caribou, the wild deer that make this their home. The nearest railroad
is half a thousand miles away. Automobiles are unknown and would be
quite useless here. Great rivers and innumerable emerald lakes render
the land impassable for horses. The traveler must make his own trails,
and he must depend in summer upon his canoe or boat, and in winter
upon his snowshoes and his sledge, hauled by great wolf dogs.
With his gun and traps and fishing gear he must glean his living from
the wilderness or from the sea. If he would have a shelter he must
fell trees with his axe and build it with his own skill. He has little
that his own hands and brain do not provide. He must be resourceful
and self-reliant.
I venture to say there is not a boy living--a real red-blooded boy or
red-blooded man either for that matter--who has not dreamed of the day
when he might experience the thrill of venturing into such a
wilderness as we have described. This was America as the discoverers
found it, and as it was before the great explorers and adventurers
opened it to civilization. This was Labrador as Grenfell found
Labrador, and as it is to-day--the great "silent peninsula of the
North." It occupies a large corner of the North American continent,
and much of it is still unexplored, a vast, grim, lonely land, but one
of majestic grandeur and beauty.
[Illustration: "THE DOCTOR ON A WINTER'S JOURNEY"]
The hardy pioneers and settlers of Labrador, as we have seen, have
made their homes only on the seacoast, leaving the interior to
wandering Indian hunters. They do, to be sure, enter the wilderness
for short distances in winter when they are following their business
as hunters, but none has ever made his home beyond the sound of the
sea.
In the forests of the south and southeast are the Mountaineer Indians,
as they are called by all English speaking people; or, if we wish to
put on airs and assume French we may call them the _Montaignais_
Indians. In the North are the Nascaupees, today the most primitive
Indians on the North American continent. In the west and southwest are
the Crees.
All of these Indians are of the great Algonquin family, and are much
like those that Natty Bumpo chummed with or fought against, and those
who lived in New York and New England when the settlers first came to
what are now our eastern states. Labrador is so large, and there are
so few Indians to occupy it, however, that the explorer may wander
through it for months, as I have done, without ever once seeing the
smoke rising from an Indian tepee or hearing a human voice.
The Eskimos of the north coast are much like the Eskimos of Greenland,
both in language and in the way they live. Their summer shelters are
skin tents, which they call _tupeks_. In winter they build dome-shaped
houses from blocks of snow, though they sometimes have cave-like
shelters of stone and earth built against the side of a hill. The snow
houses they call _iglooweuks_, or houses of snow; the stone and earth
shelters are _igloosoaks_, or big igloos, the word igloo, in the
Eskimo language, meaning house. When winter comes big snow drifts soon
cover the igloosoaks, and the snow keeps out the wind and cold. As a
further protection, snow tunnels, through which the people crawl on
hands and knees, are built out from the entrance to the igloosoak, and
these keep all drafts, when a gale blows, from those within.
The Eskimos heat their snow igloos, and in treeless regions their
igloosoaks also, with lamps of hollowed stone. These lamps are made in
the form of a half moon. Seal oil is used as fuel, and a rag, if there
is any to be had, or moss, resting upon the straight side of the lamp,
does service as the wick.
Of course the snow igloos must never be permitted to get so warm that
the snow will melt. The temperature in a snow house is therefore kept
at about thirty degrees, or a little lower. Nevertheless it is
comfortable enough, when the temperature outside is perhaps forty or
fifty degrees below zero and quite likely a stiff breeze blowing.
Comfort is always a matter of comparison. I have spent a good many
nights in snow houses, and was always glad to enjoy the comfort they
offered. To the traveler who has been in the open all day, the snow
house is a cozy retreat and a snug enough place to rest and sleep in.
On the east coast the Eskimos are more civilized and live much like
the liveyeres. All Eskimos are kind hearted, hospitable people. Once,
I remember, when an Eskimo host noticed that the bottom of my sealskin
mocasins had worn through to the stocking, he pulled those he wore off
his feet, and insisted upon me wearing them. He had others, to be
sure, but they were not so good as those he gave me. No matter how
poorly off he is, an Eskimo will feel quite offended if a visitor does
not share with him what he has to eat.
Though Dr. Grenfell's hospitals are farther south, on the coast where
the liveyeres have their cabins, he cruises northward to the Eskimo
country of the east coast every summer, and in the summer has nursing
stations there. Sometimes, when there is a case demanding it, he
brings the sick Eskimos to one of the hospitals. But, generally, the
east coast Eskimos are looked after by the Moravian Brethren in their
missions, and in summer Dr. Grenfell calls at the missions to give
them his medical and surgical assistance.
As stated before, the liveyeres and others than the Indians, build
their cabins on the coast, usually on the shores of bays, but always
by the salt water and where they can hear the sound of the sea. Every
man of them is a hunter or a fisherman or both, and the boys grow up
with guns in their hands, and pulling at an oar or sailing a boat.
They begin as soon as they can walk to learn the ways of the
wilderness and of the wild things that live in it, and they are good
sailors and know a great deal about the sea and the fish while they
are still wee lads. That is to be their profession, and they are
preparing for it.
The Labrador home of the liveyere usually contains two rooms, but
occasionally three, though there are many, especially north of
Hamilton Inlet, of but a single room. All have an enclosed lean-to
porch at the entrance. This serves not only as a protection from
drifting snow in winter, but as a place where stovewood is piled, dog
harness and snowshoes are hung, and various articles stored.
In the cabin is a large wood-burning stove, the first and most
important piece of furniture. There is a home-made table and sometimes
a home-made chair or two, though usually chests in which clothing and
furs are stored are utilized also as seats. A closet built at one side
holds the meager supply of dishes. On a mantelshelf the clock ticks,
if the cabin boasts one, and by its side rests a well-thumbed Bible.
Bunks, built against the rear of the room, serve as beds. If there is
a second room, it supplies additional sleeping quarters, with bunks
built against the walls as in the living room. Travelers and visitors
carry their own sleeping bags and bedding with them and sleep upon the
floor. This is the sort of bed Dr. Grenfell enjoys when sleeping at
night in a liveyere's home.
On the beams overhead are rifles and shotguns, always within easy
reach, for a shot at some game may offer at any time. The side walls
of the cabins are papered with old newspapers, or illustrations cut
from old magazines.
The more thrifty and cleanly scrub floors, tables, doors and all
woodwork with soap and sand once a week, until everything is
spotlessly clean. But along the coast one comes upon cabins often
enough that appear never to have had a cleaning day, and in which the
odor of seal oil and fish is heavy.
Those of the Newfoundland fishermen that bring their families to the
coast live in all sorts of cabins. Some are well built and
comfortable, while others are merely sod-covered huts with earthen
floor. These are occupied, however, only during the fishing season.
The fishermen move into them early in July and begin to leave them
early in September.
As stated elsewhere, no farming can be done in Labrador, and the only
way men can make a living is by hunting and fishing. Eskimos seldom
venture far inland on their hunting and trapping expeditions, but some
of the liveyeres go fifty or sixty miles from the coast to set their
traps, and some of those in Hamilton Inlet go up the Grand River for a
distance of more than two hundred and fifty miles, and others go up
the Nascaupee River for upwards of a hundred miles.
Trapping is all done in winter and it is a lonely and adventurous
calling. Early in September, the men who go the greatest distance
inland set out for their trapping grounds. Usually two men go
together. They build a small log hut called a "tilt," about eight by
ten feet in size. Against each of two sides a bunk is made of saplings
and covered with spruce or balsam boughs. On the boughs the sleeping
bags are spread, and the result is a comfortable bed. The bunks also
serve as seats. A little sheet iron stove that weighs, including
stovepipe, about eighteen pounds and is easy to transport, heats the
tilt, and answers very well for the trapper's simple cooking. The
stovepipe, protruding through the roof, serves as a chimney.
The main tilt is used as a base of supplies, and here reserve
provisions are stored together with accumulations of furs as they are
caught. Fat salt pork, flour, baking powder or soda, salt, tea and
Barbadoes molasses complete the list of provisions carried into the
wilderness from the trading post. Other provisions must be hunted.
Each man provides himself with a frying pan, a tin cup, a spoon or
two, a tin pail to serve as a tea kettle and sometimes a slightly
larger pail for cooking. On his belt he carries a sheath knife, which
he uses for cooking, skinning, eating and general utility. He rarely
encumbers himself with a fork.
For use on the trail each man has a stove similar to the one that
heats the tilt, a small cotton tent, and a toboggan.
From the base tilt the trapping paths or trails lead out. Each trapper
has a path which he has established and which he works alone. He
hauls his sleeping bag, provisions and other equipment on his
toboggan or, as he calls it, "flat sled." He carries his rifle in his
hand and his ax is stowed on the toboggan, for he never knows when a
quick shot will get him a pelt or a day's food.
Sometimes tilts are built along the path at the end of a day's
journey, but if there is no tilt the cotton tent is pitched. In likely
places traps are set for marten, mink or fox. Ice prevents trapping
for the otter in winter, but they are often shot.
At the end of a week or fortnight the partners meet at the base tilt.
Otherwise each man is alone, and we may imagine how glad they are to
see each other when the meeting time comes. But they cannot be idle.
Out through the snow-covered forest, along the shores of frozen lakes
and on wide bleak marshes the trapper has one hundred traps at least,
and some of them as many as three hundred. The men must keep busy to
look after them properly, and so, after a Sunday's rest together they
again separate and are away on their snowshoes hauling their toboggans
after them.
At Christmas time they go back to their homes, down by the sea, to see
their wives and children and to make merry for a week. What a meeting
that always is! How eagerly the little ones have been looking forward
to the day when Daddy would come! O, that blessed Christmas week! But
it is only seven days long, and on the second day of January the
trappers are away again to their tilts and trails and traps. Again
early in March they visit their homes for another week, and then again
return to the deep wilderness to remain there until June.
Sometimes the father never comes back, and then the wilderness carries
in its heart the secret of his end. Then, oh, those hours of happy
expectancy that become days of grave anxiety and finally weeks of
black despair! Such a case happened once when I was in Labrador. Later
they found the young trapper's body where the man had perished,
seventy miles from his home.
As I have said, the life of the trapper is filled with adventure. Many
a narrow escape he has, but he never loses his grit. He cannot afford
to. Gilbert Blake was one of four trappers that rescued me several
years ago, when I had been on short rations in the wilderness for
several weeks, and without food for two weeks. I had eaten my
moccasins, my feet were frozen and I was so weak I could not walk.
Gilbert and I have been friends since then and we later traveled the
wilderness together. Gilbert has no trapping partner. His "path" is a
hundred miles inland from his home. All winter, with no other
companion than a little dog, he works alone in that lonely wilderness.
One winter game was scarce, and Gilbert's provisions were practically
exhausted when he set out to strike up his traps preparatory to his
visit home in March. He was several miles from his tilt when suddenly
one of his snowshoes broke beyond repair. He could not move a step
without snowshoes, for the snow lay ten feet deep. He had no skin with
him with which to net another snowshoe, even if he were to make the
frame; and he had nothing to eat.
A Labrador blizzard came on, and Gilbert for three days was held
prisoner in his tent. He spent his time trying to make a serviceable
snowshoe with netting woven from parts of his clothing torn into
strips. When at last the storm ended and he struck his tent he was
famished.
Packing his things on his toboggan he set out for the tilt, but had
gone only a short distance when the improvised snowshoe broke. He made
repeated efforts to mend it, but always it broke after a few steps
forward. He was in a desperate situation.
He had now been nearly three days without eating. He was still several
miles from the tilt where he had a scant supply that had been reserved
for his journey home. To proceed to the tilt was obviously impossible,
and he could only perish by remaining where he was.
Utterly exhausted after a fruitless effort to flounder forward, he sat
down upon his flatsled, and looked out over the silent snow waste.
Weakened with hunger, it seemed to him that he had reached the end of
his endurance. So far as he knew there was not another human being
within a hundred miles of where he sat, and he had no expectation or
slightest hope of any one coming to his assistance. "I was scrammed,"
said he, which meant, in our vernacular, he was "all in."
Gilbert is a fine Christian man, and all the time, as he told me in
relating his experience, he had been praying God to show him a way to
safety. He never was a coward, and he was not afraid to die, for he
had faced death many times before and men of the wilderness become
accustomed to the thought that sometime, out there in the silence and
alone, the hand of the grim messenger may grasp them. But he was
afraid for Mrs. Blake and the four little ones at home. Were he to
perish there would be no one to earn a living for them. He was
frightened to think of the privations those he loved would suffer.
Suddenly, in the distance, he glimpsed two objects moving over the
snow. As they came nearer he discovered that they were men. He shouted
and waved his arms, and there was an answering signal. Presently two
Mountaineer Indians approached, hauling loaded toboggans, laughing and
shouting a greeting as they recognized him.
"'Twas an answer to my prayers," said Gilbert in relating the incident
to me. "I was fair scrammed when I saw them Indians. They were the
first Indians I had seen the whole winter. They weren't pretty, but
just then they looked to me like angels from heaven, and just as
pretty as any angels could look."
The Indians had recently made a killing, and their toboggans were
loaded with fresh caribou meat. They made Gilbert eat until they
nearly killed him with kindness, and they had an extra pair of
snowshoes, which they gave him.
This is the life of the trapper on The Labrador. This is the sort of
man he is--hardy, patient, brave and reverent. He is a man of grit and
daring, as he must be to cheerfully meet, with a stout heart and a
smile, the constant hardships and adventures that beset him.
Dr. Grenfell declares that it is no hardship to devote his life to
helping men like this. His work among them brings constant joy to him.
They appreciate him, and he has grown to look upon them as all members
of his big family. He takes a personal and devoted interest in each.
It is a great comfort to the men to know that if any are sick or
injured at home while they are away on the trails the mission doctor
will do his best to heal them. Before Grenfell went to The Labrador
there was no doctor to call upon the whole winter through.
The trapping season for fur ends in April. Then the trapper "strikes
up" his traps, hangs them in trees where he will find them the
following fall, packs his belongings on his toboggan and returns home,
unless he is to remain to hunt bear. In that case he must wait for the
bears to come forth from their winter's sleep, and this will keep the
hunter in the wilderness until after the "break-up" comes and the ice
goes out. Those who go far inland usually wait in any case until the
ice is out of the streams and boat or canoe traveling is possible and
safe.
The break-up sets in, usually, early in June. Then come torrential
rains. The snow-covered wilderness is transformed into a sea of slush.
New brooks rise everywhere and pour down with rush and roar into lakes
and rivers. The rivers over-flow their banks. Trees are uprooted and
are swept forward on the flood. Broken ice jams and pounds its way
through the rapids with sound like thunder. The spring break-up is an
inspiring and wonderful spectacle.
When the hunting season ends and the trappers return from their winter
trails, they enjoy a respite at home mending fishing nets, repairing
boats and making things tidy and ship-shape for the summer's fishing.
Everyone is now looking forward with keen anticipation to the first
run of fish. From the time the ice goes out all one hears along the
coast is talk of fish. "Any signs of fish, b'y?" One hears it
everywhere, for everybody is asking everybody else that question.
In Hamilton Inlet and Sandwich Bay salmon fisheries are of chief
importance. Salmon here are all salted down in barrels and not tinned,
as on the Pacific coast. Once there was a salmon cannery in Sandwich
Bay, but the Hudson's Bay Company bought it and demolished it, as
there was doubtless less work and more profit for the Company in
salted salmon. Elsewhere the fisheries are mainly for cod.
In a frontier land it is not easy to earn a living. Everybody must
work hard all the time. Men, women, boys and girls all do their share
at the fishing. Women and children help to split and cure the fish. It
is a proud day for any lad when he is big enough and strong enough to
pull a stroke with the heavy oar, and go out to sea with his father.
The Labrador, or Arctic, current now and again keeps ice drifting
along the coast the whole summer through. When ice is there fishermen
cannot set their nets and fish traps, for the ice would tear the gear
and ruin it. Neither can they fish successfully with hook and line
when the ice is in. When this happens few fish are caught.
Then, too, there are seasons when game and animals move away from
certain regions, and then the trapper cannot get them. Perhaps they go
farther inland, and too far for him to follow. I have seen times when
ptarmigans were so thick men killed them for dog food, and perhaps the
next year there would not be a ptarmigan to be found to put into the
pot for dinner. I have seen the snow trampled down everywhere in the
woods and among the brush by innumerable snowshoe rabbits, and I have
seen other years when not a single rabbit track was to be found
anywhere. It is the same with caribou and the fur bearing animals as
well. In those years when game is scarce the people are hard put to it
to get a bit of fresh meat to eat.
When no fresh meat is to be had salt fish, bread (rarely with butter)
and tea, with molasses as sweetening, is the diet. There is no milk,
even for the babies. If all the salt fish has been sold or traded in
for flour and tea, bread and tea three times a day is all there is to
eat.
People cannot keep well on just bread and tea, or even bread and salt
fish and tea. It is not hard for us to imagine how we would feel if
every meal we had day in and day out was only bread and tea, and
sometimes not enough of that.
X
THE SEAL HUNTER
No less perilous is the business of fisherman and sealer than that of
hunter and trapper. Every turn a man makes down on The Labrador is
likely to carry him into some adventure that will place his life in
danger, at sea as on land. But there is no way out of it if a living
is to be made.
It is a strange fact that one never recognizes a great deal of danger
in the life that one is accustomed to living, no matter how perilous
it may seem to others. If a Labradorman were to come to any of our
towns or cities his heart would be in his mouth at every turn, for a
time at least, dodging automobiles and street cars. It would appear to
him an exceedingly hazardous existence that we live, and he would long
to be back to the peace and quiet and safety of his sea and
wilderness. And our streets would be dangerous ground to him, indeed,
until he became accustomed to dodging motor cars. He is nimble enough,
and on his own ground could put most of us to shame in that respect,
but here he is lacking in experience.
The same hunter will face the storms and solitude of the wilderness
trail without ever once feeling that he is in danger or afraid. He
knows how to do it. That is the life that he has been reared to live.
The average city man would perish in a day if left alone to care for
himself on a trapper's trail. He has never learned the business, and
he would not know how to take care of himself.
The Labradorman being both hunter and fisherman, is perfectly at home
both in the wilderness and on the sea. He has the dangers of both to
meet, but he does not recognize them as dangerous callings, though
every year some mate or neighbor loses his life. "'Tis the way o' th'
Lard."
Ice still covers the Labrador harbors in May, and this is when the
seal hunt begins, or, as the liveyere says, he goes "swileing." He
calls a seal a "swile." With a harpoon attached to a long line he
stations himself at a breathing hole in the ice which the seals under
the ice have kept open, and out of which, now and again, one raises
its nose and fills its lungs with air, for seals are animals, not
fish, and must have air to breathe or they will drown. The hole is a
small one, but large enough to cast the spear, or harpoon, into.
Seals are exceedingly shy animals, and the slightest movement will
frighten them away. Therefore the seal hunter must stand perfectly
still, like a graven image, with harpoon poised, and that is pretty
cold work in zero weather. If luck is with him he will after a time
see a small movement in the water, and a moment later a seal's nose
will appear. Then like a flash of lightning, he casts the harpoon, and
if his aim is good, as it usually is, a seal is fast on the barbs of
the harpoon.
The harpoon point is attached to a long line, while the harpoon shaft,
by an ingenious arrangement, will slip free from the point. Now, while
the shaft remains in the hands of the hunter, the line begins running
rapidly down through the hole, for the seal in a vain endeavor to free
itself dives deeply. The other end of the line also remaining in the
hands of the hunter is fastened to the shaft of the harpoon, and there
is a struggle. In time, the seal, unable to return to its hole for
air, is drowned, and then is hauled out through the hole upon the ice.
These north Atlantic seals, having no fine fur like the Pacific seals,
are chiefly valuable for their fat. The pelts are, however, of
considerable value to the natives. The women tan them and make them
into watertight boots or other clothing. Of course a good many of them
find their way to civilization, where they are made into pocketbooks
and bags, and they make a very fine tough leather indeed. The flesh is
utilized for dog food, though, as in the case of young seals
particularly, it is often eaten by the people, particularly when other
sorts of meat is scarce. Most of the people, and particularly the
Eskimos, are fond of the flippers and liver.
Sometimes the seals come out of their holes to lie on the ice and
bask in the sun. Then the hunter, simulating the movements of a seal,
crawls toward his game until he is within rifle shot.