table; when, too, +to keep her awake and busy, late o’ nights, +her father would make believe to throw a +bloody cod’s head at her. It began for that +woman’s son when, at five or six years old, +he was just able to spread the fish to dry on +the flake, and continued in earnest, a year +or two later, when first he was strong +enough to keep the head of his father’s punt +up to the wind. But they seem not to know +that fishing is a hard or dangerous employment: +for instance, a mild-eyed, crooked +old fellow—he was a cheerful Methodist, +too, and subject to “glory-fits”—who had +fished from one harbour for sixty years, computed +for me that he had put out to sea in +his punt at least twenty thousand times, that +he had been frozen to the seat of his punt +many times, that he had been swept to sea +with the ice-packs, six times, that he had +weathered six hundred gales, great and +small, and that he had been wrecked more +times than he could “just mind” at the moment; +yet he was the only old man ever I +met who seemed honestly to wish that he +might live his life over again!</p> + +<p>The hook-and-line man has a lonely time +of it. From earliest dawn, while the night +yet lies thick on the sea, until in storm or +calm or favouring breeze he makes harbour +in the dusk, he lies off shore, fishing—tossing +in the lop of the grounds, with the +waves to balk and the wind to watch warily, +while he tends his lines. There is no jolly +companionship of the forecastle and turf hut +for him—no new scene, no hilarious adventure; +nor has he the expectation of a proud return +to lighten his toil. In the little punt +he has made with his own hands he is forever +riding an infinite expanse, which, in +“fish weather,” is melancholy, or threatening, +or deeply solemn, as it may chance—all +the while and all alone confronting the +mystery and terrible immensity of the sea. +It may be that he gives himself over to aimless +musing, or, even less happily, to pondering +certain dark mysteries of the soul; and +so it comes about that the “mad-house ’t +Saint Johns” is inadequate to accommodate +the poor fellows whom lonely toil has +bereft of their senses—melancholiacs, idiots +and maniacs “along o’ religion.”</p> + +<p>Notwithstanding all, optimism persists +everywhere on the coast. One old +fisherman counted himself favoured above most +men because he had for years been able to +afford the luxury of cream of tartar; and +another, a brawny giant, confessed to having +a disposition so pertinaciously happy +that he had come to regard a merry heart as +his besetting sin. Sometimes an off-shore +gale puts an end to all the fishing; sometimes +it is a sudden gust, sometimes a big +wave, sometimes a confusing mist, more +often long exposure to spray and shipped +water and soggy winds. It was a sleety +off-shore gale, coming at the end of a sunny, +windless day, that froze or drowned thirty +men off Trinity Bay in a single night; and +it was a mere puff on a “civil” evening—but +a swift, wicked little puff, sweeping +round Breakheart Head—that made a +widow of Elizabeth Rideout o’ Duck Cove +and took her young son away. Often, however, +the hook-and-line man fishes his eighty +years of life, and dies in his bed as cheerfully +as he has lived and as poor as he was +born.</p> + +<h2 class='chapter' id='clink10'><a href='#toc'>X—<i>SOME OUTPORT FOLK</i></a></h2> + +<p>It had been a race against the peril of +fog and the discomfort of a wet night +all the way from Hooping Harbour. +We escaped the scowl of the northeast, the +gray, bitter wind and the sea it was fast +fretting to a fury, when the boat rounded +Canada Head and ran into the shelter of the +bluffs at Englee—into the damp shadows +sombrely gathered there. When the punt +was moored to the stage-head, the fog had +thickened the dusk into deep night, and the +rain had soaked us to the skin. There was +a light, a warm, yellow light, shining from +a window, up along shore and to the west. +We stumbled over an erratic footpath, which +the folk of the place call “the roaad”—feeling +for direction, chancing the steps, splashing +through pools of water, tripping over +sharp rocks. The whitewashed cottages of +the village, set on the hills, were like the +ghosts of houses. They started into sight, +hung suspended in the night, vanished as we +trudged on. The folk were all abed—all +save Elisha Duckworthy, that pious giant, +who had been late beating in from the fishing +grounds off the Head. It was Elisha +who opened the door to our knock, and sent +a growling, bristling dog back to his place +with a gentle word.</p> + +<div style='text-align:center'> +<img id='ilink14' src='images/illus-014.jpg' alt=''/> +<p class='caption'>“THE WHITEWASHED COTTAGES ON THE HILLS”</p> +</div> + +<p>“Will you not——”</p> + +<p>“Sure, sir,” said Elisha, a smile spreading +from his eyes to the very tip of his great +beard, “’twould be a hard man an’ a bad +Christian that would turn strangers away. +Come in, sir! ’Tis a full belly you’ll have +when you leaves the table, an’ ’tis a warm +bed you’ll sleep in, this night.”</p> + +<p>After family prayers, in which we, the +strangers he had taken in, were commended +to the care and mercy of God in such simple, +feeling phrases as proved the fine quality of +this man’s hospitality and touched our hearts +in their innermost parts, Elisha invited us to +sit by the kitchen fire with him “for a +spell.” While the dogs snored in chorus +with a young kid and a pig by the roaring +stove, and the chickens rustled and clucked +in their coop under the bare spruce sofa +which Elisha had made, and the wind flung +the rain against the window-panes, we three +talked of weather and fish and toil and peril +and death. It may be that a cruel coast +and a sea quick to wrath engender a certain +dread curiosity concerning the “taking off” +in a man who fights day by day to survive +the enmity of both. Elisha talked for a +long time of death and heaven and hell. +Then, solemnly, his voice fallen to a whisper, +he told of his father, Skipper George, a man +of weakling faith, who had been reduced to +idiocy by wondering what came after death—by +wondering, wondering, wondering, in +sunlight and mist and night, off shore in the +punt, labouring at the splitting-table, at work +on the flake, everywhere, wondering all the +time where souls took their flight.</p> + +<p>“’Twere wonderin’ whether hell do be +underground or not,” said Elisha, “that +turned un over at last. Sure, sir,” with a +sigh, “’twere doubt, you sees. ’Tis faith us +must have.”</p> + +<p>Elisha stroked the nearest dog with a gentle +hand—a mighty hand, toil-worn and misshapen, +like the man himself.</p> + +<p>“Do your besettin’ sin get the best o’ you, sir?” he said, looking up. +It may be that he craved to hear a confession of failure that he might +afterwards sustain himself with the thought that no man is +invulnerable. “Sure, we’ve all besettin’ sins. When we do be snatched +from the burnin’ brands, b’y, a little spark burns on, an’ on, an’ on; +an’ he do be wonderful hard t’ douse out. ’Tis like the eye us must +pluck out by command o’ the Lard. With some men ’tis a taste for +baccy. With some ’tis a scarcity o’ salt in the fish. With some ’tis +too much water in the lobster cans. With some ’tis a cravin’ for +sweetness. With me ’tis worse nor all. Sure, sir,” he went on, “I’ve +knowed some men so fond, so wonderful fond, o’ baccy that um smoked +the shoes off their children’s feet. ’Tis their besettin’ sin, +sir—’tis their besettin’ sin. But ’tis not baccy that worries me. The +taste fell away when I were took from sin. ’Tis not that. ’Tis worse. +Sure, with me, sir,” he said, brushing his hand over his forehead in a +weary, despairing way, “’tis laughin’. ’Tis the sin of jokin’ that puts +my soul in danger o’ bein’ hove overboard into the burnin’ lake. I +were a wonderful joker when I were a sinful man. ’Twas all I lived +for—not t’ praise God an’ prepare my soul for death. When I gets up +in the marnin’, now, sir, I feels like jokin’ like what I used t’ do, +particular if it do be a fine day. Ah, sir,” with a long sigh, “’tis a +great temptation, I tells you—’tis a wonderful temptation. But ’tis +not set down in the Book that Jesus Christ smiled an’ laughed, an’ +with the Lard’s help I’ll beat the devil yet. I’ll beat un,” he cried, +as if inspired to some supreme struggle. “I’ll beat un,” he repeated, +clinching his great hands. “I will!”</p> + +<p>Elisha bade us good-night with a solemn +face. A little smile—a poor, frightened +little smile of tender feeling for us—flickered +in his eyes for the space of a breath. +But he snuffed it out relentlessly, expressed +his triumph with a flash of his eye, and +went away to bed. In the morning, when +the sun called us up, he had come back +from the early morning’s fishing, and was +singing a most doleful hymn of death and +judgment over the splitting-table in the +stage. The sunlight was streaming into +the room, and the motes were all dancing +merrily in the beam. The breeze was rustling +the leaves of a sickly bush under the +window—coaxing them to hopeful whisperings. +I fancied that the sea was all blue +and rippling, and that the birds were flitting +through the sunlight, chirping their sympathy +with the smiling day. But Elisha, +his brave heart steeled against the whole +earth’s frivolous mood, continued heroically +to pour forth his dismal song.</p> + +<p>Twilight was filling the kitchen with +strange shadows. “We had disposed of +Aunt Ruth’s watered fish and soaked hard-bread +with hunger for a relish. Uncle +Simon’s glance was mournfully intent upon +the bare platter.</p> + +<p>“But,” said Aunt Ruth, with obstinate +emphasis, “I knows they be. ’Tis not what +we hears we believe, sir. No, ’tis not what +we hears. ’Tis what we sees. An’ I’ve +seed un.”</p> + +<p>“’Tis true, sir,” said Uncle Simon, looking +up. “They be nar a doubt about it.”</p> + +<p>“But where,” said I, “did she get her +looking-glass?”</p> + +<p>“They be many a trader wrecked on this +coast, sir,” said Uncle Simon.</p> + +<p>“’Twere not a mermaid I seed,” said +Aunt Ruth. “’Twere a mer<i>man</i>.”</p> + +<p>“Sure,” said Uncle Simon, mysteriously, +“they do be in the sea the shape o’ all +that’s on the land—shape for shape, sir. +They be sea-horses an’ sea-cows an’ sea-dogs, +Why not the shape o’ humans?”</p> + +<p>“Well,” said Aunt Ruth, “’twas when I +were a little maid. An’ ’twas in a gale o’ +wind. I goes down t’ Billy Cove t’ watch +me father bring the punt in, an’ I couldn’t +see un anywhere. So I thought he were +drownded. ’Twere handy t’ dark when I +seed the merman rise from the water. He +were big an’ black—so black as the stove. +I could see the eyes of un so plain as I can +see yours. He were not good lookin’—no, +I’ll say that much—he were not good +lookin’. He waved his arms, an’ beckoned +an’ beckoned an’ beckoned. But, sure, sir, +I wouldn’t go, for I were feared. ‘’Tis +the soul o’ me father,’ thinks I. ‘Sure, +the sea’s cotched un.’ So I runs home an’ +tells me mother; an’ she says ’twere a +merman. I <i>knows</i> they be mermans an’ +mermaids, ’cause I’se seed un. ’Tis what +we sees we believes.”</p> + +<p>“’Tis said,” said Uncle Simon, “that if +you finds un on the rocks an’ puts un in the +water they gives you three wishes; an’ all +you has t’ do is wish, an’——”</p> + +<p>“’Tis said,” said Aunt Ruth, with a prodigious +frown across the table, “that the +mermaids trick the fishermen t’ the edge o’ +the sea an’ steals un away. Uncle Simon +Ride,” she went on, severely, “if ever +you——”</p> + +<p>Uncle Simon looked sheepish. “Sure, +woman,” said he, the evidences of guilt +plain on his face, “they be no danger t’ me. +’Twould take a clever mermaid t’——”</p> + +<p>“Uncle Simon Ride,” said Aunt Ruth, +“nar another word. An’ if you don’t put +my spinnin’ wheel t’ rights this night I’ll +give you your tea in a mug<a id='fna4'></a><a href='#fnt4' class='fnanchor'><sup>[4]</sup></a> t’-morrow—an’ +mind that, sir, mind that!”</p> + +<p>After we had left the table Uncle Simon +took me aside. “She do be a wonderful +woman,” said he, meaning Aunt Ruth. +Then, earnestly, “She’ve no cause t’ be jealous +o’ the mermaids. No, sir—sure, no.”</p> + +<hr class='tb' /> + +<p>It is difficult to convey an adequate conception +of the barrenness of this coast. If +you were to ask a fisherman of some remote +outport what his flour was made of he would +stare at you and be mute. “Wheat” would +be a new, meaningless word to many a man +of those places. It may be that the words +of the Old Skipper of Black Harbour will +help the reader to an understanding of the +high value set upon the soil and all it produces.</p> + +<p>“Come with me,” said the Old Skipper, +“an’ I’ll show you so fine a garden as ever +you seed.”</p> + +<p>The garden was on an island two miles +off the mainland. Like many another patch +of ground it had to be cultivated from a +distant place. It was an acre, or thereabouts, +which had been “won from the +wilderness” by the labour of several generations; +and it was owned by eleven families. +This was not a garden made by gathering +soil and dumping it in a hollow, as +most gardens are; it was a real “meadow.”</p> + +<p>“Look at them potatoes, sir,” said the +skipper. He radiated pride in the soil’s +achievement as he waited for my outburst +of congratulation.</p> + +<p>The potatoes, owing to painstaking fertilization +with small fish, had attained admirable +size—in tops. But the hay!</p> + +<p>“’Tis fine grass,” said the skipper. “Fine +as ever you seed!”</p> + +<p>It was thin, and nearer gray than yellow; +and every stalk was weak in the knees. I +do it more than justice when I write that it +rose above my shoe tops.</p> + +<p>“’Tis sizable hay,” said the skipper. +“’Tis time I had un cut.”</p> + +<p>On the way back the skipper caught sight +of a skiff-load of hay, which old John Burns +was sculling from Duck Island. He was +careful to point it out as good evidence of +the fertility of that part of the world. By +and by we came to a whisp of hay which +had fallen from the skiff. It was a mere +handful floating on the quiet water.</p> + +<p>“The wastefulness of that dunderhead!” +exclaimed the skipper.</p> + +<p>He took the boat towards the whisp of +hay, puffing his wrath all the while.</p> + +<p>“Pass the gaff, b’y,” he said.</p> + +<p>With the utmost care he hooked the whisp +of hay—to the last straw—and drew it over +the side.</p> + +<p>“’Tis a sin,” said he, “t’ waste good hay +like that.”</p> + +<p>Broad fields, hay and wheat and corn, all +yellow, waving to the breeze—the sun flooding +all—were far, far beyond this man’s imagination. +He did not know that in other +lands the earth yields generously to the +men who sow seed. How little did the +harvest mean to him! The world is a world +of rock and sea—of sea and naked rock. +Soil is gathered in buckets. Gardens are +made by hand. The return is precious in +the sight of men.</p> + +<hr class='tb' /> + +<p>Uncle Zeb Gale—Daddy Gale, who had +long ago lost count of his grandchildren, +they were so many—Ol’ Zeb tottered up +from the sea, gasping and coughing, but +broadly smiling in the intervals. He had +a great cod in one hand, and his old cloth +cap was in the other. His head was bald, +and his snowy beard covered his chest. +Toil and the weight of years had bowed +his back, spun a film over his eyes and +cracked his voice. But neither toil nor +age nor hunger nor cold had broken his +cheery interest in all the things of life. +Ol’ Zeb smiled in a sweetly winning way. +He stopped to pass a word with the +stranger, who was far away from home, +and therefore, no doubt, needed a heartening +word or two.</p> + +<p>“Fine even, zur,” said he.</p> + +<p>“Tis that, Uncle Zeb. How have the +fish been to-day?”</p> + +<p>“Oh, they be a scattered fish off the +Mull, zur. But ’tis only a scattered one. +They don’t run in, zur, like what they +used to when I were young, sure.”</p> + +<p>“How many years ago, sir?”</p> + +<div style='text-align:center'> +<img id='ilink15' src='images/illus-015.jpg' alt=''/> +<p class='caption'>“TOIL”</p> +</div> + +<p>“’Tis many year, zur,” said Uncle Zeb, +smiling indulgence with my youth. “They +was fish a-plenty when—when—when I +were young. ’Tis not what it used t’ be—no, +no, zur; not at all. Sure, zur, I been +goin’ t’ the grounds off the Mull since I +were seven years old. Since I were seven! +I be eighty-three now, zur. Seventy-six +year, zur, I has fished out o’ this here +harbour.”</p> + +<p>Uncle Zeb stopped to wheeze a bit. He +was out of breath with this long speech. +And when he had wheezed a bit, a spasm +of hard coughing took him. He was on +the verge of the last stage of consumption, +was Uncle Zeb.</p> + +<p>“’Tis a fine harbour t’ fish from, zur,” he +gasped. “They be none better. Least-ways, +so they tells me—them that’s cruised +about a deal. Sure, I’ve never seen another. +’Tis t’ Conch<a id='fna5'></a><a href='#fnt5' class='fnanchor'><sup>[5]</sup></a> I’ve wanted t’ go since I were +a young feller. I’ll see un yet, zur—sure, +an’ I will.”</p> + +<p>“You are eighty-three?” said I.</p> + +<p>“I be the oldest man t’ the harbour, zur. +I marries the maids an’ the young fellers +when they’s no parson about.”</p> + +<p>“You have fished out of this harbour for +seventy-six years?” said I, in vain trying to +comprehend the deprivation and dull toil of +that long life—trying to account for the +childlike smile which had continued to the +end of it.</p> + +<p>“Ay, zur,” said Uncle Zeb. “But, sure, +they be plenty o’ time t’ see Conch yet. Me +father were ninety when he died. I be only +eighty-three.”</p> + +<p>Uncle Zeb tottered up the hill. Soon the +dusk swallowed his old hulk. I never saw +him again.</p> + +<hr class='tb' /> + +<p>We were seated on the Head, high above +the sea, watching the fleet of punts come +from the Mad Mull grounds and from the +nets along shore, for it was evening. Jack +had told me much of the lore of lobster-catching +and squid-jigging. Of winds and +tides and long breakers he had given me +solemn warnings—and especially of that +little valley down which the gusts came, +no man knew from where. He had imparted +certain secrets concerning the +whereabouts of gulls’ nests and juniper-berry +patches, for I had won his confidence. +I had been informed that Uncle +Tom Bull’s punt was in hourly danger of +turning over because her spread of canvas +was “scandalous” great, that Bill Bludgell +kept the “surliest dog t’ the harbour,” +that the “goaats was wonderful +hard t’ find” in the fog, that a brass +bracelet would cure salt-water sores on +the wrists, that—I cannot recall it all. +He had “mocked” a goat, a squid, a +lamb, old George Walker at prayer, and +“Uncle” Ruth berating “Aunt” Simon for +leaving the splitting-table unclean.</p> + +<p>Then he sang this song, in a thin, sweet +treble, which was good to hear:</p> + +<p> + “‘Way down on Pigeon Pond Island,<br/> + When daddy comes home from swilin’,<a id='fna6'></a><a href='#fnt6' class='fnanchor'><sup>[6]</sup></a><br/> + (Maggoty fish hung up in the air,<br/> + Fried in maggoty butter)!<br/> + Cakes and tea for breakfast,<br/> + Pork and duff for dinner,<br/> + Cakes and tea for supper,<br/> + When daddy comes home from swilin’.” +</p> + +<p>He asked me riddles, thence he passed to +other questions, for he was a boy who wondered, +and wondered, what lay beyond those +places which he could see from the highest +hill. I described a street and a pavement, +told him that the earth was round, defined +a team of horses, corrected his impression +that a church organ was played with the +mouth, and denied the report that the flakes +and stages of New York were the largest in +the world. The boys of the outports do not +play games—there is no time, and at any +rate, the old West Country games have not +come down to this generation with the +dialect, so I told him how to play tag, +hide-and-go-seek and blind man’s buff, and +proved to him that they might be interesting, +though I had to admit that +they might not be profitable in certain cases.</p> + +<p>“Some men,” said I, at last, “have never +seen the sea.”</p> + +<p>He looked at me and laughed his unbelief. +“Sure,” said he, “not a hundred haven’t?”</p> + +<p>“Many more than that.”</p> + +<p>“’Tis hard t’ believe, zur,” he said. “Terrible +hard.”</p> + +<p>“We were silent while he thought it over.</p> + +<p>“What’s the last harbour in the world?” +he asked.</p> + +<p>I hesitated.</p> + +<p>“The very last, zur! They do say ’tis St. +Johns. But, sure, zur, they must be something +beyond. What do it be?” After a +silence, he continued, speaking wistfully, +“What’s the last harbour in all the whole +world, zur? Doesn’t you know?”</p> + +<hr class='tb' /> + +<p>It had been a raw day—gray and gusty, +with the wind breaking over the island from +a foggy sea: a sullen day. All day long +there had been no rest from the deep harsh +growl of the breakers. We were at tea in +Aunt Amanda’s cottage; the table was +spread with dried caplin, bread and butter, +and tea, for Aunt Amanda, the Scotsman +who was of the harbour, and me. The +harbour water was fretting under the windows +as the swift gusts whipped over it; +and beyond the narrows, where the sea was +tumbling, the dusk was closing over the +frothy waves. Out there a punt was reeling +in from the Mad Mull fishing grounds; +its brown sail was like a leaf driven by the +wind. I saw the boat dart through the narrows +to the sheltered water, and I sighed in +sympathy with the man who was then furling +his wet and fluttering sail, for I, too, +had experienced the relief of sweeping from +that waste of grasping waves to the sanctuary +of the harbour.</p> + +<p>“Do you think of the sea as a friend?” +I asked Aunt Amanda.</p> + +<p>She was a gray, stern woman, over whose +face, however, a tender smile was used to +flitting, the light lingered last in her faded +eyes—the daughter, wife, and mother of +punt fishermen. So she had dealt hand to +hand with the sea since that night, long +ago, when, as a wee maid, she first could +reach the splitting-table by standing on a +bucket. As a child she had tripped up the +path to Lookout Head, to watch her father +beat in from the grounds; as a maiden, she +had courted when the moonlight was falling +upon the ripples of Lower Harbour, and the +punt was heaving to the spent swell of the +open; as a woman she had kept watch on +the moods of the sea, which had possessed +itself of her hours of toil and leisure. In +the end—may the day be long in coming—she +will be taken to the little graveyard +under the Lookout in a skiff. Now, at my +suggestion, she dropped her eyes to her +apron, which she smoothed in an absent +way. She seemed to search her life—all the +terror, toil, and glory of it—for the answer. +She was not of a kind to make light replies, +and I knew that the word to come would be +of vast significance.</p> + +<p>“It do seem to me,” she said, turning her +eyes to the darkening water, “that the say +is hungry for the lives o’ men.”</p> + +<p>“Tut, woman!” cried the old Scotsman, +his eyes all a-sparkle. “’Tis a libel on the +sea. Why wull ye speak such trash to a +stranger? Have ye never heard, sir, what +the poet says?”</p> + +<p>“Well,” I began to stammer.</p> + +<p>“Aye, man,” said he, “they all babble +about it. But have ye never read,</p> + +<p> +    “‘O, who can tell, save he whose heart hath tried,<br/> +    And danced in triumph o’er the waters wide,<br/> +    The exulting sense, the pulse’s maddening play,<br/> +    That thrills the wanderer of that trackless way?’”<br/> +</p> + +<p>With that, the sentimental old fellow +struck an attitude. His head was thrown +back; his eyes were flashing; his arm was +rigid, and pointing straight through the +window to that patch of white, far off in +the gathering dark, where the sea lay raging. +It ever took a poet to carry that old +Scotsman off his feet—to sweep him to some +high, cloudy place, where the things of life +rearranged and decked themselves out to +please his fancy. I confess, too, that his +enthusiasm rekindled, for a moment, my +third-reader interest in “a wet sheet and a +flowing sea” and “a wind that follows +fast.” We have all loved well the sea of +our fancy.</p> + +<p>“Grand, woman!” he exclaimed, turning +to Aunt Amanda, and still a-tremble. +“Splendid!”</p> + +<p>Aunt Amanda fixed him with her gray +eye. “I don’t know,” she said, softly. +“But I know that the say took me father +from me when I was a wee maid.”</p> + +<p>The Scotsman bent his head over his +plate, lower and lower still. His fervour +departed, and his face, when he looked up, +was full of sympathy. Of a sudden my +ears hearkened again to the growling breakers, +and to the wind, as it ran past, leaping +from sea to wilderness; and my spirit felt +the coming of the dark.</p> + +<div class="footnote"> +<p><a id="fnt4"></a><a href="#fna4">[4]</a> +A scolding.</p> +<p><a id="fnt5"></a><a href="#fna5">[5]</a> +Some miles distant.</p> +<p><a id="fnt6"></a><a href="#fna6">[6]</a> +Sealing.</p> +</div> + +<h2 class='chapter' id='clink11'><a href='#toc'>XI—<i>WINTER PRACTICE</i></a></h2> + +<p>It is, then, to the outporter, to the men +of the fleet and to the Labrador liveyere +that Doctor Grenfell devotes himself. +The hospital at Indian Harbour is the +centre of the Labrador activity; the hospital +at St. Anthony is designed to care for +the needs of the French shore folk; the hospital +at Battle Harbour—the first established, +and, possibly, the best equipped of +all—receives patients from all directions, but +especially from the harbours of the Strait +and the Gulf. In the little hospital-ship, +<i>Strathcona</i>, the doctor himself darts here and +there and everywhere, all summer long, responding +to calls, searching out the sick, +gathering patients for the various hospitals. +She is known to every harbour of the coast; +and she is often overcrowded with sick bound +to the hospitals for treatment or operation. +Often, indeed, in cases of emergency, operations +are performed aboard, while she tosses +in the rough seas. She is never a moment +idle while the waters are open. But in the +fall, when navigation closes, she must go into +winter quarters; and then the sick and +starving are sought out by dog-team and +komatik. There is no cessation of beneficent +activity; there is merely a change in the +manner of getting about. Summer journeys +are hard enough, God knows! But winter +travel is a matter of much greater difficulty +and hardship. Not that the difficulty and +hardship seem ever to be perceived by the +mission-doctor; quite the contrary: there is +if anything greater delight to be found in a +wild, swift race over rotten or heaving ice, +or in a night in the driving snow, than in running +the <i>Strathcona</i> through a nor’east gale. +The Indian Harbour hospital is closed in the +fall; so intense is the cold, so exposed the +situation, so scarce the wood, so few the +liveyeres, that it has been found unprofitable +to keep it open. There is another way of +meeting the needs of the situation; and that +is by despatching the Battle Harbour doctor +northward in midwinter. The folk know +that he is bound towards them—know the +points of call—can determine within a +month the time of his arrival. So they +bring the sick to these places—and patiently +wait. This is a hard journey—made alone +with the dogs. Many a night the doctor +must get into his sleeping bag and make +himself as comfortable as possible in the +snow, snuggled close to his dogs, for the sake +of the warmth of their bodies. Six hundred +miles north in the dead of winter, six hundred +miles back again; it takes a man of +unchangeable devotion to undertake it!</p> + +<div style='text-align:center'> +<img id='ilink16' src='images/illus-016.jpg' alt=''/> +<p class='caption'>“THE HOSPITAL AT BATTLE HARBOR”</p> +</div> + +<p>The Labrador dogs—pure and half-breed +“huskies,” with so much of the wolf yet in +them that they never bark—are for the most +part used by the doctor on his journeys. +There would be no getting anywhere without +them; and it must be said that they are +magnificent animals, capable of heroic +deeds. Every prosperous householder has +at least six or eight full-grown sled-dogs and +more puppies than he can keep track of. In +summer they lie everywhere under foot by +day, and by night howl in a demoniacal +fashion far and near; but they fish for +themselves in shallow water, and are fat, +and may safely be stepped over. In winter +they are lean, desperately hungry, savage, +and treacherous—in particular, a menace to +the lives of children, whom they have been +known to devour. There was once a father, +just returned from a day’s hunt on the ice, +who sent his son to fetch a seal from the +waterside; the man had forgotten for the +moment that the dogs were roaming the +night and very hungry—and so he lost both +his seal and his son. The four-year-old son +of the Hudson Bay Company’s agent at +Cartwright chanced last winter to fall down +in the snow. He was at once set upon by +the pack; and when he was rescued (his +mother told me the story) he had forty-two +ugly wounds on his little body. For many +nights afterwards the dogs howled under the +window where he lay moaning. Eventually +those concerned in the attack were hanged +by the neck, which is the custom in such +cases.</p> + +<hr class='tb' /> + +<p>Once, when Dr. Grenfell was wintering +at St. Anthony, on the French shore, there +came in great haste from Conch, a point +sixty miles distant, a komatik with an +urgent summons to the bedside of a man +who lay dying of hemorrhage. And while +the doctor was preparing for this journey, +a second komatik, despatched from another +place, arrived with a similar message.</p> + +<p>“Come at once,” it was. “My little boy +has broken his thigh.”</p> + +<p>The doctor chose first to visit the lad. +At ten o’clock that night he was at the bedside. +It had been a dark night—black dark: +with the road precipitous, the dogs uncontrollable, +the physician in great haste. The +doctor thought, many a time, that there +would be “more than one broken limb” by +the time of his arrival. But there was no +misadventure; and he found the lad lying +on a settle, in great pain, wondering why +he must suffer so.</p> + +<p>“Every minute or two,” says the doctor, +“there would be a jerk, a flash of pain, and +a cry to his father, who was holding him all +the time.”</p> + +<p>The doctor was glad “to get the chloroform +mask over the boy’s face”—he is a +sympathetic man, the doctor; glad, always, +to ease pain. And at one o’clock in the +morning the broken bone was set and the +doctor had had a cup of tea; whereupon, he +retired to a bed on the floor and a few +hours’ “watch below.” At daylight, when +he was up and about to depart, the little +patient had awakened and was merrily calling +to the doctor’s little retriever.</p> + +<p>“He was as merry as a cricket,” says the +doctor, “when I bade him good-bye.”</p> + +<hr class='tb' /> + +<p>About twelve hours on the way to Conch, +where the man lay dying of hemorrhage—a +two days’ journey—the doctor fell in +with a dog-train bearing the mail. And +the mail-man had a letter—a hasty summons +to a man in great pain some sixty +miles in another direction. It was impossible +to respond. “That call,” says the doctor, +sadly, “owing to sheer impossibility, was not +answered.” It was haste away to Conch, +over the ice and snow—for the most of +the time on the ice of the sea—in order that +the man who lay dying there might be succoured. +But there was another interruption. +When the dog-train reached the coast, there +was a man waiting to intercept it: the news +of the doctor’s probable coming had spread.</p> + +<p>“I’ve a fresh team o’ dogs,” sir, said he, +“t’ take you t’ the island. There’s a man +there, an’ he’s wonderful sick.”</p> + +<p>Would the doctor go? Yes—he would +go! But he had no sooner reached that +point of the mainland whence he was bound +across a fine stretch of ice to the island +than he was again intercepted. It was a +young man, this time, whose mother lay +ill, with no other Protestant family living +within fifty miles. Would the doctor help +her? Yes—the doctor would; and did. +And when he was about to be on his way +again——</p> + +<p>“Could you bear word,” said the woman, +“t’ Mister Elliot t’ come bury my boy? +He said he’d come, sir; but now my little +lad has been lying dead, here, since January.”</p> + +<p>It was then early in March. Mr. Elliot +was a Protestant fisherman who was accustomed +to bury the Protestant dead of that +district. Yes—the doctor would bear word +to him. Having promised this, he set out +to visit the sick man on the island; for +whom, also, he did what he could.</p> + +<hr class='tb' /> + +<p>Off again towards Conch—now with +fresh teams, which had been provided by +the friends of the man who lay there dying. +And by the way a man brought his little +son for examination and treatment—“a lad +of three years,” says the doctor; “a bright, +healthy, embryo fisherman, light-haired and +blue-eyed, a veritable celt.”</p> + +<p>“And what’s the matter with him?” +was the physician’s question.</p> + +<p>“He’ve a club foot, sir,” was the answer.</p> + +<p>And so it turned out: the lad had a club +foot. He was fond of telling his mother +that he had a right foot and a wrong one. +“The wrong one, mama,” said he, “is no +good.” He was to be a cripple for life—utterly +incapacitated: the fishing does not +admit of club feet. But the doctor made +arrangements for the child’s transportation +to the St. Anthony hospital, where he could, +without doubt be cured; and then hurried +on.</p> + +<hr class='tb' /> + +<p>The way now led through a district desperately +impoverished—as much by ignorance +and indolence as by anything else. +At one settlement of tilts there were forty +souls, “without a scrap of food or money,” +who depended upon their neighbours—and +the opening of navigation was still three +months distant! In one tilt there lay what +seemed to be a bundle of rags.</p> + +<p>“And who is this?” the doctor asked.</p> + +<p>It was a child. “The fair hair of a blue-eyed +boy of about ten years disclosed +itself,” says the doctor. “Stooping over +him I attempted to turn his face towards +me. It was drawn, with pain, and a moan +escaped the poor little fellow’s lips. He +had disease of the spine, with open sores in +three places. He was stark naked, and he +was starved to a skeleton. He gave me a +bright smile before I left, but I confess to a +shudder of horror at the thought that his +lot might have been mine. Of course the +‘fear of pauperizing’ had to disappear before +the claims of humanity. Yet, there, in +the depth of winter,” the doctor asks, with +infinite compassion, “would not a lethal +draught be the kindest friend of that little +one of Him that loved the children?”</p> + +<hr class='tb' /> + +<p>For five days the doctor laboured in +Conch, healing many of the folk, helping +more; and at the end of that period the +man who has suffered the hemorrhage was +so far restored that with new dogs the +doctor set out for Canada Bay, still travelling +southward. There, as he says, “we +had many interesting cases.” One of these +involved an operation: that of “opening a +knee-joint and removing a loose body,” with +the result that a fisherman who had long +been crippled was made quite well again. +Then there came a second call from Conch. +Seventeen men had come for the physician, +willing to haul the komatik themselves, if +no dogs were to be had. To this call the +doctor immediately responded; and having +treated patients at Conch and by the way, +he set out upon the return journey to St. +Anthony, fearing that his absence had already +been unduly prolonged. And he had +not gone far on the way before he fell in +with another komatik, provided with a box, +in which lay an old woman bound to St. +Anthony hospital, in the care of her sons, +to have her foot amputated.</p> + +<p>Crossing Hare Bay, the doctor had a +slight mishap—rather amusing, too, he +thinks.</p> + +<p>“One of my dogs fell through the ice,” +says he. “There was a biting nor’west +wind blowing, and the temperature was +ten degrees below zero. When we were +one mile from the land, I got off to run +and try the ice. It suddenly gave way, +and in I fell. It did not take me long to +get out, for I have had some little experience, +and the best advice sounds odd: +it is ‘keep cool.’ But the nearest house +being at least ten miles, it meant, then, +almost one’s life to have no dry clothing. +Fortunately, I had. The driver at once +galloped the dogs back to the woods we +had left, and I had as hard a mile’s running +as ever I had; for my clothing was +growing to resemble the armour of an ancient +knight more and more, every yard, +and though in my youth I was accustomed +to break the ice to bathe if necessary, I +never tried running a race in a coat of +mail. By the time I arrived at the trees +and got out of the wind, my driver had a +rubber poncho spread on the snow under +a snug spruce thicket; and I was soon as +dry and a great deal warmer than before.”</p> + +<p>At St. Anthony, the woman’s foot was +amputated; and in two days the patient +was talking of “getting up.” Meantime, a +komatik had arrived in haste from a point +on the northwest coast—a settlement one +hundred and twenty miles distant. The +doctor was needed there—and the doctor +went!</p> + +<div style='text-align:center'> +<img id='ilink17' src='images/illus-017.jpg' alt=''/> +<p class='caption'>“THE DOCTOR ON A WINTER’S JOURNEY”</p> +</div> + +<p>This brief and inadequate description of +a winter’s journey may not serve to indicate +the hardship of the life the doctor leads: he +has small regard for that; but it may faintly +apprise the reader of the character of the +work done, and of the will with which the +doctor does it. One brief journey! The +visitation of but sixty miles of coast! Add +to this the numerous journeys of that winter, +the various summer voyages of the <i>Strathcona</i>; +conceive that the folk of two thousand +miles are visited every year, often +twice a year: then multiply by ten—for +the mission has been in efficient existence +for ten years—and the reader may reach +some faint conception of the sum of good +wrought by this man. But without knowing +the desolate land—without observing +the emaciated bodies of the children—without +hearing the cries of distress—it is +impossible adequately to realize the blessing +his devotion has brought to the coast.</p> + +<h2 class='chapter' id='clink12'><a href='#toc'>XII—<i>THE CHAMPION</i></a></h2> + +<p>The Deep-sea Mission is not concerned +chiefly with the souls of the +folk, nor yet exclusively with their +bodies: it endeavours to provide them with +religious instruction, to heal their ailments; +but it is quite as much interested, apparently, +in improving their material condition. +To the starving it gives food, to the naked +clothing; but it must not be supposed that +charity is indiscriminately distributed. +That is not the case. Far from it. When +a man can cut wood for the steamer or hospitals +in return for the food he is given, for +example, he is required to do so; but the +unhappy truth is that a man can cut very +little wood “on a winter’s diet” exclusively +of flour. “You gets weak all of a suddent, +zur,” one expressed it to me. In his effort +to “help the people help themselves” the +doctor has established cooperative stores +and various small industries. The result +has been twofold: the regeneration of several +communities, and an outbreak of hatred +and dishonest abuse on the part of the traders, +who have too long fattened on the isolation +and miseries of the people. The cooperative +stores, I believe, are thriving, and +the small industries promise well. Thus the +mission is at once the hope and comfort of +the coast. The man on the <i>Strathcona</i> is +the only man, in all the long history of that +wretched land, to offer a helping hand to +the whole people from year to year without +ill temper and without hope of gain.</p> + +<p>“But I can’t do everything,” says he.</p> + +<p>And that is true. There is much that the +mission-doctor cannot do—delicate operations, +for which the more skilled hand of a +specialist is needed. For a time, one season, +an eminent surgeon, of Boston, the first of +many, it is hoped, cruised on the <i>Strathcona</i>, +and most generously operated at Battle +Harbour. The mission gathered the +patients to the hospital from far and near before +the surgeon arrived. Folk who had +looked forward in dread to a painful death, +fast approaching, were of a sudden promised +life. There was a man coming, they were +told, above the skill of the mission surgeons, +who could surely cure them. The deed was +as good as the promise: many operations +were performed; all the sick who came for +healing were healed; the hope of not one +was disappointed. Folk who had suffered +years of pain were restored. Never had +such a thing been known on the Labrador. +Men marvelled. The surgeon was like a +man raising the dead. But there was a +woman who is now, perhaps, dead; she +lacked the courage. Day after day for two +weeks she waited for the Boston surgeon; +but when he came she fled in terror of the +knife. Her ailment was mortal in that +land; but she might easily have been cured; +and she fled home when she knew that the +healer had come. No doubt her children +now know what it is to want a mother.</p> + +<p>Dr. Grenfell will let no man oppress his +people when his arm is strong enough to +champion them. There was once a rich man +(so I was told before I met the doctor)—a +man of influence and wide acquaintance—whose +business was in a remote harbour of +Newfoundland. He did a great wrong; +and when the news of it came to the ears of +the mission-doctor, the anchor of the <i>Strathcona</i> +came up in a hurry, and off she steamed +to that place.</p> + +<p>“Now,” said the doctor to this man, “you +must make what amends you can, and you +must confess your sin.”</p> + +<p>The man laughed aloud. It seemed to +him, no doubt, a joke that the mission-doctor +should interfere in the affairs of one so +rich who knew the politicians at St. Johns. +But the mission-doctor was also a magistrate.</p> + +<p>“I say,” said he, deliberately, “that you +must pay one thousand dollars and confess +your sin.”</p> + +<p>The man cursed the doctor with great +laughter, and dared him to do his worst. +The joke still had point.</p> + +<p>“I warn you,” said the doctor, “that I +will arrest you if you do not do precisely as +I say.”</p> + +<p>The man pointed out to the doctor that +his magisterial district lay elsewhere, and +again defied him.</p> + +<p>“Very true,” said the doctor; “but I +warn you that I have a crew quite capable +of taking you into it.”</p> + +<p>The joke was losing its point. But the +man blustered that he, too, had a crew.</p> + +<p>“You must make sure,” said the doctor, +“that they love you well enough to fight +for you. On Sunday evening,” he continued, +“you will appear at the church at seven +o’clock and confess your sin before the congregation; +and next week you will pay the +money as I have said.”</p> + +<p>“I’ll see you in h—ll first!” replied the +man, defiantly.</p> + +<div style='text-align:center'> +<img id='ilink18' src='images/illus-018.jpg' alt=''/> +<p class='caption'>“A CREW QUITE CAPABLE OF TAKING YOU INTO IT”</p> +</div> + +<p>At the morning service the doctor announced +that a sinful man would confess his +sin before them all that night. There was +great excitement. Other men might be prevailed +upon to make so humiliating a confession, +the folk said, but not this one—not +this rich man, whom they hated and feared, +because he had so long pitilessly oppressed +them. So they were not surprised when at +the evening service the sinful man did not +show his face.</p> + +<p>“Will you please to keep your seats,” said +the doctor, “while I go fetch that man.”</p> + +<p>He found the man in a neighbour’s house, +on his knees in prayer, with his friends. +They were praying fervently, it is said; but +whether or not that the heart of the doctor +might be softened I do not know.</p> + +<p>“Prayer,” said the doctor, “is a good +thing in its place, but it doesn’t ‘go’ here. +Come with me.”</p> + +<p>The man meekly went with the doctor; +he was led up the aisle of the church, was +placed where all the people could see him; +and then he was asked many questions, after +the doctor had described the great sin of +which he was guilty.</p> + +<p>“Did you do this thing?”</p> + +<p>“I did.”</p> + +<p>“You are an evil man, of whom the people +should beware?”</p> + +<p>“I am.”</p> + +<p>“You deserve the punishment of man and +God?”</p> + +<p>“I do.”</p> + +<p>There was much more, and at the end of +it all the doctor told the man that the good +God would forgive him if he should ask in +true faith and repentance, but that the people, +being human, could not. For a whole +year, he charged the people, they must not +speak to that man; but if at the end of that +time he had shown an honest disposition to +mend his ways, they might take him to +their hearts.</p> + +<p>The end of the story is that the man paid +the money and left the place.</p> + +<p>This relentless judge, on a stormy day of +last July, carried many bundles ashore at +Cartwright, in Sandwich Bay of the Labrador. +The wife of the Hudson Bay Company’s +agent exclaimed with delight when +she opened them. They were Christmas +gifts from the children of the “States” to +the lads and little maids of that coast. With +almost all there came a little letter addressed +to the unknown child who was to receive +the toy; they were filled with loving words—with +good wishes, coming in childish sincerity +from the warm little hearts. The +doctor never forgets the Christmas gifts. +He is the St. Nicholas of that coast. If he +ever weeps at all, I should think it would be +when he hears that despite his care some +child has been neglected. The wife of the +agent stowed away the gifts against the +time to come.</p> + +<p>“It makes them <i>very</i> happy,” said the +agent’s wife.</p> + +<p>“Not long ago,” I chanced to say, “I saw +a little girl with a stick of wood for a dolly. +Are they not afraid to play with these pretty +things?”</p> + +<p>“They <i>are</i>,” she laughed. “They use +them for ornaments. But <i>that</i> doesn’t matter. +It makes them happy just to look at +them.”</p> + +<p>We all laughed.</p> + +<p>“And yet,” she continued, “they <i>do</i> play +with them, sometimes, after all. There is a +little girl up the bay who <i>has kissed the +paint off her dolly</i>!”</p> + +<hr class='tb' /> + +<p>Thus and all the time, in storm and sunshine, +summer and winter weather, Grenfell +of the Deep-sea Mission goes about doing +good; if it’s not in a boat, it’s in a dog-sled. +He is what he likes to call “a Christian +man.” But he is also a hero—at once the +bravest and the most beneficently useful +man I know. If he regrets his isolation, if +the hardship of the life sometimes oppresses +him, no man knows it. He does much, but +there is much more to do. If the good people +of the world would but give a little more +of what they have so abundantly—and if +they could but know the need, they would +surely do that—joy might be multiplied on +that coast; nor would any man be wronged +by misguided charity.</p> + +<p>“What a man does for the love of God,” +the doctor once said, “he does differently.”</p> + +<hr style='border:none; border-bottom:1px solid black; width:80%;margin:2em auto;' /> + +<p class='c'><i>Decorated Cloth, $1.50</i></p> + +<p class='c ad'><i>Doctor Luke of The Labrador</i></p> + +<p class='c'>BY NORMAN DUNCAN</p> + +<p>“Mr. Duncan is deserving of much praise for this, his first +novel.... In his descriptive passages Mr. Duncan is sincere +to the smallest detail. His characters are painted in with +bold, wide strokes.... Unlike most first novels, ‘Doctor +Luke’ waxes stronger as it progresses.”—<i>N. Y. Evening +Post</i>.</p> + +<p><i>James MacArthur, of Harper’s Weekly, says</i>: “I am +delighted with ‘Doctor Luke.’ So fine and noble a work +deserves great success.”</p> + +<p>“A masterpiece of sentiment and humorous characterization. +Nothing more individual, and in its own way +more powerful, has been done in American fiction.... +The story is a work of art.”—<i>The Congregationalist</i>.</p> + +<p><i>Joseph B. Gilder, of The Critic, +says</i>: “I look to see it take its place +promptly among the best selling +books of the season.”</p> + +<p>“It fulfills its promise of being one of the best stories of +the season. Mr. Duncan evidently is destined to make a name +for himself among the foremost novelists of his day.... +Doctor Luke is a magnetic character, and the love story in +which he plays his part is a sweet and pleasant idyl.... +The triumph of the book is its character +delineation.”—<i>Chicago Record-Herald</i>.</p> + +<p><i>Miss Bacon, Literary Editor of The Booklover’s Library, +says</i>: “Of all the stories I have read this Autumn there is +none that I would rather own.”</p> + +<p>“Norman Duncan’s novel is a great enterprise, and +will probably prove to be the greatest book yet produced +by a native of Canada.”—<i>Toronto Globe</i>.</p> + +<hr class='tb' /> + +<p class='c'><i>8vo, Cloth Price, $1.75 net</i></p> + +<p class='c ad'>Denizens of the Deep</p> + +<p class='c'><i>By</i> FRANK. T. BULLEN</p> + +<div style='float:right; padding-left:10px;'> +<img alt="DENIZENS OF THE DEEP FRANK T. BULLEN" src='images/illus-019.jpg' /> +</div> + +<p>There is a new world of life and intelligence opened to our +knowledge in Mr. Bullen’s stories of the inhabitants of the +sea. He finds the same fascinating interest in the lives of +the dwellers in the deep as Thompson Seton found in the lives +of the hunted ashore, and with the keenness and vigor which +characterized his famous book “The Cruise of The Cachalot” he +has made a book which, being based upon personal observation, +buttressed by scientific facts and decorated by imagination, +is a storehouse of information—an ideal romance of deep sea +folk and, as <i>The Saturday Times-Review</i> has said, worth +a dozen novels.</p> + +<p>Not the least attractive feature of an unusually attractive +volume is the series of illustrations by Livingston Bull and +others.</p> + +<hr class='tb' /> + +<p class='c'><i>By</i> MARGARET SANGSTER <i>Cloth, each, $1.50</i></p> + +<p class='c ad'>Janet Ward<br/>Eleanor Lee</p> + +<div style='float:right; padding-left:10px;'> +<img src='images/illus-020.jpg' alt=''/> +</div> + +<p>Without exaggeration and with perfectly consistent naturalness +Mrs. Sangster has produced two pieces of realism of a most +healthy sort, demonstrating conclusively that novels may be at +once clean and wholesome yet most thoroughly alive and +natural. As with all her work, Mrs. Sangster exhibits her +splendid skill and excellent taste, and succeeds in winning +and holding her readers in these two books which treat of the +life of today.</p> + +<p>“If ever there was an author whose personality shone through +her work, Mrs. Margaret E. Sangster is that author. Mrs. +Sangster has written a novel with a moral purpose. That was +to be expected, but it was also to be expected that the +story would be free from hysteria and intolerance, filled +with gentle humor, sane common sense and warm human +sympathy, and saturated with cheerful optimism. The book +fulfills the expectation.”—<i>The Lamp</i>.</p> + +<hr class='tb' /> + +<p class='c'><i>Essays Fiction</i></p> + +<p class='c ad'>By JAMES M. LUDLOW</p> + +<p><span style='font-variant:small-caps;font-size:1.2em;'>Incentives for Life</span>. Personal and Public. +12mo, cloth, gilt top, $1.25 net.</p> + +<p>“Dr. Ludlow shows versatility and rare culture in this book of +essays. From the first page one is impressed with the +beautifully clear style, the brilliant thought which flashes +through every sentence, and the marvelous storehouse of +illustration from which the author draws. The vital importance +of will power in the formation of character, and the +incentives which lie back of it as motives to action, are set +forth with vigor and power.”—<i>Christian Observer</i>.</p> + +<div style='float:right; padding-left:10px;'> +<img src='images/illus-021.jpg' alt=''/> +</div> + +<p><span style='font-variant:small-caps;font-size:1.2em;'>Deborah.</span> A Tale of the Times of Judas Maccabaeus. By +the author of “The Captain of the Janizaries.” 12mo, cloth, +illustrated ... $1.50</p> + +<p>“Deborah is a genuine Jewess, noble, brilliant, loving and +lovely.”—<i>Congregationalist</i>.</p> + +<p>“Nothing in the class of fiction to which ‘Deborah’ belongs, +the class of which ‘Ben Hur’ and ‘Captain of the Janizaries’ +are familiar examples, exceeds the early chapters of this +story in vividness and rapidity of action. The book as a whole +has vigor and color.”—<i>The Outlook</i>.</p> + + +<hr class='tb' /> + +<p class='c'><i>Tales of the West Virile, true, tender</i></p> + +<p class='c ad'><i>By</i> RALPH CONNOR</p> + +<p><span style='font-variant:small-caps;font-size:1.2em;'>The Sky Pilot</span>; A Tale of the Foothills.</p> + +<p>12mo, cloth, illustrated ... Price, $1.25</p> + +<p>“Ralph Connor’s ‘Black Rock’ was good, but ‘The Sky Pilot’ is +better. The matter which he gives us is real life; virile, +true, tender, humorous, pathetic, spiritual, wholesome. His +style, fresh, crisp and terse, accords with the Western life, +which he understands. Henceforth the foothills of the Canadian +Rockies will probably be associated in many a mind with the +name of ‘Ralph Connor.’”—<i>The Outlook</i>.</p> + +<p><span style='font-variant:small-caps;font-size:1.2em;'>The Man From Glengarry</span>; A Tale of the Ottawa.</p> + +<p>12mo, cloth ... Price, $1.50</p> + +<p>“As straight as a pine, as sweet as a balsam, as sound as a +white oak.”—<i>The Interview</i>.</p> + +<p><span style='font-variant:small-caps;font-size:1.2em;'>Glengarry School Days</span>; A Tale of the Indian Lands.</p> + +<p>12mo, cloth ... Price, $1.25</p> + +<p>In pathos it reaches the high level of “The Sky Pilot.” In +atmosphere it is “The Man from Glengarry.” In action it rivals +“Black Rock.”</p> + +<p><span style='font-variant:small-caps;font-size:1.2em;'>Black Rock</span>; A Tale of the Selkirks.</p> + +<p>12mo, cloth ... Price, $1.25<br/> +12mo, cloth, cheaper edition ... .25</p> + +<p>“‘Ralph Connor’ is some man’s nom de plume. The world would +insist on knowing whose. He has gone into the Northwest +Canadian mountains and painted for us a picture of life in the +mining camps of surpassing merit. With perfect wholesomeness, +with exquisite delicacy, with entire fidelity, with truest +pathos, with freshest humor, he has delineated character, has +analyzed motives and emotions, and has portrayed life. Some of +his characters deserve immortality, so faithfully are they +created.”—<i>St. Louis Globe-Democrat</i>.</p> + +<p>The world has known and today Ralph Connor has been accorded +the signal honor of seeing his books, by virtue of their +sterling worth, attain a sale of over one and one-half million +copies.</p> + + + + + + + +<pre> + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Dr. Grenfell's Parish, by Norman Duncan + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK DR. 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